here i am

i'm impressed all over again by more evidence that often times the only way to learn something is by doing it. i always approach my teaching practice this way, because it's so clear that this is the way very young children learn best - always showing, doing, exploring, experiencing. but i forget this is also the way i learn. i was having trouble with tango. i had various problems, but they could all be tied to my inability to let go and be present - be in my center and from there be ready for anything, but also not anticipating anything, or deluding myself into thinking i knew what was coming next. i was stiff, heavy on my feet, off balance, difficult to lead - in short, a disaster. i was talking to a good friend and sometime tango partner about it, and he reminded me that it's about trust. i hate ceding control; i have a deeply ingrained inability to trust another person to guide my steps. all of my control freak tendencies stared me squarely in the face and i had t...

i haven't written much here about being in love, because after such a tumultuous experience in the world of post-divorce dating, i didn't want to jinx this. but somebody has to say something about the elephant. it's killing me. it's hard to believe being in love once you've been in love once and it's failed. it makes you mistrust your own instincts and perception. what does it mean to have thought you had the right thing, and have it turn out not to have been? it haunts every next right thing you may ever have and warns you away from trusting it. or at least from talking about it - declaring it to be true. so this is my disclaimer ... m

i have a sinus infection. i have the sneaking suspicion that i've had it for a while, but i tried to deny it. i have been sick off and on and off and on and quite miserable. they run in my family; my dad suffered them for years before his body miraculously developed some sort of immunity to them. i've been plagued with them more often than is pleasant for a while now, too. i hate allopathic medicine and doctors and most all of what they stand for and perpetuate, but i finally had to break down (after diligent use of my neti pot, all manner of vitamins, herbs, holistic and homeopathic treatments, and torturing everyone around me with twice daily consumption of raw garlic), admit that my body wasn't going to take care of itself this time, and go get an antibiotic. since i'm allergic to penicillin, i normally end up being prescribed strange and frightening synthetic antibiotics. no exception this time. mysterious, mutant, resistant strains of sinus infections requ...

today was a sunday. sundays are sundays. i didn't get anything done. i rested and watched some soccer and talked on the phone and ate some fruit. i always have big plans for sunday. somehow i never accomplish any of the things i plan to do on sunday. and then i feel sort of guilty and lazy. somehow they seemed like all the good plans to change my life and my person for the better, and not having done any of it means i've somehow failed and i'm doomed to mediocrity. that's the strangeness of sunday. if it's cloudy, it all seems more momentous than it really is. m

call your boyfriend on the phone to ask him to help you double check your ingredients list, and have a 20 minute discussion of just what the hell a broad bean is and what might be its closest english translation. (decide, without telling him, that you'll just get frozen lima beans and hope they're close enough). go to the co-op and get way more organic arborio rice than you need, and don't look at the price per pound. try to play off your 'holy crap!' eyes when you see the total ring up at the till. go to the regular grocery store where all of the veggies are not organic and therefore don't cost a million dollars, but spend a million dollars anyway buying what you think will be enough veggies for two paellas, since you are teaching a girlfriend to make it on saturday and want to do a practice run. get way more veggies than you actually need, even for two paellas. so many veggies that the bleached blonde teenaged asian checker with dangly, sparkly earrings ask...

eres tanto eres mas de lo que puedo decir te quiero gigante como nubes grandes flotando por un cielo azul un día soleado como café con un panecillo con queso de nata un domingo como límonada te quiero como feliz te quiero como playas y sonrisas y todas las buenas cálidas cosas del mundo te quiero como el abrazo más grande que se puede imaginar

tall trees wide streets my bed thrift stores cricketsounds slow driving stop lights (vs. traffic circles) the oldies station my brother my friends big kitchens my pantry morning edition my plants the salseros the tangueros no dust roll up blinds my bed cool shady expanses wide open prairie dorky midwestern friendliness my students the sound of my keyboard non-detachable shower heads staring out my kitchen window while doing the dishes big tubs of plain yogurt my co-op driving my car linoleum olvi the fish

