Windmills of my mind

Stepping into March

The last weekend of February was a perfect ending to the long winter! Splash of the sun over two days! 

On Saturday we went to our dream field, the place that often visited during the lockdown days. On Sunday, we continued the ritual and drove to Abingdon and took a walk next to the river. Walking under the sun, with the weather of 10 degree, having coffee in hand, watching people’s talking, waking, and laughing reminded us of another possibility of life. The side that we have forgotten during the long winter.

Once again, my partner and I, dared to dream. Dared to think of tomorrow and hope for good days coming. 

Just before the weather changed, we submitted his Australian partner visa, the plan that we had since last year and provided many documents over the past six months. Surprisingly enough, I also received good news from one of my job applications. Don’t you think there are sings of Spring? 

I don’t want to spoil writing about her in a diary, I owe her a proper essay. But I just want to write this fact that what has impressed me the most about her character is believing and acting based on this concept of “Feel Free”, something that I am the complete opposite from many aspects of my life...

Scattered Clouds, -4°C

Oxford

Renew

Every second night before bed, I do a yoga session from a series named ‘BREATH’, and each session has a name. Tonight session was called ‘Renew’

Today is 11th February, exactly a month after I’ve started my job in 2021. It doesn’t feel only four weeks, with the lockdown, all the hassles at work etc etc 

After a month, my yoga session was ‘Renee’ and I keep thinking this cannot be only a coincidence...

Overcast clouds, 2°C

2 Arnold's Way

Walking into February 

This post is a week late. I wanted to write about entering the second lockdown month of winter sooner, but February had a rush start for me. It started with shocking news of a job application that I was sure of it. 

Although I submitted my big translation book, the project that I worked on it on daily bases for ten months, the effect of the news was so strong that left me very unhappy. 

It was not only an application rejection on the surface, deep down I was angry with my family, with the uncertainty around us, with so many pain bodies inside me...

It took me three days to recover from it. Early this morning I spoke with my best friend in Australia, I finally felt to be heard!

So, February has just started for me! 

Jobs and Relationships 

Sometimes, our feelings about our jobs are similar to our experiences in relationships. An unjust job could has an effect of a bad relationship that breaks your heart.  You can find yourself in a dark room late at night, breaking down into tears and feeling sorry for the situation you are in ...

And like all difficult relationships, the sadness about unfulfilled jobs would be over one day, the day that you would have the courage to walk out of it ...

It has been two weeks that I am back to work. As usual, office work is quite busy after holiday time, didn’t find time or space to write.

The last two weeks, I had usual work responsibilities, plus a strict plan of 20 pages per day for translation, plus doing half an hour yoga practice each night before bed, in addition to attending English and Farsi short stories online classes with all their necessities. You only realise how much you have done until you list your achievements on paper! 

But today I didn’t do one thing as usual, that was not attending our half day team meeting. Instead of spending half day listening to conversations that I often didn’t enjoy, I worked on my translation and plan to make my network stronger for my next role. And the truth is I felt so good to abandon my old team, and did whatever I felt good about. Interestingly enough, at yoga session tonight, I learnt about space and how important it is to keep space from the old and make room for the new. 

Home Office Change before starting work in 2021!

Today, I rearranged my study room to get ready for the first day  at work from  January 11th 2021. I needed some motivation for tomorrow and felt by a little change in my home office environment, I  would reach a level of satisfaction, which I did.

My desk is now facing the room door and I have the window behind me with my ivy and geranium plants and some photos sitting on the edges, a much better background to compare with last background of my degrees hung on the wall behind.  Now, I can still turn my chair a little bit, and overlook at the line of trees from Oxfordshire Farmer reservoir in distance. I also have better control over room from this angels. My electric bike, dumbbells  and  yoga matt are in front of me as reminder of 'keep it moving!'. 

