16 Mar Walking Myself Home
Walking was the only thing that helped. I would walk for miles around town, not knowing where I was going or when I would be home, but I never thought of how I would get home until a Sunday in March two years ago, but I did. I made it home.
“Where are you going?” Damon asked as I grabbed my coat from the entrance closet.
My choices were the lightweight rain coat, Mom’s heavy Alaska coat that she purchased for their trip to Alaska hence the name, a circus logo fleece jacket, one of the few black jackets, or the handful of others sitting in the closet collecting dust since I live in Southern California. At one time – at that time – a choice like this wore me out. I was in the deep waters of trauma therapy, putting in the work of unraveling and healing 40 years of denial, repression, and memories, centering myself on feeling emotions, trusting my intuition and guiding myself to peace, so grabbing a jacket felt immobilizing. I just stared into the darkness of the closet.
“I’m going for a walk,” I answered. After two years of witnessing my suffering, supporting me when I asked, and otherwise being helpless to what was happening, Damon simply and compassionately said, “It does look like rain. You might want to bring an umbrella.”
I looked around the corner of the open door: there he sat in our living room as the sun played peek-a-boo with the clouds allowing in light and then shadows, light and then shadows. His face – bright and sunny. His face – dark and haunting. But him. A smile spread across his face seeing me look at him.
“You okay?” he asked.
Once a question that I would answer ripe with illusion, now my go to response was, “No, but I will be.” And, I wanted to be. I desperately wanted to be okay because okay would have been better than grief, sadness, loneliness, depression, anxiety, anxiousness, and near debilitating misery. But you don’t arrive at okay without doing the work, without taking grief’s hands and sitting her down, listening to her because she’s been boarded up in a very full emotional hallway closet for 40 years. You don’t get to okay until you watch sadness sit and cry her eyes out until they are puffy, red and hurting, so you offer her a cold eye pad for the swelling. You don’t get to okay until you ask to approach loneliness while she mutters in the corner, and then with consent you give her a hug because she has been trapped there for decades. She is scared and vulnerable. You don’t get to okay until you watch as anxiety and anxiousness pace back and forth, stripping away the few spaces of your mind that were free or at least provided the illusion of freedom. You don’t get to okay until you help yourself through the misery that encloses on you until all you have is pure darkness.
“You don’t get to okay until you watch as anxiety and anxiousness pace back and forth,
stripping away the few spaces of your mind that were free or at least provided the illusion of freedom.”
It would be Mom’s Alaska jacket keeping me warm that day and a pair of rain boots that looked pristine from the lack of use.
“I’ll be back,” I said aloud.
“Be careful,” Damon replied.
Our home sits three houses in from a main thoroughfare that runs east to west in our town. This Sunday, as most weekends go, there was not a car in sight, not even an ambulance which frequently is heading towards the local hospital a few blocks from our house.
As I stepped onto the pavement, light drops fell on me. I looked up, catching some on my cheeks and the skin on my face. They were a pleasant change from the typically salty tears that ran like rivers. I stuck my tongue out catching a few sprinkles. The slightest of smiles spread across my face. I remember catching raindrops in Karachi and in Chicago and even as recent as Rialto. This was nice. This was an emotion I hadn’t felt in a while. I tucked it away, not having a name for it.
At the corner, I turned left walking away from the hospital towards the local elementary school where all three of our children attended. It sits fewer than 10 houses from our own home, but there are two smaller streets to cross before you arrive at the gates. Our own kids have had plenty of practice “looking both ways before crossing the street” throughout the years.
The light sprinkles turned to heavy drops by the first street crossing. Thankfully, I did listen to Damon and grabbed an umbrella: an obnoxious golf one that I got at Costco years ago and at one time fit the kids and I all underneath its massive span. They were all taller than me now and held onto the umbrella if we ever shared one because their height would keep me dry but my height would poke an eye with the spokes if I wasn’t careful.
By the time I reached the school, the rain had turned into a downpour, the wind had kicked up and I could hear the palm trees that lined the street hushing and shushing the wind with their palm fronds. Alright, it might be time to head home.
