How Our Bodies Respond

A virus can be a teacher

Sometimes our appetite for life overreaches the body’s capabilities

And we have to look at what’s motivating this overreach. In my case, it was truly just a desire for connection…a sense that relating to others is the only way through the current mess.

Mess: below is the language that is currently forbidden to be used (by federal agencies) by the corrupt regime who thinks that they are in power…they ARE NOT.

• accessible

• activism

• activists

• advocacy

• advocate

• advocates

• affirming care

• all-inclusive

• allyship

• anti-racism

• antiracist

• assigned at birth

• assigned female at birth

• assigned male at birth

• at risk

• barrier

• barriers

• belong

• bias

• biased

• biased toward

• biases

• biases towards

• biologically female

• biologically male

• BIPOC

• Black

• breastfeed + people

• breastfeed + person

• chestfeed + people

• chestfeed + person

• clean energy

• climate crisis

• climate science

• commercial sex worker

• community diversity

• community equity

• confirmation bias

• cultural competence

• cultural differences

• cultural heritage

• cultural sensitivity

• culturally appropriate

• culturally responsive

• DEI

• DEIA

• DEIAB

• DEIJ

• disabilities

• disability

• discriminated

• discrimination

• discriminatory

• disparity

• diverse

• diverse backgrounds

• diverse communities

• diverse community

• diverse group

• diverse groups

• diversified

• diversify

• diversifying

• diversity

• enhance the diversity

• enhancing diversity

• environmental quality

• equal opportunity

• equality

• equitable

• equitableness

• equity

• ethnicity

• excluded

• exclusion

• expression

• female

• females

• feminism

• fostering inclusivity

• GBV

• gender

• gender based

• gender based violence

• gender diversity

• gender identity

• gender ideology

• gender-affirming care

• genders

• Gulf of Mexico

• hate speech

• health disparity

• health equity

• hispanic minority

• historically

• identity

• immigrants

• implicit bias

• implicit biases

• inclusion

• inclusive

• inclusive leadership

• inclusiveness

• inclusivity

• increase diversity

• increase the diversity

• indigenous community

• inequalities

• inequality

• inequitable

• inequities

• inequity

• injustice

• institutional

• intersectional

• intersectionality

• key groups

• key people

• key populations

• Latinx

• LGBT

• LGBTQ

• marginalize

• marginalized

• men who have sex with men

• mental health

• minorities

• minority

• most risk

• MSM

• multicultural

• Mx

• Native American

• non-binary

• nonbinary

• oppression

• oppressive

• orientation

• people + uterus

• people-centered care

• person-centered

• person-centered care

• polarization

• political

• pollution

• pregnant people

• pregnant person

• pregnant persons

• prejudice

• privilege

• privileges

• promote diversity

• promoting diversity

• pronoun

• pronouns

• prostitute

• race

• race and ethnicity

• racial

• racial diversity

• racial identity

• racial inequality

• racial justice

• racially

• racism

• segregation

• sense of belonging

• sex

• sexual preferences

• sexuality

• social justice

• sociocultural

• socioeconomic

• status

• stereotype

• stereotypes

• systemic

• systemically

• they/them

• trans

• transgender

• transsexual

• trauma

• traumatic

• tribal

• unconscious bias

• underappreciated

• underprivileged

• underrepresentation

• underrepresented

• underserved

• undervalued

• victi

  m

• victims

• vulnerable populations

• women

• women and underrepresented

I hope many poets start writing poems that include every one of those words and that there are collaborations with visual artists to post them everywhere - murals, street posters, and online. I’ve started experimenting with this in my studio this week.

Given this list, they might as well ban literacy - in fact, it seems from the data that I’ve seen about “red states” that literacy was thrown out a long time ago. I feel sorry for the people living in those places because it seems that most of them don’t have access to the tools that would help them understand what is happening to them or how to resist it. And I’ve no doubt that they will be manipulated into hating anyone the current regime wants to demonize (probably us).

I am recognizing the current and very temporal sense of safety that surrounds me as I witness all of this awfulness from a distance since I am no longer in academia and not active in frontline resistance, but I know that the fallout will impact everyone who thinks, creates, and speaks out. And if Medicare and Social Security collapse, I will be impacted in ways that are going to be hard, and hopefully have the capacity to join millions in various forms of daily resistance.

With the illegal arrest of the Palestinian activist, a former Columbia student with a green card, I expect the days of disappearing people might be close at hand, but I am doing my best not to go there. Instead, I want to make sure you know about

Mahmoud Khalil.

He graduated from a leadership program at Columbia University in December, and was living university housing. He's married, and his wife is eight months pregnant. Mahmoud is passionate about education, and has had a variety of jobs involving education and disadvantaged youth. He's particularly interested in creating programs that help educate out-of-school youth in developing countries.

Mahmoud has a green card. He is a lawful, permanent resident of the United States.

Last night (Saturday) as Mahmoud and his wife walked into their university-owned apartment building, two men in plain clothes slipped in the door behind them.

The men claimed they were ICE agents. They also claimed that they had a warrant for Mahmoud's arrest on their phone, and that his student visa was being revoked.

Reminder: Mahmoud has a green card. He's no longer on a student visa.

Mahmoud told them he had a green card, and his wife went up to their apartment to get it. When she returned, the agents, confused, made a phone call where the agents were told "we're revoking that too."

The agents refused to give Mahmoud's wife a reason why he was being detained. When Mahmoud's lawyer called, ICE refused to say why Mahmoud was being detained and that his "student visa was revoked." When the lawyer (again) pointed out that he had a green card, ICE representatives said that also would be revoked.

You may be wondering, "Hey, isn't it illegal for ICE to come onto private property -- the university -- without showing a warrant to the university for the arrest? Wouldn't the warrant necessarily say something about why he was being arrested?"

