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I spent a large portion of my morning holding back tears. I don't think I've ever cried over missing Mehdi, which is actually strange, but I've managed to pull myself together whenever I feel homesick. But for some reason, today, even though I had dragged myself to the library, and was under the pressure of an upcoming supervision, I still found myself taking that deep breath you take when you're trying to push emotions back in, and setting a tissue to eyes welled up with tears. But in the end, I'm not too upset about it, because it lead me to coffee with a colleague, who, I must add, is also one of the warmest and dearest people I've met at Oxford. We didn't talk about how pathetic my day had been or even about how horribly suffocating the thick, dark sky is. Instead, we spent most of it talking about creative writing, in a very raw way. We talked about how sometimes we find ourselves overcome with this intense rush of desire to write the novel we both have been thinking about for years, but how we just can't do it, for some reason. Why? "Why don't we write?" we kept asking one another. Well, we don't have time. This program is so intense. But, is that really the reason? Did we start the novel before the program? Did we write in our long breaks between terms? I don't think that's the reason. I've been thinking about this for six months now: Why don't I write? Because, if there is one thing that I am not confused about in my life, it is that I want to write a novel, and I know I can. I don't know. I remember my creative writing professor once told me that he will do just about EVERYTHING to prevent himself from sitting down to write. He said, he would straighten his laptop for minutes. He would dust the keys. He would even organize the pens in his pen holder, and label all the folders on his desk. And only when he had run out of all procrastinating tasks possible, he would start to write. I'm not sure what it is about that initial keystroke that's so difficult to overcome.

I was overcome with one of these rushes to write on the plane ride home to California, this past Spring. And I opened my laptop (probably out of sheer boredom on the plane) and wrote. I wrote the first three pages of my novel, and it felt so right getting this story out. Then my battery light flashed, and just as it was about to die, I clicked, "Save" and the window popped open, "File Name:" "Save as Type:". "Docx" was right. I paused over the "File Name" for what felt like hours. I thought, "If I label it as 'novel' then I'll always see it, and feel guilt over another unfinished project blinking at me in my Documents folder. I didn't have a name yet for the novel, so I couldn't save it as that. I couldn't save it as short story, because that wouldn't do it justice." so I decided, to name it "-----" That's what it's saved under. "This title comes with no pressure," I thought. 

Yesterday, I opened "-----" and felt my heart skip a beat, because no one can tell if those rush of writing moments churn out any good work. But I read through, and I liked it. I really did. I know I can write this novel. I know I will, one day. And today's coffee with my dear friend assured me of it, I think it assured both of us.  

Conditions

As I twisted a napkin, so it felt hardened into a chain, they spoke,
"If they didn't actually rig the last election, and Tehran is just very different from all other towns in Iran.
If smaller towns are influenced by promises and threats of the military,
     and if the military has sided with Ahmadinejad.
If there is no internal strife between Ahmadinejad and Khamenei,
If there is, in fact, backstage engineering of the votes
If people are not entirely as apathetic as it may seem
If they don't have any other dangerous intell on Rafsanjani,
If he has entered the race so late as a tactic and not in rashness
If Khamenei is actually convinced that he has the majority of the people on his side
     And if Ahmadinejad also imagines that he has the majority of the people on his side
If my sources, and my sources, and my sources of the right-wing conservatists, the left-wing liberals, the swing voters in Iran are correct,
And if we assume that they will hold the reins tighter as a result of the last election,
If there isn't a boycott against voting
    (because, you see, there is not ideal candidate, we are in defense, throw them onto a continuum, stand for the best of the worst)
If we all vote
Then, I am 100% sure that this election will move to the second round, and that he will win...."

Past them, in my line of sight,
behind the closed circle of chairs we sat in, in the cold common room,
a young man stood at a TV,
pressed his palms together,
and ground his teeth into the sides of his hands.

The score was 2-2
and it was a penalty shot.

This is why I'm lucky....

