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najat el hachmi
Right there, on the bridge
where no more than two
trains can cross at once, my
head went into one of those
endless spirals that assail me
from time to time. A single
thought, repeating, repeating,
repeating itself like a restless
hammer, each repetition
bringing an element that
makes it ever more painful.
These spirals are paralysing
but rush me to the brink. The
fact I can see them eddy and
am perfectly aware how they
work and observe them as
if from the outside, doesn’t
mean I am able to do anything
to stop them. That makes
them even more distressing.
In this instance, while on the
bridge I became obsessed
by the stupid idea that in all
my plans to leave home, my
mother’s home, I’d made one
huge, unforgivable mistake:
I’d used the usual amount of
yeast for the bread, I hadn’t
reduced it bearing in mind I
would never be going back.
When we are likely to be away
from home for longer, we use
less so the dough ferments
more slowly, but that morning
I’d acted routinely, as if I
was returning at midday. My
thoughts spiralled and I kept
blaming myself for this slip, a
silly slip that meant that when
my mother got home she’d
find the dough had spilt over
the sides of the bowl. With
each loop in my thoughts, a
single idea thumped away: if
I had to explain all the bread-
baking process in this Catalan
language in which I think, I
wouldn’t be able to, I’d lack
the words, because when I
do that for my own benefit
the description is packed
with words from my mother’s
language that nobody else can
understand. Only a person
like me, who’d had a mother
like mine and learned this