2020: What a fucking fucked up year.

Written By Robin Castel

Normally, at the end of each year, I write an entry on this long neglected blog where I assess my personal successes of the year. And despite the whole “rapture plague thing,” I had many successes. However, it feels terrible to toot my horn when there’s so much grief right now and basically, this dumpster fire keeps burning. Honestly, I would have traded in all the wins if it meant that 300k people weren’t dead from a virus that could be prevented if everyone just wore a mask, washed their hands and avoided large gatherings. But maybe we’re too obsessed with winning short term to think long term.

Here’s a narrative version of my year as a listicle:

1. In January, We premiered Season 2 of Radical Cram School!

And unlike last season, this time I wasn’t the target of a massive trolling campaign. Made me wonder if I had lost my edge.

2. In February, I premiered “Kristina Wong for Public Office” at the Skirball Center and it was the greatest fucking show of my life.

I’m talking a crowd on their feet at the end of the show before I finished the show. People laughing so hard I could feel the floor shake. I was in my own HBO special. I had really made the most timely show of my career about what it was like to run and win a local office, and I was ready to tour it alongside all the events leading up to the election.

3. In mid-March, my whole national tour of the greatest fucking show of my life was cancelled because of the whole global pandemic thing that we’re still in. And I was out an entire year of income with no clue what to do with myself. And my savings was quickly running out from under me.

4. So I succumbed to my martyr complex which often kicks in during times of panic and scarcity. I harangued my City Council Office for port-a-potties for my un-housed neighbors. Then I worked on getting them laundry money because a couple of them were saying that being able to stay clean was the hardest part.

5. But because that somehow wasn’t enough, I started sewing masks for front line workers on my Hello Kitty Sewing Machine. Then I offered to make them for those who needed them, not realizing how many humans there are in this country. I ended up on this story on Spectrum which further exploded the demand for masks… sewn from me specifically.

My friends were like, “If the sewing is too much, just walk away.” But if I showed up at a hospital sick, I wouldn’t want the nurse to walk away from me to go watch Tiger King. So I kept saying “Yes” when people were asking for help.

6. Then I started a Facebook group called “Auntie Sewing Squad” because going around offering to help people by sewing them masks is actually one of those never ending endeavors that I clearly was not going to tackle on my own.

Auntie Sewing Squad was supposed to be a 3 week stopgap until factory made masks got to the US, but ended up growing in a matter of weeks into a powerful Mutual Aid network of hundreds of volunteers nationally. We were darlings of the media, and basically… a shadow FEMA.

I was even on Good Morning America.

7. Because my entire life had become about running a remote factory of volunteers in the face of the greatest existential threat of our lifetimes, I started to create a new show about how close I had come to this pandemic via running this group. I started writing and touring from my home called “Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord.”

The show is playing all of 2021. All streaming from my house.

8. As it turns out, screaming aloud to the internet 24/7 about your “factory of Aunties” and how hard they are working to get masks to vulnerable communities is an excellent calling card. And without any measurable evidence, I can affirm I was on like every single panel imaginable that had to do with “artists as first responders” and “art as political action.”

While I was able to recover a great deal of my lost income by end of year, I don’t know if I’d recommend to anyone to “stress yourself out to no end organizing a national sewing group trying make masks that have suddenly become a partisan thing (!?!) as a calling card” for invites to be a guest on on a panel. But hey, I guess it worked out for me?

9. I was in a few Zoom shows by other artists. Some were one-on-one experiences with an audience member.

The Zoom shows I was part of included a reading of Heather Woodbury’s “As the Globe Warms”, “Binge” at La Jolla Playhouse by Brian Lobel, a reading of Amy Tofte’s play, and a reading in “400 Years and Voices: Reproductive Justice Project”.

10. In a matter of months, Auntie Sewing Squad got a book deal, was doing relief drives to the Navajo Nation, had a kids sewing summer camp, and was being courted by major news outlets every single day. Every time a story ran, we’d get a ton of new requests for masks and from Aunties wanting to join our group. I went from cutting up my old t-shirts for mask to using our donations to purchase THOUSANDS of yards of fabric at a time to stock our hubs. It was so intense.

11. A bunch of events that I was part of were cancelled because of the second pandemic– the racial pandemic and the uprisings in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. This was a big reckoning for everyone as we had to pause and consider what actions we were truly taking to be anti-racist.

12. Auntie Sewing Squad began to sew for black communities as part of BLM solidarity mask requests. I also sewed a few fabric banners that friends who were braver than I was about braving the crowds during a pandemic took to BLM rallies.

It wasn’t hard to realize that what consistent in all the communities we were supporting with masks– they were all mostly indigenous or communities of color that had long since born the brunt of systemic racism and structural violence. They were vulnerable before the pandemic and especially now.

