Yamamoto Masao (Japanese, b. 1957)

after walking miles in the heat, i tore my clothes off, stared at my naked body in the mirror for a bit, then flopped into the bed. not even a minute later, my phone alarm goes off. it’s time to take my cocktail of meds for the evening. my doctors have me on a number of hormones, anti-depressants, and other things to counteract the years of damage an autoimmune disorder has caused to my body.

i swallow a handful of pills down with luke warm water and open up tiktok. the american eagle ad pops up, the same one i saw earlier. the girl in the ad says something about how genes are passed down from parent to offspring, helping to determine hair color, personality, even eye color. she zips her pants up, then faces the camera and says, “my genes are blue.” she bats her big blue eyes at the camera, then overlain text pops up: SYDNEY SWEENEY HAS GOOD JEANS.

i swipe to close the ad. in the next video, a black woman sitting on a couch talks about how “too many of us” are out of shape. in the comments, everyone weighs in with some kind of self-shaming, mentioning not wanting to look like the women before them and how our community has to do better. only once did someone bring up a study where black women are found to be more susceptible to high blood pressure, heart issues, and other ailments due to stress. i think to comment about epigenetics and how it informs the way our bodies react to external stressors, then passes it down to the next generation.