fig yogurt movie theatre popcorn in old school cartons hanging laundry on the balcony grilled sepia in ajo y perejil the mamas and the bebes hanging out in plazas and parks dads leaning in to tell you a story with hands and shoulders fully engaged the cedar trees moving in the wind of the courtyard long meandering walks just for walking's sake big loud happy family dinners round happy pictogram highway signs scooters cool old white, yellow, or navy blue 600s little old men with black hats and canes cotton ball clouds the architecture the sea drying off in the sun on the beach after getting dizzy from water in my ear after doing a somersault in the sea tortillas de berenjena walking to the store good cotton sheets public spaces public art terraces of cafe bars tiled surfaces churros con chocolate staying up late waking up late dust short trees fresh fish at good prices good gazpacho good bread the corner fruit stand my baby

i've been challenged by kind murph to break my silence. i have just been sort of uninspired to write lately. more busy living than thinking. i think. sometimes when i experience incredible things, i like to try to keep them inside of me for a while rather than spilling them out into the wide world. it seems like somehow trying to put words to them cheapens them. like there aren't enough words, or the words or the experiences don't fit. and i don't want to try to make them fit only to see how miserably i've failed. i feel like then i have somehow betrayed the experiences by leaving them behind, the words left there to represent them sort of hollow and dusty and inadequate. or maybe all of this is just an excuse not to try harder. it probably is. i need to do the write something every day again challenge. hmn ... thanks murph. i'll be back again soon. m

we spent a few days up north in girona, near the french border. unfortunately the camera crapped out, otherwise i would have lots of amazing photos of crazy off the wall things like a field with giant antique miniature golf heads with scary eyes and gaping mouths ... there was a strange absurd surreal circus music theme going on. the circo americano (which has been touring europe for a couple decades at least, so ... the americano connection must be long lost, i can only suppose, but the name stayed) was in town in empuriabrava, along with the aforementioned abandoned mini golf attractions. lots of mini golf in empuriabrava, for some reason. the following day we spent exploring figueres, birthplace of dali, and home of his museum. the town is quaint and quirky and whimsical, as one would imagine. the outside of the theatre-museum is as insane wacky crazy as he must have been, all bright red and decorated with golden loaves of bread and ancient scuba diving helmeted men and gigant...

so here are my thoughts and musings about my new minimalist wardrobe project. first, it's not really minimalist in an artistic sense, though i have found that the shapes and lines that work best with my body tend to be fairly clean and spare. i have hips and thighs, etc. so i tend to favor late 50s early 60s designs. that's the nice thing about getting to this age in life, you have sort of figured that much out, and your shape probably won't change too drastically. but the fact that one tends to spend one's time thinking about this sort of thing at all (or at least, the fact that i have done so) is what brought me to this project. let me digress. i have attempted to fashion a minimalist wardrobe as regards quantity, but i have a little excess. my idea was enough clothing for a week, but i have a bit more than that. i may still have some paring to do. but color wise, i have decided on black only. so this is the project. i have just what i need. just enough of wha...

so i guess the trick to the mosquito thing is to get some citronella or a little motorized insecticide version of a plug-in. nice, i only have 3 bites today though, so things are improving. the heat has been next to unbearable. it makes me cranky and headachy and fatigues me to the point of being able to do nothing but make smoothies and watch old season one episodes of lost or game shows in catalan. just for anyone's reference, it is not fun to shop on the ramblas in barcelona in july. it's hot and gross and gritty and grimy and you can get lost easily and the tourists wander around all stumbly and dumb and just get in your way and make you make angry faces. my next project is to explore a bunch of museums and public art. i'm all out of money for shopping anyway, since i decided to adopt an entirely minimalist black wardrobe (more on that in another post) and so ... well, that required shopping. finding the right cuts and fabrics for black clothes to wear in 90 plus de...

