Kinship and care

Irigaray’s postulation of non-hierarchical sexual difference does not abolish the dominant western model of kinship. It does, however, profoundly modify its structuration so that the exchange of women would no longer be possible.

Adoptees’ curiosity around origins and the past is significant, then, not only because it may lead to unearthing information regarding their personal histories, but also because of the knowledge it generates about a larger, collective experience.

Radical care is multidirectional and interdependent. In this ecosystem, care doesn’t flow in one direction or even reciprocally but rather gathers where it is needed.

As I begin to write kin and ethics no one writes to me. It’s a day or so into 2022 and the Omicron variant blazes across the globe and the containers that I so wanted to hold – physical distancing, vaccinations, testing kits – seem to be more porous than ever.

Loving someone, however, isn’t so easy. Loving someone for your entire life, even your child, especially your child, can be one of the most difficult things you will ever do.

Recently, the spirits from my mum’s side have been particularly active. I hear them when I am scraping the frypan after dinner or watering what is left of my lavender or dreaming of scootering up and down the driveway at my family home.

As I begin to write kin and ethics a dear writing friend corresponds with me in messages about writing and love and rallying and the idea of being ‘inside the between’ when we come close how there is a ‘turning there’ how it is ‘the both of us’ and how the work of language of prepositions and prepositional thinking opens derring-do to a means of queering and transing language that becomes possible.