.SOMETIMES RAW.

Yesterday, my son and I spent the day “Corona-sunbathing” in a park. While he played at the playground, he found a letter, written in German. Kids find weird s***. I will give it my best translating skills and share it here because I think it is beautifully written.

It read:

The love I experience with you always takes me back to myself. Entering into union with you brings me into union with my soul. I meet you in my oneness. You look at me from this oneness and reflect this state of purity and oneness back to me. As we trust more in this love, I see aspects of me come out in you that I am still learning to love. I have this amazing opportunity to love you in areas where I am still struggling to love myself. I get to tune in and be formless, as I learn how to love you in the depths of your vulnerability. As I learn to surrender in areas I used to be bull-headed. 

I did not know I could receive a reflection so true. I am so open to receive these reflections on all aspects of myself through you. I trust you, I trust your discernment, I trust how you open up for energy to flow through your heart and express how you are moved by this. I always want to experience how you are moved by life. I am very grateful to be on this journey with you.

You love me when others would give up. You care for me when others would say: care for yourself. You listen when I speak my heart’s truth. You know when I’ve given it my all and I need a warm place to rest my head. You show me love in different ways. You listen, especially when I’m sharing from my eagle-like sight and shift perspectives when what I share rings true. Remember: Love is always enough. I feel you truly see me while seeing more of yourself. The more you can receive your own love, the more you will attract someone who mirrors that.

Oh yes, our connection has been challenging at times, but we don’t give up on ourselves or each other. We also don’t settle for less than the love we know. We upgrade each other and learn deeper compassion and kindness in it all. I wouldn’t trade this for anything.

I simply love you. When I look at you I see someone with such a bright light. And you shine it on me with unconditional generosity. You are a truth seeker. You are determined to recognize the truth of every situation. You inspire me to step into my power, to shine bright, and to look at myself with honest eyes. You shine the mirror to me with compassion and patience.

The more I get to know you, and the more I witness you in his authenticity and vulnerability the more my heart opens. The more I expanded in love with you I become. And the safer I feel to love so fully. A commitment to a spiritual path was the most important quality I desired in a partner. You are unwavering. It’s how you live your life. My love wanders to the next level. One that will accelerate, open, and deepen our being on every level. Your love reflects back at me the most radiant smile. I found my center in you through me. 

I know to throw away all doubt and risk it all over again. Trusting you like my bestest best friend. This trust will make it so, for in you is all the me I’ll ever need to know. Can you hear your heart speaking to you? Sometimes it gets drowned out by outside influence, opinions, society telling us our lives should look a certain way. Ever feel that way? I sure have. It’s become far too easy these days to back out when something gets challenging. The excuses are endless and seemingly legit. The problem is if you don’t figure out how to stay with it, you’ll simply never achieve what you truly want to achieve. I don’t mean following through with something that feels unsafe, misaligned, or out of integrity. Follow through with something that feels awesome.

I simply love you.

For some, love in the time of Corona is pretty tough. Are you currently dating? I came up with a quiz to determine if you even are in a relationship. With all my experience (cough, cough, #eyeroll) I will help you out. Dating Quiz: Is your thing with *___ (insert any name here) a relationship? You have been hooked up for a few weeks but are too nervous to define the relationship? You need answers? Take this quiz.

1. On your last date, where did * take you?

A) To a dorm party, at which he played dart and ten rounds of beer pong because he was “on fire”. Then back to his “crib” at 3 a.m.

B) To a baseball game, at which he bought two six-packs of Budweiser, hotdogs, and popcorn.

C) To IKEA, to shop for comfortable couch for his new apartment.

2. How often does he text you?

A) Three to six hours after you send him a message, or maybe more depending on how long it took you to respond to his last text. Or maybe not at all.

B) Frequently, but WHY IS HE NEVER SENDING ME THE RED HEART EMOJI? Why the green one?

C) He responds shortly every time you send him a text. He also sends you e-mails with references to jokes that you don’t always get. He is also interested in helping you with your gas and heat bill to find a cheaper solution.

3. How many of your friends has he met?

A) He has met your dog. Does that count?

B) He has met your shrink. Does that count?

C) Many. Some think he is constantly all over you but you don’t mind. You like it. Also, he won’t formally introduce himself to your friends all the time which you are cool with, too.

4. When you told him that you really like the movie Dirty Dancing, which song did he personally record a cover of and send to you?

A) “Eenie Meenie”, by Justin Bieber

B) “Hallelujah”, by Leonard Cohen

C) “Shine on you Crazy Diamond” by Pink Floyd

5. For your birthday, he gave you _________

A) A text message reading “big horny dick” two days late.

B) Sad flowers from the gas station.

C) Breakfast in bed and La Boheme opera tickets.

6. When he sleeps over over, he wears/brings__________

A) A robe his ex gave him last Christmas. A detail that he mentions constantly.

B) An adorable, cute pyjama. Also, a sleep mask, earplugs, and cream to moisturise hands and feet.

C) Nothing. He prefers body-to-body contact when he cuddles you all night long.

7. Your last fight was about __________

A) You asking him if it is possible to drink less and stop wearing sagging pants.

B) How he shouldn’t have been the one apologizing when the waiter spilled soup on his lap. Ask him if he is Canadian.

C) You are not sure if it was even a fight? You both just stopped talking at dinner and then didn’t say anything for forty minutes and it seemed kind of weird, but also, shouldn’t you be able to enjoy silence together?

