AUGUST . 2023
Resting pose ~
Less of a pose
more of a place
where muscles
move like flowers
where flowers
grow like hair
where a month
is a respit, a rest
on the road
𓎂
August: What if rest wasn’t radical or revolutionary or an act of rebellion?
What if rest was just what it is.
What if attaching the idea that rest is a political solution to our modern woes is actually detracting from the act of rest itself? What if it made rest less restful, less organic, & just as machinistic as every other thing we do in a night or a day?
Rest is not a machine nor is it a weapon. Rest is something people take & do all over the world. There are entire cultures built around resting in the middle of the day. And there is room to rest in our culture, too, you just need to know it for what it means for you. And then take it. Because rest belongs to each of us, to every single one of you.
𓎂
The word rest means a stopping-place, a place to pause & to refresh oneself. One of its many roots is akin to the Middle High German raste, “a day’s march,” which refers to the distance that a person or group of people could travel in one day.
Even a day rests at the end of itself & that end, varies, depending on season.
Rest is a normal & necessary function of a living organism.
As normal as a breath.
As normal as a kiss.
As normal as the momentary & automatic blink of your eyelid.
Seasons rest, skies rest, birds rest, we rest. If you ring around the rosie enough, you will fall down because because: ringing around anything for a time is tiring & so, you will need to rest.
Rest so you can ring around some more when you are ready. Or more importantly, when you aren’t.
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Rest allows for many things & it doesn’t look just one way. This month, make a meandering & unfettered list of the ways in which rest looks for you.
For example, one way it looks for me is to go outside & stare into the world at nothing in particular if I have been looking at a computer screen for too long. Another example is to breathe deeply, consciously while I reach out to touch the paw of one of my sleeping cats. A third way is an active decision to say no when I need a reset. And then there is a sleeping in. And there is also switching from Earl Grey to Lapsang every so often in the morning. Or, for changing up my personal flower essence when we have marched as far as we can together. And then there is…
The list can go on & on. And maybe the more you think of it, the more you will have to add to it. Maybe the list is on-going & it is less a list for keeping you in line & more a page of memory & affirmation.
𓎂
Rest allows for something completely & utterly important to occur.
Shirley Jackson, I think, describes this best in the first two lines of The Haunting of Hill House when she writes:
No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks & katydids are supposed, by some, to dream.
And so, to dream is to rest. It is to rest absolutely. It is to regain sanity & sovereignty over your inner landscape.
Dream by day, by noon, by night.
Dream unexpectedly & without warrant or desire or reason. Dream without looking & without meaning. Dream just to dream.
Dreaming allows for many things & it doesn’t look just one way. This month, you are granted permission to dream in the most meandering & unfettered ways you can.
𓎂
So much has been going on for you. So much change, transformation, shedding, building, birthing, creating, splitting apart, breaking, healing, traveling, working, instagramming, walking, dinner-making, seeking, summering…
All of these things are life & are part of living.
And so is rest. Rest is part of life. Nothing more & nothing less.
Another etymological root of the word rest is in Old Norse röst, which means “a stage on a journey.” Which is to say, once again, that rest is part of living. It is just another juncture or phase or point in time of a journey.
And so, let rest be as such. Let it give you a sense of peace & perspective in the midst of all your life’s many myriad phases.
𓎂
Now, onto this August’s almanac…
And just as a little preview: this month features a short monograph of one of my favorite summery stone fruits + a special recipe (which, incidentally, has been an almost daily ritual of rest for me) that starts with a s & ends with an orbet…
It is something you can enjoy by the spoonful while listening to the Augustine playlist that DJ Stella (aka Emma Ledgerwood) curated for us ~
Enjoy ~
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