SOCIALLY DISTANT THOUGHTS
- If a found a way to travel back to the past to warn my younger self of an incoming pandemic, I would not have believed it! Which sort of reminds me of a thing I read somewhere about beliefs; and how even with facts supporting or disproving said beliefs, we still hold on to them. Such as the group of strong religious believers who were found to be even greater believers the day after (the world not ending) Wild, isn’t it? The stronger you hold on to a belief the less likely you’ll let go of it because why? The fault in our beliefs. A year ago I would have taken this to mean that I should hold my beliefs loosely, which I do of course lolz. This year however i’m holding on to certain beliefs. For one, I choose to believe in miracles and inexplicable luck because why not Jules?
- The “why not” is a wonderful decision making tool for someone who says no a lot. Saying no comes fairly easy to me so I struggle to understand people who can’t say no easily. You don’t want to go for the party but you’re worried you’ll disappoint your friend who invited you? “Si you just say no kwani what’s the big deal?” Just be polite yet firm, good luck! But if you’re anything like me maybe a “why not” before the “yes”. Small small baby steps, you get me? Maybe next year will be a “year of yes” when I master the “why not” or at least try it. I can try. I am a trier. Now trying…
- Do you know what I want to be said about me at my funeral? Please let the masses know that from the moment she set foot on this beautiful yet wretched earth her Yesses were yes (after she practised her “Why nots” in adulthood which bloomed into “Yesses”) and her Nos were no. Is that from the bible? What are the odds? I just googled. Matthew 5:37 But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ For whatever is more than these is from the evil one. If there was ever a word! Someone said that about my grams and may the same be said about me.
- I miss her everyday. I still cry when I think of her and for the first time I feel words that I only read about.Ali Smith in one of her books, How To Be Both explains the story of a character who had lost her mum and was grieving. In one of the character’s counselling sessions she describes how she found it odd that the rest of the world went on existing as though she had not lost her mother. Or how in the Year of Magical Thinking , Joan Didion describes that a single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty. Last year, I requested some of my friends during a trip that to occasionally ask me about my grandmother. Which is an odd thing to ask of your friends and an even odder thing to bring up in normal conversation I guess. Grief is as personal as it gets and we seldom find the words for it, to ask or to explain.
- Grief expert, David Kessler said that this COVID-19 period of our lives is essentially about grief. “We are all dealing with the collective loss of the world we knew. ” Our ‘predictable’ futures, normalcy, freedom, connection… As with all other things, acceptance is where it starts and right now that could mean;
I can wash my hands. I can keep a safe distance. I can learn how to connect virtually and I can keep hope alive.
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I hope you find comfort in knowing that you are not grieving alone, we’re all in this together. Grieve if you must, this too will pass :)
“But does it make any sense at all to know that it ends badly for all of us, even the happiest of us, and that we all lose everything that matters in the end-and yet to know as well, despite all this, as cruelly as the game is stacked, that it’s possible to play it with a kind of joy?”
― Donna Tartt, The Goldfinch
(Also i wrote this to get the “I haven’t been writing in ages blah blah “ insert procrastination speech out of the way. Writing so that I can write.)
But mainly excited to write after Naomi sent me the Isolation Journals prompts about a week agoooooo or more. I’m excited to see if that goes and pumped to write shorter and more colourful sentences as I learn how to punctuate because I forgot? And that’s on period :’)
