My Brilliant Friends: The Baddies

I’ve been watching a lot of TV lately, and yes, that clearly includes My Brilliant Friend. While I am late to the game, I’ve somehow managed to find myself at the end of season 4 in only two weeks. I know—but this is a judgement free zone and when I get obsessed with a new series, there’s no stopping me. I love being transported into different worlds and this show is so beautifully shot, I feel like I’m ready to book my flight to Ischia and spend my summer at the beach like baby Lenu. Also, it’s a great escape from my current reality, unemployed in the US during this fucking political circus.

I haven’t felt this absorbed in storytelling in a really long time and I am counting down the 16 weeks until the book series is available on my kindle. The premise of the story is about a very codependent and toxic relationship between two girlfriends that span from their early childhood to late age. There is so much drama, poverty, men boy problems, fascism, social divide and lots of power dynamics between literally every interpersonal exchange, but it also sheds light on the complexities of female friendships. I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I caught myself saying “This bitchhh, are you fucking serious right now.” Or yelling at my TV, “Leave him!!”You guys, plz listen to me if you’re not already a fan, it’s SO good!

But fr, it also got me thinking about my close girlfriends, the Baddies. If you’re new here, I co-founded Radical Clothes Swap, we’re a mutual aid, Womxn of color run nonprofit that hosts free clothing swaps in LA. Our motto is Free Clothes For All and we help combat capitalism and overconsumption by encouraging folks to swap, not shop. It’s run by me, Jannine, and Enri—the Baddies. We’re officially turning 4 years old this year, 2 as a 501c3 nonprofit. I say this with pride because it has not been easy and I say this to everyone, RCS was just supposed to be a fun little side project I did on the weekends and it’s grown into a full blown community of sustainable baddies.

Because we host anywhere between 2-4 swaps a month, I don’t really get to see my friends that often. But the Baddies—my RCS team, have really been my biggest support system these past few years. I didn’t realize that in creating RCS, we’d also create a sisterhood. Honestly, we’re really lucky.

Over the weekend, we celebrated International Womxn’s Day at Angel City Brewery, our main swap headquarters. The brewery even named a beer after us for the month of March, The Raddie Baddie Brew. Usually, the three of us run the swap, from setting up, to accepting donations, restocking racks, talking to folks, etc. This month, we did things a little differently,