i worked for just under two hours today. my bleeding body revolted against the platitudes, exertion, and moving of objects (what i begrudingly become) in the workplace. so i wept and left. the president is in town, and his great gift of saying much but moving little manifested in traffic patterns. i spent 45 grueling minutes clenching my jaw, pressing my knees against the dashboard, and willing myself to not give in to vertigo. then i was home. i passed out on the corner of my bed, where the saturday sun rests when i am away. it’s a routine i often do not see, and my aching pelvis reveled in the warmth of beams as i slept. i dreamt of sourdough and open doors and pear trees.
i’ve been reading ‘the will to change’ by bell hooks. after resting i took it outside, holding my belly like a basket of blood oranges. i’ve been watching a show where the main character is pregnant, and something about that, the movingness of my body’s rhythms, and the babyness of feeling ill made me want to be extra tender with myself today.
eventually, my sweet neighbor apollo and his mother came outside — apollo hauling a toy fire truck the size of himself. at only three he has the courage to roar like a dinosaur from the bottom of the stairwell just to melt into my arms seconds later. he’s brilliant at multitudes, brilliant at keeping me company, brilliant at being himself.
over the past two months i’ve connected more with my neighbors, something i haven’t really experienced since i myself was a child — the ever-present hyper-individualism worm slowly digging into my brain as i grew. now, i am ever so slowly digging it out — pulling a little more each day. over the past two months of living alone while my roomie backpacked through europe, i would find apollo at my door after 4-or-so jumbled knocks, a grin reaching his eyes, a drawn out ‘miiiiirrraaaaa’ squeaking from his mouth. i think he, but especially his mama, could tell that i was lonely. so i would sit at my doorstep while apollo showed me stamps, triceratops and pterodactyls, and occasionally an update on the stuffed kitten i had given him on his birthday. he’s seen the child inside me, and given me a new experience of what it means to be adjacent to boyhood — so much of which i admired and feared. (still do, still do, still do).
i anticipate talking more about the contents of ‘the will to change’ as time moves elsewhere, but as of now i am revelling in the concepts of ‘will’ and ‘change’. somewhere in the beginning chapters of the book, hooks quotes harriet lerner who writes, “…we can count on only two things that will never change… the will to change and the fear of change. it is the will to change that motivates us to seek help. it is the fear of change that motivates us to resist the very help we seek.” as i navigate the unexpected delights of settling into a new rhythm with my roommate, the limbo between one job and the potential of another, and the new ways that autumn looks in a world permeated with climate grief, i think of both the inevitability of change and the tenacity to change with (and without) it. it’s mostly thinking now — perhaps writing later.
i am saying farewell to the bugs, which have been abundant in my life this week. a collection of carcasses on my dining room table from a trinket box my roommate unearthed, a spider who walked sigils on my chest, and a new-bloom green beetle that crawled on my pinky between two sunbit men who marveled at them with me, our eyes all awe. “have you ever seen anything like this?” “no, no, no” turned “yes, yes, yes” turned green beetle resting on a bamboo leaf, life returning to its usual rhythm but somehow changed.
content warning for images of bugs below.
content warning end.
to a new week where we all can experience a full-bodied YES and meet change with grace.
with love for our unraveling,
mira
beautiful work mira!