times ten

deep red bells

2008-05-22T21:50:00.000-07:00

i miss you. your absolute underground wishwashes that swoosh up my bare legs under skirts onto shouldersneckcheeks even in darkest hours. even in darkest hours you kiss me and fling dancers and draggers and doers and don'ters towards doorways and yourways are all laid out raw jubilant terrible and rich. here it is mild, all the time. the subways are carpeted, seating padded. but i remember loneliness and wideeyes, your denizens willing to meet me upon the slightest hand extended. you, out of manholes and barstools and hundreds of miles of sidewalks, calling from around the next corner. i hear you, as summer begins her boil. i see your finger crooked: gold ring and dirt under the nail.

intoit

2007-11-20T21:36:00.000-08:00

hello here. nice to meet you.

i left my fair city with a bang. or with a boom- in the park and on the hazy haz-mat beach. then a smack, in the hip-to-help-you-on-your way mission. and finally a thump, a bump, and a pow, as i exited my old home.

strangely, ominously, auspiciously (?), my entry into my new home began also with a pow, bump and thump. i would that being in the midst of this orchestral orgasmic palindrome, both bedrooms alike audience to a san francisco oakland sandwich of sensation during my move, has some cosmic tidings of good fortune.

this morning i woke early, walked to the smiling counter man bakery, fresh juice and cheese roll while waiting for the bus that carried me over the sunbathed bridge, coming up fast on the skyscrapers coming up fast. a day in the city with trains and buses and papel picada, a quick wineglass stop to a home that's no longer mine, dinner with a dearie. it's not hard to hop on bart afterward. and downtown oakland is so peaceful, and the lights around the lake twinkle as stars to lead me and my bike home at the end of the night.

loveletter

2007-11-17T01:58:00.000-08:00

joy & pain - it's like sunshine & rain

tonight it's dedicated to skip. skip, whoever you are, thank you for founding your tavern. instead of one more night at a crowded, hip mission bar, i suggested to my two friends we meet in the neighborhood i've been living in for the past year. good old bernal heights. hello, bernal heights, thank you for housing me.

after a drink at a fine establishment, stray dog, which only today i peeked into for the first time while fetching moving boxes, we headed to skip's. i have some distant memory of a night a skip's, with some of my oldest san francisco friends, and feeling like i really found something that night. for 4, 5 years, i've held skip's in my mind: the search for that jazz club in the sky continues ever onward, but in skip's i believed i'd found the blues club of my dreams. tonight i confirmed that supposition.

tonight at skip's, the subsitute bartender, long ponytail down his back and shirt broadcasting "atencion, gringos" poured a drink with 4 bottles in his hands at once. this quadruple feat trumped by flaming shots and more importantly the geniality that one wishes of all bartenders. but really, let's get down to brass tacks. the band. electric guitar, drums and bass. easy does it. the set we walk in on features shuggie otis and jimi hendrix. (not necessarily blues, but) the second set blows in with a woman vocalist, just ruling the bar. all eyes on her. an impromptu dancefloor develops. her skinny friend, in subdued collar shirt and zipper jacket joins her on backups. let's get it on. she's the cause for hootin' and hollerin'.

guitarists switch in and out. two drinkers hop on a mike to accompany a blues number. a glass is broken near the stage; a broom is requested. drummers switch in and out. all around the 360 bar, heads are bobbbing. the backup man steps forward to sing sittin' on the dock of the bay. we all know this one. we all know this one.

loveletter

2007-11-14T19:43:00.000-08:00

i've loved you for so long. even before we met, i knew. for years - times anear and times afar.

two fridays ago, you were celebrating - the aftermath of Your Holiday. on to dia de los muertos - somehow this one seems more yours than the one that is clearly passsing into shadow. castro streets gone quiet, from revelery to two-days-later death march. aww, i know, you are no morbid soul. i know you well enough to see it was a joyous observance. sitting on your concrete block, like so many time before, your willlingness to parade and get laid in full view. i watched the mixing of old and new, i witnessed the barefoot feathered ankle banded ancestors stomp and sway the pavement, with children green blue blackeyed looking on. i saw mourners and hopers of all stripes around the roots of your trees - we all know the end, don't we? it was a testament to your silent sensibility, the way all your lovers gathered that night, quiet and festive, somber and celebratory. thank you for counting me among them.

and three nights ago, how your sidewalks welcomed me and my dear companion, like you have, so graciously over and over and over and over again. when no interior would suffice, your balmy coat wrapped warmly around, encouraging us into your heart.

i'm leaving you for now. just a little ways away, i promise. for weeks i've cried to think of it, missing you already. everyone assures me we'll still be close, i'll visit you often. i know you'll have me time and time again. strung out on another one. you did it though - you really did, taught me how to love: the towering, the dirty, the unexpected snow patch, the streetcar, the crazy lady telling the truth,the sparkling, the stranger biting my back, the car crash, the lost in the park, the ocean lullaby, the whatever may come.

immaculata

2007-07-18T21:35:00.000-07:00

:shiny: :white: :light: like riding an outline
a ghost and a cloud::an angel phantasma

the bike riding is my favorite. it is my new favorite. how my feet learnt to slip into toe cages without a glance. how i hear in surround sound. the do-si-do of my compatriots in the bike lanes - are you going faster, i pass you-okay, now you pass me, shall we wait at the stoplight 2 abreast? click click click my gears - me and bike and road, micro adjustments subtle swoop missing manhole

and the mind. the mind's favorite time, so happy to be with the body. moving.

today, mind and legs working easily, down empty street.
an unexpected friend calls out my name. well, hello, summernight surprise.
and later riding home, two lanes over, the guy and girl on motorcycle ask the taxi for directions to nearby restaurant. he doesn't know. but hey, hey i do, free air neighbor.
and continuing on, the last stretch, but my least liked (though somehow more favorable after nightfall), not too fast on the slight incline

whoa, wha, boom
i got doored
from the left
holy shit

a momentary jolt. but it's just my handlebar. i'm fine. really, i'm totally okay. the woman exiting passenger side was more traumatized than i. both she and the guy driving looked at me with horrified faces. "i'm okay - i'm okay" i pedaled forward a few feet. see?

i love it

hello operator, give me number bleen

2007-07-08T23:35:00.001-07:00

8 minutes till the bus comes, so i head out the door, down the block, 'round the corner. hop on the sunday evening, uncrowded 24. up front is a shaggy slightly dishevled corduroyed guy. asking for reassurance from the operator when the bus stops at diamond. celltalking. i'm listening to music - the 24 line makes me a particularly evil readingsick. we got on at the same stop. his question makes me think he's not from around here.
then i go to the movies with the guy who sold me my bike a few weeks ago.
standing in the mezzanine, fishfry calls up to me from the lobby. earlier in the day i thought about inviting her to see the film with us - she would like it, anime about dreams. but she's here to see something else.
afterwards we walk back to the busstop, only a 2 minute wait.
music back on. a friendly operator who waves me past when i'm fishing for my transfer. one guy greets him knowingly after hopping on; they chat it up. down in the castro, shaggy cords gets on again. oh - smiles. sits crosslegged near me. he's got a worn greyhound luggage tag on his backpack (a-ha). after a bit, he moves up to the front and begins talking with the operator. i exit at the front of the bus, and i am wished a good night.

between 22nd & 23rd

2007-04-26T01:05:00.000-07:00

on bartlett

there is a bird, who will riff incessantly in the midnight hour

the best date (n)ever

2006-07-12T22:56:00.000-07:00

on the long roster of new york city summer, there are countless museums and parks, bike procurement, outdoor performances, restaurants, and a fling.

last weekend i was at one such outdoor event at one such park. flying solo, so it’s sink or swim. either you step up and start talking with people, or…you don’t, and the whole thing can be a bust unless you put on those x-ray observation glasses and simply sit back, but that’s often just a copout anyway. but this evening was on, and it was easy, butterfly easy. and so, among others, i met one particular gentleman with whom i sincerely enjoyed the conversation - architecture and design, the joy of an old man sitting on that which you have built. he lives in new york, but he also had lived in san francisco. so, you see…
at the end, a pleasantly awkward exchange of information, because yes, we’d like to keep talking.

then ensued a week and a half of email and phone tag after an initial proposal to wander. this is a new game for me, enjoying the wait and see of it all, appreciating the days inbetween, the slow progress but underlying sureness that eventually. and then today…today? okay. it had been long ago and brief enough that i had begun to lose his details, and i wondered if he had similar difficulty. so laughed as i conjured up my best memory – form and colors and wire-rimmed spectacles - to spot him in washington square park. it sufficed and the challenge was fleeting.

and then the ambling commenced.
through the meatpacking district, we found ourselves on a pier overlooking the hudson river. new jersey looks pretty from afar. i asked about the high line project, which will turn an old elevated railroad track over 20 blocks on the western coast of manhattan into a sort of floating park. well, he’d done a project on rotation there with 2 bicycles and a 10 foot tower and videocameras on a spinning axle. Oh. and so we set off, but you know, it’s under construction, and so the first staircase we get to, sneaking past snoozing parking lot security guard, is locked and surrounded by razor wire. similarly the second. we near the end of the line, and down into a lot where truck containers reside, slipping in darkness between their slender corridors, to gravel embankment, and then …there we are, wooden slats and metal rails, above the city. walk to one side for a while, to avoid the glance of security man, and to our left is a slumber party of subway trains, then a private tented party to spy. and on and on, down the tracks, overgrown with knee deep weeds, and talk of this and that...i start to realize he has an understated quality, reminiscent of a dear person past that I have not seen the likes of since, it causes an innate shift in the whole way i see things. oh dreamy city lights so strangely seen from wild, meandering peaceful path above it all – it is the best place I have been since I arrived. thank you for bringing me here. it is secret and slightly surreptitious and an incredible treat.

so you see, it already has the makings of a quite special date.

upon our return from the high line, ready for food, so we entered an old diner. the traditional silver fancy pre-manufactured kind, with the red round counter stools and vinyl booths. the cheyenne diner. we order a breakfast dinner, with glasses of fresh squeezed orange juice. conversation continues – friendships with old people, figure drawing. apt words are chosen.

now you may recognize, this date is bordering on classic.
but, no, none of it is planned.
and wait!

halfway through the meal, a spectacular lightening and thunder storm. sheets of rain. each person walking past the window a delightful amusement. one well dressed woman is running down flooded sidewalks barefoot with high heels in hand. shall we wait it out? for a bit yes, but eventually it just seems time to go, and so we set out, getting sensationally soaked, walking to the station together.

clearly, this is an exemplary date, bar none.

