As year-end reflections go, I spend the twelve nights before the winter solstice enveloped by the early darkness, looking back on the year that has been. It’s both gratifying and uncomfortable, looking back at what I have achieved and paid attention to, what have I offered to others, and what has nourished me in turn.
I find that, after a decade of volunteering, and community organising that followed, recently I have become more solitary –
but my yearning for community never abated.
Grappling with what I commonly think of as – shovelling GDP, the endless scroll (now with AI!), and the un-anchoring from morality, mutuality, consequences and care, I find myself in surprise conversations with scarcely-known acquaintances who share a similar sense of unease.
This recent stock-take of my inalienable assets of conscience calls me to set sail on treacherous waters. I seek islands of consciousness. I regard the insatiable Charybdis inhaling human ingenuity it will never be able to engineer.
Maybe the only way to preserve one’s humanity is to keep existing as human through messy, liminal, sacred experiences that we tell stories about, and listen attentively.
It is a personal rebellion to do the effortful work of writing and publishing, hoping for no particular return, and dreaming of the cross-pollination of conversations – when it is becoming more common to turn to chatbots for companionship, mental health support, and the ever-elusive skill of reading comprehension and skilful writing.
It is an act for its own sake.
draw together 