Good Soup

On teenage-hood, loving people, and creating art.

“A million times heartbroken, and Dublin keeps on going. You’ve gotta love Dublin for dreaming.”

“So how’s the heart?” / “It’s traveling, Da.”

“Love’s all very well, but in the hands of people, it turns to soup.” / “Are you married, Eamon?” / “Yeah, I am, actually.” / “Still in love?” / “Yeah.” / “Good soup.”

— from the Irish folk musical Once

SCENE I: Soup (Good and Bad)

Last Thursday in a coffee shop at 5:42 p.m., my soul healed à la grilled cheese and tomato soup, because sometimes it really is a soup and sandwich discount deal that reminds you that childhood is not yet gone, and part of it can always return to you in circular, if terminable form. I delightfully discovered a surprise crouton at the bottom of the bowl, its craters soaked in bisque. My Moroccan mint tea dwindled into murky dregs at the bottom of the mug, and I capitalized on the cafe’s free refill policy. New curls of steam rose to the drywall ceiling, carrying my toasty contentment upward, as if announcing it to the birds. I’d like to think the chirp of the song sparrow outside meant it replied. (I take an ornithology class at school now, which has rendered me insufferable in the outdoors; I will obnoxiously inform you that the bird you are hearing is a scrub jay, house finch, mourning dove, Bewick’s wren, or yellow-rumped warbler; luminously, I have noticed the sounds of the birds with far more vigor than before—it is astonishing how loud a thing can be once you finally pay attention to it.) Regardless of the sparrow’s response or lack thereof, I departed for theatre rehearsal on a warm stomach. I grabbed a double-chocolate pecan cookie on the way out because it felt like a double-chocolate pecan cookie kind of day.

Aside from last Thursday, I have three distinct memories of this very meal, minus the cookie. In reverse chronological order: 1. On a weekend retreat for my a cappella group, when the tenors were assigned lunch duty, and I concocted a large pot of tomato soup to complement our grilled cheese sandwiches, 2. The day I learned my best friend had never eaten a grilled cheese sandwich with a bowl of tomato soup, which was such a diabolical notion that we made it for dinner that day, and it’s safe to say her life changed immeasurably, and 3. The first time my little brother and I ever had grilled cheese and tomato soup, when I was very young, in Disneyland. Grilled cheeses and tomato soups are always shared; even in the coffee shop, I was surrounded by a community of cramming undergraduates and paperback-armed grandparents alike. Simple as the meal is, its communality makes it sacred.

Often, I dream I have unlimited time to write, and an unlimited supply of tea withal. Occasionally, I blanch at the idea that one day, inspiration may elude me, and the thousands of poems I write in my lifetime will coalesce like a viscous soup—a kind I disfavor, like cream of mushroom. Imagine forcing yourself to stomach the disgusting sludge of your words that once held meaning but have since gone cold. Then again, I do that already.

Then again, soup is meant to be shared. Someone at the table enjoys cream of mushroom, and perhaps one day, you will too.

SCENE 2: A Between-Lunch-and-Dinner Party

I brought the mezze platter; another friend brought the fig leaf tea. A nutty scent wafted into the kitchen as we steeped the dried leaves in a porcelain teapot. We removed the damask drapes from the bay window, opened the two baby panels, and looked east into the neighbors’ garden of lemon and mulberry trees. It was quiet there; clouds plaited in latticework wisps. We had dried apricots to substitute for light, little suns fluorescing on the mezze platter. Everything was a platter there: hummus, fruit, charcuterie. We arranged tahini oceans, berry homes, and camembert snow—things that lived when put together. Before any of these gatherings, I arrive at my friend’s house at least half an hour early to bake cinnamon rolls or slice Asian pears into crescent moons. That day, I’d separated pomegranate seeds from their membranes until my fingertips stained a faint crimson that persisted through the afternoon. I realized that is what growing up means: bittersweetness, suds to rinse the evidence, the evidence enduring anyway.

SCENE 3: Friday the 13th

Yesterday marked the six-year anniversary of what I associate with the beginning of the COVID era, even though the virus itself had been present since 2019. That was the day my elementary school shut its doors for what was supposed to be two weeks, which turned into two months, which—well, you remember.

I didn’t remember it was the anniversary until I was, regrettably, scrolling on Instagram and found a reel that said so. It played BENEE’s “Supalonely”, a song I don’t think any of us could escape in 2020, and cycled through a series of photographs that encapsulated the era: Netflix parties, Zoom meetings, masked hangouts, even Chloe Ting’s ab workout, which people in the comments shuddered at with haunted recollection. I watched this video and felt an inexplicable ache. Some part of me missed this era that was so objectively awful for the world, and in addition, irreparably fractured society’s perceptions of community.

