The Little Prince and the Fox

On my hike/climb yesterday I injured my ankle pretty badly. And yet, over the past couple weeks, for me the feeling has crystalized that I am, in general, really finding my footing here.

I’ve decided I’m going to stay here. I’m going to do everything it takes to allow me to stay and grow and build my career and reshape my personal life here.

As is often the case for me, this important decision came almost spontaneously, surfacing almost on its own from the broiling waters of “in betweens” that have been my landscape for the past month or so. It’s like bubbles surfacing in a frothy pond, or a meadow appearing clearly after a snow storm, or an island on the horizon emerging peacefully after a violent gale.

I’m staying here because I want to stay here. Because I like it here and feel happy, at peace here, and because there seem to be concrete professional pathways that are better supported for my interests here. I’m not staying because I dread or loath California: I’ve made peace with California and will always love the place where I spent six very important years of my life, I’ll always love it as one can love an ex-partner with whom one has found a kind, sweet, loving closure. Something or someone that one might go back to later on in life, as an old friend.

I’m ready to give this place here a chance, to give myself a chance here. I’m also ready for (a) romantic relationship(s). Probably I’m ready to finally try and make the effort, invest in (a) romantic relationship(s) precisely because I have found my own geographical and, hopefully, professional, footing.

My non-binary climbing friend in California, whom I like in a special way, has asked me again if they can come visit me here. And this time I said “yes”. Because I know that no matter how much I like them and regardless of where they want to live or of what happens between us, I want to stay here for now.

On my hike/climb with a new climbing buddy here yesterday, he asked me about my romantic relationship situation. Despite it being a new acquaintance, I feel very comfortable with him and I knew there were no “extra meanings” in his question, that it was just genuine interest between two people who are building a new friendship. This feeling, together with my own newly-found grounding, allowed me to answer very openly and honestly – that I don’t have a partner now, that I don’t like to do online dating, but especially that it’s hard for me to find someone because of my non-binary/trans gender identity, because “I am a boy who likes boys”. His spontaneous reply to the latter was, “There’s nothing wrong with that!” So I explained better, telling more about myself: “Yes, but it’s not easy to find guys who see me that way because I have a female body. I’m a boy in a girl’s body. I like my body and I don’t think I want to do surgery or take hormones to change it, but it’s difficult for me, and has been very difficult for me in some past relationships, to not be seen as a boy by the guys I like”.

My being able to say all that to someone whom I’ve known for only a short while comes not only from the instinctive ease & familiarity I feel with him, but also and probably foremost from my own newly-found confidence. From finding my own footing.

“This is who I am, this is what I want – whether you like it or understand it, or not”.

Early this morning, I did my first free solo ever! At least in climbing – in life, I guess I’ve been “free solo-ing” for a while now…  

A few days ago, when I went for the first time to a school here where I’m collaborating part-time, I met one of the PhD students and she helped me around. As we took our teas and pastries at the end of the line in the cafeteria, I instinctively managed to hold all my stuff (jacket, bag, beverage, snack) on my own, shifting objects between hands and even using my legs to hold things. And the grad student, a very acute and sweet person with whom I’d been chatting for over half an hour at that point, said: “You’re a very independent person, used to doing everything on your own, right?” – and then, smiling, “I could help you hold something”.

I guess I’ve gotten used to “free solo” a lot in my life, for better or for worse…

Today, I hiked/climbed the second Flatiron with a new friend here. And twisted my ankle really badly jogging a little stretch on the way up, before starting the climb. I knew it was hurt worse than the many times I’ve rolled an ankle while being on trails. But I was there, at the bottom of the Flatiron’s face and really wanted to climb it. My muscles were still warm and adrenaline was flowing through me, so the pain was still subdued.

We started to climb. My heart was already racing from the effort of the steep uphill hike worsened by my (hopefully temporary) hyperthyroidism symptoms. But once I was on the Flatiron’s face it was more like a question of survival. I could only climb upwards. No other option. Downclimbing would have been way worse. And my friend couldn’t carry me.  

“You’re killing it!”, he encouraged me from a few meters uphill. “Is this your first free solo?”, he asked. And when I replied in the affirmative, he was amazed: “That’s impressive – you’re so confident!”.

Well, I was confident because I had no other option, because I’ve gotten used to having to get through things on my own even when they hurt or scare me, or both. And this did scare me. Or would have scared me if I had stopped and thought or looked over my shoulder. But I didn’t. I just kept going. I was really enjoying it: this is the kind of fear and risk that I enjoy, that I like to push through because it brings me satisfaction and growth. I know I will have learned from this and next time I’ll simply enjoy the Second Flatiron with no fear. And then I might be ready for the Third or First Flatiron(s)… This morning, though, it was the awareness of having no choice but to climb upwards with my own hands and feet —  and the adrenaline – that kept me going. It’s amazing what adrenaline can do, and make us do. High heart rate, near-race effort, hunger, some pain, some fear – everything was gone in an almost-tunnel-like vision of making it with the upward climb. But apart from the adrenaline, I think there’s also a conditioning that comes from having gotten somewhat used to making it through tough spots with only one’s own strength, with no other option.

