i am, sometimes, a method writer--the nature of the music playlist, the color of the sky, the temperature, the room scent, all set a certain backdrop and ambiance to even the most derelict attempts at writing.
currently listening to:
"friend of mine" - the national (merci, Mish!)
"ageless beauty" - stars (most serene mix)
the excellent feist album, "the reminder"
the stealthily addictive sea and cake album, "everybody"
color of the sky: a surprising light blue, it is 7:52pm here in the san francisco bay area
temperature: cool, after an ebulliently hot day
room scent: non-existent, although i purchased a massive handful of lavender stalks from the local farmer's market a few days ago)
and now, off to the races.
1) collisions, coalescence, convergence
this past weekend marked a one-year ripening since graduation--that ritual process of seemingly premature, begrudging, simultaneously writhing and rejoicing expulsion into the world and all its perils, through the invisible membrane that once constituted the protective sac of college life. this one-year mark is, quite naturally, a good time to prendre un pause, to reflect on how the past year has changed us in both apparent and subtle ways, to take stock of where, even in very rough and fuzzy orders of magnitude, we stand in relation to life and the swirling cosmic brew.
the quiet pause is made salient by the occasion, but rendered absolutely magical when it is filled with a confluence of disparate melodies, each carried by a critical and necessary artist, interweaving in syncopated tempo and sonic exuberance, propelled by some unseen force of happenstance. shortly after my dear, dear friend lizzie--my intellectual opiate--arrives in a whirlwind for a transitory reevaluation of california and a necessary spot on my futon in the living room, there we are, two of us and the intrepid matt and renee, riding the invigorating night wind, hurtling down the 280 to Half Moon Bay at night with a bottle of champagne to accompany a night watch of white walls of Pacific foam roaring into shore underneath a star-streaked cloak. days later megs, reubs, lizzie and i are on the futon cackling, musing, deliberating, like the old days. with lizzie, the great magnet in the universe, i find myself in the company of two precious souls who live so fully and fulfillingly--daniel and ryan, whom i did not know well before, but from this one brief tryst nourished something latent from the depths of my restless, flailingly endeavoring spirit. in daniel's words, "waiting for the brain stem to drop" (into the mid-cavity of feeling, knowing). ryan, on a transitory stop to italy (and to return with an absurdist play, that is his charter), in an infinitely sapient, remarkable and coruscating statement brings sense and order to this grappling of our places in the world: we are all translators. translators between those who live fully in their madness and those with one foot on solid ground, between the fervent idealist and the stridently practical--we are dots on a coherent continuum, making sense of the world and translating them for ourselves and our neighbors and by extension for every individual and collective that claims a place in this continuum-world; we are all necessary. and there is no need to feel obliged to some aquinian logic, putting an end to an infinite 'regression' of relations. on this weekend, one year ripe after graduation, we have all come together to check in with each other, propelled by some unseen force of happenstance, abetted only by the minimal logistical planning required to avoid the necessity of crawling into a decompressed airplane cargo cabin to get to the other side of the country.
2) i am reading again. my friend sundar pointed out, quite accurately, that all this frenetic joie de vivre of doing everything, seeing everything, and seeing everyone requires some respite, some space to become. there are books strewn all over every nook of my abode by deliberately chaotic design to maximize the chances of caprice fatiguing and choosing to indulge, instead, in the life of the mind in earnest, namely sitting for a few quiet hours to crack a book open and remain with it long enough to have myself descend into a state of deep investment or levitate to utter captivation and rapture. i am far from making it through tolstoy's tome of war and peace but i have, at least, modestly begun: "founders at work" by jessica livingston, "another day in the frontal lobe" by katrina firlik, "the selfish gene" by richard dawkins.
twilight descends.
