“If now isn't a good time for the truth I don't see when we'll get to it.” – Nikki Giovanni What if we could… 🤲🏾 Gather together in a room with beautiful food and music? 🤲🏽 Share our stories without any pressure, fear or judgment? 🤲🏻 Connect authentically, making space for strangers to become allies? How healing would that be? For the second year in a row, High Desert Playback and Explora Science Center’s X Studio come together in celebration of the National Day of Racial Healing. This initiative, launched in 2017 by the W.K.Kellogg Foundation, is a time to contemplate our shared values and create the blueprint together for #HowWeHeal from the effects of racism. Our Freedom Can’t Wait is a community gathering designed by theater artists, facilitators and cultural strategists to help us speak plain and tell the truth about how individual and systemic racism has impacted us. It is our chance as New Mexicans to share openly, listen generously and practice radical empathy. Agenda: 5PM DINNER Enjoy a beautiful meal catered by Three Sisters Kitchen, a non-profit community food space in the heart of downtown Albuquerque. A place where delicious, affordable and locally produced foods come together to nourish our community from the ground up. 6PM PLAYBACK THEATRE PERFORMANCE High Desert Playback’s multiracial, queer + trans-centered company performs your stories of harm and healing. Share times in your life when you: Were made aware of racism in a way that you weren’t before Stood up to racist acts or systems Felt held and supported in the wake of experiencing racism Although this event is for everyone in our community, we will make a particular effort to center and honor the stories of folx from historically marginalized communities. 7:30PM COMMUNITY CONVERSATION Following the show, Lynn Johnson (Co-Founder + Executive Director of High Desert Playback) will facilitate an interactive Community Conversation allowing you to: Reflect on the stories and themes shared in the performance Meet and talk with other folks in the room about your experiences Co-create our own “blueprint” for how we can continue to heal together as New Mexicans About High Desert Playback: High Desert Playback makes theater for social change in New Mexico and beyond. We use the art of playback theatre to mobilize and amplify social issues through community outreach, engagement, dialogue, and celebration. Playback theatre is an interactive form of improvisational theater in which audience members tell stories from their lives and watch them enacted on the spot. Created in 1975, playback theatre is now used in over 70 countries around the world to help build bridges across differences and to honor the human condition. Founded in Albuquerque by Lynn Johnson and Allison Kenny in 2023, High Desert Playback—a Black/queer/women-led social enterprise—is the first professional playback theatre company in New Mexico. The HDP 2025 Performance Company includes: Dalilah Naranjo, Danielle Simone, Lasha Kirker, Jessie Lane, Johnny Olesen, Noe Field-Perkins, and Tatiana Gil. About X Studio: X Studio is the teen center of Explora!, an innovative experiential learning center located in the heart of Old Town Albuquerque. At X Studio, teens experiment, create, hang out and learn.