I am not very good with dates... I can remember my own birth date, that of my mother and sister and brother but it pretty much ends there. There are a couple other dates whose numbers have been burned in my brain like a branding. The numbers pass like faces on a totem poll I must climb and gaze upon every month and every year. It is cyclical like a clock before time was digitalized.
29 is a number that means death, reminding me of my own mortality and of those around me, like ants in a chain, a breeze could sweep one of us away. 12 is a number that’s marred with hope and reality, like a mirror dropped in the salty bluff mud of South Carolina. I pick it up and look...I am not sure if what I see is my reflection.
So these numbers pass on the calendar like any other.
At a party once, I was the only undrunk one. I held my coke in a red plastic cup and told no one of the lack of rum. In a room fool of drunken people it doesn’t take long before you start doubting the laws of thermodynamics. A man sat down next to me and recited me a poem about how each year we unknowing pass the anniversary of our death. There is no point to this story, except to say that every day is an anniversary for whatever happened last year and a pre-anniversary for whatever will happen the next.
As my graduation anniversary was soon approaching (and now passed) I have been thinking more and more in terms of “what was I doing at this time last year?” Right after my oldest brother died I did this type of thing too: “This time last year I knew nothing about death, living without knowing this was going to happen.” I look back on who I was and what I did not know and feel older and bit wiser, sometimes a bit sadder. Sometimes I see i have more reasons to hope stuffed into my pockets... Every time knowing that a year from now I will be looking at who I am now and feeling the same way.
I spoke to homeless man today with my friend. He said some profound things. One of them was. “I’m blessed to be alive. I wake up each morning and say Thank you.” That’s true for every number of the month. I ought to think about those things more often rather than worrying about what outfit will pass for business casual, or if i will make it to the gym time.
Sidedish:
The gym is everywhere.
A man doing pushups on the curb at 7:30... his feet stretched out into the street, his hands on the curb. The other day I was at a bus stop and man was doing pushing using the bus stop bench. I walked from the farmer's market and used my sack of potatoes and flat bread and green beans as weights.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Un toque de mano
Once upon a time...the summer between freshman and sophomore year of
college, I went to La Republica Dominicana for two weeks. It seems
surreal now. I wonder what it means to my life that I went to this
island (and never saw the ocean from it but instead did art classes
with poor children in a mountainous region). The permanent art
teacher with the faith based org called Students International was
an indigenous man who told good stories, in spanish because he was
learning English. I dont remember his name any more, but I
remember his face. I remember how he got headaches almost everyday,
but because the town had no aspirin he took Alka-Seltzer instead. He
also threw cockroaches and other bugs on his 2 year old daughter so
that she would learn not to be afraid of them.
Everyday he would tell us the same thing... Un toque de mano, A
touch of hand or a smile goes a long way. He realized that we would
be there for only two weeks, long enough to get to know the kids
names and something about their personality and then we would leave
and forget about them. But while we were there we had the ability to
love maybe not so much with words (for those who did not speak Spanish) but with a touch of the hand or smile. He had faith that us being there did actually make a difference. He understood something I am only beginning to understand.
The Kingdom Jesus says is like a mustard seed. Something small and inconsequential, that hits the ground when the wind blows and then it blooms and blossoms and grows and there are branches and flowers
and fruit and shade and spice and bright yellow and then more seeds.
A place for birds to rest and nest; a place of growth.
Last night as I was at this meeting in a building I had not been to
in a couple years, I stood to find the bathroom. I peered around the
corner, unsure of the entrance to the bathroom and saw the door and
also a small crowd VIP types whispering important things. But then
___ saw me, and he gave me a look of "sure its fine to pass this
way", it was welcoming, acknowledging, it was a quarter of a second
long but it echoes in my ribs, in eternity. Un toque de mano, un
mirada. Rang in my head and I knew it was true. And I headed to the
bathroom feeling loved and like I wasn't taking up too much space.
As I write this two things come to me:
1) Francisco, the art teacher's name is Francisco.
2) Am I that much of an empty reservoir that a drip of ordinary
human interaction can quench?
I don't think I am the only one because Francisco, on an island in a
mountain town with no aspirin, he knew it ... and maybe its not that ordinary. Mustard seeds look as common as dust, but yet they are a storehouse of potential.
college, I went to La Republica Dominicana for two weeks. It seems
surreal now. I wonder what it means to my life that I went to this
island (and never saw the ocean from it but instead did art classes
with poor children in a mountainous region). The permanent art
teacher with the faith based org called Students International was
an indigenous man who told good stories, in spanish because he was
learning English. I dont remember his name any more, but I
remember his face. I remember how he got headaches almost everyday,
but because the town had no aspirin he took Alka-Seltzer instead. He
also threw cockroaches and other bugs on his 2 year old daughter so
that she would learn not to be afraid of them.
