The Dawning

There’s much to be said about the darkness.

In darkness, we grew in the womb. In darkness, seeds take to bed & roots themselves into earth.  In darkness, our vision is challenged.

When faced with my nothingness - meaning, I disconnected from social media, from familiarity, from the redundancy of the day to day, from all friendships & associations - I was revealed the reality of all the facets of my life. It’s not that social media or people were bad or that I’m better, but rather, my body, now more comfortable in her own skin, in her own vulnerability & aloneness, felt it all too tight, the stitching in my bones coming loose, the thread stringing on like a long goodbye.

All that imagery to say that I needed to teach myself to look inward. Which, I know, sounds very spiritual & serene but it’s shit in there. It’s not nirvana, not a heaven where tranquility & wholeness is god. No. It’s the place where all the bones you hid starting in childhood until now go to become the skeleton you’re now too scared to witness. It’s where the child that cries, hugging her knees, is trapped; where the memories we blocked out go to live, flies on a wall, waiting to land on you & shit your own secrets at you until you can’t ignore them anymore.

But the lovely thing about bones is that you can also wear them around your neck - clanking pretty things - reminders that the things that tried killing you now adorn the nape of your neck & drum at each step; a native song you compose at every dusk.

I’m not here to glamorize the edges of despair; though necessary, you’ve likely read enough about the darkness from me. For now, at least.  No. This is about the dawn. This is about the moment where, at the edge, the ledge - perhaps -, the light peeks in wearing her floral dress & begins her own waltz , matching steps with yours until you’re both risen.

But more than that, it’s about when you can rise with the dawn still wearing the bones you wore in the dusk. That’s a whole different matter. It’s one thing to learn to live in the home you make yourself in either spaces, but it’s another to bring them together - a unity that somehow remains its own entity.

After my attempt in March, I began to experience life differently. It wasn’t immediate. In fact, I even wrote about how I felt it strange that I had not recovered with some grand epiphany or a newfound love & appreciation for life.  I felt, honestly, rather indifferent. As a Stoic, I often practiced Memento Mori meditations where you remind yourself that you can die at any moment, so perhaps that’s why.  That sounds like a musing for another time.

But, it creeped in slowly, this way of seeing the world; not merely as light vs dark, life vs death, not merely juxtaposed - which is beautiful in its own way - but, rather, as a whole, truly & utterly perfect in complete harmony. I needed to remove myself & as much influence around me, because I needed to come back. But I needed to come back knowing which influences, which friends & connections & environments were necessary: challenging, but conducive to my betterment. &, of course, how I can better show up for friends, connections & in which environments I can Be.

I have taken up weekly Salsa lessons, met up with friends for coffee, talks, walks in the park & fun, new activities like Contrast therapy, where you do a cold plunge then jump in the sauna.  I have spent more time with my daughters & other family. I had also taken to hoarding money which is smart to a certain degree, & I’m still financially responsible, but I see now that - when I die - my kids would have preferred memories with their mother as an inheritance.

I have sought, for too long, to outsource the responsibility of loving me & my shadow - because I knew it was there - & I fought to be perfect; a quest I have failed many times over. But I failed because I was only loving half of me, & I can’t outsource that. I had to love all of me first.

So, I hope, friends & readers, that when you see me smiling, that you also see the gnashing on the bones that hang around my neck. I have fought, I have surrendered, to this imperfect existence, & it’s fuckin’ beautiful.