will try to come back to the keyboard here, for the color of the day, a form of “public service”.
run in a bit, a little before daylight. just the third of the week, the first of a series in a long while, or since March. Then back here. It’s M’s birthday, i have to run a lot earlier, and light the incense earlier, to be able to head out of the metro early.
Every morning, shortly after sunrise, we open all the blinds in the department, the windows face south east so all the morning sunbeams come in, in soft translucent diagonal planks.
After the windows — the doors; we open wide all the doors of the department leading to the corridor. R, the assistant (she’s more than that, she’s the fulcrum that holds the day-to-day operation of the department but i try not to spoil her) then works quietly, playing soft jazz music from her computer in her station at the center of the department, with multiple Korean telenovela actors transitioning in a slideshow as screensaver.
Then, we light an incense in Chit’s room.
Then, “walk” the incense through the length of the office and all the corners .
R continues typing and going through the chart of a site, i’m sure she sees me from her peripheral vision.
I wonder what she’s thinking, i cannot read minds, but she’s probably saying in her head — “why does she do that every morning……. is she Catholic — or Buddhist….? Rosaries in the car given by Ricci several Christmases ago and incense and scents given by Khrysta. or maybe Incan!? Seems to worship the streaming light… And the rushing wind.”
Running in the morning till your lungs feel like bursting is good for your soul.
She filled the place with flowers all the way up to the parking lot. The chapel and lobby was inundated with pure and white gleaming blossoms that overflowed to the driveway. Chit Estella lived a large life, and by that we don’t mean Oprah’s definition of a “large life” when she refers to her friends who own private jets and make three designer gown changes inside of one party (Mariah making a gown change walking away from an awards night, changing again into another beaded dress on her way to a party, slipping into another sequined outfit to walk five meters of paparazzi to her car from the party, and Oprah said it was because “she lived large…” or “she lived a large life”. No. That’s not what we mean.)
Chit in her simple but exquisite clothes unintentionally lived a large life as she documented and reported on government functions that should be accounted for by public officials – events that affected the lives of a large number of people – making the public more watchful of those who ruled them and more capable of determining their destiny.
How large could your life get when the landscape of a country changes with a turn of a well-researched page?
(albeit, without meaning to, as she joined our food binges, Christmas rehearsals; translating poetry for a colleague’s birthday)
Chit in her simple but exquisite clothes unintentionally lived a large life as she documented and reported on government functions that should be accounted for by public officials – events that affected the lives of a large number of people – making the public more watchful of those who ruled them and more capable of determining their destiny. 
