Regardless of your feelings on the police and regardless of your feelings on black lives matters we should all care about our fellow human beings.
This has been a year that I find difficult to describe with words.
2020 has been liberating, destructive, progressive, insightful, inspiring, and a complete fuck you to any plans you may have had.
It has forced us all to adapt to the times or face drowning with the ship.
One thing I hope drowns with 2020 is HATRED and how the media uses it for views but its affects on the American people are far too damaging to justify this practice.
Further division is a problem.
Guess what, you can be for Black lives matter and be pro-police at the same time.
Being in the middle doesn’t enrage anyone enough to get views that’s why no one talks about it.
You can acknowledge a corrupt system but still be for law and order and you can acknowledge the plight of black Americans people too.
As much as I didn’t want to make this political I feel that I have to in order to earn the right to grieve my fathers absence.
Luckily for myself I decided to change my sentiment this year and I chose to celebrate my fathers life rather than to morn it.
He’s been gone for 28 years now and although we never met it felt like each year at his memorial we buried him again and again.
What a strange feeling it was but noticing this self deprecating pattern I’m choosing to see the good these days instead of always seeing the problems.
There were too many problems with 2020 and I just don’t give a fuck about that anymore.
One rule my mother said to my entire life was treat people the way you want to be treated.
I’ve since modified that to fit my life and it’s a rule I now live by.
BE GOOD TO YOUR NEIGHBORS.
It’s not hard to hold the door for someone, it’s not hard to keep your stereo at level 6 instead of at level 10.
It’s not hard to put your shopping cart back. (Seriously don’t be that person.)
It’s not hard to treat your neighbor with respect no matter their skin color.
It can be difficult to be nice to cops especially if one is being a dick but at the end of the day we’re all human.
We are all somebody’s brother, son, daughter, mother, etc.
Empathy and a connection to complete strangers is one of the most powerful things you’ll ever feel in life.
Don’t let anger blind you because if you are easily enraged you are easily controlled.
That goes for the die hard republicans and the die hard liberals.
Fuck if you are die hard in anything other than knitting please seek to understand the other side.
It’s always interesting for me to take photos of cops on this day each year because I am an outsider but for this day I’m always welcomed with open arms.
With that here are some photos from my fathers memorial this year.
It was cut short due to Covid but with my fathers closest childhood friends we managed to celebrate the legacy my father left on his home town and it was an emotional day.
With love,
Atticus
