A Quiet Little Rebellion
Listen, as trite as it may be, this shit does pass.
The sun continues to rise and fall, the moon continues to show its whole ass from time to time, and the stars twinkle with the understanding of our cosmic insignificance.
It’s devastatingly beautiful to live in this story we find ourselves in. But, every now and again, folks like yourself come along and light a fire that burns ever so much brighter.
This is why it’s all worth it, why YOU are worth it all.
This is our quiet little rebellion…
I don’t know about you, but life can throw you a curveball or ten, kick you to the curb, and run roughshod over your existence. I’ve talked about it repeatedly, but this is how life will always be. We’re little more than vapour, prone to the whims and fancies of our cosmic existence, and when it matters the most, we’re undeniably and unbreakably human.
I’m constantly reminded of my place by the people who surround me. They’re the ones to whom life seems “just so,” where every hair on their heads is coiffed correctly, their wallets overflow and their coffee is hot. They catch me looking from afar and wonder who that scraggly dude is. In the meantime, just like the fox you see above, I’ve been out and about, hunting, searching, being for those who depend on me and those who don’t. I’ve got my merciless baggage to carry around, and while it may be invisible for the moment, it’s no less weighty for its ethereal existence.
I have to sit back and practice the fine art of self-care. I took the month of May off from writing, soaked in the fresh air of Prince Edward Island, took photos of foxes and cormorants, and generally made light of the situations that loom just outside my periphery. A new job, a new trajectory, and new aches and pains in my ass to deal with. I’ve been trying to find the words to commit to paper, and when it seemed least likely to happen, I got a challenge from an unnamed soul in my life. It was to stand up a little straighter, have a bit more pride in who and what I am, and realise that, for all the absolute mayhem that exists in our time and place, my perfect form of rebellion is to…be quietly happy for each breath I take.
Let’s practice that, shall we?
Quiet Rebellion is simple. It’s taking the widening gyre of society’s malaise and reflecting back the truths of who we are:
We’re blessed to breathe
We’re blessed to love and be loved
We’re able to find beauty and understand joy
We’re more than the sum of these fleshly parts
We’re ridiculous and better for it
As the quote up top says, it seems trite, but if we adopt a posture that doesn’t assume that everything and everyone is out for blood, perhaps, just maybe, we might find a little play in the rudder to change the course of a nation, a community, and a people. When we rebel against the expectations of the many, we become the fulcrum of change. Perhaps we’ll get bloodied, beaten, and bruised. Perhaps we’ll find ourselves at the end of a long, tangled rope. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.
But it’s worth the gamble. It’s worth waking up each day to the sun, closing our eyes each night to the moon and stars, and thanking whatever deity we choose for the moments in between. It’s worth the tragedy and triumphs, the despairs and indignities, the given inches and taken miles to get to a better place. And I, dear reader, believe in it, in you, in us.
So, with a lung full of breath, I say:
May it ever be so.
