I Could Use Some More Togetherness

I spend five days avoiding the cold.

Until finally, I can’t take it anymore. I double layer my pants. Grab a wool sweater, hat, gloves, dog leash, and go.

The one thing I forget is tissues. So I have to blow my boogies out into the wild to avoid sniffling for an hour straight and for that visual I’m sorry, but I think it’s important you know that none of this is as smooth as I make it sound.

But thank goodness I go. Because the morning was hard. Okay, the weekend was hard. Okay, December was hard. And inside the walls of my house the hardness seems to bounce back and forth and back and forth and back and forth, much like the shrilling screams of my children, but out here things expand and soften and I can breathe better.

As soon as I get into the woods I almost immediately feel lighter. I hear some animal calling- a bird I think. I go to find it, but it stays silent as soon as my feet move closer. I smile. Already I feel less alone.

It starts to snow and it only gets more beautiful.

With the world blanketed this way it’s so quiet and peaceful it almost hurts.

“There’s no such thing as bad weather,” I think of hygge and that Scandinavian saying. “Only bad clothing.”

I think of my five year old in her forest pre-k program. I wonder if she’s finding the same footprints as I am. I wonder if we’ll walk these woods here together soon. I dreamed of this.

I think of my friend Anna and her Wild Walks with Kids. I miss those. Can we do that again soon?

Finally, I find a trail without footprints.

“We’re the first ones here,” I think. And I can’t wait to crunch our way down the blank white canvas. And almost as soon as I think it I come across a path of tracks cutting right through the trail perpendicularly.

“Naive, ignorant human.” I think of myself. Of course I’m not the first one here.

I wonder about the tracks. Fox. Rabbit. Deer. Was there a chase? Was there play? Or just duty. I love that saying that the beautiful thing about animals is that they never try to be anything else besides what they are.

I stop walking and breathe and look around and think how much better it is in here. Those walls suffocate me. The space heater seduces me into staying. The candles, the incense, the journal - it’s good, yes, but it seems to me I can’t reach the same level of aliveness until I am out here.

I come across a huge, huge tree and I hug her. I just lay there on her. I think of Gaza. I think of my kids. I think of waters running brown. The broken tree in the distance that looks like bones.

“I’m so sorry.” I say out loud.
It’s so, so beautiful in here it almost overwhelms me.
How can we do this? I think of all the suffering. How can we do this?
And how do we survive?

I think of the mothers. I cannot think of the mothers. I think of the mothers.

How do they do it?

How do we do it?

How do they do it?

I couldn’t.

Keep them safe. Keep them healthy. Keep them connected.
These are my prayers.

We can’t do this alone.

I remember.

Though I try otherwise, often.

I see a group of deer and they pick up their pace in the distance as they must notice my presence, me and my dog.

Oh, its cold and coming down now and there’s little coverage and instinctively I’m a bit worried and whisper, “Stay together!”

And then I laugh again at my naivety. “What do I know? Look at us. Look what we’ve done. Look what we do.”

Stay together. I say to myself.

I think of my kids. My sisters. My Mom. My friends. The people in my town.

Stay together.

What if we’re all more connected than we realize?

I read somewhere recently that if all the humans died the world would keep going on and flourish, too, perhaps. But if all the bees suddenly died all us humans would perish quickly.

I’m sad a lot lately.

I’ve been trying to shake it, but there, I said it.

This all hurts a lot and I’m not doing a good enough job at any of it as I’d like.
Mothering. Being a good sister. Being a good friend. Being a good community member.

“Stay together!” I said to the deer pack in the woods. As if I know anything.

But from there, I kept going. I finally said all the thoughts in my head out loud to these woods. It went something like this:
I’m afraid to start. I don’t know where to begin. I want to be better at being with my kids. With my family. Present. Not anxious. Not projecting. I don’t have enough time. I don’t want to do the things people ask me to do. I want to be at her soccer practice. But I miss yoga. . .

Once I finally got it all out my mind felt so much better. And I looked up and around and at my own two feet walking. And I hear this:

This is it.

I just have to be here doing this. Walking. Breathing. Paying attention.

Be here now.

Slow down.

Walk. Breathe. Pay attention.

Take this with you. And it will be okay.

I want to hold more spaces.

For writing. For yoga and movement. For all of our deep terrible thoughts and feelings. For woods walks. For mothers. For our minis.

It won’t be perfect.

I don’t have all the answers. (or any)

But I can create some place for us to explore together.

I could use some more togetherness.

Could you?

Then come.

Will share more soon, or sign up somewhere on this site to stay connected.

In the meantime, I’m praying/walking with these words for you & me too:

I breathe deep for safety, for health, for remembering our togetherness.

xoxo

jaime