dangerous compassions

I call you / from the comet's cradle

Tuesday, March 31, 2020

in which I compare myself to OG Milton without mentioning the fall of man

I was talking to Ming about Milton, because I was talking about writers who go blind.  "You know what Milton did?"

"Who?"

"Milton.  You know, the one with the collar," I said.  "John Milton?"

"John Stewart Milton?" Ming asked.

"I don't think so..." I said.  "John Stewart, like the daily show?  No, different white guy.  Here, I'll find you a picture of the collar."


I started telling him the story of Paradise Lost, but I got confused for a second--I said this guy was walking in the wilderness and met Virgil and they went to hell...

Then I realized that was Dante.  Oops, not the same.  I was looking on my phone and found the cute picture of Milton with his collar, where he looks so young and freshfaced.

I told Ming that Milton was born on Bread Street in 1608, great name for a street, and died on Bunhill, which seemed to make sense.  From bread to bun.

"The people who have bad teeth, they always want a bun, thinking buns are soft," I said to Ming, still reading the wikipedia article, drawing on my knowledge of serving bread to hungry and homeless people, which is a thing of the past for now.

Then I found the text itself and read Ming the first page.  It had a "in normal English" side by side, but Paradise Lost seems to be prettymuch in normal English already...

It was fun, and I remembered why I love that stuff.  "Do you see the ironic part here?" I asked.

"What?" Ming asked.  He was half asleep in bed, face down, fully clothed.  He was wearing that supersoft black warmness that's so nice to pet.

"He's talking about God, trying to justify the ways of God to man, totally Christian.  But he's talking to this muse, and what's a muse?  A god, basically.   He's doing Christianity, but then he's totally pagan also.  He's got this whole pagan worldview."

Ming was very sleepy, and I continued.  "So all those people who dis me for having more than one religion at once--it's a really common thing!  Even Milton did it.  So you know what I say to those people?  Boo yaa!"

I guess that's an ordinary morning for a pagan-Hindu former literature major and her caring narcoleptic spouse during a pandemic.  Then I came to the living room to write this down and listen to late 1980s Samoan-Californian hiphop on youtube, dancing.

Monday, March 30, 2020

all this light


Ming's birthday yesterday, I had a lot of feelings.  I asked him beforehand what his expectations were, and I forgot to ask myself.  Oops. 

Didn't know I'd cry because my mom is dead.  She was never that involved with Ming's birthday.  But doing all the important things with her on the other side feels so sad.  So!!! sad!!!

Lots going on--decisions to make for the groups we're involved with, meetings to have, my own feelings about everything, others' feelings about the pandemic, supporting people in new ways, people trying to support me in new ways.  Friends who left.  Changing relationships. 

Spring is always weird!  Oh, spring.  How did you get so weird.  The sunlight affects me a lot.  I spent the first 42 years or so of my life a fall and mild winter girl.  Now I'm a sun-worshiping lady.  I love it all.  But what do I do, with all this light?

I made pumpkin coffeecake.  What a good idea; I should get a coffeecake award.  Well, I did--the reward is tasty coffeecake.  It's way better than I thought I'd be.  Please remind me to put canned pumpkin in my cakes always.

I'm a baker again; it had been a while.  Now I have flour--I was given some wheat flour and some quinoa flour.  Oats.  Baking powder and baking soda.  Look out for carby goodness.  I'm always a fiend for rice and pasta, but now I can bake again.  Not sure how that changed.

Birthdays have the cake ritual, but the whole day feels like a ritual, kind of.  Helping someone transition from one age to another.  I will hold you safe as you age.  I will be here for you as you become a new person.

Like a birth, or a death--that would be cool if we had Birthday Doulas.  Someone who could come help you with that.  Maybe a party planner is a Birthday Doula.

Our friend gave Ming a present of dinner delivered from Veganos.  It was yummy.  Ming had an impossible burrito, while I had sopes.

Tomorrow is guacamole day.  I bought half a case of avocados, and they're ripe!  Wish you were here. 

I like to add garlic and salt--that's it.  I know people put peppers, tomatoes, lemon or lime juice, cilantro, onions, maybe some spices.  Maybe salsa only.  My mom used to put mayo, strangely! 

I tried lots of ways, years ago, and found my favorite is garlic and salt only.  Maybe a little cayenne too.  I'll try to remember to take pictures.  Love to you.

Sunday, March 29, 2020

old old fashioned

I really liked Frightened Rabbit for a time.  This song, my friend put it on a mix for me, years ago.  Nice accent, nice tone, smart words, lots of feelings.



I thought of it because I like the whole idea of clearing the room of furniture to dance, doing it like they did in '43.  Not sure what happened in '43.  Where's a history major when you need one.

But my friend asked on facebook what they should do, at that Worker House, stuck indoors, no tv or internet.  I said talent show, charades, dancing.  They could read out loud also.

It wasn't my favorite song on the album for sure.  Ten years ago, I listened to that album like crazy.  The lead singer died, sadly, by his own hand, it's assumed, based on his tweets before he went missing.  His peeps formed a charity Tiny Changes in response.


Ming took this picture of our garden yesterday.  I prefer more closeups, but I thought you might like some context.  It looks strangely neat and tidy from this distance and perspective.  I think of it as sweetly chaotic.


I took this picture of some stones on my desk just now.  They're vesuvianite.  Love to all.

Saturday, March 28, 2020

give yourself grace


Happy to be alive, this spring.  Thank God for the new year.

We helped our close friend move.  He is gone, northward pointed, and has much of his stuff stored here.  So I think we'll see him again.  It was quite a push.

We gardened.   Put in some special lavender that grows well here, Goodwin Creek.  Some yarrow, planted seeds of a special "forest fire" hummingbird sage and another yarrow.  It's looking amazing out there!


Pink-blooming strawberries for the win.


Borage is blooming, my favorite.


Advanced theology from a trader joe's greeting card.

Friday, March 27, 2020

I invite you to love my disabled self also

The other day, I met my friend at the park.  My friend brought their little doggie.  The doggie seemed sweet.

"I don't have energy this morning," my friend told me.  They explained they hadn't taken their testosterone.  They said it was just laziness, that they'd take it when they returned home.

