the revolution is here. where they dance.

ascribe praise to Ra
the lord of heaven, the prince, life, strength, health, creator of the gods.
adore ye him in his presence beautiful in his raising in the boat.
shall worship thee the beings of the heights,
shall worship thee the beings of the depths.

- The Egyptian Book of the Dead

I started work this week and it. freaked. me. out.

before you start rolling your eyes at my princess persona hear me out because I think work has some weird attributes. office work mainly but work in the 21st century has a strange taste to it. like I said, it has some weird requirements/understandings/qualities about it.

I sat inside for 8 hours straight Monday. as I stared outside the window of my new office it hit me hard and swift. shit! I’m an animal! a mammal. if you put an animal in a room for 8 hours straight it would be strange, unkind treatment, and said animal might go a bit weird. weird office encounters that happen are awfully odd when you recount them to others.

my boss tells me on the first day, ‘we just eat our lunch at our desks.’ I wonder if she can see the terror in my eyes. am I hiding it well? cool cool, I say. i’m easy. i’m breezy. I don’t want to rock this strange jail boat that’s paying me.

my second day I stand up, determined, softly but with meaning, I’m going outside to stretch my body and breathe some air. I get 15 minutes before coming in. I don’t want to push my luck. 15 minutes of fresh oxygen, just that thing we need to survive and regenerate our cells, makes a huge difference to my mind-frame and body but it feels somewhat strange to have to ask permission to go outside. what sort of work contract is this?

I read that we aren’t meant to self regulate - that regulating is something we are meant to do together - with the earth. we co regulate, with her, that’s how we come back and calm the nervous system. she also has great tricks and treats to share with her children but we gotta spend real time with her to hear them. be encouraged to go outside should be our collective mantra.

but all this said, I am happy to be working and making money. my boss is a woman who lost her eye sight and set up a business to help people in need in their home. its a lovely story to work besides and I speak to people a lot. I’m reminded we are all getting old. I can already see that timeline and I’ll be over there while some young thang is over here looking over there.

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so we go out Friday night to celebrate me getting a job and our son stays with his nanny. we smoke a joint and I try on different outfits and heat my eyelash curler with the blowdryer and curl my lashes like a champion.

we go to st Kilda, a gritty beach suburb that still holds tight an arty creative outlandish community if you know where to go. we smoke our joint in the street and go out dancing. we’re all over each other like teenagers. the crowd is predominantly older, 50 and 60 year olds who dance with wild abandon, laughing and drinking and joking with each other.

this is their second teenage hood. for some, their kids have grown and gone, and with that total sweetness that comes from working hard for 20 years, the celebration is big and bold and free. the bar gets busier and busier with all ages - young fluid nervous kids and aged locals, comfortable in their clothes and their skin.

the older band plays Rolling Stones and I watch two men, tall with full heads of grey hair dance and laugh together and I think to myself, go where the men and women are dancing. this is where the healing come. this is where the ones who know its beautiful and that its ending go. the revolution is here. where they dance. not where they work.

the next day we go op shopping with our son. I brush my hands through the jumpers and realise I pick my clothes by how they feel first, then how they look. and this is how we should do life - go with how it feels before how it looks.

I love you xoxo