Pools of carmel swirling around a black hole abyss
My eyes call themselves beautiful.
Candied flakes swallowing influxes of light,
I love this skeleton,
Composed of bones proven durable
From years of resisting wordly tarnish
I love this skeleton,
Despite the unevenness of my ribs
The lopsided steel bars that
Protect my fragile beating core
I love my shoulders,
Likened to soils drenched
And weighed down heavy
in the exhausted screams,
of my mother
of her mother
and hers
They are distinctly proud and poised
I love how I am bound
I’ve stretched my muscles like rubber,
Then alchemized them strong
Chainlinking flesh to bone
Flesh I now love enough to not dig into,
The places where crimson once percolated
between slivers of once fragile skin
Now fastened shut, scars nearly indistinguishable
I love the places where mountains have formed proudly
I adorn them in loose silks and velvets
I’ve been told of the beauty of my deepest trenches
I’ve come to love being the tree that grows the flower
I’ve come to fall in love with melting into my souls warm embrace
the reality of dismantling the police
O
n Sunday, June 7, nine members of the Minneapolis City Council acknowledged that the current system of policing is not working
and that they intend to “defund and dismantle” the city police department. Council President Lisa Bender stated, “(We need) to
listen, especially to our Black leaders, to our communities of color, for whom policing is not working and to really let the solutions
lie in our community.” While still in the process of planning exactly what these new, transformative and community-based initiatives
may look like, the goal is to implement a model of public safety that actually keeps each community safe. Conversations of defunding
and dismantling police departments have popped up all over the country, and many are concerned about what exactly this means.
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Michigan In Color
6 — Monday, August 31, 2020
ANA MARÍA
SÁNCHEZ-CASTILLO
MiC Co-Managing Editor
‘Adorn’
My mother is a 5 foot 2 inch
Indian woman and I’m her only
child.
This
statement
alone
should speak volumes about our
relationship. To compensate for
my lack of siblings, at times she
acts like my older sister. At times
when I’m overwhelmed with life
and a bit lost (as one is inevitably
bound to be in their early 20’s),
she acts as my guide and great-
est comfort. Somehow, she’s also
managed to find the right bal-
ance of being my best friend and
my greatest annoyance and even
a few times what seems to be
my arch nemesis. How a single
person can encapsulate so many
different roles and keep them all
at various steady states is simply
beyond me. It also shows that
parenting is very much an art and
a full time job.
As a woman and an immigrant,
society has not given my mother
any favors. Like the majority of
the incredibly strong women in
my family, she’s had to kick some
serious ass and is one of the hard-
est working people I know (trust
me, raising me was no vacation).
My mother had undoubtedly
learned these qualities at an early
age but they were definitely put
to the test as she set out to fulfill
the “American Dream” (what-
ever that may mean now) with
my father. In her 5 foot 2 inch
frame, my mother carries herself
like Shaquille O’Neal. Her shoe
size may be 5.5 but she leaves
footprints that could be mistaken
for those of an NBA All-star. She
has a warmth and confidence
about her that is bound to bring
a smile to the face of anyone who
interacts with her. But as her kid,
she was also the judge and jury
in my household with her blue
Chevy Malibu being her court-
room. For anyone that doesn’t
know, the Chevy Malibu is a car
that screams “I’m a parent but
I’m too cool for a minivan”. Car
rides with my mom were often
the time she’d take out of her day
to painfully analyze the variety
of stupid decisions I used to and
still make. I knew upon entry
through the passenger door that
if my mother was speaking in
English or Hindi then our inter-
action would be rather civil. But
if at any point my mother started
to speak in Punjabi, I knew I was
in for a full fledged bar fight.
But standing at a mighty 5 foot
2 inches didn’t particularly help
my mom in her role as the disci-
plinarian. Imagine a courtroom
for an example. You’ve got your
plaintiff’s table, your defendants
table and your jury box that are
roughly at the same height. But
the judge’s bench in comparison
is significantly higher. The judge
literally looks down on everyone
and makes a decision. This was
very much our relationship till
the age of around 12-13. My moth-
er would tower over my skinny
four foot something self, make
the meanest face she could make
and bring me to swift justice — no
trial or deliberation needed. Con-
sidering this, puberty pushing me
over the height of 5’ 2’’ may have
been one of the highlights of my
early adolescent life. It’s as if the
defendant now has a bench that’s
taller than the judges - compro-
mising the height difference that
is integral to our justice system!
