Woman’s Search for Meaning

The bleed time of the month often provides answers

Some days are like today. The first day of my bleed. The day when a new cycle begins.

A lot of energy simply goes into keeping my mind in a fairly sane place. There’s not much to do on the outside — bare minimum when it comes to work and life maintenance.

But on the inside, there’s the heavy lifting of staying with discomfort.

Maintaining sanity in these modern circumstances requires a different set of practices than what humans had over millennia of generations bound by ritual and social network that provided all the meaning that was required.

Today, the meaning has to be made elsewhere.

For an expat like me, there is always the question of belonging that shines through. The meaning isn’t rooted just here and now, in this Edinburgh community that has brought me so much growth. No matter how well-adjusted I am here, and all the social capital I have built, there is always the world beyond. Part of the meaning is always elsewhere.

There is, and always going to be, the Biebrza river some 1,500 miles (or 2,500 kilometres) away. There is the language that I can’t speak with the majority of people here. And there always will be an alternative scenario, no matter where…