I Will Show Up

I had never been to a protest before. I had been content, I had been comfortable, I had been quiet in my place of privilege. I had cared, but just enough. I had signed a petition here, donated a few dollars there. I had never acted with any urgency or fear or intention.

But last Saturday, when women flooded the streets of countless cities and towns across the world, I joined them. Filled with trepidation and armed with a homemade sign, I took my anger outdoors. The anger that had been building for several months. The anger, fear, panic, and frustration unlike anything I had ever felt before.

It wasn’t easy. I get anxious in large crowds and, as an introvert, I’ve never been one to yell my grievances at the top of my lungs in public. My feet hurt, I was cold, I was nervous, and I was uncomfortable.

But I soon realized that my discomfort was insignificant. It didn’t compare to the discomfort of those who fear for their lives because of their religion or the color of their skin. Who are denied basic rights like healthcare or land free from an invasive oil pipeline. Who are detained at the airport on the way home to their families. Who are told they are insignificant, insufficient, unequal, unwanted.

So I put my discomfort aside and kept marching anyway. And that’s when my small, personal revolution happened. That’s when I found that I was not resigned to remain in my little world governed by my own needs, goals, and desires. I had lived in that easy and familiar place all my life, vaguely aware of my privilege but never fully reckoning with it. Aware of the suffering around me but never actually confronting it. But as injustices mount and hate becomes normalized, I’ve had to shift my attention to others and alter my priorities to those beyond my own.

I’ve decided that, for the first time in my 22 years, I will not come first. I will not prioritize myself over the people who struggle infinitely more than I do. I will show up for them. I will endure my unease as I march with a crowd of protestors. I will wake up early on my Saturday morning and fight for abortion rights at a clinic two hours away when I’d rather be sleeping in. I will forgo a dinner out with friends so I can donate some money to the ACLU. I will follow a few rules I set out for myself: I’m never too tired to march in a protest. I’m never too busy to call my senators. I’m never too complacent to stay quiet.

I realize this revelation came as soon as my rights were threatened. That’s inexcusable and regrettable. I won’t try to defend myself for that. What I will do is fight—and fight hard. For women like me but also for people whose marginalization and oppression I can only begin to understand.

My time for being selfish and resting comfortably in the world is over. Part of growing up is growing out. It’s about expanding your world and your concern to include experiences and struggles beyond your own, no matter how challenging that may be. Because there’s no time to lose.

The world isn’t going to wait for me to get comfortable before it falls to pieces. I—we all—must learn to be ready and bold and sacrificing now. Even when it interrupts our sleep or our fun or our complacency. Even when it’s scary. Even when it hurts. And especially when it forces us to acknowledge our privilege, recognize our selfishness, and show up for the fight.

[Photo by Rachel Mallison]

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The End of 23

Twenty-three has been the hardest year of my life, straight up. And I say that with zero melodrama and with the common sense that there will be years ahead that are worse and years ahead that are better. I know many of you can relate. Maybe this is just our early 20s, or maybe this is just life—this pendulum swinging between the dark and light, wandering and arriving, wondering and knowing, grief and joy.

Today I Am On A Plane: The Move to New York City

Today I am on a plane.

I have just moved to New York City. I have listened to "Empire State of Mind" 7 times. I have had 2 mimosas. I don't know what I'm doing here. I don't know how I got here.

Five days ago I was in Nashville, TN. My home for the past 4 years, my city, my happy place.

One day ago I was in Long Lake, MN. My home for the past 22 years, the only home I've ever lived in, my safe haven.

Today I am on a plane.

I have realized there is a difference between dreaming your dreams and living them.

I have also realized how hard it is.

Through the Eyes of a Child

One disappointing thing about getting older is noticing the mystique of things that used to excite you fade. Coming into the real world is met with its fair share of challenges, and the temptation to let this harden you is accessible; perhaps it’s autopilot to become jaded. To have a hopeful outlook towards the state of the world, towards your passions, even towards life at times, takes a conscious effort. The reality is you witness (and sometimes find yourself in the middle of) a lot of crash and burn scenarios as you grow up, and it is really easy to let ugly truths cloud your perspective.

Dealing With Heartbreak at 35,000 Feet

Three days after my birthday I got dumped. Plain and simple. I was about to leave for a month in Germany, followed by a more permanent residence in Alabama for graduate school, when my boyfriend said he wasn’t prepared for the distance. It hurt, I cried, and then I drank more wine than I should have.

