supposed to be sleeping (#16)
...on transitions & cabbage roll stew
dear friends and all those who hate boxes (claustrophobes?),
i’ve been thinking a lot about thresholds ; not an understudied topic[1] and i do not pretend to say anything new. i’ve been thinking about these in-between moments : like drinking enough / the right amount of coffee, or how to make myself start writing or start washing the dishes, or to go from drowsy (overtired) to actually asleep. thresholds aren’t actually as thin as a door frame and they aren’t as clearly marked. you can get stuck / people are often stuck in that in-between zone.
Concretely, or as concrete as the inside of my head can feel, i worry and get stuck in the transitions between.
Concretely, material boundaries demarcate our existence : out of your mind, into your body. who wouldn’t want to be a floating brain, a brain in a vat : doesn’t matter if that disconnection also severs you from your autonomy. doesn’t matter if that disconnection renders you insensible aux autres. doesn’t matter because you can walk through people. (how you ask, can a floating brain, a universal me, walk straight through a person ? “an attentive observer will notice that such windbags are anxiously intent on confining themselves to the false transparency of a world they used to run; they do not want to enter into the penetrable opacity of a world in which one exists, or agrees to exists, with and among others.”[2] a question for a psychologist: what exactly do the un-selfaware think about all day?)
my neighbor wakes me up routinely, from a zzzquil induced sleep, because she believes the world is hers and that she is chez elle and not in an internat with paper for walls. i don’t think anyone here needs help making sleep more difficult, so you can imagine the rage that must be quelled when you are shaken from your sleep but if you yell – or get up – or look at your phone for the hour – if you react you risk not ever going back to sleep. what if you knocked a hole in the wall in your desperation for not silence but quiet. what if your anger woke the quiet girl on the other side of your room, and chainreacted the breach of night-ness further and further down the hall.
i’m getting stuck in between and have the horrible self-awareness to ask ‘did i even go back to sleep at all’ or did i remain half-alert for hours, begging my ears to focus on the fizz of pink noise. what does this have to do with writing if not the exact blend of lack of control, of mind control required to induce yourself into the feverish state of accessing your whole brain. of pulling the threads together like closing a drawstring bag, never fully closed in the center. i want to write like a transe like the transe of sleep or of dancing alone in your room in which your body disconnects from its routine ways of perceiving truth and settles into a simplicity that is always available to you. enjoyment for joy’s sake. pleasure as a way of knowing. feeling (duh) is also thinking.
this too shall pass faster than you think, like the blossoming allée whose petals wilt and fall before you even reach the parc’s edge. dead and dying flowers make way for allergies and dusty green leaves. and you just have to appreciate that spring dust is different, that it is vital and energized, the necessary layers shed in service of y/our renewal, constant and eternal.
– feed me
feed me udon noodles. feed me fresh and silky tofu. feed me fish, and the mushrooms you you rarely like. feed me the end of orange season and rhubarb compote. feed me the cardamom cake tinged with bitter pomelo rind. feed me a tiny pain mulitcéreales and sandwich au thon with a sliced hard boiled egg. feed me bad coffee but enough coffee and then drown me in hibiscus tea. feed me fluffy white blooms and the sun on the dreary days of march.
cabbage roll soup, (well, originally.)