And yet, I tend to romanticize what I no longer have, while conveniently forgetting that six years ago, I would have done anything to get out of the situation I was in—freshly out of the closet, dealing with those accompanying shades of hell. Ten-year-old me would kill to be sixteen right now, would probably not believe you if you showed him the recents in my camera roll. That means I must have done something right.

At 1:26 a.m., before going to sleep, I said a prayer. I did not realize it was a prayer until halfway through. It was subconscious, an old orison my mother used to sing to me when I was old enough to mouth the words as she went and young enough to still believe. While belief is a strong word, I found I had room for something like it after all. Though it may not choose to lodge in that room, the space for it exists, and for now, that knowledge is enough.

SCENE 4: A Serendipitous Saturday Adventure

My best friend rocked on the tree swing as I climbed the boulder next to it. The eucalyptus, fondly christened Hippie Tree, extended its branches across the whole of the cliff’s edge, overlooking the indented coastline. The colors of the Golden Gate Bridge, a poppy against the cerulean sky, leaked into the waters, amalgamating with the green of the stout hills beyond, a gradient reflecting in the strait. A seagull nose-dived into the veil of the cirrus clouds like an angel falling from a firmament, caught by a net of pearls.

The way you get from one place to another is what binds you to the earth. Mine are the local bus, BART, and MUNI—a holy trinity of iron and diesel I learned to count on the way I count on sunrise. That day, a fourth and fifth member joined the congregation: the Golden Gate Ferry and Marin Transit’s 219 bus, which outran us by seconds. We stood on the corner and watched it pull away, and there was nothing to do but walk.

The old railroad trail ran out of downtown like a scar the trains had left behind, leading us to a leafy grove, murk closing overhead. Fungi reached up through the fissures in the arid soil, grasping toward a light they would never quite meet. Beside us, the lagoon opened up, grey and placid in the January cold, its sediment muted from gold to umber. The grass came afterward, thick, tall, and seemingly ceaseless, until finally, the cliff rose before us—steep and assiduous, the way hard things are always patient with you, waiting to be climbed.

The world fell away as we ascended, the shroud of fog slackening, the whole arrangement of streets and lives receding into something that could be held in the palm of one’s hand. We had to earn our view; that was the truth of it. At the top, the sights bisected, rock and spray of the Pacific on one side, silvery bay on the other, the smell of salt all around. We did not say what we felt then, but it was there, settled into us the way the fortuitous walk had settled into our legs—slightly heavy and unexpectedly full.

That day, we talked at length about the butterfly effect—if I’d grown up in New York City like my parents had planned, if she’d never moved to my school district, if we hadn’t skipped middle school together—would we be sixteen, missing our bus, and hiking up a cliff on a Saturday afternoon?

After stepping over the tiny creeks sprouting seaside daisies, lupines, and cobweb thistles, we arrived at the tree where I’d spent hours of my childhood. When I was seven, I thought the two swing sets must be for giants. Today we were giants.

A goal we have set for ourselves this year, particularly as we drift closer to graduation, is to revisit the places that made us—to show each other bits and pieces of the lives we lived before we were part of each other’s. Hippie Hill was one of mine.

Some places hold you even after you’ve left them. To grow up is to traverse a landscape without realizing, until one day you reach the top of something and look back at how far the ground has fallen.

SCENE 5: Ending with Todays

And what else is there to do now, in this coming of age, but make art?

Today, my best friend and I are at the beach, jeans cuffed as we wade into the frigid San Francisco waters. We half-contemplate taking a surf lesson when I receive the text. My band is playing a punk show on the other side of the city. An iced coffee later, with sand-sprinkled socks, we are on the hour-and-fifteen-minute-long bus ride there. We play the show, and due to the short notice, we are down a guitarist and our bassist, but we are still playing, and all the songs are ours. Today, there are no covers in our set.

We stay to watch the other incredible bands, then emerge in a titanic throng to Dolores Park, an exodus of teenagers in search of food and finally, a train home. By the time I sprawl on my bed at the end of the night, I am exhausted. I spent yesterday reading, watching, and listening to art, and today, making it—something about that circularity made the day feel blissfully complete. Good soup.

Make art until you are weary and full with it. Look back at it when you are older—laugh or cry, but don’t burn it, no matter how stupid it is in hindsight. Make more stupid art afterward; repeat.

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welcome to the commonplace archive! my essays are categorized into “drawers”, akin to an archival filing system. the piece you just finished reading is part of THE SOLARIUM. here’s a guide to help you find your way:

I. THE SOLARIUM

A place where inner things are warmed into bloom. These pieces are intimate, introspective, and botanical—growth, soft and succulent, often roots here.

II. THE MIRROR ROOM

Holding up mirrors to culture, media, and the self, these pieces are collective, dissective, and critical—taking a scalpel to our societal anatomy.

III. THE DISPATCH

Our Commonplace Correspondence and occasionally, a slice of life. Thoughts in transit, notes to self (in public), and wax-sealed letters from me to you.

with ink and intention,

ben (head archivist)