I spent the time leading up to my trip to Berlin thinking about the what if’s: What if I wasn’t leaving for half the summer? What if I could stay in Nashville? Would things change? Three weeks of driving myself crazy with questions made me realize that I needed to go to Europe, if only to provide myself with a distraction from neurotically checking my ex’s Instagram page. I packed my bags and in mid-May settled into seat 27C on a flight from Dallas to Frankfurt, thinking that maybe this was a good way for me to take a break from the breakup.

On Making Decisions When You Are Afraid Literally Always

Like a dramatic and silent slow action shot in a cheesy multi-million dollar film, I watched in horror as the barista raised the whipped cream dispenser, taking aim at my beloved mocha. But I didn’t want whip. In fact, when ordering, I had specifically requested no whip, please. An internal battle raged within me on whether or not I should say something. Over whipped cream. I was literally contested over whether I should say something about whipped cream.

Because why rock the boat? Even if it’s as inoffensive as asking for no whip.

“Don’t say anything,” Fear instructed. Over whipped cream.

Let It All Go: On Shedding Expectations and Fear

There are a few things that happen when you graduate college. You celebrate school being finished. You send out job applications with big dreams and starry-eyes. You get rejected and ignored. You send out job applications, and LinkedIn invitations, and cover letter after cover letter—you dream about cover letters—you start losing steam. You want a job. You want a job so badly.

You get a job. You celebrate. You go to your first day in a new pencil skirt with starry-eyes. You love it, for a while. Some days you hate it. Sometimes you wish you could go back to that time when you weren’t tied down to your desk, even though that’s all you wanted. You start losing steam. You want a new job, or to travel, or to do what that girl on Instagram is doing. You want that other life so badly.

And it’s not that what you have is bad, or that it isn’t what you expected. It’s that there are so many reasons to tell yourself that you’re doing something wrong. That you didn’t choose the right path.

One Year In: 3 Lessons from That First Year of Post-Grad Life

I turn 23 at the end of July, meaning I was the baby of my grade all through my academic career. Being the youngest (among other things) somehow made me feel uncool and likely had an effect on my ridiculous effort to prove just the opposite. Self-expression was key here. I found identity in a flowy skirt, Converse sneakers and a Rolling Stones t-shirt in the 8th grade. “Woah, Lane, that look sounds way chill already—how’d you manage to make it even chiller?” you ask? Braces and a DIY hemp necklace, obviously! The universe had surely never seen anything this edgy. I remember feeling like a fraud but also a badass when asked, “Can you even name a Rolling Stones song?” and responding only with a panicked “yes—of course!” before fleeing the room immediately.

I can name close to 10 (lmao, boom) Rolling Stones songs now, but in many ways I still carry around that same confidence-meets-self-consciousness. It’s this stupid thing where I don’t care what people think about me so much so that I want them to know just how much I don’t care. I believe “caring” is what that’s actually called. So just to reiterate: sometimes it’s hard to feel like an adult.

Reflecting on the year, it bums me out to realize how hard I’ve been on myself. Whether that meant kicking myself for not living up to an expectation or kicking myself for being “too much” or kicking myself for not being enough, there was always a reason to kick. But the thing is, all we can do most of the time is try to exist as we are.

That said, I’ll keep this short and sweet with three pieces of advice for those entering their first year after college.

A Letter to the Recent Grad

I took graduating really hard. Like, really hard. I left school having absolutely nothing figured out with absolutely no answers, and spent most of the summer crying to my parents and denying the fact that I could no longer get dollar drinks at the bar (one of the rudest awakenings about post-grad life…). I felt lost without my friends, without the walls of UNH that protected us all so neatly, and without my identity as a student.

…because if I wasn't a student, then who the $%&@# was I?!?!?

An Ode to Carrie Bradshaw

It’s discouraging when you work something up in your head for so long and nothing comes of it; the moment I put something in there, I can’t let it go for the life of me. And it’s even more discouraging when you realize that what you want may not exactly be what you need. But John Steinbeck once wrote to his sons: “I have discovered that there are other rivers. A great many never come to know that there are other rivers.” I over-analyze literature like I over-analyze everything else, but what I took from this is that sometimes, we try to cling so hard onto what we know, simply because it’s what we know. But you have to allow your dreams to change so constantly because you are changing so constantly. There are other rivers, and other cities, and other places to grow in. And often, they are the ones you would never expect.

Politics, LifeLiz DeadrickFebruary 9, 2017FeaturedComment

I Will Show Up

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