Pick-Up 038: What I've been up to
Hey friends,
Hope you’re doing great. I’ve been missing, if you’ve noticed, for a couple of weeks now.
I took a break…a much-needed one.
We’ve traveled to my parents home towns in the regions of Marrakech. We go there almost every summer but we missed the last one because of the whole Covid situation of course. Arriving home after the vacation made me nostalgic and a bit sad and I thought I’d share some thoughts with you on this trip to empty my heavy heart and to…just share…it might resonate with some of you.
I loved how I was disconnected almost completely from the outside world. The villages were outside the coverage zone and so I wasn’t receiving any messages or calls and I couldn’t send any. No social media which was GREAT! No Youtube…nothing! Well, there was cable tv but we very rarely turned it on. And so the two weeks seemed like a long period of time.
What I have found out about myself during this trip is that:
I love mountains; they’re majestic. I thought I was a beach person but I figured this newfound love given my reaction when I’m in front of a mountain landscape. Especially, the high wide ones of the Grand Atlas.
Come to think of it, I might say the same thing for forests. I think it’s just the thing we have for nature as humans. That necessary connection we missed after two uninterrupted years here in the city.
My Berber is much better than I thought. The remarks I received confirmed that. I would always make an effort to speak it with people there. All of them being immediate or extended family members as everyone in the village is related. I myself was surprised about how fluent sometimes I can be. Words that I never used but only heard somewhere would pop out in conversations when needed. I‘ve noticed a funny thing though! Sometimes while speaking, I’ll unintentionally mix English and Berber and it makes me wonder why it doesn’t happen with french.
I forgot how important it is to take some time off. To step back enough to get a clearer vision. I’ve lost track of the usual thoughts I obsessively ruminate. It felt as if it was a whole different “me” on that trip. There is a much simpler lifestyle in the countryside. People seem to live carefreely and less stressed than those living in the city and I yearn for that.
I miss a lot of things from the old days though. I loved riding donkeys and going to wells to bring potable water at dawn and to the river in the evenings to bring water for the cattle. I miss the sound-beats played by the water moving in the containers as donkeys head back home and the chats, laughs, and singing we used to have in the way.
I loved that there used to be cows in every house and that there’d be taken out to graze in the fields. I miss the sound of the milk churn, the taste of the bread dipped in that special butter.
This time, I didn’t cry while leaving. It was about 5 in the morning so people were sleeping and I couldn’t decipher much of the surrounding landscape.
There is much more to tell about those places only I don’t want this comeback issue to be long.
Take good care. Xx
💭 This Week’s Quote
“A place belongs forever to whoever claims it hardest, remembers it most obsessively, wrenches it from itself, shapes it, renders it, loves it so radically that he remakes it in his own image.”
― Joan Didion.
Thanks for Reading!
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As always, I appreciate you.
Stay curious and have a great week
Meriem.