In this issue I want to write about belonging, community, and how the bonds of both have the capacity to shift devastation for the better.

 

I know I promised Noma in Kyoto 2023 & 2024, which I will get to soon, but Home and the themes that revolve around Home seem much more pressing with the current LA Fires raging on. I also want to share a little bit about the aftermath of Hurricane Otis that hit Acapulco, Mexico in 2023 - both these natural disasters impacted dear friends and close family. This is Welcome Home after all. So here goes. 

 

What is it like to loose everything you own? Every object you picked out with intention, every piece of clothing that made you feel epic, every trinket, and heirloom that gave your personal space a particular personality.

 

Throughout my life I´ve moved more times than I would like to count, I observed my family, especially my mother navigate these changes with superhuman optimism (though on the inside you could tell she was facing something totally disarming).

 

In my case these changes were optional nonetheless they always left a sensation of displacement, vulnerability. Having to start over again and again - involuntarily.

 

Now think about loosing your home and everything in it in a fire or a hurricane and intensify these feelings by 100. I don´t share all this to be a bummer, but to offer a a grain of relief. 

 

During Hurricane Otis I saw some of my closest family members and loved ones loose it all: their city, their homes, their businesses, schools. Everything. 

 

How do you balance the heartbreak and hope that go hand in hand in moments of unprecedented loss? 

 

To give yourself space to grieve the loss, and with time realize as Thich Nhat Hanh says: “Your true home is in the here and the now”. After all is gone, what remains? Your home is in you, in the people you love, in the relationships you weave throughout your life, in the music you listen to, in the little acts that bring you joy, in the indescribable moments of bliss, in a warm meal, in the presence you cultivate with the people that surround you, in how you show up for them and they for you. 

 

Personally, this is how I´ve gotten through every loss. This is how my family got through Otis. Yes everything´s changed in Acapulco a year since the disaster, but the spark of life in peoples eyes has grown much more intense, fiercer. There´s this song in the air singing:

 

 

 

 

CONNECT

If its within your possibilities please consider donating to the following organization: 

 

 

WCK is first to the frontlines, providing meals in response to humanitarian, climate, and community crises.

 

If it´s not within your means please consider sharing relevant sources within your network. 

 

REFLECT