While I was rearranging my room with the help of my partner, I thought of the concept of change. How essential it is in our life? How important it is in our well-being? How little change can make a big difference? I used to have a student life for years, having a little space, a little corner for my desk and books, and the rest of the place was occupied by other essential furniture, like bed and chair. What I have today, a whole room of my own as 'home office' is a luxury! But I remember even during those difficult years of student life, I still made small changes to my environment. Sometimes, changing the direction of the desk, or rearranging the bed and desk or even adding a new small plants. I learnt this over years that a little change can go far. 

However, as a professional adult who owns an apartment and has a study room of herself, I was not looking forward for starting my job tomorrow. It feels like that nothing has changed in 2021 but got worst. We are still national lockdown, the hospitals are overwhelmed by COVID patients, the economy is down, there is not much work to do, the vaccine distribution is very slow...so really what's there to look forward? What's there to get up tomorrow and be motivated to turn on your laptop?

I don't know the answer to those questions for everybody. But what works for me was to make a change in my environment. I have to admit that this idea did not come to me last week. So, a week off paid off at the end. I feel 'almost ready' to start work 2021! Bring it on! 

Baby shoes for sale

Yesterday was a difficult day. It was the anniversary of the flight 752’s crash, which caused all its 176 passengers and crew died. The Kief Ukrain plan took off from Imam khomeini airport in Tehran on 6th January at 6:12 am local time, its final destination was Canada, when 3 minutes later it was hit by two missiles. The incident was a consequent of a series events in Iran which caused the country in “ready mood” and as a result, the passengers plane was hit ‘by mistake’ of a wrong judgment.

I was in Iran-visiting family- when it happened. Yesterday I felt homesick and was very down remembering the event. There were 15 children among passengers, there was one infant, there was newly married couple, there were many PhDs and doctors and engineers who all came to visit their families over Christmas.

What I felt yesterday was a combination of anger, extreme sadness and grief for this tragedy. I watched the documentaries made by the media interviewing with their families, friends and colleagues. Such talents and invaluable lives gone so easily...

I also felt a sense of gratitude of what I have right now. Isn’t that we become aware of our happiness when we see the misery and death of others? Isn’t a wakening call a strong effect of witnessing sudden death? By drowning into deep sadness of their death, I started to see how little are my concerns and worries. How small my scale of happiness measured against those who gone...I blamed myself of not being grateful enough, of not being productive enough, of not being kind enough to myself but only others...

Today, when I woke up after a deep sleep which was needed the most-I barely slept the night before- the first thing I saw was a tiny fresh touch of snow on trees. It finally snowed last night! I looked over my bedroom window and felt alive, grateful and ambitious! The feelings and motivation that we need in such difficult circumstances to carry on. After all, a week of off from work has paid off!  

Hemingway’s got the shortest story of the world. I adapted that to the PS752 flight victims: 

"For sale: baby shoes, ‘once’ worn."

#flight753 #planecrash

Second day challenge, Language

It was more difficult to concentrate on writing/translation today, the second day of my off week in January 2021. In the morning, frankly nearly noon, after my 20 min strength exercise and the shower, I felt the need to check my work email and my messages. I felt that this plan of giving myself a week off to think of my plans for 2021, is not working. There was a part of me feeling missing out, left alone, while almost everybody has rushed back to work! Since the UK has entered to the third national lockdown - do not let me start with it! - for most people staying at home, work is the best escape. Working in a big tech corporate, my mind is also conditioned with this escapism. Getting back to work, forcing yourself for more online training, getting more online certification, attending more online workshop etc. Whatever that makes you feel 'productive'. The thought and the resistance stayed with me until I managed to convince myself again that my 'translation work' is also an achievement, my every night 'book reading' is also an achievement, so does this blog posting! It is funny how the conventions of society has conditioned our mind that we are only 'useful' when we do things through certain channels. Perhaps, it is not much society's enforcement, it could be my own mind playing. One thing I know about myself is having a very judgement mind - I thought a few seconds what word to use … still not sure - My mind often gives me a hard time. It is very critical towards me not everybody else! 

