Log 06 – Sixth Entry: The Weight of Things

The smell of turpentine. Clay too heavy to lift. Something waits in the 
sketchbooks, half-forgotten.

Left Page 

"Passei pela loja de fotografia. Ainda aberta. Talvez compre rolos novos. Não sei para quê."
I passed by the photography shop. Still open. Maybe I’ll buy new rolls. I don’t know why.

She doesn't know what she's preparing for, but she's preparing anyway. Something in her still expects the shutter to click, the film to hold something steady.

"Encontrei os cadernos antigos. Desenhos de antes. Não sei se sou ainda a pessoa que os fez."
I found my old sketchbooks. Drawings from before. I don’t know if I’m still the person who made them.

Sometimes it feels like the old self is a stranger who shared your hands. She found the drawings, but doesn’t claim them.
The same lines, but not the same eyes.

"Comecei por arrumar os tintas. As velhas caixas ainda cheiram a trementina. É um começo."
I started by organizing the paints. The old boxes still smell of turpentine. It’s a start.

There’s something sacred in that smell, not just memory, but movement. Like art waiting to be remembered. Like proof she once created things that weren’t just fragments.

Right Page

"Não sei se quero voltar à escultura. A argila pesa. Os blocos pesam. Eu também."
I don’t know if I want to return to sculpture. The clay is heavy. The blocks are heavy. So am I.

There’s a difference between weight and gravity. Isabel feels both. Clay in the hands and in the chest.
Creation asks too much sometimes, and sometimes you don’t know what’s left to give.

"Há dias em que não saio. A cidade lá fora não me chama. Ainda não."
Some days I don’t go outside. The city out there doesn’t call to me. Not yet.

She’s not hiding. Not exactly. But the outside world feels paused, like she’s waiting for something to shift before it lets her back in.
Or maybe she’s the one who needs to shift first.

At the bottom of the page:
Something tangled, maybe a flower, maybe a star.
All points pulled inward, unsure if it wants to rise or collapse.

These pages are fragments left behind by Isabel S., no more and no less. © I.S.