On resilience (or: How do you bang your pots?)

S2: E10

Nov 20, 2024

Greetings! This is Author Abroad, a newsletter on reading, writing, and reflections from a life abroad. Today, I want to talk about resilience.

Many of us across the globe are still reeling from the results of the US presidential election. The outcome has left us numb and confused, worried about the future of the country, the world, and the planet. For some, it feels personal, an attack on our values.

My cat of 18+ years died the same week as the election. Minka was part of our family, a fixture in nearly every home we’ve lived in since our children were born—from Malawi to Italy to Myanmar to the USA. Each morning when I wake, I’m struck anew by her absence, unsettled not to meet her in the kitchen, rubbing up against my leg, demanding breakfast.

I’ve lived in nine countries over the last thirty years. Most were either in the grips of war or suffering under autocratic governments. That’s why we were there, the need for humanitarian assistance stemming from civil war (Angola, Mozambique), corruption and mismanagement (Bangladesh, Myanmar, Malawi, The Gambia), and/or a lack of basic human rights (all of the above, to some degree). Yet my experience living in these countries was overwhelmingly positive, the people we encountered generous and warmhearted, regardless of their circumstances.

My daughters are even more upset than I am about Minka. Whereas I’ve outlived several much-loved cats (Lollipop, Smudgie, Pepper, Kixa, Rocky), each of whom has lived a long and full life, they can’t remember a time without Minka. “It feels wrong to go about my life without her here,” they repeat, over and over. That’s the hardest part of losing someone—the fact that life goes on without them. Not only do we continue eating, sleeping, working, going to school, etc., we also experience moments of joy and laughter within our grief. That’s what we’re programmed to do, and in so doing, each day it gets a little easier.

One of the things that’s always impressed me during my time abroad is the resilience of people living in difficult circumstances—the determination of the mother seeking care for her sick child, the camaraderie of those fighting for justice, the creative subversiveness of the artist. Despite the many hardships they face, they seem to me more grounded, and dare I say, happier, than many Americans I know. Perhaps the most impressive quality I’ve witnessed abroad is the sense of community, a willingness to sacrifice one’s own comfort for the sake of another.

Resilience | rəˈzilēəns |

Noun

1) the capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness

2) the ability of a substance or object to spring back into shape; elasticity

The day after Minka died, we placed one of her favorite toys on the mantel above the fireplace and lit a candle to remember her. Rituals like this make the grief easier to swallow. She’s still gone, but we hold onto her memory. This is what helps us to carry on. Losing Minka is unrelated to the political turmoil in the US, of course. She didn’t die because of the results of the election; she died because she was ill.

But the way these unrelated events make me feel is similar. They invoke the same empty feeling in my gut, the same sense of loss and dread. Perhaps the path to healing is also the same: To remember and reflect, to articulate what it is I think and feel. To live a creative life, a full life.

In the weeks and months following the 2021 coup in Myanmar, my friends in Yangon would stand on the street in front of their homes at the same time every evening and bang their pots in protest. Nearly four years later, these same friends continue to go about their daily lives despite the atrocities unleashed by the military government. Refusing to allow a dictatorship to destroy one’s life is a form of defiance, remembering those lost in the fight for justice, an act of resistance.

I’m still sad about Minka and unsettled by the results of the election, but I go on living, too. I write this newsletter as a way of making sense of it all, and in the hope of connecting with others. I bang my pots by reading, writing, imagining, being curious, listening, observing, taking care of others, and speaking out when I see someone being treated unfairly. How about you? How do you bang your pots?