You not the crashing wave.
You are the deep blue ocean.
This Cuong Lu mantra, which I first encountered in his book Wait: A Love Letter to Those in Despair, has been playing on a quiet loop in my head as I move through the world lately - while I’m deep-breathing through my baby’s crying, as I navigate grocery stores and waiting rooms packed with maskless strangers, when I sit in fear or grief for the climate, for the bottomless suffering all around me. It is one I like to bring into an abortion experience when someone is overwhelmed or overstimulated: This moment is not your life. This moment is not who you are.
On Christmas Eve, before snow covered my little city, I went to my favorite neighborhood beach with someone. I had never met them before; we were there to honor and process the two abortions they had this year, and the baby they’re carrying now (due in just a couple of months). It reminded me, again, that the things I can do—the walk on the beach, the five minutes of hand-holding, the referral to an abortion fund or the support group, this book I’m writing in tiny spurts between doula work and clinic work and freelancing and researching “sippy cup my child won’t immediately find a way to pour all the liquid out of while screaming”—are still things, small as they are. A conversation with one person can be planet-shifting, in its own way. And we all contain vast, deep, enormous oceans of these conversations, these moments, the phone calls we take (and the ones we don’t because we need to rest), the pregnancies, the abortions, the births, the grief, the joy, the fear. Our messy lives and bodies are tidal and bottomless.
So today, if you need it, if there is a wave that is threatening to pull you under or if you’ve been tossed around and washed onto a shore you never wanted to visit:
You are the deep blue ocean.
You are not the crashing wave.
I’ll be launching a collection of your beautiful writing (and audio!) with the wonderful Abortion, with love in the new year; stay tuned for the call for your words and stories. Until then, do what you need to do to stay afloat. Sending you love and strength and a good thick wetsuit. (I’m mixing metaphors again, forgive me, it’s been a long year).
xoxo
H