Kindergarten Nostalgia

There is a smell. When it comes, I get butterflies in my stomach. I mean, my heart misses a bit out of some sort of unfamiliar fear.
It happens now and then, like today, walking towards caltrain. I think a lady walking by me was wearing the perfume.
Every time it happens, I search in my head and my heart to find out what this brings up.Some smells, like "America smell" are known. It's the smell that all the suitcases and magazines from America have. It's funny how even my bags and clothes smell like "America" only when I take them to Iran.
But this smell, it reminds me of my kindergarten, perhaps the first day and the fear of it. I stop and say to myself "I'll think about it and will figure out what this is later".
The thought, though, is slippery. I can't hold on to it. I can't figure it out. It's frustrating. Memories come on top of one another, get complicated, and I can't disentangle them. It's scary, I basically don't remember my memories, and that's the way it is; no "I'll remember some day".This is it.
I'm going to call it the kindergarten smell.
Think of a sunny day in Gorgan, in a car with your mom. You stop at the door and are thrown into this place where there is a bear to scare bad kids. If you're nice, you'll be fine. You also pray and chant this scary song before eating. you have to adjust; and you have to wait to go back to the familiarity of your home.
Somehow, this brings out a train of images of all your life in that city. All the mundane minutes of "YOUR" life that has passed already. Those lazy afternoons..
The hope to have you teacher say: your mom called and said you should go to "fariba joon's" for lunch today. AKKH, that joy. That feeling of importance. Those dark Friday evenings when "Azaan" was on TV, and everyone was upstairs getting ready for a party. The sound of your mom's blow drier. The safety of knowing they are upstairs, when you were in the living room, ready to go out. Worries about which shoes to wear, and whose opinion counts more, baba's or Kaveh's?
Worries, loves, fears...every little feeling you had and you have forgotten now.
And the thought that you don't remember the person you were; You no longer are the person you were.

All of that, is in that one moment when the kindergarten smell arrives.

My new friend

I don't miss him anymore. Can you believe this?
She said this to me today over a cup of tea. Her name is Alice. I met her yesterday. She's from England. "25 years in America, and I'm still quite English. I utterly despise the way Americans eat. They cut everything with two hands, put the knife away and shove in. Absolutely unbearable! I think to myself, what if I had to live with someone who ate like this? John is British, of course"!
she is in her early-mid fifties, wears glasses and has thin, short,orange hair. She dresses like she doesn't really care that much. just a little bit.she is very energetic and friendly. She shoots hellos and smiles at people in the streets. She knows the names of the cook at the Business school, the mail man, the elevator operating manager..everyone. She knows when and where they vacationed last and what "usual" dish they like to eat on Thursdays.
Next to her I feel shy and quiet. I listen to her attentively.
She talks about her ex-husband of 30 years, John, with so much love and forgiveness, it's unbelievable. She says she is not going to ever have another relationship. Why, I asked. She answered: Because I married the only man I could ever love.
Then the British realism kicked in and she said, not to say there is only one person in the world, a soul mate or anything. I just can't have what I have with him with anyone else. 30 years of a great marriage, and 2 lovely daughters.
They met at 16 and got married very young...grew up together, literally.
"He left me for a younger woman. That simple. they say it's midlife crisis".
He had had an affair for 2 years. TWO years.. and then she found out. they tried to work it out and move beyond it, but..:
"one day, we woke up in our bed..I looked at him and said, John, you are leaving me today, aren't you? and he said, yes, on 22nd of October. He left on a business trip to Russia and never came back home. He got another house. He decided he liked her more than he liked me".
vaay.
The girl was a co-worker, a friend of hers actually.
Now in my mind, I keep thinking two years..two complete years of having been fooled.
She lost 60 pounds and didn't stop crying for a year.
"I cat-napped for 3 years after he left", she said. She couldn't sleep in the bed that used to be "theirs".

the beautiful thing about it is how fair she was when she told the story. She realized in a very realistic way how John had done her wrong. She was upset at him for that; very much so, actually. But she still knew how to love him.

"He has been really fair in our financial settlement. He wants to me to be well off. We settled everything with no court.. But he asked me to tell our daughters that I left him and then he met this woman so "our daughters wouldn't get hurt". It's amazing. He is a smart, very smart , and very successful man, but he acts like an 8 year old child when it comes to our relationship. He thinks by denying what happened, it would all go away. Familiar, ha?"

