PLEASE, FORGIVE ME, IT’S MY FIRST TIME ON EARTH I am still learning how to be alive– how to allow my heart to leave my sight, to attend school, to grow up. I cannot comprehend the arguments used to bomb the lungs of children, to leach the Earth of her marrow, to ban books about love. Some days, I am paralyzed by grief. There appear to be pages missing from my manual. Perhaps I was improperly configured when they installed my software. I do what I can. I am asking the experts. I am Googling for answers. I am trying my best. Please forgive me, it’s my first time on Earth.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve felt out of place–like the only actress on stage without the screenplay. Some days, I wish I could have Please forgive me, it’s my first time on Earth permanently emblazoned on my chest. A reminder to others to be patient with me as I fumble through existence.
I don’t ever remember a time where it felt easy to be human. As a child, I was often confused by other people. I did not understand why America’s Funniest Home Videos was popular. I could not comprehend what was funny about watching people get hurt. When I began to watch the news, it was unfathomable to me how humans could allow humans to go hungry. And war, why were we always fighting over lines on a map, wealth, weapons? I expected it to get easier as I aged. It never did. Rather, it became increasingly more confusing. Academia, corporate culture, romantic relationships, parenting. I cannot begin to guess how many hours I lost asking Google for answers. How can I study more efficiently? How do I network? Is my relationship healthy? How can I communicate with my child when he’s hitting me without losing my mind?
For most of my life, I thought it was just me. I didn’t share the inner workings of my mind with anyone. I was embarrassed to admit how uncomfortable I felt, the daily burdens of living in a bipedal body. Somehow I must have been improperly configured, so I committed to learn the rules. Perhaps I too could learn to be the right kind of human. I self-lobotomized as a passion project, convinced at some point I would feel normal and less like an impersonation of what a human should be.
I numbed and escaped through an eating disorder. It gnawed at my rib meat for years, but when it threatened to become a death sentence, I understood silence and numbing were no longer sustainable. Bit by bit I opened up, shared with those I thought most likely to understand–my closest friends and my peers in recovery. I explained how I felt I’d spent my life trying to learn the rules to a game I did not understand and would never win. And almost every time, the response was SAME, SAME, SAME.
We often forget we are all new, novice explorers in uncharted terrain. We watch our children experience the world with freshly hatched eyes. We parent them, do our best to impart our wisdom as they begin their journey on Earth. But we still know so few of the answers. Our eyes and ears and tongues are still dawning.
There are times I envy other species. How they do not require a personal development industry to help them navigate their existence. The honey bee collects nectar. The mama bear feeds and nurtures her cubs. The orangutan plays. They do not read books about increasing productivity, how to be the best parent, or how to decrease stress. They do not have development plans and performance assessments. They simply exist.
It feels less lonely knowing there are others who find being human as uncomfortable as I do. The experience of shifting body and skin, how the playbook we grew up with as children is now outdated. On tough days, friends and I send each other long voice notes detailing when insecurities run rampant, when howling darkness sets in and we have lost all sense of the sun. It’s here, in the messy midst of it all, that I’m finding how to be human–where former versions of our past selves decompose. I welcome all of it—the blooming, the molting, the rotting, the growth. And on days when I struggle, please remember, it’s my first time on Earth.
Our monthly writing circles are evolving. For those of you who follow my writing account on Instagram, you know each month I have a “Poetry as Medicine” series where people share the kind of poem they need that day, and I find one from my archive. Moving forward, each month we’ll explore a different poet’s writing, an opportunity to view the world through the lens of other writers. We’ll spend 90 minutes reading and discussing a few pieces of their work and then have dedicated time to write. It’s a time of self-exploration and connection.
Our upcoming writing circles are:
Sunday, June 23rd, 7PM CST - Mary Oliver
Tuesday, July 16th, 8 PM CST - Ada Limón
Sunday, August 18th, 1 PM CST - Chen Chen
Writing circles are open to all paid subscribers. If you’d like to join us, you can sign up here:
The Understory is a reader-supported publication, free from ads or algorithms.
If you upgrade to a paid subscription, you’ll receive other valuable benefits:
A monthly writing circle where we have the opportunity to explore poetry and essays from writers all over the world and to use them as a jumping off point for our own self-exploration through writing.
Monthly writing prompts based on that month’s writer
Access to all essays including the full archive
This is so so so gorgeous. It really touched my heart. Same, same, same 💜
I feel this in my heart. Thank you.