April 1st I came back to work from furlough, and mid-April was my first trip back onsite since the November prior. I made monthly visits for the rest of the spring to fulfill reference requests. It felt strange returning - I was thankful to have a paycheck from the museum again, it was great to virtually meet with colleagues again, and the physical archive itself is a comfort in its own (relatively) unchanging, indifferent way. But it’s challenging not to feel some anger and frustration for everyone who was furloughed and those who weren’t furloughed but bore the brunt of increased workloads. And the negative feelings extend to how workers at the museum and beyond have been treated in capitalist societies. Many actions taken - layoffs, workers being forced to come onsite often without necessary protective equipment while the pandemic raged, pay cuts, furloughs - were described as inevitabilities when in reality these were choices made by those with power. In many cases, though the resulting economic downturn from the pandemic has been blamed as the catalyst for these actions, there is sufficient money available. Wealth and power is further consolidated during wide scale emergencies like this one.
A visual representation in the form of many notations on a catalog card of all the workers who have worked with this archive.
Routine work - finding and digitizing large format negatives like this one - does provide some grounding after months of instability.
It seems reasonable that those who survived the last year would move on from this experience with a different understanding of the way the world works, and how unnecessarily fraught of existences so many live. I sincerely hope that collectively, we don’t attempt to return to “business as usual.” We need better safety nets for people, and folks shouldn’t have to work in order to sustain themselves. It remains to be seen what, if anything, we carry with us moving forward. Seeing downtown emerging from winter, green replacing gray, and blossoms emerging is a reminder that time marches on. What we make of our time is up to us.
A view of Grant Park and the skyline, Chicago.
Maggie Daley Park with skyscrapers in the background, Chicago.
Lilacs blooming outside of the museum, Chicago.
A moment of peace in the north gardens of the museum on a sunny day.