Huck. My four-legged boy. He’s a complicated little man. Our morning snuggle-fest was at its cozy peak this morning...until Dave reached down to grab a seemingly benign piece of paper from the rug. Huck woke from a dead snooze, lunged and growled Dave into a corner. The paper was his. HIS. No one was gonna steal his god-given paper. No siree. Teeth bared. It was on. “No” was administered in increasingly stern tones while silently we called the dog all sorts of unsavory names. Dave managed to scuffle off, paper in hand, legs intact. A win? Verdict is out.
This weekend saw another series of protests at the Capitol here in Salem. Big signs and even bigger trucks came to advocate for their god-given freedoms to open businesses, tote guns, and roam the forests while news cameras captured the action from the street and the sky. Human life. Generally speaking, it’s not that we don’t care about it. It's just that the value of human life is usually measured by the houses, cars, and devices we own rather than our more fundamental mental and physical wellness. Wellness is relatively invisible and boring. We're flashier than that. Things become the currency in which we assess what's what.
Even without a shelter in place order, it's fair to say, we live fairly isolated lives. We've got square footage. Bubble room if you will. Kids have their own rooms; often their own bathrooms. In school, students have their own desks, books, etc. Rarely do we wait for things. Rarely do we share the things. If we're being truly honest with ourselves, rarely do we look outside of our own lives. We always have food at the grocery store. Even at its worst, a wait in line is only 10 minutes on average. An irritation but not an impossibility. Somehow we've become hard wired to see this as need versus want.
I share this not as judgement. Hell, I'm guilty of all of the above as I wonder where my new Dovetail shorts are that were ordered FOUR weeks ago. Or as I lovingly caress my new Salsa Cutthroat (the best bike ever. EVER.) If you know me well, you know that I often say "My name is Robyn Saunders Wilson and I do what I want" (a mantra). I share this because I am selfish. I share this because I've been working so hard to better understand myself, my kids, and the range of actions/attitudes I get to see from day to day at the shop. I share this because I wonder why all of a sudden I can breathe and sleep better without my calendar completely filled to the brim with activities. I share this because I'm watching my kids struggle in their own ways to navigate their schoolwork--quick to anger; quick to sadness when they don't know something and don't want to ask for help. I share this because there are so many ways to live. As the days go by, I want to ensure I'm really seeing me and you and what truly makes this life worth living. As much as I love my Huck, I want to make sure I'm not guarding scraps of paper on the floor.
"I grew up in the shoes they told me I could fill
Shoes that were not made for running up that hill
And I need to run up that hill, I need to run up that hill
I will, I will, I will, I will, I will"
--Fetch the Bolt Cutters by Fiona Apple
