Fasika

do you think about how more lives have been ruined in attempts to prevent sin than because of sin itself? bc i do…a lot.

[kaukio]

layering jewelry where it doesn’t belong

[kaukio]

caller, i mis

[unusual-suspects]

x

[kaukio]

like a vintage magazine

[kaukio]

i call this stage of life peace and reconciliation.

not because the world has grown quieter, but because i no longer feel responsible for every noise it makes. these days, i choose my battles the way a gardener chooses what to water. some things are simply not mine to keep alive. there are evenings where solitude sits across from me at the table. not as a punishment, but as a familiar guest. the laughter of my younger years visits less often now, yet in its place is something steadier. something that doesn’t leave when the music stops.

i walk through unfamiliar places and feel less foreign to them. perhaps because i have finally become less foreign to myself. peace, i’ve learned, is not a shelter built to hide from life. it is a way of standing in the rain without mistaking yourself for the storm. it is answering difficult questions before they become regrets. it is carrying responsibility without turning it into self-cruelty. it is learning that every choice leaves a fingerprint, and accepting that your hands are the ones touching the clay. people speak of peace as if it were a destination. i think it is closer to a posture. a way of holding yourself. a soft grip on what you cannot keep and a steady hand on what you can.

in this long uncertain path, i’m also becoming a companion to myself.

[kaukio]

i know my heart, though i’ve never been one to hold it up for the world to inspect. perhaps i should. still, the people who have known me across seasons have seen enough. especially those i’ve wounded. there is a quiet peace in knowing that some of them found room to forgive me.

i think love is stranger than we give it credit for. it does not always leave when it is asked to. sometimes it settles into the walls, becoming less of a fire and more of a familiar light. in time, you learn yourself beyond your surroundings. beyond who you were taught to be. and once you step into that version of yourself, there are places within you that can never return to what they were before. i hope i’ve closed every door that was meant to close. but i left a key beneath the mat. not out of expectation, only respect for the mystery of being alive. my life has always been one long question asked to the universe, and somehow i’m still listening for an answer.

[monster2001]

[kaukio]

nobody is immune to the workings of the subconscious mind

[kaukio]

to identify your principles before knocking on forbidden floors, take pleasure in time. the key is for one use and so is the path you choose

[kaukio]

i love being in love because yes knowing you feels like the textured, rich, vibrant sounds of the emotions created through Devon Turnbull HiFi Pursuit Listening Room Dream No. 3.

[kaukio]

the curiouser and the black cat

[kaukio]

i love seeing how people from my past have changed. there’s something quietly beautiful about witnessing someone grow beyond the version of themselves you once knew. and maybe what makes it even more meaningful is knowing i may have played a small role in that growth. not in the sense of changing someone, but in the sense of leaving behind something gentle enough to be carried forward.

as someone who values patience, i think people are far more capable of transformation than they realize. a lot of us are just moving through inherited ways of thinking, repeating what we were taught until something forces us to look inward and relearn ourselves little by little. one step at a time.

the difficult part is that not many people speak openly about this process. most of the understanding comes through experience, reflection, and the willingness to confront yourself honestly. but when you meet people who understand that kind of growth, they become deeply important to you.

i’m grateful to be in a place where i can recognize those souls when they appear, and even more grateful that i’ve been able to leave something good behind in others too.

[kaukio]

I hesitated when it came time to choose myself

We weren’t noise. That’s what made it harder.

There was music in us, real moments, clear notes, almost whole.

But we never played through.

We circled the same parts

same lines,

same feelings,

like a record

worn down in the same place.

From a distance,

it sounded right.

But up close,

you could hear it—

the skipping,

the hesitation,

the way everything would catch

And still,

I stayed for the parts that played.

little did i know, it didn’t keep spinning for me, its just a record.

Even when they didn’t last.

Even when I knew

we weren’t moving forward

just repeating with better timing.

There was something in it

that felt like understanding

like only we could hear it

the way it was meant to sound.

And maybe that was true.

But understanding

doesn’t fix distortion.

And no matter how many times

we let it spin,

it always found

the same scratch.

[kaukio]

i love watching the trees sway to the rhythm of the rain. i love hearing the birds arrive at my nested window, reminding me that another day has been born. i love the smell of my mother’s fresh chai and incense drifting through the house while morning prayers echo softly through the walls. i press my hands against my mother’s cheeks and tell her how deeply i love her. good morning mom, good morning to my lovely sun.

my mother is like the earth before humans touched it. peaceful even in her colder seasons. an angel made from oceans, soil, dry lands, and blooming things. i have always wondered how she does it. how someone can spend their whole life carrying others, guiding them, forgiving them, only to still rise each morning with softness in their heart.

you see, my mother has faith. and i came out like her, except i placed my faith into the universe instead. maybe that is why we understand each other so deeply. we both search for meaning in things larger than ourselves. we both keep going even when life has pressed its weight against our throats.

these past two months have felt like drowning beneath something i could not fully explain. supposedly, i deserve the ache that followed me home. but somehow, the universe still handed me grace with warm palms. and ever since then, i cannot stop wondering if the thing my mother and i lacked our whole lives was never love, never gentleness, never endurance, but simply the ability to stand in front of the world and say, “enough. you cannot keep taking from me.”

[kaukio]

fun time w me looks like this sometimes

[kaukio]

facebook mom in training

[kaukio]

what does it mean to be seen as a person outside of usefulness. outside of what you can provide. outside of performance. i am tired of feeling unfolded only halfway. tired of existing like a translation no one fully understands. pour me a glass with something soft inside it. maybe hope. maybe enough hope to survive becoming myself without going blind in the process.