The uncertainties have been overwhelming this year. Not just the political uncertainties—though the tenor of national politics have elevated my stresses—but the personal ones too. Late last year we left the lee of credible employment to embark on a journey of caregiving and child rearing. Then, in January, Louis had open heart surgery and the uncertainties began. We struggled with the elevated post-op care and anguished concerns over his mental state. With two kids in the mix we wondered how we would handle it if his recovery plateaued in those first months.
At nearly the same moment, the new regime took office and the non-personal uncertainties began to run wild. I don’t care who you are or what you support—this political situation is unusual. Maybe it’s what you wanted, maybe it’s what you were scared of, either way, it’s what we will all be required to endure.
The pace of news is dizzying, but if you want a list of grievances—Military personnel being deployed to American cities. ICE with a larger budget than the Marine Corps. Cultural centers and museums have been told to get in line with a whitewashed version of American history or else. Media companies and colleges are bending under the pressure from lawsuits and the weaponization of regulatory bodies.
The bureaucracy that was built to protect the people of this nation is being used as a cudgel against dissidents. Speech is being chilled. I feel that chill, I can read it in my silence—that pause in a thought that asks, “is this safe?”
We’re watching brown people get rounded up on a quota system—as if it’s the end of the month and they need to write more speeding tickets. They are being abducted and expatriated without due process—whine about illegals if you must, but you don’t seem to care about the bosses who broke the law to hire them, and you certainly don’t care about the administration breaking the law to deport them.
I could itemize outrages to fill this whole pamphlet. I won’t, by now, if you aren’t aware you don’t want to be.
We may not work in the corporate sense, but we work, from gardens to gatherings to kids, family, and friends—in every way we can feed a little more light into the world we work for it, and the time for silence is over. We have chosen to stand, to use our privilege as a shield to stand between the people who use privilege as a weapon and the people they abuse with it.
Immediately, that means connecting with others who share in our ideas and a spirit for opposition—but it’s growing. As always, we are oriented around building community, working to gather a network of people who share in the support and protection of others. We are raising our voices, and I invite you to join the conversation.
Everyone is welcome to sit at my table.
In unrelated news, we’ve added some prints to our Etsy shop, just in time for the holiday season. I hope you’ll enjoy them and choose to share some with your loved ones this season. Your support matters.