Survival mode —  and elation. I get why some people do this kind of thing at a much higher level as their life.

For me now, safely and cozily at home having made my first easy free solo, there’s just to hope that my ankle will heal soon enough…!

It’s a fine line between solitude and loneliness. And for me that line is often determined by tiredness — physical as well as mental. 

Tonight I’m tired. The physical effort of climbing outdoors in very cold weather on top of the mental/emotional effort of meeting and socializing with new people and finding my way in a new place is taking its toll this evening. 

Tonight I wish there were someone to hold me, somebody who could take care of me instead of just me, myself taking care of myself, as I’ve had to do almost continuously in the past years. 

The “lone road” is a tough one. It can be very rewarding, too; but tonight I can only feel its toughness and the need for a hug that I know I won’t get. 

The sun shone fiercely into my room this morning, pouring through the East-facing windows. 

Or so it seemed to me, after two mornings of muffled whiteness from the snowfall of the past couple days. 

I love listening to what my body needs, almost with the unselfconsciousness of some other animal, like the cat I’m looking after or my pet snake. They do what they feel the need to do, just listening to their bodies. And for a few months, I have the fortune to do the same. 

I was very sick in the past couple weeks, hardly able to do anything and leaving the house only to go to doctors visits. And, of course, no exercising at all! In the past, this would have driven me crazy, made me feel terribly frustrated and reignited my body-image issues, giving me a sense of guilt about eating if I didn’t exercise. This time was different. Maybe I’ve learned the lesson from being extremely sick with COVID two years ago. I just let my body do its thing. And gradually I’ve felt my health, my strength come back. Monday I felt an intense desire to swim: so I went to the pool and did laps for as long as my body could take it. Tuesday my body itched for a run, so that’s what I did: my first run in ten days and as I listened to my steps in the snowy fields I was actually able to do better than the last time I ran. But most importantly, I felt great after the run, after the swim. I didn’t overdo it, nor am I starving myself, as I might have done in the past. I eat when and whatever my body asks for it (embarrassingly healthy stuff most of the time anyway!). 

Yesterday we got a lot of snow. Tons of snow again. As early as 7 in the morning, it looked like it would be a “snow-in” day. So I pondered canceling my tattoo consultation appointment and just making a day of it working at home. But I felt an itch. Snow was falling thickly, the sky was low and heavy with grey-white clouds, visibility was reduced by the flakes swirling in the wind. And yet, the snow wasn’t sticking on the ground: I could drive to my errands safely enough. I’d be pushing my comfort zone but that was what I felt that I needed. It was an anxious drive to the tattoo parlor and then another anxious stretch to the bakery where I decided to pick up a couple muffins to pamper myself, almost as a prize for my bravery. But it was worth it. It was technically safe enough to drive. I would have regretted postponing my tattoo consultation and the muffins were delicious! 

Snow: enjoy it while you can. That was my thought, my feeling, as I came home, starving for a late lunch but itching to immerse myself in the white swirl and snowy fields. 

It was just a short walk, just a couple miles, in the snowy fields and below-freezing temperatures. Everything was white and quiet around me: the silence was absolute apart from the gentle howl of the wind and my crunchy steps. I couldn’t see the path in the fields but I know the way by now, so I just walked and walked, feeling my heart pumping, my legs and arms moving in synchrony, my warm breath meeting the freezing air, every inch of my body tingling from cold and excitement. 

I love this feeling of conditioning myself to the cold: both mentally, like driving in the snow in unfamiliar conditions, and physically, getting out there and exercising in the cold, enjoying the snow that I’ve missed for half a dozen years. 

This morning is slow. It feels like my body just wants to melt into the couch, like all my muscles would just want to let go. There’s no sense of sickness or sadness or lack of motivation: it’s just a need for relaxation, for slowing down, for enjoying this moment even if I’m doing nothing but sipping tea and petting the cat purring in my lap. I can tell that today I need to take it easy, so I will (despite the errands I must go on).

Listen to the body: the body knows. This is also part of conditioning: coaxing my body (& soul) back to health and tranquility.

I know this is privilege. This break is a gift. And as such, I’ll make the best of it.