down into the subway, and sit down, wet tousled hair and he removes his watery glasses, and well yes, he is quite handsome. some banter, it’s coming to a close soon. and then:
“i suppose i should tell you, i have a girlfriend.”
(apparent awkwardness from him)
“oh,” i smile, “i appreciate you telling me that.”
(pause)
“yeah… i don’t know if this is a date…this feels like a date to me”
(he’s thinking, and then)
“when we talked last week…i wanted to continue the conversation. i enjoyed talking with you…i like you…i’d like to hang out again.”
(our stop approaches - ah, dear rushed conversation-of-import)
“yes, i’d like to, too” my reply, and still smiling, “good job.” which I really meant.
which gets a thankful laughing smile in return.
then a mild hug on the platform and a reassurance that I will see him at his party on friday.
and he departs and I await my transfer.

the cheese stands alone,

2006-05-25T22:05:00.000-07:00

the cheese stands alone,
heigh-ho, the derry-o
the cheese stands alone

and then, the cheese RUNS

hold the mayo

2006-05-02T20:19:00.000-07:00

it came. it's coming. i didn't ask for it, and neither did you. but it's here, and making itself known. it's calling, lulling, singing sweets in that ear of yours that longs to be licked. and when that tongue all gushy and warm fills the sound and the touch and the eyes go blind...then you will know its coming, too. and so swept away you and i will be, each and all to sidewalk cafe and sunnied lawnspot, to the ignorance of what must be, to the answering of what is, to the hourlong happenstance of here we find ourselves, though we've never met before.
i wondered and questioned, indeed i prayed. oh bestow upon me your aromas, your unspoken wanderings, lead me to where i know not. i doubted and floundered, aimlessly i treaded. but baa, twas not for me to decide - no, never for me to grasp in ringless fingers. need only i wake into each day, grass growing, leaves sprouting, petals blossoming, air breathing...i will your in out in out.

taking the turtle for a walk (for mlle ff)

2006-04-13T19:42:00.000-07:00

okay. in the past week, the word Flâneur has popped up twice.
first, on the project for public spaces listserve, a back and forth about the spanish translation of the term 'placemaking'. since placemaking is the theme of my thesis, and i'm still gnawing on my spanish, this was of particular interest (not to mention the implications for cultural perceptions of such activities). apparently there's no spanish equivalent, and in electronic discussion one person tangentalized, offering something akin to Flâneur, for which there is no english equivalent. the writer went on to suggest that calling one a Flâneur was not necessarily complimentary.
the second just happened, in reading on "the significance of the memory of urban spaces", the author writes, "he refers to benjamin's remarks on the tendency of the Flâneur in nineteenth century paris to "turn the boulevard into an interieur" turning public space into a living room sounds good to me.
then i looked up Flâneur, and found that simply, the Flâneur is an idler, a stroller, and an observer of street life. but there are historical and class associations with the bourgeoisie and on one site the mention of "intellectual parasitism"...it seems some pretty -ugh- stuff. i've got some more to learn here, but if we strip away these associations, at first glance i think i like the Flâneur. enough to have been one many times.
and i wonder at the role of the Flâneur in the present day. it seems like this person certainly walks in the world of another current fascination: psycho-geography. i do like the mixing of the tattered old smelly with the bleeping blipping now.
all this, and i'm supposed to be writing my thesis. isn't this it? discovery of new words and ideas and put them together, i'll stop the world and melt with you? i went to school and became a Flâneur? (oh, curses. forgive me my historical oversights, i know not how i implicate myself). but above all this bullshit, get this:
"The Flâneur is typically well aware of their slow, leisurely behaviour and had been known to exemplify this state of being by walking turtles on leashes down the streets of Paris"

knackyard

2006-04-04T00:17:00.000-07:00

lately i've been ruminating on the nature of the davis foodie. appreciating such a creature beyond the bay area variety, beyond the candied cherry chockolate cake sophistikate. it's a different league here, and one that deserves more applause, in my opinion...more savoring, more reaping and crafting of one's own. and so this morning, i was invited to dinner by a new friend, she who had a martini party due in large part to the readiness of the fall olive harvest in davis, wherein there were perhaps ten or more varieties of olive, each cured differently by he or she, orange zest or kosher salt, and all the martinis sipped sipped sipped slowly, because that was the only way possible, with the smelliest of cheeses (oh ye fine camembert) along for the refined ride.
but tonight, bean pated and i shucked english peas, an hour of english peas, from the backyard garden right_outside_the_door, and the parsely picked, and oh, how- i've-tried-to-love-you-grapefruit, but finally, yes finally you are divine with aguacate and the perfect wine. and wine, so funny how the perfect wine to pair is german, with such a tropical treat, but it was the wine with the pink and the green that made it so delectable.
and wine, yes, how i have downed you and drowned you so many times, but tonight, how it seems so justified and apropos to open eight bottles for four persons, because each one so different, and taste, smell (smell, the oldest sense, he said, it forms in the brain before consciousness) and so we should drink down each one. this one with the olives, this one with the cheese, does chilling this white in a sink-o-fied swamp cooler do it justice? how about this red with...
the sausage.
the saugage, the pig, the pork, the free ranging pink breathing beast, wrapped in casing which just today mlle fishfry procured for art, yet we reaped the cured rewards. and oh, bite of salty and fat, you meat, you flesh. only 3 little bites, only one little round circle of muscle and wandering, snout to the ground, of carcass and smoked and hanging in the freezer, of sizzling in the pan, one two three tubes, and yes, tonight i learned to de-glaze, whether meat or onions it is the same. these bites sit long on the tongue, and the belly churns and rolls them over and over, working them and wondering, what is this? what is this hoofed somesuch? what have you given me now to digest diversify and dive into? tiny forkfull, eyes closed, for this is not a seeing thing. nay, none of this is a seeing thing

class dismissed

2006-03-15T20:54:00.000-08:00

yes, we were sitting first outside, then inside. during the inside, our professor bought all of us a glass of wine. all of us except the mormon. and during the outside we talked about books and blogs and china and iraq and mexico. and inside i talked about going to talking with tijuana and san diego...why? because i want to write about what i know - or i want to know what i write about. that's it, okay? i want to do what is a part of me. (an aside) the sun shined through the red and window. and then we went around the table, and each of us, all six of us, talked about each thing - landscaping day laborers, why do we call it unskilled labor, mail order wives, iranian nationalists in the us, the westernization and popularization of tibetan buddhism, women's businesses exports from ghana to hungary...and then she had to catch the bus, and then he had to TA a class, and a few of us sat around including the professor, and the boy sitting nearby finally spoke up - why, he's a somalian refugee who lived in san diego. he's studying managerial economics, but just so he can learn the system, and then go back to his home and change it.
and i stayed back, to meet with the project committee...only 2 weeks away and we will be putting stone on stone, then feet on earth, then rocks in clay, and months of waiting and planning and wondering will come to be..and finally, when waiting is full
and when it was over i walked back outside and the bursting moon was rising in the east, behind a haze that projected it even bigger, and i mounted my trusty steed, and on the way home i rode farther than ever with no hands on the handlebars, sitting straight up and straight ahead.
and so passed the last day of class
that i will know this time around.

chosen ones

2006-03-13T21:56:00.000-08:00

*we chose it*

))intake inhale((

we chose it
we chose squares instead of circles
we chose mobility
we chose a hole for each leg
we chose speed
we chose beige, cream and khaki off-white
we chose flat and smooth instead of bumps and irregularity
we chose regularity!
can you believe it?
who would of thought? but look it's everywhere
around amazed at the amassed

biting a rose

2006-03-03T19:35:00.000-08:00

wide steps solid pace face forward cool giddiness ready
get on that plane again and go some place. starts in the normal way, a locale with a familiar face and welcoming doorstep. a launch pad. look around a little, peripheral vision see whats on the sidewalks. it's not too long though, before my little toe leaves the welcome mat. tres dos uno...blast off. senses electric. all pores open for maximum intake. yeah, i'm new around here, but i know where i'm going. generally. i'm willing to be sidetracked down a sideways sidestreet.

getting ready to do it again. it's the only way i can get that feeling. put me on the spot. see how i perform. thinking and winking on your feet, chica. just you and the whole wide world busses bums gesture traffic greasy high heels futbol catcall park bench orange stand a-ha this time it's brief, but i can use the taste, just a bit on my tonguetip:::::::for now

cervezas a media

2006-02-27T14:06:00.000-08:00

i haven't been to a bar before noon since the viewing lehigh/layfayette game at the final final in the marina in 2001. at least, not that i can remember. but today, today it was justified. even business. or at the least schoolwork. (what's the difference?) after 'interviewing' 12 6th graders for approximately 15 minutes, me and my 2 collegues/coworkers/cohorts needed a place to reconvene. castro's hideaway being the obvious choice, because my cohort/casamate has been itching to go there. besides, there's not many options in west sacramento.
the sixth graders are all conflict managers. they go out onto the playground during recess, donning really cool denim vests with a red C on the back, and make themselves available to students in first through sixth grade. somebody called you a name? go to a conflict manager. a boy threw a football in the girls bathroom? conflict manager. the pint sized conflict managers learn not to interupt, not to take sides, to be good listeners, and importantly 'not to laugh, since some of the conflicts are pretty funny' according to the teacher leading the CM's.
CM's are supercool - we never had anything like that at st. thomas aquinas elementary school, although i could see those red C's really complimenting our already mandatory
navy blue vests. plus the teacher in charge noted that grown-up playground monitors don't really want to deal with fallout from kids calling each other names - let them take care of it themselves. fair enough. CM's are really playing an important roll during recess, and i commend them. nonetheless, talking with a dozen of them of them at once in a class room with 20 other CM's is tough, and i didn't get too much information from the ladies i was with. they want a mall and ice skating rink in their town. they want more swings at the park, and maybe a football team (for girls, rock on). there's a lot of drunk people on the street, and they don't like that. they have elderly neighbors with funny ears.
so clearly, distilling this information as soon as it was recorded was in order. and castro's hideaway fit the bill. perhaps the more fruitful interview was held within, with castro's proprietor, frank. at 11:46 am, frank's sister, 40-something nephew, and a few other friends were already patronizing. after the first round, our drinks were on the house. frank told us about the police barging into his house, pulling him over because of his lowrider vintage 60's car, and general harrasment for no good reason that's lead to a decline in customers at his bar. frank talked for a long time, while his friends teased him for ignoring paying customers so he could talk with the ladies. a good song was played on the jukebox. i silently questioned the differences between morning and evening metabolic rates. i listened to frank's stories.
lately, mostly in bathrooms, i've been making a new list in my head. the list starts, "community development is..."
today's addition, skyrocketing to the top: going to the local dive at noon

carrie

2006-01-16T22:08:00.000-08:00

danielle (judge of god) asked me what my name meant. i'd forgotten. an internet search turned up, inevitably, the shortened version of caroline (not me), coming from charles (particularly fitting given that my mother's name is charlene). a couple of definitions that didn't ring a bell: manly (on this danielle agreed), song of joy (french), and then, there it was, the one i recognized from baby paperbacks past: free man. yes. but alongside, "It is also suggested that there is an alternative meaning - creative beauty." a little too much, there.

and from one site "Cultural & Historical figures with this name: Carrie Chapman Catt, A feminist and advocate for women's suffrage." surely there are more notable persons with my name? true, carrie fisher was also listed as a "Sports and Entertainment figure with this name," and certainly princess leia and postcards from the edge were not lost on me. but then, finding more about ms. chapman catt (*3 Cs*) why look, she was born on january 9, one birth day shy of this carrie. after her first husband died she worked as a newspaper reporter. with her second husband she "signed a prenuptial agreement which guaranteed her two months in the spring and two in the fall for her suffrage work." they had no children. she lived for a time in san francisco. she was key in the passage of the 19th amendment, allowing women to vote. after, she organized the league of women voters.
go carrie, free man

!

