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I opened my eyes yesterday and then I opened my phone
Shooting
Sale
Sale
Sale
Sale
Biggest sale of the year
Huge sale
Time to shop
Trump has his twitter back
5 dead at gay nightclub
Murder
Murder
Hate Crime
Murder
2 gays save the other gays because cops don’t save us we do
Sale
Black Friday comes early
Sale
Sale
Sale
It is time to shop everything is on sale
I cried into my coffee then I cried in the shower then I cried texting friends then I prepared to teach Quilt Class, a place I have come to know I can be my full messy imperfect self, just as my quilts are, just as the space of learning is. I attempted to “gather” myself before opening the zoom, putting my phone down long enough to center away from the beam of messaging to shop and grieve simultaenously.
During Week Three of class we talk about all of the things you can do with quilts. Sell them, gift them, raffle them off, donate them. Create a memorial quilt, auction a quilt in an art show with your friends, make them for babies and weddings, make them for yourself to sleep under, and so much more.
The biggest collaborative art project in the world is a quilt. The NAMES Project Aids Memorial Quilt founded by Cleve Jones and friends in 1987 now has over 50,000 panels which you can view here. This piece of art and activism touches into a part of me that no other piece of art ever has. The way I think of my queer ancestors, my own practice of quilting, centering awareness and action, and the research of people and place.
When I read Jones’ speech from the chapter We Bring A Quilt from his autobiography out loud in class, channeling a whole generation of our queer ancestors lost, I feel weepy and shaky. But on this day something flooded through me I have perhaps never felt so deeply. This rage and pain and grief of how hated we are, how much the systems don’t even consider taking care of us.
We bring a quilt. It grows day by day and night by night, and yet its expanse does not begin to cover our grief nor does its weight outweigh the heaviness within our hearts.
For we carry with us a burdensome truth that must be simply spoken. History will record that in the last quarter of the twentieth century a new and deadly virus emerged, and that the one nation on earth with the resources, knowledge, and insitutions necessary to respond to the new epidemic failed to do so. History will further record that our nation’s failure was the result of ignorance, prejudice, greed, and fear in the Oval Office and the halls of congress.
It is no mystery that the systems are not built for us, but there was something about reading the news of queer community being murdered in Colorado Springs at Club Q to then reading to queer community and the parents of queer community in quilt class, that my body just couldn’t be in “professional teacher mode” whatever that even means.
When I got to the failed to do so part of reading I completely lost it. I couldn’t catch my breath, I thought surely I can float above my body and finish reading this for my students. But I just couldn’t stop crying. My brain was racing with codependent thoughts of - they think I am a whack job, this is unprofessional, I shouldn’t have read this today if I didn’t think I could get through it.
Failed to do so
Failed to do so
The anti trans and anti queer rhetoric by Republicans and Conservatives isn’t just failing us, it is killing us
By the time I somehow finished reading I looked up only to see the chat filled with love, and responses of gratitude for everyone being able to feel their own feelings. At the beginning of class one student paused me and asked if we could all take a few deep breaths together, a reminder even as facilitator I don’t have to guide us alone, we guide us together.
I have walked through a lot of my life with huge awareness of my feelings, a Gemini ability to name them and know why they are there. But to feel them has only just started to be truly available to me. I left quilt class yesterday thinking - what an absolute gift to feel so big and want to stay.
If you are performing on a stage, teaching a class, on a podcast, at your cubicle, parenting your kids, walking your dog, trying to “get through” a moment where being flooded with feeling is “inconvenient” - may it safely rush through you.
May its rush be of great benefit to those waiting for their own release
May we keep each other safe, as we always have
Many Hands Make a Quilt: Short Histories of Radical Quilting by Jess Bailey, Public Library Quilts
When We Rise: My Life in The Movement - The Autobiography of Cleve Jones
The Quilt: Stories from the Names Project
Join me in supporting this Go Fund Me today
Look at the way we love each other forever and ever
When I think of sacred queer ancestors lost to AIDS, failed to be protected, I think of Arthur Russell
Fearless, Unashamed, Full of Life
Kelly Loving <3
To everyone having a sale - I love you. Thank you. I like buying beautiful things. If you can’t afford to put your beautiful art on sale, that is ok too. Winter is upon us, the season that asks us to turn inward. Yet capitalism prevails, and we need to make money. May you find ease and fun in your marketing, may your sales reach many people, may you be in lush abundance.
Set the bar low, may you do only enough to be in your body today. May you revel in cancelling, laying low, saying no. My only loyalty is to love.
A portion of November’s paid subscriptions goes towards the The Mishigamiing Journalism Project - which provides support for Indigenous people to report, consult, and train in the Traverse City Record-Eagle newsroom
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Photo of me on the beach in my NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt Shirt by little brother Sam Cook-Parrott