I don't know how all that works.  I've had a lot of trans friends but never asked about some aspects.  I assumed that taking testosterone would be a big deal, but I never knew it was energizing.

I felt "no fair" like I want energy.  I also thought of some offensive ideas my doctor said to me about women's sex drives and testosterone levels on my blood test results.

I thought how I'm disabled and my energy is low.  I wanna be like "fuck your productivity norms" and that my worth has nothing to do with how much I can do, especially work kind of doings.

But what if I want to get more done?  Energy can feel good.  This morning I cooked breakfast, started some ginger tea simmering with Ming's help, assembled cold oatmeal to put into the fridge for tomorrow.  Sliced overripe banana, quick oats, cinnamon, nutmeg, chia seeds, milk of my choice...   Doing felt good.

I want to love my disabled self and love me all the ways I am.  But it can be hard to go against a whole world telling me go go go.

I am enough.
I am good.
I'm good how I am, right now, this very moment.
I don't have to do anything to prove I'm good.
Just sitting there, I'm good.
Lying in bed, doing nothing, I'm good.
Sleeping, I'm good.
Digesting food, pumping blood, thinking a thought, breathing, feeling a feeling, all that amazing work my cells are doing at all times--that's way, way more than enough.
I don't need to compare myself to anyone.
I don't need to measure up to anyone.
I don't need to look at myself in the context of other persons.  Not Ming, not my mom or dad at my age, not friends, not enemies, not ex-es or the partners of ex-es, not people I went to grad school with, not Mother Theresa, not Santa, not Audre Lorde, not my dearest theory hero Mia Mingus, not the teacher I wanted to be like years ago, not even Sufjan Stevens.

Thursday, March 26, 2020

yellow flowers


Our friend's kale bolted. We sat on the couch in his backyard, talking for hours, eating lunch.  He was wearing his R2-D2 socks. 

"That's the droid I'm looking for," Ming said.  We talked about R2-D2's personality.  His squat loyal snarkiness foiling C3PO and C3PO's fear.

A hummingbird came to sip nectar and dart away.  We talked about feckless, pulses, matriarchy.  Sufjan Stevens, my darling.  Painting icons, stormtroopers.

Bittersweet, to finally learn where our friend's house is, right before he leaves and the house is sold.  A place so dear to me I may never go again.  As we drove away, I cried.  Ming sees this happen, but not the person I'm crying about.

I told my good friend last night, sometimes life seems like a fuckton of loss.  I imagine a huge crane, lifting a mega pallet of loss, moving it slowly to another location.

Wednesday, March 25, 2020

heyoka

Some bit of advice someone gave me, 15 years ago, I still remember and consider. 

When Ming and I moved in together in North Oak Park, the previous tenant had left behind some shampoo, in the cabinet under the kitchen sink, which I used to wash my hair.  A friend who dumpster dived a lot said to be careful doing that.

Recently some rich friends of ours moved away, and they gave us seven boxes and bags of stuff, mostly pantry foods.  Today Ming is going through the cleaning products.  I want some fancy shampoo that I suspect is in the bag.  The bottle's angular shape.

I was reading about some sacred clowns.  They do stuff backwards.  Sounds fun.  Something about whether Thunder Beings had spoken to them...

I was thinking, Thunder Beings never talked to me.  But I've heard voices ever since I can remember.  Maybe they're Thunder Beings?  Probably not.

We could wonder all day, about what my voices are.  One on end of the spectrum is "malfunction" and on the other end is "oversoul."  Maybe somewhere on that spectrum is angels, Thunder Beings, and errant dream bits surfacing while I'm awake.

This art is on the side of the free box at San Miguel Community Garden.

Tuesday, March 24, 2020

competitive religion

"Are you going to turn Quaker?" I asked Ming.  "Do you need another religion?"

He looked at me from over the newspapery newsletter he held in his hands.

"If you had three religions, and I only had two religions, you would be winning," I said.

"I would be what?" he asked, turning pages.

"You would be winning," I said.  "In the religion competition."

Later I was trying to learn about inflammation.  I was trying to understand--is this a vague hippie thing, or a real thing, or what?

Don't get me wrong--I love hippies.  Hippies are my people.  But asking hippies for health advice can be dangerous, you have to admit.

I was looking online--wow, that was dangerous too.  One thing I read was listing foods for an anti-inflammatory diet, and one of the foods was pasta, which I'm supposed to cook till al dente.  I'm like--"What?  You're saying pasta is better for me, if I cook it less?  Who are these people?  Why should I believe anything they say?!"

So I was telling Ming that, and he said I could swing the other way, and I was like--"I don't want to listen to a bunch of hicks either!  They're going to be all--Eat beef!  It'll heal you!"  Then I was laughing a lot.  "Eat lard!  Eat a jar of lard!"

Probably the laughing is what will heal me.  I was telling Ming, hippies giving you nutritional advice would tell you to strap a crystal in your belly button.  Ming didn't smile.  I accused him of having crystals in his belly button.

In my imagination it's a pretty amethyst, held in by a strap of hemp.

R was pulling weeds--I noticed the weeds were rocket.  I went outside and told him, it's like a mustard.  Like a wild arugula.  He ate a leaf.  I ate one too--it was tasty.  It wasn't bitter.  It wasn't too peppery.  It was good.

This year, rocket is growing everywhere--a green carpet by the laundry room with airy yellow flowers.  Ming said, "You're a rocket scientist."  I said no.

I would be a salad scientist.  Salad is complicated.  What is salad?  People think it's "healthy."  But I think it's any cold food, that's not a sandwich or dessert, that has bits of foods mixed together.  Maybe in a dressing.  And dressing can be the worst thing in the world.

Maybe I should get a Master's degree in salad.  If I wanted to be a rocket scientist, I would need a PhD in salad.  Well, I don't want to be in school that long.

Monday, March 23, 2020

seeds

My mood fluctuates.  My belief in humanity fluctuates.  My ability to spell fluctuates fluctuates.  I wanna put an x in it, of course.


This is new growth on the palo verde tree we planted at the end of last year's Sacred Peace Walk.  I like the red.

