Annie Q Syed » life

Mama. Mothers. And Other Days.

annie — Sun, 13 May 2012 15:35:42 +0000

May 13, 2012.

Still Sundays

I’ve always liked the time before dawn

because there’s no one around to remind me who I’m supposed to be,

so it’s easier to remember who I am.

My friend am(Erica) sent me the aforementioned quote earlier this week. She knows that once it is finally summer I prefer to start the day quite early on Sundays. However, I believe and know, with enough practice we can carry Dawn with us throughout the day and anywhere.

I am grateful for the sun after what seems like weeks of cold rain and windy clouds in New York City. We skipped right ...

Lotus Sunday

annie — Sun, 06 May 2012 18:08:12 +0000

Still Sundays

May 6, 2012.

The moon rode into Earthtown last night. I could hear its supersteps around midnight.

How wide are your shoulders, Time?

New York City is a funny bone of time zones. Usually when we are awake here the West Coast is still asleep and over the Atlantic people are ending the day. How many more ways can I be in between worlds?

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I finally finished a fiction short story yesterday. It is 700 words over the submission guidelines but other than that it is finished. I could make it into two different stories I suppose: keep one for myself and the other one for submission. Or I could diligently sandpaper it down to ...

A Still Sunday with Love

annie — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 16:47:54 +0000

April 22, 2012.

Mirror Mirror on Stillness’s wall which Sunday is the truest of them all?

Last Sunday I was swimming in the lakes of nostalgia for certain places and this Sunday the present is all I could ever hope for.

Nostalgia, I hope you like the caricature we have created of you, a doodle of escapism framed in fad.

When I am nostalgic about certain places and times, it is without longing to “go back” unless I am desirous of being imaginative and want to go “back in time” to a period in which I was never born or participated. My nostalgia is more an impromptu tribute to all things for which there are no photos or words.

...

A Human Sunday

annie — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 18:56:50 +0000

Still Sundays.

April 15, 2012.

It wasn’t until this weekend, last night, when I felt there really is something distinctive about this time of the year, particularly April 15th.

In 1865 on this day Abraham Lincoln was assassinated.

The Titanic sank.

In 1927 a great American asset, the Mississippi river, became a tremendous liability when the sky fell down in the form of non-stop rain causing the river to burst and cause one of the greatest floods in American history.

In 1986 on this day American warplanes bombed Tripoli in retaliation of Libyan terrorism.

2012 seems packed with events but time is passing in slow motion. It is only April 15th and so much has happened all across ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 16:02:24 +0000

April 1, 2012.

April fool’s day. Yes, let’s have a worldwide recognition day to reflect that we are all such fools. We know so little and therefore we have so many experts of Knowing!

I want the weather gods to say, “Just Joking!” I want to hear It is all just a hoax that it is December temperatures in April. There is no global warming heading to an ice age. “Please laugh already!” I want to hear from the cold front that lasts longer and longer each month every passing year. I don’t want historians to describe in words “what was once known as Spring”; I want future generations to be able to experience it. Somewhere.

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Yesterday ...

Third Avenue, BX

annie — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 02:21:42 +0000

Some days I work part time in the South Bronx.

It is one of the most dilapidated parts of Bronx, a borough of New York City.

Most people don’t know that New York City is comprised of five boroughs and that Harlem is in Manhattan and quite expensive.

“The hub” is the retail heart of the South Bronx, located where four roads converge: East 149th Street, Willis, Melrose and Third Avenue. In the 1930s the Hub had movie palaces and vaudeville theaters and a few decades after it became a national symbol of urban decay.

I have witnessed some extreme poverty in my life given my travels and work in legal and education ...

Stillness is a peyote that shows what is real.

annie — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 17:57:32 +0000

March 25th, 2012

STILL SUNDAYS

New York City can’t make up its mind whether to continue enduring pain and stay in winter or finally move forward into spring and summer.

Stillness is a peyote that shows what is real.

You can’t jump into stillness, you work your way into it and realize it is a fusion of all sorts of coming together.

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It was in Paris when James Baldwin was first able to come to grips with his explosive relationship with himself and America. Of course that is not why I went there in 2001—I have never followed in the footsteps of anyone—-this is not a boast, just a fact, just how things have turned out ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 18 Mar 2012 21:07:00 +0000

Today doesn’t need a date, 2012.

Trying to understand how I see New York City and how an artist sees what is and is not really there.

A weekend ago I was saddened by my inability to successfully articulate to another what is it that I “saw” in New York City. It is like a fairytale that is true only if you believe it. I questioned whether the lens through which I have viewed New York City is tainted with unearned affection. Something I have just made up!

I know many people who live here because they have always lived here. There are also people who have no desire to visit other towns and cities. And frankly ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 15:26:25 +0000

March 11th.

