I Know the Weight

The weight I choose to carry… (Appalachian Trail, April 2024)

I woke up bright and early this morning, excited for another day in Spain. I’ve met friends here—wonderful, caring, thoughtful people here—and a girl with a beautiful smile and kind eyes who covers books ear-to-ear, cover-to-cover with wild and wonderful thoughts and colors. I want to learn Spanish… I want to learn her language.

But I’m sad. 

This morning, against my better judgment—or perhaps longing for familiarity as an American abroad—I opened YouTube. Video after video of the latest execution. An ICU nurse, Alex Pretti. I didn’t just watch one video. I watched nearly an hour’s worth… just like I did after they murdered Renee Good. 

Another U.S. citizen—with her last words: “I’m not mad at you…”

“U.S. Citizen”…

Those words, I don’t give a fuck about them. Why should those words matter? Every day, stories of ICE—America’s Militarized Immigration force—terrorizing communities, schools, kidnapping—masked, shameful faces. Disappearing real people. When I think of my country, I am sickened. I am heartbroken. I am sad. 

I think about all the trails I have hiked from Yosemite’s breathtaking El Capitan and Half Dome to the Never Summers and Long’s Peak in Colorado. From Amicalola Falls in Georgia to Maine’s highest peak, Katahdin. I think of the beautiful sunrises in Sedona, Arizona and the hidden fae villages in Seattle. I think of my wonderful friends I’ve met along the way. I miss Wings—collecting fallen butterfly wings and feathers alongside trails. My chosen family… how I miss Kati’s pink-and-purple, fairy-puff hugs that smell like sugar and crayons. Joe scouring a board game’s rule book—a Brit, rules obsessed with the U.S. Constitution in his back pocket. The same one he’s been carrying for the past 10 years since I’ve met him. I miss my sister and our late night Korean binge eating. I miss spinning my nephew around and planting fat kisses on his precious head. 

I may be an American… but I am a human first. 

I love and I feel. 

I have hopes and I have dreams.

Family.

Friends. 

I’ve held loss after loss after loss—

And I’ve held that pain. 

At 24, I lost:

• My job

• My hearing in my right ear

• My balance

• Silence

At 25, I lost:

• My parents

• My best friend to gun violence

• My sanity

• My hope

• My respect for my country

But somehow along the way, I changed. 

I found hope again.

I found healing. 

I found family. 

I found myself. 

I found I’m a better person. 

I found myself resilient. 

I found myself strong. 

I found myself kind. 

I found myself compassionate. 

And I’ve learned how to hold these—

Not just for others—

But for myself. 

I have walked a life as both a woman and a man. 

I walked more trails than most see in a lifetime. 

Encountered elk, bears, rattlesnakes.

Hiked in hailstorms, 

Sleepless nights in thunderous downpours,

Retrieved a bag of food stuck 20 feet in a tree—

Hiked 500 miles. 

I’ve been trained since I was eight to survive—

And fight. 

I’ve been shooting guns,

Detonating explosives in the Arizona heat,

With my Revelations-apocalyptic, 

NRA, concealed-carry card holding,

Republican dad—

Ever since I could remember. 

But I’m not that person anymore. 

No.

I’m not that person anymore. 

I don’t want to be that person. 

I don’t want to hold a gun. 

I don’t want to look down—

A barrel of a scope.

You see, I know the weight. 

I know the weight of a gun— 

I will not glamorize it.    

I know the weight of a gun. 

I know the weight of the loss of a friend. 

I know the weight of the continuous,

Persistent, loss of life in schools. 

Children.

I know the sickening feeling—

Of being numb

To the weight of children lost in schools.

I know the weight— 

Of hearing your beloved town’s grocery store—

A place where I met my next best friend at a bus stop—

A place with monthly ‘bike to work’ days—

Community events—

Boulder, Colorado—

I remember— 

Waking up to hear that place— 

A place with welcoming, warm hellos—

Has been shot up. 

A place where I used to live,

Buy groceries. 

A place where I have friends. 

My heart carries that weight.

I know the weight of cleaning,

And maintaining,

A gun. 

I know the process of buying

And dialing in a new gun. 

I remember collecting shell casings,

The repetition of cracking—

Reloading.

I know the false sense of security of a gun. 

I know the power I felt. 

In another lifetime,

I was trained by police. 

In another lifetime,

I was a concealed carry 

Republican Party member. 

In another lifetime,

I strapped a gun to my side,

With “‘Merica” on my lips,

I thought I was safe. 

I know the weight of metal in my hands.

The way it makes silence louder.

The way it makes fear feel justified.

But I was wrong. 

I’ve been attacked on the street. 

I’ve been followed. 

I’ve been pushed up against a wall—

Repeatedly shoved into it. 

I’ve been on the other side of a door—

As someone has tried to force themselves in. 

All while carrying a taser and handcuffs in my backpack—

A gun in my apartment. 

You never know what you’re going to do—

Until it’s happening to you. 

And when my dad asked me why I didn’t fire my weapon—

After a decade plus of methodical gun training—

With eight- and six-year-old neighbors—

Paper thin walls—

No, it wasn’t fear that stopped me—

I say,

“Daddy, I know the weight of a gun.” 

I don’t know what to do. 

I don’t know what the right thing to do is. 

I love my country. 

But I know what I can choose to carry. 

I know what weight I’d rather carry. 

I don’t know why I learned that lesson…

But my dad did not. 

So right now,

In this moment,

All I can do is write…

And hope. 

Encounters with ICE: Know your rights

I am currently uncertain about the status of StandWithMinnesota (www.standwithminnesota.com) and currently it appears to be offline.

Below is a link to donation websites I have gathered:

This journal is not about tidy stories. It’s about gathering around a fire—with grief, with hope, with stories that ache and heal. The hearth is where we remember who we are, who we’ve been, and who we might become: