Items

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  2020-06

  June of 2020: a quarantine journal

  This past June, for the first time in my life, I began keeping a daily journal—composed in formally identical declarative sentences—as a record, not only the events of the world that were on and affecting my mind, but also my domestic observations of home, of family, the creatures in my yard, the blooms erupting throughout the garden. In a season of isolation and upheaval, it in many ways helped to keep my brain from total dissolution into quaking depression. Once this month-long record was complete, I launched a Kickstarter campaign in support of the limited publication of *June of 2020: a quarantine journal*, with all profits being donated to Black Girl in Maine, a social-justice blog founded by writer, educator, and activist Shay Stewart-Bouley. While my skill has always been the construction of narratives that allow the reader to feel what it’s like to experience the characters’ experiences, Shay’s talent lies in taking the complex abstractions of social justice and explaining them in a way that is not only immediate and concrete, but also grounded in the experiences of both herself and her audience (in other words, she takes the cultural phenomenon at large and makes it directly relevant to you and your life). She has an ability that I lack. So I’m using my abilities to help support her and her work.
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  2020-06-28

  Camping During a Pandemic

  Before COVID-19 had hit the US as hard it did, a couple of friends and I had talked about going camping in Saco River once the semester was over. However, once we all went into quarantine this plan felt far from reality and we all forgot about it. It was the beginning of July and things had calmed down a little bit. I remember being out of quarantine and businesses had started to open up. The topic of camping came up again when we were thinking of ways to see each other in an open land where we can have a good time considering social distancing. Once we thought through the logistics, a couple of friends and I decided to hit the road and drive up to Saco, Maine, and spend two nights by the river in our tent. This ended up being the experience of a lifetime and just what we needed to get away from the pandemic for just a little while. We were restricted from using our phones and all sorts of social media because there was no service. We cooked, swam, played games, and tanned by the water with no worries of what was to come. We also went tubing down the river one of those days and breathed in the fresh air. We truly lived in moment and cherished the beauty of nature which allowed us to escape the reality of the world and take some time to clear our minds.