Great question. Columbia University has publicly said that ICE requires a warrant to enter non-public areas of campus (like housing), but also as of the moment has refused to answer whether ICE contacted them before slipping into the apartment building behind Mahmoud and his wife.

Meanwhile: Mahmoud has been sent to a for-profit prison in New Jersey with no official charges.

Nevertheless, we know why Mahmoud was arrested.

Mahmoud has been involved in peaceful protests at the university, asking that the school stop investing in weapons manufacturing and, in particular, that the school stop investing in companies that are helping to fund the killing of people in Gaza.

A lawful, permanent resident of the United States has been arrested for exercising his freedom of speech.

The US government doesn't like some of his OPINIONS and so they have arrested him and are making plans to deport him.

Maybe you don't like Mahmoud's opinions. Maybe you don't agree with him. Fine. But the point is: the US government is arresting LEGAL IMMIGRANTS -- PEOPLE WITH GREEN CARDS -- for *exercising their freedom of speech*.

This is not the behavior of a nation that is the "land of the free and the home of the brave." It's an act of profound cowardice and an arbitrary and cruel exercise of power.

ETA: Mahmoud's wife, an American citizen, attempted to see him at the New Jersey facility today and has been told that he's not there. His lawyer says he may be as far away as Louisiana, but the point is this: he's now not only been "detained" without charges, but neither his wife nor his lawyer know where the US government is holding him.

(quoted from some anonymous person on social media)

Here’s the latest news about Mahmoud Khalil (his deportation has been prevented, but he’s currently living in a prison for immigrants in Louisiana).

On this late winter day, with the sun playing hide and seek, I was watching the snow melt off the trees outside my window at the Santa Fe Art Institute. The building is quiet. I cannot hear any of the cohort, so I put on Gregorian chants to keep me focused. It hasn’t been easy to concentrate on my writing. Given the continuing onslaught of crazy and dangerous things happening politically, it’s not surprising. I saw a short reel on IG this morning that compared the impact of the last 6 weeks on our nervous systems to the first months of COVID. Well, for me, those first months of COVID lockdown felt profoundly different. I had a loving partner to comfort me in 2020, so I felt relatively well-supported and resourced then, despite the intense challenges our son was facing at the time.

Here, in Santa Fe, in an arts/writing residency, I’m fortunate to find members of our cohort who give hugs while offering reassurance through shared conversation and food. There’s also been a network of progressive friends in the region with whom I can process things. Of course, I’m also relying on my long training in meditation, therapeutic & creative tools, to find center.

If your centering practices are not accessible at the moment, here’s a fine suggestion from my fellow writer, Nelly, based in Ottawa who shared this post last week: “Though it can be challenging to look past the dejection at present, I believe that kindness has always been a way to stand up to all that is hostile, inhumane, and threatening—unyielding, dogged, and unapologetic kindness. Unlike hope, which is pinned onto a change in the future, kindness lives in the present moment. It can set off a ripple effect, but it could also begin and end with one thought or act. And that’s good enough.”

After coming down with a cold virus last week and self-isolating and masking for several days (a bit difficult when you share a community kitchen), I am on the mend with only an occasional deep cough to remind me to continue to slow down. The benefit of slowness is immense, although I often complain bitterly to myself that I have such poor concentration these days and don’t use my time well (this is how capitalism lives inside me, no?). In spite of these not-so-helpful inner voices, my slow time has helped me reflect more deeply on what to build in the shattered remains of academia as it continues to splinter apart. When I was still on a faculty, I saw that the emphasis on “full-time enrollment” and quantities of students was going to take the quality of education into some shaky terrain. The inevitable collapse of neoliberal educational institutions as they demonize and censor their faculty and students for being anti-genocide, as the federal grants freeze up, and fewer and fewer potential students can afford the cost, opens a door for other sorts of educational hubs and skill shares to emerge.

These sorts of initiatives are already happening in many places, and they have a solid history, although economic sustainability of such ventures can be a challenge (new models of sustainability are being tested). An example of one creative emergent strategy is Heron’s Nest, a land back and restorative justice project in Seattle that I learned about from my friend, Aloysious, who is deeply committed to its thriving. Yesterday, they invited me to come to one of their next cultural gatherings and share some of my knowledge about diverse activist and community-based art projects. I hope to get involved in something similar in Tacoma as well.

Teach-in’s, skill shares, and various forms of grassroots education are not so uncommon as people may think. It’s a form of mutual aid. If you know of examples of these educational and cultural hubs, please offer them up in the comments, we all need inspiration about both historical examples and nascent ones.

Last night, in my weekly online parenting group run by the Neurodivergent Collective, I suggested to my peers that the emphasis on getting a college education and degree, as much as we might want that for our young adult children, needs to be removed. In a world experiencing the disintegration of status quo structures (ones that created an illusion of security and are actually often doing damage in this current moment) our young adults will need buoyant and adaptable skills. Many neurodivergent folks (it’s a spectrum that we all sit on in various ways) carry aspects of particular talents that will be in high demand: such as kindness, curiosity, honesty, compassion, a strong sense of justice and loyalty, sensitivity to each other and the natural world, creativity, and a whimsical sense of play. An assemblage of these skills plus a good dose of mediation, conflict resolution, critical thinking, problem solving, and abilities to reset dys-regulated nervous systems will be needed to heal and regenerate our world. It will likely be more important to have communities where people know how to collaborate as they sing while growing food and building shelters.

I will end this by saying that my project to draw many of the words that are now forbidden to be used in federal agencies, will be expanded upon by members of the SFAI cohort and the public who comes to our open studios on March 19th, 5:30-7:30 pm.