I.

Yesterday, I started a blog post about Earth’s biodiversity: its scale, its richness, and the extent of the threats it faces from humans, extending a plea for help to defend the precious uniqueness of life on our shared planet.

Before finishing that post, I dropped into a virtual call with some former colleagues discussing their current research projects. I was happy to see them (they’ve all been good friends to me) and to hear about the work they’ve been doing and planning. Afterwards, though, I had to fight back tears. They’ve got irons in the fire, exciting prospects for studying jaguars and gibbons, whales and wolves. Meanwhile, I’ve been sitting at home with pinched nerve pain and no job.

Nobody wants me. I’m washed-up. No… I can’t even say that, because I never went high enough to slide down. I’ve never made anything beautiful or useful or admirable of my life.

I didn’t feel like writing that blog post anymore. Instead, I got back in bed, watched Crazy Ex-Girlfriend music videos, and ate way too many cookies.

You’re so fat, and your teeth are getting worse. Why are you eating cookies and lying in bed, you loser? Why don’t you apply for jobs or work on writing your game? Oh wait, everyone will reject you, and you don’t know how to write anymore. Your inspiration is dead. Your mind is shutting down. You’re nothing.

I thought of a game I like about a writer suffering from writer’s block, who goes on vacation to clear his mind and ends up fighting hordes of zombies instead. I played it again for the first time in ages, shooting zombies in someone else’s game, finding the pages of a fictional author’s manuscript instead of mine, fighting that character’s demons instead of my own. It didn’t solve my problems, but it distracted me for a while. Battling an overwhelming cloud of darkness in a game is a lot easier than facing yours in real life.

Why can’t you do something, you worthless waste of space? What’s wrong with you?

In the late afternoon, I considered making lunch, though guilt about the cookies still weighed heavy on my mind. I opened a box of macaroni and cheese and started boiling water. But it was taking too long, so I stopped.

You don’t deserve to eat. You don’t belong in this world.

I sank deeper and deeper into despair. I was hungry, but the darkness consuming my mind was hungrier still.

II.

This morning, those tendrils of darkness have wrapped around my throat, trying to squeeze the life out of my lungs. By the time I arrive home after dropping my boyfriend off at work, the whispers in my mind have risen to a roar.

I pull away from the curb. I drive, blasting sad Taylor Swift songs. I turn left on Greenbelt Road. Not right towards the Target and Baskin-Robbins and Mattress Firm, but left.

I enter a national park I’ve never visited before. I turn the music off. I am in church. I am a witch, so the woods are my church.

I park and follow a trail. These maples and elms are not my redwoods, but they are older and taller and wiser than me. The sunlight slipping through their leaves almost soothes my soul.

I come to this sign.

I take the longer route.

I wish I had pointed ears that swiveled to catch every sound. A tail to balance myself and say what needs to be said. Four long legs built to run. I wish the remnants of the rain could kiss the pads of my paws. I would never write stories, because I could smell them all around me, with no language separating me from the world.

I arrive at a bridge.

I feel sad that I don’t have a dog or horse with me.

I step onto the bridge and look down at the water.

I keep going.

I don’t reach the end of the trail. I long to wander deeper and deeper, but the tether of human society pulls me back. I know I will never belong in this forest, no matter how much my heart aches to shed my furless skin, to trade my life for a wilder one.

It hurts on a visceral level, but I head back the way I came.

Along the way, I meet a turtle. We blink at each other. Their orange and black eyes burn like something cosmic.

I offer them a blessing, though I don’t know how to pray.

As I walk, I flex my hands like paws. I wonder how it would feel to roam in a digitigrade manner, to sink my teeth into something warm and real. I wish I never “grew up,” so I could still pretend with all my heart.

I think about how there are no wolves here anymore. How Trump wants to let more wolves die.

By the time I arrive back in my room and sit at my desk, there’s still a cloud of darkness looming over me. But there’s also a white wolf howling in my heart, singing to remind me of who I truly am.

III.

We don’t all get to be wolves in this lifetime, but the ones who do deserve to live in peace. My boyfriend shared this page with me last night, which offers a chance to help Mollie’s wolf pack: https://act.biologicaldiversity.org/piHqX1a_UEeLExYo7tKYsw2. Although hunting season has already commenced, I encourage you to read it and consider submitting an updated message.

Peace be with you, fellow travelers. 🐺