Monday 30 December 2013

Pistachio Nuts

As a child, I loved pistachio nuts. They were something my mom would buy on occasion because they were expensive but she loved them too. But when she did, she'd be selfish with them and would only spare me some if she hadn't finished the pack within a few days. However, here I sit in a house where pistachio nuts are left on the island of an ombre, wooden kitchen for snacking in and between meals or rushed rides out of the house to whatsoever location.

As I stood there sipping on my wine and breaking open the shells of the pistachios, I realized the beauty of change and the things we value. If you asked me right now what my favourite type of nut is, pistachio would not be the number one contender. I might have a hard time deciding between almonds (which I am allergic to) or pecans (which I barely ever eat, and when I do, I can never really decide whether I completely love their taste, or totally despise it). However, pistachio is not at all at the top ranks. See, when things are rare to us, they are more beautiful and more desirable for whatsoever reason. There truly is something in wanting something you absolutely cannot have. This should be clear in the fact that I crave and love almonds even though I am allergic to them and they are one of the few things I cannot eat.

However, as we grow and have the pleasure of experiencing all these thing that were rare or kept from us, we realize that they are not at all as special as they seem.
....This revelation is something that I am going to take into the new year, because it is something that has been demonstrated to me time and time again, however, my child-like mind and naivety kept me from realizing it. Yet, all it took was a bowl of pistachio nuts and memories of my sweet, beautiful mother that brought the lessons of the universe into my perspective.

Rarity only means beauty because we receive it in small doses; but that does not mean that your diamond in the rough is more rare than the gem you've find amongst the many stones of a sandy beach. It really just lies in a change of perception and a change of perspective; and that is something I need in this new year. Because my diamond in the rough could well be hiding in the shore of gems I have so inconsiderably dismissed as inadequate.

Sunday 29 December 2013

Discomfort in my Own Skin

I was uncomfortable in my own skin for 17 years. I could not love myself because of the colour of my skin for 17 years. I spent more money than what was necessary to turn my mane of a head into flowing locks of golds.
....I was uncomfortable in my own skin for 17 years because every day served as a reminder of how imperfect my blackness was; because the vulgarities you yelled etched into my skin like the hot tongs used to mark slaves.

..and after 17 years I realize: My black skin is just as beautiful as yours, and my kinky hair is as it is supposed to be. Black does not mean ugly, and your laughs cannot define me. Your preference is not my concern, and your hatred isn't either.

I was uncomfortable in my own skin for 17 years....and that is exactly what is wrong with our world.

Tuesday 24 December 2013

This Old Heart

Our hearts.....we're so in touch with them; or are we?

I hear my heart beating everyday. I hear it through my ears, I feel it pumping through my veins. I feel it reaffirming itself as it pounds against my chest when I well up in anxiety thinking about all the unknowns in my life. It's like a silent symphony that plays loudly but so often that it gets forgotten... but it is there, ever present, this huge fist that looks like it's covered in blood and meat.

My mind is far too plastered to think about any of this in the conventional manner it usually would....so I am allowing myself to type as I feel and I think without a second look to clarify my thoughts or what they intend to say.

But here I am; just letting my heart beat as I listen to the sound of angelic words that are supposedly empty because apparently words don't speak loud enough. But as I lay here, they are all I have. In my mind, in my thoughts, in my subconscious these words are everything and they are just pouring out of me, flowing so freely, against my own will. Much like my heart which pumps without any direct instruction from me, these words just keep coming..... And with words come memories. Images that need to be painted by only a collection and specific placement of alphabetic symbols.

.....and this old heart. This old heart that has been broken, torn apart, reassembled, shot at, stabbed, ripped out, put back in etcetera, etcetera, this old heart beats another day. And in the name of anything on which I can rest all my hope, I hope that it continues to beat against the wild current that attempts to drown me. Because I need this old heart to live. I need this old heart to spare me another chance at friendship and love, at happiness and lessons, at everything. I need this old heart.

Thursday 19 December 2013

A Formidable Zest for Life

...as I sit here listening to Frank Sinatra's "The Way You Look Tonight", I have a smiled sprawled across my face. As the tune tingles its way down my spine, with my head rocking from side to side and my shoulders bobbing up and down to the rhythm of this classic, I reminisce about everything.
As the days pass by and the year finds itself coming to an end, I find myself feeling happy and content despite the menial issues that prevail that would ordinarily have me wishing death upon myself. But for once, I go to bed thankful for the day that was and praying that the universe will grant me another chance at life come tomorrow. For the first time in a long time I want to be alive, and I have this formidable zest for life.
Yes, nothing has worked out how I had hoped. Nothing has gone according to plan, and I would cry day after day about it, feeling as though I had failed myself. However, now that I look at the situation again, I realize that everything has worked out the way it was destined too... Most of you probably rolled your eyes at that one. Blegh, destiny; who needs it.... amiright?
But I believe much of our lives have already been scripted, and the only role we play in it is figuring out how long it takes us to get there, depending on the decisions we make day to day. So, since I'm smiling instead of crying, I must've made a right turn toward my destiny.
....and now I'll lay here, soaking in my happy as the smell of my conditioner fills the ambiance, and smile with more than content.
Speaking of....I should probably write in my journal too.

Wednesday 18 December 2013

A Good Feeling

I feel good. I feel........something.

See I'm feeling and I'm allowing myself that luxury. Yes, it's a hurricane and beach days to storms and spring days. But it's divine. It's refreshing. It's like a cooling mint in a mouth that has been thirsting for days.

