Log 08 — Eighth Entry: New Module

New neighborhood. Old fears. A camera she hasn’t touched yet. A spiral
 glued between the eyes, still watching.

Left Page

“Este bairro é novo para mim. Ruas velhas, mas eu ainda não pertenço. Talvez isso seja bom. Uma página em branco.”
This neighborhood is new to me. Old streets, but I don’t belong yet. Maybe that’s good. A blank page.

She calls it a blank page, but it’s already filling with tension. Her body is alert, cautious, almost like it’s waiting for something to go wrong or for something to finally begin.

“Tenho medo de que, se parar de trabalhar com as mãos, perca o fio. O corpo sabe mais do que eu.”
I’m afraid that if I stop working with my hands, I’ll lose the thread. The body knows more than I do.

This line stayed with me. The way she says the body knows more, as if it’s the one leaving breadcrumbs, and she’s just following behind, hoping the trail doesn’t vanish. I know that fear. Of losing momentum. Of letting something fall quiet and never finding your way back in.

In red, two words repeat like a heartbeat at the bottom of the page:
“Meus olhos. Seus olhos.”
My eyes. Your eyes.

Right Page 

“O próximo módulo vai ser difícil. Não tenho vontade de estar ali. Mas os alunos não precisam de saber.”
The next module will be hard. I don’t feel like being there. But the students don’t need to know.

Her voice softens here. She doesn’t want to be in that room, but she’s still going. Still showing up for them.
There’s something human in that, the weight you carry quietly so others won’t feel it.

A single phrase in red ink stands out, almost like it doesn’t belong to the rest of the text:
“eu te vejo”
I see you.
Feels less like a note and more like a breach. A line crossed. A presence felt.

“Amanhã levo a Polaroid comigo. Comprei novos rolos hoje, talvez me inspire.”
Tomorrow I’ll take the Polaroid with me. Bought new film today, maybe it’ll inspire me.

So many of her entries orbit this: the camera, the images she hasn’t taken yet, the eyes that might appear again.
The collage at the bottom of the page is almost a whisper: green, grainy, an iris behind prison bars, or is it trees? It’s hard to tell. The spiral is glued right between the eyes.

She’s still searching for a new way to see.
And still afraid of what she might find when she does.

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

Log 07 – Seventh Entry: Old Habits

Circles drawn in pencil. Words left unsaid. The door stays shut, 
but something still listens.

Left Page

“O Monroe tem estado na mesa de cabeceira. Algumas noites leio, outras só olho para a capa. Há frases que ficam na cabeça. Acordo a meio da noite a repeti-las.”
Monroe has been on the bedside table. Some nights I read. Others I just look at the cover. Some phrases stay in my head. I wake up in the middle of the night repeating them.

She doesn't say which phrases.
But I’ve done the same: stared at the cover like it might answer back.
Journeys Out of the Body.
Maybe she was looking for a way to slip out again. Or maybe she already had.

(A chain of pencil-drawn circles, tangled like linked rings or ripples frozen mid-movement.)

The spirals are gone for now, replaced by something else.
Still circular. Still looping.
Less cosmic, more grounded.
Like breath. Like repetition. Like a mantra she’s trying to hold onto.

“Hoje voltei a desenhar com carvão. Mãos sujas, mente mais leve.”
Today I drew with charcoal again. Dirty hands, lighter mind.

She says it so simply, but it’s a quiet victory.
The kind you don’t celebrate out loud.
She let the dust settle on her fingers. Let the ink take over, even if just for a moment.

Right Page

“A Polaroid ficou na prateleira. Acho que funciona. Mas para quê usá-la agora? Não estou pronta.”
The Polaroid stayed on the shelf. I think it works. But why use it now? I’m not ready.

She was still afraid to look through the viewfinder.
Still afraid of what it might show her or what it might remember.
The weight of the camera wasn’t in grams. It was in ghosts.

“Às vezes, ao entardecer, penso que vou ouvir a porta abrir. Velhos hábitos.”
Sometimes, at dusk, I think I’ll hear the door open. Old habits.

This one cuts.
The quietest grief lives in muscle memory.
She doesn’t say his name, she never does — but he’s in that sentence, standing behind the door that never opens.

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

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.

Log 05 - Fifth Entry: The Mirror

One spiral collage. One page drifting. A self-portrait she erased before it 
could see her.