On my road trip driving over from California to Colorado six weeks ago, one of the CDs I listened to the most was an old album of Meredith Brooks, “Deconstruction”. One of my favorite songs from this album is “Sin City” and I still listen to it very often, sometimes on repeat. I really like the tune and lyrics of the whole song, but the chorus has a particular pull on me and I often enjoy singing just the refrain to myself.

I love to sing (although this thyroid issue is making it harder on my throat) and since the pandemic I have started doing so more often in public places that are wide open and where I feel nobody will really notice me (or I won’t really bother anyone). 

I was doing so today as I walked through the hospital’s parking-lot after getting blood tests done —  singing the refrain from Meredith Brooks song “Sin City” over and over totally unselfconsciously. And when I got to my car, I just sang one more round, thinking there was nobody nearby. But then, when I finished, I heard a voice from right behind me say, “Thank you”. At first I didn’t turn around, I was partly embarrassed and partly convinced it wasn’t directed at me. But then the voice came again: “Thank you — Hello!?”. So I turned around and saw this person in their car right next to where mine was parked, smiling and reaching out of their window to give me a yellow flower. “That was lovely” they said as they handed me the yellow flower. “Here, this is for you, a flower of peace”. 

It made my day.

I just got home from my post-lunch walk in the fields near my host family’s house. 

The weather has gotten cold again, dropping almost 30 degrees (Fahrenheit) overnight. The sky is heavy with grey-white clouds and the Rockies, which are usually visible from here, are hidden behind the snow already rolling in. 

The fields were quiet, apart from the geese calling and some mysterious bird of prey screeching. 

I could hear my heavy steps, my heart racing from my thyroid gone berserk. My health is still very shaky and all I can do to exercise is a short daily walk in my neighborhood. 

Today was peaceful as the snow flakes started to fall in the quiet atmosphere, as everything was sort of wrapped up in a quilt. The snow that covered the fields from the last snow-fall a couple weeks ago is almost completely melted but the ponds are still mostly frozen over. So today for the first time I ventured out on one of the frozen ponds, gingerly watching my step, feeling excited and happy in a simple way, like a child. 

This morning I started a new notebook for my journaling: a nice notebook that I got myself yesterday in a bookstore. 

Something has shifted. 

I’m still in between. In between sickness and health. In between winter and spring. In between Colorado and California. And yet today I feel a quiet peace within me. I feel more tranquil and grounded. I feel healed. Like I’ve turned a new page — like the new notebook I’ve started. Sure, the pages are still blank: my future, my decisions, my next steps haven’t been written yet, they are still mysterious and mostly unknown. But this sense of healing coming from the final closure with the “boulderer” is profound, like water from rain showers trickling into the ground, running deeply into the soil, and thus reaching the roots of the trees, infusing them with new — gentle but steady — life. 

I’m loving this winter here: I love it here in general and often feel that I’d like to move and settle here. This new sense of healing, though, is trickling into my relationship with that place in California where I had lived for four and a half years: I almost feel like I’d be “emotionally ready” to move back. 

It’s no time for a final decision for me, yet, and as unsettling as it may be, I’ll keep holding the “in between” for now: but I also want to celebrate this calmness of today’s “in between”, the renewed peace of this winter-spring enveloping me today, mindful that tomorrow might be different. 

This is today: a healing from “in between”; something as of yet unknown opening up while something else closed peacefully.

For the past few weeks I’ve been struggling with a sense of being in a limbo. The expression “holding the uncertainty” has come to my mind so often… Uncertainty, feeling “in-between”, neither really here nor there: uncertain of what I want to do professionally, of what I even want to do as of next summer or fall; the being “in between” geographically, neither in California anymore nor fully in Colorado in a stable way; not knowing where I want to live next; the being “in-between” genders; having a legal name with which I don’t identify anymore and cannot wait to change but being unsure of where and when and how to change it legally… 

I’ve been trying to hold all this uncertainty, while not thinking of it too much. 

But in the past two days, there’s been more than uncertainty for me to hold: there’s actually been certainty for me to hold. And I’m finding that certainty can be just as intense to hold as uncertainty. 

Ten days ago, I made a gift: a gift to myself, first of all; but I was hoping it might also be a gift for the other person, the one receiving my message. It was intended as a free gift, in order to give myself — my conscience, my soul, my heart — deeper peace and real closure, at last. It worked for me. But it went even further: it generated further gifts. 

I received a gift in response this week, two days ago: an unexpected reply to my message. And with it, certainty: the certainty of having been an extremely important figure in that person’s life; the certainty that the other person had special and intense feelings for me, too, as I did for them; the certainty that everything that I had imagined and intuited and felt was correct, was real, was true. 

It lasted three years, almost to the day. Three years of confused messages, of conflicting or tricky situations, of intense feelings that had to be mostly kept hidden. A weird relationship and yet one of the most intense, and maybe important, ones in my life. And now it’s finally healed: closure with everything being said, openly, honestly, with kindness and gratitude, on both sides. And with the knowledge of it having been mutual, mutual all along. 

