Hi Friends,
There are moments of collective trauma that either shift societies toward solidarity or division. Some of these collective moments in my lifetime have been when the space shuttle Challenger blew up (I was in the 10th grade, and we are all watching it on TV at school, and our teachers did not know what to do), 9/11, when the country went into lockdown in March of 2020, when rioters stormed the Capitol on January 6th. There are other moments, too, such as when a favorite celebrity or other public figure dies. Or hearing about another mass shooting…
For this exercise, I want you to think about these (and other) moments of collective trauma. And they do not have to be from my list above. I remember watching Christine Blasey Ford testify at the Supreme Court hearings in a Guadalajara hotel room and then going to the hotel gym and running and crying on the treadmill. And then going back to my hotel room to pull myself together and write this essay.