The first of the month

Happy first of November! It looks like this month will be:

Big book of contemporary poetry | hot tea | plans for next semester | work | other kind of work | one-hour-of-sleep-kind-of-days | celebrations | fending off the cold rain | confused by the weather all around | making connections | rediscovering what health looks like in winter | learning to love through distance and how to talk on skype and a phone | setting aside time for leisure|

Today’s rain makes me feel more exhausted than ever. Last night, I celebrated Halloween the best way I know how (by dressing up as a man *which turned out to be a very empowering, and fascinating couple of hours) and dancing with the good ones. This morning, after only a few heavy hours of sleep, I was back at it -> writing and editing an essay before a class where we learned how to make a decent souffle.

If the rest of November is  anything like today, it will be filled with exciting times (*Phantogram tonight with brother Sam, Danny and Immy) and a lot of hard work. The rest of this weekend involves a few good meals, some projects, some essay-writing, and trying to remember how to correctly wear a sari.

The only thing one can give an artist is leisure in which to work. To give an artist leisure is actually to take part in his creation. -Ezra Pound

All I know is now

Today.

I wished I had said more in a three hour presentation . . .

or at least I wished I shared more of my true feelings.

I wished I followed my instincts more.

I wished I had a dog to take on walks.

I wished I was Indian.

I wished I had a child.

I wished I went swimming.

I wished I always walked places.

I wished I was back to work at this dark desk in Delhi.

I wished I was the couple making out in the grocery store parking lot.

I wished I had more days like these where I crossed most things off my list.

I wished all the things that seemed urgent and scary at the time were put into perspective.

I wished (for a moment) I was the girl on the bike pretending she was really on a motorcycle.

Then, I stopped.

I stopped wishing.

I wanted to be me.

Walking home on a hurt foot and with a backpack too heavy.

Always with too many feelings. Troubles. Ambitions.

But I’m all I know right now.

All I know is now.

And today taught me this.

Two.

Planning for the future and getting more stuck in the past in the process. . .

“Monsters exist, but they are too few in numbers to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are…the functionaries ready to believe and act without asking questions.” – Primo Levi

Today will be like a lot of other days around here, but I’m not too scared of it. . . yet.

[Photo: Foggy day at Jama Masjid in Delhi, India//Grace Farson]

The good trains

The good trains looked like this.

And I spent my time reading, writing, drawing, and taking pictures of my beautiful mother.

Today, I miss India. I miss moving. I miss the sounds.

[Photos: A train ride from Mumbai –> Delhi//Grace Farson]

The past few days

The past few days have looked (*and sounded) a little like this.

[Photos: Images from mom’s phone & travel sounds from our drive to Agra//Grace Farson]

Back to it. . .

Train booked.

Traveling by train will be nice. No more buses again (*at least for a while).

Leaving the city of death (aka lovely Varanasi//Banares) the day after tomorrow and heading back to Mumbai.

Plans change, but its all a part of the journey.

“I wanted to go on sitting there, not talking, not listening to the others, keeping the moment precious for all time, because we were peaceful all of us, we were content and drowsy even as the bee who droned above our heads. In a little while it would be different, there would come tomorrow, and the next day and another year. And we would be changed perhaps, never sitting quite like this again. Some of us would go away, or suffer, or die, the future stretched away in front of us, unknown, unseen, not perhaps what we wanted, not what we planned. This moment was safe though, this could not be touched. Here we sat together, Maxim and I, hand-in-hand, and the past and the future mattered not at all. This was secure, this funny little fragment of time he would never remember, never think about again…For them it was just after lunch, quarter-past-three on a haphazard afternoon, like any hour, like any day. They did not want to hold it close, imprisoned and secure, as I did. They were not afraid.” – Daphne du Maurier

[Photo: Delhi’s trains//Grace Farson]

Bits and pieces, Delhi

Yesterday was the first time India felt really real again. Spent the day sightseeing and trekking through the heat just to experience bits and pieces of Delhi all over again.

Time with Greg has been good fun and it is so lovely to be here with a familiar face. We’ve shared memories of UNC, Indonesia and now India.

Tonight, I’m off to Rishikesh. My stay will be brief but I’m looking forward to seeing a new place and a bit cooler weather.

“Perhaps it’s true that things can change in one day. That a few dozen hours can affect the outcome of whole lifetimes. And that when they do, those few dozen hours, like salvaged remains of a burned house–the charred clock, the singed photograph, the scorched furniture–must be resurrected from the ruins and examined. Preserved. Accounted for. Little events, ordinary things, smashed and reconstituted. Imbued with new meaning. Suddenly they become the bleached bones of a story.” – Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

[Photos: Delhi life for now//Grace Farson]