Author: Heather Robinson

“What is this, some not even winter night? When we are all looking at each other with neither surprise or delight? We are holding our own souls tight.”

So, where are we? Where am I? Yesterday it helped me enormously to go out and walk to look for the leaves green who don’t lie, at least not on purpose.

Just a week before, I was back in the harvest. And that action of bringing something to fruition felt like nothing as simple as hope. One that came unbidden, not forced.

It was at their house. Yes, my friends at La Mas de la Fourbine who saved me more than once before, quite literally, and yet here I was again, back in that bed so soft as to give promise…at least of dreams, for once a restful night.

Back to this bedroom and this joyful family. 

Today, I had a thought of young Juliette demanding during a break, “I like it when you make your legs like that,” meaning mine crossed like Buddha and her sitting in the middle that was left. I would love to watch her do that simple manoeuvre of pulling herself up towards me with one hand and a book in the other while trying not to wonder too much what is the beauty to be a Mom. I would correct her quietly, as she sounded out the words but not every time that she made a mistake. Sometimes, it was fine to listen to that otherwise confident voice testing out the sounds, learning in live time. 

During the days, I would pick at the olives so quietly. I was most happy when I was inside the tree.

I would rotate the swampish green fruit between my fingers and marvel at the perfume. Picking without thinking, time rotated from between “until lunch” to “until sunset.” And then, we were done. We folded up the nets that had been placed under the trees in the near dark with wispy exhales that reached up towards the cold, stubborn stars. 

I would have stayed another day if there had been more to be done. Another week, another year.

And now those treasures, fought for with a declaration of, “No olive left behind!” (that was me, on the first morning, a bit giddy) will be pressed and strained until they have transformed into something else entirely. A briny, initially spicy, oil. A promise of something that will continue to change and develop over time.

I know that feeling. I know it well.

As there was so little to take this year, R and N relied on their friends to do the picking, a traditional provençal style affair. And I would chat and smile with these strangers, instigating conversations. Curious. Stealing a laugh when I could. How different an experience from when I last participated in 2016, a period when I could barely understand the pain as it ripped through my body, let alone the challenges to come. The trees held me up then. I hid behind my camera. Don’t see me. Don’t see me, please. My hosts were generous in their carefulness.

Will I always be one, or two days behind of believing again, truly? Sometimes. But not always. In those recent few moments I felt rooted with that balmy earth. I wasn’t as desperate for the light of the moon as usual. The sun felt rather good. 

I suppose the point of this story (remembering it once again) is that I am still here. I have grown. And although I am still not able to forsee the possibilities, I can start to feel them coming. Or hear the door creaking on its hinges as if begging for a push. 

That moment with my friends preceeded, directly, the US presidential election. In the joy of the past few days, with the dancing in the streets, it feels like a harvest of another sort has also taken place. How I cried to see humanity…win. Despite what lies ahead. I kind of know where I am, as a person and as a person of the world. My community. My family. And hopefully, there will also be more kindness and love towards my struggling self. 

That one still to be completely refined. May I rest inside those branches in peace. 

May we all, each in our own way.

With Love, always,

Peace and peace and yet again,

Heather, somewhere in Provence

A storm rolled out of nowhere and the rain came pelting down, mere seconds after I tucked myself inside my front door. A little laugh caught in my throat at the joy of it, that escape from being drowned. And yet, the sun was dogged and quickly burst through despite the continuing pour; skies exuberant, clouds la vie en rose. Such is the life in Provence. 

“A toast, ” I rallied. “A toast to my good fortune.” And so I skipped up the steep steps to my kitchen and opened up a split of champagne that a guest had given me at the hotel. It was, admittedly, something that I had been saving in hopes to share with someone special, for it was a good bottle. But oh, I am learning – and forgetting and learning again – that I am most certainly worth the bubblies, the gifts, the good meals, the love, all just for myself. 

Boots kicked off, I stood in the open doorway and watched the rain battle the sky. But of course the light won. How could it not, while I held champagne in hand? With the coupe just under my ear, I could hear the static of popping, like a shell to the ocean. A car swivelled into a parking spot across the street and the young man stretching out of his car looked at me quickly, then away. “Yes, this is me,” I wanted to reassure him, “a bit of an oddball, a bit of a beauty. Me.” 

You see, I am talking about that kind of moment. 

When all of the relentless noise and doubt is tamed by hope and breath. 

I had it, tonight.

A week ago, a dear friend called me out for the negative talk that I was casually spewing about myself. I can do that, as a kind of blanket cover (not a shield) when I am feeling self-conscious. That digging to hear, “Oh no, of course not, Heather, don’t say that, you are…” But she didn’t take the bait. Instead, she pulled me aside and in a tone beyond stern, she vocally shook me: “You have to stop doing this to yourself. It isn’t making anything better.” Just as the following day she would admonish, “What kind of message do you think that you are giving to women when you say such things?” (i.e. “I am old…I am fat…I am not pretty anymore) “What kind of message are you giving to me?” 

