I am my own witness

I think I am an unreliable witness.

I have a comfortable life. That is what is true to me. That’s my truth. Mimi’s life is comfortable.

When something happens that challenges that truth, my brain has trouble accepting it, and I start doubting my senses, because clearly something like that couldn’t have happened.

It’s like that me, too example I shared a while back. Right after it happened, I already started telling myself that it couldn’t have happened. I must have imagined it or dreamed it or exaggerated it, because stuff like that doesn’t happen to me. Uncomfortable things only happen to other people.

This morning I had another uncomfortable encounter. That is true. What I know is true is that I was uncomfortable, that I was scared, and that I very much wanted to get away.

But immediately after I was out of the situation, my brain was already changing it. Is that really what he said? Is that really where his hand was? There’s no way he could have meant that. There’s no way he could have been doing that. People don’t do things like that. And I certainly don’t see things like that.

Yet the sick feeling in my stomach remains. And my spirit is still rattled.

And I doubt my eyes and my ears, but I can’t deny my feelings.

But what if I misjudged him? What if my fear clouded my perception? What if I didn’t see what I think I saw because I was trying so hard not to see what I thought it might be or what if I did see what I feared I saw despite my best efforts to not see? But what if I really didn’t. Because I couldn’t. Not me.

I spend a lot of time on my beach these days. I volunteer with an organization that is conducting research as citizen scientists regarding the sea turtle presence on our beach, visiting schools educating children about the turtles and proper waste management, and organizing trash clean ups with volunteers and various organizations. I train new volunteers who join up, and I’m one of the people who manage the patrol team, which documents tracks, nests, and turtles. When I am training, I have always told my fellow volunteers that I have never felt fear on our beach.

I can’t say that anymore after this morning.

But maybe I overreacted?

Because there is a lot I don’t know, but what I’m pretty sure of is that things like that don’t happen to people like me.

Do you ever feel the same way?

I refuse to fear the beach. And nothing really happened. I was never approached. I was never touched. It is only what I think I heard and what I think I saw. And what I felt. So while I felt fear today on the beach, I do not fear the beach.

I wrote those words yesterday and have had a day to ponder the experience. Now that I am considering the experience with a calm mind, I can see that while the actual encounter was unpleasant and uncomfortable, it was not actually something I needed to fear. The reason I felt so much fear was because when it was happening, I didn't know it would end with just uncomfortable. I didn't know if it would escalate and what would happen. So I wasn't actually fearing his actions. I was afraid of the possibilities.

Interesting.

This is what the beach is to me.

Turtles and trash and friends and beauty.