#31DaysIBPOC: Reasons

One of my favorite emails to receive arrives on Sundays. Suleika Jaouad’s Isolation Diaries prompts. She began these tiny delights early in the pandemic. I signed up randomly then, not quite sure what to expect, but also relishing the fact that it would be something I could look forward to that would temporarily transport me from the dread and uncertainty I felt as everything changed so rapidly. 

Fast forward three years, and while life continues to be uncertain, I still receive these Sunday joys. I don’t always write to them, but I read Suleika’s invitations, which have documented much of her life throughout this time, and welcome them for the potential that beckons, simply by slowing down to read them. 

It is in that spirit that I write this post to kick off our fourth year of #31DaysIBPOC. Wow it’s been a YEAR, hasn’t it? I’ve never quite felt so weary, so disappointed, so…as I have over this past year. I’ve often found myself coming down much more on the side of thanking clarity for the gifts it reveals about people and systems, and also rage that this is how we can treat each other, particularly our Black children. I’ve felt so vulnerable as I’ve witnessed and experienced how, again and again, schools can give up on Black children and Black families, how “community” doesn’t necessarily mean all children, and how “normal” has meant a nearly soul-crushing march back to maintaining systems that have never even thought of Black folks as human.

Thus, when this week’s Isolation Diaries prompt, #192, arrived last Sunday, it was a perfect meshing of National Poetry month and a reminder that even in a storm, there is good. That good can be so small, though, that it can be overlooked, I realize. 

My post this year is just that: a response to Nikita Gill’s poem “Reasons to Live Through the Apocalypse”. The prompt was: “What are your reasons to live through the apocalypse? Record them in a prose poem or a long, lovely list.”

As you read this month’s entries, there are plenty of moments to reflect, pause, and think about what good remains (however you choose to define it, and not in some toxic positivity way), and how each #31DaysIBPOC writer is helping us to think about our current moment. And, too, if one of these writers has a book, or a fund they support, or something else, please support them, as these gifts they are giving us all require a tremendous amount of energy and vulnerability. Happy May. Thank you for joining us again.

Reasons.

The weeks when yellow forsythia bloom. Calling an old friend who says, “I’ll always pick up the phone when you call,” and knowing he means it. Losing my balance and my 7 yo reaching out with “Mommy, let’s hold each other’s hands.” Spring peas that are beginning to grow up a trellis. Stopping by to play dodgeball with second graders. My partner’s insistence on dancing together in the kitchen as well as her constant reminders and quoting of the Nap Ministry that rest is our right and I need to do more of it. Surprise deliveries of Jeni’s Ice Cream from my bestie. Thoughtful packages that arrive in the mail containing books of poetry, excerpts that are invitations to a book I might like, and a Ketanji Brown Jackson postcard reminding me to persevere. That moment when, on college trips with high school juniors, we crest the hill of a gorgeous campus on a day when the sun is shining just right and they can see themselves thriving there. Anyone who purchased, shared, reviewed, or recommended Literacy Is Liberation. Fiction, especially ones listed here. Unschooling. Black children playing outside together. Listening to their laughter. Dreaming of summer on the Vineyard. Writing and sending a card to someone and telling them that I bought it “because it reminded me of you” (and actually having the stamps to do it!). Deep River sour cream and onion potato chips. Bearing witness to a new teacher talk through their career plans and desire to teach Black children in the city. My mom’s recounting of the fun she had going to lunch with her two sisters.Melissa on the Real World: New Orleans Homecoming. Finding a candle with a nice scent at T.J. Maxx that won’t give me a migraine. The monstera plant my partner gifted me that sits beside my desk and brings more comfort and joy than I ever expected (does this make me a #plantmom?!). When my nephew keeps one of my audio messages. Podcasts, particularly Didn’t I Just Feed You, Still Processing, Truth Be Told and The Stacks. Reading all three of Jacqueline Woodson’s most recent picture books (SO GOOD). Group texts that are simultaneous sites of encouragement, celebration, mourning, love. Red Birkenstocks, especially when my sun takes them and wears them himself. Voice notes. The way my mom asks, “He diiiiid?” when I tell her a story. A wise friend’s advice about how to accept compliments, especially as a woman writer: “Thank you. It’s true.”  Carolina Wrens that visit the window bird feeder long after the other birds have departed. Brunch. Sitting on a bench reading beside my sun who is also reading. Our morning walks to his school. Donut holes. Pho. Happy stories of Black women winning…

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This blog post is part of the #31DaysIBPOC Blog Series, a month-long movement to feature the voices of Indigenous and teachers of color as writers and scholars.

Please CLICK HERE to read this year’s and previous years’ contributions.