I thought we decided, I tell myself—all of my selves: the one who likes lazy days of lounging in the hammock made of time, the self who stares at a wall too long after a dream doesn’t quite add up, the self who questions every single day: do we choose to become this thing, this “person”, who writes?—-that today we were going to just enjoy a very still Sunday without words. A drive to Philly was in order to see my best friend, am(Erica). But she will understand, I told myself, like all friends who have been a close part of my life the last two decades, if I changed my mind last minute to write.

There ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 16:53:03 +0000

March 4, 2012

I had a dream the sky was such a fantastic blue that they were holding a contest to come up with a new name for this shade of blue.

My team was made of the people with whom I am closest and we were trying to run our ideas by one another via email, phone calls, and text messages. At some point we got so absorbed in the process that we neither cared about this new color nor making the deadline of the contest.

My sister, in coming up with a name for this new shade of blue, had designed the most unique blue cards. My friend, (am)Erica, had decided to create a man with a blue ...

My father on Sharia law & art; Social Media, the snake oil of our times

annie — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 23:34:33 +0000

February 26, 2011

Still Sundays.

There is fair weather, great weather, and then weather I simply categorize as Wrath of the Universe.

New York City’s weather yesterday was some Wrath of the Universe.

The weather in New York City feels like a curse from the Universe right now. Did winter come late this year?

I know my mother is right and I am not supposed to take it personally. It is just winter. It doesn’t have a personal vendetta against me. It will pass like all the years before. But I do take it personally. In my vocabulary the word cold doesn’t suffice…only wrath of the universe makes sense. I know there are those who love winter ...

Still Sundays

annie — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 00:14:01 +0000

February 19, 2012.

I ate a lot of Internet this weekend. I justified it because I ate healthy and kosher. The meat of the articles was halal. Fresh sources, great nutritional articles, lots of juice for thought. And I usually don’t eat meat: I had not browsed through any of my feeds or online journals in over a week. As is often with most things that happen to me, I had tapped in to the momentum exactly at the right time.

The right place, the right time, the wrong me.

I gathered that social media is going through some mid-life crisis. I thought Internet was only a baby. Don’t you first have to grow up, live (or more accurately not ...

Love like…

annie — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 02:27:42 +0000

February 12th, 2012.

Love like my parents. Love like yoga.

I like when I re-read something that I wrote and I find it is still accurate and applicable at large. A favorite t-shirt that never gets old. This brings me immense joy and surprise. Somehow it makes me feel I caught the hand of Time and danced to a short tune barely audible. I don’t feel this way towards most of my fiction attempts. Not yet anyway. I am deaf and Time mute when it comes to fiction. Then I am humbled: authors who passed the test of Time were indeed some gods.

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My eyes don’t make natural tears as easily anymore. I have to put ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 23:58:42 +0000

February 5th, 2012.

The super bowl of social media and creativity.

I woke up thinking about Wednesday this morning. As if Wednesday was a person I knew.

This last Wednesday was a chaotic morning and no amount of breathing was going to lift me out of the mushroom of frenzy.

Usually calm and steady, on Wednesday morning I was agitated and hyper sensitive to noise. I always try to see what is the longest amount of time I can go without plugging into music with my headphones. This time even music didn’t help. People rushing to some grand nowhere. I joined them to head to one of the most dilapidated parts of New York City. Poverty has a smell ...

A Still Sunday Night

annie — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 03:54:21 +0000

January 29, 2011.

Stillness bypassed my Sunday morning like a breeze you don’t notice because you are out of breath. Except I was in deep sleep breathing. I woke up long after stillness had closed its canteen. Although I realize Stillness is everywhere and available anytime and it is up to us to reach into the hive and retrieve any amount of nectar, certain moments feel like a red carpet walk to the doorway of Stillness. Sunday mornings are such a walk. After noon the zone is narrow even if you are a devout Stillness practioner.

I gave myself permission to sleep in and allow the body to recover. Everything about the status quo seems contrary to how we ...

Still Sundays: Shakti and Ibn Sina

annie — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 19:57:49 +0000

It is a new year after all.

Makes me wonder about all those other “new” years. I never felt they were new per se so it wasn’t that I got duped the last decade with the habitual hype at the end of the year. It is just that I couldn’t participate as authentically as I would have liked because I knew better in my bones. But this year is finally new.

new | n(y)oō |

adjective

1. not existing before; made, introduced, or discovered recently or now for the first time

2. already existing but seen, experienced, or acquired recently or now for the first time

3. just beginning and regarded as better than what went before

The word new ...

A Still Sunday, particularly today.

annie — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 21:21:51 +0000

December 25, 2011.

on criticism, on friendships come & gone, Keats & soul-making.

New York City is asleep although I have been awake for some time.

Silence is that music where we become instruments.

I have never experienced Stillness and silence this grand in New York City as this Sunday.

This is my first Christmas holiday and New Year’s Eve in New York City despite having lived here for over a decade. Usually I have always been “home” this time of the year, whatever that has meant: sometimes Lahore, other times Johannesburg or Durban, most often a farmhouse, my parents’, in California.

