My Life

Long time no post. Big surprise.

My fourth installment on 21st Century Anarchism hasn’t been forgotten. It will come when it’s ready.

I just wanted to write briefly about something personal. As I’m getting older and creakier, I think I’m starting to finally make piece with my own internal cycles. These are cycles that have dogged me since my earliest memories of school (2nd and 3rd grades…) all the way to the present. They’re cycles that cast a shadow over every aspect of my life. And I bet they’re very similar to the cycles that most people feel. Although I wouldn’t know, since shame has kept me from ever talking much about them.

The cycles are simple: weeks and months where I feel confident, creative, life-loving, connected…followed by weeks and months where I feel lackluster, ashamed, useless, corrupt and like a general nobody. These cycles have almost nothing to do with the actual conditions of my life, since they happen no matter how bad or good things are going. But they do have real consequences as they affect my friendships, my work, my writing on this site, and more.

At the root of it all, I think, is insecurity and a bad ability to handle pressure. When I feel low and forgotten and like I don’t have much to lose, my inspiration and creativity shoot up. But when I see people wanting to appreciate me, be near me, hear what I have to say, I feel like I will inevitably fail them, so I retreat, I distract myself, I wallow…and pretty soon they are frustrated with me or forget me…at which point I feel the upper swing of the cycle again.

It’s absolutely fascinating, especially when I look at it in its pure continuity throughout my entire life. By looking at it and acknowledging it as less of a personal failure and more just like a rhythm of my social personality that I may or may not grow out of, I think I can make peace with it. I think I am making peace with it. And that, I hope, will allow me to be more intentional in my work, more open in my friendships, and more accountable all around.

To those of you who read this and who have been burned by these cycles of mine (as all of my friends have been, and some for years and years), I hope you read this and forgive me. I hope you read this and understand that sometimes my silence is a sign that I’m doing important grappling with myself…

…but also sometimes its a sign that I’m just wallowing in self-doubt and doing internet window-shopping for 6 hours with crumbs of tortilla chips and peach pits all over my bed. Both scenarios are common and real.

I hope you can love me regardless, as I love you in your cycles, too.

I’m officially married…Glendi is living at the house with me…I joined and then withdrew from a Master’s in Teaching Program…I’m about to start a new job as a co-director of a youth empowerment non-profit…my hair’s getting long…a center-leftist won the presidency of Guatemala!

But mostly, I’m really happy these days. And I’m thinking about a whole bunch of stuff. So now it’s time to start writing again!

Nearly a year since Glendi and I really started talking about this, and now we’re almost there. I just need to pack my bag and head to the airport, and then…

Glendi, her mom, and her brother Ivan will meet me in the airport, where we will travel by bus for four hours to reach her home, and there we will spend 1 bittersweet week, as Glendi prepares her things and her family says goodbye.

I’ve been talking with Glendi’s dad and he seems a lot more prepared emotionally than he was a few months and weeks ago. Stilly crying occasionally, but much more open about his excitement and happiness for us as well. Glendi is excited. Her mom is excited and sad, of course.

I have so much I want to write about, but I don’t have the time. Hopefully during the summer, now that school is out (yay!).

I want to talk about my hopes and my fears about Glendi and I. I want to talk about the possible futures, about the balance between this relationship and my other friendships. I want to talk more about the politics of this relationship. There is just so much. There are all of these things that I’m thinking about all of the time, but I still haven’t put them down in this blog yet.

Still, for now I can tell you that I feel so free and happy…and I’ll let you know where it goes from there.

Much love, and hope to write a least once from Guatemala.

Hi there,

First off, my apologies to those who have commented and who have not yet received a response. Please be patient with me.

Second, you really should read this article about the battle for Bolivia’s future, and then read the Movement Toward Socialism’s Vision for a New Bolivia. This is really promising, I think.

Third, and most importantly, I leave for Guatemala on Friday! Glendi and I will be coming back to the U.S. together on Saturday, June 30th. My life is about to radically change at the end of this week. Wow. I am excited, nervous, stressed, scared, and then excited again. It’s a whirlwind, as one can imagine.

The good thing is that I have lots of support. Many people have emailed me or called me with support, and many people also are supporting me face to face. Moreover, talking with Glendi every night is really grounding and relaxing, as is talking with her family, who are definitely sad right now, thinking about saying goodbye to her for a good number of months.

But the hardest thing is having no clue about what I’m going to be doing for us to be able to live come the fall. I’m really leaning against going back to school right now. It just doesn’t feel right, and it will be expensive. At the same time, I don’t have a sustainable job anymore at the high school (they still want my work, but don’t have the money…can anyone point me to any grants or fellowships?)…so the big question is “What Now?” I don’t know, but I think it involves getting more focused on concrete organizing and pushing my politics, and thus maybe even looking for a more brain-free kind of job just to pay the bills. We’ll see.

I just took a break from cleaning the apartment in preparation for Glendi in order to write this entry. Perhaps I should get back to work.

More to come, I hope.

Hey folks,

I’ve received some really interesting feedback from a few folks about my “big announcement,” and I want to write about two pieces of it here…maybe more later.

First, there was concern expressed about posting such an intense, personal letter as Glendi’s on a public blog. That perhaps this is something I should share more carefully, with my close people, rather than just anyone who comes along. I’ve been thinking about this, and I want to talk with Glendi more about it (as soon as the phone card works again!), but for now I’m going to pull the letter from the writings section, and just email it out to those who email me and ask to see it. For now, anyway.

A second piece that I’ve gotten from a number of people is some concern about the tone of my letter, as if I’m coming out with armor on, ready for our relationship to be attacked, and so I’m bringing out my talking points. This is more or less accurate feedback. I feel extremely vulnerable talking about my relationship in general and this decision in particular with people. Somewhat with my family, but definitely in political circles. This is complicated, because there are many, many levels to it, but mainly because I know that our relationship is complicated, and because I know that it is easy to go from thinking something’s complicated to thinking that it’s problematic…and then to go from that to thinking its fucked up…and then going from questioning silently to shit-talking publicly…. I have been an activist for 11 years now. There are sketchy interpersonal dynamics across all communities, including activist communities, and so yeah, in making this more public beyond certain close circles, I kind of came out erring on the side of caution, just wanting to get my reasons and my thinking out there. You should have seen my rough draft…way more thorough and intense!

Bottom line, I have worried that people, even people who I care about, won’t trust us enough to be able to do this with care and intentionality. I have worried that people would talk behind my back and even spread rumors (and some crazy rumors HAVE been spread). These things have run through my imagination too many times, and so, yeah, maybe there is some attitude in my letter as if I’m anticipating a fight.

But the wonderful thing is that so far people have come back with concerned feedback, but also with love and support, and with an understanding that I really am trying to be careful about this…perhaps even too careful. I can take that, I can hear that. I’m also prepared to hear more feedback of all sorts.

All my love,

Jeremy

To all of my family and friends,
To all of the people who I love so very, very much,

I’ve got a really big announcement for you.

This summer, my partner, Glendi Susana Aguilar Lorenzo, is coming from her country of Guatemala to the United States, in order to live here with me.

We are engaged to be married.

Now, I imagine that this is a shock to most of you—and for some of you, not so much—and so in this letter I want to share with you first about our story and then about our plans, so that you can better understand and support us in this major change in our lives.

So, pretty please:

-Read through this letter (especially the part at the end with our plans and what we need from you in terms of support)

-Then, find some time to read the letter that Glendi has written to you (in the writings section). It’s actually a collection of 13 emails that I’ve translated from Spanish and edited, with her guidance and a double-checking of the translation by my friend, Isaura…thanks Isaura!

-Then visit here to see some photos!

All of this is quite a chunk of reading. I’m sorry for that, but that’s how it is, and I hope that you’ll make the time to read through it.

———————-
The Story, As I’ve Experienced It
———————-

I met Glendi in the summer of 2005, just two years ago, when I was studying Spanish in Guatemala. She was (and is) a teacher in La Escuela de la Montaña (The Mountain School), where I studied for just three weeks. We would chat a little between classes, and then she became my teacher for a week, and out of that we developed a good rapport. When I returned to the United States, through emails and phone calls this rapport turned into a friendship, and then about three months later into a more serious long-distance relationship. In those months, I had fallen for her, and she had fallen for me.

For quite a while, however, I was scared of my feelings and of our connection. One reason was the fact that my previous partner of four years, Briana, and I had just transitioned into being friends, and I didn’t want to move too quickly into anything new. A much larger reason, though, was the fact that Glendi and I are coming from such very different places, and I was worried that those differences—and especially the power dynamics that come with them—would make a long-term relationship impossible. I am an urban, middle-class white North American, Glendi is a rural, Indigenous Guatemalan from a poor, farm-worker family. My primary language is English, hers, Spanish. I am a strong atheist, she is a deeply faithful, though liberal, Protestant Christian (she calls herself evangelical, but it should be noted that this means something different in Guatemala than in the U.S.). I am a dedicated radical activist, and she is very sympathetic and is definitely lefty, but has never considered herself an activist. Moreover, I knew that if our relationship were to be real and sustainable, Glendi would have to be able to travel freely between the United States and Guatemala, and that would probably require marriage, which is a legal/religious institution that, to this day, I do not politically or ethically believe in. I had never imagined myself in such a complicated situation, I certainly hadn’t looked for it, and frankly it was freaking me out.