We're going to get some soil.  I wanna plant a bunch of seeds.

I told Ming a long time ago, I enjoy getting a garden that was already made, seeing what's there, adding to it and making it a new thing with a lot of the old.  That's what life feels like, to me.

He said a lot of people like to plan a garden and make the plan real, then move on.  The creation is the part they like.

In my dreams, I find old gardens I made and forgot about.  Usually they're doing great and I'm happy to find them.  Often they're geometrical in ways I would never make in real life.

I was dreaming early this morning, a white guy was going to swim in a cold place.  It wasn't for fun--there was some other purpose, symbolic or to fulfil a weird need.  To prove something? 

He handed me something in a little paper dish, with a white plastic spoon.  A bit of ice cream, maybe, lavender colored.

"Please be safe," I told him.  I was afraid he would die in the cold water.  He tried to kiss me on the mouth, although I think he was gay, and I dodged it.

The whole dream had a feel of very dignified cosmopolitan.  Another part with this white lady everybody liked.  I resented her.  But I could see why everyone liked her.

Sunday, March 22, 2020

spring song

At the garden, we bought tomatillos, basil, a tomato, a mild hatch chili, a cilantro. 



It was fun to walk around and see the garden beds.  Tons of aphids had infested the cruciferous veg, but ladybugs had come to eat them.

Ming also took a berry cane, to plant here, and I took a sprig of chocolate mint and a sprig of oregano to try to root in water, here.



I love spring.  In the past I've been known to spurn spring, or think spring's too easy.  I'm a lover of fall, usually, and a mild desert winter.

Well, I changed my tune.



Saturday, March 21, 2020

no bus drivers allowed

I was kind of mystified.  The white guy on the zoom yesterday, giving me condolences on the death of my mom.  Then I realized--it was just his excuse for him to talk about his own mom dying.

He said how it was 25 years ago.  She stopped treatment, at the end, which he didn't know until later because he was traveling in Germany.  He said how it was so difficult, the loss of a loved one, so much time to recover, but then he was divorced and bankrupt soon after, and it led to clinical depression.  How his sister took it much harder...

I was like, why are you telling me this?  It was hurting me.  His story flowing on me, phrase by phrase, like gross dark blue lava.  Ugh.  Get your ideas off me.  Get your past off me.  I don't want anything about you in my mind.

Something about the clinicalness of the depression.  A doctor said my feelings are real, so you have to look at them and admit they're real.

He was explaining how it was, like that was supposed to help me, but he doesn't know me, has no idea of my life, who I am, who my mom was.  I felt rigid, closed, and angry.

I was harmed, but I couldn't stop him.  I wish I could have said, "Hey, will you stop?  I really didn't want any comment on my share."  Sometime it's hard to ask for what I need in the moment.

"You're a jackass of pain," I would have liked to have told him.  How about, "You're everything I hate about humans."  As he talked, I felt hatred toward him, and it was like he was digging himself into a hole.  But maybe he didn't know that.

Or he was getting farther and farther from me, like his computer chair on its little black plasticy wheels was rolling farther and farther away, down a long far distance, so he was getting tiny in my sight and his voice more quiet.  He was trying to connect with me or heal something about his own mother loss pain, but the result was the opposite.  By hurting me, he was getting more alone.

I woke up in the night and wanted to sort my socks.  I need some black socks, and I wondered if there were black socks hiding on the bottom part of the pile, in the socks / chonies / bra shelf of my clothesshelf.

Ming woke up.  I cuddled his warm, half-asleep body.  "I need to get up," he told me.

"Why?" I asked.

"Bad dreams.  Bad bus driver dreams."

"Ok," I said.  "How did the bad dreams get there?"

"Bus drivers," he said.

Ps, I have almost no black socks.  Now I know.

Friday, March 20, 2020

greater vehicle

I dreamt I was traveling down a stream in a paddle boat.  "You have a flat tire!" someone yelled to me from shore.

"Ok!' I said.  "I didn't even know paddle boats had tires...."

"You have a flat tire!" someone else yelled at me, a minute later.

"I'm heading back!" I said.  I was on a paddle boat course.  I had never been on it before or seen a map.  I had taken over someone else's paddle boat without receiving the training.  I was just guessing which way was back.

I've heard that in a dream, a vehicle is you, the dreamer.  It's funny because I wrote an email last night to the radical mental health collective saying fairies, faeries, and ferries are welcome at the upcoming meeting, as well as other kinds of boats.  So maybe that's why I dreamt of a boat that was me.

Also there was a broken bracelet in the road, with pink round beads.  I had made it, and then it had broken.  I wanted Ming to pick it up from the street, but he couldn't reach it.  We were making a u-turn.  I guess that was in a car.

I woke up with a Madonna song in my head, from when I was a kid.  "I'm tired of dancing here all by myself.  Tonight I want to dance with someone else," is the part I'm thinking of.



I watched the video to see if there was some clue in it.  I mentioned Madonna in a letter recently to an old friend, reminding her of a roadtrip we took together around 1993, to LA, to visit her dad.  We listened to a Madonna tape over and over again--Like a Prayer.

The combination of intense sexuality and religious imagery--you know I like that.  Prince did that too, the combination of sexy and religious.  For some people, it's all ecstatic.  So it makes sense.

Thursday, March 19, 2020

not disposable

Last night I was at a fat tea held over zoom. It was my first activity with Fat Rose, which is a fat liberation, disability liberation group.  I met a bunch of people and liked them, heard what's going on in other parts of North America. 

I liked being in a space where being fat was normal and ok.  That was new for me.



I bound zines while listening, and I checked in, which felt good also.  I was the only desert dweller.  Most of the people were in the Bay Area. 

I want to do more with them.  I lasted just more than an hour.  Sometimes I can like something a lot, but it feels intense and I can only do it for a little while.  Especially at the beginning.

I keep waiting for a bored time.  Things seems busy and weird despite civilization slowing down.  Yesterday Ming bought me some menstrual pads, as well as laundry detergent and bananas.  I was excited.

I don't understand how long we'll be told to stay home, and I don't understand how much things will break down.  I guess not knowing is part of the fun of all this.  Two weeks is pretty different from six months.

