"Every moment of one's life, one is growing into more or retreating into less." - Norman Mailer

Monday, December 11, 2006

Why one has to take 12 hours of a foreign language at the University of Louisville

"Those who know nothing of foreign languages know nothing of their own." Goethe

I just got this quote from the Facebook profile of a friend of mine, André, whom I met through my Spanish classes at the University. It is amazing how such a little sentence can speak to such a great portion of my heart. This is my mantra for anyone who wonders why s/he has to take "stupid 12 hours of a foreign language." Language is an amazing gift to humankind. It has the power to build civilizations--and to tear them apart. Language is the fundamental unit of our humanity; it is unique to our kind of all living things on earth. (Certainly, there is communication among all living things; and within specific groups--bees or dolphins or redwoods--there is a more specific kind of communication. But this must not be mistaken for language, for a formal system of finite rules and infinite possibilites, a generative quality than can only be understood and replicated and used by human beings.) It is part of this gift that we, as children, can load many different languages into our heads without the need of formal training. Learning to use language is as natural to (most of) us as learning to walk or to feed ourselves.

But this extraordinary miracle has a drawback: since we learn our first language(s) intuitively, we never have need of formally (abstractly, left-brainedly) understanding the system we are using. It only becomes necessary to understand language as a formal system when we must learn a second language. By the time we reach a mere 6 years of age, our brains have already rewired to the point that intuitive language learning has been severely diminished, and so we must learn language a different way. Instead of just hearing, repeating, and understanding, we must also read and write, memorize, diagram and list. These are all helpful in becoming comfortable navigating within the foreign language.

Because our brains have rewired and because we read and write, we can also use these tools to re-examine our own lengua materna. It is in dissecting a second language that we can see how to do it to our own language; and when we do this, we become better speakers, better writers, better communicators in our first language. As well, we can come to understand, in a larger sense, that since there are many languages--many systems--there are furthermore many ways of expressing a thought, each unique and essentially untranslatable. We can also, most importantly, understand that language is a SYMBOLIC SYSTEM, and understanding its structure can extend to our understanding not only of other languages but also of other symbolic systems such as music or mathematics. Through initiating and then deepening our understanding of a foreign language (or multiple foreign languages) we have the ability to tame our first language as well as to open the door in our minds to greater understanding of the intangible systems that compose our universe.

Monday, November 27, 2006

Three and a half babies

I had a dream last night, very vivid... I dreamt of travelling, and I was in Africa. I was at the base of a mountain, in a clearing. It was a sunny, warm winter day. I witnessed a wild, dark brown, shiny horse in the throes of labor, and she finally, explosively, gave birth to a foal. Then she ran off as if spooked, or in a hurry. I searched to see if the foal followed her in the trail of dust she kicked up in running, but I couldn't see the foal. I feared she hadn't made it. I can't remember for sure if I finally found the foal or not.

Shortly thereafter I witnessed an elephant giving birth as well, in the same clearing, in the same place. Her birth was slower and seemed more comfortable--not like the wild and writhing foal's birth. Also, while the wold horse gave birth in the sunlight, the elephant was slightly closer to me in the clearing, in the shade of a tree, although it was still plainly daylight. After the baby elephant was born, she and her mother sauntered off together. They seemed private and shy.

I then witnessed a rhinoceros give birth. Her body completely contorted, expanded, and contracted again as her baby emerged. When the baby was out, she seemed to be the mother's twin. They departed, intertwined souls, together.

Finally, after the three intense birth experiences I saw at the foot of the mountain, I found myself suddenly inside a midnight blue hospital room with three women lined up in beds against the wall, close together. One of them was Oprah, and she was also having a baby. She was in labor, and was covering and uncovering her head with a hospital gown. It looked sort of like a burkah. She seemed uncomfortable, but not uncontrollably so. She was still smiling, but she wasn't speaking. Kirstie Alley was in the bed beside her, writhing and whining and complaining.

Then I woke up.

Twas a three birth night. Wonder what it means?

Friday, November 24, 2006

What will those crazy techies think up next?

This is one of the crazier things I've seen lately. Every time I think I can sort of envision the path technology will take, my inklings are completely blown out of the water! I am totally amazed by this. Check it out:

http://www.vonage.com/vonagevphone/#

I think traditional land line phones will be virtually extinct in the next 50 years. We have already eliminated public land line pay phones. Many people use their cell phone as their main personal line--and quite a few of them don't even have a landline in addition to their cell. Most larger companies and institutions have inegrated their phone systems with their internet systems, and they all have DSL. USB online phones seem like the next logical step for the consumer...

Although, all this switch to high-speed info makes the necessity of more fiber optic cable laying an absolute necessity. How are we to manage the increased traffic and utilization of this fantastic technology without supporting it with more infrastructure?

Anyhoo. How cool is Vonage?

Thursday, November 23, 2006

Why I'm Thankful

1. My family
2. School
3. People who care
4. Love
5. Holy people
6. Hybrid cars
7. Tofurkey
8. Christmas
9. Intelligence
10. Human communion
11. Scientists
12. Public Radio
13. Artists
14. Anthropology
15. Music
16. Animals
17. Gardens
18. The sky
19. Travel
20. Friends
21. Books
22. Humour
23. Miracles
24. Popular uprising
25. YouTube

Besides number 1, which is obviously most important, numbers 2 - 25 are in no particular order. I couldn't possibly order them; they are all essential, and essential to my life. For all these things (and many more), I am reminded to give thanks especially on this day.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all.

PS. You will perhaps note that I posted a new quote on the left column, under "Quotes Favoritos". Here it is again, just in case you missed it:

"The world in which you were born is just one model of reality. Other cultures are not failed attempts at being you. They are unique manifestations of the human spirit." - Wade Davis (anthropologist and ethnobotanist)

I also added a new favourite link, "Seasoned in Hell." It is the blog of my husband, and I highly encourage you to read it, as it's quite well-written and thoughtful. (Not that I'm in any way biased, mind you.) Right then. See you!

Sunday, November 05, 2006

Breastfeeding International Icon

Vote for your favourite international (universal) icon for breastfeeding. Mothering Magazine is holding this contest. Check it out!
This is the abstract of the contest: http://www.mothering.com/sections/action_alerts/icon-contest.html


View MicroPoll
Web Survey

Thursday, November 02, 2006

Dia de los Muertos / Day of the Dead

I haven't been around much in the month of October, but here are some recent pictures. Día de los Muertos was today, and I built two altares; one to Elvis, and one to Santiago de Compostela. We showed them at the Day of the Dead celebration on campus today. It was great fun, apparently, but I missed all but set-up and take-down, since I had to study for a test, take a test, and attend a class. But I digress.

Here are a few pics.




Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Dostoevsky

This is the first draft of a poem I wrote this morning while reading Anthropology homework and thinking about why I act the way I do. Post comments and tell me what you think (and what you think needs changing).

working title:
Approaching whole mind

from my mother, the gift of candid speech
of laying one’s heart at the feet of another
and trusting that they will pick it up, hold it, and hand it back
rather than step on it and squish it to oblivion.

from my father, the gift of rhetoric
of building an argument
of clarity of logic, thought expressed eloquently
of the ability to turn heads with words.

I married them: the heart and the head
And I use the tools of each one (of each hemisphere)
I build towers of logic and gardens of feeling
With my mother’s purity and my father’s strength.

In the words I speak, and in the ones I write
I look for the hem of the line, the body callosum
Where the fabric of feeling and the fabric of reason
Are met, and marry and intertwine.

Monday, October 09, 2006

Ireland, ourstyle




The following pictures are:
Thomas and me at the Clonakilty Post Office, which is inside a former church. The people of Clonakilty are pretty sure that theirs is the only post office in the world that is housed in a former church. It's quite interesting; a beautiful old church building, which on the inside has a queue and plexiglass with tellers behind it, and a drop box!





Thomas with a bust of Barry McGovern as Vladimir from Waiting for Godot, taken on our visit to the Dublin Writers Museum.







Us with Nick Harper! Holy Cheese. We gave him a present, which he wore the night he played with his dad. We felt very honoured. The gift was a T-shirt with an Alex Ross painting on it of George Bush as a vampire, sucking the neck of the Statue of Liberty. tee hee. (pictured here)







.

