Hunkered at home during the escalating pandemic is not, in fact, a terrible thing for a writer. There are fewer excuses to keep me from the work. So, last month I finished my novel (yes, again!) and my literary agent is now submitting it to publishers for consideration. I have also contemplated, and partially drafted, any number of pieces in recent months, but Wingbeats, my latest post, felt like one of the more important ones I’ve written since emerging from my library to your screens as a writer, and none of the other ideas carried the same urgency. Until now.
Windy today, I felt as buffeted about on my hike as I have been by the news since January 6th, when a storm of a sort I never imagined I would see in our country blew through the United States Capitol.
To duck out of the worst of the gusts, I dropped into a deep arroyo. Savoring the sudden calm, I stopped and settled onto a boulder. I could see the juniper boughs whipping in the wind above on the rim of the steep slope, but the wind had hushed around me. The metaphor of finding inner peace in the midst of chaos, not only in its absence, wasn’t lost on me. But it is winter, and too cold to linger for long. Rising, I stretched toward the sun, then bent at the waist, arms sweeping low my fingertips brushed the boulder’s surface. Straightening, I filled my eyes with the view and my lungs with the fresh mountain air, before heading the two or so miles down to my snug adobe home.
I have crossed this arroyo in previous wanderings, but never trekked up or down it. As expected (from the lessons I learned in Geology 101 decades ago), there are more and bigger boulders deposited in this high-gradient zone of the drainage than farther down, where the slope gentles and the drainage widens. This observation was more an unconscious taking in, less an academic analysis, as I wound around and scrambled over boulders of granite, limestone, and breccia.
Wait a minute, breccia? I’ve been hiking these hills for more than 20 years and I don’t recall seeing breccias before. They are coarse-grained sedimentary rocks in which angular clasts (rock fragments, for those not geologically inclined) are cemented in a finer-grained matrix. They can be quite beautiful, like these boulders, and are even polished as decorative stones. The shapes and colors of the clasts are intricate, interesting, and artful as only Mother Nature can be.
Since digging into words is as much my thing as rooting around in rocks, the etymology of breccia is Italian, meaning broken stones or rubble. With that, another metaphor occurs to me—the contrast of these ‘broken stones,’ this ‘rubble,’ to so many broken systems—the failure of our public health system, the systemic racism that pervades our society, the incongruity of how the White rioters who stormed the Capitol two weeks ago were treated compared to Black Lives Matter protesters flooding the streets in cities across the country this past summer, and the rubble left by those rioters bearing Confederate flags and symbols of white supremacy and neo-Nazism. Indeed, for millions worldwide, so many dreams have turned to rubble, so very many hearts have broken. It leaves me with few words, dazed by the grief of this moment in history.
Then I remember a long-ago conversation from a time I was overcome by grief of my own—about a broken heart being an open heart. Perhaps with all that is broken open, we can try to focus on the ‘open,’ rather than the ‘broken.’ Take the rubble, and build something beautiful with it.
The trail is where I have calmed the clenching in my heart these past months. This morning, I ventured out in search of that, in the aftermath of yet another loss this tragic year—that of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a revered champion for equality. I wandered up the far reaches of an arroyo, and before turning for home, looked toward the mountains, a view usually so clear it helps me find my own clarity, but today is shrouded in smoke. Enough to dry my throat and sting my eyes. No clarity to be had. Perhaps today’s hike would simply be an exercise in putting one foot in front of the other, and that would have to suffice.
I’m seeking direction in these days filled with smoke, and fear—in how to make a difference in diversity, equity, and inclusion in the geoscience profession, and in finding what actions are my right actions as we near the most important election of my lifetime. Though I knew exactly where I was in the foothills, I felt lost.
Diverting from the contour I’d followed, I dropped into another arroyo headed down (and away from the solitude of the hour or two I give myself most days toward the waiting to-do list, which I also give myself most days). Within a few steps, a shadow and the whoosh of wings passed overhead. A crow, not flying terribly low (as they will sometimes), and still I could feel the air it moved wash over me, the pulse of its wingbeats in my chest. With that, a wave of resolve filled me. A rush of thoughts followed. And, at least for this moment, this day, I know my direction.