i´m on my third peach mango smoothie. here in spain it appears that you can only buy yogurts in packs of four or multiples thereof. which really is fine, because they are kinda little. on the other hand, it´s more a waste of packaging than anything if you are a yogurt lover as i am. they don´t have those big ol' tubs of the plain stuff i like to use for smoothies. at least not that i've been able to find so far. by the way, if you are one of my thousands of regular readers, when you see early hour of my posts, don't be alarmed or think aliens have invaded my body or anything, i just haven't changed the time settings on my account. there is something i like about thinking i might still be sitting at home blogging away in the dark early morning hours. it's been fairly warm here for the past week or so - bearable 90s - just enough to make me whiny if i have to walk to the train station. but last night it stormed a tremendously lovely storm and the heat wave has ...

my right shoulder hurts it´s hot and i´m kinda sweaty i have one mosquito bite on each knee i like fig yogurt i want to go swimming but only if no one else is in the pool so i have to get up and look out the window to see on they way i will notice that the basil needs watering and water it then i will forget what i was going to the window for but i´ll see a box of nag champa and decide to light one up after which i will realize i am thirsty and go to the kitchen for a glass of water and think hmn ... i should take my vitamin but not on an empty stomach i´ll realize it´s 3pm and i haven´t eaten anything but fig yogurt so i´ll make something to eat

a friend of mine talks about ´one-eye mornings´ where you wake up and, well, you know ... the one eye open thing. it happened to me the other day. one-eye open and i didn´t even realize it for i dunno how long. but what happens to me more often are the half-eye mornings. where for a while after i wake up, for some reason i´m still kinda squinty. my eyelids feel puffy and tender. it happens especially if it´s hot and i´ve slept in too late. everything kinda feels achy and creaky and hot like i´ve been baking in a kiln for a while. and i don´t know where to start my day so i just sort of sit and stare for a while. and then i make a smoothie. i should do some yoga. i think my humors are all stopped up. m

i´m a kind of wave. i have learned this about me. i seem to go through a sort of pattern of rise and descent and if i just feel that flow, and go with it, i can be okay. it´s like with most things in life, sometimes you can´t see the pattern because you are right smack dab in the middle of it, but if you are able to step back and have some sort of perspective, the chaos makes sense. so now when i feel sad, or down on myself, or lost, or worn ... i remember that i´m on this wave, and just feel to ride it where it goes. just remember. i´m not broken or anything, just down. and i´ll come up again soon, i always do. m

today is officially the last day of school for us. there has been something in the air. everyone has seemed extra sensitive. a little volatile. vulnerable. slight perceptions of harm evoke painful wails and extreme reactions. plus everyone's wild ... crazy-loco. i'm more tired at the end of the day than i normally am. they're wearing me out! i think they can sense something in the air. it's got them all stirred up. they are deeply a community. they know some friends will be leaving, moving on, or that they themselves will be, they know somehow, about the upheaval that is change. it's interesting that this 'last week of school' phenomenon happens even to ones of this small age. maybe even more so. because they aren't able to identify or articulate the source of their confusion. one more day. deep breath. m

i started another blog on another site and i remember now why i did this one the way i did (with not many people i know in 'real life' knowing the address - if i had it to do over again, none would). so i got sort of caught up somewhere in between and between that and being dead tired and exhausted with work, i got into a not-writing-much phase. ech. it's not a good place for me. i feel like a sawdusty wheel, or dried blood in decomposing veins. non-flow. now. it has been heavy air for days wanting wanting wanting needing to rain. i've been aching waiting sighing in the humid hot ... but more than that ... just so very unreleased. and the sky has just unleashed itself and the air is cool burst open free flashing wet gushing wholly open. so right this very moment i'm going to go get soaked and shimmy barefoot crazed in a puddle somewhere. and hope to fuck i this is me starting to write again. because i have a lot of stuff to say. m

i do this thing where i challenge myself to jettison things. to divest myself of accumulation. i am riding a constant pendulum swing of hanging on and letting go and it manifests itself in my relationship with my material surroundings. i have this dream of possessing so, so little, and being able to be that way. free of all that stuff that clouds and constricts and weighs down and blocks transmission and being. so every once in a while i decide on a bunch of stuff i don't need and i pile it up in a bag or a box to get rid of. it's like pulling a wiggly tooth or jumping off a high dive - there is a wavering point of fear-filled hesitation, then ... now or never ... 123 go! and there's no going back, there's no looking back. no thinking. no hesitations. no rumination. no worry. no what-if. it's gone, it's done, it's over. there's no chance to regret, there is only moving forward with what is. and even if there was a chance you mightn't have b...

