Getting Together Has Lost Its Scent

Getting together has lost its scent… Damn the Islamic Republic for shrinking our gatherings at Grandma’s house, and the people in them, until all that remained was a chat group called “Get-Together.” The bustle in her courtyard, Dad and my uncle laughing over the barbecue, became a wistful photo of my cousin in another country after he spotted a little Iranian restaurant. The long cloth spread on the floor, everyone gathered around it and squabbling over the crispy rice at the bottom of the pot, became a table by a window, a bedroom, a balcony, a workplace, a university, a car. In each place, the same people appear on a phone screen in the background. I mean… we do get together… but it has no scent anymore. Damn the Islamic Republic for turning evenings spent watching old wedding videos and laughing at the clothes and dances into evenings spent crying over videos of farewells at airports… Getting together became being far from one another… became… Became loneliness. Grandma’s stories, remember those? Now maybe music and a pill can make a lonely night disappear… Long live the Shah.