2005-11-17T10:22:00.000-08:00

"CELEBRATE OCTOBER 10, 2005
THE SIXTH INTERNATIONAL POWERS OF 10 DAY
This year for Powers of Ten Day (10/10/05) we will explore Chairs. It's always a remarkable experience to look at our lives from the next largest and next smallest perspective and to ponder Charles Eames' words, "Eventually, everything connects." For those visitors new to Powers of 10, learn more by reading the history of the event, below.

Why a Powers of Ten Day?
In 1977, Charles and Ray Eames made a nine-minute film called Powers of Ten that still has the capacity today to expand the way we think and view our world. Over ten million people have since seen the film and it continues to be shown in classrooms, business meetings, festivals and retreats everywhere. Starting with a sleeping man at a picnic, the film takes the viewer on a journey out to the edge of space and then back into a carbon atom in the hand of the man picnic, all in a single shot. It is an unforgettable experience.

After pondering the impact and influence this short piece still generates, we thought it might be valuable to create a special forum for thinking in terms of scale and applying this cross-disciplinary approach to all subjects. Each October 10th, the Eames Office now celebrates Powers of Ten Day to promote and share this method of viewing ideas from an infinitesimal to a cosmic perspective. Much like a knowledge of geography which allows us to place locations near or far in our mind's maps, an understanding of scale allows us to organize our thinking and experience in terms of size. On October 10, 2000, we addressed the environment with Powers of Ten thinking and began understand ecology, botany, geology, etc. from a new perspective. This year on 10/10/05, we will use Chairs as a springboard for such study. Our hope is to create a community of awareness that we believe can help stretch our understanding and even tolerance. After all, at 10-4, our physical differences become invisible to the human eye."

(http://powersof10.com/events/tenday.php)

oh, i am in a state of disbelief and vindication all at once. rejoice, there are others who celebrate 10.10 as well. and so properly, utterly perfectly.

yesterday, i walked into the physics geolgy building for the first time. to make my way to the 5th floor for a moonrise viewing, with fresh kettle corn in hand, i entered the elevator. there, was a chair. on a spring. attached to a post. upon which are hatch marks and ordered numbers. glee, my companion and me, scrambling on to the chair before lift off to floor five. baaruuuM. immediate laugher, this is physics simplified exemplified. the chair is on wheels - perhaps we should take it to the roof. so we started to move it into the hallway, but it quickly came clear that this chair absolutely belonged with the elevator. although we left it there in the hallway, upon my return after nightfall, the chair had been replaced in the elevator, and so again i joyfully partook of obvious relativity.

in a flash it was clear that the chair was destined for my final video project. from there rolled the idea that this final one would be a science one. a satisfying moment of assuredness after just saying that afternoon how the final project is so wide open, where should my lens go? the final project is meant to be an imaginary collaboration. after choosing an artist(s), researching and writing a (too) brief paper on he/she/them, the student will make a video in imaginary collaboration. no boundaries there.

later, bike riding home, where good clean thoughts are wont to transpire, while ruminating on the nascent science video... that bouncing chair... the cosmology posters in the hallways...
i thought of the powers of 10.
and yes, ray and charles eames shall be my collaborators. oh, how exciting to work with them.

and now, for the first time this quarter, i'm reading feverishly in academic pursuit. oh ray and charles, partners and see-ers and workers and designers and lovers and collaborators two. i am looking forward to learning from you. and i am jubilant in celebrating the powers of 10.

flimschool

2005-10-11T23:32:00.000-07:00

i'm taking a video production class. ART 116: video practice and theory
there are so many things i like about this class. sometimes we watch films and videos. sometimees we talk tech. sometimes we learn to use software at the computers. sometimes we talk about art.
then i go out and look through a camera and decide. i used to be fearful and self conscious of the camera - it alters the experience, i don't want to draw attention to the moment, i don't want to blow it out of proportion, i just want it to be. but yesterday, in the back yard with scarf and sun dapple, all the things i thought about scarf changed, i saw scarf anew. pretty trite, i know, ooh, look at the scarf in the wind, oh, now look how flowers look under its semi transparency. but it's ok for now, while i'm in the beginning.
and today, today we watched something extra special. so special that we almost didn't watch it at all. our TA said, well we were gonna watch this one about a childbirth, but [me and the professor] watched it last night and it was so graphic, so intense, we decide not to show it in class. no no, let us watch, i pleaded. the girl with the dreads seconded. and so we watched, except for student man in his ~early forties, who just kept his head down. see this flim: window water baby moving, by stan brakhage. it's only 12 minutes. i just did a search and couldn't find a free version. it's not the nova childbirth prime time wonder of science extravaganza. it's love and blood and hands and youth and grimace and waiting and tenderness and disbelief and belief.

and afterward, yes it illicited alot of talking. and yes, some about how parts were disgusting, and then the comment, lamenting that we find the image of bringing of life so gross that we are rarely exposed to it, but death we can see time and time again (i know, mostly fake deaths, it's true). and then later, talking with a friend on a different topic, of safe sex, and how it seems many of us (the us i know) are willing to risk disease, lifelong or fatal, but we are so much more careful with the risk of conceiving a child. willing to expose ourselves to the dark of sickness and subject to a fate of medicine, but so much less willing to potentially create new unknown life. oh, great mystery of aliveness

middlegate, nv population 18… 17... 14.

2005-07-18T15:35:00.000-07:00

just one day, the very first full day. began it at a stranger’s house – jane. we dropped off our playa bikes at her place in sparks last night. she asked us where we were staying for the night, and we weren’t sure yet, and she offered her floor. then she directed us to the vegetarian diner in reno. i’ll be seeing her in six weeks when I fetch the bikes, and she said I was welcome to stay at her place again.

off interstate highway 80 right quick, onto route 50. the loneliest highway in america. california all the way to boardwalk ocean city, md straight shot from the pacific to vinegar fries and t shirt decals. but in between… in between there is middlegate, ‘in the middle of nowhere’. where there is a bar general store grill toilet motel set upon the desert. with a rickety front porch with table and rocking rolling chairs made of old wood barrels, and through the creaky screen door, you are there. there are dollar bills stapled covering the ceiling and the rafters, with notes written in sharpies. there are novelty postcards, plaques in memory of the desert dad, 1933-2003, impressive mounted antlers, a bumpersticker proclaiming ‘i love animals: they’re delicious”, a computer, an open area with three guitars for the weekends, and people. beards and cutoffs and tattoos and beers and smokes in hands, at 2pm. she came from new Orleans, he’s the 3 time champion fiddle player, she lost her purse off her motorcycle 20 miles back, and somebody just called her to let her know it was found. come on and pick it up, honey, it’s still got your five hundred dollars in it, the money that will last you the rest of your ride.
and don’t you know, sitting at the bar, swillin and smoking, he pulls out his fiddle, and he takes up the guitar, and without any pomp, just start playing. and the singing, low and his own. “i see your waist is slender your fingers they are small, your cheeks too red and rosy to face the cannonball” “i know my waist is slender my fingers they are small, it would not make me tremble to see ten thousand fall”

i’m back on the road now, headed east, towards a stand of bristlecone pines. the oldest living beings on earth. but i’d been happy to stay in the middle of nowhere.

class: in session/out for summer

2005-06-22T19:32:00.000-07:00

oh what a lightening of load - it is my first full week of summer vacay, and although i have a job and thesis work to do, i feel so free. and i am super excited about guiltless reading for pleasure. i feel like i just discovered that one can use the university library for more than research. and so i ILL'd rushdie's 'the ground beneath her feet,' and just today checked out "red emma speaks" and "living my life." since i saw a biographical show on emma goldman last year on pbs, she's been in my pantheon and i've been wanting to know more. and so, i'm pleased to cut the ribbon on the summer session of carrie university.

out on the patio, dinnertime, i just read one of her essays: Marriage and Love
it's a thankful challenge to imagine where she was coming from, so harsh on marriage is she, in her eyes and heart a show of man's superiority and female opression. it's no wonder she raised feathers, really heralding non-marital sex for enjoyment and ecstasy. but oh, she is a believer in love, and it is dramatic in her writing, which for summertime is just right. all this, and i went to a new (to me) women's health clinic. a feminist women's health clinic, where all services were free to me, and i was handed birth control pills without question, i was offered a speculum to take home to see my own cervix, and without requesting it, a package of emergency contraception. how do you like that, emma?

last night talking with my soon-to-be housemate, i expressed my hesitation in taking a women's studies class - i'm not sure i want to walk around with that lens for 10-plus weeks, i just feel sure that it would make me scowl too much. but it appears that i've signed up today for just that. i would like to know more, i would like to talk to the crones and know the changes over the years. better or worse mrs. vanek, so vibrant and gossipy and 80 years and married forever? what say you aunt jean, so adventurous and independent and then you married in your 40s and now it's your husband and dog? always fighting fighting for more, but it's important to see all that came before.

instead of writing my paper due tomorrow at 1pm

2005-05-17T22:34:00.000-07:00

this post is goodbye kisses after someone you just spent the night with, but his/her mouth is new to you. the whole damn person is new to you. and we were up till the wee hours, and oh cozy sleep, and hmm, we don't really want to get out of bed, but you've got to go to work and i've got class, of course i'd be happy to drop you off at the bus stop...okay bye (okay we just shared these intimate times and were kissing all night and of course we should be kissing goodbye) ...and kiss...but this kiss is coming from a different place, isn't it? uh-huh. and it's not really the place all that lip-locking was coming from the night before, eh? but that's how it ends, the departure is on this sweet and sunny 'have a good day at work' note, which, while yes, sweet and sunny and you're all high anyways so it feels just fine, seems truly so inappropriate, unaligned.

welcome, new students

2005-05-07T00:53:00.001-07:00

i talked up being single for quite a while. i asked questions. i observed. i pondered the meeting of strangers, the taking home of them, the exchanges of phone numbers or emails. i was titillated by the stories of others. for many years prior, i sat on the other side of the fence - where my friends would scold me for my naivité, in expecting all those 'dates' with strangers to be innocent efforts at making new friends. "you fool, they are looking for more than friendship." or, "you are leading them on." and i would fight back (and still do). oh, all the fighting i've done in favor of the platonic.
but here i am, in the thick of it now. and unlike the marriage research, i'm learning quick that all the interviews in the world are no alternative to diving in to living it (as always). and there's really not much point in talking about it because it's more a feeling than anything else, fortified by a healthy dose of spring, although sure, yes, i'm sure you know what i'm talking about. and i certainly feel ages behind, feel like a teenager or something all of a sudden. or like a sophomore undergrad. so let's dive in, shall we, canary girl? let's find out about the awkward and the exhilarating, about the shaking of hips and the shaking of heads, about the surprise of a sunrise and the morning after. you know, i've been walking around my not-so-new hometown for months now, not really caring how i looked. dress up and style were mostly for trips to my fair city. funny how all that can change so quickly. some one could see me. bittersweet to halt my slovenly.
tonight i hung out with some classmates. the last 2 guests at the married couple's house were only single ones there. oh, dear reader, can you recall, or do you still live, where this world was unfolding for you? where butterflies abound?

