They’re sending us time, stranger
024-My last "Monday Update" of 2024
“They’re sending us time, stranger.”
It was 2:00 a.m., and I was attempting to sleep in my bed in Brooklyn. I haven’t had good sleeping habits the whole time I’ve been in New York, and this night was no different.
When I finally began drifting off, I was jolted back awake by a sentence that kept repeating in my head: “They’re sending us time, stranger.” I had never heard this phrase before—not in a movie, a song, or a book. There are movies where the main characters are shaken awake by the small voice of God in their ear. I imagine it would have felt something like this. The voice felt friendly. I sat with this strange melody of emotions in my body, puzzling over what had been whispered to me.
“They’re sending us time, stranger.”
I sat up in bed and wondered a few things:
Why am I being called Stranger?
Who’s “They”?
What does it mean, that they’re sending us time?
I rested my head back on the pillow, but it was no use. As soon as I’d find myself drifting off to sleep, I’d twitch and jolt myself awake, like a fish propelling itself back to shore after being tossed into the water.
This is the last Monday Update of the year. I believe I will spend my New Year’s Day quietly and mostly by myself, just like my Christmas—and my birthday. Quiet days, nervous days, but days where I am forced to look at myself with more intention.
I’ve been thinking of all the things that happened this year:
I lived in 3 different boroughs in NYC.
I went to Mexico and lived in 5 different homes over 6 months.
I went to the Midwest and stayed there for 2½ months.
I came back to NYC (still here) and have already stayed in 3 different boroughs.
I have been bouncing around since September 2023. Oftentimes, I wouldn’t know where I would be in two weeks—or even a month after. Each step was taken with an immense amount of inane faith.
Despite it all, I find myself deeply missing home. It is hard for me not to think of Japan. Even though I’m tempted to go back to Nara, I will give myself a bit more time. I will work harder here, more intentionally, for a bit longer.
And when I’m done, I’ll return and find a home again.
The days aren’t long anymore. They haven’t been long for a while. I often find myself looking out the window as the sky turns from dark blue to black. When I go to check the time as the sun disappears, it’s always around 17:15.
“Please, light, don’t leave so soon,” is what I often find myself pleading.
Don’t deny yourself the experience of pain just because the world says it prefers you happy. You get to experience this. It is not fun. A lot of things aren’t. A lot of things aren’t good. And they are ours.
For happiness, too: Do not deny it for yourself what would bring you joy just because society prefers you in pain. When you feel heavy layers of duty, responsibility, and even guilt draped over your shoulders, I encourage you to attempt to remove them—one by one, or even all at once, if you don’t mind the risk that will come with it.
I picked up $14 earplugs at Duane Reade. I can only assume they were priced at $14 because they were the only ones not bright red or bright yellow. You must pay a pretty penny for the aesthetic, minimal brown ones. For that amount, I hope they help my tinnitus, which the clamoring din of New York has only made worse.
I find mystery cuts and purple bruises on my hands and legs all the time. I don’t know where they come from. I must not feel pain when it happens.
I feel like this year has given me so much. I’ve learned more in 1 year and 3 months than I did in 10. I’ve been away from home for so long. Before this, I hadn’t spent more than one month outside of Japan. Now, I can see two years of being gone on the horizon. How spectacular is that?
I’m feeling meditative tonight, and a whole flood of memories is coming in—ones from this year, but also from a decade ago. Memories of my childhood home. I’m slowly trying to make sense of it all, and why they are visiting me now.
I never thought I’d begin my year in New York and end it here too. Two short silvers of time at each end—if my year were a s’more, NYC would be the graham cracker to Mexico’s marshmallow.
As I’m writing my Monday Update, I’m also planning what will happen in January, February, March, and deeper still into 2025. I’m writing it on a separate sheet of paper, trying to play Tetris with my time—trying to make sure I have the correct priorities and a rough plan for it all.
It will be a constant tug-of-war with the heart. But there’s one thing I want for this year: to finally complete my new series and to finally have a photo book made, alongside the e-books I’m developing.
I don’t know what this year will bring, but I know I will do what I can to stay laser-focused on my projects.
I began the year reading Kate Chopin’s The Awakening and am ending it reading Seth Godin’s This Is Strategy. I don’t even know where that first book went. I wonder if the same mystery will eventually surround Godin’s book as well.
Thank you so much to my new friends here on Substack, and off it. After a deeply heavy week, I’m finally feeling grateful and a bit more at peace. I’m ending the year in good spirits and high hopes, truly thanks to my friends—new and old.
Thank you for coming on this ride with me. In all the mementos, memories, and challenges I collect over these months of travel, I can only hope to share as much as I can and to be better because of them all.
Wishing you all the best in 2025. See you next year.
Always,
Reylia
FIND ME ON
Monday Updates is a section of this blog where I’m letting my hair down, figuratively. I am often preoccupied with getting things perfect, rather than simply sharing and enjoying the process while talking about life. Instead of the tradition of hating Mondays, I’m going to try to associate them with creative freedom and allow myself to speak my mind without the worry that a perfectionist usually has. Things here may be a bit disjointed, incomplete, and occasionally nonsensical, but they may also be playful, curious, and whimsical. I will do my best to make it more of the latter.
As a new Substack friend, happy new year, and I wish you all the best things in the world! They're sending us time, friend!
Wishing you all the best for 2025! ✨