it’s a struggle to try and stay positive (read: not fall into a deep pit of despair and general hopelessness) throughout all of this. i work in a public library in a purple state that has thankfully yet to see massive pushback from organizations trying to censor resources in public and school libraries, but that may change at any moment. i don’t know if the federal funding freeze will have any impact on public library funding and what that means for me going forward. more importantly, what that would mean for the people who rely on the library. it’s too easy to get sucked into just… general malaise about our current situation.
it certainly doesn’t help that i’ve been sick with the flu for the past three days either.
i recently read anxious people by fredrik backman for a book club i facilitate at my library and there’s a passage towards the end that i haven’t been able to stop thinking about since i finished the book:
“The truth. There isn't any. All we've managed to find out about the boundaries of the universe is that it hasn't got any, and all we know about God is that we don't know anything. So the only thing a mom who was a priest demanded of her family was simple: that we do our best.
We plant an apple tree today, even if we know the world is going to be destroyed tomorrow.”