Together Tea

by Marjan Kamali

Americans went about their business as if life were short and all their energy and efforts had to be spent today. Rushing around with gargantuan shopping carts and rushing off to appointments and errands and whatever was next on their schedules. They saw shrinks and doctors constantly, bought do-it-yourself home-repair kits, and believed self-esteem could solve problems. They acted as if every action they took were just for the sake of taking action. They acted as if everything were a race. As though the faster you moved, the more it mattered. As though by simply repeating something, you could make it true. And how was it that Parviz, her husband, a doctor, for God’s sake, had bought right into it? Hook, line, and sinker. Parviz repeated mantras and took bloody action all the time. But that’s not how it worked. That’s not how it added up. Not for one minute. This much Darya knew: Life was cruel. Beauty passed. Children grew. Countries transformed overnight. Fundamentalists tortured the young. Mothers died from bombs. Why act as if a single bit of it were okay?

” She saw that the definitions of things like “history,” “good,” and “bad” shifted depending on who was in power. Mina realized that whoever had access to dispensing information drew and colored the world.