condolences

Today is Jack's birthday. He would have been 27. I took the day off from work to grieve and to spare myself interacting with anyone other than SRB and maybe a shopkeeper or two. One unusual part of the grief I feel in the aftermath of Jack's death is the need to be alone, to shut myself off from conversation. In normal times I don't mind being alone, but I draw energy from being with people. There is something deeply private about grief, though, and something tiring about people constantly sharing condolences. My grief is especially acute today, and my lack of tolerance for, well, anything.

This morning I talked to Mom, Dad, Linc and Linc's friend K for a little while. Other than Mom, they seemed drained. Linc spent four hours yesterday going through Jack's phone, a chore I can scarcely imagine doing. I'm grateful to him for doing it.

And I just finished, finally, going through the cards that Dad scanned and emailed to me, from friends and family. In the days after he died I wrote that there will be no new memories. I was wrong about that, other people's memories of him have poured into our lives. Some of them are in these cards. I took a few notes along the way, which I'll copy here:

• The first one to break me down was from Teresa Smith. So many of the cards say more or less the same things, but I didn't even have to read past her name to start crying. What a dear person she is. And holy cow what beautiful handwriting. 
• I have no recollection of the woman who says her first boyfriend was Jack. Her note was really sweet, I thought. 
• I'm grateful to Maryanne and Michael for writing a special note to Linc and me. 
• Brandon's card is beautiful and moving. "He could never make sense of life on this planet, in this form...and so he has taken another." True.
• I lost it a bit after reading Eyal's card.
• I really disagree with the Bill Coffin sermon, that we shouldn't say that sudden deaths are "the will of God." I'm not sure I believe in any kind of god at all, but if I do it's something like the god of Job, who wills everything into being and unbeing. The god of my understanding doesn't choose sides, doesn't consider some deaths natural and others against its will. If there is a god, it absolutely does go around with its fingers on triggers, its fists around knives, and its force in gravity and in every molecular bond holding together the concrete that ended Jack's life, the snow that caused Coffin's son to crash his car. Any other god is a lesser god, one too much like us, not worth venerating or even contemplating. To paraphrase Spinoza: If triangles could speak, they would say that God is eminently triangular. Bill Coffin is a triangle, and me too, and his god sounds an awful lot like a triangle, and I'm trying to embrace a god or something beyond my understanding that doesn't have our shape at all. 
• The mourner's kaddish is alright with me

The other reason I wanted to take the day off was to give myself time and space to confront Jack's death and my grief. I've written before about how easy it is for me to compartmentalize and put away things I don't want to think about. Mom said on a call the other day, in a different context, that one of my characteristics is a knack for being present. It's true that I have low anticipatory anxiety and that I let go quickly, for the most part, when plans don't turn out the way I thought they would. Those are things I like about myself. But a downside is that I don't readily allow myself to be present with my suffering. Jack died nearly two months ago. Today the sun is shining, birds are singing, I have lots of work to do, there are books to read and people to talk to and things to learn and trips to plan and a house to move out of and another to move into. 

But Jack is gone and I am deeply, deeply sad that I will never see him, hold him, laugh with him, play Scrabble with him, hear him rhyme, eat his cooking, be irritated with him or worried about him ever again. I must confront that pain, or else seal off a part of myself that I don't want sealed. 

A care package finally arrived today from a group of friends. They sent Cracklin' Oat Bran, peanut butter cups, confetti cake and frosting, a New Yorker and an Economist, and some books of poetry, and a sweet card. It must have been in the mail for weeks and I had to pay $55 in customs charges because Pakistan is a ridiculous country. I don't pay any income tax so actually I shouldn't complain too vociferously when they get me on things like that. Anyway I'm very excited about the COB. Must purchase some milk today.

Now it's lunchtime. SRB and I have some pad thai and some cabbage-carrot-beetroot-parsnip-onion salad to polish off, which is good. This afternoon I'll start packing and maybe make a trip over to the new place, to spread out the move. We'll hire a truck and a couple of guys on Saturday to do the furniture. 

Jack's dearest friend is going to be with the fam today in Silver Spring, which I'm glad about. I'll call tomorrow morning to be with everyone for a little while. 

pizza

A married couple that I'm friends with here run a private pre-K and elementary school. They're lovely, great people, one Pakistani-American and the other French, and once in a while they host a pizza party at their school. J, the husband, built a full-on brick pizza oven in the backyard and has a yeast culture that he keeps going. They get real semolina flour and make excellent dough in the afternoon, ask people to bring a couple of toppings each (SRB and I were tasked last night to bring Nutella and strawberries for dessert pizza), and then set up an assembly line where people take turns rolling out the dough, assembling their pizzas, and sticking them in the oven. J supervises by hollering at people to get out of the way and upbraiding the crowd for not keeping the pizzas coming fast enough. The result is quite possibly the only good pizza in all of Pakistan, certainly better than any restaurant I've been to or heard of in Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi, or anywhere else.

