Welcome back,
[If you’re new here this is my quarterly newsletter that aspires to be aligned with the solstices & equinoxes, but alas that never really happens. Read on for reflections of the current season, the things I’m getting up to and lots of recommendations of music, jobs & opportunities, articles & podcasts recs, and so much more! ✨// P.S. If you’re reading this and you only know me by my birth name, here’s a little life update! I’m going by Téyo now! (Pronounced They-oh, or Tay-oh) New name, same me! If you have questions or are curious about it, happy to talk about my gender-free & gender-fabulous journey!]
TLDR (Too Long Didn’t Read, or a helpful summary of What’s Below!)
Winter Solstice & the animal body
ART SALE: Birthday Calendars Oh My!
STOKE offerings~
Work life updates~
Monthly Jamz , Listenings + Readings 4 The Culture
Jobs + Opportunities people should know about! (Yobs +Opps)
Winter Solstice & the animal body.
It happened again! The winter solstice flew by me, and the flury of this season caught me off guard. I am glad, at least, that I was able to celebrate the shortest day of the year, and celebrate the light by making candles with friends, and nourishing my body with many delicious meals. Hopefully next season I’ll get closer to the mark on sending my winter newsletter out at the start of the season. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Although we’re well beyond the winter solstice, I like to imagine it as the metaphorical midnight of the year; praise the start of the cold season for the reminders to rest, get introspective, and go inward. Winter is often represented as the night, the new moon, the element of water. Even though winter(capitalistic) holidays can kick off a flurry of activities, travel, and heightened exhaustion by too much people time, I’m always struck by the contrast of the undertow of sorrow or grief asking us to slow down and tend to our hearts a little bit more.
Even though my Capricorn heart wanted to dive into a ‘new year’ head first and headstrong, my animal body mostly just wanted to curl up and be warm in this season. One of the many contradictions currently living in my body as I try to re-define what balance looks like in each season.
For me, winter is a season of grief because my body is finally catching up with the waves of water I’ve tried to ignore in the warmer seasons of the year. That undertow often doesn’t get the space to be held when there’s work to be done, when the sun is out, or when the harvest is full. But in the past few years as I orbit closer to grief intentionally, I find there’s so much more room for the fullness of life when I sit and listen to my grief, even if only for a few quiet moments.
All i know, is my friend
Grief, accompanies me
and will continue to do so.
Here’s a playlist for my fellow grievers, for those riding the waves, for those holding the heaviness of the world we live in, for those grieving alone, and with the collective. For those still holding on to dreams for the worlds that don’t yet exist. I’m right there with you holding space for your grief.
ART SALE: Palabra Paper goods!
I’m very excited to finally announce that the Palabra Paper Evergreen birthday calendars are now up and available on my website (new website too!)! Took a little longer than expected to get them printed and ready (+technical difficulties) but I’m so incredibly happy with how they came out!
These were printed at the incredible community Riso studio @risolana based here in Albuquerque! I’ve been so excited to be learning this kind of printmaking process so definitely check them out if you’re in the area! They are printed on locally sourced cardstock, with eco-friendly rice based ink (completely recyclable) and fabulously colored with cornflower blue flat gold, and fluorescent orange inks. This set of 12 prints are evergreen calendars because they don’t correspond to a specific year, and are meant to be cherished for a long time! If you want one of these birthday/special dates/anything you want to track calendar order today: link here. These will only be up for sale for a limited while & since It’s a limited run I expect to sell out ~don’t say you weren’t warned ;o
There’s also some other prints available on my online shop as well!
STOKE Offerings!
Last year, as you may already know I joined The STOKE Collective, & we’ve been dreaming up a lot of new offerings and ways to plug in our networks more intentionally. If you’re interested & involved in community organizing, social change and movement work at large then these offerings are probably for you! (If you’re not sure, talk to me about it) For most of our offerings we recommend joining with someone you work or organize with so you can bring back tools to use together. Check out our offerings here!
