Willfulness

WillfulnessRW

#diary, #seasons, #blood/menstruation, #climbingrose, #hormones

March 12th: Spring hides in the ground, in the buds on the branches, in the longer light of every day, in the excitement, in the birds coming back, and in me. I am aching to open my closed doors, windows, eyes, and ears.

March 16th: After a week of winter, spring burst open today. All the accumulated energy came out at once. The world turned from black, grey, and white into green, red, yellow, blue.

March 18th: I bought a rose called Filipes Kiftsgate. The rose is able to climb trees, just like me. It has white flowers which bloom in abundance only for 8 weeks. The rose was bought to climb around the door but, when I realized it could grow up to 18 meters long, I decided it needed a different place to bloom.

March 21st: The forest floor is like a cushion covered only in small white flowers. They popped their heads above the ground to find my smiling face.

March 23rd: Today, summer fully emerged. The sun was there when I woke up, took a swim, had dinner, read a book, and went to sleep. I wish summer would last longer than a week.

March 27th: Filipes Kiftsgate is waiting for me to choose a place to root: An immense responsibility. I walked around the neighbourhood to check trees, parks, houses, and gardens. I can’t decide which place is the best for her, and closest to me.

March 30th: Summer pushed me high, and when fall knocked on my door I started falling downwards. I kept spiralling and tumbling until I pierced the ground. Underneath the soil I found the toads hibernating. I joined them, dreading the downpour which I know now, is to come in one week.

March 29th: Tonight, in the extra hour of darkness, I planted Filipes Kifsgate next to a tree in the dunes. Since it is fall now, she will be able to shoot roots before winter, quieting down and emerging in two weeks. As silent as possible I entered the bushes and dug a hole next to a big tree. I saw myself lying in the hole, and I put Filipes next to me. I covered us with earth, emptied a bottle of water, wished us well, and left.

April 4th: Filipes is doing ok. He is not yet sprouting but I can see from below that he is rooting and will shoot his branches in a while. The toads around us know they too must wait for spring to come before they can leave the soil.

April 6th: A day full of wind, sun and horizontal snow, which blows so hard that I have to put all my weight against the wind. Icy spikes of hail attack my body. My legs feel heavy as bricks. Together with the flow of blood, winter has arrived again, as heavy and dark as always. I am getting emptied just like the clouds. Who is putting me through this? My body? My mind? Someone else to blame would make it easier.

April 9th: Winter disobeyed my wish for it to stay away this month, to be postponed. It is just three weeks ago that it left, why is it back already? Today sunlight alternated with hail and snow for hours. Now a white darkness has taken over. Spring has lost the battle, the sun is out but unable to melt my cold. Hail and snow are here to stay; on the streets, on the cars, and on me. Did winter wilfully disobey me, or does a part of me want the seasons to alternate monthly? Does my mind like the roller coaster highs and lows? Weeks ago, when it was spring and summer, the cyclical ritual of my body seemed like the most beautiful idea. But starting with fall and being fully winter now, the darkness is so vast and it feels like it won’t ever leave. I wish for it to never arrive again. Please let me be the equator.

April 10th: My body, my hormones dictate my cycle. They give me seasons, let me burst with energy and break me down again every month. ‘Queer use could thus also be interpreted as vandalism: the wilful destruction of the venerable and beautiful’, writes Sara Ahmed. My body as the queer user, building me up and breaking me down again and again. But also my mind as the queer user wants to become the equator; a life without seasons.

April 11th: The one who decides what is the venerable and beautiful is the one who builds the laws. The one who builds the laws, is not the one who is wilful. The one who is wilful just does what she needs to do. Spiraling around the law, breaking the law, deciding for herself, she is carving her own path. Using but for the law misusing, obeying but for the law disobeying, spelling but for the law misspelling.

April 12th: Besides the occasional drip, the rain stopped today. The sun came out. Is this winter leaving again? All the branches, trees, leaves, and buds are still wet but the rain and sun is intensifying their colours. The toads can end their hibernation, Filipes Kiftsgate can begin to sprout and I will ascend back into the light again to be spring once more, and maybe waywardly stay spring forever.