Mine doesn’t either. Let’s just get that on the record.
The photos on this site were taken in my living room, on a white blanket I pulled off my own bed and draped over the table because it photographs well. Just out of frame: a pile of blue couch pillows that match absolutely nothing in my house, shoved to the side so you wouldn’t see them. My bedroom has grays and greens that don’t go together and two dressers in two different colors. I rent a small house. I don’t drive anything expensive. I keep my space clean and organized and I’m genuinely happy in it — it just doesn’t look like the internet says a home should.
Receipts: the actual setup. Tripod, laptop, the good blanket — and every mismatched pillow in the house shoved just left of the frame.
That’s the whole trick of the grid. It’s not that people lie, exactly. It’s that everyone crops. A hundred small crops add up to a life that doesn’t exist — and then you compare your uncropped Tuesday to it and wonder why you feel like you’re failing.
You’re not failing. You’re just seeing everyone else’s footage after the edit.
I sell things on the internet now, which makes this my problem in a new way. It would be easy to drift — better lighting, tighter crops, a version of my house that’s always clean and a version of me that’s always done. The numbers reward the drift. That’s exactly why I’m writing this down where you can hold me to it:
- If I show you a product, you’ll also hear what it doesn’t do.
- If I show you my house, you’ll hear about the mismatched pillows shoved just out of frame.
- If I have a rough week, I’m not going to perform a great one.
I’m not anti-pretty-photo. I like a good photo — I think the blanket ones came out really good, actually. I want to present myself well and professionally. I’m anti-pretending: I cuss a lot, my stuff doesn’t match, and I will never act like I’m living a life I’m not — because I’ve been on the other side of the screen at 11pm feeling like everyone else got a manual I didn’t, and no sale is worth doing that to someone else.
The honest middle isn’t a compromise. It’s the only place I’m willing to live online.
— Kay 🤍