When I was a kid of all ages, my father would tell me to walk it off when I got injured. I was raised in the kind of family that walks it off....
Which is probably why one of my favorite things is to just walk... and specifically to walk heavily buzzed, at night, in the woods, in Michigan. It's this weird kind of walking I rarely experience despite the fact that I walk many miles every day... It's so quiet and I just move; one foot in front of the other... But it's a manic walking... a walking that makes my heart beat in strange rhythmic patterns that tell me I am alive in this odd way I never experience elsewhere...
And that's how it was that day, almost 5 years ago... 2 months after the transplant. 1 week after the kidney died. I wasn't buzzed, because I was totally sober...but I walked or took the shuttle to the phones. I can't remember which, but it doesn't matter. I called someone-- I don't know who... I probably called many people-- trying to get information. But no information came. I hit another dead end. Emphasis on the dead. Emphasis on the end.
I can't remember what happened next. I remember collapsing into a ball, trying to make myself as small as possible. I remember trying to fold into myself; trying to become a contortionist because if I could just become smaller, more compact, or more inside myself, I wouldn't have to feel this thing... this loss... this fear... this confusion about how this could happen... how this beautiful intension could turn into this tragedy... this loss... this nothing...
She walked up to me, touched my shoulder and said something so completely Mich Fest... I can't remember the details, but they don't matter... I collapsed on her and then somehow I ended up walking... I was walking so fast I was almost running... and it was this manic desperate walking; the kind with a purpose. The kind that seems to have a destination but most likely does not.
That walk did have a destination... an oasis at Oasis... in I walked and the womyn just looked at my face and knew... and ushered me to a shaded area in the back. Before I knew it, I was covered in ice packs and there were hugs and calm voices and open ears.
Since then I have walked like that dozens of times-- last year when I found out she was living with someone, and after the dyke march for what reason I do not know...
Tonight I walked with a similar desperation. I noticed the little things like a couple flirting in a restaurant or a man reading by the side of the road or a woman walking alone like me. I wondered if she too was remembering donating an organ, only to have it not work out; only to have the recipient end up in a coma; only to have the recipient's mother block his records while the woman was at a womyn's festival in Michigan; only to feel so sad and lonely and confused; only to collapse at the phones after having tried for days to get information; only to run to Oasis, the emotional support tent; only to decide to write him letters; only to finally have his mother answer the phone; only to be able to tell him she loved him while he was intubated and couldn't speak but could give the thumbs up; only to have him die 4 days later....
But that's my story alone... and tonight, as I walked, I was painfully aware of that single lonely reality... desperately trying as I have always been told to just walk it off....
Which is probably why one of my favorite things is to just walk... and specifically to walk heavily buzzed, at night, in the woods, in Michigan. It's this weird kind of walking I rarely experience despite the fact that I walk many miles every day... It's so quiet and I just move; one foot in front of the other... But it's a manic walking... a walking that makes my heart beat in strange rhythmic patterns that tell me I am alive in this odd way I never experience elsewhere...
And that's how it was that day, almost 5 years ago... 2 months after the transplant. 1 week after the kidney died. I wasn't buzzed, because I was totally sober...but I walked or took the shuttle to the phones. I can't remember which, but it doesn't matter. I called someone-- I don't know who... I probably called many people-- trying to get information. But no information came. I hit another dead end. Emphasis on the dead. Emphasis on the end.
I can't remember what happened next. I remember collapsing into a ball, trying to make myself as small as possible. I remember trying to fold into myself; trying to become a contortionist because if I could just become smaller, more compact, or more inside myself, I wouldn't have to feel this thing... this loss... this fear... this confusion about how this could happen... how this beautiful intension could turn into this tragedy... this loss... this nothing...
She walked up to me, touched my shoulder and said something so completely Mich Fest... I can't remember the details, but they don't matter... I collapsed on her and then somehow I ended up walking... I was walking so fast I was almost running... and it was this manic desperate walking; the kind with a purpose. The kind that seems to have a destination but most likely does not.
That walk did have a destination... an oasis at Oasis... in I walked and the womyn just looked at my face and knew... and ushered me to a shaded area in the back. Before I knew it, I was covered in ice packs and there were hugs and calm voices and open ears.
Since then I have walked like that dozens of times-- last year when I found out she was living with someone, and after the dyke march for what reason I do not know...
Tonight I walked with a similar desperation. I noticed the little things like a couple flirting in a restaurant or a man reading by the side of the road or a woman walking alone like me. I wondered if she too was remembering donating an organ, only to have it not work out; only to have the recipient end up in a coma; only to have the recipient's mother block his records while the woman was at a womyn's festival in Michigan; only to feel so sad and lonely and confused; only to collapse at the phones after having tried for days to get information; only to run to Oasis, the emotional support tent; only to decide to write him letters; only to finally have his mother answer the phone; only to be able to tell him she loved him while he was intubated and couldn't speak but could give the thumbs up; only to have him die 4 days later....
But that's my story alone... and tonight, as I walked, I was painfully aware of that single lonely reality... desperately trying as I have always been told to just walk it off....
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