I thought about that on the train home, holding my breath, socially-distanced. Also that these words came from the same person who had surprised me by buying my Birthday lunch, hence, a real friend. Tough love can be true love. Hot tears descend my cheeks as I type. They aren’t sad.

What kind of message do I wish to give? To myself? We define ourself by our thoughts expressed. We can release wings or build cell block cages. Which is it to be? 

I now see growth not as that perpendicular ascent that we (certainly we Americans of my age) were taught at school. University then hopefully marriage plus children and career. A home. Cars then better cars. Savings. I have known none of that by name but the first and the second as its own version of something real, until it wasn’t. Does that lost love haunt me still? It does. Am I scared by the lack of the rest? Often. I have no net and sometimes I would just like to rest, confident.

Ten years ago to the day, I started this blog because I was truly lost. Then, it was in Arles. After what still remains to be one of the most difficult years of my life. My Dad’s death, losing the first house that actually felt like a home, the gallery with it. But you see, despite my fear, I am a fighter. So I started this space as a way of climbing out of the well. Just me writing to me, trying to make sense of all of the emotions that rattled my cage on a daily basis.

But then, you arrived. You know who you are. I cannot name you all. I don’t know how most of you found me. Probably through links from lovely women such as Vicki Archer and Sharon Santoni or Ann Mah. It was so fantastic how we supported each other then, as now. 

I know – as they say too – that I have the best reader family. But I truly do. I win! We win. We do. I actually was recently stunned when I was shown statistics proving how loyal you are. And yet not in the least surprised. Because between us, it has always been about what is real. We can’t do it any other way together. 

Do you remember when I was so scared to tell you about my separation? When I was convinced that I would lose all of you and yet you ALL stayed? You, my second family, have been through everything with me…or more acutely, we together have been through so much. Such incredible happiness when I shared with you the immense history of Provence, the day to day delights of such a life, the pain, losing Rémi, losing Ben, starting over, beginning dating again and my efforts at building this new life, on my own. For me. 

And with you as well. I know that I am looping in a circle around my learning and my growth. And yet, I feel so held by your love. That loop is, nonetheless, moving in an upward spiral. Can you imagine that? We have never met and yet I love you and you (I believe) love me. My ex did not think that it was possible for me to have real connections and friendships with you. Over and over again, you have proven him wrong. I have slept on your couches when I have had nowhere else to go; I have eaten at your tables.

So while in some ways I feel right back where I was ten years ago in my questioning, I know that is a good thing. It is just another twirl forward. I don’t doubt you for one second. And I promise to keep trying to doubt myself less too.

With the last drop of champagne, I toast us for these ten years spent together. Cheers. I raise my glass to the now sapphire sky.

And on we go. 

I have two little circles on the top of my thighs. 

It took me awhile to understand why they were there, like sombre dots in a Seurat painting.

Until I put my fingers to fill their place.

And I realised that I have been holding my body so tightly that this is what it creates.

Bruises. Two dark plum bruises. 

Of fear. Of desperation. Of clinging to my own body so much as a resource of faith.

And I am barely holding on. 

I am so tired.

And yet we do not have that luxury to lay down our heads. Not in the least.

I wonder of my elders, is this the exhaustion of vigilance when we are at war?

And what will it be if we fail?

That question is bitter, overripe on my tongue.

My fear is a pickpocket.

In our ignorance of what we actually can do or not, lies the vaccine that we need.

We are so used to everything being easy. This is not easy. 

Can we look for the answers? 

Can we be our own silent revolution before a violent one strikes?

I rub the taught muscles between my eyes and wonder.

My God, can that tiny sliver of a moon deliver us to where we need to go?

This is my post today. Call it spoken word if you want. It was created as an improvisation because the ideas came too quickly to write them down! It is a short piece that you can find by clicking below :

I was writing in my head while doing the dishes. “At times, I don’t know if I am going to survive this. To get through.” I stopped scrubbing as I realised with a bit of a shock but also a laugh that I haven’t. The me that was before all this began is…Changed.

Now, I am not talking about the essence. I proclaimed that a little too forcefully recently in a friendly text exchange: “I know that at the center of my existence I am a good person, generous and kind. That much I am certain of.” It is my refrain when the world becomes doubtful. No, I am talking more about the fuzzy outer layers. Personality, if you will. Ego. Tastes and preferences. Perspectives and preconceptions. A matter of trust.

Over and over, trust. My lips are sweaty against my folded knuckles, I take a moment to breathe in and out, loudly, over that word. It has been four years, four years since my couple imploded and yet I still have trouble putting trust in a man. And to trust my choices and attractions, me who usually considers myself such a solid judge of character. To trust that I am worthy of a good man, a clear strong love. Why do my eyes tear up to write that? Because my heart was hurt this week in the trying. And how long will it be before I finally heal myself? This too, I know is up to me.

I have written about the impact of the months of imposed solitude and isolation have had on my psyche but it was premature. Just like any trauma, the after-effects are still rolling out. Often, I find myself walking through the streets, finally free to do so with hunched shoulders and lowered head, as if hiding. Sometimes, I will chide myself, “pick your head up, Heather. Stand tall, you have nothing to be ashamed of.” But I can’t always do it. Sometimes, I feel ashamed.

