walk on the perimeter
of your dreams. it’s not
that the roads are blocked
but that the hearts have
given into the violence of the wind“Friday, March 25 at 4PM”
Etel Adnan, translated by Sarah Riggs
Into the second week of February and here we are, still living in interesting times, as the apocryphal expression goes. The past three years have brought disease, war and natural disaster, and have, sadly, served to demonstrate just how little we can care for one another. For many of us, it has also been a time of deepening isolation, especially for those with fragile connections to the community and outside world.
For days now I have debated putting my feelings into words, uncomfortable, as always, in talking about myself, even if most of my non-review related writing falls into the sphere of the personal essay. Of late, I have mostly written about how even that avenue feels fraught with barriers and challenges that my own sense of self worth cannot overcome. Then, when I turned to look at some of my occasional journal notes, I found that what I am feeling now I had already clearly articulated two years ago. Little has changed, except that the despair runs deeper and the mental health resources that were so important to me are now gone. I had overstayed my welcome in a system that is buckling under the pressures currently crushing healthcare services here and elsewhere.
Since the pandemic started, I have crossed into my sixties, encountered new medical challenges—none especially serious, as far as I know, and as of yet, no Covid—but I have not been outside the city limits and, apart from my immediate neighbours and my children, I have engaged in little social interaction. Finances have been a major factor, as have problems at home, yet I fear I have become increasingly withdrawn over this period. Trapped even. I go out every day, marking kilometres on the trails but the satisfaction that used to come with a good outing is increasingly elusive. I want to travel again and yet I cycle between anticipation and anxiety and keep pushing possible departure dates back.
I feel old, I feel tired and overwhelmed by loneliness. I fear I am drifting. It’s hardly a new sensation but it somehow seems that the past few years have made me feel at once anchored and anchorless.
I am also troubled by a continuing anxiety about my identity. Or lack thereof. At a time when identity has become such a loaded term, for better or worse, I can’t understand how people take some measure of pride, even comfort, in being queer or trans or something. I feel that the layers of my fundamental identity—sex, gender, sexuality, nationality, politics, religion—have all been stripped away. I am worse than naked. I am emotionally and socially flayed. Who am I now? Better yet, what am I? I have no job, no title, no vocation, no partner, no value.
I read. I write about the books I read and publish my thoughts in this space, typically trying to remain to the sidelines of my reviews. Any other words I try to write spiral into the void. I distract myself with little satisfaction, little connection, and a meagre measure of confidence. What do I have to show for sixty-two years? A differently gendered past rendered invisible on the outside that has left me in a body I will forever be at odds with? And a chronic psychiatric condition that has robbed me of the freedom of trusting my own worth, my own sense of self, my own existence.
There are far more books dealing with gender identity and mental illness on the shelves these days than there were twenty-five years ago when I was navigating crisis after crisis on both counts, but at this point in my life most of them seem to be speaking to someone alien to me. Rarely do I hear a discussion on either subject and think: Ah, yes, that’s so familiar. I wonder who I might be today if an understanding of the two separate and yet interwoven conditions that set me apart from such an early age had been available when I needed it. I might have had a different life, but I’m not convinced it would have been better. By the time one reaches sixty, the tangled complications of a life lived are impossible to unwind and reimagine. One can only look ahead.
In recent weeks I’ve been reading Etel Adnan’s collection Time. Published when she was well into her nineties, the poems in this handsome volume would have been composed when she was in her late seventies and early eighties. Clear and precise, her poetry crosses borders and time, touching again and again on myth, memories of war, desire, the body and the inevitability of death. With wisdom and grace, the poet untangles, reimagines and reminds me that life is marked with beauty and longing even as the end looms closer.
So where should one write? Back to the past or into the future?
roughghosts 
Oh Joe, I don’t know what to say.
Except this, in answer to your question What am I?
A friend. My friend.
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I know, Lisa, and your friendship is precious. It was another difficult night here and I just had to get these dark feelings out. It helps.
