Preface: Why I Started Leaving Pawprints

Hi. I’m Bumbly.

If you’re here because you want a neat, heroic “overcoming” tale, I should warn you early: I’m not built for neat. I’m built for real. I’m built for slow mornings, crooked plans, and the kind of laughter that shows up after something goes wrong.

And that’s exactly why this diary exists.

I didn’t start recording my shenanigans for an audience. I didn’t start it to be brave on the internet. I started it because I needed proof—proof for myself—on the days my brain tries to quietly rewrite history into something smaller.

Because a few years ago, there were things I genuinely didn’t think I would ever do.

Not because I didn’t want them.

Because the world is full of friction you can’t see unless you live inside a body like mine.

Sometimes the friction is obvious: doors that fight, curbs that lie, bathrooms that turn into logistical puzzles, taxis that promise “five minutes” like it means something. Sometimes it’s quieter: pain that changes your schedule without asking, energy math that turns fun into a negotiation, doubt that creeps in after you’ve had to plan for everything long enough that you start pre-canceling joy before it even shows up.

I’m an engineer by trade—problem-solving is how my mind breathes. I spend my workdays untangling systems, finding the hidden assumptions, asking the annoying questions, and making things work for real bodies instead of imaginary perfect ones.

But most of my best stories don’t happen at work.

They happen outside.

In the wild.

In the messy parts of life where people look at a wheelchair and quietly file you into a category called wouldn’t. Wouldn’t go to a sauna. Wouldn’t manage a festival. Wouldn’t have a love life worth mentioning.

Those “wouldn’t” assumptions?

They’re basically an invitation.

So yes—sometimes my shenanigans are the unexpected trips. The sauna steam, cedar heat settling into my fur like a deep exhale, the world going soft and kind for an hour. The festival nights where the bass thumps straight through my chair frame like a second heartbeat. The twilight-soft moments of intimacy I’m not going to narrate for strangers—but I will say this plainly: being disabled doesn’t cancel desire, closeness, or being wanted. It just changes the route.

And that brings me to Pinkpop.

Pinkpop is the reason this diary stopped being a vague idea and became a need.

I remember the smell first—wet grass, damp fabric, fries, the metallic edge of rain in the air before it fully commits. I remember the sound: guitars cutting through the sky, a crowd moving like one big animal made of joy. I remember thinking, in a quiet corner of my brain, I can’t believe I’m actually here.

And then the rain hit hard.

Mud thickened. Water found every seam. My wheelchair—my faithful engine, my independence, my way through the world—decided it was done.

It didn’t fail in a cinematic way. It failed in the most realistic way possible: inconveniently, at the worst moment, with absolutely no respect for the vibe.

If you’d asked me in that moment what the day was about, I might’ve said: panic. ruined. stuck. here we go again.

But that’s not what I remember now.

Now I remember that we still laughed.

I remember the music still being music even when my chair stopped being a chair.

I remember that the night bent around the problem and somehow stayed mine.

In hindsight, Pinkpop wasn’t a story about my wheelchair dying in the rain.

It was a story about the fact that I had fun anyway.

And a few years ago?

I wouldn’t have believed that was possible.

So I started writing it down.

Not as a list. Not as a trophy shelf. As trail markers—so I can find my way back to myself when things get hard. Some days you’ll feel the Hearth Trail in these pages: warmth, recovery, slow rituals, choosing softness on purpose. Some days are Craft: systems, access hacks, solving the world’s nonsense with engineering and stubborn humor. Some days are Play: going anyway, making the memory. And some pages are Twilight: after-hours truth, boundaries, closeness, the gentle stuff I keep private but never hide.

And the pawprints?

They’re not symbolic on purpose. They’re just… what happens when you live.

Coffee smudges on paper. Marks on maps. Little signs that say: I was here. This happened. I didn’t just survive it—I lived it.

So if you’re reading this, welcome.

Take a breath. Stay a while.

And if you ever catch yourself thinking, I don’t think I can do that…

Trust me.

I’ve been there.

Sometimes the only way forward is to roll into the day with a straw in your coffee, an engineer’s brain, and the willingness to laugh when the plan gets rained on.