Alphabet Soup

A-Z Notes to Self

Notes A-Z

Art

I am sometimes too careful and cautious. But I believe in an art that invites me to play. I notice when I can’t move in a way that’s inherent to me, I’m no longer thinking about me and making the thing. I’m probably thinking of someone else and then it is no longer pure or play. And I no longer feel like me. I only need to focus on the thing. It’s better that way. Everything else is irrelevant. 

Bookstore

I should have walked back home. Instead, I took a detour to the used bookstore. For about three hours, I inhaled literary dust and cat dander. This was maybe a mistake; I’m still undecided. Now my throat tickles, and I haven’t stopped wiggling my nose, or sneezing since yesterday.

Community

At my most full, I’ve nourished myself with some sense of community. It’s key. It doesn’t have to be community in a big way. Sometimes being in community looks like time with one other person who gets it. It makes a difference. I wonder what it would look like to carve out and shape a community myself. I’d probably get more of what I need if I cultivated it than I would waiting for others to figure out how to create it.

Daylight

The days are short again. Less sun, so my energy dwindles too.

The days must be rearranged again. More inward too.

Exit

The moon was pasted against a starry sky when I passed through the back of a local high school. I looked at the glass door of some science classroom. The glowing red of the exit sign inside caught my eye. I stared until I was distracted by the decorated lawn, where ghosts hang from the trees, across the street. No one else was outside. It was silent. All I could hear was the subtle scraping of a leaf gently flowing along the cement.

Future

There might be something to preserving writing that is less polished. Someday, somewhere, a future-me may look back on my own words and see within my clunky wording and phrasing a truth; within this text is a sincerity and a reaching for something beyond me. I hope to always look back at what I’ve written and my constant attempts at trying to get it all right with the deepest affection.

Garden

I want my life to be a meditation. Not one filled with a humdrum nervy tension; more like the same kind of mindful sensations I get from the sensual experience of a morning at my local rose garden. The colors, the floral fragrance, the earthy fresh crisply cut grass, the water flowing from the fountain, all blooming under a motionless quiet; It’s grounding. I’m not looking for an escape. I just want better integration.

Hide

Some people are so scared to expose who they truly are, so they hide by holding on tightly to their writing, refusing to share it with anyone. But I wonder how many of the writers I know are actively hiding behind their published words.

Impressions

Like an impressionist painter who strives to capture the essence of an ephemeral thing, I too, am trying to capture impressions; painting my own perceptions. I’m not trying to beat the sun, I’m not worried about lighting, but even with words everything feels fleeting. 

Jealousy

In thinking about it, witnessing a mild jealousy in someone is actually kind of useful. It does point to what they care about. That’s not a bad thing.

Know

We can never know all the people and places that made someone who they are. In a way, that always makes me feel robbed of ever really knowing anyone or anyone ever really knowing me.

Loyalty

Being a loyalist by nature is frustrating. I’ve been told it’s a great quality, but I think it’s mostly because other people benefit from my loyalty more than I ever do, or ever will. It’s taken time to learn that not everyone is deserving of such loyalty. I no longer give it away so freely. Blind loyalty is unbecoming. But I’m still learning.

Moon

I think I like myself most when the moon is out. Some people feel the possibility of a day in the morning, and though I am a morning person, I think I feel and believe in my own possibility most when the sun has gone down. The world is entirely quiet. There is more room to imagine. It’s easier to dream awake in my sleepiest state; everything feels loose and open and possible.

New

I’m always convinced I’ve made a bad first impression when meeting someone new. I either feel like I haven’t said enough, or I say a few things, and feel like I’ve said too much. Either way, I end up convinced they hate me. It’s humbling.

Out loud

Write about all the things you’re afraid to say out loud.

Place

In reflecting on my favorite places, I drop into different moments. I’m reminded how I like the feeling of a pause in a conversation. But I also like the feeling of listening to a voice so deeply I feel like I’m sinking into the lush nooks of a person’s brain or soul. If it counts, my favorite place might be in the corners of those moments.

Questions

I hate being asked big and broad questions. I mostly don't know how to answer them. The more specific, the better; it’s easier. Otherwise, it’s overwhelming deciding what I want to share, what is okay and makes sense to share, and what is worth sharing. I end up in a mental game of chess, imagining all the ways a conversation can go. It’s dangerous.

Roses

Every time I’m among the rows of roses, I think about what Emerson said: “The earth laughs in flowers.” I want to live in the thick of that laughter forever. But soon, they will be gone and they will leave behind a blanket of dull quiet.

Slow

Sometimes I feel like I need to justify my desire and prioritization for going slow. I don’t. Things have moved slowly these last couple of years, I know. At first, out of necessity. Now, out of love. It’s a good place to be in, I think. I don’t know if in the future I’ll ever have time to go slow the way I do now. That will change at some point. It might be soon, I don’t know. But I do know that I don’t want to look back and remember my own impatience and longing for something quick and clear and easy. I like slow. Right now, there’s a high level of uncertainty, and stumbling, and if I succumb to comparison, insecurity. But at some point, I’ll have more certainty and less stumbling, and I know I’ll miss the time when everything was slow and in the process of being figured out, and myself in the process of becoming. Even just thinking about it I can already feel myself missing it while I still have it. I don’t care about anyone’s timeline. Right now, I celebrate my slow. It’s the best thing I ever gave myself.

Text

I was so late to getting a cellphone. I would still use pay-phones until sometime during my senior year of high school. Since I couldn’t text, my best friends would show up and toss rocks at my window to get my attention. When I finally got one, I remember the panic once I realized everyone had instant access to me.

Useful

Stepping away from my job allowed me the space to interrogate different parts of my identity and made me examine and question my own worth. I still haven’t figured out how to untangle my worth from how useful I am to everyone.

Voices

Over a decade ago, we sat sat on the dirty carpet of a Barnes & Noble, reading children’s books together. We took turns reading in animated voices. We giggled and got stares from strangers. But we just laughed harder and made the voices funnier.

Walk

I walked by someone who smelled like sunscreen. Instantly, I smelled childhood. It’s weird. I was reminded of summers in the backyard pool and the feeling of pruney fingers. And that tired. That kind of tired that felt so good, the tired from being in the sun too long and having too much fun, the tired that hits you with a full-body joy, a tired that is earned from an afternoon well spent, a tired baked in memories. That sunscreen smell has stayed with me since then. I can't let it go. Maybe because it makes me a little bit sad, or maybe because it makes me a little bit happy. Sometimes I think I don’t even know the difference between the two feelings anymore.

X

I feel like I blinked and suddenly my calendar is filled with X’s marking off each day. Soon, the year will be over. And I don’t know how I feel.

Young

I look up and I see a little boy, maybe around 5, and he’s running across blades of grass chasing bubbles. He shouts while waving his arms. I see his grandma and grandpa smile. I put my book down and watch. Him, so young with life ahead. Them, so much older with who knows how much time left. And I’m somewhere in between it all and I can’t help but cry.

Zoom

I’ve seen and spent more time talking to some strangers on Zoom more than I have certain family members or friends I’ve known for years. It is both a strange, and beautiful thing. I’ve sometimes felt guilty because of it. I still haven’t made sense of it.

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Hi friend!

Thank you for checking out this issue of Sunday Candy.

This was filled with a hodgepodge of my thoughts plucked from various places from various dates. I’m curious, did anything resonate?

Drop me a comment and let me know what you’re thinking!

See you next time.

Stay Tender,

Sandra