Every Thursday for 4-6 hours, beginning around 8pm, I have the honor of being with my family—a group of brilliant Detroit artists and healers, formally known as The TETRA . We commit to a lifelong journey consisting of rituals that help decolonize the mind, reckon with inter-generational trauma, and activate the imagination towards new concepts of Freedom. Through our time together, we actively and intimately show up together, disrupt the societal fractures between us, and account for one another.

The external and internal work I do with my community directly informs my research, teaching, and service—well beyond intellectual exercises—the stakes is high. Sustained commitment to anti-racism, decolonization, radical care, and solidarity is a requirement to be in right relationship with my community, myself, and my life purpose. As a white cis-man scholar who commits to community values based in queerness, my equity and justice practices are informed by the healing spaces I have cultivated with my community. They encourage me to actively choose to practice my research, teaching, and service differently than my socio-political positioning may suggest.

On May 19, 2019, I met my partner, Kemeyawi at Dear Mama Café on the eastside of Manhattan. We have been through a global pandemic, long distance quarantine, and countless moves together. Kemy and our Italian Greyhound puppy, Karl Marx are my everyday community. We love to go on long ways, eat good food, and watch trash reality TV. I wake up everyday excited to live life with them, which motivates me in everything I do.