Yet talking on the phone and writing emails every day, the connection we had was undeniable. The openness, warmth and humor that we shared and that grew between us made it a safe place to talk about all of our differences, to analyze them and feel them, without feeling a need to push away from or reject each other. We decided to take a risk and hold on, with open eyes, yes, but also with open hearts.

And so we have held on, not only through almost two years of daily emails and phone calls, but also through 3 more trips to Guatemala, with me spending about 2 ½ months living with Glendi and her family, and through discussions of the relationship not only with my close people but also with her closest people. In all of this we have faced some real struggles, primarily related to cultural differences around dating and family, and we have processed through these struggles in ways that have strengthened our relationship and that have built intimacy, but which also have required compromises from both of us.

One of the most fundamental compromises is the very subject of this letter: our decision to get married.

For those of you in my family, I don’t want to freak you out or offend you, but I do not generally believe in the institution of marriage. I believe deeply in committed relationships, but for political reasons, historical reasons, ethical reasons, and just plain personal reasons, I do not support the institution of marriage (though of course I support people’s rights to choose to get married, including couples of the same sex/gender). Glendi, and especially her close-knit family, are not in the same place. Neither is U.S. immigration law. For these and other reasons, the decision to become engaged with Glendi has been a long, hard decision to make…a decision that, especially for reasons of the U.S. border, has been weighing on us from day one.

I am not going to detail all of our discussions and deliberations here. There is simply not room in this letter to outline the emotional and logical paths that we have followed to come to this point. If you email me or call me and ask, I will surely talk with you about it, but for now, I do want you to know just a few things:

• I love Glendi tremendously. Tremendously. I am committed to her and I am excited about building a family with her, a family that has strong, deep connections with our existing families, friends, and also with our extended activist “families” as well. Though our decision to get married has been confined and structured by U.S. law, this is no kind of “green card” marriage. Our commitment is much deeper than that.

• Our marriage, however, will not be completely conventional. We are going to share between us all of the traditional “husband/wife” marriage roles like cleaning, cooking, childcare, working, etc. ; we’re also going to prefer the term “partners” to “husband and wife;” we’re going to try something creative regarding the whole changing last names thing; we’re going to have a very non-traditional, non-religious “ceremony of commitment” in the U.S. (and something more traditional in Guatemala); and we are definitely going to work to stay connected with our communities, friends, and families so that we don’t get too isolated into our own little nuclear family unit.

• I have a strong relationship with Glendi’s family, and though I do not agree with all of their beliefs and traditions, I have tried to build my relationship with Glendi in a way that has been open to and respectful of where she and her loved ones are coming from. This has sometimes meant things like traveling to Guatemala to ask her parents’ permission to enter the house (which is a Guatemalan tradition), or traveling to meet all of her aunts and uncles…and it will also mean an eventual traditional-style wedding in Guatemala, in her family’s church.

• So far, our relationship has grown in a Guatemalan, Spanish-speaking context…in Glendi’s context. Now we are taking a major step towards strengthening our relationship in my context…the United States. Seattle. We think and discuss constantly about what this means in terms of greatly shifting power dynamics, of her experiences as an immigrant, as an English-learner, as a poor woman of color, and so much more. We also recognize the sad possibility that, despite our will to commit, our relationship might not be able to survive all of the challenges this transition throws at us…but we hope so much that this isn’t true! I take my own responsibilities very seriously in all of these regards, and we hope that you also will do what you can to support her and us (even if that means lovingly holding me accountable for mistakes sometimes). Please read Glendi’s letter and finish this letter to get a sense of the support that we are asking for.

• Even with our current plans to live in the U.S., our relationship is founded on a long-term commitment to share our lives in both of our countries. This means that probably within the next three years we will be moving together to Guatemala, to live near Glendi’s family. We are planning on moving back and forth periodically throughout our lives, and the life of our family, and this will very much depend on circumstances. I just want you to have a heads-up about this, and also to know that I will take my responsibilities as a North-American living in Guatemala very seriously, as well.

There is much, much more that I could say. There are many stories to tell (about Glendi’s family, her culture, our relationship, the VISA process, etc.), and I hope that you will stick with us and hang out with us so that you can hear these stories directly from our mouths!

I imagine that some of you are worried, skeptical, questioning, and I want you to know that I support you in those feelings. It shows that you care about Glendi’s well-being and my own. At the same time, we need you to put some trust in us that we know what we are doing, and what we are getting into, and we need you to know that your loving support and welcoming attitude toward Glendi are crucially important, even with any lingering doubts that you may hold.

I love you, and I look forward to further discussing this amazing new stage of my life with you as it develops. But for now, let’s move on to the actual plan!

———————-
The Plan
———————-

June 22: I leave for Guatemala, where I will spend a week with Glendi’s family as she says her “see you laters” and gets ready to come to the United States for the first time.

June 30: We fly together from Guatemala to Houston, where she will go through customs, and then we will fly to Seattle, arriving at night. This will be her first time in a plane, we’ve got seats together (of course), and any strategies you might be able to offer a first-time flyer might be helpful! We will stay one night in a hotel near the airport, to relax, get our bearings, and save her first real view of Washington for the daytime.

July 1: We will drive to Bellingham, where my parents live, and we will spend a week there. Glendi will give my family Spanish lessons (a great way to balance the power dynamics and allow us North Americans to feel some of the vulnerability that she will be feeling for a long time), we will cook and explore all together as a family.

July 8 or so: We will return to Seattle, where we are going to live together in the basement “apartment” of my cooperative house, alongside 5 other wonderful people. This way, Glendi will be able to be welcomed right in to my political and social community, she will be less isolated and less dependent on me alone (once again, helping to balance power dynamics), and both of us will be less isolated as a couple. Once again, Spanish lessons are offered to everyone in the house (but thankfully some already speak it)!

At some point in the three months of her visa: We will get officially, legally married, with no fanfare and the minimum number of witnesses (not even family) necessary. This is just the official part.

Sunday, August 12: We will have a non-religious, very non-traditional, and bi-lingual “ceremony of commitment and partnership,” probably outdoors. I am very excited about it!
ALL OF YOU who have received this ARE WARMLY INVITED, but I do need to make two points: 1) Because of the stress and newness of her first few months in the U.S., Glendi and I need to be able to focus on each other and make this event very casual…which means that we can’t take logistical responsibility for any of you who wish to come from out of town…so if you come (and you are invited!) you may need to coordinate it through my parents, or on your own. 2) Since this will be our kind of ceremony, which will uphold our values and the values of my community, this will be an event that is welcoming to all of my queer, lesbian, gay, and transgender friends and their partners. I want them to be safe and free to express themselves and have fun, and so if sharing this kind of space with my friends will make you so uncomfortable that you are unable to participate happily, then I want to give you a heads-up that this event might not be a good idea for you.
Please let me or my mom know ASAP if you are planning on coming to this.

August 13-20 or so: Glendi and I will fly to Alaska, to celebrate with my Alaska family and to explore the places where I was born and grew up. Ondras, Kochs, Brewsters: this also means that it’s okay if you can’t make it down for the ceremony.

August 20 until Glendi receives her permanent residency or at least permission to return to Guatemala: We will just focus on building our lives together, while Glendi prepares to start her business as a private Spanish teacher (waiting for a green card), and I will be working and possibly pursuing a Master’s degree in teaching.

When Glendi can travel back to Guatemala (hopefully by December): We will return to Guatemala, with my family, where we will have a more traditional Guatemalan wedding in Glendi’s church and with Glendi’s family and friends. If you are really interested in coming down to Guatemala for this, please let me know ASAP.

For the next 3 years or so: We will live primarily in the U.S., traveling when we can to Guatemala. We will be focusing on saving money and paying off my college debt, so that…

In the future: We will build a small house on a small piece of land near her family’s community, where we will live some years in Guatemala, some in the United States…we clearly don’t know the actual breakdown of how it will work yet.

———————-
How You Can Support Us
———————-

Of course, you can support us emotionally by writing to us (Glendi’s email address is aguilarlorenzo_3@hotmail.com) with love and best wishes, and by trying to make it to our August celebration (please RSVP ASAP), and by being at our sides in good times and bad.

But also, because I have chosen a career path of important social justice work that pays very little, and because Glendi will be moving from a situation of being the breadwinner of her large family to being unemployed until she gets her green card (anywhere from 3-6 or more months), we actually can use your financial support as well.

In sort of a surprise move, the Bush administration announced a doubling of immigration fees, and we are not sure how this is going to affect our budget, and with our need to support ourselves, plus the need to support Glendi’s 12 person family in Guatemala, plus staying on top of my debts, and also trying to save for the return to Guatemala, your financial help can make a huge difference. We will have no wedding registry, but if between now and the August ceremony you would be able to make us a donation, we will really, really appreciate it.

