Nothing Costs Nothing

For my readers, thank you for your patience last week. I was in the middle of writing a paper about transportation and inequality in Guadalajara–in English and in Spanish. This was a very difficult endeavor because it was an academic paper, which could mean attention, though I hope not in a way that takes my life from me. However, it was easy in a way because it was something I have done for quite some time now: study how those who refuse car payments traverse areas that have become hostile. If anyone wants to hear more about this, I discuss some of the process through my involvement with ATX Walk, Bike, Roll in Name Brand Negro.

However, the most important aspect of the paper last week was not my announcing that I was about to be published. I might not even be published, because despite how arrogant most imperial residents have been–myself included–someone else has control over this situation, not me. As an educated, native Spanish speaker, Lalo helped me a great deal because he is both an architect and a long-term resident of Guadalajara, and he did it while putting one of his own projects on hold. Only by last Friday was I able to compile all my English writing into a very rough Spanish draft so that he could begin to edit. Believe me when I say that it was one of the most exhilarating and stressful writing moments of my life–largely because it cost me something other than time.

This leads me to my topic of the day: nothing costs nothing, and most people without resources intrinsically understand this, but the beneficiaries and the sycophants do not. All of the suggestions that I have been seeing and hearing about circle the topics of using the dominant narrative to break itself, and I shake my head at such naivete. It is as if everyone thinks that the descent into fascism is one vote away from resolving itself after a commercial break. Not many people have changed much about how they operate, even if they move to other countries because believe me, there are several people who just want the United States, but in another setting. They want their comfort and their stability–but more than both of those things, they want to regain the ignorance of what “comfort” and “stability” cost without thinking about how it might affect others now and in the future.

People have lost the capacity to offer without direct knowledge that they will be repaid, and that is a problem. The many steps of my journey have taught me that unless I put barriers around myself, it is possible to be devoted to a cause that offers nothing back. Some would call me stupid, but I do not regret helping people avoid homelessness, offering breaks to single- and/or working parents to watch kids, or the little things that I will not describe because 1) I did most of that in Name Brand Negro; and 2) there are others doing far more than I can or will. Organizing costs something, and those who are maintaining rental properties, hoarding promotions/job opportunities, or vaguely looking around for either direction or “heroes” are not changing anything, even after signing petitions or voting.

A lack of vulnerability is not going to fix situations that legitimately made people vulnerable. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction, and “actions” that cost nothing will yield nothing. The paper I turned in was riddled with errors, even though I turned in a more polished copy hoping for some grace. I may not look like the person I have been because translating oneself is harder than simply being. Nonetheless, it is worth the effort and the cost because without doing things that take something out of me, I am not really doing anything. That is what people should remember while they continue to bite their fingernails and frantically posture.