A generally uncool week has led me here to an uninspired Sunday morning. I am listening for the words, but they’re just not there. Cellophane dreams blew out early when I woke at six with the spaceship alarm. There was nothing left to work with. A small moon, gauzy and full, sets behind the mountain across the valley and now the sky slowly intensifies, my new favorite color: electric tangerine.
One week back from Mozambique and I’m talking to myself again, grappling with crying jags. Tangible details – dogs and sunglasses – will do this to a person. There is a growing preoccupation with changing the insular, disconnected life I’ve wound up living, tethered to this house and the kids, wrapped up in work that’s not even really mine. The plan is to try to meet people once lockdown is over, to stride out into the starry, frenzied night and find myself a friend or two.
Also trying to work out where to set a story: USA feels unknown to me now, my position in SA irrelevantly specific. It’s possible to put things in the past, that other country, or into temporary places where nobody is meant to stay long, where nobody really belongs… it will come to me soon, I hope, just need to keep listening.