My address is 1643 S. King St., Seattle, WA 98144

Also, if you know anyone in the Seattle area or in King County who might be interested in paying for private Spanish lessons from an excellent professional teacher from a highly regarded Spanish school, Glendi’s classes will be available for a reasonable rate when she has a green card, but until then she is up for trading English lessons for Spanish lessons, groceries for lessons, or other fair barter/trade kinds of things. Please let us know, and when Glendi has a website, we’ll send it out to you.

Thank you so much for reading through this whole thing, for being in my life all of these years, and for continuing to be in my life and now in Glendi’s life for many years to come!

I love you,

Jeremy

For a little while I’ve been hinting at opening up about some rather big stuff that I haven’t yet discussed on this blog…for a variety of reasons.

Well, things are getting to a point where I’m ready to change that situation. So just sit tight and check back on this blog in the next few days.

I hope you’re well, and things are flowing okay in your lives. My life is okay right now. The big staff meeting is tomorrow, supposedly. But I don’t believe anything anymore. I’m just going to show up, speak when asked to speak, and see what happens. I’ve already been saying my goodbyes to students.

Until soon, much love to each of you.

I’ve received a little bit of advice from a net-savvy friend of mine that maybe I should be careful about my “blog identity.” That is, I should be careful about how much I talk about my job, people I work with, etc.

I think he’s right. People do find this site in their google searches sometimes. And although I don’t think I’m saying much that I wouldn’t say to anyone’s face at the school, I think I do want to be more careful.

So, I’m going to keep updating occasionally about the job, but more cautiously. And maybe I’ll end up making some of my previous posts unavailable to the public. Not sure yet.

Please comment here if you think differently. Thanks to all who are reading!

Today, after lunch ended, the principal came into our office, with all of us standing there awkwardly, and she said:

“I just want to tell you that I want you two here. We need you two here. And I want you to know that I’m going to find the money. It may only be part time, but we will do what we can. I’m going to take the budget home over the weekend and find the money.”

She also apologized for her insensitivity and hurtful comments in a past staff meeting, she acknowledged her use of power to try to frame reality, and told us that yesterday’s emergency student/staff meeting was powerful…and she left saying, “So, before I just walked in, were you two organizing to overthrow me on this?”

No, we weren’t. But the students were planning some things. They had refined their walkout plans and messaging, and they were getting ready to go…the campus has been buzzing.

And they still are going to do something, but now it is a much more toned-down lunch forum about the future of student voice at the school. They’ve made new fliers. None of us are giving up, because having funding doesn’t mean that we get the kind of work we want. This is just the opening of the conversation.

What a weird place to work. A low-income high school that two years ago was totally traditional and has now become a national darling as an example of a successful conversion of a large campus into 3 small schools…an institution that is in an active state of transformation, and where very marginalized young people are finding themselves in new positions of activism and leadership around all sorts of issues…seriously, my head is just spinning and I’m in shock. What is this place?! This job is so hard to read. Every year we keep pushing and pushing, and they eventually give in…it’s like: when is this power structure actually going to stop us, because in four years it hasn’t yet. It’s kind of disconcerting.

It was almost easier just to see the principal in her power role…Briana and I were just staring at each other, like: “What happened to her? What got to her? What do we do now?” It was almost easier having all the drama…more familiar.

We’ll see, huh? There’s still the lunch forum and the staff vote on Tuesday. I’ll update as it seems valuable.

This’ll be funny coming off the heels of my last post, but I just got word today that I’ve been accepted into the Master in Teaching program at The Evergreen State College.

It’s flattering of course, to have the opportunity to go grad school to eventually be a teacher, but all my thinking and reading and experiences, as shown in the last post, are just really telling me that this is not a bargain that I should be trying to make with the system. I have other things I could be doing.

But I will admit that I’m not sure yet. Teaching public high school is way different from joining the academy. Yet it is still working for the state, and choosing to spend the vast majority of one’s active energies within a more or less structurally limited institution. The good thing is that I won’t even hear about financial aid/scholarships until mid-June, so I have a long while to decide. In the mean time, I have many other things going on in my life that I have to think about, and write about soon enough.

Also, you should go here and watch the newest PBS Frontline, a history of the Mormons. Fascinating stuff. Really got me thinking a lot about how faith works…it simply isn’t rational, it just isn’t. And as much as I try to understand religious people (including my Christian partner, Glendi) with my intellect, I can’t. I can’t cross that gap of faith that they have. Now, maybe I do cross it in my own ways (for instance, believing that revolution is possible), but I can’t cross it in their ways…I just find myself shaking my head and being perplexed. Doesn’t mean that I can’t respect faithful people in many ways, because I can. But there are just certain ways that I can’t understand them. But I am fascinated.

I just recently finished reading the memoir of a relatively prominent leftist by the name of Michael Albert, called “Remembering Tomorrow.” Albert is one of the founders of South End Press, as well as Z Magazine and Z-net. He’s written or co-written many books about revolutionary theory and post-capitalist vision, such as “ParEcon,” “Looking Forward,” and “Liberating Theory.” His memoir is not great, and in some places it downright pissed me off (mostly regarding his treatment of the Black Panthers, women’s liberation, and really many parts of the sixties in general…if you ask me to explain myself, I will, but otherwise, I’ll save it), but still it was well worth reading and it inspired me.

The truth is, I have read I think almost every book that Michael Albert has written, some a couple of times (his earliest work with Robin Hahnel, “Unorthodox Marxism,” is actually my favorite). I first discovered his writing when I was 16, and his thinking has been pivotal in my own development as a radical. In many ways still, I’m kind of an “Albertist” in my radical worldview. At the same time, he’s definitely a sixties white, male leftist, with many of those trapping and contradictions, plus I’ve had friends tell me that’s he’s kind of a jerk, etc, and that all probably holds too. But all of this together, I’m glad that he has lived and done the work he has, because he has helped me to become a better thinker, a better, radical, and frankly a better person. His writing frankly helped me transition from standard white male anarchism toward listening to the ideas of my anti-racist and feminist friends. If I hadn’t had that role-modeling from an older white male radical intellectual, I don’t know if I would have listened as intently to my friends’ demands for me to change my ways…even still it took me years.

I’m writing about all of this because, in the book, Albert mentions numerous times that actually, among his prominent radical friends, his thinking is actually met with silence. He seems genuinely frustrated by the lack of critical response he gets even from his friends about his work. I was wondering why this might be…maybe he’s hard to be honest to, maybe, personally, he’s an asshole (as I’ve heard from some, but not all), maybe he’s such an obnoxious debater that no one wants to get into it with him….or maybe they actually just don’t care very much to help push his ideas forward. Maybe engaging in his theorizing and vision doesn’t seem worthwhile to them, which I think is just kind of crazy. I know that almost all of my friends have had almost no interest in reading the theorizing of an old white male leftist. I’ve let them have that opinion, but that hasn’t stopped me from keeping up with his work, and I don’t regret it. Frankly, I’ve met very few other contemporary US radicals of different identities who talk about revolution and actually winning as much as he does (other inspirations that come to mind are the women of INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence…they are on the cutting edge, way far ahead of Albert in many ways on many things…but I don’t think all).

But his discussion about the great silences that surround his work really shook me, because honestly it is kind of how I feel about my work. For a really long time, I’ve felt that while overall I’m liked (mostly, I think, because I’m nice, a good listener, and very non-threatening…and a perpetual optimist, which I think people sponge off of, because they aren’t…it can actually be very draining for me), I don’t think I’m recognized as actually very useful as a radical thinker, or as the kind of asset for social change that I have worked hard to try to be for years. Usually, this doesn’t bother me much at all, I’ve gotten used to it, being within a political context of non-white males who really don’t trust people like me very much for doing much more than staying quiet and nodding along, as “allies”…because of such a long past of broken trust by white male radicals. I get this, and I have just sort of been patient, because I know that someday someone will ask my opinion, and someday that will be able to make a difference…like it did for awhile at the school. But that is precisely it. I have realized that now that I’m feeling un-valued and thrown away at the school, a key source of my intellectual and radical self-esteem has shriveled, and I’m realizing that outside of the school, in this radical “community” that I am more or less a part of, I actually have almost no developed base of trust, where I am known or appreciated as anything other than a smiling, humble background character.

Like I said in my ego post, all of us have egos, and all of us want to be validated and valued, like we’re contributing. That goes for me, too. Not because I want to be a big leader or have fame. I simply want to feel useful. We have a revolution to build, and I think I’m pretty young, smart, energetic, and frankly ethical, and so I want to have a place where I feel like I can make a difference. But the problem is that nobody really wants me……but it’s not just me they don’t want. Nobody really seems to want anybody. Because nobody really thinks that way on the radical left. People on the left mostly just seem to be thinking of themselves, of their pet projects, and on getting everyone else to just be spectators, or marchers, or readers, or donors to them. People signing up to be equal, active participants in creatively building grassroots organizations? No, there is almost no interest there.

This is what capitalism has done to the radicals. It has sucked us dry and turned us way too far inward. And not inward in a healing way (that would be great, and is necessary), but in an unhealthy, cannibalistic way. Let me explain:

On one level, capitalism has captured many of our really energetic intellectuals, influencing them to go to universities and become academics, where they will be totally isolated from the movement outside of books and, worse, where they will be so pressured to come up with original theses and ideas etc….more books and cutting edge analyses, even though we really have many good ideas already, we just don’t practice them, and so we have radicals who just end up making old ideas more inaccessible, then they don’t engage with each other, they find cozy positions in society and…suddenly…where did they go? Off the streets, out of the neighborhoods, and into the ivory tower.

