my first words to you <3
new friendships are terrifying and wonderful. i hope we stay friends for a long while.
hello and welcome my friend[s].
i must begin by being honest, i do not consider myself to be a writer. i am usually one to consume art and words as if it will be my last meal on this earth but become paralyzed at the idea of creating something of my own. over the years, i have dabbled in words [both creative and academic] and painting and sketching and felting and music and who knows what else but it stays like that, dabbles. but recently i have seen so many beautiful words and pieces of visual art that i feel so overwhelmed that i feel as though i must make something and put it somewhere.
this may be because i have not been in school in three months [due to summer break] which is the longest i have not been forced to create in ages. i finally have a chance to breathe and go slow in a way that has lead me to want to create for my own being. i like to think it is a bit of my mother coming out of me- someone who was always writing in life, always found a place to include writing wherever she was. this feels like an age-old blog that has ceased to exist in years.
i am getting ahead of myself. | my name is delphi, sometimes delfi depending on how good your memory is. i am named after delphi, greece —in a similar way to my siblings. we are all named after a place my parents have been to. i feel as though places that are not my home are in my blood. i have many ‘other home’ stories to share that i am sure you will hear about one day. | i use she/her pronouns [probably? idk ask me later] | i am 19 years old, born in july, in what is currently known as canada. | i have four siblings and my father and my mother [who passed a few years ago]. | food is the center of my world. my truest forms of love come in packages shaped like meals and i believe the best place to exist is a food market. my father is a chef and shaped my life in the kitchen. i joke that my life has been made for me the day i was born// in a pool in the dining room of my home. a water sign who for a number of years breathed sailing and whose life is utterly consumed by food and eating. | i am in university, double majoring in environmental sustainability and german. | music consumes my life so please expect several playlists scattered in these letters. among my most listened to musicians, you will find bts at the front, followed closely by a wide, wide range of others. lately, i have been listening to lofi and soft-toned music the most.
despite it being the middle of summer for me, it is very cold. the last three weeks of july have been filled with rain and partially cloudy skies. this last week it has not gone above 25 degrees celsius and has gone down to 9 degrees. a month ago, it was 42 degrees. this sudden coolness has put lots of tea and soup into my body. i am currently sitting on my favourite chair in the kitchen [my favourite room] watching my sibling make soup in our fourth biggest pot. we are both wearing wool socks and sweaters. despite being in constant -30 degree weather in the winter [and surviving], the current 15 degrees feels like ice compared to what is normal august weather.
this morning i woke to rain falling, a blissful day off from work [i am a nanny for two small boys for the summer]. from under my duvet, i can hear my little sister practice piano [i can never name what she is playing but i always hum along to the familiar tune she is practicing]. slowly, i get up. i brush my teeth to the soft sounds of rain falling onto the roof outside the bathroom window///the window i frequently climb out of to sit on the rooftop. i place a kiss on the head of my two siblings currently awake before going to make chai for my sister at the piano and myself. my youngest sister wakes and comes downstairs/ i find another teacup and switch mine to a smaller one. we sit each in different rooms sharing the same pot of warmth. its been two hours since then and i have finished the poetry book i bought recently. without by donald hall. these poems are a collection of works he wrote while his wife was terminally ill, he wrote of their struggle together, her struggles that he could only watch. midway through the book, his wife dies and he writes of passing moments, letters to her. i do not have the space in my mind and heart to write a review or to give my thoughts on this book but perhaps later on i will share some of my annotated pages. i found many similarities in my life and in hall’s which lays a blanket of comfort.
for now, i eat the soup that my sibling in the kitchen has finished cooking in the time it took me to write this.
this note has turned longer than i had thought it would be. i am sorry for the long run-on sentences but that is simply how i must write. everything is continuous as it comes to mind with breaks only when i can spare. i hope you will stick around. i am not sure how often i will write- i am hoping weekly. maybe i will make this a sunday thing. another writer i love writes on saturdays and it is a wonderful reminder of the weekend.
for now, i send you love, a playlist, a poem, and a painting i adore.
xx delphi
p.s. the header at the top of this note is from my morning bike rides to work. i bike through a farm in the middle of my city, an oasis.
“You can put your strength down. I’m sitting here with you at your kitchen table. You don’t need to say anything.”- eden robinson
sisters by holly warburton