And like any comic book villain
with an epic origin story— at 5’
3’’, my newfound sense of tallness
gave me license to wreak havoc in
middle school. This set off a long-
standing back and forth between
my mother and I of me making
very stupid decisions and my
mother somehow always being
one step ahead of me and catch-
ing me within the act.
Fast forward a whole decade
to now, if you’re taking classes
from home and living with your
parents and particularly if you’re
a freshman — reading this may
not make you feel any better
about your current living situa-
tion. But take it from a seasoned
vet who’s commuted to campus
for the last three years now — it’s
not as bad as everyone thinks it
is. Yes, I understand that living
with your parents as a 21 year
old isn’t a particularly attractive
quality but hear me out. I’ve had
the luxury of going to college in
my hometown. I’m on campus
for the majority of the day and to
get home I take a Bursley - Baits
and walk 10 minutes. Therefore,
as a sophomore when I told my
very Indian father about my idea
of living with my friends in a
house on campus I was met with
a confused reaction. I was sternly
reminded of how he immigrated
to the United States not even
dreaming that he’d end up own-
ing a house in Ann Arbor and
now I was asking him to pay for
a second place in the same city?
It was one of the rare times you
see a person’s blood pressure rise
visibly.
At the time I had my concerns.
I mean I had lived in the dorms
during my freshman year and
was afraid of missing out on an
essential
college
experience.
Sure living away from home
meant that I went from finding
texts from my mother “annoy-
ing” to actively trying to call her
when I could. But moving back in
with them? I had done four years
of high school and who wants to
do that again? Whenever an adult
tells me that they wish they could
go back to high school, I prompt-
ly remind them that it didn’t get
any better. But what I overlooked
is the ability for relationships to
change. If there’s anything that
the 300 page Khan academy
MCAT
psychology/sociology
review document taught me, it’s
that the cerebrum — the part of
your brain that is responsible for
actions such as critical think-
ing and decision making — is
far from fully developed during
adolescence. Therefore, as a high
schooler dealing with classes,
hormones and trying to do every
extracurricular out there to make
your college resume special,
some things are bound to just
not stick. For me this was often
the many conversations that my
mother and I would have in her
Chevy Malibu. Sure, some of
those were about academics, but
most of them were about growing
as a person.
I can guarantee that your
relationship with your parents
will not be the same as it was
under the angsty pretenses of
high school. Mine certainly isn’t
the “catch me if you can” type of
game that my mother and I have
been playing from the ages of 13
through 18. In fact, many of those
conversations from my mother’s
Malibu have really started to res-
onate with me and have become
an important part of my identity
as I’ve gone through college. I’ve
been truly blessed to have the
best of both worlds of being from
the town that I go to college in.
I’ve been able to have my free-
dom and grow as an individual by
being on campus while also keep-
ing myself grounded with where
I’m from. Continuously learning
invaluable lessons from my par-
ents about growing up and being
an adult (responsible or not — the
jury’s still out on that one). Take
it from your now very boomer
sounding friend, give your par-
ents a chance. I promise they’re
not as hopeless as you think they
are.
Now more than ever before,
I have found myself with a fuse
shorter than imaginable. I am a
ticking time bomb, eager to be
set off preemptively. Harmless
slights from my siblings lead to
prolonged campaigns of verbal
exodus consisting of every insult
in the book and insignificant dis-
agreements with my parents are
the catalyst to what seems to be
the next world war. It’s a marvel
no one in my family has had some
type of mental breakdown result-
ing from the compounding stress
and anxiety being generated
like electricity from a turbine of
anguish.
I have been on the brink of los-
ing it quite a few times since this
all began. I get into these moods.
It happens intermittently, maybe
about once every 2 - 3 weeks. And
similar to the tide, the intensity
of the wave that carries my emo-
tions oscillates violently. These
moods translate into episodes in
which I just shout about all of the
little things that have been eating
away at me.
