Aaaand.... release
It's autumn: make like a leaf and let go!
Hi, hello!
Well. The Queen died. Yikes. Depending on your social media algorithm, that “yikes” will resonate with some—or, based on my personal online community, many—of you. I think that this event was a really good example of how the content we’re served reflects the version of the world we live in.
Personally speaking, I was totally insulated from any pro-Queen content. My version of the world is one which is unequivocally critical of imperialist institutions and present-day colonialism. My feed was a veritable overwhelm (yes, we like noun-ing verbs here) of accountability and, as Malcolm X would have said, chickens coming home to roost. This was my scrolling face for most of last week: 😬 (which is the emoji you get when you type “yikes”, btw).
A reliable metric for gauging a person’s algorithm was how shocked they were by anti-Queen memes. I know people who were hugely offended by like, one meme they saw on their socials, and my first reaction was that, wow, we were really not following the same people. I wonder what they would have made of my feed? I think, perhaps—hopefully—they might have questioned themselves and their default responses more if they knew what so many other people were thinking—that outside of their echo chamber, there was a whole world of marginalised people who really weren’t trying to celebrate the Queen and the brutal imperialist history she not only represented, but upheld. But without being touched by that experience yourself, how would you know?
I didn’t jump on the “ding, dong, the Queen is dead” bandwagon, myself. I needed to sit with the complicated feelings that have arisen to unpack them, and I kept my thoughts offline all week. I did know I didn’t want to celebrate her death—she was a person who had people who loved and mourned her, and that in itself merits some respect. I felt that her passing was a loss to visible female leadership—a Queen is all many of us have ever known, and I wonder what having a King will do for, or to, us. I suppose as a woman, the Queen felt kind of relevant for me, somehow? Whereas there is no part of me that vibes, on any level, with a King. Try as I might to care, I am coming up empty here. I also asked what good it does to put all of our focus on someone who has died when the institution behind her and her colonial legacy still exists.
And what of her family, anyway? One friend in the UK, who is second-generation Indian-British, and deeply uncomfortable with pro-royalist ‘Thank you ma’am for your service’ guffing, asked what exactly she was supposed to feel sad about: “My reaction was, ‘she was 96 and her family are a mess’”.
😬
True enough.
Regardless of where you’ve been getting your information this past week, the truth is this: there are very, very many people who are not sad that Queenie died. And in my opinion, this sentiment is truer and more valid than that of anyone who misses her. The only social media post about the Queen that I reshared this week asked, “What have you gained in your life from her 70 years of service?” I imagine that precious few can answer this question compared to the millions globally who can cite what they have lost in their life from her 70 years as a monarch—who have been systemically robbed, murdered, gaslit, marginalised, and traumatised in ways they, their families, and countries may never recover from.
Aside from checking any sentimentality in favour of keeping it 100, what I felt watching my social media-promoted news cycle this week was… awks. I mean, I think that the vast majority of us hope to be remembered fondly when we die. Remember that scene in Amélie where she bawled while imagining her own state funeral and a global outpouring of grief? It was adorable because it was so melodramatic but, still, relatable. One would hope, would one not, that we would be missed? That people would speak of the good we did, and that we left the world—our own personal corner of the world—better off?
Imagine dying and for millions of people around the world to collectively declare, “Good.”—particularly when you’d upheld an image your entire life as a much-loved, benign matriarch. God, it’s so awkward. Imagine that being your legacy. Do we think she knew? Do we think she cared? I don’t know what she actually did, but I rather think that if she had one job as so-called leader of the Commonwealth, it would be to have a good understanding of, and give a modicum of a shit about, how she was perceived by nonconsenting subjects around the world. And if she didn’t, well—she certainly wasn’t the nice old lady she was made out to be.
She should have done better. I hope the next one does better—and better than any colonist who has pulled out of a country by divesting entirely, left them to their own devices to figure it out, and then called them a third-world country while indebting them further for centuries to come.
In other news, it’s my favourite time of year. On September 1, I sat in an ambient courtyard bathed in cool sunshine and hit “play” on my favourite song, which I can only comfortably listen to 30 days out of the year.
I don’t know what to tell you, I find seasonal irrelevance deeply discomfiting.
And yet… The next day, I sat at my desk looking at the changing leaves outside my window while listening to Spring 0 by Max Richter, and thought about how autumn is really what spring is supposed to be: a beginning.