On another level, capitalism takes some of its cash and it doles it out to foundations, who dole it out to non-profits (read The Revolution Will Not Be Funded, by INCITE! must-read book), who then suck up our most accomplished and efficient organizers, having them organize stale campaigns and, worse, fundraisers, when they should be doing grassroots base-building outside of the non-profit system. They become professionals, who have traded efficiency in making narrow gains (and then exaggerating their victories for their donors and boards of directors) for effectiveness in building a mass-based visionary politics. Suddenly, where did all of the dynamic organizers who were willing to work for free go?

And the rest of us? With professional intellectuals making our ideas less user-friendly, not more, and with professional organizers making our work less ordinary-person friendly, not more, those of us who don’t join have to find normal jobs, where we are tired, and then we do activism on the side, in more or less unfunded and unstable groups, where we have a constant brain and ability drain into the academy and the non-profits, and we are left with sad little radical groups…which really just become the equivalent of farm teams in baseball…just a way for the big leagues to recruit our best and brightest, leaving us hanging.

Do I sound bitter? I am. I’m also furious. I have been a radical activist for more than 11 years. I still don’t have a radical group to belong to. Almost no one around me even seems very interested in the idea. My inspirations have all gone on to grad school. Maybe I will too. This makes me so sad.

Everything we know about global warming, water, and oil tells us that we are the generation that must take swift, decisive action. Us. Everything we know about the system tells us that it will not make these changes fast enough, or good enough. We must get organized and act for fundamental systemic change. We have the knowledge, the creativity, the generations of experience, the kick-ass intersectional revolutionary ideas and the ability to popularize them. We could win. We really could. But why aren’t we organizing more?

Because capitalism has bought too many of us off, and it has us cozying up. It had me for four years, at the high school, and I’m just now realizing how many other great things I could have and should have been doing. I still don’t regret it…at all. But now that I’m on my way out, I’m antsy to really find something effective to do now.

We can’t let this system beat us. We just can’t allow it. We are the generation to begin turning the tide. I want to rejoin that effort. Fuck getting paid for it (although, of course, I understand that some people have survival needs much bigger than my own…I’m speaking for myself)…fuck getting a book published out of it…I just want to make the world better….and yes to have my close people see my worth. This isn’t too much to ask.

Tomorrow, we have a staff meeting at the high school, in which mine and Briana’s work will likely be called into question, and it may very well mean that our services are no longer wanted.

I have worked there for four years now. It has simultaneously been the hardest, most painful, most powerful, and most effective political, emotional, and personal work I have ever done in my young life. They have been four incredible years. I will not regret them if this is the end, but I don’t want this to be the end. We’ve been working with a vision and a strategy, and for it to get rolled back this year, at this point, would be a major, tragic loss.

Tomorrow we will present our views, and all of the staff members will present theirs, and we’ll see where we all are. I have no idea what to expect. There frankly have been a lot of rumors going around about divisions and factions, and that freaks me out…because in dramas like that the radicals and visionaries are usually the first to be sacrificed.

I’ll let you know what happens, but I am preparing to leave. Crying sometimes. Enraged sometimes. Most of all sad for the students. I know that I am nowhere near the kind of educator and ally they really need at that school, but at the same time I KNOW that I am good for them, that Briana is good for them. If we leave, it should be because the school is ready to move on without us, not just because our work is not wanted or understood anymore.

But that’s the problem, isn’t it? Our work was possibly never wanted or understood as it really was, but rather as an idea, easily tokenized and marketed, of “student voice” and “student empowerment” and “social justice.” But then folks start to see the substance underneath the style and they get scared. It is a story that is WAY too old. I’m sorry to have to be just another rerun of it.

In this way, it was good yesterday to re-discover my old writings, and to recognize my own radical visionary abilities again. I think I’d forgotten lately that I am a valuable thinker and worker for social justice.

Wish me luck tomorrow, and still don’t forget to check out the writings, when you have time.

I’ve posted four of my most substantial pieces of writing from the last 5 years. Check them out (they are Word documents).

Two of them are works of revolutionary theory. The other two are attempts to express that theory in more creative, visionary ways (that is, they are fiction). I’m proud of all of them, with their flaws and gaps and all that.

To be honest, I’m thinking about maybe trying to do something more with some of these pieces. Not like a book, but at least trying to publish these as articles or zines…with some modifications, of course. I’d be interested to know what people think about that.

But seriously…the last two pieces are actually pretty fun reads, in my opinion, so I suggest checking them out.

Love you…and please be kind with any constructive criticism…because I am SUPER-INSECURE about my writing. Not defensive, but insecure.

P.S. If you do like any of the pieces, please tell other people about the blog!

Hi folks…

Well, I’ve gotta say that the old design of the blog was becoming too claustrophobic for me (but great job designing it, Dave! It served me well.) and so now I’m moving on.

The new design will make it easier to navigate and find things. It’ll also allow me to present more different types of content in the blog, which I’m really excited about.

So, you should come visit again in the next few days, and see what’s up!

I wanted to visit and to say hi to my little blog.

I’ve been busy. With some things that I still don’t want to talk about here. And with other things like applying to grad school (to become a teacher? Yikes!), and with designing a Magic: The Gathering style card game.

Tomorrow I have a meeting to find out about the future of my work at the high school, and I imagine that it will be pretty tense. So maybe that’s why I’m not sleeping right now.

I feel like this blog is becoming like a distant friend now…where I’m keeping so many things to myself that I feel like it doesn’t represent me or “know” me anymore. I don’t want this to be the case.

For those who have noticed my absence this week, I’m sorry.

I’ve been having a real hard time at the job and it’s kind of sucked away my emotional energy.

Truth is, I’ve had a lot that I’ve wanted write about…be it ideas about local organizing, Iraq, the Democrats, analysis of oppression, The Good Shephard, Borat, the upcoming constitutional referendum in Ecuador (April 15th!), and much more.

But really there is a more important post that I’m working on that should be up some time in the next week, so just be patient.

In the meantime, check out the comments on my post about Oppression Olympics. Some one wrote in and challenged me with some really good points.

Hope y’all are well.

Check this out, on my friend Andrew’s blog.

I’ve been thinking about how I still want to be writing more about more local, more grassroots kinds of things, but I think I realize why its hard: the vast majority of the political work that I’m doing and seeing relates to my work at the school, and I’m reluctant to speak about that work in a public forum like this as long as I’m employed there and working for the State. But I wish I could say more, because that work is so very, very satisfying, more than any other political work I’ve done in the more than 10 years that I’ve been an “activist.” Someday I’ll talk about it.

Sunday morning and I’m listening to Propagandhi’s latest album (they are a Canadian political punk band). I just had the strongest urge to hear them after my week of work. I’ve been listening to them since I was 15 (wow, 10 years!) and they just have a specific kind of white-boy “I can’t believe all of this is happening in the world and my parents never told me about it so now I’m REALLY pissed” rage that speaks strongly to me.

Also have the urge to listen to some Cat Stevens and Tracy Chapman today. And earlier this week I was listening to Alanis Morrisette. She has some really good feminist songs!

Been following the democratic presidential race daily, because it’s something to do, and every day John Edwards is impressing me more and more. Never expected it. Now clearly I am pulling for Obama and Hillary for the identity milestone reasons, but politically Edwards is setting himself apart more each day. He’s actually talking about real stuff on a daily level. For example: talking about ending poverty in the US by 2030 (at least talking about it), talking about drastically cutting down carbon emissions, talking about a non-aggression pact with Iran, about the genocide in Darfur, about net neutrality, about withdrawing troops now, about supporting rights of workers to organize, and most recently, talking about a cabinet level global poverty position, which would be his priority approach to national security…classrooms not battlefields (which still could signify expansion of empire, but AT LEAST by feeding people and providing books instead of killing them). So, yeah, he’s intriguing right now.

Another Friday evening. Got home from the high school a few hours ago, cooked some dinner, then mopped the kitchen floor. I’m tired.

And right now I don’t know why I do this.

Do you ever get that? I bet you do…those moments or days where you forget why you’re doing the work you do, why you’re living where you’re living, why you made all of the chains of choices that brought you to this point?

I think it’s really healthy to let reality unravel like that every once in awhile. Everything in moderation, and all that, but for me it helps remind me that this, my life, is just one of many possible lives, and that there are many other choices I could be making. It’s grounding, I guess.

Working at a high school, and being there to organize for social justice of all things, is just so tiring on every level. My body is tired. My back hurts. I’m perpetually sleepy despite almost always getting 8+ hours. I cherish my evenings and my days off like warm, golden honey. Even five minutes more on the snooze alarm is worth resnuggling into my bed for. Perhaps this is just the working life in general, but I’ve never felt it so strongly as this year, working this hard at this high school.