2005-05-02T22:43:00.000-07:00

Canary-birds pair in a state of nature, but the breeders in England succesfully put the male to four or five females. I have noticed these cases, as rendering it probable that wild monogamous species might readily become either temporarily or permanently polyamorous.
~Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man

nightshade

2005-04-21T21:37:00.000-07:00

with one leg exposed, toe to hip, coolwarm air through furhair
and the other cloaked in the twenty year cotton once donned by my mother
both cycling up and down through the soft darkness
the scent of jasmine was ten times more intoxicating
than any brew i sippped while the sound of lonely banjo picking
wafted through the delta

not so fast

2005-04-20T22:02:00.000-07:00

i'd been waiting a long time. it was at least a year ago when i began anticipating the passing of pope john paul II. because i was ready for a change on a global scale, and because i wanted to see firsthand the whole fiasco.
jp II is the only pope i've ever known, and compared to the multitude of catholics worldwide, my exposure was probably more than most: between sophomore and junior year of college, i made a pilgrimage to world youth day with a handful of other young faithfuls from my church, under the auspices of getting together with tens of thousands of other young catholics to be with the pope and revel in our christianity. really, i was going because it was a free trip to colorado, the farthest west i'd ever been. god must have known my deviant reasons and it was the most horrendous week ever. but, i did get to see the pope driving his pope mobile around mile high stadium, and i camped out in cherry creek state park to wake up to hear jp II giving mass the next morning, after a night of whispered disbelief that the swedes were -naked- in their sleeping bags because 'it's warmer that way.'
the next time i saw him was accidental. i happened to be visiting vatican city on the day of his weekly meet and greet. or, greet and bless. this is a big event for some folks, and obviously some travelers had come in groups, replete in matching t-shirts (or habits). of course, the all knowing jp II made sure to give special shout-outs to these devout pilgrims, and when he called them by name, they all hollered and waved. i watched for a while, then headed in to see hundreds of years of catholic treasure booty in the vatican museum.*
so, finally the time which i awaited has arrived. i found out from nytimes online. which also presented me with slide shows about those in the race for next pope. theoretically, there's no "race," but it's likely the campaigning has been going on for quite some time. oh, what promise for something transformative - this was not a simple u.s. election, it was a coming together of spiritual leaders (albeit from one sect) from the world over. would it be an african? south american? an acknowledgement of healthy change and the need to renew? no. it shall be an old fogey, soon to die. perhaps his old ways will pass with him. perhaps not.
around the same time that i began to look forward to the changing of the papacy, i also began to feel deep inside that it is time for a female president of the united states. and so now i re-turn my attention, and patiently pray on a bumper sticker i saw a few weeks ago: hillary and oprah 2008.

*(while i will not at this time begin a rant about the implications of vatican's incredibly vast horde, i will say this: when i attempted to enter the enclosed parts of the vatican (as opposed to the main piazza, into which you can just wander) the two italian guards checked my bag, as was their job. they found the swiss army knife that i'd been carrying all over the continent. they pointed to the five gallon drum for discards beside them. i gave a desparate glance to my traveling partner and said half to him and half to the guards, "this was my grandfather's knife. i can't leave it here. i can't go in." (it was totally true, but after spending a few weeks in italy i also understood the insane respect and reverence for family). they looked at me, let down their guard, lowered their voices, and made the appropriate hand gestures to indicate that i should put the knife in my bag and come on in. this was the greatest example of compassion i witnessed at the vatican.)

present tense

2005-03-15T01:28:00.000-08:00

it's happening.
everybody recognizes it. sometimes we talk aboout it, oftentimes it goes unsaid. there is the occasional knowing glance.
changes are afoot.
the next timesten you see me, call me fred astir.

*

2005-03-09T00:18:00.000-08:00

i try hard, but not hard enough, not to skip to the end of the page/paragraph/scene. to the part where you know the juice is gonna be. its like, i get so excited about what's gonna happen, it's building up and higher, and the next few sentences are probably where the author is really at one's most poignant, but my eyes just
-jump-
to the last sentence, to the sigh.
then i go back up again,
a bit higher then where i left off
but of course you can never get back the initial exhilaration.

surprising, since i can leave christmas presents under the tree with nary a shake for the full length of advent, and i've often left envelopes unopened for hours or sometimes days to savor the slice of the knife through the paper and the ensuing read. but once the reading begins*

in case you were wondering

2005-03-09T00:12:00.000-08:00

i just watched the last four episodes of sex in the city.
the last four ever.
(if you don't want to know anything more about this stop reading)*

they each end up with someone.
yep, all the single girls have a partner in the end.

huh.

115395

2005-03-02T21:45:00.000-08:00

is the number of the citation i was handed today, from the police officer who pulled me over after allegedly running a stop sign. while on my bicycle. i have been pulled over in a car before, but never handed a piece of paper in the process. i have been at a red light well past midnight and too full of libations, with one police officer behind me, and another one next to me, who motioned to me to roll down my window and informed me that i ought to turn on my lights. but again, and thankfully, no piece of paper. in each of those situations, my reaction is to just react with my most honest feeling.

and so it was today. but, that feeling was one of...well, i saw the flashing lights, and there she was in her car right next to me in the bike lane, her window rolled down and telling me to "pull over." which made me smile and nearly laugh, cause at my speed in a bike lane with her so close to me, "pulling over" is such an overstatement, i mean, i could and did just stop immediately. when you're in the bike lane, you're so close to being in a state of perpetual pulled over, except in motion. anyways, it set a sort of mood of ridiculousness on the whole interaction for me. but she was all business, and i couldn't be too upset with her. i did not fully stop, though i was far from zipping on through that intersection. and i looked in all directions - ALL directions - that's the thing, i always look behind me when approaching a stop sign. to look for cops. but today john law was driving behind a big old pickup truck, and so, obscured. the morning, especially the morning-out-of-doors on a pleasant day, and i wanted to talk, and learn about this woman's experiences as a police officer. but all the introductory questions that ran through my head seemed like they would sound rude or spiteful or something. i noticed her dark hair had dyed light streaks like mine, the kind that obviously don't belong there, and that was a reminder. the only break from business conversation was at the very end. she told me she was giving me a citation, then she started walking back to her car, and i said 'wait, what does this mean?' "it's not a ticket," because i was on a bike, not in a car. okay, is there a fee? yes, but i don't know how much. REALLY? i mean, i could not help my disbelief from coming out. in general, how can you hand someone a paper that could potentially really impact them, depending on their financial situation, and not even know the cost? she proceeded to show me the folded-like-a-map, abridged version of the traffic code, just a glance really, to show just how much detail was in there, and that she could not be held responsible for knowing all of its contents, now really could she? it ended after that, and i vowed to try to stop running stop lights, and go back to the good little bicyclist i was when i first moved to davis.

but, on the ride home tonight, on deserted, unlit roads, i twice found myself braking after the fact. i also found myself rehasing the incident in my head, except this time really arguing with her, or making it difficult, or simply defending myself more. no, just asking lots and lots and lots of questions. why? you figure out how old i am, no need to ask, you've written down my birthdate. does it matter whether i'm going to school or waht my destination is? (this was her first question, i wish i'd answered differently)

anyways, today, i, one of 14 people in davis who actually wears a helmet while riding, was pulled over and cited for unsafe bicycling. raise your glass high, and then toss it on the floor, on the evening of this very special occasion.

>>>><<<

2005-02-22T22:01:00.000-08:00

this is what it sounds like when doves whine

grammy recap

2005-02-14T01:15:00.000-08:00

i unexpectedly ended up at a college buddy's apartment in vacaville vatching the grammys tonight.

a feast for the eyes.
(more so than the ears)

but here are some times ten highlights of grammy night:
-prince was not there to receive his award.
-lynyrd skynard and friends playing freebird (well, just the first half, not the rockin half)
-queen latifah was the host. first, she referred to herself as the host as opposed to the hostess. second, it's queen latifah being host of the grammys. raise your feminist flag high.
-stevie wonder opening the "and the winner is" envelope and reading the recipient in braille.
-this was not a highlight necessarily, but there was this big all star studding singing of john lennon's 'across the universe' wherein one could log onto itunes and download it and all the proceeds go to tsunami relief. no comment there, it's just that during the final, drawn out, chant-y chorus, they replaced "nothing's gonna change my world" to "something's gotta change this world" or "someone's gotta change this world" or some combination of (probably both given the amount of people on stage). i don't know what to make of this change of lyrics. my gut tells me it is not favorable. don't fuck with that shit.
-also not a highlight exactly, but the president or resident bigwig of the grammy academy, or recording industry emperor or what have you, going on and on about the beauty of the music industry, as is exemplified by all the money we'll raise for tsunami relief when you go to itunes and legally download. and legally downloading, and legally downloading, and legally downloading...

able to watch with a relatively openmind. (pat on the back). vorth vatching next year? nah...

small axe

2005-02-11T16:46:00.000-08:00

i like traffic intersections. i still have my lifelong interest in women's restrooms, but traffic intersections are the community study du jour.

