#since I can't donate or go to protests I thought writing about what's going on right now would help clear my mind

[lanawinterscigarettes]

Imagine for a second that you're Palestinian.

Imagine waking up to the news that a nearby city has been bombed by Israel. The reasoning being they're searching for Hamas. You go outside and you look around. You don't see any members of Hamas anywhere. You only see family, friends, and neighbors.

Pretty soon a bomb is going to hit your city, and you're not going to be given the ample time needed to make preparations for you and your family. You're going to see the ground be leveled by bombs that are being dropped, buildings are going to crumble, cities are going to collapse. There will be so many who will die, people you don't even know, but that your heart aches for.

You're going to be outside when one of the nearby bombs hits. You're going to feel the dust and smoke in the air. You're going to hear the screams of people as they search for their loved ones, or even worse find them already dead. You're going to have to listen as parents scream for their children. Perhaps you are even one of them.

You're going to see men dig through the crumbled rocks and stones in an effort to get out to the people who were in the building when it collapsed. Their efforts will be futile because if they do manage to get through all that rubble the person underneath it is most likely already dead.

You're going to see children playing a game called carry the martyr, a game that is so morbid there hasn't been one like it since ring around the rosie, which was a game about the plague. You're going to see people write numbers and names on their arms as a way to be identified when and if they die when the next bomb hits, because it's going to hit and it's going to be soon. You don't know when it will happen but you know that it will.

Women will start going to bed with their hijabs on because they know there's a possibility they will get bombed in their sleep, and in Muslim culture it's unfit for a Muslim woman to be seen without a head covering by someone unless it is another woman or member of their family.

You're going to see mothers and fathers carry bits of their children in grocery bags or wrapped in cloth. You are going to see children and babies in hospitals covered with dust from the bombs, shaking and crying, if even that. They will most likely be silent because of the shock. They will start having panic attacks because they are scared and worried for when the next bomb will hit. The oldest hasn't even hit double digits yet.

Maybe you're not even there when it happens. Maybe you're in a western country, and you're findng out everything that's happening to your people online. Maybe you have family over there who you've lost contact with. Family you may never get to see again, who you may never even know their fates, you can only assume.

You will be told that you are the problem. That you, as a Palestinian, are the problem. That because of Hamas, you are being bombed. That it is your fault. That Israel is just doing what it needs to do with the occupation and the ethnic cleansing. The entire world will look at you as the aggressors.

There will be people who will decide to remain neutral, to not take sides because it's "too complicated". They "don't understand" the politics of the war. But there's not much to understand, is there, when one side has all of the weapons and the bombs, and the other side has no food, no water, no electricity, nothing to defend themselves with.

Imagine that you're Palestinian for just one second, and now imagine what that must be like to have to endure all of that, as well as the aftermath, every second, every hour, every day for years.

Imagine.

[allthelovelydeadthings]

Disappointment

From Merriam-Webster's Dictionary: Disappoint. Verb. To fail to meet the expectation or hope of.

In some ways, I am very different than my mother. In others, though, I can be just like her. One such way is our shared farmer's cynism.

"The dogs need to be fed, and walked. The sheep need to be let out to pasture. They don't care about the weather, how your day is, whether you're sick or not. The chores need to be done."

Replace the specifics with any farm chore, anything a custodian of nature would do, and there you have it.

I didn't want to be sad with others. I didn't even want to talk about the election. To be honest, I was a bit numb. I don't feel any big emotions, because those emotions have already been felt. The government has never really cared for me; rural, queer, humanities scholar, woman- they care about the money they can scrounge from me, and that's it. It doesn't matter who's in office- that's how it's felt since I was cognisant enough to understand that bi-partisan politics will never truly aid the people.

I don't know, man. I just don't know. I'm not surprised, honestly, I'm not even angry. How can I be? There's been a genocide happening in Palestine for over a year now, reproductive rights have been cut down again and again, school budgets have been being sliced and diced, and everyone in the queer- especially trans folks- community has been demonized regardless of who is rotting in the White House.

But I'm not saying anything new right now. That's what actually makes me angry. We will write pages and pages of woe and empty promises, but what are we doing to actually build hope?

Disappointment is not new for me. Cynism isn't either. I'm 24, watching the world go by, stuck in an office job that makes me feel unfulfilled, and kept from creating because I can't stop comparing myself to my friends who have found more success than me.

But as I write this, as I face and contemplate my doom and gloom and anxiety, I think back to one of the worst fights I have ever had with my mother, after the 2020 election. She told me that my future was ruined, and she couldn't understand why I didn't understand her fear. I told her that if I lived my life in fear, making every decision based off of what the worst outcome would be, there'd be no point to my living. That I would rather die than live miserable all of the time because that wasn't living.

The same holds true now. You have to hold onto hope, because without it, you won't do anything to make a difference. We see it all the time; "the world's going to shit anyway, who cares if I get Starbucks or McDonalds, cross picket lines, overconsume, litter, etc." "nothing I do will change, so why bother?" "Neither outcome will be good for us, so what's the point of voting?"

You've got to get up. You've got to do your chores. You've got to take care of yourself, so you can care for those you love. And most importantly, you have to find joy and purpose in what you can reasonably create and control.

Don't want to join a protest or call your reps to make changes? Make posters to deliver to those who will, flood reps' inboxes with emails. Feel too small to do something worthwhile? Go outside. Take a walk, bring a trash bag, and pick up every piece of litter you can find. Start small. Donate to local food banks, give and support where you can. Stop supporting big companies where you can. Reuse, repair, recycle.

Take inventory of yourself. Do you want to do your actions for you, or for something or someone else? What does that mean to you in the context of your decision? For me, writing this was to help myself put my thoughts in order, and get them out so I can maybe sleep better. Posting it is freeing myself of the burden of my thoughts, which, yes, is selfish. Especially when I am white, cis, and privileged. I'm lucky, even with a lot of my rights being threatened every day, that I can go to sleep in a bed that is safe, afford to feed myself, my cat, my dog, curl up on the couch and listen to the mixtape my partner made me for our anniversary.

I don't know, man. That feels like all I can say with absolute certainty. I can't make this beautiful prose. Nothing I'm saying here is groundbreaking. But I'm saying it, and sharing it with all of you, because I want you to know that I believe in your potential to care. I believe in your ability to do good for yourself and others. I believe in your ability to believe in the world. Because for every bigot, every window smashed, slur said, and ugly winners uplifted, there is a mother who jumps into puddles with her child, people who will carve out safe spaces and fight for minority voices. People who will be kind, despite, despite, despite.

I believe in you in the way I believe in myself. Take time to heal, however that looks for you, and then get out there and do the chores.

I don't know man. But I do know that the best we can do is try.