I don’t have to know, and in fact cannot, how to fly to feel the power of the crow’s wingbeats. I don’t have to experience, and in fact cannot, the injustice with which Black people are treated to work for change. I have much left to learn, but I know enough to begin.
I started my career when only ten percent of the geoscience workforce were women—I was asked if I planned to have children in a job interview (yup, illegal for a few years by then, and still they asked); I spent weeks working 14-hour days to prepare an operations plan for a complex project (one in which I would lead the field effort) only to be ordered by the client to go get the coffee at the break (because that would have to be the job of the only woman in the room); and I’ve heard men praised for being ambitious, while I was told to ‘tone it down’ (that’s right, what’s assertive for men, is aggressive for women). Never sexually assaulted, I was ‘handled’ in ways that would be fireable offenses now.
It’s no mistake I chose to spend two-thirds of my career working for and by myself. Only now, in that career’s twilight, am I acknowledging some of the deeper reasons for my choices. After nearly four decades, I’m letting myself feel the anger I stuffed so many times, to not be labeled difficult to work with (when, no doubt, for a man it would have been labeled as standing up for himself). Some days I seethe, but more days I channel that ire into action. I can use what I know and how I have felt to fight for a more fair future, in the geosciences, and in society.
‘Atta-girls’ are nice enough, but a smoke screen—where’s the equal pay and equal opportunity? It is well past time for true equality, but I don’t expect to see it in my lifetime. Still, I will take off and fly in that direction. Even small wingbeats will move me forward, and shift the air around me. Maybe you’ll feel it.
What are those wingbeats to be? For me, for now—contributing to and volunteering for candidates who stand for justice, equality, and protecting the environment; sending “Get Out to Vote” postcards and letters, looking inward at my own unconscious biases and bringing them to light, to shed or to harness; and participating in the Association of Environmental and Engineering Geologists’ effort to be more diverse, equitable, and inclusive. What are yours?
“Real change, enduring change, happens one step at a time.”
The closed doors (and borders) of the coronavirus pandemic have opened a different door for me–the possibility of “just” being a writer. Most summers, I’m attempting to write while sailing Kagán, and oh, yes, working to keep her running optimally and looking beautiful, too.
There are, indeed, many days at anchor when words find their way to the page. Wavelets rippling against the hull can be the perfect accompaniment for writing. But day-to-day cruising life, like day-to-day landlubber life, is rife with distractions.
This is not to say that the current climate we’re weathering isn’t distracting in its own worrisome way, even for those of us with the privilege to hunker down at home. But the myriad things-to-do and places-to-go choices I typically navigate have contracted significantly during the pandemic.
But it turns out there’s nothing “just” about being a writer. I imagine other artists face similar challenges, but the only artist’s journey I know is the one of creating a world with words. A young poet and I recently discussed our particular paths in verse and prose, reflecting on acts of radical vulnerability along them. It seems to me that is where art happens, where craft takes flight, and people’s hearts are opened by the work.
Years ago, a friend asked how I could let myself be so vulnerable in my writing, and I answered, “my words are not me.” And that’s true–when I’ve made the decision to let a piece go beyond my library’s walls, it is no longer solely mine. It’s my readers’ as well, for them to make their own meaning of. But I have been surprised of late at how much like me my words can feel. Real or perceived, intended or unintended, slights feel wounding, not physically (sticks and stones, etc.), but emotionally.
Still, I move through yoga postures that help me focus and place myself before the blank screen, or the filled screen (to re-write and re-write again, because artistic wings don’t soar without the craft to carry them aloft), and resolve to be radically vulnerable in this daily work of finding the words. To be a writer, just a writer, there is no other choice.
…sailors are, my mentor and friend, Nancy Erley said, when we spoke the other day. Nancy is a two-time circumnavigator, and the logistics of isolating in our homes is not unlike that of crossing an ocean in a small boat. Nancy is most certainly built for this.