13. Because the pandemic could not postpone the election, and because I created an election themed show, and because that show could not play for a live audience in the Fall, I worked with my director Diana Wyenn to adapt it for Zoom. From my home.

Goddamn those were painful rehearsals and a hard learning curve. But I think for a show performed on Zoom, we really translated it well.

14. I played like ten cities in a month, all while wearing my house slippers.

I wrote about what it was like to translate live theater to your house on Zoom in this blog for the National Performance Network.

15. I also made a bunch of Get Out the Vote videos with kids in different parts of the country with a grant from Houston in Action.

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2020: What a fucking fucked up year.

January 1st, 2021 → Leave a comment

Normally, at the end of each year, I write an entry on this long neglected blog where I assess my personal successes of the year. And despite the whole “rapture plague thing,” I had many successes. However, it feels terrible to toot my horn when there’s so much grief right now and basically, this dumpster fire keeps burning. Honestly, I would have traded in all the wins if it meant that 300k people weren’t dead from a virus that could be prevented if everyone just wore a mask, washed their hands and avoided large gatherings. But maybe we’re too obsessed with winning short term to think long term.

Here’s a narrative version of my year as a listicle:

  1. In January, We premiered Season 2 of Radical Cram School!


And unlike last season, this time I wasn’t the target of a massive trolling campaign. Made me wonder if I had lost my edge.

2. In February, I premiered “Kristina Wong for Public Office” at the Skirball Center and it was the greatest fucking show of my life.

I’m talking a crowd on their feet at the end of the show before I finished the show. People laughing so hard I could feel the floor shake. I was in my own HBO special. I had really made the most timely show of my career about what it was like to run and win a local office, and I was ready to tour it alongside all the events leading up to the election.

3. In mid-March, my whole national tour of the greatest fucking show of my life was cancelled because of the whole global pandemic thing that we’re still in. And I was out an entire year of income with no clue what to do with myself. And my savings was quickly running out from under me.

4. So I succumbed to my martyr complex which often kicks in during times of panic and scarcity. I harangued my City Council Office for port-a-potties for my un-housed neighbors. Then I worked on getting them laundry money because a couple of them were saying that being able to stay clean was the hardest part.

5. But because that somehow wasn’t enough, I started sewing masks for front line workers on my Hello Kitty Sewing Machine. Then I offered to make them for those who needed them, not realizing how many humans there are in this country. I ended up on this story on Spectrum which further exploded the demand for masks… sewn from me specifically.

My friends were like, “If the sewing is too much, just walk away.” But if I showed up at a hospital sick, I wouldn’t want the nurse to walk away from me to go watch Tiger King. So I kept saying “Yes” when people were asking for help.

6. Then I started a Facebook group called “Auntie Sewing Squad” because going around offering to help people by sewing them masks is actually one of those never ending endeavors that I clearly was not going to tackle on my own.

Auntie Sewing Squad was supposed to be a 3 week stopgap until factory made masks got to the US, but ended up growing in a matter of weeks into a powerful Mutual Aid network of hundreds of volunteers nationally. We were darlings of the media, and basically… a shadow FEMA.

I was even on Good Morning America.

7. Because my entire life had become about running a remote factory of volunteers in the face of the greatest existential threat of our lifetimes, I started to create a new show about how close I had come to this pandemic via running this group. I started writing and touring from my home called “Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord.”

The show is playing all of 2021. All streaming from my house.

8. As it turns out, screaming aloud to the internet 24/7 about your “factory of Aunties” and how hard they are working to get masks to vulnerable communities is an excellent calling card. And without any measurable evidence, I can affirm I was on like every single panel imaginable that had to do with “artists as first responders” and “art as political action.”

While I was able to recover a great deal of my lost income by end of year, I don’t know if I’d recommend to anyone to “stress yourself out to no end organizing a national sewing group trying make masks that have suddenly become a partisan thing (!?!) as a calling card” for invites to be a guest on on a panel. But hey, I guess it worked out for me?

9. I was in a few Zoom shows by other artists. Some were one-on-one experiences with an audience member.

The Zoom shows I was part of included a reading of Heather Woodbury’s “As the Globe Warms”, “Binge” at La Jolla Playhouse by Brian Lobel, a reading of Amy Tofte’s play, and a reading in “400 Years and Voices: Reproductive Justice Project”.

10. In a matter of months, Auntie Sewing Squad got a book deal, was doing relief drives to the Navajo Nation, had a kids sewing summer camp, and was being courted by major news outlets every single day. Every time a story ran, we’d get a ton of new requests for masks and from Aunties wanting to join our group. I went from cutting up my old t-shirts for mask to using our donations to purchase THOUSANDS of yards of fabric at a time to stock our hubs. It was so intense.

