brain dump

At times of profound confusion like these, I am looking for signs. Even signs that my own brain plays on me to make me believe. I go to a friend's blog, not to see the recent posts but to dig deeper into the holes of history, even before I knew her. Not for any reason except to find fragments of ourselves in others. For reverse solidarity. To look for clues elsewhere that can crack a puzzle I have the answer to. I also listen to music that would induce the right moods and thoughts. Adaweya is surprisingly too painful, or maybe not painful but rather very subjective, and why wouldn't he be! Mozart and Abdelwahab are the answer. Listening to Lacrimosa I hold back the tears. I wonder if somewhere in my head the definitions of strength and weakness or courage and fear got confused, because right now telling the difference is becoming increasingly difficult. In my head, I go through the exercise of splitting up the memories, what’s mine and what I should leave to the wind.

I think Sh is more talented than he believes. I think he is both better and worse than he thinks. But no matter how many times I have to say this, he still won't believe it until he's ready. He tries too hard and sometimes I want to tell him, like the puzzle, that the answer is simpler than he believes.

I am sleepy because I have been having dreams that exhaust me. Last week I dreamt it was my wedding in few days and I can't reach him! My dreams think it is funny to mock me like so!

I don't know if it is age or what, but I started in the last year specifically to focus on joy factor: I would rather stay hungry than eat something I do not like. And so on.

Also I was right to not trust people who tell me ya sett el kull without knowing me. I hate bullshit and bullshitters. 

winter

This cold winter air smells heavily of anticipation, and I cannot ignore it. Something is bound to happen, something good I feel, but I've been wrong before, and "good" is really very elastic. I still cannot ignore my wary sense of anticipation. Cannot ignore the feeling that I'm walking with sure steps (yet somewhat unconsciously) towards a self-fulfilling prophecy.

What if, what if, what if.
Padam.. Padam.. Padam..

bananorange

For the last few weeks, the highlight of my days has been a sugarless banana-orange concoction I've taught the juice bar guy at work to make. 

Things I've been silent about..

* how most words lost their meanings.. almost everything that could be said and done, has been said and done before.

* how I became in total control of my anger, yet fully aware that I am letting go.

* how I lost interest in expressing frustration, blame, reproach, disappointment because of how useless it is. I learned if I cannot fix it myself, then I'd better not bother. 

* how much I am ignoring inner alarms, and how tired I've become. 

* how much I do not feel like myself most of the time. 

* how I learned to say what I should feel rather than what I feel.

familiar

I miss familiarity. Familiar faces. Familiar friends. Familiar feelings. Not routine. Just the comfort of not feeling alienated... even the comfort of having familiar arguments.

The frustration that comes with this boring yet unfamiliar feeling is a silent but strong frustration... like a dull throbbing pain in the background.. a passive aggressive frustration that takes out its energy on me in different outlets..

I am tired and I cannot complain, because complaining means ungratefulness, and the truth is I am very grateful.

Tamed vs. broken. 

small talk

why do people even bother to ask questions when they won't listen to the answers? 

control

this has been the longest period I remember where I have controlled what I really wanted to say, and instead shared the toned down filtered diluted feelings...

I have a lot of words, but I choose not to use them.

mute

I miss bonding, connecting, talking. He says I talk a lot. Said so in several occasions, some pleasant and meant as a teasing joke and some not so much. Truth is, I have not really talked for a long long long time. I share, I tell stories, I confide in people some very personal secrets, I give my uncalled for opinion, I judge, I reminisce... but I do not really talk anymore like I want to. I keep most vulnerabilities to myself. Most fears. I "smile, wave, and nod" more than anything, and I try to sense and feel. But I have stopped talking. I prefer to talk through sharing, art, songs, articles, quotes, creating a collage of other people's thoughts and creations to express what I feel.

I miss myself sometimes, but I am here with her all the time, and we're getting to know each other again and again.

Casablanca

You must remember this
A kiss is just a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh.
The fundamental things apply
As time goes by.

don't forget to exhale

I am forever holding my breath.. forever thinking I should be somewhere else, doing something else.. People my age did this, people my age did that.. I did other things, but not this and that... and age? so what if I'm behind on this or that, or this AND that? what's a few years in a person's lifetime right? wrong? maybe? I reached the point of staying silent about my experiences. Dissociating myself from them. And the more I pretend to not know, the more I forget I know. A vicious self-fulfilling prophecy.

always holding my breath so hard, trying to focus that I don't lose grip... so much so that I end up focusing on the focus and not on the grip.

Even in gym classes, my biggest mistake is always forgetting to exhale.. inhale when you go up, exhale as you go down.. the harder part of the move is always the part where you should exhale. It helps you get through the move, they claim. I inhale, but I hold my breath and try, and try, and try.

I learned over time to reassure myself, instead of waiting for external reassurance. But it leaves me no energy to reassure the other then... but will it matter?

The future is gloomy, scary, so I ignore it. Until it looms over me and then I confront it and force the other to confront it. But I am always waiting on actions to react to, or reactions for my actions. Always waiting.

I think the only time I manage to let go, to breathe, is when I consciously meditate. I drift, floating slowly, becoming in sync with the rise and fall of my chest with every breath. The only time I intentionally choose not to think, but just to "be".

Be here. now.
in the moment.
become aware.
become present.

Stephane, Stephanie... click clack

How could I have missed the Stephanie reference? or did I get it and pretend not to? I forgot. I miss in-betweens.

Tolerance and Love

Things lose their meanings. I used to have a lot of fire and anger for my beliefs, now I do not fight as hard. Growing up or growing tired? 

