I’ve come back to this page numerous times over the past couple of weeks. today alone, I’ve sat at my desk, on my bed, on the floor dragging myself back to this space for the fourth time trying to draw whatever words wish to come out of me. I wouldn’t say I’m feeling uninspired; I’ve been giving space for paint to fill its space on canvases, for music to carry its melody through me and the multitude of emotions I experience through the week. and even though time seems to be whiling itself away, as the hours and minutes mold into one big capsule, creating empty holes for us to fill ourselves up with the night seeming to take longer to arrive nowadays. when 3AMs become bedtimes and 2PMs the time we break our fasts, unwillingly waking up to our reality.
in the midst of uncertainty, there is an unshockable and unchangeable knowing that we will be home for another day, doing everything and nothing filling our hours with whatever seems to let time slip from us. Monday comes by, and we rest our heads on our beds to find that Friday has already rolled itself over, stretching its arms, longing for the days we thanked God for its arrival. Friday no longer means rest, even if we’re home working, there is no longer a difference between the weekend and the weekdays because boundaries have been blurred and moved about. which for some of us resulted in the steady rhythms we had previously set, being side-barred completely. maybe this is all sad, and it’s taking time, it’s taking time to adjust to the change and the new paces that have to be set, a different tone shadowing over the one you’d so carefully filled the gaps with. and these new gaps that have been filled have left no time or space to practice, you’ve been thrown into the middle of the stage having to will yourself to play a piece you’ve never seen or heard before. and even though nothing seems to be making sense,
there is stability here. everything is changing and we may not entirely know or understand what is going on, but there is stability here. there is a likelihood that we will be home for another day; that we will most likely have another facetime or phone call set up to call friends and family to ask them again, ‘how they really are’.
there is stability in knowing that the sun will rise, that you may stay up until you hear the birds chirping; that work and school are still happening, and that we have to rely on technology more than we’ve ever had to.
there is stability in knowing that there is no such thing as a quick visit to the store anymore, that we’ll most likely be in pyjamas, sweats, and dungarees for 5 out of the 7 days during the week.
there is stability in creating rhythms that you never thought you’d have the opportunity to create.
I’m not telling you that you have to be productive, that you have to do every single thing on your to-do list every day, or that you don’t have to do anything at all. you have the choice to live your life as you wish. I’m just here to tell you that you are not alone, and even despite the uncertainty and the rocky foundations we’ve been handed and expected to trust externally – you have permission to move things around in your internal home. to take a sledgehammer to it and knock it down completely, to rebuild the foundations, to rearrange the furniture, add a new layer of paint, or simply leave it as it is because you don’t feel the need to change anything at all. you have the time to do that now, and that may be a wild assumption coming from me, as not all of us have the free time to do as we wish, but you aren’t missing out because even if you don’t have time now, you always will have time.
the changes we experience in life are continuous and they fluctuate and change as often as our current climate. the only difference is that we weren’t given the opportunity to really sit with ourselves through it all, especially when it’s uncomfortable and inconvenient to do so. we didn’t leave room for stability or stillness, but right here, right now, you can be assured that in this odd moment in time that will soon be history, you have permission to simply exist as you are and run at the pace you wish to set for yourself.
sunday, once more 