Last night I experienced New York City in a whole new manner. I understood why it is ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 22:24:53 +0000

December 18, 2011.

Herman Hesse’s Demian. “Tug on Anything at all…” A fortune-teller who could tell all but one thing.

It’s not easy to leave New York City. A stranger-friend, an Italian Ph.D. student, must return to Italy tomorrow as her yearlong fellowship is finally over. And she is not ready. I don’t think those who come to New York City for anything but an idea can ever leave that idea behind. At worst we carry that idea that is New York City with us wherever we go. At best, we return again. And again.

Love is a hard idea to give up.

What will she miss the most, I asked her? She held back tears and replied, The ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 19:07:18 +0000

December 11, 2011.

What is art without vision, then?; Symmetry Breaking; Darren K. Woods on his passion for opera; Music to My Ears.

I was immersed in life to my fullest capacity the last two Sundays. Every cell felt like a sponge for Stillness, joy, love, warmth, observations, growth…

There comes a point when living and experiencing catch a momentum faster than one can share through any medium. I believe that’s when the real challenge begins for one who has decided to undertake being an artist.

We are all creative (some more talented or innately gifted than others); however, not all are artists.

Art without vision is creative stimulation for pleasure. In order to have a vision you have ...

Occupy Stillness. Viktor Frankl: the challenge of potential meaning to fulfill

annie — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 19:41:54 +0000

November 20, 2011.

Still Sundays.

The New York City skyline never gets old.

I am getting older; I like it.

Love too never gets old.

This month is over, this year is over, my obsession with time, truth, and love continues.

What do I want to be when I grow up? A writer? A doctor? A teacher? A lawyer? A writer? This time I get to decide how I want to be, not who based on what.

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People have recurring dreams. I don’t.

My latest obsession is putting into words this “recent” dream: I am in a field of teal colored dragonflies. They are everywhere. The field is on the edge of a horizon or so ...

persistence: keep drawing / writing / …

annie — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 05:30:00 +0000

For those of us for whom it is not about money (although that is marvelous given one needs it, however minimally, to exist in this physical space without anxiety) nor about fame or celebrity (celebrity is a choice and it comes and goes; fame may not be a choice and can be attributed for a variety of reasons one never intended) but about the fragrant, sweet gratification of having sewn our stitch or stitches in the Embroidery of what we saw and heard and what is Possible…for those of us, there is no alternative but persistence.

Mama says persistence means you believe [honestly] in the [realistic] value of what you have to offer regardless of however success may be defined ...

“Fartists”, Light triumphs, Grow!Grow!Grow!

annie — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 19:46:28 +0000

Still Sundays.

November 13, 2011.

Stillness is a guardian angel.

That being said, on days where the frozen wind in New York City feels like the wrathy breathing of some evil gods, I do yell aloud, forgetting all I know about seasons, climate, and weather, “God you can’t be real! Because no one in his or her right mind would actually create a day this cold!”

Yet so far November feels like early spring. Will March then be like early winter? Maybe winter has never been that long after all? Climate change is changing.

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What do I know without a doubt this Sunday morning as this calendar year is almost over?

Light triumphs. Again and again ...

to really understand is divine

annie — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 22:37:50 +0000

Still Sundays.

November 6th.

No matter how many times I write about New York City it is not enough. Not enough for me and not enough for those who just don’t see what I see.

Rage is a bull and I am a champion rider who neither tires easily nor plans on retiring. At best I can tame the beast with humor. But I find cynicism easy and eventually boring; therefore, I take whatever it is that I don’t understand by the horns: the spleen wants to spit.

That being said I never write when I am angry. I can create a fury of words that can dissolve the deads’ bones, but actually write?—never. I don’t even “journal” such thoughts ...

“at the midnight hour to talk with the clock” ~ Vera Pavlova

annie — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 16:32:00 +0000

“To Converse with the greats” by Vera Pavlova

To converse with the greats by trying their blindfolds on; to correspond with books by rewriting them; to edit holy edicts, and at the midnight hour to talk with the clock by tapping a wall in the solitary confinement of the universe.

Tashaki Miyaki – Somethin’ Is Better Than Nothin’ Link to video.

Great video, I say. Resonated with me for the writing process, along with the poem. The two came separately to me. I just seated them at the same table, made of resonance.

On a personal note, I never have, and I never will, settle for something just because it is better than ...

Still Sundays

annie — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 18:02:55 +0000

October 30th.

Enjoying New York City despite the winters. Truth. Social Media and this Age of Inspiration.

The day before yesterday was a golden Fall day in New York City: sunny, bright, crisp, and filled with sunbeams shooting around every other autumn leave.

Yesterday winter came unannounced like an unexpected cavity that really should be no surprise. The snowstorm was not pretty: the sleet a constant sleazy nose drip. The snow was only “pure, pretty, and white” here and there, perhaps to create a fantasy of loveliness for those who are not here via photos taken from mobile devices. Sometimes we are able to alter our reality only if someone else believes our perception of it. If you had ...