Read Carolina Gelen’s recipe once for ingredients then riff/make things up to suit the size of your pot and the ingredients you can get at biocoop. Plus you are kind of tired of cabbage. So ignore regular old onions and instead sliver the green tops of a leek or two, stopping when you reach the lighter green-white core. Dump into a bowl and fill with more water than you think to passively rinse the silt from the tightly coiled leaves; the dirt will settle to the bottom and the green will rise to the top. Slice/dice a stalk or two of celery, and appreciate the pleasant fragrance offered by this watery stick of cellulose. Stick leeks and celery in a pot, not bothering to dry anything, because you are going to sweat them until they are soft: use a bit of water, rather than olive oil, to get this going because you don’t really want to brown them at this stage. When the vegetables are sufficiently soft, add 125g 85% lean ground beef {{vegetarians, etc: instead use an appropriate amount of olive oil and previously cooked beluga lentils, which are as quick to prepare as red lentils, but do not turn as easily to mush}}. Break up the meat into small pieces, and let it brown slowly, rendering plenty of fat to make this soup (stew?) unctuous. Scoop out about 1 tbs tomato paste and stir both to coat the things in the pot and also to prevent the paste from burning – you are going for a gentle caramelization that you’ll recognize as the deep scarlet paste goes ripe persimmon orange. At this stage, also include 1 generous tsp each of smoked paprika and fennel seeds. Pour in 80g-ish risotto rice, and stir to coat/deglaze the fond of the pot before adding 3 cups of water and the corresponding amount of bouillon. Mine happens to be incredibly salty, but if yours isn’t, you may want to season a bit at the vegetable stage. Simmer steadily for 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally and adding an additional cup of water/bouillon as the rice absorbs the liquid. It has been brought to our attention that this may be less of a soup, and more of a stew, but play with the amount of liquid until you are satisfied with the texture. The overall feeling should be soft for maximal comfort. Once the rice is tender but still has some bite, add the handtorn leaves of about ½ bunch of Rainbow Chard (the stalks add a beet-like earthiness that isn’t great in this soft stew, so save them for a different dish). Let the dark green leaves swirl until they are also tender, before serving yourself a bowl topped with parsley and mint leaves. my ancestors’ will to pickle speaks through me, so don’t forget to squeeze half of a lemon on top in lieu of vinegar elsewhere in the dish. These ratios serve two.
– read me
La plus secrète mémoire des hommes, Mohamed Mbougar Sarr
I have been blown away by this novel, which i would love to claim in the name of millenial irony. it is both a classic french novel and a cutting critique of frenchness, and it makes you want to read it forever, and also stash it away, savor it in small morsels.
it is a writer’s novel: which means a novel about writing, about a writer, for writers.
i’m sure it will be translated soon, it was the actual winner of the prix goncourt 2021.
La loi du rêveur, Daniel Pennac
Started this book as a palate cleanser from thinking too hard. Seems like a story about boyhood, but is fanciful in the peaceful way I was looking for.
La vie devant soi, Romain Gary
One of my all time favorite books. I was reminded of this book when trying to describe another. An ethics of care that is expressed through atypical relationships.
I finally got off the Libby waitlist for this book. the stories in the book revolve mostly around the author’s mother who is Alice Waters of Chez Panisse. i thought it would resonate a bit more, but i think i missed the moment for it to be satisfying. I’ll wait til there an audio format, which might suit more.
– admire me
the bright orange quilted puffer hopped on the bike and pedaled into the middle distance.
you don’t realize that the workshirt is actually a beige wool suit, but you can’t help but admire the length of hair that rests both delicately and with force above the chin : that optical illusion haircut that is short shiny and practical but luscious and flowing.
i would also wear the lugged boots whose final layer is deep iris purple, but purple is never really my color.
ochre linen with rounded black piping. the sofa is better dressed than me.
– clap for me
let’s hear it for a certain david r. who ran a half-marathon this weekend. cheers also to new york who reached an ambiant temperature of 72°F.
📸 credit: Mingyu Tang.
**new regular feature alert!** if you, a friend, or an event deserve a shoutout in this letter, please contact me or my intern my brother with the key details.
TRUISM #093489q87 : you do not have to be depressed to make good art. yes, you suffer for your art, and art can make you suffer. art is also the opposite of suffering.
[1] see postcolonial theory, and also virginia woolf: “with her foot on the threshold she waited a moment longer in a scene which was vanishing even as she looked, and then, as she moved and took Minta’s arm and left the room, it changed, it shaped itself differently; it had become, she knew, giving one last look at it over her shoulder, already the past” (to the lighthouse, 1927).
[2] Édouard Glissant, trans. Betsy Wing. Poetics of Relation (1997), p. 114.