Friday, October 06, 2006

Glocality

I'm feeling very technologically interconnected at the moment. I'm sitting in locally owned Sunergos Coffee on Preston (full o' people right now, by the way--cheers to college kids and Christians, the principal occupants of said shop!). It's 10:15 in the ayem, and I'm using my trusty little Apple iBook, mooching Sunergos' electricity to power the thing, sipping Guatemalan blend coffee, listening to someone else's music library on iTunes--someone who must also be in the coffeeshop. There is a band in their collection called the Appleseed Cast, and they are pretty supercool. (Like, I think I'll buy an album kind of cool.) Meantime, I'm reading Elizabeth's blog all the way from Boston and simultaneously chatting with folks on campus and around the country through Gmail and Facebook.

How glocal! (as in global and local at the same time.... It's an anthropology/economics term I learned. Doesn't roll off the tongue well, but it's linguistically interesting).

It all seemed so 21st century to me... and I mean that in a futuristic sense. Sometimes the feeling of living in the future now comes upon me with overwhelming clarity. Timelines, notions of "progress" and "civilization," fold and compress before me, around me, and I get a glimpse of what it must have been like to be Philip K. Dick. In the book VALIS he posits that time actually ended in 79 AD and that this 'modern' world is laid over it, and obscures that reality. I don't subscribe to that particular manifestation of the notion that time is illusory, but I do believe in that general idea. Time as an external, measured and measurable reality is a false notion. Time exists insofar as we create it and then observe (and obey) our creation, but it doesn't exist in some Platonic, empirical, objective, progressive kind of way. And all this intellectual theorizing is tangible for me when I have these moments of supreme surreality, when facets of what we in this culture, day and age call "reality" bends, shifts, or disappears completely, and one can see the pattern of all of it. I guess it sounds a bit like the Matrix, eh? But it is what I experience.

Sometimes I can look through this hazy distracting veil of habit and structure and have these peircing moments of true clarity, when I can see the world full-on, not sideways or peripherally. It's breathtaking, and exhiliarating, and terrible.

So, enough of that. I hope you're all keeping up with Elizabeth's blog, A Room Full of Books , because it is hilarious, and poignant, and insightful, and lovely. Please do yourselves a favor and read it.

And speaking of blogs, sorry I've not been 'round much. The semester is eating me from the outside in. I'm holding off the attacks for now, but it has been disheartening and frustrating and draining in many ways. In equally many ways it's been a grand and worthwhile adventure, full of new and fascinating people, places, ideas, experience and feelings. In all ways it has been taxing. I look forward to rest and press on to the next project.

P.S. I have asked Jimmy and Thomas if I may post pictures of them from the Ireland trip, and they are fine with it, so expect more Ireland pictures SOON! Love and learning to each of you.

Thursday, September 21, 2006

Autumn becomes me

Hace casi un mes que no estoy aquí en la red, en la blog. I haven't been on my blog in almost one month. And what a month! I had some pretty desperate moments of wanting to drop out of school as I attempted to negotiate my time, balancing between three executive boards, classes, work, and home--what with Thomas being ill and all. But he's on the mend now, happy to say. It was a long six weeks, worrying about him and having the added stress of a sick husband. And I am quite enjoying my semester, although I often think I have more to do than is possible to do in 24 hour days. C'est la vie.

In any case, I didn't come on here tonight to write about any mundane goings-on; rather, I wanted to post a poem I wrote a few weeks back when I had been mentally railing against the ridiculous Louisville weather as I drove home on a particularly sticky evening. I watched the sky turn from bright blue to pink and orange, not able to enjoy the colours for the heat. The beauty of the sunset was pushed back from my consciousness, as if I were appreciating a painting through a periscope, though, and I suddenly realized as I felt the heat and all the people enjoying it, how futile it was for me to pretend that hot weather is a thing I enjoy. I also realized, in a moment, how silly it is, more generally, to consider the weather we have in Louisville between May and September to be the thing called "summer"; it is not. Furthermore, it is an implied lament that I don't leave in a place where September is more autumn than summer. To have the stifling heat of the summer survive into September... it's just not fair. This poem is an expressed feeling about what a Louisville autumn really is: a disgustingly unpleasant period of time, free from breezes, cool rains, pleasant smells, or shade. It's hot and oppressive and dangerous and exhausting. And silly. So here it is.

Kentucky's Ohio

and what is autumn
anyway
in this stygian pocket
of the river’s ridge
the heat and damp
swallowing the spine of
this twisted river body.
We’re tucked in:
Ken-tucked
in this Ohio Valley summer
where the moisture hangs
and the mosquitoes multiply.

Is it October yet?

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Facebook innovates again

Clare Gervasi Kalb's Facebook profile

I wanted to see if this would work. It's a Facebook "badge." Not sure exactly how it will be useful to me, but I was curious to see what happened. Hmmm.... Curiouser and curiouser.

¡Qué maravilla el internet!

In other news, the first two days of school are enjoyable thus far. I've only had one actual class so far, but have been keeping quite busy with Honors Student Council. I am looking forward to posting more pics from Ireland, but in the meantime I am feeling more placid than last semester, trying to be more organized and hopeful. This plan is going well so far; for instance, I have planned out all the dinner meals for the week. Yesterday was pesto pasta, the day before was beef stew, and tonight will be polenta cakes. I have revoked my veganism and feel quite good about it. My body feels more grounded, in a good way. Nourished, not schizophrenic. We'll see how it goes.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Overseas and into the heart

I've just come back down after an exhiliarating (and sometimes tense) vacation. Ireland for a week was amazing. The absolute best vacation ever. It felt so good to travel with my husband, to brbing together my love of travel with my true love. We stayed mostly in County Cork, and a few days in Dublin. I'll hopefully post a more detailed account of the trip, but for now, here's a picture or two of some of my favourite things on the trip.


a pretty cottage on Clonakilty Bay, West Cork.











me, taking advantage of a photo op at the Clonakilty Model Railway Village.












Nick Harper, playing his show at deBarra's Folk Club in Clonakilty, August 2nd. It was a spiritual experience....












This is a sheela-na-gig on the side of a 16th century castle. Sheelas were pagan goddesses carved into the sides of churches and castles to protect them from invaders. These sheelas were hags, or wisewomen, with hideous faces, who exposed their genitals, the source of their protective power.
















:)

Friday, July 28, 2006

Swear Eternal Friendship to Beauty

"In each person I catch the fleeting suggestion of something beautiful and swear eternal friendship with that."

-- George Santayana

This is the way to always love people: to see the good in them and believe in that goodness. I love this quote because it is such a perfect crystallization of why and how I seem to enjoy almost everyone's company, and why it's possible to be an optimist. It's an interesting meditation, especially when one forces oneself to find and see the beauty in others normally considered anathemic to oneself. Such as George W. Bush.

But when one can look and see the beauty in any one person, one never wants for compliments, or hope, or allies, or friends.

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

JK (kidding, not Rowling)

This post was intended for my birthday, but I had some technical difficulties. Thanks for your patience with my spotty appearances, and I hope all is right with you and yours. And now, unfettered and unindulged, in its original text, my post from two days ago....

Hi again, Mouseketeers! July has flown by in a gust of productivity and contentment (and a certian measure of worry and stress, of course, I must admit). I've checked many things of the "I desire to do" list, such as: see the movie A Scanner Darkly, get stuff for Honors Student Council rolling, visit the Anthropology Department, attend the birth of the baby K (name omitted for privacy's sake), watch lots and lots of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and NYPD Blue, love on my husband, bake things (eg banana bread, chocolate chip cookies, birthday brownies, curried rice).

And so, although I've been absent here, I've been trying to be more present elsewhere. I feel that my attempts to attract the good and repel the bad are having tangible repercussions, the most disturbing of which is that as I feel the bad energy draining from me, I am pretty sure that I'm being attacked by dark energies from the outside. Odd things keep happening, namely the deaths of pets of my family (first, my sister-in-law's bunny, then my mom's loyal dog, then another bunny of my sister-in-law's). Then, my computer broke and was away being fixed for two weeks, in a bid to deter me from being efficient. Littler things, like inexplicable bruises and pains in my body, along with a flat tire, all sort of converged this month, communicating to me that the process of trying to think positively is an arduous and sometimes dangerous task. But I feel determined. I want to be a hopeful person again, a peaceful and understanding person. I want to stop being "right" and start being helpful. I'm sick of my beliefs and my judgments and biases. I want to clean my heart of resentment. This is difficult, but it is worth the effort, I think.