It has not even been a month since George Floyd was murdered. Do you remember feeling that shock in watching the video for the first time? Trying to comprehend what was happening? That moment when you understood that you were watching a man being killed? I do. That too, broke something in me. As has the incomprehensible police brutality, the unsparing hatred screaming, the relentless provocation of a man so insensitive to the world that he could propose to stage a rally in America’s most racism ravaged city on Juneteenth. Through my spirituality, I had previously come to the point where I thought that “good” and “evil” were mainly religious constructs. Now, I question that as well. To not have trust – yes that word again – in the morality of humanity? That has changed me too.

I am in a state of parenthesis. What is to be filled in between the ( and the ) I do not know.

Listen, this is not sad. This is, again, not about me really. It is just that if I feel that I am no longer the person that I once was, either four years or four weeks ago, it is just a further reminder that we are all constantly in a state of more forceful change than we realise. As in Buddhism, there are the waves that flow through our lives but we are not those surges and hollows, we are the sea. We are the sea itself. Perhaps it is helpful to remember that if we can.

I may not be entirely sure of the “who” of I am right now but I very aware, on this Summer Solstice of…of?…my aliveness. I have a voice. I have this heart that cares too much but that is what it is. If I focus, I can wonder what trust in this time would feel like…in my own body, where can I sense it? In our collective society, where can I antennae tap out something to lean into? … Again, I put my head into my hands, I massage out the “lion’s wrinkle” in-between my eyes and…the only answer that makes any sense at all is Love. It seems completely paradoxical given all that I have written above but the only thing that I can trust in when all else is broken, falling and yet beginning, is, Love.

There is nothing that burns brighter in our human existence. Yes, it feels a bit like coming home, of an evidence to think so on the longest day of a very long year. In journalism, it is a cardinal error to repeat oneself. I am entirely aware that I am doing so, constantly, in these posts. And yet if it is because I continually do so to side with Love, on that I will stand.

In some ways, I feel right back at the beginning.

Those first few days of realising that we were in for the long haul with COVID 19 and that we have no idea how it might end.

So gripped in fear that I am paralysed by it.

Spending hours upon hours scrolling social media and the internet to try and get information, to try and understand.

As if it were possible to comprehend all of the pain and anger, the division and violence that has occurred since the murder of George Floyd.

It has been almost a week and the police brutality that I have seen has broken me.

But it can’t.

For if we still have far to go with this pandemic, it is nothing compared to the battle of dismantling racism. Racism, inequality, which is stitched in the fabric our Western and capitalist societies. Someone is always “better off” than the other, that is just “how it is.”

It is why so many have been blind to their own beliefs for so long because they were literally born into them. It’s too close to see.

And it is too close. Too close when police officers shoot a peaceful protester in the face with rubber bullets or Taser or tear-gas a young girl.

It is too close when members of the press are fired upon and arrested.

When politicians incite not protect. When they do nothing to quell or unify. Or simply nothing at all. “Let the fires burn.”

Several times this week, I have wondered if there are elements to what is happening that make it similar to what it must have been like at the beginning of the rise of Nazism. So many events in so little time and the public cannot handle it, so they simply side with the easiest “solution.” The winning party. One with plenty of propaganda, whether it be fact or fiction.

Even while humanity falls apart.

We can’t let it. We can’t. Not again. Not again and again and again. And again and again and again.

In an exchange with my friend Patricia this morning, she asked: “Where are the voices of strength and guidance?” and I responded, “Who is going to bring us all together again?”

Which brought about another idea that had been rolling about in my brittle brain recently, that of President Barack Obama’s comment during one of his recent graduation speeches: ““If the world’s going to get better, it’s going to be up to you.”

It’s up to us. No one is going to help. There is no “leader” in sight. Please don’t turn away. I know it is painful and frightening but nothing near what it must be for the black community who lives through cultural, societal and economic discrimination every single day because of the color of their skin that they were born into. That is not a choice.

But how we move forward collectively is.

I don’t know what that looks like but I do believe that it is possible.

And that is the most hope that I have felt in months. Perhaps I am too naive. But if the pandemic has taught me anything, it is that there is much good in this world. We can unite around a cause and we can find each other through love.

Please. Don’t think, do. The change starts within me. The change starts within you.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

Sign a petition:

Justice for George Floyd on change.org

#JusticeforFloyd on act.colorofchange.org

Donate:

Official George Floyd Memorial Fund on gofundme.com

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund

Black Lives Matter

Communities United Against Police Brutality

The Minnesota Freedom Fund

National Bail Out Fund – Free Black Mamas

Educate yourself:

Black Women Radicals and AAFC Solidarity reading list

“Algorithms of Opression” bookclub via womenscenterforcreativework.com

“On becoming anti-racist” on cupofjoe.com

I thought this was very much worth the watch. Truly helpful:

Trevor Noah speaking on recent events.