A Renaissance of Our Own

Introduction

A Journey to Reimagining
 
There are points in time that can divide our lives into a before and an after. A moment when a line of demarcation is drawn, after which the lens through which you look at the world permanently shifts. Usually, these mo­ments come unbidden, when you least expect them. For me, it arrived during a bicycle ride in Phoenix, Arizona, in the spring of 2017.
 
Biking through the Phoenix Arts District one afternoon while heading back to the color-washed hostel I d been stay­ing in on Ninth Street, I found myself deep in thought. Bal­ancing my iced coffee in one hand and steering with the other, I let my mind wander. I was a bit awestruck by the afternoon I d spent at a museum, a visit I d expected to be insightful but that had also turned out to be deeply moving. For the last several weeks, I d been indulging in all the good­ness Phoenix offered, witnessing how the desert moon rises high, long before sunset. The city was one of many stops on a backpacking trip I d decided to take the leap on, and I d just toured the Pueblo Grande Museum and Archeological Park. The park is home to a replication of a thousand-year-old indigenous village of adobe homes arranged communally in compounds that allowed people to hunt, fish, cook, eat, gather, build, work, play, and celebrate together. The Ho­hokam people had figured out a way to exist communally and simply, with intention and innovation that mirrored what I was craving: a way of life I hadn t yet witnessed but that I deeply longed for. The museum made clear this way of existing had been possible all along and had been achieved with great efficiency in societies past.
 
As I considered how many other undiscovered ways there must be to live and how many existences I might learn about, honor, and borrow from, I heard my phone ping. Still dream­ing of the sloping, sand-colored arches of the Hohokam vil­lage that married function and form so beautifully,

Rachel Elizabeth Cargle

Dazzling a loving, bold tale of imagination, bravery, and radical action in the face of injustice . . . Through an account of Cargle s own complicated life journey, she provides a framework for our own acts of courage as brutality threatens to strip us of humanity. Elle

I loved and admired this book as much as I have always loved and admired its author. Rachel Cargle is that rare sort of phoenix who rises from the ashes of her life not only reborn on the personal level but also fully ready to change the world. A Renaissance of Our Own is an elegant, thoughtful, vulnerable, and inspiring memoir. May this book land in a million hands, all over the world. Elizabeth Gilbert, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Big Magic

Magical. Shape-shifting. Cargle recounts how she spun silk out of the threadbare yarns of patriarchy and white supremacy while reminding readers that such alchemy is possible for them, too. Such wonder is inevitable if we give ourselves permission to reimagine our existence and re-create ourselves in our own divine image. Sonya Renee Taylor, New York Times bestselling author of The Body Is Not an Apology

What a beautiful offering and gentle invitation Rachel Cargle has extended with A Renaissance of Our Own. I felt the pull to really slow down and sit with both her stories and my own. This book is not meant to be simply consumed but explored. Joy Harden Bradford, PhD, founder of the award-winning Therapy for Black Girls and author of Sisterhood Heals

A profoundly moving and powerful story of how one woman transformed both herself and her community while giving us the tools to do the same . . . Rachel shows that the closer we get to our own true light, the brighter we may shine for the world. You will celebrate, you will mourn, but ultimately you will leave these pages changed for the better. Gabrielle Union, New York Times bestselling author of We re Going to Need More Wine