Our Tears of Joy Archive
Since January 10th, 2020, I’ve been documenting my tears of joy on Instagram, which you can view on my account through the ✨💦 highlight at @wordsiheld. I had always felt ugly, especially because of my acne and its scars persisting into my current late 30s. I rarely post photos of myself, but I decided over five years ago to start taking selfies whenever I cried out of pure happiness. The causes range from kind strangers’ comments to the works I wrote years before. At first I’d only share the initial of the person who caused it and never tell them how much they moved me, but eventually I would send that selfie immediately, no matter how well or long we’ve known each other. It was only through this process that I began to feel beautiful and more affirmed in my self-image and have a higher self-esteem.
Despite how deeply personal this archive is, I want to share it with the viewing public to encourage folks to document their own tears of joy. To especially let the originating person know how moved they were. Recording these moments has given me so much happiness, determination, grounding, and courage to move forward. I’ve never seen a face like mine in the media, not even on Filipino TV shows which normally depict ghost white, narrow-faced, pristine, and lithe people who are opposite of me so this feels absolutely affirming. Tears are normally let go of and never documented as it is seen as embarrassing & cringe to cry or be emotional no matter the reason. I decided to keep record of the ephemeral as it’s important to remember to connect to your whys for being and of pursuing your goals and heart. I cried when a stranger told me that I help more people with my writing than I’ll ever know. When a curator beautifully wrote about my artwork and even showed reasons I never considered. Even while I went through the archive to transfer them into these index cards. Reminders of how wonderful I, the people around me, and how this life truly is when things inevitably get dark.
This is my invitation for folks to contribute to this archive, composed of index cards set in a metal box. I’ll have pens, rubber stamps with ink pad, paper clips, clipboards, and such for attendees to use whenever I'm at events. I encourage you to share what is deeply meaningful to you, what you hope to never forget. I find that since starting to document, I’ve had more frequent tears of joy than ever before. I’m also a lot more open and honest with folks too, and especially have grown closer to them. I want to expand the notion of an archive as only limited to a chosen, elite few to be more open and public for anyone to contribute if moved to. I also endeavor to print my archive, and any accepted contributions into a physical zine.
You can mail them to:
Eileen Ramos
PO Box 10022
Edison, NJ 08906
Please fill out this form whether you submit them to in-person or via mail so I can ensure you receive your zine and print out your photos if need be. Please nothing sexually graphic or discriminatory. I will reject them.
I shall mail a printed zine for free and I will have them for sale and trading. That way people will always have a reminder of what truly blessed them with joy. I will also upload accepted submissions and my own archive of tears of joy on this website.