And today is my birthday, happy auspices already received. I turned on the radio this morning while making lunches, and the first song I heard was "Hounds of Love" by Kate Bush, one of my favourites of all time and on my birthday mix this year. Odd coincidence, eh? And then, when I got in the car to drive the kids to daycamp, "Funkytown" by Lipps, Inc. followed by Prince's "Kiss"--great songs to hear on one's birthday. As I've mentioned on the blog before, each year on my birthday, I make a compilation CD of important songs for me that year. Here is this year's list, which I will burn a bit later on today, and enjoy for time immemorial: (and with this list, I give my leave. Until soon!)

What's My Age Again? by Blink 182
Wild Witch Lady by Donovan
It's Not the Fall That Hurts by the Caesars
Never Been to Spain by Three Dog Night
Hounds of Love by Kate Bush
Psycho Killer by the Talking Heads
Town Called Malice by the Jam
Down by Nothing Error
Running Up That Hill by Kate Bush
Hey Rose by Girlyman
Bilingual Girl by Yerba Buena
Everlasting Sea by Donovan
Treasure Island by Nick Harper
Maori by Girlyman
Roun' the Globe by Nappy Roots
You Have Killed Me by Morrissey
I Am Here to Break Your Heart by Nothing Error
You Show Me Yours (And I'll Show You Mine) by Kris Kristofferson
One Night in Bangkok by Murray Head
Frankly, Mr. Shankly by the Smiths
Cosmic Dancer by T.Rex

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

In with the new, out with the pink

I haven't been around much on my blog this summer, and for this I am sorry. Me lamento la falta de estar presente en la red. I've been occupied loving my husband and trying to foster closeness with him. I have also been working hard on stuff for Honors Student Council and BirthCare Network. And I have two birth clients whose due dates are about to collide with each other! (One is late in coming, and I have a feeling the other will come early....)

You might also notice that my blog looks different, and has a different name. This change is meant to reflect a turn in the road for me; I am reconceptualizing my creative space as a reflection of the process of reconceptualizing that I am doing in my life. Please let me know what you think. As a last note, this new template does not allow links, so here, inside the post, are links to my favourite sites:



Happy reading! May the road rise to meet you, etc.

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's ME! ...or not.

I am apparently Supergirl. Take this superhero quiz to find out who YOU are:

http://www.seabreezecomputers.com/superhero/

My results:
Your results:
You are Supergirl
























Supergirl
85%
Spider-Man
80%
Wonder Woman
80%
Iron Man
80%
Superman
75%
Hulk
75%
Green Lantern
70%
Batman
45%
Robin
40%
The Flash
40%
Catwoman
40%
Lean, muscular and feminine.
Honest and a defender of the innocent.


Click here to take the Superhero Personality Test



Link to my results:
http://www.seabreezecomputers.com/superhero/result.htm?a=75&b=80&c=45&d=85&e=80&f=40&g=75&h=40&i=70&j=40&k=80

Thursday, June 15, 2006

Making Up For Lost Time... No te preocupas.

I have taken a proverbial page out of the blog of my good friend Elizabeth (see new link to the right) and have happened upon--albeit "sin querer" (unintentionally)--my own "FreeWill Astrology" horoscope o'the week. And Elizabeth certainly has a page to spare for me; her new blog is called "A Room Full of Books," and all I needed was the one page.... Elizabeth's blog is the absolute authority on all things literary. At least, in my world, it is. Elizabeth is my biblio-beacon, illuminating for me her opinions of her favourite tomes, and giving me ideas for great picks and must-have items. Go check out her blog. She is the most amazing rising Reference librarian EVER! She will someday rule the written wor(l)d!!!!

To get back to it, ahem, here is my horoscope from FreeWill:
"My life is about finding time to dream," M. Night Shyamalan has said. I urge you to make that your motto, Leo. The progress of your most practical ambitions later in 2006 will depend on whether or not you spend the next few weeks tapping into information that's available through fantasies, meditations, dreams and other altered states."

Now, to some who read this blog, perhaps my finding credence in astrology is akin to listening to demonic spirits. For me, however, I feel like it's affirmation from the cosmos that I'm heading in the right direction. For the past year or two even, I've been adrift in the metaphysical sea, with no dogma to guide my path--except the belief that belief systems as a rule are flawed and even deceptive and that the people who stand atop them and wave their banners are, at best, inconsistent but well-intentioned, and at worse, malevolent liars.

This belief in "no belief system" is the most dangerous kind of metaphysical existence. I have felt the lack of true and sincere belief in my heart very acutely for some time now. I have sought to fill that gap in all manner of ways (med school? smoking? partying? grade-consciousness? scholarship? agnosticism? money?), but what it's come down to is that I have to remove the impediments in the path to that lacking. I had blocked my open heart with rationalization, anger, disappointment, skepticism. Now I am trying to uncover those layers that have been blocking my ability to commune with the metaphysical part of myself.

(At least) one of my family members is worried that I am opening myself up to evil forces if I open myself up to "positive energy" of the random and unidentified variety. I understand what she means, because I saw her go through the same dark path for several years. But I feel like I've already been on that path; that when I stopped listening to my heart and started listening to my ego instead, I allowed those darker forces to wheedle their logic into me. I know what darkness feels like and looks like; I know well how I behave when in their sphere of influence. And what I'm trying to do now is push them back and out of me, and fill that part again with goodness and hope. But I'm not, at this point, ready to name the positive force to which I am praying, because I still feel like that inherently puts spirituality into a man-made box and creates more room for anxiety and anger to reign in me. Nevertheless, this force is, intuitively the same as that which I've always appealed to, but which at some point I decided was indifferent to me and possibly non-existent. It's easy to see now that this force never changed; only I did.

So I'm trying to change back. "...At this point a new story begins, the story of a [wo]man's gradual renewal, her gradual rebirth, her gradual transition from one world to another, of her growing acquaintance with a new...reality." (Dostoevsky, the second to last sentence in Crime & Punishment)

And the horoscope in LEO encourages me; that is all. And as far as its advice goes, I have been paying special attention to my dreams of late, as they seem to be imbued with transcendent meaning, full of vivid images and memorable phrases. I have begun writing poetry again (most of it, as yet, horrible--case in point in last entry); I am drawing a bit; I am trying to dig back into my memories, in order to remember the magic of children's thinking. I am looking for the divine instead of the man-made; I welcome the supernatural, the creative and the unifying.

We'll see how it goes.... !

Friday, June 09, 2006

Things Are Intense--but Good. (What Else Is New?)

This is flippin' ridiculous. It's been over two weeks since my last, pathetic post. Inexcusable!

And yet, I have some excuses. For example: I have been a busy bee! in such pursuits as Birth in the Bluegrass (still wrapping up the loose ends from that one), Freshman Orientation at UofL (ongoing), creating a myspace account (yes, I'm officially addicted to the internet), Facebooking, reading, having some intense interaction with my husband (not like that, you perv). I also just got hired as a Spanish and Italian tutor for REACH (free tutoring provided by UofL). Oh, yeah, and one other little detail:

I GOT A FULL TUITION "ETSCORN" SCHOLARSHIP FROM THE HONORS PROGRAM FOR THE 2006-07 SCHOOL YEAR!!!!

Bwahahahahaha. I am so very happy not to have money troubles for the foreseeable future. Aaahhhhh..... I also have started doing yoga in my backyard (weather permitting) which has made me feel better physically. Spiritually I seem to be going through some kind of passage.... the immateria and the holy are calling to me. I am beginning to seek to answer that call once more. I have started trying to meditate and pray (on purpose) again. I'm not sure who I'm praying to except that I want to channel the forces of peace and good and power bigger than myself. --I think I've been trying to rely too much on myself for answers, instead of just letting them fall upon me, as they used to. Too much seeking, not enough finding. I need more stillness to find, I think.

Anyhoo. As part of my re-invigorated "Slow down, you move too fast; you gotta make the moment last" mantra, I have written my first poem in more than two years, in an attempt to get the creative juices reciculating through my soul. I share it here with you now, simply to demonstrate that I am rusty, but I am trying to reconnect with that part of me. Here it is:

I never noticed, till now
how the clouds resemble bones
A front of sirrus whisps
lined up
like a column of crooked vertebrae
with good bone density
...no celestial kyphoplastys on this front.

There, after the spine,
a single, trailing hyoid circle
of a cloud
smeared by the wind
--Someone must've smashed the throat.

These cloud x-rays float beyond my roof
toward that gibbon of a moon:
waxing, the densest bit of bone mass in the evening sky.