i miss my friends. having sort of made the biggest part of my growing up and into the person i am during college, i made a lot of the most fast friends of my life in a time and place of flux for all of us. we have gotten more and more spread out physically, and sometimes otherwise, as the years have worn on. scattered more and more afar. seeing one another less. talking less and less. one more goes, and another. academics tend to find jobs whenever and wherever they can. creative types have a wanderlust. people who want to make change go where the change is needed. and then i got married moved and sort of stopped making new friendships. and then i got un-married and ... what? the couple friends, few we had ... i dunno. i have made some good online friends as well. met some incredible people i would otherwise never have connected with. some i have met in real life, some i might someday, some i likely never will. but the connections are nevertheless the same. they are just ...

thanks to the influence of a kind, generous and inspiring friend, i am currently attempting to learn juggling. at the moment, my efforts consist of tossing one lonely ball back and forth, back and forth. the process makes me feel very much like the karate kid. wax on! m

sometimes life is just surfing along, thinking you're all snugly (smugly?) ensconced in something that makes perfect sense. you just hum along and hum along and you're happy to be happy and you never peek out the shades to see that something richer and more complex but maybe a little less comfortable might be shuffling around out there ... because that would mean that the simplicity of the security you think you value might not be what you really want. or need. or feel. m

anhelo el sosiego que me trae tu presencia ahora mas que nunca necesito sentirme arrimada a ese lugar tan especial entre tu hombro y tu pecho donde cabe perfectamente mi cabeza

the idea of cooperation versus competition is one that i've been encountering and pondering quite a lot lately. this is a note to myself to remind me to write down my thoughts about it. m

this has been one of those week from hell kinda weeks. one of those every day morning till night start to finish everything goes wrong and it all just sort of piles up on you like one heavy wet blanket after another until you collapse under the pressure kinda weeks. it was awfully rainy all week and it felt like it. usually i love the rain and find some catharsis in it. but this week it just kept on dragging me down and down. until the storm broke, and i broke. and then it was a little better. so i guess it worked, in the end. yeah. so, for lack of better focus i will share the litany of crappy crap that happened to me this week: the cleaners ruined two of my shirts. the morning that i disovered the ruination of the shirts, i was late for work arguing with the laundromat guy on the phone. when i got to work and finished the meeting i was late for, there was some chaos in my workspace that resulted from someone not completing their assigned tasks. as i juggled to deal with thi...

ahora que tienes todo mi amor envuelto seguramente en tus brazos cuando decides te vas huyendo con el paquete mas precioso mas delicado y me quedo plantada alli con el mundo girando alrededor tiesa perdida sola lagrimas en el precipicio de ojos grandes de sorpresa de consternación he aprendido he estado aprendiendo proteger despues aprender estar menos protegida en esta vida me parece que todo se vuelve a repetir siempre

about twice a year, almost like clockwork, something like this happens and i swear i'm never speaking to you again. usually i'm hurt and more than a little bit angry and indignant. this time i'm mostly just sad, and i feel sorry for you. i wish you had the capacity to communicate what you are feeling about me to me and with me. i used to care what you thought about me, but now i'm just tired of having you judge me all the time. especially now that i see just how unfounded your judgements are. i have always supported you, even when i was skeptical of your choices. i love you and have done my best to hold back my judgement. i feel sorry for you that you think you are so superior to everyone else that you feel justified in hating them and disdaining them for their choices ... and justified in treating them like total garbage as a result. i would never treat you the way you have treated me, or the ways you have treated other people in our family and people that you love. y...

