323

And again, it's a beautiful day. I just want to say that I have been opening each and every day (still) by observing that it's a beautiful day.  Despite the general existential sense of disintegration and epistemological dissonance, externally and quite personally, somehow through it all I can still come out and tell myself it's a beautiful day. Even in heartbreak, calamity, destruction, bereavement, maybe this is the ruler we actually use to measure our status of survival.

"How to Choose a Husband"

"How to Choose a Husband; or, All is Not Gold that Glitters. An Eastern Tale" (23 February 1850)

Zeila and Amedan are blessed by a good marriage because Amedan doesn't surround Zeila with guards "as was the custom of his country". But Zeila is bored with her man and confides in an old woman from a nearby village that her husband "'has no brilliancy; there is such a sameness in his character that it makes me die of ennui', he never rises above the generality of men, nor do I ever hear him praised for his talents or his wit... I perceive with grief that my husband will never make a figure in the world'". The old woman uses a magic mirror to display various men who might excite Zeila. Predictably, Zeila decides after all that Amadan has "the only qualities that can ensure the happiness of a wife - kindness, delicacy of mind, implicit confidence ... and good common sense - a treasure far more precious, and which is daily becoming more rare, than great or splendid talents" . Thus the tale praises righteousness, simplicity, and humility in a husband, qualities inherent in the average "unexceptional" partner. 

Contentment

Sitting here alone with the blue sky and white clouds, autumnal winds blowing, and the sun shining on my head, whilst really great music is playing and keeping me and the elements company. Despite the context of the song playing and the very state of being up here watching the tips of the evergreens alone, I'm smiling.

TBT: 5 Years Ago Today...

Palindrome

I’ve sat for an hour trying to write a poem. And it goes without saying – for it’s been already been said – that it just hasn’t come. Oh, I had one, ready to fly off my pen when I put it to paper – on week ago. Now I’ve got flickers of what it was, random words that were the structure of what it was supposed to be, but no poem. In one week, where did my poem go? In one week, how did so much change? Not in just one week only – in a day, an hour, a blink of an eye – when the change happened, even I do not know. How is it possible? Words want to put this experience in record, a memorial of some sort, but the experience itself defies expression.

I sit here alone. Surrounded by crowds, all going this way and that, on their business, and all I can think is of that over clichéd saying about the world and that one person. That one person who becomes your entire world. It is very scary. It’s the scariest feeling in the world – because you know once you let it happen, the second you lose them – that’s it. It. Poof. Bam. Ow.

Just thinking about it, it gives me shivers. Butterflies. Cold hands. I’m scared. I admit it. For all my bluster and bravado about love being nonsense, and marriage a sham, I confess ( I confess!) it’s only that – a sham of its own. Bluster and bravado. My shield of some sort. I don’t know. I guess you tend to want to, try to, need to, protect the very thing most close to heart. In my case, it’s exactly that – my heart.

I am scared. Because I know that if I let myself go, I will keep falling. I know, I know, I need to learn to bungee jump. And there I go again, my humour; what’s with that, right? Is it another self-constructed defence? I suppose, but then again, I do believe you’ve got to laugh at yourself first. It’s what I do. When I slip on ice and land on my glutes in public, yeah, I laugh! So do I take a page from my own book, and learn something? Fall, laugh? Fall, laugh!

No, I’m still scared. Maybe more than ever.

Tell me, does this love at first sight thing really happen? I believe in it. But believing in something, and it occurring to you, they’re really different things. When it happens if?) you go, “Wow.”, you go, “Whoa.”, you might go, “Watda?!” Well, I believe in it, but what I want to know is, how do you KNOW? Seriously, not fooling yourself into believing it’s what you wish it would be- how do you know? That’s the scary part.

Now, you’re going to want to know why I believe in such a thing, right. I may as well believe in Santa Clause, right? (Well, for your information, I do. Ha!). Ok. Love at first sight. Not infatuation, not lust, not eye candy. Love at first sight. Why? Because I do. Why do I do? Because, simply, I believe in soulmates. I do! I’ve wrote about this before. I believe someone has got that missing part of you out there, the muniute you meet, you feel something. Like a piece that’s clicked back in place. And you sort of don’t know why. It’s just one of those things that are beyond reason. You might know why. You might know sooner or later. But the feeling itself, damn, beyond explanation. The hard part is knowing for sure. Because you’re going to have been wrong that many times before.

I guess I've just got to find out.                   

Lectures To Self

NEVER depend on someone else to heal and complete you - you will always be left heartbroken.

If you feel that there is a part of you that is broken, or a part of you that is missing, that crack and that hole can only be perfectly replaced by what it originated of: yourself.

Yes. You will meet someone who feels like they complete you. And you will feel that way, until you realize they don't. They can't. The only you that can be you, is you.

Yes. You feel better with the friendship and love of others. That is the point of said relationships; they give you the opportunity to recognize yourself in how others see you, by their words, actions and behaviour.  What they are giving you is not completion but an opportunity.

That opportunity is how you make yourself become your best you. They will laugh at something you say, making you feel amazing because you're funny. They will give you a hug, and you will feel a sense of belonging. Yes, you belong in this earth with all of us. They will give you attitude, rudeness, anger and reprobation. You will feel hurt, angry, offended, vengeful. Thats OK. That's fine. Youre feeling. But these are still opportunities, even when it's a bit harder to see through the dimming fog of these emotions. It will take some practise, but even here you can wipe the condensation of the glass, and seek that reflection that will tell you if you like what you see - not them, but yourself.

