![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Among the Prickly Pears
May. 22nd, 2021 01:43 pmIt's been months since we posted here, but I think it's time we try to get back into it. I wrote this essay, or whatever it is, while we were on the first vacation we've had since being vaccinated. It turned out alright for being the first thing I've written in awhile:
Yesterday we climbed Enchanted Rock. It was hard for us to do. We used to be able to hike for miles on the Appalachian trail, walking up and down steep inclines, but we’ve left those days behind. Much of our time has been consumed by graduate school, leaving less time for travel over the past 4 years. Our body has aged and we have spent most of the last year indoors.
This week is our first trip out of town since just before the pandemic began. The weekend before we knew what was happening, we attended a conference. It was a short trip. We had no idea what was coming. A year and a couple of months later, we have finally been able to leave town. It felt strange to drive out of the small bubble we had been contained within for so long. We were unusually quiet in the car. We have felt out of it a lot lately. Any attempt to reflect on what’s happened has been interrupted by that numb feeling, the don’t-think-about-it that has kept us from completely losing our shit all year.
When we arrived at the park, the climb seemed nearly impossible. The people on top of the rock were miniscule, like tiny hairs on top of a massive, bald head. We struggled up the steep incline, taking a lot of time to rest and drinking a lot of water. We switched a lot so that different people could experience the view, and because switching gives us more energy. At the top, our feet hurt, but we continued walking around because it was stunning. Up on top of the apparently barren rock were all of these mini-ecosystems contained in pools of water that had collected in the pockmarked rock. Grass with wildflowers existed in small pockets with flowering cacti. It was so beautiful and unexpected. The wind up there was relentless, and eventually we went down a ways to find a sheltered spot to sit.
We have struggled all year to understand what has happened to us. We have often had the experience of being triggered by something specific, spiraling into a state of terror and a mess of old mindsets and outdated reactions, and then waking up a few days or a week later to realize we had gotten sucked back into the past. This has happened repeatedly during the last four years, as our field is full of material that we find triggering. But these cycles were always short enough that we figured out what had happened before it was able to impact what we actually did to solve whatever problem. 2020 felt like one continuous descent into madness, where everything was triggering and there was never a chance to take stock and readjust to the present. The past seemed to meld into the now in completely indistinguishable ways. We were constantly activated and felt like we were not able to climb out of the hole we were sinking into.
I’ve written all that in the past tense, but I’m unsure if it is still happening even now. We are doing better, but I wouldn’t call it our usual state.
Sitting among the giant boulders and the flowering cacti, watching vultures weaving and diving in the wind and feeling more alive than we had in a long while, we were able to reflect on this past year without dissociating. There were so many traumatizing moments. George Floyd, who was from our hometown. Sitting in our bedroom with no power in the dead of winter, shivering and wondering if we would get hypothermia. Watching friends and family get sick and getting sick ourselves. Getting our vaccines, which was at least as traumatizing as being sick had been. Watching the nation descending into an apocalyptic state of near civil war.
So many of our relationships strained, broke, or simply disappeared. This was true outside as well as inside. We fought many internal battles on important topics. We ended up going on an antidepressant that turned out to be retraumatizing before going on one that has yet to fully kick in. Our going on a medication says a lot about how our brain state has been. We were absolutely desperate before we took that route.
Through it all, we have finished another year of grad school. It was our last semester of classes. There are still several years ahead of us, but we will have less to focus on at one time, which will be good for us.
Sitting among the cacti, yucca, wildflowers, and boulders, we resolved to go on more hiking trips. We remembered that being in nature reminds us how small human beings really are, and takes us out of the toxicity that is our cultural landscape. While we were stuck in our tiny bubble, we forgot about the healing power of nature. At least this gives us a direction to go as we attempt to move forward.
-Calen
Yesterday we climbed Enchanted Rock. It was hard for us to do. We used to be able to hike for miles on the Appalachian trail, walking up and down steep inclines, but we’ve left those days behind. Much of our time has been consumed by graduate school, leaving less time for travel over the past 4 years. Our body has aged and we have spent most of the last year indoors.
This week is our first trip out of town since just before the pandemic began. The weekend before we knew what was happening, we attended a conference. It was a short trip. We had no idea what was coming. A year and a couple of months later, we have finally been able to leave town. It felt strange to drive out of the small bubble we had been contained within for so long. We were unusually quiet in the car. We have felt out of it a lot lately. Any attempt to reflect on what’s happened has been interrupted by that numb feeling, the don’t-think-about-it that has kept us from completely losing our shit all year.
When we arrived at the park, the climb seemed nearly impossible. The people on top of the rock were miniscule, like tiny hairs on top of a massive, bald head. We struggled up the steep incline, taking a lot of time to rest and drinking a lot of water. We switched a lot so that different people could experience the view, and because switching gives us more energy. At the top, our feet hurt, but we continued walking around because it was stunning. Up on top of the apparently barren rock were all of these mini-ecosystems contained in pools of water that had collected in the pockmarked rock. Grass with wildflowers existed in small pockets with flowering cacti. It was so beautiful and unexpected. The wind up there was relentless, and eventually we went down a ways to find a sheltered spot to sit.
We have struggled all year to understand what has happened to us. We have often had the experience of being triggered by something specific, spiraling into a state of terror and a mess of old mindsets and outdated reactions, and then waking up a few days or a week later to realize we had gotten sucked back into the past. This has happened repeatedly during the last four years, as our field is full of material that we find triggering. But these cycles were always short enough that we figured out what had happened before it was able to impact what we actually did to solve whatever problem. 2020 felt like one continuous descent into madness, where everything was triggering and there was never a chance to take stock and readjust to the present. The past seemed to meld into the now in completely indistinguishable ways. We were constantly activated and felt like we were not able to climb out of the hole we were sinking into.
I’ve written all that in the past tense, but I’m unsure if it is still happening even now. We are doing better, but I wouldn’t call it our usual state.
Sitting among the giant boulders and the flowering cacti, watching vultures weaving and diving in the wind and feeling more alive than we had in a long while, we were able to reflect on this past year without dissociating. There were so many traumatizing moments. George Floyd, who was from our hometown. Sitting in our bedroom with no power in the dead of winter, shivering and wondering if we would get hypothermia. Watching friends and family get sick and getting sick ourselves. Getting our vaccines, which was at least as traumatizing as being sick had been. Watching the nation descending into an apocalyptic state of near civil war.
So many of our relationships strained, broke, or simply disappeared. This was true outside as well as inside. We fought many internal battles on important topics. We ended up going on an antidepressant that turned out to be retraumatizing before going on one that has yet to fully kick in. Our going on a medication says a lot about how our brain state has been. We were absolutely desperate before we took that route.
Through it all, we have finished another year of grad school. It was our last semester of classes. There are still several years ahead of us, but we will have less to focus on at one time, which will be good for us.
Sitting among the cacti, yucca, wildflowers, and boulders, we resolved to go on more hiking trips. We remembered that being in nature reminds us how small human beings really are, and takes us out of the toxicity that is our cultural landscape. While we were stuck in our tiny bubble, we forgot about the healing power of nature. At least this gives us a direction to go as we attempt to move forward.
-Calen