Everyday he would tell us the same thing... Un toque de mano, A
touch of hand or a smile goes a long way. He realized that we would
be there for only two weeks, long enough to get to know the kids
names and something about their personality and then we would leave
and forget about them. But while we were there we had the ability to
love maybe not so much with words (for those who did not speak Spanish) but with a touch of the hand or smile. He had faith that us being there did actually make a difference. He understood something I am only beginning to understand.
The Kingdom Jesus says is like a mustard seed. Something small and inconsequential, that hits the ground when the wind blows and then it blooms and blossoms and grows and there are branches and flowers
and fruit and shade and spice and bright yellow and then more seeds.
A place for birds to rest and nest; a place of growth.
Last night as I was at this meeting in a building I had not been to
in a couple years, I stood to find the bathroom. I peered around the
corner, unsure of the entrance to the bathroom and saw the door and
also a small crowd VIP types whispering important things. But then
___ saw me, and he gave me a look of "sure its fine to pass this
way", it was welcoming, acknowledging, it was a quarter of a second
long but it echoes in my ribs, in eternity. Un toque de mano, un
mirada. Rang in my head and I knew it was true. And I headed to the
bathroom feeling loved and like I wasn't taking up too much space.
As I write this two things come to me:
1) Francisco, the art teacher's name is Francisco.
2) Am I that much of an empty reservoir that a drip of ordinary
human interaction can quench?
I don't think I am the only one because Francisco, on an island in a
mountain town with no aspirin, he knew it ... and maybe its not that ordinary. Mustard seeds look as common as dust, but yet they are a storehouse of potential.
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
top of the tip top
I've been on the tip top of my very tiniest toe trying to hang on to the rail on a wild bus ride, with a purse, a phone, a book, and three bags filled with who knows what, trying to stand and not land in some stranger's lap or hit the small kid next to me with the edge of my bag. My toes are tired and so am I.
I will spend the rest of the summer on my knees.
Oh Lord, it is my prayer. I am ready to fall into your hands.
I will spend the rest of the summer on my knees.
Oh Lord, it is my prayer. I am ready to fall into your hands.
my mind's been in the gutter
I signed a petition at church to close a recycling center on Adams Blvd. It is an ATM machine where drug dealers and gang members lay in wait to attack the newly moneyed. A boy was recently shot to death there when asked to name his gang, and he did not have an alliance. I never knew this and it makes me feel uneasy. I see the people, many sorts from old ladies to young men, sorting and sifting through our trashcans and recycling bins on Tuesdays when they line the street in wait for the city collectors. Rolling their carts. They are clever and have the sticks and gloves to make their jobs as easy as possible. I don’t know why I never thought they would be recycling my tuna cans for crack. It just never occurred to me; evidence that I am still naïve. I mean I didn't all these soda cans and plastic bottle collectors did this because they cared so very much about the environment, but my mind never made the connection to drug dealers.
In 12th grade government I learned something in about trash and drugs dealers. I learned that it used to be that people would just throw their garbage in the Glad Trashbags® on the curbside for the garbage collectors to pick up. A meth manufacturer (kitchen laboratory), threw his drug making waste on the curb tied tightly in your standard plastic trashbag. The police searched it found evidence that proved this man was a drug dealer. In a court of law, the drug dealer claimed his rights were violated because the police had no search warrant to search his private property: his trash. The judge ruled when you throw away your trash, it becomes city property and therefore it was fair game. The plastic trash bins that say Property of Los Angeles reinforce this truth: Your trash in no longer yours. I am okay with that. But the drug dealer didn’t like that ruling so much.
Today on my way to the bus stop, I walked behind an older man pushing his cart of recyclables down the street. He turned around because he sensed someone was behind him. Not being very threatening in my business casual, he smiled and asked how I was. Good I replied how are you? He started coughing, a deep chest with phlegm cough. Blessed. He managed to get out between coughs, blessed to be alive.
I passed him and continued my walk to the bus stop.
As I walked past the gas station I got a whiff of warm exhaust and sidewalk stench. It reminded me of Manila, and I felt a little homesick for a place that’s not mine. Between the stenches and the people living off our trash we are not so different from the Manila.
