Gender: Female
Sign: Scorpio
City: Our Fair City
State: California
Country: US
Signup Date: 9/27/2005
|
|
|
|
Thursday, November 05, 2009
|
Current mood:  tired
Category: Writing and Poetry
My dear friend Russ has been gently prodding me to write something, so this is for him, and anyone else with the patience -- 
"Right lane! Right lane!"
(The unofficial navigator, otherwise known as my son, is shouting instructions into my ear while we negotiate the I-5.)
"Fifty. Forty. Thirty. Twenty. Ten. Shhhhhhhzh... "
Our airplane must have landed safely, because there is silence for a few minutes.
"Mom. Our teachers don't wear dead runt." The silence didn't last long.
"What?" I respond blankly, then it hits me --
"You mean your teachers don't wear deodorant?"
"Yes."
"And who told you that?"
"Captain Underpants." (The tone of voice is flat and staccato, but after this explanation, he actually begins to giggle at his own joke.)
I marvel at the patience of his teacher, who, to judge from the phrases my son repeats, must be teaching a class full of boys enamored of Captain Underpants and Professor Pippi P. Pottypants. Or perhaps I should congratulate her on a stroke of genius -- supplying said vagabonds with semi-contraband literature in order to lure them into considering that reading is an adventurous pastime.
I cannot help but laugh, and wonder what his speech therapists would say if they knew how he was utilizing the fruits of all of their hard work.
But he is not the only one who offers me a never-ending series of moments that could never be described as dull.
"And then I go, Ooooooo, Ooooooo!"
A female passenger, our neighbor, is whooping it up.
"No. I go, Ooooooo, Ooooooo!"
That was the middle schooler's turn .
"But yo mama goes Ooooooo, Ooooooo, Ooooooo..." sings out the neighbor with a final flourish.
The fifteen-year-old looks up from her manga and mutters something under her breath in Japanese, possibly unprintable (but how would I know?)
The other day I took a group of children to the park, and sensed trouble when I saw that the boy began to obsess about a certain unusual slide, made of rolling pieces. I made sure that he was taking turns with his sister and friend, and then was distracted for what seemed to be just a moment. And that's when the worst happened. Another parent came up to me and said, "Your son is misbehaving on the slide. He isn't listening to me. He must have social problems. You need to expose him to more children."
Ears burning, I agreed with the other parent. "Yes, he does have social problems. I apologize." I went over and took his hand and told him that we needed to leave. He let me lead him to the car. When we got there, I explained to him how it was not okay to behave like that, that he could get in trouble, that other people don't understand how important it was for him to climb up that particular slide. We talked for a while and he actually told me that we shouldn't go to that park again. A half an hour later, we drove to a different park, without that type of slide, where his behavior was exemplary. I breathed a sigh of relief.
We have discussed the concept of claustrophobia several times during the past few weeks, partly because so many of my passengers seem to suffer from it, judging by their behavior.
The other day, while we were on our way to pick up siblings from school, the boy showed that he had been thinking deeply about the word.
"I am claustrophobic," he declared, "for everyone except Mom."
All in all, I'd say we are doing pretty well. At least we are on our way to beginning to figure ourselves out. We have our struggles, but doesn't everyone?
One of my greatest accomplishments of late, beside the time I've been spending in the kindergarten, was to adopt out four kittens and their mother (the kids rescued them from the bushes around the apartment) to three families. Our favorite cat was recently located after being lost for almost a year, and she is adapting well to being back with the crowd. The newer cats aren't so sure about sharing us with her, but she just sits and licks herself placidly, not letting herself get bent out of shape about much of anything. I should take a few cues from her.
Love to you all,
Flame & family
P.S. Just out of curiosity, are there any other corners of the world, where the word, "hecka" has become part of the vernacular, as in "She drives hecka fast."? Or is it just Northern California, producer of so many fruits and nuts?
Powered by  | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
|
Current mood:  determined
Category: Writing and Poetry
You
elude my grasp.
You say you are sick of me not listening,
that you have been sending out hints to me,
but because I can't place
all of the pieces of the puzzle,
that I obviously don't care.
My dear,
even before you were born,
you were the beginning
of the end
of my illusions.
Swaddling your tiny body in flannel
enhanced the skepticism
of your too-wise gaze.
At three months,
I propped you up on a cushion,
a beribboned satin baby-doll, ;
you stared back--
twin aquamarines emerging
from subterranean depths.
