Getting acclimated
Meet our new arts and culture writer, Shrishti Mathew, and hear how she’s been adjusting to the Capital Region scene
It’s been two weeks since I started out as a professional, full-time arts and culture journalist. It still hasn’t sunk in that I do this for a living now. My 12-year-old self would be proud.
My 23-year-old self however, is in a state of panic. I stepped into the massive shoes of a veteran journalist, who started her career before I was even an idea. I’ve been in Albany for all of three weeks and have spent most of them indoors, thanks to the cold and COVID -19 and I have no idea what most of my colleagues look like, in person.
But Albany has been welcoming. The biting cold that often makes my ears burn comes with bright sunshine that makes my seasonal depression vanish for a few precious hours. The streets are lined with some of the prettiest houses I’ve seen and then of course, there are the local arts, the very reason I moved here.
From what I've witnessed so far, the Capital Region’s dedication
to the arts is heartwarming. I’ve reported for three publications through the pandemic and I’ve seen the arts shut down.
I’ve written about theaters becoming food banks and classical musicians who gave up their jobs to nurse sick family members, much like many across the globe. But here, to my delight, the arts are thriving. Theaters may not be open, and musicians may wear crazy PPES while playing, but they soldier on, set on ensuring that come what may, people have some respite.
To say that the past year has been difficult would be an understatement. Personally, I can’t believe that it's only been a year since last March because it’s felt like a decade. There has been a horrible sickness, murders that shook the country, protests, an election, an insurrection, just to name a few. A period of stability, this is not.
In the midst of this brouhaha, trying to stay employed, indoors and COVID -safe, many of us forget to stay sane. This is where art comes in. Books, movies, music, TV shows, stand-up comedy, all things that distract us from the strange dystopia that the world has become over the past year. It’s easy to forget how important the arts are in the consternation of working from home, trying to attend online classes and make ends meet. But the Capital Region has not. The arts are ever-present; the people who make it are continuing to do so.
What makes me get over the awe of my new big-girl job is actually doing it. For me, the whole process of reporting, writing, going back and forth with the edits and finally seeing my work published is — in a way — therapeutic. But what’s better is the quiet reassurance that art is still there, that there is something in which we can immerse our souls, that can cushion us from the world outside and possibly even make us confront harsh realities within. It is there and it will get us through.
And through my writing, I can’t wait to tell you more!