How does a rootball fit into a writing practice?
Plants remind me of magicians, their textured green leaves, skin or needles able to transmute even effuse sunlight into energy that is then shared endlessly, while almost saying for my next trick and then unfurling new leaves, cones or fruits. All the while invisibly soaking in carbon dioxide and breathing out oxygen that we need in a cycle so silent we often take it for granted, noticing only when the plants around us are in a state of suffering.
While there can be a variety of factors that need to be addressed, sometimes the plant’s root ball has become a tangled nest, a webbing of overlapping nutrients and growth circling and choking out its ability to continue as is. A tangled rootball is symbolic that it has outgrown the spot where it was planted, that so much transformation has taken place it will suffer if it’s not allowed to change form.
Teasing out the root ball then becomes necessary for the plant to survive, allowing the roots to spread out and grow in different directions, where they can root down, soak up more nutrients and become something new.
To untangle the root ball is to work with its magic.
There are things in there that have been hidden that can be found. A lot of what you are looking for you already have.
The mind is rife with hidden thoughts and memories that could be overgrown with moss. Maybe there is a mushroom growing out of the top that can be eaten. An apple core whose seeds can be soaked and planted. Improbably a fish swimming inside out of it. Each might lead you someplace completely different and provide an opportunity to make engaging writing starting from your lived experience.
Grief may come along with the magic as it’s an inescapable part of our experience and often changes us. And yet, some things can only be viewed through the lens of loss. This loss can potentially be used to fuel writing, or it can be felt and put down.
Grief. Magic. And everything in between. Maybe it’s time to explore what’s been longing to be expressed.
Teasing roots apart is a best practice for writing.
It also feels like the best metaphor for unwinding our tangled brains as thoughts and unprocessed feelings can get tangled over time, choking out our ability to see what’s in there.
Teasing out evokes the sense of using the fingers to separate out individual strands slowing and with great care to not break a strand that cannot easily be replaced. Sometimes tightly woven rootballs even require soaking that allows them to be separated more easily and with less damage.
Similarly, we can begin to separate our thoughts out carefully by grouping them according to theme or focusing on memories or events instead of being overwhelmed. We can also walk away from something for a time, knowing that part of our subconscious needs to work on its own time.
Over time it becomes evident that some roots will have to go.
Maybe these ends are decaying or dead. Perhaps they are simply too tangled. Something usually has to go. It’s important not to see any one sentence as too precious to delete. Untangling also provides us with the opportunity to observe the health of the soil. To slice into healthy soil, you would find mites and protozoa, earthworms, nematodes and spiders, burrowing animals and bacteria. These organisms help aerate the soil so there is enough oxygen and do the deep work of helping churn waste into nutrients.
Addressing our soil health by looking at what kinds of daily tending through exercises and practicing techniques, when we are ready to replant, or to begin writing in earnest, the roots will grow strong.
Like plants, writers often seem able to conjure up something out of thin air. Divining intuitive thoughts and insights that resonate so much we can feel them in our body when read. A healthy writing practice can come from being able to work with and untangle our own root ball.