Last night in the of the middle of the night I awoke to find Arnaud sitting up in bed beside me. His shoulders and head were slumped forward in that perfectly poor posture evidenced by seated sleepers everywhere. It was clear to me that he was a bit stuck, and although he continued to sleep soundly he seemed unsure of his next move. What IS one to do after sitting up in bed, asleep? It appears in this family we do not have the answer.
I reached my hand up to Arnaud's big, sleeping shoulder and guided him, with barely a touch, back down to the position generally thought to be more conducive to sleeping. With both of us again horizontal I turned over and went back to sleep.
These moments are when life makes sense : when touch happens and when touch matters, when life is REAL. The man sleeping beside me forgot how to sleep for a moment - and my touch helped him to remember.
I forget how to do the most basic things. I forget how to eat well and how to be kind. I forget how to relax, to feel pleasure, to give pleasure, to wait, to be patient, to remember, to dream, to sleep, to stretch, to breath deeply, to really listen. I forget to risk, to hope, to dance, to be proud, to create, to play.
None of these things happen on a screen, and yet a screen is where I seem to wait, and wait...
I want them all to go away - every vacant place where I wilt, waiting for life to happen instead living it. Life is becoming a spectator sport, and the lives I am watching instead of living my own do not touch me or matter to me, and yet in watching them all I forget to live, somehow content to blindly observe in this screen-filled void.
Writing used to feel like magic. It was a way my heart and mind and body could finally figure out what the hell was going on for them (they often felt a bit out of my control... "really Charis?" says everyone from my past in faux surprise) : and quite often there was a lot going on (to put it mildly). So as my desire to write changes, meaning that it no longer feels like my alternative to burning down buildings or murdering assholes, does this mean I now have less to say? Maybe. I certainly have different things to say.
But I think for some time now saying things has become tedious and distracting to me, often just another version of life as spectator sport.
I read one-thousand perspectives yet am left feeling hollow and without perspective. Words are everywhere I look, and yet they distract from life rather than deepen it. Words as information have grown deeply tiresome to me. I feel myself rejecting the idea that I must absorb so much new information each day, especially when, again, the inundation distracts me from real life and in the end does not touch me or mean anything to me.
I always wanted to be different and interesting. My worst nightmare was to be boring, so I made sure I was not (or so I thought). Funny thing : a lot of people were going through the same thing. The vast majority of (American) people I know even remotely close to my age have felt/are feeling the same sensations of desperation to be special - a generation of people needing to be unique, a generation of the specialist, most specialer snowflakes of all. Of course the fallacy of this idea is obvious: everyone IS unique, and therefore everyone is interesting. Whether or not they are interesting to you is one thing - but that's just perspective. I have friends in Europe who find my descriptions of conservative, mid-west families to be MIND-blowingly interesting.
I text with my friend Rae on a nearly hourly basis. It will definitely be Rae who notices my absence and alerts the authorities should I ever be abducted (you see? I am chosen and special even in my foreshadowing). Rae and I have been friends for years, and yesterday I confessed to her that I simply do not give a flying fuck anymore about being famous or accomplished. It has never been an obsession of mine to be famous - but in the back engines of my doings - the wood being burned, the things being dreamed, the risks being taken - there were always hopes of something great, of seeing a giant shooting star across the sky that would happen if I only worked hard enough. Maybe it could have been reality. Maybe I missed the opportunity to be a great ballerina - to write a best-selling novel - to be rich and famous - but my confession is that I no longer care.
I feel apathy towards even the potential of greatness, and while I realize this may seem depressing, it feels to me more like a bowl of homemade chicken soup. In fact making a really good soup seems like a much better investment of my time and guarantor of my happiness than being smart, or right, or fit, or liked, or famous, or current, or stylish, or connected. Delicious soup wins.
I take our scrappy little dog to the park almost every morning. Bois de la Cambre is the beautiful park close to our home in Brussels and includes rolling hills, a lake, running paths, wildlife and forests stretching in two directions. Lilou goes off-leash as soon as we arrive, and immediately begins the task of looking for the perfect stick, or "baton," in French. I speak with Lilou as I speak with everyone, with a tedious mix of French and English thereby creating an unhelpful dialect that leaves everyone confused regardless of their mother tongue.
Some mornings we run around the lake together and on others we walk, but every morning we spend a good half hour playing fetch. "Ah non, c'est enorme ça... choisisses un autre... that one's good... ALLEZ! VVWOOOOOSH! Ramenez!!! GOOD girl."
One thing I have discovered about myself this year : I am unable to throw le baton without making sound effects. No baton has ever left my hand without believing itself to be starring in a feature film - "WHOOSH" "FFFFYYYEEEEW" Also of unfortunate note, onomatopoeias change with language. A duck says "quack" in English, but in French they in fact say "coin." I am not sure what a flying baton says in either language.
Lilou runs like Rafael Nadal during fetch. She goes after that baton every time as if it was the last baton on earth, and she runs it back to me as if wolves were on her tail. On and on we go - I throw it away, she brings it back. The rhythm of this ritual reminds me of fly fishing. Every cast is different, every cast is the same. The fly touches the water. The stick hits the ground and bounces.
The rhythm does not deaden your senses as you might think - it heightens and centers them simultaneously - every thought is on this moment - every muscle knows it's function.
And this is life. Not defining your worldview or delineating your religious or political affiliation or being famous or cultured or well educated or having the best job or the best looking lover or 10,000 followers or the cutest kids or the funniest tweet or the most intellectual outrage or the most unique idea or the most defined abs or the most money or the best clothes or the most homemade furniture or healthiest diet or best hobbies or the most eclectic taste in music or the most countries visited or being the most devout christian/yogi/democrat/republican.
None of it matters. None of it matters to me.
Picking up your knife to cut an onion at dinner time. Throwing back your head and laughing at the diarrea story your brother tells. Walking in after a long day and seeing a giant mess, just where you left it. Staring at the ceiling as you remember your dreams from the night before - wondering if they will fade or stay. Passing eight hours fishing on a lake with your Dad and catching nothing. Watching someone do something truly kind. Feeling anxiety squeeze your neck as you try to sleep. Watching the shadows appear on the walls as the sun arrives after weeks of darkness. Seeing your partner's shoes beside the door. Missing the people you love who are not with you, and wishing they were. Wrapping yourself in a quilt your Mama made for you. Sitting on your couch with a deep, good sigh and knowing you will not get up for hours. Doing the dishes. Using the dishes. Folding the laundry. Wearing the laundry. Letting a song take you over and over again. Feeling that deep exhaustion at the end of a long day. Pulling the earth behind you as you run. Seeing yourself so clearly in your baby brother that it's hard to breath. Growing inside jokes with your friends like a garden. Dreaming of your next trip. Laying back in a hot, hot bath. Listening to the endless chatter on the bus. Rubbing your body with lotion. Brushing your teeth. Having a baby. Losing a baby. Feeling the morning kiss of your dog.
These moments are real : moments when I remember what I already knew and yet forget so easily : that I am alive and that my life is now.
We cannot bottle or passively observe these moments on a screen : we have to forget them and then remember them every day on our own, over and over again.
Picking something up, throwing it, watching it come back.
Every cast is different, every cast is the same.
The fly hits the water. The knife cuts the onion. The dreams fade away. The sun warms the room. The baby cries.
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