He wants to be friends with her now. He keeps visiting her They play scrabble. He doesn't want to let her go.(mind you, he doesn't want to let the other girl go, either).

Would you ever take him back, I asked? YES. she answered, with a smile and without a pause: because I'm stupid.

list

I'm going to list what has been on my mind so I will remember it later:

1. The girl was crying loudly. Very very loudly. I wanted to go hold her, but then she didn't know me. She cried and cried, and I stared at her feeling useless. Then, I jsut left. I had to catch the last train, you know.

2. Sunny days, caltrain routine. People on caltrain are very different from those on bus line 27. Caltrain has clean cut yuppies. Even the bus towards caltrain has lots of professionals. It feels better not to go in the middle of the tenderloin and sit next to drunk men, but I miss those young mothers and old ladies with their bags and their familiar, old lady perfumes.

3. The man speaks his heart. He told me his heart aches for home. I know that feeling.

4. Painful dreams can at the same time be full of love. full of caring.

5. I feel like I want to show my emotions more. I also feel like I have these stereotypically "feminine" or "maternal" emotions and have no channel to express them. I have never had them before and don't quite know what to do with them. Somewhat out of character, but they are here. I can't deny them.

6. umm, dar nazar e saboktagin, eyb e ayaaz mikoni.

Khajoo

Goftaa sar e che daari kaz sar khabar nadaari?
Goftam bar aastaanat, daram sar e gedaayee

Nocturnal: Zolf bar baad - Mohsen Namjoo

Now, I have to be sleeping, but I can't seem to be able to.
Walking from the bus station today, I felt alive, loved, relaxed. I listened to "Zolf Bar Baad" by Namjoo. Maybe, one of HAfiz's most beautiful love poems, with great music and his unique voice. He really made that poem come to life in a deep way.
The poem is interesting. It's limiting the beloved and setting her free at the same time:
Yaar e bigaane masho ta nabari az khiiiiiiiisham,
Gham e aghyaar makhor ta nakoni nashaadam
Zolf ra halghle makon ta nakoni dar bandam
Torre ra Taab nade ta nadahi bar baadam
.....
Rokh bar afrooz, ke faaregh koni az barg e golam
Ghad barafraaz ke az sarv koni azaadam....

And then it comes...
.
Hafez az jor e to HAASHAA ke begardaanad rooy
MAN AZ AAN RUZ KE DAR BAND E TOAM AAZAADAM.....
....
That. That is just it. No one ever needs to say more than that.

Friday Night Blues

I'm getting ready to go out.
In my head, a Shamloo like voice reads..
Sarv e chamaan e man cheraa meyl e chaman nemikonad?

Mundane

1. I want a deep embrace; a big hug, so to speak.
tang o tulani.

2. Today I asked my "supervisor" if there is a dress code. He answered:
The way you are is perfect.
He has a way of putting the most mundane things in sentences that touch your heart.

3. I read half of Golestaan e Sa'di last night. I wanted to find a story that Amoo Shari had read to me this last time I went home. Then I just read one more, and then another....he writes incredibly well. Even with all his close mindedness and blind absolutism, he is a wise man.
But is that even possible?
I always struggle with him.I like to take comfort in his wisdom, but it's impossible. He leaves me with the the scary realization that there is no absolute wisdom. No baba to run to and be safe. Even the man who is sounding so wise, is not all that.
To learn to look at this world more realistically,I suggest one should read Golestaan!

Dylan

..
....
I'm ready to go anywhere, I'm ready for to fade
Into my own parade, cast your dancing spell my way,
I promise to go under it.
.....
Then take me disappearin' through the smoke rings of my mind,
Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves,
The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach,
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow....

Finally...

It happened..
They made me an offer I couldn't refuse.
I,now, understand this paradox quite well.

For The Three ladies in Shomal, with unconditional love

This is inspired by our conversation today, and the story of the fork...and by how colorfull each of you are..

Some people, when you throw a pebble at them, respond with throwing a brick at you.
Some don't.
Some people forget and forgive.
Some don’t.
Some people threaten you to take their “love” away from you
Some don’t.
Some people make you feel safe and secure.
Some don’t.
Some people need a “reason” to love you.
Some don’t.
...
...
Some people take it easy.
Some don’t.

