Empress of Guexico

In Response to Kevin Powell's Open Letter to Chris Brown

2011-03-24T00:58:00.004-04:00

Kevin,

I'm sure you get this a lot and I don't even know if you'll read this, but after reading your open letter to Chris Brown, I was so incredibly grateful that I really felt I had to reach out. I am a 30-year old Latina 6-time assault survivor and a healer. The first time I was violated, I was 5 years old and the last time I was violated I was 26. I grew up in a home with a wonderful father who treated feelings like they were poison. He did not speak to me for six months after my last assault, and it took quite the journey to place him squarely in my life again. I can truly say that the work was worth it.

His ease with anger and alienation to his pain created my total lack of ease with anger at any level. So much so that when it came time for me to be angry at my attackers, I had an awful self-imploding reaction. It has been many years of therapy and a lot of diving into the ugly before I've been able to really claim my full emotional spectrum. And no matter how I fight it, there is constant learning that being a survivor is a life long process.

In any event, I wanted to thank you for a few reasons. One, I absolutely understand the courage it takes to be truly introspective about a life long battle with the scars of trauma. In that way, I feel like so many of us are in a fox hole together in our are enduring journey to self-healing, we're in a fox hole and so many times in that journey you feel alone. I can only imagine you may know what I'm talking about when I say that its the art of learning that the valleys should be relished instead of avoided or accepted that you find peace. That learning, as painful as it can be, is salvation. Every. Time. When your trauma happens young, your brain is wired in a different way, and you have to fight the perceptions of right and wrong built in your head from the beginning of your cognition.

Many years ago, I was sitting in a group of teenagers, much less healed than I currently am, and I had a young man admit in a session to punching a hole in a wall and pressuring a girl into intercourse after she had refused him. He had listened to my survivors story and admitted this racked with such guilt, he had not understood until that moment, what he had done. He loved and respected me and that connected him to a larger narrative of women and the crosses we carry. Now all the damage in me yelled so loud around the need to scold or chastise, in fact many of the young women in the group were already ready to verbally lacerate him. What came next, I can only see as God's divine hand, as my heart opened up and I allowed my love to say that I saw him as whole and flawed and redeemable. I told him the first step to his own healing was admitting and owning that shame but that the second step to his healing was going to be admitting the pain that causes any being to seek value in external gratification. That self-medication and the denial of that can cause such anger, that anger can then cause such guilt. Guilt is an albatross around the neck of a healing spirit.

It is of this young man I thought of as I read your letter to Chris Brown. Admittedly, in the way you can with celebrities, I felt indignant about him and his anger until reading your letter. And when the GMA interview aired my first thought was "She'll always have to live with having been a victim, it is only right that you live knowing the pain of being seen as a predator". And I never factored in the truly broken spirit and pain of a young man who would react in such ways to someone he loved. He was not a human to me, he was, as you so eloquently pointed out, the face of every attacker in my history.

It occurs to me that a part of being a healer is the empathy you are blessed with and the ability to extend love to every last unhealed soul. While we make choices around whose healing we participate in, I feel like we are bound to a coda that has us at very least see the humanity in our brothers and sisters. Thank you for reminding me that these brothers and sisters exist everywhere and that this love is something we put into the universe. Whether we know them or not.

I have watched so many of my brothers, especially the brown and black men in my life, fight their emotional body. As if this fight could render into submission hearts that strong. I have watched men I loved medicate on drugs, alcohol, sex, and in some cases even medicate with me as their drug of the moment. I have watched them run from themselves at full speeds, hoping they could get away from both their better and worst angels. I say this because my last piece of gratitude in this overly long letter is for being a man that is okay with not running anymore. The more there are of you, the more I know my brothers will understand the peace that happens when you stop running. I am convinced that my ability to truly feel safe in the world as a woman is tied to the end of that running. So thanks.

Warm regards and more appreciation than I can possibly put into words.

Your sister in the fox hole,

Karla

Feel Babies! Feel! The Art of Deep Sea Diving

2011-03-19T10:28:00.008-04:00

I read a book once that said the American narrative is "Good and getting better" and that this narrative taints our history books and doesn't really allow for all of the complexities and flavors to come through. If the stories that are being told do not reflect this narrative, then they get silenced. I've come to wonder whether or not this is a very cultural American view of the world or just every peoples view; I can see how that robs us of people, stories, and worth all the time.

I recently saw the CEO of my org do this session on failure that really struck me. Her basic message was one I had been trying to work out in my head for awhile. Failure is a necessity in a fully lived life. She said if we only accepted or avoided failures than we encouraged living that was tepid. Our peaks can only go as high as our valley's and as a result both get shrunken. On the other hand, if we failed deeply and relished the failure, the learning from the ultimate valley's created massive peaks in our living experience. (She had visuals that make this easier to express, haha)

I think a tepid relationship to failure ties into a tepid avoidance of the dark in our worlds and I think it's why we get so fascinated with pieces of art that are particularly dark, because they dare to go places where we normally put firm boundaries, but I digress.

As an assault survivor I can say that the avoidance of the dark stymied my healing for a very long time. The thing with being a survivor is that you actually CAN'T avoid it. It sneaks up on you in increments and pieces numbing or darkening your life. So then, you're faced with a choice, do I live a numbed and slightly sadder (for some slightly angrier) existence or do I dive into the pool of dark emotions and allow sadness, grief, and anger to be a visceral part of my living?

I have found that as I do, I may be in iteration 5 or 6 of diving back in to the scary parts, living becomes more vibrant, richer, and more full of gratitude. I feel the anger or sadness and thus feeling hours liberated from it and doused in gratitude for the warm and beautiful world that surrounds me, is a better high than I can bring myself to articulate in words. I am so aware that if I avoided the dark, my ability to see the light would be limited. So constricted with the pain that it would be hazy at best.

I've worked with a lot of kids and its taught me so much about our shared human experience. Mostly, they say what adults don't like to admit, and I appreciate the candor around it. In this time, a major theme pops back up over and over again when it comes to healing. Many of them have conceived success as "not hurting". And this, to me, is the major disservice that we do our collected community. We let so many of our little creations grow up believing that the goal is to not fail, hurt, be mad, or sad. In reality, this is exactly the existence we should wish for them. One of great joy and great pain which means life has been full of great living.

I can't tell you how many times I've been in rooms of adults and kids where I just want to scream out "FEEL my darlings! Feel!" I mean, I don't cause part of communicating is finding ways to be heard and the crazy lady screaming is rarely heard. haha. But the emotion is there.

I hate the thought of cauterizing a heart/spirit, especially as carelessly and unintentionally as we do. It really is such a different deal when someone makes a choice around this and says "No, actually, this is the life I want." vs stumbling into half living believing there is no other choice.

Of course, I can also see that this emotional meandering and self-indulgence is a luxury of the safe. When you have created a world as safe as mine, you can dive back into the dark, you know life rafts and life guards exist all around you. So thank you my lovely friends for giving me such a safe place to go deep sea diving in. It is allowing me to ingest more and more that I am not broken, just human.

Boy that humanity guys, it will get you huh? This overriding want to be animatronic when we are flesh. When did we put such a premium on being unaffected? When did that make us grown ups? What I know, and I admit that is very little, is that all of my favorite people have gone deep sea diving. They have dived so deep that the pain/anger/frustration/sadness/indignance/grief is no longer a trophy that gives them exemptions in how they treat themselves or their loved ones. They don't use booze, sex, drugs, church, kids, or anything else to avoid the tide of emotion at their perimeter. They swim and it is just another emotion(s) in the many that they get to feel as a part of living.

Don't Ask Don't Tell, The DREAM Act, The Defense Bill, and how we all got screwed

2010-09-22T11:36:00.004-04:00

I'm fairly annoyed with the coverage of yesterday's Senate vote and so I decided to bullet point why I'm as annoyed as I am because I sincerely can't get over how bad the reporting around it is. I will state facts and then opinions because they are two very different things.

1) This was not the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" bill
Facts: The bill was a defense bill. It asked the country to spend $740 billion on the defense of our country. Now whether or not you agree with that money being spent on armed forces is a a whole other issue. Two things were tagged onto the bill last minute (this particular bill has been in the pipe for awhile).

Opinion: It is journalistic malpractice that this is not a part of the conversation. These two amendments were incredibly important and emotionally difficult to see voted down and they were not built into the original form of this bill. I find it absolute hypocrisy that military strength can be such a tenet of the Republican party and a bill meant to spend a large sum of money on that defense won't even be put to a vote. Not voting on this in war time is a dereliction of duty. I also find it hypocrisy that two weeks before a major bill these two very emotionally charged issues are tacked on to a bill. To be clear, I do believe they are a part of our defense. But they knew they didn't have the votes to pass these issues in one bundle and they were put up anyway. They put the hopes of a lot of people that they knew would ultimately be heartbroken. I'm not saying they aren't important issues to put up anyway, I do however think if there is a genuine interest in them, they aren't an after thought but a part of how a bill was crafted and these individual issues can also be put up for a vote. But you know, morale for voting is low and if you're looking to get the base out to vote for the 2010 election, this just may be a way to do it. Make of the choice what you will, but the opportunity to push these individual measures through has been there, and it has not been a priority.

2) The DREAM Act was a part of this bill... lest we forget
Facts: The majority of stories filed today are tagged as "Senate votes against DADT", which really neglects the DREAM Act. The DREAM Act was a measure that was previously sponsored by 11 Republican Senators. It says that kids brought here outside of their own will by their parents, can earn a path to residency by going to college and/or going to the military.

Opinion: If you have a group of kids that want to be educated and serve their country, turning them away because your constituency is voting on you in November and is out for blood, is nothing short of cruel. You have 11 senators that thought this was a good idea before. 11 people have not changed their minds, 11 people have abdicated their duty because they are afraid of losing their jobs.

3) The Senate did not vote down the bill. They didn't even let it come up for a vote.
Fact: The vote yesterday was not to pass or not pass the bill. The vote was to send it to the floor for debate and an official vote in front of the American people.

Opinion: They won't even TALK about it. Are you kidding me? It is one thing to say no. I don't agree with it, but I can't fault you. But to not allow for the measure to even come to a vote is cowardice. It is trying to circumvent the responsibilities you were put in the seats to do. And it allows you to hide.

That is all for now. Just wanted to make sure we had some context for it all. It's a lot juicier for juicier for journalist to keep mentioning Lady Gaga rather than actually talk about what we need to know to be an informed republic. On every side of the aisle, there are not a lot of people doing their jobs. And yet we wake up in the freest country in the entire world another day, with the opportunity to change our world to be that much freer. For that, I'll forever be grateful.

Hermanitas Introduction to the Vision Space

2009-10-25T13:16:00.004-04:00

Mi'ja, I recognize you
I read through your scars and find kinship

With a saddness that could drown a bright moon
You walk wearily through a world that has done you no favors
I want to scream, "Smile, its too soon! It can be better!"
Yet I know from experience, any holler sounds like degradation, no matter the content

You've learned the armor already
You know that to leave your home with any measure of safety
You must brace yourself for the disrespect that is to come your way
From men, whose lack of emotional education, leaves them with sex and anger as expression for every emotion they ever bottled away

Mi'ja, I recognize you
I read through your scars and find possibility

Understand that it has nothing to do with you
Every time they look at you as if your clothes are strewn on the ground
It is the ghosts of what they feel they need to prove
They are looking at what they imagine is comfort, in emptiness they know not how to fill or even name

Understand that on the other side of the armor you hold so dear
Is this world full of light you can barely comprehend
If only there were ways to show you the joy that could dust every moment of your being in this crazy world
A joy so large, so vast, you could not doubt the grace that exists for you when you let the armor go

Mi'ja, I recognize you
I read through your scars and find the path

There is no one in this world that can promise to keep you safe with any measure of certainty, including you
And I would like to say I remember the day this discovery did not fill me with terror
I would like to say I remember a moment, when the cradle of my gifts freed me of my fear
I would like to say to you, that you reach a moment in life, where adventure becomes more important than refuge
But I would be stretching truths past their elasticity

It isn't an epiphany or a realization,
You don't wake up one day knowing and believing the world to be your playground
Your heart doesn't let go of all that hurt in one swoop
Healing is a collection of love, persistance and vision beyond a discipline I knew I had
Yet there it was.

Mi'ja, I recognize you
I read through your scars and find myself

Reaching to take off the armor or feeling safe is not enough
Getting to the top of the mountain bears little fruit without the view
There are mornings where every smile is a championship and laughter is an all-stars game
I heard it said once love is as much an ability as it is a feeling

Mi'ja, get yourself able.

I am too familiar with worlds dipped in sorrow
And I find every metaphor and smilie for a world of light inadequate
How do I paint you the picture of a freedom so liberating and absolute that fear becomes a triviality
How do I scuplt you a mold so full of grace that you welcome the challenges you used to dread
How could I ever sing you a song so sweet and blissful that you know what its like to be whole

I stand before you a product of the many people, whose happiness I saw but could not figure out
Having read the entries of a life I can barely believe I've lived
At once at ease and apprehensive about the hurdles to come but an absolute certainty in my jumpers ability... and yours

Mi'ja, please know that my humanity does not allow for perfection, and I claim nothing of the sort
I am full of grace and likely the least graceful messenger you may ever meet
And though I can't paint, sculpt or sing you into a vision of completeness
I can stand here with my scars and tell you that it exists for you as it did and does for me
And one day both of us will dance in that vision with our sisters radiant with the music of new dreams we can only start to touch

Marrying Myself

2009-04-19T23:12:00.003-04:00

I did the most loving thing I've ever done for myself this weekend. My heart is so completely full right now. As the blessings wash over me and my world feels the impacts of loving out loud, I wanted to write a little about the experience.

Over the holiday’s, I had a thought that went “What do you do when you truly commit to yourself? How do people celebrate commitment?” then I thought, “Well they get married,” I proceeded to think “I can’t marry myself though,” and then decided that being in this wonderfully beautiful space required so much hard work, that a celebration just as big as that very work was exactly what I wanted and I would do this for my birthday.

Getting to the day was a journey, one that I'm sure God was really amused about. I received the gammut of reaction. Some people laughed at the idea, some shared in my joy, others couldn't understand it, and at the end of the day the very thought process that brought up the desire for the event was tested. This was really good for me. I appreciate every last piece of each side of the coin. It made me really firm in my purpose and very introspective about 1) Whether I truly believed in what I was doing, and 2) Whether or not I was ready to do it.

When I thought this up, I think I had this picture in my head around doing this for myself and what that looked like. And step by amazing step, my community of friendship stepped in and took the reins of the big day. I watched as these people, that I loved so dearly, put into action all of the love they had for me. This was also a test actually, because it really made me allow others to love me. Being on the receiving end of that love is not an easy task for most of us. I give it well, but receiving it is a challenge because my relationship to self-worth hasn't always been so great. My friends bought and cooked all the food, set-up the decorations, created schedules, gave directions, tracked the arrival list, created the ceremony, brought the bubbly, and kept me relaxed and laughing. I was bathed, just bathed in love so absolute and thick that my heart nearly exploded from my chest.

I wish I could describe to you the day. It was rich, like a good chocolate cake. There was just so much love there. I loved how much openess there was about love. Unabashed adoration that we all gave each other. It was remarkable. I am so incredibly grateful. Grateful to my friends/family for being so understanding and loving of my flights of fancy. Grateful that they were able to open their hearts to an unorthodox expression of self-love. Grateful for all the work I've done to be in a space that would allow me to actually let-in an event centered around loving myself without having to cut down any piece of it or myself. Grateful to God for the amazingness of his grace to give me this as a foundation in my person.

My best friend in his toast talked about our essential nature. How in its truest form we were meant to exponentially give and receive love, like an undying fountain, regenerating ourselves as we give. This reciprocity was one that I discovered in the last couple of years. Life is a process and I will be chipping away to continuously become better at receiving and giving from authentic places, places that come from wholeness. This weekend I got to celebrate the understanding and clarity that the first leg of the journey provided. I found myself feeling so very healed, and so very free to love and be loved as a result. And let me tell you, it was quite the party.

Recently, I was reading this story by Paulo Cohelo and his preface said something like this... There are builders and gardners in this world. A builder will work up building and dutifully build and cement and labor until their construction is done. They will soon after find themselves trapped in by the very walls they have labored around. A gardner lives in a much more uncertain world. The gardener understands that it will plant much, and not always see the fruits immediately. The gardener struggles much more because they have to constantly survive the harshness of the elements, water, and care for their garden. A gardners work is never done, because it requires constant attention for growth. Then he goes on to say that garndeners can always recognize other gardeners. Each always recognizes that in the growth of each plant lies the growth of the whole world.

Thank you all for being a part of my garden, for allowing me to be a part of yours, for the depth of your love, and your willingness to always push us closer to the beauty and bounty of the gardens we deserve. I am blissed out friends. :)

25 Facts About Yours Truly

2009-02-02T10:07:00.001-05:00

Rules:

Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.

(To do this, go to “notes” under tabs on your profile page, paste these instructions in the body of the note, type your 25 random things, tag 25 people, then click publish.)

I was just on the phone with Nia and she says to me “So when are you going to get to do your list of 25 facts about you.” Haha. And here I thought I was going to skate on it. However, I am in a writing mood today, so here goes:

1. I am currently watching the movie Dirty Dancing, that I saw while I was in fourth grade. At the time I had no idea what it meant that Penny was knocked up, but had an audible reaction of “Oh! I get it!” in eighth grade when I found out what it meant. Aw, innocence.

2. I have a playlist on my iPod called “Some of us are Rockstars” and I play it at least once a week and sing to my hearts content hittin all sorts of bad notes, but not really concerned.

3. I also have a playlist called “I feel like dancing with myself right now” and I put on a full on show all the time.

4. I cry at everything. Sad movies, happy movies, kindness, puppies, you know, everything. I just can’t help but be moved by all of the things that make our world beautiful.

5. My favorite Sesame Street character when I was a kid (and you know now) was/is Grover. Something about how neurotic and goofy he was appealed to me.

6. I learned English both from Grover and the “Young and the Restless” and I’ve had a creative vocabulary ever since.

7. I write poetry in secret. I don’t really show it to anyone, and it’s my way of expressing lyrically.

8. I’m going to marry myself in April for my birthday. It took me a long time to be as committed to my happiness as I currently am. I allowed myself to make mistakes, take risks, create boundaries, and make tough decisions. It’s been a journey and I want to commit to myself, and its going to be a great party.

9. The people who know me the best know how truly goofy I am. I don’t really show that side until I’m comfortable.

10. I love jewel tone colors. Red primarily but green, blue, purple, anything that sparkles just makes me want to smile.

11. I love Disneyland. It was the first place I truly got to be a kid. I threw a penny in Snow White’s wishing well every visit from 14 till now at every trip. I was once a tour guide there.

12. I saw my first musical/play at 18. It was RENT and it blew my mind.

13. I absolutely love my cousin Jorge and we’re friends in real life. I mean, my family is pretty great in general, but it’s always felt like he was the first person to believe in everything that I could become. He gave me my first novel (Jonathan Livingston Seagull) and I think it was foundational to how much of a dreamer and doer I became.

14. I have had a lot of people tell me “I’m too emotional” like it’s an expletive. I always wonder what I’m supposed to do with that. I can’t really help having a really strong emotional core, and I think it would probably be pretty toxic to bottle it up. It’s my soft heart, and it’s been through a lot of rough and tumble, I think it’s a miracle it’s still this soft.

15. I’ve been to 11 different countries, but I was 18 before I even got on an airplane.

16. I have this thing for Otis Redding music and I love, love, love that scene in Pretty in Pink where Ducky dances to “Try a Little Tenderness” because it embodies how that song should be performed.

17. I think I’m meant to live in New Orleans and Miami before ever picking a place to settle down in. I just love the quirky bright vibe of those cities.

18. Dolores Park is my favorite place in San Francisco. Nothing beats sitting down with a burrito and a book in Dolores Park.

19. I love running. I never in my whole life thought I would say that. But it’s really a pretty wonderful to have that space for your head.

20. I make really great food, but nothing beats my shrimp cocktail and guacamole.

21. I think about my little brother every morning when I wake-up and pray that his planes fly safely (he’s a pilot)

22. I have phenomenal friends. I love them and they are like my family. They are one of God’s greatest blessings to me.

23. I love Salsa music. My favorite song is by Celia Cruz “La Vida Es Un Carnaval”. Ayyyyy, no hay que llorar, la vida es un carnaval, es mas bello vivir cantando!

24. Rey Faustino Jr. is my best friend in the entire world. I’m glad we met when we were kids, because growing up would have been so much tougher without him.

25. I have rediscovered my love for Clementine’s, I love peeling them and having the juicy sweet pieces pop neatly into my mouth. It’s such a yummy snack. And when I’m feeling really hood with it, I’ll put some Tapatio hot sauce on them. 

Karla and the Beautiful, Tender, Heatbreakingly Remarkable, Very Very Good Year

2008-12-26T00:48:00.012-05:00

(Me, peaceful and happy after getting my tattoo)

I moved across the country, healed big over my biggest traumas, I read 19 books, water colored on my rooftop on sunny days, learned how to deal with a snow day. I fell in love. I learned how to wear scarves for function instead of fashion. I experienced 4 seasons in an actual city, not on an mp3. I learned how to run. I forgave my father and was able to have him as an active part of my life. I found function in my little dysfunctional family. I went salsa dancing at least 20 to 30 times. I washed a sad friends feet in honey to remind her that we walk in sweetness. I allowed myself to be devastatingly heartbroken. I picked myself back up again. I made succulent, delicious, mouthwatering mistakes... and meals.

I laughed... a lot.

My little brother got engaged to a wonderful woman, they called me at 3am screaming with their joy and news. She came to visit me and we became sisters. We got a black president! The white guy, he didn't even come close. I saw brown people create and perform their own musical, it won a Tony and my heart. I got a tattoo!!! It means the movement of creation on earth and the will of the creator be done. It reminds me of how God carried me with his blessings from challenge into happiness. He fought along side me against my greatest demons and reminded me I was a warrior. I started active conversations with God. I left the door open for someone and it was the right call.

I let myself be rip roaringly angry and pissy and then I didn't beat myself up about it. I yelled at someone in defense of my heart, because I finally fundamentally understood and followed through with honoring how amazing that heart is and how much it deserves to be both protected AND pushed out on a limb. I danced in my room every week and basically put on a concert for myself all the time. I talked to my best friend - every. single. week. Even though we were very far away from each other, he still celebrates and mourns with me, cause its how we do. I stood up for two of my friends to people who had their head in their ass.

I managed to make myself my biggest project and I enjoyed the work so much, that I re-upped the contract. I made enchiladas, tostadas, guacamole, and Mexican tissue flowers for days - just because it makes me happy. I indulged... in everything. I made a poem with a friend. I wrote my own stories. I honored my story. In the same week, I saw the St. Louis Arch, the Seattle Space Neeedle, and the Lincoln Memorial. I committed, heart and soul to myself, and then asked me to marry me. Save the date cards will be in the mail soon. It was a year of abundance, not perfection. And I am abundantly happy as a result.

I was thinking of what direction I was piloting my story this year, the New Years resolutions and all that; it occurs to me that we must celebrate and as Rey reminded me "savor" every bit of the good parts. This year was probably one of the most blessed years of my life. I'm savoring them. Thank you for playing a part in my story. You fam, you're a blessing. I relish having you and celebrating with you. You are the beautiful treasure of my life. My world is better because of you, in challenge and in joy. I hope this year was as amazing for you as it was for me.

2008, if you were a person, I would hug you, kiss you, make out with you and send you on your way. Thank you for being such an amazing year. I will savor what I have left of you and then joyously welcome your homie 2009. Friends, feel free to savor with me. Its so important.

My full heart to yours,
Karla

The Most Blessed People in the History of the World

2008-11-05T19:37:00.002-05:00

"If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer."
- President-Elect Barack Obama

I am overcome with emotion. All day, I randomly would get this knot in my throat. Every single time I heard someone say the words "President-Elect Obama" my heart fluttered. It is my privilege to bear witness to the history of my country at this time. I am sure that as the next few months and years play out I will both agree and disagree with the decisions of my chosen leader. But I really would just like to say, that in the next days, I am committed to allowing myself to be washed in joy.

Watching people celebrate last night, it was so clear to me how game changing this was. What it meant to people of all colors, both genders, and all nationalities was just a blessing. Many people who previously may not have identified this way started to identify themselves as Americans. And then together, as a community, an engaged electorate, we became the most blessed people in the history of the world. Never in any other country, at any other time, has so much been an option for all. Even in our economic crisis, our two wars, our ailing schools, and our obscene debt; there have never been a people as wealthy as ours. Never have people of color in any other country been able to aspire as high and seen proof of the possibility. Never have all people been as equal as we are at this very moment in our precious country.

It can and should be better. It can be so much more than what we currently have and it will be. As a community, we will continue to work to make it what our children deserve... what we deserve.

For today, for this moment, I choose to revel in our absolute blessings to have been born in a place full of this much hope and passion and community.

"For that is the true genius of America – that America can change. Our union can be perfected. And what we have already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow."
- President-Elect Barack Obama

Things I Love About My Younger Brother

2008-09-14T22:18:00.006-04:00

I had a pretty mellow day and in reflection I came up with all of these things I love about my little brother. My heart was so full with them, I had to write them all down. Here is my best shot.

Dear Hermanito,

This is a snapshot of my love for you, I could never fully capture it in words, but I hope that it gives you an idea about how much love and admiration there is.

I love that you are a hard worker. Every time we talk on the phone you are heading into work or coming out of it. You fight as hard for your future as any person I know. You do it quietly, you don't make a big show of it, but your determination to be the caretaker of your future family floors me.

I love that you have never uttered the words "I'm a grown ass man." to me. I'll call you little brother or baby brother or boo boo, and you don't even wince. You recognize that my affection for you, isn't even close to an indicator of how grown you are. And that makes you the most grown ass man I know.

I love that you give a damn about what other people think. Your first and foremost concern is always how you feel and how your family feels, not what anyone else would say. It gives you this independence that I love.

I love that you are a protector. In the toughest time period of my life, the one person I wanted around was you. I called you, and I sounded like an absolute mess, and as hard as it would have been, if I asked you to, I know you would have jumped in a car in that minute to travel 6 hours to give me a hug. And that, is a security, I carry with me at all times.

I love that not only have you loved one woman for the last seven years, but that you committed to her. You were gutsy enough to take this huge leap. You valued her and her contribution in your life enough to become a man. And come to think of it, you valued yourself enough to know that taking that step was actually valuing yourself a bunch too.

I love how chill you are. It drives me crazy a lot of the time, but baby brother, I can always count on you to tell me "Eh, its gonna be okay, its only --fill in the blank--."

I love how you forgive us. Whether its me or our dad, you forgive so beautifully. It's like nothing we could ever do, would ever take your love away. You show me what it means to be unconditional with love.

I love how you take care of our folks. I've been all crazy and gallivanting across the country trying to save the world. And you've stayed with them and loved them, and helped them. Its so awesome, and takes so much more strength than anyone could know.

I love that when we were kids, you would play with my dolls because I asked you to. And even though it was a GI Joe or something, I always made it Jem's boyfriend and you let me run the show. You were happy with just spending time together.

I love how much fun you get out of poking at people. You are at 24 (almost 25) still this little kid in a candy store. You probably would still sit in my room as I dragged you out by an ankle and laugh while I got furious just because you like seeing me mad. So I kinda get annoyed by that, but I love it too, no lie.

I love that you still have patience with me drunk dialing you like a 21 year old. You would never know I'm the older sibling, but thank you for laughing.

I love that no matter how long its been since I've called or returned a call you always pick up and say "Hey babe, how's it goin?" And hold no ill will over my spazzyness.

I love that you show love to my friends. You recognize in a way that our family always had a hard time with, how much they are family to me too. And you care about them and welcome them as a part of our lives.

So I'm going to stop being cheesy, because I'm sure you're rolling your eyes at this point. But I just needed to tell you a few of the things. Because you really are just such a special person. And I'm having time lately, to reflect on all of the blessings in my life, and you are one of them. You and your future wife are two of them. And I love you with all my heart and I just hope you know how much.