Yeah, it's weird. Sorry. As an aside in case you're curious, a kyphoplasty is an outpatient surgery performed by a neurosurgeon or orthopoedic surgeon wherein a collapsed spinal vertebra has a needle inserted into it with a balloon on the end; the balloon is blown up to resotre the vertebra to its original height, and special cement is inserted to fill the balloon and recreate the density and structure of the vertebra to its original state. In addition, in case you are burning to know, the hyoid bone is the only bone in the body that is not articulated (does not connect) to any other bone. It's high in the throat and helps the tongue navigate its intricacies. It's cool to look at on an x-ray because it appears to be floating in the throat, different than the stacked architecture of the spine, shoulders, ribs, et al. Here's a representation of it in the body, relative to the cervical spine and skull:



Here is a short pictorial representation of the main parts of a kyphoplasty procedure:

Saturday, May 27, 2006

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

Spanish phrase o'the day: Amas de Casa Desesperadas (Desperate Housewives)

I have only the energy to post this quote, which Elizabeth so fortuitously sent me. It's sort of a snapshot summary of all my feelings about the nature of reality, and the constant and on-going thought process I have regarding the seeming reality that "truth is stranger than fiction." Here's the quote.

"Without realizing it, the individual composes his life according to the
laws of beauty even in times of greatest distress. It is wrong, then, to
chide the novel for being fascinated by mysterious coincidences...but it is
right to chide man for being blind to such coincidences in his daily life."
(Milan Kundera, from The Unbearable Lightness of Being)

Monday, May 22, 2006

One Night In Bangkok

THOSE IN LOUISVILLE:

Birth the Play at Actor's Theatre: Friday, June 2 and Saturday, June 3 at 8pm. tickets $15; $12 for students & seniors. (502) 584-1205 for more info.

4th annual "Birth in the Bluegrass" Childbirth Conference June 3 at Executive Inn West in Louisville KY, 10am - 2pm. This year's theme: "Achieving Balance in Childbirth." see link to Birth Care Network on the right side of this blog for more info. www.birthcarenetwork.com

PLEASE BE THERE! You are supporting choice in childbirth for birthing families!!!!!

Right. Sorry about the week gap in writing here, but I've been horribly productive doing other things. It's quite brilliant, actually. Although I've been pretty bitchy much of the week (either due to PMS, echoes of Mother's Day, or my husband's stress level, what with the end of the school year upon us and all), I have gotten lots done, for myself and for my satellite interests. For example, I've done loads of things to get ready for the Birth in the Bluegrass Conference week after next!!! I'm in charge of the Silent Auction, and have been colelcting plenty of lovely items and services to auction. I've also made calls to prospective vendors and have tied up other Birth Care Network loose ends. I even got myself a lovely massage on Wednesday and lunched with Andrew the Lovely Medievalist. We had a civilized chat over salads and soups about some viking named Something-wulf cleaving people in two. Quite civilized, I assure you. Especially the cleaving.

And my beautiful Elizabeth moves! She migrates north for the summer, and then back to MASS. Interestingly and by coincidence (as usual), this morning I was talking to one of my many bosses at the Honors House (Tony), who purports that all people from Boston are mean. I disagreed with him, saying that my experience in Boston had been quite lovely--especially the North Quarter--and he replied by saying, "they don't call them MASSholes for nothing." I thought that was pretty funny, although I disagreed, obviously. tee hee.

In other news, I've begun my summer job at school. I'm in training this week so that we can begin advising freshmen during orientation next week! Exciting times! My kids end school this week as well, and my sister's in town visiting, too! All kinds of things happening, and yet I'm a bit melancholy to be out of my routine of visiting friends from school. They've scattered to the four winds for summertime, understandably. And I've got plenty on the docket, what with the play and the conference and working and the end of school etc., but I still miss seeing my "peeps" (which I must always say with a bit of irony...).

PS. The title refers to the song I've been listening to incessantly for the past week. It's from a Tim Rice musical called "Chess."

Monday, May 15, 2006

How Do I Hate Mother's Day? Let Me Count The Ways

I am a doula. This means that I spend a considerable chunk of time with women who are seasoned mothers, women just preparing to be a mother, or women who are handling the new job of mothering. I love my mother; I love my mother-in-law. I love my sister--also a mother. I love all my colleagues at BirthCare Network, most of whom are mothers several times over. I love women and mothering and birth and uteri and vaginas and voluptuousness. I love the Goddess.

Nevertheless, I hate Mother's Day... a LOT.

Mother's Day is a sucky day for me, because I am confronted with a reality which normally I am able to keep on the fringes of my consciousness. But as I watch my husband make a present with the kids for his ex-wife, I naturally tend toward feelings not unlike that which chopped liver must feel. All in all, I feel pretty marginalized. ...I did get a cool present yesterday from my family, but it was given to me with the understanding that it was meant as a 'thanks for taking care of us' present. So, in short, I had mixed feelings about it. I love my stepkids, and I love my husband and his appreciation for the contribution I made to raising his kids. But on Mother's Day, it really hurts--a LOT--not to be a "real" mom. As a logical result, I was in a pretty bad mood all weekend, and now I'm just glad it's over.

Ironically, the blatant Mother's Day salutations I did receive were from my sister-in-law, my own mother and father, and from my husband's ex-wife. She gave me a very beautiful card expressing how much she appreciated the contribution I make to her children's lives. To receive this from her is somewhat bittersweet, you know, as I simultaneously appreciate the recognition while also resenting her for having had her own babies, while I probably will have none. It's a weird life, to be sure.

Questions and sentiments about being a parent, reproducing oneself, sharing one's life with another person and mutually raising and transmitting their culture together to this new being are much more momentous and primal than anyone can really accurately feel in youth. It is only with time that the import of these human rites becomes obvious. For myself, I don't think, now, that I'll be a happy woman at 60 if I have no children of my own to show for it. I don't have a sense that I'll ever make a baby myself, but I think adoption will be a necessary part of my future. I've got to have some kid to call my own. Sharing other people's children (whether my stepkids or those children whose families hire me during their gestation) can only go so far.

Friday, May 12, 2006

2 Years Late: Better Now Than Never

Although this album came out 2 years ago and I never tried to publish this review, perhaps I can persuade a few of you to buy/listen to the album. Here's the review.



All That We Let In CD Review

The Indigo Girls' newest CD, All That We Let In, is another set of beautiful, uplifting songs that speak to the truth of our hearts as Americans and as lovers of human nature. Amy Ray and Emily Saliers appeal to the best instincts in their listeners; this faith in their consumers is the chief reason for their success on this album and in previous years.
The most necessary song on this CD is “Perfect World,” the Indigo Girls’ simultaneous praise of the utopian aspects of America and admonishment of its underlying roots in injustice and excess. Case in point: “I’m okay if I don’t have to do the killing/or know what the killing is for..../And in this moment we are denying/what it costs.../for one perfect world/when we look the other way.” The song exhorts us to “learn to live another way,” and realize the price we must pay for the cost of the freedom and privilege we enjoy in the United States.
Another must-have song is “All That We Let In,” the CD’s title track. It is an anthem against apathy, an invitation to love the world unconditionally, despite loss and sadness. The poignant yet simple lyrics pull on one’s heartstrings with effective zeal, but never cross into that dreaded arena of “cotton candy” music: “You see those crosses on the side of the road/Or tied with ribbons in the median/They make me gratedul I can go this mile/Lay me down and wake me up again.” Typical of the Indigo Girls, Amy and Emily walk the fine line between gripping emotion and fetid melodrama, always steering clear of the mediocre.
Musically, the album has all the variety one would expect of these such seasoned musicians. Some tracks have a reflective tone, with velvety vocal harmonies and stripped-down instrumentals. There are, of course, upbeat, folksy songs, in signature Indigo Girls style. “Dairy Queen” is a dramatic country ballad with sophisticated and heartfelt lyrics, while “Heartache for Everyone” has a decidedly ska sound, with its organ and accordion instrumentals and hyper-reggae beat.
As an added bonus, the album art is drawn by the renowned comics artist Jaime Hernandez of Love and Rockets fame, and is worth the price of admission alone. So it’s the icing on the cake that All That We Let In will have you tapping your feet while also causing you to want to make the world a better place. It speaks to the most reverent place in the heart, and is a perfect album for any poetic soul. - Clare F. Gervasi

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

Old thoughts, with a comic

I started going through old journal entries this morning in an attempt to make sense of the vast folders and documents plugging up free space on my hard drive (eww, that sounds gross). Here's an excerpt I thought was worth sharing from February 23, 2004:

I am sitting here in the window of Day’s coffeeshop at the age of 21, writing, the same exact place I was 3 years ago. Writing--constipatedly, grudgingly--and no closer to holding a college degree or a tangible future.
I have just finished listening to a piece on NPR about twenty-somethings moving back in with their parents post-graduation because the job market is so prohibitive at the moment, due to recession. First, they said kids are moving back home because there is less stigma associated with it, and because “young people” want to save money. Then they begin in on how kids actually LIKE their parents. They get along with them in a way their parents could not with their own parents.
And I sit here by myself in this cold storefront window, staring at the slacker-filled abyss that is Bardstown Road Highlands, and I feel a note of discord strike my heart at the thought of what this guest on this radio show is saying. It dissettles me.
There is something extremely distasteful to me in the notions of this ex-hippie talking on the radio about how parents today “don’t want to separate themselves from young people. They listen to more of the ‘young people’s’ music; they wear more of the ‘young people’s’ fashions, and they are close to them in ways that World War II generation parents could not relate to their kids, to us.” A statement like this--and it is not a new assertion--really rubs me the wrong way. Well, it forces to the forefront of my consciousness all doubts about the veracity and genuineness of this statement, where they then ferret and furrow uncomfortably into and around the gyri and sulci of my brain. It is worthy to note that this parent and commentator who spoke about generational differences in the parent-child relationship NEVER ONCE referred to his own child. He referred to “young persons.”

In other news, I also found a comic strip I made for my lovely friend Elizabeth last year. Here it is:



And as Meigooni faithfully pointed out, not everyone who checks this blog reads Spanish! (duh, Clare. sheesh.) So, Here's the translation:
FRAME 1: My God, rooster! We're in Spanish! What're we going to do?
FRAME 2: I know... First, we have to get new clothes--STAT!
FRAME 3: Dave: Why? Rooster: Because, Latinos never wear ties, man. It looks stupid, you know?
FRAME 4: Oh, yeah, I get it: Don't be a gringo.
FRAME 5: So, how do you like our new duds?
FRAME 6: That's not funny, bitch! I'M not the gringo, motherf*er!
NOTE: For Elizabeth, my gringo bitch :)

Thursday, May 04, 2006

Just Another Facebook

Spanish word of the day: Envenenada (adj): poisoned.

Well, I did it. I joined Facebook. I am officially a college student now, full and initiated. It was sort of scary, actually, to join the network, but I knew that I had to be a part of it. I think of myself as the kind of person who cares about being plugged into as many people as possible, and what better way to do that than the forum of Facebook? It's an amazing phenomenon, really. To connect so many people in such a social and personal way, completely using fiber optic cable and ethernet connections.... It's pretty cool. I think it's a further expression of the technological manifestation of the very sincere human desire to be aware of and concerned about and interested in each other. --So, despite my reservations about the collision between one's personal and professional life everyone keeps talking about, I'm a joiner. Go me!

I am reading Anthropologist on Mars right now, and at the very front of the book are two quotes which I would simply like to leave with you here, and then I'll go (busy as I am enjoying my free time, unencumbered by school!!!):

"The universe is not only queerer than we imagine, but queerer than we CAN imagine." - J.B.S. Haldane

"Ask not what disease a person has, but rather what person the disease has." - (attributed to) William Osler

Monday, May 01, 2006

Anchovies, Hamper.

SPANISH WORD OF THE DAY: enchufes. (en-choo'-fays) noun, literally, an electrical outlet. Slang, however, has them as powerful people that you know. People who can "hook you up," so to speak. For example: "How did you get box seats to the Derby?" "Enchufes, hombre. I serve coffee to Bob Bafford's dog's trainer's shrink."

This blog is such a nice cranny in which to hide. Much better than writing my two final papers for the semester. Bwahahahaha. I am working on campus today (getting paid, in other words, to sit here and listen to music and surf the net). I'm listening to a band called Nothing Error, headed by Doug Hill, of whom I know little but wish to know more. His band's got an EP out called I Am Here to Break Your Heart. His myspace website can be viewed here, for those of you interested in edgy yet not exhibitionist punk, full of feeling but little frustrated tire spinning, like so much "punk" music is these days:

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=5297528.

At this particular moment, I'm listening to a track called "Down," the best line of which is "I'm not to blame\It's not my fault\That all your wounds\Filled up with salt." Probably not the kind of thing a Louie Prima lover such as Michael Jackman would enjoy, but perhaps Grant (of Reginald Meeks' fame...go publicly elected officials and their interns!) or Andy Bart (of recent birthday fame) would be into it.

Speaking of Michael Jackman, I pleasantly ran into him last week at Heine Bros on Chenoweth. I was there to meet a classmate to study for our Spanish final later in the week (hence the paucity of presence here on Barefoot and Married last week, sorry. Finals take precedence), and he happened to be there, for I'm not sure what reason. It can, I suppose, be chalked up to the fact that Jackman is ubiquitous in coffeeshops, as any good writer ought to be. Coffeeshops have everything the writer needs: a decent wifi connection, plenty o' caffeine, electrical outlets and interesting people to look at. I only got to speak to him for a moment, but he mentioned that he recently had a commentary published in LEO, which I was delighted to hear. It's a great one, and I got to hear the audio version live a few weeks ago, right after he'd written it, when we met for coffee (of course) at Highland. Go read it! http://www.leovia.com/?q=node/1237 ...Also, his own website is extremely well-maintained and interesting. His writing is incisive, honest, self-deprecating, and of course hilarious. Here's a link to his website: http://www.mjfreelancer.com/

I'll go now, I suppose. I must finish writing about invented tradition. I shall force myself. Argh! (That was me making my tough face at myself.)

PS WTF is up with Bush? Does he WANT hippie liberals to take up arms against him or what? see picture below.



PPS. The title for the blog entry today comes from the spellcheck on blogger.com. It wanted to change "Enchufes, hombre." To "Anchovies, hamper." It doesn't get better than that, now does it? Furthermore, it wanted to call Bob Bafford Bob byproduct. How unfortunate! Also, Blogger's spellcheck does not recognize "blog" as a word. --Ironic, ¿no?

Friday, April 21, 2006

A Series of Unfortunate Coincidences


As I was driving home last night in the rain from the Latin America Fiesta sponsored by Spanish Club, it occurred to me that I've made 3 extra trips between home and school this week. Generally, I'm exceedingly good at conserving and multitasking my goings out in my car so as to save fuel, but this week meetings etc fell in such a way as to make it quite impossible to waste less than 3 gallons of gas.

And, the unfortunate coincidence of it is that of course, all this extra driving has occurred in the same week as the highest gas price spike since Katrina. I really know how to plan these things, don't I? Grrr. Ah, well. Can't be helped. I had to go to the fiesta last night (which was so much fun, by the way) because they announced the winners of Spanish Club elections, for which I ran for secretary. I won (it was an uncontested race... go figure.).

Anyhoo, in other news, I was listening to NPR this morning, and they were interviewing Sergio Mendez and Wil IM of the Black Eyed Peas about his redux of classic Sergio bossa nova songs. It didn't make me want to buy the album--although I did enjoy the interview. Instead, I pulled out the original Austin Powers soundtrack which contains one famous Sergio Mendez song (the only one i have in my collection as yet), "Mas Que Nada." Now the CD has moved on to other songs, and at the moment the 'classic' "I Touch Myself" performed by the Divinyls is playing.

...Yeah. It's that kind of a day, I guess.

Still raining in Louisville, and I'm loving it. Can't get too much rain, I say. Quizás I ought to move to Seattle? No. I don't think I'm that big a fan. In any case, the rain has blown all the blossoms on our dogwoods, just as I acquired some new prayer flags to hang from them after my others were stolen in March. Go Republican Catholic neighborhood! I do so love religious hate crimes. But, as the Buddha would say, "Whatev. Stuff happens."

Hasta luego, y'all. ¡Diviértense! Los amo a todos de ellos. :)

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

To Do List en Espanglish

I have another half hour on the clock here at the desk in the Honors House. I have managed to not start my final paper in anthropology, and instead have been emailing and researching el Barrio del Once en Buenos Aires, Argentina. It's a project for class. Me interesa mucho, no obstante. I am drinking tea of the Irish Breakfast variety (need more--lack of caffeine headache descending upon my parietal and temporal lobes..ach!) and listening to Gillian Welch.

