So I opened a page to publish between the sweet humming of Emily Watts's take on the classic, "Le Vie En Rose" and a thought to type the title "blogging to blog" and then was like, "yeah, but, what's underneath this is something of a pause, a revelation and a rant, it's an honest take". So here you have it, an honest take. Massive white fans spin over head with minimalist white blades and a tempo slow that their reflection motions like smoke upon the black screen of my phone. Fooled me, I could've sworn a piece of incense was pluming from the bent edges of this well worn canvas bag it flashed over. Sunburned leather straps tamed and stretched by all the water bottle shleping amongst tattered piles of very, very important never ending and never finished documents that I carry from home to coffee shops and home again. A shuttle of words wasted, and maybe even a little stale at this point.
And then there are the baskets. The baskets of ideas so old that they've become new again according to a generation of humans who pee on well worn beautiful things, claim them like a telemarketer and forget to call themselves Columbus. There was a time when that behavior was kind of saved for twenty somethings in college as they discovered the whole old beautiful world around them, however, this not very generous way of moving through the world seems to have stretched its way into a cultural norm in which society has begun to eat itself.
This is why I stopped writing. Coming to grips with the sunny layer I used to lead with and realizing that while a deeper inner happiness remains, I see things differently and so my words land differently.
This journey has landed me in a place where I wonder what I am surrounded by, what I'm made of, and if this paper boat is about to sink or swim it's way its way to the right hands that may unfurl it's purpose with love and wonder and relativity.
That's what I set out for when I began writing. An unfurling of time and perspective morphs into a patina of thoughts with age and evolution and yeah maybe a little bitterness that I've learned is actually quite good for you - to digest, to reset, to be realistic and even a little more palatable to those of us who've learned to know better, that sometimes it doesn't work out. That while God is on our sides (I believe) the purpose of life is not always to win, or to succeed. It's to learn and evolve. To find beauty and meaning in the moments when we erode to the same extent as when we grow.
I'm missing a world sans pretension - while breathing in a world that's utterly built upon it, yet, holds few legs of integrity. The power in which marketing has yielded from and by very hungry people selling a story, "being relatable and vulnerable", "feeling seen and heard' has landed us into a series of isolation and distrust hardened like bathroom stall walls that hold something terrifyingly disappointing when we take a gander at the actual level of privacy they shield and yield. No, I mean literally. If you've used it in the bathroom, it's on tape somewhere.
So, somewhere between the stalls and a few other life land mines I gave up the ghost. I don't know if I know what that really means. But, really all of this (writing, teaching, sharing, being) began to feel more like a means to an end where I worried about defending my own right to originality as a sovereign being, and at this point it's about relinquishing my ego on ownership while defending the rights of humans to be respected enough to at least receive a head nod from a billionaire machine.
What reality is this in which we are living? I feel so far from my days of yore where I found myself cursing at how annoying it was to still be hand cutting and taping labels to a freshly poured tincture bottle that I lovingly poured for another human being so they could find levity and deep rest. That was the extent of my frustration largely.
But, it's strange to sadly no longer curse scissors made sticky from years of cutting wide packaging tape to protect the printed instructions as I wrap it strategically to prevent it from bubbling up. I still use these labels and tape. I not longer feel annoyed by them. I no longer long for something pre-printed, fancy and delivered warm into the plastic arms of printer that not longer accepts cords as a reasonable utensil for receiving information. "We accept air and invisible realities only" ... this is a bandwagon that my brain, for whatever reason has failed to wrap it's gnarly roots around becuase it just can not comprehend it ... it does not make linear sense. It wants all digital concepts to be 3D. Make it real, I want to touch it. Enough of this airy fairy "tis on the cloud" bullshit. It's all counter intuitive to me ... why would we ruin something so simple and straight forward as a plug (?) to only replace it with a million disjointed divas with such unruly routes and rule books as bluetooth and wifi? There is no rhyme or reason. No manners. I'm a moody woman, but, come on, if I'm on the clock and expected to perform a function I'm not going to protest, shut down or ignore a command because the air just feels off. And yet we've come to a point in society where this is not only to be expected, but, tolerated. Kind of like how customer service died, or, how things are now not only made to be broken, but literally given up when they are still working because the companies make the object stop working from the inside ... the subscription model, the "next gen" model.
It's often written out plainly like that. In my mind "next Gen" is not about the object - not about a newer or "next" generation of the object. It's about how standards being lowered in a period of time in which the newer generation of human will be so far removed from higher expectations that they will not even know it's an option. This next gen will tolerate less because it will be far removed enough from quality that they not only won''t even know the difference, they will pay more for less under a guise of paying less for more.
When I began my practice ... things were not like this. It was simple, it was real, it was human, it made sense. It was a time where people were less hungry to crush one another and steal ideas and do things for the aesthetic or latest trend. I honestly miss the days when my main problem was trying to deal with people who didn't believe in what I did, which my response was hardly defensive and more of a pathetic "white flag?" because I simply did not care. I made it work well enough... and now we're in a time where what I do falls into a freshly made up umbrella of a multi-bazillion dollar industry and part of me wants to run as far away from it as possible as I find myself feeling sick as I watch the market take something so good, well-intentioned, meaningful and pure and twist it up into a swindling little trend that oozes with pressure, fakeness and a commitment to the gram or whatever.
Oh my. If there is an ever more jutting flavor that is less widely palatable, or, spikier than bitter, I will claim it. And, I know I'm not alone here in wondering how much a landline costs, or, if I can finally just take a hammer to help put this sweet little printer that could not to rest and then maybe find something a little more primitive and pleasantly uncouth as a lovely plastic printer gone yellow from the sun with a tail I can plug into this little laptop.
I guess that's mainly what I came on here to say. You're not alone. We're all ready for cords and hand written love letters and warm light bulbs. I'm grateful to implode enough to scatter these words like a tired old burlap sack falling over and open -- a mess of clunky pool balls, cold, hard and colorful, rolling, falling, clacking, unsure what soft green wall they'll butt. There are typos, there is no purpose beyond presence and a hope that at least one other human out there will get this. We're still breathing. We're not sure what it will look like in even a year. But, I guess I'm just tired of hiding and tired of editing and tired of not writing due to ... insert any litany of fears that have less to do with rejection and more to do with the a braid of integrity, overwhelm and inspiration ... and timing. They say that sometimes procrastination is just your intuition saying "not yet" and I guess my third eye has either retired, given up, or, permitted me to finally run with this hot mess.
Thanks for listening. May you find something real in your hands and heart and calendar that makes you feel even more human that you did when you began to read this. May it bring you joy this week, this year, this hour. And, if you can't find it when you look up, I do wonder ... how will you make it? And, who will you invite to join you?
There was a reason to love Catcher in the Rye so much in the 90's. The fan is still spinning.
WITH LOVE (and classic bitterness), Nishaan
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