Ming's been wearing a sweater I wore for a while and don't like anymore.  It looks great on him, dark blue and light blue marled together.

One of my access needs is that I can be quiet in groups and need people to let me be who I am, including quiet, without taking it personally.  I don't want to face consequences later, that I was quiet. 

My quiet is not about you.  It's about introversion, what feels comfortable for me, not knowing what to do socially, a lifetime of being told I don't matter and my words aren't relevant to the conversation, my need to feel safe, listen, and feel things out for a long time before speaking up a lot--possibly indefinitely. 

Possibly I'll never feel safe enough to talk a lot, especially if the group is difficult for me because it's full of small talk, weird us and them binary gender stuff, conversation about media I don't use like movies and tv shows, a bunch of white cis ostensibly straight people, commonplace guilt ideas about food and fatness, or even talking a lot about the kids everyone has. 

I love kids, but I never had my own.  I want everyone to get support about raising their kids, but yeah.  It's especially hard when non-kid-havers are getting assumed about or shamed.

A lot of my traits make me strange.  People can assume that my not speaking means I'm angry, stupid, or don't have thoughts to share.  Or I'm judging them a lot. 

Really, I don't belong almost anywhere I go.  I belong at the radical mental health collective meetings, and now I belong at fat meetings also.  At meetings of the Las Vegas Catholic Worker, I'm loved and known.  Everywhere else, I can try really hard to understand what's going on and behave appropriately, but I miss the mark.

My main disability is capitalism.  I'm disabled by capitalism.  Being crazy can be hard too.

"Wrong Laura-Marie!  I need to trademark myself!" I just told Ming.  "You look really cute in my sweater."

"I feel very cute in your sweater," Ming said.  "What's more important, I feel warm in your sweater."

Wednesday, March 18, 2020

deeply ok

A funny sentence a holy person said as she led UU church on Sunday was, "I invite you to mute yourselves."

I remember when I was in grad school, many years ago--this professor I knew used "invite" a lot, and I enjoyed making fun of her, privately--not to her face.  "I invite you to do academia.  I invite you to be a highly appropriate person.  I invite you to stop inviting me. "

The only time I smoked a cigar, I couldn't do it right--I inhaled.  I didn't know how to smoke without inhaling.  You're supposed to keep the smoke in your mouth only.

Humans do some weird things.  Who figured out to grind wheat and mix the resulting powder with yeast and water and let it rise and bake it.  Weird invention.

Or kombucha.  The brave soul who saw the scoby and thought, "That liquid around that scoby might be delicious."

I've heard there's scoby jerky.  I'd like to try it.

Last night I was crying because I wanted to talk to my mom.  I told my friend I wanted to talk to my mom--she asked what I wanted to tell her.  My friend said she believes my mom is still in the world, even if she can't respond.

I would say this: Mama, I'm ok.

Another friend asked what I liked about teaching.  I said, "The teaching part."  He wanted to know what I meant by that.  I said, "The part that's actually teaching.  Not the administrative stuff, not grading.  Not negotiating.  Not staff meetings or commenting on drafts."

He didn't understand what I meant by teaching.  I explained I meant the part where we're in the classroom, discussing a text or ideas, I'm modeling a level of discourse, students are rising to that, and we're doing it--we're learning.  Sharing ideas, building on the ideas of one another, making connections, making something new.  Getting somewhere.

I could have said something about helping the lightbulbs turn on.  That spark of life where someone understands and has a new skill they can carry with them their whole life.

I mentioned as an example students in groups, and one student would go up to the board and write her sentence, and we would all talk about it.  Being vulnerable about ideas.  Risking foolishness to bring something into the world that was never there before.  I enjoy the excitement of helping someone get to a new place.

My friend said something about one-on-one.  I asked, "You mean office hours?"  I said no--well, sometimes.  I had some bad experiences of students trying to bully me about a grade.  Or a student who had problems generating ideas and wanted me to teach her how to think, but I couldn't do that, as she was panicking.  She lashed at me, angry, and blamed me for not being a good teacher.

I could help in certain ways, but generating ideas feels a bit mysterious.  How do you put your mind into a space where something new can arise?  It seems almost mystical.  I know how to brainstorm, how to loosen up and ask God for an idea.  To ask for a solution in a dream--to sleep on it.  I like to hold a bunch of known ideas in my mind loosely and ask for some new connection among them, or to ask for a new direction, or a new perspective.

If that sounds religious, I guess it feels that way, for me.  I can explain it without God, but it can be hard when someone's not receptive to anything because they're scared.  They want an equation, or to plug in x to get y.  Can you teach someone how to think?  I can help someone down a path, but to invent paths, or invent mental movement itself, seems hard in a different way.

I remember going to my homeland when my mom was dying and staying at the big hotel in town.  We were on the fifth floor, and I was looking out the window as the sun came up, at the clouds on the mountains.  I was getting a new perspective on my homeland, literally.  I was amused by that and deeply grateful.

My friend was saying teachers grade a student's work based on preconceptions about the student's work, rather than the work itself.  It's about the relationship with the student, not what the student actually did.

I know expectations can affect us a lot--people see what they think they'll see, much of the time.  I'm not fan of grading.  I know grading is bullshit.

But his criticism hurt a little bit.  He doesn't know what I went through with grading, all those years, or that I scored standardized tests also, with no relationship with students or any ways to prejudge them, except for their handwriting, I guess.

It was me, essays, and a rubric.  That's it.  A six point scale.  I don't believe in grades or scoring.  But I have 10+ years of experience.  I guess most all of us have experience from the other side of the desk, being graded...

I think I was a really good teacher.  It drove me nuts to be positive and upbeat, entertaining.  Thirty people were looking at my clothes and my body, judging my voice, my gender performance--all that.  I would see some of them, staring at me, half-listening, and we're animals.

I was being evaluated on things that had nothing to do with my teaching.  That was hard to know, and at the end of the term, I would get evaluated on a piece of paper, and which classes I was rehired to teach was partially based on that.

Needing to be positive and entertaining made me crazy.  I mean that literally.

Well, it's good to get swept up in remembering.  Thank you for listening.

