This week was terrible. This past six months have been difficult, but this week before Easter felt like the climax of all that, and not in a good way.
Part of the reason it was bad is because it was bad, and part of it is because instead of letting all the feelings and experiences flow through, I let them take residence in my body.
A long time ago, I wrote a post about death. Then I wrote one about Swedish death cleaning. And surely you’ve noticed in recent days a lot of talk about death in my writing about Palestine. Today we’re going to kind of veer in a different direction, but like everything in life, it’s still all connected.
A while ago, I saw a video where Irishman Tadhg Hickey challenged Irish Americans. He educated us on the history of The Great Famine. He said in Ireland, they call it The Great Hunger, because the food shortage was not because of a lack of food. It was because the British Empire, Ireland’s colonizer, was exporting all the food and leaving the Irish with fields full of rotten potatoes.
I’ve read another book I want to recommend, called Wild Thorns, by Sahar Khalifeh, translated by Trevor LeGassick and Elizabeth Fernea. First, I wanted to share a little about the background of the collection it is a part of, and some info about the author. I found the context really interesting.
Back in December, I commended my NYS rep online for calling for a ceasefire, and got trolled. I responded to the comment, and we went back and forth a few times. I was sick to my stomach for a couple of days over it. I was afraid to go online because my notifications no longer guaranteed good news. Every aspect of it felt terrible.
After that encounter, I came across the advice never to engage with trolls. I’m sure I’ve heard it before and forgot. I have a reputation for doing that. But since I had that recent experience, the advice imprinted this time.
