I’m here because of other people.
It’s not just that other people helped me make the books I make (although it is that too). It’s that without other people I wouldn’t be here at all.
I want to start by acknowledging that me making books or friends or family would not be possible were it not for the land I live on. My family came to Tkaronto as uninvited guests fleeing anti-Semitic violence and discrimination. I grew up learning about how unwelcome we were in our homeland and also in the land we fled to. What I did not learn was that the people who didn’t want us here were themselves uninvited guests, who came here with violence, who took land that was not theirs and who continue to maintain that this land is theirs. Descendants of European settlers whose colonization and genocide formed the basis for the country that is now called Canada. Now that I know this, I try to live on this land with intention and respect for the peoples who cared for and continue to care for it, and who share it, even while they continue to face the very kind of genocidal violence my people came here to escape from.
When I was younger, I felt alone most of the time. I was desperate to feel connected to others, but didn’t know how to do that. This might be something I learned at home. The people I come from were persecuted and killed for being different, and maybe part of the intergenerational trauma that I live with is the feeling that other people are dangerous.
It took me 50+ years to learn that many (most?) people are not out to get me. It’s the ideologies and practices of white supremacy, colonialism, capitalism, racism, ableism, and anti-Semitism that are coming for me and all of us.
I’m lucky I survived. And I survived because of other people. People who taught me how to connect, people who showed me that sharing our differences and recognizing what we share is powerful.
I’m often asked about people whose work I turn to, or people who have influenced my work. So here is a very incomplete, and always growing list. There are lots of people on this list I’ve never met, spoken to, or corresponded with, but their work continues to teach and change me. Others are close friends. At least one is my therapist.
Thank you to: