Dear ones,
In preparation for her memoir, anarchist thinker and rabble rouser Emma Goldman asked her friends to send her the letters she’d written them throughout the years. In the introduction to the eventual book, Emma described these “epistolary effusions” as an archive that would “truly capture the atmosphere of past days.” Her letters (nearly always beginning with “Dear Comrade,”) would meander from updates on the latest jailed comrades to fretting about her neurotic broken heart; from the internal politics of the CNT to concern for an “off balance” mutual friend; from asking for feedback on an article on Lenin to asking if a former lover had mentioned her lately. Reiterating their use, she explains: “at no time does one reveal oneself so much as in one’s intimate correspondence.”
I have been drawn to letters since I was a child. It was a 90s kid pastime to write “notes” to your friends in class, fold them up near origami-like and slide them between palms across the desk rows. “Dear KS, Did you see how cute M looked today?! I want to dance with him so bad on Friday. Have you decided what you are wearing yet? I just finished the homework in class right now, this class is so boring and so easy. Anyway, see you at lunch! TTYL, R” is a version of probably hundreds of letters I exchanged give or take a different crush name or class. And from about age 10 until age 17, I kept a journal, which I anthropomorphized and addressed dutifully: “Dear Journal.” Xanga and LiveJournal came next, and although those weren’t as traditional in form, I knew that every entry was really a letter to the friends who read it, to the point that sometimes I’d name them directly anyway: “you’ve caught me in a good mood,” I begin one entry; “(i never want to hurt you.),” I say in as an aside in another. Fast forward to blogging in ways that felt like letters, then to newsletters where I insist on a greeting and a sign-off. And of course, I have, for almost ten years, been an advocate for and member of pen pal programs like Black & Pink that support incarcerated folks. My relationship with my friend KB has existed entirely of letters (either hand-written or JPay email, plus a few expensive phone calls).
I’m not as consistent with the pen to paper exchanges like Emma wrote to her friends and lovers, but I have become quite faithful to “voice notes,” which, to me, feel like aural love letters that I share back and forth with a few of my closest kin. (Or what an article on the growing trend describes as: “the joy of a phone call without any of the commitment.”) Often, we share the way Emma did - about thoughts on political struggle juxtaposed right alongside matters of our hearts, for minutes that would translate to pages of reflection. I have written before about the ways that our relationships inform our politics (and vice versa), and I think Goldman understood that the “intimate correspondence” of her friendships and romances would matter just as much as her speeches and essays in cataloging her anarchist life.
Intimacy is a word that’s thrown around, but I think the epistolary form gets to the root of the stakes of it: an exchange between humans that opens up the space for vulnerability. Certainly there are layers to this -- I share much (much!) less in my public writing about myself than I do in my exchanges one-to-one -- but in both cases there’s an invitation for dialogue. I often get responses to my newsletters -- emails that feel like they are coming from stationary, written with heart and empathy and openness -- and I cherish them.
“Intimacy,” writes philosopher Alain de Botton, “is the capacity to be rather weird with someone - and finding that that's ok with them.” I sense that in my closest relationships; the reveal of the unbecoming, and on the other end, the non-judgemental embrace of it. Letters (and voice notes) allow for so much of this because we are with our selves alone in the first part of the correspondence. So much can be revealed -- our weirdness, our dreams, our tangential meanderings -- when we are alone with our thoughts, even if we know an audience is eventually coming. And it’s in those spaces of imagining that the most important kind of “politics” can formulate: the visionary kind, the ‘impossible’ kind, the kind that is ultimately rooted in our connection to our fellow human.
I am thinking about letters because here I am writing you one, but also because I spent this week (my spring break from teaching) diving back into my next book project, which will be a collection of advice letters at the intersection of the personal and political. I knew the content of the book could get at my belief that intimacy matters to struggle, but lately I have been thinking also how the form itself lends itself as a tool we shouldn’t dismiss in the work of new worldmaking. How can letters offer us a more gentle space for radical possibilities? How can the medium ensure we don’t forget that our organizing only matters because of real, complex human lives? How can intimate exchange help us feel less alienated, and how can we hold that feeling with us to remember: this, this is what we’re fighting for?
love & solidarity,
raechel
Reading, Watching, Listening.
An essay full of layers of grief: a late writer reflects on his late friend, queer theory, and Pavement. Larissa Pham theorizes crushing. A podcast series I just discovered (thanks SJ) called Stuart Hall: In Conversations. R.T. Collins celebrates non-binary porn. Melissa Febos on touch we want and touch we don’t. An interview with Harsha Walia on why the border crisis is a myth. And finally: rest easy, DMX. </3
Mutual Aid.
Here are some Venmos I’ve seen make the rounds recently, linked to folks who need funds now:
@insolidarity
@misspiggybitch
@shaderipley
@eliza93822
@lovestyles71
@phattphattt
Joy & Attention.
Health. Blooming flowers, everywhere. Walks. Sweetest kitties. My solo writing retreat week, feeling spaciousness and room to be me outside of the routine of pandemic life. NSFW photography. Seltzer. Lyra, our newest plant friend in the apartment. Overhearing conversations in public spaces for the first time in forever. Fully vax’d family members. Being half-vax’d. Queer elders who remind us to be careful of our discourse around vaccination. Dried mango. Big Thief’s cover of The Breeders. My plant identifier app (thanks KS). Voice notes. Friendship. Conner Habib. Making time for crafts. Printing more copies of The Prison Arcana Tarot Zine (I have about five left, let me know if you want to buy one!). Birdsong. Archives. My smart friend MH’s dissertation proposal. Duolingo. Cleveland. Working on an exciting freelance essay that involves interviews with rad people. A good americano. Pink and purple skies. Porch time with family. Long floral dresses that feel like the 90s and my mom. Poetry. & you. <3