On not knowing where to plant tired feet

debs/ June 20, 2024

“Something needs to be said about Rosa Parks other than her feet were tired… Lots of people on that bus and many before and since had tired feet… lots of people still do… they just don’t know where to plant them”

— Nikki Giovanni’s “Harvest” (quoted from Rosa Parks with Princess Weekes on You’re Wrong About)

Having tired feet and not knowing where to plant them… Oof, I might just feel called out enough to end a year-and-a-half hiatus here.

Tired Feet, Literally

On a literal level, last year the was year of big hikes.

Had I had pandemic levels of free time, I certainly would have written blog posts about each one of these.

Hiking has always been the outdoor activity that appeals to me most. Before this year, the only overnight “hike” (it was more of a glorified walk) we had done was a near non-stop walk from Toronto to Guelph. We just napped on grass/park benches and bought food from grocery stores along the way, so we didn’t have to deal with carrying sleeping bags, tents or supplies.

This year we decided to take this hobby to the next level with overnight hikes that actually involved elevation changes, various levels of support (ranging from family supporting us with food deliveries to carrying/sourcing everything we needed), preparation for changing weather, and strategic pacing (ie. needed to get real sleep so we don’t burn out in later days). Basically we were going further, on more technical terrain, with heavier baggage than we had before. Major props to the true MVP, Tim, for planning everything… All I had to do was walk (and complain)!

I have come to terms that I someone who doesn’t know how to live in the present or generally enjoy myself; and I mean this as a matter of fact, not a lament. I reject wellness platitudes that “being present” is the ideal state of mind. I mean, it would be nice if I could, but I prefer to just lean into it and make my unmindfulness work for me. All this is a roundabout way to announce that I’ve truly found my calling in Type II fun. If I’m not mentally in the present anyway, I might as well make future-me proud and enjoy weaving narratives about the “hardcore” shit that past-me survived.

This is the kind of tired feet I need more of!

Tired, Professionally (Planting, Literally)

Another reason why being part of the “many who don’t know where to plant tired feet” feels like a personal dig at me is because my job is, well, literally planting. (Planting vegetables, not feet; for the record.) Because plants operate on a seasonal schedules, my concept of “work-life balance” also tends functions on annual cycles: work has my full attention from January to June, and I like to have a life and focus on my hobbies from July-December. I reject wellness platitudes that demand that work and life must take on daily/weekly rhythms (but try not to impose it on others). I prefer to work the same way I prefer to hike: without moderation.

Yet two entire planting seasons have passed since I last updated this blog, and in that time I must have played a role in planting thousands of plants; the call to interrogate where to plant tired feet is a timely reminder that I need to be more deliberate about where and how I plant myself. Within that time, by virtue of working at the same place for quite a long time, I fell into a middle management role. I spent so much of my younger years avoiding power, contemptuous of bureaucracy, suspicious of profit; now, I can’t help but feel like I am the problem. Aging and old-people problems are creeping up on me faster than I can mature mentally and I am terrified.

So far the way I am coping is by–as much as I’d loathe to perpetuate icky “work family” metaphors–tapping into my “older sibling” mentality. Somehow thinking this way makes leadership more palatable? Like an older sibling, there is no functional hierarchy between myself and my “younger siblings”, the only difference is that I’ve been around for longer! I can pass down the context that our proverbial “parents” have that my “siblings” do not, and also I have a responsibility to advocate for the “younger siblings” who most impacted by decisions made. On the other hand, I recognize the tendency we have in the West to obscure the reality of hierarchy/power (see: CEOs appearing to be relatable) is equally gross. I may feel like an “older sibling”, but I enjoy a kind of employment security that the “younger siblings” don’t have that even I have trouble justifying… this is probably why the family analogies in corporate contexts are usually perpetuated from the top and sound so insincere from the bottom. My decisions, opinions and moods (God, I’m so moody!) certainly impact more people than they used to. In this respect, the call to plant tired feet is about striving to be better so that I can do better by all who are affected.

As dramatic as I can be, I can’t say I am uniquely tired; I’m not winning any awards for having the most tragic anime backstory. I’m just a schmoe who has a tendency to get into situations where I (over)do fun things so much longer than I need to, that it’s no longer fun anymore. Hikes and art challenges–heck, even work and family–could have been more fun in a liiiiiittle bit of moderation.

Indeed, it’s laughable to utter my brand of “tired” (mentally, relationally and recreationally) in the same breath as the “many before and many since” who are legitimately tired of their social, economic and political circumstances. Rosa Parks’ most well-known act of protest made her stand (or, rather, sit) out as a “few” amidst a “many”, elevating her to deservedly main-character-energy levels of main character-ness. The radical act was to claim rest for herself in spite of her being tired of her social, economic and political world. As much as I resonate with the NPC-ness of the “many before and since” who have tired feet, it is decidedly not me it is referring to. I mustn’t confuse myself for those I desire to be in solidarity with.

Not knowing where to plant tired feet

Time and time again, I find that “planted feet”–deliberate stubborn refusal–is my kind of resistance.

As much as I feel out of my depth whenever I reference anything historical, this isn’t the first time I’ve been inspired by Rosa Parks enough to write about it. This time around, I was struck by the observation that not having children afforded Parks to take risks that others couldn’t. I, too, wonder how I can best leverage this and so many other particulars and privileges about my station in life, if I just knew where to plant my feet.

In past blog posts, I see myself fluctuating between anger, grief, and resignation. At present, I know that I’ve been in resignation mode for a long time. This podcast on capitalism realism (combination of postmodernity and neoliberalism) calls me out on these feelings of resignation:

Postmodernism is the critique of the critique. … It is fundamentally not about constructing any new cultural forms, … it’s about the elevation of difference to the level of the universal. This is what makes the critique so effective, but it also comes with certain social effects. It becomes very difficult to go external to yourself to find meaning in a postmodern world or to declare universals and … imagine a different social future.

— Stephen West, Why the future is being slowly cancelled. – Postmodernism (Mark Fisher) on Philosophize This!

I know full well that the status quo stands to benefit most when I’m feeling this way, yet I am afraid of the precursor required of social change: a commitment to any universals. Looking back, its times where I was most committed to something (read: times when I’ve been a sucker) that make me cringe that most. In this way, critique is defense mechanism against buying into anything. In so doing, I am not planting myself anywhere. I am restless.

Now that I have a bit more free time, I need to get back into reading. I thrive on the synthesizing different people’s thoughts and finding ways to produce crosstalk with each other. However, these thoughts need to be active in my working memory. My working memory is frustratingly small, so I constantly need to be exposed to the thoughts and creativity of others in order to keep them in my working memory. I need to be thinking to act deliberately (or deliberately refuse to act), but I need to be reading to think.

If the theme last year was having tired feet, I hope the rest of this year could be about finding a place to plant them.