With all my heart,

Tu Hermana

To all the boys I've loved before - Mayda Del Valle

2008-09-06T11:05:00.002-04:00

I believe I've posted the link before, but this poem speaks to me...

to all the boys I’ve loved before

part 1:

we are not your mothers
and are not meant to be
it is not our responsibility to raise you into respectful beings
you have been weaned from the breast of a woman for years
yet you come to us
wounded and half filled with promises you can only keep half the time
trying to suckle our sense of self dry
we’ve become much to accustomed to sleepless nights and damp pillows
have become accustomed to waiting for our empty beds
to be weighed down with the bodies of men heavy with the scent
and the hands of other women
mornings with swollen puffy eyes are becoming routine
and we simply wanting to be loved
simply wanting to be able to love ourselves unconditionally
simply wanting to be held and feel safe
simply wanting the truth of whether you can really love us or not
play Hester Prynn
wear scarlet letters on our chests
become adulteresses
cheating ourselves out of what we truly deserve
willing to settle for less
willing to act like a little less than a goddesses
willing to sleep with the enemy
men too scared to stop acting like boys
thinking we can love away their scars
so we take the lashes of the insecurities they pour on us
and lick our wounds in quiet mourning for the little girls we lose by the minute
fast fading memories of playing hopscotch
and skippin’ rope
we now play freeze tag with each other’s hearts
play hide and seek with our love
if we just don’t breathe maybe we won’t get caught
up in the spider’s web we weave while waiting for what we give away to be returned

part 2:
you said you had a photographic memory
but apparently you forgot that honesty
begins by being real with yourself
and the ones you claim you love
should have never wasted my time
and just acted like the man you claimed and told the world you were
made a production of setting my folks at ease with tales of how you’d do all it ever took to never break my heart
I guess you thought you were talking to a roomful of the deaf and blind
figured they didn’t hear you
coz I never saw it coming
but the truth cannot be hidden
what’s clouded in darkness will always come to light my love
you shoulda known that
claiming you saw my light so clearly and brightly
so I left
chasing paper trails of promises you’d already set on fire
left with nothing but the ashes of who you’d written that you were
and singed fingers from trying to grasp the impossible

and the only thing I’ve really lost
are lukewarm kisses
that for too long I kept trying to tune the beat of my heart, a few lies, and stories
about honesty and truth

I guess shit happens
I just wish it wasn’t me

and I guess
it’s so much better to have loved and lost
than never to have loved at all
I know that’s some easy shit to say

but I’m still gonna try to live by it
I’m still gonna try to put my faith to rest in it

I will sleep on dry pillows now in a bed big enough to love myself in
I will awake these coming mornings with my eyes dry and shining
full of the knowledge I am priceless and worth nothing but honesty
I will remove the scarlet letter from my chest and hold the hand of the little girl I used to be
and say I’m sorry to her
I’m sorry for cheating you out of the joy you have always deserved
and I will wait
for a man
to come along
that can give me the truth of how much he can really love me

Generation Change Vs. Baby Boomers - Why we don't get each other

2008-08-31T09:57:00.002-04:00

It's been awhile guys! I think the last time I wrote I was just starting the uphill climb of workshop season... the roller coaster just left me off. I'm dizzy, exhilerated and maybe had a touch of nausea at the end - but no worse for wear. I've since made many a mistake as a result of the broken heart I wrote about, gotten a tattoo (finally!), become incredibly comfortable with myself, taken a vacation and made some more friends. All in all, standard fare.

Anyway, back at the business at hand. I was moved to write, so let me do just that.

I watched on Thursday as Barack Obama delivered what was to my heart and my head one of the best speeches ever. I was in a room with over 300 people around my age, and literally, you could have heard a pin drop. A lot of young people, some who completely agree with his policies - some who don't, enthralled with this man's words. We want to be led and low and behold, here came what seems like a leader. And low and behold, we are following. None of which, we see any problems with.

I've heard much being said about the "cult of personality" and the very fabric of the "change" message being non-substantive. And I wanted to take a quick second to respond to that. My preface, is that I am in a world of social-change makers, a group that grew up with the words "Social Entrepreneur" in their lexicon and pulled on the word regularly. So my views are most definitely colored by this. I will speak in the we as a member of my generation for the sake of this post, but I am fully aware that we are a diverse set of individuals with many different thoughts. This is my effort to bring some clarity and respond directly to those of you in the Baby Boom who are confused. Now that my preamble is done:

When it comes to this "Cult of personality" or that "Change" is somehow non-substantive. We think its bull. We have grown-up in a world where people younger than us have made millions because of their innovation. Where information and thoughts that used to be held close to the vest are posted online. Where being a change agent went from the picket signs and protests of your generation (which btw, we admire) to the ideas and scalability analysis of ours (which we dread but are willing to do for progress sake). We have watched as one of the richest men of our time retired from Microsoft to tackle programs in the social sector because it was the "exciting" challenge. We've been relatively unscared of failure and fairly entitled when it comes to moving up in the world. We digest information quicker, because it is accessible to us at the touches of a keyboard. We trust more. We don't believe that we are going to be led off a cliff if we let our guard down, and if it was coming, we trust ourselves to be able to spot it waaaay in advance.

We don't get dues paying. We empathize with it on some levels. It hurts our hearts that you had to spend years upon years proving what you knew to people, to only then advance one step. But this generation, it doesn't have time for that. We grew up in communities where people are dying. Dying from gun shots, health problems, and a lack of education. We get learning, we get that its important and necessary, we get the need for professional development - but see that totally separate from paying dues. That is inefficient to us. Your generation has thrust us into a ton of jobs where we were trial by fire, mostly mis-managed, and we exceled. Ya, there are definitely some of us who struggle, and for that, we want to create mechanisms that bridge the gap. We refuse to be sedintary and just watch it happen.

We see the world in this very high stakes light. With every moment we waste, another kid/family/elder is put at risk. So ya, we've got lofty plans, lofty ideals, and we're fairly unapologetic for it. No doubt, we will likely over do it. But we'd rather over plan and over program and then find ways to make things efficient than leave our people out in the wash. Give us ideas and we'll run with them, otherwise, let us create and see what happens.

We know that the way that you got ahead was keeping your head down. Be good, resilient, put up with a load of crap, earn your salt and you will be rewarded. We know that the second you got ballsy about something, there were some mean people around to put you in your place. And really, I thank you for putting up with all of that for me. Very few in your generation wanted to be seen as the rabble rouser past the age of 22. In our generation, we delight in it, and being a true rabble rouser (different from a brat) really starts at that age.

As a result the concept of "Change" is a lot scarier to you, than it is to me. You think its a luxury, and I think its an imperative.

About a year ago, I had a conversation with my dad where he was worried about my success. Now, I thought this was silly. I graduated from college (a luxury to him, necessity to me; required both of us to sacrifice), got a good job, progressively got better jobs, have been around the world and my own country as a result of the life I lead. And he was worried about my future. When we got down to the thick of it, his concern was that I was not settled down. I could own a house by now, have picked a husband, at very least - picked a neighborhood. But those weren't the things that were going to make me happy. Changing, traveling, getting to know, and enjoying my world makes me happy. At the time, he saw my life as dangerous. "What happens," he said "if everything falls apart. " and my response was "Then I build it back up." I hugged him, because I love that he loves me that much. My father spent his life worrying about putting a roof over our collective heads, I spend my life in self-analysis - worrying about how I best leverage myself in the world. He is barely learning how to write email and I update a feeling on my facebook status.

It's a gap of mutual understanding. We grew up in different worlds. Please know that I get that nothing comes without hard work. Which I also know, not every member of my generation understands... but it's more of us than you think. And we're willing to fight; some of us, everyday, all day - to insure not only a secure future but a resplendant, promising one. When I see Senator Obama, my thought is this, "Oh God, someone who gets and is willing to lead me there." I haven't been led a lot in my life. I have trusted only a handful of people to lead me. I think the same can be said by many people in my generation. So when you see us captivated and hopeful, don't tear it down. You don't understand it, but on some levels, you don't need to. Let us be led. Let us lead.

Lessons from falling in love...

2008-04-05T08:03:00.000-04:00

(The Heart Chakra)

The last 9 months of my life can really be described as a turning point for me. I have at once, hit rock bottom, hit it again, hit it one more time and then turned around and looked at my pieces, maybe, more completely than I ever have. I went to my fathers home country and discovered that I loved him and understood him enough to forgive him for the role he has played in my story. I fell in love with a man (for the first time - not that I've ceased to count Eric, but it was a very different love), only to find out that he wasn't ready to love me back, only to find out that I had at the same time totally fell in love with myself. And now, as Nia pointed out to me, I am the star of my own story for the first time in my life and I am both relishing and getting used to that.

Even when its yourself, loving someone isn't always easy, its a commitment, one you have to renew every day. The temptation to prioritize other things, people, situations is always there. Falling in love means partnership, and being your own partner is the business, but it is the most challenging partnership you enter into. ;c)

For some reason, I always thought that when you fell in love that it meant all of your issues with love went away or it meant that you had gotten past them enough to really be in it. I had this impression that it became easy to roll around in and a particular person became enough of a reason to drop your bs. That's cute isn't it? Wholly untrue, but really sweet on some level. Love is this altered state where you not only see your partners shit but your own and you just have forgiveness for it. Love involves this whole other level of empathy for yours and your partners pieces. I love everything about you and everything that made you what you are. I see you. I'm willing to give my fear over because I think you're that amazing. This comes with its share of high and low.

There is this scene in "Love Actually" where a little boy is telling his stepfather that he's miserable because he's in love and the stepfather says "That's all?" and the little boy replies "What could be worse than the total agony of being in love?" Word.

And its agony because you see with so much clarity, all the things the world doesn't pause to point out about this empathy, about this beauty, about this miracle of a person and yourself that on some level, ready or not as you may be for it, its fantastic and horrendous.

So to fall in love with myself, I basically had to learn a skill that I never had. And the beauty of the skill is that you can't unlearn it, you can only block it or refuse to allow it. That's a little cowardly. And though numbing out has always been a problem for me, its not because I wanted to do it, its because I didn't know I was doing it and I didn't know how to stop it. But I do now. Suffice to say, I've spent the last three weeks crying, laughing and adjusting to the idea of being in love with me and the need to let go of loving this other person. Now I'm totally unfamiliar with this process. So feel free to input on what's next, but here's where I'm at. unLoving someone else is a gradual process, and it doesn't mean that you think they are sheisty and you kick everything away (necessarily), it just means that you love both of you enough to let go of the role they played in your life and finding ways to show yourself extra love through that. I woke up last Monday and was like, alright, I'm done with the wallowing now. I've got a priority to attend to and thats the courage to love myself as deeply as I would love someone else.

The level of forgiveness and love that I have discovered for the people in my life helps me see for the first time my stories with a greater clarity. There are so many stories that I have living inside of me that no one has heard. That really I've hesitated to look at because of the amount of blame and sorrow they contained. Before, each of them was this indicator on how unloved I was. A measuring cup of what my parents/friends/self/life couldn't give me and/or each other. A barometer on how I should have known better. It was full of so much judgment. And that's just not how it works. Parents, siblings, people, you are fallible. And before you know and are aware of your issues, you don't know and aren't aware of your issues, so why do you insist on punishing yourself for that ignorance. On some level, for me anyway, it was easier to do that then sac up the courage to love myself and the people around me in the way I deserved. And thats just what it is friend.

In any event, with my new found clarity, I have discovered that the sorrow doesn't go away because you can see it. You have to talk about your stories so the iron grip of them doesn't choke away your abilities. I've started to discover that I mangle the stories too, like I anticipate this reaction, that involves so much judgment, but when I finally tell them - judgment isn't there. No one blames me or the people I love for our mistakes either. Converting my stories into a history book and not my bible is a process that takes faith. Faith that God gave me all that I needed to learn the lessons he had predestined. Faith that I am strong enough to weather not only having lived the story itself but coming to peace with it. Faith that I have the strength to love myself enough to open up the spaces for other people to love me too.

So the next few months, I'll be writing down a lot of my stories. I don't need to cage them up anymore. In fact, I want to find peace with them. And that, is love.

Divide and Conquer

2008-02-10T10:20:00.000-05:00

I grew up 45 minutes outside of Los Angeles in a town by the name of Pomona. The LA riots however were just as prevalent in my hood as any hood in the middle of LA. The night they happened I was in fifth grade, and the season finale of the Cosby Show was on TV. My family and I lived in a two bedroom house in a not-so-great part of town. In looking out of my window, I could see angry people reeking havoc. I have this very vivid mental picture of this woman, Latina and pregnant, throwing a trash can through the window of Church's Chicken across the street. People had bricks, and they were screaming, and my eleven year old brain prayed that they did not turn their anger towards my apartment. Though I have to admit, as upsetting as it was, I might have been more upset at the possibility that the news cycle would interrupt the finale of The Cosby Show.

The next day, at school, I was one of 4 other kids. The others; a white male, an Asian female, 2 black females and myself; did diligent work and play for an entire day while exhausted teachers tried to collapse their classrooms and decide who stayed with the remaining children. I remember overhearing my fourth grade teacher (a woman I now get was probably around my age now) talking with my fifth grade teacher (an older very respected but ornery woman) "We should talk to them about all this. They must be scared." and my fifth grade teacher responding "And what do you suppose we say, we can't make them unscared. Last night was the product of a whole lot of crazy we can't control."

I bring this memory up because it was the end of a certain kind of innocence for me. The way the news covered the trial and the aftermath of the trial, built this anger in the community that lasted for years. My middle school experience for the next three years was marked with racial rioting. My school was put on lock-down on a number of occasions. What this meant, we were locked into the confines of the school until a parent came to pick us up, because the racial rioting at the high school endangered our safety.

And steadily, I watched as the racial divisions at my own school became fiercer and fiercer until there were "race problem" at the middle school level as well. I watched many things at the age of 12 that left many scars. I could tell you many stories of moments when my heart broke because of what I saw happen with and around my peers. At the end of the day, the worst part, is how much anger we all carried around. All of us. Actually, scratch that, the worst part, is we had no idea why we were angry. We just knew this world around us was very unfair and for some reason skin color mattered and though many of us wanted to "deal" with it. There was so much anger and so much violence, you had very little power over it. And this likely created even more anger.

I write this today because I have been watching the racial divisions that are being marked up and discussed as far as the presidential campaign goes. Its exploiting our community. I have watched stories and read articles about Latinos and Asians that simply won't vote for Senator Obama because of his race. Where those voting blocs are addressed as unreachable for the good Senator.

Now let me be clear, the Senator's Latino strategy has been pretty crappy and started pretty late in the game. Really, I don't even know if there has been an Asian American strategy. Given all he's overcome to be this kind of a contender at this point, I can forgive it. You can't handle the whole pie in one sitting, you take it in slices and the Clinton's have just been eating for way longer. Doesn't make Senator Clinton the best candidate, just the one with the luxury of being at the table longest.

But really, I'm pissed off at the way this is being marketed. Because it sounds like a simple news story for the journalistic world, a valid point that can be addressed from time to time. But what this is doing is causing scars and divisions in communities that really don't need more. It's a news story for whatever conglomerate prints or airs it. But its years of living in racial discord and violence for a middle school kid. Repercussions of which, we won't even see immediately. And that, is bullshit. You can't dangle the lives of people out there for fodder and take to responsibility for what it does.

I've been so proud of the black leaders of this country for seeing this. There have been many slaps in the face to the black community throughout this presidential race. Yet, these leaders, knowing the fall out of any quote that divides have stayed away from speaking. Choosing instead, to be "above the fray" and working to keep some sanity for everyone. So as a constituent, a Latina, and a kid who grew up in the middle of racial havoc; thank you for thinking of all of us. Thank you for acknowledging that in division there is danger. And though at the mountain top it sounds like an interesting discussion, without adding the many layers and many truth and many lies within the arguments, down in the valley's its not interesting. Its hurtful.

Communion

2008-02-06T22:06:00.000-05:00

I have often written on here about the impact that having strong women in my life has made on me. I knoooow I wax poetic about it. I do. But I have to tell you, there is a reason and you're just going to have to bear with me one more time. I was out with an old girlfriend tonight, a woman who is basically my twin, haha. I mean, we have some differences but the way we look and interact with the world is so similar, we might as well be family.

In short, I adore her. I mean, adore. This girl just knocks my socks off, she's one of those people that has such grace, you just wanna be in her presence. The deal is, that when one of us is "going through something" we both withdraw from the world and struggle with how to fit. We struggle with how to let people be there for us. Accepting love is a task on our to-do list that we haven't quite mastered. So we kinda take turns, this friend and I, being able to commune and needing our own space. But I get it. And she gets it. So when we DO get together, its like finding sisterhood in your backyard. We laugh, talk about some deep issues - personal, professional, global - gossip about boys, and just vibe.

I am so blessed. To have these strong women in my life. I know i have said it before. But really, I must reemphasize. It is key to the development of your person. A woman, uncomfortable with women, is missing a piece of her soul. Its the piece that knows how to truly connect with herself. That is not to say we aren't going through thangs and trying to constantly figure ourselves out, but damn, the phrase "I just don't get along with girls. I don't know why they hate me so much." is a BIG RED FLAG about a woman, still struggling to find comfort in her own skin.

Sisters, get yourself some women. Some good women. To be for you, family. To be for you, guidance. To be for you, period. I mean, I love men. And when I say love, I mean loooooove me some mens. They are so special and wonderful in their own right. So I'm no she-woman-man-hater. But ladies, get yourself some girls that sweep you off your feet. Because at the end of the day, it keeps your base firm to have these women. To be sisters. They are calligraphers to your stories, and though survivable, the world looks just not quite complete in their absence.

So thank you darlin, for reminding me of how important you and the rest of my girlfriends are. It is in our presence that we commune, become whole, remember ourselves, find courage, and get the strength to be and define our womanhood. So that when the right brother sweeps us off our feet, we actually had our own feet to stand on in the first place.

Seduce Me

2008-01-28T16:25:00.000-05:00

This is a beautiful poem Nia directed me to by one of my favorite poets Mayda Del Valle. This thing is breathtaking. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

_______________________________________________________________________

Seduce me

write me a poem

tell me about the scent of musk at the nape of my neck

that you dream of spending sultry summer days between

my breasts

that if you could taste me

it would be mangoes and tropical breezes on your tongue

keeping you up at 2am

for weeks

staring at black ceilings

legs entwined in sheets

wiping your brow

wondering when the next will be

seduce me

write me a poem

drop those weak pick up lines

and overwhelm me with quotes from Nerudas 100 love sonnets

tell me i walk in beauty like the night

trace the lines in the palm of my left hand

decipher

then read and whisper their meaning to me

tell me my life line crosses your destiny

imprint your words on me like overnight scratchmarks

leave butterflies in my stomach

with honeysuckle syllables

that remind me of first kisses

and holding hands at recess

seduce me

write me a poem

that prays my name

and preaches our passion

chant a litany of our lovemaking to come

under your breath

with the faith of withered hands holding rosaries in cathedrals

until images of us entwined in each other

burn themselves inside our minds

like incense at mass

seduce me

write me a poem

with your eyes

lock glances for a moment

across a crowded room

soft smirk on full lips

and a slow deliberate blink followed by a flutter of

eyelashes

that says

damn I wish...

seduce me

write me a poem

with your body

approach me with the certainty of the tide

move to me without doubt or question

make me your origin

and your destination

let music be the catalyst that lets our bodies meet

spin me in and out of conga rhythms

lead me into a Coltrane wail

grind me into the bass-line

of between the sheets...

then pull me close enough

to feel our hearts beat together

when we dance

seduce me

write me a poem

that speaks of our timelessness

remind me it was you I loved in a past life

on some faraway continent

tell me I carry you in my genes

that I can't forget you if I tried

that our memories are engraved into eternity

that time is just a theory to us

seduce me

write me a poem

that needs no words

compose a silent sonnet on soft bare skin

where your caress on exposed back

speaks that syllable I need to hear you

a poem

where melding bodies become

the book

where shallow breathing becomes prose

where

you

seduce me

and

inspire me to write you the poem

that shows you how to love me

by Mayda Del Valle

Una Fiera, a political conversation with mama about the country breaking her heart

2008-01-27T12:06:00.001-05:00

I was a militant socialist of a 10 year old, quick to invoke every freedom fighter I had ever heard discourse in documentaries or on TV whenever I spoke about the need for change. I would say by the time I was in fourth grade, I spoke exuberantly about the lack of resources kids in the hood had to experience and the unfairness of the world. Now as an adult, I wonder where I got the rhetoric. I mean clearly, I was 10 and my ability to know nuanced views about the issues was incredibly limited. And I wouldn't say that my parents spoke about politics in the same way I did. I mean my parents and I have always aligned ideologically/politically. Having grown up in their house, I took away many and most of their liberal ideals. Though, I believe I was always the one to start conversations around politics in the house. They were always trying to reign me back in and had a fair level of concern with my anger at the injustices of the world. And I hesitate to downplay my ten year old angst because it meant something to me. I just knew our ability to make change and I didn't have the patience to be older before I started vocalizing it.

16 years later, I am on the phone with my mother and we are discussing the Democratic primary. Having been so aligned, it is the first time we have ever not been in full agreement on an election. I am an Obama supporter and she is tenuously in the Clinton camp. After his South Carolina win, I call, not to brag, but to ask where she is at. And she tells me, "Mija, people in politics are just so mean, and the country is so evil. He seems like such a good man, how can a good man survive this. If they killed him, it would be devastating for the country, I don't know how Latinos and Blacks would ever recover."

And there it was, the fear many people of color in this country carry when it comes to the thought of an Obama presidency, what if he's killed.

"Is this why you aren't voting for him mama? I thought you liked her." "I do mija, I think she's really smart y una fiera (a wild animal) when she's attacked and when she is attacking. Pero, I think he is a good man with the right ideas, but it scares me, what could happen to him. This is a country that does not love us and it does not want us here."

The media has made so many assessments about the Latino vote and where it will go and why the Clinton's (and yes I say that plural for a reason)likely have a stronghold on it. How the supposed hatred in brown/black relations make Latinos voting for an Obama presidency unlikely. But I gotta tell you. I have yet to see any "expert" discussing it on tv that is actually Latino. Not a one of them has the language ability to even watch Univision or Telemundo. And it really pisses me off. They also assume that Latino is never black, when obviously, so much of the Dominican, Puerto Rican, Hatian, Central American and Cuban populations have the ability to be both Black and Latino. No doubt, there is a history of racism in the Latino world. The more light-skinned you are, the more revered in some places. But I would come close to making the bold assessment that this is pretty much a global problem that has roots in a looong line of socio-economic oppression. And that there are just as many allies in these communities as people who create division.

My mother's reasoning, actually resonates to me, much louder as the true fears behind the Latino community. I would venture to say that Latinos in this country have felt in the last 3 years even more than usual that we are not wanted here. It has played psychological havoc on our community and our children. Trust me, having been told in the past to go back to my own country, having being born in San Gabriel, California... you just feel like a less than to a country that is supposed to thrive as a result of its diverse population. My mother fears another blow. This woman who fought so hard to study and fight for her citizenship. Who fought for her children to become educated here. Whose admiration of this country just a few short years ago (pre-Bush re-election) was so unfailing. Her patriotism while I was growing up was almost blind. It frustrated me, yet at the same time infused me with hope and belief in this country.

And this is what it comes to? She starts to vote in elections here, the way she and my father would have voted for elections in their mother country? Based on fear and a lack of belief in the ability of change?

Is it my luxury at my 26 years to still have hope? To still ardently believe that as a country we are capable of getting past years of division. And to believe in a leader whose been more aware of my experiences growing up with a lack of power and privilege. Don't get me wrong, some of the fissures, I know they will always exist. But some of it, it just doesn't need to be this way. I want to be "una fiera" for that kind of belief.

So I close this entry with how my mother and I ended our conversation...

"Mama, I'm tired. I'm not going to vote in this election based out of a fear of what could happen. Or because this is the least evil person that could be the most evil and pull it off. I want to believe because I always believed. I have to take a leap of faith mama and if something bad happens deal with it, fight against it, and move on. Because the country shouldn't have broken your heart like this, you never spoke about this country like this."

"It's so much more corrupt than I ever thought it was Karla. But for your sake mija, I hope you are right. I don't want it to make you feel the way it makes me feel. And you do with your heart and your brain what you think should happen. And then we'll both pray."

"Si mama, we'll both pray."

Happy 100th!

2008-01-19T12:42:00.000-05:00

This would officially be my 100th post on my blog. Yay!

I want to thank everyone whose ever read the words I write on here. They come from my heart, and it has allowed me to keep alive my love of writing. Which in truth, is both sanctuary and therapy for me. I have all of these words in me on any given moment in time and this blog helps me put them in the world. The release of them is as vital to me as meal times.

This week, in my search for balance, I had a friend challenge me to write a list of the things that bring me pleasure. Just pleasure. Not something I do for someone else, to benefit anything or anyone but me and my heart. In the short run, I was pretty stumped. It took me sometime to sift through. And if you would permit me, I would like to write the list down now.

1. Writing my blog
2. Writing in my journals (yes, there are thoughts I have, the larger world is not privy to.)
3. Singing
4. Dancing
5. Cooking
6. Latin American Art (as of late, particularly art depicting Mayan culture)
8. Reading (For enlightenment, education, and general girlyness)

In the coming year, I'd like to put some elbow grease in one of these and work on expanding the list. May your lists fill you with just as much, if not more, joy.

Epiphanies and Illness

2008-01-12T22:22:00.000-05:00

I've had time to reflect in the last two day about how I ever got myself to this space in my health life. I got so sick, it was scary. I believe it is the longest any illness has put me out of commission. I've spent an entire week literally in bed because my body just didn't have it in me to do anything else. I thought I had reflected at the beginning of being sick, why I got this sick, but really, I didn't. I came up with the boiler plate answers. But the last two days I've been lucid enough to really get it.

I'm an epiphany kind of person. I'll have moments of insight and get clarity like no other. Even the lessons that take a great amount of time to garner, usually hit me like a brick in a moment of a-ha. The way that I take care of myself has inspired many of these epiphanies. Moments where I go "Okay, now, this time, I will take care of myself." "Now I will be my biggest priority." "Now, I'm gonna do it."

It's a pretty lame repetition. I've gotta admit. Its lackluster at this point. The epiphany means nothing. I know, at this fundamental level, that what is missing is me treating myself like the most wonderful precious thing that I have in my life. Or even, like I would treat any other person.

I have this reverence and regard for people, organizations, and good work. Its one of the things I love most about me. That I genuinely care and am deeply vested in the world around me. But that level of care, it just doesn't translate well when I'm dealing with myself. You would think it would be so easy, once you know, you just do it right? I mean its basic, this is wrong, fix it, do better. But I never seem to grasp this particular principle.

So how do you do it? Does anyone know? How do you gear 26 years of making yourself less of a priority than the world around you into a change of lifestyle? I don't want it this way anymore. I don't want to get so sick or so sad or so overwhelmed that I hit a wall and have to crawl back to level out. I want to value me, my body, my spirit, and my heart so much that I am there for me. All of this growth and introspection and self-evaluation that I've been fortunate enough to do, I've always done it in relation to the other. "I'm going to learn this and be a better daughter" "I'm going to do this and be a better manager." "I'm going to learn this and be better with kids." "I'm going to learn this and be better for my family." and in all honesty, I struggle to remember a time when I've thought, genuinely, "I'm going to learn this to be a better Karla for Karla." To an extent, even the counseling I've done has been to not be a mess for other people. And I want it for me. I mean really really want it for me. But I don't know how to get it.

And thats the epiphany this illness has given me. I don't want to make myself or those concerned about me any more empty promises. I just wanna hold my shit down for me. And really get why that means something. And move forward. Because the cycle, its not cute, and I don't wanna be in it anymore, but how? I'm just in such prayer as to how...

