Lindsay

I had a thought a couple weeks ago that is the kind of thought you write in your diary: “I’m living my dream life.” This was not a thought I expected to have now or maybe ever. Or a life I would’ve dreamed up exactly. But here it is – 

On Thursdays, I make my way from Gettysburg to Philadelphia. Sometimes I take a bus to a train to a Lyft. Sometimes I drive. Sometimes I take a detour that takes me on a hike. Sometimes I make it back in time for breakfast, sometimes not until 9 or 10pm.

Today, I am in no hurry to get back. I wake up in Gettysburg to the sound of mourning doves. I am surprised that one of the first TikToks the algorithm shows me is also of a mourning dove, this one laying an egg in a small nest outside someone’s apartment. A sign! Of oneness with The Universe? Of effective data mining? Of spring?

So begins the unfurling of thoughts and feelings as I languish in the bath. I think:

Spring in Philadelphia is special to me. I decided to move here in the spring eleven years ago when I got into grad school at Temple. I visited in April. I stayed at the motel that is now the Whole Foods and dreamt of who I would become here. I cried thinking about all of the things I would leave behind to move here – my family, my friends, the restaurant where I worked, and a lot of very good food. I was only 23, so I was understandably sentimental, scared, emotional. Dramatic. Setting out for a new big life in a new big city. I moved into my own apartment with my own dog and tried to figure out who I wanted to be: a writer, an academic, a know it all, a teacher? A friend of who? A girlfriend of somebody? It was a very Mary Tyler Moore throwing her hat in the air type of moment. Triumphant, hopeful, and extremely important.

I’m now 35 and have not aged out of the drama, the romance, the crying about everything good and bad. That part of me has only gotten stronger. Especially in March. March is always such an uneasy month, isn’t it? All of the past year is still decomposing while tiny bits of new are starting to creep up. It’s a month that brings inevitable but painful endings and a little glimpse of what the future might hold. I had a very painful break up in March one year. Got into grad school the next. One year later, got put on academic probation. And so on. 

This week has that same uneasy vibe as we approach the one year anniversary of my former union’s strike ending. On March 9, 2023, we reached a tentative agreement with the administration after 6 weeks on strike. Sitting in my living room the night before, I got a text, got on a zoom call, and felt a mixture of joy, fear, and despair. Winning a strike was one of the coolest things I was ever a part of, one of the most meaningful things I may ever do. An end like that is sure to make anybody cry. But on top of that, this time last year I felt the end of everything was upon me (yes yes drama). Some very stubborn part of me had decided that it was also going to mark the end of my time as a TUGSA organizer. The end of my time attempting to be an academic. The end of my time at Temple. The end of my time teaching. The end of being the Lindsay who sent you emails and texts to remind you to come to stuff, who got on phone calls when you were crying because your work situation was fucked, who got so much joy out of organizing spreadsheets and tinkering with newsletters, who stayed on campus, on zoom, on the google doc until the work was done, who was for so long a relentlessly reliable TUGSA person that tried to hold 800 people in her hands. It was the end of the era of my life that started when I moved here to go to graduate school. The Temple/TUGSA chapter was done. What began in March 2012 ended all at once in March 2023. 

I jot fragments of these thoughts in my Notes app, the bath getting colder. I wash my hair, the rest of me, and take a fair amount of time lotioning my skin, brushing my hair, making my face up before my 10am staff meeting. It’s a new ritual, part of the new chapter. 

I have a new job, new jewelry, and I dyed my hair (+ bangs). I also paint my nails now. I have two astrology apps. I have bought more than one crystal in the past six months. I have created and destroyed many word docs and notes on my phone where I have screamed into the void about being sad and lost, angry and alone. There’s a lot of data out there to suggest that I have been “through something.” The algorithm knows, even though the people that I see everyday don’t (although I guess they might if they read this). My new coworkers, the people I’m organizing with, the person who works at the front desk of the hotel where I stay – they all think I’ve always had bangs. That I’ve always been this hot and cool. 

I get on a zoom call with a bunch of people that were strangers just a few months ago, now my fellow staff. We check in about how organizing is going in our areas, troubleshoot issues that are coming up, celebrate the milestones we’re surpassing in each campaign (zoom style celebration of emojis). A note from our meeting minutes: “The idea is that we have time, but it is also urgent.”

I decide to take my dog for a hike to Pole Steeple. It’s a familiar route for us, but always energizing. I pick up a rock for our collection. Embracing the spirit of decay and rebirth, my dog rolls in something dead and I have to drive back with the windows down. He reeks.

On the way back from our hike, I take a couple work calls. We discuss the plan for our afternoon meeting. In organizing, there are lots of meetings before meetings and meetings after meetings. Pre- and post-chatter are actually the best. Some people find it tedious I think, or redundant. But it’s where we dig into what’s really working and what’s not, what went well and what remains to be done, examining the social dynamics that are emerging and talking through strategy going forward. It’s a very recursive process, which I tend to like, going over everything over and over again until you get it right. 

I have an afternoon zoom call–another meeting before a meeting–to plan the organizing committee meeting on Monday. We go through the prepared agenda and think about how to overcome the anticipated post-spring-break sluggishness and shyness about making concrete plans that can come up in meetings like this. Creating the right environment for building trust, confidence, and a sense of determination is crucial. We’re thinking big and we’re thinking long term. I refer to this visual as we speak. Yes, we decide, we’ll end the meeting on Monday with beers.

I spend the rest of the day pacing around worrying about this (the past) and that (the future), cleaning up around the Gettysburg apartment, sending texts and making phone calls to invite people to next week’s meeting. I’m waiting for my boyfriend, Matt, to get back from teaching so we can start our drive back to Philly. Every Monday and Thursday we pack and unpack our lives. He brings 4 pairs of shoes, I carry along every necklace I own, who knows what mood will strike us. Our dog brings his only toy and we bring his anxiety medicine.

On the drive back, I listen in to a different organizing meeting. The group discusses a lot of things. There’s some reflection on what’s going on on the ground and speculating about what may be coming. It’s a very March conversation – there’s a feeling of being on the cusp that frustrates and excites us.

We get back to Philly around 8pm, drive promptly to Abyssinia, where we order what we always order: gored gored medium rare, miser wot, a Sierra Nevada, and a Czechvar. By the time our food comes, we’re the only people there. We have good conversation, as we always do. Many things will come and go this year but this ritual remains. 

Lindsay is a union organizer who lives in West Philly.