Rhetoric

’Hood Vibrations

Winter Garden has got me hooked on a feeling.

Text: Rheya Tanner

Recently I found myself at a fancy downtown event, unaccompanied—a precarious situation for someone who accidentally ends conversations with “hello.” I enjoyed thankfully unawkward dialog with friendly folks, but mostly I employed my usual strategy for large gatherings, which is “just vibing.”

A subgenre of people-watching, vibing is an active passiveness. It entails taking up an innocuous position, solitary but not separate, and giving up my senses to the environment. Maybe that makes me a wallflower (and some people take it as that … I could have Resting Vibe Face?), but it gives me an appreciation for the uniqueness of that space and time.

The vibe at this particular event, the dedication of the new Monarch Sculpture, was a swanky three-piece jazz band, standing tables, burlap bouquet centerpieces, and various hors d’oeuvres that either delighted me or petrified me. Many attendees aptly wore butterfly-themed outfits—I’d have been one of them if I kept up with my laundry. And the aforementioned folks who made my acquaintance were dizzyingly learned horticulturists who rattled off names of flowers as casually as I say the alphabet.

After the sculpture was good and dedicated, I expected to want to go straight home. But despite the stress of that day, despite how tired I was, I felt the sunset tugging me toward downtown for a few minutes more. Who am I to disrespect the vibe?

I drifted along the main drag, eventually settling in the plaza with my dog and an ice cream cone. I vibed with the creaking of the swings, with the patter of the fountain, with the dwindling hum of a small town winding down its day. I smiled at the young families taking in the dusk alongside me—and they smiled back as I pinched some ice cream off the cone for Mako to lick off my fingers.

In that moment was a feeling that’s hard to explain. It only ever lingers for that moment, like a spicy déjà vu. And I have come to the conclusion that the feeling is belonging.

Back when I was only technically an adult, and saw the world as nothing but my oyster, I thought belonging was just out there somewhere, like a penny on the sidewalk, and it was up to me to find it. But as I’ve become an adult-adult, I’ve learned that I do not like oysters, and that belonging is just gratitude for being wherever you are.

That fickle vibe might very well take me across the world one day. But for now, the vibe is cobblestone streets, metal swing-seats, and that butterfly buttondown still in my dryer. And there’s no place I’d rather belong.