If you were to put two-hundred 20-somethings in one room for an art show to talk about death, what would decide to leave after they die?

These were some of the things they’d leave:

A wax figure of their face, a painting signifying their maternal lineage, photos of the people they spent their entire lives, and clothing they mended from scraps of fabric. All left for family, friends, and communities they found themselves a part of in this lifetime. 

Some more metaphorical than others:

Unconditional love, memories, and wishes for their loved ones.

I spent this past summer with thousands of strangers. Faces who became familiar, bodies that synced when in close proximity, people I saw once, and never again. Every week for half a year, I was with my friends, helping get people together. It was a thrill doing the same thing every week for a few months in a time where things were constantly changing. 

Summer ended, friends moved to New York, and I was here in California. I bounced around figuring out who I liked being around, where I enjoyed spending my time at, and I felt fulfilled doing. Things that I thought I would have already established by the ripe age of 16. Yet, here I was again. 

I was becoming impatient. 

At the very end of summer, I sat at a coffee shop that I spent many of my summer days at, but this time with a pit in my stomach. Unsure of when’s the next time I’d see my friends, the next time I would be a part of something bigger than myself, or the next time I would be around strangers at that level again. 

I sat there until I was able to place the emotion that crept up on me—the feeling of being left behind. 

A year ago (almost to the exact day of my art show), I was at my friend’s house talking about the things we wanted to do within the next year. Inspired by an art show we went to a few days before, I told her, “I could do that here”. She reassured me that I could do it, but that was all there was to it; a thought and nothing more. 

As I was becoming more impatient and overwhelmed with frustration, in a conversation with a friend, she randomly told me, “It’s just not your time yet.” I don’t recall what we were talking about, but she was right. It’s wasn’t my time yet.  

I knew I wasn’t the only one who felt this feeling of confusion, impatience, and displacement. I thought of ways to make it as though I was going through this process alone, so I put together Leave Ahead: A Journal of Objects and Memories by New 20-Somethings. 

“To leave ahead. To think about what you will leave behind, but instead of thinking behind. Think ahead. We are planning what it is we are going to leave and for whom, it’s all intentional because it will live beyond us.” 

I wrote this on September 18, 2025. The last week of summer.

For the next two months, I spent countless hours thinking, nonstop.

I’d split the two months like this; 

A month of making people believe that I knew what I was doing and a month of showing people I knew what I was doing. 

I’d also split the process into a third section—the week of the art show. 

In the beginning of the week, I had lost a friend. The concept no longer was just a concept, but a living reminder of what I was living. I remember sitting on the floor at my friends’ place in New York wanting to postpone the show. It didn’t feel right, but it also didn’t feel right canceling. The words, “the sweetness we deny ourselves when the world is wailing,” have followed my subconsciousness ever since I first encountered them by Saeed Jones. Then more than ever, these words echoed. 

The day after, my friends and I were once again at a coffee shop. That same pit from last month followed me from California to New York and it was growing in my stomach. To stop it from growing any bigger, I got up and walked aimlessly.

I walked around a market across the street with overpriced, essentially junk. Through the dust filled outdoor aisles, I skimmed forgotten warped records, wiped off the smell of rusted jewelry from my hands, and tried to ground myself in the reality that was physical. 

I went back to the shop and stood in front of the heavy glass doors. The pit was only growing larger as I inched closer to the door. I turned around, already exhausted the few surrounding streets, I sat down on the curb.

I called a friend from LA to talk about the art show as it was coming up at the end of the week. It was another excuse to try to use the show to distract myself. A month prior, he offered to help if I needed it. I was hesitant to the help. 

As I contemplated pressing call, he answered almost immediately. We talked about our days, New York, Los Angeles, and even the most mundane thing like the weather. This was just two days after the heavy rainfall that flooded the city. For a brief second, I felt a wave of guilt as if I was trying to escape the inevitable storm of grief that was looming over me and my friends. Those five minutes on the phone became the first conversation in the last 24 hours that had felt “normal”. 

As I asked if he was still able to help, he reassured that he could. Before we ended the call, it wasn’t guilt that I was encountering. It was an urgency that was being brought to my attention. I wasn’t looking to escape from what was happening or abandon the emotions that were running rampage in me. I was subconsciously and urgently searching for some sign that life can and will continue. 

I came back to California and spent the next three days focused on what I needed to get done, anything and everything that was not emotionally taxing. I woke up the day of the show, distraught. It was coming to an end—before it even started. 

The show began, we opened a few minutes later than expected, but this helped form a line and selfishly, brought me a small feeling that I did something right. 

