sharing – Jasmine Flavoured Jazz

I was printing Sudoku. Thirty minutes to noon, dressed in random coloured clothes, brushed hair, but no makeup. My nails have been chipped for days now, and my glasses are as dirty as can be. I had just finished listening to an Agatha Christie mystery. Maybe for fun, maybe for educational purposes, most probably to not let the time pass me by so painfully.

The front door opens and a mask that hides a smile or a frown walks in. I don’t notice something is wrong, well, more wrong than the normal wrong of normalcy, right away. A few breaths later, a grandfather is dead.

I’ve always wondered why people simply say “dead”, so informally, casually, breaking the news of someone’s passing like they’re telling you they’re going to the supermarket. I don’t know if there is another way to say it. All I know is I didn’t manage to print any Sudoku.

And I took my headphones off. And I stopped lounging around my bed and the sofa and sofa and bed and found my way to a proper table. Because now life is serious. The tree has fallen and we have heard it. What an irony, that the tree was falling all morning, and was fallen for a few hours before we glanced at it and decided to define it ‘fallen’. What a blissful journey that of ignorance was. Utterly unfruitful and deceptive and, isn’t that its charm? Now, what is left for us to do but to look at the tree and look at ourselves and look at the rest of the forest with a knot in our stomach and regret in our eyes.

So, to sum up, I won’t be doing any Sudoku today.

Today, my housemates lost someone precious to them. And for the first time in these dark months we’ve been living, the danger and pain came too close to this house, close enough to show it’s unforgiving teeth.
Stay safe, stay inside, stay connected to the world we all love to hate.

It was one of those nights when pure adrenaline kept you going. Adrenaline, anxiety, worry, fear for the day to come, pure unadulterated inspiration, for lack of a better term.

It was one of those nights when anything seemed like a better alternative to sleep. So, I supposed I shouldn’t have been surprised when I couldn’t let my eyes close, even though I know they longed too.

It all started with a cup of tea. Nothing fancy, simply a big cup of assorted green leaves floating in steaming hot water. Three minutes later, my bedside table had become the haven for all sorts of dry snacks. From dried fruit, to biscuits, from nuts to sesame bread-sticks.

It was after fruit number two, bread-stick number three and nut number one-hundred and eighty five, right when I grabbed the packaging of the biscuits with determining fingers, gripping the ends, ready to tear open the treasure chest, when I ceased, confused. “Am I even hungry?”

These days, I find that no question is easily answered. No, I’m not hungry, and yes I’m hungry, and no, I’m not hungry for biscuits, and yes, I am hungry for answers, and yes, I am starving for a sense of security and relief and no, I don’t want any more peanuts.

I put the biscuits down for the night, turned off the light and hugged my pillow tightly, imagining it was the ease and certainty I ached to hold.