It's a beautiful day here again today. SRB is sleeping, I was watching Olympic giant slalom until a few minutes ago when I got bored because the live feed was showing the lower competitors. I'm sure it's very exciting for random guy X that he's competing in the Olympics and finishing 36th or 45th or whatever but there's not so much drama as a spectator. Turns out my interest in watching skiing on TV extends to maybe the 10th-best person in the world and not beyond. Good to know.

Once she wakes up I think the plan is to go for a nice long slow run around the diplomatic enclave and perhaps see a Black Panther matinee. Skype with M&D and Linc later.

rain

It is raining like absolute gangbusters right now. It sprinkled last night and was drizzling this morning and once the workday got underway the heavens opened. Earlier there was hail and a thunderstorm, now it's just a steady downpour. The last 18 month or so have seen a moderate drought -- the reservoir behind the dam that powers most of Islamabad and Rawalpindi was dangerously low last summer and fall -- so here's hoping we get a bit more of the same in the weeks to come. Rain on the window is in the fire in the hearth range of soothing sounds, too. Will need to figure out what to do about running until it warms up a little, though. 

communism for kids

Really wanted to like this. Bought it on a whim because it seemed like such a good, fun idea. But the execution of the "for kids" part reads like someone who has a pretty strong sense of what they're talking about rambling as they try to work out a good metaphor to explain it as they go. Nothing inherently wrong with that, it's a perfectly fine way to have a conversation with someone. But it really doesn't work in a book. The scenarios Adamczak describes as she spins out the metaphor she settles on are unclear and clumsy and fail to make her point. She herself sounds very convinced, though, which is nice for her.

And then of course the "for kids" part is just a cover for her to give a turgid if passionate rant in the second half that seems like it was lifted from a zine she maybe co-published. Blah blah blah jargonese blah blah blah.

Oh well. 

hm

Had a perfectly nice Sunday going. Went to sleep at a reasonable hour last night, woke up around 8:30, picked up omelette parathas and dal channa from Ravi, ate on the terrace at SRB's place. Talked to Gabby, brought up potential plans to meet up in Europe this summer. Came back to my house for lunch, took a nap, talked to SRB's dad (it's his birthday today). Then back to SRB's to play pool and find our vocal ranges on her housemate's keyboard. Then she started playing songs and I picked up her guitar and fussed around with it a bit, and she came over and showed me a couple of chords.

And suddenly I was restless and wanted to run, and then just as suddenly I felt very sad and enervated. Crying is not something I do much of, even when I want to (see earlier post), but I had a bit of that heavy chest, tight throat feeling that sometimes precedes crying. I left to run but came home and sat on the couch instead. Still sitting here, an hour later. People are coming over to the other house later to jam and hang out and for whatever reason all of a sudden I just want to be alone. Very strange feeling. Not pleasant. I think running would make me feel better but I can't stand up.

***

Yesterday evening before going out to dinner with SRB and a couple of friends who just got engaged and are leaving soon, I talked with Dad for a while. It was the first time we've spoken one on one since I got back to Pakistan and an intense and moving conversation. It's a remarkable coincidence that we each lost our youngest brother in our 30s, although the circumstances of Tom's and Jack's lives and deaths were very different. It's also quite amazing that his parents lost a beloved dog a month after Tom's death, just as we lost Sherlock within weeks of Jack's.

***

Strange.

***

Update: Went for the longest run of my life, 11.01 km (6.84 miles for those counting at home). Nice and easy, right at 5:00/km pace with a couple of stops for major road crossings. I feel much, much better. Very glad to have done that. Now will stretch and perhaps order a cheeseburger and some curly fries. 

dream

A couple of nights ago I had a dream. I was in a park on a sunny day, joining a meeting of colleagues from Geneva who were sitting at a long picnic table. We had a nice time, doing whatever work-related thing we needed to do, and then parting ways as the sun went down. People dispersed but my old boss Jo and our colleague Staci ended up sitting on some small bleachers with a railing along the bottom. I stood against the railing and we talked a bit, and Jo said something about being gentle. For whatever reason, the word "gentle" in the dream made me think of Jack and I started to cry. Not sobbing, just letting tears pour quietly down my face, turning toward my arm, which was braced against the railing. I woke up and without thinking checked my cheeks to see if they were wet.

