Thread by @kdurquiza

June 30. #MarkTheDate Hi. This is Kristin. Sharing what's on my mind as I observe the 2-year anniversary of my Dad's passing from #Covid19. This is an unedited, uncut version, like the B side of an album. Give it a read. Then do something for those @MarkedByCovid 1/

My first memory of life without my Dad is seeing the last tendrils of sunlight disappearing over the horizon. I suspect I'll lean into that image for the rest of my life. After all, it helps numb the reality that I was at a gas station. 2/

I was at a gas station because I was driving from San Francisco to Phoenix in an attempt to get home and wrestle my way into the hospital to see him. I was driving because we were in the middle of a pandemic and there was no other way to safely get from point A to point B. 3/

Mom, Dad, myself, my entire family, his community, & the pple who cared about all of us were in this vortex b/c @POTUS45 repeatedly lied & downplayed the severity of the crisis in an attempt to keep a strong economy, critical precursor for re-election. 4/
nytimes.com/2022/06/23/us/…

Fanning the flames of his cult following he discouraged every single common-sense public health mitigation tool and in return allowed for the virus to take hold in our country, buoyed by conspiracy theories and rugged individualism. 5/
cnn.com/interactive/20…

His henchmen, @DougDucey and @AZDHS @drcarachrist did nothing to protect people in #Arizona. They prevented local municipalities from instituting mask mandates and welcomed indoor, maskless super-spreading campaign events to take place. 6/
azcentral.com/story/news/loc…

Dad believed and trusted the people in charge. He was trained to do that: during times of crisis, you put your trust in our leaders. While an accident made him unable to serve, his brothers did & he was in ROTC. He loved this country. 7/

He loved the military. He loved politics. He loved democracy. When the President and Governor said it was safe -- and encouraged people to get back and spend money like it was their duty to do so -- to start resuming normal activities he believed them 8/

I can imagine he took it as the best thing he could do for his country. So as he spent his measly check to stimulate the economy, he quickly caught the virus, got sick, and died. 9/
azgovernor.gov/governor/news/…

While we went through this nightmare there was also never a doubt that what was happening could be directly linked to the failed policies and dereliction of duty of our elected officials. 10/
nytimes.com/2020/08/18/us/…

There was also never a doubt that the people who would shoulder the most were the people already living on the margins. And all of this was in the context of the recent murder of George Floyd. 11/
thehill.com/changing-ameri…

The murder of #GeorgeFloyd had a profound impact on many of us. I remember feeling disgusted by the corporate scramble to issue statements uplifting the call of "Black Lives Matter." Don't get me wrong: #BlackLivesMatter. But I'm no fan of BLM-washing. 12/
marketplace.org/2021/05/24/a-y…

Or the appropriation of any movement for either virtue signaling or making money. It's obscene. Want to know what I'm talking about? Think about that @pepsi commercial with @KendallJenner at a "protest." 13/
time.com/4726500/pepsi-…

Being queer, I've watched as corporations have appropriated the rainbow to wave it in June #Pride to only fund anti-LGBTQ legislation and candidates from July through May. I also loathe the color pink. 14/

fortune.com/2022/06/01/maj…

Not bc I don't care about breast cancer and breast cancer awareness but because non-profits like @SusanGKomen encourage the adoption of pink to everything. Now there are all these consumer products linked to breast cancer claiming to help stop cancer. 15/
theguardian.com/world/2012/feb…

As my father struggled to beat COVID I looked around with eyes wide open. The neighborhoods shouldering the crisis during the beginning of the summer surge were the Navajo Nation, Maryvale (Latinx/Immigrant), and South Phoenix (Black/Latinx). 16/
brookings.edu/research/one-y…

These neighborhoods didn't have tests and their workers, essential. During shutdown season they went to work while we sheltered-in-place. Maryvale, my little corner of PHX, was not just the worst in the state for cases, it was the worst in the world. 17/
yahoo.com/lifestyle/woma…

The hospitals were overloaded and those faces were the faces that looked like me and my Dad. If I really cared about BLM and every other community of color, I needed to act. 18/

theconversation.com/during-a-covid…

I kept thinking about if I don't say something, I'm no better than one of those corporations. I talk a big talk about racial justice but can I actually act in a way that might actually make a difference? Kind of like @EmmaWatson re: @UN @HeForShe 19/

https://twitter.com/elleuk/status/575914201786531840

I thought back to the journey of my life. I've always connected--maybe even romanticized-- the notion that I'm the product of the American Dream. 20/

My grandparents were migrant farmworkers from Mexico and Oklahoma. My mother's mom grew up in a tent and basically ate what she hunted. My father's father came from Mexico with just about the shirt on his back. 21/

They all ended up in @CityofTolleson, my parents met, & were fortunate enough to live in a time where you could buy a house making minimum wage. I excelled in school, went to a very fancy college, 22/

& decided I wanted to make a career out of this abstract concept, "Make the world a better place for children with backgrounds like me." 23/

While swimming/drowning in the elite swimming hole of @Yale, I kept thinking to myself, these kids are no better than the ones I grew up with. Why am I the token brown girl? 24/

So as my dad's condition worsened I asked myself, "If not me, who? If not now, when?" Which I know is a teaching in the Jewish faith but I kid you not, those exact words popped into my head. 25/

I thought to the hundreds of times I've asked someone to do something in my career as an organizer. I thought, how could I ever ask anyone to do something again if I can't. My entire life was adding up to this moment and NO ONE was screaming from the rooftops:

"SOMETHING IS TERRIBLY WRONG." So I did.
My therapist once told me that courage is moving forward with fear. I had a lot of fear but more than anything I had fury. The fury of a lifetime of being set up to fail. The fury we were in this mess. 27/

The fury that my country found my father's life expendable. The fury that for year after year our president called me a descendent of rapists and murderers. The fury that no matter how hard I worked, how hard I pulled up on those bootstraps that 28/

that those bootstraps were cemented due to my origin of place and race. The fury that I did everything right and when the shit hit the fan it hit ours first. The fury that I knew what was happening to me was happening to people like me. 29/

The fury of living in a caste system. The fury of playing by rules that allowed "boys to be boys." #MeToo The fury of growing up being told that I could be and do anything only to learn came with so many conditions. 30/

The fury of the original Big Lie: America had evolved into a place where the Haves Have It and if you're poor you are expendable.
Enough was enough. And with my Dad's death, I allowed myself to be liberated from the shackles of this society that has kept me in my place. 31/

In case you can't tell, I give 2 F*** about what anyone or any institution thinks of me. I no longer hold back punches or censor myself or sit silently on the sidelines because it's the polite thing to do to wait my turn. Why should I play nice if the system 32/

is built to come crashing down on the people I love the most? No way.
Because nobody is going to give us our turn. We must take our turn. We must surround ourselves with those who lift us up and find the courage to lift up the voices of others like ourselves. 33/

That's it. That's the meaning of my life now. Make space for justice. Make space for more warriors. Move from an authentic place. Speak up. Put my body in the way. Put my entire future on the line. Yes, put your goddamn money where your mouth is and put your body in action. /34

Call me a feminist. Call me a liberal. Call me whatever. Call me a democratic hack. Call me all the things that make you feel better because I finally feel fine feeling my lifetime of fury. You think you can hurt me? Have you seen what I am capable of doing? /35

So as the hurricane in my body grew and the waves of grief pounded my entire person and in between screams and tears as we drove through the night, I looked out to the milky way and thought, "I'm not going to let them get away with this. /36

The people going through this didn't deserve this."
I had a calling. I answered it. I'm not looking back.
I will not rest until justice is served. /37