I admit--
at communication,
sometimes I fail miserably.
As a girl, I remember
listening for my mother's anger.
I wrapped myself in its detonations
and my own angst,
and hid behind them like a trench coat.
I'm sorry I uprooted you
from everything you knew,
sorry that noisy siblings
jangle at your nerves,
and distract your mother's attention.
I hope you know
that I would leap
in front of a speeding SUV
for you,
and, more pertinently,
I would attempt to do a better job
at sharing my feelings.
I wish that I could remove
all obstructions from your path,
but I know it is your response to them
that already defines your character.
When I say I don't understand you,
please take it as a sign of my respect,
because, whatever your trajectory,
and wherever you land,
I know that you are meant to fly
far beyond my reach.
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Friday, September 18, 2009
|
Current mood:whimsy-califragilistic
Category: Writing and Poetry
Beyond the blue Formica,
a woman bends over her task.
Flashing salt-and-pepper hair,
and the curve of a care-worn neck,
she counts each pill
as it slides home;
a constant pinwheel of cars
streams away from a
roundabout;
red-yellow-green bulbs
blink like Skittles into
a rose window;
countless machines
freighted with fragile cargo
form a jigsaw puzzle
that leads back to our kitchens;
you grip my life in your hands,
and mine lift to reciprocate;
how is it in this always now
that we are sustained?
sun-seared,
a golden sphere drops to the grass,
light and prickly,
a liquid amber pod;
on the verge of the too-carefully groomed park,
one wild weed resists the weekly blade,
lily-white with a violet edge,
my eye-lids crease at the sight of its defiant blooms,
its name a whisper:
"snow in summer"
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Sunday, August 30, 2009
|
Current mood:river
Category: Writing and Poetry
while
we peer
through limpid fingers,
the sun-star
bombards us
at the speed of light
the night may remind
our throbbing cells
of their past lives
as phosphorescent
meteorites
we throw words
at the spinning,
we name our breath
we are always empty cups
being filled
at the intersection of nothing
and something
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
|
Category: Friends
We've just returned from a family excursion, and I promised the writer of the poem below that I would share this story with my online friends, so here goes ...
"Why are you crying?" wondered my 17-year-old. The van door opened, but not without a protesting croak.
"I was thinking about writing," was the short answer. She wasn't looking for a long answer. She shook her head over me in bewilderment and pronounced, "Take off your shoes and come down to the beach, the sand is awesome!"
I slipped off my rickety sandals and moved toward the sound of the waves, letting the wind whip my sandy hair into an approximation of dreadlocks. The cool water licked at my toes. I shivered. For a few minutes, I crouched in the sand, listening to the soothing wash of the tide, but the chilly air began to accentuate an ache that began somewhere behind my eyes and was pulsing down my jawline. Lack of sleep, and the pressure of being the driver, were taking their toll on my body. I headed back to the van to take an ibuprofen.
The sand clung to my feet, begging me to notice its incongruous warmth. The sun had had a chance to heat it just before the fog rolled in. I wished that I could somehow find a kindred spirit who would understand my frustration at not being able to write a poem.
Between me and my destination, a white-haired, bearded man sat cross-legged on a wool blanket. I glanced at his shoes--the quality of his leather boots reassured me somehow of his intentions. He pulled a paperback out of a backpack and I think my lips must have curled in answer to his attempt at a smile.
He showed me the book he was reading, and then asked unexpectedly, "Would you like to hear me read a poem?"
Oh, yes, I found myself saying -- I was just having a conversation with the Universe about wanting to hear a poem.
He pulled out a small, college-lined notebook and cleared his throat:
"Summer Twilight," he read. "I wrote this one last night."
"The horizon's afire by a summer sun beyond its set,
and winds aloft shoulder sounds of a passing day.
Pipers wrestle tidbits left from a comber's crest,
while the shore prepares for twilight in its ever-changing way.
"Waves thunder upon the sand,
then recede with a sigh.
Beach verandas glow by candlelight
with wine and brie;
and pinpoints of crystal ignite
the Universe 'n sky,
solar embers remain, highlighting
the ebb of the Sea.
"Celestial lights embrace
the final descending rays.
Summer twilight is on the
midnight azure plane;
and as a compass moon ascends,
ending another summer day,
I, desperately longing for You,
hear the ocean whisper your name."
