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㋡🥀

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Insha’Allah

by Danusha Laméris

I don’t know when it slipped into my speech that soft word meaning, “if God wills it.” Insha’Allah I will see you next summer. The baby will come in spring, insha’Allah. Insha’Allah this year we will have enough rain. So many plans I’ve laid have unraveled easily as braids beneath my mother’s quick fingers. Every language must have a word for this. A word our grandmothers uttered under their breath as they pinned the whites, soaked in lemon, hung them to dry in the sun, or peeled potatoes, dropping the discarded skins into a bowl. Our sons will return next month, insha’Allah. Insha’Allah this war will end, soon. Insha’Allah the rice will be enough to last through winter. How lightly we learn to hold hope, as if it were an animal that could turn around and bite your hand. And still we carry it the way a mother would, carefully, from one day to the next.

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“If you knew how hard it was, and how long it took, to rebuild my little universe of peace and happiness then you would understand why I’m so picky about who I allow in my life.”

— Weird People

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Unknown, Home Movie

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Sadness matures us in a way time can’t help but envy

-𝘢𝘺𝘢 // 𝘢𝘯 𝘦𝘹𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘱𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘮𝘺 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴

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“What’s the difference?” I asked him. “Between the love of your life, and your soulmate?” “One is a choice, and one is not.”

— Tarryn Fisher, Mud Vein

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Alain de Botton // Jon Kabat-Zinn // unknown

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Pieces of me.

I left pieces of my heart in every places i've land my foot on.

The places I used to go for my driving lessons with my dad, where he told me to hold the brake but instead I kept on pressing the pedal gas even harder, and the narrow roads that frustrates me, but even more so for him on the passenger seat.

The front gate of a certain lime green building, where me, my sister, and my dad would go to every evening to picked up our mom from work, and the store that we'd visit after to buy me my favorite magazine. 

The quiet, vintage house of my grandparents, where I spent times with my cousins playing hide and seek, and one of us would break my grandma's oriental vases.  And the spacious front yard where me and my then teenage aunt used to play in the rain, and we'd get scolded after.  The one and only time I've had ever dance in the rain, my aunt would carry me on her back as we were laughing freely, mischievously.

The river on my grandma's hometown that we all used to swim in, I remember my uncle jumped off from the cliff and his pant accidentally slipped.  I also remember I didn't want to come out of the water.

My cousin's wooden house that I could not stop admiring, even until now.  The conversation pit where we used to play cards at.  The high ceiling full of intricate wooden structure. The study room where we used play roles at. And the clear sound of the beating drum from the 2nd floor above.

The house we used to live at, at the town faraway from our hometown. I remember the ever-dusty terrace due to the high traffic on a road in front of our house. The place where my sister and I used to fight for a tv remote cause we want to watch our own favorite shows at 6 pm.

The rooftop of my certain 3rd grade teacher's house at 5.30 pm where the sky turns purple-pink-ish and the sound of a recital could be heard clearly from the nearby mosques. The same teacher who cried for me because, for the second time, I would be moving to yet another town in few weeks—the first person outside of my family to ever mourn over my departure.

There are many other pieces of me. Some are remembered, many are forgotten. It shatters me how much of my pieces—that I once considered important—I could've forgotten by now. And now I can't help but wonder: which memories contributed to who I am the most? Or perhaps, each of these amalgamated into a big, one part of me. Who knows.

The most important thing is, I am grateful for the memories from my early life. While I forgot most of them, I could faintly remember how fascinated I was with everything, and how those first times I ever experienced made me think that life was wonderful and full of exciting curiosities.

It's hard to be fascinated these days when all I do is keeping my sight to the concrete ground. Sometimes I forget that the world is more than just a dreadful cubicle. Maybe I should learn from my younger self on how to be  joyful again⏤to be myself before the world changed me, to be free of expectation, to be a white, clean, unwritten paper once again. That way, I might know how to continue making memories and left my pieces at places I've set my foot into.

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Taylor performing “The Archer”, The Eras Tour in Las Vegas, March 24th 2023

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BARBIE (2023) dir. Greta Gerwig

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A Split Second

Everything can happen in just a split second.

A brief moment of eyes meeting another. A second of hearing a small laugh. A moment of suddenly noticing a beauty in a crowded room. And a moment enough to flip your world upside down.

A split second that could give you the time of your life, or memories to burn— but strong enough to engrave in your heart, forever.

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Jane Austen // Bao Phi

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Linger, Presence, and Footprint.

You don't quite sure how to reach him, so you make sure that your presence left a footprint.

You sit on his chair when he's not around, you put your shoes just beside his, you use the same brand of a ballpoint he uses—even though he doesn't even know about it.

You listen to his favorite artist's album because you saw him updated his story last night—preparing yourself if you ever have a conversation in the future.

You watched Before Sunrise because he mentioned it once. You wear the same color of his often-wore clothes palete—hoping that one day both of you'd "accidentally" wear matching clothes.

You go to the library a little bit earlier than the time he usually goes—sitting near a rack of book he usually goes to, so he could remember the girl who sit on the corner everytime he walks there.

You do everything to justify your linger without having to interact with him because that would be too scary—but still enough to make you dream.

⏤ 01/26/2023.