community

Embracing Hard Conversations in Community

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
A table with a blue tablecloth on it and cards and multi-colored pens all over it

“Remember Ms. Margarett from church? She’s in that picture,” I said to my younger son, pointing at a photo of her and her husband. “She’s had cancer for a long time and she’s at the point where the treatment isn’t doing much and is making her feel worse. So she’s stopping treatment. But that means that she’ll die soon. They’re just trying to make her as comfortable as possible and we’re making cards about peace and love. But like, we can’t say get well soon or anything like that. Because she won’t.”   

“Hm,” he said, contemplating the situation. He started drawing an elephant.

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Extending a Bit of Empathy to a Fellow Parent

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
My older son when he was three and my younger son was an infant. (Alt-text: A young white boy in a red sweater, sitting on the floor playing with a toy fire truck)

“What age is she?” I asked the dad standing with a double stroller next to me in the elevator. The top seat had an older toddler in it; the bottom one was empty, but from the conversation between them, it sounded like there was a baby with the mom.

“Three,” he sighed, obviously exhausted.

“Oh, that’s a tough age,” I responded, trying to sound as sympathetic as possible. Three was by far the hardest for us, especially when our older kid was that age and our younger kid was an infant. “It gets easier – and more fun.”

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Cultivating Kid-Friendly Neighborhoods and Cities

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
My older son from a couple of years ago in a blue sweatshirt, crossing the monkey bars as part of a larger playground at our local park

Kids fly down my street on their skateboards and bikes to the nearby community center and I smile and shake my head. “I do wish they’d be safer on their bikes,” I mutter to myself, but am glad that they can do so. I think back to my mom talking about how she’d walk around her town as a kid and take the bus to the movies in the next town over.

Sadly, I know my neighborhood is a relative rarity in American society. 

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Keeping Pride Revolutionary

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
A necklace with rainbow peace sign pendant

I smiled as I saw my friend’s kindergartener running towards me waving the trans rights flag of pink, blue, and white. While she may have known what it stood for – her parents are supportive of trans folks – I suspect she was just happy to have a flag. But I was also heartened that the organization supporting LBGTQ+ youth had a prominent booth in-between the kids area and the carnival rides at our city’s big festival. It was impossible to miss, with all of the lovely rainbow decorations. When we stopped by the booth, we picked up a rainbow peace sign necklace.

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When “progress” splits and divides us

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
Photo of a tree in my neighborhood that has branches on both sides of a power line, with the power line going right through the middle. There are cars parked on the street next to it and houses on both sides

Leaves reach upward, branches split as they rise into the air. There’s a striking gap between the two main branches, an absence of tree and canopy. Through that gap runs a power line, the industrial shaking its way through the biological, ecological. It’s nearly half a tree, restricted. And yet, it is still full in its own way, defiantly standing tall despite being cut again and again.

Some days, I feel like so many of us are that tree. Cut through for the sake of progress, of capitalism, of others’ needs. Having metaphorical branches cut away from us, making it harder to be healthy and whole. Letting go of parts of ourselves and working ourselves to exhaustion because the only other choice is to be cut down altogether.

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Teaching kids about democracy by involving them in it

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
Photo of a bulletin board with five different sheets of paper, each with several different photos of playground equipment. Each photo has stickers on it that indicate 1, 2 or 3 for ranked voting.

“So there’s two regular swings and a baby swing and regular swing and an adaptive swing and regular swing,” I spoke into my phone while trying to maneuver the camera on it so my kids could see the bulletin board in front of me over FaceTime.

They were staying at my parents’ house (thanks mom and dad!) and I was at our neighborhood community center. The bulletin board was covered with photos of options for a future playground at the park across the street from our house. The community center had invited the kids in the neighborhood and after school program to do ranked voting for their favorites. That day was the last day to vote.

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How sustainability today can help us prepare for tough times ahead

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment
Photo of a climate justice protest in Washington D.C. with trees, the White House, and the Washington Monument behind a gathered crowd on a rainy day

Endless hurricanes, wildfires, and flooding; astronomically high prices and low wages; biodiversity collapse – is this the future you expect for your kids in 30 years? For many of us concerned about climate change and social inequality, it seems like the future is going to be pretty grim. Some people are even going so far to think we’re going to be living in something out of a dystopia SF novel (if we’re not already).

But while being prepared for a legit natural or human-caused disaster is a good thing, hunkering down in despair isn’t. Honestly, our children deserve for us to at least try to turn this ship in the right direction. No one wants to tell their kids, “We didn’t bother trying because what was the point?”

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Why I Had My Kids Write to the City Mayor

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment

Screenshot of a scanned in letter that says "Dear Mayor Newton, I believe we need a healthy Earth for everyone who lives on it. We need to work together to make less pollution and stop climate change. Don't value profit more than my future. We need climate justice now! The Earth is everyone's home. Draw what you want to protect from climate change." with a children's drawing of an elephant

“I’m sure the mayor will respond to you – they love getting stuff from kids,” I promised my kids, crossing my fingers. In the back of my head, I thought “Damn right, she better.”

I was trying to convince them to write letters to our local city government officials about climate change. While heavy topics like climate change can seem scary for adults to talk to kids about, finding ways to empower kids can help them be much less anxiety-inspiring. When kids know that they are not helpless – that they can make a difference and that their parents want to do it with them – they can tackle hard topics much better than we would expect.

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Juggling the Standards and Ambitions of Modern Parenting

/ Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment

Juggling the Standards and Ambitions of Modern Parenting (Photo of a kid pulling a rope with another kid holding on to it)

“The house should be so much cleaner!” I think, panicked about my parents arriving any minute. That streak of panic occurs despite the fact that they know perfectly well that they’ve been the only people in our house since last March and that we’re not exactly the tidiest people by a long shot. Expectations are already low.

And yet I think this anyway. The self-judgment weighs hard, even when I push back against it. The hardest part is that I think this way about everything: cleaning, cooking, parenting, activism, writing, even taking care of myself. Perhaps worst of all, I suspect I’m not the only one.

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