Have you ever run down a steep hill? Maybe it was a sidewalk, maybe it was a sand dune. Maybe it was a grassy knoll. Doesn’t matter, the principle is (more or less) the same.
When you’re running down a steep hill, you’re never really totally in control. Maybe your heels are skidding as you try to keep from falling over. Maybe you’re running faster than you really intended to because, well, gravity, I guess. Maybe you can see that when you get to the bottom you’re not going to have much space to slow down. If you even get to the bottom, have you seen yourself?! You’re going to break a leg first.
But at the same time, it’s thrilling. Exhilarating.
I’m kind of analogy-obsessed. I don’t see a lot of pictures in my mind’s eye1, but sometimes I’ll get a flash of something, and it’s often some kind of metaphor for how I’m feeling. Adrift at sea, trying to catch my breath while being knocked about by waves, trying not to drown.2 The word that accompanies this is always floundering. It happens particularly when I’ve got a lot going on and I’m struggling to keep track and stay on top of it all.
Curling up by a window, warm, in a pool of sunlight, is a sense of safety and contentment. I absolutely love taking a nap in sunlight. It’s one of the happiest things in the world to me. This is the image that I get when I come home from a long trip, or when I’m kissed on the top of the head. This is a moment outside of time where I don’t have to worry about anything. This is warm.
But running down a steep hill? That’s negotiating the early phases of a relationship. Not romantic relationships, I have one, thank you, and for me, that’s enough. Regular old… will we be friends? the “bosom buddies” of Anne Shirley’s dreams? acquaintances? mortal enemies? Will we just fade out of one another’s lives completely? No time to figure that out now, I’m running down a hill very, very fast!
It’s that same mix of exhilaration and borderline panic. Sticking my foot in my mouth is skidding on the grass. Getting too comfortable and saying too much is hurtling towards the bottom of the hill with no regard for what might wait there. My fear is that I’ll come out of it with a broken leg. Do I dare try to enjoy just getting to know someone when I know how clumsy I am?
I’m negotiating this getting-to-know-you phase with a couple of people right now. It’s complicated.3 But I am learning something about myself. And that is that the right people laugh at my jokes. That is to say, I say things that I think are funny a lot, and regardless of whether or not the jokes land, the people I am most comfortable with are probably going to be the people laughing when I make them. Whether they’re laughing because they can’t believe I said it, because they can’t believe I said it, or because they really do find me funny, I’m gonna need the laughs.
But this idea, this careering down a hill. It’s kind of a slippery slope. A sort of literal slippery slope. And I mean, slippery slope argument. The fallacious kind. You know the ones. The argument that some proposed course of action will lead to disaster for the whole of society and the world will explode and the sun will go dark because some kid is allowed to be who they are.
Because I’m arguing (to myself) that every one of my attempts at ordinary social behaviour is doomed to failure. That if I slip once, I will go crashing down the hill. That if I say the wrong thing, my world will collapse. As though it is inevitable.
It is not inevitable.
And I need to give myself a different visual.
I’m not running down a steep hill, I’m sledding. There are no obstacles in sight and the runway at the bottom of the hill is plenty long enough for me to slow down. I’m taking away the fear of falling and all that’s left is the exhilaration. I’ve got my snowsuit and hat and scarf and gloves on and I am toasty warm. Warm enough to be lying curled up by a window, in a pool of sunlight.
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1 Not sure whether or not I’m actually aphantasic but I think my sister is so maybe it runs in the family.
2 In this one, I sometimes have a lifebuoy or PFD of some sort but I’m more often putting my meager swimming skills to the test. How long can you tread water?
3 It’s soooooo complicated.