sonia | Counting up to the election: Netzach and Hod

rosefox's post on Netzach

I resonate with endurance and tenacity. Stubbornness. One foot in front of the other in front of the other. I don't resonate as much with vision, victory, and eternity. Except the kind of eternity that is an eternal present. I noticed around Tiferet that I feel injured in relation to vision. Flinchy, growly, like an injured cat.

I like this video's vision of the future. It's realistic about how terrible things are going to continue to be in the near future, and pulls out into a future I would like to live in. I would like everyone to be cared for in the future, including me. I would like us to use resources well so everyone has enough, and I would like us all to do the work of living well together.

It feels like even having a good vision of the future is a vulnerability, a weakness that can be exploited. I feel like I'm guarding my sense of what might be possible even from myself, lest it be leaked to the outside and opened up to destruction.

I wrote 5 letters every day to encourage Texas voters for Vote Forward. That's done now with their Big Send. I hope it made a difference, and we weren't all just deluding ourselves that we were taking positive action. 17 million letters! I hate that so much of politics is advertising and spamming people. That's why I'm reluctant to give money to political candidates. The Vote Forward letters were on the edge of what feels right for me to participate in.

The future feels so foreshortened, I don't know how to act on the future's behalf. Except what I always do, trying to make future-me's life easier by setting things in order now, making sure there will be enough food, etc. I feel like the future keeps being wrenched from our hands by the sudden jolt of unexpected events. Like Ruth Bader Ginsburg dying. (May her name be a blessing, an inspiration, a revolution.)

Leading up to the 2016 election, I said I was assuming Hillary Clinton would win because I couldn't deal with the alternative. Then I had to deal with the alternative. I haven't been nearly so blithe leading up to this election, but I do have flashes of, what if it turns out okay. What if everything we're doing is enough, and Biden gets elected, and good things start happening. Once I have done what I can do, I think that's a good place to rest while we all wait in not-knowing.

I enjoyed listening to Ella's Song, and watching Sweet Honey in the Rock perform, and marveling at how they each hold their own distinct line of harmony and rhythm. I remember seeing them perform as a child at the Glen Echo Folk Festival, but I think there must be new members since then.

Regarding mentors, I want to give a shoutout to RaceFail 2009, where I got a lot of my initial anti-racist education as I silently followed the blossoming of posts across the fannish internet. I appreciate all the people who turned their pain into posts and gathered links to move that struggle forward.

I like the idea of sitting with the ungraspable nature of being alive. Here we are, as bizarre as it is!

rosefox's post on Hod

Acceptance and presence. Being with what is, all of it, even when, especially when, we'd rather have nothing to do with it. A lot of trauma healing is about that, being willing to be with the core of the trauma without being overwhelmed by it.

I'm acknowledging anxiety as a problem I might be able to address in new ways, and I'm going to try taking some additional supplements to help my body cope. It's been a lot! It continues to be a lot!

I was returning something to Powell's Books today, and they said over the phone to do it inside the store. Okay, I'm willing to do that. I did not remotely predict the number of people wanting to shop for books in person at a partly open bookstore. I stood in a socially distanced line outside the building for half an hour. And since I had nothing better to do and had recently read the Thich Nhat Hanh article on presence, I named my in breath and out breath for a lot of that time. And enjoyed looking around, and appreciated the family behind me speaking a language I couldn't quite identify. Norwegian? Finnish?

I didn't name an anchor for day 20. I do meditate on the breath, while also allowing my attention to go to body sensations. I have a 17 year ritual/habit/practice of meditating every morning. I'm not sure I need or want more rituals. It feels close to that vision flinch. My supportive rituals keep getting taken away from me, like my weekly trip to the farmers market, and longer bike rides, and several weekly folk dance groups, and a semi-weekly singing group. Many of my supportive rituals were amputated without warning in March, and I have established some replacements over zoom, but it's not the same.

I keep thinking about my local grocery co-op. I support them by being a member and shopping there. They keep saying they want feedback, and sometimes I let them know something isn't working well. When they respond by suggesting I run for the board, I shake my head. I want to shop at a functioning grocery store without having to run it myself. I feel somewhat similarly about encouraging voters in Texas. If things were functioning the way they should, it wouldn't be my job. In my practice helping people heal from trauma, I have to be mindful of what's my job to help with, and what I have to simply witness. I think those boundaries are important in activism as well.

I like the idea, for tomorrow, of supporting something that's already good. I'm finding that kindness is so crucial right now, the small kindnesses of smiling, acknowledging someone's presence, making their life a little easier, appreciating when they do that for me. I have been ordering a bunch of stuff online lately, and while I'm giving the spending a bit of a side-eye, it also fits with supplying my future self, supporting artists and small businesses, and gathering gifts to send out later. I think something in me is trying to batten down for an unpredictable winter. Scared, and grieving, and reaching for comfort.

Thanks,

rosefox, for putting this structure together and giving me the opportunity to be with everything it brings up.