A Dose of Octuple Patterns
(Inspired by Sei Shōnagon’s “The Pillow Book”)
Things that make me feel cheerful: The feel of a baby’s soft, tender and gentle fingers. The flesh of chubby cheeks. The taste of cuisine foreign to my tongue. The taste of cuisine familiar to my tongue. The bellow of my father’s deep-throated laugh. The presence of my older brothers. A well scripted, crafted and documented film. Swift bodily movements on recently polished, buffed and waxed floors against the thump of mellow music. Entertainment. A morbid sense of humor. A pleasant conversation. The theme song to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) franchise. The MCU franchise. The smell of air conditioning in a thoroughly cleaned room. Decent company to a newly opened restaurant. Decent company to a frequently visited restaurant. Decent company. The collective sound of cheers from relatives during a football match. Strangers with a morbid sense of humor. My father’s jokes. Friends with a morbid sense of humor. A morbid sense of humor.
Things that make me feel at peace: Going for walks in the summer evenings with the cool, crisp breeze flowing between my arms and legs, through my clothes and down my back. Standing beneath the rustling leaves of a tall tree while watching the leaves gently cascade to the ground. Listening to classical music. Listening to a song played on the piano. Laying on the grass focusing on the crickets, focusing on the silence in the air and focusing on the stars in the sky. Breathing deeply, really deeply. Being in the company of the ones I love. Walking aimlessly through a thick forest. Skating with my arms stretched out and my face directed towards the sky. Listening to Tame Impala, Far Caspian and Arctic Monkeys. The reflection of a city on the surface of a body of water. Street lights. The warm, tight embrace of a bigger, fatter, mushier human being. The sound of waves crushing against the shore of the beach. Silence. Noise. Good music. No music. Honesty.
Things that make my heart beat fast: Fluid movements of the body with little attention paid to the world. Skating down a slope. A pleasant conversation about something new with someone new. A pleasant conversation about something familiar with someone new. A pleasant conversation about something familiar with someone familiar. Roller coasters. Spicy food. A conversation with an attractive man. An attractive man. The sound of one’s own voice emitting from speakers at an amplified volume. Pointless trips. Airports. Hospitals.
Things that make me feel nostalgic: Smarties. Kinder joy. The sound of children bickering in the grocery store. Coming across bicycles outside the yard of a sub-urban house. The smell of freshly baked scones. Crayons and coloring books. Birds chirping softly from the tops of trees. The sound of rain while watching a Marvel movie. White mini-buses with tinted windows. Swings. Sand. Wind. Rain. Heavy, heavy rain. A Nissan Hard-body pickup truck. A Land Rover. Cornflakes and Rice Krispies. The scars on my knees and the scrapes on my elbow. The smell of Milo in the warm, comfy setting of a living room. Construction. Tree houses. Booby traps. Pirated tapes and CDs. Kids playing football in the middle of the street with four rocks as the goals. A grandmother visiting her grandkids with a bag in her hand and a chitenge wrapped around her waist. A father coming home with a pizza box and a rented blockbuster movie. Phineas and Ferb. Disney. Nickelodeon. Cartoon Network. Africa Cup of Nations. Boomerang.
Infuriating things: Passive aggressive speech. Unexplained bursts of anger or frustration. Disrespect. Men. Unnecessary rudeness. Robby, my anxiety. Fear. Wet clothes. Disrespect. The inability to articulate exactly what thoughts hover in my mind to curious individuals in my presence. My siblings. Spoiled milk. Burnt food. The need to be right. Procrastination.
It’s disgusting when food rots or goes bad after days of not being eaten. Clothes lay damp for hours after laundry. Individual’s egos cloud their ability to be empathetic in relationships. One’s upbringing pushes them into a state of perpetual self-doubt and inauthenticity. Spectacles fog up at immediate contact with a humid atmosphere. Sweat dries on the temples of one’s forehead or on the surface of the skin, leaving behind a sticky streak and an unpleasant odor. Clothes are left unwashed for weeks. Unpleasant odors linger in the atmosphere and on one’s clothes.
Things I could do with my time: write an ethnography of the bodies that bump into me every day. Bake banana bread. Cook nshima and kapenta. Cook visashi. Crotchet products from chitenge. Knit products from chitenge. Speak to my parents about a history they had long left behind and refuse to revisit. Speak to my father about his life in Egypt. Speak to my mother about her life before my father. Speak to myself. Stretch. Dance.
Things I do instead: Have an existential crisis, several crises.
It’s attractive when one walks around with a palpable sense of self-assurance and self-worth. One holds strong eye contact during a conversation, however short the duration. One takes extra care and caution in their upkeep. One owns their faults and mistakes in a way that demonstrates a will to improve. One is honest with themselves and with others. One admits ignorance towards certain topics rather than feigning knowledge which may ultimately lead to offense. One is kind, truly and genuinely kind. One walks up to their full stature, posture ramrod straight with their chin up and their shoulders back. One smiles or laughs. One pulls another aside to adjust a hair out of place or a stain in one’s teeth without grasping unwanted attention. One is unapologetically oneself.
