Griffin

This post has taken me several days to write. It's hard to find the words to sum up an entire relationship in only a few paragraphs.

I actually met him before we started working together. One of my dorm roommates befriended him, so he began coming by my room with some regularity. Typically, I only saw him in the late hours of the night while he smoked marijuana and blasted house music in my dorm with my roommate. He was usually laughing about something or initiating a discussion about the complexity of life.

There was one evening where I went with my roommate, some of his friends, and Griffin to the dining commons. They decided to organize a game of mafia; I opted to observe the game. They played one round and one person died. For the next two hours, Griffin and my roommate's friends debated among each other who the mafia could be and what motivations they might have. He analyzed the relationships that every single person had and why each person might choose to kill off that particular person. Because that's who he was--an incredibly intelligent man who sought to fully understand the world.

Near the end of my first semester, I saw his name on the list of recipients of the email that Patrick sent to the new hires. I was a bit surprised because my only exposure to Griffin up until that point was pot-smoking and loud-music-blaring Griffin. One day, I was walking with a friend of mine down Telegraph. I saw Griffin at CREAM. As we passed, I said hi to him and asked if he had been offered a job at Cal Performances. "Cool, I'll see you there!" he said after I told him that I had as well.

Griffin and I grew through Cal Performances together. We were hired together, we were promoted to Assistant House Manager together, we were promoted to House Manager together. During our junior year, Jackie began contracting the scheduling out to us. For the next year and a half, Griffin and I worked together on the schedule, covering each other when the other was too busy to do it. He showed me how to be an effective student assistant. He continued to retain his pot-smoking and loud-music-blaring affinities, as well as his desire to deeply understand the complexity of the world, but I began to see an additional side to Griffin after working with him for some time. That was his dedication to community and to relationships. He showed up to almost every social event we had outside of work. On multiple occasions he opened up his apartment to host the crazy lot of us. He sent emails to the staff inviting us to his DJ shows. Through these actions, he gave so much to make Cal Performances front-of-house an inviting community for everyone we hired. We would not and could not have been as strong of a team if not for his magnetism pulling us in.

I never once saw Griffin stressed, angry, or upset. He brought so much light into any room he entered. His smile and his laugh were infectious. He never concealed his passion, his zest for life and for the people he loved. When he talked with you, he listened intently to every single word you said. Because he legitimately cared about you and what you had to say. There was no forced politeness or courtesy small talk. And when you said something funny, his mouth opened wide, his head tilted back, and he let out his high-pitched laugh to which it was impossible for you to maintain a straight face.

I take some comfort in knowing that he passed surrounded by things he loved. He had been at Zellerbach with his staff earlier in the night, and then he was at a music party.

Even though his physical presence was taken far too prematurely, his light and his spirit have touched so many people that he will never really be gone.

Drumpf

It's been almost a month since our country chose to legitimize fear and hatred for the next four years. The search to find any shred of hope or positivity hasn't gotten any easier, especially since hate crimes whose perpetrators use trump's victory as justification have been on the rise in media coverage.

Several years ago, my mom told me her story of the morning of 9/11. As she watched live footage of the towers engulfed in flames on our TV screen, she felt utterly helpless, desperate, and confused. She stepped outside our house for a few minutes. While outside, she hoped one of our neighbors would do the same thing and the two of them would lock eyes and share a look that encapsulated the sentiment of, "What do we do? What can we do?" All their feelings of despair, confusion, and fear could be understood by each other in a single glance without exchanging any words.

I will never know exactly what she felt that morning. But as I awoke the morning after election night, I think I have a good idea of what that felt like.

I fell asleep on election night before trump reached 270. I think I halfway woke up at about 12:30 AM, checked Google, and saw that 270 had been reached. I think sometime around then my friend called me to make sure I got home safely from the bar where we were watching the election. I awoke in the morning, unsure if those midnight occurrences were real or just a nightmare. I checked Google first thing, and I was suddenly forced to accept that I was indeed living in my nightmare. The unthinkable had occurred.

The same friend and I were texting sentiments of despair and helplessness that morning. Text conversations with other friends that day echoed those thoughts. I cried at work while preparing hot water for my tea.

It's moments like 9/11 and the 2016 election that remind us of our commonality as human beings. Somehow there is power in shared powerlessness.

In the wake of the election results, at least two people "shared their wisdom" with me saying that in their many years, they have seen both good and not-so-good Presidents come and go--and yet we survived. I get the sentiment, that maybe things will not turn out as bad as they seem, except this wisdom came from people who were white and straight. (They were both women, actually, but they're Christian women, so I have a suspicion that they accept unhealthy levels of patriarchy/sexism.) But I cannot afford to take the mindset that things will not end up as bad as I think they will. Because my recently-won right to get married has been questioned by the president-elect and VP-elect. The VP-elect defunded Planned Parenthood in his state, worsened the LGBT+ AIDS crisis in his state, and advocates for suicide-inducing gay conversion therapy. These concerns which I feel very acutely are things that these women will never understand.

What did I do to make the pro-trump crowd hate me so much?

I am privileged to not have to worry that my skin color or gender identity might compound on my concerns, but others in this country are not as fortunate as I. And yes, in four years, the administration will be gone. But the legislation passed and the ideologies perpetuated during the next four years will linger in the years that follow--these are not subject to a four-year term. This is why the trump presidency causes me despair. I have too much to lose.