Stacks

I’ve talked to so many people around the world over the years, and written just as many letters. Sometimes when I try to piece together my bygone years, I go back and reread them, trying to remember how I described myself or my day to whoever was on the other end. It’s strange how differently I remember a year versus how I described it while I was actually living through it.

I always thought of 2018 as an unremarkable year. Then I found a letter I’d written to a stranger and realized I was still spiraling back then. I am not sure, how I never noticed this before or why don’t I remember it as a lonely year? That one caught me off guard. This particular letter went to someone I never actually got introduced to in real life. We stayed pseudonymous to each other the whole time and lost touch after a few months of exchanging messages, but was one of the first people exchanged many letters with. Here’s a letter from a random day in September 2018.

Hey ██████,

So how did your weekend go? Did you meet your friend and her 3 year old? I think that is a fun age. You can converse with kids and sometime it can be hilarious.

Wow, your dreams are kind of intense. Shooting people! That is sort of hard-core. I usually am just selling drugs or escaping a high speed car chase.

Now it is 12:22 am in night. I have given it my best to sleep. But the sleep eludes me tonight. Don’t think it is going to be with me anytime soon. Plus I have a bad irritation in throat so I was coughing incessantly. I decided to come out in the eerie silence, make myself some hot water and settle down with some music.

I am listening to Re: Stacks by Bon Iver. It is one of my favourite songs albeit a bit depressing. But on the days I am feeling low, it gets me through. Today is one of those days. How do you deal with days that don’t go the way you wanted them to?

I sulk a bit, don’t talk much, usually hole myself in and then when I am lying in my bed I think about a worst possibly lonely situation and then work from there towards hope. Today I was imagining, a cloudy evening, really dark. Right before it starts raining. Standing on top of a mountain at the edge overlooking a valley. No big trees. Only short shrubs and grass. Chilly wind. Really windy. And not a soul for hundreds of miles away. Standing there lost. And then it starts raining. So I am standing in the rain, feeling chilly and there is absolutely no one who can help or console. And then I start walking to somewhere, although I have no idea where. But the thing is that if you really think about it. I might be cold and lost and night is falling in. But in couple of hours it will be morning and hopefully Sun will feel nice. Unless you are in Iceland or Norway of course, in which case anyone will shiver and die. 💀

Imagining stuff like this sort of helps. I know it is a bit melodramatic but that is how it goes on in my head. I was just thinking about how you said the kids live in their own world. I think everyone does, we just stop acknowledging it. There are so many things that you know I think but I will never say out loud, cause it is petty, childish, embarrassing or just inappropriate. But that is how we all are, I suppose.

Next song in my headphones is, Holocene by BonIver. They shot the video of this song in Iceland. It is incredibly beautiful. I love the song as well. If you are into English music you should check it out or atleast the video. I don’t think everyone will love Bon Iver. I think knowing that I like his music makes me feel old. 🙂.

Anyway, I think, you’d be like what kind of crackpot is this guy on? Well, looks like I am going to get another mug of hot water and sift through my catalogue of music.

Until then, stay away from that gun in your dreams, unless you are surrounded by aliens trying to probe your mind. In that case fire away.