In Communion
Written midday on the couch downstairs while watching Avengers’ Ultron (making my way, again, through the Marvel Universe in timeline order) on a random pad with an erasable pen. Yes, I completed the Harry Potter chronology.
My first book of 2021 was Undrowned by Alexis Pauline Gumbs. I closed out the year with bell hooks’ all about love new versions, which I started in November. Similarities in spirit and structure encouraged me to choose chapters that resonated in the moment and to explore deeply affirmations, invitations, provocations, reflections and tensions.
Each author offered guidance and grounding as I made my ways through 2021. I have no doubt that Gumbs’ prose, wisdom and humility – as she eloquently and lyrically made connections between humans and marine mammals and the lessons we might take with us helped me through the events of January 6 and its aftermath.
As the Weddell seal grows she will shed her fur, become sleek. She will feel completely at home in the ocean she avoided. She will see and feel things no other mammal has felt. But right now she is coughing and spitting and clinging to what she has known. She feels like she is drowning, but she’s just meeting herself again for the first time. (Gumbs, Undrowned, p.68)
hooks’ definition and exploration of love recommitted me to being – well, seeking to be – my fullest, most loving self at all times, recognizing that our systems, structures, incentives and rewards as a society ask us to do the complete opposite – to the point of not even loving ourselves and our own families. And as a Black woman there are additional complexities to living and working with love as core.
To truly love we must learn to mix various ingredients – care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment and trust as well as honest and open communication (hooks, all about love, p.5)
So when I picked up Undrowned on January 1 (after a six-month hiatus) – having completed all about love a day earlier – it was clear to me that my inner self (as well as wisdom much older and wiser) was directing me back to voices, hearts and heads that I should continue to hold alongside me as 2022 unfolds.
Deep appreciation.
About The Author:
Jara Dean-Coffey (jdc) is Founder and Director of the Equitable Evaluation Initiative and the Founder of Luminare Group. For the past twenty-five years, she has partnered with clients and colleagues to elevate their collective understanding of the relationship between values, context, strategy and evaluation and shifting our practices so that they are more fully in service of equity. For more about musings + machinations click here.
