here i am

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