Dispatches from the flower foxhole

Sometimes resistance looks like rest

I am no longer reading the room.

My daughter and I are having our flowerchild summer moment. Fingers in ears, la la la la. Sometimes resistance looks like rest.

My daughter sitting before a bed of daisies

I’m visiting the one person in my life with whom I can actually have a conversation while pooping: my sister.

We are cohabiting: my sister, her husband, my mom, and kiddos. Like a commune without the sex cult.

Last week, per the passage of the Big Billionaire Bailout Bill, I was full of fuckyous and fuckoffs. Add that to the incessant rain of summer in Juneau, and I wanted to pour some whiskey in my covfefe.

Bellingham's weather, however, makes it so easy to become soft and bloom. No plotting of revolutions. No meal prep. Other women cook while I meditate over washing dishes.

Maybe resistance is seasonal. And yet, how very “Let them eat cake” for me to wage revolution from my flower bunker.

Of course, “rest” implies that I will soon return to work. Joel Leon writes, “Far too many of us are choosing silence, its own form of complicity, to maintain the status quo, using our fear and need to ‘rest’ as a way to avoid accountability.”

But sometimes rest is what’s needed. Rest assured that someone will stay on night watch if we need to recharge for a bit. Break from the grind and absorb what makes life beautiful.

Beauty can also play a role in resistance. Beauty reminds us what we’re fighting for. It offers a buffer for despair and a balm for healing.

History is full of examples of integrating beauty with social justice work. The United Farm Workers movement, the Civil Rights movement, Indigenous water protectors at Standing Rock, and the ACT UP protest movement paired music, visual art, cultural rituals, street theater, legal and political advocacy, voter registration, boycotts, strikes, and civil disobedience.

Of course, resistance without concrete action becomes performative, a form of spiritual bypassing, and a privileged avoidance. There is a balance between facing down monsters and shoving our face in a daisy.

Resistance also requires the sacrifice of one’s comfort. Refusal to face uncomfortable truths because of our positions of privilege is how we arrived at so many injustices in the first place.

Meanwhile, not-so-distant conflicts manage to creep in through the magic of my pocket anxiety machine. Mother nature and government-inflicted violence continue to punch down on the underdogs. Ted Cruz offers prayers instead of flood relief funding while voting to increase ICE's budget by 2,000%. (Apparently, God loves border enforcement 2,000% more than flood victims.)

I pull Oracle cards to see how I can help fight injustice. The first card I pull is Shapeshifter, naturally.

Yes, I can take the form of a lily pad for now. I have been treading water while carrying twice my weight. It’s OK to float in the shallow warmth sometimes. Soon, I will dive back into the deep and get salty again.

The second Oracle card I pull is Magic Words. Words cast spells, manifest new realities, and shape our beliefs and experiences. Much like this newsletter.

The third is Cailleach, the divine hag and goddess of seasons in Celtic mythology. Apparently, the revolution is giving big crone vibes—but we already knew that.

Guess we’ll need those flowers for some spells after all.

Ready to tend this garden of resistance with me? Subscribe and let's see what blooms.

Love,

Summer