Workin’ it out: Changes & Transitions
[Created in partnership with the Center for Innovation in Worker Organization (CIWO)]
In the fall of last year I started to get more clarity about what I want my role to be in movement + social change work, specifically around what skills I wanted to be learning and leaning into.
While I have been so incredibly lucky to have been running my business— doing freelance graphic scribing & visual storytelling for some incredible groups and efforts over the past few years. It can be spiritually exhausting when it is my main source of work + income, and while I have dreams of scribing in a collective one day, I’m going to be slowing down on my freelancing work. I’ll still be working with a few clients, but won’t be taking on any new clients for some time.
I am very excited to share that I’m starting off this year in a new role as a Communications and Social Media Manager, working with NewMexicoWomen.Org. I'm excited to dig into more narrative-based creative storytelling + broader communications work while also supporting and connecting gender justice movement work locally!
Of course, I’m still dreaming & scheming up lots of other projects but feeling really lucky to usually be right where I need to be in my work and in my many worlds.
On to the rest of the things! Hope you enjoy some of my squirrel gatherings below!
Monthly Jams
~Monthly Playlists~
October: a joyous time regained.
December: an interrupted interlude.
Bonus playlists: My top songs of 2022
4 the Culture
Listenings & Readings that I share ~for the culture~
~Podcasts:
2023 Year Ahead Horoscope | Ghost of a podcast
Gender Liberation as Healing Justice | Gender Stories
Freakonomics | If Books Could Kill
Pleasure is the Mesure | Come as You Are
Possibilities of Divine Love w/ Alexis Pauline Gumbs & Sangodare Akinwale | Possibilities Podcast
Sustaining Love | How to survive the End of the World
Abolition is Disability Justice | abolition is for everybody
~videos:
"Be A Man”: Modernists and Traditionalists Debate Masculinity | VICE Debates
~Readings: (lots of juicy social change + movement reflections in this round up y’all!)
Building Resilient Organizations (!!!) ← Really read this one tho!
Embracing Conflict Didn’t Tear Our Organization Apart, It Transformed Us
Organizing Liberatory Networks: An Invitation
Unstill Waters: The Fluid Role of Networks in Social Movements
Why movements need to start singing again (!)
When Black Death Goes Viral: How Algorithms of Oppression (Re)Produce Racism and Racial Trauma
Plants’ Response To Being Eaten Is Very Similar To Our Response To Pain (!)
A Tongue-Tingling Tour of Mouth-Numbing Spices
Our Lady of Guadalupe and Colonization
A List Of All Wins For Trans Rights And Trans People In 2022 (!)
100 Favorite Albums of 2022 (!!!)
~Bonus: Books I read last year!
Yobs + Opps
~Jobs:
Changing Woman Initiative | Community Engagement Coordinator (Abq, NM)
Casa de Salud | Multiple Positions (Abq, NM)
IfNotNow | Multiple Organizing Positions (DC)
SISTA Fire | Lead Organizer (Providence RI)
Pa’lante Transformative Justice | Dev. Manager; Co-Exec Director (Holyoke, MA)
NDN Collective | Multiple Positions (Rapid City, SD/remote options)
Abortion Care Network | Multiple Positions (Minneapolis, MN/Remote)
Headwaters Foundation | Director of Operations + Finance (Minneapolis, MN)
We The People MI | Multiple Positions (Detroit, MI)
Frontera Fund | Legislative Coordinator (Remote/Austin, TX)
Texas Freedom Network | Multiple Positions (Austin/Brownsville, TX)
National Day Laborer Organizing Network | Multiple Positions (California/Remote)
O2O | Senior Campaign Organizer (Remote)
For Them | Multiple Positions (NYC)
Resource Generation | Program Director (NYC)
Idealist | Community Support Associate (NYC)
Environment | Multiple Positions (Mostly Remote)
~Opps:
WESTAF BIPOC Artists Fund - Deadline Feb 12th (Abq, NM) (!!)
Fellowship Opportunity for Disabled Poets - Zoeglossia Fellowship (Feb. 15th Deadline)
Somatic Scribing Courses (!!) ← Who wants to take these with me??
Arts Grants, Fellowships, and Residencies: The List