Last night the fear gripped me again past midnight as I lay awake on bed with lights on, my second hand copy of The Return of The Native lay open dutifully facing down beside my pillow. I flipped the thoughts that have crowded my head into various hypothetical situations, to let the fear have some substance to solve its way out. The best way, I have learned now, to deal with one’s fear is to give it attention, love, substance—so that it feels secure and doesn't bother for attention.
Excerpt from my journal dated 10 Oct ‘21
The sunrises are delaying by few minutes, the sunsets are existing earlier, the in-betweens remain as usual but a chill in the air now as sunlight tears away from the sky—I have made it to the terrace in time these past two days to witness this twin events: of the light escaping and the chillness settling in. Yesterday morning the chillness was felt about the ankles as I woke up—even with the windows closed, the walls that would trap summer mornings until dawn are now slowly losing its thermotic capacity to the arriving winter. Woke up earlier too than what has become the usual, thus undoing the loosened hair-knot uncombed since the last time I went out dangling about the nape of the neck into a neat tightly knotted bun about the crown of the head, I go the kitchen to make the morning tea. The sunlight pools into the shadows on the floor from the eastern windows, the boiling of the water slowly warms the kitchen as I stand amidst the morning stillness. The contemplation breaks as I call everyone for tea, the rest of the morning goes on without much notice, unless the rain hails as if asking us to seize a moment to be mindful. The secret is to fool yourself into timelessness, to assign a task for each hour and then forget that those hours are finite. The hour after tea is usually spent reading, which used to be the mood setter for the rest of the day. Now it is the following hour that grounds the reality, as I go back to the kitchen to knead the dough and make rotis. The tea routine was introduced in the beginning of the first year of quarantine and now well into the year this new routine has been added. I had made the dough before messing up the quantity of water unable to grab any sense of proportion. As soon as it became a requirement instead of mere try-out, not only the sense of proportion naturally came to being but a second hour of contemplation was called in which my earlier routine never allowed. The changing texture and form of the flour under my palm, between my fingers, pressured with my knuckles into a soft cold dough ball, to then rolling them to resemble a round shape and lastly seeing them puff pulls the strings of being—an hour of staying in touch with the world's existence via mine. Then there is an electric charm of claiming a space that has been overriding on the evils of gender norms for centuries as one’s own. I am still very slow in doing any chores, so if someone needs me to get any of this done quickly it again all breaks apart. But it is still a wonderment how something that became a part due to a requirement but is not judged can bring forth a sense of self that you wouldn't have otherwise found eight in the morning.
Words have been hard to come by these past three weeks, I didn't try to find them either, but as the days of October went by unnoticed the consciousness to have not known how this October is to be remembered kicked in. The only thing I have consciously sought after since the last newsletter is to read more and so I did—read Aristotle and Dante discover the secrets of the Universe & Aristotle and Dante Dive Into the Waters of the World by Benjamin Alire Saenz, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson, A Single Man & Prater Violet by Christopher Isherwood, The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy, and Letters to a Young Poet by R. M. Rilke. Each of them stimulated thoughts, yet the thoughts couldn't stimulate the coming of words. What they did however to make me feel seen, that hasn't happened for a long time. Words give me a sense of self, but there are moments one can do away with the things that are important and still feel cognizant. The books didn't tell me anything new, no books have ever other than those that merely tell facts and figures—they only remind me what I knew, have known, for we often take things for granted than the times we are unaware of them. I used to be conscious of coincidences, joining the dots of random moments who somehow fits into the same puzzle. In the first book of Aristotle and Dante, Ari thinks as Dante give him a poetry collection of William Carlos Williams—I’d never read a book of poems before and wasn’t even sure I knew how to read a book of poems—this I read two weeks after I read four poetry books back to back for the first time, discovering that somehow in-between I have finally learned to find my rhythm to read a poetry book. To some it might appear as romanticizing, but to me it is to see with one's mind.
Staring and staring into the mirror, it sees many faces within its face – the face of the child, the boy, the young man, the not-so-young man – all present still, preserved like fossils on superimposed layers, and, like fossils, dead. Their message to this live dying creature is: Look at us – we have died – what is there to be afraid of?
It answers them: But that happened so gradually, so easily. I’m afraid of being rushed.
—A Single Man, Christopher Isherwood
A few recommendations:
Jennifer's Body Reunion: Megan Fox and Diablo Cody in conversation
Emotions You Can Eat by Emile Rafael
Thomas Espedal Interview: My books are about language
In Conversation with Jonathan Legge
Ricardo Darnin's ode to tomatoes and Mother Nature
Journals, Letters and More (started a new Instagram account to share excerpts from famous authors' and artists' journals, letters, and other works)
That’s all for today.
Until next time,
Try joining the dots.