I'm just sort of coasting till classes are over. Yo sufro una gran falta de la motivación hoy día. I have NO motivation to finish my work. I just want to be out in my yard pulling weeds, or reading the huge stack of books waiting for me as soon as the semester is over, or watching Smallville or the Simpsons or Being John Malkovich or whatever else I feel like doing!

Between me and vacation stand only a few tasks: final project in SPAN 355 (hence the barrio), final exam in 355, finish reading the book for 355, do capítulo 6 for SPAN 321, final examen oral in SPAN 321 (no worries, yo lo anticipo animadamente), write final paper (10-15 pages) for ANTHRO on "invented tradition," take final exam in linguistics, take last quiz in LING also.

See? Like nothing.

BTW, here are some of the books I plan to read veddy soon after break begins:

Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho
The Alchemist by Coelho also
Women, Fire, & Dangerous Things by George Lakoff
Moral Politics by Lakoff also
The Chomsky Reader
Communist Manifesto
Teenage Confidential (a non-fic collection of teen culture memorabilia from the 50s and 60s)
Peanuts Collections 1 & 3
Eva Luna por Isabel Allende
Ficciones por Jose Luis Borges

and many others not appearing in this film.

Wish me luck that I survive the next 10 days!

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

F*** Disney

Posting had better not become a chore for me. It is good to have incentive to keep up with semi-regular posts because a blog is online, but at the same time, there is a certain amount of pressure associated with it. I had big plans to post while I was in Florida last week, but Disney--of course--charged for their internet access, even for professionals at their convention center. In the hotel rooms, they had only dial-up access, which was quite expensive; in the convention center, there was wireless, but it was also very expensive. So, a week later, I am posting to give you this warning:

NEVER--EVER--GO TO DISNEY! Or ever go to Florida, for that matter. The whole place is just ugly: hot, muggy, bug-filled, one long, penicular range of urban sprawl and bad drivers. Disney itself is King of Commercialism and Consumption. There were literally a million people in the Magic Kingdom park where we passed Saturday afternoon after the conference, and it was so expensive, and filled with lines, and freakishly Twilight-Zone-ish in its contruction of reality. The redeeming part of the whole experience was the abundance of cute children, from 3 months all the way to 11 years, just bouncing about, meeting characters and eagerly waiting in lines for rides.

Here is a picture of Allie (co-presenter with me for one of my research projects) and me at Downtown Disney, about to eat dinner at Planet Hollywood (3 hour wait--we were finally dinig at about 9:45pm). It was fun to present research and get to know other students, but I hope never to return to Disney as long as I live. So, there you have it, for what it's worth.

Saturday, April 01, 2006

Playing a Townie in Bloomington

My trip to Bloomington over Spring Break was entirely rejuvenating. I left quite early in the morning and arrived in sleepy little Bloomington at about 7:45am. Elizabeth was up and ready for me, loyal and trusty friend that she is, and upon my arrival made me fresh espresso and we had some scones I had brought her, with fresh whipped cream and lemon curd. A perfect moment, really: scones and espresso and all things lovely and fresh, with my friend whom I miss so much and so often. Visiting with Elizabeth (no matter which one of us translocates—and I must admit, it’s usually her) is like coming home. It’s like recharging a dead battery in my mind and my heart. I love the way Elizabeth thinks; independent, kind, wonder-filled, a bit tragic. In fact, I actually sort of think of talking to Elizabeth as talking to Virginia Woolf reincarnated. Elizabeth is my Reina Elisa: she is a queen, and all that issues from her is intelligent, regal and luxurious. It’s a gift to speak to her. I know Elizabeth doesn’t view herself this way; she thinks she bumbles and trips and is quite self-conscious. She ought not to be, but it is an understandable extension of a poetically introspective life. C’est la vie en poésie.

After breakfast, we drove to town and walked around Indiana University. I had never really experienced IU’s campus on foot, so she gave me a bit of a tour. We, of course (for reasons of shared passion about all things related to books and their collections), visited the Lilly Special Collections Library and the main library on campus. The Lilly was quite elegant and well maintained, with dark wood bookshelves to the ceiling, surrounding a stone fireplace in the meeting hall, gentle sunlight streaming in from the high windows. The wallpaper in the Lincoln room was actually silk, with an embroidered pattern that made one feel one ought to be wearing gloves and an evening gown. In another room were personal letters from Ezra Pound and TS Eliot (among others), behind glass cases and soft light. It was quiet—actually sleepy—as we were first in the door at 9am on a Saturday, when all the other townies were asleep or at the Bakehouse, and the students were all on Spring Break. In fact, the Lilly is so lovely that if you wanted to take a tour yourself, you could utilize the website they have created and take an online tour of the place: http://www.indiana.edu/~liblilly/tour.shtml . Go!

The main library, named the Herman B. Wells, was precisely the opposite in ambiance to the Lilly. There were in fact people about despite the early hour, but the building itself housed none of the charm or elegance of the former place. From the outside it appeared more like the Ministry of Love from George Orwell’s 1984, a huge stone box that seemed to angle outward toward the top. The shape of it was almost comical in its exaggerated hugeness, as if it were meant to be some ironic, postmodern silent joke on a piece of modernist architecture, like so many constructions are these days. I believe it was not a tongue-in-cheek sort of moument, however, as it was built in the 1960s and lacking that final bit of over-exaggeration or flippancy. Instead, I decided it was meant as a paean to modernism, all geometric and pure from feeling or human touch. It was disgusting to my eyes: almost funny, but falling just short of laughing at itself, and so really rather disturbing. (I should insert here that my own university’s library is also hideous, and so I do not intend to speak with condescension, but only bafflement and architectural/artistic apprehension.) Inside was not much different, either, from my mental construction of the Ministry of Love: the 11 or 12 floors were all the same (with the exception of the ground floor): cramped, darkish, overfull, labyrinthine, deserted, overly clerical. The ground floor was the most interesting bit: a wide lobby with art-deco accents that made one feel as if one were standing in a 1930s bus or train terminal. There were shabby couches about and I could swear I noticed an ashtray or two, but perhaps that’s my mental superimposition of a train terminal upon the library lobby. (see photo below)

After IU we spent the remainder of the morning at Soma Coffee and the vintage clothing store above it, among a few other stores. Soma had a lovely T-shirt (too expensive, though, at $17) that said “Soma” on the back and on the front, “No corporate after-taste.” I loved that so much. Elizabeth and I mulled over our various love, family and career situations and futures, not really coming to any conclusions. I was relieved to simply share my emotional meanderings with someone else of like mind and spirit who neither judges nor attempts to fix; she just listens. Qué bendición.

We later visited the Monroe County Public Library where Elizabeth works. It is a beautiful place, full of light and activity, white and wood. I told her it reminded me of a children’s museum; I think that pleased her for some reason.

We lunched at Esan Thai, a new restaurant in Bloomington apparently, which I can recommend with gusto. Quite spicy and good and filling, for about $8. We returned to her house and I thumbed through her books, perused her walls filled with photos and magazine clippings, posters and other incidental information. Later, after a snack of Girl Scout cookies and Twizzlers (classic Elizabeth fare), we drove north of Bloomington to Oliver winery and took a wine tasting session, selected a few bottles for purchase and then walked about the peaceful grounds under the sun and the breeze, which at that time in March still left a chill after it.

After we felt our heads had re-grounded themselves after a stomach full of wine and Twizzlers, we returned to Elizabeth’s and climbed up to her roof, where there is a deck and some Adirondack chairs. We sat up there, looking out over Bloomington and the cemetery close-by, and we drank sweet blackberry wine and relaxed (or, as Bernie Mac would say, “chillaxed”). I don’t remember much of the conversation's particulars (heh...), but I remember Elizabeth walking right alongside me in the lane of conversation the whole time, which is not how I oftentimes feel when talking to others. It’s such a blessing to have someone to talk with who is “with you” all the time. After a while, we went to a Mexican restaurant, se llama "El Norteño," for dinner; I returned to Louisville shortly thereafter.

‘Twas a good, good day. Thanks for loving me, Elizabeth. It was the most ideal Spring Break I could’ve imagined.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Rant, with picture


This is a picture I took last week when I had a moment to myself and I went to Java Brewing on 4th and read some homework articles. It was rainy and cool and there were so many beautiful people everywhere. I had a little Thomas Merton moment as I realized I loved all these people, and saw the beauty oozing from each one of them, to be soaked up by others or by me. It is the very same corner where Merton had his revelation. He was a bit of allright, I think.

