Dreaming the World

Today dawned clear and chilly. The bare branches whip around against the blue sky. The danger of fire is unusually high, and the turkeys and geese are traveling in large packs.

The wind has been intense the past few days, breaking branches and taking down scaffolding. The barometric pressure has been bouncing around as well. Both intensify my asthma, so that I feel as though I am struggling to breath. The problem is one of sensation and perception as my primary doctor assures me that although I am most uncomfortable, my lungs are fine.

A bouncing barometer also tends to set off intense bouts of post-polio syndrome, which feels like having the flu. I am challenged to get in enough steps in the winter and feeling ill and having no energy serves to make walking all the more difficult. Then there is the simple truth that when I walk in the wind I lose my breath.

The combination of wind and asthma often trigger memories of being ill with polio. In the extreme I may find myself feeling as though I am back in the iron lung. Everything except my head was sealed inside the lung, which used variations in internal pressure within a sealed tube to cause my paralyzed diaphragm to force out air so I could intake air on the in-breath. The lung sounded like a deafening wind storm. It was terrifying and saved my life.

I imagine that even without asthma many people at this time of fear and anxiety are struggling to breathe.

We now know that what Indigenous people everywhere have known for eons is true: the body stores trauma and traumatic memory can be passed genetically across generations. Inter-generational trauma is one of colonialism’s cruelest methods of control. The craziness being loosed upon the world at this time promises much more long lived trauma.

My physician and I often talk about the state of the world and this week’s visit was no exception. He’s a person of color and we both grew up very much lower class. At the end of our meeting, he said of the current American experiment in politics, “This will not end well.” The previous evening I had been in a committee meeting that concluded with a marginalized person saying of this present moment, “This will not end well.” Lately I have found myself saying the same whenever anyone asks my opinion. The truth is that it cannot end well.