Future Spring
A story about collective care, mutual aid and regenerative systems in Bed-Stuy, Bk
I woke up this morning to a family of blue jays yelling at me to wake up from the nest right above my window. I said thank you, good morning. I brushed the sleep off and went for my morning walk. I said hello to my favorite ginkgo tree that has lived on my block for over 80 years. It’s taller than most of the buildings I see. Every block has one, they’re protective spirits. I greet the family of squirrels that live there too, yes, we still have squirrels. My neighbor Rosa’s daughter named them all, something soft and fuzzy I can’t remember.
I see Zahra, drinking her morning tea, I’ve never seen her without it. She always smells like something crafted in a grandmother’s kitchen— warming, like a big hug of nostalgia. She tells me about a concoction she dreamt up and is brewing in her kitchen right now. She asks if I ate breakfast yet, she knows I always forget to do that, and I swear she keeps a bag of dried fruit in her pocket just for me. Thank you! I hope you have a joyful day, a greeting ’til the next time.
I turn the corner, past the mural Javi painted years ago, layered with stories of what this place was and what we dreamed it could be. It moves with the sun, shifting colors, catching shadows from the fruit trees expanded from the food forest growing along the sidewalk. I trace my fingers over a section that maps the old water routes, now guiding rain into the flood gardens instead of flooding our streets. I remember when this was pavement, when we had to fight for the right to let the land breathe again. And now? Take a breath & you’ll feel it too.
I grab a persimmon and take a bite. I pass the food forest— once a vacant lot, now something abundant, something ours. The scent of basil, tulsi, thyme, mugwort carries through the air. I see Etiosa kneeling in the soil near the medicine wheel, checking the mushroom beds that stretch in patches of shade between Chestnut trees. He waves, that’s how I know he’s deep in it right now. We’ll chat later. To the right of him, the compost station buzzing with life. The chickens are running around, pecking at the soil, kicking up leaves, scratching the ground the way they’ve always known how to. Mr. Luis is turning the pile, steam rising as he chats with a few kids about soil microbes, and how everything cycles back, and I can’t tell who enjoys it more — smiling faces all around.
Novaa says “goood morning sunshine!” from the water filtration station, adjusting the solar panels that power the pumps. Our regenerative energy wizard! Novaa grew up in a co-op housing model with shared energy and water systems, and her knowledge is constantly overflowing. A few sparrows also gathered near the water collection spouts, dipping their heads to drink. Water is a lifeforce here still, caught from the rain, cleaned through soil, mycelium and algae networks integrated within our filtration systems, guided and given back to the roots that hold this place together from deep in the ground up. It’s all so enchanting to witness.
Elio is nearby, tending to the communal repair workshop, fixing a cracked cistern with reclaimed clay from the streambeds flowing under the base of the Center. We’re still figuring out how to make that hold up better. Elio constantly reminds us that Javi, an elder who mentored him would say “the pipes don’t flow by themselves” and laughs every.time. Bambu, the cat sleeps beside him on a pile of fabric scraps that will become a wheatgrass bioplastic tarp for groundcover. Laughter sounds inside, the usual morning rhythm of people gathering, building, tending to and basking in what we’ve made.
Amari walks past, pinning a new announcement to the mutual aid board outside the gathering hall, “see you there?” ‘you know it!’ Today’s skill-share: preserving summer fruit. Someone has scribbled in the margins “Who needs extra seedlings?” Someone else has already answered “Left some by the free stand! take what you need!” A few bees buzz lazily near the edges of the paper, drawn to the faint scent of crushed fruit on someone’s hands. No one leaves empty-handed here.
I keep walking, past the library kiosk Kai curates, filled with old abolitionist texts and new mutual aid manuals, past the co-op kitchen where someone’s already baking bread to distribute in a few hours, past the solar-powered streetlights, hand-built benches & rain-fed gardens. Javi’s banner still hangs above them — "We keep us safe. We keep us fed. We keep us free." The words are softened by years of sun and rain, but they hold, stitched and restitched by so many hands over time.
We didn’t get here without loss. I remember the floods that swallowed homes whole, the fires that painted the skies red for weeks, the silence of the air when birds stopped singing, the sirens that never stopped. I remember how people clung to screens, to false promises, to systems already cracked and crumbling beneath us. We had to wake up — no one was coming to save us. We had to look at the ruins, the grief, the exhaustion. That pain was real. And so was the power we realized when we turned toward each other instead. We continued organizing in the face of collapse. We started dreaming not just for survival, and that’s when everything changed.
It took years to get here. Decades!!! All the destructors of the Earth have left for space. Annnnd we made it — together, that’s what matters. I remember when we were just seeding the idea, when this was all a possibility, a far-away dream. We were still gathering in basements, in borrowed spaces, talking late into the night, and day-dreaming about what we could build. And now, we are living emblems of it. The many hands and hearts of the free.
I pause for a moment, taking it all in — the roots beneath my feet, the warmth of the sun on the leaves, the quiet rhythm of a place built with resonant voices of care. None of this happened overnight. It took time, patience, and a long, steady commitment — all unwavering still. It took hands in the soil, hands building, hands mending, hands healing, hands holding and holding. It took people showing up, again and again and again, even when the path wasn’t clear.
I’m grateful. I see it all, connected, every piece of it — every piece of us, echoed through, slowly & constantly evolving.
I think of those who dreamed alongside us but didn’t get to witness this for themselves. To the ones who fought for this, who planted seeds knowing they might never see them grow — we carry you. Your work is here, woven into the land, in the food we share, in the way we care for each other. We echo your spirits for all of eternity.
To the land, to the water, to every hand and heart that made this real. Thank you for being here with me. I yell thank youuuu into the sky as loud as I can, and I hear the whole block yell it back.