track+field: a May 2025 recap
A film workshop in Hamra, Lebanon's summer fruits, magazine spreads from the 60s, Etel Adnan's daftar, the National Library, risographs, and rejection
This newsletter incorporates movement and activity (hikes, walks, etc) into my work. I’m a productive and self-disciplined person except when it comes to tasks related to taking care of myself (like exercise, diet, and rest). This log blends the two areas of my life (health + work) and it tracks my time in the field.
The 2024 paid newsletter, Grapevine, a bulleted list of offline things I was exploring, is now collapsed into this monthly dispatch.
For the last two months, I was attending a film workshop at Kalei Hamra Ras Beirut so I was walking around Hamra more regularly. It will always be a special neighborhood to me thanks to my years at two universities there and I’ve missed knowing its streets and alleys the way I used to. The workshop itself was a weekly 3-hour session where the instructor broke down elements of film into parts (like light, dialogue, character building, storytelling, sound, etc). We were a very small group so the exercises pushed me out of my comfort zone without it being too embarrassing. Now that it’s over, I have mustered up some motivation to return to my work-in-progress which was the reason I signed up so it was a win overall.
Besides that, my youngest sister got engaged, my nephew started walking before his first birthday, and I spent about a week taking antibiotics. I’m better now 🧿 I also added “visual artist” to my bios. It’s taking some getting used to but I’m trying to own that that’s what I am, in addition to being a writer.