We know where our pains are. Which movements hurt most, how long time we can hold on, stand up, stand out or stand for. Only we know where and when, how and why. Only we know when it should end because we are the cause and effect of it. We carefully grow and harvest our pains.
It’s funny to see how somethings inside of us change, and others stay apparently still.
Following the idea that even our cells are constantly being replaced for new ones, our ideas, tastes and hopes also go changing and being replaced, every single day.
Some of our feelings, deep inside, are also exposed to the action of time and even though we don’t clearly notice it, when they wake up, they surprise us with old tastes, but completely new sensations about it.
The other day, after all the travelling around the world I have done for the past 20 years or so, I caught myself sitting on a bus station, waiting for a bus to visit a dear friend of mine, from my very teenage years. I have had a car, all through my adult life, so the whole experience felt very new, funny, exciting for me.
Suddenly, awaiting for the bus, I had it all there, right in front of me.
I could taste, see and feel exactly how it was, 26 years ago, at that same spot.
I was a girl that felt in cloistered in a city that didn’t have anything to offer or challenge me, a dreammer and a quite smart girl surrounded by very ignorant people who’s aim in life was to get married and grow old. To me, while that city ment death for me, that place ( a bus station) ment the vortex to life itself. I remembered getting any possible excuses to grab the first bus out of there and stay away as long as I could. I did that many times and dreamed of the day I could really drive out of there and never, never look back. So I did.
And because of that I was happy enough to do amazing things in life, to travel, to see and live stuff so beautiful that no explanations are possible and no other soul would be able to relate to the kind of magic life can be and offer, if not having such desperate, hungry soul and eyes like mine.
I felt very compassionate with the girl I was. I understood how much she suffered back then and how unappropriated she felt in that poor, weird, hostile environment. I honour my effort to get me out of there. And I am really happy I ever did.
In the other hand, destiny brought me back… It was like life wanted to show me that not everything, out of a hell-ish experience, was lost. At that point I understood that some treasures in life grow in the darkest times and places and makes us better people because we endured it.
I realized that the friend I was going now to visit was one of the few greatest gifts I got for free from life. I thought: “She is worth it” and so she is.
I understood that maybe that dark moment of my existance was so that I could meet and keep a friend like her for life. I understood that she saved my life back then, by only being my friend, and while I felt so disconected to that world, she brought me back to the very delicate sense of being happy no matter where or how.
Vania, I have a few things I didn’t say back then that i can say now:
You saved me.
You made it worth.
You transcend friendship, time and space.
I love you.
Thank you.
And now I am sure: all adversities bare beautiful, magical, hidden gifts in it.
For me, you were it!
And I am happy to be back for you!
I am participating with 7 paintings!
I am trying to keep a quiet heart while these days pass by. Excitement blands with deep confusion, and I go from desperation and anxiety, to solitude and ease.
One side of me is eager for whatever movement I can get out of each moment, while the other side is tenderly searching for the energy of each thought, trying to understand the delicate temperature of each feeling, every emotion.
I rather kill the beast that torments my dreams and crowd up my every attempt for peace.
But in order to do that I must keep calm and centered, which is the very opposite of what my soul is struggling to overcome. My shaky hands are trying to hold firmly on to that heavy shiny sward, while my fragile feed touch the unsafe and unstable ground beneath me. I focus on the silent noise that I can find deep inside my troubled mind and with eyes closed I try to conquer my enemy, so determined to drain my strength, and dry out my hopes, to crush down my spirit.
The soil is overheated and infertile, I know well this battle will not be an easy one.
I also know that fate is not an option or a for granted act of destiny.
I must continue believing and persevering, and also holding on to my pathway.
One day, all this evil will be a dusty and blurry memory, kept locked or dead enough to never bother me again. But until then, I will be counting on gigantic angelical wings to hold me in and keep me alive. I will count on innocence and dreams to keep my head above water and forbid me of drowning into my own tears. One day, hopefully, the devils inside and out will surrender to brighter days and allow my strength to rule my destiny. That would be nice. That shall be.
Time to say goodbye is the hardest thing for me.
I don’t say goodbye to people, no, I am not that cruel to myself… But I need to say goodbye to stories, to time that passes, to moments that end. I must say farewell to now to start the new now that is already coming. I can’t help it. I can’t avoid the cruelty of time when time comes. I am afraid of not liking the times ahead of me, so I suffer. I am afraid of missing the time I am leaving behind. Somehow I feel that I live in fear of all these farewells, all these lost moments, usually the moments I didn’t choose for myself, moments that time, life or destiny eventually pushes me into.
[…]
If I can’t avoid this time to pass, I will try to follow the advice of a very special acquaintance of mine. As this dear friend (may I call you friend?) said:
“look at things with this: how interesting that this happens, funny”.
So will it be.
I will stop fighting it. I will give in.Trust and surrender to these kind words of wisdom…
So, posting this painting of Saint George, the peaceful warrior killing the dragon (that’s how i feel) I will try to accept the inevitable, get on my way to the airport and leave.
Farewell… There, it’s done.
It’s never been easy being me.
I want to be here but also there.
I need freedom, but also love.
I feel passion and extrem boredom.
I am a mess, and yet peaceful.
I look for movement and color and rest my head in dark quietness.
That’s how it is.
Good and bad – they all end.
Luckly… And unfortunately.
Sometimes time feels like an eternity… Other times it escapes as water between the fingers.
I wish I could play some more.
But I can’t.
Not enough money.
Not the right passport.
Not enough time.
I am always afraid when the good now seems to escape too fast into a not so funny now.
Tomorrow may never happen, but somehow it still haunts me.
I want to stay here.
I want my now to freeze and i want all problems to stay as far away as possible from me.
That’s why here and now feels so good to me… Because it’s all I have.