this week in our bioregion seminar, lead completely by grad students (there's no faculty member present, even), sitting outside on the grass on a beautiful sunny day, the topic of conversation was 'regional transportation systems.' what is a regional transportation system - what does it look like, who does it serve, how could it work? which lead to discussion of the present road system, the american individual driving freedom thing, which of course degenerated into the 'what is wrong with people today, where are people's values?' conversation, with requisite walmart references. davis is unique for its strong bicycling ethic, which gave a twist to the talking - complaints about drivers not noticing bicycles and the such. some people were talking alot, and so by the time there was a rest in conversation, i decided not to say my bit (for a few different reasons).

which was, this. i've been encouraging interaction at intersections. just in my own life. the big intersection right before i get to my home, with a traffic light. i pass by slow enough on my bike to make eye contact with the people i pass by, waiting for the red light to change. i smile at them. i smile at them even bigger if they are singing - yeah, i know you're having fun singing in your car, i do that too sometimes. then i keep riding and the light changes. but there, you saw me from inside your big hunk of steel and i saw you while my legs were working. it's very simple, i know. but in the short amount of time i've been learning about community development from an academic standpoint, when i combine it with my preference for life-sized personal doing that's what i get: interaction at the intersection.

so just now, i was riding home, a friday evening, the weekend is starting ride home, and i approach my intersection. the light is red, and i hit the crosswalk button. across the big street, someone else has been waiting on his bike, to come in the other direction. he's really hitting the crosswalk button a lot (it makes a loud noise if you do it right). at first i'm a little condescending about the impatience he seems to exude. then i decide to just hit my button lots, too. i stop, he starts up again. silence, then a few bangs from me. back and forth, but not at all in a call and response way.no recogintion of the other person, very natural. just felt to me like sharing the waiting time together. then the light changed, and i passed by an 11 year old boy with glasses.he was smiling and so was i.

it has been _____ days since my last

2005-01-31T19:39:00.000-08:00

.very slow ride home tonight.

thinking about guilt. feeling guilt. leading me to ponder the nature of guilt. questioning: what were the guilt impacts of my catholic upbringing, after all? but my upbringing had a large dose of criticism, skepticism and cynicism, too, so the whole guilt thing was public. apparent and discussed and laughed at. but not erased. then wondering about guilt in other cultures and religions. maybe there is a group of people out there that doesn't even have a word for guilt? and furthermore, what's the relationship between sinning and guilt? surely one can have guilt without having sinned. but hey, when a person is sentenced, they are found...guilty.

stop. recognizing my drift into intellectualization and away from the feelings that raised the whole issue. that's so easy to do, isn't it?

who absolves guilt?
do i absolve myself?
the one whom i feel guilted about?
has jesus already taken care of this for me?

on the eve of

2005-01-19T20:34:00.000-08:00

downstairs, reading the sacramento bee that has mysteriously appeared on our doormat the past 2 days. today somehow the 'style' section was put on the top of the pile. so, the front page news bound by rubberband was of what the bush women are wearing to inaugural events. i am a sucker for those slim fashion design drawings, and so i read on. half way through, i stopped and corrected myself. something seems just _off_ about fascinating over the clothing choices of the female first family at this juncture.

when i finally reached the real front page section (after reading the food and wine section, which naturally comes after style), i read about condoleeza rice's testimony for senate approval to become the secretary of state. the article focused on our own barbara boxer's grilling of ms. rice. much use of quotations, by rice, boxer, a supportive republican. and then,

"Frankly, your answer disturbs me," said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., making his first public appearance in the Senate since losing his bid last year to defeat Bush.

oh. hi john. it's so nice to see you. really, i'm glad to see you, to read your voice. the last time i saw you, on tv, you told me, and a huge roomful of people, "thank you. i love you." it's good to know you're still here. best wishes for a happy new year.

wednesday - the new tuesday?

2005-01-19T20:25:00.000-08:00

just yesterday, i was lamenting the passing of tuesday as the bold frontrunner for friday last fall. i wondered at which day might emerge triumphant, secretly cheering for a dark horse, and not the old usual, the yankees of the seven day week - friday itself. and while it's too early to get out that ribboned wreath and the old big flash camera just yet, it's clear that wednesday is taking the lead. will she ride to victory?
i hope so. burdened with so many letters, and that unfortunate humpday stigma, one would expect she'd be too weighed down to rise to the weekly occasion. but nonetheless, my bets are on wednesday.

hands lightly on the brakes

2005-01-18T17:26:00.000-08:00

in trying to make an appointment time with a professor this afternoon, i stumbled and tripped over numbers "3:45. no, no, i mean quarter to 2. after 1 sometime. 3:45. no." over the past days i've had to write a statement of purpose for a fellowship application. the directed thinking it necessitates about my life, past present and future, weaves like the blueprint plans of city streets i'm reading about, and on the sidewalks there are families with babies, lovers, loners. but the mental map is becoming flooded - strollers, old condoms, dog leashes, are all floating around in a high density urban pool. when i stick my toe into that fluid geography, i can't tell if the water's hot or cold right now. it's just soaking wet. riding my bike to and fro on campus today, nearly entirely not there, until i caught myself: i just randomly tilted my head down and noticed my hands on the handlebars, and realized i was outside, on a traffic circle, operating a moving vehicle.

and bingo was her name-o

2004-12-28T20:50:00.000-08:00

the stupendous outburst directed at my parents concerning my old friend abe’s disregarding to ask if his wife could join us for coffee, for his egregious assumption that she would be joining us by mere contract of marriage, wherein I flew off the handle, and at the nadir, after much pointed pointing, exclaimed that this was just one more reason why marriage is a sham, at which my mother retorted that no one would ever want me with that attitude, wherein I replied, Exactly, fine and well.

And so I made my way to coffeehouse, surfing through radio hits: Fleetwood mac, “ooh you make lovin fun’ and the mamas and the papas, ‘Monday Monday” until I could commiserate with ren (of stimpy fame) singing the blues about Christmas on the familiar old jazz station. A deep breath, and then I entered, and there they were, across from each other, smiling, 1 year married and 4 months pregnant (I dreamt of this pregnancy a month ago, and here it was before me, live and flesh and in a cable knit sweater). and for the next hours we talked of the passing of phish, and the coming of a child, of midwives and labor unions. I left feeling a bit foolish, for here was my friend and the fine woman he loved, living, together, and oh what I can learn from them, and see between them. Ah, coming home is the paradox of replacing myself into the past and acute confrontation with the change and ever-newness of the passage of time.

push on till the dawn

2004-12-05T02:10:00.000-08:00

interesting thing about school is how it encapsulates time. i get 3 prescribed 10 week doses. patient waiting, weird onset and buildup, gradually growing, peaking, then coming down. funny how, when i've got this set amount, clear begining and end, i can orient my my whole movement through time. its a strange shouting way of marking progress, noting the passage.

sometimes the first song i hear in the morning on my alarm clock sets the whole day

2004-12-02T08:30:00.000-08:00

more about A's: the intersection of alone and alive (or) lessons from cooking (or) my name isobel

2004-11-09T20:47:00.000-08:00

right now she's singing:
you are going to have to find out for yourself

i've been experimenting with aloness. successfully. it is honestly unlike any endeavor i've ever set myself upon. i don't feel like going into the details of it's all encompassing-ness. but one of the effects. some days i am bursting with it: the desire and drive to put into action my big ideas. there are two big BIG projects i want to take on. i go back and forth from meetings between the 2, the buildings where the meetings are for each are right down a path from each other. one involves a huge state grant, nearly a half million, for designing and implementing a community-based urban stormwater runoff program. education, landscape design, schoolkids doing GIS, the works. this comes from my work study job. this could be my thesis. this is my re-entry into the water world. the second is developing a campus energy efficiency campaign, working with facilities management and students to reduce electricity use at dorms. this keeps my in touch with my present expertise, but expands a bit from the world of renewable energy. this is something i could really take full control of. this would put the years of sitting behind my desk at my old job into action. this is what i wanted to do at my old job. this is something i for which i would apply for a fellowship.

with the aloness taking effect more and more, suddenly i see myself throwing myself into these time consuming, energy slaking projects. and i want to. all through college, and in my fair city, i wouldn't commit to anything, not anything beyond the requirements, that would keep me from hanging out. this was, in part, a reaction to my life from k-12 grade, when i held numerous class president positions, academic challenge membership, model u.n., etc. back then i strove. then striving wasn't cool anymore for me, i guess. but it's always been in there, my ambition for being extraordinary. i think the timer wrote of this once, maybe in different terms, about 'whats so wrong with ambition?' and so now i see that in aloness, i can rekindle it, and like it. nay, i can't be alone forever, and i'm guessing (hoping) that i can strike a balance down the road. but right now it's gaining momentum, propelling me. my concern was that i could not handle 2 big projects like that at the same time, plus school, plus enjoyment. but tonight, in crisp air with clean clear darkness around me, i felt so energized with it all, catapulting forward. i don't know if i can maintain it. i put some things away to get to the aloness, but they are not gone, and i don't know how where the integration lies. but i have faith in this feeling. while preparing stir fry sizzling and popping in the background, i was chopping the beautiful yellow and green pepper, slicing through it with a very sharp knife, and i said yes, this is what i feel like right now.

A to the muthafuckin' K

2004-11-02T20:00:00.000-08:00

i'm in a celebratory mood tonight. listening to french hip hop. five dolla' wine. full on dinner topped with my favorite goddess dressing, the first bottle i've cracked since i had a kitchen in my fair city. and now my housie cracks a new bottle, too, of our favorite cheapster wine. the wine's name is borgia. i like to think of it as victor borgia, who is actually a woman, but also a man. like victor/victoria.

why all the pomp and circumstance? why the grand toast, bird?

tonight, i initiate myself into the halls of studentdom. yes, boosted by the receipt of good grades and pats on the back for a job well done after two monday nights in a row of up after 2 am writing, but that's only 33% of the equation. the middle third is my shift in commitment to studies - baa, i managed to stay away from my fair city on hallowed halloween weekend. it's easy now to just say no (except on tuesday nights. tuesday the closed sign is on the door). in fact, i have never ever known a better excuse for ducking out of any social engagement "oh, i can't join you tonight, i have too much work, too much reading to do." a fellow student can never argue with this. the beauty of this excuse is that it can always be said with a straight face; it's always true, even if only in the long view. perfect. the final 33% is attributed to the blossoming of my interest in classes and topics, i.e., getting into it. infact, i currently have a huge crush on landscape design and urban planning. in the course catalog, the three letter specification for the department is LDA, but i prefer to list it as LSD. indeed, maybe in fact that's the extra 10% - when becoming immersed in a subject so much that it seeps into the space behind your eyes, so that everything seen goes through it. now i walk around looking at sidewalks like never before, watching people cross the street with peaked curiousity. oh, the differences between a crush on a human and a crush on academic subject matter. much more managable, the latter. and i hearken back to a card i sent to lady v the first time 'round in college that quite rightly declared:

book lovers never go to bed alone

of beets and rain and crushes, and most of all, pouring

2004-10-19T20:26:00.000-07:00

i walked home in the rain today. i mean, when i set out, it was not raining. it was obvious sun behind many clouds. it was the alternative of when i am on the airplane, and the thick layer of clouds below but the sun so shining on all of us flyers, and we can't believe those below aren't just soaking it in. but then, nearly there, only 10, 15 minutes left, and it's really coming down. i love how the rain varys in intensity, but no one is skimming the dimmer switch. when it's raining, it's remininding us of another fourth demention, that the sky is 3-d, too.