IN COMPLETELY UNRELATED NEWS, a rant!:
Right. It's amazing how difficult it is to have time to oneself during the week. I literally feel as if I've got no time at all. Although, I really shouldn't frame things that way, you know. I have loads of free time on Thursdays, I just usually fill it up with appointments or coffees and cetera and cetera. Oh, what a coincidence: TODAY is Thursday.... I love checking in here and just allowing myself time to write. This happy occurrence is, however, overshadowed by my own OCDness which creates all these dramas and traumas where there ought to be only bliss. For example, writing in the blog = Clare happier. However, writing in the blog also = stress about dial-up internet (tying up the line, in other words) & stress about "you ought to be checking items off your to-do list of homework instead of writing. I wish I could get course credit for writing in my blog.... ¡Oi, dios mio! I do believe I just implied I ought to be an English major! My sworn enemy in academic choices!

Perhaps I ought to elaborate. I've got major huge issues with a few things in my professional/academic path: (1) I do not want to be a teacher (both parents = teachers AND I am married to a teacher); (2) I do not want to be an English major because I do not want to be an "English person" as everyone assumes I am. After almost every first paper I turn in for a class, I am asked by my professor, "So you're an English major, right?" NO! I'm not! It's possible to be a good writer and NOT be an English major! ¡Dios! Some people just happen to write well who also happen to be interested in other things, such as foreign languages, such as women's rights, such as sexuality and politics and philosophy. Ahem!

I interject here, by the way, to mention that I do at least find it flattering that professors tend to think highly of my writing; I certainly am proud of whatever skill I have for the written word. Nevertheless--nevertheLESS!--I don't think it's fair to pigeonhole good writers to the realm of English. Seems quite limiting, at least for my interests. I realize as I write this that my husband was an English major and does teach English, that my best friend is an amazing writer and majored in English, and that I am having coffee this morning with a writer whom I very much admire and who teaches writing. I mean not to insult those who feel at home in the English Department and add to its merits by their participation. I merely want to state, out loud, for the record (sorry, My Morning Jacket...hahaheh?), that I want to choose another path than being an "English person." I also want professors to stop framing the question as "You're an English major, right?" And at least say "You write so well. I'm curious to know what your major is." if not say, simply, "Could you tell me what your major is?"

Sorry I have nothing more profound to add at this moment. I've gotta go write an abstract for my anthropology final and get Joe ready for and off to school. Thanks for reading. I anticipate writing about spring break soon. Hopefully this weekend, in between planning for the Silent Auction for Birth in the Bluegrass and writing a research paper on women's birthing choices in the US.

Friday, March 24, 2006

Death of a Frenchwoman

“Death comes in threes.” This is the bit of metaphysical superstitious advice I took from last Sunday’s episode of “Gray’s Anatomy.” I had never watched it before, but I enjoyed it. Sandra Oh is my favourite part of the show—she’s usually my favourite part of any show, a ser honesta. I think she’s amazingly beautiful and intelligent. She steals whatever scene she walks into, in my opinion.

But about the death. La muerte: viene por tres. The verity of this anxiety-producing thought had not congealed into consciousness in my brain until just this evening, when I was writing a sympathy note to my godmother. Her housemate of many years passed away last week. My mom just told me this morning. I realized as I wrote this letter to Hildegard that it’s the third sympathy note in as many weeks that I’ve sent out. First it was the mother of my friend and pen-pal of a decade whom I met in Zimbabwe. She died unexpectedly, leaving him groping for a way to travel to Nigeria while awaiting green card status without permission to travel. Then, a week later, I received an email from the Mrs. of the neurosurgeon I used to work for, telling me that the doctor’s mother had passed away, to whom he was so devoted. Now, I hear from Mom that Denise has indeed crossed over.

It’s an odd thing to think about, for me. I don’t spend much time dwelling on the end of life, except in philosophical, libertarian terms. I think about “The Right to Die” more than any tangible effect dying has on one’s surroundings and surrounders. I spend so much time thinking about what to do NOW, while I’m HERE, and what I can AFFECT or in what I might PARTICIPATE, that it feels unnatural or strange for me to try to understand death in any meaningful or personal way. It’s seems far off: not part of me or my life or my identity. I’m a living person, surrounded by other living persons. I prefer this.

The ratchet thrown in that wheel of living, however, is my mother-in-law. She’s not terribly well, you know. She’s in her 80s, and her health declines yearly. I visit her often, and spend a lot of time talking to her. She’s helped draw my attention in a visceral and emotional way to the end of life, since as much as my husband and I prefer not to think on it, my mother-in-law has many more years behind her than ahead.

Still, this thought does not affect me strongly—at least not in the way I suppose it ought to. I see people grieve and cry and heave and thrash when a loved one dies. And I certainly love E. (not going to put her name on the blog, out of respect for privacy; she’ll just be E.), but I don’t think I’ll do any of those things when E. finally takes her rest. She wants to go; she tells me so—verbatim—every time I see her. She was an active woman for most of her life, and now mostly lives in a 20-foot radius. She hates it, because she sees how limited her body and her brain have made her life, and it frustrates and saddens her. When I see all this, it doesn’t make me feel anything hysterical; I just feel sympathy. I can’t say what I’d do in her place, but I think I feel the same frustration and exhaustion, anyhow.

Which is all part of why I don’t feel like death is something to mourn or dread. E., for instance, has lived a good long life, and now she wants to go, since her level of existence has changed so drastically from that to which she had been accustomed. I understand this; it does not make me sad or lonely. Is this freakish? Ought I to feel the loss more strongly? Perhaps it is because she is not my own mother? I doubt it. I love E. as much as it’s possible to love, and I’ll miss her a lot when she goes. But I don’t dread the thought of her going or being gone. I wonder if this is normal, or if I’m some kind of psychopath....

In other news, I haven’t written in a while. I’ll post more about my trip to Bloomington, etc. v. soon. Must go finish my homemade chai tea and get some kiddies to bed. “Turn of that Friday Night Smackdown! Time for prayers and stories!” (Things we normally say around our household.... Pro-entertainment wrestling with a chaser of prayers and bedtime stories. It all makes sense. ...It’s a good life.) More to come. Tx for reading; vos agradezco.

Monday, March 13, 2006

¡Descanso de primavera! (Spring Break!)

I'm on Spring Break! Yay, oh the infinite happiness. At the moment I'm listening to Iggy Pop's "Family Affair" and drinking a lot of coffee. I'm all alone in my house, it's quite rainy outside, and I'm just sitting at my computer being efficient. I've sent out meeting updates for BirthCare Network and Honors Student Council, I've created abstracts, I've been phoning the BCN president and doing planning for the Silent Auction at Birth in the Bluegrass. Go me! It's nice to feel completely in control of one's schedule, and to have large stretches of time in which to get the ball rolling and really develop trains of thought. Usually I have to switch gears so often that much of my productivity gets lost in the schuffle. It's nice to be in one place for hours and hours, even if I do have to wait for dial-up internet speeds to catch up to me.

Spring Break quite agrees with me. I am sleeping much better, and have decided to be mostly vegan again. I am back to my rule to only eat when hungry, which means I am eating much less often, since I hardly ever feel hunger pangs. When I do eat, I try to be as vegan as possible, although SMALL bits of cheese are acceptable as garnish, and eggs seem to agree with me, so I eat them in moderation. I am trying to stay away from refined sugar as much as possible, although I admit that I am still putting Coffeemate creamer (read: cancer in a bottle) in my coffee. I think I have already lost weight, as my pants seem looser. However, I refuse to weigh myself, as it is unwaveringly depressing to do so.

Also in celebration of the liberation afforded by Spring Break, I have begun doing some pleasure reading for the first time all semester! I have begun reading Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal About the Mind by George Lakoff, and Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. One non-fiction book, one fiction: gotta keep a balance. I also plan to clean up as much of the basement as I can deal with, and maybe even create a little private space for myself down there! And I am going to Bloomington (Indiana, that is) on Wednesday, which I anticipate with much eagerness, because I will be visiting my beloved kindred spirit friend, Elizabeth. All happiness... I can't wait. I also can't wait to give the highlights of the trip here later in the week.