We’d been talking about “provisioning”
for the stay-at-home orders we’re living under, but it’s not just grocery
shopping that parallels–I find myself thinking of meal planning, checking the
pantry, reviewing recipes, and coming up with back-up meals (contingency
planning for if my next trip to the store gets pushed farther out, just as it
might to sit out a storm at anchor, which seems an apt metaphor right now). When
you can run to the store to prepare what you decided to cook any given night,
you don’t have to do that. If you’re cruising on a sailboat where you won’t get
to a store for two, three, or more weeks, and when you do, you’ll be walking to
and from the store, carrying all that you bought, then doing a big shopping
trip before you cast off can make life a lot easier. Here on land, it can make
life a lot easier and safer now that our family’s, and indeed everyone’s,
health depends on minimizing exposure to each other. And thinking safety first
is one of the things that life on Kagán has taught me.
I don’t generally like grocery
shopping or cooking, not on land, anyway. But on the boat, it’s all part of
cruising, and I enjoy reading recipes and trying new ones. Seems that when the
pace slows from 75 mph to 6 knots, prepping and sharing meals becomes part of
the rhythm I love about life on the boat. It’s not completely unlike the slower
rhythm life has assumed in this time of social distancing, minus the background
music of water lapping on the hull.
It’s all about planning ahead. Inventory the pantry, freezer, and fridge. Check recipes, old standbys and ones you’ve been meaning to try. Make a list and organize it in sections, like the store is–produce, canned foods, spices, baking supplies, beverages, paper goods, etc. At the store, get everything that you need in one section before you move on to the next. I’ve heard that in some areas stores have instituted flow patterns, to help maintain social distancing. If yours has, and you know the direction, organize your list to flow through the store the way you will be. How’s that for smooth sailing on a provisioning trip?
Stowing groceries is also a
strategic operation for a long-term cruiser–first, because it actually makes a
difference in balancing the boat, and second, because who wants to be crawling
into the hard-to-get-to compartments on a routine basis. At home, we don’t have
to lift a mattress to get to the extra 12-pack of sparkling water or a bag of
kibble for Capi, but we have rearranged the pantry a bit, since we’re shopping
for much longer periods than we usually do in our land-based life.
In the large, deep, top-loading
fridge on Kagán, making sure to stow what’s to be used later in the cruise in
the depths saves electricity by minimizing the time the fridge is open, because
what we need early and often is handy. Saving electricity can mean an extra
night or two on the hook in a favorite anchorage. On land, you don’t have to
worry about listing to port or starboard, but stowing your provisions
thoughtfully can make life easier, and result in wasting less food. First night
post-shopping, serve those baby greens for salad, they won’t hold long. Then use
the romaine. And later on, cole slaw (because cabbage will hold while you sail
across an ocean or wait an extra week to venture to the store). In all my years
of cruising, I’ve learned that a little planning goes a long way. So, yes, I am
built for this.
Another way sailors are built for this–we routinely live with our mates in close quarters for long periods. Kagán has been my self-contained, 35-foot sailing summer home for 15 years. By comparison, my modest sized adobe house is palatial. Though Kagán is very well appointed, there’s only so much elbow (and foot and hip and head) room on a 35-foot boat. We’ve learned to give each other space and time to be alone together on the boat–me reading or writing in the cockpit/Eric playing guitar in the salon or me doing yoga on the coach roof/Eric drinking coffee and reading in the cockpit. So we’ve adapted well to the situation of being in the house together much more than usual, with the added bonus of not tripping over each other (literally), an inevitable part of boat life where someone’s feet are nearly always in the way of wherever someone else wants to be.
“Hey, Dad, did Mom hide my treats in the compartment under the navigation table with your potato chips?”
Sailing is a dream many hold, and I
wonder how many have longed for something like this long-term “cruise” right at
home without realizing it. Certainly we haven’t longed for the grief for those
we’ve lost, the anxiety around who may be struck next, concern for those on the
front lines of this crisis, or fears about finances. But maybe slowing life
down a bit will provide some time and space to dream, reflect, and plan for
what might be next. I know that my summers on Kagán have given me that over the
years. Amidst the anxiety of the moment, I’m trying to re-connect with that
rhythm. I love the phrase, you can’t change the wind, but you can adjust your
sails. Now is one of those times.
