My Fridays have been something like this; come home from work, find the parents, my brother, sister-in-law and the baby at home, hug him squeeze him kiss him, eat dinner while the little dude is passed around from one lap to another, finish the last bites of the salad off of the salad bowl to my brother’s disgust, continue entertaining the little dude until he’s tired, cranky and go to sleep, help clean up around and pass out by 11pm.
I’ve been cranky lately and for no specific reason. I’m not unhappy but I’m also not booming with joy. I’m content and at peace but feel very blah. Something needs to happen to change this current state of being but I don’t know what it is.
I must have fallen into a routine; I feel like I have nothing to share today.
I managed to completely avoid the craziness of May 1st in Istanbul, where some neighborhoods got smashed windows and shops, and stayed in my little neighborhood. I may have been completely removed from the rest of the world, but it was just too beautiful of a spring day to waste elsewhere but the streets of Nişantaşı.
Thank you Murakami for taking me to a world far far away on a night where I needed to escape reality.
Apparently it is very amusing for my father to see me in the kitchen. Every time I chop something, crack an egg, stir a pot, he curiously comes in the kitchen, watches for 10 seconds then walks away –only to repeat his visit a few minutes later. I didn’t understand at first why it was so fascinating, but I now realize that this is a side of me my parents don’t know about. I buy ingredients they’re not familiar with and actually spend a good amount of time in the kitchen. My mom doesn’t enjoy cooking very much anymore, which is something I don’t understand as I enjoy it so much. So now, I’ve become the one person in the house who’s in and out of the kitchen multiple times a night, with my big knife of which they’re scared of and my bamboo cutting board, cooking away. As I’m adjusting to living at home, they’re also adjusting to my daily habits.
Today’s culinary activities resulted in a new batch of homemade granola, a pot of quinoa, 2 trays of roasted sweet potatoes and asparagus –of which my father cleaned one tray full.
It had been a while but I finally made it back to the “studio” today, planting the seeds of a new project. I’ve been feeling impatient and anxious about not having produced work lately, but even a few hours of playing with new ideas put me back in the groove. Feeling much much better.
I thought for hours what the hell I can write about being on the 100th day, but I really feel nothing. It’s just another reminder of the realness of this move; I hadn’t spent 100 consecutive days in Turkey since 2001.
This is my last two digit day in Turkey. They say time flies when you’re having a good time. I think I am.
I feel like a true Turk tonight. Sitting by the Bosphorus, playing backgammon and smoking hookah with the familiar sounds of a soccer game on the big screen as the background noise.
