Permission to Write

Hi, All!

How are you doing? 🦖

I’ve been chasing my memories, looking to uncover the stories that make up my life.

In my pursuit, I discovered something I forgot: I always used to write.

I copied text, any text, just so that I had lines to pen.

I pounded on my parents’ typewriter; pretending the random characters on paper meant something profound.

I plagiarised poems and read them on stage as if they were entirely mine.

My first own works, however, were mocking essays on my teachers’ flaws.

I meant to study journalism.

To own a magazine.

Yet, somewhere down each line, sometimes with the help of others, I talked myself out of it.

Now, I’m talking myself back into it, encouraged by the permission slip that reads: “You always used write.”

Words

I flaunted the walk you get to boast when you’re a regular in a cafe, and you know that the moment you open the door, the staff will graciously smile at you and flood you with “hi’s” and “how are you’s.”

In that flow, I picked up a magazine near the cafe’s entrance, just before I sat down for my morning coffee and made myself at home.

Without much thought, I went straight for the editorial column, when it hit me, how I had wished to write columns myself.

In the weeks to come, the whole universe would conspire to make me try. It almost succeeded; however, Mirha Left turned out to be an essay.

Here’s how it starts:

The other day, I deleted all my WhatsApp conversations. I even left inactive group chats, and risked whatever judgment people would lay upon me as they’d find that: “Mirha left.” My craving for a clean slate trumped my desire for social acceptance, and yet, I still squinted each time I tapped clear chat, and felt the sting of future regret reach into my second chakra.

Quote That’s Been On My Mind

Anyone worth knowing is inevitably also going to be complicated, difficult, and exasperating—making the same obvious mistakes over and over, squandering their money, dating imbeciles, endlessly relapsing into dumb addictions and self-defeating habits, blind to their own hilarious flaws and blatant contradictions and fiercely devoted to whatever keeps them miserable. (And those people about whom there is nothing ridiculous are the most ridiculous of all.) –Tim Kreider, I Wrote This Book Because I Love You

With lots of love,
and the permission slip you may have lost,
Mirha
📮