ways of growing

cw: mediocre prose-poetry, scattered abstract concepts, pretentious and heavy-layered metaphors, AND SPOTIFY WRAPPED

Dec 13, 2022

this week’s Thought (singular)

the satisfaction of using up all the pages in a notebook or all the ink in a pen

(apologies for the three-days delay. we faced some slight turbulence, but we’re back on course now.)

this is a cliff’s edge, and when i fall there will be things that will need to be left behind, because the heavier the backpack, the swifter the landing.

listen. listen, come close and listen. i am young. i know i am young. i know that two decades is barely anything, that i have the bulk of my life ahead of me, but who decides what graceful aging looks like?

it’s one thing - a beautiful, terrible thing - to look back, to view my childhood through a telescope, to see that girl who seems so far away. it is another thing - a beautiful, terrible thing - to look to the future, to view my adulthood through a kaleidoscope, to see that woman who seems like vague, colourful blobs. and because i am addicted to quantitative measures, to desperately trying to make sense of these abstractions using good old-fashioned logic, it’s a third thing - a nothing-much-to-say-about-it-really thing - to be standing at the zero of a number line right now, my past in the negatives and my future in the positives, both stretching to their respective infinities. not only am i a speck in the universe; i’m a speck in the span of my lifetime.

into how many divisions can i split my life each way? +2: college graduation; -7: music exam; -19.6: birth. what are the spaces? are irrational numbers allowed? if we added more dimensions, would i be able to mark the increasing length of my hair, the stages of my grief after my grandmother’s passing, the gradual rise in my nervousness before a big exam, each of them red permanent marker points on a different line? what events symbolise my aging do events even symbolise my aging am i falling behind should i be twelve steps forward already-

what does growth look like?

i cannot talk to new people without giving myself a pep talk first, even then with my palms clammy. but i can now have mature conversations with the parents of my childhood friends, parents who’ve known me since i was six, parents to whom i politely ask questions like, “how did your surgery go, auntie?” and “have you eaten, uncle?”. i take ill-advised decisions like napping too much in the afternoon so my nights stretch long and sleepless, the mornings-after becoming bleary-eyed and tired. but i’ve started making an effort to help out future-me, like filling a water bottle before-hand so i’m not in a rush when i have to leave, and regularly taking my iron supplements.

my number line is in multiple dimensions, each completely different from the other. and i’m not at zero in any of them. i’m near the beginning - that could be 0.000012 or it could be 12 - but i’m not at zero. one plane measures my chronological age - the easiest one. one measures my achievements - the one i need to pay more attention to. another measures my griefs, small and large. one measures my growth in terms of my ability to hold Adult conversations about surgery and on-time meals, another in terms of the time it takes me to get comfortable in a large group of strangers at a party, a third one in terms of the time it takes me to forgive myself for a mistake. and yes, one to measure the length of my hair. that one’s all over the place.

and that’s the crux of this uncomfortably personal soliloquy. there are so many ways to grow, and so many factors that influence each of those ways.

special feature: spotify wrapped szn is here!!

(this was supposed to go out in last week’s issue, but i forgot to include it. let’s pretend you’re still excited about this.)

big fan of the people who caption their top artist with things like ‘3 years strong’ or ‘always my fav’. yes!! to love an artist so much that their discography never gets old, that their tracks become comfort, that their music becomes a constant through multiple years of change!!

also adore the people who are surprised, who are confused, who did NOT see that coming. the art you love knows you, sometimes better than you know yourself.

special mention to the incredible subset of people who accidentally left a song running, who were obsessed with an obscure soundtrack for a grand total of 24 hours, whose relatives/friends used their account and skewed their stats - i see you. thank you for the serotonin. i hope you had a good chuckle, and continue to share your spotify account with your father who listens exclusively to pritam.

anyway, here’s mine -

turns out i’ve turned to comfort songs this year, discovering and being obsessed with new classical-based tracks, and re-discovering old bollywood nostalgia bait.

tell me your top artists and songs, or anything about your spotify wrapped stats this year!!

English Recitation Competition

“Stop. Go put your shoes back on. They’ll know we Okies,” a Lost Image Reclamation, Anthony Cody

Spirits of the Dead, Edgar Allan Poe

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Be silent in that solitude,
   Which is not loneliness—for then
The spirits of the dead who stood
   In life before thee are again
In death around thee—and their will
Shall overshadow thee: be still.

Lord, I Ask a Garden . . ., Alfonso Guillén Zelaya (translated from the Spanish by William George Williams)

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I wish that you would never take my mother,
for I should wish to tend to her as a child
and put her to sleep with kisses, when somewhat old
she may need the sun.

I wish to sleep well, to have a few books,
an affectionate dog that will spring upon my knees,
a flock of goats, all things rustic,
and to live off the soil tilled by my own hand.

A Poll!

your opinion on irreverent matters is not needed this week! maybe next week your voice will be important again!

Middle School Book Review

The Drowned Woods by Emily Lloyd-Jones

there’s a heist, there’s found family, there’s a slow-burn romance and low chances of survival and adventure and magic and the occasional timeskip. i only wish it were longer.

find all shared books here.

A Picture!

The Good Side of the Internet

Human Trafficking’s Newest Abuse: Forcing Victims Into Cyberscamming (investigative)
Tens of thousands of people from across Asia have been coerced into defrauding people in America and around the world out of millions of dollars. Those who resist face beatings, food deprivation or worse.
Movies where behind-the-scenes drama was better than the actual film (listicle)
Into on-set gossip? Don’t worry, darling. Here’s a rundown of movies where actor feuds, fallouts and scandals have overshadowed the actual plot.
I Do Not Keep a Diary
I do not keep a diary although I plan to start doing so any day now. Every preparation is in place and it only remains for me to begin. Everywhere I go I carry a pencil, or a pen, and a small black notebook in readiness for the day that I become a committed diarist. The pen, which is sometimes a pencil, is cheap and ordinary — I am not superstitious about these things. The notebook is blank. It isn’t one of those that has the day of the week printed at the top of the page or else the seven days of an entire week running down its left-hand side. Those are for recording things that one plans to do whereas my diary will be for recording things that I have already done (even if, at present, many of these events have not occurred yet and the entire enterprise of diarizing currently remains a plan).
Whatever happened to the It Girl?
The reign of celebs like Alexa Chung and Cara Delevingne is officially over – but the It Girl is still about. You just have to look a little harder for her.
14 hours in The Queue to see Queen Elizabeth's coffin
Stood among strangers in search of history, I had a strange epiphany