Trident | Nadia Gohar, Camille Jodoin-Eng, Maya Fuhr
September 1 – 7, 2017
Little Sister Gallery

We learn people as we do language. An intonation, a gasp of air, a long pause. What are these tiny details but revelations and obscurities at once. Lessons of the spirit. To try and reach the transcendent and fail, but in that failure find closeness. That’s fine. Connection, friendship, it’s the closest I’ll get to divinity.

Memories, like words, often evade me. They sit on the tip of my tongue and stay there until they fade; a simple reminder that they don’t belong to me. It’s times like these I need others to enlighten me. I prefer the tenderness of working together than confronting a burden alone. Besides, a memory that belongs to one person

can only bear that name, but a shared memory can sometimes be called history.

I can’t describe to you when we met, or when we evolved beyond acquaintance. We meet several times, first in groups, then alone. Eventually I am surrounded by warmth. I don’t intellectualize this experience, but I pay attention.

There are parts of my friends’ souls that are kept. Each effort to access them is a barren one, but stubbornly, I’ll try again. They don’t know it, but I ache with every attempt, and when the pain is eventually alleviated its coupled memory loses its power. We all suffer from repeating ourselves, but some of us have better excuses. Another way to describe it is admitting defeat, and accepting the unknown with grace, then surrendering to the desire

of wanting more.

I am ambitious and misguided. What did Cassavettes say? “Love is the act of not knowing.” He was right. My truest friends I will never understand completely. Their value is in their mystery.

Text by Rosemary Flutur