I taught online also.  The discussion was very different--make a comment, comment on someone else's comment.  It seemed more than ever, students were like, what's the bare minimum here.  I have to write three sentences.  Ok, here's my third sentence.

That was a long time ago.  I have a whole different brain now.  Maybe I could do a better job teaching online, as a 43 year old lady.  I have a different understanding of people now, including myself.  I'm hurt by different things.  Some things that really hurt me 20 years ago, now I would just laugh.

Thank you for listening.  I feel like I'm playing violin as the Titanic sinks.  I guess it's been sinking for a long time.  Better than rearranging the deck chairs, I guess.  Thank you for being here with me, virtually.

Tuesday, March 17, 2020

gardeny

Ming took pictures of our garden yesterday because I promised someone, the quail lady. 


Sunflowers are sprouting in the square bed, and the tree collards we took cuttings from, they're doing great, rooted and living.  I'm impressed!


The chard is tasty.  Isn't this pretty?  Ming is a good photographer.  I think he's gotten better, over the years.

Is this the revolution?  How long will we have electricity?  I'll miss the internet. 

How about the mail?  Hmm.  I told Ming I could keep writing letters in hopes the mail would come back.  The letters would stack up and up.

For now I enjoy the bananas.  I should look up other good ways to get potassium. 

I'm drinking cold rosehip tea and listening to the windchimes.  I want a hug, will go back to bed to hug Ming soon, as he sleeps.

Monday, March 16, 2020

anxiety is normal

Ming was telling me toilet paper represents civilization.  People want to hoard toilet paper because they want to hoard civilization.  They think it'll keep them safe.  Of course, there's no safety.

I want to get a Master's degree in dystopian armageddon.  My thesis could be about toilet paper.


This is my new zine--Lost Child 4.  I believe in it.

I wanted to learn a tiny bit of Korean because Ming and I make our photocopies at a place owned by Korean people, or Korean-American people, and we really like them.  They speak Korean to one another a lot, in the shop.  I wanted to shock them by thanking them one day in Korean. 

The only languages I ever studied are Spanish and French.  I know the tiniest bit of Thai from some Thai friends I had in high school.  And then I know a bit of Sanskrit, from singing it.

So this was my first actual lesson in an Asian language.  Korean sounds good.  I could mimic the words ok, but they wouldn't stick in my head.  I think I'm more of a visual learner than before.  Without something to look at, I felt a bit lost.  It was cool to try, though.

Therapy today is online.  Never did that before.  I attended a UU church service yesterday over zoom.  I liked it way better than regular church.  I liked the checkins but was unprepared for how emotional everyone would be about the pandemic.  Like I needed to do a shielding exercise beforehand so their fears wouldn't go on me.

Anxiety is a friend I've known for a long, long time.  We walk the path together, arm in arm.  Anxiety is normal.

I have some tricks up my sleeve.  I want a tons of art to nourish my soul.  I want to cook a lot.  We ate some veg from our garden last night--tree collards and chard in our pasta.  Even if it's just a token, I love it.

Sunday, March 15, 2020

if I could I would break into flower

Hey, guess what?  The asian pear tree we planted in the courtyard came to life.  It looked like dead sticks for a time.  I wondered if it was ok.  Then these beautiful leaves emerged.  Thank God for spring.


Are they the most tender, vulnerable things ever, or is it just me?

The other asian pear that's planted in the driveway, to pollinate this courtyard tree--it's still looking like sticks.  I hope it's just a late bloomer.

"Why are you standing there with your hands in your shirt like a second grader?' I asked Ming.

"I'm trying to figure out what to do!" he said.  He moved his hands around each other, nervously, inside his shirt, like a second grader.

"Hmm, it all makes sense now," I said.  "Now that I understand you're a second grader!"

The days are running together weirdly.  Did that happen today, yesterday...?   I forgot to leave the compound.  It seems more compoundy, now that we might get locked down.  I had friends in jail who got locked down a lot, then other lands.

Anxiety is part of life, for me.  I see people panicking.  I think, "I could feel all those feelings with half my wits tied behind my back."  I have a lot of experience.

My favorite part of "Lovesong" by the Cure is "whatever words I say, I will always love you."  I like the way he's insisting--don't listen to what I tell you later.  Listen to what I tell you right now.  This is the real truth right now. Evocative.

I like being alone with people too.  Love you!

Saturday, March 14, 2020

things I want to remember about the Southwest trip to Carrizozo in March 2020

--meeting distant relatives
--the nice artist and the art smell in the gallery
--C's amazing story about her mom's death
--singing Eight Stanzas to Bhavani in the room at Arcosanti all echo-y
--seeing sunset and sunrise on that mesa
--red goldfish in the infinity pond
--that wonderful cook I wanted to hug who put cheese on my pasta
--very solid big tiles at Casa Javelina comforting under my feet
--how fast G drove in the pouring rain in the mountains
--my joy / gratefulness at getting better from the sinus infection, thanking my own body
--crying in the pew at the cathedral in Santa Fe after looking at the bone relics and talking to G about holy art
--how one thing prepares me for the next, experiences build on each other
--how medieval artists didn't know what lions looked like
--the cemetery ritual thanking my matrilineal ancestors for surviving to pass their gifts to me
--digging a little deeper with the abalone shell to find damp clay
--wanting to break off an old yucca inflorescence to gently beat Ming with
--beautiful bright minerals in mineral museum
--saying about the copper "pre-sculpturized for your convenience"
--kissing Ming in the glowy rock room
--getting a grapefruit from the infoshop grapefruit bag
--when G said I was half-white
--when S called me nueva mexicana
--the dream I had where all the little kids simultaneously threw their toys into the sky and the toys stayed in the sky

I'm grateful to Ming, G, my credit card, people who built the roads, socialism, all the restaurant workers, petrol people, rain, my ancestors, God herself, and everyone who made the trip possible.  Thank you.

Friday, March 13, 2020

for everything there is a season

Yesterday (on account of pandemic) we postponed the Sacred Peace Walk, the biggest event of the year, for us.  We might do it in the fall, which seems very strange, to me. 

To me, doing the Sacred Peace Walk in spring seems necessary.  Like doing it in the fall would be a whole different energy.  Like why would you even do that. 

