We Fight

History doesn’t remember everything, history forgets too. Names lost in the sands, how many things buried in the bottom of the hourglass?

Writing tips I know but never use #2

Art is hard, writing especially. You shouldn’t wait for inspiration to hit you, you should sharpen your blades, ready the guns, and hunt the damn thing down. Pin it to the page, and hold it there until it stops struggling. Go outside looking for it, talk to someone random on the bus about their coat, call a friend and ask them what the weirdest experience of their life involving the colour blue is. Hunt inspiration, do not let it hunt you.

Nothing like the constant feeling of inadequacy to keep me company as I stare at the empty page, ignoring the heaps of deadlines that advance like the shadow of death.

Writing tips I know but never use    #1

When you have an idea, write it down and stick to it. Doesn’t matter if it’s a tremendously stupid idea, like a microwave that sends food through time. Write the first chapter, where Napoleon receives a microwave home dinner which determines the outcome of the battle of Waterloo. The point is that you write it, and finish it. Even if you will never let it see the light of day, it is something that you can look at later to find the story you want to write. 

Commit to an idea, however weird, and see it through. It will be very valuable in the long run.

Every day, I come home to this guy doing something stupid. Today is no different than any other day.

Amen!

11 stages of love in arabic.

1. الْهَوَى (hawa) = Attraction The beginning of love. This love can arise suddenly, but is transient, not yet firm in the heart. 2. الْعَلاقَةُ (‘alaqah) = Attachment Love that becomes attached to the heart, and loses the transitory property ofhawa. 3. الْكَلَفُ (kalaf) = Infatuation Love that begins to intensify and have a physical affect on the lover. 4. الْعِشْقُ (‘ishq) = Desire  Love that engulfs the heart of the lover entirely, and takes it as its residence, such that love and the heart in which it resides become intimately familiar with one-another.  This love blinds the lover to any faults in the beloved. 5. الشّعَفُ / اللَّوْعَةُ / اللعَاج (sha’af, law’ah, li’aj) = Passion  Love that starts to burn, but at this stage, the love is still pleasurable in the heart. 6. الشّغَفُ (shaghaf) = Affliction Destructive, all-consuming love. The heart begins to be devoured by the love. 7. اَلْجَوَى (jawaa)= Grief Love that started with the outer covering of the heart. It takes over the entire heart, and results in an inner grief and sorrow. 8. التّيْمُ (taym) = Enslavement Love to the point where the heart is enslaved to the beloved. 9. التَّبْل (tabl) = Malady Love, which was once living pleasurably in the heart, having made it its home, now turns against the heart, and so overwhelms, confounds and bewilders it, that it is as though it were its enemy. 10. التَّدْلِيْه (tadleeh) = Disorder Love when the heart is thus being destroyed from within, and begins to lose all sense of balance and reason, it goes into a state of chaos and disorder. 11. الْهُيُوْمُ (huyum) = Insanity Love that comes to its conclusion. 

Ha!

“We can look back at those people and see how evil that was, but we can’t see it in ourselves. So therefore beware of Virtue.”

-Alan Watts

[Record scratch] [Freeze frame] Verily, that is me. Abraham, chosen one of God. Thou art probably wondering how I came to be in that situation.

Rest in peace Cruzeiro Seixas (1920-2020)