My Polycrisis in March

Re-entry after long flights or any other intense emotional or physical experiences is difficult for me. Recently, a return trip from Oregon to EST in Ohio coupled with the time change to daylight savings required I rise at 2 a.m. Pacific time to catch an early flight. First flight out, I always say and curse at myself later.

Once back in Ohio, bleak mornings greeted me as the reality of my son and his wife, living across the US, would soon bring a new child into this world while our country waged war overseas. And others contemplated retaliation on our home shores.

Fuel prices were on the rise, flights too. Worry increased for a cousin’s son who could be called into action if the current administration demands. The graves of innocent children appear as Lego impressions in the ground. Have we yet to connect this all to the madness of men? ICE agents are still rampaging any city with the appearance of leaning blue.

And the looniness of a grown man, a secretary of state, wearing shoes that did not fit. How far have we fallen? I’m embarrassed for our country on many levels. None more so than as the granddaughter of an Italian immigrant couple who poured their life savings into ensuring a proper shoe fit for their customers. There are certain times when we KNOW we will NEVER grow into a pair of shoes.

Read the Brannock device (the metal slide) I want to shout through my iPhone screen.

The week prior, I had argued about a personal issue with a family member who said I’d been angry for a long time. Did she count back since 2016?

I had.

*
By Friday, the 13th, I’d managed to crane myself out of bed early enough for a walk before work. I’d missed my morning walks through the week. For some reason, I connected to the Wonder Cabrinet podcast with Rebecca Solnit, an American writer and activist, who has covered feminism, the environment, politics, and art. The show notes mentioned the word polycrisis, a word which stuck with me throughout my walk under the cloak in darkness, as if mimicking the times.

What is a polycrisis and do I need this word to help me navigate through the above?

“It's an idea that was launched by a French theorist of complexity called Edgar Morin, and then it was picked up by Jean-Claude Juncker, the President of the European Commission, in 2016, to describe the experience of trying to govern Europe when you had to deal with the Greek debt crisis, Putin's first aggression against Ukraine and the rumblings of Brexit in the background, and the refugee crisis in Syria spilling over into Europe,” according to Peter Tooze, a history professor at Columbia, NY, when speaking in Davos in 2023.

Why was this word put in front of me now?

A polycrisis implies a simultaneous occurrence of pivotal crises interconnected with one another.

The word has helped soothe *some of my anxieties in the same way an official diagnosis of a medical problem would for someone experiencing a health challenge. To put a name on something gives us the hope we can manage.

*

Following the verbal altercation with a family member, that night, a dream came to me. My dreams are vivid and filled with meaning. I have a text thread with two girlfriends with whom we share our dreams. I don’t need a dream notebook. The remembrances in my morning body are frightening enough. I am sometimes visited by my dead parents, and every so often, my dead husband. And my sister in her care home, with whom my anger is separate from the others.

In my dream, sunny sidewalks surrounding me spilled over, landing me mid-street, where I stood with arms out, like my mother did while driving with her kids as passengers and stopping urgently at a stop sign. (Mothers were the original seat belt). What or who was I protecting behind my arms in the dream? My granddaughter. She’s three now, in a big girl bed, able to read whole books back to her mother from memory. She is bright. As in future bright. As in the light to lead the way. On one side of the street, a middle age white male made inroads toward us. In that moment, rancid saliva juices rose up my throat. Danger lurked on the precipice.

I woke up. Shaken.

Heavy on my mind surely was the blog I had posted about Team USA women’s hockey, how their gold medals were a path forward for young girls, and how the Olympians’ push was motivating for Epstein’s victims too. That day, I had also listened to Hillary Clinton as she gave testimony regarding her lack of knowledge of Epstein’s actions. What we missed in having a smart, intelligent, compassionate person like her in the White House twice.

The dreams of the jet-lagged were no different this week. Or shall I say filled with no less terror—someone trying to enter my home, sliding their hand/arm through the letter slot in an attempt to reach the deadbolt. My husband assured me that was not possible. Later, awakened by my own throated and thus thwarted scream, I checked on the lock. He was correct. Another dream—my father is walking down the road toward Kmart (in Amherst). He’s wearing russet colored polyester pants with a crème knit polo shirt from the 70s. In my Suburban (he always drove one), I drive up over a puddle-laden curb cut to turn around. When my car is facing in his direction again, he is gone. He is gone.

One can chalk so much of this up to the madness of March. Talks from Something Italian, based on memories of growing up Italian American. Visits from a cousin who mirrored and reflected much of what I recalled during those years. Reconciliations. Weather patterns shifting, arriving from the north, the west, the south, and every direction in between. Winds gusting up to 45 miles per hour. Every time I left the house on Friday, I convinced myself, sometimes 13 is a lucky number.

One can attribute this to so much more. To the polycrisis of the political climate we find ourselves in. On that podcast, Rebecca Solnit remarked, “In some ways, everyday life under capitalism produces a lot of anomie and isolation, a kind of lack of agency, connection, meaning. And in those moments of disaster, people often find them, which is so meaningful, so important to them that even their own house has collapsed or burned down, everything is uncertain, death is all around. They often live more vividly and find something remarkable in it.”

Working on her latest, The Beginning Comes After the End, Solnit takes the long view that western industrial capitalism will be a blip on some future timeline. Much of what we feel and experience in theses moments builds toward more than we can imagine. Yet, there are several mentions by Rebecca and the host of Antonio Gramsci’s quote about fascism from his Prison Notebooks—'The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.'

We must live with them before conquering them. In our anger and our dreams. Until the new is born. Perhaps like in a new grandchild in Oregon.

My readers have been showing up and showing support through coffee meetups, online book purchases, and in person. I look forward to more connections at my events below. If want to collaborate, chattiamo—let’s chat!

Here are updates and details for Something Italian appearances and other workshops. The book is stocked locally at Roebling Books in Newport, and by April 1, Joseph Beth booksellers in Hyde Park. And throughout libraries in Ohio. (And the Italian American bookstore in Boston).

March 16 - Kenwood Senior Star. 2 p.m.

March 28 – Lorain Historical Society, book talk and signing. 11 a.m. Details here.

April 4 - Contemporary Arts Center, Creative Writing Project, Winter series SOLD OUT. Check out the CAC website for details on the Spring Series.

April 6 - Moderator, in conversation with Amanda Becker and Nan Whaley. More information here.

April 7 - United Italian Society, monthly meeting. Book talk and signing.

April 11 - Italian American Museum, Cleveland. Details forthcoming.

May 10 - Mother’s Day, Something Italian is the perfect gift for Mom! Subscribers will receive a special discount. Look for an upcoming information.

May 15 - 16, Women Writing for a Change - Friday evening book talk, Saturday morning Finding Memoir in Food writing workshop. Renowned chef James Beard writes, “Food is our common ground, a universal experience,” providing us with a center as we seek commonalities among others. Details coming soon at womenwriting.org.

June 1 - Book Club

July 28 - Caring for the Caregiver Writing experience, virtual, FREE. REGISTER. Contact Kara Pierson Harper. Phone: (513) 244-5494. Email: kpierson@muchmorethanameal.org.

Upcoming in the Fall

West Virginia Italian American authors conference, Tuesday, August 25

Cleveland Book Festival

Cincinnati’s Books by the Banks

Library and Museum in partnership with Fotofocus, October 21.