GL.25.15: Caseysimone Ballestas
GL.25.27: MARY PERO
GL.25.28: Tom Morgan
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In 2025, I turned my life upside down. I have rewritten this section like ten times today. The short of it is I have grown a lot this year. I learned to lean on friends, and I mean lean without holding back. I am also better at evaluating what makes a good friend. Personally, I have grown a lot in processing my emotions in real time, and creating space for negative emotions. Here is the playlist that has been my soundtrack for 2025:
“Forgive Myself” - Griff: This was my single most played song in 2025, I played this loudly in Indian Creek at girl climbing weekends, and alone driving in the dark. It became my mantra.
“Letting Go” - Angie McMahon: This is the sister song to number one, a lot of this playlist can be listened to with arms spread wide in opposite directions spinning around.
“Good Grief” - Fancy Hagood: This song has been so on the nose for me, this last year any time I needed a break from Los Angeles, I found myself in Joshua Tree. A place my sister and I spent long weekends often in the winter, where I learned to drive way too young and she and I practiced jumping on top of boxcars, and dancing at night.
“Mirage” - Eva Snyder (released 2025): This song is raw and brutal. My life became so crazy for a bit. I tried so hard to control it. I needed to let go, and lean on my friends. I put my focus on surface level issues and the rug got pulled out from under me.
“Leftover Coffee” - Sydney Quiseng (released 2025): I heard this song for the first time in the Smoky Mountains, and this became a transitioning song when I had stopped disassociating and accepting my life for what it was.
“Strange Girl” - Laura Marling: Laura has always held a shelf in my heart. While driving around the country, I listened to all of her albums from start to finish. My sister passed last year, and this is the last song I sent her.
“Gone” - Haim (released 2025): This album came out when I was at Corpus Christi, Texas. The entire album is worth a listen. I listened to it repeatedly the night it came out. I had a campsite at the beach. I had danced in the glow in the sunset, and then had on a hoodie sweatshirt and bikini bottoms. I must have smoked half a pack of cigarettes sitting on a wooden bench staring at the waves, alone. The guitar solo, alone - swoon. The feeling is imprinted on my brain.
“Bovine Excision” - Samia (released 2025): This song touches on femininity, self discovery, and self acceptance. It memorializes girlhood, and how much we give ourselves away and when we decide to rein it all back in - and just be.
“Be a Bitch” - Maren Morris (released 2025): This song had been pivotal for many moments of the year, including just a few weeks ago.
“Let Me Be Wrong” - Jensen McRae (released 2025): Jensen is such a powerful songwriter. And this is such a release song, her voice carries such intensity in all the right ways.
“Quitting” - Eliza McLamb (released 2025): This song embodies youthful play in relationships and I think that’s something we forget is important to be playful.
“Virginia Slim” - Clover Country (released 2025): There are a handful of songs on this list that resonate with me and my personality and this is one of them.
“Saltwater Queen” - Ben Long (released 2025): While I have sat in front of many bodies of freshwater this trip and spent time chasing something, the deepest moments of love I felt for myself have been facing the sea.
“Sweet to Know Ya” - Andrew Montana (released 2025): This song is about restarting, I have spent a lot of time in the car, and listening to the chorus while tapping the steering wheel has left an impression.
“San Lucas” - Kevin Kaarl: When all else fails, go to Mexico. Mexico was the first place I visited outside the US, and the people in Mexico have such a sense of family, and radiate warmth, and deep respect for hardship and grief.
“NUEVAYoL” - Bad Bunny (released 2025): The entire album is iconic and this song in particular I feel like portrays rhythm in a way it could never do in English.
“Como un Pájaro” - Silvana Estrada (released 2025): Beautiful. Exquisite. Her voice is weightless.
“Boys Who Kiss You in Their Cars” - Ber: Throughout my travels and my whole adulthood, there are boys that just make up an alternative universe to who you are - they romanticize you, plan a life with you that you don’t want, rewrite you so that you are their dream girl. They are just the boys that kiss you in their cars.
“Jesus and John Wayne” - Googly Eyes, Joy Oladokun, August Ponthier (released 2025): With so much happening in the US, I wanted at least one political song, and this one hits so many key elements of the year.
“Beat A B!tch Up” - Alemeda, Doechii (released 2025): I am so grateful for the friends I had this year. There were plenty of low moments, but some really big high moments.
“You Give Love a Bad Name” - Bon Jovi: After leaving New Orleans, I started to appreciate my younger self - and this is now back on my regular rotation in my car.
“Be Yourself” - Wilder Woods: Sometime after my sister’s mass, I found myself wearing all of her clothes and replaying her old voicemails. I searched for her in everything and I found her playlists on Spotify. My sister had some tough years and so did I. When we didn’t talk, she had been listening to my “liked songs” on Spotify, and I am not sure how she knew I would look on her Spotify after she passed. She had saved this song below. This year, Dillon gave me space to talk about the happy moments I had with her. I can remember exactly when this happened and it was to this song, on a dirt road in Patagonia, while the frame of the car rattled. Dillon has been a big part of my 2025 year, and I have never been more grateful.
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