Pandemic Bulk Buying

Nothing is different. And yet, everything is different. I’m feeling a lot of gratitude these days. I know that there are many lives that have been deeply, radically, terribly altered by this whole coronavirus pandemic. Anything I might say about how my life is changed has to first be prefaced by an acknowledgement of my personal privilege. I’ve been buying my pantry staples in bulk for years. A year or so ago, I took on the coordinator role for my “drop” with Azure Standard, a company out of Oregon that sells organic food items (think: rice, beans, oats, flour, nuts, …

Probably not an Intended Consequence

We live in a very mixed neighborhood.  Approximately half of the homes here are market-rate, home-owner occupied; the others are subsidized public housing.  This neighborhood is mixed-everything: income, age, religion, ethnicity. Many of my neighbors are immigrants.  Community events can have up to seven translators (all talking at once).  Talking a walk in the early evening is a marvelous olfactory experience, with dinners from many places all under construction at once.  Current events are sometimes very personal around here. In the wake of  Travel Ban 1.0, some of our community members drafted a letter to our immigrant neighbors.  “We know …

Part of the Resistance

I could call it homeschooling, but it feels way more important than that. We’ve always tried to be open and up front with Caitlyn about political issues. We’ve talked voting, been to a campaign office, watched debates and news clips, discussed issues, gone to caucuses. The urgency has gone up a lot in the last week, and so now we’re participating in 10 Actions in 100 Days. Caitlyn has written her first postcards to her congresspeople. (Yes, we’ve rounded her age.) I’m sick that it’s come to this, but I’m proud of my girl. I’m doing what I can to …

Where do we go now?

It seems quiet here today. Caitlyn’s FIRST Lego League team had a field trip to Highline’s Marine Science and Technology Center, and even the kids seemed subdued, somewhat surprising for a handful of geeky 12 year olds. We parents carried on, shellshocked, exhausted, grieving. I expect there will be many, many conversations to come, but everything I could think of to say to people today sounds like empty platitudes in my head, so there were many moments of just looking at each other. “Yeah…” one of us says. “Yeah,” the other one responds. Shock. Anger. Denial. Depression. Bargaining/Compromise. Adaptation. This …

Observing History

Thirty years ago, something woke me up in the middle of the night. When I went downstairs to investigate, I found my mom watching the wedding of Prince Charles and Princess Diana. Amazingly, she didn’t send me back to bed, and we watched the live broadcast in the middle of the California night. I was 6 years old. Caitlyn is well-trained to sleep through a lot, so I didn’t wait for her to wake up on her own, but collected her from her bed shortly after 2am our time Friday morning to watch the live stream of Prince William’s wedding …

The Long View

I feel badly that I don’t want to really think much about Current Events. The proposed federal laws that would redefine rape and shut down a national organization that provides a wide variety of health care services to low-income women. The protests in Wisconsin. The assault on the EPA and the shelter given to polluters. Citizens United. Really, I get sick to my stomach thinking about it. Where did rationality go? What are they all afraid of? Or is it that it’s all about greed? Why is it not possible to talk things through in a reasonable fashion without having …