“We don’t talk much about the future because we can’t; we need to survive right now”

I came to Canada after falling in love. I met a very hot Torontonian who had a union job, and because I work in user experience and have the far more mobile job, it just made sense for me to make the move. We met in 2013 and I moved here in 2015 when I was 40. My family in the States is a Black nuclear family primarily, though we’ve expanded to include Filipino and Jewish and Croatian members. In each family meeting, there’s a lot of talking over one another at first, saying how much we love each other, then another spate of talking over one another about how angry we are at the president and the evil motherfuckers enabling the traitor, then another jumble of us telling one another to stay safe and do you have enough protection? We don’t talk much about the future because we can’t; we need to survive right now. We need to make sure we’re all right, we’re alive. My parents have delicate health and so do my siblings. My little brother has Type 1 diabetes, my sister, asthma, my parents myriad things. My dad is the eldest male in his family and my mom is the eldest in hers. Death has already touched us. My sister’s father-in-law has passed due to COVID-related illness exacerbated by his heart issues. His birthday was a couple of days ago.

And then there’s the issue of race. We don’t talk about it explicitly, because it’s pervasive, and it colours the fabric of our despair about the health situation and thus the future. The president’s disregard for our well-being as a nation, and race – it’s all wrapped up together.

The biggest difference between here and there is, in the States, I could afford a nice home with a big yard. Here, we live in a little condo. When I came to terms with the fact that I probably could never afford an actual home in the same style that I was used to, I cried a lot. I come from Detroit, which has lots of trees and nature, a good balance of city and green, and the homes have great architecture and are affordable and quite big in pockets and in the suburbs, and I’m still not used to not having that. This city’s been an adjustment. I haven’t been myself for a while here.

Our family has thrown our support behind Bernie Sanders, so much so that one of my nieces was a state delegate for Bernie at age 21, five years ago at the last Democratic National Convention. She was also an intern at the White House under Obama. As a family, we are angry. We grit our teeth and support Biden; my parents are ecstatic about Kamala Harris, though. My siblings and I are not Democrats, per se, but we are for a strong nation that invests in its citizens, cares for the environment, creates (delightfully, not just tolerably) livable conditions to eradicate poverty and bestows true equity to all races and genders, abilities and ages. We are a hopeful family in that regard, specifically about the abilities of Harris, but right now we are concerned with two things: staying alive to vote, and voting.