i never understood what finding your voice really meant. after reading quote-unquote quality books, their prose ceased to be unique. i’m not sure what i mean here. maybe i mean the prose found a rhythm in each novel, the clauses segmented. as a student i attempted this staring down at my loose-leaf paper in grade school trying to find a written genesis, an inception to a masterpiece, something my essay has yet to be, rather, has yet to take form. now i delete, type, delete, type uncommon turns of phrase, substituting collections of words easily traced back to, re-reading, reading, and reading again.
i arrived in san francisco at 4:37 am with an american passport that felt heavy in my bag. i stared outside the train windows with wonder, finally free from the grip of adolescence. an immense pride reverberated through my chest as i traced the power line signals with my eyes up and down and up and down, daydreaming. i know people say wisdom is earned through time, but that’s just a lie we tell ourselves for not figuring out something important sooner. i knew the depths of my ego before my 13th birthday. i couldn’t afford to not know who before it was necessary as i feared my personality would calcify before i cared to revert anything back.
the explanation is escaping me but my body stops tensing up after the sun goes down. after spending months praying for longer days with sunlight, i’m impolitely asking for darkness like a petulant goth child. i spent the summer equinox staring out an apartment window fantasizing about the pastel blue sky collapsing down into a mosaic of stars, clouds transforming into plasma right before my grateful eyes.
for the past three weeks i’ve had the same recurring dream. in it, i’m looking off a building balcony that faces spadina with pure shock and awe, watching snowflakes fall on the ground in the middle of the summer. the patches were small enough to be transparent, ice collecting on the perimeter of each mound. people surrounded the buildings wearing coats and scarves, somehow all in a trance, not scared, certainly not alarmed. regardless, i brushed it off the first time, annoyingly reciting to an article to myself, reassuring whatever my subconscious is working through represents “blessings soon to be called upon” and “a much needed clean slate” i’ve been manifesting for, all while navigating a busy street market across town.
i was scrolling through reels (as one does at 6:51 pm on a monday) and my mood was sadly soured by the takes of white people talking about, of course, hip hop in a podcast studio. ignoring the obvious micro-aggressions from everyone in room, it speaks to, i think, a conversation that we’ve been having for decades at this point. said conversation has been characterized by the golden age fallacy (i.e., the belief that a specific period in the past is objectively better than the present), with many perpetually looking backward, averting their gaze on the art being created in the present. for anything that does illicit some response—teetering between neutrality and small bouts of un-enthusiasm—it’s more of a fluke than an indication that good art is out there for us to enjoy.
and if the world ends tomorrow surrounded by the burning. despite it all. i want to try. i want to look for something more, waiting for something to break in my favor. if i sit with the desire for too long i can feel a cry bubbling up. i’m not asking for much. not fame nor fortune. but to teach. why do i always lag behind? is it the past sticking to me? will i ever be sterilized?
my brother said he didn’t become a person until he was 16. everything else prior was a blur or forgotten outright. how could he ever remember me as a child? or the apartment by lindsay park? or the walk from humboldt to graham? i swear i was there. i don’t say i’m from The South but my personality crystallized in the repeatable suburbs of florida. my friends drove me everywhere. i survived without a license by unapologetically imposing my presence on my peers to get a ride home. i was always a passenger lending an ear. i remember the muted teal pacifica with the peeling leather seats that sucked in the humid heat, a victim to my neurotic inspection on the way back, somewhere. i befriended the viscosity the florida warmth bestowed upon me. i was always dewey with sweat. it never bothered me, really. the landmarks we considered holy were parking lots, stoplights, and boba shops within shopping centers. it’s trite but obvious but true! the backdrops to arguments were mundane. i look out to no skyline or bustling street. it’s a cul-de-sac i’ve walked 100 times. the prospect of leaving was more enticing than our daily lives. i can’t wait to go. my life will start once i leave this place. why would i ever come back here? i feel trapped; a prolonged prison sentence despite good behavior. when will i be released? the streets have not changed. the routes i organized in my mind still run the same. time has not moved. middle class hell indeed. no wonder no one ever wanted to stay. was i even supposed to be there in the first place? i became a person there.
this is a musical answer to the question: are men still yearning?
i’m most drawn to the songwriting where love spells tells his partner no, i’ll take the blame for their eventual downfall, even if no intimate details can be shared with curious bystanders. he even guards their relationship with pride telling us to worry about ourselves if we push our inquires too far. the music video paints this picture of pushing and pulling away from a relationship that shouldn’t work, but with sheer, white-knuckled will, any opportunity for breaking up is closed off. in the visuals, love spells dances his way to the door of his lover (very manakin-like tbh), declaring his love publicly for her knowing that people will be peering outside curious to see the finalé.
i started listening to lush because i wanted to post a spotify link of my favorite song on twitter, all in attempts to get a like from a hot guy i (briefly) met at a house party. that aside, these two songs are some of the best indie rock to come out in recent memory. i’m most impressed with jordan’s guitar playing, switching between pretty abrasive strumming patterns and intricate finger plucking seamlessly. these songs also pair narratively: speaking terms seems to have the narrator assert their agency over an unloving partner insisting that they have unknowingly gone too far. despite this, heat wave starts with (presumably) the same speaker, waking up in their clothes having dreamt of them. we also can’t forget:
and i hope whoever it is
holds their breath around you
'cause i know i did
on an oddly specific personal note, this song represents expansion. i remember looping this album as it accompanied me walking in between classes my freshman year of college. how crazy was it to be free for the first time?
i want to say that i got into tennis before i saw challengers, but that would be a lie. rather than the movie itself sparking my interest in the sport, it was the coverage i saw online that did it for me. i watched countless sports creators give the “yep! this is pretty realistic!” stamp of approval on the film, and i felt just moved enough to watch the tour’s remaining competitions that year with a well-meaning, observant eye.
