#junglewrites

I once had an internship in a group home in Sweden, and my mentor there was an older woman named Synnove. I adored her. She seemed to adore me, too. 

Although she was probably 40 years older than me, she confessed she thought I was wise and wondered how I got that way. I can’t say I agree with her, that I am wise. But I have been told that sort of thing for most of my life, that I was mature for my age or what have you. Most people just wanted you to laugh about it and thank them, but Synnove and I were genuine with one another, so I decided to give her a genuine answer. I thought about it a moment in order to translate the words in my head into Swedish, and then told her being an older child might do that to you. Trauma and suffering, too.

She wanted to know what I meant, and I told her that growing up I didn’t really come from anywhere. I moved thirteen times in as many years. She asked me: “But where do you feel you are from? Where are your roots?” I told her I do not have any. I am like a baby spider. I have been moved wherever the wind willed me, never there long enough to lay down any roots. It made her cry.

Sometimes, it still makes me cry, too. I wouldn’t say this has shaped me into an unhappy person, because now I find comfort in solitude and in my independence. But for many years of my life I was unhappy because I never felt there was a place I could call home, a place where I belonged. I am ever reluctant to reach out to others and make friends, to lay down any roots. Though I no longer am moved wherever it is my parents go, I have a restlessness now in my bones, and the uncertainty of life, housing, the economy... it means that where I am now is not really solid ground for me, either, and I am not immune to the occasional bitter wonderings of what may have been if we had stayed in one place.

This is only the background for the poem, but not what sparked its creation. For me, poems have always been something pulled fully-formed from the ether while I’m doing anything but thinking of poetry. Usually only a word or two needs to be swapped out before it’s done, and they are always short as a byproduct of their method of creation. 

TWO  /  birthday: January 25th

THREE  /  zodiac sign: Aquarius sun, Taurus moon, Aries rising 😘

FOUR / height: 5′4.5″

FIVE / hobbies: Writing, for sure, although at this point that’s also partially an ideal career and an obsession. But also reading, video games, and eating cooking!

SIX / favorite colors: Purples, teals/cyans/green-blues, and grays.

SEVEN / favourite books: Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov is my all-time favorite, and Nabokov’s The Defense is also one of my dear favorites, as are the First Law Trilogy & The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie. The Hot Zone by Richard Preston, Level 4: Virus Hunters of the CDC by Joseph B McCormick and Susan Fischer-Hoch, and pretty much any other epidemiological book I’ve ever touched are also faves that I can never get enough of. 

EIGHT /  last song listened to: Funny Little Creatures by Nothing More

NINE / last film watched: I honestly don’t watch many movies, but the last one I watched beginning to end was Night School lmao

TEN / inspiration for muse: Everything. Absolutely everything. Nature / weather / mythology / music / other characters / real people / etc., I’m constantly refilling my well of inspiration.

ELEVEN / dream job: Full time author who can afford her mortgage? Yes. But I’m also very, very enthusiastic about the idea of working in the field of biodefense/biosecurity. 

TWELVE / meaning behind your URL: Asch is my pen-name, and I’ve always been--admittedly arbitrarily--drawn to including ink in my usernames, so I settled with aschenink sort of as a play on asch/ash. In hindsight I wish I’d just gone basic with aschwrites or something, but I’m way too deep into this to bother changing my url now, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