That Brown Girl

2008-01-08T13:20:00.000-05:00

So this is day 5 of stick to bed illness and I'm frustrated, so I figured I would just write about something thats been bothering me. Cause when you are laid up in bed unable to do more than go from room to living room, you kinda wanna nag about something. Rather than nag the good people that are being so sweet to me, I am going to nag about an actual issue. Maybe this way, I spare us all, haha.

The East Coast is the most "Latina" I've ever felt. I mean, don't get me wrong, I am Latina and proud of it. But when living in CA, I can't say that I totally was aware of my ethnicity, every, single, day. I was aware of it in the way that I am proud of my identity, have very cultural ways of being, speak in Spanish regularly. But not aware in the way that I felt when people looked at me they saw "Latin girl" and I gotta say, I definitely do here in our fair nations capitol.

There are things about DC that are much better in so far as diversity than SF. I love walking into places and being in diverse settings without even trying. I love feeling like there is so much out there to explore. But really guys, every single day, someone reminds me I am brown. It's the "Hola" I get when everyone else gets a hello. It's the habit of anyone in throwing distance coming to tell me whenever they have had ANY kind of Latin food. My favorite was someone coming to me on and telling me they had great Peruvian this weekend, like I should hand out a diversity doggie biscuit. Do you go up to Filipino men or women and say "I had the best Chinese this weekend!" No. You don't. And if you do, stop. Now.

I have even had someone go as far as saying "Ole!" when I accomplished something. Its just gotten to be a little ridiculous. I get confused for other Latin co-workers, though I'm relatively new to the city - I get asked for Latin food recommendations, the amount of men at bars whose opening line when they come up to me is some Spanish phrase they have no idea how to pronounce is staggering.

The East Coast is different. Or maybe its the northeast. Whatever the case, its happened enough times where I know I have an obligation to point out these faux paux's but struggle with how you correct in a way that is clean. Especially when I've let it get to the point where I've heard so many of the comments, every new comment makes me have to pause and breathe. I just know I am about 2 months away from becoming "that brown girl". And don't get me wrong. I'm glad I came out here. Though my initial instinct that this place could never be permanent I feel was right on. It will be interesting navigating being "exotic" to my new community. I'll post something the first time anyone calls me spicy. Oh and please believe, its happened before, so it wouldn't be an out of left field surprise. For now, I guess you gotta do what you gotta do. I'm proud of my heritage, I'll just have to find a way to bridge gaps between it and my new community.

Okay, back to napping. Muah.

Getting There

2007-12-25T14:40:00.000-05:00

As poor as we were growing up, my parents always tried to do something nice for me and my brother at Christmas time. They always (and by they I mean my mom, but dad gets kudos for financially backing the ventures) really thought about what we would like and got just the right thing. We weren't the kind of kids that would make requests or ask for particular indulgences, we just waited to see what would happen. It never failed that our faces on opening the present or presents (depending on the economic stability of the year) would always light up. As nice as it was getting stuff, cause as a kid, opening presents is never unwanted, I think the best part was how incredibly appropriate the gifts were. Like the year I turned 13 and got a phone for my room. Or the year I turned 7 and got my first Jem and the Holograms doll. They worked it out with what they had man, and I will never forget to appreciate that.

This year, the part that I loved the most was watching my parents open their own presents. We've had hits in the past in so far as presents go, but my brother and I are finally getting to a place where we can make holidays and special occasions truly special. Both from an emotional and economic perspective, we've hit a new plateau. All I gotta say is that my parents deserve it. I mean hella deserve it. They have sacrificed so much in the name of pushing us ahead, I thirst for the day both my brother and I can send them on an all expense paid vacation.

I know that my parents don't need or want extravagances. It is not the people they are. Nor would I give just an extravagance for extravagance sake. They would rather fix up their little house and go on a walk with the dogs. But their faces at Christmas, man, it was like their hearts filled knowing their kids loved them enough to think about them. I gotta tell you, we always think about them. They imbued us with a love and culture that I struggle to find English words to explain. I was one of the very lucky ones.

She Said I Prefer a Broken Neck...

2007-12-22T03:44:00.000-05:00

This has been my favorite slam poem for awhile, but it just came up on youtube. Enjoy it guys! Its gorgeous.

The Cagefight: Fundamentals About Race and Immigration We May Not Be Paying Attention To

2007-12-14T17:05:00.000-05:00

Alright, so I have spent weeks at this point in time being pissed at this political issue and I gotta say something. I mean I really gotta say something.

Off the bat, I gotta admit, my filters on this, totally not clean. I was waiting til they cleaned up to write about it, but to hell with that. I just came from Guatemala and there are just some things about immigration and the current debate around it that make me so mad. The hypocrisy of it, its just ridic.

So number one with a bullet. I've been listenin to the debate on how people need to wait in the back of the line to come here and do things with process. How other people do it, why do they break a fundamental law and ignore policy.

So ya'll, its hard to understand this because we don't know poverty in this country in the way other countries do. But people in Latin America who come here are so poor they struggle to eat and have clean water. And coming here is the choice between breaking a law and death. You can be a doctor or lawyer or architect in Guatemala and still really struggle to make a living wage. You can go to college for 20 bucks a semester there, no joke, so people go, and it makes no to very moderate difference in the economic situation. They still feel like living there is condemning there kids to a life with very little hope. The transition into having money is about who you know. Not what you know. And though the same could be said here, the honest to God truth is, my parents struggled my whole childhood with making sure they kept food on the table and us in school, but I make more than my father does now. And I'm 26. I would love to be rich and make more but the fact of the matter is, I'm not going hungry (knock on wood).

I mean think about it guys, say you had to go to Germany with absolutely no money tomorrow or you and many of your family members would die or be close to dying. You choose Germany. This place, that you don't get what the heck people are saying, you have to do back breaking menial work, and the people don't want you there. But at the end of the day, as menial and as badly paid it is, you get to eat and drink. You get to send money back to the US so other people you love can eat and drink. And its actually possible for your kids to do something for themselves. I'm sorry Guttenag. I'd be out.

These are people we are talking about. And I'm not saying I want lawlessness, duh, I don't want this country to come under terrorist attack again, nor do I desire the end of our comforts. However, our debts and our problems have so many rich and layered reasons, we can't just blame it on this one. And when I listen to people running for office, they act like its a fix all. Its not even an iceberg. For example, there is the "Immigrants are this drain on our healthcare system" argument. So I'm not rocket scientist, but there are 45 million uninsured Americans out there and they have health problems too. 45 million is more than the entire brown and black population here. They gotta be having a bigger affect than 10 million people who are too afraid to step into a hospital out of fear of deportation. So don't tell me that's why we got problems. But you know what, most of these people are poor white people, and they hear the reason that they are uninsured is that we got people drainin our healthcare system and its a wrap. Because they don't get their needs addressed either. Because we are too busy tryin to blame someone.

Then there is the whole "they don't even pay taxes" bs. Which is like, hello, most of these people make so little money that they would get all of it back in income taxes if they were to file. When you add the fact that they pay property tax if they own a house, or they give rent to someone who pays property tax, the fact that everyone pays sales tax, illegal immigrants are actually putting a lot into systems they will never use. In fact $420 BILLION dollars of Social Security, comes from illegal immigrants. So ya, lets stop all immigration next year and see how our elderly population fares the following year. Meanwhile in the I make $97,500 and up category, people who make a living wage and then some, there is a cap on how much of their income is taxed on a year to year. So you can make 12 million buck one year, and get taxed just as much as someone making $100,000. Don't talk to me about not paying your fair share.

5% of all people in the military, are illegal immigrants. Cause apparently, even if we don't want you here, we'll put your life on the line when its convenient to us.

And finally my favorite, "They just make our schools worse cause they don't pay into them, but their kids use them" HA. Please. So back to that whole taxes thing. In this country, we pay for our schools by paying for our property taxes. So I'm not sure, but something tells me a very very small percentage of the people in this country illegally are actually not paying taxes that keep their kids in school. They are doing everything they can to make ends meet so they can quietly survive in the background and this, inadvertently, pays into the system. Cause its the brilliance of how we, a nation of immigrants, were developed.

My cousin, Jorge Mario, in Guatemala is 19. I love him. He's brilliant and I would love to pay for him to come here and visit me. However, he must have a certain amount of money in his bank account to even apply for that "visiting visa". And then, at the end of the day, if he shows up, gets the lottery that has him visit, and the guy at the front desk doesn't like the t-shirt he's wearing, they'll still reject him. And you talk to me about fairness. About justice. About being fair to the people who apply.

For those of you who grew up in the hood or work with the hood, you know how tough it is for people to do right, when what they worry about is how they keep their family afloat. I'm not saying its right, I'm not saying I understand it completely. What I'm saying is we are getting snowed. And in the process, the ethnicities of this country are getting split up and divided because its easier that we vote or act resentfully based on propaganda, cause everyone wants someone to blame. When really, there is hope here, we just keep getting fed the shit that makes us sad, cause then we won't act on what we can't fix. Cause that, really inconveniences someone with even MORE convenience then we got.

Oh God, it felt so good to get that out of my system. To hell with it being clean. Cause if you don't know, now you know.

Our Responsibility

2007-12-10T20:41:00.000-05:00

So you guys know I just came back from Guatemala, and it was an amazing experience. While I was there I really looked at how we (as a country) impact the world around us. Having seen Guatemala's poverty, their beauty, and the goodness of my family; has motivated me in a whole new and different way, to make this place the kind of country I really believe in. This next election guys, its just about the most important one we've ever had. I really believe that whomever we collectively choose, will have ramifications on our lives for decades to come.

I have done lots of research for the last few weeks about the political candidates, both Democrat and Republican, and I can say that I fully believe that Barack Obama should be the next president of the United States. I can tell you the many reasons why I believe this and would be more than happy to articulate them for you, but that's not what this email is about.

This email isn't to ask you to vote for him in the primary (though I would love that) but its a genuine call to arms (and by arms I mean knowledge) to start educating yourselves on what the presidential candidates support, sponsor, and value. I challenge you to know about their stand with as much ease as you can sum up your own. I'm scared for us guys, scared and excited. Which I know sounds all sorts of crazy, but its the truth. We can't sit back and let the world be determined for us.

I know each of us is active in our own ways, and highly involved in the world around us and making it a better place. Which is why I sent this to you. But its not going to be enough if we don't start making our voices heard on this level, the level that determines the man or woman thats going to be our leader. The primary is just as important as the actual election. Don't let these next couple of months or even weeks go by without reading a damn thing about the people that we are going to place our lives/livielyhood into for the next 4 to 8 years. We deserve more then that.

We cannot in good conscious advocate for change on a local level and not advocate for our people to pay attention to the national level as well. It's like making sand castles on a beach and paying no attention to the waves (and in some cases the tsunami's) that are right behind us. These waves could create beauty or destroy the work we, in many cases, sacrifice parts our lives to do.

From the bottom of my heart to you my friends, please, pay attention.

I love you all very much,

Karla

PS I realize some of you are permanent residence and not citizens eligible to vote, however, I challenge you guys to get involved too. Your demographic will receive some of the biggest changes, be influencers in your world even if you can't cast a ballot. You never know the person that you educate and the impact their vote will have.

http://www.barackobama.com/oprah

A word on mosquito bites, plantations, and family as a way to sum up the Mayan Empire.

2007-11-25T11:39:00.000-05:00

It is my fourth day back in the states and I woke up hella early today. I figured it was my bodies way of telling me it was time to write. The non-pen and paper kind of writing, but I digress. I've been reaching for a summation of my trip, a way of wrapping myself in the love that it gave me and using it to shawl me from the world I am about to step back into. But rather than trying to combine several stories from the trip, I thought I would tell just one, and see where I go from there.

About four days into my trip, I went to a "Finca", now I have no idea what a finca is when my family tells me where we are going. I am wearing a purple tank top and comfortable cotton skirt, we are in Barrios at this point in time and it is hot as a mofo in Barrios (though I hear I got off easy). I see no reason to change. I ask what a Finca is and all anyone can tell me is that there are lots of fields. So I say, what the hell, and head on out with a few cousins. Before I know it, I am in the most beautiful terrain I have ever seen. A mix between jungle and forest, depending on the stretch you are driving through. At some point my cousin in-law stops the car in what can only be described as a Lychee Forest. Huge mama jamma lychee everywhere in tons of different colors, lots of yellows, reds, red with green spindles, oranges, etc.

Now I'm hard headed, so when I'm told that it probably wouldn't be good to climb around in all of it, that there are many insects and mosquitoes and I may pay consequences, my response is "It will be worth it" (which I still believe). And so hiking through I go, parrots flying past me, mammoth butterflys the size of your hand, and the faint buzz of insects. I pick fruit and taste, and laugh as a chicken follows my dad.

The rest of it is an interesting experience, where as beautiful as the finca is, I cannot get over how the indigenous people in the fields are being treated. Young Mayan's seem to be working the land in a way my American ass can only interpret as "plantation". Which as beautiful as it is, makes it hard for me to see it as anything but that. Which I know isn't very culturally open, but on another post I can describe this in further detail. It made me a little heartsick. I did my best to not let it read to my family, who was really trying to show me everything beautiful in Guatemala. By the time my father told me that he had worked on a Finca as a young boy and so had many of our family members, I was ready to leave.

I get home and realize that I have in fact been highly bitten by mosquitoes. Only, these bites are larger and more swollen than I have ever had mosquito bites ever. One of my aunts says that if I was bitten by mosquitoes then they were of the mafioso variety. haha. My aunt who is a nurse there looks at them to be certain I have gotten no other dangerous insect bite and deems me fine but in for a lot of itching.

Now I'm not trying to be obnoxious, but I've traveled a lot, so a few mosquito bites, even bad ones, is a blip on my travel radar. My father on the other hand looks obscenely worried. For the remainder of the day he continues to look at me in duress as if watching the mosquito bites on my legs is painful. Now to his credit, it does look bad, evidenced below.

But his reaction surprises me. The father that I have known has always been ornery and slightly apathetic (I say this in the most loving way possible). After a day of trying to find things to calm the itching, Mama Mirta (my dad's aunt/oldest living relative I have/pseudo-grandmother/all around gutsy lady) says we should put menthol on my bites. This sounds like a good idea to me, I figure the menthol will cool the bites and I had been putting ice cubes on them when no one was watching to get some relief until then.

I put on the menthol all the way across my legs and my dad watches, grunts mildly at me, but says nothing. It takes me 5 minutes max to slap it on and provides me minimal but definite calm.

Later that night, after everyone had gone to bed, I was up writing in my journal and about to slather on some more menthol. My dad comes in the room and says "Ay mija, look at what they did to you. Your mother would kill me." I laugh and agree, but tell him I'm fine. But he asks me if he can put the menthol on my legs for me. I am so ready in that moment to say "No dad, I can do it, I can take care of myself, its only mosquito bites, I'm not a princess." But instead, I look at the worry lines creasing his forehead and ease myself back on my uncles couch and make room for him to sit as I think "don't let him not be your dad right now". And for the next 30 minutes my dad sits on the couch and one by one rubs menthol on each of my mosquito bites. He shakes his head in what can only be described as sadness as he looks at each one a throughly rubs the menthol into each as if he were preforming an important surgery. And it dawns on me then, 1 am, sitting on the couch of an uncle I've only known for days, in a tiny tiny tropical and rural port town in the south east of Guatemala, just how much my dad really does love me. It hurts him to see me with mosquito bites. And where as I was fully willing to brush them off as inconvenience and take a minimal 5 minutes to take care of them, my dad thinks its worth 30 minutes of his time to try and make it better. Now for those of you who are familiar with my father, haha, you know he isn't the most expressive man. He has a gruff exterior and its tough for him to say I love you unless severely prompted and it takes him years to allow any new people in his life, his expression in the states is usually one that verges on scowl. So you can see, how a girl as emotional and expressive as I am, was a toughy for him to handle. But that night, and many other moments on the trip, I was struck by how in our baggage as father and daughter, I had not ever truly understood just how much my dad loves me, even if its hard for him to say it. I am loved.

Family in Guatemala is just different than in the states. There is a different way that family relates to each other. They talk and become friends and rely on each other. When one family member hurts the whole family does and when one family member has joy the whole family rejoices. Older people are treated differently. They are spoken to with a different regard and importance. Like you know your time with them is limited and you are blessed to learn whatever you can. It is not rare to see a group of people in conversation that spans at least 3 generations. In a household where there is no father, there is almost certainly an uncle that guides a boy into manhood. And at very least in my family, they go from being Tio to Papa. It is not rare that a family overwhelmed with children has one child raised in the grandparents home.

All of this is necessary to even get by in Guate. Because really, you can be a doctor, lawyer, nurse and still be absolutely poor. The pooling of resources both emotional and economic within the family becomes a way of surviving as much as a way of life. For sometime, they need each other, and in needing each other, they begin to want each other around too. And though my dad was pulled from all this love and support at a very young age and put in homes and orphanages until coming to the United States, this is where his base was created. Everything he learned about being a dad got packed into the first 8 to 9 years of his life. It is heartbreaking but important for me to remember that. Because the knowledge that that nine year old boy soaked in about family and all the bruises and trauma that followed created the man who sat at my legs and dedicated 30 minutes every night for 5 nights to provide his daughter with comfort.

There are so many stories I have been privy to in the last three weeks. So many. Rich and beautiful stories. Stories about my revolutionary great-grandmother "La Abuela", that hid propaganda in tortillas to help Pancho Villa, the Mexican revolutionary, spread the gospel of the need for change for the poor. Stories about her exile and escape from her mother country. Stories about the loss of her 13 children and her immediate jump to raise all her grandchildren in their absence. Stories about my 10 aunts and uncles and their upbringing in steep poverty but rich experiences. Stories that are full of immense pain and tremendous pride at what each of them had to do to guarantee survival for the rest. And how they always always minded the rest.

No doubt, I'm American. I have the optimism, idealism, and privilege that defines my ability to really embrace and take on the world. My sense of justice was created here because justice can prevail in our society, even if present governance tells us otherwise from time to time. It is nowhere near what we see in other countries.

I understand now, perhaps better than at any time in my life, that I am Guatemalan and Mexican. I am fundamentally tied to my culture. To a people whose ruins remain more amazing than any modern day building I have seen. Linked to traditions and values created out of struggle and hope. I am loved by them. I was loved by them before I ever was even born. And they fought for themselves, each other and my future. And now I get the distinct honor of being their historian. Making sure that my kids, my students, and my friends know where they come from.

Crazy Thoughts

2007-11-05T15:32:00.001-05:00

I had a someone ask me how I felt about forgiveness. I immediately answered "good, uh, most of the time, uh, it depends." And now, weeks after the question, I sit here and fully get that that particular response means that I'm pretty crappy with it. The good news for all those concerned, very rarely do I think people do things so bad, that forgiveness is necessary. I leave room for people's humanity, the mistakes they make just because we make mistakes as people. I love the utterly flawed and aware. My ability for empathy is so big, I think a key to it, is really accepting other people for what they are.

I chose to take a few days before my vacation to sit and mentally prep myself for what it looks like to be with my extended family in Guatemala, what 2 weeks with my father looks like, thinking about what I want to gain from really 3 weeks without the constant pressure of work.

Here is the thing about sitting and thinking. You get all sorts of crazy thoughts. Left to my own devices, thats what happens, crazy thoughts. I somehow manage to blame myself for every mildly inconvenient to traumatic thing that has happened to myself, my friends, and my family.

This of course brings me back to thought number one, I'm crap at forgiveness. I wonder if the people who live life good, I mean real good, thats what they get a handle on. How to forgive themselves for their humanity. How you take the pieces and look at yourself as utterly flawed and incredibly beautiful is a mystery worth solving. I can do it for others, I'm just puzzled as to how. If I could crack that, how I do that, I might have a shot at turning the same kindness around for me. This way, on the first Monday morning off I can remember, prepping myself for my first vacation in years, I wouldn't be mulling my crazy thoughts and my crap forgiveness. haha.

May your crazy thoughts not inundate you today, peace and quiet is so hard to come by after all, you wouldn't want to kill it with your own brain. ;c)

To All The Boys I've Loved Before

2007-10-20T01:50:00.001-04:00

Life of Incredible Succulence

2007-09-16T08:35:00.000-04:00

I am absolutely in love with the word succulence. Thank you Nia Mclean for bringing it into my life as a requirement of personal description.

I have been up for 30 minutes on an early Sunday morning with songs in my heart. I find when those are there, I must write them down. The songs don't come every day, and I encourage you all to write down your songs as well. The world needs them.

I'm reading this book called Succulent Wild Women and the way this woman writes, half stream of consciousness and half purposeful reflection, inspires in me a way of being I often leave in a corner.

Ya'll I'm about to be as honest as I can be. I am going to write down all the worst and best things about myself I can identify as a way of releasing them into the world, not letting them be locked inside of me. This comes neither from narcissism nor horrible self-esteem. It comes from an acknowledgement that everything in me touches on beauty and it is okay. It is actually okay for you too, everything in you touches on beauty as well, love. Allow yourself to touch and be touched, and yes that sounds dirty, but I love that I don't care.

Some of the things that I think are the worst: I can't help but loving to talk everything out, sometimes, you leave well enough alone, and I can't. I have very little self-restraint. That last cookie, I eat it; that phone call to the him you shouldn't make, I make it; the snooze button, I push it. That being said, I am self-indulgent (which maybe does make this narcissistic). I allow being a survivor to hurt for at least 10 hours in each day and I don't know how to stop. I am at once too emotional and not emotional enough. I do not allow myself to carry the full cycle of emotion, I stop it just in time to feel sorry for myself. When I pass gas, its a horrendous unladylike smell and I don't always own that it comes from me. I am utterly human with no ability for perfection, though I am a perfectionist, just so I can criticize myself. I am a slob and really have to put an effort into making sure that I don't just drop every article of clothing right where I undress. I want a bigger world than my family has known, and I want it at least 10 hours out of every day. I wallow with judgment, so as were most people could wallow and then get over it, I wallow and judge myself the entire time. The division of the two lets me victimize myself a little too much. I'm a huge fan of baths I never take. I will go entire days having eaten once because I am too self-important to make room for food. As much as I've been through I still take unnecessary risks to prove that I am independent. I own books I do not finish. I think I know it all. I don't let myself get angry. I love dancing and exercising but I get too lazy to go and do it everyday.

Now I challenge myself to make the next list just as long.

Here are some of the best: I think the world is sooo beautiful sometimes, I will celebrate it in my room alone. The celebration is a better dance party than you find in most clubs and I need no one but myself to have it. I am a true friend. When other people find good fortune I genuinely do not feel it makes me less than, I get so proud, so as not to seem silly, I'll go to the bathroom and shed tears of joy. They are my tears, I shed them privately and they are full of beauty. My eyes are magically trained to give empathy. I can look at a child or an adult and have a pretty good instinct of where the hurt comes from. I know people. On very good days I radiate light. I bring community into the world and allow people to remember the root of family. I truly accept and encourage imperfection in others. I wear perfume on my wrist so that I can sniff it at any time in the day and love that I smell good. I wear perfume on the nape of my neck as much for myself as for anyone who may hug me. I love to comfort. I am a great hugger, I give embraces full of life, warmth and tenderness. I love to learn. I read as much as I can. I love to sleep. Good sleep is my favorite thing in the entire world. When I kiss, I nibble, as if tasting my partners lips is the most delicious thing I can think of doing in that very moment... because it is. I'm feisty. I am as much of a girls girl as a guys girl. I do not feel intimidated by good women, I revel in them and encourage their brilliance and succulence. I respect the male heart, its genuineness, its difference from the female heart. I truly love in men how well intentioned they can be in their want for adventure, to protect, to rescue, and even to conquer. I sing at the top of my lungs no matter who is in the car. When I sing, I put my heart into my voice, not because I try but because my heart is so big, it has to find other ways of jumping into the world. I dress up for myself, because I love watching the end product for me. I love to cook, and I cook wonderfully. I bring flavor into the world.

Main Entry: 1 suc·cu·lent
Pronunciation: -l&nt
Function: adjective
1 a : full of juice : JUICY b : moist and tasty : TOOTHSOME a succulent meal; of a plant : having fleshy tissues that conserve moisture
2 : rich in interest

Give yourself love today. (I say this as much for myself as I say it for you)

Oh Dad...

2007-09-05T23:28:00.000-04:00

I was in my parents home for about 36 hours this last weekend. A home that is as familiar to me and as foreign to me as any place can possibly be. My parent’s home has gone through refurbishment ya’ll and its beautiful to see. I look at how proud my mom is showing me all the new pieces; the wood floors, the new mats on each wooden step, the virtually new kitchen. I believe she has repeated to me the decision for each piece, the rationale behind the purchase and the path to the purchase at least 3 or 4 times per piece. I can absolutely count on certain other stories from my mom too. I know that in stepping into the house I will hear of how loyal our dog Tyson is and he follows her everywhere, how my father has acquired a new cat (the newest one is called Leonel for anyone keeping track), I’ll hear about how hard of a worker my brother is and most definitely I will hear about how my grandmother nags her all the time.

And as the stories have become staples, the conversations with my father have become more and more sparse. We acknowledge each others presence. I give him a hug, ask him how he is, he grunts some response and goes back to watching television.

Its been particularly cold as of late because since my assault in April, he has yet to ask me how I am doing. Not a one time has he inquired into how I am doing. I wait for phone calls that never come and am naively hopeful every time that I speak to my mother that he will at least ask a question through her – but he doesn’t.

I try not to put my mom in the middle of our beef, its not fair, but she is naturally concerned that her life partner and their progeny do not communicate. In this last trip, my mom let me know that he was mad at me, because I hadn’t called him since April. She says this and my mouth drops “What? Are you kidding me mom?” I feel the wave of sadness wash over me. “Mija, he says that you don’t call him and ask him how he’s doing.” I breathe, not letting the tears prickling my eyes go any further, these tears are unfair to my mother. How do I say this “Mama, I was sexually assaulted and he hasn’t once asked if I’m okay. Not once since. And he’s mad at me because I don’t call him to see how he’s doing?” “I know mija. I’m so sorry. I try to tell him. He just shuts down.” And I watch as tears fill her eyes, because she can’t give me the one thing I want, comfort from my father. “Don’t mama, its not your responsibility, this is me and Dad’s love to figure out.” I smile and tell her that I love her and that I love him. I know he isn’t a bad person, it just hurts.

Knowing this new nugget of information, I swallow my pride and go to him. I say hello daddy, how are you daddy, can I get you anything daddy. And there he sits, unmoving, years of hurt stapling him to a couch with his eyes trained on a television. He makes minimal conversation back and turns coldly back to his one true friend, a screen that doesn’t talk back. It is pain so mutually deep, over years of distance that I can feel it pierce me. I go to the bathroom and grip the sink, shedding the tears that are also familiar to this home. “Let it go,” I tell myself, “He just doesn’t know how to be the adult.”

When dinner comes, he elects to watch TV by himself in his room while the rest of the family sits around the dinner table. And I force myself to not be hurt. But its deep ya’ll. With my dad, it’s not even the stuff he says that hurts as much as what he doesn’t say but puts in a room.

My dad’s always been the kid in our relationship. His responses when approached in conversation are always the kind of responses that you would expect to get from a sullen teenager. I don’t say this disrespectfully, just factually. It’s always about how he was hurt, why he doesn’t care, why the other person is in the wrong. There is no self reflection, no ownership over his role. And for awhile, this was just hard. I wanted to be the teenager. I wanted to be the kid and it was a role that I never had. Not as a kid, definitely not as an adult.

Please don’t get me wrong, I’m not ungrateful for the father I have. He came home every day, he put food on the table, he never lifted a hand to my mother and he hugged us. This is more than many can say and I do not take that in vein. It’s just for a long time I needed my dad in ways he couldn’t give to me. I craved a father that would emotionally comfort me and tell me I was his little girl. But I think I’m past that age. It’s not really about needing him anymore. It’s about wanting him. I actively want him to be a part of my life. I think about it constantly throughout the day. I want to know him and exchange friendship with him the way my brother does.

