we sat around the soil, talking about human things, sharing our humanity while our hands dug gnarly weeds out of the clay. chernobyl weeds, the director of the community garden calls them. persistent, lasting. damaging. 

i think about chernobyl this morning while the slight sunburn is rubbed by the collar of my suit. today i'll move through task after task, cheerfully greet visitors to the supreme court, and continue in the weeding that i do at work. but there is a poison beneath my skin threatening me. 

my favorite tree is the ginkgo, its leaves a cheerful yellow during autumn, its unique shape. four of these trees survived the bombing of hiroshima. the internet tells me that ginkgo biloba, the extract of the ginkgo tree, provided adequate protection for recovery workers at chernobyl.

last night i dreamed about standing around with my family. we started a prayer for a meal, and i looked around to see so many familiar and unfamiliar faces. my 'family' was made up of friends from years past, their visitors. there were aunts and uncles i didn't know but felt love for. i hugged a young cousin as we gathered and began to pray. the prayer turned into smatterings of our gratitude, each person mentioning what they were grateful for. it swelled in my chest as i slept- this gratitude, i remember that we were crying as we spoke.

i am protected by the words of my friends and family. the gentle reminders, the smiles and jokes, the sacred sharing. this life offers us poison, unfathomable doses of pain, anxiety, tears, and struggle. i carry the poison of anxiety in my body. i need strong doses of friendship, consistent reminders of my value and my values, the gratitude of my familial body, gathered together with affection, and the calming water of love. with daily doses of this goodness, i am adequately protected from poison. i can continue.