Over the past several weeks, community has kept me driven to continue doing my organizing work both within the classroom and outside of it. Planning the Love, Care, Connect event reminded me of the value and importance of communication, mindfulness, and intersectionality when we organize for our communities. Working with my boutique team was nothing short of a breeze. Everyone was so enthusiastic, flexible, and we had great transparent and clear communication throughout the whole process. When it came to outreach to get clothing donations, we were already very much blessed by Christine and other folks in our class who came through with bins of clothing the day of. We worked together to delegate tasks, create efficient systems of set up and take down, and maintained an open mind when any hiccups came about. It is through experiences like these that inspire me to continue to organize my own mutual aid events for folks in the greater San Diego community. What makes events like this so inspiring and impactful is that we are being mindful and reflective of our own roles in society, we are aware of our positionalities, our privileges and we leverage them in a way that is most instrumental to bridging gaps in equity when it comes to having our basic needs met. Being mindful about what folks actually need versus what we think they need is an important distinction to make because it puts us in the position of being the student. It puts us in a non-hierarchical structure of trust, commitment, and love. Caring for our communities is an extension of the love we have towards ourselves. It is a new form of love language that I continue to adopt today.
What I love so much about this class is how we get to learn through the art of storytelling. As someone that loves poetry and writing, it is especially meaningful to get to talk to elders in different living environments and hear about all of their amazingly fruitful and rich lives and co-create meaningful work from it. During our combined class outing, we went to see the SRO at Sara Francis, visit the Potiker Senior Housing units, the Talmadge permanent supportive housing apartments, and the LGBTQ senior living units. What stood out to me the most was our final stop and getting to eat lunch and converse with the elders there.
I got the opportunity to talk to some really interesting Queer elders like John. During the lockdown period of this ongoing pandemic, he showed us a framed photo of a collection of over 50 paintings he did on baseball cards he collected over the years. It was such a cool form of creating something new out of something old. He was able to really tap into his artistry and his painting skills with some guided prompts from an intergenerational artist collective he is a part of. Each week they would send out either a prompt or a letter or some phrase to formulate his work around to garner inspiration while setting a guide for artistic direction. Hearing his life story of traveling around the world being in the military to landing in San Diego and working on his art now was inspiring. It's a reminder that while life is "short" we can also shift into the perspective that life can be long too. Life can be long in the sense that we don't always need to worry when we're young about how our lives are going to pan out right here and now. We can focus on the actual 'here' and 'now' by being present, enjoying what life is to us in this current time, and use each day to build upon what it is that we truly want, follow our purpose and create the life we hope to be living in our inevitable old age. Getting to develop connections to older adults is so special because it is a living reminder that we can find happiness and joy in the present and focus our attention to what actually matters to us, and not what our capitalist society or social constructs tell us that we need to focus on. Lesson 1: Love is Transcendant
I met who I'm calling my "surrogate grandmother" at the Gary Mary West Senior Wellness Center. Her name is Eiko. She is 82 years old. She is a volunteer ambassador who comes into the center every day except Sundays. She caught my eye when we first set foot in the center because she was wearing the coolest denim maxi dress with embroidered flowers and a beanie with a metal rooster pin in it. She was holding 1lb weights curling them for the bone health exercise class the West Center offers to their clients. After the tour of the facility, I mustered up the courage to go over and talk to her. I met her friend Tom (pictured to the left of the selfie) and they were both so warm and friendly to me. We talked about our cultural background and when I mentioned I was half-Japanese on my mother's side, her eyes lit up and she immediately gave me the biggest hug. I got nervous that she would be disappointed that I didn't speak Japanese well, but she said she didn't mind. We joked about having 1:1 Japanese lessons so I could practice with her. I made sure I complimented her outfit once I felt more confident in our interaction. I couldn't help but feel so much awe and admiration towards her. Tom also spoke very highly of Eiko-san. That she is well-known throughout the facility, and I now understood why. She told me that she loves to make her own items like the beanie she was wearing. She then proceeded to reach into her bag and took out two cloth discs wrapped in plastic. She told me that she hand-stitched them herself. Eiko described them as oven mitts for the microwave. My eyes began to well-up with the overwhelming feeling of love. She reminded me so much of my own grandmother. I told Eiko that my grandmother was a seamstress and made items similar to the mitts and beanie. We hugged again. She told me that the mitts were for me to keep. I thanked her in Japanese, and tried my best not to lose all my composure and just absolutely burst into tears. Before we left, my peers were telling me that Eiko was looking for me. When I reached her, she took the black beanie off her head and placed them in my hands. She said it was for me to keep. I would've lost it right then and there, but I just hugged her tight and told her I would come back to visit her again. The love that she had for a complete stranger, only sharing a similar cultural background amazes me. I have been raised by my own family, including my Japanese grandmother with this same value, to always care for others and do right by others when given the opportunity. Eiko-san is someone I will never forget. She carries such light and bright energy, and we both knew we felt a beautiful connection emerging from our short-lived first interaction together. Indeed, love transcends across oceans, cultures, race, language barriers, and age. However, there is something to be said about the way Eiko-san's love transcends the socially constructed emotional barriers of being a stranger. |
Mira GuptaMira is a Global Health Major and a Healthcare and Social Issues minor. She is from New York City, and her interests and passions include singing, dancing, being in nature, writing and research on social justice and health, writing poetry, community organizing, and fashion! She has also recently been picking up new hobbies such as hiking, bouldering, and collaging! ArchivesCategories |