I decided recently to go to Guatemala with my father. My father’s homeland and the place that contains the history that created my father into his current incarnation.

Going to Guatemala is another attempt and to some extents my last to get to know my father at another level.

I’m surprised that it doesn’t hurt more to write this. I would think that it would be painful knowing the last respites of my energy in this particular subject have a timeline. There is finality to it that I really hope I stick to. It helps me breathe through it a little more. I have spent the better part of my adult life dealing with daddy issues. You know, there comes a time when you have to say “fuck it”. I refuse to spend my life crawling to a father figure that has no desire to know me. I can’t keep waiting for him to want to open a space for me. He loves me, that is enough. Liking me is not an obligation that I have to lay out like a grand golden hoop. It’s unfair in a way. But Lord do I ever pray for joy on that trip. If not joy, peace. And if not peace, more reasons to hope.

Homage to Bobby

2007-09-04T03:34:00.000-04:00

Tonight, as I struggle to get a few hours of sleep before a big flight, I'm restless because I can't stop thinking about Bobby.

You see, in high school, I had this amazing group of friends. Our history teacher dubbed us the brat pack, and a brat pack we were. We were this bizarre collection of random ass people. It was me and Michelle (the former yet still attached to the ghetto, latina girls), Eric (our fearless, yet at the time closeted ring leader), Ricky (our resident videographer), Miley (our actress and eccentric), Valerie (our athletic wonder girl), and Arron (our dumb blonde and resident white girl, and I say this only because she would beat me to the punch).

Now each of us came from INCREDIBLY different life circumstances, I mean we should have essentially never been friends. Except we all reveled in our differences, hated high school dramatics, and ultimately loved each other dearly. Our families loved each other too. They invited us all over, spoke to each other at big events and from time to time broke bread together.

We were a community. And because of each other we survived. As adults, though we don't maintain as close contact, we all just need to be in the same room together to really laugh and let go.

Today, I found out that one of our mothers, Arron's mom, Bobby passed away.

I think I spent hours in shock today. I cannot imagine how Arron is feeling. I want to be able to grab her and hug her and let her know that she has family everywhere.

Bobby was without a doubt one of the coolest mom's I have ever met. She was one of those mom's that you could be totally and completely unfiltered with and she would still look at you like she was proud. She gave us all love. I mean huge quantities of it. She carted us around in her car, let us hang out in her living room being obnoxious teenagers. And on random nights of teenage sleepovers, she knew how to balance being a member of the group and being a parent that would let her kids have space. She had the greatest sense of humor and not in that cliche "she was so funny" kinda way. In the, when you were around her you couldn't help but give a full throaty, clutch my belly cause it hurts laugh.

As an adult, I realize now more than ever, how difficult some times in our childhood were for Bobby. So many countless moments that I can reflect on her baring down and trudging through. Yet as kids, we never knew, she never told us. She always had a smile on her face and let us be kids. Which is more than many adults in our lives afforded us.

I have this memory that I've been thinking about all day. I had spent the night at Air's house, Air was in the shower. I was sitting on Arron's bed listening to some awful pop music and Bobby comes in the room. We start chatting and randomly she says to me "Ya'll are such beautiful girls." I laughed it off, really not able to accept compliments that heartfelt at that stage in my life. And she stopped me, she pointed to the bathroom door and said "My girl, she's amazing, I mean crazy and a loon, but she's amazing. And ya'll love so much. I can't wait for ya'll to see. You are both such beautiful girls." It was the first time anyone besides my mom called me beautiful. And I felt it. I felt how much she meant it. I felt it from the top of my awkward teen head to the tip of my toes. I remember blushing and her saying "Oh don't be such a goober, you'll get it some day."

So that's the Bobby I remember, brash, ballsy and fantastic. The first parent I knew who got how important it was to be a kid, a raving lunatic, a girly girl, and a ballsy mo fo from time to time.

Thank you for loving us Bobby. For showing us that it was okay to mess up and start over again. For encouraging us to collect as many mistakes as successes. For unconditionally loving Air enough for two parents. Even from years away, I see the impact that you made on lives. I hope that where ever you are, you are having much peace and a good laugh.

All my love,

The one formerly in pig tails

Better

2007-08-17T14:49:00.000-04:00

I am the kind of mofo that really cannot be happy unless she is pushin herself to another level. Sometimes, in early morning, when I am trying to wrap my brain around who I became, I wonder... why can't I just be happy with what I am and give myself a break every once in awhile. It's crazy, that quest, to be better. Because better you see, is intangible. You never achieve better. You wrap your arms around and hug it. You can't taste better. You most definitely can't see better.

Maybe that is where the problem lies. How do you rework your person to be satisfied with what you are currently, instead of seeking better? Is that how it works? Is that the key to it all? Figuring out how you lay off and just let yourself be who you are?

Yesterday, I grew to be excited about my job again. I can't really go into specifics yet. But more and more I realize how my role can make change on a really large scale. Its really about motivating people and making them as passionate for better for our kids as possible. And I do say our because I think we are a community and we are all responsible. I had this familiar ache in my stomach after the conversation I am referring to. I couldn't figure out what it was for a bit, but as I laid in bed last night, it came to me. It was mild "can I do this?" anxiety, mingled with excitement that I had another way of challenging myself to be... thats right... better.

I guess the perks to this is that recently, I added the personal bucket to the better paradigm. It's allowed me to take leaps I have never taken before. I was inspired by a friend, who seems so at ease with himself most times, that I have to just pause and be in awe every once in awhile. I mean don't get me wrong, I've seen him riddled with insecurity and doubt too. But its different for him, it all comes when it comes and you don't have control over that in his philosophy and that is just a totally different way of being for me.

Tomorrow, I take my first cross country flight by myself in over 6 months. For those of you who know me well, or at least read this blog, you know what a big deal that is for me. I'd be lying if I didn't say that this flight doesn't mean reclaiming my independence for me.I know I shouldn't make it into such a big deal but I can't help it. It's the build-up to being "better" again.

So as I struggle with the deamons of "not enough" I pray for the understanding to relax into myself and accept the beauty that I help create. May the Gods of logic and rationality win out and help me believe in the present as much as I do the future.

The Men Of My Life

2007-06-08T02:52:00.000-04:00

I have a wonderful beautiful group of friends. I'll be the first to tell you, I'm not the kind of girl who says the phrase "I just like hanging out with guys. Me and girls totally don't get along". I know that female, and usually it comes from a deep fear of strong women. Not always, there are exceptions, but I have found that that is pretty much what you get. My female friends sustain me, give me permissions for my heart, fortify and mother me in ways I find hard to do myself.

That being said, my male friends are a different breed. They are seriously the most amazing men. Just the most wondeful amazing men. I'm a lucky girl. Today, I spoke to a record breaking 6 of them in one day. And I gotta tell you, it was great to have them.

There is something about the male heart that just floors me. Not that its so much different from the female one, but it at once one of the most vulnerable, playful, and heartbreakingly beautiful things I ever see. Oh these brothers of mine, with the ties that bind them to preconceived beliefs of what the word "man" means. How they fight to find their true selves among the depictions of dominance and infallibility around them.

One of them today, just broke my heart. I see his fight and I so honor it. Its the struggle that everyone goes through to find happy. As his voice broke, ironically enough, I felt relief. It was only then that I felt he was allowing of himself to be true to the amazingly beautiful soul he was blessed with. In his struggle, I found hope that he was finally starting to see what the world around him saw. A tender spirit with love to give and receive.

Another one, he just made me smile. I think he sensed the heavyness I have been carrying and just brought to me joy. This man knows how to make me laugh. We sang to eachother silly theme songs of cartoons long forgotten. And with him, I find myself able to be the kid I never get to be. The one that is truest to my most authentic self. And for that and so much more, I feel blessed by him more with every passing day. He is a highlight.

So ya man, these men, these beautiful men. With hearts full of laughter and pain the world barely gives them the shot to express. I'm so lucky to be able to see them, hear them, feel them and love them. They remind me that all the spirits of boogie men past do not carry as much weight as strengths as the battalion of my guards and confidants in the present. They show me with their mere prescence, that kindness is not a female exclusive trait. That redemption, is something everyone is seeking. That life, is something everyone is struggling with.

And I trust them, oh do I trust them. There is gold in them. Warmth that is just unbelievable. Strength that is just unmeasurable. And for this and so much more. I cherish them. These men in my life. These beautiful men.

Like a Brandy song... Brokenhearted

2007-05-30T04:24:00.000-04:00

Friends, I am nursing a broken heart. No man in particular is responsible for it (that revolving door hasn't slowed enough to cause that kind of hurt as of late). As silly as it may sound. I am fully and completely in love with the world around me. And lately, its done some jacked up stuff to and around me. So tonight, for one night, I am grieving the broken heart I feel as a result of my partner, the world.

At once, you have given me everything, every worthwhile connection, salve and fragment of hope. Yet in gasping breaths you have also caused me the most physical, mental and emotional hurt I could ever imagine. I have watched first hand and experienced things that have shaken me to my core, left me in despair and thrown me for a loop. I lay here at 1 am recovering from the savage way you have ripped a part pieces of me. So ruthlessly in the last 3 years you have taken safety, love and peace. I wish world. I wish I could hate you. I want to so bad, just cast you aside. Remove myself from your sphere. Close down my boundaries and put up my walls and never let you penetrate at the level of intensity that I do.

Yes here I lay, knowing that I cannot do that to either of us. You hold too much beauty for me to walk away. I have too much yet to learn. When my heart finishes mourning and grieving. I hope to be in a space of forgiveness. Not only with you but with myself. How I have attacked and punished myself for ever having let you get this deep, this entrenched in my soul. How I have critiqued myself for caring this much and being so intricately involved with parts of your healing that I neglected to vigilantly guard my own.

Tomorrow, when I wake, may I be healed. At least in the smallest fraction. Let me feel more whole, show me that I am not lost. Help me move forward, help me move on. May the scars serve only to remind me the path of the warrior. That I may not forget the courage it takes to face you. The power it takes to not conquer but commune with you. Provide in me the light needed to feel grace. May I find a song so sad, that I connect so deeply as a result of you, that I can sing my pain away.

Tatoo... not the midget

2007-05-14T23:14:00.000-04:00

So I think I found her... ain't she cute! I have wanted a tatoo for years. But said I would never do it without a reason, never with an embarassing symbol. Something I was guaranteed to always appreciate. This is the Mayan symbol for a Quetzal. It has a sun-disk shield on the front of its body. The Quetzal symbolized the movement of Creation and the will of the Creator come to earth. Which I think is beautiful. I like that it has a sun shield, like all the bright pieces of the world protect her, regardless of the hurt. To quote Jonathan Larson, "The opposite of war isn't peace, its creation." And friends, I believe in creators, healers and change makers. I'm gonna soak it in for about a month. I will get it on the anniversary of my survivors celebration. June 29th.

Choosing A Movement

2007-05-12T12:07:00.000-04:00

Once, someone told me that my scope and capacity could only be so big. If I tried to work on healing the world, I had o choose my mission and run full strength on that mission. The person, said that there, maybe, I could make impact.

This bugs me.

Mainly because I see the world so fractured in so many ways that I feel a human responsibility to act.

For the first four years of my work in service, I chose to work with young children, helping them have a childhood. You see, for me, a group of friends (one young man in particular) gave me that gift. And though it may seem inconsequential, knowing what life could be like burden-lite was a motivator for me. And in tough moments a safe haven I rolled around in. So logically, mission number one, was doing the same.

From there I chose to do work on the ground with high school students to get them into college. This was/is one of the greatest blessings of my life. The more work I did the more I realized that it was at least in part my calling. There will never be a year in my life, where in some way, shape or form, I do not do this. College access to me, is the grand equalizer. Where you can go from being a young woman born and bred in a low-income community and be given the gift of choice. The world, looming before me after my college graduation was at once the scariest and most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I could do, at that point, whatever I wanted. And so many people had invested in me, it made sense to invest in the communities that shaped me.

Very recently, my role in this has changed. I now seek, identify and motivate other change makers and get them involved for the same causes that grew, challenged and reinvented me. It is my great honor to be a red kool-aid peddler. And I'm good at it btw, solely because my product helps create more whole individuals both on the student and volunteer end. My true and unwavering belief that this is the case, makes me want to yank people off of streets and get them active.

This all brings me to this week. Where I sat in a room with 1,000 other people listening to a call to arms around the cause of Darfur. It took one statement. One, to literally get me to lose sleep the last few days. "Women are in charge of cooking. To cook they need firewood. To get firewood they must go into the brush with the Janjaweed militias. At this point they are in danger of being raped repeatedly. To feed their families, these women must risk rape every single time they walk out of their door." And that one phrase, hurt my heart so deep, I sat the rest of the night hearing the phrase echo in my head. Fighting tears, even when engaging in other conversations. I now must figure out what action looks like.

I am a 6 time survivor of sexual assault. And in my worst moments, it feels more than any human (not woman, human, I have known quite a few male survivors at this point and I honor their path as well) should ever have to bear. The long term repercussions of this violence have left scars I have to wrap my brain around every day. It is my struggle not only in selecting, opening up to and trusting men. But my struggle in everything. My own personal safety, my self-identity. I constantly ask myself to stay aware of filters this abuse could be affecting. I refuse to live a half life running from the skeletons or closing my doors to them and that makes life just a little harder. So to hear that a woman, half way across the world, has to live with that fear more intensely, and bear its repercussions more literally every single day and every single time she fulfills her maternal instinct to feed her home, it absolutely floors me. It makes me want to scream at the top of my lungs to make good people stop and fight on their behalf.

I write this to say, I can't choose one movement, I am a heart divided. There has to be more that one human being can do well. I am in a period of new education of a new issue that I am sure to take on as my own. How? I'm not sure yet. But I can't sit here and pretend that this injustice isn't happening now that I have been made aware. Now I just have to figure out what I do.

The Precipice

2007-04-08T15:09:00.000-04:00

I met this musician a couple of weeks ago, I've seen him preform three times. His gift is so gorgeous and has such depth. When I first approached him to tell him how much I appreciated it, I knew instantly that he couldn't yet fathom how powerful and gifted he was. But it's great to see people on the precipice you know? There is something about that ledge before you just swim in who you were born to be that just amazes and delights me. WIthout even knowing him I know the coming months are going to be one of ledge balancing for him. But I didn't wanna come off like a weirdo, so I didn't say anything. haha.

Last night he said in conversation "I don't know you know. I just don't know where I'm going." and as he said it, I don't think he even believed it. When you have gifts like that, you know. You try to deny it for a long time because of what those gifts mean. But they are such a piece of your fabric.

I met this anthropologist that is in the same place. His gifts are so there for everyone to see. But I could tell he has this "Why was I given these pieces, now what do I do with them?" There is such crippling doubt there. And I can tell he's in the middle of a soul search, I wish I could say "yo, its gonna be okay. You have been chosen. Scary but doable." But really, people don't need that, cause at base. You know. I mean if someone else can see you and know, you know.

People are so beautiful.

My Tia gave me a sarape once. It has beautiful colors in it. When you take your time and really look at it, I mean really look, those colors are amazing in there vibrance. They have almost a glitter to them. When put together, they are a comfort for me and a couple of generations of women before me. I think it's this thing you could probably skip over, but it's art is art.

I think people are just like that. Just brilliant and vibrant but if you aren't really watching. You could miss it. That moment when the folds of their colors open up and put the light in them that they were meant to bless the world with.

The tough part is accepting that about yourself right? I mean who am I? And that humility is a blessing and curse at the same time. Almost like that "Who let me sneak in and do this? Obviously I came under the radar." And when you are at the precipice, its scary, because you just start to understand your purpose, and purpose is great and hella freaky.

But damn, that ledge is like staring into art before it gets created. To all the people that I see at that ledge, I just honor your journey. Light the world up mofo's cause it needs it. It needs you.

Acting Like I'm 21 on Easter Weekend

2007-04-08T15:08:00.000-04:00

So I just got home from my Friday evening. My body is totally wiped. I have to rally though, I got stuff to do and you can't ignore a sunny day in San Francisco, its a sin and being Easter Sunday. Can't be sinnin.

Every once in awhile, I think you need a weekend where you just kinda while out and have fun. I can't say I'm a major partier, I love things that are fun and low-key (very SF). Well, thats not totally true, I go through phases. But I got my dance on fierce this weekend, =c) And it was really good times. My liver will be in recovery for a second, but what can you do.

I gotta tell you, I love being a girl. Everything about it is so appealing to me. I love dressin up, I love dancin around, and as independent as my ass is, if I'm honest with myself, I love all the stereotypical girly things. At the same time, I really enjoy being the kind of girl that will take one outfit and rework it three ways, not make a fuss about it and keep charging through and having fun. I know I have a strong uber-feminine presence and I love the hell out of it.

As any one of my overthought ramblings I did tons of thinking with Andra this weekend. Thank God for growing man. I love the place I'm in. My heart aches sometimes for the girl I used to be. But not aches in a feel sorry for her way, more like a "it's okay boo boo, it gets better" kinda way. It's crazy to comprehend how blind you are to yourself sometimes. All the great pieces just seem to be laid to the weigh side. It took me 25 years to acknowledge myself as a pretty girl. That's 25 years of wanting to rework my face and body into someone else's version of beautiful. It is obscene how tiring that is. That doesn't mean I don't wanna keep working on myself physically, I think out of respect to myself, I want to do that. But to even just marginally let go of some of that baggage is like breathing in a different way.

Thank God that I get to dip back to having fun the way I did in less "preoccupied" times, but can still have the heart and knowledge that I grew into.

Good Easy Days

2007-04-08T00:05:00.000-04:00

So my night was great and so was my day. They deserve homage sometimes, those really good days.

Woke up on Andra's couch
Saw the Devil Wears Prada and quoted lines with Andra
Got up and went to Cafe Lo Cubano
Talked about every topic under the sun over a havana chicken sandwich
Drove back to Andra's apartment to get my iPod
Blasted Dez Hope music while Andra drove us to the movies
Went to the mall and tried on perfumes
Watched 300 on IMAX (Thouroughly enjoyed abdominal muscles that were 15 feet high)
Played at the MAC counter with new gay boyfriend Jason who does great makeup
Decided we needed to go out dancing
Drove back, still talking about everything under the sun
Went to Walgreen's so we could buy hygenie supplies (esp toothbrush for me)
Carefuly took a shower making sure not to get my newly makeup'ed face wet
Put on dirty yesterday clothes on newly good smelling body
Had another glass of Bailey's and Milk (as God intended milk to taste)
Danced around Andra's apartment
Now will head to Medjool to enjoy tunes with newly good smelling body in yesterday smelly clothes. haha

I love good days, every once in awhile, they should be recorded for posterity. Hope you had a good one too. =c)

Strong Women

2007-04-07T13:07:00.000-04:00

As a woman you create so much of your identity based on the women you have in your life. Everything that you do, everything you are, you get permission for by the women that surround you. Now, don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean that you are sitting there waiting for approval (at least if you're lucky and grounded you aren't). But you are a girl and you have these thoughts that society never gives you permission for. Everything about you and who you are in your assertiveness, your sexuality, and your emotions is created in tandem with the women around you as you all help create each other. I would say that we aren't raised with a sense of easy disclosure. I'm not even sure if this makes sense but its like, there is this sisterhood to womanhood and you realize you aren't a freak when you are around women that show you, "hey, you are totally normal."

I have been blessed with strong women. At all ages I have just had these partners and sisters in my gal pals. I trust the women in my life implicitly. I know they keep my secrets, bring my game up, push my boundaries, call me out, esteem my gifts, and encourage the "fun" me. I have so much inner monologue, the "fun me" part is actually pretty important.

So I write this particular blog entry as an homage to those women. Thank you for showing me that its okay to be me. For having enough security in yourselves and who you are to encourage my growth and not be intimidated by it. For being just as good on your own as you are with men. But mostly, for honoring this sisterhood with your hearts and honesty. Thank you for teaching me and my scars that its okay to be sexy, ballsy, bawdy, independent, dependent, soft, emotional, fierce, scared, scarred, ghetto, classy, smart, silly and at peace. I owe you my life for giving me permission to be myself. And the beautiful thing about you all is that you are always so adamant about showing me that we owe each other nothing but that this is the way it should be. I concur.

Obviously Pretty Girls Part Two

2007-04-04T00:35:00.000-04:00

I am not an obviously pretty girl. I may have explained this distinction before but in the event I haven't, an obviously pretty girl is the kind of girl that the world readily, speedily, and many times overtly acknowledges as beautiful. Not in the, wow, she's a full package kinda way. Not in the, she cleans up good, kinda way. Not in the, when you look at her when she talks she's beautiful kinda way. Obviously pretty girls have the body (thin/big boobs/tall or petite), the features, but mostly, they are the women that from a very early age were told over and over how pretty they were. So the muscle they developed there was the one that let them lean on their looks to get what they want. In short its the attitude. They know how to use it to their advantage.

And don't pretend like you haven't met that girl more than a handful of times. Fellas, you in particular seem to fall all over yourselves when you meet her. She can also be the "super cute" girl. So cute you just wanna squeeze her and put her in your pocket. Which is why she, like OP girl, can get away with ANYTHING... at least until you get sick of being dragged around on a leash. That is not to say that an OPG couldn't extend way past this. In fact, most...if not all of them do. But I watch consistently as my sisters in this camp struggle, cause guys have a hard time calling them out on their shit. Mostly because of the validation tied to having them on their arm.

Now before anyone tries to tell me, that this is a low self-esteemy/judgemental/self-effacing/mean thing to say... I'm not saying I'm not pretty. I'm just saying I've never been raised as an OPG. I'm the presence girl. The one that gets prettier as you get to know her because she's got so much in her. Not to say that I'm bad to look at, its just not the muscle I developed to lean on. We all have those muscles I believe. It just depends on where we create it. I think one of the first ones we build as women (and maybe even as men?) is the pretty muscle or the personality muscle.

I would venture to say that obviously pretty girls have many times a tougher time with the issues attached to that particular social sect than the rest of the population. At least I would rather have the issues that are attached with my side of the green grass. I can't imagine being constantly and consistently identified as a sexual object. Which of course, has its roots in many of the things I write about regularly, but I digress.

I feel as a "regular" girl you get the shot to work your way into different arenas. You get to develop your other muscles so much, you have to work harder... for everything. You get to flesh out who you are with the world around you, instead of with the people who can see more to you than the validation your presence provides.

I dissect this only because I've really been looking at the muscles I've developed lately. What they mean and how I could develop the others. Is it an innate attitude do you think or is it a learned behavior from validation in a certain area? I'm curious. Are you born to be that person or do you become her/him? Just a few things to ponder.

To Write

2007-03-25T21:53:00.001-04:00

I have a poets words but not a poets bravery
Miles of paper inked with my heart in drawers hidden from the eye,
I turn to these blank pages for peace and watch as they save me

In stacks of red leather, embroidered flowers, flip book, composition black and white
My gift stands untouched and unjudged by the world
There in their pages exists a reserve of warmth, power, spite, love and anger

Emotions so strong they are indescribable
At night I lay in prayer hoping that my children never feel this level of pain
Only to wake and believe this level of love is the genetic gift I am born to pass down

Verses so caged they fight against the societally trained walls of my being
Then my heart opens, purges and flys
Allowing my words to glide at such altitudes I swear they summon rain

I stand in the mist of their tribal call feeling purified
Moments of bliss surrounded by the freedom of letting go, drenched in my own song
Only to watch the world and the pieces it tries to take from me while I seek my redemption

I kneel to rebuild with logic and rationale a concerete prison of loneliness
Feeling the severing of my soul as I withdrawl from the world I usually jump to paint
And there with bruised knees and bruised heart I wait to heal myself again

Tears streaming down my exhausted face

A Youth Workers Verse

2007-03-11T21:09:00.000-04:00

I ask you with my embrace to allow me to be a part of your family and only after years of consistency do you allow me to hold the space
Foreign – the practice of allowing the outside in
Frightening – the thought of breaking the character you have to wear as a survival system
Peaceful – the first moments after your first extension of faith

In your silence I hear you screaming for me to listen to your story
You sit still and unmoving
Any movement will break the massive efforts it has taken you to control emotion
You pull up your sweatshirt hoodie as if it were armor made of steel
Watching you, I see it is

You are coming to me from a life-time of training
A world that tells you being a man is never letting you break
16 years of learning from women, peers and TV how to be men
And here I am, yet another woman, hoping to be here for you, when what you need is a man

I ask you to let go of the anger, allow me to help you ease it from your tight grasp
Frustration – the confusion of not even knowing how to get there
Anger – the thoughts of verbal assault other people in your life do not hesitate to dish out
Hope – the thought that maybe, just maybe, you will find a way through this time

In your silence I hear you screaming for me to listen to your story
You sit still and unmoving
Any movement will break the massive efforts it has taken you to control emotion
You arch your eyebrows and pout your lips, hand on your hips, attitude, hardening, as if it were armor made of steel
Watching you, I see it is

You are coming to me from a life-time of training
A world that tells you being a woman means ingesting every insult hurled at you as if it were truth and then hurdling it back at light speed
16 years of learning from men, peers and TV how to be a woman
And here I am, yet another woman, hoping to be here for you, when what you need is a mother you can dialogue with

I ask you to believe me when I tell you how beautiful you are
Frustration – the confusion of not even knowing how to get there
Anger – the thoughts of verbal assault other people in your life do not hesitate to dish out
Hope – the thought that maybe, just maybe, you will find a way through this time

In your tears and your laughter I hear as you share with me your story
You stand and invite me in
Your movement breaks the massive efforts it has taken you to control emotion and a child reappears in the place of your pain
You start to believe in your strength the way I do, as if it were armor made of steel
Watching you, I see it is

You ask me with a tentative fear, will it always be this hard.

My heart fills with empathy, wishing I could make lifetime guarantees

I ask you with my embrace to allow me to be a part of your family and after years of consistency you allow me to hold the space

Tongues Curl and Give Birth To Words and Worlds

2007-03-11T12:14:00.000-04:00

I cannot take credit for the title of my entry. It belongs to a young poet from Oakland, CA. When I heard it last night at the Youth Speaks Poetry Slam Semi-Finals, I decided it had to be repeated everywhere. I wish I would have brought a notebook and taken down the many phrases that touched my heart last night. The night was so blessed in so many ways. I really have to hand it to that organization. The work they do is so vital to the survival of young people. Giving them a mechanism to express themselves is key to any child/person so full of emotion, they have no idea what to do. Learning to do that, is like learning to breathe. So as I breathe out last nights emotions, know that I am one of the lucky ones. Knowing how to write, having this random piece of cyber space as my forum keeps me centered. Because letting go of these words is nothing short of reclaiming life.

I invited three of my old students to come with me to this Poetry Slam last night. I was well aware of how difficult the week had been for them. You see they were informed this week that three more people from the after-school program I used to direct were quitting. With these particular three, I knew what a devastating loss it would be and I wanted time with them. I'm not sure if I wanted that time to help them process it or if I wanted it to just be able to give them a piece of my heart and time so that the four of us could enjoy each other.

My idea was that we would have dinner together, like a family, go to this slam, Twin Peaks, and then I would take them home. They each brought a side dish with them and I provided main course and a couple of other odds and ends. When I picked the two boys up, there was this odd mix of happy and awkward. This was interesting, because in all the time I had known these two particular boys, even in the beginning, there was never any awkwardness. I let it ride out as we drove up to the city, chalking it up to hunger. Yet as the hour passed and we reached my apartment, their emotion became thicker, yet what they were telling me was more and more sickly sweet. Unable to allow my time with them to be false, I said to them "Listen, I know that this week sucked. If you want to tell me that it sucked, if you want to tell me that you are mad at us, if you want to sit here and be silent; all of that is okay with me. But please don't sit here and try to put up Disneyland for my benefit. I can feel the hurt in you right now and it's louder than what you are saying to me."