all over today, it's fall. i have not experienced explicit autumn since 5 years ago. how i like it, how it makes the smells grander, and the colours richer, and the textures more canyonous. rubbing a bit of shrubbery between my two fingers all the way home, transferring hard earned chlorophyll from it to me. so fresh it smells. biking is good, very good, but in the end, walking is the better. 'walk along little children, take each other by the hand, we will all live for ever when we make it together, walking to the promise land.' today i noticed that the little berries that i'd been riding over, pondering over, are acutally olives. many of them are still connected to trees. can i harvest them (do not eat freshly harvested olives, too bitter, no no, one must marinate them first. attenzione)? i will find out from a stranger in the polmology department, which i have been itching to get into, but lamentably is closing after this quarter. the last polmology department in the country.

but when i get home, after passing also persimmon trees and pomegranates ripe, it is time for the wine. coming home to the glass(es) of wine is coming home to a lover. the lover is my academic self. it is the reflection of the hard work and the romanticism in reading. oh, we have a toast to the new words and the way our heads spin with the new ways of thinking, to drown the hard paper edges and soak in the rich thinking for thinking's sake alone.

tonight it was the beets i have been harboring for the past 2 weeks. lately too lazy to put in the beet effort. but tonight, after that walk, after the autumn aroma, it was time. everytime i eat beets it is a celebration, a religious rite. blame it on tom robbins, and on the way they stain like that. but tonight, a new fact did the beets give rise to. as i was lauding writer tom to poet megan, she informed me that salome (of other, non-beet, tom fame), daughter of some famous queen (one we've surely heard of, but don't be so quick to label her sheeba), after performing her enchanting and irresistable dance of the seven veils, was granted anything she wished by some famous king (one we've surely heard of, but don't be so quick to label him herod). and so, after consulting mommy dearest, salome requested the head of st. john the baptist. and so came the death of my old testatment/new testament crush.

but it is a different crush altogther, a biblical friend (for reasons to be discussed later. dear god, only so much bible study in one night, please) that leads me to the last topic. that of pouring. it all out, that is. oh, this is a theme that comes in and out all the time. knowing when to speak and let the floodgates open, and when to keep quiet. until i crossed paths with a certain majestic one whom i truly admired and adored, i had not known the virtue of quiet. of keeping one's own counsel. now i believe in it, like a creed, like a beatititude, blessed are those who keep their own counsel, they shall find their own reward. but perhaps it is not in my nature - i certainly have not determined this yet. but again this shabazz rears is vocal head at a time when, in other avenues, i am forcing my mouth open and words to come out. today, a triumph of speaking in class, in both classses, and reason be damned, i do not care if i sound foolish or un.phd.educated, for it is what i'm thinkin', i just let it flow - about honor and the american dream as it applies to chicano youths in chicago in the 70's, about the changing concepts of community. ah, sure, why not?

but beyond why not?, a bigger question arises for me today.
do we ever truly hear the sound of the wind, or just the sound of the wind rushing through other things?

little rascal

2004-10-16T19:37:00.000-07:00

does it look different? it's coming from my very own - my very own little computer. it's white. i will refrain from referring to it as cute. i feel like i've been searching through pet stores and shelters and i've finally taken home the pup i've been searching for (it's true, i've never had a real pet before save for some shortlived goldfish, so i'm still looking to place those kid - my dog is my best buddy - feelings somewhere). anyways, now i have no excuse, and together we shall enter a new era in which times ten will flourish. though, i'm sure that times ten will flourish because of excuses... not to write papers, to take a break from reading, to avoid my workstudy job...i'll excuse myself

was it for this my life i sought?

2004-10-08T13:50:00.000-07:00

during my four years studying civil engineering at the undergraduate level, i had the fantasy of being a sociologist. towards the end there, when i was really beginning to freak out about not knowing what i was gonna be when i grew up, and watching all my overachiever engineering friends head straight into grad school, there was a lot of nervous laughing for me. a lot of manical laughing, too. i used to joke that i would get a masters degree in sociology, but i never really laughed at that one.

and now, as my fellow CEs head back to bethlehem pennsylvania this month for our 5 year reunion, i find myself in a graduate sociology class. and the fates are laughing up a storm. because in that class, and the education course on experiential learning, and in the community development theory class, my head is spinning. but not with the joy of an academic world opened wide to me, that i have made my entree into a lifelong dream. no. it spins on an axis of incredulity, that we can spend an hour discussing what "learning" constitutes. and how about "experience"? that a group of highly educated phd students can sit and be perfectly serious about this winding conversation, thinking that it will actually achieve some higher purpose. i'm experience a jarring culture shock this week - it's the canary culture of practicality versus the academic social science culture of blather. it's my lists and agendas versus thier mental wanderings. the thing is, i know that i have to lose this competition. i have to put up the white flag and give in, and not only accept but participate.

in one week of classes, so many times have i wanted to bring attention to the class at the seeming unnecessariness of the conversation, but instead i am calling attention to myself. to force a redirection in approach and way of thinking. i don't know if that's really possible to the fullest extent - i'm me and i'll bend, but i won't break. i thought that moving to a new town, departing from one social scene and entering another, doing homework, that these would be the hardest. i never imagined that my biggest challenge would be stomaching my own dreams.

miles of aisles

2004-08-26T15:38:00.000-07:00

at this very moment, i am experiencing my first visit to my new library. a university library. upon entering, my sense of smellmemory overtook me. smells just like the newer library at my undergrad alma mater (unfortunately, nothing can compare or come close to the olfactory overload one experiences in the hundred year old library at lehigh). i've yet to wander through the stacks here, but my visit with fishfry yesterday has me psyched. soon, i too will be able to check out a fat pile of books just like hers upon her return from the first day of school.

i did wander through the basement of the campus bookstore right now. many of the shelves are still empty, with only little orange placeholders to announce the impending paper chase. but by the divine/libraryine intervention, just the right ones were there. and so my recent freakout of not finding any graduate classes interesting in the course catalog is now solved - all it took was a stroll through the aisles, and some books sang out to me: Living with the Earth; City Builders: Property, Politics and Planning; Great Thirst: Californians and Water, A History. Each of these books for a different class - epidemology, sociology, and that subject i apparently cannot escape, civil engineering. so the solution arrives in book form, huzzah.

in my present location, and after reading with reckless abandon this summer, and the second to last book i finished being focused on books (the name of the rose), i am now wondering in a psuedo academic, pre-re-entry into school sort of way, about how i am bound to books. the books themselves, not just their contents. sure, there's the smells and the touch of an embossed cover and that joyous greedy hoarding feeling, but there's more. for it's not only the answer of what classes to take that they offer me. but they provide also, i am discovering, an amorous keystone. and, as i have known since childhood, a natural laxative. ahh, if u.c. were not about to overtake c.u., this would be a study for the fall semester of my own personal curriculum, indeed.

not a bedtime story. well maybe.

2004-08-09T09:24:00.000-07:00

i miss my blog. traveler companionship has whisked me away. we are at the beach. in a resort town, even though we thought that taking a ferry across the river would get us away from a resort town, we just landed in a smaller, cooler one. it is the most like my old family vacations to that grand east coast summer destination, ocean city maryland. i mean, not in location and surroundings, but in activity. lying on the beach, trying to read by holding the book above my head but always falling asleep with it on my face, vainly wondering if i am getting tan, checking out others´asses. a sunset cocktail, a drowsy walk home, an evening nap. big nighttime event to choose where to eat dinner. yesterday the friendly brazillian man, former club med employee who graciously showed us around, happening upon us on our way to the beach, boldly greeting us, ´ah, my friends, you look like tourists.´ we laughed in our straw hats, but it echoes in my head and i don´t like the way i feel like my parents.

but last night there was a shining moment of grace. the guidbook says this town attracts a ´younger´ crowd, and over dinner i was trying to figure out what the hell that was supposed to mean. why the quotes? but afterwards, we crossed the street to see the live band and the people dancing. and there, in this little square, were a bunch of teenagers. beautiful kids, young, girls with exposed bellies and boys with requisite shaggy beach hair. but they were dancing impeccably, gorgeously. so sexy (oh, this is the area in which the lambada was born). it was like a high school dance, but what i imagined before i actually went to one. all couple dancing, really intricate steps with twirls and hips shaking and the boy spins the girl to the right and then the left with a light hand on the back of her bare waist. the boys look like stoner beach kids but they are perfect in their moves. partners are changed inbetween songs. this would never happen in the united states. never - simply not mature enough, and parents would freak at the way his leg is always in her crotch, but i can see that it is so much better and healthier than keggers at the river. the band is a bunch of teenagers too, my favorite is the one playing the huge triangle (like the size of a hanger). oh, this is the sweetest thing i have ever seen.

i can write today because it´s raining, but now i have to take leave. because a rainy day at the beach, as my parents would declare, is meant for shopping.

logunede

2004-08-02T06:53:00.000-07:00

saturday night we went to a candomble ritual. arranged by our little hotel, we got into one of the white mercedes vans seen everywhere but whose functions elude me. picked up 10 other tourists and drove drove drove through the slick darkness, past local eateries, into the heart of the city. not the center city, not the historical part where everyone visits. the part where everyone lives, where cars are parked half on the road, half on the sidewalk, and everyone´s hanging out on the streets. we pulled into what i believe usually functions as a used car lot. but on special occasions, such as this night, the big building in the back next to the house is transformed into a candomble temple. it´s surrounded by smaller white buildings each dedicated to a god or goddess, i think where the animmal sacrifices take place. a man hops into the bus and tells us that it´s already started - tonight is very special, a woman is being initiated into the cult. she has been isolated for the past two weeks with black and white spots like a chicken painted on her body. tonight we will see her go into a trance via rythmic dancing, and her patron goddess with inhabit her.

