I love the smell of soap. And the smell of soap saddens me.

Good soap smells like possibility. Some soap smells like inspiration to me. Soap makes me feel like I can have a fresh start. It reminds me of being a child, naive and hopeful and constantly adventurous.

And soap smells like remembering that there aren’t any fresh starts. We don’t get to start again. We can only give it another go. We always move forward with what has already happened.

The smell of soap is bittersweet. In evoking feelings of cosiness and newness from childhood, I’m reminded that those feelings are long gone. Sometimes, in winter, wrapped up beneath blankets after a shower, I can still feel that way. But it’s never the same. Years of life have placed themselves between those early memories and my feelings and hopes today.

Sometimes I think that life is made up of circles. Events seem to repeat themselves on every level - world events, history, relationships, our own beliefs and thought patterns. Sometimes the veneer changes but the same processes remain. The same circles.

Most of the time, I’m spiralling. Mentally and emotionally, sure, but also in the way I learn and grow. In my relationships. In my motivations and desires.

Circles can make us believe in fresh starts. A relationship ends - you can start again with a new person. A job ends - you focus on your clean new goal. Something goes wrong and we think that if we analyse enough, fix enough, heal enough, we can avoid it ever happening again.

But we always carry around our past and experiences and knowledge and beliefs and values. We can’t shed them.

We don’t need to. Sometimes what we know - all those years of life in between - sometimes it hurts us. It’s also what can keep us going. It informs how we grow, whether that’s in ever-narrowing or ever-widening circles. It’s what allows us to try again. Maybe we can’t have truly new beginnings but we can always try again.

For me, seeing the repetitions and the circles in my life, in the world, in everything around me, well it’s one of the worst possible things for my mental health. If the circles can’t be broken, if I’m destined to have the same experiences over and over, if the world will repeat the same patterns until it dies - then what’s the fucking point?

I’m never going to think it’s acceptable to be complacent. I’m still wrestling with the idea that maybe humanity as a whole will always be at least a little bit shitty, and in all honesty, I don’t really know how to parse that one out. But I do know that on a smaller level, we can make meaningful change.

If you pay attention to your history, and particularly if you want to grow as a person, you will make change. I often feel like there are some throughlines in my life - the circles I travel on have had an unshifting foundation. But even if the foundation remains the same, a lot of other things have changed. My priorities, my knowledge, my boundaries. I don’t know if I can ever break those circles but maybe I don’t need to. Maybe it’s enough to be mindful of them, to take care of myself in ways that are realistic for me, instead of asking nature to change.

I don’t have any answers. Sometimes, I smell soap and I feel like the world has become a lot harder around the edges than it was when I was young. Or maybe it’s me that’s tougher, more rigid. But I don’t feel that way. I feel soft, vulnerable, fluid. I feel like I could fall out of the world at any moment; it’s just a matter of concentration. And then my own personal circles comfort me. They are dependable and maybe they can remind me of who I am, what I stand for, what I need. What do I need right now, to get through to tomorrow? What do I need right now, to break a cycle of poison? What do I need to do, to make a difference right now?

I can’t have any fresh starts. I can never be new again. But that means I can know myself better. It means I can strive for what I need and it means that I’m still learning what that is.

Heavy Machinery is written by Zainabb Hull and powered by Palmolive and spirographs.
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