And now I want to hold this certainty. After three years of doubts and uncertainty, of confusion and frustration, now I want to hold this little treasure, this precious gift. Just hold this feeling: hold it and kindle it to let my heart heal fully, to let my heart become whole again.

The power and sweetness of this closure, this closure with kindness and gratitude, is wonderful. It’s one of the most healing feelings I have ever experienced. 

But it’s also mixed — there are mixed emotions. There’s mostly a warm, soft joy, on the surface; there’s also a very intense relief and some deep satisfaction. But there’s also a sense of loss. Because for me this is truly the end: this relationship now lays fully in the past for me. In another ”lifetime”, as I wrote in my message — and I truly meant it. 

This morning I found myself telling my counselor about this latest exchange of messages and after a while he pointed out that I was talking about that relationship, that situation, that person, using the past tense, whereas the other person wrote about “reconnecting”, using the presence tense, in their email reply. That’s when it really hit me: for me it’s over. This time, I’ve really found my closure: I’m in a different place, both emotionally and geographically, from the last time we met in person. And I’m not going back. This is part of that certainty that I’m holding now: it’s partly heavy to hold but it’s also extremely precious, and I want to hold it for as long as I may need. Hold this certainty of having loved and been loved back, of having understood everything all along, of having planted some lasting seeds; but also hold the certainty of this being all in the past for me. 

Loss and relief. Bittersweet. But there’s something warm and golden and luminous about it. And that’s what I want to hold now: hold this little light in my heart now and for as long as I may want to, while I look ahead and walk on.

Last night I went to bed feeling miserable: profoundly sad and lonely. Granted, it’s partly due to the hormonal issue that sent me to the hospital last week and is hopefully temporary. But it is a fact that it took less of a month from my departure for my friends in California to forget me. And that hurts. 

This morning I woke up still feeling quite miserable as I’m still sickly and it’s now been over a week that I have unwell. 

But then two seemingly small things made a big difference for the better, at least to my mood. 

One: my running coach wrote me a short, sweet text msg, ”Thinking of you”! That’s all I need really: a brief acknowledgement of not having been forgotten. 

Two: the son of my host family, who’s the nicest 19-year-old I’ve ever known, asked me how he should conjugate my non-binary possessive pronouns in German (German is his mother tongue and the language we communicate in most of the time and it’s not only a very gendered language but also has cases and declinations). So we went to my computer and I showed him what I had found about the still-work-in-progress grammatical rules that are being made up for non-binary pronouns in German. It felt so good to be able to share this with him, knowing that he really cared. 

When I met my host family over five years ago, the son was a shy 14-year-old whose sweet intelligence was often shut down by his stuttering. At the time, I was just a prospective tutor, a trusted neighbor, a friend of a friend, and someone who generally shared a lot with his parents. Then, I was his Science teacher for his 8th grade, when he was still very shy and awkward. When I saw him again last summer, after a break of four years and shortly after his graduation from high school, I could hardly recognize him: he had blossomed so wonderfully! As far as age, I’m right in between him and his parents. And with all my experiences as well as multi-faceted character, interests, and non-binary gender, I get along with all three people in my host family almost equally well: different parts of me are friends with the three of them separately, in very spontaneous but different ways. Yet the easy closeness and camaraderie between the son and myself touches me more, maybe because it’s always a bit surprising to me. He truly does enjoy chatting with me and we actually do have quite a bit we share: common interests in mostly fun and reckless activities. We talk as if we were at once siblings and buddies. I love it. It’s like the boy in me can wholly come out and interact with him without it having to be mentioned explicitly and yet being fully understood. 

Today, it’s exactly one month that I’ve been here in my temporary home in Colorado! 

In this first month here I’ve already: 

– written two chapters of my textbook; 

– sent in one of those chapters to my editors for review; 

– been to my local climbing gym; 

– met a few climbing buddies for both indoor and outdoor activities; 

– met up three times with one of the friends I made here last summer; 

– joined an online writing group (thanks to the friend I have here); 

– had one (my first!) tattoo consultation; 

– reinitiated professional connections and arranged in-person meetings for the upcoming weeks; 

– reached out to, and received warm welcomes from, local LGBTQ+ & gender support groups; 

– come out to my sister (via email) about my non-binary/trans gender identity; 

– gone on many walks and hikes and runs on snowy trails; 

– needed to get my car towed for engine overheating and hitch-hiked a ride back home; 

– gone to see a doctor and been sent to the ED; 

– been forgotten by most of my friends back in California;

– experienced the warmth and kindness of many people here, including many strangers; 

– shoveled tons of snow!