The high of my week was… the return of game night! We had a long hiatus from game night, as we pause our biweekly Saturday night tradition during football season. Usually, we start it back up after the Super Bowl but my brother got the flu and was out of commission for a few weeks and then Coronavirus happened. My brother texted my mom and me on Saturday, asking if we were up for game night, and we were both totally on board! It felt so nice and normal and wonderful to hang out and play games and eat pizza. I’m trying to continue to be cautious about venturing out and being around people, but I feel safe having my mom, stepdad, brother, and nephews in my circle.
The low of my week was… the horrific murder of George Floyd. It feels so trite to call it a “low” of my week, but his murder has been on my mind constantly. It’s not that these deaths are surprising, but they do make me feel so angry. And helpless. As a white woman, I don’t know what my role here should be. I try to educate myself as best as I can on racial injustice through books, articles, and podcasts. I try to educate other white people, although I could definitely do a much better job of that because I know how fragile white people are and I kowtow to their needs more than they deserve. I could also do a better job of lifting up Black voices on social media. Sometimes I worry that I’m just adding to the noise and doing something that doesn’t require any effort on my part. But maybe the point isn’t about my role in this—maybe it’s just about exposing the white people in my circle to Black voices and views in the hopes of breaking them out of their bubble.
An article I appreciated was… 75 Things White People Can Do for Racial Justice by Corinne Shutack. I encourage every white person to read this list and write down a few of the things you can do to either expose yourself to the Black experience or work on criminal justice initiatives in your community. I know I’ll be looking through this list this weekend and thinking about the steps I can take.
A podcast series I’m enjoying is… In the Dark: Coronavirus in the Delta. I’m way behind on my podcast queue so I’ve only listened to two of the episodes in this series so far, but it’s so very good. (I’d expect nothing less from the In the Dark team!) It’s all about how Coronavirus is affecting people living in the Mississippi Delta. Episode one focused on churches and episode two was about conditions at the prison. It’s unflinchingly honest—truly excellent reporting.
The best money I spent was… $291 on two new bar stools for my apartment! Whew, let’s take a swift left turn on this post. Since I am planning on staying in my apartment through 2021, most likely, as I save up for a down payment on a condo, I have decided to invest in a few things to make my apartment more livable for the time being. The first thing was trading in my rickety bar stool for two more comfortable ones! I found these bar stools on Wayfair available at a deep discount, so I bought two and they arrived yesterday! I have to put them together, which I’m planning on doing tonight. It’ll be so nice to have a comfortable place to sit and eat in my apartment! (And I know the cats will greatly enjoy them, too, and isn’t that the most important thing?)
My plans this weekend include… literally nothing. Ah, that’s how it is these days, right? I know I’ll be putting together my bar stools, doing my weekly grocery store run, and Zooming with a friend. Perhaps I’ll try to take a walk in a nature preserve? I’d like to spend time at the pool, but I doubt people will be properly social distancing there. Ugh.
What was the high of your week?
George Floyd’s death and the looting/distruction of my city are definitely among my lows. This week was just in general a big low for me. I found out a former coworker died suddenly on Tuesday and heard the news about George Floyd and things just went downhill from there. It also feels trite for me to say that killing of Floyd was a low for this week but it’s sad to see this happening over and over and over. I hope arrests are made very soon so things can calm down here in my city. The county attorney lives one block north of us so we can hear the chanting/yelling as there have been protests at his house the last 2 days. They have been peaceful, and there is a creek between our blocks so we are a bit isolated from it. But it’s eery to hear chanting and yelling from inside my home. When Phil and Paul got home last night, I questioned if it was safe for me to walk to my garden with Paul. I ultimately decided it was. But it’s weird to feel uncomfortable like that.
Those stools will belong to the cats once they are assembled 😉
I am glad game night is back! Gosh, that sounds really fun! What do you guys prefer to play? Strategy games? Non-strategy? Board games? Cards?
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on what is going on in our country so eloquently. I know I can always expect that from you, and that I can have a respectful conversation with you. So much of what I saw on social media this weekend seemed like its intent was to shame people who are not reposting memes, when like you, I am wondering what I can add to a social media conversation, and have those conversations with my friends and family offline. Thanks for sharing that list, I am going to read it. And there are a few books I need to read, too.
And the high of my week… was Steven surprising me with donuts 🙂 And another one, this sounds odd, but I had a difficult conversation yesterday that I’d been thinking about for months, and I felt relief to finally have it. (I just realized both my highlights happened AFTER you posted this, ha).
The last two weeks were… crazy… for a lack of a better word. I feel like, I keep using this word way too much these last few months.
The death of George Floyd was horrific, I keep wondering what was going through this officer’s mind while he was kneeling on a man’s neck, a man who was already handcuffed and on the ground. The response that followed is nothing short of absolutely necessary.
It’s just a lot right now with the global pandemic still going on…
On a nice note: I love the bar stools that you ordered. It’s amazing what a huge difference one piece of furniture can make!
I love that you have regular game nights with your family. I LOVE games, and my friends and I used to play every weekend back in the day. Now, I don’t really have many people to play even though I still have a pretty large game collection. What kind of games do you guys play?