Should you burn the place down while I’m gone…

TL;DR: Mom's leaving of town for a couple years. The emergency newsletter is on the fridge, my comrades have a spare set of keys, and I've left enough toolkits in the freezer to keep you stuffed for a generation. I’m not telling you to overthrow the government while I’m gone, but I also wouldn’t be mad about it if you did.

Hey friends,

When I was younger, my mom would head out of town for the weekend to attend Very Important Hair Business Conferences.

Which sounds like the setup for an 80’s family comedy where a single-mom hairdresser played by Elisabeth Shue leaves her kid home alone for the weekend, only to come home and discover I (played by Soleil Moon Frye at the height of her quirkiness) have turned our house into a shelter for talking animals and accidentally won the mayoral election.

All because Elizabeth Hairdresser left a handwritten note of House Rules on a piece of paper, which accidentally got blown out of the window as she rushed out the door to catch her flight.

None of that would happen, of course, because I was a terribly boring child who didn’t just adhere to rules, but insisted on drafting my own contracts of conduct signed and copied in triplicate.

So while I am not against you getting into cahoots while I’m on my limited work visa hiatus, here is a FAQ to answer your questions about how to behave while I’m gone.

All our kid-centered resources (toolkits, book collections, etc.) remain free & public on the BooksForLittles.com website for as long as your donations keep the site up. A couple awesome members of our community (Rebecca B. & Lena H.) have volunteered to keep the site up to date so nothing breaks.

So there is nothing stopping you from using these resources to say, stock up your local library with subversively diverse children’s literature. Or stage abolitionist teach-ins in your neighborhood. Or to run for mayor and drive ICE out of your city with the help of your menagerie of talking animals.

I’m just saying - there’s nothing stopping you from getting into good trouble while I’m away.

Before my visa restrictions start, I’ll draft and pre-schedule a few years of newsletters highlighting 1-3 helpful resources each month. Out of hundreds, so I’ll have to be choosy!

This makes it easy for younger families who just getting started with kyriarchy-smashing, and will keep your newsletter subscription live for when I get back and want to bore you with my vacation pics / cool zines I wasn’t allowed to tell you about while on my non-work visa.

Or maybe by then we’ll have diverted funding away from military occupations and prisons and toward public schools and libraries, overthrown the American Empire, and elected a benevolent pod of orcas to govern humanity through mutual aid and consensual hugs.

In that case, Books For Littles probably won’t be necessary anymore. I guess we can decide when we get there.

I won’t be reading website comments, newsletter replies, emails, contact form submissions, or coded messages delivered by our highly trained squadron of Raccoon Saboteurs.

After June 25th, I won’t be able to answer any questions about integrating social justice into your care work because that counts as ‘working for myself’ 🙄😡😤

So if you run into challenges, you can submit a message on the Books For Littles Contact Form, which will be monitored by volunteers. Support is limited as our volunteers won’t be in charge of maintaining or updating content, newsletter subscriptions, or accounts. But they may be able to point you in the right direction.

If you have any questions relating to Books For Littles that only I can answer, email ashia@booksforlittles or schedule an Ignition Call BEFORE June 25, as I’m legally not allowed to talk about work after I leave the US.

We currently have two folks maintaining the website, but if you’d like to help with IT, website moderation, or newsletter support, hit reply before June 25th.

To keep the site up, I would greatly appreciate any contributions to keep the Books For Littles Legacy Library up with donation into our Piggy Bank Fund.

Donate!

Yes, kinda! But only if it’s not related to Books For Littles.

After we’ve settled in and I’ve collected my marbles, I will be a series of exploratory projects to burn off all my infodump compulsions without getting in trouble with the law.

What will it be!? I don’t know yet! Hit reply or leave a comment before June 25th if you’d like me to loop you in on my future shenanigans.

I’ve been thinking of starting a new newsletter that I am allowed to update to infodump about [Insert Good Future Idea That Won’t Violate My Visa Here]. What do you think about:

• Frolicking Into the Abyss.

• Mildly Concerning Behavior.

• No Longer Your Problem.

• What The Fuck Just Happened?

• I’ve Made A Terrible Mistake.

• Share your thoughts and suggest your own titles for an idea I haven’t created yet!

C’mon kid, jump in my white van full of scary unknowns. Well be back in time to clean up all the animal poop and bubbles before your parents even realize what you’ve been up to.