Checks and balances, motherfuckers!

This week I have been listening to the audiobook "We Were Eight Years In Power" by Ta-Nehisi Coates and it's had me thinking extensively about the systemic injustice cooked into the very foundation of America. Very little of it was new information, but it was freshly upsetting to hear about the different racial inequities that have been very intentionally orchestrated at all levels of government, from municipal to state to national levels. 

I listened on my drive to work one morning I thought about how the three branches of government were created to limit absolute power. I think I literally said aloud "Checks! And! Balances! Motherfuckers!" because I was feeling really spicy about the fact that despite the good intentions of this system, our government it pretty warped 250 years down the line. Because while we theoretically have checks and balances between branches of government to cover creation of laws, execution of laws, and evaluation of laws, what we really have is a ruling class of very wealthy people who are generally not interested in protecting the masses. I do think many elected officials are doing their best. But I don't think the majority of them care deeply about much more than appeasing the electorate enough to retain their status and power. And it's just really fucked up.

I was also thinking a lot about a tiktok video I saw many months ago where someone was reminding the viewers that it's OKAY to scrutinize the politicians who represent you, even when they belong to the party that you identify with. It is okay to hold them accountable for the decisions they make on behalf of their constituents while in office. And in fact as part of the public who has elected and employed them to represent us, it is actually our job to hold them accountable because if we don't nobody is. Again, as it turns out the checks and balances thing is deeply questionable at best.

So I was thinking about how fucked up it is that our government can just decide to send billions of our dollars to the Middle East to fund a genocide and there's essentially nothing we can do to stop them. Like, that's kind of insane? That we're just being held hostage in complicity on this one with our own money and by the people we have chosen to give power to. And it's not like this is the first time this has happened; there's so many instances from the Vietnam war, to various US-backed coups and governmental ploys in Latin America and the Middle East throughout what can reasonably considered recent history (I'm not sure where the line gets drawn on recent history, and arguably very little of American history would be disqualified, but within the lifetime of people currently alive feels pretty recent, ya know?). 

I don't have much else to add here. I guess this is more of a rant than anything productive or insightful. But it's what has been roiling around in my brain all week and I am reminded anew of the centuries of disenfranchisement that Black people in America have endured, of the myriad hurdles the white majority have placed on a group of people who have never had a reasonable chance to get ahead or honestly to draw even with their oppressors. 

Just A Few Books.

 Yesterday I participated in a book holiday called Novellus that a friend of mine created last year as a way to ease the drear of post-holiday winter. Eight of us participated and were secretly assigned gift book recipients. Then, we could go onto the website and add our personal book preferences and what we already own lots of etc. We could also send anonymous questions to our assigned recipient to further clarify what they might be interested in. 

I tend to get ridiculously excited for whatever holiday is coming up next. I don't think I really have a favorite holiday, I just like holidays in general. I love a theme and I love having something to look forward to. And it turns out this applies just as much to made up holidays- I was so invested in refreshing the page everyday because, as it turned out, the questions people anonymously asked were answered non-anonymously and publicly visible on our gift exchange page. It was so fun to see what people were asking and answering! And then, about a week after our exchange assignments were made, the questions petered off. I assume this was because people already knew what books they were getting each other, but there were still two weeks left of anticipation and I needed more continuous dopamine hits. Which was when I discovered that anyone could ask anonymous questions of anyone else! So I took it upon myself to become and agent of chaos and ask a question of a different person each day for the two weeks leading up to the exchange. 

I got a lot of good info about what books people were interested in. With all this good information, I took my role as Master of Book Pandemonium to the next level and picked what books I would have gotten for each of them if I had been their assigned gift giver. Then I drew the covers of my book recommendations onto cards for each person (and listed some additional recs inside the cards, too). I thought they came out pretty good, and people seemed excited to receive the additional book recs based on their interests. Only one of my recommendations (The Red Tent) had previously been read by the person I gave it to, and it was one that I had kind of guessed, but on the smallest chance that she hadn't read it, I thought she should because I knew she'd love it. 