Hejab, personal

1. I was going to the "Institution for Building Schools" in Tehran for getting data about school construction. It was in a nice neighborhood in northern Tehran, in a little alley.I went there with proper hejab, a "maghna'e" I had borrowed from a cousin and a long, black "roopoosh", and no makeup, obviously. I went inside and three middle aged men were sitting in the lobby. They were all unshaven and dressed in the typical white blouse and baggy gray pants; They looked kind of unprofessional and careless. The first thing they said after hello was: "khanoom", please fix your hejab. I looked at them with awe. I could not fix it anymore, really. Anyway, I pulled my "maghna'e" further down into myface just to make them feel better. Then they asked for an ID,and the only ID I had was my California Driver License!!! Not only was my head not covered in the picture, I was also wearing a revealing top! I gave it to them, somewhat embarrassed. They accepted it, stared at it, and gave me an unpleasant smile. I just ignored them and left.
I came down to leave an hour or so later, upset at the system for not keeping data, for being so short sighted, irresponsible and unprofessional; for not caring at all. I got to the lobby, and of the three men, there was only one left, and he was on the phone. Before I got to talk at all, an old man, the servant (abdarchi) came up to me, with his blue uniform and a kind, fatherly smile. He looked like a "babaye madrese". He opened his shabby coat and from his inside pocket took out my driver license. He said : Ghaayemesh kardam ke hich ki nabine.[I hid it so no one would look at you (without hejab)].
This was just too cute.
I smiled back.I was thankful to him for doing that. For protecting my dignity the only way he knew how to. By hiding the real me!!

2. Maman gorgani was not religious at all, not even conservative, really. When I went back to Iran over the summer, I used to visit her everyday in the afternoon. In the unbearable heat(and humidity) of Gorgan, I usually wore as little as I could manage inside the house without baba saying that our "saraydar" would be insulted. Maman lived next door, so I'd just put on a roopoosh and run to her house. when I took the roopoosh out, she would look at me with amazement, her eyes twice their usual size. Then she would say "Unjaa intori miri birooon?"[do you go out like this in the US??] and I would say yes (while actually it wasn't exactly true). She would bite her lips,move her head to left and right in disapproval and say "VAAA", Na, pretending it's so outragous she couldn't believe it.This was our daily routine; I think both of us knew this was just a game, but I just loved to look sexier each time to induce her to play her role in a more exagerated way. Then we'd both laugh and say KHOB, now what's new today?!!

Q & not A

1. How do things we do when no one is watching define who we are? Are those moments the “real” us, if that even means anything? [For a very simplified example, think picking your nose]. ( An interesting film: Death and the Maiden by Roman Polanski; not about picking your nose)

2.What is “sharm”? I disagree with the person who translated Salman Rushdie’s “shame” into Farsi and called it “sharm”. Sharm is not shame.
Sharm can be kind. Shame, not so much.
Shame is built up. It is a feeling you develop based on a thought.
Sharm, on the hand, is sudden. It just wraps herself around you, like silk, for a moment and disappears once you become conscious of it.
But what IS sharm?