The spiral shows up again. This one isn’t drawn or printed: it’s a collage, carefully cut and pasted in, like she needed to anchor it right here. She has other spirals tucked between these pages too, little circles that loop back on themselves when you least expect it.

Left Page

"*Pensei em telefonar. Mas o que diria? Não há mais nada a dizer.*"
*I thought about calling. But what would I say? There’s nothing left to say.*

Probably her ex. The one she left behind when the walls got too tight, or maybe when the silence got too loud.
She writes it like a full stop, but she doesn’t stop.

"É estranho como o espaço muda o corpo. Aqui movo-me devagar. Como se tivesse que pedir permissão às paredes." 
It’s strange how space changes the body. Here, I move slowly. Like I need to ask the walls for permission.

"O apartamento ainda não é casa. Não sei se algum dia será."
The apartment still isn’t home. I don’t know if it ever will be.

Some spaces never let you settle. Maybe they like you untethered.

And the collage spiral sits there beside her words - neat but endless, still circling the same point.

Right Page

"Faz três semanas que saí. Três semanas. E ainda me custa respirar à noite."
Three weeks since I left. Three weeks. And it’s still hard to breathe at night.

The nights always weigh more than the days: here, for her, for me.

She writes: “Comecei a ler de novo o Monroe. Não sei porquê. Talvez procure uma saída.”
I started reading Monroe again. I don’t know why. Maybe I’m looking for a way out.

She doesn’t explain, but I know what she means.
The copy I found inside the Polaroid bag — Journeys Out of the Body. Her bookmark still tucked inside.
Maybe she was looking for a way to slip out, a way to watch herself float above the spiral. 

"Tentei fazer um autoretrato ontem. Apaguei." 
I tried to make a self-portrait yesterday. I deleted it.

The spirals, the books, the collages. They’re all ways to see yourself when you’re not sure who’s looking back.
Sometimes I think these pages are the real mirror.
One that only reflects what you’re afraid to say out loud.

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

Log 04 – Fourth Entry: The Polaroid

Her Polaroid. My Polaroid. A new way of seeing, imperfect and heavy.

This fragment picks up right where the last one left off. She kept writing: same ink, same room, just a deeper breath.

Left Page

“...fácil concentrar. Mas talvez seja isso que me faz falta, trabalhar com as mãos, com as formas.
Estou a preparar um novo módulo para os alunos.
Escultura e luz.
Ontem encontrei essa câmara numa gaveta. Escondida, atrás de velhas toalhas. Não sei de quem era. Perguntei ao senhorio, disse que não sabia. Talvez tenha ficado de algum inquilino antigo.”
…easy to concentrate. But maybe that’s what I’m missing, working with my hands, with forms.
I’m preparing a new module for the students.
Sculpture and light.
Yesterday I found that camera in a drawer. Hidden, behind old towels. I don’t know who it belonged to. I asked the landlord; he said he didn’t know. Maybe it was left by some old tenant.

She writes about the students so lightly, just a line, like they were a fact of her life she didn’t need to explain. It’s strange to think of her as a teacher: standing in front of a class, talking about light and sculpture, holding all her pieces together long enough to show someone else how to make something out of nothing.

And then the camera. Tucked away behind old towels like it was waiting to be found. I like that she asked the landlord, as if the right answer would settle it. Or maybe prove she wasn’t the only ghost living in that apartment.
Sometimes I wonder if the spiral let her find it, or if the camera found her.
And now it’s mine. I bought it in that second-hand shop, tucked in a box with her Moleskine, her book, her photos. Her Polaroid is my Polaroid. No scratches, barely any sign of time — just the weight in my hands now.

Right Page

“Disse-me para ficar com ela. Polaroid. Bonita. Usada. E parece que funciona.
Talvez faça um projecto com isto. Imagens instantâneas, imperfeitas. Um novo olhar.
Algo em mim diz que vale a pena tentar."
*‘Não era suposto estar aqui sozinha. Mas agora é assim.’*
He told me to keep it. Polaroid. Beautiful. Heavy. And it seems to work.
Maybe I’ll do a project with it. Instant images, imperfect. A new way of seeing.
Something in me says it’s worth trying.
*‘I wasn’t supposed to be here alone. But now I am.’*

She was already imagining a project. Instant pictures, all their flaws frozen on film.
When I first held it, I thought the same thing — that maybe imperfection could teach me to see what I’d always miss in digital. That if I caught a moment just once, it would mean more than any polished version ever could.

