CHASING THE GRAND
Continuously, a question lingers at the
edge of my throat. A question about the entities of necessity we allow to
consume us. What is desired? How much is enough? At the edge of my throat, it
lingers, this quiet question. But I am not choked by my inadequacy of a
befitting answer, I am rather engrossed in a futile yet momentarily satisfying
form of distraction. Because some questions are harder to answer than others.
Last week I had an enjoyable conversation
with an amiable vegetable seller in the market. She complained about the
weather, the government and old age. She told me about her daughter who was
around my age and was having her first child soon. She seemed happy to be a
grandmother. The corners of her eyes crinkling with soft happiness.
As I watched her, I felt like I was folded
into a moment where the only thing that mattered was the green smell of
vegetables sliced through by very sharp stainless-steel knife, and me touching
her happiness with my tongue and refusing to welcome the foreign taste in my
mouth.
It tasted strange because I could not
understand it. It was not the kind of happiness I could share because I did not
understand how to want it.
What kind of happiness did I desire? The
kind carried by a travelling foot. Rubbed into skin of fulfilled dreams. Buried
underneath the layers of a restless heart. I desire the kind of happiness one
desires in the prime of youth. Complete with mad anxiety.
How much would be enough? Muscles-full of
fatigue. Skin deep shrivelled with age. Heart bursting through, filled with
experience. Maybe.
I am chasing the grand, as a lot of us are.
Our grand idealistic dreams that we savour with tongues shivering in uncertainty.
Our dreams, they vary. The taste of happiness on our tongues are different. The
feet we carry, diverse. The hearts that carry us, assorted.
We hold on to these hopes, even if they
leave us empty sometimes, screaming soundlessly into a world consumed with
noise.
We hold on because we cannot stop ourselves
from wanting the taste of happiness.
A hi nya, with
love, x E
Photography
|| Ene Ijato
Styling
|| Ene Ijato
2 comments
[URL=https://naviadv.com]In NAVI[/URL]
ReplyDeleteHappiness differs.
ReplyDeleteI just hope the woman's daughter is happy, just as her mother is happy about having a grandchild soon.
Individuals like her makes ot looks like marriage is an achievement to me because I wonder the essence of telling me her expectation for a grandchild.
Eager to hear your thoughts!