The Restless Moon

First forget inspiration. Habit is more dependable. Habit will sustain you whether you’re inspired or not. Habit will help you finish and polish your stories. Inspiration won’t. Habit is persistence in practice.

Grew up on self improvement: endless Beauty pageants and daily ballet. The commonplace cruelties of imperfection. This is the story of how I burned it down.

We arrive when midnight witches one day into another. We set up camp in the first empty spot and I don’t know where my family is. Kateri, Wayne, and I drove six hours to be here. We carry sleep to our camp. Three young men help us set the tent, chatty and kind. I feel welcome but not safe. There is a static crackling, a murmured, frantic voice. A man wearing a walkie-talkie strapped to his shirt is here. A truck is whipping around, probably Dakota Access LLC. I watch the taillights rush over the hill. The three young men assure us that it’s okay, and that DAPL have been trying to agitate the camp. The static crackle again, and then there is a fire spreading in a field. You can hear the tension rise and the three young men try to soothe us—not to placate but to instruct. People are told not to go to the fire. There have been snipers in the area and we need to avoid being targets. I remember earlier a police officer had smiled and told us to be safe at their checkpoint, four miles away. The fire burns all night with no response from the police and no fire trucks. Panicked campers wake us up twice during the night as the fields burn. It is a dry night and the wind is heavy. There is no response. We learn later that multiple people called for help and were laughed at, hung up on.

Beware: Ignorance Protects itself. Ignorance Promotes suspicion. Suspicion Engenders fear. Fear quails, Irrational and blind, Or fear looms, Defiant and closed. Blind, closed, Suspicious, afraid, Ignorance Protects itself, And protected, Ignorance grows.