Arctic Light

The past couple of weeks have honestly been, for me, revolutionary.

Like virtually everyone alive, I grew up with a lot of restrictions on my autonomy that were eventually reduced. And like many other people, I wasn’t really told what I could do with the new autonomies I was granted. This is an incredibly basic observation. It’s not the point. This is a diary entry, not an essay.

So last week, as we were driving to campus from a meeting with TW’s rabbi, we passed a creek. As I drove on the road running alongside it, I kept thinking how much I would love to be in a creek, to walk through the trees in the sunlight and climb on rocks and stumps. And after a minute or two, I realized that I could literally just fucking do that. So I did—I parked at the Rock Creek Park visitor center (and you can tell them I sent you, it’s a very solid park for being in such a sub/urban location), and we took a forth minute walk together. I realized that we hadn’t been on a hike with any degree of difficulty since Monday joined us, so I took joy in teaching him how to move our janky body which follows different rules than he’d been taught. (He and the Knights are very effective in moving our body the way a body should move, though. I have to imagine combat training and solid memories of an abled body has a lot to do with it.)

We had brain fog too bad for class, so we went to the Hirschhorn, a modern art museum I have a previously unsubstantiated personal beef with. Monday suggested it, and I couldn’t tell if he was antagonizing me, but since he hasn’t gotten to go to any sculpture gardens because of the cold weather I went with it. We wandered, we investigated the gift shop (which is a museum in itself to me—we grew up with museums in many ways, and the gift shops are always fascinating if you view them through that lens), and we took a stroll on the National Mall, which is one of the places in DC that annoys us the most, but also has a lot of open air where we could see the ready-to-storm sky overhead.

I went to my D&D session, and I asked a member of my campaign for help physically grounding when I was too brain fogged to understand the session. I had a panic attack after, and I asked a friend who lived on campus if I could go over for a hug. These were very hard and brave things to do. They were also very kind things people did for me. I’m proud of myself, though not as proud as Riley is, who almost started crying over it? Which confused me a bit, but alright.

The next day, we took our first walk through one segment of our home creek in months. Monday got to endure me pointing out everything about it. I love my local creeks dearly, what can I say. I should make a zine.

Yesterday, I found out one of my favorite bands was performing in DC at 6PM, with the show beginning at 7PM. And I just went, because I could! And it was a truly fantastic show—Moon Walker supported by Sarah and the Safe Word, whose set I mostly missed, and Demi the Daredevil, whose set almost made me cry twice. I got my battle jacket signed by all three lead singers, and also had great conversations with two of them. Jeff (Demi) gave me his book for free because of woke (by which I mean it came up that I’d bolted to the show straight from a Power Privilege and Inequality class and we talked a bit about how my major rules), and it’s been a beautiful read so far. I’ll recommend it properly once we finish it.

I’m working very hard to live a life I love. I’m lucky that I get so many chances. Here’s to being braver and walking by the creek. -crow&