I meditated this morning. And among the many many thoughts that swirled, was this need for connection. For a deeper foundational connection to where I came from. To something eternal. Something that has endured, persisted. Changed, but still is. Roots. Ancestry. Solidity. The earth even. My Native American side? Something that I can feel like I can draw strength from. Find beauty and power and patience in… when I feel like it’s dwindling in me.
Sometimes I feel… not disembodied (although sometimes I feel that too!) But sometimes I just feel alone, you know? I don’t mean that in a lonely, depressing way. But I mean… alone in this journey of personhood… motherhood.
Mark is a huge source of strength and support for me, of course, we’re such an undeniably fantastic team… But I even sometimes feel like we’re alone in this.
Not always. We have amazing friends and family… and it’s a comfort to be able to share in their journey… But I sometimes even feel like we’re all alone.
What I’m trying to say, is that there is this whole, rich, deep, continuous source of personhood, parenthood, motherhood… centuries and centuries of people who have lived, trying to be as true to themselves as they know how. Trying to act with passion and integrity, to find adventure and solitude and peace. Who have fought and loved and raised children with as much whole-heartedness and imperfection as all of us are doing everyday…
I know that…
But I want to feel connected to it.
I’ve been thinking about a theory my friend Kim Gill and I came up with a couple of years ago… about how a person’s sense of rootedness correlates with the place they grew up, and how long it’s been settled. I know this is a vast generalization, but she said that people on the east coast seem more grounded, sure of their sense of place… and that west coasters often seem more untethered… seeking more, always searching. And if you think about it more… take Europeans… the French, Italians, Grecians.. They have such an ingrained sense of belonging to the locality, so tangible you can nearly steep in it as a visitor, that I really think it fosters a sense of connectedness to history, continuity, that is missing out here…
Like we’re all sourcing from a wading pool, when in actuality, we have the ability to reach so much further and deeper…
I don’t have an answer… just taking notice of some things … in this small window of stillness I found this morning.
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