Brooklyn-based artist Caitlin Masley talks about:

Her Carroll Gardens home virtually right under the BQE, and how she's frequently lived near (or under) trains, and how that's been comforting; her recent couple years co-running Guttenberg Arts, an artist residency and community-based art organization, and how her working there came out of her many years doing artist residencies all over Europe and the States; how she had to turn down a 6-month residency in Finland -- which would have included a house, a studio, a daily stipend and a Finnish-English language school for her daughter – because her son was too young at the time; the internal challenges she grapples with daily around living in an urban center with inspiring cultural benefits, and yet one that's also filled with environmental detriments (her son suffers significantly from asthma and food allergies), and the proposition of leaving New York is always on the table, and yet she essentially puts the researching on that topic out of her mind because she's afraid of what she'd find; the 'goldfish scenario' that applies to where they do and might live; the paradoxes of her family's Carroll Gardens neighborhood, which has become extremely pricey due to location and its charming brownstone, while at the same time through its proximity to the Gowanus Canal and a cement-making factory, among other things, the air quality is at dangerous levels; her master's thesis on building a community air trust, relating directly to her neighborhood experience and her son's health issues; the fact that despite her prolific record doing residencies, she's had to apply prolifically as well, getting accepted only 1 out of 50 times, by her count; and her latest residency, Artist Residency in Motherhood.