On occasion, I retreat to my workshop to get away from the problems of the world. I can’t. It’s hard to displace worry and fear from my mind. Why? I’m not living fully as a citizen of this country.
It’s very difficult to do my work when this country is on fire. Bearing witness to grief and loss makes it very hard to focus on the work on the bench.
I try to carry on but the sound of the collective bones of black women and black men cracking under the boots of unearned, yes, stolen, authority is just too loud to ignore.
The fact is that I cannot run from it or keep my head in the sand.
I digress. NO. I do not digress.
Acknowledging that fact and doing something about it opens the door to healing.
Face. The. Facts.
This is not working.
Pursuit of wealth, education, status is held to be the American dream. If you don’t have those things, it’s a nightmare. But the “dream” is really a nightmare for those who think they’ve attained it.
Because that dream is defined by somebody else upholding:
- gated communities
- exclusion at the corporate table
- moral bankruptcy
- glass ceilings
- structural and domestic terror
- maintenance of the facade
These and more are evidence of the horror and fear inside the dream.
A dream defined by somebody else.
The acts perpetrated by keepers of the horror and captured on video for all the world to see is only a manifestation of what’s really going on inside that dream.
It is a rotten labyrinth from which continues to emerge immaturity barely disguised as leadership.
With the world watching, it’s embarrassing and annoying.
Lessons from the Woodshop
Wood, when cut, still lives. Wood cells are not still. They continue to react to their environment. Sun and humidity can wreck lumber.
They wreak havoc on fine furniture from years past. Most woodworkers know or regretfully find out, wood twists and turns for eternity.
I love the sun. I need the sun. Humidity won’t wreck me. I am not unlike wood, however; my life twists and turns. It’s never been still.
I’ve never ignored the horror and hypocrisy wreaking havoc outside my door, my world.
When I leave my shop at the end of the day, I step back into that world.
But, I was never really gone.
Voting does not begin or end on Election Day
I have never missed exercising my right to vote. If I was not going to be in my precinct on election day, I made sure that I voted absentee, by mail, or participated in early voting. When I was living overseas, I voted. When I was in the military, I voted.
Ahead of this election, I’m not in the wood shop.
Well, I’m not fully in the shop. As I have done in the past, I am studying all the candidates. I am holding local politicians to their records and scrutinizing referendums on the ballot.
And I am voting accordingly.
Also, I am training as a Polling Place Technician for election day. I’ll be setting up and troubleshooting the booths and machines for voting, among other duties. This dovetails nicely (pun intended) with my identity as a citizen-woodworker.
This act lowers my anxiety about this entire political fiasco. I’m not closing my eyes or looking the other way. Becoming educated about the behind the scenes planning to ensure that no one is denied their right to vote is, strangely, calming.
I brushed that sand from my head
And out of my eyes. But sometimes I just don’t want to see what’s happening. Now, the bottom has been breached.
44
On the brink of death, people voted. They voted from their death bed. They stood in long lines to cast that vote for 44. Afterwards, happy and proud, they made the journey home. R.I.P.🌹That is their legacy to us, the living.
Ours is to claim our time and know who we are.
To not shut up and play. To take that breath…
Say their names.💜
If it was not evident before, doing nothing has its consequences. Sometimes, ignorance of the facts drives inaction. Change that with this:
- research
- common sense
- critical thinking
- historical perspective
From that, take your own facts to the ballot box on election day. Define your own dream.
Think about the late black leader and civil rights hero, John Lewis, marching across that bridge in Selma in 1965. He got busted on his head and was knocked unconscious.
Years later he recalled, “I thought I saw death. I thought I was going to die on that bridge.” So you and I won’t have to. So you and I have the right to vote. Protect his legacy.
Yes, we can do this: support the women and men who are running in earnest for office. We have to do it today, tomorrow and all the days to come, so that our voting choices are never again between a rock and a hard place. Define your own dream.
My workshop is still my sanctuary and an incubator of hope and healing. A tiny bit of sand remains, but not nearly enough to cover my head.
•
VOTE
-Shirley J
🔓
