I’ve gotten really obsessed with counting the grey hairs in my hair line. Not that I know the number, but that maybe if I keep track of them I’ll have an understanding of time. Ageing. I remember my sister braiding my hair and pulling the first grey strand from the pack. Holding it up to the light. I couldn’t believe time came for me and I yelled at my mum for not telling me about grey hairs at 22 the same way I told her she had to warn me of periods and UTIs. Like time is something that festers, generations of women warning me of what comes ahead.
We work to quantify so much. Likes. Followers. Clicks. Percentages. RSVPS. Dollar signs and decimal points. For someone that claims to be a water colour I spend so much of my trying to slip each pan of ink into the cells of a spreadsheet. Counting. Quantifying.
Six grey hairs about my left temple. One new one above my right ear.
Rounding up our experience of time to rank it out of ten. Algorithms numbering us off to fit neatly into the streams. The moral manic of sharing and measuring and what we share and what machines do our thinking for us. Will i even have a job if all the numbers on the sheet come out with the odds against my favour? Pulling the thread we we cannot see but surely feel tugging on our rib cages when we sing out, back onto the spool.
When we begin to quantify we start by asking the wrong question. The how we got here, or how we show off. Of age of art of trying and timing. We act as if time spent soaked in wine and laughter is measurable. Like a skipped stitch in a sewing machine the gaps are only noticeable if we look for them.
How we create or usher something into the world is only ever qualified on behalf of a something. An effort to measure me against itself. To reduce my to the measurement. The three dimensional humaness of breath and space and just trying to figure out how to make it make sense. Like if I rearrange the cells the odds may work in my favour. Quantifying on behalf of being good. Evidence that I am good. Or ahead of time. Or right on time. Like if I count the grey hairs on my head I wont be shocked by time passing at all. If I could the measure of each word I can stay ahead of the reaction. You can’t hate this I already hate myself. You can’t like this I have already moved beyond it.
An effort to pay attention to what we’re paying attention and only ever always missing the mark. spreadsheets, cells, algorithms of creations and categorization are not something we escape from. This essay is beyond a measure not because it is free of numbers but because art, creation, is a reminder of being alive. That we are not quantifiable.
The more and more I write and deliver myself, my whole self into a feed, the more and more it feels like a trap. Quantified vulnerability. How brave she is. What pedestal of healing and growth look like. When the answer is there is no box or pedestal but instead it’s a trap. A measurement of self worth. Of time. Of ageing, of the same thing I told my mother to warn me against. Something my sister couldn’t pick out.
I am not Phoebe artist, creator writer 3d human, I am Phoebe six grey hairs about my left temple. One new one above my right ear. I am not authenticity and lonelines in an essay I am the the growth of my mailing list. I am not free I am just wrestling against the quantification of it.
Creation requires community. We are not islands. We are not meant to do this alone. We are In The Roots: Together In Process
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big love and many blessings for creations beyond all measure
xx
Phoebe 🌸