I have learned a lot on love and tolerance over the last couple of years, learning it from where I least expected it. I have also learned by experience that tolerance, as a "higher" state of mind, takes a lot of energy, albeit renewable energy. It needs a constant conscious effort until it manages to become a habit. The watch-out? It can slowly lead to apathy. 

Acceptance, accepting the other, accepting oneself (not only pretending to), being accepted. 

city of the dead

It is very cruel in this city that is a mixture of Gotham city and Ankh-Morpork.
People are cruel and they smell like a mixture of feet (that unclean masjid bathrooms smell), dust, and gebna roumi.
A city that never sleeps but is lazy in its endless waking hours... I am so tired here, so exhausted. Everything is so dusty, even the people's souls..

Yes I am judgmental, they tell you to start with the change in yourself. Well, I take a shower every day, I wash myself and I wash my thoughts.. I started carrying smaller weights, to be lighter to move... but then the loads come on and start piling up again, and I go back to moving on with my 2 loads... wanting my laptop to be identified as a separate entity from my self. Here you go, I started. Your turn, world.

I get my energy refill from my favorite baby boy, followed by my closest circle. But I fear for the souls of those closest to me, I see them withering like I am... on and off.

Mama has become incredibly considerate at times. I think she is going through the same, and hence we are exchanging the care-taker role.

I think I am suffering from chronic stress... I noticed my heartbeats race faster whenever people raise their voices (even if not at me) and whenever I hear car horns. Please, don't raise your voice. I raise my heartbeats and my voice to match you.

I do not bite my nails anymore, have been nail-biting-free for more than a year now.. Papi would be proud.

I have become nostalgic to my father's family, kinder to strangers, tolerant to stupid waiters -letting go their small insignificant mistakes..

This world needs more error-tolerance margins.

Logical Fallacies

I am tormented annoyed by logical fallacies to no end. Since the day I learned about them at university, I decided that spotting (and avoiding them) is a passion of mine... for example, contrary to what they taught as in the Egyptian curriculum, saying phrases like "No one can deny the importance of..." or "Everyone agrees that..." is one of the most common fallacies we tend to fall into; the assumption that the other will agree with us, the assumption that we're on the right side, and the "other" is different or wrong or doesn't exist.. Hasty generalizations, they are called....

When I told my friend a couple of years ago "I don't do .... ", he laughed, and called it a categorical statement that I would get to look back at and take back. And in this, he was right.


more on fallacies and their interesting types: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_fallacy

nice earrings

the first thing I noticed about her was her earrings. I really appreciate nice earrings, to the point that I believe they tell more about a woman's character and strength more than any other jewelry item. Much more.

So, I noticed her earrings, first on her, then on the dressing table.. several pairs of them.. all lovely, all catchy.. And I complimented him (as I didn't know her much back then, or now) on his wife's taste in earrings, joking that she wouldn't notice if a pair went missing by me...

She still wears nice earrings, but it doesn't matter now, for there is another who also does..

nice earrings, short dark hair, and big smiles. Patterns.

Mediocre

I am haunted by fear of mediocrity. There is a thin line between being mediocre and being content, and I am haunted by the fear that I will be one of those who settle for mediocrity and claim it as contentment.

I am also tongue-tied. I think I forgot how to write. So much so that my posts tend to have a gloomy concise nature that annoys me and then I end up saving the post as draft hoping it will one day be polished to see the light, which it mostly never does.

Tired

I am tired.

I am tired of caring and of not caring. I am tired of pretending to care and equally pretending to be apathetic.
I am tired of wanting and needing. I am tired of doing and tired of being lazy.
I am tired of sensing and feeling and judging and forgiving and loving and making mistakes and fixing mistakes and justifying and explaining and understanding and fighting.
I am tired of reaching out and settling down and stepping up and moving on and paying back and showing up and making up and acting out.


I am perfectly fine, just tired. 

Amman

Things I liked about Amman
The houses - all built in white stone, no tall buildings.
The plants and the roses. Almost all balconies had roses and flowery plants. Huge roses. The city's soil is super fertile apparently.
The food, I miss this food in Cairo.


Things I did not like about Amman
The people. They barely smile and they're not very easy to communicate with as the Lebanese. The accent is very heavy and the tone is harsh.
The lack of true companionship during this trip.
The fact that shops and malls close real early especially that they're not keen on opening early at all.
The "knafeh" at Habiba (presumably the best knafeh in Amman!) that had curry powder added to it and I could swear on that.

I will give it another chance someday, but not soon.

ذاكرة الأشياء

زمن متجمد في ذاكرة الاشياء، غير أن الاشياء بلونها، بطعمها، برائحتها، بصوتها أو صمتها، تستفزه فيستيقظ، ولا يكتفي بأيقاظ صاحبه، بل يؤرقه حتى يعيده الى الوراء عبر ذاكرة تنتظر أية حجة أو مبرر لتعود الى ماضيها الحميم

اعتقال الطائي، ذاكرة الأشياء

Depersonalized..

Depersonalization (or depersonalisation) is an anomaly of the mechanism by which an individual has self-awareness. It is a feeling of watching oneself act, while having no control over a situation. Sufferers feel they have changed, and the world has become less real, vague, dreamlike, or lacking in significance. It can be a disturbing experience, since many feel that, indeed, they are living in a "dream".
~ Wikipedia

my sister and I call it "the double bubble". The feeling that you are inside a bubble, watching everything around you in a dreamlike slo-mo fashion.

They say that in these situations it is best to be around familiar faces and places, sometimes this physical closeness is reassuring.