nothing seems like a bad idea
notes on changing
Does a caterpillar know what’s going on when it feels compelled to form a cocoon? Does it know that its skin will dissolve and a new body will form around its guts? Or does it just feel an impulse to change? The weather is warm, I must act, it must think.
The winter was long, I’m sure you noticed it. Even when the calendar spoke of spring days, icy winds cut through. The sun would shine and hardly warm the earth, the malaise of the colder season stretched and stretched until it felt like all that we would ever have. It was a triumph to do anything other than lie on a couch after work, to brave the cold long enough to find warmth in a restaurant with a friend.
At home, it was more difficult to create. I would circle my apartment, looking for anything to do other than write or draw or create in any way. Time lost to YouTube, to more TV than usual, more video games. The light inside was dimmer, less life to draw from to turn into self-expression.
And then, finally the warmth arrived. It appeared unceremoniously, unaware how much we’d been yearning for it. The city was suddenly fuller, louder, more joyful than it had been just days before. I felt the same. Within me, something had shifted — my shoulders straightened, my energy levels rose, I saw beauty everywhere again.
There was the newfound energy and sense of wonder, but also the desire to grow. I could feel the ways that I had stagnated as a creative, as a friend, as a human being in the throes of winter. I had done little non-writing work, I hadn’t hosted my friends in months, I had become less focused during my workouts. I had known these things in my mind, but now a feeling in my chest pulled me to do something about it, to become something more. Change seemed possible, yet unclear.
The ambiguous feeling nagged at me, forcing me to look for inspiration for change in every moment. Friends came to visit from other states, and as we dined together and laughed together, I remembered what deeper friendships felt like. I walked through an art exhibit filled with beautiful paintings and sculptures by high school students in Greenpoint, and wondered where the creative spirit I had at 19 went. And, after the James Blake concert, I couldn’t stop thinking about his comment in between songs, “you release an album of songs and it doesn’t really matter until you’re in a room full of people.”
In these moments, amid all the joy, I felt loss. I no longer lived in the same city as these friends. Their trips would soon end, a sea of land would separate us once again. We would laugh together again, I knew this, but I didn’t know when. I stared at a painting of a horse made with more skill than I had ever had, made by someone a decade younger than me. I thought I would’ve made more art by now. I had written for years, but I yearned for more — my work had never extended beyond a written page or a screen, beyond screaming into an opaque cyberspace. I wanted to connect with people while in front of them.
When I was younger, I was always creating something new or learning a new skill. Even as I was still learning, I created dozens of illustrations and took hundreds of photos. I filmed and edited two short films through class, and I constantly tried to build a community around art. But even then, I lacked the sort of experience that I was yearning for now. My creative work has always been too digital, and the search for community has never been easy.
Some time in the years since, I started undercutting my own sense of possibility. I focused entirely on writing, because that’s what people did. I stopped thinking about what the intersection of all of my skills could look like. I grew as a writer, but the future seemed to narrow. When it came to community, I imagined that whatever I had done in the past was possibly the limit of what the future could hold. If I had failed to build it before, then how would this time be different?
During colder months, caterpillars slow their development. They enter a state where they no longer grow or consume as much. They just stay the same for a while, forget about change. But it doesn’t last forever. Once the warm weather rolls around again, life continues. They start to eat as much as they can again and move toward chrysalis, towards transformation.
It’s nearly summer now. Even when the sun is missing lately, the humidity and the heat stick around. Life continues, I begin moving again. I start to edit photos again, learn a new software. I start to play around with designing posters and think about fun projects I could build. Nothing seems like a bad idea. My girlfriend and I plan a party. We pick a date only a couple of weeks out and I wonder if anyone will show up, like before. I invite friends I want to get closer to, we design a poster with her drawings and my graphic design skills. We will celebrate the coming summer, and all that it will contain.
💧 Drops of the Week 💧
ALBUM - SOMA by Skrillex - lots of fun
POEM - “Thirst” by Mary Oliver - Another morning and I wake with thirst / for the goodness I do not have
Good read! I love the caterpillar extended metaphor