More significantly, you will fall in love and you will fall and hurt. Again, and again. There is something wrong with all these people you are falling for, right? Maybe. But more likely, this too is the opportunity for you to recognize what is happening to yourself, how you are feeling and how you are behaving. And this way you will actually discover how much potential you possess to rise up.

When you're down, its hard to make sense of all this. When you're hurt it is difficult to even see. When you're depressed, the last thing you want to do is really look in the mirror.

So break it.

Smash it to pieces. Stomp it to smithereens. Dropkick it. Powerbomb it.

That was you. All that's left is dust.

But you're still there. Looking at that dust. So who are you?

You be whoever you want to be.

But never let someone else be the one to break your mirror. And never ever expect anyone else to be the one to save you. They will help you on your way. They will stand by you even through it all. They will give you all the inspiration, hope, love and fulfillment you think you could ever wish for. But always remember that they're only there for you because you're you. They aren't you.

And if you realize that you're the only one who can fulfill you, you will truly never be alone. People don't like being depended on day in day out for hand patting, back rubbing, self-esteem caressing, no really. It becomes a chore. Who wants to be someone's emotional janitor? Love is meant for living in today, with the I scratch your back you scratch mine mutual agreement, knowing that you're secure in becoming a better person for yourself first and therefore for whomever else.

That's the 'gift that keeps on giving.'  You're going to discover that dust just keeps on coming back together again, and if you look close enough even the tiny glitches in the glass start looking really sexy.

#465134

It came down to wearing the thicker black or lighter olive green. When I don the olive, that's when I am in my true element. 

It means the weather isn't that briskly cold as yet, that the caresses of breezes along the collarbones - even wrapping around the waist as buttoning hasn't yet been enforced - is permitted. That is when the winds swirl upward and outward, taking with it the long tendrils of my hair, bestowing Medusa-esque powers, if only in appearances.  This Medusa's antipathy for the mortal man is only a fluid and shifting one, never at any one time truly palpable. The snakes hiss in ecstasy of exposure to the intertwining of  all elements and seasons at once; perhaps they have summoned them through the mind they are interconnected to.

Today was an olive green day.

Soar

As much as I strive to absorb all the knowledge that is out there, however much as I revel in how this knowledge makes me here with my feet on the earth, the more I learn the more I realize that there is that one thing I could never really know: the measure of 'how much' there is to love. Even the oceans start and end. Even the sky starts here on this very earth and expands to a certain distances above before it ends. But this...even I don't know how to start to comprehend it, I don't know where to place the ruler to its beginning - how could I know where the end is?

Day 308

Maybe I jinxed myself when I related to doing just that in yesterday's post, because I ended up doing just that. Not the same context but still that, "Oh no, come back!" belatedly grasping onto the email last sent.

Hate when that happens.


It is again a beautiful day. I have a whole cartload of work piled up and I am right at this moment lost in a splendiferous mellow daze upon a cloud of floaty buoyed up by really great music. There is something to be said about not choosing your music yourself and letting yourself hand over the reins to another entity, even if it is a robot or radio. Funnily, I am not too worried about the cartload. It actually accentuates my sense of contentment not just by contrast but as an additive.

Day 307

Of course today had to be such a gorgeous day. I'm totally in love with November's weather right now, even though this comes with the knowledge that winter is ever-approaching, sitting on the sidelines just biding its time, letting everyone get warmed and toasted with this gorgeous summer-like autumn. 

There was a story on the front page of the paper today about this womangirl who decided to propose to her boyfriend and wrote an email discussing her plans to her best friend and inadvertently cc'd the email to her said boyfriend without realizing what she did until he brought it up later in the evening at which she screamed and ran out of the room mortified. 

It's certainly not your typical stop-the-press type of news; nothing about plane crashes, poverty, nor new prime ministers, but the story made my day because that's totally what I would do, including the screaming and running out of the room.

Or maybe it's nice to know that love can still make the headlines.

Regression Analysis

Honestly, I was on my way to setting a world record. I really thought so. I hadn't cried in a few weeks. And after the hurricane (no, the intensely personal one preceding Patricia) I was adamant that I would remain affixed in my nonchalant and cheery facade for reason that by continued upkeep it would become the true thing. But then today out of nowhere, it had to happen.

I was doing the damn dishes, and the kettle was on, and I was singing as one does while doing chores (I just sidestepped using 'choring' ahem). To be fair, I don't really pay attention to what I'm singing, because after all it is an absentminded thing. Then it hit me as I was singing 'kyun koi paas hai, door hai' that I was singing that goddamn Dooriyan breakup song from Love Aajkal. And I was crying. Wth.

So I shut my mouth for awhile. Then somehow it starts up again, this time singing Main Tainu Samjhawan. And then I had to throw the damn sponge down and go sob to myself. My cat was like, wtf? This again? Human you are screwed.

I'm writing this to make it separate and not an unexplored part of me. And to make fun of myself in my throes of deep unmitigated anguish. Personal catharsis.

In other news, the weather is just gone bonkers today, in a totally good way. Its revolving around the four seasons every hour. Bright sunshine. Dark gloomy spalls of rain. Cold windy dropzones with suspicious white precipitation and mild moments of sun and cloud. Five million threads of subtext happening in this post. I'll quit while I'm ahead.