Learning to stay

The other day I encountered a poem from Antonio Machado that I always really loved and it stayed with me for a few days and this part really rang loud: “No hay camino, se have camino al andar / “There is no road; you make your own path as you walk”.
About two weeks ago, I hit a wall. It surprises me how much I find myself using this expression. Perhaps because in my mother language we don’t have a translation for it and it does, for some reason, feel really accurate. We are way past the time where we thought this whole situation would be over in a few months, especially with all the misleading information and lack of leadership coming from this government. So, how do we move on from this? Or how do we stay?
Machado’s words keep speaking to me, this path I'm treading although feels like a road to nowhere, maybe is in fact taking me in painful drops to somewhere. Not a tangible place, not a full arrival. A constant touch and go frontier, which for way too long we’ve collectively avoided. It’s quiet and loud at the same time. Then I think back on the wall I hit, maybe the expression is actually not bad. It’s not a bad wall, maybe it’s a support for my tired back and feet. What if it’s a pause so I can lean in and stay? What if the walls we hit can be a reminder we can actually rest on it instead of carrying it?

With love,

Mariana