The recycling center on the Adams is a place of death, not renewal. I wonder about the people who recycle goods for good and not evil. Who are they and where will they go to find a safe recycling center and few extra bucks to buy dinner for the kids.
In 12th grade government I learned something in about trash and drugs dealers. I learned that it used to be that people would just throw their garbage in the Glad Trashbags® on the curbside for the garbage collectors to pick up. A meth manufacturer (kitchen laboratory), threw his drug making waste on the curb tied tightly in your standard plastic trashbag. The police searched it found evidence that proved this man was a drug dealer. In a court of law, the drug dealer claimed his rights were violated because the police had no search warrant to search his private property: his trash. The judge ruled when you throw away your trash, it becomes city property and therefore it was fair game. The plastic trash bins that say Property of Los Angeles reinforce this truth: Your trash in no longer yours. I am okay with that. But the drug dealer didn’t like that ruling so much.
Today on my way to the bus stop, I walked behind an older man pushing his cart of recyclables down the street. He turned around because he sensed someone was behind him. Not being very threatening in my business casual, he smiled and asked how I was. Good I replied how are you? He started coughing, a deep chest with phlegm cough. Blessed. He managed to get out between coughs, blessed to be alive.
I passed him and continued my walk to the bus stop.
As I walked past the gas station I got a whiff of warm exhaust and sidewalk stench. It reminded me of Manila, and I felt a little homesick for a place that’s not mine. Between the stenches and the people living off our trash we are not so different from the Manila.
The recycling center on the Adams is a place of death, not renewal. I wonder about the people who recycle goods for good and not evil. Who are they and where will they go to find a safe recycling center and few extra bucks to buy dinner for the kids.
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Do Re Mi - Let's start from the very beginning
I’ve been having trouble eating.
Maybe its because we are out of food
and I ought to go grocery shopping.
Or maybe its because I have found
these guitar strings taut against my insides.
Pop songs on the radio, clichés and recollections pluck them.
Words spoken by mouths, shadows around sunset,
and places I have been before strum them.
Unfamiliar tones, timbres hum against my bones,
reverberate in the hollows of my heart and stomach,
echo in my muscles and sinews.
Maybe its because we are out of food
and I ought to go grocery shopping.
Or maybe its because I have found
these guitar strings taut against my insides.
Pop songs on the radio, clichés and recollections pluck them.
Words spoken by mouths, shadows around sunset,
and places I have been before strum them.
Unfamiliar tones, timbres hum against my bones,
reverberate in the hollows of my heart and stomach,
echo in my muscles and sinews.
Saturday, June 17, 2006
For the record
I have been complaining about my job a lot in the last two installations but I dont hate it any more and I have seen the good things it is developing in my character and I am not resentful, just easily given in to complaining. Did i ever tell you that I was an X men and my super secret power is Complaining. Yes I complain. People fall asleep and the world is a little less evil because while the bad guys are sleeping thier plots to take over the world are postponed due to REM sleep.
peace
or rather lullaby and goodnight
peace
or rather lullaby and goodnight
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Good Jorb
Here I am again, not so much at the end of my rope so much as the end of my day. With not much more to give. My to do list has been checked off and refilled with things yet to be done. EOC’s have been sent out and they have started to pile up again. There are few things I could print out. A few things I could file mindlessly. But I am choosing not to. I have a new nickname at work “Traitor” as I am moving from the service to the sales side. The other new thing they say is Congratulations. I have moved from Admin 1 to Admin 2. There is no Admin 3. I do not EVER want to be an account manager. Therefore this is my last promotion in the world of B_C_ until I am promoted to Ex- Admin 2. I am okay with this. I am nolonger upset about my job as i was when i first started... there are times when I can even see the good in it. A friend is going to start working at BX in July. I am very excited to have a friend start there. I just hope she doesnt hate it the way i did when i first started. I think a lot of other factors went into my hating it like the fact i wasnt ready to leave santa cruz.
Yet, I still hold the dream of the day I break the heart of my managers. “Today, I quit... you see here,” I will flash an airplane ticket or the draft of my first book to be published, “I have been offered a position at the competition, life” “MetLife?” “No life life, the thing I want to live, far away from here, this strange place where women walk around in gravity defying high heels [luckily that is not a part of the job description it is a personal choice, one I never choose].” “Oh I see” my boss will say, but she wont really, “she could have gone so far” she will mumble under her breath as her fingers climb an imaginary stair case of success. Then she will start to write the email, as I start to clear my desk. With my postcards in my back jean pocket, my plant (conviently in basket with handle) in one hand, and my reduce, reuse recycle US Santa Cruz travel mug in the other hand. I will smiling head for the elevator and realized how much this place has meant to me and how much i have learned here. As the elevator doors close, I will hear for the last time, the digital “ping” of a new email received in everyone’s inbox at the same time. It will read:
Effective immediately, Alessandra S______, Sales Assistant at Los Angeles Sales Office, has resigned from the company. She has chosen to pursue a career outside BC. A plan will follow for coverage of her desk, until we are able to hire a replacement.
