Resistance and Self-Care

Like many people, I am quite concerned about the fact that my nation is holding immigrants in substandard facilities.  As I typed that sentence, I thought about how I had sanitized my language.  We can argue about what to call them, but the facts seem clear:  these facilities weren't designed to hold as many people as they're holding, and they were designed for the single men who used to be the primary people who crossed the border illegally.

I have been most concerned about how we're treating children, but it doesn't sound like anyone is being treated humanely in these facilities. 

I could list lots of suggestions for how I would do it if I was in charge, and you've probably seen them floating around, everything from sending children to stay at a Disney resort or sending them to church camps to having more lawyers so that asylum claims can be processed more efficiently to just sending people back to building an impenetrable wall--and you've probably seen other suggestions that are much more cruel.

I am not in charge, and I've not seen much evidence that the people in charge are interested in any ideas that we may have.  I know that the people on the ground are overwhelmed.  As with many of the policies coming from this administration, I'm not convinced we have an overarching policy so much as reactions to situations.

So I've been doing what I always do in these situations where I can't really do much to change the policy.  I've prayed.  It may not do much good.  But I do believe that God has a much larger vision than our human vision, and I also believe that in a universe set up on principals of free will that God can't act unless we ask.

I have also given money to a Lutheran group that walks with unaccompanied minors through their journey in the U.S.  I like this group, but there are many worthy groups. 

I am also working on not shutting down.  I know that the danger of the times we live in, and the fact that I have some protection from the times we live in, is that I might stop seeing what's happening.  I might stop protesting.  I might shut down my heart.  I might turn a blind eye to what's happening because it's not happening to me.

That process of not shutting down takes many forms.  My creative practices help me stay open to the distress but not immersed in the chaos of the emotions.  Last week, I wrote a poem that led to a sonnet.  And yesterday, I decided to try a crown of sonnets.  I wrote a second poem with this first line, which is the last line of sonnet #1:  Or maybe this time we will hold the evil ones at bay.  Sonnet #2 ends with this couplet:  I leave the modern news cycle for reading a bit more slow / The U.S. Constitution, Bonhoeffer, and Thoreau.

I have written most of sonnet #3 in this cycle.  I haven't figured out the last couplet, but once I do that, I plan to write sonnet #4.  Let's see how long I can do this. 

I am also working on creating beauty that has little to do with acts of resistance.  That seems important too.  Yesterday I realized that one of the butterfly plants has caterpillars on it:

I did some research and realized that we should have monarch butterflies if all goes well.  I have such joy--the joy that comes from observing nature in action, which I don't do that often.  It's also the joy of doing simple research to find out information--I couldn't remember the life cycle of the butterfly, and instead of berating myself, I simply looked it up.  I have that joy since childhood, the joy of figuring something out.

It's become clear to me, as I look at not only the state of politics in the U.S. but also at the larger state of the world, that we're going to need to practice resistance for awhile.  It's important to stay observant and engaged, but it's also important to take care of ourselves for the long haul.  Future generations need us to not burn out or tune out or become too disabled to do the work that must be done.