Partner, Parent, Portal

"o Mother, Father, may i please share this bounty?"

"no."

"but--" 

"we said no."

this past week, one of my partners visited. we'd both been planning it for a while. shortly before they came, they'd told me a story about how they 'had' to call the cops on someone at their work for being violent. apparently a woman came in asking if she could use the bathroom, for the second time, as she'd tried earlier at a different place in the neighborhood, another chain, she was told she couldn't, and she snapped and started throwing things. my opinion of that woman doesn't matter; though, for those who wonder, it's that not only do i have sympathy but i actually relate and i hope she's safe. what happened after was quite curious. i called out my partner on whether they truly had to speak to the police or not, and they were hurt. personally, they made it personal. my priority wasn't their feelings, simply because i knew the individual feelings of someone on that end of the phone can be soothed easier than, say, a broken bone can be healed. and i know, i have been egocentric before, and likely will be again, yes, i could list the times i remember and that list wouldn't be complete by any means, but speaking to the police? or rather, not speaking to the police, for the protection of community? that is lesson one. i asked my partner why the bathrooms were closed to customers in the first place, and they told me it was because addicts were using them to do - and apparently sell - drugs. okay, and? anyway, the next night, the curious thing was, they rescinded the things they'd said. including that they disagreed that ACAB, not entirely A of them, because one was nice, and even cute. they rescinded that. but not in a way that suggested they had actually thought about what i'd said from their own positionality, their own experiences intact, it was more like they were revising, editing what they'd said, with the same intentions & sentiments behind the changing words, to make it seem more like they agreed with me. it was suspicious. 

they visited from last Monday to this Saturday evening, and it was strange.

i love them, deeply, and i wanted to have a good time with them, and so we did the things we talked about doing, like going to multiple malls, because i like malls.

at least, i liked malls.

i referred to malls once as the contemporary agora, but i realized, during these days, no, for malls to be contemporary agoras, they would have to be destroyed and rebuilt as inland ports, of sorts, places where traveling merchants could sell & trade their wares, but corporations would have no place there, nobody would get arrested for loitering, there would be no security guards to protect the individual profits of someone who is not beholden to the community. this is the problem with justifying your individual profits with statements like 'commerce is not capitalism,' we currently have no clue what anti-capitalist commerce looks like. maybe instead of fast fashion selling out fast and disintegrating faster, there would be warehouses full of base materials, and patterns, templates, uploaded to a communal database, where if you wanted something made, from clothes to household objects, you'd have to make it yourself out of something that would go to someone else if you didn't use it, rather than expecting the unnecessary excess. whatever. that's a tangent. it's not important.

'really not important.

i am in a very strange position, my positionality is very strange. i am disabled. i am white. i am abused. i have resources, not an obscene amount, but i am definitely not poor, but i am, in two ways, but not in a third; alone, i have nothing. with my parents who allow me no autonomy, who have control over my financial futures, i have so much more than i would ever be allowed to use. i have a bounty, that i have been chained away from. to cut the chains completely and be without them would mean being without the bounty completely. i cannot afford rent, without being propped up by people who'd only deem me worth it if i conformed to what they wanted, but i can afford to go the mall, and buy useless things. maybe that's what middle class is now, being unable to afford true survival but perfectly able to afford frivolous distractions, being in the middle of inevitable starvation and fruitless decadence.

it was very strange, rolling my wheelchair through the mall, finding that i didn't want a damn thing.

okay, so, that's not very true. i saw a short-sleeved, hooded jacket, that i texted pictures of to my sewing friend to ask if she had any patterns so i could make one myself, there were some collectible art toys, too, that i did like. but i didn't want to spend money on them. my partner ended up getting two of them for me, however much i tried to tell them i didn't need any. they're a bit cool to have. and that's it; something that's 'a bit cool to have' is far less valuable to me than human life. and that really is what i feel it's come down to lately. i don't think you all understand; i like pimping cars, i like rock music, i like playing poker, i like baking casseroles. i have a favorite revolving sushi restaurant in my neighborhood. i like things. i like food. i am not an angel on Earth. the only thing i am is human.

that's it.

that's all that's changed, is the depth of my awareness that i am, in fact, human.

