Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. Selamat hari raya Idul Fitri🌙 In Indonesia it’s time for Muslims to celebrate Lebaran, the accomplishment of the month-long fast. For us, it means we mudik (go home to ancestral village), we visit the houses of family and neighbors and friends, we drink so many coffees and eat so many cookies and snacks, we sungkem (kiss the feet of) our parents, and to everybody we may have wronged, (which is everybody), we salim and say, “Mohon maaf lahir dan batin.”
Forgive me body and soul. Even as an (awkward, shy) newcomer, a poignant and humbling exchange that has brought tears to my eyes in the receiving and giving, a days-long flooding of the soul with gratitude. At once to discover and to satisfy a deep longing for reconciliation with one’s own people, the others with whom one belongs. Cleansing us, if for a precious and rarified moment, of the ten thousand niggling obstacles to trust. A mantra of community spoken again and again, a making by saying, threads that will hold us together for another year. Alhamdulillah. Amin.
Sri Rejeki with crispy leaf.
Past 8pm here and over 240 million Indonesian Muslims are still waiting to hear if they can eat tomorrow, this blows my mind.
*edited to change from 420 to 240, typo haha
Finished third day of yoga (switched rest day to Eid), feeling strong, fed and watered myself, texted mom back about eclipse, enough. Clouds moving in for afternoon storms, it’s 3 again and dark. Cats (and E) asleep. The sounds of starting rain. Nobody needing. Cozy socks on. Curl under cotton blanket. Heavy eyelids don’t wait for permission.
Jeki plays with a huge bendo leaf (artocarpus elasticus) that came down in yesterday’s storm, jumps at the “crispy” sounds it makes. Delighted if she’ll be in today’s photo prompt. Couldn’t post a pic of tempe goreng, I have my limits. May eat some for dinner but I don’t want to get my blog greasy.
Forget the fantasy of a universal clock. No announcement yet of Eid al-fitr, waiting for local communication of the ulama watching the moon. Google put it on the 9th and I was fooled, again, aduh. All these plans. Could be not until the 11th, two more days. Time is conditional, (especially in Indonesia), unpredictable, unbusinesslike, following the lunar rule, a silvery sliver of borrowed light.
Precipitation prevention (from going out).
Large thud from outside. Voices of men yelling from corners of village. I run outside. A tree fell from all that wind and rain. Next to our place, on a building being renovated by foreign money… nobody was there. Still jittery. Next time, listen to locals when they tell you to trim the branches.
Big rain doesn’t stop the gamelan in the pura across the street, it summons the people, makes space for the god. There will be dark moon ceremony tonight. Snails are quick now, slimy and free, a bullfrog swims in the pond, stops. Regards me. No, I will not eat you. I just want to look at your bumps.
Well-being in concrete and rain.
Made an about page for Phaedrus replies. No wonder I was tired.
I’ve been informed I have to add diarrhea, muscle aches, and excess sweating to the list of possible symptoms of masuk angin. Upon reflection I think it’s impossible to write a comprehensive description without reducing it unforgivably. Which E and Blih both agree is very Indonesia, (Indonesia as an adjective), how we escape definition.
Got dragged by the undertow to a watery blue deep, surfaced after sundown but incomplete, sinking weight to movement and sluggish sensemaking because I am a being on loan from unconsciousness. Where do I belong. The cats are crying and other questions to answer. Ok let’s be temporary for a while.
Up again at 3am for sahur, only two more days before Eid and I am so tired my eyes seem permanently puffy, but being surrounded by those who are fasting really shuts up most of my complaining, in that way fasting has a very good effect on me hahaa slightly chilly with thunder in the distance.
Jangan masuk angin. Gunung Semeru, Jan. 2020. (windy)
Editing this photo of Semeru, I think of Angelina, by Bob Dylan, which I hear as a love song, an expression of vulnerability, bewilderment, exhaustion. From his Christian period, in tumultuous relationship with a difficult savior, broken but speaking. Certain mountains make me feel just like that.
The dialectic of posting a photo to the blog. // You can’t just post a photo to the blog. (Of course not.) Look at the image and be with it for a while. What do you like about it, what do you find beautiful? What, through the visible, catches your heart? An emotion or mood, mysterious or graceful or kind, daring or bright or sublime, ecstatic or elemental or raw, it does not need words. Adjust the image to make it more clear, the beautiful thing. Enjoy it. Then press “Post”. Ha! Enjoy it again. Understand your responsibility for it. The image is out there because you saw it in there before it was visible. It was born from your eyes. It is a reflection of you. Feel humble. Then let it go, but keep something of it. Let yourself be like the beautiful thing, that you made and let go, because that is a beautiful thing to do and to be. Go back sometimes to look at it again and remember, what you saw, what you did, what you are. Fin.
I didn’t include in this post another autobiographical note, that my whole life used to be all about books, and then all of my books burned in a housefire. That was fifteen years ago, a long time now. After that, I didn’t have the heart to replace them. Anyway, I guess they were never really mine, was my basic conclusion.
But I wouldn’t be who I am without them.
Also wouldn’t be who I am without that fire.
Serene Spathiphyllum.
Nothing is more satisfying than when pieces start fitting together. (This may not be true but it feels true in the moment!) That little rush of wonder and understanding.