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I wonder, this week I caught sight of an article which I didn’t have time to read, about how getting out in nature can sometimes help with mental health. I’m not thinking of your icy trails, I’m thinking of something green. I just looked Googled Botanic Gardens Alberta, and it looks beautiful. It says it’s open on weekends. (https://www.ualberta.ca/botanic-garden/index.html)
Is that do-able from where you are? A place to take your camera and find some colour because I know how that lifts your spirits when you find it on your trails.
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That’s a 3 hour drive each way. I appreciate your suggestions, but it’s a more complex issue that we can talk about next week. 🙂
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I wish I could do more than just nod while reading and saying that I understand and sympathise. I have been far less lonely, more fortunate to have friends and family nearby, to go out and work, and yet I still have days if despair and feeling old and insignificant.
But this isn’t about me, it’s about you. I hope you get some good days and weeks soon, and that they outnumber the bad ones.
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Thanks, Marina. I do have many casual contacts and, of course, I live with an adult child, but I fear I am avoiding closer friends. I sure miss my therapist (and my mom)!
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I don’t know you, and I’m not on WordPress enough to know your history, but thank you for reaching out and I hope it helps for you to know that others far away are thinking of you and hoping you find peace
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Thank you. I don’t write about myself here very often, I just needed to get this out today and it may not be obvious, but I think I even ended on a brighter note than I expected I would. 🙂
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hello Joseph!
You are so articulate, on so many subjects that despite the “cloud of darkness” that hangs over you right now – never forget that your voice in the universe, matters! I love how you encapsulate the emotions, the existential dread (we all feel to a lesser or greater extent) and the inchoate longing for “being in the world”. Never forget that however tenuous those gossamer threads are – they are what keeps you going. Sharing is a vital part of what you offer others who have no voice! Keep writing. This (time) too shall pass!
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Thank you, Bonita. Your words mean so much to me.
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Oh Joe… my words are not adequate, but never doubt you are a heartfelt writer, a deep thinker, a compassionate and caring person and it shows in all you have put down here. The pandemic has screwed with so much, not least our sense of time, and I understand that it feels interminable. I wish you better days ahead.
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Thanks, Kim. Sometimes it does help just to share. No solutions expected.
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These are very strange times, Joe, and I just want to send a note of support. “So where should one write? Back to the past or into the future?” Isn’t it always both? And that’s the difficulty. You’ve done that here, and beautifully.
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Thanks, Theresa. At this age one tends to see more past to draw on and more cynicism about the future, but I have to look beyond that, I guess.
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Or that can be the territory of the work! The uneasy border…
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“One can only look ahead.” Yes, so keep writing. Just keep writing. And go outside once in a while. There is no cure, only treatment that we have to keep applying ourselves. (From one who suffers in a similar vein.)
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Thank you for your response, Paula. I really appreciate it. 🙂
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Life is complex and difficult Joe, and I totally get that. Just know that you have friends who care for you out here in the ether and who appreciate your words and what you share here. I think these are particularly hard times for people to live through and as for your writing? Aim at wherever your heart feels it needs to. ❤
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Thanks, Karen. My online and far-flung friends are so precious. I am so grateful for you all.
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The future. No point in looking backwards.
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Yes, thank you.
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I belong to the Edith Piaf School of Life.
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Classic!
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Joe, I am sure that your writing means something very precious to readers who are struggling and need help articulating their struggle and it must be very valuable to realize that someone else finds the struggle just as hard and puzzling. I know I’m an optimist at heart, but I always see your beautiful writing as the most powerful, positive expression, even when it’s full of pain. There’s a whole world of people out here who love you dearly.
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Thank you, Terry. I can assure you that these small little essay pieces I write garner more attention than any book review on my blog. Writing can be therapeutic when I allow myself to do it. I am beginning to think the question might not be whether to write into the past or the future (I mean, how can you do one without the other?), but whether one can write into and through the sadness.
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Thank you for sharing this thought!
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Thank you for reading. 🙂
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