In other news, I would like to share something. I make a CD for myself every year on my birthday to remind myself of all the songs that were significant to me in that year of my life, so that I can refer to them in the future and reminisce auditorily. My songlist this year is so far comprised así:

Wild Witch Lady by Donovan
Never Been to Spain by Three Dog Night
What's My Age Again? by Blink 182
Psycho Killer by the Talking Heads
Town Called Malice by the Jam
Running Up That Hill by Kate Bush
Hounds of Love by Kate Bush
It's Not the Fall That Hurts by the Caesars
Bilingual Girl by Yerba Buena
Hey Rose by Girlyman
Maori by Girlyman
Treasure Island by Nick Harper
Everlasting Sea by Donavan

--not necessarily in that order, mind you. Anyhoo. That's just a sample of what I've been listening to and importing to my brain and my life.

I've gotta go be happy now. It's SPRING BREAK!
Yay.

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

I Want to Have Jon Stewart's Babies



Have I mentioned lately how much I love Jon Stewart? Despite his uncomfortable appearance as host of the Oscars last Sunday, I still find him enchanting. I especially like his young, cute Jewishy-ness in the college picture above. *sigh* And not that i'm on Face Book, but if I were, I would join my friend Elizabeth's group there called "I want to have Jon Stewart's babies." Yeeeah.....

In other news, I feel the need to explain the quote under my blog title. Firstly, I just wanted to give nods to Jane Austen. It's like Jamie Foxx said in his Oscars 2005 acceptance speech: (something along the lines of) "I see Oprah, and Halle.... I don't have anything else to say about y'all, just wanted to say your names, I see you sitting out there...." Yeah. So, not that Jamie Foxx is my cultural compass or anything, but I feel about Jane Austen the way he feels about Halle Berry and Oprah Winfrey: I just repsect and admire her so much, I try to give recognition whenever the opportunity presents itself. The quote itself is sort of a supplication to readers of the blog, I suppose. I am a young person, married, in an interesting situation, and so hopefully will be kindly spoken of. I implore the reader with this quote to indulge me as s/he reads.

Enough psycho-literary analysis for the day. Just wanted to report that today is lovely. It's going to rain, I'm wearing my great-grandmother's alligator shoes, I finished my Anthropology paper, I made plans for dinner double-date with Luke and Kelly (which I've been desiring to do for about a year now), I'm listening to Kajagoogoo and Kanye West on my iTunes, and I'm heading a meeting today. Although I'm not particpularly prepared for the meeting, I am excited to be starting an Honors Student Council. I am even more excited by the student interest in the Council. More to come on the progress there....

Must go study for my Spanish Conversation test at 1pm today. Thanks for reading!

Monday, March 06, 2006

Vodka Is My Friend, or Would Be

So I was feeling pretty good today, for a while. I had made some free time (i.e., not specifically scheduled time wherein I might catch up on the hundreds of prjocts of mine suspended in mid-production) during the last few days. I had reconnected with Thomas. I was feeling capable of writing my summary/reaction for Iberian Anthropology despite a paucity of support from the class itself. And I was eager to schedule my classes for fall.

Everything was good; then, this morning, I got to actually schedule my classes for next semester, and suddenly that knot in my stomach rewound around itself once again. And so here I am, feeling very anxious. Two of the classes I need for my major are scheduled at the very same time that I need to be home to meet my children’s bus from school. This is very very unfortunate. More than unfortunate; it is eating me. This is not a sane or helpful way to react, but here I am, stomach knotted and feeling like I ought to take a few shots of vodka (it’s 3:30 in the afternoon).

I hate not having total control over my school schedule; I have run out of most of the wiggle room I did have, since the pool of necessary classes is shrinking as I get closer and closer to a degree. While this means the end is near (yay! I won’t have to miss the buses after I finish college!), it also means making harder choices about balancing school and home until that diploma is in my hands. This has always been a point of great anxiety for me, and it’s only getting sharper (the point, that is).

Hence the stomach knot, which can only be untied by alcohol. (Wow; that DEFINITELY sounds like a problem. I ought not to drink. And don’t—at least not at 3 p.m. on a Monday. Just want to.) I know, of course, that this knot must be undone not by self-medication, but by a solution which includes other people. (Another problem: relying on others. Tres difícil.) I feel guilty for dragging Thomas into what I view as “my problem:” scheduling conflicts between my scholastic goals and my domestic duties. Why do I feel these must be in conflict? Why don’t I feel like they’re two halves of the same coin, or something? But I feel like school is “my problem,” despite the financial and other support Thomas has given me with school. And I feel like home duties are set in stone, never to be re-negotiated, and those duties I have (like the buses) were always mine and will always be mine—but that isn’t true either.

Why do I get so freaked out by this stuff? Why don’t I feel like everything’ll just “be okay”? I used to feel that way about life; now it’s not so easy. Why is that? Why is everything hard? Do I make it so? Why do I, or would I? Grr. I need a drink.

Sunday, March 05, 2006

This Is Not Bridget Jones' Diary

Posting two. I hate to think this might be true, but I wonder (me pregunto, como se dice en español) if part of my decision to go ahead and start a blog was inspired by my reading of Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding earlier this semester. (I live in semesters, not seasons or months or weeks.) While the book itself sort of irritated me on an individual, page-by-page basis, I found myself consuming it like a chocolate bar and picking up little linguistic idiosyncrasiess from it into my thoughts. ("V. bad," for instance, instead of "very bad.") Overall, I'm glad I read it, but I'm not sure it was good for me. It is a book about the private ramblings of an unhappy single career woman who seems to find the worst in everything and make mountains out of molehills. Not really me, in other words. To me, she seemed like an ungrateful, whiny, overgrown child. But what do I know?

However, the postmodern, mirror-looking-in-a-mirror moments in the book really tickled my brain. They were all so unintended, too, was the great part. i.e., when Bridget Jones complains in her diary about the enduring popularity of Hugh Grant despite his cheating on Liz Hurley with a prostitute. (He later plays a main character in the book in the movie adaptation.) Preternatural, prophetical self-reference in art. That's pretty funny.

Also, in another such instance, Bridget's excitement about watching the TV version of Pride & Prejudice. Then her subsequent dismay and discomfort at seeing "Darcy" (or rather Colin Firth, the actor who plays him in the BBC miniseries to which Fielding's book refers) dressed in street clothes and an "unconvincing mustache" (loved that) snuggling up to "Elizabeth Bennett" (Jennifer Ehle in real life) in the pages of celebrity magazines as they played out their real-life love affair. While this is sort of "postmodernism as art-killer," it is actually REALLY weird, since Firth ends up playing another main character in the movie version of the book, a character ALSO named Darcy. It was weird. And it tickled.

So, in other news, today is much better. Last week I was seriously on the edge of reason (haha: another B. Jones reference...I am such a loser. gawd.), but I feel a lot better now. This is due in no way to any change in the amount of work I have hanging over me, but simply a reconnecting of sorts with Thomas, after a week of estrangement. We have these days sometimes of being strangers living in the same house. It's stressful, but I wasn't in any kind of a place to interact like a human being. --Makes it difficult to be an adult at such times.

Anyhoo. Signing off now; I didn't really intend to rant about Colin Firth, but you know how he can distract one.... So as a closing note, let me simply give this essential and useful bit of info, and a photo: Jennifer Ehle's last name is pronounced "eeee-lee" so far as I have been able to discern. Here's a photo. See y'all.

Friday, March 03, 2006

Signing On

Wow. Here's my very own first blog. Well. I had a mini-crisis of an identity nature in trying to decide on the name for my blogsite, but decided upon Barefoot and Married, since it reflects both my feeling of stuck-ness in some ways (typical college-age issues: what to do with mí misma?) as well as my status as a married but NOT pregnant, as the saying usually goes. But that's a whole other issue.

This juxtapostion in my life has been throwing me for a loop of late, and it just seemed appropriate to call my blog by this title. "Married," you see, implies a certain status: adulthood, responsibility, staticity of personality and congealedness of goals, etc. However, being "barefoot and pregnant" implies that one has gotten oneself into a predicament; one is taking on these adult identites ("parent") but is unprepared for them (implied by "barefoot"), either monetarily or in terms of emotional/spiritual maturation. Furthermore, I'm only married, not pregnant, which is, I think, a more serious or inexorable state of being. Right?

However, my lack of pregnancy has actually been a bit of a point of sadness for me of late (more on that later), and so to be in that more serious state of "pregnant" from simply "married"--upgraded from orange to red (haha) in the realm of womanhood--I would in many ways actually be happier, although it is a more ponderous way of being. Taking not only your own life into your hands but that of another, smaller, defenseless, new generation of yourself. Yikes. And yet, blissful.

More to come.