Anyhow, I managed to deal with the strong thought of going back to work and stayed focused on second revision of my translation for a few hours. Once I settled into the task that I enjoyed the most, my nagging/critical mind shut up! 

This evening, before starting another round of editing, I decided to add one new aspect to my routine. Allocating half an hour for Magazine readings while having my tea. The outcome of the first day:  Granta magazine 153 edition, "The Ard, the Ant and the Anthropocene" by Charles Massy and an article on "Writing in Second Language' from Vinesh Magazine in Farsi. Still too early to summary the first article, but the second article cheered me up. Kurdish writers in Iran have written about their experience in writing their Kurdi (mother-tongue language) and Farsi (Official and everyday language in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan).

For me, the difference is between English and Farsi. While I agree with many comments that the Kurdish writers have made, I feel there is a great deal and comfort in me when I express myself in English. I read in English, think in English and communicate in English with my partner ALL THE TIME. However, I struggle to write fiction in English, lacking the artistic and sentimental aspects of the language. Interestingly enough,  Farsi writing is not so easy for me either. I have lost the touch with my mother-tongue language for years and sometimes while translating, I perfectly know what the word means in English and am unable to present it in Farsi! 

Talking of language and its complexity can take pages...a topic that I truly like to think and write about. Let us have it as a start, I'll come back to it later! 

P.S. Resisting my critical thoughts this morning and adding this hour of reading magazine to my routine has made this day super productive! :)

New Year, New Way!

2021 has arrived four days ago. After a long weekend, today is the first day back at work for most people. I, however, am still on my annual leave. 

I still have 4.5 days from my holiday balance from 2020 which I can roll over until April 2021. But I decided to use these days now to take a longer Christmas leave. The fact that we all worked hard in 2020 due to COVID lockdowns and restrictions, made me wonder to start 2021 differently. We all still work from home, although the distribution of the vaccine has  began in most parts of the world, the most optimistic estimation is we may have normality back in late Spring! So, even we get back to work after 2 weeks Christmas break, everything else is the same. Still virtual meetings, emails, chats, and long hours work from 8 am to 6 pm. In particular for my current role, there is not much going on and most likely we would have a quiet January. So, I ask myself an honest question, does it really matter to start the work in 2021 from 4th January or 11th January under the current circumstances? 

I could not focus much on my goals and aims or even had a proper REST for the new year during the holiday time. Last night I finished translation for a novel of 455 pages, still the final revision has to be done by first week of February! So again, I asked myself which one is more important, allocating a week for proper planning and preparation for the entire year or jumping back to the routine life? 

A poet from Rumi, Great Persian Poem, says that "You are what you seek". I have known about this for years but I have not been able to truly applied it to my life. So, I have decided to act on this year. I start 2021 by seeking more balance and happiness for myself but nothing else. I start 2021 by giving more space to myself from work and other commitments. I start 2021 by waiting for the world to reach out to me rather than I reach out everyone else. I start 2021 by prioritising ME! 

Happy New Year! Happy New Way! 

A Gloomy Saturday 

It is an gloomy Saturday evening. I have felt down since this morning, not sure exactly what is the reason. The truth is I have had a rough two weeks when two different companies have reached out for various roles and they have scheduled three interviews. Preparing for those interviews plus the hassle of everyday working when I have to be still active at my current role, has worn me down. Perhaps that was one of the reasons that I couldn’t write much...not a good but when you don’t have a peaceful mind, writing becomes the last priority. 

 I did two interviews yesterday. They went well, I think! The whole day, I was energetic and positive, despite the stress and hard-work. But this morning I woke up with a different feeling. I had a bad dream about my uncle in Bristol-whom I haven’t heard from him for months-. I was also not sure what to do today. Translation? Preparation for next interview for company A? Or company B? Or just do nothing! Stay in bed and watch some episodes ... My body and mind screamed for last item in the list but I went for the first! Four hours interview got me back on schedule for last week (still a week behind of my plan!)

