reverb11: S01E02

December 2 – Sangha (Tribe)
Where have you discovered community in 2011? What are the defining characteristics and essential qualities of your tribe?

i'm a rather solitary person, so it's difficult to think of myself as even belonging to a tribe or a community. growing up, i was never a joiner. i wasn't a girl scout or on sports teams; i didn't have a ton of friends or attend all those sixth-grade parties where your eventual fate is sealed. i had myself & books & music & the entire cities i built in my head.

and yet, somehow, despite my discomfort in most social settings, i look around and see that a tribe - a family - has grown up around me anyway.

i can't think about my community without thinking about the lyrics to "the perfect space" by the avett brothers. although, like i said, i was never much one for joining or group activities - i always envied the people that were. i always harbored this little side dish of jealousy for people who've had the same best friends since childhood or, hell, even siblings. i secretly longed (while simultaneously rejecting) the idea of being that girl at the mall surrounded by her girlfriends laughing at some inside joke.

but whenever i tried to be that person, whether i was 13 or 30, it just felt ... forced, and i've ended up losing more friendships than i have maintaining them. to be honest, whenever i thought of community, it kind of freaked me out. like it came with some sort of rule book where i had to eat dinner at a certain time or wear certain clothes or listen to a specific kind of music all while saying something insightful & intelligent on some low budget movie that everyone knew about but me.

my parents tell me that when i was younger, i would just go down to the end of the driveway while the neighbourhood kids were out playing - and i'd just stand there. i would stand there and wait until one of them came up to me and invited me to join in. and, if that didn't happen, i would just go back to reading.

and i kind of feel like my adult tribe grew up the same way.

when i think of the people closest to me, sometimes i don't even know how they got there: summer missionaries back when we were 19 or 20; an old college acquaintance with whom i barely had more than a passing dialogue half a decade ago; that high school kid that took out my trash when i was working for the newspaper. how did those people become these people - the ones that know and love me despite my quirks, the friends that understand that sometimes i just need a weekend to myself, my treasures who are always there when i reach out and who push me to toe the line, to blur the line, to erase the phucking line.

i realize i have a number of different communities for which i am grateful: my e-mail family whose commentary on life feels just like having a conversation; my work family who understand that sometimes we have to make dark jokes to keep our own lights shining, my biological family who still manage to have game night at least once a month; and to all the friends that have come before & will come after. i would never seek to diminish the relationships i have. i am blessed to be cushioned by amazing people.

but, when i think of my tribe, and i know this is my tribe because of how i can't imagine just walking away from them to go to something else, i think of a select few. i want to join in their lives; i want them in mine. when i find myself still building these cities in my head, they are inhabited by my soul siblings.

my tribe personifies balance, tolerance & [the perfect] space.

"i want to have friends that i can trust
that love me for the man that i've become
& not the man that i was
& i want to have friends
that let me be
all alone
when being alone is all that i need."