Facing The Wind.
(So…..thoughts and musings of the past month plus. These things keep me up at night.
Maybe after I get them out of my head I can get back to the silly stuff. I need that too.)
I used to think we had won when I watched “Broad City”. When I saw Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson cutting up on the streets of New York City, fluid and rolling, celebrating a dog wedding in Prospect Park with their friend who had just gotten citizenship, saving Bed Bath and Beyond coupons, smoking sticky. I thought we had won. The culture had shifted. So many things that had been taboo, shameful, WEIRD…they were accepted now. In my lifetime. It is good to see yourself on a funny show and laugh. It is good to feel that the next generation has learned from your hard road, gained freedoms we did not have in OUR youth.
I remember when the show, right at the end, embraced Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid. Her victory seemed a done deal to so many people. Trump, such a buffoon. Friends laughing at me that he could never win. (I have those text messages saved.) So there is Hillary with the girls. Female empowerment. All good things.
When that neo-liberal fable crashed, leaving the Javitz Center full of tender tears and massive flags…..I knew that truly….we had NOT won. There was so much yet to do. When the crash happens….it’s pretty chilling. That same Shattered Mirage is on full display right now in the Middle East. Below link is to Reuters article re: the US transfer of THOUSANDS of large and small bombs to Israel as of TWO DAYS AGO.
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/us-this-week-approved-transfer-thousands-bombs-israel-official-says-2024-04-04/
Stop giving Israel bombs. STOP. Our special friend has gone off the rails.
Shall we play Schwartz to this Sandoval forever? (Could not resist. The hemming and hawing and excuses is just TOO TOO)
We are giving them the means to enact this savage genocide. There are no “good guys” here.
And the DEI blowback. And the Gilead campaign to end abortion. Happening all around us. Happening in my state of North Carolina….because one state senator changed her party affiliation AFTER being elected and now runs around enacting the laws of The Kingdom of White Grievance. IT’S HAPPENING. They don’t have to actually ENACT laws to scare the fuck out of people. (Sorry, but people are truly scared. Get with it.). There is a culture of hate that is spreading and WE ALL KNOW IT. Slurs and insults at Jewish people, Gay folk, anything that smacks of “woke” or progressive. It’s the culture to say weird racist jokes again. I know because people get sloppy and say them in front of the WRONG people, in front of me. I see it, I see you…..You don’t even want to hide. The haters are bold.
OKAY HERE’S THE DEAL:
I REFUSE TO GO BACKWARDS.
We are not going to do that. I grew up in a time when gay people were NOT accepted. You did not talk about that. People who came out to their parents were routinely kicked out of their houses AND NO ONE THOUGHT THAT WAS WEIRD. Your partner did not come to family gatherings, that just wasn’t even a conversation. You were “wrong", a disappointment, a MISTAKE. There weren’t gay characters on TV unless they were the butt of a joke, a stereotype lampoon. Gay people were not protected, most often and most especially by their parents.
WE CHANGED THAT. We are the generation that said NO, WE DESERVE RESPECT - and we are going to have to say it again.
“Now is the time to face the wind…..”
And then - in the middle of all this darkness - the Beyoncé album. American Requiem indeed. I encourage you to listen if you have not. She has delivered - with a lot of deep layers that speak to now. It gives me hope. If this music and these lyrics resonate today, this album, then more people than I know feel all that I speak of. There’s a tornado in OUR city. A tornado on our courts - Undefeated Gamecocks v. Caitlin and her Hawkeyes. Lots of NEW power on those basketball courts these days….inspiring young girls AND boys. There are new paradigms out there….the culture really has shifted, in important ways. Maybe we are winning, if we keep fighting….maybe so.
I wish I could say in this time that we had a great leader at the head of the pack. We do not. I know it is not Trump and it is not RFK.
I look to all of US. The walking forward will have to be together, arm in arm.
Keep listening. Listen first. Bring support to the quiet ones. There is enough love for all of us here.
I will keep crushing ignorance and hate and cruelty if they keep asking me to. If I don’t, we will lose ground gained. That will not happen on my watch.
I ask you to join me, in your everyday, every day. I thank you.
“Can we stand for something?
Now is the time to face the wind (Now is the time to face the wind)
Now ain't the time to pretend
Now is the time to let love in (To let love in)
Together, can we stand?” - Beyoncé