Growing Against the Wind
I’m coming back to you for the first time in 7 months. A lot has happened since, and it’s both a relaxing and challenging time of the year and period in my life.
I’m temporarily in Texas for a summer internship, a requirement through my graduate school program (the internship, not the being in Texas). I chose the site I’m at, ENTRE Film Center & Regional Archive, because one of the Worker-Owners visited one of my classes in fall 2024. They described what their archive was able to do and its place within the local community. It sounded so harmonious and supported that it felt too good to be true. I continued to follow their work, and reconnected with said Worker-Owner at a conference in December 2024, where we bonded over the struggles of being vegan and pescatarian, respectively, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. As the time for planning the summer was fast approaching, my primary thought was to advocate for my placement somewhere commutable; there were several options that would have been a long train ride away, or where weekend travel back to the city would have been an option. I still suggested this internship, just in case, and I’m so glad I did. When I was accepted, I knew I had made the right call solely based on the amount of excitement I felt.
I’ve just passed the halfway point of said internship. It’s the longest I’ve been away from my partner and cat, which already takes me away from a level of comfort I typically operate from. While I love the AirBnb I’m in and the people I’ve been meeting, this city is certainly not New York City (not that I’m used to that city in many ways, but still!). Instead of the stressors of subways, grocery delivery, and noise, I’m facing driving, navigating huge stores and businesses on foot, and piercing quiet. And sure, there is free time because I’m not in classes, but I have filled much of it with research, conference proposals, finding extracurricular groups and activities, all while trying to maintain a semblance of balance for the coming academic year.
In a yoga class yesterday morning, the teacher was talking about a contained facility that grew trees that grew huge and plentiful. However, the trees fell over, because there was no wind. Tree’s exposure to wind allows them to grow reaction wood (or stress wood), which strengthens them so that they can combat gravity. Without challenge and the chance to react, trees cannot stand tall.* Similarly, I do think it’s valid for us all to say yes not just to easy, comfortable things, but also to those that will challenge us and allow us to rise to the occasion, within reason. It’s through the reactions we push ourselves to make in new situations that we learn more about ourselves. It makes us more able to root deeper to discover who we are, who we want to be, where we want to go.
So, has this summer been difficult? Yes. Has it been rewarding? Yes. Has it made me homesick? Yes. Has it shown me the type of work I want to do? Yes.
Wherever you are, I hope that through the good, the bad, and the challenging, you’re able to see that it’s all opening your eyes to your future, even if it hurts or doesn’t seem fruitful in the moment. Grieve and take care of yourself, but also try to see what you’ve learned along the way. I hope your summer is eye-opening, fun, relaxing, and eventful, in whatever mixture you need!
*She may have been talking about the Biosphere 2 facility, though I saw no concrete evidence online that this happened at the facility. Be that as it may, the Wikipedia article on reaction wood sheds light on this phenomenon and still supports the point.