Highest common factor

Reading time: 9 minutes

The stationery shop near my school had the most exquisite selection of notebooks that the owner neatly stacked according to size first thing in the morning, only to be left in a mess later in the day, usually before check-out when students chickened out to pay. The notebooks, gel pens and erasers in various types and colours, and most importantly, stickers that I would slap on pretty much everything I owned would call out to me like a paper-mache siren. The brutal decision-making that followed wouldn’t be about ‘what to get’ as I always knew what I liked, but how to budget my bare pocket money, although in the end, I would be satisfied whether I got a strawberry-scented eraser or a fat chicken dürüm and somewhat cold ayran.

‘Maddy knew who she was from a very early age.’

I thought owning exquisite stationery was the pinnacle of education, not studying and getting good grades. I was simply obsessed with how things looked, whether they looked good, and how I could make them look even better. Stationery was my first foray into proto-curation: The make-up of my pencil case or a particular kind of notebook, in my mind, would signal how superior of a taste I had, something I realised with conceited satisfaction that my classmates were not privy to.

This would prove to be a matter of life and death even more so at the start of every new term, always preceded by a summer of commiserating over the previous year and how I failed to be the best version of myself. Surely, I would think to myself, I would do better this time and pretty notebooks would take me there. Maybe I took ‘turning over a new leaf’ way too literally, who knows. In any case, it was the sole source of motivation for me; a beacon of excitement, somewhat discernible in a rough sea of anxiety. I would toss and turn the night before the first day at school, nervous about seeing my classmates without having achieved my ideal self over summer, but all too giddy about finally getting the opportunity to use my new stuff.

Almost unmistakably, Maths would be the first class of the year - genius planning according to the teachers on scheduling duty, purely psychopathic if you ask me. Pressing my shimmery gel pen on crisp paper until it bled golden specks, I would write the first topic of the year in tenacious commitment: ‘highest common factor’. I would try to listen to said factors intently, fighting the urge to daydream, doodle or fixate on how the teacher’s hands moved on the board and how different colours of chalk built up on his fingers, creating an odd combination that I thought was disgustingly fascinating.

I lived in a world of images that I mentally photocopied to be produced as imagery I would redress in the form of writing or mere fantasies, the process of which provided me a mental pocket where I could just roam free without any constraints. No common factor could hold my attention as much as when my brain filed the syrupy way my classmate slowly played with her hair. When I snapped back to reality though, usually spurred by a sudden crack in our teacher’s voice, I would get overwhelmed with all the information I missed in between and new numbers that magically replaced the old ones I didn’t even get in the first place.

What always followed would be a pesky response that I still have trouble unlearning. Because I didn’t get this right the first time, it’s best I stop trying. If it is not perfect, why bother? So, I’d stop listening altogether, swallowed by anxiety that I failed once again. The bitter taste of defeat could and would only be alleviated by chasing distractions even further, which provided me instant return in serotonin. Until next summer, where I would then play out what went wrong and vow to do better this time for sure, I would ignore the fangs of reality that got sharper and sharper each day - exams, homework, missed opportunities, a body that was giving out every possible sign that it was distressed and depressed. It carried into my uni years - I would turn off my phone and disappear off the earth to avoid facing my inability to understand Derrida as perfectly as I should have. Getting an F for not sitting the exam was an easier pill to swallow than a medial C. Later, it was balancing writing with my job(s) - my creativity would briefly come alive during my annual leave in summer, prompting me to write, but soon followed by orphaning every single piece once work and shorter days engulfed me, forcing me to surrender for mere survival.

My flatmate Bahar, who was there for me when it all felt meh

In the last few years, I was able to denominate this manic summer-to-depressed autumn pipeline that has gotten me by the throat. Seasonal depression fuelled by ADHD and anxiety is my thing, you guys 😍 You would think knowing what’s causing this would help me be more prepared come autumn, but nah. It is so stupidly similar to how I feel when I am pms’ing badly - each cycle I get baffled by the sudden malevolent shift in my energy: I was doing so well, what is wrong with me?! The way I remain oblivious to the root cause of my mood swinging like a deranged pendulum is something I know I share with many. That one Tiktok is true, women who menstruate do get only 2 (good) days a month.