i supposed it was time to update ... to put at least something here, since it had been so very very long. but what? i'm still trying to assimilate my experiences. and it's hard to find the question mark on a spanish keyboard. so, i'm here in barcelona, and i have a cold. go figure. i'd have to travel all the way accross the atlantic to get a cold. i think it's because of the humidity. if its not super sunny, its a bit chilly, and it has cost me a bit to get used to the climate. but other than that its been a nice time. ive not preoccupied myself too much with being super touristy. figure there will be time enough for that sort of exlporing later. however, just being here is in effect a touristy experience. just absorbing all of the differences. the new sights and sounds and smells and being-ness of another place ... and doing things like try to figure out how to work funny windowshades, and double flush buttons! i like hanging the laundry out on the balc...

i found this - hope it helps you out. you know i'm sending in a suggestion for their next test subject! m

i sat in your bathroom and cried today. i fed your cats. used to be our cats. now yours. i fed them. and they were happy to see me. they remember me. i remember them. we said hello. and i looked around at what used to be our home. and my heart just sank. because we wanted so much. we were so young and hopeful and clear when we started out. at least we wanted to believe we could be. i wanted to build a life with you. i tried. we tried. we tried really hard. we tried until it got hard, and then we tried some more. and then it got harder and it got harder. i wanted to raise up the beauty in your heart and hold it up for the sun to shine on. i wanted to put mine in your strong hands and let it rest there, in between beats. i still want to hold your head on my shoulder and let you be weary. when i think of you, i want to take your weariness away. because i care for you. because that is what we do. but i needed more. i needed strength. i needed rest. i needed more. ...

so lately there has been this experiment going on here at my house of just leaving things hanging about. about a week ago i was walking out the door, and among the stack of papers i was shuffling through was a print-out of something i didn't need. so i had this weird impulse to just crumple it up and toss it on the landing, and i guess i just figured i'd pick it up when i got home. but for some reason i didn't. i just smiled at it, at myself and my silliness, and left it lying there. and then it became a little game between me and the white crumpled piece of paper on the landing. how many times could i walk by it? how long would it stay? would i keep being amused by it, or would i begin to become annoyed? would this sense of annoyance, if it developed, become motivation to dispose properly of the paper? now there is also an interesting accumulation of abandoned printed matter on and around the chair on my front porch. first came the telephone books. the ones i don't lik...

sometimes i wonder if they really put the right number of garbage bags in the box. it never seems like i could have gone through, say, 45 garbage bags. and like you'd count them! i wonder if they bank on that, and try to shave a few pennies off their costs. bastages. m

hello i'm here! i'm here, i'm here, i'm here. the wind is cold, the world is strange. i've had a cold. angry sinuses. cough. something. i have less than twelve weeks left to train for the 1/2 marathon. i decided i hated the treadmill and ran in 4 degree windchill the other day. i might have to go back to the treadmill though. this bums me out. i'm in love. (again. but can this be the last time? please?) and ... i need to write. more. but someone is calling me now. and i answer, i do. m

i feel scratchy and longing. i feel lost and found. i feel ghostly and away from me. i feel in the dark with the hallway light on and the glow of the computer screen lighting up the wrinkles on my knuckles and one tingle in my left shoulder because i didn't do my exercises this week and it's weak. i feel so far away from you and you feel so far away from me but you're in the bottom of my stomach curled up like a warm firm trustworthy ball of a feeling that makes me smile. i'm listening to a song called other side of the world because that's where you are and that's all that i can think of. i went to a chinese new year party tonight. there were some karate kicks and lovely pink fan scarf dances and the best of all was the incense sticks dancing in the dark ... sparks everywhere and i thought the stage would light on fire but it didn't and we all clapped out a good solid rhythm for them and they did a good good job those incense stick kids. i got a red envelop...