In other news…there is a lot happening in Ecuador…with 57 opposition senators being fired by the electoral commission or something for trying to stall the constituent assembly…and Chavez, as you probably know, made a tour across Latin America and the Caribbean in an effort to overshadow Bush–and succeeded. Chavez is actually on Barbara Walters tonight…check it out. Locally, the Tacoma Port protests have marched on, and I still would like to tell my story about that someday. It was weird to be there, with tear gas and weird sparkling fireworks things flying around me…and yet I was perfectly calm, just trying to help other people out, trying to keep people from running and panicking. Interesting bodily response, I thought.

There is so much that I still don’t share on this blog and I wonder when I will have the guts to break those silences.

One last thing: I believe that the next generation of activists will be much better at what they do than we are…and I think that we are actually pretty good.

I love all of you. Until next time.

OH AND PS:  Still having vivid dreams nightly.  Last night I was fishing  by hand for salmon in a creek.  It was kind of beautiful.

Another fact about me that some people know and others don’t: I’m straight-edge, which is a stupid punk-rock term that means that I don’t drink, or smoke, or do drugs. Never done any of those things and I doubt I ever will. I’m not judgemental or in your face about it, it’s just kind of something I came to in high school and never felt like giving up…it’s an eccentricity that I like about myself.

When I was in high school I had this super dorky slogan I told myself: “Dreams Over Drugs.” Truth is, I’m a very, very vivid dreamer (I often have lucid dreams, in which I know I’m dreaming and I can shift and control them…so I very rarely have nightmares), and so I decided that I would focus on my dreaming as an alternative to the psychadelic drugs that my friends were doing.

What I’ve found is that if I actively try to remember my dream from the night before, especially if I write it down, then I will dream vividly again the next day. I’ll let you know if this is confirmed by my dreams tonight…

Edit: Yep, I had very vivid dreams last night, and since I remembered them I hope the cycle will continue and my dreams will just get better.

I want to talk a little bit about growing as a political person, and the significance of that for me.

When I was a little kid, like 6 years old, I used to watch the TV show “Family Ties” with my mom. I don’t have many concrete memories from the show, but I do remember that I looked up to Michael J. Fox’s character, Alex P. Keaton, and I remember that he loved Ronald Reagan, and so I loved Ronald Reagan, too. I also remember the youngest child on the show, a cute little blond-haired kid, and I remember that I was entranced by him. I was entranced by the idea that there was actually somebody my age on TV. More importantly, I remember that I was very concerned with whether he was younger than me or older than me, because if he was younger than me, then somehow that reflected on me and my self-worth…that I was actually older than someone on television. That maybe I could even be on television.

The same thing happened years later with Macaulay Culkin, right after Home Alone came out. I remember reading a magazine and I found out that he was 3 months older than me and I was devastated.

When I was 16, I heard something about how the old philosopher David Hume wrote one of his most famous works before the age of 21 or something, and I told myself that I was going to beat him, and publish my first book before the age of 20. It didn’t happen, and I remember having a tinge of sadness on that birthday, although I didn’t tell anyone.

Also, when I was between the ages of 14 and 20, I was very interested in historical figures like Mao and Lenin and Stalin and Ho Chi Minh, and read biographies of all of them. I was particularly interested in their beginnings as leaders, in their school years, in their twenties, and I took mental notes of how I was stacking up. Was I going to make history like them? Was I going to be a famous leader?

I sure wanted to be a leader like them. Clearly, I would be a leader who would NOT be a butcher or a sellout or a hypocrite, I would be the one who broke the historical legacy of faulty leaders. Who truly WAS a liberator. I would be different, and that would be my particular claim to fame. The anarchist version of the Mao, of the Lenin (complete contradiction in terms, though it is)…and the biographies would highlight my distinctions boldly.

For a good number of years, I lived my life and grew as a political activist and organizer with a very real kind of double-consciousness going on. I genuinely wanted equality, social justice, liberation for all people, and I could imagine many details of that dream. But at the same time, I wanted that global liberation to come FROM ME, from my innovations, and leadership, and legacy. As if the revolution were Arthurian legend, I wanted to be the ONE to pull the sword from the stone (actually…thinking about it…that too was an old cartoon that really spoke to me growing up…interesting). I was a revolutionary optimist partly because I knew that it was my own destiny to usher in the revolution.

The problem was that, of course, there was a fundamental contradiction between my supposed beliefs in direct democracy, massive grassroots social movements and non-hierarchical social structures and my own ego. And over a number of years, as I began to rise in the “activist ranks” and began to find myself being offered opportunities to assert myself as a leader, as a spokesperson or whatever, that contradiction became a lived reality that really started to affect my choices. Especially in the climate of post-WTO radical organizing in the Pacific Northwest, I found myself faced with questions of integrity that held many of my friendships in the balance.

Thankfully, though, I met some feminists.

And, as so many feminists do for wayward young activist dudes, they introduced me to a way of thinking that, for them–and I would imagine most marginalized people–was just second nature, but to me was earth-shattering: they introduced me to the reality that I am not the center of the world.

From those first rocky interactions with feminism (I very nearly lost most of those friendships, too…in fact I pretty much did), I was eventually pushed and guided toward critiques of white racism, and then even more deeply into women of color’s thinking and organizing around ideas of multiple, intersecting oppressions…and each time, each day, each conference, each book just shook me further and further away from notions of myself, of who I am, and of why I’m here.

The realization, so obscenely simple: that there are actually billions of people on this planet, all of whom hope to be good people, to do good, to be recognized in their work, to be loved and cared for and admired. And that for me to want to claim all of that, to hoard that all for myself and for my posterity…how brutally greedy and foul it is…and how typical.

This shit simply just shook me to my core. Not like in one night of epiphany, but much more slowly, over time, in a process of realization that really just doesn’t stop.

Egos. Of all the questions that surround us when we think of social change, I think this question of ego often gets missed or, more often, misunderstood. It is sooooo deep, and it goes so far beyond just me and my particular story, and it goes so far beyond just white dudes, or white people, or middle class people, or educated people. It is much, much deeper, and I think much more crucial than the particular experiences of one or a handful of identity groups.

This is about who we are, about our places in the world, and about, like I said, a very real desire to be loved and to BE RECOGNIZED in this life. It is so simple but there is so much there, and if we look at social movements (or really any grouping of people) it is amazing to see how far egos and their misplaced desires and insecurities take us. The hierarchical, competitive nature of our society and of all oppressive societies fundamentally warps our senses of our selves — certainly some more than others, and probably proportionate to how close we are to the centers of power — and it warps our ability to hold our own value and desire for recognition alongside that of those around us. We sabotage even those we love because we see and feel threats to our egos all around us.

For me, this question of ego has required me to examine and redefine pretty much every aspect of who I want to be, of how I define success for myself. I cannot deny that it is still fun to think about being able to give speeches that draw crowds, to write a book and maybe get on c-span bookTV, to maybe be somewhere in a history book…and I think a lot about the implications of those lingering fantasies. But more commonly these days, these years, I feel like what I want for myself has shifted towards things much more simple. I dream much more often now of participating in revolutionary processes so big and complex that my own head couldn’t possibly hold onto them, of revolutions that would make me feel like a constant tourist, watching in awe as the people all around me create new things and we really learn from each other. I think about my personal success as the building and sustaining of even just a small community…of shared food and reinvented holidays and kids running around and looking up to us maybe for a few years, but then discovering our foibles, rebelling, and then maybe then reconciling with us years later…I think about plants, and simple music, and simple writings that maybe only my friends read, like these blog entries. I think about designing and playing games. I think about doing good work at a local level, like in the high school where I work, and fighting so hard for the people around me…with the people around me. Knowing them. Crying with them…and just weeping and embracing in sharing our losses and our triumphs.

What I think about is the significance of being just one among many, and rather than thinking that means something boring, conformist, robotic, I think about the magic of it: that we live in a world that is so richly filled with beautiful, brilliant, creative people, and that if unleashed we could share in so much joy and discovery every day, on every block, in every nook and cranny of our lives. In this life it is a privilege to be one among so many who are so fantastic.

Over time, and through the struggle of many patient people who love me and believe in me, I have come to see that there is something far, far more beautiful than the sight of a billion posters with one great liberator’s face: billions of faces making billions of unique posters about their own mutual inspiration and liberation.

So suck on that, Macaulay Culkin.

Just read this article and thought I’d link to it. It’s a good overview of Venezuela’s communal councils, and I think it does a good job of exploring the numerous questions that are bound to be raised in a process like this. A lot of these questions remind me, on a much smaller scale, of questions raised in the high school transformation work I’ve been doing these last few years.

Speaking of which, I’ve been feeling very overworked and emotionally exhausted working at the high school, and that is a big reason for why I haven’t posted since Saturday night. This is sad, because there is much that I want to talk about. I have a whole list of topics that I keep on a crumbled piece of paper in my pocket.

For now, though, I feel safe in asking you to go rent the documentary Jesus Camp and then please come back here and comment on it. Anyone who’s been around me these last few years knows how much I talk about and think about the Evangelical Right and their movement-building work, and this movie really puts faces on the stuff I’ve been thinking about; namely that they are trying to build a rich, parallel subculture which acts a base for eventually winning power in the US. This movie is especially interesting because it focuses on one of the most essential elements of any culture or subculture which hopes to sustain and reproduce itself: the children. It’s a freaky vision of what’s happening out there, but I hope also that it’s a wake-up call. I will write more about this in the future.