8. What does he say when he climaxes?

A) “YEAH, I f****** nailed it!”

B) “Do you need help filing taxes? We should do it right now!”

C) “I love you.”

9. What did you both dress up for Halloween?

A) He forgot that you wanted to do a couple-costume and showed up in his Borat sling swimsuit. You were a single pea without a pod.

B) He went as Donald Trump. You tried to tell him that it was a bad idea, but he kept insisting, “I know him!” You stayed home.

C) Harry and Sally. He somehow had both of your costumes already.

10. You have been seeing each other for three months. For your anniversary, he takes you to ________

A) McDonalds, his favourite restaurant, across the street from his place, even though this food has already made you sick twice and you told him about it.

B) An upscale restaurant. He hired a band. He proposed at dessert but spells it “desert”.

C) A picnic at a small park in the city, where he carves your initial into his favourite tree.

The Results

Mostly A’s: I hate to break it to you, but you and * aren’t in a relationship. In fact, * is a complete asshole flirting with a group of twenty-one-year-olds by showing them his juggling “skills” and telling them that he owns a hotel in Zanzibar. Honestly, you can do better. And you will.

Mostly B’s: Yeah, so…… * is just a “project” who probably knows you have “greencards” for Canada and the U.S I guess, you already want to change a lot about him. So does he. It is hard to fall in love, but it’s way harder to get a visa. Use caution with this person but I guess it could work out. I have heard stories. And I have seen things, man.

Mostly C’s: Yes, you are dating *! Congratulations! This could be the real deal! Just be careful though. Take a closer look at that tree he showed you. Maybe yours weren’t the only initials he carved next to his.

“And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.” — Haruki Murakami

Quarantine has, undeniably, turned me into my best and my worst self. Before this pandemic, the future had a somewhat defined shape for me. Now things feel nebulous. At points, I am no longer certain where I would go from here, where the world and the economy go from here, where humanity goes. I don’t think what I valued before will be what I value after. I already have indications that those values have changed. I ask myself why I am suddenly waking up at 6.30 a.m. every day and practicing yoga daily and caring for my body more than ever before. It does not feel like it is just the extra time I have on my hands.

These days, I am taking pictures of trees, magnolias, flowers whose petals are now just beginning to brown at the edges, while feeling grief settles temporarily in my shoulders. Just the way grief does, and from my inability to be inside a store without a face mask. I miss strangers, I miss bodies, I miss festivals, I miss readings and real lectures at my university, I miss the moments of getting no seat on the subway, I miss going to work. I also noticed that I have the weirdest dreams lately. I guess due to my weird sleep cycle. It is universally understood that to talk about your own dreams is entertaining, while listening attentively to someone else talk about their dreams for more than 2 minutes is next to impossible. Having said that, quarantine dreams seem to hold my interest a beat longer than dreams would in average circumstances.

These days, my dreams seem to be brimming with extra weirdness and symbolism. I dreamt for example that I packed my suitcase for a trip to (ha!) Italy while the plane was already taxiing on the tarmac. I also dream a lot about meeting friends. A couple of nights ago I dreamt I gave birth to a cat in a public restroom at the local movie theater. Why? What would Sigmund Freund say about this? Or this rather Kafkaesque dream of me being taken to prison for not wearing my face mask. At the prison, it turned out that it’s not a prison but an insane asylum like in the movie Shutter Island. And I am here because I killed everyone at the local grocery store. Did I just deposit my weird coronavirus-era dreams into a virtual dream catcher?

But these weird dreams may occur because my sleep-cycle is completely off. During the week I used to go to bed at around 11 p.m. and woke up at 6 a.m. Maybe a 30-minute interlude wedged somewhere before of after. I used to sleep deeply without waking up and felt rested when waking up. On weekends I stayed up later and slept in which was fine, too. These days, I tend to sleep in a weird rhythm. Two hours just after 1 a.m., another two between 5 a.m. and 6.30 a.m. I sleep in chapters, in fragments. These days, there is no softness or continuity. Even with this messed up sleep cycle, however, I exist among the living in this new Corona world. In the morning I get dressed, I brush my teeth and get ready without going anywhere in particular. At night, when my son is asleep, I am this other thing, disenfranchised from the swell of standard human behavior. Caught in an expanse of hours that contain writing but no routines and obligations.

I continue to function, more or less, according to the rules of social normalcy. I am okay with the fact that, currently, I am a broken biological clock, a circadian rhythm sans metronome. The world is crazy these days. My sleep rhythm is weird and crazy but this is what it is. In fact, it’s become something of an asset. I have the luxury that this sleeplessness guarantees me something exclusive: a unique, thoroughly intimate relationship with myself. Insomnia and I have become friends, even. We pass the time together and all of it reframes the night until things get back to “normal” again. For now, not sleeping is simply more interesting to my body than attempting to sleep. I savor the extra time to read, to write or to work on my dissertation. Or to prepare elaborate midnight-snacks that I won’t consume alone. Especially if it is something with chocolate.

I have gone through worse, but I have never been a better version of myself. Corona seems like a condition of the world we are forced to live in now, and it may last for longer than I am prepared to handle. But I will power through that, too. Maybe you, too can give yourself the space to let your multitudes exist and offer them compassion: the good, the bad, and the turbulence in between. What? That’s crazy.