Driftwood Fish and a Stone Heart

This is one of the pieces I was working on during this semester for Heather Seller’s creative writing class. 

- Imitation (in reverse) of Brian Arundel’s “Things I’ve Lost”

A driftwood fish for my stone heart

            A white stone shaped like a heart in the Klamdiggity River: near the Sluice Box boating put-in that served as our lunch spot on my first-ever whitewater kayaking experience, in 2009.  A dark-brown-when-wet piece of driftwood that could fit in my pocket the following summer at Opal Creek, Oregon; it had the eyes and mouth of a salmon.  This was my next direction: Keep swimming!  At the same wilderness area, I found a 21-year-old girl who had morphed into an Oregonian: sports bra, wet basketball shorts and Merrell hiking boots that she constantly shed to add another swimming hole to her “been there, touched the bottom” list. I found a white sticker outline of Oregon with a green heart in the middle; I placed it on my lime Nalgene.

A picture of two young children. Both smiling; the blonde sits bareback atop her best (horse) friend Atara, while a round-faced brunette wearing pink stirrup pants and a teal sweater leads her around her grandmother’s barnyard with a blue leadline; she is 13 months and 5 days younger than her older sister that sits aboard the dappled Arabian.

My life thesis: during sophomore year of college in the eyes of a man who stocks shelves at Meijer during a one a.m. trip to view box upon box of food in order to relieve anxiety. I would be good to others. I found truth in the phrase that “everyone carries their own burdens.” I found my 20-year-old self unlocking my 2004 Pontiac Grand Am with tears streaking my face because there is more sadness than in the man at Meijer, and I would never know it. I found I can offer a smile or a thanks, I found that I can help everyone I come in contact with—even if it is only for a moment. I found that by lovingthankingcaringsmiling at others, I helped my own little depressed self unintentionally.

I found that my heartbeat slowed and chest released in prayer and found myself having to find that again and again.  I found the make-believe world of Schoon Chapel; I asked a friend to show me because I needed help. I needed a small altar and Christmas lights. I found a place where others wrote about our troubles on the walls. I found myself on my knees at the front of the room, praying for peace, praying for health, praying for help, mostly praying for help.

I’ve found that basketball has made me a talker. I’ve found that I can “put my head down and take it to the hole” so-to-speak in daily life. I realized this in a trivial instance one morning when I began the trek to sit in the weight room at 6:05 a.m. “Just start hoofing it, Dani.”  I’ve found that my last year of basketball, in which I spent the majority of time working my butt off in practice and letting my butt go numb, literally, taught me about business politics. I found my coach offering me Kleenex after Kleenex at 7 a.m. that March morning that I told him I couldn’t do it anymore. I found a bald man I’d feared and resented for the past six months telling me that I was up for captainship next year, that I was one of the most valuable on the team, and that I was making a poor decision.  The next summer, I found that I didn’t have any regrets.  I’ve found that adults of stature aren’t always right; sometimes only you know what is good for you. I have found that my favorite day of the week is Wednesday night when I show ten fifth-grade boys what I know from eleven years of basketball: hustle and head fakes. I found that I never lost basketball, but I’ll work to make a bunch of nine-year-olds confident through it, instead of letting a game put me in a bad mood.

I found a future in 2011 during an interview with a man named Lars in East Lansing, Michigan.  Two weeks later I found myself in a room with a man in possession of a Ph.D. telling me that he thought Oregon’s Environmental Science, Studies and Policy would be a good “idear” for me.  I found a cold sore on my lip the following Monday: Oregon or my home state?  I find myself asking where I’d rather be on the weekends, what will allow me to live out west in the long run, where can I be free to be the youngest Ph.D. student that shakes the department? For once in my life I find that I can’t go wrong.  Either way, I’m doing what I want—saving the trees. I’ve found a place in Doc Brudvig’s lab where I can do good for this piece of heaven we’ve been set on.  I found my dear mother saying “Excuse my language, but holy fuck Weezie, that’s awesome!” on a cell phone call on my way up to coach my boys a few Saturdays ago.