July
1/2024. An Illustrated essay by Anni Vilkko. Daydreams of July.
1/2024
Have you ever read the poem ’Let July Be July’ by Morgan Harper Nichols? You should. That poem, no matter the situation, makes me trust that everything will fold out just how it should. I should remember it more often.
At this moment, it really is July. And I shall let it be so. Perhaps my favorite month. In July there’s plenty of everything: plants seem to fill every gap they can and cities are full of events. We are currently living in the heart of summer. I would want to be able to stay awake long into the summer nights so I could feel the summer breeze on my skin. It's a bit like taking a deep breath. Both remind me of who I am. It’s no wonder big changes often happen in my life when the light hours start to increase here in Finland.
Do other species comprehend the abundance of July? I wonder how much of it is a creation of my human brain. Of my subconscious. As a child I felt like I had time and energy to do it all - or maybe I was purely living in the moment. The abundance of July feels incomprehensible to a human being. I know everything is happening simultaneously but I can't grasp or experience it. And, something always remains outside of awareness.
A beverage of choice in the burning hot sun. Refreshing evening dip in a lake. A well-needed summer breeze, that creates a dopamine rush. Too many mosquitos, but they are part of the summer experience. The perfume-like smell fills the air in the evening. Sudden summer rain falling heavy from the sky. Sky, that just seconds ago was blue and bare. Clothes soaking wet and you can’t decide if it’s funny or annoying. Napping at the beach, which, by the way, I'm a master at. The only way to take all the joy out of the beach is to nap there. What an unhurried way to momentarily feel that life could be easier – simpler.
I still have to find the July in myself. I know it is there, hidden somewhere underneath the layers of November. November – gloomy, uncertain, and cautious. The product of hard times. I’ll memorize ’Let July Be July’ and repeat it in my mind until I have immersed all its meanings. Until I can feel the peace in the uncertain.
Let July be July.
Let August be August.
And let yourself
just be
even in
the uncertainty.
You don’t have to fix
everything.
You don’t have solve
everything.
And you can still
find peace
and grow
in the wild
of changing things.
- Morgan Harper Nichols