there is a box. the box spends most of its life in the attic. inside this box there is another box. it is in that box where my memories reside. little things that, upon seeing them, you wouldn't have any idea why someone would have them saved like this inside of a box ... part of a movie ticket, a piece of candy, a shopping list, a bookmark, coins from various countries, a bit of wrapping paper, photos of certain people, a round white pebble, a grocery store receipt, a bus transfer ticket, a bracelet made by a child ... but they are things that have been carefully chosen. each one of them transports me instantaneously, forcefully, with all emotion imaginable, to an important moment of my life. most of them remind me of happy moments. all of them make me smile. some of them make me cry at the same time. they remind me of the people and events that have formed an integral part of my life. that changed me completely. that made such an impression on my life that after having experience...

hay una caja. la caja vive la mayoria de su tiempo en el ático. adentro de esta caja hay otra caja. está en esa caja donde residen mis recuerdos. cosas pequeñitas que al verlas, no tendrías ni idea por qué alguien las tendría guardadas asi adentro de una caja ... la parte de un billete para una pelicula, un dulce, un marcador de libro, monedas de varios paises, un trozo de papel de envolver, fotos de ciertas personas, una redonda piedra blanca, una pulsera hecho por un niño ... pero son cosas que han sido escojidas con mucha atención. cada uno de ellos me transporta instantáneamente, y fuertemente, con toda la emoción imaginable, a un momento importante de mi vida. la mayoria de ellos me recuerdan a momentos felices. todos me hacen sonreir. algunos me hacen llorar a la vez. me recuerdan a las personas y los eventos que han formado una parte integral de mi vida. que me cambiaron por completo. que impresionaron tanto a mi vida que después de haberlos experimentado, no era después yo la m...

i awaken. i shut off the alarm. i see your photo. with a huge smile i remember that you exist in this world. that on some part of the planet, you are still alive. as far as i know. it could be that you exist. i can’t be sure. i try to get up. i sleep ten more minutes. i sleep ten more minutes. i make a cup of tea and try to focus on the day to come. day full of wind. of rain. of gray skies. where might you be? what might you be doing? how is it that you smell? i have no idea anymore. traveling to work. putting on lipstick on the way, because as usual, i’m in a hurry. because i’m late, as usual. i get to work. the day continues as the days tend to continue. with happiness, with frustration, with weariness, with complexity ... but every once in a while, i stop, and i smile, because you exist in this world. on some part of this planet where we live, there you are. you are still alive, as far as i know. and so i spend the day this way....

me despierto. apago el reloj. veo tu foto. con una grande sonrisa me acuerdo que existes en este mundo. que en algún parte del planeta, sigues vivo. segun sepa. puede ser que existas. no puedo estar segura. trato de levantarme. duermo diez minutos mas. duermo diez minutos mas. preparo una taza de té y trato de fijarme en el día que viene. día llena de viento. de lluvia. de cielos grises. donde estarás? que estarás haciendo? como es que hueles? ya no tengo ni idea. viajando al trabajo. poniéndome pintalábios mientras estoy en el camino, como siempre, porque estoy de prisa ... porque llego tarde, como siempre. llego al trabajo. el día sigue como los dias suelen seguir. con felicidad, con frustracion, con cansáncio, con complejidad ... pero de vez en cuando, paro, y sonrío, porque existes en este mundo. en algún parte de este planeta en que vivimos, estás tú. sigues vivo, según sepa. y asi paso el día. con una sensación en mi estómago que me deja saber que hay una felicidad en esta vida q...

okay. i'm just gonna say this. say what? say everything. i've been trying too hard. i've been sleepwalking too scared. i've been hesitating the what ifs and what nots. i can't get to my gut. i can't get out. so. i just keep. just keep doing. just keep doing it. over and over till i get to it. and you'll just have to wait till i get to it. because i might have to try twentysixthousand different ways. but what the fuck. who cares. suffer me my fuzzy tongue. tonight my doorbell rang twice. i answered hesitantly (and to be honest, a bit irritably ... wet-hairedly) and two different girls asked for two different boys two different times. i gave them skeptical raised eyebrow answers. some other house must be your boys are hiding in. *shrug* my good friend mike assured me that it will be hard for me to find someone for me, because i am so very special. i could have kissed him. but he is in winnipeg, so really i could not have. then my ex told...