Been playing the board game Carcassone a lot with my brother and his wife. Damn is that game fun! Especially with the towers expansion, which makes the game a lot more cutthroat and interactive.

This past Thursday, I went to a special neighborhood meeting that was called because a local non-profit, Casa Latina, wants to relocate all of its services to our neighborhood, and some of the neighbors are concerned. Frankly, some of them are terrified and, as usual, those damned isms are the culprit.

Racism, classism, and xenophobia, to be more specific.

See, Casa Latina is an organization with the purpose of helping mostly Latina/o immigrants to pursue work, education, and personal empowerment. They have ESL programs, women’s empowerment programs, and they also have an active day-labor center, which helps immigrant workers to find day-labor within more dignified conditions than they might otherwise find. Basically, they are doing really good, important work.

My neighbors all seem to agree. Except some of them don’t want that work to be done “in their backyard.” “Can’t you do your good work somewhere else, doesn’t our neighborhood have enough non-profits doing good work?” (actual statement) “Our neighborhood is finally moving away from being a social service magnet, this is taking us in exactly the wrong direction.” Basically, the message was: go help poor Latina/os elsewhere. Here they’re good enough to build our houses and cut our lawns, but god forbid that they actually stick around and set up shop here!

It seems that our neighborhood, Jackson Place (sort of within and between the International District and the Central District in Seattle, right along Jackson st.), is definitely undergoing a process of gentrification, with fancy condos going up and businesses moving in (target is also looking to relocate nearby), and so Casa Latina is exactly the kind of thing that some folks just don’t want. It’s bad for the property values, you know. More white professionals? All for ‘em! More poor brown people? What, what?!

So basically this is how the meeting broke down: the majority of the members were older Asian folks, with some older white folks. The majority were against Casa Latina (but this was just the last in MANY community meetings about this project…and this one was organized by the angry neighbors who seem to have not have heard about the MANY other meetings!), and there were a handful of us who welcome Casa Latina. Also, there were a number of women from the Casa Latina board strongly and clearly defending their project and their organization, and there were two Mexican immigrant men who spoke very emotionally and painfully about the effect that racism and distance from their homes has caused them here in Seattle.

In my view, the “antis” already had their minds made up before the meeting even started. The majority of them were defensive, distrusting, and snotty as hell…basically insinuating that Casa Latina has been planning this project deceptively and with some kind of sweetheart deal with the city, and that they are trying to sneak these new offices onto our streets without telling any of us. When the women strongly explained that this was not the case, it seemed like most of the folks weren’t listening. And there’s a reason for this: the isms had drowned out all other noise in the room.

Only five minutes in, the real issue was out in the open: the anger had nothing to do with lack of open communication or planning protocol or anything, and it had everything to do with the image of poor Latino men out on the street-corner waiting for work.

Latino men. That was the issue. Period.

“I’ve been living here twenty years and we have fought prostitution, drugs, homeless people, people sleeping in benches…and we are terrified of this. We don’t want you here in our neighborhood,” yelled the angry white man who then proceeded to interrupt pretty much everyone else in the room as the night went on.

“Just tell me, are these people legal, or are they illegal?” Another white man chimed in.

“Sir, we don’t ask.”

“Well, then you’re supporting criminals!”

“You don’t even do a background check? We have children going to school nearby, how can the city allow this?”

Fear. Fear. Fear. The image of Latino men, huddled together in the morning, speaking in tongues…who knows what they are saying in that language of theirs…perhaps they are planning on kidnapping our children…or selling drugs. You know, because drugs do come from, you know, those countries down there.

God, it was just a few rifles short of being a Minuteman meeting…and the sad thing was that some of those angry folks weren’t white…they were Asian. It was actually quite devastating, especially in that the “antis”‘ petition actually compared the deal that the city made with Casa Latina to the JAPANESE INTERNMENT! What the?!

There were some allies who spoke up, and the two Mexican men held their ground (even when one of them told the Asian folks that their minds had been poisoned by the racism of white people…every one gasped and laughed at him…despite him being completely right), and frankly Casa Latina is going to win this, because the actual majority of the neighborhood supports them…but it was so painful to watch as stereotypes just rolled along and just got worse.

But I could only smile during the last minutes, when things were really made clear. The old angry white man, who had been yelling and interrupting, all to much applause, decided to tell us a story about how there were three groups doing neighborhood break-ins. One group was caught, and they were three Latinos. (At this point, I loudly said, “OH GOD, here we go!”). He told us that they had climbed up and broken into like the third story of the building…

“They were Latinos who broke in like this. Not black people. Black people just do not break into buildings. Black people will break into your car, or steal other stuff, but they don’t break into buildings.”

And with that, I hope the rest of the “antis” really got to see what position they were associating themselves with. The same old bullshit, dressed up as civic concern for the neighborhood. Those old White Citizen’s Councils were all about being civic minded as well.

Every day more lines are drawn in a not-so-new war against immigrants. Before Thursday, I didn’t know that our own block would end up being a battlefield.

Viva Casa Latina…

Pero, realmente, viva la revolucion…porque una chiquita organizacion como esa no va a poder ganar lo que realmente necesitamos…un cambio completo de este sistema tan injusto, corrupto y criminal. Poco a poco…

Well, I just got back from an amazing youth poetry slam and on my way home I was crafting a post about it. I was going to write about how, for me, poetry is the closest I feel to a revolutionary spirituality, a kind of deep, whole sharing of ourselves, our subjectivities, within a shared context. We are all there, and we get to watch as the center is shifted from person to person, with new stories and perspectives and ways of connecting us to something powerful through language, and intonation, and movement.

So, that was what I was going to write about…but then I read my friend Andrew’s blog and he, amazingly, has said much of what I was going to say. That is a neat bit of serendipity. It kind of made my day. Please read that entry, and then keep reading his blog, because he’s a sharp and dedicated fellow.

In other news, Seymour Hersh was on Democracy Now! today, that was interesting.

Venezuela’s Vice President gave a great speech at the anniversary of the “Caracazo”, the anti-globalization uprising in 1989 that arguably kicked off the current revolutionary process. Once again, he talked about how the communal councils will become the new form of government of Venezuela, a communal socialist government. He also talked specifically about how if the government tries too hard to direct or manage the “explosion of popular power” it will only kill popular power; and about how the government needs to get out of the offices and into the streets. This is a good sign, but of course time will tell.

I’m searching daily for more news about Rigoberta Menchu, but right now the Guatemalan media is more focused on the brutal killing of 3 Salvadoran congress people by Guatemalan police officers. Clearly it’s a really big deal, whether it is related to organized crime, or the state, or whatever.

Maybe someday I will write a poem and post it here. I did write poetry in high school. Even did some slams and had a show downtown. But then I just stopped, and for some reason it feels hard to start again. But that’s how it felt to write in this blog, too.

It’s really interesting to me how the entire flavor and texture of life can change simply by changing the ways in which we engage ourselves in it.  Just by writing in this blog again I feel so many parts of myself are opening up in other parts of my life, and I feel like my mind and senses are getting sharpened.

I’ve started working alot in the garden of my 6-person collective house.  We’ve been tearing up weeds and digging some paths and then laying down bricks and gravel to make them pretty.  Yesterday I helped install a low fence made out of old bicycle wheels dug halfway into the ground.  I’m also renovating our greywater system, which recycles shower water through  series of sand filters, into a small bathtub pond which then filters the water more, until it is ready to go through a hose and water the garden.  It’s neat.  Also I’m talking with my housemates more, eating better, being better with email correspondence (including writing to some old friends).  I’m applying to grad school to get my master’s in teaching (maybe).  I’m more focused at work (sometimes).  And I’m more present with my friends, family, housemates, and partner.  This blog is some kind of amazing medicine for me.  And it’s an addiction.  I come home from work and I just want to write in it, but then I stop myself because I realize that I would just be writing about work all the time.  So it’s better to pause, think, and wait before I just write whatever.

So, now for some random things I learned today:

-Just read Seymour Hersh’s new article (look, I can do links now, thanks Dave!) in the New Yorker about the administrations shifting foreign policy in the Middle East.  Damn.  So it looks like we’re covertly siding with Sunnis in order to contain the Shiites, to the point of financing radical Sunnis (like Al Quaeda allies???) to attack Hezbollah, etc…all of this running without congressional knowledge through the Vice Presidents office? Wow!  Now that’s sinister!

-Today the socialist president of Ecuador,  Rafael Correa (remember, I like this guy), ordered the military to make itself useful by providing for the public good, in an emergency order to build and repair the highway system, using the money that was slated to be used to pay the foreign debt.  This is important for two reasons: 1) Because Correa is making good on his promise to prioritize the “social debt” of the country over the foreign debt, and 2) Because Correa is playing like Chavez in trying to integrate the military into a protagonistic, civil role in the transformational process.  Very, very smart.  Arbenz and Allende fell not solely for lack of military support, but it was part of it, so this is good stuff.  By the way, Correa also has insisted on having a woman as the defense minister.  Even after the first one was killed in a plane crash, he made sure that her replacement would be a woman.  ALSO, he refused to allow anyone call his wife the first lady (primera dama), because he says it is sexist.

