Editor’s Desk: Issue 9
Dear reader,
I’ve opened up a blank google doc countless times over the last several weeks and just stared at it. I’m doing it again now. Hopefully, this time, words will fall from the sky and land on the page so I don’t have to keep agonizing over its blankness and what it says about me – Am I blank? Google: is “blank” an adjective I can use to describe a person? Have I already emptied out all of my thoughts? Will they ever replenish?
Fall is always a bit of a listless time for me. The season of dying and shedding things. It feels like a moment to pause and reflect on everything that has happened in the year and what it all means and what has changed. Idling seems only natural…
But I need to get this done. So, a week before we print the paper, as Ashlie sits across from me laying out pages (one of which, I imagine, has a gaping hole where this editor’s desk needs to land,) I am deciding that I’ll write about the behind-the-scenes happenings of our paper.
Per usual, the way this issue came together was chaotic: a story angle changing here, a piece falling through there, an author seemingly falling off the face of the earth. It’s widely acknowledged that those who work in social services, particularly nonprofits, are often pulled in a million different directions; spread thin. The same is true of our team at the Mother Jones Center. But the great thing about a publication that is focused on highlighting underrepresented communities is that there is a treasure trove of untold stories to tap into. Articles that fall apart seem to be naturally replaced with new ones that often end up being my favorites of the issue – like the story about Sarah, a detox nurse who overcame addiction and a felony to dedicate her life to uplifting her peers.
This issue, even more so than the others, is really about people like Sarah and their transformations. Constant change is not really a component of this work, it is the work. Many of our contributors have struggled with homelessness, mental illness, poverty and addiction and use those experiences to inspire others – an illustrator who uses art as a tool on his path to recovery, a vendor who manages her bipolar in pursuit of her dreams of authoring a novel, a NAMI member who overcame homelessness and medaled in the Special Olympics.
Our writers also dig into some of the reasons people might experience hardships – how domestic violence can push victims to living on the street, how anti-homeless rhetoric and legislation further displaces people, how not having identification or a birth certificate impacts your ability to secure a job. A central goal of this publication is to use journalism to bring awareness to these issues and I think the best approach is multi-pronged: featuring informative, fact-based stories alongside human-centric, personal stories.
At first, I was frustrated that this issue felt a bit less cohesive than the others. But I’m realizing the through-line is really just our mission itself: humanize the dehumanized and bring awareness to poverty, homelessness and addiction. I hope we accomplished that at least a little bit, in some way. You’ll have to continue reading and let us know.
Sincerely,
Your tired, writers block-stricken editor
Niamh Coomey