Here is a picture of a van load of sewing and relief supplies dropped off to our partner on the Navajo Nation who will distribute it to her team of sewing ladies.

11. A bunch of events that I was part of were cancelled because of the second pandemic– the racial pandemic and the uprisings in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. This was a big reckoning for everyone as we had to pause and consider what actions we were truly taking to be anti-racist.

12. Auntie Sewing Squad began to sew for black communities as part of BLM solidarity mask requests. I also sewed a few fabric banners that friends who were braver than I was about braving the crowds during a pandemic took to BLM rallies.

It wasn’t hard to realize that what consistent in all the communities we were supporting with masks– they were all mostly indigenous or communities of color that had long since born the brunt of systemic racism and structural violence. They were vulnerable before the pandemic and especially now.

13. Because the pandemic could not postpone the election, and because I created an election themed show, and because that show could not play for a live audience in the Fall, I worked with my director Diana Wyenn to adapt it for Zoom. From my home.

Goddamn those were painful rehearsals and a hard learning curve. But I think for a show performed on Zoom, we really translated it well.

14. I played like ten cities in a month, all while wearing my house slippers.

I wrote about what it was like to translate live theater to your house on Zoom in this blog for the National Performance Network.

15. I also made a bunch of Get Out the Vote videos with kids in different parts of the country with a grant from Houston in Action.

October and November were truly the most exhausting months of my life. I had never worked so much before. Not having to travel to shows, and doing a show in my house made for a maximum efficiency situation that was totally exhausting.

16. I then filmed the show for Center Theater Group at the Kirk Douglas Theater and it streamed to audiences for a month.

This was a big freaking deal! Unfortunately I don’t own the rights to the recording so it’s an endeavor if anyone wishes to see it again. But it was gorgeous!

17. I was in the New York Times 3x in one month!

One of the weird perks to theater going virtual is the NYT can cover a show that you performed in Los Angeles. Here was one of the articles that covered it!

18. Then there was the election. What felt like the Season Finale of a show we live in called “Civilization”. It was so agonizing. All of it HAS BEEN AGONIZING. It is STILL AGONIZING.

19. I stuck to at least TWO of three of my weirdo pledges from last year. One was to be Vegan in January.

With the exception of some accidental egg bits, I did it! I was a great challenge. It was tough because there is a lot of dairy hidden everywhere. But I recommend every try a vegan diet if anything to get you thinking about what is in your food. I’ve fallen off the 100% Vegan wagon, but still maintain a largely vegetarian diet. Did you know that we probably would not have these pandemics and strange flus if not for factory farming? It’s true!

20. My second challenge was to spend $50/ month on groceries or $600/ year or about $1.65/ day. I did it!

It made for an obsessive new personality trait I now have where I have a more attentive mental inventory of what I have in the fridge as I track for myself when to eat it. I also got really good about accepting offers of backyard fruit and food gifts. I don’t know if I’m just lucky to be in LA, but I’ve definitely been able to figure out where a gal can eat for free or cheap around here.

One of the many “Food Haul” videos I did this year from World Harvest!

I’m so grateful for World Harvest Food Bank for making it possible for Los Angeles Families to have access to good quality food. I love this place so much I found myself making fan videos for them every month. A cart of food is $40 or 4 hours of volunteer work. I would go in with friends on the cart. We literally could feed 10 households with one trip of food. While I spent under $600 for the year on groceries, I did make them a very generous year-end donation so they can continue their work feeding families in Los Angeles. Especially now.

21. I can say I failed my “Buy Almost Nothing” year challenge. I still managed to buy a ton of shit. However, the pandemic didn’t have me in a rush to buy any new clothes or shoes. I also think I ate out less this year than even the brokest years of my 20s. Because I don’t own a car and haven’t been on a bus since the start of the pandemic, I have a small fraction of the Uber expenses that I used to have. But my world has truly been just the parts of my neighborhood that I can walk to. When I do ride through other neighborhoods, I feel like I’m in a different country for the first time.

22. I actually did ok working at home.

For someone who often passes out at home on weekdays and wakes up not sure what day it is, I was surprised how well I was able to work from home during the lock down. Both my co-working spaces shuttered permanently. I obviously couldn’t work in a cafe in the last few months. But somehow I managed to stay awake more at home than before the pandemic when I was constantly falling asleep in my house. I think it came from the adrenaline of running a sewing group.

What’s next in 2021? I teach a course on Art and Activism next Spring at Chapman University. I have a lot of speaking and tour engagements from my home. I’m running for office again! I’m looking forward to the Auntie Sewing Squad retiring. To all the Aunties meeting in person at our book launch events and us using this experience to make better for the world.

Thanks for your support. See you in 2021. When it’s safe to go to the Korean spa again, I’m probably going to just move on in.

Robin Castel
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