-There is an article here about Chavez and his environmental projects.  It’s a bit propagandistic, though I tend to like Eva Golinger’s writing.  This is a bit much, considering that there are still major critiques to be made of the Venezuelan governments oil projects, industrial projects, and ambitious pipeline projects.  Some more perspective, please, Eva.

-Didn’t play any Star Chamber today.  I was too tired from work to concentrate.  Plus it’s more fun to read the news on the internet.

-Watched the Oscar-winning Melissa Ethridge song on you tube…and I just started crying all over the place.  That would be a longer blog post to explain why (the last post can give you an idea, I think).  This world is just so, so beautiful and we deserve so, so much better.  Does global social transformation really need to be so hard?
Darn you power elite for always being such sticks in the mud!

I have nothing particularly profound to say tonight, but I had a hard day that has only gotten harder as it has progressed. And the thing is that all of it has involved watching other people who I care about who are hurting.

Don’t want to be naive guy here, but why are so many people hurting? Why are so many people so lonely, or self-doubting, or, just tired of living?

Sometimes I just sit here, in my bed, and I just look up at the ceiling and I think about how seriously, deeply fucked up our society really is. I try to allow the enormity of it pass over me. I don’t care what cynical folks say, or post-oppression folks, or folks who make themselves feel smart by being dismissive of rage and sadness at the world…I don’t care what they say because I, even with all of my happy times and great privileges, can see just how totally senseless this place is. Not the world, because the WORLD is beautiful. But our SOCIETY…

Senseless. Without fucking sense.

And it’s amazing how many people there are who get paid, who get degrees, who build status and careers all trying to explain this mess, to package it as THE way, trying to argue how it’s good for us, that this is the best of all possible worlds. Well, perhaps so, but it still sucks…and it could be a whole lot better.

To all of you who I know or who know me and who are in pain, I love you. I love you from the core of me, from my baby self through my wide-eyed toddler self and beyond. You may not believe me and that’s part of the problem, huh? And I am sorry. And if I’m a part of the pain then I hope you really know that I’m sorry.

When I was little I just wanted to cuddle up with the Snuggles Detergent bear. I just wanted to lay in those soft warm towels with that cute little bear. Boy, have I seen alot since then.

Umm, pretty much the nerdiest stuff of all:

-The Nintendo Wii.  My brother has one.  He got up at 5 in the morning and waited in line for it.  It is one of the funnest toys I’ve ever played with.  Even my mom enjoys it.  I played Zelda for like 2 days straight.  Then I played Wii sports tennis for like 3 hours…and now my brother and I play Madden football on the Wii every weekend or so.  It’s simply really, really fun.  Of course, all critiques of consumerism, etc. apply.  But still it’s hella fun.  And I avoid the really offensive and violent games, naturally.

-The Nintendo DS.  Really almost more fun than the Wii.  I’ve been playing this musical rhythm game called “Elite Beat Agents” and I don’t think I’ve ever had more fun playing a video game.  It’s very, very addictive.

What’s wrong with me, playing so many video games?  Don’t know, but now I’ve imposed a new limit on myself of no more than 2 hours of TV or video games a day.

There is just way more important stuff to do in the world…

The good thing is I don’t spend any money on this stuff…it’s all been gifts or borrowing or whatever.  I’m actually pretty much only spending money on food these days.  Everything else towards savings and debt and international phone cards.

I would like to thank Alisa, Andrew, and Dave for showing me that you’ve been reading this site lately…for making me want to reach out to you and write more…share more of myself with you.

I also want to thank Glendi, Lambert, and Briana for what y’all are doing to make me feel inspired again.

I just wrote a whole flurry of blog posts in one sitting, because something has clicked in me and I feel inspired again.

It’s okay to have typos and it’s okay to make personal and political mistakes…but it’s not okay for me to just go through each day silently when I have so much that I want to share and experience with the people who I love.  I don’t want my fears to be that powerful in my life.

When I was 14, I kind of decided that I wanted to be a revolutionary.

That decision transformed my life.

Being who I am, with all of the privileges associated with a white, male, middle-class identity, I have always just been sure that I will see global revolution in my lifetime…just like other kids of my identity were sure that they could become doctors and politicians and businessmen. The mythology of our culture is, after all, that we can do anything we put our minds to…I just applied that to global social transformation. And that has always made me one of the most optimistic radicals that I know.

Well recently I’ve been talking with old radical friends and we get to talking about we’ve grown and changed and settled and compromised…and we get to talking about hope, and I say, “yeah, I feel like I have more hope for revolution now than I’ve ever had before.”

…and they just kind of stare at me. Or can’t believe it.

And really, to respond, I only need one word: Venezuela.

There is something magical happening in Venezuela. It is the magic that happens when the energies and aspirations and minds of millions of ordinary people are awakened into social movements. There is a genuine revolution happening there. And it is speeding up so fast that I don’t think the English translators have caught up yet.

It’s not all about Hugo Chavez. Yes, he is the leader, the icon, the figurehead…yes he has tons of power (and now more with the “enabling law” which allows him to fast-track new laws without approval from congress)…and yes there is a gross cult of personality around him (seriously, it’s really gross). But it really isn’t all about him. What he symbolizes, what he talks about, and what he is trying to create is not all about him…it is literally about giving power to the people. I know that sounds weird…especially coming from an anarchist. But it’s the truth.

From the beginning, Chavez has said that to end poverty power must be given to the poor, and since the beginning he and his people have been transforming Venezuelan infrastructure to open up more spaces for popular participation and organization.

Down there, the discourse is very lively around democracy. WAY more lively than here. Unlike supporting Hillary or Obama or McCain or whatever, down there supporting Chavez implies wanted to actually be A PART of the process. They are very critical of representative democracy down there. They talk a lot more about participatory and DIRECT democracy.

And institutionally, these new forms of democracy are blossoming. The Venezuelan state is massively funding new Communal Councils…which are directly elected and recallable councils that represent 200-400 families only…and they are being given state funds to improve their own communities…also there is more and more talk about workers councils…about democracy in schools…about participatory budgets. The discussion of economic democracy and Socialism is now mainstream in Venezuela. The movement toward democratic socialism is now a mainstream debate…and it is a fiery one.

What I see in Venezuela is millions of people engaged in a very messy process that a lot of people outside of Venezuela don’t really understand (and I KNOW that I don’t fully understand it…but I’m reading about it, in Spanish, every day). It is a process that my radical friends and I have only been dreaming about…but down there they are building it. And soon, too, in Ecuador, in Bolivia…maybe in Cuba someday. Maybe in Nicaragua…maybe even in Guatemala.

So yeah…I still consider myself a revolutionary. And I still believe that we can do it. Venezuela can’t show us the way…because the US is much too different. But it should definitely be lighting a fire under our asses.

Need to bring some other parts of myself to this blog.  So with that, some nerd stuff:

-I have been spending about two hours a day lately playing a game called Star Chamber online.  (www.starchamber.net) It’s like a cross between a collectible card game (like Magic) and a board game…with a Star-Treky sci-fi theme.  It’s basically one of the greatest games I’ve ever played and I’m a total addict.  I’d love to play my friends on it, so maybe you should look into it.  It does cost a bit of money to get cards…but there is a strong player community that’ll give you tons of free cards.  They’ve given me hundreds.

-Recently read the sci-fi/woo-woo-fiction novel “The Fifth Sacred Thing,” and even with witchraft and magic and stuff I absolutely loved it.  It reminded me once again of the spirituality of my politics…and how so much of what I believe is rooted in a simple love for life and people and animals, even if I end up getting distracted by big-word theory sometimes.

-I love youtube.com  and I really have gotten into the fake tech-show called “infinite solutions.”  See if you like it.

-I also am a sucker for Saturday Night Live’s digital shorts…I love the newer “laser cats” ones.  When I was 8, my brother and I made a homemade “Aliens 3″ that was almost exactly like those videos.

-I tell my friends that the movie “Children of Men” was a movie for people like us.  It’s the best movie I’ve paid $9 for in awhile.  Also Dreamgirls…loved it.  And I laughed more than I’ll admit at “Music and Lyrics” with Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore (saw it with my parents, okay!)

There’s much more nerd stuff that I keep inside.  Maybe another day.

Yeah, so it’s been awhile and the funny thing is that the last time I wrote I said that I wanted to write more. But I didn’t end up doing it.

Why?

Well, basically because, as much as I want to write and express myself and explore ideas, etc, I’m just scared. I’m scared to write, and I always have been, for as long as I can remember.

For some reason, when I first started this blog while I was in Guatemala, I could write and write and write, and I didn’t really want to stop. But as soon as I got home, when I actually had MORE access to the internet and more free time, that is when everything froze.

What happened? Why did it take a LACK of access to the internet to get me to write, to actually share something of myself…and then when I’m in my normal life I clam up. I procrastinate. I just have so much anxiety and fear about so many things.

I think partly its because when I was away, I was distant from all of the forces in my life that keep me quiet. The people who I fear will judge me. The pressures that I feel on my time, etc.

I think also it is the affect of living the kind of consumerist lifestyle that I live. I am surrounded by distractions. I have so many other things to do besides be creative and expressive, and it seems that at nearly every opportunity, I choose to do those other things.

