Seven days into 2021
It is about 9:30 p.m. and I am all in on Bridgerton (now you know).
I have about 6 pages (which is really two 8x11 pages) left in this silly small sketch pad and
I am almost ready to commit to an actual writing journal.
I have no intention of sharing this until February or March. As I write that, I know that I have no idea what will be front and center then but it will be different than today.
What is happening at the Capitol in Washington, DC is all that could have happened.
It is time, as I believe things happen when they are possible, for white people (as a collective) to see themselves as others do and determine if that is the image they desire — the one they can proudly point future generations to.
What ails this country started when it was stolen from its original caretakers. Add to this brutal origin the creation of race, which is a constructed hierarchical categorization system that allows people of primarily European descent to declare themselves superior and the construct of race becoming the ideal by which all others are judged and deemed inferior. The belief systems stemming from both the colonization of this land and the construct of race are foundational to this set of federated states and have become a dog whistle for cruelty, stupidity, ignorance, greed and short sightedness. I have to wonder if white people seeing other white people desecrate the Capitol and threaten elected officials and those that protect them was the vision of themselves that they want reflected back.
I wonder if the perceived distance that racial violence “somewhere else” and by “those people” afforded white people was rendered ineffective as a deflection because the absoluteness of the American white identity could not be denied on January 6th. Even if they were not there, even if they never supported the regime and rhetoric that allowed this all to happen — statistically they knew and loved someone who supported the rhetoric and movement. Personally, I don’t know any of my white friends who do not have someone in their family who did not fully disagree with rationale for the events of January 6th (i.e., domestic terrorism, insurrection, etc).
And that is, I think, an actual reckoning. A reckoning with who white Americans are, who they wish to be and, most importantly, who they are not (debunking the American exceptionalism narrative for those willing to take it all in).
So as January unfolds, I am watching and waiting. I am long past wishing.
I am weary and wary on the one hand and full of joy and validation on the other.
I hear people talk about balance.
My mind immediately goes to when I was a child and a playmate and I would seek that delicate dance amongst the two ends of a see-saw. Shifting a bit from side to side.
As an adult, I have no expectations that the balance is attainable externally but I continue to seek it within.
*This blog was written on January 7, 2021.
Related Threads:
Previous Posts: It's not any late Saturday in October
Twitter Posts: This is a coup
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.
