Some like it hot
Hello. The last time I wrote to you was from the crest of the heat wave and when I wrote those words I assumed that the worst was behind us. Well. I was wrong.
I don't know about you but I spent July in a fevered daze, unable to differentiate between the hot hot heat of the world, which continued to burn in both literal and figurative fashion, and the heat emanating from my own distressed body. For a month straight I flushed, I flashed, my head spun, I woke at 4 am in ponds of my own sweat. I was not able to eat. My own personal ecosystem has been in crisis, frantically throwing adrenaline and cortisol in all directions, seeking balance.
This has not been exactly fun, but it has been interesting, trying to figure out what's going on, and trying to stop my body from ricocheting between the impulse to fight, fly, or freeze on a daily, or hourly, basis. I read up on trauma and its physical manifestations; I went to the doctor, to see if I have been abruptly launched into menopause. I got a massage; I got reiki. I tucked a pebble into my bra to ground me and spread lemons around the house to clear my energy. I went to visit my mother. And I did a lot of circus.
Throughout all of this I've tried to take solace, inspiration even, in the actual fact of this physical struggle. Because it's true: I have been under stress. Bad things have happened, and they did without doubt trigger all the old traumas to surface and to amplify. The fact that this is all substantiated by my body, in the stench of my hot, damp skin, in the taste of ashes in my mouth, is a comfort. See? You're not crazy; your body proves it.
As a young person and (for a while) a serious dancer, I reveled in the potential of my body even as I internalized a lot of bad messaging about mind and body and their alienation from each other. The mind was to be valued, it did hard work worthy of respect; the body -- especially that of a young woman -- was to be controlled, disciplined, and displayed. It has taken no lie a lifetime to shake this bullshit off, and some of it still adheres, putrid and reeking as it is. So I try, over and over, to welcome this summer's reminder of my unruly, uncontrollable body, the way it can shake with fear and the way it can spin with joy.
Please enjoy here this photo of me performing last month as Colonel Mustard in an aerial act inspired by the board game Clue, in a 90-degree church.
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Now that I've made you thoroughly uncomfortable, talking about my messy female body, some news from the mind: The Chicago Neighborhood Guidebook, aka "my book," comes out next month and we have events scheduled around town in celebration. Please come! The first one is Wednesday, September 11 at the Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia, from 5:30-8 pm. The second is Tuesday, September 17 at Marz Community Brewing, 3630 S. Iron, from 7-9 pm. And the third is Tuesday, October 1 at the Hopleaf, 5148 N. Clark, also 7-9 pm. All events are free and open to the 21+ public. See our events calendar here for more information on who will be reading and so forth. Books will be available for sale! And, well, I'll just throw in another reminder here that you can also always ORDER THE BOOK DIRECTLY from Belt, off of our website. That page is here.
My friend Nance wrote beautifully about sweat and the summer heat in her Chicago Reader column last month, which reminds me to remind you that you can also still purchase her book, The Soil Keepers, online, here.
And in news from the tropics, a second story produced from our Pulitzer Center grant was published a few weeks ago by Reuters Place, on gentrification in San Juan's Barrio Machuchal. And I'm going back to Puerto Rico in a few days to report another story, about zoning, for PRI. I'm excited about that, both for the professional opportunity it affords and for the chance to go swim in the salty Atlantic -- for this body, a cure-all -- before summer's end.
Thanks, as ever, for reading.