Dark Angel | The Art of Being Too Much

On self-expression, the fear of judgment, and the freedom to be unapologetically alive.

I’m sitting here crying about my brand on a Sunday afternoon.

Not sad tears, or necessarily happy tears either. More like the overwhelming realization of just how deeply this little business I've created is rooted in the depths of my soul.

What started as me overthinking an Instagram reel somehow turned into an exploration of my brand values, my childhood, my insecurities, my grief, and the way I want to live my life.

And somewhere in the middle of all that, I think I uncovered something about what SIREN + SOL really IS and what it means to me.

But let's start with the reel…

Yesterday, I went to a Halloween party dressed as a dark angel. I loved the concept because the black, oil-slick wings reminded me of the earliest depictions of sirens in Greek mythology. Before they became the beautiful, fish-tailed mermaid creatures we recognize today, sirens were depicted as part woman, part bird.

But something happened when I put on that costume: I felt like myself.

Not the everyday version of me sitting around in a messy bun with no makeup and a baggy tee, but another side of me. A more theatrical, seductive, unapologetic version.

I don't always feel confident. I certainly don't always feel beautiful. And when someone compliments my appearance, I'm usually quick to attribute it to my artistic abilities. The makeup, the styling, the photography. As though I can accept that I've created something beautiful, yet struggle to accept that I might actually be beautiful.

But standing there in those black wings, something clicked.

I felt like I'd been possessed by some badass demon who didn’t give a damn what anyone thought of her.

Naturally, I decided to channel that energy into a little Jennifer's Body performance in the mirror. Because what else does one do when dressed like a demonic angel?! And when I watched it back, I thought: Damn. I look good.

That is a VERY foreign feeling for me. I loved the video. I loved the character. I loved the way I felt making it. I loved my expressions.

So I posted it. And THEN I started overthinking.

WHO DOES SHE THINK SHE IS?!

What if people think I'm trying too hard? What if they think I'm ridiculous? Immature? That I'm trying to be sexy when I'm not nearly attractive enough to pull it off? What if a family member sees this? What if someone thinks, “Oh God, who does Heather think she is? Megan Fox?”

And suddenly, the woman who'd felt so confident in front of the mirror was worrying about the opinions of people who weren't even in the room. And assuming the worst... Sometimes I go down the rabbit hole of re-watching or over-analyzing something I've created from the POV of every individual I know and then assuming what each person might think about it. YIKES!

The funny thing is, I've always been unconventional. Proud to call myself “unique”.  In High School, I wore purple plaid flare pants designed by Avril Lavigne, red cowboy boots, and these incredible silver metallic pants that would've made Steven Tyler proud.

While everyone else was walking around in Abercrombie, Aeropostale, North Face, and UGGs, I was apparently dressing for a rock concert in outer space. And I fucking loved those pants.

I didn't want to look like everyone else. I never have. But I remember how uncomfortable it could be to stand out. There was always inevitably someone asking, "Why are you so dressed up? Who are you trying to impress?" High school in the inner city with a class of about 1,000 isn't for the faint of heart.

Sometimes it felt as though wanting to look beautiful, interesting, or different meant you were seeking attention. And seeking attention was somehow embarrassing or just generally negative. BUT - in my defense it worked because I opened for Aerosmith at 16 (but that's another story for another time.)

I never stopped wearing what I wanted. But that didn't mean the judgment didn't bother me. And apparently, almost twenty years later, some part of that feeling is still hanging around.

WHEN DID BEING YOURSELF BECOME EMBARASSING?!

I've been thinking about how strange it is that we seem to associate growing up with becoming less imaginative.

At some point, we're expected to become sensible, practical adults. To tone things down. To stop playing dress-up. To stop being so dramatic. But why?

Why should getting older mean abandoning the things that made us feel alive when we were younger? Steven Tyler famously sings “Instead of growing old all dapper and neat, I’m gonna grow my hair right down to my feet,” in the 2001 track Just Push Play and I’ve always LOVED that, and wanted to live like that…

I still love mermaids. I still love fantasy, being uniquely myself and dressing up. I still want to make beautiful, strange things and occasionally pretend I'm a supernatural creature.

And I don't think there's anything immature about that.

In fact, the older I get, the more I realize how precious those things are. Because there's something else that's changed the way I see all of this.

