This is the inaugural volume of Patina, and with it came all the hesitation and pressure of beginning something. I knew I wanted it to feel intentional—something that slows you down and sharpens your attention. I had to begin somewhere, so I began by looking around.
The result of all that looking around (and inward) is the deceptively simple prompt that threads through this volume: What do we carry?
Carrying, after all, is not a neutral act. It is gendered, classed, often caste-marked. Some carry by choice, others by compulsion. Some are permitted to set things down. Others are expected to inherit, uphold, and perform care indefinitely (often without credit, and without interruption). And so by posing this question, I hoped to offer a way of looking at what lingers, what accumulates and what can and should be made legible.
The creative works in this volume stretch this theme in different directions. A Manipuri sweet becomes the anchor for a story about caste, labour, and generational resilience. A box of receipts, shopping lists, and wrappers becomes an improvised family archive. A personal dictionary tracks how three generations of a family redefined words like obedience, agency, and authorship.
Some pieces focus on food and its ritual logic. Others examine tradition as a system that must be continually negotiated. Across them, you’ll find something more rigorous than plain nostalgia: close attention to inherited structures and the small, often invisible work of adapting or subverting them.
I hope Volume N°1: The Things We Carry reads not as a finished product, but as a beginning. As always, thank you to the Patrons who generously sponsored this first volume.
Happy reading,
Patina Magazine 