We've been having family zooms every other Friday and mostly I love them. I have three sisters and a brother in widespread locations and one sister goes to my Mom's and helps her get online. She doesn't say much but we all love looking at each other and it has helped our family dynamics in many ways. I continue to find things out to work on, some enriching and some distressing, but that's how it always is with family gatherings, and I've learned to value all of it (eventually.) Yesterday I happened to remember to ask my older sister if she discovered any slavery in our ancestry, since we had McWhorter relatives in Virginia, South Carolina and Kentucky, and there is a large community of Black McWhorters including a man called Free Frank who got himself and his family free enough to form a town in Indiana (I think) when it was the frontier. He's somewhat famous due to a book about him and a Time Travel show on PBS. Anyway not only were there enslaved people but we are actually distant cousins to Free Frank. I plan to dig up the census data to get more firsthand knowledge of that. [Edit: I did, and apparently after the 1790 census, no more enslved people were owned.We can only guess why, or why they thought it was acceptable in the first place.] It's one of those things I thought about abstractly but now it's way more real.
I have been reading so many books about racism and ableism and other isms so I can have way more meaningful context to move through my own internal racism and sexism and ableism and white supremacy and it does help. Ibram X. Kendi is really laying things out clearly for me, and I'm finding plenty of resources that I am grateful to use. It's weird to know that most of them were around for quite awhile and my interest was just not sparked...that's privilege, to not have to be interested in what is taking the lives of so many and working against so much that I believe in. So, taking down the barriers of my privilege, and it's a big job. Amber Ruffin is delightful and serious and I am grateful for the moments of almost-laughter that she provides. All of the books are valuable and fascinating.
Being a joyful warrior like Kamala Harris is a goal. It's serious business but some of it does feel good or could if I felt I had done enough work to deserve some leeway. I'm not there yet. I'm still a selfish person working on learning to share and trust. I don't like people most of the time and that is a fatal flaw apparently that ensures I will die alone and destitute but I'm just doing the best I can with that.
I don't fit that well into my family on a lot of fronts, which is painful at times but just the way it is. I have had to learn to not say judgey things when they talk about their lives and choices which are different from mine and they don't actively judge me either, but we often kind of give the side-eye on some subjects. Apparently I am obsessive or fanatic about how to do the right thing for climate issues and politics and even self-preservation in some ways...because I have never held money in high enough regard to accumulate a lot of it or spend what I do have in the socially acceptable ways taken for granted by what could be called the mainstream society. And I'm single and that's not gonna change.
I expect that "mainstream/alternative" is also a false construct that divides people as there is realistically a gigantic spectrum of choices and I am just on it somewhere, probably closer to them than I think. I once thought about what I would do if I did have a lot more money and some of it was things like having a bigger house and a newer car and the regular stuff. Old-age security. Actual health care I would use. But anyway, I am the hippie and I'm not changing that and I just have to work out my boundaries and their boundaries and keep us all in the middle of the nice meadow where we can all picnic without fighting about it. Completely possible, and something that gets easier as we continue asking about each other's lives. Just don't put cheese in everything. I enjoy not having a continually runny nose like I did for three-quarters of my life. I'm allegic to dairy.
One thing I cannot talk about yet is how the Market season will go this year, with the Farmers in a transition spot while the Butterfly lot disappears and is transformed. You'll all find out soon enough what will happen and it isn't my job to tell you. Suffice it to say I expect my tote bag sales will tank and let's hope that is just a negative projection that doesn't turn out to be true. I am worried about the odd/even days, as last year I was able to come every week and this year with people coming back I might not be able to do that. I can't even deal with the thought of selling only every other week. I guess the best strategy is to allow that it is a possibility, and might even have an upside, and try not to make predicitons about what hasn't been decided yet. Maybe we can go to 75% usage of our space and that will help. At the same time I am dreading the stress and hard physical work of selling outdoors. Having Saturdays off is very pleasing to me.
I am missing attending the Jell-O Art show for the first time in 30-some years, and that is hard, but I need to be at Market and Maude Kerns had to change the show hours to 1-5. Even though Market is closing at 4 this year, I'll not even be home at 5:00. So that's that. I'll be there virtually. It's just one year. Hopefully by next year everything will change again. Nobody knows. It will just be one more little loss for me and I've grown used to accepting loss without huge distress, because what other choice is there? Getting freaked out is hard on the body and brain and I'm tired of it.
I want to be at least content. I want to feel like I am moving through things even if I get stuck sometimes. Mistakes aren't unusual for anyone and I can't care too much about mine, except to try not to hurt people if I can help it. Nothing is finished until way after it is over and I finally admit it.
Sometimes I like being slow to adapt. I get to be in a weird but liminal space of unreality while I catch up with what other people think is reality. Sometimes I end up agreeing with them and sometimes I don't. Learning how to not be too obsessive but to love my eccentricity is getting easier.
Be safe! Being vaccinated is good but it's not everything. I'll still be wearing masks and you can too. Let's all die of other things, later, gently in our sleep when we are ready, decades from now. Or keep pretending that will be the case, anyway.