People are walking disappointments in its full potential.
Here and now I do not count on them.
Loneliness suits me well here and now.
I am going back to the past, where everything ended.
My body aches as it was begging to stay.
Here and now is pure uncertainty, but is better then before.
And I am afraid of going back to before.
I don’t want o play that game anymore.
If all things must end, let the things that ended be dead.
Let the now never stop being.
Because, in fact, it never does.
Two trees and then, one tree.
A green chair that doesn’t match.
Pink wall, confusing and yet warm.
Hanging beads, no wind.
Transparency and grace.
A lonely vase, with a lonely tulip, on a lonely window.
The white cat licks its paw, then it stops… What’s happening?
One hand, curious eyes… Where is she?
Excitement. Thrill.
(…)
Blue sky, quiet clouds.
Pearls falling from trees.
Toys that we never play with
Charms for luck. Superstition.
Blue sky, frozen clouds, empty horizon.
More beads. Hanging quetly. No wind. No movement.
(…)
Will i ever be found?
Will i ever be loved?
Where is he?
What should I do?
Where should I go?
(…)
Marine blue boots ready to go. Deep purple umbrella. Scarfs.
Silence.
……………………………………………………………………………………….
Duas árvores e então, uma arvore.
Uma cadeira verde que não combina.
Parede rosa, confusa e ainda assim quente.
Contas penduradas, sem vento.
Transparência e graça.
Um vaso solitário, com uma tulipa solitária, em uma janela solitária.
O gato branco lambe a pata e para… O que está acontecendo?
Uma mão. Olhos curiosos… Onde ela está?
Excitação. Suspense.
(…)
Céu azul, nuvens quietas.
Pérolas caindo das árvores.
Brinquedos que nunca brincamos.
Amuletos para sorte. Superstição.
Céu azul, nuvens congeladas, horizonte vazio.
Mais contas. Penduradas quietamente. Sem movimento.
(…)
Vou ser achada?
Vou ser amada?
Onde ele está?
O que eu faço?
Para onde vou?
(…)
Botas azuis marinho prontas para partir.
Guarda chuva de um roxo profundo.
Cachecóis.
Silêncio.
The last 41 days, out of the 41 years I have lived so far, have been very intense, interesting, provocative, colored, instructive, satisfying, confusing. Words keep falling down on me like drops of very cold water, on a warm day, on my bare skin. Refreshing, amusing and yet disturbing, unsettleling.
Instigating words flew by:
Being fluid
System
Ecology of Sensations
Resistence
Criticism
Love
The right and the chance of being lost
Admiring the temperature
Sensing the light
Unfeeding emptiness
Sex without the body
Hidden kindnesses
Pleasure of not knowing
Intentional agressions
Infinite curiosity and wisdom
Woods that are able to bend
End.
…
Os últimos 41 dias, dos 41 anos que vivi até agora, têm sido muito intensos, interessantes, provocativos, coloridos, instrutivos, prazerosos, confusos. As palavras ficam caindo em mim como gotas de agua muito fria, num dia quente, sobre a minha pele. Refrescantes, diveridas mas ainda assim complicadas, incômodas.
Palavras instigantes voaram:
Tornar-se fluido
Sistema
Ecologia de sensações
Resistência
CrÃtica
Amor
O direito e a chance de se sentir perdido
Admirando a temperatura
Sentindo a luz
Desalimentando o vazio
Sexo sem corpo
Delicadezas escondidas
Agressões intencionais
Madeiras que se dobram
Curiosidade e sabedorias sem fim
Fim.
Thinking about things we accumulate throughout our lives and the way we clutter our inner and outer spaces. Good and bad, ugly and beautiful, we accumulate a whole lot of residuals from our experiences, impressions and time. Sometimes it’s like a cloud of virtual information, some times it’s like a dark and dusty room in the basement of our thoughts and feelings. No matter how laid in nicely it is, it’s clutter. When we do not pay attention to the frailty of existance we tend to surround our selves with things that will “serve” us later. We feel protected in the mess of our collections of past time, events and acquisitions but it only makes the pathway more full of obstacles, the luggage heavier, the view less wide. It’s like buying a heavy expensive coat to use during the winter in Siberia… When you are heading to summer in the Caribbean. If you can: Let go! Life only hapens in the present moment and the clutter you carry on you almost never will be as usefull as you thought it would. Give room to the new, to the light, to the unknown of each present minute of life. After all, all that you possess is not really yours and all this shall also pass.
…
Pensando nas coisas que acumulamos através da vida e como atravancamos nosso espaço interno e externo. Bom e mau, feio e bonito, nós acumulamos todos estes resÃduos das nossas experiencias, impressões e tempo. Algumas vezes é como nós acumulamos um monte de resÃduos a partir de nossas experiências, impressões e tempo. Às vezes é como uma nuvem de informação virtual, outras vezes é como um quarto escuro e empoeirado no porão dos nossos pensamentos e sentimentos. Não importa o quão arrumadinho esteja, é desordem. Quando a gente não presta atenção na efemeridade da nossa existência, a gente tende a cercar nosso ego com coisas que nos “servirão” mais tarde. A gente se sente protegido pela bagunça das nossas coleções do tempo passado, acontecimentos e aquisições, mas isso tudo só deixa o caminho mais cheis de obstáculos, a bagagem mais pesada e a vista menos panorâmica. É como comprar um casacopesado e caro para passar o inverno na Sibéria… Quando de fato você está indo para o Caribe. Se você puder: desapegue-se. A vida só acontece no momento presente e a bagunça que você carrega em você quase nunca vai ser tão útil quanto você pensava. Dê espaço para o novo, o leve, o desconhecido de cada minuto presente da vida. Afinal, nada do que você possui é realmente seu e isso tudo também há de passar.
luciana mariano 