men to the left, women to the right. there are more females than males, many more. the gringas crowding in with the women and girls of the neighborhood. call and response, the priest singing out over the drummers, the audience knows the words to countless songs. and in the middle, the women, dancing. wearing all white - cotton lacy headwraps, blouses with what seem like hoop skirts and pantaloons underneath. and a further lace wrap around the chest, like you would wear a bathtowel. the dance movements are simple and repetitive. and endless. some songs last only a few minutes. but they all sound pretty much the same to me and all blend into one long repition of noise. it is a complete circus. the two leading women, one in her 30s, one stately and old but with the most vitality, directing the dancing, talking to the priest (no, not that dance, she shakes her finger at him, we´re not doing that one tonight). women in white constantly coming and going from the temple to the house and back (do they need a rest, a pee break, a toke?), always having to press their way through the throng of onlookers blocking the doorway. and on the sidelines, the young girls, the most enthusiastic singers, passing around a baby, mouthing off to older sisters across the way. someday they will be the ones dancing.

going to a candomble ritual is one of the things to do in salvador. but it´s a sketchy undertaking because the tourist needs to discern which guide is actually going to take her to something authentic, yet having no idea what authentic looks like, and being unable to go solo. (in general i completely shy away from any guided activities, to the point of completely disregarding experiences that require guides. ahh, but i am not traveling alone anymore and my dictatorship has become a democracy). the travel book says ´ask someone local if you want to go to a ritual.´so the hotel man behind the counter helped us out. and although he has been very helpful all along, i was filled to the brim with skeptism. even once i arrived and saw that there was quite a large group of people participating, and even larger number of neighbors in the stands who obviously knew when to clap, i wondered. maybe the leaders convince everyone to participate by promising all the locals who come a big chicken dinner with the profits from the tourists (it was 15 usd a piece, and we guessed that it probably cost more for the folks from the posh hotels - that´s a lot of chicken). but during the break, when the women in white change into their elaborate costumes to reflect the gods and goddesses, i looked out into the lot where everyone was loitering, waiting i saw little kids running around and old people smoking cigarettes, men smiling and shaking hands women gossiping. remaining even when it began to rain again. no, this was the real deal. this was 10:30 on saturday night, and a whole community was gathered to sing and dance and revere the mysteries.

when things started up again, and the newly initiated woman entered in her shiny blue costume with a headress of beads covering her eyes, revealing the goddess of the sea, i could feel her triumph. and later, when my favorite, the young woman who i´d been watching all night, began her dance, now dressed all in yellow and green with a golden bow and arrow, the priests and men up front pointed at her, nodding, look out. she had not opened her eyes for the whole second half while she waited in trance to be called. on and on she went, simple steps around the room with elbows back and forth, stopping to bend her knees and scream. song after song, and the priest looked questioningly at the other men, but her spirit was still strong and she had not yet lain down her will and so they had to keep going. and when the tourists were gathered up and shuttled back into the white vans, the singing was growing louder and she continued. i did not want to leave. there was so much more, things were heating up. i was exhausted from the day and hungry, but i would have stayed all night.

oi, oi, oi

2004-07-31T07:50:00.000-07:00

from ecuador to brazil. from solo travel to companionship. from spanish to portugese. andean mountains to atlantic coast. a bit overwhelmed since my change in scenery. everything is exploded, bigger and louder and more. in sao paulo, a city in that in 20 years will be the largest in south america, massive amounts of people. at any time of day, sidewalks like veins, pulsing with people. the city has districts: the electronics district, the clothing district, and my favorite, the hardware store district, with tools displayed in cases like precious gems.

and now in salvador, bahia. the afro~brazillian capital. the home of capoeria and samba. a bona fide beach town, with sandals aplenty. all the women wearing tight tank tops, a profusion of cleavage and bellies, flat or round. right now the humidity is weighing down on me. i had forgotten humidity. it~s easiest just to sit in the open door cafes and drink cheap, strong caipirhnas, in all their limeliciousness, to avoid the agressive street vendors, to enjoy the coming and going rain, and to marvel at this friend beside me. for suddenly, here is someone, not a stranger. a connection with lots of others, with home. a connection with my past, but not my most recent past.

last night, in the strangest of dream experiences, i felt the hands of a man caressing my breasts. i knew this was a stranger, an old man in my hotel bed. i turned around and sat up. i looked at him in the dim light, lying beside me, , he was big with white slicked back hair, so real. confused and frightened, i cried out loud ´who are you?´and out of the dark body, a response ´carrie, it´s me, jake.´the familiarity of the voice, full of calm and concern, drew me back into reality, and in a blink the body was young and intimately recognizable.

i am still unsteady after this experience. later in the night, i woke myself up laughing in a dream (the second time this has happened on my trip). there is something unsettling about that blurring of the line between dream and awake, and i doubt that my questions can be answered with my good old reliable, science.

your opinion counts

2004-07-19T11:57:00.000-07:00

here at times ten, we value your input. when important issues arise, you have a say.

in one week, my solo travel will end. i will meet up with my international traveling companion. said companion is also he whom i lay down next to in bed most often in my real life. once again grappling with the proper moniker for this person, an older english woman at a hostel a few weeks back recommended the term, 'my bloke.' while i don't think that will fly in the states for numerous reasons, so far this title has sufficed, and it always gets a chuckle out of british travelers.

so, the issue is this - the aforementioned bloke is yet unawares of times ten. shall the song remain the same?
at present, times ten has either shyed away from or been disinterested in topics of a tender nature. future topics are, obviously, unforeseen. in past discussions with senior/mentor bloggers, this serious issue has been raised in a cocktail conversation way. but now it takes on real concrete importance. times ten is looking for your opinion here. the comment button is live, and we've got operators standing by.

while you enter your important and influential thoughts, i will be mulling it over in a cloud forest for the next few days. the best place for clarity being the mist, of course. in the meantime, let your voice be heard.

ritchie ritual

2004-07-17T16:06:00.000-07:00

in my few volunteer experiences abroad, i've found some common threads. one dreaded, one dear. the former being the washing of dishes. i've yet to come across a volunteer residence with a dishwasher. having a dishwasher would seem to indicate a lack of need for volunteers in fact. in truth, the washing of dishes is not always a drag. it just depends on the setting. in the jungle, with only a mere two meals a day, we all lingered around the table. i chose to keep my dirty empty plate planted right in front of me rather than push it away, a blantant announcement 'i'm done'. for this would mean i'm available for doing dishes. in my case jungle style dish-doing was a nasty affair: several eaters= several plates, several old, gross plastic prep bowls often with a) banana goo or b) sticky water flour mixture, and at least 2 pots/pans that were suspended over an open fire, resulting in a thick layer of black carbon. these pots are always done last, because it is impossible to keep yourself clean while washing them, and everything touched afterwards is sullied. still, i might not have tried to shrink back into the candlelight shadows as dishwashing time approacheth, but for the lack of running water. 2 plastic basins with rainwater. the first for 'cleaning' which i was loathe to plunge my hands into after the first few items emerged, and the second for 'rinsing.' yeah right. rene, the canadian in his mid 30's, the only male volunteer, was regularly the default dishwasher, with his girlfriend standing by for moral support. i think we all knew if we sat on our stumps long enough, he would save the day, he who was nicknamed 'el capitan,' he who also took responsibility for ensuring we had dry wood and he who rose first to stoke the morning fire. although i walked away many times from that table filled with relief, it was not without a sense of dishwashing guilt that grew larger as the days passed. but now i am doing my dishwashing penance, in a kitchen with very cold running water, a cd mp3 player, and a pleasant latin american hippy atmosphere complete with indigenous mandala mural on the wall. i'll wash dishes anytime i see one now - today it was a joy as with pensive strains of beethoven to accompany me and through the window rays of sun absolved me. forgive me my sins, i'm going to heaven after all.

the second activity is just as common as the first. the taking of tea. true, teatime is revered everywhere. but with the volunteer set it takes on greater importance. the making and drinking of tea, it is doing something in its own right. to put this in perspective, consider the volunteer's role as you would a temp job. in both, you have been brought in under the auspices that there is additional work to be done, and we need your able bodied help, pronto. but upon arrival, you wait for orders that may never arrive, or your critical task feels alot like sitting around doing nothing. ahh, but when you are making tea, well then you are doing something. you are warming yourself up in often draughty residences, taboot. the english, with crustless cucumber sandwiches in dainty hand, the japanese in their gardens of traquility, they have nothing on volunteers the world over.

lost & found: epilogue

2004-07-16T07:49:00.000-07:00

a while ago, i wrote of the loss of my brother's dear ironman watch. i did not find it later, though i never returned to the place where i'm sure it departed me. instead i went to a tiny watch store and bought a new, junky digital watch. i insisted to the young woman vendor that it must have an alarm - there was only one that fit the bill. i reluctantly purchased it, knowing it was a piece of crap. there were no directions to set anything, and though i figured out how to set the time, i could not get it to cooperate concerning the alarm. which means i could have bought one of the cooler, sturdier looking kid's models all along. to top it all off, the name of the watch was 'osama.' mmm, osama around my wrist, binding me with time. sure enough, not even a week later, on my long hike into the jungle to arrive at the lodge, the watch broke. just couldn't take the rainforest humidity. i've decided after 2 watches that i don't need one on this trip, and i've been free-wristing it ever since.

while retiring for the evening last night, i discovered that i could not find my black notebook which serves as a journal, a datebook, an addressbook, and repository of important numbers for credit cards, passport and airline flights. looking under the bed and the nightstand, i remembered one of my favorite passages from 100 years of solitude (the book i raced). the matriach, ursula, is blind, and the author is describing how she functions in her home without ever letting on to the family that she can't see at all. she even finds a wretched daughter in law's (or is it grand-daughter in law, or great-granddaughter in law?) precious ring. her methodology is this: she knows that people often lose things in the places that are an anomoly from their regular routine, yet they only look in the common places of their routine. so she thinks of what happened that was unusual the day the ring was lost. in the same way i considered my notebook. and so this morning, just now, i walked right into the post office, and the smiling woman kindly took it from the top of the pile where it was waiting for its owner and handed it over. thanks, ursula

visions of grandeur

2004-07-16T07:28:00.000-07:00

my new volunteering gig is in a town in the andes. cotacachi is a world trendsetter: the province has established an environmental charter for itself that supposedly is leading edge, to protect it's precious natural resources which include 2 of the world's 25 'biodiversity hotspots.' i came to the cotocachi ecology center to help out, but more to learn how they were going about putting the charter into action. 'cause it's this type of action that i want to study in school.

