All the kinds of blue

I recently finished reading Bluets by Maggie Nelson. It’s a short book, a sequence of paragraph-long meditations on her (and my) favourite colour — blue — shot through with reflections on loss, grief, joy, relationships and (dis)ability.

Nelson writes about collecting blue objects. And so likely inspired by that1, I went about collecting a few of my own (with my camera that is). These shots were recently taken on (or near) Crete, an island which offers blues in abundance2.

If you’d asked five-year-old Alex for the reason blue is his favourite colour, it’s unlikely he would have been able to tell you. And, still, a large degree of mystery remains as to why I love it so much, why I seek it out, why blues can stop me in my tracks3 or make my spirits soar.

But, the almost-36-year-old Alex does now have this impression: that blue is a spacious, expansive colour. That within its calm, impassive depths lie both the possibility of joy and hope — and the potential to acknowledge pain and grief4.

A little over two years ago, on my first visit to Greece, I was on holiday in Lefkada swimming in so many shades of blue. It was there that I learnt that my dad’s terminal illness had drastically worsened, that it would be leading to imminent death. I raced to Cape Town to try to say goodbye, missing his passing by a few hours5.

When I landed back in Athens a few weeks ago, it was the 9th September 2024 — the second anniversary of his passing. And so, without this having quite been the intention, returning to Greece has become a pilgrimage of remembrance, and swimming there an opportunity to mourn his absence and reflect on his life. Being there also ushered in reflections about the many people mourning the loss of loved ones right now — in the Middle East, in Sudan, the Horn of Africa and elsewhere.

I certainly don’t want to equate losing a father (to cancer) with the devastating personal toll inflicted by armed conflict. But I can say that losing Dad offers me visceral reminders of the universality of loss, and brings the losses experienced as a result of conflict closer to home.

As much as I seek to revel in the beauty of the world, I’m also grieving at the brutal state of it6, at the tendency too many of us have to privilege the humanity of our kin over the lives of those we disagree with. For all the advances as a species that we have made in science and tech, it seems like valuing all human life — equally and with sacred reverence — remains very much out of reach.

The patterns — of violence, hatred, persecution and division — driving the events in our newsfeeds are so easily replicated, and yet not inevitably so. There are ample examples around the world of situations where individuals and communities decided to act differently, made a change, wrote new stories, found ways of healing and connecting with each other. None of us can singlehandedly bring about world peace, but each of one us can do something, can act differently. And so, the question I am asking myself right now is how can I show up to — and in — this beautiful, brutal world? How can I practise tender, compassionate grace — not just towards myself7, or to loved ones… but to those I disagree with, those I perceive of as different, even those whose actions may have hurt me. It’s daunting, but worth attempting, I suspect, nevertheless.

ONE LAST THING!

Together with , I’m compiling RISO West Coast, a catalogue of riso-related printshops / presses / community spaces / events / libraries / artists along the western edge of North America. If you live on the West Coast and are involved in riso8, please add an entry about yourself (you’re welcome to add other entries for riso things you know about, too). The deadline is September 30, 2024 (short notice, I’m sorry!) and here’s the form.