It’s already happening.

Parents are being called back into office as schools around the country throw their door wide open. And the desperation for summer camp options this year is… whew!

Setting aside the MASSIVE safety issues all of this presents, I understand the grab for “normalcy”. This past year has been traumatizing and so many people just want to feel okay even for a fleeting moment.

I get it.

I FEEL IT, TOO.

Andplusalso - it’s bullshit.

Normal is how we got here in the first place. Normal always, ALWAYS left other mothers out. Normal consigned other mothers to the isolation that we’ve all experienced this year.

Disabled mothers, mothers with chronic illnesses and chronic pain, Deaf mothers, and mothers of kiddos in all the categories and more.

Normal is what led to a staggering drop in employment for women over the last year, specifically for Black women and women of color.

Normal is why as soon as “outside” started to open up, mass shootings spiked.

Normal is how kids with IEPs were told over and over again to just hold on, to just wait, as schools went virtual. Normal is how those kids got left behind.

Normal is how millions of mothers and children were trapped with their abusers for the last year even more than they’ve been in the past.

Normal is how even with every state in some form of lockdown cops still found Black men, women, and children to murder.

Normal is how you end up with political ‘activists’ in Cadillac commercials.

NORMAL IS SICK.

NORMAL IS WRONG.

NORMAL IS KILLING US.

Mamas, please hear me. I fully deeply, to the absolute core of my being, understand the driving need for comfort right now. I’m hurting so badly that words will not contain it. And all I want in the world is for someone else to come take responsibility for a moment so that I can rest, so that I can just BE and be safe.

And that impulse, that will not be assuaged with normalcy. We cannot participate in the true American pastime, the immediate erasure of painful experience.

We MUST not forget.

We must find a way (if you haven’t already) to use this pain and anger as fuel for change. I listed out just a few broad-stroke ways that American normalcy has harmed us, but you and I both know there are so many others.

And for each one that seems insurmountable and overwhelming, there are already SO MANY people coming together to create change. I’m asking you now to look for them, to turn toward community and away from normalcy.

Join something (even if it’s just online, yes that counts). Pick something - learn about it, learn about the folks already working in the area, and help them.

Start where you are.

Use what you have.

Do what you can.

- Arthur Ashe

For our children, for ourselves, for us all, we must create a new normal.