"o Mother, Father, may i please share this bounty?"

"no."

"but i cannot hold it all within me, i have to share it, it's too much to hold alone. i am only one man."

"we said no."

a few summers ago, in western Yaanga (you may know it as "Los Angeles"), where i currently live, a storm was coming through, and i practically begged my parents to allow me to turn our home into a heat shelter. only temporarily, and i'd do all the labor, all they had to do was give me the keys to the castle, for lack of a better phrase. they said no. and it was final. i begged them, and then i fought them, i only backed down once i literally had to, but it was final. the no crushed me, and even worse, it might've killed a few folk, too. i still have no idea how many people died of colonial hypothermia that year. and everyone i've told that to has conceded my parents have a point, but it wasn't a problem with logistics that i wasn't seeing, it was that my mother was uncomfortable with houseless people in our home. that was why the answer was a resounding, crushing, killing no. that was why. o, Mother, do you not see how much of a crime your discomfort is? how cruel your hurt feelings are? someone is out there dying, and you are complaining that i am being disrespectful!

you might think i'm a cynic. you might think i'm lacking in love. in truth, i am practically overwhelmed by & overflowing with it. i love people. people are not distractions, people are not tools. people are vibrant and complex and with depth. yeah. i love everyone, i really do, and i wish sometimes that i could forego discernment and welcome everyone into my life. regardless of any harm to me. but it’s not even just about me, individually. we’re a community, and every choice has consequences. welcoming someone in who isn’t for abolishing literally all cops, for whatever reason, for instance, might very well lead to them being called and putting everyone’s work&life in danger down the line. welcoming someone in who doesn’t fw land back, who doesn’t care about indigenous sovereignty, yet, means you’ll have someone at risk of practicing neocolonialism under a different name and superficially different ideology. this stuff can be taught, but it takes effort to teach. it’s a lonely world, when you’re trying to build a better one. i love my partner, deeply, i love my mother, deeply, i love my incredible asshole friend, deeply, i love everyone, deeply, i really do, and i wish i could take everyone with me. i wish that i could spread my arms, open my hands, and out could flow life-giving waters, i wish giving and giving back was that simple, that inevitable, that unstoppable. i love everyone deeply, and yet i am lonely, because i am apparently insane. i am the one with whom there is something wrong. i am, at my dinner table, the black ram of the devil. (i find it interesting and tragic that darkness, blackness, and so Blackness, is associated with negativity. why? the night is dark, and it is beautiful. but i suppose 'the black sheep' is a metaphor a lot of people use to describe someone forcibly disconnected from their family, and i connect with the devil as the first rebel, so i consider this to be positive.) i am the downer.

yeah, no, i didn't want a thing from the malls i went into.

i wanted an end to genocide. i wanted freedom. everything else, everything 'a bit cool to have,' paled in comparison.

