translation

The heat is seeping into our bones, the silence and heft,

 and the elk are roaming the south sides of the mountains

and the fires are clearing out the underbrush.

It is September in the high desert.

I used the term “borate bomber” the other day and had to translate it, forgetting that not everyone grew up watching huge airplanes roar over desert valley ridges and drop their loads of orange powder, feeling relief from the worry of billowing smoke, imagining heroic soundtrack music accompanying the roar.

That conversation reminded me of another, decades ago.

As I really started growing up, I took a train from that hidden desert valley to a school at the foot of Lake Michigan's glacier-carved bowl. In the first week, my roommate and I thoroughly confused each other talking about what she heard as “walking beans” and I heard as “wok-ing beans.”

We came from very different cultures, within the same country.

Another reminder of how easily we misunderstand each other, down to use of the same words in the same language - not to mention the explosion of chaos that happens when we move into other languages!

Another reminder of the expansion of self and world that happens when we choose the hard work of connecting and understanding. Even with people we think we know.

I remember this work when my friends and neighbors and family use "my body, my choice" for COVID immunizations and my other friends and neighbors and family use it for abortion. When my community has protests and counter-protests, when my child thinks I mean something I don't and when I think my colleague doesn't mean something she does. What are these words we think we know?

I remember this work when laughter breaks out, when "4-to-6" becomes "46"and "earn more sessions by sleeving!" is thrown into the room. We know we don't know the words, and we don't want to live without the people.

The absolute silence of a high desert September is at times a vacuum and at times a relief. The people are always our hearts.