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30 December 2010

#365 Make a child

I land at the airport in Malmo after two weeks in Egypt. I’ve been away on one of my charter trips. I try to do one per year. Be by myself. Catch up on my reading. Fall asleep when I want, and waking up when I want.

I’m met by a cheerful E. She always has a difficult time admitting that she has missed me, but I can always tell by the way she hugs me. They’re a little harder, a little longer. We sit in the car and she talks about Christmas. Relatives, friends and the night out on Christmas Day. I think about I’ve missed hearing her talk. The constant flow. No room for breathing. No breaks. I smile and think how I’ve missed her too.

When we get to the burger joint to buy some burgers to eat at her mother's apartment, where we will spend the night, my phone rings. It's my dad. We talk about Egypt, the need for rest and other things. I don’t remember all the details.

Fast forward to E's mother's apartment. View over the rooftops. It’s the end of December and it's cold. It is nothing compared with Egypt but I am glad to be home again. Everything is as usual. Almost everything. Almost nothing.

E comes out from the toilet with her pants down at her ankles. She is holding something in her hand and stumbles through the hall crying. I turn around and look at her. She jumps up and down:

- We’re going to have a baby.

I land in my body after 25 years of life. I'm going to be a father.

Text: Navid Modiri

Required time: 
1 hour or less
Cost: 
Free.
Cons: 
For a short period living together might feel like a baby factory. Sometimes you need to have sex at times that aren’t not optimal just because she’s ovulating. Listen to each other and try to be sensitive and kind. Try to avoid shame and performance anxiety as best you can. You’ll have that thrown in your face then when you become parents anyway.
Pros: 
Life will never be the same as before. The change is monumental from the first second you’re standing in her mother's kitchen jumping. You will lie in sleepless wonder. You will cry and you will laugh. You probably won’t understand a thing until the baby’s there and then you’ll know even less. Try to enjoy it. Treat your child’s mother to massages, tasty and healthy food and peace and quiet. Treat yourself to one another.
Taggar: ovulation test, make a child, love, junk food, existence, baby, 365 things you can do
17 December 2010

#352 Write a personal ad

Perhaps you’ll find love at the vegetable counter instead of in a bar. Or after writing a personal ad.www.creativecommons.org

Perhaps you’ll find love at the vegetable counter instead of in a bar. Or after writing a personal ad.www.creativecommons.org

There are a bunch of people in the world who would say that they were born with a certain talent. Some of them call themselves, and each other, poets and writers. Just to keep others out. It's bullshit. Anyone can write. But to get good at it, you need to practice. Get up early and sit in your chair, stop whining and write. Here are: Seven things you can write.

The strange thing isn’t that it’s considered a bit uncool to post personal ads or date people online. The strange thing is that it’s accepted to at any time to go out to a pub, get drunk and fuck a stranger in the hope that one day, through this method, you’ll meet someone who you'll share the rest of your life with. As if you, by going to a bar and observing a person's jawbone or attitude, will find the woman or man of your life. And that is if there is only ONE woman or man that you could share your life with. There are a thousand different ways to meet people and there are thousands of people who could be your future partner. The remarkable thing is how closed most of us are to the various methods and opportunities that exist.

Such as:

- Dating on the web.
- Writing a personal ad.
- Going on a blind date.

Writing a personal ad isn’t easy. It’s natural to begin to slip into the usual traps of thinking that you want to meet someone who shares your interests. Maybe you want to meet someone who doesn’t at all have the same interests. So you’ll have something to talk about and can learn from each other. Write that in your personal ad. Maybe you want to meet someone you don’t understand at all. Write that in your personal ad. Dare to go a different way. Write a totally honest personal ad where you write exactly what you're looking for and don’t use worn-out phrases such as beach walks, non-smoker seeking non-smoker or middle-aged man who likes women is looking for similar someone like-minded. Think again. Do the opposite. Dare to.

Text: Navid Modiri

Required time: 
1 day or less
Cost: 
Less than €50
Cons: 
You could meet crazy people who aren’t at all who you want.
Pros: 
You could meet crazy people who aren’t at all who you want.
Taggar: ragga, notebook, love, hugging, dinner, degebo, collective, coffee, 365 things you can do
16 December 2010

#351 Write a love letter

There are a bunch of people in the world who would say that they were born with a certain talent. Some of them call themselves, and each other, poets and writers. Just to keep others out. It's bullshit. Anyone can write. But to get good at it, you need to practice. Get up early and sit in your chair, stop whining and write. Here are: Seven things you can write.

The best love letter I ever wrote was a hate mail. I had met a girl who was a few years older than me and I had fallen head over heels in love with her. She was complicated, nuanced and had been through things I hadn’t been. I adored her and her uncompromising integrity. I thought she was absolutely magical. And based on the classic cosmic rules she hurt me over and over again by dumping me. After the tenth time I had had enough. My torso was minced meat from all the knife blows. So I decided not to try again.

Instead, I sat down and wrote a long letter to her about all the things that she wouldn’t know about me. All the things she wouldn’t get to hear me tell. Everything she would miss out on when she kept dumping me time and time again. I told her my two favorite colors. I told her about my aunt who set fire to herself to escape her husband's beatings and the two children who remained in their father's violent (lack of) care. I talked about how my parents met. About my nightmares as a child. About my nightmares as an adult. I told her about the obsessive thought I have as to which chair to sit in when I walk into a room. I told her that I had broken my hand twice. And that I hate penicillin.

All this I wrote in a letter. I didn’t dare send it to her. Instead, I formulated the beginning of the letter so that I could read it to her answering machine. I sat next to the phone and found the courage to call. My hands were totally sweaty. My body shook and I was one second from calling her. I held the phone in my hand when it began to vibrate. Her name appeared on the screen.

I answered.

It was quiet.

- Sorry, she said.

Then we started from scratch. I told her that she couldn’t keep behaving like that. She apologized again. Then we moved in together. Then she proposed. Then she gave birth to our daughter.

Text: Navid Modiri

Required time: 
1 week or more
Cost: 
Free.
Cons: 
It might have the completely opposite effect. You might get turned down. You can embarrass yourself. You can get even more hurt. You can feel like shit.
Pros: 
You may get the ones you love to realize that they love you.
Taggar: shelf, Quito, never give up, love, degebo, courage, colorful, 365 points
24 July 2010

#206 Tell people you love them

1. Sit down. Make a list of people you have around you. Divide them into three columns. People you care about. People you love. People you don’t want to live without.

2. Get out your cell phone, pen and paper and e-mail programs. Send e-mail or SMS to the ones you like. Write nice and encouraging things.

"You are beautiful."

"You are a good person."

"I hope you have a fantastic day."

3. Call the people you love and ask how they are. Ask them what they’re doing tonight. Ask what they’re doing tomorrow. Before you get off the phone, say: “I love you. You are such a good person. “

Then comes the finale. Pick up a pen and paper and write handwritten letters to the people you have around you that you can not live without. They are indispensable, magic, and can read you like an open book. The people who put up with your hangovers, crying spells, panic and doubt. Those who will remain with you during the hard times. Write how much they mean to you. Write from the heart. Write slowly and mean it. Finish with love.

Required time: 
1 day or less
Cost: 
More than €10 in stamps
Cons: 
It's hard to say you love someone. Once the words are uttered, you'll be vulnerable. It is dangerous to be vulnerable.
Pros: 
It is human and beautiful to be vulnerable. We’re not meant to be alone. Man is a herd animal and we need each other.
Taggar: vulnerability, text message, telling people that you love them, love, letters, herd animals, 365 things