Sunshine and a multi-coloured crayon!

Another New Year, another resolution. The most important nursery rhyme we learn (in English) may well be 'Insy Winsy Spider,' what life seems to be nothing but an endless series of climbing up walls, sliding off and trying again. I am not sure what the spider's goal was but as I grow older, the doing itself has become my goal. Just to be writing. Writing what, who will read, is it good? I actually don't care. But this is like those fifteen minutes that you get to soak your feet in a tub of hot water with salt or something fancier--wonderful in the moment. 

Year-end lists, new year resolutions--been there, done that. I might actually have nothing left/ new/ useful/ interesting to say. 

So let me capture this moment in words, just for the fun of it. A lovely morning sunlight, with the glimmer of a threat--"Shall I remind you of summer?"--in the glint of this light. All quiet on the Kamalabai Street front. My messy desk, left with all the residue of last year that I had no energy to actually tidy up. This reminds me of the mess I would leave behind were I to die this minute, this week, this year. Too much stuff, too much stuff. The baggage of a lifetime lived in hard work and anticipation. I spy three gifts on the table. A mobile stand, new, gifted by a new entrant into the family. A mug, designed in the 'ethnic cuteness' style, faded now on the outside but bright as ever inside--maybe like my spirit? A violet acrylic jar, a little visitor gift by a poet friend, repository of unpoetic but essential pendrives, of which I own many. I also have two tubes of hand-lotion--something else that I buy freely. I still spend more money on small things than large ones--the legacy of a lifetime of financial uncertainty. New diaries, old bills. Cables, cables, chargers, chargers. Three mugs full of pens. Because the aspiration to write--many words in many colours--will not die. 

When I die, just burn the material stuff with me. It is not worth the bother of sorting and filing. We are just dust and ashes, after all, and all our profound thoughts, turbulent passions, heartbroken fatigue and tickytackystuff are just waste material. Like this empty dabba that once held mints, or this sample 'activating essence' (activating what?), or this 'Refreshing Tissue' from some long-forgotten flight. 

There are also some nice little things here. A box of copper-coloured ("rose gold") binder clips that improve every printed text. A lovely multi-coloured crayon (another gift) I still haven't tried but that I realise must become the image that goes with this post. In the photo I just took, it separates the gloomy from the bright, brings colour and the promise of time spent creatively into this New Year weekend. Perfect! 

There has not been a day without writing in my life--email, cards, tweets, posts, brochures, prospectuses, articles, talks, pep-talks--but when I say that I need to write, I mean this. This feet-in-a-tub-of-water feeling of just sitting down and writing what I want, and away with the world. This is, once more, my promise to myself this new year, for which my uncleared desk might well be a metaphor, given all its tired, painful baggage. May we all find sunshine and multi-coloured crayon this year! And now, I must remove my feet from this tub-of-writing-water and hit the publish button so that I might play with the crayon!