There were two prompts really… One, writer self-care, was to write in a place you don’t usually write, notice the difference in self and mood. I took myself to the river, to the place where the fishermen’s have trampled the grass and left me a place to sit, and the river runs a bit deeper and slower.
The other, the writing prompt, was about what do we carry with us, what is in out pockets or purse. The only thing i really carry in my pockets are work related (knife, phone, paper scraps, malt bag strings), so I’m using the far more interesting talismans I carry in my messenger bag.
The first is an oracle coin; hamsas, clouds and the word YES on one side, a winged skeleton and the word NO on the other. It’s big and weighty, like two toonies weighty. Substantial. I don’t use it often, but I like having it for when I want to put some randomness into my life.
The other is a tiny version of the Travellers Notebook, released for their 10th anniversary. I refused to buy a tin at $40, but bought two at $10. Once I put it together, I got caught in my what if I wreck it what if I run out of pages, it needs to be perfect loop of inaction. After staring at it for months, I hand wrote the Laughing Heart poem by Charles Bukowski in it. It’s my reminder to live my best badass life.
The Laughing Heart by Charles Bukowski
your life is your life
don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.
be on the watch.
there are ways out.
there is light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you chances.
know them.
take them.
you can’t beat death but
you can beat death in life, sometimes.
and the more often you learn to do it,
the more light there will be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have it.
you are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in you.
— by Charles Bukowski