Minneapolis
"I'm working, dude."
On the flight back to Minneapolis, I watched Clueless (1995, dir. Amy Heckerling). Classic escapism. I’m not usually one for romcoms— AS IF!— but I’ve always found Clueless to be an incredibly likable film. Alicia Silverstone plays it perfect, and fuck it, so does Paul Rudd. Everything is so PG-13. Maybe I was looking for something light, given the recent turn of events back home. It wasn’t until I landed in St. Paul that I started to think and feel a bit more concretely about how things have once again shifted here in light of the current ICE invasion. I felt a lot of solidarity while in Portland, but it was also a little awkward when someone basically confessed to me that they wanted to f*ck Jacob Frey after I said I was visiting from Minneapolis. OK?
In Clueless, there’s a scene where Cher and a classmate are participating in a low stakes debate on the subject of immigration; the question on the table: “Should all oppressed people be allowed refuge in America?” Cher rehearses the “pro” position, but keeps mispronouncing Haitians— HAY-TEE-ANZ (or, Hate-ians, if you like).
She concludes her speech by proudly observing, “It does not say RSVP on the Statue of Liberty,” to great applause. It’s basic. AND CORRECT. Fast forward to 2026…
By the time I was back in the Lyft, I wondered if my driver felt nervous. His name was Hassam. Rather than get into it, I opted to just be in the silence. The previous afternoon, I went to the Hollywood to see the new Jim Jarmusch movie, Father, Mother, Sister, Brother (2025), which was a bit of a throwback to Night on Earth (1991) and Coffee and Cigarettes (2003). It was a quiet film, but kind of anodyne and unnecessarily contemplative; every pair felt a little too much like one of those New Yorker cartoons. I am reminded of the film in this moment because the conversations that took place seemed filled with subtext, but it all felt somewhat pale or genteel, despite whatever global aspirations with the various settings—rural New Jersey, Dublin, Paris.
So, relative to that, the shared silence on the way home between Hassam and I felt poignant, to me at least. The following day, I caught up on the local news and began reading through unanswered emails. There were some nice messages from people I’d met in Portland. After making my way through some other notes, announcements, queries, misc follow-up, I realized I was not actually ready to deal with anything that wasn’t work-related or urgent, and posted a new out of office message. I am back home and I plan to be for some time, but I am now faced with a new and unexpected set of concerns, like: do I need to carry my passport around? Will I be racially profiled? Is it safe for me to shop at Target? Do I have to worry about getting gas? Do I need to move book club on Sunday online to Zoom? Are there certain roads or neighborhoods I need to avoid for fear of being racially profiled and harassed? What new risks do I need to consider when making plans that involve travel in, around, or out of state? Do I need to strike my name from a series of public programs I’ll be hosting in April because it sounds too ethnic? Does proximity to me if I am perceived to be anything other than a citizen endanger others?
This is unfortunate! I can’t believe I am wasting my time thinking about this rather than writing, or going about my business (I have yet to unpack my bag…).
Well, I suppose I am writing, and reflecting.
When I throw up an out-of-office message, I am requesting time to think and write, and also asking the sender to reflect on the conditions of writing/speech— theirs, and mine. I’m logged out of Instagram indefinitely, but my friends are also texting me. I’ve gotten slower about responding. If my basic needs are not met, or if I am distracted, I am not likely to respond. When I assert a need for space either willfully or absentmindedly by allowing silence to enter a conversation, I think of this as a means of interrupting a communication style where the space between call-and-respond seems to have collapsed into call-and-react. React to my anxiety! My fear. My needs. My insecurity. It’s very tempting to do that, but the answer, in most instances, has also got to be: No— which likely translates to: I’ll think about it, and in the interim, you learn that you will go on living after my death. (C.D. Wright: Poetry is the language of intensity. Because we are going to die, an expression of intensity is justified.)
I do a lot of work behind the scenes to learn how to go on living in your absence. It’s work I enjoy doing, for the most part. At this point, I would rather do that, and enjoy the freedom to choose to do that, rather than lapse into complicity or false urgency. This most recent invasion by ICE is not the first, but it is among the most aggressive and distracting; my out-of-office reply is an attempt to establish or remind the sender of the conditions of speech, and without peace, it will be difficult for me to respond in a timely fashion, because I am at present distracted by forces beyond my control.
Toni Morrison:
The function, the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being. Somebody says you have no language and you spend twenty years proving that you do. Somebody says your head isn’t shaped properly so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Somebody says you have no art, so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdoms, so you dredge that up. None of this is necessary. There will always be one more thing.
I want to close with words by Ahmed Bin Hassan who I’m taking inspiration from this week; in response to harassment by ICE, he replied: “I’m working, dude.”
Read more about Ahmed’s and other civilians’ local encounters over at MPR.