It’s been a minute 😱 since I checked in…but I’ve been thinking about you ALL THE TIME❣️ SO MUCH 🫠 is happening faster than I can type and I can type like rull fast 💨.

But there’s one really big reason why I’m emailing you.

and I can’t wait to do EMOJI 🤷🏽‍♀️ @ Gotham Storytelling Festival 🔥at a frankly nicer and much bigger venue _{(it’s bigger than my husband's!)}

EMOJI: The Hieroglyphs of Our Time, or how I learned to stop worrying and send the risky text 🤷🏽‍♀️ is… a poetic 📝 hilarious 😁 love letter 💌 concert 🎙 lecture 👩🏽‍🏫

you know, just another one of those!

With… original songs 🎶, a sexy glimpse into the ~my receipts archive~ 🧾 , jokes about emoji! art criticism! and a LOT of big feelings!!! 🤣😫💀🥰💩🫣🫦🌝 about relationships👯‍♀️, texting 💌 language 💬, power 🔋, connection 🫂 , and the SUPERMOON. 🌕

If you’ve ever…
☺️ Craved community
💬 Wondered why some text a novel — & others send a single heartxclamation point❣️
🤔 Felt the crushing weight of an awkward miscommunication
📱 Sent “no worries if not” when you actually meant “I’ll do it this time I SWEAR”
🍆 Wondered the true meaning of the eggplant emoji (Guys, I think it’s just an eggplant?)
👀 Loved a show that makes you laugh, feel, & bond for life with the person sitting next to you…

I have started (slowly) postering in NYC. If you see one in the wild, please feel free to take a pic and tag me in it! And if you want some posters to distribute — and/or have a printing hook-up, let me know. ✂️

The guy at R&A Hardware that sold me tape and scissors put one up. My awesome yoga teacher put one on display in her little yoga teacher station.

Well, my press release says…

Other Aarushi updates….

This was a real bummer because I lowkey slayed both the talent portion (I sang 🎶) & this confessional…

alas, the merciful Rejection Angel eliminated me even though NO VOTES were cast against me!!! TBH it was heartwrenching to have to eliminate my peers, so I think it was a bit of a mercy-kill. Plus maybe? some? of those? people? will come? to my show?

Do you feel sorry for me? Then come to my show!

I won tickets for me and two of my friends to attend the Diwali on Hudson by the Desai Foundation, an incredible organization that helps women and children in India by addressing menstrual gaps and empowering small businesses.

The Goddess Lakhmi did personally tell me that anyone who wants wealth has to come to my show. 🕯 But to be honest, Diwali is a time of bringing abundance to our communities and I am endlessly grateful for the lovely people and artists who nurture me, including my best friend, Nita, and my dear friend and collaborator Abhi Alwar, with whom I danced crazy on Diwali as documented below:

It was a beautiful festival, ripe with new and old talent, puppets, fascinating hybrid works, classics, and just some very warm artsy community — a lot of heart-filled people. 🫀

My show received feedback like…

“Aarushi needs her own TV show!”

“This show was so heart-forward. It really matters.”

“This was really a Fringe show.” Which my producer Jess confirmed was a good thing.

Newburgh was an idyllic vibe. 🌄 Walked all over town with my little posters and talked to basically everyone. In particular, I stayed with Dan Daly — an incredibly talented and thoughtful set designer whose project Pocket Change ran during the festival. With Dan’s help, we designed our own coin-sized theaters, where we performed for ourselves a variety of short plays written for, and featuring, the actors, Penny, Nickel, Dime and Quarter.

Dan sells these online! 🪙

Due to some logsitical/venue issues beyond our control, I was forced to canceled my first show at the festival — which really bummed me out. 😔

I had come all this way, and no one knew me here. I knew that if some people saw the first show, then more would come to the second show (because I am actually very confident that what I’m doing is excellent and worth doing).

I worried that less people would get to see my show, and hear its message, which I do feel spiritually called to share. 🕉 Dan gave me the loveliest gift; he told me that after the show, folks came into his “Pocket Change” activation and talked about EMOJI, saying I was hilarious and praising my singing voice, and my general Charisma Uniqueness Nerve and Talent. 🌸 I’m still sad people missed out, but I’m happy for each and every person that did get to see it! I spoke with some really lovely kind people afterwards, and it felt valuable to get a diversity of perspectives on the piece.

Dan also let me sleep on his dog bed… where Jess did a photoshoot with me.

Also, my lovely producer Jess accidentally got locked in the Washington Headquarters State Historic Site, because the park got locked on all sides while they were watching a beautiful sunset! 🌅 And Dan had to call the fire department. So that was patriotic of us.

But because the show got canceled I got a chance to visit the Dia Beacon, and literally all of Lower Manhattan was there. So they were all like, we can’t come to your show tomorrow, but maybe we’ll come in November. Everyone pray they remember.

It was a really lovely experience to get to connect with non-NYC-dwellers. The local community in Newburgh is hella vibrant and artsy. I got into the best conversations with everyone I sat next to, or who waited on me. They were like wholesome moms and dads and lesbians. It was crunchy granola but it was also cultural. I could go on and on… 🫢

I was on with the lovely Andrew Cortes, a dedicated steward of the arts, along with fellow festival participants Ivan Dalia and Rob Neill of The Infinite Wrench, by the New York Neofuturists to talk about my upcoming run of EMOJI in Gotham Storytelling Festival!

You can listen to that here.

On Monday, I had the pleasure of visiting a class of Pratt Institute BFA students called “Writer As Worker” taught by Alysia Slocum-Ferriere. I am the inaugural Alum-in-Residence at Pratt; my job is to share my practice as a “working artist” with the students, and read some of their work. I finished my MFA at Pratt in Writing about 7 years ago, so naturally the whole idea of this gives me the worst impostor syndrome.

But I am relieved to say, the children did not demand to see my tax returns. They were more concerned with how to find artistic community that understood them, why some stand-up doesn’t land, and how to cold-email people with style. They were soooo sweet and happy to meet me 😱 and excited for me to read their work! 🥲☺️

It was really lovely to see how much I really have grown as a person (👵🏽) and how my nature and presence alone can change the vibes of a room, or give someone hope. If I can bring anyone a shred of joy, or redirect anyone toward loving themselves, I am pretty damn happy. 😁

Anyway, here’s one last plug for my show. I hope you can make it.

Love you!
Aarushi 🙋🏽‍♀️