Johnny boy: this one is too looong

Johnny boy and I quickly became friends. We lived next to each other and were together almost all the time. In the mornings, I would knock on his door to wake him up. If it wasn't for me, he'd be late for all his classes. I felt shy knocking on his door because I thought his roommate would think I was in love with him. He probably did. But I cared too much for him to care about the roommate.
Then we'd walk to campus.
He would skip and sing with almost a childish melody:
Gooooooood morning Mr. Sunshine
Gooooooood morning Mr. Plante
Gooooooood morning Mr. Fungus.
Every time he said “gooooood”, I would laugh out loud. It was a game. We were walking among the trees and he sang to them all. He explained words such as “plante” and “fungus” to me. He was very animated.
And then he would say: Come on Negster, sing along.
I was too shy.
Once, he told me he would not speak to me if I didn't sing! He hummed a tune and said, talk on this melody.. Say whatever you want, just with this melody!
I was too shy.
I liked him so much and felt so comfortable I wanted to let my clown out. It would not come out. It was an even more uncomfortable clown back then.
We almost always ate together without ever having agreed upon it. There was a lovely anxiety around each meal, waiting for his melodic knock on my door. It almost never failed. He'd be at the door, with his usual smile and the brown wooden necklace around his neck, looking sharp.
We had very long conversations, very emotional or philosophical at times, and I tried hard to sound intelligent in English. Sometimes I'd go to my room at nights frustrated, with tears in my eyes because I felt like I sounded like an 8 year old. My thoughts were mature, my language was not; but Johnny boy didn't seem to care.
He wrote a poem in Greek for his dad’s birthday. I secretly suspected it was crap(!) and thought how estranged his dad probably felt that his son couldn’t speak his native language. He loved his mom and his mom would come and take him home every weekend. His mom reminded me of Iranian moms. I never met her. Her name,I knew, was Vanessa.
For me, Johnny boy was a window into a new world. One day he came to my room and announced: "this room needs music". We started some sort of pop- musical education: He taught me who Dave Mathew’s band and Sara McLaughlin were. He blushed at the lyrics of Adia because he said it was about Lesbian love. He had “sharm”. That was what I loved about him.
He wanted to convince me that Jesus was right. We had never ending conversations about god and Christianity, and that was the only thing I didn't like much about being with him.
I was too unaware to have formed anything sexual for him. I think he may have "liked" me though. I remember his heart beat really fast one time when we took a picture, just the two of us.
As for me, I remember one evening, when I walked to the lab and saw him passing a notebook to another girl. Just that, and my heart stopped beating for a moment and I was upset that entire night. I couldn't believe he could have a friend, especially a girl, without my knowing. I never told him that. I just imagined that whole night away. I was 19.
He knew maman gorgani, all my Sara's, and all my family, or my tribe, as he would call them.
The night before one of our finals, he came to my room and wanted to stay up all night to study. I never stayed up at nights, so at some point I told him, you continue, I'll sleep.
When I woke up, he was still there, in my room. He told me I slept with my eyes open and talked and scared the shit out of him.
I had never felt so close to anyone in America.
He almost carried me home one day when I had taken one too many shot of DayQuill in the morning on an empty stomach and was about to faint."Negster is drunk on DayQuill " he sang all the way home from class.
Everyone thought we were “dating”. We were not.
It was a beautiful friendship; maybe a start to a series of undefined relationships with men for me; something between friendship, love, crush, becoming one, or even becoming like family. It was, for sure the most pure of them all.We were kids; we lived and sang together; we even showered next door to one another in the dorms and occasionally passed along a bar of soap or something to one another while in the shower.
He wanted to become a doctor. He was a good Christian. He was half Yugoslavian, half Greek and was born and raised in the US. He played the saxophone. His handwriting was flawless, his room, clean and spotless.
He used to visit me years after we moved out of the dorms and he left berkeley.He would bring me cherries from the tree in their backyard in Saratoga.
One day he called me. He was at my door and said he had a surprise for me.
I screamed OH GREAT, you finally brought your dog so I'd meet her! It’s about time!!
He said, no, no, don't guess anymore; just come down.
It turned out he wanted to "introduce" his "bible study friend" to me; a nice girl with long hair. I don’t remember much about her. She was American looking; that’s as much as I remember.
Somehow, I never heard from him after that day.
I don't know how it happened that he just disappeared. I want to know about his dad, his mom,his Greek grandma with a goat in her backyard in Menlo Park,his dog(I can't believe I forgot her name)... I want to know about his life.
I want him to see how I have grown into this new person that I am. I want him to see I am not as shy anymore; that I'm trying.
I fancy that I run into him one day in streets of San Francisco. I pat him on the shoulder and say: Johnny boy, it's negster!!!
And I will finally sing in the melodic, funny way he used to sing for me:
Goooooood morning Mr. Sunshine...

Familia..

What would you do with deep love that's intertwined with absurdities ?
[more than occasional judgments, at times harsh unfairness or wrong actions ]

I take the love, and color all those absurdities...
cute.

Positive...

I hung up, politely, on the telemarketer
New strategy cooks up in his head for faster convincing
...
next time.

Wild is the wind...

How far away from the world of my childhood am I going to be able to go before I collapse? Just how far?
I feel estranged. I have lost "myself".

Ey vaay bar asiri kaz yaad rafte baashad
dar daam maandeh baashad, sayyaad rafte baashad

Aah az dami ke tanhaa, baa yaad e u cho laaleh
dar khoon neshaste baasham, chon baad rafte baashad

Pain

Man dard dar ragaanam
hasrat dar ostekhaanam
chizi nazir e aatash dar jaanam pichid....



[Pain in my vains,
Regret in my bones,
..Something like fire swirled in my soul...]

Songs..

It ain't me babe.. no no no, it ain't me babe..
It ain't me you're looking for babe..

Bang bang, he shot me down, bang bang, I hit the ground, bang bang, that aweful sound..bang bang..

She always had that little drop of poison.

Man gholam e ghamaram, gheyr e ghamar heech magoo

Yaa jaame baadeh, yaa ghesse kutaah..!