Fragments of (a) Life
In this stream of consciousness, writer Thea Fredheim Lian explores multiple sentiments of single life during lockdown.
I have been told that life is meant to be lived a certain way. All my years I've tried to meet the subtle expectations of strangers I have yet to find. Studies. Job. Travel. Nine to five and the rest of the time laughing with friends over too many glasses of wine in one of those places that just feel right, with French rap streaming through the speakers and a way too fancy wine list.
But now. Inside.
Four white walls, ten green plants and an iPhone. I scroll through the New Year. Fireworks. Greetings. Happiness and expectation replaced by loud voices of correction and the muffled screams of frustration. Eight thousand. Four hundred. Five. The numbers seem too complex to grasp. Have I heard my own voice today? I test my vocal cords. Nothing of interest appears. Do I still have the ability to carry a tune or a mingled conversation?
I slam the phone down. Not in anger. Confusion, perhaps. I pick it up again. It’s 2022 already, I guess. New year, new me. Self improvement. I write down a list of new year's resolutions but no words appear. The pages are blank, my journal of experiences is full of nothing. Am I supposed to write down what I did today when I once again did the same as the day before? My mind is a fog and I've disappeared like Mags. I don't know what I've seen or done the past week, yesterday, the day before that, last month, a whole year gone into the abyss. A lifetime passes while I wait for something forgotten.
I put the kettle on the stove. Maybe a cup of tea will help but my thoughts are disrupted by the sound of my neighbors fucking. Or at least I think it’s the sound of sex, I seem to have forgotten what that sounds like. It could just be the new episode of Euphoria or another endless Netflix loop. When was the last time I made those noises?
The tea went lukewarm before I had the chance to taste it. My nonexistent thoughts are too distracting, they take a physical form and I can only sense them in the distance. My apartment seems to be growing smaller, maybe it really is, maybe the square meters are slowly turning into something less, shrunken in size over the past year, the space seems too small, the walls too big, the atmosphere is suffocating. I can't breathe, I can't breathe, I need to get out of here.
I step outside in the dusk with nowhere to go. I look to my left, then my right. No one. The snowflakes cover the streets in a million, one not quite like the other. The dim city noises are muted by the snow falling and by the new restrictions strictly in place. A lone taxi driver parked on the other side of the street, a new dog with an owner hurrying towards home. The magnitude of solitude echoes through the night.
Where has all the laughter gone the loud people in the streets the line to McDonalds at 3 am the smell of pee and lust in the dark alleyways. Whatever happened to the one night stand the sweaty shoulders of strangers the bliss of the blinding lights and the smell of something new. How is it to feel the beat of the base the sound of the music we listened to in our teenage dreams the tingling of dizzy tequila shots. Who am I if I am not a lover a stranger a fighter a random conversation across the bar a daring stare a friend a foe a full human being with dreams and expectations and inspirations and reflections of our general existence.
Time passes and I have lost my sense of self. I am no one.