Note: I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that sailors are also built for the TP problem. Any sailor who has had to unplug a marine head will tell you that three squares of TP at a time is the way to go (yes, pun intended). Do that and watch your valuable commodity go farther, see, you’re built for this too.
And a more important note: Fellow sailors, stay home! I’m writing this from my house, where I’m sheltering in place. And so should you. Thinking you can ride the coronavirus pandemic out long-term on your boat is irresponsible. Because there is just so long you can provision for, just so much waste your holding tank will hold, and you need to think of the impacts your going to shore will have on communities already struggling with scarce resources. Don’t be entitled. The seas will be there for all of us when fair winds blow again. For those full-time cruisers without a home port, I hope you can find a safe harbor to shelter in until those metaphorical fair winds do come.
Some of these words have been percolating through my mind for weeks, and I intended to transfer them to paper for Earth Day in April, but I think the time is right, right now.
In my last post back in November, I talked about rocks in my backyard, specifically the Madera Limestone. After traveling so much last year, I felt particularly grateful to be back in my own big backyard. But the travel also heightened my awareness of and appreciation for all our backyards. The way we move around the world makes so many places accessible to so many people – a friend recently spent a few days birding in Australia; which made me think of some special birds (Penguins!) I saw on travels to New Zealand; another friend recently returned from a language immersion program in Salamanca, Spain; and my first mate, Eric, and I live both on our sailboat cruising British Columbia’s coastal waters and here in the high desert of New Mexico. The whole world can feel like our backyard.
A conversation about backyards got me thinking about all this – a friend told me about a community group she heard was protesting expansion of an urban trail. That group, no doubt, uses the existing portion of the trail, but opposed the extension because it would go right by their backyards. This group would most likely be in favor of the extension, if it were to be located, say, one block over – not in their backyards, but in someone else’s. It’s a classic example of the NIMBY (Not-In-My-Back-Yard) principle.
For the Earth Day essay I contemplated, I was going to write about how we must consider our bigger backyards, our community backyards, indeed, our global backyard. Climate disruption should have us all thinking long and hard about that, and taking action.
But the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 has, within a few short weeks, brought the global picture into really sharp focus; focus I hope we don’t lose when this crisis fades from the headlines. Uncertainty, of nearly everything, except the spread of the disease, is pervasive. For many, fear follows on uncertainty’s heels. A sense of helplessness too.
For years, I’ve tried not to succumb to fears, but I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to a twisty feeling in my gut these days. A lot of people I love are in the higher risk groups for the impacts of COVID-19. I am too (yes, even if we don’t feel our age, if we’re of a certain age, there we are).
I know panic is not productive, and I know ways to quell it, so I’m reminding myself to do those things, not just think about doing them. And there is time and space now, as my normally busy schedule shifts with social distancing. Like breathing, for one. Yes, taking good, long, deep breaths. Yoga and meditation. Even for a few minutes at a time. And Capi, of course. For me, a little canine cuddle time can be a short cut to calm.
I’m also walking in my backyard, and thinking about all my backyards – from the one whose trail I’m hiking – to my Placitas community – to New Mexico – to the stunning American Southwest – to the entire U.S. – and to the global community. It appears to me from the reading I’m doing (and, please, do your reading from responsible sources – both the New York Times and Washington Post are offering free access to their coronavirus updates) that taking care of myself and my family is a good start in taking care of the wider community – that’s exactly how social distancing works. But we have to really do it – not just when it’s comfortable or convenient. We especially have to do it when it isn’t. For ourselves, for everyone.
And ways to help with that helpless feeling? Help those in my communities who are going to suffer from the financial hardships that have already begun, and will worsen before they get better. I can call my legislators and push them to vote for bills that will help families in need. I can donate to a food bank. I can shop online at small businesses (even if I don’t need anything, I can buy a gift certificate that will infuse them with a little cash, and help them survive this crisis). If we all take small steps, we can help in big ways.
We
live in a world where we can’t be NIMBYs – my backyard is your backyard
is our backyard – let’s take care of it, and each other.
Geologists study the earth and the processes that shape it. Writers study the human heart and the processes that shape it. The GeologistWriter builds a bridge between the two. Come across it with me!
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