Transactional love
Love has veered away from its divinity. Its become “earthly” and transactional. Before going on a new years eve run, an older immigrant delivery man, rushed inside to grab a food order he misdelivered to the wrong address. It was 11 pm, exactly one hour before new years. We exchanged a smile, and he expressed a minor sigh of light hearted despair in his mistake. This was a reminder that there are people who work, while the world celebrates. He spun around the back of his car to enter the driving seat, where I then noticed, his wife accompanying him during his delivery.
I watched, and quickly started my run. Reflecting on the existence of love in a shared struggle. The plethora or perpetual metamorphosis of love. As the children of immigrants, we’ve witnessed the downfal of sacrificial love, yet we still crave it. All other forms of transactional love feel shallow. But the ministry of presence, “through thick and thin” seems to be the purest type of love to us in the end.
“we just respond creatively to what humanity pushes aside”
architects on shipping containers.
it was a really hot and sunny afternoon, i was walking out of fairview from the new food court entrance, towards my motorcycle. i wore ripped jeans, a bandana, venice beach harley t shirt. before hopping on the bike, i received the email : “you are in failed standing”. i was kicked out of university for a period of 1 year. I knew the consequences ahead; I had no real plan. And i was going to be stuck working at the bank.
Despite it all, i couldn’t help but feel free.
I texted inder, and i called mel. mel was immediately trying to figure out a plan to save my ass; get me back in; make a plan to talk to mom and dad. but i just did not care about any of it, and i told her i had no real interest in mending the damages.
From the height of the playground, I saw, and waited for the train to pass. Grand-Papa Paul would sit on the metal bench, and read his papers. When the train would pass, he would tell me dad was on that train. To wave at everyone going to work. I’d focus on every passing window, waving at everyone, fixating to find him. Some silhouettes behind the windows would wave back. Once the train passed, and my goodbyes were waved, I’d play with the dome web structure, and the mini sand tractor. In the end, I wasn’t sure if he was ever on the train. But there was comfort knowing at least someone received my regards on the way to work.
١١١ بورت سعيد
sea shells still sing
sea shells still sing
behind her brown pupil lies a vacant room. mud bricks, and wood shutters. An ancient city, a spirit follows her in tobacco smoke. the universe seemed to move one way on Port Said; a street of trades. Where she learned the value of her knits. learned to trade for her kids.
behind her other pupil lies a vacant room. painted baby blue for the boy who once grew. playing hide and seek in the blinds, counting the electrical lines. powerless without her feet, and restless without her sleep.
white clouds have filled those eyes, fragmented, and driven. with no sight of direction, the waves creak and rumble like the wheels of a wagon. they roll with a gentle strong momentum, day by day, from one room to the next. in their vacancy, they ripple and resonate. Once lived, their music still rings like the shell of an empty conch.
We’re doing great!
And he found that he hungered after them [mountains] much as he thirsted for the water; but he knew the mountains were there, he could see them; and he did not know precisely what hunger or thirst they would assuage.
Butcher’s crossing
