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Dangerous Compassions

RIP Candice Yemaya

Hello, reader.  How are you doing?  Local activist Candice Yemaya has passed over to the other side.  I was crying yesterday when I found out, shocked.  Rest in peace as we continue your vital community organizing work.

Candice Yemaya

I first met Candice in my backyard when Ming and I lived at Walnut Street Co-op.  There was a monthly community dinner potluck; we spoke briefly.  She was fat and Black, and you know I love having other fat people and People of Color around.  I learned later that she was also Japanese and other ethnicities.

Candice had brought her family with her, including children.  The kids were running around being kids.  I was happy with how much life had suddenly arrived.  The normally-serious space was filled with motion and sound.

“Wow, some real people are here,” I thought.  At the time, Walnut Street was almost all white people.  Ming is Asian, and my mom was Mexican-American so I’m half.  Otherwise, everyone there at the time was white.  Probably I’m not supposed to mention it, but sometimes I feel like white people are ghosts.  More about that later.

As a contribution to the potluck, Candice brought ice cream and ice cream cones.  I can’t eat those foods, but I’m glad other people can.  A few leftover ice cream cones were in our community’s shared north kitchen for a month or longer, afterward.  Every time I saw them, I would think of that happy evening.

rent strike

Candice was being evicted from her home, and there was injustice the way landlord-tenant situations tend to have injustice.  Property is theft!  Rent is theft.  All we want is total freedom.  Whose streets?  Our streets.

So a site of resistance sprung up.  People moved there to camp in the yard.  There was a fence, gate, and an outdoor kitchen–there was a first aid medical supplies area, and a bookshelf library of books and zines.  There were art supplies and signs that people made, multiple seating areas, lights.  At times there was a party atmosphere of joy.

In fact my friend’s birthday party was held there, and bands played amazing, loud music.  Ming and I danced under a huge tree.

There was “the stoop” which had someone guarding 24-7.  The idea was that one day the site would probably be raided.  Eventually that did happen, and the resistance there is no longer.  But the dream is still dreamt.

sacred love

The community that sprung up around the eviction resistance was sacred.  It was sacred because it came from the people and was formed out of love.  It wasn’t top down from a nonprofit–it came from our hearts.

Ming and I visited frequently to deliver flowers.  We felt happy to contribute.

I would pick lilacs, wild carrot, lemon balm, mint, lavender, calendula, and sunflowers at Walnut St to bring in DIY vases like a pasta sauce jar I pulled out of the recycling bin.  Always I would include rosemary for protection.

the revolution should be beautiful

The flowers were prayers.  The revolution should be beautiful.  Resistance can be serious but should also be happy.  We all deserve pleasure.

The flowers Ming and I brought were our biggest contribution.  I rarely saw Candice, but I hoped having cheerful plant beauty around enriched her life.

Other people brought flowers too.  When we visited, I would sometimes grab a jar of faded, falling apart flowers I’d left the week before so I could reuse the vase.

Sometimes the person personing the stoop would recognize me and Ming, and sometimes they would not.  But always the flowers we brought were accepted.  We also contributed zines, medical supplies, and foods.

aftercare

Next door was an intentional community, and I spent time there outdoors, visiting a friend or writing.  Also I was part of an aftercare team set up to support the resistance.  The idea was that we could offer aftercare in the days following a raid or other painful interactions with authority.

I had an aftercare menu on a clipboard and would take a shift, letting the stoop person know I was available in my spot.  But mostly nobody knew who I was.  I’m an autistic outlier introvert, and who wants aftercare or any kind of emotional care from a stranger?

One day I felt a prayer stir inside me.  So I whispered my prayer in the beautiful outdoor kitchen, then wrote a version on a postcard and gave it to the loyal anarchist at the stoop.  I had no idea that a few days later the kingdom would be raided and destroyed.

Candice Yemaya

I knew Candice for only a short time, and mostly just this one piece of her life’s work.  There was so much more to her that I will never know.  A person is a miracle.

I loved Candice Yemaya and was very interested.  I thought there would be years and many chances for our work to intersect.  What if we had made the queer fat disabled dance studio together?  As her friend on social media I learned of her health struggles and a little about her past.  I saw beautiful pictures of her and her family.

Now she’s transitioned to the other side, an ancestor to worship.  She was younger than me.  My life is a gift from God–that I still have my life is an honor I won’t take for granted.

How can we resist oppression and build the people up?  How can I use my lifeforce and remaining years for the power of love?  I renew my vow to nourish the revolution with pleasure and beauty.  We need songs and sunflowers if not roses.

alive

I wasn’t close to Candice, but she was more vivid to me than most.  It’s weird how the liveliest people I’ve known are the people who have died: my mom, my friend in high school who committed suicide, my caring, feisty therapist Tracye Ditmore.

Not all white people are repressed like ghosts.  I spent most of my life quiet and at times silent.  For ten years I wrestled with the Audre Lorde quote, “Your silence will not protect you,” until I decided yes, she’s right.

I keep a symbol on my altar of the community of resistance that formed around Candice because I wish there were many eviction defense sites in every neighborhood that I could support.  My prayer is that the people continue to rise up.

Let’s all continue to speak the truth.  I will honor Candice on Mother’s Day, and renew my commitments.

possum kingdom

By Laura-Marie

Good at listening to the noise until it makes sense.

7 replies on “RIP Candice Yemaya”

Thank you for sharing your feelings and some stories about Candace. She sounds like a very special person. Sometimes I feel like people who die young are really efficient live-ers. Wow, they got it done in 5, or 20, or 43 years. I am always amazed. They got their soul intent done quickly. I think I am beating around the bush for longer, at least, longer than my dad did. But who knows how long I will be here.
Sending you love and I am sorry your friend has passed out of life here, Laura-Marie.

yes, I think about length of life also and wonder the big questions. I appreciate your ideas, and I love you. thank you for caring about me and the people I love. you are a wonderful companion on the path. besos y besos!

and I hope Candace’s children will be well and feel her love, and be cared for very well with her no longer here. I am sending them my love, too.

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