Then it came, the emotions, the ones that I became accostumed to receiving every day while I was there. One of the boys started explaining to me how frustrated he was with the verbal abuse he was experiencing at home. The more he spoke, the closer he came to his voice breaking, until tears streamed hot and fast down his face. The young woman nodding her head in agreement in emotions I could tell they hadn't expressed in some time. As I watched him release, I watched the other young man shut down. The fear of breaking radiated off of him palpably. Even his body turned slowly away from the dinner table. He put the hood up on his sweatshirt. Like a turtle, I could see him retreating into his shell. All of it spoke volumes. I told them how much I loved them, how much it hurt me to see them being this hurt. But I knew at that point, the way you know, that your words will do nothing to resonate in the situation. There was too much hurt for words to heal any single part of this. I got up. Put my hand on the shoulder of the first young man and then asked the second young man if I could hug him. This 16 year old boy got up from his chair and in that moment he wasn't a tough teenager anymore, he was a kid. A kid who desperately needed love. He hugged me with such warmth and need that it hurt my heart. I asked the other young man to stand up and join us and both of them stood there in my kitchen, holding me and each other, tears spilling down there cheeks but managing not to fully cry.

I think the first young man and the young woman were aware of how much more the second young man needed a conversation. Soon after they busied themselves cleaning the kitchen and the young woman eyed and the second young man, silently asking me to talk him through this.

In my living room we sat there and he finally spoke the words that made the pain so much more relevant to him and really all of them this particular week. "It's just, its the same way for me that it is for him. It's that way for all of us. But before it was like, my mom or whomever would yell and call me a piece of shit, but when I got to College Track, it was different. I didn't have a mom that told me she was proud of me or that told me she loved me and stuff. But I had ya'll. And now there is no one there. And I want the services and stuff, but the other stuff was more important. Even walking in there is sad and hard for me right now. I wanna support you guys and tell you to do what you gotta do to be happy, but when you guys leave, my family leaves. That stuff, leaves."

And there it was, everything I was trying to articulate about why staff retention is important and quality of service being quality of heart. Better then I could have ever said it, this young man hit the nail on the head.

I was a little floored by how much space and room this created at that point for them to all be open. They spoke to me about everything after that, as a group and as individuals expressing to me what was good and bad in life right now. One of them said to me "I'm just afraid that I'm sensitive. It's like everything hurts me or makes me mad and no one else is that way." God I would never be a teenager again. I think that is why I am so dedicated to them. It's just so hard. I told him, its not about being sensitive, its about having a full cup of emotions. When its already full and getting a barrage every day, one more thing ends up overfilling the cup, it matters... a lot. When you know how to empty the cup, the world is a different place. He looked at me like this concept was relevatory. And we made a commitment to each other to learn how to empty his cup better.

The rest of the night was laughing and joy. There was good conversation. Activist conversation. Proclamations of changing the world. Silly singing and jokes being cracked on each other. It was FABULOUS. God I miss the kids. It was so nice to enjoy them outside of it being my job. It was different and good in a way that words struggle to articulate. Ironic when the night was really about the power of words.

We need to find ways to help us all express. Its a matter of survival. There is too much else to do for us to let emotional constipation be a block in the progress of the world.

Aruba!

2007-03-10T15:52:00.000-05:00

So I made the hottest decision yesterday when I got my Jetblue miles statement. Turns out the benefit to always traveling is getting the kind of miles that allow you to travel and it's quite conceivable for me to have a free plane ticket to Aruba by the end of the summer. Holy geez! I've been running and running for the last few years with little to no vacation that did not involve helping out a friend or org. I am ready to sit my ass on a beach and ask a cabana boy to get me a Mai Tai. Wahoo. I will schedule it at the end of the workshop/volunteer season and use it as the FIRST leg of a longer vacation. I swear to you, it makes the heavy lift I'm about to run all the more conceivable and exciting for me. Wahoo!

Anyone is invited to join, though I can't promise you I will do more then sit on a beach, read a book, dance and hike.

Thank you for my vacation going friends that have inspired in me the want to chill the hell out. I swear to you, I am gonna do what you guys have been requesting that I do for myself for years. I love you for so many reasons and among them, caring for me so much. Must go purchase a beach boys song now to keep me inspired! haha.

Don't delay, rebel

2007-03-09T02:24:00.000-05:00

As a side note before I write my entry for the night, a friend of mine told me I was like Carrie Bradshaw tonight but instead of naming my writing "Sex and the City", I should call it "Action and the Community". That gave me a little chuckle, thought it might do the same for some of you.

Tonight I got the priviledge of a family ticket to an awards banquet for an old student of mine. Its totally humbling you know, when a kid takes one of five tickets given for a ceremony and asks you to be their family for the night. My babies are soooo talented. I mean amazingly, infinitely talented. That is why tonight, I sat in a room honoring one of them for getting a community service scholarship. She was one of the higher end prizes, a $5,000 scholarship. And it meant a lot to me to watch as she beamed, knowing what she brought together.

I was standing there talking to an old co-worker (also invited by another student) and all of a sudden I feel arms swing around me. I see this young woman, whom I've had the priviledge of knowing since she was a child of 14. Tears in her eyes, and she's telling me how much she loves and misses me. Its funny what wells of emotion feel like.

Have you ever been to the gulf of mexico? I've only been once when I was a little kid. So my perspective is that of a really young child. It was a really surreal water experience. It's like your stepping into the ocean, but when you get in, its so warm. And it laps against your legs and makes you feel comfortable and excited at the same time. Everything I had been conditioned to with the ocean was always to brace yourself for the shock of cold. But in the Gulf, you get the exhiliration of the ocean, with the comfort of warmth.

Standing there with Wendy felt like swimming in the gulf. I know that sounds weird as far as metaphors go, but it is what it is. I had always been taught that outward displays of emotion equated weakness. This made home really tough, because I'm an emotional girl by birth. It never worked to suppress it, it just served to create in me a standard I could never meet. In working with the, its a little over 1,000 now, students I've worked with, I have learned the importance of swimming in the gulf. But I digress.

I sat in a room where 27 teenagers were getting awards for working to heal the community. My awe in them is still present as I type this. I love that young people care so much. And really, they all do. Even the ones that say they don't care, only say they don't care because caring as much as they do is frightening for them. You teach our young how to put up a fight, and a fight you'll get. You teach them how to learn and engage and you will get community leaders.

This teen tonight said something along the lines of seeing something that talked about how if you had all the kids in China jump at the same time. It would throw the world off it's axis. He said he hoped that they were all jumping so hard that the world would be rocked by them too. And I felt it, I felt the axis tip. I saw hope. No tatoo, black clothes, goth makeup, picket sign, piercing, bald head, alcoholic binge, sexual exploit, or screaming match is a bigger act of rebelion then what those kids put in one room tonight.

I left inspired and ready to work for change again.

We don't have time to waste guys, rebel.

Dear CT Babies...

2007-03-07T01:53:00.000-05:00

To my dearest babies,

It's funny that I still call you all my babies. The truth of the matter is all of you are grown enough to know life more then most adults I have ever met. Your strength far surpasses anything anyone could ever conceive. I dream of days when people know your greatness. You are my picket line and my civil rights movement. Investing in you, is investing in miracles and change. Know that even today, as I do my work, you are my inspiration to fight hard for what your generation deserves.

I know that today was hard for all of you. I wish there was a way I could be there to hug you and let you know it was okay. Last night, I had a hard time sleeping thinking about the news you were going to hear today, anticipating your reaction and your hurt. Not being there to hold you while you heard the news that another one of us was to leave you. I racked my brain for ways to be there for you, this letter, was the best I could do.

I know this year has been blow after blow for you. I respect the steadfastness that you've had to approach your education with, as adults you had become accostumed to leaning on fade into memories. How it has hurt me to see you have to recover from the loss of each.

Then I woke up this morning and I looked out my window and I thought, "its like everything else. They are going to be okay, they have each other." Guys, as staff, we are the icing to the cake. That place, can have a ton of different people running the services because you are the absolute heart of College Track. You show anyone who walks through those doors just how deserving you are of everything. Hearing from the staff how you created the Brotherhood and Sisterhood groups after I left, I felt such pride in you. In the value that you chose to place in each other. I thank you for making it work. Thank you for keeping the heart of that place pumping and knowing how important that is.

I honor how hard this time period is, I know that it comes with its share of struggle. But struggle teaches you something. It gives you the fundamentals for getting back up and continuing the fight. In honoring this time, I must also honor you. I wouldn't be doing that if I didn't give you this feedback.

It does not matter who gives them or where you get the services guys, but get them. You deserve your college education. You deserve the doors it will open for you. You will have freedom in ways I can barely show you right now. If I could stand in front of you and have you feel what life looks like on this end, how beautiful it is to have this piece of me, no one can take away, I would never have to fight any of you to study hard for any test. This is a story in the book but it is not the entire book. You still have a ton of chapters to write.

This is YOUR civil rights movement. It isn't flashy, its fought with text books instead of picket signs, equations instead of sit-ins, but it is just as if not MORE important to the betterment of all of us.

We do not have time for you to not become a fighter on the front lines fully armed with the weapon of your academic arsenal. There is too much that needs to be changed to lose even one of you. You are capable. You were capable before us, you will be capable long after. I challenge you to look at what you need to make happen to make it through this transition. Do not let this turn into an excuse. You are among the chosen and you are the chosen for a reason. Your talents, your intelligence and your hearts are life saving. And as I know you all know, there are lives to save.

I love and miss you. Keep going my darlings. You are not from the mid, the g, the vill, the flooda, MP, Redwood, MA, Sequoia, Woodside or Carlmont. You are from your own ABSOLUTE greatness. There are no neighborhood or school divisions to that. You must fulfill the promise of that greatness and get the tools to be unstoppable. Going to college is a huge part of that. Do NOT give up the fight. We do not have the time for you to waste any of it.

We need you. Keep going.

All my love, admiration and esteem,

Karla

Happy Re-Birthday Rey and Regsy Begsy

2007-03-06T10:05:00.000-05:00

It's crazy the events that alter and shape your life. Five years ago two of my friends had a life altering experience that sent ripples into the lives of everyone. The night of the accident is one that will not soon be forgotten by any one of us. The aftermath was a testament to the friendship and love that existed and exists between all of us.

Rey and Regs,

You've been an absolute inspiration. Watching how you put your lives back together, became even stronger, took on even more challenge and worked to help others live life to the fullest continues to touch me. Your experience would have folded other people and it doubled you. It was and is an honor to be your friend. I thank God everyday that he spared you. Your contributions to the world are phenomenal. I honor every uphill battle you've climbed to reclaim your lives both emotionally and physically.

I love you,

Karla

The Pink Martini Glass

2007-03-06T01:41:00.000-05:00

So today was a long day and that means it will be a long post. For those of you that choose to stick around, settle in.

I have a bar in my house. Yup, a bar. Fully stocked. Important asset of my kitchen. Makes the kitchen pop really. I won this bar on the Price is Right. Yup, the Price is Right. Bob Barker had me on contestants row. Rod Rodey, may he rest in peace, called my name. And there I went, bouncy, 21, and in pigtails. Totally happy, shocked and surprised until right there on national television some jack ass bid a dollar above me and I gave an on camera dirty look to my right. However, the door prize was a bar, and every 21 year old should be so lucky to get a bar on their 21st birthday. About 4 years ago when I first moved to the city and learned what hard work days were, I bought a martini-set for this bar. I replaced one glass in that martini set with a delicate pink martini glass. Because damnit, on a hard day, I was going to treat myself to a martini in a pink glass, that would be my reward to myself. Now, in terms of rating tough days, they run the gammut. They go from water to beer to martini(regular glass) to martini(pink, thought I like to call it blush, glass) for a number of reasons. I'm sitting here friends, with my blush martini glass. But it feels kinda silly. Like the day didn't really deserve one, but I just gave into feeling like it was a bad day.

My brain went from thought to thought to thought and the stream of conciousness was exhausting. Today I felt like a little girl. Just young and naive that I allow for my heart to experience such sadness. You see I started out by thinking about the man I encountered in the morning. Waves of what I called sadness in the last blog entry, but really it was more of an overwhelming weight of how much work was left to do. Even to just get people to pay attention to people who are screaming top of lungs for help. I didn't even want to talk about it at work, I felt like it would undue the deed if I did. Like there was something sacred and personal that I shared with this man by buying him a meal and speaking to my co-workers about it would be more for affirmation of my person than helping him. And today, what I did was a personal choice.

Then I hopped into thinking about my uncle. About his path and the role that I have played in my family and asking myself what kind of role I should play. Having the gifts I have, quite honestly, it is very few and far in between times that I have stretched back to them. It is a cause of unease, but I also don't feel positioned to provide healing in the way I do in other places. But is that undercutting my ability to make excuses. What ownership do I carry for the lack of healing in my family. What role do I play in that cycle having gotten out and really gotten out. Argh, here I go again. Anyway. I sat at work churning through things, missing my students, feeling a little guilt. Trying to take the weight away. I gave up insulting myself for Lent and ultimately I don't believe in victimization, so why would I go there with myself.

Then I started to think about how I am with men. Because when I think about the men in my family, I think about the men I've had in my life. There is of course close correlations. A while back, Jeremiah taught me this paradigm of thought. Victim, Aggressor, Rescuer. It's just different ways of instinctual being. People rarely do just one, but they often veer more to one category. I was figuring out today that I'm phobic of the aggressor/victim (ie daddy), but at the same time, he's the man I have dated. The aggressor/victim is the guy that kinda bulldozes his way in with all his issues. Then I sit there and try to sort through them in an attempt to be loved for what I can do. I could beat around the bush, and sugar coat it, but thats been my pattern.

My male friends, they are more the rescuer/victim guys. They find the broken girls and try and fix them or at least try and have sex with them. Until they get so tired of the fixing or the sex (because though straight men will never admit it, they get tired of empty sex, its only novel for so long), they give up or they get tired of dealing with it... like they didn't seek it out. You see in the triangle of behavior, the way you respond to the world depends on what you've gotten result from. The men I know are amazingly good. Just the most fantastic beings, I'm so blessed. The level of comfort, protection, insight, intelligence and humility is just far beyond what most women get to know and see, and for that I'm grateful. But in the tradition of men are dumb and girls are crazy. You fill in the blank. They make me laugh though, and I love them for that.

I gotta tell you. I miss having straight guy friends around. I love my gay guy friends, don't get me wrong, so much of me has been uplifted and cared for by these men. But the one's that I have in my life, I've assisted through some of the tougher times in their levels of personal security. I'm the protector. In the same way I protect most people in my life. (Rescuer/Victim) Most of my straight male friends live on the east coast. When I'm out there, it is so nice to receive that perspective. To have conversations with the dudes. In both the depth and shallowness of it. I find that the men in my life do not censor themselves around me. I get to hear the undoctored for women truth about how they think, feel, act, its raw and lude sometimes, but its comforting to be around a lack of bullshit pretense in that way. It's hysterical too. I don't have guys out here like that. I miss it.

I rounded out my night with sets of tears. One adult, two teens. I just sat on the phone and listened and prodded. Most of it silence, a lot of hurt. I can't really talk about it yet, I will eventually, I can't right now. It was just hard to be far from some people that I love that I know need me right now. I wish I could provide the comfort of my embrace to them and its just not what is possible or even healthy right now. As I listened to them, I felt the trueness of how futile it is to try and protect people from life. It's life and it just bites sometimes. You can't change that, you just prepare people to handle tough.

So thats why, when I came home today and sat down with my pink martini glass, all I wanted was a hug. I wanted to know that someone understood that though I can't change everything in the world right now, eventually, I got it in me to make some major changes. Someone that could tell me, "yo, its gonna be alright Karla, don't trip for too long." That though I beat myself up for half the day, I was making strides in the right direction.

Maybe this is the point to this time period in my life. It should be about me giving that to me. Which is why the blush martini glass exists. I'm dating myself, ;c), giving myself all the things that I used to wait for someone else to give me. But it was never enough that way. I knew that then, I know it now. You learn little by little how to empty the cup. How to not be heavy. I've spent my life teaching other people how to do it, but I never learned to do it for myself. And its okay that on a week when your closest friends are out of the country and you have a hard day, you struggle with the emptying process. Doesn't make the need for a blush martini glass any less necessary or wrong. Repeating to myself "I'm not a bad person. I'm not a selfish person." isn't enough anymore either. It's other levels. It's time to accept who I am and breathe through that. Feel okay with the weight of the day, knowing tomorrow will be different.

His Cries Were So Deep...

2007-03-05T13:44:00.000-05:00

He was crying too hard for me to ignore him.

I was coming into work, laptop in hand, mildly heated at the problems I am having with a small "fix-it-ticket" about my address. I had just become a woman my mom would be disappointed in by dropping off my laundry at a "Wash and Fold" type establishment. After trying to get to washing clothes all weekend, I gave up the ghost and dropped it off for someone else to do it for me. So I was in the middle of thoughts about how malfunctional our legal system is (who has to go to traffic court in Redwood City for an address change and then get turned away and told to come back) and how malfunctional I am for not being able to do my own dang laundry and the variety of things my mom would say about it, when I heard a man on the street sobbing.

It seemed so normal for everyone, walking to work, ignoring the bum on the corner. I have to tell you, I do it too. But his crying. It was earth shaking. Just deep and painful. He wasn't asking for money, but he was crying about how hungry he was. I felt a lump in my throat as I watched how accostumed we've all become to this. I wanted to shout for the world to pay attention, ask them if they see how much work has to be done. Instead I approached him and asked him to come with me to Subway.

He kept asking me if I wanted to share his sub with him. It broke my heart.

All I could think of was my uncle. The one whose death I so brazenly hardened against because of how his drug use affected our family. Last year when they told me they found him on the side of the road, the tears I shed were minimal and I pushed it all to the back of my mind. Now I reflect on all the pain that he was in and I wonder if he ever begged anyone for food and if they ignored him on the street. It doesn't take away from the hurt he caused because of his sickness but I really do sit here praying he never found himself that alone.

The man kept thanking me. I wanted to give him sustance but I didn't want to cry in front of him or act all bountiful. I mean really, its humiliating enough to ask people for food, you don't need their condecension. I gave him directions to GLIDE, a church I know has an excellent homeless program that helps people get back on their feet and I left him with his tuna sub, tuna melt, chips, soda and brownie. He kept making the sign of the cross when he thought I wasn't looking and he blushed scarlett the entire time he accepted the meal.

I'm not special or a great person. I have quite a few friends that have done something similar, if not bigger, in the last month. It's what we do when one persons eyes/story/heart/face reach you in a way you can't turn away from. But I need to do more. God let me find solutions. The world shouldn't be like this. Not with so many of us doing well. That is my prayer for the day, let me find sustainable, scalable, empowering solutions. That and let my uncle be at peace wherever he may be.

The End Up and Tim'm

2007-03-05T03:24:00.000-05:00

So here goes reason number 798 for loving San Francisco. The End Up.

My friend Tim'm was in town tonight, a one night engagement out of DC. You see, he's the baddest mofo you'll ever know. Amazing writer, lyricist, spoken word poet, activist, artist, jock, facilitator, rapper, you name it, Tim'm does it. In fact, you can catch him on a PBS documentary circling around called "Independent Lens: Hip Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes." He is such talent and light. In fact he was just at Humboldt state as a keynote speaker, panelist, guest lecturer and performer. (Check out his music at http://www.myspace.com/timmwest) And he did all of that in two days and managed to get my butt out of my house on Sunday night to go to The End Up.

So I've heard about this place on a number of occasions and never went. I was pleasantly surprised to find one of the most diverse clubs I have been in since I moved here. And by diverse I mean people from 21 to 55, White, POC, gay, straight and everything in between. Not to mention that it was dropping everything from gospel to latin to R&B with Drum n Bass backing. It was rockin.

I love dancing. I really do. I remember watching this Oprah interview with Michael Jackson when I was a kid . She asked him why he grabbed his crotch when he performed, he said to her "I don't do it, its what the music asks me to do." Now though I love Michael, I thought then, as I do now, that he was a freak. But I really can see his point in that particular matter. It's crazy what it feels like to just move to the rhythm and beat of an artists soul. It's connection. Sensual, peaceful, energizing, joy and connection. And tonight, with Tim'm and another good guy friend, we danced and let ourselves be free. I'm so glad the joy of dancing is returning for me. I missed it. Of all the things the assault robbed me of, that was a deep loss. It's great to feel that freedom to go forward more and more.

In ANYevent, check out the End Up and my pal Tim'm. Both are worth the price of admission and then some.

An Hours Worth of Thought

2007-03-04T21:49:00.000-05:00

So I sat down to think of the things that I heard today. I would really appreciate feedback from anyone willing to give it.

I come to the same conclusions over and over again about this one. I'm a little stuck.

I believe transition times are times of much acknowledgement and much scorn. For me, in this time, I've recieved some of the most beautiful compliments I've ever had. I've had people of all ages tell me the impact I have had on their lives. How grateful they are to have been near me and my heart.

I guess my question is how do you accept what people say, not take away from the emotions around all of it, let yourself soak in your contribution to the world and keep your humility. I mean, doesn't it sound obnoxious to be all "Ya, I rock." haha. It's just so foreign to me. I mean I have some horrible habits around it. It used to be when people gave me that, I would think in my head, if I had assisted in the "right" way, they would realize they changed their own lives and really did it all themselves. Then I would start to tear myself down. I know that this peice is just personal decimation. There is no reason for me to take it there. I refuse to be that dysfunctional. There was a time when I allowed this of myself, but that time has passed.

And I mean, I'm lucky, of all the things to be conflicted about, this one, not so bad. But my humility means something to me. It's an important part of my empathy. I see such wonderful freakin amazingness in the world. I'm humbled I'm allowed to be a part of people's hearts that way. It's an innate part of who I am.

At base however, I've always encouraged others to own their own power. I firmly believe that you cannot make change running from your own greatness. I've watched others struggle with it and underrating yourself does as Marianne Williamson so eloquently put it "does not serve the world... as we let our own light shine, we unconciously give others permission to do the same." Which is I think one of the best quotes ever, so how? How do you do it and keep that part of you that knows there is always more growing and work to be done. Any thoughts?

A Year Later

2007-03-04T21:46:00.000-05:00

bout a year ago, on an excavation of College Track history, I accessed one of the first staff members to see how deeply ingrained some of historical practices were. By the end of the meeting I had found someone who was totally willing to mentor and collaborate with me. I remember leaving that brunch by the ocean with this sense of "Oh wow, some people are just good." and ever grateful that someone showed me a personal map.

A year later I sit down with the same young woman, I'm in a completely different place in life. It was great to bounce ideas off of her and get her perspective. She is truly a pioneer in self-care for women of color. It was that same crazy feeling of wow, someone gets it.

She said some things today that were incredibly flattering but ultimately scary, haha. She said she was proud of the place I was in, that I would have never made it in the situation I had been in personally and professionally a year ago. She said that it was a turning point for me and that it was important because I'm the kind of person that makes change at the level that makes it into history books. That I had made indelible impressions on the lives of my students and that she was happy I chose to show myself more love. It was necessary to get to the place I am routed for.

So ya, scary. She impressed on me the seriousness of release and fun. And we both summed it up with a declaration of having a lot of work to do to change the world around us. Such a trip. Oh the healer and the change maker, just such interesting ways of being.

Pssst... Go to Twin Peaks

2007-03-04T03:53:00.000-05:00

So I have a secret. A lame and odd secret, but a secret all the same. I've had a few margaritas (not drunk by any means, but I knocked a couple back) so it seems like an opportune time to write my secret out. haha.

...So I'll go up to twin peaks at Sunset and ask families and tourist if they want me to take a full family picture. I know I am a LAME ODD individual for that secret, but for real, thats what I do. I haven't done it once, I've done it almost dozen times. I went and did it today. Oh for shame. I love it. lol.

I love going up to Twin Peaks when the sun is setting. It's just fantastic. It's high tourist time, but the light on the buildings down town is magnificent. Beautiful in a way that is hard to describe if you haven't seen it. The sun, it gets even brighter at sunset. Like it won't go down without a fight. It's orange glow goes on about 75% of the downtown building and everything else in the city looks hues of purple and gold. The light is great for pictures and it never fails that sets of toursit are up there trying to take advantage. They are sitting there struggling with wanting to enjoy the sunset and wanting documented memory of it. I'll go up there, enjoy the first few seconds of it. Breathe it in. Then I'll walk around and ask families if they would like me to take a complete family picture. Their faces when I ask this are awesome. Like I'm fuckin Santa on Christmas morning. The light makes for perfect pictures that illuminate both families and buildings in clarity. They look so happy to get that record of their trip. There are time that they may be arguing, but after I take the picture, they are too happy to continue, instead they coo at their cute visage. haha.

I love twin peaks. It is SF for me. I read there, I think there, I walk around. It's a quiet place in the early mornings and late nights. But at sunset, it lets me be this low intensity, low effort, freak of nature that helps families have good San Francisco memories. Ande that it what I did toniight at sunset. I didn't end up going to this poetry slam I wanted to go to because I lingered there too long, but it was worth it. It made me happy. and I'm loving this whole happy thing.

Then I went home, took another shower, looked at my Haight earring purchases, got dressed and went out on my own. I had a couple of drinks (purchased for me by nice guys) at this place called La Rondalla, then I met up with a new friend (who is really. for lack of a better term, super cool), got hit on by a few guys, had one more drink and brought my ass home. And here I sit, content and outing my secret photo indulgences. Knowing what a nerd I am but loving that I am that nerd. Sweet dreams everyone. I hope your day was as sweet as mine.

Patchouli Mofo

2007-03-03T21:40:00.000-05:00

Dear Patchouli Mofo,

So there should be a rule in San Francisco. If you drive a Z3, and are a jack ass, you shouldn't be allowed to troll the Haight cutting people off to get a parking spot. You also can't be driving that car and have dreads, wear hemp, puka shells and have the smell of patchouli covering up your funk. Listen mister holier than poser, BE NICE and let us Hyundai economy car drivers have the spots we've been circling 45 minutes for. I'm just tryin to go to my favorite earring store and get myself some kickin gear, I'm romancin myself and you are getting in my way. I believe it to be fraudulent for you to look so free love and to ultimately be a prick who cuts into my good mood. I'm sitting here dancing and singing Jerry Rivera/Salsa in my car. You are not allowed to intrude! I have a poetry slam to get to later that you are making me late for. So go and take your hypocritical lifestyle and park your car in the 10 dollar pay lot. Come on, lets be real. We both know you can afford it.

Thank you,

Grumpy LA Transplant

For Whom The Bells Toll

2007-03-03T03:30:00.000-05:00

I didn't believe in the institution of marriage until I was 22. Wedding bells until that time were signs of a cool party but not much else.

I always saw marriage as an institution where the woman had to give up peices of herself in order to hold on to something we had been told would last forever. Compromises that were only made on one end to keep together a family. Because as women, being the strong light bearers we were, thats what we did.

I have this very vivid memory of sitting on some steps in front of our little apartment trying to get my dad to tell my mom "I love you" the way boys did for girls in the movies. He refused. I was young and reflecting on how awkward I made the situation for my mother, is still somewhat painful. "Come on daddy, just say it." And he sat there and refused as my mother watched his child beg him on her behalf to express a sentiment that I know came easily for her. I knew he loved her, I still know. For some reason, he just couldn't give her that tidbit. Yet stubborn I stood demanding that he say the words. Even then, I felt the hurt on her behalf. I remember putting my little hands on his face and trying to force his mouth to say the words. Afterward, I went to the bathroom and cried in a place my mom and dad couldn't see me, I couldn't understand why daddy was so mean. I was seven years old. For a long time I thought he was holding onto emotions like that because it gave him a power he couldn't relinquish. As an adult I realize its much less sinister than that. Not a lot of people openly expressed love to my dad before my mom, my brother and I. It takes practice. Until we showed him, he just didn't know.

I always liked the idea of a wedding, in the way little girls like the idea of big white dresses and parties. Even when I was shorter than an adult pant leg, I knew wedding and marriage were separate entities. And the latter, I thought was too painful an institution to participate in.

