The Unofficial Guide to Life
Fall is the most wistful season and fall walks are the most wistful walks. In movies, there are always montages of people walking through parks or past their old highschool, thinking about childhood or reminiscing about old loves during fall. If spring is the season of new life then fall is definitely about the past.
Continue reading “Wistful Weather”
One time, when I was very sad, I saw a picture of the sky that someone posted on Instagram and wondered how it was possible for people to be happy and post beautiful pictures of nature when I felt the worst I had ever felt. I wanted to look at the sky and feel like maybe life wasn’t so bad. Maybe it mostly isn’t – but it took a long time to remember all the reasons why.
Continue reading “Skies and Sadness”
Even though it’s still summer, everything about September automatically feels different. The mornings are chillier, the songs are sadder, and I’m annoyed at myself for letting the whole season pass without wearing jean shorts even once.
Continue reading “Summer in Reality”
The other night, the neighbours in the apartment next door had a party. I could see them in a yellow room or out on the patio, drinking, smoking, talking too loud. Sometimes I feel sad that I missed the part of life where you’re supposed to go to parties all the time, and get drunk, and do stupid things. And sometimes I don’t care at all.
Continue reading “The Party Next Door”
There is someone on my street who has excellent taste in music. I don’t recognize half the songs playing, but all of them are evocative, sentimental, and oddly cheerful, reminding me of the type of songs a person would listen to in the olden days, or when looking back on life, or while in the middle of living a very colourful life, or because he knows a great deal about life, or because he just really like dancing or staring into space.
Continue reading “My Neighbour’s Music”
Reading on a windowsill is not just sitting on a windowsill with your nose in a book. Since the beginning, it’s meant something more to me. The image of some ideal life I wanted to achieve, a symbol of being luxuriously lazy, of having an infinite amount of time, of being young enough or old enough to be free from real life.
Continue reading “Reading on a Windowsill”
My past relationship with time was twisted. I had too much of it and then I never had enough. When I was in elementary school, I remember tapping my fingers on my desk waiting for Christmas break. Even when the air was cold, we rushed outside but we couldn’t rush fast enough: it was only lunch recess.
Continue reading “My Friend, Time”
When I get tired of lying on my bed, looking up at the ceiling, I sometimes lie on the floor. There’s something I find comforting about the hardness of the surface beneath me. It feels supportive and solid, and I like knowing that this is the bottom and the ground is holding me, and that I am safe.
Continue reading “Looking Up”
Apparently, teenagers go through a phase where all they do, or want to do, is sleep. This was something I never experienced – but then again, I don’t think I experienced a lot of ‘normal’ teenager activity. In the times before, I didn’t have time to nap or feel tired enough to sleep during the middle of the day. Eventually, I reached a point where I physically couldn’t ease my body into slumber because it felt awkward and I felt like there were better things to do with my time than close the curtain while the sun was shining.
Continue reading “Naps”
Things I Learned Growing Up 