As these moods swallow me
up, I feel as if I’ve been thrown
into the ocean accompanied by
a sack of bricks to help weigh me
down. My natural buoyancy isn’t
enough to keep me afloat, and so
I’m pulled deeper. Without any
semblance of what’s pulling me
down further, I become disori-
ented. As what feels like dark,
cold saltwater fills my lungs I
scream out. I try to remain con-
scious in an attempt to construe
why I’m drowning, why it is that
I am so distraught.
Even as I eventually breach
the surface, as suddenly as I was
pulled to the depths, I struggle
to understand what sequence of
events, emotions, ebbs were to
blame for my episode.
As I said, I haven’t been able to
figure out what it is that drives
me into the aforementioned
moods. I’m not familiar with
some dogmatic approach like the
scientific method to better grasp
the probably neurological devic-
es facilitating my episodes.
One
virtue,
however,
has
served as a floatation device.
This virtue, patience, has kept
me afloat at times when I was
bound to have another episode.
It should be made clear though,
I am not describing inherent
patience. The patience I speak of
is learned, conscious and seem-
ingly tangible. It’s easily attain-
able, though upkeep requires
effort.
It can be difficult, remaining
stuck in our homes, virtually
experiencing the same thing day
in and day out. We begin per-
forming familiar tasks, latching
on to whatever brings us closest
to that sense of normalcy, of a
routine. These de facto routines
that keep us from what seems
like dying of boredom become
monotonous and to an extent
create faulty faculties of comfort.
Once we’re accustomed to these
routines, even the slightest devi-
ations caused by external fac-
tors (i.e. a younger sibling rudely
disrupting your mid-afternoon
nap) can feel catastrophic. We’re
snapped back into our current
(and
indefinite)
reality,
los-
ing grip on those routines that
ensured we kept pace.
That’s where patience steps
in. It acts as that intermediary, a
breath before the yelling ensues
and insults are hurled. It reels
us in, offering a moment of clar-
ity to decide whether the battle is
worth fighting, if there really is a
battle that needs to be fought at
all.
That insight, that awareness
that creates those brief pauses
for patience to intervene are
only half of it. We may learn that
skill, but we still have a conscious
decision to make. It requires
willpower to deliberately take
what’s commonly known as “the
high ground.” I’d prefer to refer
to it as a willful election of an
alternative to conflict. I don’t
think there is anything immoral
about expressing human emotion
(even if it may come in the form
of shouting), so to call it “the high
ground” would be an admonish-
ment of those who choose to
share their feelings in a more
passionate manner. By resorting
to that willful election we reaf-
firm that ability to defuse con-
flict and dissipate tension.
It would be quite ignorant,
foolish even, of me to place the
responsibility of being patient on
a single individual in an entire
household. It goes in either
direction, and just as we must
practice patience we should be
able to expect it in return. How-
ever, to think that the principal
incentive of practicing patience
is for oneself contradicts the act
of willfully electing something
other than conflict; as conflict
requires more than one. This
means that our attempt isn’t to
become more virtuous or pious
than those around us, but instead
to guide those we reside with
in being more thoughtful when
interacting with one another —
even if that requires taking the
first step. That first step is prac-
ticing patience with others even
if it isn’t reciprocated.
Patience is a virtuous cycle that
pays dividends in an invaluable,
intangible currency. A currency
that cannot be spent, yet is typi-
cally worth more than the value
we assign it. It is best we hold on
to it though, so as we continue
on in these times we have some-
thing to keep us sane when facing
total and utter uncertainty.
ADAM BAZZI
MiC Staff Writer
DEVAK NANUA
MiC Staff Writer
From Your Friendly Neighborhood Commuter
What I Learned in Quarantine: Patience
As the summer comes to a
close, and our time as Manag-
ing Editors is now complete,
we would like to close off with
a letter and a hope for MiC —
an ode to a summer of revolu-
tion, if you will. Neither of us
could have predicted what we
signed up for, but we are more
than proud of what we were
able to accomplish. Thanks to
a group of brilliant and talent-
ed writers and staff, we were
able to pull off a summer of
enlightening and educational
series of writing which not
only shared personal expe-
riences or reflections, but
provided scholastic and expe-
riential insight into the many
departments and institutions
that feed the Black and Indig-
enous plight in America — a
truth that is often rejected
and whose existence is per-
petuated through journalism.
