The Right to Assemble
Originally, this post about me.
An update.
I’m facing Housing Court on June 26th; another stumble in my fight to survive: sheltered, making a livable wage, and with a plan to physically and financially move. So far, I’m failing at all three.
Yet at the same time, I’ve had more courage in the last month to explore nouns (people, places, and things) than I have felt for years.
I’ve barely left my apartment since COVID made its first wave of news in 2019, and it’s taken half a decade to not have a panic attack just walking outside without wearing a mask.
Perhaps the fear of losing my home has nudged me emerge from my bubble of safety and find it somewhere else; but more likely, it has burst that bubble, forcing me to recognize that this apartment never truly felt safe:
My PTSD was seriously triggered less than two weeks into moving here, and since then I’ve been hospitalized for my Crohn’s three times, had two and a half major surgeries, and went from morning runs before going to my “dream job” to mourning that job while working a minimum wage one, where I spend half my shift battling with a cane.
So it’s not going well.
Much has changed, the illusion of safety has well and truly been shattered.
I was going to write about seeking comfort outside of these (possibly still wasp-infested) walls.
And then the world changed – and I have to respond.
Now, this post isn’t just about me,
Yes, a lot is difficult. Yes, I am scared. Yes, I still have no clue what my life will look like in two weeks. But now, I am extremely aware that I am one of many in America fearing for their futures.
Writing this, I sat at my keyboard, the cursor blinking back at me as my words and fingers fell still.
How could I write about myself when there is smoke, yet again, in my old city, where ashes are still haunting its hills?
How could I speak of feeling alone, when I feel like I should be lending my support?
And how could I write of five years of fear, when others face it for a lifetime?
As the cursor continued to blink, a muted metronome marking each movement of my stillness, I started to realize the trap I’d fallen into: Silence.
Sharing my perspective doesn’t lessen the significance of others, how could it? If anything, it will shed more light into the shadows, illuminating the same monster under the bed of our country.
Words are my strength, the form of my protest, a voice I can amplify without juggling a megaphone and a cane.
I pulled myself out of my silent trap, and then the cursor couldn’t keep up.
Words tumbled out, propelled by the weight of five years spent watching.
Wanting to protest, wanting to love, wanting to make changes in this world, and finding myself constantly fighting to be seen at all.
That’s when it clicked.
If there is one benefit to be found in being an extremely analytical person forced to spend five years watching others get to live a life without fear and questioning why I couldn’t, it’s discovering the answer:
I wasn’t meant to.
I fought to be acknowledged by a corporation and was let go because of it.
I figuratively shouted until my voice was hoarse, but that didn’t make others want to hear.
I sought sanctuary from a government that chose capitalism over safety.
I wasn’t meant to survive.
Which means two things:
Of course I am struggling to get back on my feet in a culture that doesn’t make room for others to stand (or sit, we really need more benches), and
I was fighting a losing battle and yet I am still here.
I may not have won, but I haven’t lost yet, so by simply existing I am resisting.
I can’t speak to what different minorities face, it would devalue their experience to even try.
But as someone who was left to die in his first term, I know the futility of trying to get this orange monster and his sycophants to care.
I’ve learned that if they don’t want to, they won’t.
You can appeal to their logic, humanity, compassion, even their own values, but if they want a world without you, they will do everything they can to eliminate you.
You can never prove your worth to them because they refuse to see your value.
So seek your validation from others; that is the best lesson that I learned.
Still protest.
Resist injustice.
Fight to protect your neighbors, family, community.
But remember that it is those standing next to you who truly matter.
There are more that seek to understand than those who refuse.
More that have felt persecuted than those who have let their ignorance harm.
More waterfalls of compassion than dried-up wells of apathy.
And our power lies in connecting with those who don’t run when tear gas pelts your way; with those who check in; those doing anything to help share your story, so you don’t have to strain your voice yelling that you matter.
They already know and will shout it with you.
Assembling together, different lives and perspectives uniting as one, that is what makes waves, creating currents of change, that we can hope will result in tidal waves of acceptance.
But remember, it is not our job to change minds. That’s for the politicians, and where voting has its own power. But if the goal of a protest is to create a collective, all united in values and care, then each day can be a success.
I know in my own way the sisyphean task of trying to get this administration to care about human lives, and I broke under the lack of recognition….but I still exist and that is the most defiance I could ever show.
So look around you.
Fight for your community.
Love those standing next to you.
And let our struggles connect us.
In the meantime, I’ll leave you with the words of Martha Graham:
“No artist is pleased…
There is no satisfaction whatever at anytime
There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction a blesséd unrest that keeps us marching and makes “us” more alive than the others.”