This makes me so sad, because really there is always so much interesting and beautiful stuff going on in my head that I would love to explore, and even share with whoever reads this, but it just doesn’t get out. But that’s also a part of it, as well. I get so overwhelmed by all of the things that I want to do, all at the same time, that I end up not doing anything.

I want this to change. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t. Maybe I’ll do something or not. I guess we’ll all see, depening on future entries.

…And really, there is SO much that I want to be saying to all of you, to myself, right now.

Maybe someday.

I got back from Caracas on Monday evening. I’ve been pretty much home sick since then. Nothing serious, just a sore throat and slight fever.

But it’s made it even harder to acclimate back to my life here in Seattle…especially because of all that I experienced down there in Venezuela.

Don’t be fooled by the lack of updates to this blog…the reason I haven’t written isn’t for lack of things to write, but just the opposite. I was having so many back-to-back experiences every day (from 7am to 2am…I only got about four hours of sleep a night) that I couldn’t find time to search for an internet cafe and write up my reflections.

Only now, sick at home and bored, am I finding this time to type something up.

And what do I have to say?

Well, fundamentally, I can say that I have come back to the United States with a whole new level of hope.

For the first time in a long time, I feel like I have real hope for the world that is not based in my own self-generated fantasies of a different society, but rather in concrete processes that are actually taking place. For the first time in a long time, I can sit back and relax as my hope is refilled from an external source rather than from my own rusting reserves of teenage idealism…it feels so refreshing.

In Venezuela–and more broadly in contemporary Latin America and in the World Social Forum–there is something happening. It is something that people like me and my friends have been dreaming about and have been predicting for years, only to be called naive, only to be accused of misunderstanding human nature. There is a process underway that is engaging millions and millions of people in the creation of a new kind of society, based around a handful of key values: inclusion, participatory democracy, socialism, and integration.

The process is not perfect. In fact, it’s a mess. There is corruption. There is mismanagement. There is conflict. There is chaos. There are power struggles and there are injustices. It would be foolish to hide these or to apologize for them. They are real and they are a problem. But at the same time the process is also real. It is not made moot by it’s contradictions, in fact it might end up being strengthened by them…

I know that this is all vague so far. Sorry for that. But what I’m talking about is actually very solid and concrete and measurable…and it goes like this:

Venezuela, historically, has been a tremendously unequal country. 60-80% below the poverty line, while the middle and upper classes have enjoyed a US/Europe style consumer lifestyle…including shopping trips to Miami for new clothes (Venezuela isn’t that far from Florida…or Cuba for that matter). At the same time, it is one of the most oil-rich countries in the world…but historically only the top few have benefited from this wealth. As in most Latin American countries, there have always been social movements in Venezuela…there have been coup attempts, Guerilla movements, protest movements, riots (especially the 1989 riots in Caracas called the “caracazo” which arguably led to the current revolutionary process)…and these have left a legacy which eventually led to a left-wing coup attempt by a young paratrooper named Hugo Chavez Frias in 1992…Chavez’ coup failed, but he became a popular hero, was able to build a movement from jail, and then ran for president in 1998 on a promise to change the entire system, starting with a new constitution. He won. He won by 55+ %, which is rare for Latin American elections…especially since he didn’t really have a party. But he won. And he immediately held a national referendum to ask about rewriting the constitution. This passed. Then he called for elections for form a representative constituent assembly. This happened. Then the constitution was written, hastily debated at all levels of society (but emphasis should be put on the word hasty), and then it was also put up for referendum. It passed…and became one of the most progressive constitutions in the world, spelling out such rare things as social security guarantees for housewives, a whole chapter on indigenous rights, the idea of participatory democracy as opposed to mere representative democracy (that is, citizens actually directly participate in decision-making, they don’t just elect higher representatives to do all that in their name), rights for people with disabilities, etc…I have a copy and it really is quite amazing. It actually became a huge source of pride, especially for poorer Venezuelans, who for the first time began to feel included in the political process.

With the new constitution, Chavez and the entire government needed to be “re-legitimized” and so he and the entire new national assembly were re-elected in 2000…again by majorities. Then the reforms came. Land reforms. Fishing reforms. Oil reforms. The rich became antsy and they began to more seriously resist…

In 2002, with US support, the rich organized a coup. It only lasted 3 days. The poor supporters of Chavez, along with the rank-and-file of the Venezuelan military, came out of their homes and barracks and took the power back, putting Chavez back into the presidency (there is an amazing documentary about this, “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” and you need to see it).

But the rich didn’t stop. They organized an “oil strike,” shutting down Venezuela’s most important industry and smashing the economy. But over time, this tactic failed as well, because lower-rank oil workers took over oil production, and Chavez filed the upper-bureacracy…stabilizing the economy again…

Then Chavez began deeper reforms. The missions. Mission Robinson, which seeks to complete eliminate illiteracy through free neighborhood reading programs. Mission Ribas and Sucre, which allow adults to finish high school and college, also for free. Mission Barrio Adentro (1, 2, and 3), which provide doctors and clinics within poor neighborhoods for absolutely free care. Mission Mercal, which provides special supermarkets with heavily subsidized foods….all of this paid for by oil profits that previously had only gone to the rich.

And so the rich kept at it…and they tried to use the constitution itself against Chavez…being a progressive constitution, it allows for the population to recall any politician from power, even the president. And so the opposition gathered signatures from 20% of the population (though this is disputed), and there was a recall referendum in 2004…once again Chavez won with a 55% majority. Only solidifying his political stability.

Since then, Chavez has become even more radical in his programs. More money for the missions. More money for social spending. Increased support for the formation of worker’s cooperatives as opposed to traditional top-down capitalist businesses…and just last year he finally used the “s-word”….Socialism. That is the direction that Venezuela is heading in. I couldn’t be happier.

Chavez states, repeatedly, that Venezuelan socialism will be fundamentally different than the USSR, or Cuba, or China…those models do not work (in my view, they aren’t socialist at all). In the Venezuelan process, they are trying to build socialism right alongside this other thing, called participatory democracy. They want equality, but they want it anchored in a democracy that allows people to discuss and debate and have real control over how things develop in the society…and this is what I saw in Venezuela.

In Venezuela, we visited a number of cooperatives, and missions, and community meetings, and we met with a large number of folks who are involved in this revolutionary process, and what I saw in all of this gave me hope. Just as I said in the last post, Chavez is not a dictator. He’s not perfect, and I think he’s too popular (he’s like a folk hero, with t-shirts, and dolls, and posters and all that…not by imposition but genuinely because he’s so popular…which is a problem. No person should be that popular, it’s dangerous), but at the same time there are millions of people trying to make this process happen independent of Chavez…and I think they will succeed. With time, I think they will succeed.

Okay, I’m tired for now…but I want to end this post just by saying that I think we in the US need to study what’s happening in Latin America very carefully. First, because if we don’t then we are going to be taken very much by surprise when we see a whole slew of socialist societies right down there at our South. But second, because we can learn so much from what is happening about how our own society should be changed. Hopefully we can do it without a strong personality like a Chavez…but I hope we do it somehow.

To all of those who actually read this thing,

I’m back at the keyboard again, preparing to share more about myself, my life, my ideas once again…and it’s taken another bit of international travel to get me here. I’m going to Venezuela.

Through a unique opportunity at my college, I am traveling to Caracas, Venezuela to attend the 2006 Americas Section of the World Social Forum, which is a massive annual gathering of people who believe that “another world is possible” (that’s the forum’s slogan). There are expected to be around 100,000 people attending, from all over the Americas, and there are 2,200 scheduled workshops, meetings, performances, speeches, etc.

This is all really exciting, but honestly I’m more excited just to be going to Venezuela itself. I’ve been following the political developments in Venezuela since 2003, pretty much on a daily basis, and I believe that people down there are genuinely trying to create a peaceful social revolution…which hopefully those of us in other countries can learn from (both positive and negative lessons). At the same time, however, this revolutionary process is very polarizing down there, and there is A LOT of media/government bias here in the U.S. about what they are trying to do in Venezuela, and so it’s very hard to get accurate information.

A good tip is: DON’T BELIEVE WHAT THE MEDIA SAYS ABOUT VENEZUELA. Hugo Chavez, the president, is not a dictator. He is not just another Fidel Castro. Flawed? Yes. But dictator? No.

Okay, this is enough for now. More as it comes…in the meantime check out this site to learn more about the Venezuelan revolutionary process (they call it “el proceso”).

You can also check out info about the forum itself here.

I love you, all of you who are actually reading this, and I hope to keep you energized and reflective and inspired as I tell you all about my experiences.

This is it. My last post from Guatemala. For this last post, I want to translate into English the speech I gave for my final graduation from the mountain school. I think it says everything I want to say:

—
There aren’t words. There aren’t words to describe my experiences here in Guatemala, here at the escuela de la montaña. How can you describe the subtle changes inside of a heart?

I’m a gringo. I come from a country, a culture where latinos and latinas are almost invisible, as farmworkers, gardeners, maids, mechanics. Where my students who don’t speak English are treated as if they don’t have brains. We, we white folks, are so lost in our things,