My life is a full one, honestly. My life has layers and layers that need to be dissected and that will certainly happen when the one decides to walk on in.... But all that baggage is an indication of my livelihood. It's an illustration of my mistakes, my risks; ambitions and hopes that tried to be reached but fell through the cracks. It's an indication of the soul that lies within the broken. It tells me that I've been living, despite the fact that I've been crying because I felt like I wasn't.

Man....I'm in such a good place. I'm breathing. I look in the mirror and see beauty and am content with the way I am. I know what my dreams are and I know what I want to pursue... But I'm okay with the idea that life will throw me curveballs and I'm excited for those too, because that only adds more dimension and depth to my life.

I have loved and I love and I am loved. I dream. I write. I aspire. I miss because I have people to miss. I'm lonely but I've found the beauty in it. Now I wait patiently for life to bring everything else it has in store for me. I'm reading to keep exploring and I'm glad to say that i don't know who I am. Because I am like a ball of clay and day after day I'm moulded into something new and different. And boy, like new clothes, gifts or cars, isn't that exciting!? It's all excitement..

Monday 16 December 2013

Finding Happiness in Lonely

   Being by yourself has a strange beauty to it. The lonely, the cold - It's all beautiful in its own strange way. 
   Yeah, you probably spend most of your time conjuring up memories, unable to control whether they'll be good or bad. You probably find yourself weeping and sobbing then suddenly laughing and smiling and feeling warm surges sparking at different corners of your body. 
   See, there's beauty in lonely. There's something so happy about being alone and being sad. There's something joyous about every tear you shed as you think about the first time you told him you loved him, repeating it through your tears as loud, rave music blared from nearby, beach sand spilled into your shoes and the ocean kissed the shore. There's something joyous about that incredibly broken and sad feeling you get when thinking about just how much everything has changed. 
   The beautiful thing about it is that your life is moving. That is to say that your day in and day out aren't the same, and that a year later you can recognize the extent to which everything has changed. A static life is a sad life. A mundane, monotonous, "do the same thing every day" kind of life is useless. 
   In all honesty, that sad and that lonely is a blessing. It's a moment away from the harsh world and a moment to be introspective. You cry about the change but you forget that the change symbolizes that you've been living instead of just being alive. You made strides. You changed your yesterday. 
   ...so yes; it hurts sitting reflectively by oneself and sobbing about the changes in your life, longing to go back to the life you knew; but all of that makes it one of the most beautiful things too. 

Sunday 15 December 2013

Watering Down the Things That Are So Pivotal to Who We Are


   The word relationship finally makes sense. Relation-ship. Relation Ship; therefore, a friendship, a loveship? A parentship. A siblingship. 
    It's the question of what ship are you relationed/related to? Makes sense now huh? See, that's why our first mistake was calling the most significant of these ships by the name and virtue of the general ship. We forgot what the relation was and that had to stand as something besides a relation. Allyship? Partnership? Soulmateship? But we reduced it to………. relationship
   That's the funny thing about us; this superior species we call the human being. We have a way of watering down the things that are so pivotal to who we are. The things that lie core to our existence. We water them down and live in a haze, unknowing, and in a treacherous search for enlightenment. We live in and out of this obscurity only bringing more ache to ourselves than happiness, because we believe we know the entirety of what knowledge is, when in fact, we only know the most minute fraction of it. 
   The love we have for someone cannot be reduced to a simple relation. Heck, even friendship got it right. Even that word sticks to it's virtue of where this ship harbors in it's bay. Yet, we can so easily refer to the most intense love, the most intimate, the most robust and the most impassioned of these ships as a relationship. 
   We're losing touch with love and romance, and by me I won't have it. Call me naive, gullible or any other synonym you'd use to describe anything that isn't hard-well stuck on the idea of whatsoever nonsense has substituted romance; but I am a believer in true love. I am a believer in the quest to find your soulmate. I am a believer in an all encompassing love with one person that suddenly puts your entire world into perspective and makes it whole.
   Don't get me wrong. This is not to say that we should all be on an hour-to-hour lookout for the one that is our supposed soulmate, or that we should spend 20 years neutered. My point is simply that we need to believe in romance and bring passion back into what it means to love. We need to redefine the conventional relationship and uplift it with aromas of sugar, spice and everything nice so that it can be elevated to the stratum it deserves. 
   ...because when I love, I am going to love passionately, deeply and with everything that I am. No holds barred, no stone unturned. Because when I love, it'll be with the one that my soul has been longing for, has been calling for, and has so patiently been waiting for. When I love, it will be pure and passionate, emotional and encompassing. When I love, I will not be afraid, because I will be inlove with a fraction of my whole, and my whole deserve all of that. When I love it won't be a relationship. When I love, it'll be a soulmateship. A love-of-my-life-ship. A wholeship.

Sunday 1 December 2013

...and here's to December.

...and here we are folks, calmly entering the final and most exciting month of the year.

There has always been something about December. Between the realization that you've made it halfway through an academic year, and knowing that all at once you get to start over (metaphorically), there is a thrill that comes with this month.

For me, December has always been a month of heartache and reflection, and a time that allowed me to grant myself a clean slate. A brand new page on which I could accidentally spill the ink of this grand, unerasable pen I call my life....and as I sit here, smiling at my excitement of what is to come, I begin to reminisce on the year that was. I think about the progress I have made personally from exactly a year ago and I shed a tear of happiness for the memories that will forever be encapsulated in this year that has so quickly glided past me. Day in and day out I beg for the beginning of the end, for December, and as the time sluggishly passes by, I know that I will eventually be granted with it... and here it is, in all its glory.

So here's to December; my most treasured time of year. Here's to all the tears I'm going to cry as I reminisce, and here's to all the memories this time of year will conjure. Here's to the strides I've made and the lessons I will deduce from all my mistakes. Here's to a new type of December, deserving of a new type of me.