Not only did we learn so much
from our peers, but we are so
grateful to have been given
this opportunity to amplify
issues in our country which
have been occurring since
the genesis of our nation, and
which built the nation. These
issues will persist until we
confront them in every system
through which we function —
social, governmental, econom-
ic, etc. — we hold our peers
accountable
for
this
same
confrontation, actively edu-
cate ourselves on how these
systems affect society at micro
and macro levels and utilize
that education to grow and
change with an united front.
Michigan in Color started
out as a safe community exclu-
sively for BIPOC to write and
share their experiences at the
University of Michigan and in
the broad United States. We
tried our best this summer to
uphold MiC traditions while
also adjusting to inevitable
change and pursuing neces-
sary actions as a section to
carry on the change we insti-
gated this summer. Before
we give up our positions, we
would like to remind others,
especially at The Michigan
Daily, that the sentiment of
change which began this sum-
mer can not and should not
stop here. The newspaper’s
responsibility does not only
rest in its published content,
but in the team that they hire
to write, edit and administrate
that content for the paper. In
all of our efforts to expand
content and staff, we must be
adamant about centering the
Black and Indigenous voice —
especially those of womxn. As
the MiC section, we also want
to hold each section account-
able for this responsibility as
individual groups — it is not
enough to have Michigan in
Color at the paper; this work
must be demonstrated by each
and every section at the paper.
Simply put, MiC cannot and
will not be your excuse or your
teacher. We must treat MiC as
an individual section which
operates on our own basis. We
are not diversity issue scape-
goats and we must operate as
a whole group to rectify our
wrongdoings for a greater
future.
But this conversation and
demand
for
accountability
is far greater than the paper
— we would like to inspire a
bigger call to action for our
readers, as this time is one to
take advantage of. We have
sat comfortably for too long
in great periods of performa-
tive activism. As we continue
to stand complacent in the
visual apologies granted to
us by large corporations and
brand names who participate
in oppressive systems, we our-
selves perpetuate them and we
ultimately oppress one anoth-
er. Amidst this pandemic and
simultaneous civil rights and
liberation movements sprout-
ing globally, we have been
given
the
opportunity
to
demand more from ourselves,
from one another and from
those who puppeteer these
systems. We encourage you to
be intentional and reflective
with each pursuit of activism
you engage in: Is this truly the
most beneficial way for you to
wield your privilege and/or
space for the liberation move-
ment at hand? Do you know
who and what you are fighting
for? Do you know what you are
willing to sacrifice? Will you
sacrifice it? Ask yourself these
questions.
As for me, Cheryn, I also
wanted to give a big thank
you to my co-managing editor
Gabrijela. Without her, I do
not know if I could have been
able to do anything this sum-
mer. As a woman who identi-
fies as Korean-American, I
can’t and will never under-
stand the Black struggle in
America and wanted to make
sure this summer I was able
to work for and with Black
Americans without silencing
their voice, and Gabrijela has
taught me so much regard-
ing how to be a proper ally. I
simply thought going into the
summer this would be a job,
but it was much more than
that, and I know Gabrijela and
I will always be a team and
friendship, whether we are
MiC ME’s or not.
As for me, Gabrijela, I want
to first thank Cheryn, my co-
managing editor. With her,
I was given the space and
platform to create something
greater than me and my own
mind. My dear co-ME works
like a racehorse, because that
is simply who she is. And for all
of your intellect, compassion
and truth, I thank you. I want
to thank our writers who were
committed to their stories and
to our community, and who I
ultimately could not do my job
without. I want to thank you
readers, even if there are only
two of you, and tell you that I
have extreme hope for you and
for our society’s future. But
this hope is dependent on what
we as civilians are inspired to
manifest. If you want mental
and economic revolution — as
I so desperately do — then you
will see it come to fruition.
A big thank you to the Opin-
ion EPE, Brittany Bowman,
for putting her heart and foot
into her contributions to MiC’s
educational mission this sum-
mer; as well as our EIC, Emma
Stein, and ME, Devak Nanua,
for helping us create and final-
ize our vision.
CHERYN HONG &
GABRIJELA SKOKO
MiC Summer Co-Managing Editors
A letter from the summer editors