On Boundaries & Tree Trunks

Holding on while the world spins maniacally

It would be disingenuous of me to say that the recent U.S. election results knocked me on my ass. Reeling backwards for a few steps, absolutely. While I had every hope that Kamala Harris would be our first Madame President, as the results began to come in, like many others, perhaps especially many other women, I had that sinking feeling of here we go again. And I wasn’t thinking only of 2016, but the whole of my life.

Sitting at the kitchen table at my mom’s house in Pennsylvania on election night, I began to take note of my response – not just in my head, but in my body. Yeah, this was going to be bad, really bad – the next four years and quite possibly the rest of my life.

But, unlike in 2016, when I had not yet done a huge amount of work to understand and name the authoritarian and misogynistic culture, church, and family I was raised in, this time, I was not feeling immobilized. My heart and thoughts were not racing and pinging all over the place. I was not descending into a fugue state of disbelief or dissociating. I was not falling apart.

I felt vulnerable, as always, to be in a female body in this country. These authoritarian and misogynistic attitudes, along with conscious and unconscious belief in the superiority of White people, have been running through American culture for my entire life and since our nation’s founding, despite the far right’s suppression of the telling of actual U.S. racial history. 

So I am not here to tout how strong I am. But I do feel whole – intact in a way that feels less susceptible to the mind-fuckery of the everyday tyrants who move through our lives, as well as the ones who want to be kings. And I ascribe this feeling of wholeness – this integrity of being – to the fact that I can now acknowledge that I have survived a bunch of this shit before.

My younger self did what she had to do to mentally and physically to keep herself safe: dissociation, minimization, compartmentalization, fighting, fawning, fleeing, rebeling, defensiveness, putting up walls inside and out. I’m sure there are many more coping mechanisms to add to the list. She deserves a pat on the back and a gentle hug. And if you know what I’m talking about, feel free to give yourself that acknowledgment too. 

In the last several years, I’ve come to understand how porous were the boundaries between myself and other people and the events of the world. So many of the actions and responses of other people, including politicians with odious personal histories and cruel, damaging policies, had nothing to do with me personally. I don’t mean to say that I don’t care about politics anymore, or that my obligation as a decent human being to make this world a better place has ended. Far from it. 

What I mean to say is that I know where I end and all the other stuff and people begin, and they are not worming their way into my finally-individuated self. Which makes me more resolved than ever to fight for equality, dignity, and justice for all who are marginalized, including myself. We are all worth fighting for.

Like many people disappointed in the election, and like many artists, I’ve done a lot of soul-searching in the past few weeks about what will be a meaningful way to live and to act politically with the onset of an authoritarian regime on the horizon. I am still sorting it out, still in conversation within my communities, but some things are for certain:

I am picturing a solid and enduring trunk of justice within me, one that has held me steady my whole life.*

Holding on for dear life. Still standing.

I am holding onto my own boundaries.

I will use my voice and privilege to protect those who must stay quiet to stay safe.

I will continue to seek and build community where I live.

I will not give emotional energy to people who deny the humanity of huge swaths of people. The world is literally burning. There is no time or energy to waste. 

I am going to keep writing this newsletter, which I had always envisioned being about more than just the physical objects in a basement that I need to dispose of.

I did not know when I would write my first in-depth post about an idea or feeling that I wanted to let go or hold onto. This is it.

*Thank you to Blair Glaser of The Human Intelligence (HI) Stack for providing the workshop space for me to think of myself this way, at this time.

Trees in community. Santa Barbara, CA, 2023.