I feel called to be other than I am, but remain in place. Sheltering in place has been a lifelong experiment for me already, only I retreat into my own self. Collapsing onto a bed behind a closed door or sitting in silence shoulders hunched trying to retreat, trying hard not to connect or be needed for anything.
Like a lot of people lately, I’ve been feeling not quite myself. Anxiety and depression has ebbed and flowed through my years and I ride the waves when they come. Sometimes I take medication to see me through, sometimes I pray or practice yoga or mindfulness and meditation. Sometimes I resort to gluttony and eat my way through the worry, trying to stuff down feelings of panic and dread.
Still, I anticipate those moments where I’m on an island. Those times when I am in a roomful of people but feel very far away. When my conversations feel as though I’m talking with people on an old-school long distance line even when they are standing right next to me. I am present and absent all at once. I am tired. I work to appear normal but know I am not hiding anything. I isolate and overthink and wallow whenever that is an option.
Unwilling to wait, though, households demand attention, children need to be fed, dogs need to be walked and professions need to be managed. So, this morning, before coffee, before attempts at meditation or morning email checks, I step out with my dog on a leash.
For the first 200 yards, I notice a low grade annoyance. I wonder who else is awake in the neighborhood and whether or not they have fertilized their grass. I consider briefly whether it is rude to allow your dog to pee on the edges of their lawns or whether that is accepted as a social norm. My dog sniffs away at the edges of the street.
By the stop sign at the end of our road, we have already greeted a local cat, passed a little library stocked with books and have seen a typically boisterous terrier quietly observing us from his front window.
Rhythm and breath now. Slow cadence of steps. Cool air entering and leaving me in a whispered whoosh. Stride. We swing right at the corner to take the long loop around the neighborhood. The morning is cool and clean and my head is beginning to clear. My thoughts turn to feet and the fact that mine are feeling fine. My dog happily trots alongside me occasionally glancing up to make eye contact, pausing to step out of the road and sit when a car passes. I think how lucky we are to have a border collie and and how easy it’s been to train her. She’s like another person in our home and not a pet.
We take another right turn and walk the circle in the back part of our community. We spot another dog-owner duo, an enormous Bernese Mountain dog pulls on the leash anchored by his tall owner. The dog is more like kangaroo than canine as he leaps and twists in desperate attempts to come greet us. His owner passes by laughing and shaking his head.
The trees on the back loop are gnarled and leaning. Bark is missing from some of their torsos and I wonder if deer have chewed these coverings off or if it was some other violence. The homes here were built on the edges of wetlands and while the houses seem suburban, the vegetation seems to know the difference. This area is tamed but wild. One house is now missing — claimed by the unstable terrain. It was briefly flagged as damaged and dangerous, the occupants removed and then it was razed leaving only an empty lot with a For Sale sign on it. Grassy quicksand. I remember the childhood thrill at the terrifying concept of quicksand. I used to have nightmares of being caught up in a pit of it unable to escape and clawing at the illusion of surface. I think of this house as being sucked down into the world to disappear rather than being surgically disassembled and carted away in trucks as it was.
Life on the outside is always more practical than its inner turbulence would reveal.
Intentional Mimi 