The errands that multiply

and swell like starling murmurations

Somehow the second half of May turned into a twisting and turning water slide with seemingly no end in sight. Turbulent, quick, and full of surprises — not necessarily the good kind.

There seem to be a rule at play that’s underlining these experiences — the errands that multiply. It goes something like this: the sum total of time you have been putting off a task for will embed itself into that task once you do decide to do it.

In my example this looks like the following: I have been putting off getting my eyes checked up for 5 years despite my vision getting worse. I finally decided to embark on conquering said task and now I find myself back and forth with the opticians for the 5th time — making up for all those years of negligence. Same happened with contact lenses… I have been there 3 times now, so if you wonder where I have been and what I’ve been doing, now you know. Back and forth with the two different kind of opticians. I am on the 8th round if I add up these two incidences and I still have at least one more round to go at each of them.

Weird laws that I just invented aside, and over 76 charcoal drawings later, we arrived at a natural phenomenon — the starling murmurations. Here’s a select few of those drawings. Just like my recurrent eye appointments, these drawings too, quickly multiplied.

“murmurations” flow series — charcoal on newspaper print

Perhaps just like with these magnificent murmurations, there is a sense of safety in the numbers. Going to the opticians so often gives the perception of security and increased trust in the accuracy of their readings and advice (or so I like to convince myself as to avoid utter disappointment), and with each passing occasion we exchange information just like starlings do, albeit not about which feeding areas are the best. Perhaps discussing such ‘feeding areas” like restaurants and food will come naturally for us too as I slowly build rapport upon my frequented visits to the opticians. Just like these starling murmurations that build over time and multiply into hundreds of thousands of starlings! Side note: this astonishing increase will unlikely to occur to me. On the downside, starling population have fallen significantly and now they’re at risk in the UK — which can be likened to my worsening eye sight.

Reference on starling murmurations:
https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/wildlife-guides/bird-a-z/starling/starling-murmurations/

see you next week,
B x

ps. sharing is caring ☺︎