My head and my heart have always been at war with how to deal with them. I mean on one I hand I acknowledge I have wonderful parents. My father, with his inability to express, loved us the only way he knew how growing up. He would work 16/18 hour days and come in after bed time. I would stay awake with my eyes closed, just to feel him walk in the room and kiss my brother and mine's foreheads. My mom, has to be THE most loving woman you'll ever meet. Her warmth is unparalleled in this world and I do not believe that to be remotely an exageration.

We have the similar kinds of issues I imagine all families have. There is particular duress between me and my dad. A disconnet in personalities that goes from small to large in under 5 seconds flat. They had a lot of problems when we were younger and I played marriage counselor until about the age of 14 when in a car in front of a Mervyns, I told my mom that I wasn't her friend but her daughter and I wasn't sure I could handle it anymore. So I left the car feeling guilty that I was leaving my mom friendless and mad at my dad's inability to express anything emotionally.

All in all, they are much healthier now, but we have a divide and it leads to distance between the two of us. Their marriage is something that I respect but have never wanted to have. My mom was always translating him to the world explaining how good she believed his heart to be. Which on one hand, I appreciated as a sign of the resilience of love and on another despised because I felt like it was a really tiring way for my mom to always be living.

When I met Mark and Amy at 22, it was the first time I ever saw a marriage of mutual respect, friendship and passion. The way they regarded each other and even looked at each other made a believer out of the most anti-marriage individual. They talked things out, he went home because he wanted to be around her, they traveled together and shared hobbies to spend time with each other. They were that couple that you look at and can't quite figure it out. I mean you know they have ups and downs like any other couple but they love each other so much that its just a part of what their fighing for in their life together as a couple.

I moved out here on my own the year I met them and didn't really have anyone I knew. I had a boyfriend who cheated on me 6 months into my stay here and they got me drunk and took me home to their guest room where both of them treated me like their little sister. Mark got drunk with me because he said that no one drinks along on nights like that and Amy laughed, consoled and dressed me for bed later when I was too drunk to unsnap my own bra. Even sitting there, drunk and hurt in Mark's t-shirt, I watched as they hugged each other before they went to bed and I said to myselfr "They have it. It's possible and I won't settle for less then that." I am forever grateful that they showed me a template worth following.

Once I met them, I met a couple of other couples that have the same kind of relationships. Where the woman isn't always "the understanding one" translating her husband to the world. In these relationships I know they are partners not people who need to feign completeness for each other.

Last night as I watched another friend celebrate this kind of union. She looked resplendent, gorgeous, pregnant and glowing of new bride and new motherhood at the same time. I'm glad I get to see reinforcements of these unions all the time. I can't just defer to Mark and Amy as a fluke. If anything, I'm at the point that I realize that they should be more the rule than the exception even if they aren't. So I'm a convert. I'm starting to really accept, believe and be happy that its about more then a big expensive party. It's about big living and loving.

Cheers Cristel! Thank you for being another example to look to. Last night was fabulous and you deserve all the happiness in the world. I'm so happy that your baby gets to be loved the way I know you and Jon will love him. I'm open for baby-sitting if you need a nap or a moment. You two will be an amazing mom and dad.

Left to My Own Devices

2007-03-02T18:34:00.000-05:00

Funny how you don't realize how much time you spend with people until you are planning our your week when they are on vacation. haha. So Bola, Alex and Rey are going on vacation extravaganzas. Spain, Barbados and Thailand respectively. Besides being totally jealous about not country hoppin with them. I'm just realizing how much time I spend with them on a week to week. haha. I mean we all have pretty jam packed lives. But we are integral parts of them. It's nice havin family here that way. Bola and Rey are truly my sisters. It's nice to have that unit.

Although I gotta admit, I'm a little excited about what I'll do with the time on my own. I think a road trip is definitely on the radar, maybe some time by myself in a very green area, movies, cafes, books in the park... the possibilities are endless. Send all suggestions to my Myspace Comments, most creative response to what to do with my time gets a prize! ;c)

I made a decision to take a super long vacation after workshop season. Guatemala here I come!

Peace be with you, and also with you

2007-03-02T05:17:00.000-05:00

So writing is just this addiction lately, it's 2am here and my taxi gets here at 4:45am but I have to get the rest of this out...

I grew up in a Catholic household. This basically meant I respected God but didn't really visit with him but for a couple of rare occasions when my dad wasn't sleepy, grumpy or hungry on a Sunday morning. Now I love my father, but if you know him, you know how rarely I ever went to church. Still, to my dad, being anything other than Catholic was a betrayal to my great-grandmother, who in addition to riding with Pancho Villa, getting extradited from Mexico and bucking the "system" of the time period had many children (with different last names) down the Central American coast but never had a need for a man, was a devout Catholic. How you connect the radical with the religious, I'll never know. They say I'm a lot like her. I like that.

I'm a fairly spiritual person, I think regardless of religion, healers are bound to be. I have gone through stages and time periods where my religion means a lot to me. I have had two major breaks with my faith. Once when the first messenger/priest whom I really trusted violated an acquaintance and the second time with the assault its self. It is only now years later that I feel myself reconnecting. But I must admit, I am reconnecting to my spirituality, my connection to the world around me and the higher being that touches me so frequently, not a church.

I don't know how I feel about church. I think in theory, its wonderful. A place of love and worship and spirituality. But in practice it just becomes this weapon. I am not fond of weapons.

You see, I feel like the good relationships I know, there are things that are incredibly private. The pieces, tulmultuous or pleasurable, that are most sacred are not shared with the outside world. That in context of a relationship is incredibly respected. The tighter, intimate and more private the bond, the more I look on admiringly as a public. This is the way it should be.

So here is the disconnect for me, if your relationship with your God is the most intimate relationship you can have. Why would you ever be expected to honor it in the same way as your bretheren? Why is it up for public scrutiny how I choose to celebrate that partner? This relationship is mine and mine alone.

As I lay in this bed, sheets and comforter wrapped around my body, pillows propping me up, fingers typing, I get that I have been blessed. I share with you my blessing not to impose it or to have it judged but to let you know, I'm happy. It took me so long to get here, and there is no way that I could have done it alone. Who or what guided me, I don't know fully and without a shadow of a doubt. What divine prescence kept me safe, I can't for sure say. But the beauty of that safety is God's kiss to me. God's loving embrace. My spirit after all of the hurt, remains in one piece and if nothing else has grown in love and intensity. And again, I am happy. Perhaps for the first time in my life, I am learning to fall in love with myself. Thank God.

Laughing Out Loud for VDay

2007-03-01T23:54:00.000-05:00

So I was writing this whole post on religion and God before. I was all about it. But then I went to go see my friend perform in the Vagina Monologues and talking about God after just wasn't/isn't the spot I'm in. haha.

ANYway, so tonight my wonderful, graceful, amazing, gal pal Jessica performed in the Vagina Monologues. I've been looking forward to this for a long time. To explain the significance of tonight I have to tell you about Jess.

You see Jess and I knew each other when we lived in this tore up two bedroom apartment with eight people and a hole in the wall in Alexandria, VA for close to 4 months. Our only decor in that apartment was a map of the DC Metro we stole one night, when all of us were out late/early. That 4 months, for all of its cramped one bathroom frustrations, was fantastic. It was living the way you live when you are 20 and are working in Non-Profit and figuring out the cheapest way to be young, have fun and survive.

I always have loved Jess. From the first time I met her, I found sisterhood in her ability to laugh just as loud as I did giving a rats ass who was watching. She's always had mad cool style, a great being, a peaceful nature, even at 20 she was just as graceful and individual as the woman she's grown into being.

So tonight as I sat there and watched my friend, I laughed loudly. This would not have been such a big deal, but its an open dress rehersal. There are literally 10 other people there. I have to be one of the only people laughing. So I giggle all the time, its a part of the person I am, but if you've ever seen me throw my head back and laugh with all the joy I got, its really... embarrassing for some people. Not me, but if I got company, I feel the need to warn people. haha. So as I sat there, flowers in hand, watching someone that I've known for years scream "CUNT" and "CONO" (Cunt in spanish but I don't know how to do a tilde on a PC) at the top of her lungs, and do a "Militant Bisexuals" orgasm. I can't help it. I was laughing hysterically.

There was such a reclamation in the play. An owning of female power that is just remarkable. And there I sat and watched my friend be a foot soldier in claiming it. Damn straight. We always knew it would be this way. Its wonderful watching her be exactly what she was always meant to be. This light of freedom. She's just a fuckin inspiration. There, in a room full of women, I felt absolutely beautiful. Words are powerful, and really, so are my friends.

Spotting Healers

2007-02-28T21:26:00.000-05:00

I can spot healers within two minutes of meeting them. I don't know what it is. I don't know quite how to articulate. Something about both groups of people. I just know. I'm in conversation and I can see clearly the capacity of the person in front of me. Almost, come close to feeling what will happen with them when they heal. I literally feel pain when I sense their hurt. Not in a pitying sort of way, but in an empathy and respect way. Then the awe of their greatness sets in with me. I really firmly believe that I see a persons beauty in a way that is a gift. When I meet them, I struggle not to tell them. How do you explain that at base, you just know that they will not only find their way, but help others find their way as well. It's all very Catholic in the whole "peace be with you" kinda way.

It's funny how the world will send you messages about who you should have in your life. In the last month I have to say I have met more people whom I've identified as healers then I have in quite some time. I've met them in a variety of ways, randomly at cafes, through craigslist ads, my new job, or at the park. It blows my mind. I'm trying to figure out, what kind of message is being sent to me here? For quite a few of these people I have gotten a strong feeling that I am supposed to be in their lives. But really, how do you tell someone you've barely met, "So hey, I think we were meant to be friends, not quite sure why, but don't flip, I know these things." haha.

Am I just being a freak? I mean just because you can see that kind of beauty in the world, does it mean that you have to be or have a right to be an active part of it? Should it just be a comfort to me that it exists in that kind of quality in the world. When the world is in the state that it is in, where there is no more time to waste and healers are needed, what kind of responsibility do you have to them? So many thoughts. Such beauty.

Just a thought for my fellow survivors...

2007-02-28T00:25:00.000-05:00

So I was walking down the street in DC tonight. It was fairly late, a few bums, the general ask for money and lude comments about my butt. It's always a vocal assault about my butt or my boobs with offensive men really. Sorry to break it to them, but they are mine, they will never be owned by the cat caller, much as you may think that might work. ;c)

But I digress. So I had a random thought. As one of them shouted an obscenity about my ass, I gave the "Touch me and I'll put a heel in your eye, mofo" look. It reminded me about the anger I had at my attacker when I was boxing.

Your bodies immediate instinctual reaction to violence is to protect itself. Anger will spur you to guard your body and attack another. This instinct for "how dare you invade what is mine"

But as survivors know, as we recooperate, the distance makes us blame ourselves. What did I do wrong? How can I take away blame from the attacker and push it to myself. Why is that? Is it because we are the only ones we can bare to punish?

Maybe a part of the healing process is finding a way to connect with the ass-kicker in you. The person that you become when its not about analysis, but intuition and impulse.

What do you think?

Finding the Path

2007-02-26T23:22:00.000-05:00

I've been processing this one for a few days now, I think I'm ready to write about it. It may not make sense, so forgive me.

Being an educator is really exciting. There is something about choosing your audience and giving them the gifts that have been given to you. No matter what I do in the future, I will always remember that my roots were those of someone in education. There are still moments for me though where being that person takes its toll. Being an educator you see is a gift and a 24 hour responsibility. It's about taking moments that could essentially be painful and shifting them, moving them into something that helps people heal and understand.

I found myself in a spot last week, as an educator, that was hard. I was about to sugar-coat it by saying a little hard, but if I'm honest it was a lot hard. I can't really disclose the full details of the incident, but it involved misunderstandings and race and equity and all of those hot button topics that cause emotional reactions in EVERYONE.

I left the room I was in and tried to process things from both the rational and emotional pieces. The things I knew from knowledge and the piece that stung emotionally no matter how much I tried to talk myself down. In a span of minutes, there I was, tears and emotions stuffed into my shoulders and lower back, explaining the difficulties for people of color. As always the lone representative in the room. This was high school for me, college, now my professional and sometimes even my personal world.

Though incredibly productive and beneficial, I gotta tell you, I walked away raw. I left the room feeling alone, isolated and mildly grieving. I held it all together until I left the room. I walked down the street for about a block and only then did I start to cry. It wasn't hurt exactly. It's a little hard to explain.

I wanted to talk to someone who would understand. You see in my dream world, I would have an older latina female, one in management or some education position, that would understand the feelings that I was experiencing. She would tell me it was normal and that she had gone through many similar experiences. She would explain to me how to reconcile the pieces. The ones that make you feel both out of place in a world you launched yourself into and the world you launched yourself out of. I would get books to read, things to think about, ways of looking at the situation that took out a bit of the sting. I would feel at ease because someone would have answers for me. I would know beyond a shadow of a doubt, it was going to be okay.

But on a windy, grey day in San Francisco, as I walked home and scrolled through my cell phone, not a single number that I own, not a single connection that I have, could give me those answers. The grief that this walk home left me, was heartbreaking. It was another moment when I realized that I will have to piece together feedback from many different sources to make due with what I got. Now, I'm not trippin, I get that I'm lucky to even have that. But man, would it have been great to have known someone whose taken the path before me. The older I get and the further into the many beautiful pieces of my life I go, the more frequent I find these spots. No comfort blankets anymore. My parents aren't familiar with my world, they don't know its intricacies and to an extent I think they feel it took away their daughter. The ability to turn to them really ended around the age of 15. And as many times as I may try, since then, it just hasn't fit.

Truth be told, since then, I don't know where I fit. It's like I made myself independent knowing that my path was uncharted waters for most. It's an exciting swim, but what I would give to find a coach that knows most of the terrain and understands, at a fundamental level, what it means to fight this hard for what you want. Even when you haven't identified exactly what it is.

Rain and lessons learned

2007-02-25T10:40:00.000-05:00

So I made healthy decisions last night. Instead of going to a party I had no desire to leave the house for, to dance at a place where I have not been a big fan of the atmosphere, I stayed home. I watched Real Time With Bill Mahr and a Woody Allen movie. Slept at a decent hour and now have woken up at 7, waaaaay earlier then my standard weekend hour. I'm feeling content and excited with the prospects of my day.

Lessons learned this week:

Rain looks beautiful in the morning, when you can sit and enjoy it with a cup of tea.

Choose for you, you'll be happy with your choices.

Making space in your heart is important, it allows you to really sift through what you want.

Anger is okay. You're allowed.

Every once in awhile you can spazz out about work, there is a difference between a spazz and a toxic pattern.

If I don't write, the emotions stay in my body. I am more centered this way.

Just because you can facilitate a situation so that the feedback you give is clean, doesn't mean it doesn't cause an emotional reaction in you. You can be totally productive and functional and still walk away feeling like it hurts.

I spend 9% of my life reading and writing (thanks for the break down Rey), honor that and do some activities that honor it.

It's time to honor me.

I still sing a rockin disco song at The Mint and wahoo for free drinks. ;c) (thats my favorite)

Addiction Backsliding

2007-02-23T01:07:00.000-05:00

So I came to a conclusion today, criticizing yourself to oblivion is just as much as addiction as alcohol or drugs. You do real good. You believe in yourself. You see your beauty. You see your grace and magnificence. Then one day you wake up and there is a trigger. An old boyfriend, stress, a lack of validation, a tiring day, a hard week, etc. can send you back to get a fix. For that matter a good week, a triumph, a conviction, a moment of perfection, peace, makes you seek the leveling. I can't possibly be this good. And then I show myself how I am not.

You suck, you're ugly, you're dumb, pound, pound, pound. Until you leave yourself so raw, its hard for even the most loving friend to reach you. It's deceptive. You give yourself just a small taste. "Ugh, don't be dumb Karla." and then before you know it, its an arsenal of assault. Harsher then any parental whip. You start to rehash the painful history, pull out the greatest hits. Your father walking away from you as you cry to explain to him that no matter what you'll love him, being told that they don't think you're pretty, the boys that rejected you, the friends who took advantage of you, the family members who think you abandoned them for pursuing your dreams reiterating your selfishness for being your own advocate. Then it becomes a group bashing. You and your ghosts in a battle to take you out. Until all that is left is a fragment of your goddess presence.

There should be a sponsor.

Then you snap back, realize you are backsliding and fight like hell to give up. But its an addiction. Like any other addiction, it hurts and it feels good. How do you explain addiction to the logical/rational world. How do you find a sponsor?

I don't know. I spend my life teaching the world how to access each other and I struggle to allow for people to give to me. I am figuring out how the receiver, receives and does it without guilt. I'm "independent". AKA Stubborn.

My addiction, more unique and more common then any other. Waking up from it, is like finding oxygen. Reminders of the world you help build to sustain. Thank you for the blessing. For finding my way back quicker every time. Give me peace to learn how to let the ghosts and obssessive reduction of my truest self go. Not because the world needs me but because I need me. I want to be in love with myself so deep, my vision allows me to see myself, the way I see the world. In its infinite majesty.

Contact Boxing, Contact Healing

2007-02-19T23:05:00.000-05:00

I just came out of my first boxing class. I contemplated for about 30 minutes whether or not I was going to write this entry. How do you put an experience so personal out for the world to read? And I thought of silence and how it kills more people than any gun ever does. How deadly passivity is. I know too many survivors to not put my thoughts into the world. I honor other survivors with my words and our struggle is so communal, my sisters and brothers, I understand the feelings attached.

I have been assaulted/violated 5 different times. At varying degrees of intensity. The most violent being the last, June 29 of 2005. As early as age 5, small and unknowing of the world, I carried with me scars of another persons illness. Then, at every stage in my life, as if to remind me of the wounds, I was violated again. I have never known a world where I felt safe in my own body. I have not known a time in my life of memories where this passive imprisonment did not exist. And I did not realize or accept until now, how that was a choice.

I say that only to tell you how amazed I am that tonight was my first night taking a class that had any element of self-defense. As I walked in, I felt the feelings of a child going to their first day of school. Naively unaware of the reasons for my own apprehensiveness.

I am very much a novice at this, so forgive the crudeness of my explanations on this sport...

There, with a bag and a set of gloves, I claimed my right to be the goddess I was born to be. I learned basics tonight. A jab and a hook. My instructor said his goal was to sweat us out. I knew from the instant that my gloved fist first touched that bag, that I was going to think of that man. I, of course, use the term man, loosely. I felt in my heart, the anger I usually suppress. You see, I am good at a lot of emotions. I am emotionally verbal in a way that is unique. Anger, for many reasons, has always been tough for me. But there, in a public space, with three other women and one male instructor. I was angry.

The jab was not the hardest part. The right and left hooks however, took me to another place. For a hook you need to place your body closer to a bag/opponent, it is the move you use when you have a lack of space. In my gym gear, near that bag, I was back in a dance club, backed against a corner. But this time, I did not struggle to defend myself. This time was different. I think my instructor saw it. He encouraged me "Who ever it is, keep going, let it push you, not stop you." Over and over again, past my physical limitations I beat the shit out of a predator.

Tonight was so many different things for me, I cannot possibly write them all down right now. I need clarity. What I will say is that I am in a different place then I have been. I would have needed to be to even place my hands into a pair of boxing gloves.

I will never allow someone to touch me like that again. How fucking dare he. I am a goddess and no one has a right to take my light like that. So here, in my fifth go around of surviving trauma. I come to peace. I will not be a prisoner to my own body. I will celebrate it for its utility. How could I ever find beauty in myself if I felt like a prisoner. I am light and strength. To hell with the people that used their size and physical dominance to try and take my gifts. How dare you take your gifts and use them as weapons to disempower. That is it. Never again will I allow it to happen.

Brothers and sisters, you are sheer brilliance. We are worth the fight. Our path will lead us to happiness and that will lead us to freedom. As I sit here and cry rivers of redemption, know that i understand the pain that is attached to all of this, but the prison is self-imposed. You may know the world in a completely different way than you "should" but it does not mean you have to settle for a life that is devoid of your own beauty. Find ways to let go of the anger instead of trying to defeat it. The deep pockets of discomfort will dissapate and you will be left with the truest version of yourself.

I will feel safe.

I wish you peace.

Sunshine

2007-02-19T12:50:00.000-05:00

Score! We get another day of sunshine. Amazing what it does for the people here when its bright.

Cheers to the guy that taught me to be a kid!

2007-02-19T02:35:00.000-05:00

Number three of the day, I'm on fire! You should see my journal after today, its deep... ANYway...

This is an homage to the guy that taught me to be a kid. Waaaay back in the day, when I was 14 and sure that the world was going to swallow me whole. I met a guy by the name of Eric Gonzalez. He has recieved kudos and thanks on this site in the past but today is his birthday and I feel like its only right to honor him.

Where was I, oh yes, I was 14. I was the kid from the proverbial "wrong side of the tracks" and quite literally crossed tracks to get to school each morning. I would sit in my parents car terrified of going inside the gates. I was alone. I was not accepted and really miserable. I felt seperate and unlike the people inside that school.

Then one fateful day I tried out to be a cheerleader (mortifying when I think of it now) and met a girl who introduced me to a boy, that changed my life. I was such a sad kid. I felt the weight of the world on my shoulders half the time. I had a lot to do and had seen no one succeed before me. I was a tragedy that sat next to the trash can near the girls bathroom. Then I had them. And best of all, I had him. The person I would know as my best friend for years. The kid that taught me how to laugh with abandon. To run around and play hide and go seek at 15 (I had never done it), to not take the world so seriously, to figure out what the kid in me wanted first and use that kid as a guide. He helped buy me a yearlong pass to Disneyland because he wanted me to continue to have fun, was my first date to a formal dance, my first love, subsequently the first guy I ever saw come out of the closet and most times, the first person I run to if the need to hear "You're going to be okay Karlita" comes up.

Thank you for showing me that in finding my childhood I would find the truest version of myself darlin.

I love you, Happy Birthday.

Kick Ass

2007-02-19T00:33:00.000-05:00

So this is the second post of the day, so you know i've spent it thinking. I was with a peronal trainer for the first time... ever, the other day. It was the most enlightening experience. I don't think I've had that fish out of water feeling with anything in awhile. It's healthy, I thrive on that shit, so it was all copacetic.

The piece that surprised me was when he asked me what my goals were, and you know I thought it would be the traditional, lose weight, work on my tummy, blah blah blah. But I was incredibly surprised when I said "I want to know how to throw a punch." I said it with a force that surprised me. I mean really surprised me. Even the trainer said "Where did that come from?" So I spent some time explaining the assault and how it made me feel about my body. I explained how I barely escaped and how much I longed to feel safe in my own skin again.

Crazy how you don't know what's still issues until something just brings it to the forefront. So you heard it here first ladies and gentlemen, I am going to learn to kick some ass. I want to know what its like to feel totally capable of protecting myself without the need for anyone else. Though I did it once, I feel like I could have done it with less trauma to my body and it just doesn't need to be something I carry around as a worry anymore. So I'm done. Watch out. ;c)

A New Place

2007-02-18T17:12:00.000-05:00

I'm happy. It took me a year and a half since the assault to get there, but I gotta tell you, I'm happy. Life is just different now. The predominant thought in my head is no longer the many ways that I need to protect myself, its how much I deserve to enjoy the world around me.

Yesterday was a wondeful day for me, mellow, in the ways that good days are. I woke up early, dressed for me, met some old coworkers for lunch, read in the sunshine of a beautiful park, took notes on a gorgeous book, met up with a really cool guy, had dinner with my roommate/best friend, went out dancing with a great friend and came home drunk more off of my own happiness than vodka (though the vodka did help). Today, I woke up, powered through my hangover, went up to twin peaks, still the best place in the city if you ask me, and let the sunshine dance on my skin.

There is so much beauty in struggle ya'll. It's like all the scars of the last two years are my merit badges. I keep them in my coat and show them to those I believe deserving enough to see. How wonderful to transition from letting them be my walls to letting them be my honor. I feel in my heart the love I have to give to the world and it feels good. I trust that the world deserves it and I give it with joy.

Happy, contrary to popular belief, is not a destination. It is what happens when you live and dream to your hearts content. Even in times when it is dark, the dream that you will see the world as it lights up again, is enough to get you through. As light bearers it is our responsibility to show those bereft of the light, possibility. That journey, helps you find your place in the world. I feel so at peace right now. Though I know its a peak in what is sure to be another journey, I find myself not caring. I fuckin love the ride.

Being Grown Folks

2007-02-11T19:37:00.000-05:00

I had this really interesting conversation with my mom today. She was telling me some really tough family news about the health of a cousin. And she started to beg me to inform her on how I was doing more consistantly. She asked over and over again for me to be more open when things were tough. Her insistance and fear broke my heart.

Last week my roommate and best friend of years was pretty sick. In a so sick its almost scary way. We ended up at the ER Sunday while she fought a high fever and a lot of pain. I sat there on the phone balancing telling our parents enough to not blind-side in the event that things went worse but not enough to majorly worry them. It was a tough balancing act. I was peaking in on her ever few hours and to be honest. It was a little hard to sleep knowing how sick she was. It was one of those moments where you go, dang I'm an adult now. There is no mommy and daddy to run to if things go wrong, I'm gonna have to figure this out. I had been running on automatic pilot until I missed my flight to DC the next day. I called a friend and co-worker and my voice broke when I told him. I quickly apologized. He said he understood and would pray for my friend and I. It struck me how great it would have felt to have parents to do that with in that moment. To figuratively crawl into someones lap and have them tell you its going to be okay. See, my parents were never those people. Comfort was not something they offered well, they didn't know how. So I could probably count the number of times after I hit teenagerdom that I have done the crawl into your lap and get reassurance thing with anyone.

So that brings me back to the conversation I had with my mom. Sitting there on the phone, feeling how heavy the last week was. Wanting so bad to break a little with her and seek comfort. But hearing the fragilty in her voice. And I was so close. So close to saying "I was scared" "I didn't know what to do." "I felt like such a little kid." And I couldn't do it. Instead I sat there on the phone tears coming down my face, trying to supress it while I assured her I was okay.

What is the line with independence? When do we cross it? How much of it is underestimating there capacity. I mean I believe my parents to be strong and capable. I know they won't break if I let them in. But if I am honest, I am afraid letting them there, will break me. I'm struggling to figure out what taught me to shut other people out in my times of greatest need.

Don't get me wrong. I am an open person. I would say I access people pretty well. But in times of hardship, trauma, real bad issues... I think I try and handle on my own to an extreme. I'm going to spend some time tracing back the tree on that. When did I decide that being grown folks meant handling solo? When do I reaffirm my commitment to that solitude? I'm such a hugger, isn't it ironic that I am not great at allowing people to hold me.

Can the healer, be healed?

I hope so. I have to believe it.

Haha I was just about to add an addendum that said "This post is much more melancholy than my mood." You know, just so no one would worry. ::shakes head::

Good Women

2007-01-28T18:45:00.000-05:00

Can I tell you, I love being a good woman.

I have often had conversations where I bemoan my good girl tendancies and wish I had it in me to be a little more bad. What would life be like, I have thought, if I just allowed myself to really mess up. To just not care about morals or reprecussions. I realize as I lay here in bed enjoying the comfort of my room and thinking about my week, that I my friends, am full of shit. I love being a good woman and I doubt I would ever trade it for anything else.

Last night, I went out with a group of gal pals. We went to this place called Tunnel Top. It was a fun bar, good male to female ratio (depending on whether you were asking me or a guy there) and there was this group of men from out of town. They were a funny group of guys and as we started to make conversation with them, one of my friends however, pointed out the shiny glint of wedding bands on all of them. I had a laugh, let them buy me drinks, joked around with them. But there was a point in the night where lines were being crossed. I could see some of my gal pals folding on some of the pieces that I know usually would matter a lot.

I sat there for a good second, a married mans arm around me, thinking, how big of a deal is this? And that is when I backed away. I knew in that moment, no amount of validation, alcohol, male appreciation, would ever make any line crossing okay.

Please understand, this is not a knock on the women I was with. I mean I get it. It's tough in those moments to really back away. You've loosened your inhibitions, you are feeling like being appreciated as a woman, and its nice. Each of us has to find the line. I just love that for myself, the line is so clear and that my heart really speaks up loud in those moments. I think, for myself, I felt more beautiful walking away then I ever would have staying. And for that, thank you heart, for taking me down the paths that honor who I am.