you might think i enjoy being some kind of pretentious asshole, but i don't. i've talked about my drive to get home to Greece. well, my mother, even though it is my motherland, she operates as though she forgot. and yet she holds the keys to the castle, still. she holds the keys to my becoming a Greek citizen. she holds my money. to become a Greek citizen, i'd have to swear allegiance to Greece, The Country. not Greece, the Land, the Water. and i frankly don't want to swear allegiance to any state. i'd like to think i could survive as a "'houseless' 'non-citizen'" in Greece ('i am not homeless if this is my home,' i'd think to myself, arriving back on those shores). i'd like to have something i could use to prove i'm not weak like i fear others think i am (that's probably internalized ableism, but--). i don't know that for sure, though, i don't know. anyone who encourages me to center my individual comfort will be promptly punched in the face, because i want to be loved among others, not above others, and loved for the work i do, and not barred from work, due to neither entitlement nor perceived fragility, however, i cannot lie about my reality. i cannot throw myself forward and hope i will land on my feet. if i have the privilege to have the choice to break less of myself when i jump, shouldn't i take it? if only so i can be effective? so i can maintain what little autonomy i have? there is specific medication, if nothing else, i need to survive. which means i need to conform just enough to make it attractive to the suppliers & insurance companies to allow me to live, if i choose to live. i would rather tear those people asunder. i would rather we just give & receive what we need, directly and reciprocally. but i will swallow my discomfort with feeling weak, with wearing the mask of one who performs complacency, at strategic times, in the very short-term, just to get to where i need to be, if it means that the kyriarchy is destroyed. do you see? it is not for my survival, for my comfort. it is for my surival, for all of our survival. everyone matters. anyway, to wear that mask in front of my mother, i have to convince her to make us citizens of Greece by pointing out all the wonderful-to-a-Westerner things about Greece, about Europe, generally, even though Greece, and Europe, Generally, are very different, like efficient public transportation, and free, universal healthcare. things that center her comfort. it feels like having to offer dog treats to a human being. it feels demeaning, to them, and to me. but if i explained the truth of why i want to return home, i would be insane. i already am. not everyone even gets the chance, the privilege, to become a citizen, but because i have the privilege, i have the chance, the choice, but i might have no choice at all, i might have to keep to the mask, lest i jump and break more of myself that can be repaired. and even if i keep to the mask, i still may not be allowed citizenship. just like before, i am not-trapped and trapped all at once. is my individual life even worth the risk of performing complacency, and therefore practicing it, in the face of atrocity? i am looking for survival, not comfort, but the systems we exist under lead us to constantly conflate the two - god, especially for disabled people, the disability money i get is much more than i'd ever need, individually, but i can't share it or spend it on anything that really matters, anything i do need, like affording rent, like i said, or a vehicle, otherwise it all gets taken away - and we need to parse this out, is there another way to survive? hmm. these wonderings are untangling in me & others. i'll give them time, and keep you all updated.

if i die before then, if i am killed before i am able to return home, either to Greece or in some other place-form, some other elsewhere-home, in other words, if i am killed before we are all, all free, i will be pissed. 

i will not be at peace. i will be livid.

because i was not done, dammit. i had finally put plans into motion, these were not just words anymore but today's and tomorrow's actions. and yesterday's, too. and i was not done. and we were not all free.

when i was younger, i had a dream, that a ring of continuously erupting volcanoes surrounded the city where i lived. each volcano had two heads to it, and in-between the two heads on each was a stretch of road, and it was all laid out so the road went in a big circle, and all the cars on that road just kept driving in that big circle, under that black-red, smoky, choking sky. (cyclical thinking is not 'bad,' and linear thinking is definitely not 'good;' i am just transcribing the dream the way it happened.) fire and ash, everywhere. and the cars just kept driving. eyes on the road, nowhere else. nobody else in the car i was in seemed to see what the city, no, the entire visible world, looked like, except for me.

i'm getting out of that fucking car.

i am looking at the sky, and the people around me. i do not care if the ash hurts my eyes, or if the others don't want me around because they taste it on my skin.

when we drove my partner to the airport tonight, i gripped their hand, tightly. i love them, deeply; please, walk through that portal. like i have. i know it's terrifying. this is why i do not want to be alone, here on the other side of the first of many portals. please, share in this bounty. the bounty of constant becoming. please, see the ash. lick it off my skin, and i'll lick it off yours. let us taste the flame, and join in it. together.

it's a lot to ask, i know. it may not be answered, i know. i won't force it. with certain people, with all this collapse-change coming closer to where they live, they will either learn or not-learn. and i will not let anyone tell me what to do. did you know? after a volcano erupts, that is the time of the nutrients. the soil is reborn.