What if We Started Now?

Hear me out.

Beloved friends,

While pondering a re-write of this essay last week 😬, I thought about the Oakland Unified School District teachers’ strike that I was a part of in 1996. Let me set the scene:

The teachers’ union was demanding better working conditions and higher salaries, after watching the district’s administration become more bloated while classrooms were lacking basic supplies. There had been a long build-up to the dramatic all-hands vote to strike, including a two-day walkout and months (if not years) of frustrating contract negotiations.

I’d never considered not joining the strike. However, my then-husband was in graduate school at the time, and our toddler’s preschool cost more per month than his UC Berkeley tuition, so forfeiting my—our family’s only—salary was no small thing. We’d be living on credit card debt, not knowing when it would end.

As soon as the walkout began, several colleagues and I set up a “strike school” in a nearby location so that families who wanted to support our efforts against the district could make that choice while still having a place for their children to learn and be cared for. We taught our make-shift “strike school” in the mornings and joined picket lines in the afternoons. Some were sleeping in tents outside the admin building.

The bond between striking teachers grew strong through our dedication to the cause. Solidarity kept us going. We needed each other’s support because what we were doing was really hard.

Meanwhile many—almost half?—of our colleagues chose to cross the picket lines and continue teaching at the school as usual the entire time, receiving their normal paychecks.

When the strike finally ended after five long weeks, those “scabs” received the same benefits we did, without having had to make any sacrifices (other than being the targets of our ire). They got the same raise we’d struggled for, and the same hard-earned bonus pay.

It felt really unfair.

The strike ended in March, but tensions among the staff remained high for the rest of the school year. I could barely even look at my non-striking colleagues without contempt, so I mostly avoided interactions when I could.

And yet. We were all there to teach the neighborhood’s children.

I don’t know all the reasons those teachers chose not to join the strike, because I never asked. I did make a lot of assumptions about them, however, and they weren’t generous ones.

By the next fall, some of the anger had dissipated. A few of the “scabs” had left to teach elsewhere, but plenty remained. Our staff got on with the business at hand, but it took me several more years to completely let the animosity go.

Where we direct our energy matters.

Looking back, I see how we fell into the classic pattern of a social hierarchy in crisis: We minions were divided into two opposing sides, which drew out the conflict and caused a lot of our energy to be directed at each other, rather than at our true aim, which was change at the district level. I’m not saying the school district intentionally pitted us against each other (as our current political administration is clearly doing, if you see where I’m headed with this), but while we were distracted with fighting each other, we bought those in charge time to continue with business as usual.

Let’s hold that thought while I step off on a tangent.

(I would have included a photo of our strike here but I couldn’t find any. I’ll let this one connect us to today:)

Click here to learn about the serious work of “tactical frivolity.”

I’m thinking a lot about babies lately.

Earlier this month my niece gave birth! Their tiny daughter is the first of a new generation in our family. My sister is now a grandma, and I’ll join her ranks in a few months, as my oldest is also expecting. 🥰 These are soul-stirring milestones that give me pause to consider the long view of life.

Having observed oodles of small humans up close, here’s one thing I’m sure of:

No child is born with the life purpose to hunt people down in the streets and terrorize them. Nor is it any newborn’s destiny to give genocidal orders to their underlings. Those are empty, tragically misguided pursuits, a symptom of how lost we’ve become as a culture, how disconnected we are from what really matters, which is each other.

Us.
You and me.
Our neighbors of every color.
And also them, the perpetrators of violence, because they are also “us.”

“Each other” includes all of our ancestors in the great stream of humanity (regardless of how they behaved in their lifetimes), plus those who will come after us, no matter their life choices and accomplishments.
And our more-than-human companions on this Earth.
And the Earth herself, with that life-giving, nurturing body we’ve been abusing for too long.

Connection is what we humans are wired for. It’s the desire to inflict harm that goes against our nature.

What if we started healing NOW?

It might feel counter-intuitive to the struggle, but what if we could start now to re-humanize those masked agents who are causing so much harm? Could we see them, not as “bad guys” but as little lost boys playing a morbid, misguided form of dress-up? (They, too, were once somebody’s precious baby.) If they were proud of what they were doing, after all, why would they hide all identifying features, KKK-style? It can’t feel good to act out fascist fantasies. The job looks horrible.

I think it was Professor Timothy Snyder, author of the invaluable little handbook, On Tyranny, who said in an interview that an important stage in a resistance movement is when combatants (ICE/DHS agents in this case) begin to defect. We need to be open to receiving them when this happens. Proactively inviting them seems even more expedient. I fear that when “our side” shouts profanities at DHS agents, we encourage them to harden the armor they’ve already built up around their hearts, prolonging and possibly escalating the conflict.

To be clear, I’m not condoning their efforts, nor suggesting we ignore them.

Nor am I equating my picket line-crossing colleagues with violent ICE agents. The similarities are: 1) I couldn’t relate to/didn’t approve of the position they chose; 2) Their choice of action clearly prolonged the struggle; 3) They also got cursed at a lot.

Note from the Bella Vista Play Structure

When the Oakland city park next to the public school I taught at was renovated, the new play structure bore this inscription on one of the panels:

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

- Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.

