Tongue of Fire

Breathe. Burn. Build.

the Byrne Alive Blog

Remembered by Dust Chapter 6: Broken Levees

“Broken Levees” threads together Sumerian floods, New Orleans trauma, and the quiet disasters we inherit. Dust witnesses who gets the boat and who gets the blame, how levees crumble long before they break, and why resilience is never as simple as staying afloat.

Remembered by Dust

Meridith Byrne

Nov 142 min read

3D forest diagram titled Community Mindsets. The X-axis shows Gratitude versus Entitlement, and the Y-axis shows Empathy versus Judgement. Four trees illustrate the quadrants: A – Gratitude + Empathy, “We thrive together,” a healthy radiant tree. B – Gratitude + Judgement, “I’m blessed,” a strong but self-focused tree. C – Entitlement + Empathy, “We deserve this,” a smaller in-group tree. D – Entitlement + Judgement, “I’m better,” a dark, stunted tree. The image represents how gratitude and empathy sustain communities, while entitlement and judgement erode them.

#We Can Thrive

Hard work matters, but it’s not the whole story. Some fields flood, some forests burn—and still we judge the ones left in shadow. #We Can Thrive challenges the myth of moral merit and asks: what if thriving was something we protected for everyone?

Resistance

Meridith Byrne

Oct 264 min read