The cactus flowers wouldn't be blooming pink or orange or yellow.  It wouldn't have to do with resurrection.  New life, a movement toward summer's ridiculous excess of light and fruit and homicidal heat.  A whole different direction. 

Like having a funeral for a wedding.  Putting the marrying people into a coffin, then into the ground.  Wait, why are you burying us?  Those flowers weren't for...  Help me!  Aaaaah!

Hmm, sounds morbid, Laura-Marie.  Where did that come from?


Almost like a brittle, yellowed plastic Mary broken off a tombstone, lying on the ground in a semi-abandoned desert town in New Mexico.


Or a broken rosary at a cemetery on a random grave brick.


Or seeing a strange rock in the street in a ghost town and looking closer to see it's actually the disembodied head of a doll.

We couldn't stay our second night at Arcosanti because there had been heavy rains, and the road we needed to travel was mud.  We thought about getting a hotel room, but Ming checked the weather report.  The rain was supposed to continue.

So we traveled home in the night, in the rain.  I stayed awake, strangely.  Guess it was the kombucha.  I was sipping it and didn't think the little bits of caffeine would affect me.

At home, we slept, not enough, and yesterday morning I wanted to do All the Things.  I got irritable, then beyond irritable.  Overwhelmed with feelings and the combination of seeing thousands of tasks to be done plus low, low energy.

Here are a couple pictures Ming took of me at Arcosanti.  By the room we stayed in there.



I hope we can go back, some day.  The world keeps changing, and I keep changing. 

Yesterday a new friend suggested I download an app for leaving video voicemails, kind of.  It's like video conferencing but asynchronous.  I'd heard of it. 

I will let the young people lead me, somewhat.  If I make more room on my phone, I could download it today.  Meanwhile, I gotta sleep more.  Gnight, Earthlings.

Thursday, March 12, 2020

land of enchantment

Hey, guess what.  We went to Arizona and I didn't almost die.  You have no idea how happy I am to be home in one piece.  Yay!!!!  We did it.


Just to be confusing, this picture is from New Mexico, which is a whole other story.

Tuesday, March 10, 2020

not in Las Vegas

We went to Santa Fe.  It wasn't how I expected.  We saw friends and ate delicious foods.  I got a sunburn and a headache.  I sat in the cathedral and was unprepared for the emotions I'd feel there, praying and crying in a pew.


I knew these were tulip leaves from when Ming and I grew the same.  I recognize the red on their edges.  I predict the tulips will be beautiful.


I like this art I saw at arcosanti--it reminded me of synapses.

Our view from the room we stayed in was this mesa thing.


In Santa Fe, Ming paid a park bench poet for two poems.  Honestly, I don't care for them.


I used to take a lot of graffiti pics, so here's one for old times.  I'm feeling like the opposite of a loner, lately.

I wanted to see a friend and was lying in bed having dreams while I was still awake.  I felt malfunctiony and very uncomfortable.  I couldn't push it.  I slept while Ming saw the friend.

I want a hug.  I have a headache.  I'm drinking a lot of water.  I want a deep comfort.

I wrote in the prayer request book at the cathedral my request for help with being on the right path for me, learning what I need to learn, and doing service based on my particular gifts.

My peace walk friend asked me if my parents were still in Las Vegas.  I said I came from the coast, and how my parents had both died.  I said, "I don't know where they are.  I hope they're ok.  But they're probably not in Las Vegas."

Monday, March 09, 2020

overclouding

My friend likes this mashup music.   Maybe seven songs at once, played together, stacked like music pancakes.  I was like, why in the world do you need seven songs at once?

This friend likes his food super-spicy also.  He needs everything turned up to 11.  He thinks spinach is boring.  He needs tons of stimulation.  He has a lot of energy too.

I was slightly insulting it in my mind, or at least finding it ridiculous.  Then we were driving, and I saw a few different kinds of clouds in the sky at the same time.  I realized that gazing upon seven kinds of clouds in the sky at the same time is my favorite thing.

I bet you see where I'm going with this.  I like cloud overstimulation.  Overclouding.

Sunday, March 08, 2020

I love ginger

"What do you like best about me today?" I asked Ming.

"Your ability to adapt," he said.

"Hmmm," I said.  "I was just thinking what I like best about me today.  And I was going to say my crazy.  Maybe they're the same thing.  My crazy is how I adapted."

"Yeah!" Ming said.

"Yeah, I'm blowing my own mind right now," I said.

Guess where we just were.  You have three guesses.  No, not an orchid farm.  No, not a dude ranch.  No, not a jacuzzi factory.  You give up?

We were at Arcosanti.  We stayed in a beautiful room, ate delicious dinner, watched sunset and sunrise in the gorgeous desert by a cliff and pond.  Talked to a wonderful caring cook.  I kind of want / wanted her job.

https://arcosanti.org/project/architecture/

Now we're in Abq, and it's raining.  My friend tells me this is unusual.  I'm resting as hard as possible.

Ming brought home carrot ginger soup and a grilled cheese sandwich.  What a nice spousy.


Saturday, March 07, 2020

goddess of gluten


Hey, I like this wheaty lady.  I like her mudra and sheaves.  Her serious look.  I think she's worshiped by eating bread.  Let's do it!

Friday, March 06, 2020

collective friends


Here's the banner.  What do you think?  My friend left space for others to add to it.  How about a bunch of mushrooms or merfolk?  Or some skeleton keys and valentine hearts.  Tons of suns.

The radical mental health collective is the only place I can go and feel comfortable about being who I am.  I cried tonight for all the five minutes as I checked in.  It felt so good for them to let me do that.  Accepting my cry as a normal thing.  People cry.  They didn't have to stop me, fix me, change me.  They let me do my thing.  They could handle it.

I can't tell you how good that is for me.  It's not every day I get that.  Places I go, they would want me to stop crying as quickly as possible.  Or crying is like farting.  An embarrassment we pretend didn't happen--people start squirming.  It feels wonderful to be witnessed in a caring but chill way.

The mockingbird outside is singing--I like to pretend it's my friend.  I have some things to do!  I hope I can find the energy.