Since soon after Jack's death, once we started talking about having a memorial service in the spring, I had it in mind to recite one of his poems or raps as a tribute to him. Over the last couple of days I've had a different thought. So much of his rapping at least was about pain and fear and drugs. Even his triumphant moments were about survival and overcoming really dark experiences. Those were part of his life -- a bigger part than for most people -- but he had joy and happiness and contentment and generosity, too. I want to focus on that. Lots more time to ponder and reflect, of course. 

super bowl

Steph finally convinced me to get a pedicure this weekend, my first ever. It was nice, I suppose. Something to do once in a blue moon on a lazy weekend day. But now I have purple toenails, and that makes me think of Jack, who went through a passionate nail-painting phase nearly 20 years ago. I honestly don't remember if he ever painted my nails, although my guess is he did. Either way, men or boys wearing nail polish outside a greater expression of gender fluidity always makes me think of him. So my cis self is enjoying the sparkly bright color and also getting a little twinge every time I take my socks off and look at my feet.

Talked to Linc for a good while on Friday night. It was the first time we'd spoke on the phone since I got back to Pakistan and it was good to check in. Fingers crossed for him in this many-stepped-but-actually-not-all-that-lengthy-when-I-think-about-how-long-it-just-took-me-to-hire-one-person job application he's got going on. Fingers crossed for SRB in her application to the Australian High Commission, too.

Speaking of SRB, we started looking at places to move in together. Her lease is up in March and I'm living month-to-month: my lease ended in November and my landlord hasn't made a fuss about me signing a new one. She first suggested it last year and I resisted, but something recently flipped and now it feels good to be trying to find a space to be in together. My place is nice and cozy and funky but it's also small and dim. Might as well try out a bigger place while I'm still living somewhere I can afford it! Most of the places we've looked at this weekend were kind of eh, but a couple in the fanciest neighborhood are promising. One's a basement but recently renovated and nicely designed. Another is an "upper portion," as they call it here, otherwise known as an apartment that starts on the second floor. We're split on which of the two we like better -- she's into the basement because of the newness and niceness, I'm into the latter because it's spacious, surrounded by green, and full of light. But the one I like really is a bit shabby and the kitchen is cramped and kind of tucked away, which is a bummer. We'll revisit them both at evening prayers, when you get a sense of (1) what it's like with less direct sunlight and (2) how loud the azan (call to prayer) is. Azan volume is critical because the first one is pre-dawn and if it's loud it can wake you up every day. We checked one place out this afternoon from which you could practically read the brand name on the speakers on the minaret. Hard pass.

No urgency there because her housemates have both found other options and if we don't find a place we really like she can move in with me for a little while or vice versa. Her current place is okay but it's enormous; we'd have lots of unused space. Good balcony and garden though.

It's Kashmir Day here, a federal holiday, perfectly timed to coincide with Super Bowl SunMonday. So I was up at 4 AM, making coffee and then driving over to a friend of a friend's place to watch the game in the wee hours. SRB stayed asleep until around halftime and then joined. This friend of a friend is an American diplomat so has access to bacon, and our mutual friend made pancakes with chopped up strawberries and bananas on top. Most delicious. Plus the game was outstanding, a real barnstormer featuring the most yards ever gained in a single game in the history of the NFL, and also the first team to gain 600 yards and lose in the history of the NFL, and the team that lost is the team I wanted to lose. Fly Eagles, fly. My fandom feels truly liberated now, in the FreeDarko sense of no longer caring about any one team but only rooting for the games to be entertaining, the players skilled, the narratives compelling. This Super Bowl delivered.

Two short naps and a bunch of reading and apartment visiting later, the sun's going down. SRB is working on her macroeconomics course, I'm writing this post, we'll go for a run some time in the near future. Back to work tomorrow.

perfume: the story of a murderer

Gripping, unique thriller about a man with the world's greatest nose, a bloodhound on steroids, who is consumed by scents and indifferent to everything else. But he himself gives off no odor and is thus off-putting or unnoticeable to people he meets. He becomes obsessed by the scent of virginal young women, and a couple of them in particular, and sets out to create a scent that captures their essence. This involves him becoming a master perfumer, a hermit, an even greater master perfumer, and then a serial killer.

It's a really good tale and the writing is wonderfully rich. The original language is German but it doesn't feel like much was lost in translation. A huge proportion of the imagery is, unsurprisingly, given over to the odors that make up the protagonist's day-to-day existence. I've never encountered anything like that. I was seized by the desire to read it after Diane Ackerman refers to it in A Natural History of the Senses. It did not disappoint.

In related news, a writer in the UK started a prize for thrillers and mystery fiction that do not involve violence against women. The one disappointing thing about Perfume is the boringness of young virgins as the object of desire ne plus ultra. Looking forward to seeing the Staunch Prize shortlist later this year.