The Joy in Disaster:
Finding Community and Connection During the LA Fires
As promised, an earnest (and slightly chaotic) post on community. <3, CK
--
I first felt it at the relief center hosted by Holy Assembly Church in Pasadena, where I arrived a couple days after the fires erupted with a car full of suitcases I picked up from my friend Esme at Feed the Streets. I was meeting to drop them off with a woman I’d never met named Brandee, who I got connected to by a guy I went on a date with once (I’m not beating the bi allegations on this one lmao). As soon as I got out of the car, Brandee greeted me with a big hug, the type that only aunties with double Es can offer. She asked me how I was, keeping a comforting arm around my shoulders as she brought me inside the church doors and introduced me to the other organizers. They brought me in affectionately, passing a steaming, fragrant plate of Jamaican brown stew chicken and warm tea into my hands. We talked about gratitude, we gave outlets to our fears, and we shared how it felt to be connected with each other that evening. In that moment, I wanted nothing more than to be present with these strangers who welcomed me with a love reserved for family. I felt connected. I felt held. I felt…happier than I had in months? Shit.
Experiencing joy during a tragedy feels awkward. Borderline shameful. After all, the only reason I was at Holy Assembly was because thousands of people had lost their homes (and some people, their lives) to the devastating fires. Shouldn’t I be joining my fellow Angelenos in the depths of despair? Of course, I’d experienced all the emotions you’d expect— fear, grief, exasperation, concern, uncertainty. And yet—there was joy, loud and present in all her glory, like that random +1 at a wedding that ends up being the legend of the after party. It’s a strange feeling to hold amongst the rest, an emotion whose place feels tough to justify in the midst of disaster, but it was present nonetheless–and so, I’ve been exploring it.
I realize I’ve felt this kind of joy before. I felt it when my friends and I marched alongside the rest of New York City after the murder of Eric Garner. And when, as a kid in Florida, we’d head out to assess the damage and share food and candles with our neighbors after another hurricane roared through our typically quiet neighborhood. It’s the type of joy that only comes when experiencing tectonic moments of togetherness. Devastating moments that necessarily force the connection that’s so rare these days, but that we crave more than ever. Moments of despair that grab us by the shoulders and shake us, reminding us what AirPods and self-checkout and Waymos would have us forget: that we need each other. That it feels good to lean on our neighbors. That to be human is to be interdependent. During those first two weeks of the LA fires, despite the chaos and overwhelm and terror and exhaustion, I felt full.
––
The pace of the city has slowly returned to “normal” over the last few weeks, at least for the people and areas not directly impacted by the fires. The intensity and immediacy of the tragedy is slowly fading in our psyches. It’s one of the beautiful things about being human—our resilience lets us move through tragedies, to translate pain to memories. To continue on, the pain of grief must fade.
But while the pain slips away, another form of sadness takes its place: the loss of that fleeting spirit of togetherness many of us felt during those first weeks. Why can’t we enjoy this level of connection all the time?
I shared some of these feelings with a group of gatherers at a FLOC meet-up recently, and my friend Kenzie (an organizer at Love Hour’s emergency relief effort Love Bank) suggested Rebecca Solnit’s writings in A Paradise Built in Hell.
“Just as many machines reset themselves to their original settings after a power outage, human beings reset themselves to something altruistic, communitarian, resourceful and imaginative after a disaster. We revert to something we already know how to do. The possibility of paradise is already within us as a default setting.”
The seemingly paradoxical fullness and joy that I (and perhaps, many of you) felt during those weeks where mutual aid became a part of daily life was an example of humans operating as we’re meant to– as an interdependent collective that cares about each other, differences and all. Every day, our tech and our relentless cultural worship of individualism (thanks, Capitalism), leads our society away from that delicious paradise. But for a couple short weeks, we had the privilege of tasting it.
“Disaster offers temporary solutions to the alienations and isolations of everyday life.”
I’m reminded of a study by University of Chicago psychologist Nick Epley in which he surveyed train commuters about whether they thought their ride would be more pleasant if they spent it talking to a stranger or in quiet solitude. Most predicted solitude (lol, shocker). He then instructed half the participants to spend a ride keeping to themselves, and the other half to speak to a stranger. Results showed that those who spoke to strangers reported significantly more positive feelings than those who kept to themselves. “A fundamental paradox at the core of human life is that we are highly social and made better in every way by being around people,” Epley reflected after the study. “And yet over and over, we have opportunities to connect that we don’t take, or even actively reject, and it is a terrible mistake.”
I keep thinking about what it takes to keep those feelings of “paradise” alive that Solnit speaks about, and I’m not a moron—I know a lot of this is out of our control, especially with this new political administration on a tyrannical march of destruction and division (although let’s be real, it was happening before they arrived, too). But I also firmly believe that there’s a lot we can do, where we can see and feel immediate impact in a time where we might otherwise feel frozen by our incapacity. The answer lies in engaging and communing with the people around you. All of them.
“Disaster shocks us out of slumber, but only skillful efforts keeps us awake.”
Sure, the people in Epley’s study experienced a more positive 20 minutes–it wasn’t life-changing. But the first step to tasting that elusive paradise is to begin making connection a practice. Those 20 minutes each day start becoming your life pretty quickly. The strangers around you are your people, an infinite source of joy. The person you see every day at the dog park, but never say hi to. Your houseless neighbors. Your local bookshop owner. Notice your aversion, and strike up conversation anyway. You take care of yourself by taking care of each other—by being in community with each other. And if the self-care angle isn’t compelling enough…well then, do it for the plot.
That’s it for now! This rat is heading to Oaxaca to overdose on mole.
*Reminder that you can find the FLOC community index here, and you can email us at hi@floc.community if you have any suggested additions to the index.
CK