Thursday, March 05, 2020

love is for everyone


There's a lot going on.  Three friends are moving away.  We're leaving on a trip.  I feel excited.  Things are extra fluxy.  Is spring always like that?

New music, new ideas, fresh feelings, turning of the wheel of the year.  Warmth.  More sunlight.  Possibilities wanted and less wanted, but what do you do with what shows up?  Make elderberry lemonade.

I like this quote because I really believe in love, and I can't believe putting up with exploitation is normal.  Screw that!  Really!  Why is it so weird to believe humans deserve love?  I want to help make a world where love is normal.  Not relegated to a small segment of our lives, if you're lucky, conditional.  Love is for everyone.

I made a packing list, I made an agenda (which is a list too), I'm brainstorming.  I have this particular writing project I'm working on, combining a few things into one thing in a very exciting way, but I don't have good brainpower.  I get distracted, too tired, or scattered.  I need two or three good hours uninterrupted.  Maybe on the trip.

I hope you get what you need--the support and understanding, delicious foods, shelter, ideas.  Clothes that fit you.  Deep fulfilment of your soul and your life's mission. 

What's your life's mission?  Mine is about connection and saying what I most need to say.  Thanks for being part of that.

Wednesday, March 04, 2020

elderberry tree dreams, sun fear, other illumination

We went on a desert hike.  I was excited by water in the creek.  It was good to move and be outside, doing something animaly. 

The labyrinth was big and felt like commitment.  I was hiking with Ming and G, who are darker skinned.  We stopped to eat vegan donuts on a boulder.  I felt like life was good and things were possible. 

About an hour into the experience, I wanted to sit by the creek, but I got an overexposed feeling, like I needed shade right away.  Ming and G went on without me.

Walking back, I felt scared.  I wanted to stop and rest on a rock, but I was too afraid.  I had water--not sure what I thought would happen to me.  I want to go back soon in the early morning,

In the car, in shade, I wanted to sing.  The mother song I want to sing most lately, Eight Stanzas to Bhavani, I sang the first few words and started crying.  I wished my mom was still a living, happy Mama. 

My hand touched G's jacket, dark blue and black, which was on the right side of the driver's seat.  The wool feeling of the fabric contributed to my strong emotions.  I cried to God instead of singing to her. 

Oh, Mama.  If only things had been different.  Should I say it was the pesticides in the fields?  The rocketfuel on the water?  House by the toxic waste dump?  Everyday chemical exposure?  Living with smokers when you were young?  Random chance?  Stress of longterm abuse?  Bad genes?

My friend said to eat blueberries.  I said I wanted to plant elderberry trees, but Ming told me they usually grow by the river.  I think they wouldn't live here, or would take a ton of water.

I get stressed and regret saying yes to anything.  I brainstorm what to cancel and surprise Ming with my ideas.  Sometimes I'll say a weird idea and he'll get confused thinking it's something I chose.  An idea could be on a spectrum of silly impossible notion I thought of one second ago, to lifelong plan.

I posted a freecycle lightbulb ad, but no one wants this random lightbulb collection.


This is potentially illuminating also.  Friend's lamps, about to move across the country.



I had an essay published in BiWomenQuarterly.  Page 12!  I reread it and saw some things I would change.  But I think it's ok.  I like bringing together the different kinds of activism.

http://biwomenboston.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/spring-20.pdf

Tuesday, March 03, 2020

lumpen

I was talking to Ming about the accent marks in French.  I told him about accent grave, accent aigu?  Then the accent circonflexe, of course.  I forgot about la cedille and the umlaut thing.

He said something about Vietnamese.  I said something about a French invasion.  He knows about that.

"Do we really need all those accent marks?  Couldn't we forget about them?  French is asking too much!  I'm like--French, you gotta be kidding me."  I was telling Ming all this as he drove us to Treasure Island to deliver some sunglasses to the front desk so my friend's parents could pick them up.

This friend visited from New York and left sunglasses here three years ago, and I've been holding onto these shades ever since.  We're doing a thing.  I had them in the bedroom on a shelf in an It's-It box.  But I didn't close the box, so they got dusty anyway.  But the friend's parents are in town, staying at Treasure Island.

"It's good to come here to remember why we don't come here," I told Ming on the strip.  We were at a red light, watching masses of tourists and a couple of locals pass by.

"What are all these people DOING here?" I asked.  I commented on their crisp shopping bags and long plastic margarita cups tourists carry a lot.  The novelty of drinking a margarita as they walk around.  A lady's pretty scarf.  How almost everyone was wearing black.  I looked down and saw I was wearing black too.

I had intended to run in to drop off the sunglasses at the front desk, while Ming waited in the car, but I got scared.  I was afraid they would read me as homeless, scowl, and tell me, "Get out of here before I call the cops."

I think that's a paranoid concern, but what can you do.  I'd rather be silly than have a panic attack in a casino.  I'll say that's valid.  You're ok, Laura-Marie.

Casinos are kind of like video rental stores.  I remember the overstimulation and stress of Blockbuster, trying to decide on a movie with friends on a Friday night around 1993.  The too muchness of colors and sounds, bright carpet, tvs playing movies.  The stress of trying to agree what to get.  No, I won't watch a horror movie.  We watched that one already.  No, that's a stupid movie.  No way am I seeing that.  

Casinos have cigarette smoke also, and the gambling thing, of course!  Memories of my dad squandering thousands of dollars on a type of "fun" that didn't seem to make him happy whatsoever.  It seemed like a really gross, grabby fun.  An expression of a deep sadness.  That sounds mean, but if you were there, you would have seen it too.

I told Ming how I don't usually suffer from imposter syndrome, but I couldn't bring myself to step foot into Aveda.  (I'd never told anyone that before.)  I like their beauty products--I had a best friend years ago who worked there and gave me some of their products that smelled wonderful.  Hair conditioner, a pretty candle.

But yeah, a similar thing of being read as totally the wrong class, style, and fatness level.  I would be seen as Not Belonging, and the pain of just imagining the condescension of the workers.  Let alone experiencing it.  Ouch.  I flinch before they even see me.

