Boundaries

Boundaries have been on my mind as of late, as both the invisible lines that divide, as well as the demarcations that keep our personal lives safe and sane.

One one hand, boundaries are invisible state lines in the USA that determine who can go to college for what price, who can get an abortion, have access to medical marijuana, and who can use which bathroom. Boundaries enforce laws and regulations. Boundaries are walls erected at borders. Boundaries say you are a Democrat and he is a Republican. Boundaries restrain mixing, keep people and places separate.

And yet, boundaries are also the rules we set for others and how they are allowed to treat us. They are the very foundation of healthy relationships, offering permission to a certain point… and no further. Boundaries are an unwillingness to sacrifice, abandon, or censor the core truth of the self. They are an invitation to collaborate and share, but with stipulations on what goes too far.

Boundaries are complex and contradictory and that makes them worth writing about.

When nature divides itself into boundaries, ecology calls those divisions the edge. Edges are the borders between ecosystems, for example where the shoreline meets the sea or the forest meets the field. Edges are areas where two environments converge. They are important ecological centers of interaction where plants and animals can utilize two environments instead of one, fostering the creation of networks, interdependence, and cohesion.

Using the example of the border of land and sea can illustrate the exchanges that take place. On one side (in the sea) we can find coral reefs teeming with diversity of sea life and on the other side (land) we see tidal pools bursting with life of different forms. Through the edge, there is an exchange of material (salt, rocks, shells, fungus, bacteria, organic matter, etc.) that might not otherwise happen deep at sea or far on land. And those exchanges can and do enhance one another so long as one side does not completely overtake or submit to the other. There is a balance that is upheld in order for both sides of the edge to benefit, if indeed the two are to mix.

The media these days seems to repeat ad nauseam the narrative that the US is “polarized” and that citizens are “more divided than ever.” However, looking to nature, to balance, to healthy social boundaries are there strategic opportunities that lie in wait in the mixing of the boundaries and edges we have created? Then again, can unification and cohesion of “both sides” really be a viable strategy in the threat of fascism? In the face of hatred, of racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia what choice is there but for the tides to rise up and obliterate the shoreline?