Change lives, create social change in just four days.

2007-01-15T20:03:00.000-05:00

Hi guys,

So the deal is that I've been volunteering for an organization by the name of College Summit for the last 5 years. Every summer its been one of the best experiences I have all year.

The way they work is that they bring together groups of 50 kids in the summer at different workshops across the country. The kids are all low-income, with GPA's between 2.0 and 3.0 for the most part. In four days, these kids, rising seniors, get all the materials they need to apply to college. Its a life changing experience and for a lot of them its their first time believing that they can make it.

The reason I'm posting this is that the volunteer application is up. The position of writing coach lets you work with 5 students, you get totally trained to do it, and its the most fun you'll have with a group of kids all year. It's four days and you'll get a $150 stipend if you so choose.

I swear it will be something you will be glad you did. I am attaching a PDF that tells you a little bit more about the organization and what they do. I really hope you apply. I think you'll find that the four days doesn't just change the lives of the kids you work with but your's as well. Go now to http://www.collegesummit.org/volunteer

All my love, admiration and esteem,

Karla

Freedom Writer

2007-01-14T15:45:00.000-05:00

I sat in a movie theater yesterday and watched the movie Freedom Writers and couldn't help but feel certain emotions stir in me. I had long tired of the "great white hope" comes in and changes the ghetto kids genre, but this movie was definitely different. It was done with a dignity to the students that Erin Gruwell served in a way that was befitting of their struggles. I loved that for once asian kids were not isolated from the world of violence many kids live in, the story was more about the kids then the teacher, loved that the main latina character struggled with a lack of moral absolutes.

But I was still mildly bothered by the whole thing. When do the stories about us, for us, by us get told? It's been almost 20 years since Jaime Escalante and Joe Clark took the screen. And it bothers me that our stories, teenage or otherwise, are not just happening in the classroom, but really that is the only place they ever get played. And don't tell me that "Take the Lead" is supposed to cut it. I mean real emotion. Stirs you that you identify, regardless of color with the character, even though the man/woman so happens to be a minority. Anyone in the mood to challenge me could give me a list of movies with characters of color that should shut my mouth, but really, its a mere handful and how many of those movies had a producer that understood what it was like to grow up not as a part of mainstream culture.

See when I started writing this, I was about to apologize, I'm aware that my blogs have been a lot about race lately. Why its been a hot button issue with me as of late I don't know. But I was ready to apologize to this non-existant reader for the effect of not seeing myself on a screen. And then I stopped myself. I won't apologize for a structure that I see consistantly doesn't raise our kids the way they deserve.

I realized that its time for me to start writing faithfully again. And by faithfully, I mean putting my story down on pages. I have no right to complain about what isn't out there if I have yet to add my own contributions.

New Years Resolutions, Round 1

2006-12-25T17:18:00.000-05:00

1. I will have a longer term dating life then my standard 3 weeks.
2. I will upgrade my wardrobe all year.
3. I will find a physical activity that I enjoy that isn't seasonal that I will do regularly.
4. I will hike at least once a month.
5. I will discover more places in the city I enjoy.
6. I will go out at least three times a month to a non-bar/dance place.
7. I will go out at least once to a bar/dance place.
8. Create non-negotiable boundaries with my job and friends.
9. Figure out how to stop my "all or nothing" habit. Look into where it comes from.
10. Learn how to say no without feeling guilty.
11. Stop letting other peoples needs and wants from coming before my own.
12. Stop allowing myself to feel like a bad person when I say no to someone.
13. Learn how to say no up front instead of when I've maxed myself out.
14. See more plays.
15. See more live music.
16. Cook more.
17. **** *** (thats a private one)

CNN Article: Poll: Most Americans see lingering racism -- in others

2006-12-12T14:15:00.000-05:00

Poll: Most Americans see lingering racism -- in others
POSTED: 1:02 p.m. EST, December 12, 2006

• Poll shows most Americans consider racism a problem
• Blacks more than twice as likely to call racism a "very serious" problem
• Almost half of whites and blacks say they know someone who is racist
• Only a few of either race say they are racially biased themselves
More on CNN TV: Are you prejudiced in ways you don't even know? Find out in a Paula Zahn NOW Special: "Skin Deep: Racism in America," tonight, 8 p.m. ET.
Adjust font size:

(CNN) -- Most Americans, white and black, see racism as a lingering problem in the United States, and many say they know people who are racist, according to a new poll.

But few Americans of either race -- just one out of eight -- consider themselves racist.

And experts say racism has evolved from the days of Jim Crow to the point that people may not even recognize it in themselves. (Watch people in a Texas town where blacks are still afraid to stop )

A poll conducted last week by Opinion Research Corp. for CNN indicates that whites and blacks disagree on how serious a problem racial bias is in the United States.

Almost half of black respondents to the poll -- 49 percent -- said racism is a "very serious" problem, while 18 percent of whites shared that view. Forty-eight percent of whites and 35 percent of blacks chose the description "somewhat serious."

Asked if they know someone they consider racist, 43 percent of whites and 48 percent of blacks said yes.

But just 13 percent of whites and 12 percent of blacks consider themselves racially biased.

Professor Jack Dovidio of the University of Connecticut, who has researched racism for more than 30 years, estimates up to 80 percent of white Americans have racist feelings they may not even recognize.

"We've reached a point that racism is like a virus that has mutated into a new form that we don't recognize," Dovidio said.

He added that 21st-century racism is different from that of the past.

"Contemporary racism is not conscious, and it is not accompanied by dislike, so it gets expressed in indirect, subtle ways," he said.

That "stealth" discrimination reveals itself in many different situations.

A three-year undercover investigation by the National Fair Housing Alliance found that real estate agents steered whites away from integrated neighborhoods and steered blacks in to predominantly black neighborhoods.

Racism also can be a factor in getting a job.

Candidates named Emily O'Brien or Neil McCarthy were much more likely to get calls back from potential employers than applicants named Tamika Williams and Jamal Jackson, even though they had the same credentials, according to a study by the University of Chicago.

Racial bias may even determine whether you can flag a cab.

New York Times writer Calvin Sims wrote a recent article about all the cabdrivers that refused to stop for him.

"If a cab passes you by, obviously it is frustrating, it's degrading and it's just really confusing, because this is akin to being in the South and being refused service at a lunch counter, which is what happened in the 60s and 70s," he said.

Victimized

The Opinion Research poll shows that blacks and whites disagree on how each race feels about the other.

Asked how many whites dislike blacks, 40 percent of black respondents said "all" or "many." Twenty-six percent of whites chose one of those replies.

On the question of how many blacks dislike whites, 33 percent of blacks said "all" or "many," while 38 percent of whites agreed -- a wash because of the poll's 5 percent margin of error.

About half of black respondents said they had been a victim of discrimination because of their race. A little more than a quarter of whites said they had been victims of racial discrimination.

The poll was based on phone interviews conducted December 5 through Thursday with 1,207 Americans, including 328 blacks and 703 non-Hispanic whites.

Depersonalizing

2006-12-12T14:10:00.000-05:00

So I would say, as of late, I have not posted anything too personal. I think I've hit a time period that I cannot disclose to the general public just yet. I'm sure there will come a time that I can, and I will, but that writing has had to be more personal and private. It's gotten me through struggle and I want to keep it to myself for a second. There are other things however, issues that mean a lot to me, that may not necessarily involve a huge forthcoming of personal details that I have been mulling. I'm about to write that blog entry right now. My life will soon return to my blog. I think once I get a handle on it, I'll feel more freedom with it. Until that time... enjoy my other musings. =c)

Thinking about it... from the "Latino Desk"

2006-10-26T20:09:00.000-04:00

(Me looking Latina, because apparently, that matters)

So I have thought about the CNN article I posted. There are pieces of it that I'm puzzling over as I ponder it. I think it's a great theory of how we should be, the whole, America takes in the cultures and accepts them as their own. It's great except that its bull.

When has this country welcomed information and culture on my African brothers and sisters? When has the booming Pacific Islander community found themselves represented ANYWHERE? When have asians in this country been marketed as anything but "smart". You want me to believe that there is no division but all I have heard this year is how unwanted the latino community is here. How the whole of the brown community (as the words latino and immigrant seem to be interchangable in the media, and may I point out that I am latino but fully an american citizen- born and raised) is a drain on all things economic, medical and educational. As silly as it may sound, it was the second time in my life that I felt like I was just not welcomed in this country. the first time, I was in kindergarten and a ton of kids were making fun of me for having an accent. It's a different situation but its the same basic gist.

So now you realize, as a media/as a country (and maybe soon as an electorate), that due to personal human value, the humanity of a majority of people not only welcomes the people but wants in to the pieces that make them unique and we are now the magically marketable. Honor both ends mofo's. Don't perpetuate the myths and marvel at the successes. OF COURSE Ugly Betty is a success. The country was STARVING for it. Latin explosion articles make us sound like a rarity. The last time my people were a rarity, Leave it to Beaver was a number one hit. Those aren't good old days, "simpler times" they were just times of simpler people. Welcome to complexity and dimension. Maybe the articles should be about the growing multi-cultural intelligence of the average American and what can be done to heighten that awareness in our people who lag behind.

I Rest My Case

2006-10-22T03:50:00.000-04:00

Check out this CNN Opinions Editorials piece...

Monday, October 16, 2006
America's Latinization: Shakira, salsa and Ugly Betty
I feel like I keep doing this same story every year, telling the tale of how the booming Latino population is changing the United States, how the U.S. media business needs to take note of this vast and demanding market. I'm Latina and in the media, so I cop to having a special interest here.

But, as the U.S. population approaches 300 million people, the story has finally changed. I've written for years about how Latino content -- in Spanish and English -- is growing so much that it's going to transform American media. Now it seems to have actually happened.

It's not just that People Magazine also publishes People en Espanol or that CNN has a Spanish-language channel called CNN en Espanol. All U.S. media is changing its content to reflect the fact that Latinos have become the nation's largest minority group and that the rest of the country is feeling their own culture become Latinized.

You can see it in supermarket snack aisles, where tortilla chips and salsa outsell most everything around them. You can hear it on the radio and on MTV, where Spanish music and music with a Spanish beat are everywhere. Hello, Shakira! I flipped through childrens channels the other morning with my 15-month old daughter and there was Handy Manny talking to his toolbelt in Spanish, Dora exploring the world with her amigos and Diego talking to some birds in Spanish. By the time my little girl is my age, it is likely that one in five school children will be Spanish dominant. Our country is changing, fast.

Just a few years ago my relatives in Peru told me not to call them when Betty La Fea was on because they wouldn't pick up the phone. I remember visiting them and TV reporters were on air around Latin America doing live shots to show how empty the streets were during the broadcast. The show was a major telenovela phenomena. Everyone watched, every time. When ABC announced it would produce a U.S. version in English, I figured this would be a true test of whether the U.S. audience, Latinos and non-Latinos, would embrace something so quintessentially Latin American. Well, question answered. Ugly Betty has become the most-watched new series this season.

The show is funny, with crisp writing and a compelling story line. It is also very much a Latino show. Yet the numbers speak for themselves. It's not the nation's Latinos watching; it's everybody.

After years of watching Spanish-language shows and news broadcasts in the U.S. attract Neilson ratings that were the envy of U.S. broadcasters, it's heartening to see something Latino holding its own in English. It means there has been a coming together, a melting in the melting pot. That's the thing that makes the United States a special place for immigrants. That it welcomes and assumes their culture. That it goes out of it's way to welcome the millions of Bettys out there into their home.

*****************************************************

Ethnic Folk on TV

2006-10-13T12:50:00.000-04:00

Can I tell you that I have absolutely loved loved loved watching TV on Thursday nights. Something special happens on Thursdays. A latina female that doesn't look like a sex kitten comes on at 8pm. And after she abdicates her seat, a show about surgeons comes on, the show features prominent characters in many ethnicities. The focus of both of these shows are the people. Not their ethnic heritage, their racial struggles in the world, but the people. Not that these shows would shy away from these issues, its just that these shows recognize they are much more then the melanin in their complexions. They address how they view, experience and love the world. And I think its FANTASTIC.

I think that network executives have been so afraid to feature people of color in their shows. What happens if America doesn't tune in and they lose dollars? Well, In addition to being the best shows on TV, these two shows are the highest rated shows on TV. So my question is this, after the success of Ugly Betty and Grey's Anatomy, if network executives still don't look at casting shows by the best actor/actress but by the demographic that they think they should hit, what kind of rebellion should occur in the face of this blatant racism. I mean you have a solid case for featuring people of all heritages and you still oust them? I think that this racism is the most pervasive. Our children deserve to see people that look like them play surgeons, fashionistas and all sorts of three dimensional characters. Then they see what they can aspire too. When we don't do this, it sends a silent but deadly message, that only certain people count and/or make it. I think evening out this playing field will play a role in evening out the disparities/despair in our neighborhoods.

The Silver Platter

2006-10-06T11:36:00.000-04:00

My cousin Jorge (wildly talented photographer and first person to ever give me a book), used to tell me "The harder you work, the luckier you get." I always found it to be true. I mean no one, no matter how cool just "gets" what they want. Their had to be an element of control to it in some way shape or form. But I'm starting to wonder how much that "no control" variable does play. As tired as I am right now, as hard as the week has been, as much work as I have had to put in, I feel like an incredibly lucky person.

In high school my friend Eric used to say that I was born with a silver platter. He said I just always seemed to get what I want. The grades I wanted, the people in my life, the opportunities, the acceptance to my favorite college. At the time, if truth be told, the joke bothered me a great deal. There was such a disparity between my economic brackett and the brackett my friends lived in, I felt my hard work shouldn't be chalked up to being born with luck. I thought it was being born with a work ethic.

Last night while at the program I work for, I was rushing around trying to get kids into vans, and two of my boys are sitting in the computer lab. I walk in and I say goodbye and I call them my two favorite huggers. Hugging, as you may already know is a premium with me, Jammo and Freddy are pros. They jump up and run over and give me a hug. They start to compete over who can give me the best hug. And then Freddy, says to Jammo "I'm sorry man, Karla is mine. She's my mom." haha. Now, the 16 year old boy as a species is known for many things. To this day, I don't think they have been noted for their affection and warmth. So you can see why it is even on a crappy week that I feel so lucky. How many people in the world get that? I seem to have repeated blessings of good people that just fill my life.

I've met my share of celebrities and politicians. I have to tell you though, they do not compare to the healers, changemakers, artists, comedians and musicians that I have come into contact with. At every stage of my life, new people in these categories come along and feed my heart. My students feed me like it was Thanksgiving. Even in the toughest of moments it seems like invisible hands will push me into the arms of more good people to get me through. No success I have had, matches up to the warmth I feel when I reflect on these people. So maybe they are the silver platter. Maybe it's tough but the people are the blessings and the opportunities come because I seek out the people. Just some thoughts to tide me over while I procrastinate.

What happens in Vegas...

2006-09-18T15:19:00.000-04:00

I'm baaaaaaack. Well suffice to say If I heard that phrase one more time in the last week... well I would have thrown something. Vegas is the most interesting place. It really just draws a collection of people filling voids and daring themselves to be different. Between the half naked women and the ogling men, you know, its just one big sociological experiment of a city.

JUDGEMENTAL ALERT - The following entry is incredibly judgemental, forgive me, I just had to say it.

I am no slouch, but I am not an obviously beautiful woman. I am cute but by no means head turning. There are women in the world that are obviously beautiful. Not beautiful from an angle, or when you talk to them but the kind of girls that make a majority of guys say "damn, she fine" without knowing anything about her. I think this subset of the population is many times plagued with how to step out of using there beauty to get them things. After all, the world has taught them they can have whatever they want if they smile pretty and flirt. It gets to the point where these women genuinely have no idea what they are doing, they just use their blessed faces and bodies to get the only attention they know exists. My heart often hurts for these women, because as much as I hate being "mother, sister, friend" I am heard in such a different way. I would hate to not be heard and to always be paranoid that a guy is just out to sleep with me to validate himself. Most of all, I would hate to not know when I am using my body to get things and not my heart. These women are often disconnected to that piece and struggle with how to connect back.

I have had many friends in this category. The obviously pretty girls who struggle just as much as the rest of us with how they fit. I have seen as the society of womanhood pushes them out and resents them for the kind of attention they garner. I get it too, a lot of times you just don't know how much you can trust an obviously beautiful girl. It occurred to me this last weekend, while in Vegas (capital of the obviously pretty girl, in case you dudes were looking and didn't know) that I scare obviously beautiful women. Not all of them, I think there are some very strong OB girls. But I think I scare a good chunk. I came into contact with a few last week that got all twisty around me. See, I'm the kind of girl that gets increasingly prettier the more you are around her. And I think OB girls 8 times out of 10 go the other way. Just because they have never had to mind the hearts of other people. It made for an interesting Vegas experience if nothing else.

I'm done with my general obnoxiousness for now, I'll post more about the wedding later.

Single Shamed

2006-09-06T13:05:00.000-04:00

So I am maid of honor at a wedding in about three weeks. This morning the bride calls me, one of my best most supportive friends in the world, and asks me the question dreaded by all single brides maids the world over "I need to know if you are going to bring a date". To which I replyed "Nah, we'll have lots of friends there." and then my friend proceeds to go "Niiiiiiiiña" in a voice that reminds me of my mother.

Now I know it's best of intentions. I know she just wants me to be happy. But why is it that the only time I ever truly pay attention to my singleness, its because someone else does. I mean don't get me wrong, if a super cool guy showed up and swept me off my feet... I'm down. Like any girl, the thought appeals to me and I would like it. But I am content in my own world.

I have dated and had a life, I just haven't had anyone that I would keep around to take to a wedding where they would meet all my family and friends. I mean really I have never brought a guy home, I also have never met a guy that I contemplated bringing home. I'm okay with that, it will come in its own time. It's a shame too, I look hot in my maid of honor gown. I'm having fun right now. But damn, Valentines and Weddings big reminders of current states of social conditions. haha.

ADDENDUM:

Just as a status update. I didn't go crazy and try and find a last minute date as I contemplated. I rebeled against the system and all was well. ;c)

Surfing and Acceptance

2006-09-02T20:05:00.000-04:00

It's absolutely amazing how much a physical activity can teach you about yourself. I just came back from surfing for the very first time. I totally fell in love with it. It was just the most beautiful manifestation of how to deal with life I have experienced. Everything that I struggle with as a person, I struggle with on the board. I learned about myself today. It was DEEP. Something about the ocean is so soothing for me. Today was learning how to not try and beat it, the ocean is massive, it is strong, but allowing myself to flow through a wave is much more effective then trying to crash against it. I doubt I'll ever be able to live long term in a place without a large body of water. I really just so incredibly enjoy it. The feeling of letting it take me in the directions it chooses...

I know it's sounds dramatic ya'll but it's like communicating with God. Or at least how it should be communicating with God. You ask for the knowledge of your body to better know how you get carried through a wave. You ask not to defeat but to commune. You ask how do I let go of my instinct to conquer and pull from my instinct to just be. There was a point in time where I was asking for the peace to not criticize myself for not getting it because it didn't leave me the room to just flow and try again. When I actually started to learn how to get on my board was the moment I accepted that I did not have the upper body strength to get myself on and I needed to figure out how to allow the strength of the ocean and my legs to help me. My life has been this struggle. Accepting that I can't do it all but looking to and trusting that the world and God will take care of me. MAN. I am hooked.

I have never enjoyed something I am so God awful at so much. I love the learning in the process. After a while, even eating it and crashing into water was a joy. I laughed so hard. I smiled a lot. I screamed. It's hysterical for me that after years of dreading being in swimsuits, today akward and gangly floppin around everywhere, I felt beautiful. Yay for finding a
sport I enjoy working at... finally. Yay for weekend number two featuring water as a prominent character. Oh the archetypes. My senior year English teacher would be so proud. I hope your labor day weeknds are going as fabulously as mine. Enjoy.

Yo Home Skillit from VA!

2006-08-30T21:55:00.000-04:00

So I have this sitemeter thing that tells me what parts of the world my blog is being read. It's pretty cool and I have to admit I've become a bit obsessive in checking it, Mostly people just come here to read the lyrics to the Kate Havenik song I posted a while back. That particular entry gets read by people LITERALLY all over the world.

I'm FASCINATED by the person who regularly reads my blog from Herndon, Virginia. Whoever you are, please tell me how you know me. If you are a random stranger I don't care. I would just really like to know. I've been racking my brain to figure out what Virginian I may know and I really can't come up with it. So please leave a comment, even an anonymous one. I'm dying to know. Give a girl a break.

Perfect

2006-08-28T21:11:00.000-04:00

There are days that are so perfect. In those days I feel safe being so connected. I'm sitting here in an office waiting for a meeting but my brain is on a beach in Portland. I feel sand underneath my toes. I'm standing there watching 4 men who are just most the amazing people I know. They are splashing tackling each other and making me and another friend laugh on the shoreline. I'm getting picked up and thrown in the water. Salt water is rushing past me as I laugh. I'm catching my breath and diving towards my friends. Trying to tackle them as they have thrown me. We are laughing, screaming, taunting and splashing. One of them grabs my arm and swings me into the surf as I flail and make sure it's tough for him to let go. I bruise. I laugh. I feel beautiful in your estimation, but better then that, in my own. We head home in a van. We listen to the radio as the sunset. In our silence there is love. There is fear of tomorrow because today felt so good. I carry you friends. I just carry you with me. Today, lack of sleep and exhaustion do not diminish my glow. I carry your beauty. I walk confident in a world where you love me and I love you. And I praise the powers of beings greater then I ever imagined that they brought you to me.

The People I Love

2006-08-27T06:15:00.000-04:00

It is 3am and I am hearing the snoring (and assorted other choice noises) of my friends. I am in Portland, Oregon. I have spent the last two days just valuing and being valued by a good group of people. My heart is full. And I can't sleep because the thought of going back makes my heart ache. errrrrrrrrrrrrrgh.I still have one more day. Why am I doing this now? Oh well. What can be done I suppose.

Kailicious and the Baby Burrito

2006-08-22T02:49:00.000-04:00

Tonight I babysat Kai for about 7 hours. Now Kai is the six week old daughter of my ex-coworker and pseudo-big brother Mark. She, like he and his wife, is amazing. I mean absolutely fantastic. I was sitting there holding her and just fully in love. I wonder how you can love people who aren't your blood relatives so much. It was sad for me, driving away from them. The first and really only exemplary marriage I have ever known. The people who helped me believe that loves exists and that it can be a partnership and fun. I'm just sooo utterly grateful to them. And I'm happy for Kai. She is so lucky to have them as parents. Amy is a strong ass woman and Mark is this amazingly wonderful man. The odds are all in her favor. I love seeing how much they love her, how much patience they have with her and each other. Its really beautiful. I am going to miss having that beautifulness (is that a word?) in close proximity. I was watching Mark swaddle her tonight, wrapping her up tight like a baby burrito. The first of many times I know he will venture to make his girl feel safe and protected. It was just sweet. I know the kind of support he will offer her. I only wish more men were the kind of father Mark will be. I'll miss them. I've already spent 30 minutes being weepy and silly because of it. But what they showed me, I'll carry it with me forever.

Here are the lyrics to the song that reminds me of Mark and his Baby Burrito

Father and Daughter by Paul Simon

If you leap awake
In the mirror of a bad dream
And for a fraction of a second
You can't remember where you are
Just open your window
And follow your memory upstream
To the meadow in the mountain
Where we counted every falling star

I believe the light that shines on you
Will shine on you forever
And though I can't guarantee
There's nothing scary hiding under your bed
I’m gonna stand guard
Like a postcard of a Golden Retriever
And never leave till I leave you
With a sweet dream in your head

I'm gonna watch you shine
Gonna watch you grow
Gonna paint a sign
So you'll always know
As long as one and one is two
There could never be a father
Who loved his daughter more than I love you

Trust your intuition
It's just like going fishing
You cast your line
And hope you'll get a bite
But you don't need to waste your time
Worrying about the market place
Try to help the human race
Struggling to survive its harshest night

I'm gonna watch you shine
Gonna watch you grow
Gonna paint a sign
So you'll always know
As long as one and one is two
There could never be a father
Who loved his daughter more than I love you

I'm gonna watch you shine
Gonna watch you grow
Gonna paint a sign
So you'll always know
As long as one and one is two
There could never be a father
Who loved his daughter more than I love you

Singing

2006-08-19T18:24:00.000-04:00

I've spent my morning/afternoon talking to friends and singing at the top of my lungs. Oh thank you Alicia for providing the material. It's been great release.

Tired

2006-08-17T14:28:00.000-04:00

So I am a germ monster today. Hella sick. MY GOOD GOD. Why did I just realize yesterday that I have been working for the last six weeks straight. Which I assume to be why my body is rebeling. There just doesn't seem to be enough time. I wonder, is there too much too soon in your professional life?

Don't get me wrong, I feel totally capable of doing the tasks at hand. I know I wouldn't be happy if I wasn't challenging myself. But I just did about $2000 worth of accounting I've been procrastinating on, more when I add the other $2000 worth of checks. I am managing a budget that is pretty close to $700,000. I sat there for a second tonight and had this overwhelming feeling of just tired. I can't believe they let me do this stuff. They trust me with this, and I am trustworthy. But damn, most the other 25 year olds I know are not managing this. Everyone else seems to be having a lot more time for fun. They don't carry the kind of weight that I feel like I carry. I guess the next best question is, am I self-imposing the weight?

Truth be told, I have no idea. But I want some time for my own brain. I have a trip scheduled to Portland for next week. I'm visiting with some friends and WILING OUT! I really can't wait. I have been everyone's role model for just a little too long. My brain is flippin and all it wants in the world is to stop. I wonder about my pace and am I cut out for this, and then, even if I am, do I want to be? Will I have a really successful professional life at the sacrifice of being young?

I will step out of the victim place tomorrow, I swear. Tonight, I wanna be a kid. I wanna be a kid not in charge of 150 some odd lives. I want to sleep and not think. I want to fully immerse myself in a crush that is healthy for me and not worry about the time I'm "wasting".

Gizmos and Gremlins

2006-08-09T12:16:00.000-04:00

It's funny how there are times when you go long time periods without writing, even if there is something to write about. Then randomly you will want to write and you pretty much have nothing to say. That's kinda the boring spot I have put you in today. I am just sitting here in my robe, mentally prepping for my second workshop in a row. I just wanted to ramble. You are under no obligation to read. My last workshop was a huge learning experience (I guess they all are). I had 28 boys (I know I keep saying this, but damn, it did mean something to me), 4 alumni that I had rap directed, and lots of other little fun factors.

When I say learning experience, I just mean, it allowed me to observe the way I have come into contact with the world. As much as I have tried to let the feeling go, I really believed that I blew last years certification. I mean I walked away feeling like the most awful person for even stepping into that workshop. I questioned how irresponsible of me it was to walk into a workshop recovering from an assault that had happened only a week prior. I didn't think I did what was in my capacity to do. Never recognizing that different capacity comes with different trauma and experiences.

Let me tell you about Jo. That workshop, I had this fiery, angry, cuss you out in the hallway if you look at her the wrong way, girl. And I loved her, I loved her immediately. From the beginning I could see the capacity of her heart. I just knew she had been hurt so many times that she bites as a reflex by that point, not a defense mechanism. And over the course of the workshop I wondered how far she had internalized the lessons.

Then I saw her this last weekend. This tiny, spunky, loving girl. She threw her arms around me and hugged me in the airport. And as I tried to recover from the shock I sat an watched as she and 3 past students of mine showed me how they had discovered the world through the year. She was changed. She had opened her heart a little more, let herself share and feel more. She is also going to be a student at Cal State Fullerton. All facts that delighted me to no end. I really laid into her anyhow, because really, I know her capacity, and this girl can be a superstar. In the end, I feel like she had more tools to find peace and was looking forward to a world that didn't have to genuflect whenever her parents commanded it. I was proud of her.

