SEATED : R & the case of a sister-in-law

Once, after snapping out of being quite a horrid person to a girl I knew, she told me that, despite how nasty I had been, she felt secure in the fact that, deep down, I was a good person. I didn't felt like that, I was, and still am, deeply ashamed. I don't know what make me be that kind of person, what made me behave like a bully. I've no excuse for that except that being a teenager was one of my worst moments, that growing into an adult and into my character and body was a struggle of helplessness, of anger and that I clung to any kind of power I could muster as a way to fight the fact that I was drowning. I do not mistake this as an excuse, just a mere explanation of a mindset.

Now, I treasure her words, which must have cost her more than I could imagine, because they felt sincere, and I try to be as good a person as she thought I was. I'm still brash and direct and my filter sometimes disappears between my brain and my mouth, but I try to move around with that moral compass she was sure I had.

And when I see real gentleness and kindness I do my utmost to appreciate it as much as cleverness and intelligence. And that's why when I see my sister-in-law I see beauty. She's clever, smart, pretty and, more important than that, kind in a level that anyone should aspire to be. Her honesty and kindness glow from within.

SEATED - Bang Bang

Bang Bang

So, this little story has haunted me for years for a few silly reasons, well, haunted in the sense that "nobody lets me really forget it" and it's a pain by now because it's really silly, but, when I met her, I had a bad impression of her and her best friend just because I wanted to see a concert and they wanted to talk (what? it was Fleet Foxes!… alright). Not really compatible. But, that's alright, my mistake, she's so lovely that none can really not like her. She's intelligent and feminine and articulated and so pretty in person that I feel ungainly sometimes when I'm with her.

SEATED - La mujer maravilla

La Mujer Maravilla

I finished my degree after years of putting it off, living on my own, working full time to pay for all of this… life that I had; and suddenly I just don't know what to do with it. Like all this purpose and drive that I had, completely halted, stopped, dried out. A friend then tells me to go together to Madrid, a new plan seems just like the thing. On the way to get there she ditches me, which was unexpected but then I didn't quite have a bullshit filter to detect talking just for the sake of talking or a serious person talking... but I wanted to give it a try anyway, on my own, I don't like not having a goal. 

Madrid was harsh for me, I missed the sea like crazy, I missed the light, I missed my family. I didn't cry exactly, but I always had the impression that they were around the corner, this big fat tears waiting to ambush me, if I let my control slip.

On a hard winter weekend, taking a course on teaching there was this girl that talked to me and made me, slowly, like the city again. She was very much like me, but more driven where I'm lazy, and we both were doing that particular course because we thought we had to; but what we really wanted was to write, write in magazines, write in poems, write in internet, write in walls, write in paper. She became my friend, something that I badly needed and, since then, even after I moved back, we try to meet up either in Madrid or in Barcelona to eat, chat and talk about our other biggest passion in common: traveling. 

Because the world might be small but our time in it is quite short.

SEATED (Introduction)

Pierre-Yves

It all started more or less because of him. Funny story actually, when we met, we couldn't stand each other, he thought I was dry and humorless, I thought he was rude. But, as the saying goes, "shit happens", time happens and since then we've shared an apartment and have become like brother and sister. The things I tell him, I don't tell anyone else, and he's painfully honest with me too. Mainly we talk about sex, because we like to laugh about sex. Oh, and food, because food is, in the end, what this is all about. 

You see, as a teenager I hated eating, not the act in itself, I hated eating when I was on my own. I skipped meals on High School because I was the only one back home (my brothers and parents had a different schedule and I could go back home to eat when I didn't have evening class). My mum noticed and started to let me easy to fix meals on the fridge and to call me to make sure I was eating. I lied a few times, but not a lot and, slowly, I got over that phase. Except that I still didn't really enjoy it. 

But, again, time happens (and I've become more aware of internalized ideas of beauty, social expectations and body image), and as I get older food has become one of my favorite things in this world. It's been a slow process for sure, but I love eating now, what's more, maybe because of those years, eating with people is now one of the things I enjoy more than anything else. 

When I got my ZenitB a few years ago I started taking it with me everywhere and a lot of those times, Pierre was with me, so he became the impromptu model of my new obsession. Slowly, I decided that instead of taking pictures of the food I was going to take pictures of the people I was enjoying that food with. And this is how this silly idea started. 

I have an small collection of the people I've been eating with this pasts months, some are friends, some passing acquaintances, but with all of them I shared a few important moments, because eating is important, and enjoying it, even more so. And thanks to them, to these people that I encounter, I enjoyed that moment. 

The punch line is that while I have tons of pictures of him, the one I had of his face, is lost somewhere, so I'll need to take another one. 

So here is my starting point in SEATED.