I’ve been seeing “Melt ICE” signs here and there, which I’m choosing to interpret to mean melt their hearts with love. I honestly don’t know how to go about doing that, but I know it must be done somehow. (Maybe for now, through focused meditation on melting our own hearts?) I think it would be more effective—plus it just makes more sense—than the common F*ck ICE.

Speaking of slogans, I’ve been noodling around with what to put on a sign for the 🚫🤴🏻 protest on March 28th. So far it’s some version of,

“DHS agents:

You were made for more than this. Come dance with us instead.”

Or,

“You Soul has been searching for you. It can’t recognize you behind that mask.”

What about you? What sign will you carry? What are some favorites you’ve seen? 🤓🪧🖍️ Please share in the comments!

Maybe this is one place to start?

On a related note… Want to drive me nuts? Talk to me about who is a “good person” and who is a “bad person.” This is my current pet peeve. Do we truly think something as miraculously complex as a human being can be reduced to either this one meaningless adjective or its equally meaningless opposite? I hear the terms “good person” and “bad person” being bandied about by intelligent, thoughtful people all over the place. And so will you, once you start paying attention.

I’m actually trying to eliminate “good” and “bad” from my vocabulary, and also “right” and “wrong” for the same reasons. The goal is to be more accurate in my language. What’s a “good person,” anyway? Someone who has never done anything wrong or bad? 😂Probably we mean someone whose values are aligned with mine, or maybe someone I admire for things they’ve done. “Bad person” is usually code for, “I don’t like this person’s behavior.” That’s still reductionist, but now at least it’s clear that we’re stating an opinion, rather than pretending we’re consulting a giant two-column ledger in the sky.

Also, let’s stop repeating the propagandist phrase, “worst of the worst,” as though some people are not humans but, in fact, monsters that deserve to be eliminated.

After all, if we’re labeling people good, bad, and worst of the worst, can we really say we believe in equality? 🤔

We’re all judgey. We’re all flawed. We’re all in need of grace.

As I confessed in the teachers’ strike story, I’m as capable as anyone of judging people harshly and holding grudges. Everything I write is a “note to self.” I need constant reminders and encouragement. I struggle mightily to understand how people I’m related to could be caught up in the spell of our current president.

But then I recall how I’d been emotionally captured in an abusive relationship myself for many years, despite being a strong and intelligent person.

I’ve learned, in my 60 years on the planet, that judging others and holding grudges never improves the situation for me or anyone else. It simply deflects the blame to a place where I can comfortably avoid dealing with my own sh*t for a while longer. Sometimes (but always mistakenly), it feels like power.

I’m NOT saying that we shouldn’t feel righteous anger and rage in the face of oppression. There’s a flood of crazy, illegal, and disturbing things happening right now, and our rage means that we’re paying attention. How could we not be furious about the grift, and the misuse of our tax dollars, and the gutting of social services, and the kidnapping/detaining/killing of innocent people?

Goddess Energy on the Loose 💫

The people of Minneapolis (and Portland, and L.A., and Chicago, and Maine… but especially Minneapolis) are teaching us that it’s possible to transmute rage into deep care and protection of one’s neighbors. That’s goddess energy! Fierce and protective, like a mama bear, and available to all genders. I’ve even heard the coining of a new verb: neighboring. I love it. What an example those Minnesotans are setting for us.

Folks of every walk of life are waking up. People are getting creative in their resistance. Some put on costumes. Others make clever signs. People are defending their neighbors and defending our democratic rights. All of this is necessary.

Dreaming Up the Next World

I guess I’m wishing I’d spent more of my energy 30 years ago imagining and articulating my vision for how schools ought to operate, and less of it being pissed at my colleagues.

Today I’d like to spend less time wrestling with how so many of my fellow citizens could have voted for this administration, and more time dreaming a healthier, more equitable, and just future into existence.

“Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will.”
-George Bernard Shaw

Only love can drive out hate.

Imagination is the beginning of creation.

Come dance with me.

In (imperfect) solidarity with all beings, and in need of constant reminders,
-Pam

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Some goings-on, then links to things that are inspiring me these days:

1. I’m super excited for Doodle & Draw this afternoon. Registration is also live for the March and April sessions. Paid subscribers, let me know if you’d like to Zoom in for free, and I’ll send you the link! (Sorry for the late notice. It took me forever to finish editing this post.)

2. Mixed-media Mosaics at the ReBuilding Center is this Sunday, Feb. 21, and there’s still space for you. Register here.

3. There are 2 spots left for Open Make on Feb. 28th. Grab yours here.

4. Here’s a link to the calendar of upcoming events. Hope you can join me!

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Inspiration curated for you (whereafter I can close all these tabs ;)

~ Artists joining together against the theft that is AI.
~ Links to unsubscribe to tech services. An economic protest.
~ Three journalists discuss what they saw first-hand in Minneapolis.
~ The editor of The Onion talks about using satire to fight authoritarianism.
~ A site for indigenous poets.
~ Folks getting to the heart of corruption in politics.
~ The serious message of the Portland Frog Brigade.
~ A deeper dive into the power of creative resistance, Portland style.
~ What creativity in politics can look like.

What’s keeping you going these days? Let me know in the comments.