I think my favorite part of any season is the transitional phase.
But since fall is my favorite season, we are now in my favorite transitional phase. And going purely off the perspective of weather, today is my favorite yet.
Two days ago it was in the 90s, this morning it was in the 40s.
(My apologies, my Canadian friends. I would translate that to Celsius, but I was homeschooled by Christian Fundamentalists. Go America. God Bless).
The air is crisp, the sky is a vibrant blue. There is a different feeling in the air.
Soon, the goddess Autumn will do what she does,
Dance her dazzling display of death,
Which is always so beautiful and breathtaking
That the feeling of anticipation is a pleasure in itself.
Time is feeling different today.
In fact, the sentences up until the last one were written yesterday.
But it took me until today to remember that I was writing.
So dissociation, I guess.
Here’s what I think kicked it off:
Sometimes I have mystical mornings.
I don’t know if you get them or call them something different,
But some days just feel enhanced somehow.
The air is crisper, color is brighter. There’s just a nice warm feeling in your chest.
I was feeling grateful for everything.
I was doing my patrol here at the factory,
noticing and vibing on the sudden change in the weather,
When I heard a voice. I followed the sound into a giant empty warehouse, where the sound of a radio left on was blaring the booming voice of some televangelist, which in turn was echoing off the walls.
I couldn’t make out the words, but I knew the cadence well—that southern Pentecostal gruff yet musical cadence.
Having solved the mystery, I walked back outside and heard another voice.
This one in Spanish. But also very clearly a preacher.
This voice didn’t seem to come from a stereo but sounded like it was coming from a loudspeaker somewhere nearby.
A street preacher of some sort.
I walked towards the voice as far as the large fence of the property.
It was then that I realized it was echoing off of all these empty metal buildings.
It likely originated in one of the surrounding neighborhoods.
I drifted back to enjoying the great weather and lovely blue sky and noticed a hawk. A Red red-tailed hawk, I believe (I did an image search).
All those ingredients started melting and blending together in the skillet of my mind and I began to think about this essay I read from the Chickasaw poet Linda Hogan, where she talked about the importance of eagle feathers in her tradition.
Which led me to think about how many religions have conquered the land I am presently standing on. How much violence was done in the name of those religions, even just here in this one city.
To place your feet anywhere in Tulsa Oklahoma is to be standing on the ashes of multiple genocides.
And I think of Palestine.
And Colonialism everywhere.
My mind begins to race.
I think of America,
Beloved, god-forsaken America.
Too many thoughts. Everything is connected but amorphous. Or hard to explain, at any rate, to people like my parents. Who are always kind of my projected audience when I try to write public-facing things about politics and religion.
Which is an interesting thing to realize as I write this.
But my mind was racing and so I decided to scribble some thoughts into you, dear diary, and got that first paragraph written and was about to say a thing or two about God or whatever. Or maybe just stick to the loveliness of fall (I hadn’t decided).
When my mom called.
My mom has an undiagnosed, untreated, and unacknowledged anxiety disorder. She has been having dreams about me. Dreams where I am dying or lost or trapped. She tries to find help but no one can understand her language and she can’t understand them. So she panics because she can't help me. The panic wakes her up. I made a joke on Facebook a few days ago about being broke and she has apparently been losing sleep worrying that I am about to be homeless.
She then says she has been listening to a lot of sermons about the Rapture. She says it can happen at any time. She begins to cry. She says she worries all the time about me and my brother. How she knows we don’t believe. She says all she can think about is what if she’s right? She doesn’t want us to get left behind. She doesn’t want us to burn in Hell.
God loves you, she says, sobbing. I love you. Please think about it, okay?
It’s all I ever think about, Mom. I said.
And then static.
For about a day, I guess.
I kind of remember doing stuff.
I know I ate. I played with my kitten who sat over my heart and purred all night last night as I slept. Healing, lovely, beautiful cat.
I woke up this morning.
When I got to work, I listened to the guard I relieved tell me a story about a guy who bought a rare pair of shoes for 2 million dollars at an auction and the next day discovered his teenage son unwittingly wearing them to play basketball.
I received a rather poignant Tarot reading from my friend u2october, which I feel will sink in more properly in a day or two (I was present for it, but also a little slow to process, I think).
But I really only came to attention a few minutes ago, when I heard the unmistakable sound of an ice cream truck.
It was bouncing off the walls like the voice of the street preacher yesterday. I could not tell exactly where it was.
Which was sad, because some ice cream sounds amazing right now.
But also somehow reminded me that I had just started writing something.
And by "just" I mean "yesterday morning."
And now here where are.
Where I've written a lot and have no memory of what I just typed.
I'll read it again tomorrow.
Apologies for any typos in the meantime.
The weather is beautiful. The windows are open.
The Earth is old. It spins on.
I don’t know how to be a person alive in the world.
I wish this was the practice round.
I wish there was a reset button.
Everything is so heavy.
Everything is so beautiful.
I am going back to the static.
I’ll come back out again soon.
2:47 p.m. - 2023-10-08
Recent entries:
What Will I Be If I Ever Grow Up? - 2023-11-02
no thought do nothing day - 2023-10-30
I Read the News Today, Oh Boy - 2023-10-26
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Conflicted - 2023-10-16
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