What a bizarre, Leviathan-esque year it’s been! If I wrote all of it into a story (and someone will, at some point), it would be inevitably deemed over-the-top, preposterous, bad writing.
I must say, though, that I appreciated the way in which this particular series of unfortunate global events forced so many of us to seek and find joy in tiny moments. Micro-joys, I like to call them, for they are omnipresent but invisible to us humans most of the time. As minuscule as they may be, they are infinitely important, so this write-up is entirely about them. I’m not forgetting the macro-griefs and mammoth-sufferings; it’s just that they’re so many and so vast that they deserve a long post of their own.
For me, this entire year has been like following a trail of breadcrumbs in a deep, dark, primordial forest, like the one from which fare many of my ancestors (Biogradska Gora). And I suspect that the bread is there to sustain us on the journey.
Photo by Snežana Trifunović (2007)
What I found this year, between wondering and being lost and the fragrant comfort of bread, was that, magically, I could still write a little.
I wrote a few things and a few folks read them and liked them. You can read/listen to some of the things I wrote here.
I also found wonderful forest clearings and springs full of micro-joys of cuteness and daytime snuggles and couch kisses stolen between Zooms, as I suspect many of you did too.
I got reacquainted with the three gorgeous, magical beings I’m lucky to share my little piece of forest with in the most delicious and unexpected ways, thanks to the crazy, badly written storyline we’re all still in.
I also got a job that, against all rules about what jobs are supposed to do, actually seeds my soul.
I quietly and steadily nurtured some of the most beautiful friendships of my life and got nurtured in turn.
I rediscovered old, nearly forgotten ancestral traditions and practices and weaved them carefully into the fabric of my life like the precious, fragile gossamer threads that they are.
I got to meet ancestors and guides in animal and human form and receive their teachings in quiet moments and in my dreams.
I got to commune with the wild nearly every day, alone or in the company of the dearest of friends, and there is no gift that my body and soul appreciate more.
I got to cry, and be silent, and listen, and hear.
And I also got to remember that the deep, dark forest, with all of her sunlit and shadowy places, is where I come from and where I can make a home, like so many have before me.
So I release this shipwreck of a year with a strange mix of exasperation, grief, and gratitude. I hope release is on your list of New Year resolutions too.
May we release and be released from what no longer serves, struggle-free, like the snake sheds her skin.
May we remember that wherever we are, whoever we are, and however wounded, there is a home to house everything that we are and that we carry, even the parts we don’t like or haven’t found use for yet.
In this new, much awaited and hoped for year, 2021, the one that we all can’t wait to begin, I have one little wish for you, dear reader: May you stumble upon the “home within” one fine day and may you be at home and at ease with yourself, no matter what might be happening outside your doors. And may I do the same.
