Jan 16, 2019
Katherine Wolkoff ~Deer Beds
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Katherine Wolkoff ~Deer Beds
Deer Beds, Katherine Wolkoff
Katherine Wolkoff
From Deer Beds Katherine Wolkoff
this island is my deer bed
photo by Sasha Wolf. I've recently become obsessed with deer beds. Each night, deer find a place in the grass to make a sleep spot where predators can't see them.They never use the same place twice, but the imprints last for a few days.
Hey Boo!
Super good to hear from you, sorry it's taken me a bit to respond...I loved looking at all your photos from Sri Lanka and Seychelles and so wish we could have a stoop sesh for you to tell me all about it!
I've been in Hawaii for three months now, and am just starting to feel "settled", in the sense that I live on an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and everything seems sort of temporal here...
Living in paradise is really surreal and there is so much abundant beauty to explore and immerse myself in pretty much whenever I want. I just moved into an apartment in downtown Hilo, which is a sleepy fusion of college/hippie/tourist town. Everything save a 24 greasy spoon shuts down by 9, there's a handful of bars but no real cocktail culture or nightlife to speak of.
Which is probably good for me. Aside from my job, which I'll get to in a minute, a big reason why I chose to come to Hawaii was because I knew that I needed a training ground to find balance between breaking bad habits and practicing new, more self-loving ones. Living on the farm was an ideal place for me to get really healthy and re-connected to myself, but it was time for me to test my growth outside of that vacuum...
My job has turned out to be far more challenging than I ever imagined. Working with young adults is my shit, I feel like I've totally found my professional niche in that I'm able to be my whole legit self, build casual rapport and relate really easily to be a really impactful mentor to my students. I'm outside for the majority of the day and spend my time gardening, cooking, swimming in the ocean, doing yoga, meditating, and getting vulnerable.
It's pretty ideal, except the place I work for is a shitty corporation and I didn't really think about it ahead of time what that would mean for my personal satisfaction. Our students pay $500 each day to be in the program, yet they choose to pay people in my position, the people who are with the students 90% of the time, minimum fucking wage. No health insurance. It's very much a profit-driven structure where the people at the top are getting rich at the expense of the people doing the hardest jobs.
Working shift work is also a gnarly beast. I work 8 days straight 6:30ish-8:30ish, followed by 6 days off. I feel like I only have a separate identity for half of the month, and that the bulk of my personality while on-shift is impacted by perpetual exhaustion. It's hard not to separate the physical exhaustion and the exploitation from the emotional.
But I'm here, and have chosen to accept the challenge to find balance and growth living with the hard shit and all the shit I love. I love my students, I love living in Hawaii besides when I miss Mexican food and subculture and my friends and family, and I'm growing towards loving the dudebabe in my life. His name is Lynx, he's rowdy in a grounded way, is incredibly sweet and thoughtful, and makes me feel adored and well cared-for. He's originally from North Carolina and is finishing his thesis in mycology (biology of mushrooms) at the university here.
We've been dating for two months, and the whole thing has kind of taken me by surprise. It's forced me to get real with myself about the shit I need to work on to love myself and be loved by another person. I still have trouble controlling my impulses towards destruction with my drinking at times. It's much less pronounced than it has been in the past, which is why I think I've been able to avoid looking at the hard kernel of truth about the changes I need to make. I don't feel compulsive or controlled by my drinking anymore, I don't feel compelled to drink in order to numb an overwhelm of emotion, or to disconnect from my sense of disconnection. I don't drink to the point where I violate my own boundaries and/or allow others to do the same. I can successfully drink without getting drunk or needing to push myself each time over the cliff of oblivion. I can drink at parties without feeling the need to go hard till blackout.
However, I do feel a real, compulsive need to get really drunk and numb out after coming off-shift, and this bi-monthly occurrence presents enough of a pattern in that I have found it difficult to disengage while still remaining engaged with another person and their needs or without going to a volatile, selfish place. It's hard not to be chiquiada selfish after being a single lady for so long! But he's worth it and love for my self and others is worth it and what better than love to motivate me towards some act right and conscious connection with myself and other people!
Whoah this is super long and waaaayyy more detail than I originally intended but here ya go! In summary, life in Hawaii is healing and abundant and lush and challenging and growing towards more love each day. You should come visit me before I leave. My plan at present is to pack up my shit and go home for Cwissmuss, and then embark from there on a few months of travel to South America by way of Costa Rica. After that dude I don't even fucking know. I miss San Francisco so hard but would also be content living out in the country someplace I've never been for a bit.
What's next for you? Thailand? Where did you and Nick leave things? You should send me your address so we can be legit pen pals! Love you and miss you girl. xoxoxo
(via A CUP OF JO: Deer beds)