running, herons, and raving
a world of nature, techno & birds
Hello!
It’s been a whole year since I made any time to write here. I made the decision very intentionally. I had always planned to write about my marathon experience, but after the marathon things got quite chaotic and my energy was needed elsewhere. I see it now like a coming of age kind of portal. However, I’m back with this ramble, still writing about running, and it feels like closing some gaps from my last post, from last year.
It is late August as I write this! I’m writing this currently in Sweden, at my partners family residence in Uppsala. I can pinpoint for you the moment earlier today, when I decided I had something I wanted to share here again, and it was during a run through what is known as ‘Gamla Uppsala’ or ‘old uppsala’. I’d been there previously on a run and seen some very old and large rocks covered in runes by the big old church.
I started the run with Aeva, but we parted ways a couple of km in. I really wanted to go to the church. I ran through residential Uppsala in one straight line to the north. I arrived at the church and noticed all these large grassy hills, mounds if you will, fenced off just opposite. I had just pressed play on my ‘run’ playlist, having changed to that from my alternative option playlist ‘chill run’. I needed to get a 10k in today because, alas, I am training for another marathon, in my birth city of Köln, taking place in October. Some unhinged techno playing full volume in my ears, I read the placards placed along the path about the place I was stood in.
“She had travelled on the boat on Fyrisån River many times. Now it was to carry her to the hereafter. One last gift, one last glance, and the boat grave was clad in stones.”
A woman dressed in fine silks from China and delicately woven linens, was buried at this site around the 9th century, among Arabian coins and ornaments of bronze and and silver. She was the leader of old Uppsala, and among the treasures excavated, was an amulet depicting a female deity. This deity is believed to be Freya, Norse goddess associated with love, fertility, beauty and war.
Realising the importance of this space much more concretely, I ran on through the small valley of sacred earth mounds, through groves of tall birches, sunlight reaching between the thin trunks of the trees, following the path leading out to edges of agricultural fields. I have always felt energised by places like this. Where I grew up, after visiting the church that was the original site of my hometown for many years, I discovered that the church had been built on a holy well dating back to the 10th century. It had been a revered and sacred space for a long time.
There is a particularly visceral link between the feeling I get in these spaces (and often in places among many plants and trees), and the techno/electronic music that I choose to listen to there, although it seems much more a contrast.
Intentional music, dance and singing in communal settings used to feature a lot more heavily in the societies of our ancestors. I often imagine that drumming or singing together, moving together in ceremony and ritual would have allowed people to purge and express the excess energies that naturally spill over through the experiencing of life; rage, anxiety, ecstasy, awe, joy.
I’ve of course personally experienced the modern version of this many times, a kind of healing and liberation that comes with being out raving together with friends or alone, and there’s something about the music playing during those experiences that has attributed to the emotions I feel hearing it in other contexts, but it’s the extra layer of the setting that completes the circle for me. I love the way it seems to fit emotionally. It sets something off in my brain. Lush trees and plants, and vivid, tiny flowers, the many textures of the dirt and rocks, along with the grating, resonant, humming flow of techno with its vast screeches and belches. The journeying through landscape and the subtle changes of moving through various scenery. There’s something elemental and yet contrasting about it. I touched on it briefly in a recent comic I drew about running.
I was happy to find that a fellow illustrator whose work I’ve loved and followed for a long time is also a runner, and has made art about it! With their encouragement, I felt inspired to finally put down my experiences too. Although I shared a little about the connection between running and creativity for me through my Berlin marathon sponsorship from adidas last year, it’s just the tip of the iceberg.
I’m not an activist in the traditional sense. My values show in my art, but there is something else, something that’s always bubbling beneath the surface for me, a strong sense of justice and the rage that comes with it, that does not often get an outlet. I think I’m probably not alone when I say that raving can be that outlet. Rave music and the subculture itself is closely connected to the punk movements in the late 80’s and 90’s. When I run, I listen to rave music with lyrics and energy that creates a voice against all the horror I feel when thinking about the fucked up things happening in the world. I remember I’m not the only one. An outlet is created and it’s a space for me to engage with feelings I don’t always make space for. I’d argue that’s what rave can do, at its best.
One of the first raves I went to (totally legal by the way and definitely not in a field off some motorway outside London) took place right next to a huge cornfield. I remember looking out over it, while some hellish techno played through speakers set on top of a van vibrated through my ribcage, and we, the cretins and goblins of the rave, became more and more visible in the glow of the sunrise behind the clouds.
I must now, of course, talk about herons.
For those who know me or follow me on instagram, you have likely been privy to the steady yet sudden obsession with the common wading bird that began around May this year. I have researched the whole species of Heron but focused on Ardea Cinerea, the grey heron we see so much of in Europe. I have read papers of migration flights, studies on conservation, read about the terms through which their behaviour is described. There’s so much I could say about this, the bird itself and my love for it, yet I don’t really have an explanation at this point. Heron chose me. It’s part of what I’m exploring at the moment, in this new project, this comic. Part of this story is told from the perspective of a heron who has begun experiencing visions. He has seemingly appeared out of nowhere in my world, but I know better than to assume that things that suddenly have so much meaning, are simply random.
Suffice it to say, heron is very much present in my world. My day is made if I catch a glimpse. Although it feels bizarre to explain, I am enjoying the full strength of this fascination.
People online and offline have come to me with pictures of herons, mentions of sightings, “oh I saw a heron and thought of you”. I love it! I’ve talked about it so much that people are associating me with heron! That’s pretty amazing to me.
I love this point in a project, just after the research, when it begins to take shape and you can see the skeleton of the story for the first time. The process of this project so far feels very new for me, and It’s a kind of departure from Antherda, in the best ways.
That’s all from me for now. Thank you for reading!