the book about dr. king that i read to my students on monday had me tearing up a bit, but i guess that's okay. they get it. they get the absurdity that was segregation. they get what the whole thing is about. they understand what it is to be so angry that someone has mistreated you that you want to use your hands and not your words to fight back. they understand the power of loving words, and the impulse toward fairness and what is right. the know the value of what he did and said and taught and showed. when they asked me why someone shot and killed him, a thousand different ways to answer shuffled through my mind. i settled on, 'because they didn't like what he was doing and they wanted him to stop.' by this point we had collectively determined that what he was doing was good. contemplating this event brought to a whole other level my frequent admonition: 'if you don't like what someone is doing, you need to talk to them about it and use your words t...

noodles are like, flour and water. and then you dry them out so you can save them to use later. that's so cool! m

this morning, leaving my overnight job - sans makeup, hair disheveled, eyeglasses on - i got a genuine, grinning (non creepy) ' hey pretty lady, how you doin'? ' from a fella in coveralls on his way to start the day. heheh. m

my life used to make a certain kind of faithful sense because you were the most (perhaps the only) consistent point of reference in it since i was sixteen years old. our love was the epicenter of a world that i could understand. the capacity for tenderness in my heart was inspired by your eyes. you made the way soft for me. you understood my idiosyncracies and you were patient with my neverending illogical obsessions. you smiled at me across the table of my insecurities, knowing that my strength was even clearer there, though obscured, below a few various layers of mock carefree bravado. we took care of one another's hearts. so now in some regard, my life has lost its moorings, and my being is adrift. most of my days are spent wandering happily oblivious to this fact, and then suddenly sometimes it hits me hard ... driving home from work at dusk, seeing shadows fall, knowing that you're sitting somewhere living the same sort of new emptiness. m

sorry ... it's been almost two weeks of this strict no bread, no sugar thing. just had to let it be said. whoo hoo - three and a half hours of salsasambamerenguebachatareggaetonchachacha! too much fun! i gotsta get me to bed. i'm gonna be dead tomorrah. m

after the most recent relationship flop, i'm on the phone to my mother and declare my ever so determined intention to live a year of solitude. so last night she doesn't catch me on the phone (it was only around nine, i was probably too immersed in ipod shuffle-land to even have heard it) and leaves an accusatory sounding message about how she hopes i'm not out on a date ! she's the major inspiration of exasperated headshake in my life. i'm putting lots'nlotsa songs on itunes right now, and then i'm a gon' go shoppin'. i'm all excited because i've got some things i'm going to try to learn to make, so my list is so purposeful today. then i'm going salsa dancing! yeepy! it's a good good good day! m

so i went and got a shuffle today. there were a few glitches on installation, and i missed half of lost tonight trying to figure stuff out, but i think i'll be very happy with my choice in the end. the worst part was waiting for it to charge! i'm like a little kid, so terribly impatient. it's al(l)so ironic, because i ran outside today. i ran four miles. it was an amazingly spring like evening. the sunset was warm koolaid pink and the air smelled like puddles. i also made a new friend. she's in her sixties and has run 28 marathons. she's lived a life and has great stories to tell. we have uncommon amounts of things in common. she will be inspiring to me, i can tell. i've come across so very many inspiring things and people lately. life's incredible in this way for me these days. this is all for now. m

today was just so heartbreaking and true. i just kept sitting down staring into the distance, knowing things. knowing things like ouch my heart hurts. knowing things like damn i'm a nice person. and i'm super fantastic and one of a kind. knowing things like i need someone to be good to me. knowing things like i'm not being treated as well as i should be. things like i need to stop being addicted to falling in love and selling myself short and taking less than i really do deserve. today felt like a scone. like you might groove more on a puffy glazed donut or a gooey piece of chocolate cake, but all you really need is just the slight softness and crumbly sweetness of a scone, and you know it. a scone is enough. a scone is more than enough - it is precisely enough. something quiet, with hushed grey skies and a breeze moving bare branches sadly. i kept almost crying, and knowing it would be okay if i did. not fighting the cry. knowing i deserved to be sad. knowing...

