Yesterday, I asked my husband for a pretty picture of a winter landscape and he shared this old picture of a path all lit up at my previous institution. The photo is bittersweet because I haven't walked that path in several years now, especially after leaving in 2019 having spent a long 13 years there.
It's been sobering to find out that, even after all that time in one academic institution, almost none of the close relationships with peers I forged and invested in over such a long time there, survived my departure. Still, I am so grateful for students who still email and reach out and want to gather virtually to check-in or to seek my advice. Those are, ultimately, the relationships to maintain and to continue to grow with.
2020 has been, in one word: a horror show. And we've been among the privileged few with stable jobs and no illness and no stories of family being decimated by this modern plague so far. Still, it's been increasingly hard to even muster the energy to care about anything other than the terrible state of the world and the unrelenting suffering of people and the terrible political divide. It's been a year that has tested and pushed against every single one of my limitations.
I don't have any hope for the first 20 days of January, and am bracing myself for these next three long weeks being more of the same or even more bitter flavor than 2020 left behind. But I will hope that day 21 and beyond will be different. And that's something I couldn't say in 2020.
May 2021 be a year where we find ourselves moving purposefully in the world to destroy what killed us, especially BIPOC and other more vulnerable people, in 2020, and I'm not just meaning the virus. May this be a year to make good on the promises of racial equity that still elude us, and that cost so many innocent lives, and the racism that has been a poison in this land since it seeped into the ground along the blood, sweat, and tears of our enslaved ancestors.
May 2021 be a year to double down on a commitment to working hard and intentionally for a world in which diversity, equity, and inclusion aren't just buzzwords but actual structures that dismantle the ones that currently keep us divided and keep one race--the so-called "white" one--on top and everyone else below.
May we be granted fierceness, and strength, and health, and clarity. Being a superhero has never been enough for me. I'd want to reach the level of an archangel, with two kick-ass black wings sprouting from my back, and the brightest and biggest flaming sword there could be.
Short of that, I'll accept my frailty and my many limitations but continue to devote my life to this unending fight. Now, more than ever, as I turn into my 60th year of life in 2021, that's what I want to accomplish: to make good on the wildest dreams of some of my ancestors.
