Fragments of the Quiet Mind

There you were again. Bittersweet. Mysterious. Smelling faintly of burnt hope and toasted almonds. I couldn’t place you, but somehow I already missed you. You arrived on a Tuesday — not a remarkable Tuesday, mind you. Just one of those limp, mid-tempo days that smelled faintly of budget cuts and existential dread. I found you sitting there, steam spiraling like a secret trying to escape, whispering things to my tired soul like: "You’ll survive this spreadsheet." "You are more than your inbox." "The meeting could’ve been an email." Was it your warmth that unraveled the corners of my anxiety? Or your bitterness — so artfully balanced, like heartbreak in a tuxedo? Loving you felt oddly familiar, like recognizing a skyline you’ve only ever seen in a dream. Or a crush on someone who doesn't exist — but has a Spotify playlist somehow eerily aligned with your breakup mood. I started timing my mornings around you. Measured my sanity by your pre...

Petrichor is the scent of rain on dry earth, or the scent of dust after rain. The word is constructed from Greek, petros, meaning stone + ichor, the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods in Greek mythology. It is defined as "the distinctive scent which accompanies the first rain after a long warm dry spell". Last night I made my plan to run early in the morning. I woke up at 4 am to hear the beautiful sound of the rain. Since my work starts at 4pm (12 hours to do anything I want to do) I decided to do my routine, some push ups, boil water, make coffee, get my laptop, light a cigarette and sit on the porch.  I was enjoying the serenity of the rain and each drop sounded like someone is playing some notes in his piano. Since I live in a weird place where your nearest neighbor is half a kilometer away, I can’t hear anything except the melody that the rain was playing. I just sat there relishing and enjoying every second of the moment. Petrichor, I remember that word. F...

Maybe the cure for anything isn’t grand. Maybe it’s not found in redemption arcs or second chances. Maybe it’s just this— Music. Coffee. Smoke. The holy trinity of the broken who still try to feel. I don’t go a day without them. Music drips through my veins like morphine. It doesn’t ask anything from me—just lets me be. I keep Korn on repeat—yeah, I know, not everyone gets it. Their sound is abrasive to the polished, but to me, it’s a mirror. Every note, a scream I’ve been too tired to let out. They’ve kept me alive longer than some people have. Angst. That beautiful, shapeless thing. It doesn’t tell you whether you’re okay or not. It just sits with you in the in-between. You’re not sad. You’re not fine. You’re a suspended breath. A body between pulses. It’s not even pain, not really. Just the haunting suspicion that you’ve felt too much and nothing all at once. And when that feeling builds—when it claws up my spine and fogs my thoughts—I write. Not for applause. Not for people. J...

7 minutes to midnight.  Another day is creeping in, and yet, I’m still here, awake. After 13 hours of grinding away, 20 hours without sleep,  I’m beyond tired—drained, really, in ways I don’t even have the energy to describe. Nighttime is supposed to be a refuge. A moment when your body heals, when your mind lets go. By now, most people are deep in sleep, tucked in with someone, dreaming of things that don’t really matter but feel comforting all the same. I envy them, honestly. But tonight, it’s different.  There’s no soft comfort,  no calm to sink into.  Just this tug-of-war with my thoughts, a restlessness that doesn’t care how exhausted I am. The pillow? It’s just another part of the problem. I should be winding down by now, but instead, I’m out on the balcony. Coffee in one hand, laptop in the other. There’s a drizzle, and the cold bites a little more than I expected.  The stillness out here isn’t peaceful—it’s heavy, thick with that kind of loneliness ...