Spacious Solidarity Blog: Day 73

I wake up full of rage. It’s like this burning hot ball in the pit of my stomach and it’s growing. Radiating out into my pelvis and legs, chest and arms. My blood feels like it’s on fire, rushing into my head.

Two things have been haunting me since I went to bed last night: the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis by a yet-to-be arrested cop and a white woman’s racist attack on Chris Cooper in Central Park.

I keep thinking of the families of these two men, and their communities, co-workers, friends, and lovers. How angry they must be. How deeply frustrated.

I keep thinking of my Black friends and how hard this will be hitting them at a time when things are already pretty fucking hard.

Another unmasking of this sickness in our society that runs so deep, white supremacy and all the pain it’s caused, and the ways in which it shows up over and over and over again.

And all the ways it shows up in my own mind, unbidden, often unconscious. How to undo all that? Where to start?

I keep coming back to my training and the confidence I have in the dharma. That the ways I’ve been racialized, socialised in a racialized world, can be pulled up by the root. That this spell can be broken. That new ways of being and knowing and seeing and feeling can emerge.

And that it starts with radical honesty. And humility. And curiosity. And love.

I take a deep breath and re-commit to my deep heart wish to do the hard internal heavy lifting that’s required of me in order to be a person who is safe to be around.

All this over my morning cup of coffee gazing at the dark green trees and deep blue sky of late spring out my bedroom window.

I’m meeting a friend in Abney Park this morning. The one who runs her own shop here in Stoke Newington. We’ve agreed to swap mindfulness coaching for something from the shop.

I pull myself out of bed, get dressed and make myself a smoothie.

On the way to the park I pass a sign that reads:

Dominic

Cummings

Woz Ere

I have to laugh at the play on words. Could mean he “was here” but could also mean he “was before” which I interpret as “he’s done.” The first is possible and the second is definitely true.

I get to the entrance to the park and wait for my friend, who I can see locking up her bike across the street. She crosses the road and we give each other a hug in the air.

As we walk and talk she tells me about how stressed out she’s been lately. She’s doing a big redesign of the interior of her shop, which includes building work.

I encourage her to appreciate how much she’s doing. She’s got two small kids at home and is trying to run her business online while undergoing a construction project. Of course she’s stressed!

We weave in and out of how we’re doing and share a bit more about our families and lives. At one point she asks me what year I was born. According to the Chinese zodiac, 1976 is not just the year of the dragon, but also the year of the fire dragon.

She seems really pleased to know that. Apparently we’re outspoken and creative and ambitious.

She’s a bit older than me and was born in the year of the pig. She’s also a Pisces. I tell her my partner is a Pisces and my mother was one as well. They’re dreamy and loyal and disorganized.

She wants to talk to me about the possibility of running mindfulness courses in the shop once that becomes possible. She’s hoping that will be in mid-June when the government is saying non-essential shops can re-open.

I suggest we do a bit of meditation before talking business. We’re sat on a bench now and I lead us in closing our eyes and opening up to the sounds of the bird song all around us. I immediately think to myself that I should do this more often.

Afterwards we come up with a plan to run a four-week course in July. We may or may not be able to run it out of the shop, but even if it’s online we can still run it from the shop which would be lovely.

It’s a beautiful space and imagining running a course there fills me with joy. It will be a welcome change from teaching in the tiny space between my desk and dining table. And far from my upstairs neighbours partying on the front doorstep.

I walk my friend back to her bike and we say good-bye. I head down the high street, as I need to pick up a few things at the shop. I notice that the city has put up blue barricades next the paving, essentially expanding the sidewalk.

There’s a sign with silhouettes of a walker and biker and the words “Streetspace for London.” I’m reminded of an initiative in San Francisco called Sunday Streets.

One weekend a month a different neighborhood would participate by shutting down their streets to cars and opening them up to walkers and cyclists. It was always a festive affair, bringing everyone out of their homes and into the streets simply to walk, cycle and smile at and chat with one another.

Here in London it’s taken going into lockdown during a global pandemic to carve out a little more space for us to walk down the street.

I’m grateful, as the last few times I’ve been on the high street I’ve had to walk into oncoming traffic to avoid people walking towards me on the pavement.

I pick up a few bits and pieces in the shop and head home. On the way I pass my friend’s shop and notice a sign she put in the window at the beginning of the lockdown.

I can’t imagine how hard it must have been for her to close the shop “until further notice” without knowing when she’d be able to reopen again.

I spend the rest of the afternoon writing until it’s time to talk to my Dad again. Except this time he emails saying he has to cancel. He’s gone up to Maine and the weather is too nice to be stuck indoors on the phone. He has yard work to get on with.

So instead I decide to make dinner. I make my signature spaghetti sauce. Then it’s time to go for a walk with my partner. We head back to Hackney Downs for a quick circumambulation.

On the way I realise I’ve gone quiet. I apologise to my partner and say I think it’s because I’m still upset about the news from the States. I’ve moved from rage to grief.

I know this about myself. When the world feels like too much, and especially in the wake of injustice, first I rage, then I grieve, then I get depressed, then through some combination of connection, self-care, meditation and reflection I slowly emerge into a place of calm resolve. Wash, rinse and repeat.

As we walk through the park I take in the beauty of it all. The grass, trees, flowers, sky and people. There are so many families out. Dads playing with their kids. Big groups of moms and kids, chatting, running around, holding each other in community.

The park is a gorgeous display of the diversity of Hackney in one big, relaxed, exuberant enactment of life under nine and a half weeks of lockdown.

We go home, eat dinner, and then it’s time for my partner to get on Zoom with their counseling clients. I climb into bed with my laptop and watch a couple of episodes of Schitt’s Creek.

After my partner is done with their clients we watch the last episode of Little Fires Everywhere. It’s an all out indictment on white privilege in America and it’s detrimental impact on people of colour and the disadvantaged.

And it’s also full of hope and beauty and love and forgiveness and accountability and reconciliation.

Just the medicine I needed tonight.