FROM THE EDITOR Molly Backes, Communications Coordinator
W
hen I was six years old, I stepped on a nest of yellow jackets. We had stopped on the side of the road to pee, par for the course on family roadtrips, and then my dad, little sister, and I wandered a ways into the woods, where we found an abandoned train track. I remember the before and the after: first the woods, hazy and green, dappled light filtered through leaves, and then the pain. We were somewhere along the Blue Ridge Parkway in the Appalachian Mountains. Beautiful and remote. I stepped on the nest and suddenly I was surrounded by angry wasps: ferocious and unrelenting. I remember my dad yelling for me to run, but his voice came through a veil that panic had thrown between me and the rest of the world. On the other side of the veil, my dad yelled “Run! Run!” On my side, the wasps buzzed in my ears and my feet stayed frozen in place. What a surprise it was to discover that the world can change in a second. That the ground can spin itself into a swarm and surround you faster than you can process it. I’m not sure if I knew before that moment. I’m not sure I know now. Maybe it’s something we have to discover again and again. Maybe it’s something we’re better off forgetting. Eventually my dad caught up to me and grabbed me under his arm, a little girl statue, and carried me out of the woods. I had been stung 13 or 14 times. My dad had 8 stings and my little sister had 3 or 4. My parents had no idea whether my sister and I might be allergic. Our first aid kit was what we had in the car, so I held cold cans of beer against my hot skin as my parents frantically tried to find a Ranger’s Station.
4
THE MADISON UNITARIAN
There is something I appreciate about physical ailments: I like how they bring me back to my body. I like how they put my brain in its place. They remind me that no matter how smart I think I am, I’m not really in control, because I live inside a body that is subject to illness and injury. It keeps me humble. It reminds me that I am a fragile mortal being in a world full of other fragile mortal beings, and our fragility and mortality binds us together in our brief and beautiful time on Earth. Growing up UU, I sometimes envied my Catholic friends because their church had all the answers, while here at FUS I had to figure out on my own whether I believed in one or more gods and how I fit into the universal tapestry of all existence. I had a sharp, impatient brain that wanted answers, and I hated the uncertainty of our faith. As an adult, I don’t trust anyone who claims to have all the answers. I appreciate the mysteries of life because just like physical pain, they keep me rooted in my humanity. I think about the thousands of generations of people who faced the same mysteries as we do, who looked up at the night sky and wondered about their role in the cosmos. The only certainty is that we’ll all die, but we humans go on hoping and dreaming and creating and falling in love anyway. It’s all so humbling. It’s all so beautiful. The world hurts a lot these days. Some days it’s the gathering swarm, coming from all sides. Other days it’s the sudden jab, unexpected and sharp. Some days it feels impossible to keep going. We don’t have the answers. We don’t know what comes next. But even in the face of uncertainty, we go on loving the world. ◊
JULY/AUGUST 2023
4
