A declaration of interdependence

And a poll to determine next week's Zoom gathering topic

This week, we’re settling into our new home in Central Massachusetts. I’m feeling grateful for all of the different ways in which we are being held during this transition, and also a bit unsettled, as we figure out how to rebuild our support systems in a new place. (The notion of support systems is also the topic of this week’s subscriber chat.)

There’s a lot to figure out.

I have been trying to touch in with gratitude for the systems already in place. Our lungs continue to breathe, unbidden. Our new home’s air conditioning thankfully works. As we drive through our new neighborhood, we see other signs of interdependent systems: Pride flags, little free libraries, hand-painted signs advertising eggs from a neighbor’s chickens.

And yet, I also feel a sense of sadness and confusion when I zoom further out. At what point does this expansive, life-giving sense of “us” give way to a brittle, boxed-in story about “them,” leading politicians to strip elderly folks of their healthcare, or prevent starving mothers and children in Gaza from getting food?

Signs from a recent No Kings protest in Cape Cod.

I have also noticed many moments in which my sense of compassion quietly curdles into self-criticism or even shame: Why aren’t I doing more to stop this from happening? Who am I to enjoy all of this when it cannot be shared with all of us?

Accountability is very important in community-building, of course. But shame doesn’t build; it isolates. And those who are suffering need us to come together and act collectively on their behalf. Now more than ever.

As

J. P. Hill

reminds us here:

[W]hat would Martin Luther King Jr. have been without masses of organized people? A pastor. What would George Washington have been without the forces of history culminating in millions of colonists willing to fight for independence? A plantation owner.

In this light, it makes more sense to mark the Fourth of July in America as a day of interdependence, not independence. So that’s what I’ll be doing this year. I am reminding the more fearful or anxious parts of me that my work is to find the others who feel as I do, not to find all the answers and know what to do.

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This week, I’m looking forward to hosting my friend Jonny Adler, an anti-racist social studies teacher who appeared in this interview a few months back, and offered us this syllabus for the resistance. If anyone will have insight into this historical moment, it’s a history teacher. After that, my mom — who taught me some of my earliest lessons in feminist social critique — will be moving in with us for a time, so that we can offer support to one another, even as the social safety net around us threatens to fall apart. Members of our community here at In Tending will also be gathering on Zoom next Tuesday, and I am looking forward to seeing what kind of support we can offer each other.

To that end, a few links and reminders:

We’ll be getting together for our July In Tending gathering next Tuesday, July 8 at 10:30am EST on Zoom, with a particular focus on caring for kids in K-12.

If you’re planning to attend, please vote for the topic you’d like to discuss below.

If you haven’t yet signed up for our Zoom gathering mailing list (which is separate from this newsletter list), please do so here by Tuesday July 8 at 9am to receive the Zoom link.

Can’t make it? Please swing by the In Tending subscriber chat, where we’re reflecting on how we’re rebuilding the support systems in our lives that were lost to 2020.

There’s also an extensive archive of posts here at In Tending that speak to the power of sangha to support us as we attempt to build a better world for our children. We’d love to hear from you in the comments.

Here’s a few:

A web big enough to hold the both/and

The children are always ours

Taking refuge in community, in sometimes-scary times

Many other incredible writers are also speaking this week about the intersections between community and compassionate action. Here are a few links I loved this week:

• Tasha Schumann
  ’s deep dive on interdependence “as root, path, and liberation.” She’ll be exploring this theme all month in
  Bodhisavage with Tasha Schumann
  , and hosting a “moonlit sit” on July 10 along these lines.

• Frazz
  ’s gentle parenting of reluctant Republican lawmakers who aren’t ready to use their “purple voices” to put a stop to harmful legislation

• This beautiful piece on the metaphor of dirt, by

  Swarnali Mukherjee

• This exploration of what “agency” means in midlife, when you are engaged in the care of both kids and elders, by

  Courtney Martin

• An inquiry into the difference between offering prayers vs. making demands, and accepting that regardless of which we choose, we cannot control every outcome, by

  Kazu Haga

• A list of ways in which Buddhist sanghas can be more vocal in calling for ceasefire in Gaza, by

  Alexandra Cain, M.Div

• A similar call to action and an acknowledgement of our deep collective suffering by

  Thanissara.
  , who writes, ““Millions around the world witness, hearts breaking, knowing we could not stop the slaughter. Not because we didn’t care, but because we had no access to the levers of power.” For those similarly touched, and similarly frustrated with this lack of access to the levers of power, Thanissara will also be hosting a Liberation Circle on Tuesday July 8 (details here).

May we find the others, whatever that looks like for us this week. May we know that even as we suffer, we remain interdependent, connected to one another in an unbreakable web.

And regardless of whether we choose to watch the fireworks on the Fourth of July, commemorating a season of resistance that has come and gone, may the flickering candles of our desire to build a happier, healthier, more liberated future for ourselves and our children remain lit.