Perhaps it doesn’t seem seasonally incongrous to me because our relationship with spring, as canonised by Max Richter and Vivaldi, does feel appropriate to me at this time of year. Autumn 1, by comparison, starts out dramatic and playful and then takes a sudden turn to something like bereavement. In Sonnet 73, Shakespeare talks about autumn with sober finality. Why such sad? Why so “playtime is over”?
I guess it’s because we associate endings with loss—as the season that precedes the barrenness of winter, we tend to think about autumn as the beginning of the end. To me, though, autumn seems very present with life; not only the life that’s on its way out, but the promise of life to come that it’s making way for. In a life cycle, there has to be an ending for there to be a beginning. No new leaf without old leaf gone; ergo dead leaf is start of new leaf.
Autumn smells like renewal and fresh possibility, to me. I have a (perhaps strange) default response to something ending, which is that I immediately look forward to, and am hopeful for, something new beginning in its place. It’s a coping mechanism, for sure—I rely on the belief that what is on the way already is. This is not to say that I don’t mourn the loss of what has passed; if anything, I (begdrudgingly) allow bereavement to take up as much space and time as it needs to, and settle in for the long haul.
The other day, I read, “Much of my freedom and joy is bound up in my capacity to mourn.” I think one of the best things I’ve learned to do so far in life is to mourn—a life, a love, any loss, however significant or inconsequential. I’ve finally understood that bereavement doesn’t pass until it’s been acknowledged, accepted, and permitted to have its way. Not only does it ease, it’s freeing—my capacity for love, joy, and growth has increased immeasurably on the other side of submitting to loss.
Recently, I lent my friend Lukas a copy of When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron. He texted me the other day to say he loved the highlights I’d made, and I was immediately self-conscious—oh god, what had I unknowingly revealed about myself? (I’ve always thought that, if you really want to get to know someone, borrow their Kindle and go through all their highlighted passages. I would like to do that with someone, one day—but accidentally exposing myself feels very vulnerable indeed!) As I was writing this, I asked him to send me random pages I’d marked—this one seems especially relevant:
In the past, I’ve both avoided feeling a loss and clung onto the thing I’ve lost. Imagine if nature worked that way; if the turning of the leaves was suspended because it was too uncomfortable for the tree, if they were not allowed to fall off because the tree wanted to hold onto them?
I might cry bullshit and hate it every time, but I know better now than to clutch on to a falling leaf. I have to acknowledge every time I lose something that I wanted: this is good for me 🥲 Because the pain in the ass of it is, it always is. Nothing falls away inorganically. I’m aided by a particularly clinical belief that something has to die to make way for something new—and as long as I let what didn’t work for me lay where it fell, the new always ends up being better than the previous thing was.
Be that as it may, this particular pontification was brought to you by the golden days of a Berlin autumn—we’ll see how it holds up once the bleak winter hits and I can’t imagine ever seeing daylight again. I just found out that my vitamin D3 levels are a bit on the low side so watch me stockpile supplements like a squirrel with acorns.
Things That Helped This Month
The Unicode Consortium
Because to communicate effectively, words alone do not suffice (emoji literally means “picture letter” in Japanese). The folks at emoji HQ are really nailing it these days—🫶 is my new favourite but I also use 🥲, 🥹, 🥰, and 🤌 liberally. A picture may not speak a thousand words, exactly, but the Japanese know better than anyone that sometimes a picture does speak better than a word. To express intense physical attraction? 😮💨. When something is more mdr than lol? 💀. Why does this matter? There’s a lot to be said for the comedic value of a well-chosen emoji, but mainly because I imagine a great portion, if not the majority, of our daily communication takes place via text these days—and it’s so important to be able to show how we’re feeling even if we can’t see the person’s face (or hand). I guess what emojis have done is facilitated better emotional connection in text-based digital communication—what a wonderful by-product of something we just do for funsies, and how rare that any digital shortcut might actually impact us positively and meaningfully. Or maybe I’m overthinking it, I don’t know.
