Recently I ran into a girlfriend who I hadn’t seen in more than a year. I asked her how she was. Her answer: “Girl, I am thriving.”
She looked fantastic. Yet as we fist-bumped, I wondered: What did she really mean?
DREA RICHARD, 48, OWNER OF ANDRE RICHARD SALON
Thriving means: “Doing activism in a way that I didn’t see coming. [Since the pandemic,] I’ve been working with a local branch of the Equality Federation. We are actively trying to get the Equality Act — that would protect LGBTQ people from discrimination — a federal law. Through the whole pandemic, I was in survival mode. I realized that even if my life wasn’t perfect, I needed to do more.”
How I get there: “Getting back to the basics. Going to bed early so I get the right amount of sleep. That’s the only way I have the energy to be productive.”
