Homage to Minneapolis
It's not goodbye, it's see you later
It is special to be changed by a place. A place of bike lanes, bridges, and lakes. A place of eight-lane interstates, desolate skyways, and miserable malls. A place of art shanties on frozen lakes, puppet parades in city parks, and street memorials to martyrs. A place where the city kicks people to the curb and cops evict them from that same curb. A place where mutual aid networks build yurts, share food, and keep their neighbors safe. A place of radical seasonal change, where the longest and hottest days give way to the coldest and shortest. A place where endless winters mean cozy movie nights and fleeting summers bring serene days reading by a lake. A place of radical political change, of illustrious movement lineage. A place where the American Indian Movement blossomed, where your neighborhood coffee shop is worker-owned, where ICE alerts spur hundreds to action, where uprisings ignite the globe, where precincts burn. A place where the devastation of our world is omnipresent. A place where the potential of a better world is omnipresent. A place where racist militarized police roam the streets. A place where hundreds gather to sing on a park slope and welcome the solstice. A place where I learned to love, to grieve. A place where I learned to lead with curiosity, to grasp at roots. A place where I learned to wave to passersby, to lean on friends. A place where I learned what it means to be grounded, to be principled. I came to the Twin Cities as a wide-eyed 18 year old whose heart was in the right place but who didn’t have a clue. Yesterday, I was packing my stuff and I stumbled upon an essay I wrote six years ago as a college freshman. Embarrassingly, it read: “My goal is to make a boatload of money and invest it all in renewable energy. Instead of rejecting money as a symbol of evil American capitalism, it should be used to stop the problem. Wealth and climate action don’t need to be independent.” Fuck that. In Minneapolis, it’s hard not to change. I leave this place as a wide-eyed 24 year old with a small piece of the puzzle, a sense of purpose and a desire to help usher in something new. It’s not goodbye, it’s see you later.
PS: The “Here” in “Here & Together” is changing (I’m moving to NYC for the summer and perhaps longer). My publishing may be a bit sporadic, but my commitment to share my writing here remains!
As I orient to a new place and dive into a few exciting long-term projects, your support is appreciated now as ever. You all reading the things I write allows me to continue sharing on Substack and pursuing independent journalism as a means of sustaining myself. I’m lowering the price of paid subscriptions to $5/month or $50/year to make financially supporting my work more accessible. Nothing will be paywalled and free subscriptions/sharing with friends is also incredibly helpful.
Tears. Love.
Lovely Joseph