Decolonization Conversation Café
The Capitol Hill Occupation Protest: Day 11
Whoa! It’s been a doozie.
I had to take a break from writing as I found it taking up too much of my energy when all of it needs to be focused on the work itself. I not only wanted to document everything as it unfolded, but also felt a need to justify my work as criticisms started flying in from both sides of the spectrum.
I must be doing something right when conservative “all lives matter” whites and liberal “woke” whites both start telling me I need to stop what I’m doing.
I don’t even know where to start, so as usual, I’ll start with my feelings.
I feel loved, and heard, and am so grateful. I feel proud, and at peace. My body is relaxed but my mind, heart, and spirit feel focused. My shoulders feel light, yet each night I feel completely drained and sore as if I’ve given everything I have to every moment.
In each of these past 11 days, I find myself doing the most meaningful work I’ve ever been a part of. I feel like I’m exactly where I should be, doing exactly what I was meant to do. I‘m full of aliveness and wholeness and completely in my element.
On top of all of that, I feel so excited and happy to have found the co-conspirator partner I’ve been searching for.
Please meet Keely. She is so awesome. Keely has been my supportive, guiding rock the past week and will continue to be as we take this wherever it goes. We know we can change the world through this, and we will.
This Café itself has continued to be transformative every day on so many levels. Something beautiful keeps emerging. The support I’m getting alongside everything I’m observing first hand
What started with just a few chairs and a couple signs, is now nearly a dozen couches, 30+ chairs, and an entire storage station and kitchen area with arts and craft supplies, food and drinks, and the seedlings of a true café.
We have shifted the name to Decolonization Conversation Café with direction by different Black community members of CHOP.
Our mission is to dismantle racism and decolonize ourselves and Seattle one conversation and one relationship at a time.
We had a diverse team of 8 community members collaborate and co-create our Three Circle Agreements:
- Listen curiously and compassionate
- Take responsibility and share space equitably
- Center conversations on decolonization and antiracism
We had to implement some Café rules to try to minimize sleeping, drugs, drinking, and smoking in the the space. We even have a “Suggestion Box”.
We put together four Circle starter questions to get the conversations on track.
- What are examples of racism (overt and systemic) in Seattle today?
- How has today’s BLM movement transformed you and your views on racism?
- How is today’s BLM movement different from past Civil Rights movements?
- Whats gives you hope we’ll create lasting change through this movement?
We’ve had different artists and other members step up to add their own gifts to the cause. We have young black artist, Leandra, who is creating this beautiful 8' by 12' canvas mural saying “Decolonization Conversation Café”. A community member, Juniper, is dedicating their time to document all the notes from our Dream Board.
We an Instagram now (@decolonizeseattle) and are building a community social network (www.decolonizeseattle.com) for continuing our engagements and transformations beyond the space. Please follow and join both.
It’s beautiful to see this collaborative, co-creative community naturally emerge in this experiment.
I also have to admit, every day is a struggle. We are all working hard in the Café and the entire CHOP space to keep this community culture alive and continually focused towards our purpose — the Black Lives Matter movement and a larger systemic transformation towards a truly equitable city.
I take a deep responsibility for this space and the entire CHOP as it seems more and more like the Café is one of the few regular engagements that refocuses everyone back towards our collective work. And that is an ongoing challenge.
We have a handful of regulars walking around who are dealing with various levels of mental crises and drug addiction issues. With more and more people coming into the space to either observe and judge or treat it like a block party, rather than co-create a community of purpose, we have to constantly remind circles to come back to our “Circle Questions”.
Luckily everyone is understanding once I explain why, but it is still a tiring process having to share this line of logic multiple times a day. “So, you want to make this place permanent right? Well, drinking and smoking here doesn’t get us there does it? But this café is showcasing to the city and world that we are creating something desperately needed — a place for diverse neighbors to build relationships around the challenges we are living in together. Because of that, will you help me in this work to make this entire space permanent and be alright taking that energy and activity somewhere else?”
After that, everyone is appreciative and usually get up to start helping me in other ways. Some of my most devoted helpers come from those conversations. Whenever I need a couch picked up or a small task done, they always seem to rise up to the occasion.
People are surprised when I tell them that every evening I leave everything there overnight and nothing gets stolen. There is a deep sense of personal and collective ownership when you feel truly a part of a community.
In our regular world, as we have shifted everything to be transactional instead of relational, we defer responsibility to roles. I’m not going to pick up the trash that is someone else’s job. Or when I call the police, that problem is now their problem.