The show felt like one big three hour flash. Two months of nonstop thinking of life after death, strategizing how to get these young people together, and coming to live the concept that was just a hypothetical thought—over in a mere three hours. 

Witnessing friends, family, artists, and strangers who I have never been in a space like this brought me a satisfaction that I don’t think I could have received if I hadn’t sat at that coffee shop at the end of summer. 

After the show, we stood outside of the venue for an hour talking, catching up, and debriefing. After being in New York for two weeks, late nights and early mornings, I forgot how early LA goes to sleep. As it was hitting 11PM, everyone slowly disperse back to wherever their cars were parked.

I wasn’t ready to go just yet. I sat on the curb on FaceTime with my friend on the other side of the country, where I had just been four days before. He was on his way home from a solo night out where he danced the night away, and in some way, we were both by ourselves on the same night in different ways. 

The night was ending here in LA and I was ready to go back home. A few of my friends were at a bar, but I was ready to call it a night. As I contemplated where to go, he texted me, “We’re here if you want to join and celebrate. If not, we can celebrate another night.” There was another reminder that everything continues with or without me.

I made these fellow 20-somethings think long and hard about what they would leave after they die, and not even I, had thought about it myself. 

On my train rides, I spent two weeks writing fragments that formulated into letters. Every time I sat in the fluorescent lighting of the trains, I wasn’t letting these fragments become full. I was avoiding the concept I came up with. The concept that I convinced fourteen artists to think about when creating, the concept that I was about to convince two hundred 20-somethings come be a part of, and the concept that I hoped to redefine when thinking of death. 

That was until the night before creeping into the early morning of show day. Those fragments that I wrote over two weeks in the train became letters to my mom, friend, and niece. Letters to my Past, Present, and Future.

If I wanted to be remembered for anything in this lifetime, it’s my words. The stories I told with my time on this earth. In the final letter, I wrote to my fifteen year old niece, “One day, you will be the last person on this earth who will remember me for who I am.” 

I left that night still more confused than ever, more displaced than I was before, but I was more sure of one thing—life continues, only if I force it to. 

Force it whether it is in the form of an art show, force it whether it is to call a friend asking for help, force it by making yourself sit at a bar with friends rather than wallowing alone in your room, these small decisions lead to the continuation of your life. A continuation that many of us aren’t lucky enough to be able to experience in its fullest capacity.

If you were to put two-hundred 20-somethings in one room for an art show to talk about death, what would decide to leave after they die?

These were some of the things they’d leave:

A wax figure of their face, a painting signifying their maternal lineage, photos of the people they spent their entire lives, and clothing they mended from scraps of fabric. All left for family, friends, and communities they found themselves a part of in this lifetime. 

Some more metaphorical than others:

Unconditional love, memories, and wishes for their loved ones.

I spent this past summer with thousands of strangers. Faces who became familiar, bodies that synced when in close proximity, people I saw once, and never again. Every week for half a year, I was with my friends, helping get people together. It was a thrill doing the same thing every week for a few months in a time where things were constantly changing. 

Summer ended, friends moved to New York, and I was here in California. I bounced around figuring out who I liked being around, where I enjoyed spending my time at, and I felt fulfilled doing. Things that I thought I would have already established by the ripe age of 16. Yet, here I was again. 

I was becoming impatient. 

At the very end of summer, I sat at a coffee shop that I spent many of my summer days at, but this time with a pit in my stomach. Unsure of when’s the next time I’d see my friends, the next time I would be a part of something bigger than myself, or the next time I would be around strangers at that level again. 

I sat there until I was able to place the emotion that crept up on me—the feeling of being left behind. 

A year ago (almost to the exact day of my art show), I was at my friend’s house talking about the things we wanted to do within the next year. Inspired by an art show we went to a few days before, I told her, “I could do that here”. She reassured me that I could do it, but that was all there was to it; a thought and nothing more. 

As I was becoming more impatient and overwhelmed with frustration, in a conversation with a friend, she randomly told me, “It’s just not your time yet.” I don’t recall what we were talking about, but she was right. It’s wasn’t my time yet.  

I knew I wasn’t the only one who felt this feeling of confusion, impatience, and displacement. I thought of ways to make it as though I was going through this process alone, so I put together Leave Ahead: A Journal of Objects and Memories by New 20-Somethings. 

“To leave ahead. To think about what you will leave behind, but instead of thinking behind. Think ahead. We are planning what it is we are going to leave and for whom, it’s all intentional because it will live beyond us.” 

I wrote this on September 18, 2025. The last week of summer.

For the next two months, I spent countless hours thinking, nonstop.

