Flashback to a summer where my skin requested blazing art tattoos,
howled for sun, air, freedom.
***
I am learning
the language of skin.
I exist in
sensitive skin. I move in a body reactive to foods, allergic and fearful. I
jump to over-thinking a problem instead of pausing, breathing, feeling into the
solution, which waits, always, in bones and tissues and skin desiring to be
attended to and heard.
Stress.
The answer my
skin speaks to my fretful questioning of breakouts and fine lines.
The blasts of cortisol,
the booms of adrenaline from this past year appear on my skin.
I yearn for a
glowing complexion. I strive to align my diet and routine to achieve skin
perfection.
I eat clean. I
drink tons of water. I meditate. I walk, sweat, flip myself upside down in
inversions to increase the blood flow to my face. I mindfully choose my products
and do not apply a paint supply of heavy coverage to my face. I grasp teas and
holistic creams and oils and chant mantras to fix and perfect, only to worsen a
condition that, in retrospect, wasn’t too much of a problem to begin with.
Stress.
My skin reminds
me as I stare in horror at a red constellation of acne that has decided, quite
cruelly, to pop up and beam bright as I make my homecoming to Kentucky.
My purring ego
did not conjure this detail in images of my homecoming.
I wished to
present a breakout-free complexion as I revisited Lexington, but alas, coming
home reawakens and resurfaces pent up narratives and releases deep layers of
stress.
The body does
not lie.
A glistening complexion
would be a lie.
My face reflects
the tumultuous events of this past year and how my body responded.
“How is Austin?”
“What’s Austin
like?”
I grapple for
an answer that encapsulates the challenges and joys of this past year. I fear
disappointment and judgment from the inquirer.
My Austin is
coffee shops, late afternoon walks with a pit bull by my side, bowls of soup
made from veggies in my roommate’s abundant and growing garden, the discovery
of late night comedy and improv, NPR podcasts, meditation and books on
spirituality, a graffiti park constantly erased and evolving in expressive art,
springs and short stories, a GPS set to finding alternative routes off the high
way, a taco truck on the East Side with migas that make life complete and
whole.
My Austin exhilarates
and exhausts me.
There’s a
shadow over my Austin that I cannot dispel, and perhaps, attempting to
eradicate the memory would cause further damage. There are parts of Austin I reluctantly
or flat-out refuse to drive through…out of fear.
And it’s this
shadow cast by a stalking incident in the spring that taints the city, that has
caused the eruptions of stress echoing out into breakouts and the etchings of
fine lines.
I have not felt
safe in my skin. I have fled, kept quiet vigilance and forced myself to
continue on because I needed to survive and not break down.
Now, at home,
in a city where I don’t need to reach for my GPS, I let down. I break down. The
first few days I ache with a cold. My bones seem to steam off old stress. My
skin detoxes.
“You’re
spiritually cleansing,” my healer from Florida tells me over the phone, and so I
stop waging a war against my face and let my skin speak.
Stop trying so
hard.
Stop striving
to be perfect.
Stop. You’re
enough.
Relax. Rest.
Restore.
In the
restoration, in the returning to the body, in the embodiment of the moment, I relax
into my own innate knowing.
Clarity doesn’t
need to be actively pursued. Quite the opposite. Stillness is the remedy for
confusion.
I can soften
into clarity by softening into my being.
And in the
softening, there are finally tears. Rivers and streams and an opening not felt
when I sat in my room in Austin with the police report.
For months, I
prolong the cleaning out of my closet. I avoid a bulging file of the
self-labeled “adult” papers, including car and health insurance forms, and the
report, the case number, my former landlord’s relinquishment of my lease and
the money I still had to pay for a place I was terrified to sleep in and the
police report could not get me out of not paying that money (and I am
infuriated that I did not advocate for myself for then, but I was terrified and
wanted it all over).
I sit on the
floor with the police report. I feel too overwhelmed and stressed to cry. I
remember the kind woman behind the glass helping me fill out the necessary
information. She is my age, or maybe she is younger. Her kindness I soak in
like water.
I refile the
police report. The file is lighter when I place it back into my closet.
And here, on my
yoga mat, in my old childhood room, I cry.
I cry over
trying to do the move to Austin “right” with savings, and a job, and securing a
“safe” place to live, in trying to establish a steady life, and failing anyway.
In tears, he
finds me. My golden. My Gavin.
He snuggles up,
offers a paw, and shares quiet company with me.
This year
teaches me that I must always have a dog.
2017 is my year
of no:
I break a lease
to save myself.
I quit three
jobs.
I grieve
relationships and reclaim my power by turning energy given to the ever-elusive “why”
to “what have I learned?” and “how do I proceed?”
This year
teaches me that I know how to survive. I am a survivor. I come from a lineage
of smart women, of survivors. I am not alone; their wisdom exists in my bones.
As 2017
approaches to a close, as the longest night of the year comes ever closer, I surrender
the trying.
May 2018 be the
year I relax into thriving.
The year I learn
the language of skin, which is the language of self-acceptance.
May I become
fluent.
