People. Hello.

This post was published June 18, 2020… so, 6 months into covid, shortly after George Floyd protests began… that’s the vibe here.

It’s been a while.
How are you?

I am… fine?
I guess?

Assuming we now define FINE, as: ever-escalating incredulity, and disbelieving rage.

 

 

 

 

 

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People. Hello… I wrote a post…. Author of this photo is @sonyareneetaylor I hope you are well and safe.

A post shared by Victoria Elizabeth Barnes (@victoriaelizabethbarnes) on Jun 18, 2020 at 10:50am PDT

I have not been here since before Coronavirus… the past months, panic– my baby brother works in an emergency room, Paul cannot work from home.

I wrote 87,900 pages…
… summed up:
I did NOT expect the apocalypse to have infomercials.

SCIENCE IS STUPID.
LET’S GET THE MY PILLOW GUY.

This, out of all the– THIS IS SIMPLY NOT POSSIBLE YET IT IS HAPPENING ANYWAY… returns to me occasionally and I wonder if I HALLUCINATED that during a pandemic, the American people were addressed by THE MY PILLOW GUY.

Did that actually happen?
OR HAVE I TAKEN PEOYTE AND FORGOTTEN?

Then Armaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd.

I’ve been thinking how humanity is still in the middle ages… we think we are evolved, but it has only been 157 years since we ENSLAVED BLACK HUMANS.

That’s basically no time at all.

Black humans, alive today, remember not being allowed to drink out of the same water fountain as white people… we, the United States of America, did not even TRY to end this, until 1964.

1964 was YESTERDAY… 30 seconds ago— the humans who approved of this system, are still alive, they raised children. They voted. They RIOTED when we tried to change their mind.

WANNA TALK ABOUT #RIOTS?

This picture is from Levittown, Pennsylvania in 1957. As many as 600 RIOTOUS protesters gathered to terrorize the first Black family, Bill and Daisy Myers, to move into this all-white development.

White riots ≠ Black protests #BlackLivesMattter pic.twitter.com/LlLKFykPsi

— André Marcel Harris (@andreharris89) June 7, 2020

Now, the POLICE are rioting, as we lecture PEACEFUL protesters about how THEY must be CALM in response to police terrorizing Black humans.

Ummmm… no.

A TIDAL WAVE OF RAGE IS THE CORRECT RESPONSE.

Especially considering how humans will riot at ANYTHING.
Basically, we are all just sitting around waiting.

I am certain of this because when the Eagles football team won the Super Bowl a year and a half ago, Philadelphia’s response was to set the city on fire, flip cars, loot stores, and eat dog poop.

Oh, wait no, that’s fake news… sorry!
I googled it. It was HORSE poop.

AND APPARENTLY the city EXPECTED this— because ahead of time, they greased lamp posts with Crisco so nobody could climb them and HURT themselves.

The headlines were NOT: idiots riot, because idiocy.
The headlines were: celebrations turn rowdy.

So it makes me wonder– should the response to the public execution of a handcuffed man, lying immobile on the ground, be more, or less, rowdy, than when you win a football game?

Fun Fact: The first Pride was literally a riot against, you guessed it, POLICE BRUTALITY! ✨ HAPPY PRIDE MONTH pic.twitter.com/JQmz0t4HLF

— tim hell. (@itsTimHell) June 1, 2020

I’ve been thinking that MAYBE Coronavirus isn’t just a weird timeout in human history… MAYBE it will be the impetus that shifts our collective perspective… MAYBE NOW, a radical transformation of a system that gives safety, only to those born with privilege.

For months now, every day, I think about the people who are existing in a place of enormous stress, financial insecurity, housing, food, SCARCITY… panicked, just surviving.

We force the least-privileged, to scramble, just to endure a HARD existence… we gesture to their bootstraps.

WHERE IS OUR EMPATHY?
It’s literally ALL we need.

My initial response to Coronavirus was to re-read And The Band Played On, and Polio… both survived my decluttering phase— they are excellent.

And The Band Played On, by Randy Shilts is an extraordinary documentation of the Aids epidemic— the first time I read it, I literally COULD NOT BELIEVE how INEPT AND BLIND AND DELIBERATELY STUPID our government was… and even while I KNEW the outcome, my brain STILL could not process such disbelieving horror… like, MAYBE I’m wrong! Maybe this will be FINE because SURELY we would not have been like— the blood supply is killing people? Bummer for THEM!

Polio: An American Story, by David M. Oshinsky, is a less-dementing book; because not only did we get a vaccine, it turns out people are SUPER into their children, so nobody was like— OH WELL SHRUG EMOJI.

I have a lot to catch up on here… Yes. I have a kitchen update.

Figured I would first say hello and confirm that I am alive, and thank you for your messages… I am sorry I could not respond… my catatonia has been REAL, YO.

But I guess I’m adjusting to the dystopian sideshow that is now our existence because we have a sample cabinet door, (Paul is not doing the drawer fronts) and I’m finally finding a stain place… Weirdly, I haven’t felt like emailing around, being like— hi, I know it’s the apocalypse but are you available to stain some drawers?

I am thankful this started in spring— getting the garden in has been a great distraction; and especially at the beginning, helped alleviate my fear that the food supply would be affected… we have a LOT of kale for End Times, and this is very reassuring to me.

Ok. That’s it.
I’ll go write a kitchen post.

ALSO the post about what I bought on Craigslist*… NOT giant, or fancy, just a smallish box… but still!

*driveway pickup, masks

I HOPE YOU ALL ARE WELL AND SAFE.
xo