Everything, Everywhere, All At Once
Have you seen this movie? It is bananas. And beautiful, and bonkers, and moving, and profound, and hilarious, and a whole trip—which is what someone suggested the writers were on, and I can fully believe it. I still cannot fathom how someone wrote, let alone imagined, this film. While we were watching the film, it was one of the most reactive audiences I’ve sat in, maybe ever—but when we were filing out, it was one of the quietest and most subdued. We were collectively shook. The writing and performances were transcendent, but the experience itself was lovely, too. My friend Caitlin and I went to see it at the open air cinema in Hasenheide park, a gorgeous setting that I’m pissed I only discovered at the end of summer. I will go again ASAP and next time, I’m taking cushions; the benches are not made for bodies in their late 30s.
That good-good energy
For some time, the joy in my life has been like that movie: in everything, everywhere, and all at once. In the last six months, I tapped into some inner abundance that has translated to and shifted my external world. Even passing interactions have been so delightful and enriching—and the more I experience, the more it yields. It’s nauseatingly wholesome, I know. I’ve observed this effect: when I share my joy (which is easily accessible, all the time), it’s not my energy that people receive; rather, it activates their own, and it multiplies. I described this to my friend Alex the other day and he told me that I was describing electricity. I love this evidence that we’re all just conductors of joy.
My own home
I came back to my own apartment in July after a year living in other people’s, and it’s been pure bliss. It’s not just that it’s mine; there’s something about my apartment, specifically, that seems to have a particular energy that is incredibly soothing to everyone who sets foot in it. “Restorative energy” is not something I’ve associated with Berlin (in the old buildings, particularly) but my place seems to channel something very light and positive. I think I really lucked out. As much as I love travel and new experiences—and although it’s only a matter of months before I get itchy feet again—I’m going to delight in nesting for a while.
Jazz
Heavily into Bill Evans and Ahmad Jamal these days thanks to my friend Aron, a jazz musician who regularly sends me what he’s feeling on a particular day. I’ve been writing to it a great deal, or just opening all my windows and flooding the communal courtyard with it. Hopefully my neighbours love it too—in my opinion, it’s preferable to my upstairs neighbours’ midnight techno.
A sobering podcast
I’ve enjoyed nerding out to Dr Andrew Huberman and his long-ass, deeply scientific rambles for some time. I had to take a few deep breaths and stare at my podcast app and walk away from it a few times before I listened to one of his recent episodes, though. As usual, it’s highly informative—and, as I can confirm from my ensuing lifestyle changes, it’s also highly effective.
Salads
Come warm weather or cold (I love me a hot salad), I can’t get enough of putting vegetables into bowls in various configurations—with noodles, on toast, roasted, confit, or hashed, dripping with balsamic vinaigrette, pomegranate molasses, tahini, gochujang, goma dore (ごまドレ), or hot sauce... Putting it all together is the most delicious and rewarding endeavour I can treat myself to. Spending an hour in my kitchen listening to a podcast or a great playlist and filling a bowl with yummy love is beyond self-care, it’s pure happiness—and it’s one of those joys that’s best enjoyed alone. Here are some of my recent greatest hits:
Jennifer Coolidge’s moves
Pretty sure I posted her last Emmy speech exactly this time last year. Anyway, this one is a gift, too. Thank you for your service, ma’am.
Cats That Helped This Month
I know everyone says this about their own kids, but my cats are the frickin best (I said what I said).
I hate that I moved them back into an apartment without a garden—as always, I’m committed to upgrading one day to a home with an outdoor space. For now, they have adjusted sweetly and are as adorably low-maintenance than ever.
A friend said to me the other day that he doesn’t “get” having pets—his view is that pet ownership implies some kind of codependency. To be honest, I get this about a lot of dog owners (I’m sorry—it just feels like a lot of mutual neediness), but cats are so unobtrusive that having them around feels simply like enhanced alone time. Ironically, they were all over said friend when he came over—cats really don’t give a fuck if you like them or not.
It’s been a wildly productive month and a half. I can’t stop making things, which is the best possible way I can feel. Is it the best way anyone can feel? I heard something yesterday that resonated with me profoundly: that we should prioritise satisfaction over needs because there is no satisfaction in need, and that satisfaction generates more satisfaction—and in the process, our needs will be met.
It’s certainly consistentent with the delight I’ve been experiencing lately—that ol’ electrical current—so I’m just going to keep doing what makes me glad and trust I end up in the right place.
🫶,
One of your best posts yet Meera. It is illuminating.