Minnesota in January
I want you to know what Minnesota is usually like in January.
Sure, it's cold, and snowy — so we take advantage of it. We're visiting the Art Shanties on local lakes. We're at the snow sculptures in Stillwater and the ice sculptures at the Minneapolis Institute of the Arts. We're enjoying the Winter Carnival events. We're at the Great Northern Festival. We're doing beer pokes. We're inside seeing the plays that open after Christmas, or seeing the Spirit Award movies through FilmNorth at the Walker (the only place in the country where they still run all on the big screen). We're eating out, maybe even in igloos or at ice bars. Maybe there are pop-up events like the ice portal. We're snuggled by fireplaces, maybe with a hot toddy. We're visiting a community sauna and jumping through a hole in the ice. We're at the Ice Castles. We're dogsledding, or skiing. We're at the state One-Act competitions for high schools, or the winter basketball season. We're hauling out the snowblower when it snows and doing the whole block. Schools are doing J-term projects. It's a magic place to be.
I want you to know what we're doing now. We're marching 50,000+ strong peacefully in the streets in -20 degree weather on the day of the general strike. We're gathering on neighborhood street corners with candles to remember Alex Pretti. We're standing down the length of Lake Street with signs saying "Ice Out." We're out on other street corners every damn day with signs. We're delivering food and diapers and medication to our neighbors who can't leave their homes. We're collecting rent funds for people so they don't get evicted. We're directing traffic around an arrest so no one gets caught in it when they are just trying to drive to the donut store. We're going through our pantries and our kid's toys to see what we can donate to food and toy drives. We're collecting the pets left behind in a silent household when their owners are taken away and getting them to the already-full shelters that have pledged to care for them. We're calling our legislators. We're remotely teaching kids who can't come to school. We're collecting winter gear to give to the folks that are finding US citizens that have been detained, then released and dumped in the woods with no cell phone, coat, or sometimes even shoes. We are patrolling schools and daycares. And yes, we are watching for agents and telling others where they are and peacefully observing them, as is our constitutional right to do.
And we are absolutely exhausted. There's no time for the usual fun activities (if they are still going on — many have been cancelled). We pick up our kids and come home, which is a harrowing trip in itself often, and we cry, and we get to a few tasks that all take more time and effort because there is so much weighing on us. We din't go out to eat, though many of our restaurants are empty (if they are still open). We possibly cry a little, and we head to bed. There's not even time to think about everything in the first paragraph that has been taken from us, because we are focused on surviving, and keeping our communities safe.
We may be tough, but there's an enormous cost.
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