My word of the year for 2026 is “repair”. It’s always an interesting process choosing a word of the year: sometimes I decide on them during the year prior, sometimes they reveal themselves a few months in. Now that I look closely at the fabric of my life, I see that the theme of mending has been recommending itself to me in various places for a long while now, and now seems (seams?) a good a time as any to pick up the threads.
Repairing jeans with frayed knees.
Repairing the health of burnt, poisoned or invaded soil.
Repairing my relationship to my art.
Repairing my relationships with people.
A different word I considered is “healing”. We certainly could use more of it. But personally, I like repair. It feels more proactive. Not to say that healing is less important to me, or that I don’t think it can happen at the same time as action. Two threads twisted together. But I think healing without action runs the risk of becoming a kind of passivity that may prove, or is proving, fatal at this point in time.
The way I see it is this (slightly paraphrasing J.R.R. Tolkien): Healing is something you can simply give time to. But repair is something you do with the time that is given to you. It is a choice to mend what’s been broken, by yourself, or others, or the world, in the past and in the present. It is setting yourself, in any small or large way, against destruction.
Against textile waste and overconsumption.
Against deforestation and neglect of all other life around us.
Against the theft and devaluation of creative work, craftsmanship and the arts.
Against isolation and helplessness and complacency in the face of powers that benefit from keeping us that way. Repair after disaster. Repair after hurt and grief. Repair after violation.
If that sounds awfully vast, believe me, I know. How heavy a single word can become! But I think the trick is allowing that huge tapestry hanging on the wall, so richly threaded and weighed down with significance, fade slightly into the background. It’s good to keep it in mind, to glance up at it every now and then as I consider repair and set my intentions. But as I do repair, I think in humble terms, in terms of a tool held in the hand. What can I grasp, what’s within my capability and connections to fix? Then do it. Thread the needle, pick up the pen. Make every stitch and stroke, word and action count. Over and over. As long as it takes. Side by side. Working alone—or—and yet—together, towards a patchwork whole.
Post-script: This is, as far as I know, my final story for Love for Analogue. It is due to circumstances outside my control and not my choice, but I’m grateful to BK for hosting my writing on journaling and creative practice here for the last almost-six years. It was a pleasure to share my unique perspective as a comic artist, and each essay, whether casual or substantial in subject, sensitive or humorous in tone, taught me something and helped me develop an authentic voice as an essayist. If you’d like to revisit any of my other 58 essays and photos, I’ve archived them in (reverse) chronological order on a dedicated page of my portfolio here.
I post my art to social media accounts on instagram, bluesky and patreon, and my published books are available in bookstores and online.
I was truly proud to be a part of a feature that could create a strong sense of analog warmth and connectedness even through a screen. Many thanks to you, reader, for sharing your time and space with me: on paper; through light.
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Text and photos by: A.C. Esguerra
Read other stories by A.C. : Here
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