Something much bigger than an Instagram reel…

“GO HAVE FUN”

I so don’t want to be the girl who makes her mother’s untimely death her whole personality… but a life-changing event like that isn’t something that’s easy to shake, and it will forever be a part of me. One of the last times I left my mother's hospital room, she told me, "Go have fun with Steven and Lilly."

I remember thinking that was the most ridiculous thing she could possibly say. "Mama, I'm not going to go have fun while you're in here like this." She died not long afterward.

And now, just over three years later, I find myself wondering whether she meant something more than just "go have fun" on that afternoon, or the next day. I know she was afraid she was dying. She watched her own mother die in 1985 at the age of 59 to bone cancer; and here she was… in-and-out of a hospital in Boston for almost 3 months straight with a rare cancer at the age of 60.

Sometimes I wonder if she was telling me to go have fun with my life. I think about that moment almost every single day.

Go Have Fun. Love. Laugh. Create. Go on adventures. Enjoy the ridiculous, beautiful, fleeting experience of being alive.

Losing my mother didn't suddenly turn me into an unconventional person. I'd been that girl in the silver space pants long before... But it changed something in me.

It made me realize, in the most devastating way imaginable, that we don't have forever.

Fuck it. If she can be an angel, I can be a mermaid.

So I became one.

THE BEAUTIFUL CONTRADICTION OF BEING ALIVE:

Recently, a woman I've connected with through SIREN + SOL, Kaylie of @bornofsaltandstardust, shared something that really struck a chord with me. She wrote about the coexistence of grief and gratitude, pleasure and pain, joy and sadness, and how we can be deeply grateful for our lives while simultaneously grieving the parts of them that hurt. And how none of those things cancel each other out. That theme seems to be circling in my life lately, and coincidentally Kaylie's as well.

Her words resonated with me so deeply because I've felt that contradiction in my own life, especially since losing my mother. I can be heartbroken by her absence and still be wildly in love with being alive.

And perhaps that's exactly why I feel such an urgency to romanticize my life. To dress up. To create art. To make things beautiful. To chase adventures. To feel attractive. To be my own muse. To be ridiculous or goofy or weird. To be a living contradiction. To laugh until my stomach hurts. Not because I don't understand how painful life can be. But because I do.

And I don't want to spend the time I have worrying about whether someone thinks I'm too much. Too strange. Too dramatic. Too sexy (or not! Haha!) Or too old to be playing mermaid.

Because someday, none of those opinions will matter…

BETWEEN SHADOW + LIGHT

And this brings me back to SIREN + SOL: When I started this business, I knew I wanted to create something inspired by dark sirens, pirates, mythology, and the beautiful mystery of the sea. A place I could share my art, and my weirdness. But sitting here on a Sunday afternoon, reflecting on all of this, I realize that those things have always represented something much deeper to me:

Freedom. Self-expression. Magnetism. Confidence. Wonder. Vitality. Adventure.

The freedom to live on your own terms. The confidence to take up space (I know this is like a wildly cliché saying but hear me out) without apologizing for it. The magnetism of someone who is entirely, unmistakably and confidently themselves. The wonder of never losing your imagination. And the insatiable desire to experience everything this extraordinary, heartbreaking life has to offer.

The Siren represents the darker, more defiant parts of ourselves. The desires, the mysteries, the fierce individuality. The parts that refuse to be tamed.

Sol represents the warmth. The vitality. The joy and wonder of being alive. The gilded “silver lining” of those perfect micro moments we have every day.

And somewhere between the two is the beautiful contradiction of being human. We aren't meant to be one thing. We can be sensual and silly. Romantic and rebellious. Confident and vulnerable. Grieving and grateful. We can be both shadow and light.

And maybe being unapologetically yourself doesn't mean never feeling embarrassed, insecure, or afraid of judgment. Maybe it simply means refusing to let those feelings stop you from living.

I wore the silver space pants anyway.

I posted the Jennifer’s Body dark angel reel anyway.

And somewhere along the way, I built an entire little world dedicated to that same spirit.

SIREN + SOL is an ode to the freedom of being entirely yourself, and the extraordinary privilege of being alive.

To the dreamers, the rebels, the romantics, and the wild at heart. To finding beauty in the strange, wonder in the unknown, and power in our individuality. Because life is far too fleeting to spend it becoming someone else's idea of who you should be.

Between shadow and light, we belong to ourselves.