#54 | le week-end
Welcome to post #54 of tomorrow!
food report
Spending time alone has been daunting lately due to my life being so emotionally turbulent, but I'm trying to ameliorate anxiety by setting intentions. Last week I made a big batch of 焖面 mēn miàn, a homestyle dish of steamed noodles with green beans. My mom frequently made it when I was a kid, typically with spare ribs. I tried to vegetarianize it by marinating soy curls with the same ingredients in the recipe, and I didn't have fresh noodles, so I just par-boiled dry noodles and tossed them in. It turned out sooooooo tasty and made 4-5 portions. Usually I get sick of eating something after a few meals, but not with this. I love having a wok.
Things I did this weekend
1. Went gallery hopping in Chelsea
On Saturday, I slept in and went to a Nowruz market with my friend. We bought some saffron water and checked out various art vendors before meandering to some art galleries and meeting up with another friend of mine. There was an exhibition by Qiu Xiaofei, a Chinese painter from Harbin, the same city my dad is from. I was excited to check it out, but I didn't connect with the works as much as I expected to. They evoked feelings of whimsy and dread at the same time, like watching an Adult Swim show late at night or seeing someone else's dream as it morphs into a nightmare, but I didn't like it personally. I felt more connected to the works on another floor, where I saw a poem by Louise Bourgeois, part of her sculpture called Gathering Wool:
I would rather say that we live more by the intensity of our
affects than by time or by the space
in time or in space we exist above all
by our absence since we can only
be in one place at a time and we
are only in the same hour once
but with ourselves we are always.
I've schlepped Louise Bourgeois around with me
for more than 40 years. Every day brought
its wound and I carried my wounds
ceaselessly, without remission like a hide
perforated beyond hope of repair. I am a
collection of wooden pearls never threaded -
The poem was printed next to the rest of the work, which is 7 large wooden spheres in a circle next to a barn-like wall.
Later, I read her Wikipedia page. She lived to the age of 98! Then, I read the Wikipedia page on one of her sons, Jean-Louis. He very publicly announced in 2017 that he intended to donate his $4m West Village home to the Lenape and then reneged on it and died in 2022.
2. Watched a movie alone
On Friday, I had vegan mac and cheese, finished season 1 of the Sopranos, and watched One Battle After Another. The movie was entertaining, but I don't think it should have won Best Picture at all. The political commentary in it was so frustrating and dull. Ugh.
3. Visited a refillery
I've become a big fan of refilleries - shops where you bring your own containers and pay for everything by weight. They sell basic products like soap, detergent, shampoo, and lotion, but also lots of other groceries. They even have textured vegetable protein, which I've struggled to find elsewhere. It's economical, minimizes waste, and turns a routine activity into a little journey. I like that part of living in a city, where I can make something into an excuse to wander. I keep stressing about committing myself to goals but enjoying the mundanities of life is an activity in itself.