robyn reads books

I’m writing this from the beach, well partially. Maybe continue when I get home. 

It has been a difficult couple of days personally, and I came here mostly to catch rays and read Clarice. Maybe to let the weather do some of the work my mind has been trying to do.

A few weeks ago I wrote that Clarice walked into my reading room and asked, “Who told you the room needed walls?”

And I think she’s still dismantling them.

The phrase that caught me today was, “the strength that guides me and brings me the world itself.”

I realized I’ve spent much of this year trying to understand other people and my position in their lives. Maybe even trying to understand the world. Definitely trying to figure out my loneliness and why no one wants me. But Clarice is nudging me toward something else entirely. I think she’s saying, forget understanding the world and start participating in it.

But look at the start of that paragraph…

She doesn’t begin with the world.

She begins with “About me in the world…”

Existence first.

World second.

Then language.

Then voice.

Everything seems to emerge from consciousness itself. Amazing.

Another thing that struck me…

Clarice writes about “the eroticism that belongs to whatever is living.”

A few months ago, more like a few weeks if I’m honest, I probably would have read that as desire.

The eroticism that belongs to whatever is living is scattered in the air, in the sea, in the plants, in us…

I don’t think she’s talking about sex, rather she’s talking about sex the way Homer talks about war. As one expression of being alive. I have been using ‘alive’ a lot lately… wanting to feel it, be it. She uses eroticism the way i keep using aliveness.

Or maybe it’s eroticism = vitality.

Only a little while ago I wrote this somewhere, can’t remember, but it’s always top of mind:

“I want people to know my brain and my body.”

It’s not random, can’t be a coincidence. I think it was preparing me for Clarice or vice versa. It’s clear she refuses to split consciousness from embodiment.

Thinking.

Desire.

Writing.

Touch.

Attention.

All of it. They’re one movement. I want that movement. Maybe it’s what I would consider ‘flow’.

Also curious about this expression,

“I write you with my voice.”

That landed somewhere very deep.

I write you.

I don’t know what Clarice means.

I only know she doesn’t say I write to you.

She says I write you.

That tiny shift feels enormous.

It makes language feel less like communication and more like existence itself. I suspect I’m going to be thinking about that for a long time.

Or even now, still…

Is it maybe an act of existence of the self?

She’s definitely bringing herself into being through voice. This whole book feels like she’s constantly trying to catch consciousness before it hardens into thought.

So, no wonder I’ve become obsessed with authorship.

No wonder I’m building shelves.

No wonder “being registered” has become the center of this reading room.

Clarice isn’t merely communicating. She’s bringing consciousness into existence through language. Fuck I love it. That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to do but don’t know how.

I noticed something else in my own margin notes today. Without thinking, I wrote:

time, consciousness, interior weather, attention. all after heartbreak.

I was sad writing it. I smiled when I looked back at it. Because I realized it’s my Scotland reading list.

The qualities. As in,

I must read books that deepen those four things.

I must walk in weather that deepens those four things.

I must write field notes that preserve those four things.

Because if there’s one thing Clarice keeps whispering to me, it’s:

You don’t have to become someone new. Just become more available to the life that’s already moving through you.

So regarding the personally tough days, I feel I’m in protection mode now. I need to protect my aliveness. While I don’t fully know what I mean and how much I hold there yet, it’s there, I need to protect it and I want to chase more of it.

And yes, Clarice, I still want the flow.