This is from the academic book I am reading for my dissertation:

"Only Noah and the contents of his ark were supposed to survive God's celestial wash cycle, and yet giants were still walking the earth after the divinity purged its dirtied landscape. Some theologians speculated that these monsters survived by climbing the tallest mountains and thrusting their nostrils above sea level for forty days and forty nights, or that one of them, Og, had simply ridden atop the roof of the ark." (Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Of Giants, 21) 

Jiggy

What happens if I stand up in this coffee shop and just start dancing? If I stretch my arms up over my head, and wave them back and forth, take a step or two forward and then three steps back? If I turn really slow and then bring one arm down? What happens if for a minute I let go, if I defy the social 'norms', and do what I feel? Because that is how I feel today. I feel like there is an energy boxed inside of me that needs releasing. When I go for a run, and I'm listening to music, sometimes I casually raise my arms above my head and pretend like I'm stretching, when really I'm dancing. I'll swing my arms forward and back, to pretend like I'm shaking out stiffness, when really I'm moving my body to the beat of a song. And when none of that satisfies my urge, I'll just try to keep my feet on the ground as little as possible, letting my toes touch the ground only for a split second before releasing them into the air, and I'll try to capture that moment when neither of my feet are on earth, but I'm moving. Running is the man's versions of flight, I think. And it is just about the only sensation that satisfies my constant need to dance. Because that's what it is. I'm addicted to moving my body. When I'm home alone in Oxford, I practically do all my tasks with a little jiggy. I'll flock my arms like a chicken as I walk over to the fridge. When I bend down to get a plate from the cupboard below the sink, I pause a second or two and shake my booty, just as sexy as Beyonce (only in baggy PJs). When I stand at my closet to decide which shirt to wear (though I always end up wearing the same two), I'll bring my knees down and up, alternate between moving my hips right and left. And if I'm walking over to the chair by the fire, I'll do a full-on turn in the middle of my living room. Sometimes there's music playing, but most often there isn't. Is that weird? I'll catch myself every once in a while doing sporadic dance moves when its dark outside and my light is on. I think the residents in the apartment complex across the street must think I'm a little crazy. But what can you do when there's a jukebox trapped inside of you?

Out in the garden where we planted the seeds
There is a tree as old as me
Branches were sewn by the color of green
Ground had arose and passed it's knees

By the cracks of the skin I climbed to the top
I climbed the tree to see the world
When the gusts came around to blow me down
I held on as tightly as you held onto me
I held on as tightly as you held onto me

Cause, I built a home
For you
For me

Until it disappeared
From me
From you

And now, it's time to leave and turn to dust

It was the trees. The trees taught me how to pray again. 

I stopped praying a year and a half ago. I stopped when the whole act started to become a charade, done out of mere obligation. Every time I finished a prayer I was left with guilt. Guilt for not remembering which rakaa I was on, guilt for praying late, guilt for not praying, guilt for praying too fast. Guilt clung to me for minutes after I’d finished, like the sickening and sticky aftertaste of a coffee taken with a cigarette.  At some point I just realized I hated it, its every movement exhausted me. I knew that what I was doing was merely keeping appearance, like dusting a house of cards every few times a day, without ever putting anything into it to hold it together. So I stopped. I still thought of God. I still spoke to him, but I stopped dancing his dance, and I felt such relief. It was as if I had quit an addiction, like I’d cleaned off my desk, and organized everything into neat boxes and binders, like I could finally mark that year long lingering task from my to-do list.

But ever since I’ve come to Oxford, things have changed. In my daily thirty to forty-five minute walk to campus, all I see are trees. The trees at Oxford are undescribable. These immense and graceful beings watch over every narrow alley, every broad street, every corner building. They're organs for the city, guardians of its every movement. They are more human than any.other.life in this city, including my own. Sometimes they remind me of my grandparents, my great grandparents, my friend’s grandparents. Not only because that’s exactly what they are for this town, but because that’s exactly what they look like. The one right at the roundabout on Cowley-Iffley Rd. resembles my grandma. Standing with all her pride, in all the glory and wisdom her age has given her, her hair frizzed over by age, but yet still at the whim of every tickle in the breeze, her arms out inviting me in. Standing there. Just watching. With all her patience, she trusts in what she sees, never feeling the need to move too quickly, or even speak against it or in support of it. She just smiles. She just observes.