She called it heavy. I feel that too. Not just the camera in her hands, but the weight of seeing what you can’t fix once it’s out in the light.

I wasn’t supposed to be here alone. But she is. And now I am too.
Maybe that’s the whole point: the photos, the spirals, the questions that keep splitting us in two.

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

Log 03 - Third Entry: The Compass

Two flowers drifting in opposite directions. One spiral to catch them both.

Left Page 

The margins crawl with questions. “Quem?” — Who? “Eu?” — Me?

A single spiral sits on the page like a compass that never points anywhere but in. Two flowers, half blown apart, lean in opposite directions — one reaching up, the other bending down — seeds that might never land.

“Vês,… mas onde… e quando?”
You see,… but where… and when?

“Será que estou a repetir passos de alguém?” 
Am I repeating someone else’s steps?

And then, borrowed but almost hers now:
“Yo no sé cuál de los dos escribe esta página.”
I do not know which of the two writes this page.
Jorge Luis Borges wrote that in Borges y Yo, wondering who he really was: the name on the covers, or the man who lives behind his own stories. He didn’t trust which version of himself held the pen. It makes me think about all the selves inside me. The one who wants to remember. The one who hides. And the one who’s always chasing breadcrumbs left behind in notebooks like this, breadcrumbs that were never mine to scatter.

And just below the spiral:
“Tudo vale a pena se a alma não é pequena.”
Everything is worth it if the soul is not small.
Fernando Pessoa wrote it in Mensagem when he was trying to imagine Portugal bigger than its own fear: tiny boats, endless ocean, a horizon no one trusted. But I don’t think this line is just about ships and salt water. I think it’s about the private voyages too. The parts of yourself you’re afraid to cross. The conversations you put off because you think they’ll break you. The dreams you tell no one about because they’re too fragile to explain.
If the soul stays small, maybe you never lose anything, but you never find anything either.
If it opens wide enough, even the hard parts belong to you. The storms, the regret, the places that ache: they all make the map bigger.

Sometimes I wonder which of us holds the pen now. And whether the spiral ever lets us put it down.

Right Page 

"Novo apartamento. Alugado em dezembro. Precisei sair. Não aguentava mais aquela casa. Nem ele. Ainda estranho dormir aqui. As paredes vazias. O eco. Às vezes parece que o silêncio pesa mais à noite. Não trouxe quase nada. Só livros, materiais de desenho, alguma roupa. O resto ficou para trás. Aos poucos, começo voltar a pintar. Não é…"
New apartment. Rented in December. I had to leave. I couldn’t stand that house anymore. Or him. It still feels strange to sleep here. Empty walls. The echo. Sometimes it feels like the silence weighs more at night. I didn’t bring much. Just books, drawing materials, a few clothes. The rest stayed behind. Slowly, I’m starting to paint again. It’s not…

She writes it like a confession she’s not ready to finish. The new place feels hollow - walls bare, echo heavy enough to press down on her chest when the lights go out. She brought so little with her: books, charcoal, scraps of paper that remember more than she does.

This fragment continues in the next log.

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

Log 02 - Second Entry: The Loop

A spiral inside a triangle. A dandelion that won’t bloom. A night that
 refuses to end.

I turn the page. She’s left her mark again, the neat printed words from the notebook vanish under her ink. A triangle holds a spiral at its heart, a vortex caught on paper, looping back into itself. She writes around it: 

“Não sei o que é pior, o silêncio ou o som quando ele vem.”
I don’t know what’s worse, the silence, or the sound when it comes.

Beside it, a sketch that could be a flower, or maybe a dandelion, fragile, one breath away from disappearing.

The other side feels heavier: black ink bursts like static, and just above it, a single circle with a dot inside — like an eye reduced to its core, or a seed waiting to split open. Below, the red words bleed:  

“Tudo quanto vivi não me serve senão para desejar aquilo que nunca vivi.”
Everything I’ve lived means nothing except to make me long for what I’ve never lived.

At the bottom, she tries to bury the thought that won’t let her go:  

“A noite aqui não acaba nunca.” 
The night here never ends. Crossed out, but not erased.

A tiny spiral spins in the corner like a silent promise to never stop. 
Sometimes I think these pages breathe when I read them. 
Sometimes I think they’re still spinning for her.

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