I've never purchased a new piece of furniture.  Not only because I've never had the money, but also because I spent 12 years living in Chicago, where the couches, tables, and chairs left in the alley by former tenants seemed fine enough for me to use.  I'd give those wares a good cleaning and move them into my apartment without thinking twice.

I have a good friend who was disgusted by my alley acquisitions.  She eventually had a hard time coming over. See, I would look at my studio spaces--decked out in found furnishings--and see a beautiful display of funky styles from various eras, existing serendipitously in my living room as a result of my resourcefulness.

She saw filth and germs.

And we laughed about how we could both be looking at the same room and feel so differently about it.  We chalked it up to having different points of view.

I miss laughing about different points of view.

Reader, watching the storming of the capitol this week rocked me to my core.  But what made it even harder was hearing the points of view from my conservative friends after the fact. Many of them saw the rioters as patriots.  Many of them saw justice being served. Many of them saw victory.  And initially, I started to question my point of view.  

What am I not seeing?  Do they know something I don't?  Some of these people were wearing 6MWE (6 million wasn't enough) t-shirts, referring to Jews in the Holocaust.  Some arrived at the capitol with zip ties for handcuffing.  Some called out congresspeople by name with guns in their hands.  These people are acting like assholes. What am I missing? 

Clearly, I'm missing a lot.

Dear Reader, I'm having a difficult time finding words for how dark these times feel to me. And I don't have a sense of optimism as we go into 2021, but I do have resolve to continue to keep my eyes open and my guard up.  These are crazy times.  People believe only what they want to believe. That's very scary.  I feel in my gut that it's time for us all to be very alert

I leave you with this picture of the field next to my house on Wednesday night.  It was so ominous, much like the events of the week.  As much as I like to see the bright side of things, I feel like we have a long way to go to come together and see each others' points of view, and it's important to be honest about that fact while we continue to try.  See you next Monday. -Em