something lowkey
because i want to write but don't want to deal with hard feelings. also, thoughts on fabulism, laundry, and immersive listening experiences.
Do I need to create to be happy?
This question often swirls around in my head, especially as uglier feelings bubble too close to the surface for comfort. Perhaps I’ve conflated self-actualization with the ruthless pursuit of stifling and moulding myself into becoming the person I so desperately want to be.
But I’ll save that for another time. Right now, I want to let the words fall from my lips and fingertips, roughly and carelessly, like shaking flour through a sifter.
This is more a reminder to myself than to anyone else to be grateful for the good shit in my life. And to be more honest.
Speaking of honesty, I looked up the definition of “fabulist” because lots of my favorite authors are categorized as fabulists. Fabulist means someone who creates fables, but it can also mean, according to Oxford Languages, “a liar, especially a person who invents elaborate, dishonest stories.” The example given: “a born fabulist, with an imagination unfettered by the laws of logic and probability.”
Although I imagine the second definition is meant to apply to charlatans and lotharios, the qualities mentioned in the example sound indicative of an inventive, if not masterful, storyteller. If we equate storytelling with telling a lie, then where is the room for honesty? So long as the message is honest, are we content being lied to?
Either way, I turn to fabulism because the worlds feel hazy yet distinct, the characters lurid and louche, their insect eyes gleaming like jewels.
In addition to sorting out my reading list for the near future, Friday feels like a good day for errands and chores. My laundry came out of the dryer damp, so now my apartment resembles a blanket fort. Sheets hang from the tippy top of my doors and shower divider. Socks ring the hem of my hamper. In my bid to expose my clothes and linens to the precious little sun my corner of the city receives, I’ve effectively blocked the light coming into the apartment. I type away in the dimness.
Maybe this is a sign that I should invest in a drying rack. I probably won’t, though. I’m one of those frustrating folks who’d rather MacGyver a solution if it’s immediately available than do things the proper way if it takes longer. I’m unsure what the long-term implications are, but so far it’s worked for me.
The solution really is to dry my laundry in smaller batches. But I hate doing laundry. Friends who love doing laundry flabbergast me. “But you can watch YouTube and fold your clothes at the same time,” they point out. “It’s meditative!”
“But it takes so damn long,” I complain. Ironically, for someone who loves clothes so much, I dread spending this sort of time with them. Folding my clothes and stuffing them in my drawers feels like an act of banishment. I’m sure Marie Kondo has something to say about how folding and putting your laundry away the right way is a form of respect, but so far my brain has not made the heartfelt connection.
Is this lack of enthusiasm a failure of character? I can only hope that my attitude towards laundry changes sooner rather than later.
But things still need to get done. I will go to the gym. I will take out the recycling. I will do things because it wasn’t until recently that I was forcibly reminded that I need to, no want to, live in the real world. Wandering around in my inner world is all fun and games until I realize, “Holy sh*t, I’m lost,” and the existential dread kicks in.
Yesterday, my friend reminded me that SF MOMA was hosting its free First Thursdays. It’d been years since I had last gone (for a René Magritte exhibit, a surrealist wonderland), and The Art of Noise exhibit was at the top of my “Things that interest me so hopefully I’ll check it out at some point” list.
Groggy, I bussed down to Market nursing a several hours-old now-diluted latte. Still, caffeine is caffeine, and the breeze smacked my face just hard enough to put some life back into my cheeks.
My friend E brought along his co-worker F, and we chatted on the elevator ride up to the top floor. The absence of social anxiety was a pleasant surprise, and the surprise soon morphed into wonder as we were greeted by music posters as far as the eye could see. Colors rattled off the wall in art nouveau arabesques and the rave gradients of the early aughts.
Beyond the gallery of music posters were tables lined with audio equipment. I immediately spotted the iconic JBL vintage speaker of my dreams, as well as the iconic wall-mounted CD player designed by Naoto Fukasawa for Muji. Different eras of product design were on full display, including Bauhaus, midcentury-modern, and the space age. In a brutalist ode, a designer had even installed speakers and a record player into slabs of reinforced concrete.
In a room hidden in the back, a line of small figurines designed by Teenage Engineering serenaded an attentive audience with adorable robotic tones. E riffed on a fictional scenario where all humans lost their voices and when they would attend church, a choir of robots would sing the hymns. I wondered how we might cherish our voices differently if the scenario E posited ever came to fruition.
There was another room – a hi-fi immersive listening room outfitted with massive speakers. The middle one must have been as tall as me, and the side speakers stood stalwart by its side. A spectacled man with a wiry mustache stood next to a turntable setup. He monitored the jazz record, spinning and spooning its melodies through the speakers and right into our ears.
E led us downstairs. “This is my favorite exhibit,” he said with the glee of a child who was about to unveil his latest treasure to his fellow conspirators. We entered yet another dark room. This time, LED screens wrapped around the walls. Each panel depicted a different musician in a different room in a mansion playing their instrument of choice. They all played in harmony, enacting and improvising on a melody they previously agreed to. Sometimes a musician sang. Sometimes they sang together. There are stars exploding, they chorused, and there is nothing you can do.
My head swiveled. One guitarist had completely disappeared off-video, only to enter the screen of the pianist. He leaned against the piano, smoking a cigarette as he watched his companion play.
Singing all fae, a woman set down her accordion in favor of an acoustic guitar.
One bearded man lounged in the bathtub, water rising to his stomach as he strummed with melancholy, the guitar perched against the precipice of his bare chest. How on Earth was his body not pruney from sitting there for an hour?
“The Visitors is my favorite too,” I whispered to E. My eyes sparkled. I couldn’t remember the last time they sparkled.
We slipped out of the room and slowly made our way to the bottom floor of the museum. Photographs, memento moris, and eyes painted on furniture greeted us around the bends. A woman drummed away at the drums with a ferocious magnificence, prompting E to erase the portmanteau of our trio’s names from the sign-up sheet. I didn’t care. All I could think was, How cool how cool how cool. How cool is art. How cool that this is all here. That this exists.
On the way back to the bus stop, I cut through Yerba Buena Gardens. Applause rang out. A band was playing. The frontman announced, “We are now singing, ‘Blessed Water.’”
Blessed water, blessed water, blessed water, the audience murmured in anticipation. I’d never heard of the song before so I stayed to listen. People danced with each other and their dogs on the front lines.
At the north end of the gardens, chess players huddled over their small tables, so intent on their play that their heads didn’t even budge when a fire truck squealed by in a frenzy. Golden light spilled onto a nearby bush, just the one. I paused to admire the red flowers.
I think I don’t need to think so hard sometimes.