In addition to the book recs depicted by the covers, I suggested: The Family Outing by Jessi Hempel, Leg bu Greg Marshall, The Library of Broken Worlds by Alaya Dawn Johnson, The Long Way to A Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers, Honey & Spice by Bolu Babalola, Part of Your World by Abby Jimenez, Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson, Forty Autumns by Nina Willner, Sourdough by Robin Sloan, and Spoonbenders by Daryl Gregory. And the books I actually brought to the swap were The Book of M by Peng Shepherd (for my specific recipient) and Several People Are Typing by Calvin Kasulke, which I put in the yankee swap because it's a hilarious and absurd quick read and I thought pretty much everyone would enjoy it.

Two days before we met I sent a reminder into the group chat that people should make sure they answered any questions and it was when some of the people realized questions they hadn't asked were being answered by their assigned recipient. A comment went up asking if someone was asking additional questions for "general interest" or if something could have gone wrong and assigned multiple people the same recipient (whoops!). My favorite part of the whole ordeal is that one of my friends was like "We all knew that was Aleena, right? I saw someone was asking people extra questions and was immediately like this is clearly Aleena." While I'm usually a big rule follower, I have to say I am also a fan of lighthearted mischief- especially when it involves books!

In addition to the specifically assigned book swap, we had a yankee-swap style exchange, so everybody brought two books and left with two! It was super fun.

All in all, a really wholesome day and one well spent gathering with friends who share a love of reading.

On Holding Space.

Something about me that most people find out pretty quickly is that I'll talk....probably beyond the bounds of social acceptability for any given situation. I actually have noticed that in public or with strangers and passersby I actually talk less than other people; I'll always use a self-checkout if one is available and I rarely go out of my way to engage with strangers. But put me in a situation where I'm expected to mingle and I will mingle til I drop. I will befriend at least one, if not many, people at a wedding where I know only someone standing at the altar; I will strike up conversation with a group of people at a holiday party I was invited to through a tangential connection; I will ingratiate myself with everyone at the potluck. 

I've often said that talking is my superpower. I can talk about anything or nothing for as long as needed and if I think the other person in the conversation isn't sure what to say or needs some time to warm up, I'll just chatter away until they feel comfier. I'm sure this bothers some people and is less than helpful at times when I'm oblivious to it, but I think overall it's a good quality of mine. 

The downside is that I have a hard time turning my desire to speak off which only worsened in the deep isolation of quarantine pandemic days. I pipe up entirely too often in the myriad book clubs I'm in and sometimes worry that other folks don't get the chance to contribute as much as they want as a result. Granted, this is a deeply ingrained habit from my classroom days, when most kids loathed speaking up in class and I almost always had something readily available to yammer on about. I've seldom, if ever, been afraid to be the first to speak up. 

But I've recently realized that it has a positive side I haven't always noticed, too. My chatter is inclusive. Yes, I can inadvertently monopolize a conversation, but I will do this to everyone equally. And when there is someone who has a harder time communicating, I will put in effort to include them if at all possible, which I've learned is not a trait that everyone shares. This week two people in dramatically different contexts mentioned that their loved ones who speak English as a second language and have a more difficult time connecting with English speakers because of it told me that those folks are more willing to talk to me than anyone else. And I think that's a pretty big compliment!

While I often feel like I should be striving to talk less, it sometimes helps to remember that the very thing that feels excessive can be an advantage to some people. It's always nice to feel included. I'm really glad that my incessant jabbering has opened the door for at least two people I see regularly in my life in Austin to feel like they are included and can talk to me.

I'm not really sure what my point is with all this (other than to brag, I guess) but I think maybe it's about the fact that the things that make us unique are often our greatest assets, even when they feel like things to be embarrassed about. I hope that reading this reminds you to embrace your idiosyncrasies and watch how they enable the people around you to feel safer and more welcome.