I filled out a form recently online that asked my race/ethnicity, gender, age, sexual orientation, and class.  For the class one I put "lumpen."  I felt like a funny Marxist even though I'm not a Marxist, yo.  I wanted to put a question mark after but didn't.

Am I lumpen?  I live on disability making less than $10k a year.  But in some ways I'm rich, and I have things money couldn't buy. 

It's funny because if you're lumpen, you don't know the word lumpen, right?  So if I call myself that, it's kind of a joke.  Half-joke.



I appreciated the unplanned rain.  I think wind is the escort of rain.  It brought the rain here, and it ushered it out.

Monday, March 02, 2020

language geek

"Did you read my blog?" I asked Ming.

"I did," he said.

"Did you like it?" I asked.

"I did!" he said.

"What was your favorite part?" I asked.

He thought a second.  "The length," he said.

"Ah, you're a size queen for blog posts," I said.  I guess if he likes the descriptiveness, more could be better.  Later he said he liked the dystopian hotel room part.

The printer made a sound that meant it was about to print.  Neither of us had asked for printing, so we knew it was R, probably printing homework.

So he could come over soon to pick up his papers, and we could talk to him.  Or he could forget about his papers, and we would leave them on top of the printer to languish.

"I thought of something funny last night that made me laugh and laugh, and now I'm not sure if it's funny at all," I said to Ming.

Story of my life!  Or wow, this poem looked good last night.  Now--what was I thinking.

The funny thing--laundry deterrent.  A special liquid that keeps you from doing laundry.

I guess I've been into typos lately.  Thinking of the radical mental health collective as the radial metal heath collective.  I'm a language geek.

What is heath, anyway?  A special plant on the moors in England?  A delicious candy bar of chocolate-covered toffee?  The name of an ex-friend's kid?

I started studying French again.  Why is that?  Sounds fun.  I figure I had a bunch of French in my head already.  My accent is totally hopeless, but I can write it.  If I can get the accent marks to face the right way.  Hahahahaha!

Meanwhile, duolingo seems so awkward.  More like a game related to language than actually learning a language.  I don't know how to speak Spanish at all, but I know what to click so a green owl will praise me.

Hmm, that reminds me of something.  Another story of my life.  Something about faking it, trying to pass as neurotypical, trying to pass at all.  Doing the things I need to do to live, even though many of them make no sense whatsoever to me.

Maybe I should ask my language master polyglot friend if she has any accent advice for me.  I'm thinking she's going to tell me to talk to people.  It's hard enough to talk to people in English.


My bestie made this bracelet for me a long time ago.  I was happy to wear it today, after not wearing it for years, that it fits.  I felt her love.  I asked Ming to take a picture.

Sunday, March 01, 2020

the graceful curve of a stem

"Sorry--I tried to care.  It didn't work.  I'll try harder next time," I told Ming.  We were tying up loose ends.  He was almost going to bed.  He was moving in that direction for an hour.

Now it's March.  Yesterday, leapday, felt important.  A magical day, bonus day of astronomy and math.  Extra day, sacred day.  I txted friends rabbit emojis, imagining rabbits leaping into possibility.

I spent yesterday at the house of a friend who is moving away soon.  The house had a dystopian hotel kind of feel, half-empty.  It sold for almost half a million dollars, which confuses me.  Is this California?  I secretly think of Las Vegas as part of California, but I thought that was fanciful.

I was caring for his dogs.  They are quiet, low-drama small dogs, but I still didn't enjoy the dog hair on my warmness, or tending to their needs so much. 

I guess if I knew them better.  Getting to know them, it wasn't easy.  I asked them questions like, "Why are you doing that?  Are you ok?  Are you bored out of your fucking minds?"  They didn't answer.  I don't really understand their life.  I understand certain aspects, but I couldn't put it together.

Yesterday late afternoon I got in a mode of self-loathing.  Once I'm in that mode, I can hate myself for almost anything.  Auto-hate.  Yuck.  Glad I got out of the loop.

It really helps for me to do an actual thing or two--I mean a productive thing I can point to as proof I could do good.  I get a little hit off it, and feel like I can continue.  I used to every morning do my dailies--played duolingo, gratitude journaled, maybe blogged, talked to my mom.  That was a good way, and things changed, which is ok also.

I wanted to ecstatic dance today, and there's a free concert at a church, but I have so many piled up things, fallen by the wayside things!  I love ecstatic dance, but dancing that long with others takes up my energy for the day.  I'll dance in the prayer room for a smaller amount of time.

I didn't get the wifi password yesterday at my friend's house.  He couldn't remember it.  I wrote a letter I owed a prisoner, finished another letter that had been half-written for two weeks, and wrote a postcard to a close friend I send postcards to a lot. 

There's a prisoner who can't be released on parole because he has nowhere to go.  He wrote to the Catholic Worker asking for help.  I'm the community's letter writer and was happy to take that on.  The prisoner is hyperarticulate and has served 40 years.  That long, it's a different world, when he gets out.  How is doing that to people ever a good idea?

The half-letter I finished is to a witch in France.  I barely met her and already love her.  She wrote me this beautiful, caring letter offering support about my mom's death, as her dad died of cancer a year and a half ago.  She signed "in perfect love and perfect trust."  I almost cried--that vulnerability shared so freely.  I felt a very precious thing was being given to me, and I really needed not to mess it up.

I have so many penpals, and sometimes the mail that touches me the most is the hardest to reply to.  So I didn't want to do that, with her, letting the letter sit and get other stuff piled on it.

I wrote a poem yesterday also, in my journal.  I just meant to write a funny sentence and kept going.  It's a bit uncouth.  It starts out talking about how Ming is my spouse, Noam Chomsky is my boyfriend, and Buckminster Fuller is my boytoy.  It gets worse from there.

In Santa Barbara there was a special museum I visited dedicated to Buckminster Fuller.  Yeah, I have a thing for him.  One of those special museums by appointment only.

It's windy and the windchimes and tinkling, but not like gale force hurricane desert wind.  More your standard ok wind, I think.  Blessings to you, wherever you are.

Oh, our friend gave us his garden.  He's leaving town for six months.




Is there anything more beautiful than the delicate green of carrot leaves?  Look how the stems curve.  I'm doubting it.