I’d split the two months like this; 

A month of making people believe that I knew what I was doing and a month of showing people I knew what I was doing. 

I’d also split the process into a third section—the week of the art show. 

In the beginning of the week, I had lost a friend. The concept no longer was just a concept, but a living reminder of what I was living. I remember sitting on the floor at my friends’ place in New York wanting to postpone the show. It didn’t feel right, but it also didn’t feel right canceling. The words, “the sweetness we deny ourselves when the world is wailing,” have followed my subconsciousness ever since I first encountered them by Saeed Jones. Then more than ever, these words echoed. 

The day after, my friends and I were once again at a coffee shop. That same pit from last month followed me from California to New York and it was growing in my stomach. To stop it from growing any bigger, I got up and walked aimlessly.

I walked around a market across the street with overpriced, essentially junk. Through the dust filled outdoor aisles, I skimmed forgotten warped records, wiped off the smell of rusted jewelry from my hands, and tried to ground myself in the reality that was physical. 

I went back to the shop and stood in front of the heavy glass doors. The pit was only growing larger as I inched closer to the door. I turned around, already exhausted the few surrounding streets, I sat down on the curb.

I called a friend from LA to talk about the art show as it was coming up at the end of the week. It was another excuse to try to use the show to distract myself. A month prior, he offered to help if I needed it. I was hesitant to the help. 

As I contemplated pressing call, he answered almost immediately. We talked about our days, New York, Los Angeles, and even the most mundane thing like the weather. This was just two days after the heavy rainfall that flooded the city. For a brief second, I felt a wave of guilt as if I was trying to escape the inevitable storm of grief that was looming over me and my friends. Those five minutes on the phone became the first conversation in the last 24 hours that had felt “normal”. 

As I asked if he was still able to help, he reassured that he could. Before we ended the call, it wasn’t guilt that I was encountering. It was an urgency that was being brought to my attention. I wasn’t looking to escape from what was happening or abandon the emotions that were running rampage in me. I was subconsciously and urgently searching for some sign that life can and will continue. 

I came back to California and spent the next three days focused on what I needed to get done, anything and everything that was not emotionally taxing. I woke up the day of the show, distraught. It was coming to an end—before it even started. 

The show began, we opened a few minutes later than expected, but this helped form a line and selfishly, brought me a small feeling that I did something right. 

The show felt like one big three hour flash. Two months of nonstop thinking of life after death, strategizing how to get these young people together, and coming to live the concept that was just a hypothetical thought—over in a mere three hours. 

Witnessing friends, family, artists, and strangers who I have never been in a space like this brought me a satisfaction that I don’t think I could have received if I hadn’t sat at that coffee shop at the end of summer. 

After the show, we stood outside of the venue for an hour talking, catching up, and debriefing. After being in New York for two weeks, late nights and early mornings, I forgot how early LA goes to sleep. As it was hitting 11PM, everyone slowly disperse back to wherever their cars were parked.

I wasn’t ready to go just yet. I sat on the curb on FaceTime with my friend on the other side of the country, where I had just been four days before. He was on his way home from a solo night out where he danced the night away, and in some way, we were both by ourselves on the same night in different ways. 

The night was ending here in LA and I was ready to go back home. A few of my friends were at a bar, but I was ready to call it a night. As I contemplated where to go, he texted me, “We’re here if you want to join and celebrate. If not, we can celebrate another night.” There was another reminder that everything continues with or without me.

I made these fellow 20-somethings think long and hard about what they would leave after they die, and not even I, had thought about it myself. 

On my train rides, I spent two weeks writing fragments that formulated into letters. Every time I sat in the fluorescent lighting of the trains, I wasn’t letting these fragments become full. I was avoiding the concept I came up with. The concept that I convinced fourteen artists to think about when creating, the concept that I was about to convince two hundred 20-somethings come be a part of, and the concept that I hoped to redefine when thinking of death. 

That was until the night before creeping into the early morning of show day. Those fragments that I wrote over two weeks in the train became letters to my mom, friend, and niece. Letters to my Past, Present, and Future.

If I wanted to be remembered for anything in this lifetime, it’s my words. The stories I told with my time on this earth. In the final letter, I wrote to my fifteen year old niece, “One day, you will be the last person on this earth who will remember me for who I am.” 

I left that night still more confused than ever, more displaced than I was before, but I was more sure of one thing—life continues, only if I force it to. 

Force it whether it is in the form of an art show, force it whether it is to call a friend asking for help, force it by making yourself sit at a bar with friends rather than wallowing alone in your room, these small decisions lead to the continuation of your life. A continuation that many of us aren’t lucky enough to be able to experience in its fullest capacity.