It is 7 pm and I still don’t feel boosted or energetic. I missed my deceased friend today by seeing her photo on my window corner. I feel missing my mother but didn’t give her a call. I feel my life is perfect when everyone else life is messed up! I feel we all trapped in a prison with no hope of freedom. I feel like reading a book and escaping all these formalities ...I feel the sadness with my whole body ...

Few clouds, 12°C

2 Arnold's Way

When working days finish unexpectedly 

I work up today with a positive energy that today is going to be a good day. I even went into my balcony and picked a rose that my plant flowered even in frost and rainy days of November. Although my work starts at 9 am, I usually try to buy myself an hour in the morning to work on my writing. I have a short story deadline tomorrow lunch time for Granta magazine. One of the story that I wrote three years ago, get recently motivated to work on it again! 

Work was as usual. I tried to help an online hack with our partners team, spent an hour to listen to team X use case, suggested some approaches, then focused on my own work, preparing for a webinar tomorrow morning at 6:30 am ( Australia time zone). I was quite busy until late afternoon when I checked with team X on their progress when I realised that they don’t even have an active subscription in our cloud! I really don’t know what happened at 4 pm when I suddenly felt so frustrated and angry with my day! During our evening walk with my partner, I was in a negative mood, complaining of everything in my life to him! God knows he is such a patient person, he always listens to my nagging and keeps saying: “I see you are improving, you get closer to your goals every day, some days the progress is less, some days it is more.”

I wish I have his positivity. I wish I would have stayed in pinky rose mood. I wish I wouldn’t let negativity controls me even for half an hour!

P.S. I am calm now, preparing to do yoga and then do more writings and translations.

Clear sky, 2°C

2 Arnold's Way

Early hours of an uncertain event 

5:20 am BST 

It is Wednesday, 4th Nov, the early morning of US election 2020. I’ve followed the election news until  now. There is a tight battle in key states between #trump and #biden which disappointed me. With Trump leading those key states that every news agency is covering in details,  I’ve feel sick in my stomach... It keeps me awake, although I am very tired and anxious. 

Haven’t US people seen what happens to the international relationships for the past four years?

Haven’t US people suffered enough of how Trump administration deal with Covid-19? 

Haven’t they notice how much the racism inequality has increased during his first presidency?

Well, the national exit poll results show that these facts are noticed but there are other figures and facts that they believe in. 

P.S. With my next post most, we will know the next president of the United States. For the record, I just want to say that I am very happy that I don’t live in that country! 

#uselection2020 #diary 

2 Arnold's Way

Today was a difficult day, there is something about Mondays that doesn’t feel right.

I woke up at 5ish and couldn’t go back to sleep. I worked on my Farsi story until 7, I was still anxious to go back to sleep. I could hear the rain outside and became worry. Isn’t rain supposed to calm you down?

I then used the time, spoke with my friends in Melbourne. Australia is my second home. They came out of Victoria regional lockdown after 114 days. I can’t imagine it ... I talked about uncertain time with my best friend, she said something that made my day. “Whatever happens to you, although it might look cloudy, I am sure it will turn out great for you”

I wish I could carry this belief with me every moment. 

The rest of the day went as doing a yoga session - started Nov Yoga series by Adrian the Ground - and a few hours work and felt gloomy as usual,   big fridge shopping in late afternoon before lockdown, revising my story again before submitting to my writing circle, making dinner and cleaning the kitchen!

It must be a Monday!

“This is where you are now: at the difficult and thrilling moment when you must decide whether you will go beyond amusing yourself with the creation of fictional realities, whether you set them down in writing. The decision to commit yourself, to orient your life toward of the achievement of your purposes, is already a way -the only possible way- to be a writer.” #letterstoayoungnovelist #mariovargasllosa #mondaymorningread #commitment #infinity  ‎#ماریو_بارگاس_یوسا #نامه_هایی_به_یک_نویسنده_جوان