So once again, seasonal depression has hit me in the past few weeks like the white truck of doom in K-dramas: You know it’s going to kill the main character but still, you can’t do anything about it. Commitment and motivation behind the plans and projects I laboured over SS23 have vanished what I felt like overnight, leaving a trail of disappointment and guilt in me that is as thick as tar. Lost in lethargy, I have been unable to take on anything other than work that is financially sustaining.

But I do need to give myself credit here - even though I was unable to pinpoint the descent of depression this time around, I seem to be managing okay and trying to turn things around. Faster compared to previous episodes for sure, but more importantly, a bit gently this time. Differentiating good days and bad days is the trick here: If it is the former, I push myself to function and do a bit more, whereas the latter is all about allowing myself the licence to be a non-verbal monk who lives off M&S chicken munchies and Tiktok.

I do NOT look great when I wake up

Playing this balance game seems to be working, my mental aperture now large enough to let the light in, which in this case is writing, my true highest common factor. I wrote my first comic after two months. I started re-editing a hefty chapter in my novel that has been/is tearing me apart. I returned to a collection of writings on comfort food that I abandoned two years ago. And here I am now, writing the nth version of this newsletter, hopeful that it will find its way to you soon.

Please send me lots of love when it does x

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Turning to books has been a proven antidote this time around, even though I often found myself reading the same line over and over. But good books always have a way of pulling you in. I devoured Banana Yoshimoto’s The Premonition, about a 19-year old woman untangling her mind and past, perhaps encouraged by the fact that it is less than 250 pages, which is ideal for me, like how I believe the running time of 93 minutes makes the perfect film. Alison by Lizzy Stewart, an achingly beautiful graphic novel about a young woman defining her art in the 1970s, opened so many technical possibilities that I could potentially harness in my writing.

Alison and Mad World

Non-fiction books such as Steal As Much As You Can by Nathalie Olah and Mad World: The Politics of Mental Health by Micha Frazer-Carroll felt like having a heart-to-heart conversation with a friend you can’t stop saying ‘Exactly!!!’ to. Both are, in different ways, argue how we are snowed under neoliberal capitalist systems, 1) unable to penetrate into cultural spaces as they are inherently elitist, 2) left to our own devices while struggling with mental health disorders & disabilities. I was fortunate enough to attend an event at Pages of Hackney (I was late for 30 minutes!!), where Micha Frazer-Carroll discussed the book with Sophie K Rosa, whose advice column on Novara Media I came across just around the time I was feeling my worst. Reading ‘I Can’t Fit It All In: How Do I Do My Job and Be a Good Person?’ was a cosmically noteworthy footnote in the annals of my depression.

Christo at Gagosian

I’ve also been to a number of art exhibitions - some blew my mind, some didn’t. Christo’s Early Works at 4 Princelet Street provided me a rare opportunity to see inside a Grade-II listed Georgian house that was once home to Huguenots in East End. Thank you Gagosian, especially the FoH assistant who looked after my painfully heavy tote bag so that I could take pictures without knocking over expensive art. Ahh, I can still picture how light moved there, on the walls, between the crevices that witnessed I wonder what.

Sylvie Fleury at Sprüth Magers

Sylvie Fleury at Sprüth Magers surprised me in that I liked it a lot, as I tend to find works that are too on the nose about consumerist culture a bit exhausting (and they usually trigger a migraine). If anyone at SM is reading this (no), I hope you let me take that gorgeous lift one day. Just One Day.

I first got to take in Robert Irwin’s genius at Getty Center in LA, his magnificent gardens where Burak and I had a stupid fight over—wow, I can’t really remember what it was about now, as we made up soon enough because the gardens were just too beautiful. My second time with Irwin was at Pace Gallery, his exhibition with Mary Corse that I visited, very eerily, a couple of days before his death. But what really moved me was seeing Robert Irwin: A Desert of Pure Feeling at ICA, a feature documentary about his life and work that centred around space and light. I left the cinema completely inspired, overjoyed by the lovely light that fell on St James’s Park after heavy rain - I was so happy. It is now my only desire to visit Dia Beacon in New York and Chinati Foundation in Marfa, his later projects. One can dream.

If you enjoyed reading ‘Highest common factor’, please share it with a friend. If you are feeling extra generous, you can always buy me coffee on Ko-fi 🐸

See you next time!