I turned around only to have the umbrella invert inside out leaving me no protection from the rain. The streets were deserted – not a soul, bicyclist or a car in sight. The fronds could no longer sustain the strength to shush the wind and fell around me. Time to keep moving but away from the house since the palm trees lined the street heading home and the umbrella wasn’t staying open heading back the shorter distance. I would have to walk around the school, make a left, cross the smaller streets and head a bit uphill towards home. The longest route would be the safest and smartest one.
On the Northwest corner of the school, I made a left, at which point the gusts were so strong that I was forced to hold the umbrella as close to my head as possible, leaning a bit to my right to offer the protection that I needed. With the enormous umbrella encasing me like an alien cocoon, the Alaska jacket wrapped up as tightly as it could be, my hood on and cinched with only my eyes and nose protruding, I inched my way home.
In my field of vision were my rain boots and barely a foot to the right, left and in front of me. Hunched over for protection, making my way down the other side of the school, the fenced in property let me know where I was, a guide en route: coming up on the 3rd grade classrooms, Leia had Mrs. Boutwell; kinder playground next, where I brought the kids to play when the boys attended a private, art-centered school in San Bernardino but the local school had three different play areas; Mrs. Hamlin’s classroom should be on the left now as we approach the end of the property; and finally Ruth’s class, my friend, Mrs. Thompson to most.
The chain link fence ended as did the school property line, and still the only thing in my vision were black, muddied, rainboots, sloshing in puddles and dirt and debris, guiding me home. The weather wasn’t letting up. It might have even gotten stronger with gusts blowing trashcans left unattended down the street.
A few more houses and I could make a left towards home. This street was smaller than the boulevard but there were three smaller streets that ran perpendicular to it that I needed to cross. Look both ways, I thought, but it was physically impossible to do so! My line of sight was a one-foot boundary in front of me. I could see nothing else, but I felt it all – the cold, the isolation, the terror, and the fear ravaged my senses inside of my constructed cocoon. I would have to rely on my intuition, my knowledge of the surroundings, and trust myself to get home and not collapse in the middle of the street.
Coming up on the first street, I lifted my head to turn left and right. The umbrella, rain and wind were obscuring most of my view. But it was safe; no cars. Go now! I felt, so I did. I breathed a sigh of relief. Crossing streets without looking feels intuitively dangerous. Having witnessed my brother struck by a car makes it all the more traumatic. Interesting that a memory from so long ago impacted my decision in the present. This was an observance I had never thought of: making choices in the present moment but using a guidebook from the past. I wonder how useful that is and what purpose does it serve?
Storms are not meant to destroy us. They are meant to experience, and learn and live through them.
I kept inching closer and closer to home with the help of my rain boots and the one-foot view that was my boundary. My head was bent down and only raised in the slightest when I came upon a street crossing. When tired, I rested. When scared, anxious or lonely, I listened to my own emotions sharing back. I listened without judgement or rebuke; a safe space for me to show up and share. I had never allowed myself that kindness before, that unconditional love. My emotions and experiences were there to gently guide me towards the best decision for me, if I would only allow them that privilege.
I recognized by neighbor’s front yard as I headed up our street, returning from a different direction than I had started. The rainfall, steady and slower now, allowed me to pull up the umbrella over my head and look around. I was a few houses from home, the sky was clearing and a few rays of sunlight kissed the tops of the trees. I stopped. It was the first time in two years that I saw life. Life was all around me, beaming and bursting with possibilities and promise. The Sun began poking out through the rain clouds, asserting its domain as the brightest star in our galaxy, and adding a rainbow to showcase its beauty. I heard birds chirping and tweeting, communicating their stories to one another. Life wasn’t just around me. Life was within me. Life was me, and I was life.
Amidst the healing, deep trauma work, generational wounds, and therapy, a new emotion found its way to me – peace.
“Amidst the healing, deep trauma work, generational wounds, and therapy, a new emotion found its way to me – peace.”
Shoulders back, straight spine, and with a soft heart I strode up our sidewalk, took off my boots – that had covered this journey with me – on the front porch, and walked in.
“I got concerned about you,” Damon said. “It was raining hard while you were gone.”
The usual 15-minute walk took almost an hour.
“How are you?” he asked, having heard and supported me through the last two years he knew the answer would be honest albeit painful.
“I’m okay,” I responded. “I’m actually kinda good,” I surprised myself in saying. “I think I’m through the thick of this storm, and I’m home.”
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