My friend once asked me to name my three favorite animals with my reasoning, as a part of some sort of personality test, every animal was meant to reveal something different about my character. I said, horse because a horse is strong, yet always graceful. Bird, because a bird is always singing, always happy. And elephant, because an elephant always seems satisfied with the bare minimum. Now that I think about it, I was really just trying to re-describe a tree: Strong. It moves its leaves and its branches with every touch, but it never lets anything access its core. It never moves its roots, unless it wants to grow. Happy. What better visualization for a giggle than the way leaves shiver in the wind. Humble.

Something in these trees one day forced me to take an extra pillowcase and lay it on the ground, to set a piece of earth on it, and to wrap my hair, before standing. As I stood, I realized that I don’t remember the last time I felt my bare feet against the ground. I brought my hands up and I dropped them and began. And I said every word. I did every movement, all while realizing that my feet were always in place. I was that tree, bowing and bending, moving and turning, without ever taking my feet off the ground. I was rooted, and felt more layers of flesh, of blood, of being in myself than I  had ever felt.

And so I’ve started to pray again. Yes, my prayer is still to God. I still address him, but where is he, if he’s not inside me, and who is he, if he’s not me? If he’s not the part of us that we live through. Aren’t we the creators, forgivers, protectors, nourishers, the givers of life? Doesn’t that eagle come to be as magnificent as it is, because each one of us notices it’s intricate wings, its bold dark eye, its grace as it soars. I’ve realized from watching how imbued that tree is of God, that God isn’t someone out there, up there, somewhere with a hand outstretched to me. He’s in me, with a hand stretched out to the world, to Mehdi, to my parents, to my sister, to you.

Now when I pray, it’s not out of obligation, or fear of an impending day of doom, but because I think I deserve. I deserve five minute increments in the day to myself, to think of who I am, to try to be that tree.

There's a sorrow in my heart. Things have improved so much in the past few weeks, and I'm so grateful. I feel so much more calm, at peace. And yet there's still this sorrow poking at the side of my heart, like a delicate fish bone caught in your throat while you're at a dinner party. It's not big enough to cough up, and not thin enough to swallow. It's this abnormal size, and every time you swallow, you feel a sharp tinge. And the only thing you can do is to try swallowing thick bread, in hopes that it will wash it down. That's what this sorrow is like. Only this sorrow isn't in my throat, and can't go away with a swallow or two. This sorrow is deep inside, and I'm not sure how to access it.
I guess I've begun to realize how much is out of my control, and how little I have, not emotionally, and not in an abstract sense. No, I'm rich in all the things that really matter, like family and love and faith. What I don't have is the superficial, the things that "don't bring happiness." Basic luxuries, like a predictable living situation. Like a steady income, like....why can't I even say it? Like money. I'm so broke, and so in debt.

You grow up thinking that as long as everything else is there, as long as you have all that matters emotionally, money is insignificant. You grow up thinking you'll be happy with less. But then when you have less (and by less, I mean living off money you don't have), you start to be overcome by this disease. You start to be taken over by numbers. Numbers! They're everywhere! $3 for blueberries. $2 for a bus ride home, so that I don't have to feel like my bones are breaking from cold. $.75 is how much I paid for the last three hours of heating in my flat. $10 for a toaster. $ 2 for a Latte, 1.80 for an Americano.$8 for dinner with friends. $4 for warm house socks. Everything is numbers. What you eat, what you wear, where you sleep, what you bathe with, what you walk in, what you talk in. They're everywhere. The moment you open your eyes, like a pack of wolves, like a bug infestation...and all of a sudden come 11:30pm, you realize you've spent so much of your day just making choices and navigating between numbers, constantly deciding whether your comfort is worth it, whether your craving is worth it, whether you deserve it this time....and it becomes like a sharp bone rooted deep inside of you, jabbing every time you make a move, make a choice, and you start to feel so injured and so vulnerable and so so so so so ugly for even thinking about it as much as you do, because everything in your life is telling you to have faith in your future, and yet you just can't let go of reading the numbers.