Your inner critic can be so strong. I mean, how is it that you can not even see the very things happening in front of you. It blows my mind. We can completely process things so skewed from reality. All because of the little voice in our heads that tells us we aren't enough. I mean that voice is tricky, it is forever altering its methods to really get at you. And it can change your entire perception. I saw that critic pop-up this last weekend. Instead of battling with it, I think I just kinda invited it to sit down. Put up with what it said and talked myself down. haha. I know I sound like a nutjob right now, but I hope some of you understand. It just takes so long to make peace with that critic. It's like a freakin gremlin. And not in the cute gizmo state, in the icky conniving green state. I think I should name mine. Any suggestions?

To all of you battling the gremlins I commend you, don't put water on them or feed them after midnight. ;c)

Survivors Celebration

2006-07-26T09:24:00.000-04:00

It had been a second since my last post, I've just had so much runnin in my brain, I'm not quite sure I was ready to write any of it down. This week is coming to a close and a few big things had happned that I would like to put out into the world.

So this Saturday is the one year anniversary of the assault. I'm mad trippin that it has already been a year. No joke, this one event rocked my entire perspective on the world. It took me out of my feeling of relative safety and security and launched me into something I can only define as a learning experience...

So I started to write this out before my survivors celebration but really its almost two weeks later now. haha. I still wanted however, to complete the entry.

I have to tell you, I had a lot of anxiety getting closer to the day, but that night was one of the very best nights I have had in a very long time. It's amazing the kind of space you open in your professional world that you just don't open in your personal world. The requests that I am willing to make of a co-worker but not of a friend.

So I sat them down, those closest to me, told them how much they meant to me. We ate dinner, drank and really celebrated the prescence of each other in each others lives. It was so special. Between the potluck and laughing to the appreciation circle and tears. It was just a phenomenal experience. The true manifestation of the power of my friends. To watch them as they appreciated each other was such a priviledge.

I'm so proud of myself for flipping the meaning of that day. Every year, it will be a celebration of life and not a moratorium on the day I started to look at the world differently. That was important to me. How I look at the world is important to me. As jaded as I may get, I want to know I can still see its beauty and appreciate the places where it makes my heart lift.

Whoremones

2006-07-11T23:21:00.000-04:00

You know its bad when you have so much hormonal energy running through your body that you can't tell whether you have chemistry with someone or if you just want to touch somebody. I met this nice guy today at a conference and you know nice does it for me. Nice for some reason is to me what a nice butt is for other women. Well a good pair of hands too, but that is neither here nor there. During the Young Non-Profit professionals happy hour after the event we had a bit of time to chat. We were having a perfectly nice conversation about how boys are not succeeding in the school system and in my head I kept thinking, hmmm, I want to bite his lip. It was ridiculous. I am ridiculous. I'm fired. I should not be allowed outdoors. Worse yet, I don't hit on people because I have NO game. I just sit there having the conversations I'm good at having. I was in my work element too, which is an easy one for me to grab and latch on to. It's where I know I have competency. Life skills, banter, eye batting and the like... not so much. Bah hum bug. Let us all pray for my current inability to create for myself a social life. The situation is not as bleek as I make it out to be, that is dramatic exaggeration for blog's sake. However, I am amused with myself. Even more amused when a friend tells me he thinks the guy might have been gay (although, this particular friend thinks all men are gay, I believe that is his hope). So who knows.

I-TAL-IA

2006-07-09T21:52:00.000-04:00

I have to admit, after the first half, I was worried. I knew Italy would win but I was a little worried because they looked just a little tired. But they held strong. They were the FINE ass men I knew them to be. Goodness gracious. Sports are some shit boy, the sheer exhiliration you can feel watching a group of men that you have no affiliation with, playing for a country that you have no ties to, against a country you have no grudge against. Yet there I was at 9:30 this morning at a bar in Little Italy, saving myself a seat for an 11 o'clock game. And there I sat til 1:30 when the team that I came to cheer on triumphed. I mean to be real, losing on penalty kicks must suck for France. I mean it's one of those anybodies game situations. But dear God, was I ever happy with the outcome. My love, Camoranesi, in all his long haired beautiful Italian glory had a great assist for their first goal. I mean looking at the man's thighs has been my favorite part of the tournament.

Oh World Cup, how I'll miss you. I will see you again in four years. Thanks for the cheers, laughs and beers that accompanied you.

To my azurri, MUAH!

And to this hot headed dumb ass...

THANK YOU

Grace by Kate Havenik

2006-07-08T21:22:00.000-04:00

Sometimes songs just make you sigh...

Lyrics to Grace by Kate Havenik

I'm on my knees
only memories
are left for me to hold

Dont know how
but Ill get by
Slowly pull myself together

Theres no escape
So keep me safe
This feels so unreal

Nothing comes easily
Fill this empty space
Nothing is like it seems
Turn my grief to grace

I feel the cold
Loneliness unfold
Like from another world

Come what may
I wont fade away
But I know I might change

Nothing comes easily
Fill this empty space
Nothing is like it was
Turn my grief to grace

Nothing comes easily
Where do I begin?
Nothing can bring me peace
Ive lost everything
I just want to feel your embrace

SAFE

2006-07-08T18:34:00.000-04:00

What exactly constitutes safe? The importance of it is ridiculous. I think thats why hugs feel so good. When someone is hugging you, you feel like you are just engulfed. For that moment, nothing can happen to you. Your are protected, loved, cared for and safe.

My first recollection of that feeling was in the first grade. My mom was dropping me off at school. I had to go get in line and wait for the teacher. I used to hate that moment. The one before I left my mom in the mornings. I was pretty much the dork/nerdy/unaccepted kid until I had full command of my accent years later. I remember it was a pretty brisk but bright morning. The big bad world waiting to teach me lessons about childhood and cruelty on one side, my mom and her warmth on the other, with a chain link fence straddling the middle. I would feel tears start to well in my eyes but even at 7 I knew how much it hurt my mom to see me hurt, so I kept my mouth shut. Then two large arms wrapping fully and lovingly around my small body. The hugs lasted forever. I felt so wonderful and solid in those moments. It was almost painful to let go.

17 years later, I'm a big hugger. Usually when people meet me I'll offer the akward "oh you're a hugger!" hug. You see I feel like the most doubtful person still wants it. They want to be embraced. They fear what its like to receive love like that and the emotions that get stirred in them when they do. But I offer it because at base, we all want to feel that acceptance. No matter what our scarred brains and hearts do to us after. I like giving it. I like receiving it. I think its healthy.

I write about all this because I'm delaying writing about last night. I went out to Blondies again and I knew full well that cute boy from last week would not be my dance partner again. However, the sketchness of the people was argh-worthy. I was denying sketchy men dances and saying the word no, more then is ever really comfortable in one night. I found myself feeling unsafe. Wanting so bad for my mom or someone (preferrably bigger and manly) to give me a hug and encourage the rest of the sketch-masters to go away. But I don't have anyone big and manly here, I don't have my mom here either. Then the flashbacks started. The flashbacks aren't necessarily a surprise. I mean I have them pretty frequently. More then anyone would know. I usually am able to bring myself back to where I am. Tell myself that I am safe. Encourage myself to move past it. But last night when I popped myself out of the flashbacks, I wasn't safe. I had men around me who would not take no for an answer. A situation which was unbelievably traumatizing for me just one year ago. I folded. I mean I totally caved into myself. I started strong saying no, putting my hand in their faces, pushing them away but before I knew it I just was unable to move.

Bola asked me if I was okay, I said no, I said I needed to go. She grabbed my hand and pulled me out, Bern and Bibi close behind us. I proceeded to shut myself down and when on the comfort of my couch, I fell apart. I wanted so bad to feel safe. It's crazy how you can feel unsafe in your own brain. But there I was on my couch, feeling unsafe in my brain and wanting to have my mom's arms wrapped around me. I know in a very logical part of my brain that I shouldn't feel like an asshole for last night. Just like I know I shouldn't feel like an asshole for other decisions I am starting to make for myself. But it's hard. How do you learn the difference between self-care giver and asshole/flake? I don't know right now. I just want safe. The last time I feel like I knew without a shadow of a doubt what that was, I was a kid.

Exhaustion... the other white meat

2006-07-06T21:31:00.000-04:00

So I am totally, completely and WHOLLY tired. I worked on Monday, have been at the office by 6am Wed and Thurs. And really I am freakin in need of a beer or 6. Don't get me wrong, it has been a great start to my summer program. It's been fabulous. The kids are fantastic and today, I saw fruition of a lot of hard work. But DAAAAAAAAMN am I tired. To top it all of the estrogen monster seems to be popping up and manisfesting in the worst of ways. I had to step into a bathroom today just to cry. Ridiculous and girly but I felt so emotional at that moment and didn't really want comfort. Just release. I have no idea whether the instensity of the emotion came because of who I am or because of the fluctuating hormone levels in my body near this time of the month. haha. I laugh but in that moment. It was not pretty. I mean have you ever seen ugly crying? Well I do FUGLY crying in private. It has been the week for these and many other exploits. I am currently sitting around in a top that bears more of my upper body then it should dreading the arrival of friends, who though spririted and well intentioned, I would rather have leave me to some restful sleep. I feel like I should be more up for this. Last Friday was pretty fruitful when we went out. I danced with a cute boy. And really if there were ever a time in my life when I could use a pair of male hands... it is now. I just want to feel at ease and at peace and I haven't felt that. The kids stories this week were heavy. Their pain was palpable for me. As much as I care for the newbies, ingesting an entire new set of stories and hugging new pain just feels so... tough. Have you ever read the book, "The Giver" by Lois Lowry. The emotional weight described in that book, combined with the exhaustion of a marathon runner, coupled with my hormonal influx just has me spent. I know, whine, whine, whine. ::sigh:: Maybe tomorrow I'll be more insightful.

Happy "Independence" Day!

2006-07-04T12:07:00.000-04:00

When I was a kid and I saw the American flag, I have to be honest, I felt an immense amount of pride. I really truly believed in the ideals of the independent, democratic society that were painted in my history books. I knew the Star Spangled banner, I sang it at the kickoff of the soccer season for the soccer league when I was 10. AND it meant something to me. I felt American.

Even when I was in middle school and my older cousins used to tease me that I was the youngest socialist they had met (they were/are republicans) I still believed in the power of our system for change. I hated the disparities and at 12 I had already been exp[osed to so many of them. BUT, I believed. And really, inspiration when looking at a flag is a powerful thing. It is an iconography that can have massive impact. We on the west coast I think have detached from it but it is still true for many people in this country.

Then I transferred from Pomona schools to Walnut High School my freshman year and my perspective on the world I inhabited changed. All of a sudden I was getting an education and not struggling to listen to a teacher. I realized my grammar was shit and being the "good" kid no longer got me the great grades. I came to see that the world I inhabited didn't see me as American... no matter how I saw myself. I was one of few kids with a complicated last name in any of my classes. I remember the pause before trying to execute a butchering of this last name and being certain that the next sounds to exit a teachers mouth were about me. I remember the snickering when I tried to explain what my primary education had been like. And I remember the day that I went into try out as a graduation speaker with a fire and brim stone speech about giving back to the community since our high school community had given us so much. I can see in my brain the complete lack of understanding in the faces of the teachers I was presenting to. I can see there pity.

It was during this transition in my life that I really saw that the world was truly not equal for all. It was a bunch of people who wanted it to be equal, but had no frame of reference for what that looked like or what kind of understanding, empowerment, sacrifice and knowledge that took. Overall, I think a good chunk of our country would like to live in its ignorance. It's just easier that way. Sad to say but we really are a "Brave New World" up in the sheezy.

I write this because as of late, seeing the American flag causes an agitation for me. When I see it, I think hypocrisy. It doesn't inspire me anymore. As naive as this sounds, that saddens me. I'm such a passionate person, about the small and large things, and that passion used to extend to believing in our system. I don't know if there was one moment that took that from me or a collection of pieces. I was talking to someone recently about what Franco did to Spain. The absolute mind fuck that he played on the country. Marginalizing it's peices of non-homogenity so that they felt like they weren't Spanish. Spain's turmoil, 40 years after Franco, still exists in getting those people to believe they are a part of the whole. Then it dawned on me, that the United States is in much the same scenario. It's trickier though, there is not one moment or one isolated figure that did it. It's a collection of "I'm better then you" mo fo's that got us to this place.

Intrestingly enough, though I do not naively believe in its systems anymore, I strongly still believe in its people. I have watched individuals create extraordinary change. With an idea, not even an action but an idea, people will revolutionize the world around them. This continues to be a source of hope for me. At some point all of us were fed an ideal, however hollow, about what we are supposed to be, and from that we go and seek ways to effect the world with our gifts. I mean really selfishly, americanly, we go out and do what we want to do. And this is why we rock.

So it's the 4th of July, time for beer, fireworks and family (in whatever incarnation we choose). And I sit here early in the morning, having woken up with a genuine want to see our iconography line up with our people. I sit here pissed off at the many who took away from me the sense of pride I had when I looked at that flag. I wish you knew the world better, then you would see that I am as American of a dream as it gets. And there are tons of me everywhere, but you are too busy making money off of violating the planet and its people to pay attention. Cheers to the people who continue to bring me inspiration and create room in my heart to be a fighter for the things I believe in. Thank you ya'll cause I believe in you; in your many talents, dreams, wants, desires and wishes. Happy mother freakin fourth of July.

Pay Cash If You're Gonna Be A Skanky Ho

2006-07-03T16:41:00.000-04:00

So I've been working all day doing different odds and ends, I figured I would blog and take a little mental break. To explain my catchy blog title... when I was in college a friend of mine, Courtney, and I were watching the movie "The Good Girl". In it Jennifer Aniston's character gets caught having an affair on sad John C. Reilly because she was using the family credit card to purchase her hotel rooms. Aghast at the development Courtney and I started yelling expletives at the TV. One of the phrases Courtney uttered (the brilliance of it all) was "OH MY GOSH! Pay cash if you are going to be a skanky ho!" haha. Thinking about that afternoon still cracks me up. However, after that afternoon, this phrase came to be a catch phrase we would use in regards to men. Sex was such a taboo subject among our particular group of friends (so catholic our boys, so in the closet). When the girls got together we would talk with a little more raunch, rightly so, and we claimed and proclaimed that there was no need to be ashamed of our sexual wants and needs as long as we were always up front about them. It's only embarassing if you make it embarassing and such. Thus pay cash if you are gonna be a skanky ho.

That's what brings me to this post. I have long believed that a womans sense of sexual freedom really comes from a strong group of open non-juedgemental female friends. As a girl, they let you know it's okay to want what you want, experiment with what you experiment with, lust over what you lust over. Earlier in the week I was hanging out at a friends apartment talking about the art of self-satisfaction and I was so amused at the freedom with which we spoke. haha, very ya-ya sisterhood. Then last night, I was sitting with two other women (marginally older then me) having a funny conversation about sex and realized that no matter how old we get, we always seek for permission from our girls. You don't want to feel like a skanky ho, and as much as you tell yourself you aren't, until your girlfriends say it... part of you worries. At least for us Catholics. haha. Sex and the City paradigms aside, there is always the one of you who is most confident that women are allowed to have needs (and she needn't be the lapooning maneater), there is the one emerging from prudishness and then all the women that fall in between. The spectrum however, is incredibly facinating. I would go into greater detail, but really, there are some female conversations that you have to respect as sacred. You are blessed as a woman to be a part of long standing tradition and you just don't violate that.

Maybe I bring this up because I danced with a boy this week that wasn't on the pre-approved list for the first time since the assault. The pre-approved list is gay guys, guys I know or guys that are friends with people I know. It was huge for me. The guy came up with another friend, one asked Bern to dance and he asked me. I proceeded to dance with him for the rest of the night. It was fun being a girl. I know that sounds cheese but it was ( I should rethink my blog name and change it to something like Cheesehead Ramblings). I had a few fight or flight moments but mentally I soothed myself told myself he wasn't going to hurt me and reminded myself it was okay to have a man want me. haha. Because he did. I didn't kiss him or hook up or anything. Even though he tried. I just danced. It was all that I was ready for. But it was enough for me to claim back another peice of me. The dude didn't ask for my number but it is highly likely that I will see him again. Emails were exchanged between my friend and his friend. So who knows. Little by little.

In any event, my pursuit to reclaim my body and the safety it feels around it continues. I just have to allow myself to make even bolder and more fun moves. After all "Pay Cash If You're Gonna Be A Skanky Ho," only works as a motto if you really are forking something over for yourself. And not necessarily your body, your vulnerablity is important to hang out there once in awhile too. My fortress of walls may just let that happen one day. But until the drawbridge goes down... =c)

Epiphany

2006-06-25T14:46:00.000-04:00

So after our three day staff retreat I spent a lot of time mowing over different realizations and epiphanies. I'm one tired jack ass for it too. I say jack ass because I really think I have quite the audacity to always figure things out in the present. Why over analyze later what you can beat into the ground now... really. In any event, with all my inner turmoil something occurred to me about my patterns with... drum roll... men.

I know big whoop, many women around the world figure out their patterns with the opposite sex all the time and they amount to a whole lot of nothing. Ultimately people are miserable seeking understanding and empathy in their misery. This creates happy for both participating individuals. I think the world (myself included) would like to perceive me as an optimist. I do believe that this is what it boils down to though. As pessimistic as it sounds, I actually think it's quite lovely. ANYWAY, something pretty interesting did occur to me and I thought I would post it.

So the other night I am at this Mexican restaurant with 4 friends. One of them from out of town. This restaurant I have pretty much been a regular at for a couple of months now. Every night at 9 the mariachi band comes out to play some really pretty ballads. One of the violin players/vocalist for the mariachi band I think is a little sweet on me. He is always smiling at me and seeking out eye contact when I enter. I do think he's kinda cute and I'm a fan of his talent, even so, I become the spazmo I always become and avoid that eye contact or get into fight of flight mode. (I know I'm a tragedy)

Jeremiah (my friend from out of town) was sitting next to me and asked me "What's up with that, go get it girl." and I pretty much flipped out. I mean I got stumbly, denying any kind of attraction on either end. blah, blah, blah. And then shrugged the whole thing off. Yes, ladies and gentleman, I'm scared of boys.

So I sat their trying to figure out what makes me panic with some dudes and not others. I mean I'm not a machine I have had fun times with quite a few cute guys. I was trying to figure out what separated my exes or my past hookups from the random guy that will smile at me.

I realized that the guys that are in the former category have across the board not shown sexual attraction in me when first meeting me. It's only after spending time with me, even a small amount of time, seeing the kind of person I am, do they express an interest. I mean I am attracted to them, I have never hooked up with a guy I didn't think was really cute. But I think my assumption is that if they don't want to tear my clothes off from the jump then they are safe. Which is some shit because this makes these men a little emotionally unsafe. Many times they are in want for what my heart can provide them and not what they can provide me.

My question is, does that mean that I'll never date a guy that sexually wants me. Whose interest in me isn't because I have won him over but because when he sees me, he SEES me, and immediately wants me. I wonder if I have been hooking up with guys who don't think I'm beautiful because I'm scared of how safe I would be with that. I mean I understand myself, I have been sexually assaulted at all four major life junctions, there is a reason for the fear. I guess now the question is, how do I get past it? I really do want to know what its like to feel someone be so attracted to me they can barely keep there hands off of me, but how does that tie in with the need to feel safe? Can there be both?

I'm a Parking Ticket

2006-06-24T01:22:00.000-04:00

As I have been alluding to, it's been a difficult couple of weeks. I mean good God, the conflict both external and internal has been ridiculous. I've been trying to figure out a few things about myself. Sometimes I feel like a puppy that keeps bumping into the same glass doors because it doesn't know how to walk through the doggy door. I don't feel like I know the location of the doggie door at all most times, figuratively speaking, but I digress.

This week I had a staff retreat and I kept thinking about how I hit the doggie door. The eternal struggle being, how do I get myself to believe that I am fantastic so that I don't "need" other people to think I'm fantastic. Or as Rey used to put it so eloquently in college "I'm a parking ticket! Validate me! Validate me!"

I had two seperate people tell me that they really loved me this weekend. They said it with so much heart and genuineness. They both at separate times, unbeknownst to the other, told me that I had changed their lives. That their interaction with the world was changed by how I helped them grow. How they felt this change with different people and that this would ultimately lead to them being able to connect with the world in a deeper way. They emphatically declared that I was a gift. I sat their fully unable to articulate how I felt. ME. I had no knowledge on how to respond to that. Shamefully, to an extent, I have always hoped that people would look at me the way both of these wonderful people looked at me this weekend. The kind of gratitude they had was so gratifying and overwhelming. It's part of why the rescuer, rescues. Instead I almost felt like I had done something wrong. If they had this much knowledge of the hand I played in their process, then I felt like it must mean that I am a failure. Here they were giving me what is probably the most heartfelt thanks I have ever recieved and I am sitting there feeling guilt and shame.

As I processed the whole shebang and realized how cracked out my instincts were, I really got sick of the base reaction to all of it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not an emotional crackwhore over it. I just want to feel proud of myself without the want for other people to feel proud of me. I want to feel beautiful without someone else telling me that I am. I don't want to have to wait until someone notices me and my gifts before I feel gifted. I know this all comes in time, but what exactly is the process to get there. I'm ready. I'll do it.

Does anyone ever really get there? I mean do I have this ideal in my head of a reality that doesn't exist? It just seems other people around me don't find the need to hear it as much as I do. I mean I also feel totally socially akward, now that I have verbalized it, I realize people don't agree with me. Crazy what your brain perceives that other people don't see. Oh the ruminations and how draining they can be.

I am energized however, the weekend went well, my staff got what it needed and the time spent was useful. I'm grateful to J for providing the experience. It's amazing to watch how good your friends can be at what they do. It made me feel blessed to have the people in my life that I do.

Put Your Records On...

2006-06-18T03:54:00.000-04:00

I'm loving this song right now, thought I would share the lyrics...

Three little birds, sat on my window.
And they told me I don't need to worry.
Summer came like cinnamon
So sweet,
Little girls double-dutch on the concrete.

Maybe sometimes, we got it wrong, but it's alright
The more things seem to change, the more they stay the same
Oh, don't you hesitate.

Girl, put your records on, tell me your favourite song
You go ahead, let your hair down
Sapphire and faded jeans, I hope you get your dreams,
Just go ahead, let your hair down.

You're gonna find yourself somewhere, somehow.

Blue as the sky, sombre and lonely,
Sipping tea in the bar by the road side,
(just relax, just relax)
Don't you let those other boys fool you,
Gotta love that afro hairdo.

Maybe sometimes, we feel afraid, but it's alright
The more you stay the same, the more they seem to change.
Don't you think it's strange?

Girl, put your records on, tell me your favourite song
You go ahead, let your hair down
Sapphire and faded jeans, I hope you get your dreams,
Just go ahead, let your hair down.

You're gonna find yourself somewhere, somehow.

Just more than I could take, pity for pity's sake
Some nights kept me awake, I thought that I was stronger
When you gonna realise, that you don't even have to try any longer.
Do what you want to.

Girl, put your records on, tell me your favourite song
You go ahead, let your hair down
Sapphire and faded jeans, I hope you get your dreams,
Just go ahead, let your hair down.

Girl, put your records on, tell me your favourite song
You go ahead, let your hair down
Sapphire and faded jeans, I hope you get your dreams,
Just go ahead, let your hair down.

Oh, You're gonna find yourself somewhere, somehow

That's Why Rich People Look So Different...

2006-06-18T02:56:00.001-04:00

I must say that I am very amused that it took me forever to find an image of a hot stone massage that had a brunette and not a blonde. However friend, that is besides the point. I had the BEST experience today getting my first massage. It was the most intimate beautiful experience I have ever had with a perfect stranger. haha. My boss Marshall came into the office a couple months ago with a gift card for a massage at the Four Seasons. I was really grateful, but I must admit I had no idea how great this was going to be until I experienced it.

So let me start at the beginning. This week was shit. I mean big crappy doo, stink in a pile, steaming shit. hahahaha. It was really tragic how bad it all was. I think I had just gotten to a point where I was too full of emotions to ingest anymore and I shut off emotionally to a marginal extent. Around Wednesday I decided it would be vital to my survival to book a massage for Saturday and use my gift card. So I did.

I walked into the Four Seasons admittedly nervous. I didn't know protocol. I mean, I didn't grow up in the type of family that had that kind of splurge. The people were sooo nice and explained everything to me. First they gave me a glass of "Cucumber Lemon Water" and it was so scrumptious and refreshing. Then I filled out this survey to basically let them know where my physical and emotional health was at. Admittedly my first response was to snicker at some of the questions and think of smart alec responses to them. But I put smart ass Karla away and brought out open-mind Karla. As I scribbled ratings on the various blanks, my head filled with images of people telling me "you should take better care of yourself Karla." and then I realized that I was there for that very reason.

Each person is given there own personal locker. In this locker you find a plush bathrobe, a plush towel and some slippers. After a mildly akward conversation about the role of underwear in this whole endeavor and letting the attendant know I changed my mind and would rather have a woman for my first massage (yes I am a nerd), I get nakie and then put on the various free accessories. I went to the steam room and it was pretty comical. I mean there I am trying to balance a towel and a magazine in a STEAM room. Which basically ended up with me a hot sweaty mess with a newly crinkled magazine. I'm such a mess on feet really. Common sense is just not my forte, never does it occur to me that paper (in the form of a magazine) could drench in a steam room. But there I was struggling to read the conservatives attack on George Clooney in the new Vanity Fair in the middle of a ton of steam. When I realize what a tard I was I left the steam room and put my robe back on. I lounged in the designated ladies waiting area. Sipping more of the yummy cucumber lemon water and chewing on a few dried apricots.

So this lady Erica who keeps calling me "Ms. Monterroso", which was highly uncomfortable for me, keeps reminding me that the experience is strictly for me and I should let her know when something hurts, tickles, etc. I for some reason choose this very moment to get very nervous about how my body will react. I think, what if I fart? What if I cry? So I giggle (which is customary for me when I am nervous) and I say "I know this sounds silly, but I'm afraid of crying" and she tells me "Oh thats normal, lots of people either cry or hysterically laugh, its called emotional release. It's really the whole point to being here. So don't worry." Oh Jesus.

I then lay face down breathing in this aromatherapy sheezy and proceed to remember what its like to feel my body. I mean really, really feel my body. Remember what places hurt and what places are tired. I am amazed at how I don't even consciously acknowledge the places where I hurt anymore. I just get used to it and I carry it. Can I tell you, a few times I start to tear and cry a little while she massages me. Not out of pain, but out of release. And then she takes a hot stone and places it on my heart and I literally start balling. I mean a deep cry. A sob trapped in years of "be strong Karla's" and "You can handle this" appeasements. I feel in my body the stories of the children and adults I have helped heal. I feel how tired I have been, how full of all of the emotional stress and pain of both my life experience and the experiences others have shared with me. I start saying things with what feels like little control of myconsciouss body. I say "I'm afraid of getting so full I can't help them." and "how can I be this tired?" and just as easily as I start she takes the stone away from my body and sets it on the top of my head, I quiet and regroup. Floored by what was beneath my surfaces. Relieved that I have room toreceivee and give more of myself to the world.

Ya'll now, I haven't been one to praise the chakras, chant the crystals or even light the incense. But today made me a believer in the connection between my body and my heart. Realizing now that when I abuse one, I abuse the other. They are sisters connected in a way that I have no rational explanation for. But I am grateful to the discovery. I sat there after the massage nurturing my heart feeling like a little girl who was playing grown up. I went to the steam room again, showered in a 5 nozzle palace of warm water and used all there assorted lotions and oils to get ready to leave.

I gotta say, I thought from the time I was a little girl that rich people had a certain polish to them. I realize now its the having the money to take care of yourself that gives them that sheen. haha. I mean to be serious, its amazing what paying attention to yourself does for you. I feel soooo much better and less tired then I have in so long. You know that feeling after a looong good deep cry? That is the kind of relief my body has felt all day. I'm a convert. Sign me up.