Maybe the revolution looks more mundane

A brief note on kindness

Btw, it’s midwinter…

It’s Sunday night and I just settled back home after a long, snowy drive from Brooklyn. I’ve got my mug of tea and crackers, and I ought to be turning in for the night, except I keep thinking about all of you. Especially my newcomers, who perhaps slipped inside my Substack door to sit by a crackling fire on these dark winter nights, shouldered in next to other bodies seeking warmth.

I imagine the group of us, our breath casting clouds of fog in the air, rubbing our hands together and looking around the circle of faces, leaning in, listening — expectant, weary. Each person that shares is holding a small, flickering candle. When they’re finished speaking, they lift their flame to the next waiting wick, and slowly, the flame becomes a ring of fire.

Each time I’ve posted about a small moment of human connection, I have watched the comments spread much like this imagery. This last time, it struck me: how starved we all are for these stories of human goodness. We need to hear that they’re real, and beyond that, that they may even be more commonplace than we have been led to believe.

Someone commented, “I wish moments like these were so common, they felt mundane.” And it gave me pause.

“Maybe that’s part of the revolution,” I thought. “Make basic kindness mundane.”

What if the revolution we’re seeking is not so much a resistance as it is a return to — a turning towards — basic human kindness?

Far be it from me to oversimplify anything in these frightening, complicated times. But my brain and heart really do best when I can break things off into manageable bites. While the powers that be are daily stoking mass manufactured fires of hysteria, fear, confusion, division and brutality, I need this call to be part of a revolution to feel like a touchpoint, one little flame lighting another and then another.

A kind soul who gave permission for this picture.

It doesn’t take much.

That eye contact. A smile of recognition. Putting the phone down to have a conversation. Letting someone else go first. Expressing thanks to those who help us. Offering your seat on the bus. Assisting someone to their car. Leaving art for others to find. Picking up litter. Feeding birds through the winter. Leaving water for wildlife in the summer. Showing compassion to a flustered parent with a struggling child. Planting flowers for pollinators. Learning the names of your pharmacist, grocery clerk, barista, mail person. Checking in on neighbors. Sending cards with thoughtful words of care.

Spreading these stories like sparks.

This time around, the call to revolution is one of deliberate, selective attention. It is the devotion of being a flame tender. How can I keep this little flame lit and pass it along? And if it snuffs out, where can I hold it out to be lit once more?

I’ll close with this poem, which feels more like an invitation…

Into a new week

I breathe

sighing out the stale air from

my lungs, that space between

ribs and flesh holding pause

in the empty

filling my vessel afresh

until all the pieces, swirling —

air, sun, sky

lungs, heart, skin

birds, trees, dirt —

are knitted together again

in one moving tapestry of

breath

What stories do we want to breathe life into this week? How can we tend our own flames? Where might we light other flames and help them spread?

If the revolution could look thousands of different ways, on any given day, what would it look like to you, right here and now?

It is ours, within reach, as long as we keep each other warm.

Thank you for being here. How we need your light.

Warmly,

Phoenix