Not here in CHOP.
This is all everybody’s, so we all step up to take care of it with respect. We hold ourselves and each other accountable in beautiful ways. Throughout the day, you’ll see people walking through and picking up trash. When an argument or dispute arises (or a MAGA counter demonstration walks through), we all step up and and step in. There’s been multiple conflict deescalation trainings and we are getting better as a community at handling just about any problem.
Through every new conversation, every new relationship, and every new pledge of support, I get more and more invested.
I think I can now put a finger on what it is about this space that makes it so special. It might be the only space I’ve ever been a part of in Seattle where black, brown, and white people all feel safe and like they belong.
That’s why these conversations and connections are so good. Everyone feels safe and accepted here and is simply ready to share their story and listen to others.
All the white people just want to listen to the stories of those of color. And for those of color that don’t feel drained from all the work they constantly have to deal with, they can simply share their story freely and maybe for the first time feel like they are being truly heard by white people.
There is the opposite of a Seattle Freeze here. This place is Seattle Warm.
To make it clear, this work is far from glamorous. I’m beyond exhausted. I have been at CHOP 12 hours a day for almost 10 days straight now (not counting the days I was protesting in the 10 days before that).
Yesterday I was almost as dirty and grimy as a day out in the playa (but at least I had a shower to scrub off in when I got home).
I get to the Café by 9 or 10 each morning and get right to cleaning up, one piece of trash at a time, and setting up the space, putting one couch back into place at a time. I’ve just accepted that every night it’s going to be trashed and will take an hour or so of work to get it back in order. But luckily, whoever is around always lends a hand.
Throughout the day, I walk around the Café sweeping and picking up trash all the time, take at least three trips to the dumpster a day, and continuously have little projects that need my attention. Every time I try to sit and relax, new people come in and I either go start a new Circle with them or invite them into one that’s already going.
And on top of all of that, I am engaging in conversations on race and privilege all day long. Every one of these requires my full focus and takes a lot of my energy.
Sometimes I just help clarify people’s thoughts into honed ideas and concepts. Or just ask a couple questions and share a story to get a conversation going. Other times, I find myself in the middle of a lively debate about systemic racism, future economic systems, or how we got to where we are today.
I’ve perfected the art of sitting alone in a circle with an inviting look until someone joins me. I get that conversation going as more people start to join us. Then, once it gets enough momentum, I excuse myself, make sure it is continuing without me, and then sit down in another empty circle and do the same thing.
And to tell you the deep truth, I love every moment of it. So much so. I was made for this. My whole life has led up to it.
We now have dozens of regulars that come every day. We have another dozen or so contributors and team members helping out with whatever we need done.
I am just in my element in it all — learning, growing, and transforming in each and every moment.
Everything that happened with COVID-19 in the past three months; everything with my career transition to community work in the past three years; and all of my pains, dreams, and life and career experiences over the past three plus decades of my life all seem to just have set me up for this.
It’s hard to describe and is simply beautiful to be living through. This is a fight I’m in, and it’s the one I’ve been searching for my whole life.
My realization about creating a world of belonging and connection becomes clear. It’s a hopeless, moot battle until we heal the past (and current) harms and traumas done to the Black and Indigenous communities by our white community.
We can’t create the new world, until we truly confront patriarchy, white supremacy, and colonialist culture.
It's a hard realization to swallow, and the work ahead of us isn't easy. It's fighting for policy change on one end and shepherding internal and relational transformations one person at a time on the other.
No new future community system matters until that happens. Belonging and trust can only come after healing.
That is my fight — that is what my purpose and life goal is becoming. If I can be a bridge, I will be it.
One conversation, one relationship at a time.
The fractal takes further shape and crystalizes as Keely and I dream up possibilities for where our Decolonization Conversation Cafe can go.
We’re already imagining the possibilities and potential impact of an offline/online community and cafe model all focused on this cause. It could transform this city, and then the world.
As I’ve noticed, true systemic change needs to happen on both the largest of scales and the smallest. With policy chane in our institutions and with internal liberation inside each of us and in our relationships. The latter part is the harder and slower one — it’s the fight I’ll be putting my gifts and energy towards.
The path forward becomes clear — with this Black Lives Matter and the larger fight for true racial equity in Seattle. It’s going to be hard but I know what’s ahead of me. I know what I am called to do.
I texted Keely right before I went to bed last night — “We’re going to change the world together.”