ate the rest of the aforementioned packages of wasabi peas made a batch of pretty good hummous and a really good omelette and some corn tortillas was beaten at scrabble, but had a score of 253 was given a pack of beemans gum grinned happily upon receipt of said gum looked up a recipe for something i want to learn to make made a shopping list did a funny dance across my kitchen floor reconnected with someone i thought i'd never speak to again made yet another someone smile listened to the same album about 4 times and another one twice made a realization that humbled me to the core of my being didn't call my mother back washed the dishes lickety split drank several cups of temple of heaven special gunpowder green tea although it doesn't feel like it, it appears to have been a pretty eventful day. m

i bought the new silver jews album by accident. i wanted someone to hear them, but i lost the copy of natural bridge that i had, so we went to the record store to get some silver jews and all they had was tanglewood numbers, so we got it. i didn't even realize it was brand spankin' new. so now i'm all excited about them again. i ordered the natural bridge again, and i will probably get their other ones too. too good stuff. i guess david berman has a book of poems out as well. gonna look for that. i also got some other new things - si*sé - more shine derek bailey - ballads kid dakota (my friend from college's band) - west is future and i have an ep coming in the mail from a neat dark folk guy that i found on ... some other site. it's been a new music buyin' kinda month. i need to get an mp3 player so i don't go insane staring at my reflection in the mirror on the treadmill at the ywca. the world is conspiring to overcome my luddite tendencies. next thing ...

i decided to wander in while i waited for my thai take-out next door, see if they had any of the 'special ginger candy' that i love that comes in the little white cigarette pack type packages - yes they did! i got three of them! aaaaaaaaand, i also got: two packages of wasabi peas (almost got three - shoulda, these will be gone in a flash) two packages of rice noodles one box of temple of heaven special gunpowder green tea a tea ball one bottle of lucky fish sauce one jar of chili paste and a bottle of low sodium authentic chinese soy sauce ... ... all for under 15 bucks! yeepy! m

though i had the worst new year's eve ever, for some reason i'm really feelin' the resolution vibe this year. it's easier, because most of the things i'm resolving to do, i've already been moving toward, or making a habit of. it's just about digging my heels in and getting serious and more determined about them. they are the things that make my life run more harmoniously anyway, so it's not like they're difficult or anything. a lot of them involve treating my body well, and in ways that enhance the other aspects of my being - eat well (no more cookie binges - no more sugar, period) sleep enough (this means actually going to bed) exercise (i've already built a daily yoga practice, have to get back to running regularly - i joined the y - gasp!) other things - go to more meetings get to work on time be more dedicated in my work go to shul meditate more regularly be honest. really really honest. and more kind and more compassionate ...

i was lying in the tub i was sighing for love i was taking a breath hands warm, and wet wrapped around a cup of tea watching the candle flame flicker being alone

someone recently called me cold and self absorbed. it was quite a blow at first, and my instant reaction was of course to reject the comment out of hand. find a way to rationalize its having found its way to me - they were in pain. they weren't getting what they needed from me. whatever. all that sort of thing. then i spent a fair amount of time feeling hurt and quite crushed about it. and berating myself. and feeling like crap. then i decided that it may have been true, that i may have been behaving in a cold and self absorbed way, but that it is not the sum total of who i am, and therefore i should not be condemned for it. and then i got real. and i was honest with myself. i acknowledged the fact that i can indeed be terribly self absorbed, and sometimes i can be awfully cold. i spent some time being introspective about it, which is something i don't do nearly often enough. i thought about how and why i can be those things. but i tried not to make excuses for mys...

i think that the light from my chanukiah is making the fishbowl's glass reflective, and my betta mr. pinkfish thinks there's another fella 'round to bother him, 'cos his fins are all fanned out gorgeous-like and mezmerizing. i feel guilty just looking and looking at him, but he's so terribly marvelous just hovering there, illuminated in the dark still water. m