Thanks,
XXXX XX
Management
Yet, I still hold the dream of the day I break the heart of my managers. “Today, I quit... you see here,” I will flash an airplane ticket or the draft of my first book to be published, “I have been offered a position at the competition, life” “MetLife?” “No life life, the thing I want to live, far away from here, this strange place where women walk around in gravity defying high heels [luckily that is not a part of the job description it is a personal choice, one I never choose].” “Oh I see” my boss will say, but she wont really, “she could have gone so far” she will mumble under her breath as her fingers climb an imaginary stair case of success. Then she will start to write the email, as I start to clear my desk. With my postcards in my back jean pocket, my plant (conviently in basket with handle) in one hand, and my reduce, reuse recycle US Santa Cruz travel mug in the other hand. I will smiling head for the elevator and realized how much this place has meant to me and how much i have learned here. As the elevator doors close, I will hear for the last time, the digital “ping” of a new email received in everyone’s inbox at the same time. It will read:
Effective immediately, Alessandra S______, Sales Assistant at Los Angeles Sales Office, has resigned from the company. She has chosen to pursue a career outside BC. A plan will follow for coverage of her desk, until we are able to hire a replacement.
Thanks,
XXXX XX
Management
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Usher ushers in a new mood
What can i say, i like Usher its true. and I am listening to "confessions" right now.
Today at work I found myself at the end of my rope and it it was only three thirty. Since i had to hang on for a while longer, I hung to the end of my rope and wondered how i had gotten to this place of bitterness and sarcasm and listlessness...
Maybe it was the fact that the new Temp's eyes linger in places a little longer than excusable and he kept asking me to show him how to do processes that i feel like he should know how to do already.
Maybe it was the fact that lots of people were talking about who is on thier radar screen, so to speak. Not that I am unhappy for them.
Maybe it was the fact that E. Newman from G____ Inc. Called and asked for a report that no one ever askes for because company should keep track of thier own employees. I sighed and begrudingly made the report and sent it in a nice but short email.
She replied one minute later demanding for a different report, more details and this and that. She cc'd my Account Manager and the broker. I sighed and redid the report and wrote her back a mean email: "Please find attached report... I hate you." I then deleted that email and sent it with a nicer one; "please find attached report, from our conversation i thought you were asking for the other report [becasue you did!]. Sorry about that"
Maybe it was because the day was sunny, i was wearing yellow, but i did not feel sunny.
Maybe it was because the EOCs are piling up again and i thought i was done with them...
Maybe its because i have given into complaining....
But i have climbed up my rope a little bit...
I walked to a farther bus stop in order to enjoy the sun, I bought a mango for a dollar from the corner market, I wanted corn and the corn vender (man on modified bicycle) was selling corn with chili limon and sal. and it was delicious...
and Usher is singing to me: "Its the simple things in life we forget..."
Today at work I found myself at the end of my rope and it it was only three thirty. Since i had to hang on for a while longer, I hung to the end of my rope and wondered how i had gotten to this place of bitterness and sarcasm and listlessness...
Maybe it was the fact that the new Temp's eyes linger in places a little longer than excusable and he kept asking me to show him how to do processes that i feel like he should know how to do already.
Maybe it was the fact that lots of people were talking about who is on thier radar screen, so to speak. Not that I am unhappy for them.
Maybe it was the fact that E. Newman from G____ Inc. Called and asked for a report that no one ever askes for because company should keep track of thier own employees. I sighed and begrudingly made the report and sent it in a nice but short email.
She replied one minute later demanding for a different report, more details and this and that. She cc'd my Account Manager and the broker. I sighed and redid the report and wrote her back a mean email: "Please find attached report... I hate you." I then deleted that email and sent it with a nicer one; "please find attached report, from our conversation i thought you were asking for the other report [becasue you did!]. Sorry about that"
Maybe it was because the day was sunny, i was wearing yellow, but i did not feel sunny.
Maybe it was because the EOCs are piling up again and i thought i was done with them...
Maybe its because i have given into complaining....
But i have climbed up my rope a little bit...
