Incandescent Rage & Beauty.

Love. Beauty. Rage… Plus meditation, tea, and walks. These—along with work—comprise my life these days. 

I’m very worried—not only about the mounting death toll—and food and housing precarity—but at what is coming six months from now. I’m scrambling to support people locally, including a lot of front line activists in need, but need to figure out how to plug in and do more.

Yesterday, my local government sent out updates on the most recent round of Covid protections. One thing that is getting re-upped is rent deferment and eviction moratoriums. I started yelling at local elected officials on Twitter (trust me, I’ve written to their offices directly. I’ve protested. I use all avenues of communication).

To the politicians, I wrote:

“We’ve asked for rent and mortgage freezes—temporary suspensions—since March, and received only rote replies. Deferment does not help. Who can come up with 6 mos to a year of back rent? With what funds? Meanwhile, evictions and sweeps continue.”

Then I wrote to my feed:

“I’ve been angry at government for 40 years, but the top to bottom mismanagement of this crisis makes me incandescent. We’ve barely touched the edges of this disaster, and people are already suffering egregiously.

It doesn’t take much insight to extrapolate into the near future. This disaster is massive. And yet...the people who are supposed to be aware of this don’t seem to be.

Yes. Mutual Aid. Yes. We take care of us. But government action and inaction makes caring for each other exponentially harder, doesn’t it? As resources dwindle further, I hope our communities can re-strategize. I’m down to help as much as I can.”

Rage matters. Action matters. But we cannot live in worry, grief, rage, or anger all the time. Hence my walks. Meditation. And my thirst for beauty.

Lately, I’ve been listening to even more music than usual, seeking out old familiar songs, and also looking for new artists, including on YouTube.

Doing that, I stumbled across this astonishing piece of beauty, and wanted to share it with you. It’s skaters Oona and Gage Brown skating in an empty NYC rink to Metallica:

I also wanted to share some of the beauty I’ve been encountering on my walks. This is some of what I push out on the daily to Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, in an attempt to share something other than the rolling disaster we all live in now. Four of those are above.

The other thing I did? Took a photo of myself, smiling. That felt important, too. Worry and rage are not all that I am. I made it my new profile photo here.

So, I ask: How are you organizing locally? Or what help are you asking for? 

And what beauty keeps you going right now?

Thanks for all your well wishes on my health, by the way! The flu lasted around a week.

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