so i arrived to the centre, which is composed of a few bedrooms, an office, a kitchen, a cafe/fair trade shop, and a walled garden area which is currently in disrepair. at present there are 3 volunteers: dorit, a german woman in her early 30's (?) who is pretty in an anne of green gables way; leny, a younger woman who seems cold but i just attribute it to that matter of fact german attitude; and scott, a younger austrailian guy that is incredibly enthusiastic in general. each of them have been here, or will be here for at least 6 months. wow. when i arrived, i was filled with daydreams of coming back next summer, to do my required school intership. but after spending a long quiet day 'working' in the cafe, i wondered. what am i doing here? all the other volunteers are doing things, and i could be too- i could just say, hey, i'm going to start designing that greywater system for the garden you were wishing for. what i've learned is that all the 'sucessful' expats are creative, d-i-y weirdos. there is a long, narrow, swaying suspension bridge made of seemingly weak bamboo over a wide expanse of rushing river and through cloudforest canopy that i must cross to get there. baby steps, i tell myself. but i wonder, if i will ever get to the other side, or just come to a standstill in the middle of the bridge somewhere.

machete mama

2004-07-14T11:21:00.000-07:00

Observations after ten days in the jungle
¬ beautiful places appear even more magnificent at night
¬ even the most lax americans have a greater sense of punctuality than indigeous ecuadorians
¬ riding in the back of a cargo truck on a dirt road is an incredibly noisy and bone jarring affair to be avoided at all costs
¬ mosquito nets should be more widely used, as to increase the worldwide sense of sleeping within a chrysalis, with the result of more restful nights and vivid dreams
¬ ketchup is a positive addition to virtually any dish, and adds a welcome western edge to the monotony of dishes containing only root vegetables
¬ with great determination, one can pretend away the taste and observation of canned tuna in root-based entrees and overcome a lifelong nauseating aversion to said tuna
¬the proper treatment for a poisonous snakebite is as follows:
1. apply four tourniquets with great rapidity, begining closest to the area of the bite and ascending the affected limb until the flow of blood to the major artery closest the trunk of the body has been restricted.
2. with a sharp knife, make two incisions - one on each of the bite marks, so as to increase the expulsion of the venom tainted blood
3. inject .75mL of anti-venom serum in the affected area
4. inject an additional .75mL of anti-venom serum in the gluteus maximus
5. call an ambulance and get to a hospital as quickly as possible
- under no circumstances shall the victim run or get excited, as this increases the rate of blood circulation, quickening the transit of venom to the heart
- there are two kinds of snake venom: neuro-toxin and pulmonary-cardio-toxin, depending on the species of snake. some snakes have both - if you are bitten by this type of snake, you are most likely a goner.
¬the traditional american meal schedule has one meal too many
¬the jungle has remedies to many common ailments, including but not limited to sinusitis, headaches, and asthma
¬ an effective way to repel mosquitos is to poke a hole in a termite nest, collect some termtites on your hand, smash the termites up with both hands, and smear the resultant on exposed areas of the body.
¬rubber boots can be quite stylish
¬carrie h.´s unique laziness charateristics contribute to a very dirty lifestyle, in which she is loathe to do any hand laundering of clothing, which quickly leads to an umkept appearance and unpleasant odor.(note to keep this in mind when considering future long term expeditions in areas without running water)
¬insects do indeed rule the world

a photo finish

2004-07-02T21:31:00.000-07:00

i had a mission. finish my book in 1 week. this absolute goal in place because there is a book exchange in baños. i was a great start out of the gate. monday and over 120 pages read, over a quarter of the book. mid-week, moving along steadily, a good pace. but this girl needed blinders like a racehorse, the waterfalls interrupting, the scent of the city distracting the hot baths retarding. so when the final push came today, there were at least 80 pages left, with a meeting with the jungle volunteer organizer, required parental emailing to allay jungle-offspring anxiety, and a self promised final hike between me and the 10:30 deadline. over dinner a page a minute gallop was established. words and unfortunate character names that repeated with each generation swirled and made me delirious with plot lines of fantasy parchments and bird breeding. in a last burst i rushed to the cafe, open book in hand, much to the amusement of the locals on the streetcorner (they knew not to urge me on). with relief i saw the lights still on and the be-glassesed trader at his seat - the judge had not left the podium. i glided over the finished-wood finish line to turn in my weeks´contestant and pick up my new used book.

(the crowd goes wild)

dear

2004-07-01T15:49:00.000-07:00

for quite a while, some years now, at least, i have been experience things of a grand nature through the quiet act of letterheadwriting. this happens on hikes through redwoods and grand canyons, or on foriegn treks, or sometimes even in board meetings. it consists of my writing a letter of my experiences while simultaneously experiencing them. the letter may be a to friend, or to family (as was often the case when i first arrived in cali and wanted to let them know how blown away and pleased i was with it all). the actual pen to paper rarely happens, and that´s fine with me. to write a letter that has already been written is tedious, and it never has the life of the original.

separate but similar in some ways to the letterheadwriting is the pure imagination of a person being there with you. for example, just walking through the streets with your imaginary friend by your side, laughing along with you at the hijinx you and your comrade would be certain to find hilarious.

i´ve been thinking on these activities lately. wondering whether they are detrimental. it´s natural (¿) to desire to share experiences with others. and since the l.h.w. has been going on for a long time, i´ve rationalized it to be an understanding of the way i process all that i may see and do and feel. but the latter, therin lies the greater danger, methinks. solo traveling means solo. when removed, it seems like a feeling of reliance when i have a phantom lover by my side. perhaps it is just a manifestation of missing, but it doesn´t have any of the melancholy of missing. though they bring me joy when i am on my own, i would like to resolve to say hello to those imaginary friends when they cross my path, and keep on walking. hands in pockets instead of hand in hand. very tough.

while hiking today, i discovered unexpectedly a solution to the question that has plagued me since beginning a blog. as to whom, or for whom am i writing? the answer lies somewhere inbetween l.h.w. and a white screen.

try it, you´ll like it

2004-06-30T10:59:00.000-07:00

mmm, i would love to try your..what is that exactly? oh yes, thank you so much for buying me your favorite dish in the market. i have been excited about trying local foods, and none more so than the potatoes, avocado and cow liver plate. uh huh, the grey brown slop constisting of a bean which you can not remember the word for in english, in which the the wobbly, pimpled meat slices lie, looks so appetizing. i´m sure i can load my fork with ample potatoes and avocado in order to mask the flavor of the cow liver. ha ha, it is not so easy to disguse that certain meaty texture though. yes it´s true, i have not eaten beef in nearly ten years - hoo, can you believe it? it´s funny that you told me yesterday that you were mostly a vegetarian, and today you tell me this is your favorite dish. see me laugh as i maw at the liver. mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

lost & found

2004-06-29T17:04:00.000-07:00

i lost my watch about an hour ago. i´m not surprised, in fact i guess it had to happen. i realized it must be approximately 45 minutes before it was lost, like writing it´s own fate in my head. i had been sitting, writing a letter at a particularly serene vista which i climbed at least two hundred stairs to reach. when i took off my bag to which the watch was bound, i noticed just how loosley it was hanging on. knowing that it was wiser to just give in and ring it around my wristy, i opted against it.

so down down down the stairs i went. when i reached the bottom, i went to convert the bag from dorky fanny pack mode to slightly cooler diagonal-across-the-shoulder mode. it was then i noticed its loss. i thought i might have flew off during the conversion from dorky to cooler, and retraced my steps. all the way back the the begining of the stairs. but no further. to where my watch most certainly lies, somewhere on that staircase.

and so passes my watch, of which i was so proud because it was my little brother´s who had passed it on to me when he became to cool for a timex ironman with indiglo, i had had it for so many years before putting it to use. so proud was i of just installing a new battery with an incredibly small screwdriver, so small it came with a magnifying lense. and did my pride inflate further when i found directions for its setting of time and alarm clock on the internet and put them to use. i am not so proud of halting at the bottom of the steps.

tomorrow, i must rely on my own internal workings to rise and get myself to my spanish teacher by nine o´clock am. i´m glad that i can usually do this sucessfully, but it ususally leads to a rather restless night. fortunately, the action on the street outside my window starts very early, the dogs and construction and schoolkids have aided me in the past two days to awake like it or not. maybe my lateness paranoia will cause me to rise incredibly early, and i will have a sunrise hike to search for the ironman. or maybe i will ask marcos, my teacher, to help me find a new watch. as if by some premonition, i stopped him today while writing on the chalkboard, to translate a word i recognized but did not recall. reloj, of course, means watch.

one for the manual

2004-06-28T17:16:00.000-07:00

less than 24 hours, and already the old familiar recurring dream begins. this is the travel dream, in which i am required to return to the states for some important purpose, almost everytime because of some family requirement. i don´t want to go, and explain with concern that i can´t leave foriegn country x, but there is always the gentle familial response ¨dear, you´ll be able to return just as soon as this is done´ but i doesn´t feel as so, and i´m usually left in despair. thinking, ´how did i end up in upstate new york? i´m supposed to be in foreign country x. this is all wrong.¨

not usually in to deciphering dreams, but this is an easy one, about my subconscious wishing for the easyness of home fighting with some other part of me that thinks i should be here.

only last night, a new twist, in which the reason i am called home is because my grandfather is dying. the one who has been dead since i was in 5th grade. i get there, and when my family finally returns from the hospital, all the concern has passed, and he´s going to be okay. and then he walks into the room, and he´s fine. granpa? why the hell did i come here? my dead grandfather is alive and well, wtf?

i suppose this dream will happen plenty of times in the coming weeks. but i´m going to try harder than usual to really use this time, when i´ve got the travelvivid vision turned on, to do something mas fina with my dreams. really stick it to myself. bring it, granpa.

baños = bath

2004-06-27T17:03:00.000-07:00

a long exhale, for i have arrived. at the destination that i have been traveling towards for bleen hours and minutes. the destination did not have an actual name until 2 days ago, when i learned that it was banos. so called for its many hot springs. i have not yet submerged myself, but already the little town shows me what it´s made of with a friendly sprinkle. a welcome shower. like the blessed sf fog that chooses to baptize me at will, in this city too, i walk through water and feel renewed.

the sprinkles have stopped but the fog rolls down the incredible green mountains, perhaps to calm the volcano just up the street. the rain seems to have refreshed banos, and as night falls people are alive, what luck i have to land in a town with nightlife. with mr. joel´s piano man playing in this internet shop i see lots of lively people walking by and wonder why they are here. for the same reasons as me? maybe some of those cats in the hostel i just checked into. but then, they were watching friends on the tube...

ahhh, i´m so happy to have made it. after a week long introduction, an easing in through the american backdoor to ecuador, after the old familiar jitters of the first solo bus ride, complete with tardy arrival, language barriers, and flying by of foreign countryside - now the water that touches volcanos reaches me >> my eyelids and earlobes and the nape of my neck, and i am electrified.

me llamo

2004-06-26T15:45:00.000-07:00

i've thought about names for daughters, and less sucessfully, names for sons. names for clothing lines (there are 2, depending on whether you want feminine or coolcat). b in the d, i named three cabbage patch kids. gave myself a cb radio name before entering kindergarten. a spanish name in high school. but this one is eluding me.