I walked to a farther bus stop in order to enjoy the sun, I bought a mango for a dollar from the corner market, I wanted corn and the corn vender (man on modified bicycle) was selling corn with chili limon and sal. and it was delicious...
and Usher is singing to me: "Its the simple things in life we forget..."
Monday, June 12, 2006
A cool thing
create your own visited countries map
or vertaling Duits Nederlands
This is where i have been in the world. I think I ought to do a bit more traveling...
Thanks, guy i dont know whose blog i read and it had this link, this is cool.
Friday, June 09, 2006
What's Frame of Reference?
We have killed al-Zarqawi. I am not shocked. We kill a lot of people to whom we have given the label terrorist. The thing that gets to me, is that the military took a picture of his dead beaten face and framed it in a respectable solid frame, looks like beveled wood. A costly frame, not one you could pick up at the 99 cents store. And mounted it on an easel draped with a nice black cloth (so as to disguise the tacky easel). Is this standard procedure? Take photos of the people you kill, enlarge the photos to bigger than life, and then frame them tastefully for the world to see. If this was a serial killer’s M.O. we would think them sick and deranged, more than a serial killer who just threw the bodies in the river when they were done. I guess there are many things that the white house/ military has been called and they are really doing their best to show class.
The Color of
i once had a friend who was an amazing artist. The lines that came out the pencil in his hand were enrapturing. But like many artists, he had few motivating goals in his life. Opportunity by opportunity walked by his door and he ignored them all. He did have one goal and that was to discover a new color.
“But S____,” I objected, “the color wheel is complete, ROY G BIV, where would you put the new color. It’s impossible; all the colors there are we know about.”
“The undiscovered color is nothing we can imagine. You don’t believe it because your thinking by the definitions you already have. The new color, we have no context for it, no way to think about, no frame of reference. But one day, the new color will find me and I will be able to tell the world, your crayon boxes are incomplete. I’ll be famous.”
“Okay...,” I said taken in by this idea of not having the right context or definition to discover something new. Dictionary definitions are so limited. They do not help a blind person understand what yellow is:
yel·low (yl)
n.
The hue of that portion of the visible spectrum lying between orange and green, evoked in the human observer by radiant energy with wavelengths of approximately 570 to 590 nanometers; any of a group of colors of a hue resembling that of ripe lemons and varying in lightness and saturation; one of the subtractive primaries; one of the psychological primary hues.
A pigment or dye having this hue.
Something that has this hue.
“So maybe we are just blind to this new color you will discover and one day we will be able to see it....Or maybe you’re just crazy.”
This friend of mine, I have no idea what country or state or time zone he is in now. I can not really call him a friend. He has become more of a memory. But I would like to tell him, that indeed I have found a new color. A color that has always been here, but I’ve been blind to see: The color of _ _ _ _ _
“But S____,” I objected, “the color wheel is complete, ROY G BIV, where would you put the new color. It’s impossible; all the colors there are we know about.”
“The undiscovered color is nothing we can imagine. You don’t believe it because your thinking by the definitions you already have. The new color, we have no context for it, no way to think about, no frame of reference. But one day, the new color will find me and I will be able to tell the world, your crayon boxes are incomplete. I’ll be famous.”
“Okay...,” I said taken in by this idea of not having the right context or definition to discover something new. Dictionary definitions are so limited. They do not help a blind person understand what yellow is:
yel·low (yl)
n.
The hue of that portion of the visible spectrum lying between orange and green, evoked in the human observer by radiant energy with wavelengths of approximately 570 to 590 nanometers; any of a group of colors of a hue resembling that of ripe lemons and varying in lightness and saturation; one of the subtractive primaries; one of the psychological primary hues.
A pigment or dye having this hue.
Something that has this hue.
“So maybe we are just blind to this new color you will discover and one day we will be able to see it....Or maybe you’re just crazy.”
This friend of mine, I have no idea what country or state or time zone he is in now. I can not really call him a friend. He has become more of a memory. But I would like to tell him, that indeed I have found a new color. A color that has always been here, but I’ve been blind to see: The color of _ _ _ _ _
Friday, June 02, 2006
My _ _ _ _ _ is full:
A half a shoelace, plastic spoon, tamale wrapper, chewed on straw, torn magazine, empty ketchup packet, broken tea cup, crushed juice box, yellowed newspaper, Styrofoam box, brown paper bag, fingernail clippings, cigarette carton, spit-out gum, pizza crust, discarded pen, plastic bag, grime collecting on windshield, coupons, parking tickets, old tea bag, rubber band, business card of someone unknown.
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