He read without much expression, letting the words work for him, but he noticed how the ending struck me. I stood quietly for a moment, then asked, "This must have been written about someone in particular ..."
"Yes," he admitted, "It is about my wife. I lost her two years ago. She died of lymphoma."
"I'm so sorry," was all that I could muster.
"It's the fortieth anniversary of Woodstock, and we were there together." He smiled, eyes moistened. "I had to write something."
"Do you know, I'm 39," I said, "So all of that happened just before I was born, I wonder sometimes what it all meant to my parents. I remember the music." I didn't tell him that I've never had a one-on-one conversation with my father.
He stared at me and declared, "I'm going to dedicate this poem to you."
He scribbled under the poem: "May these words bring you a smile. Great meeting you. Your friend, Eric A."
"But--" I protested, "Do you have another copy of the poem?"
"I remember it," he reassured me. He tore two pages out of the notebook and handed them to me.
"Can I share this with my friends who write poems?" I asked.
"Of course," He nodded. The skin around his eyes had begun to redden.
Just then, one of my daughters run up behind me and tapped me on the shoulder. "Let's go, Mom!"
"I don't know what to say," my words and tone were stumbling all over the place. "Thank you very much."
"Have. A great life," said Eric with some emphasis. We found ourselves shaking hands. I told him that I wished him many blessings.
When I reached the van, I slid the poem safely into a folder.
"Mom, are you up to your poem stuff again?" asked one of the children.
"Yes," I admitted, and reached for the ibuprofen, but after my meeting with Eric I hardly needed it. I thanked the Universe for giving me the gift of that conversation, and turned the key in the ignition, trying to ignore the mass of matted hair and the pale face in the mirror.
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Thursday, August 13, 2009
|
Category: Writing and Poetry
We bat words back and forth
gently, feathered-birdies,
the kind that land softly
if they miss their mark;
we attempt to serve truth's many flavors,
and savor them, like chocolate truffles;
we trust each other so deeply,
that we have exchanged sandals, mid-stride;
when we speak together in the evenings,
each sets angels around the other's sleep.
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
|
Current mood:not finding the right words
Category: Writing and Poetry
"So many years have I hidden from myself that I almost do not know how to begin this new acquaintance."
one night the thoughts pressed down so hard on her,
she fumbled with the phone and dialed the hot-line--
the one that you are supposed to call
when the unthinkable has happened to you--
she called it fifteen years too late--
was it almost an after-thought?
the voice on the other ended sounded effeminate,
obviously a man who would never dream of touching her;
somehow that fact buttressed her
more than anything he actually said
until he told her that she wasn't alone, that he
believed her, and then she clung to his voice
like the well-worn teddy bear
clutched tightly under one arm
when she became stronger, she forgot
that the world, when it sees a shy bitch,
tail tucked, shoulder-slumped,
round eyes full of wonder,
wants to snatch your paws,
your milk,
your blood,
your love,
your pups.
it wants to bag you and hang your skin up as a trophy,
it will tell you what you want to hear
while it snickers behind your back
at your unfeigned devotion;
a small voice kept telling her: find a wise woman to advise you,
but, drunk on flattery, eyes turned sky-ward, she ignored it,
she thought there was no way left that she could be harmed,
nothing she hadn't yet experienced,
but, girl, was she ever wrong...
and so one day she put in a frantic call to a woman who knows;
she put herself into the hands of a sage,
who let her in on a few secrets, one of which was:
a huge collection of teddy bears
somehow the sight of which allowed her to put her "I" aside
long enough to let a glint of soul
reappear in her eyes, and soon a pillar of spirit,
which overflowed in her until there was no room
for anything else,
except the words, "thank you,"
and a wish floating to the surface,
like a candle on a river--
the vehement desire to learn how to help
other women,
but does she even know the one closest to her?
"Did I know myself any better when I flapped delicately, like a moth under a glass cover? Or when the lid had been blasted off and I flew so close to the flame that my wings shriveled? Now I am waiting for them to grow back. For some reason I am sure that they will, like the arms of a star-fish, or the legs of a lizard. The one who knows is telling me this."
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
|
Category: Writing and Poetry
A link to a haiku-style poem in support of Aung San Suu Kyi, if you haven't had a chance to read it yet:
Lance Strate's Blog
A link to an Avaaz.org petition supporting an international inquiry into the matter:
Petition
(User has disabled new comments) |
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Sunday, August 09, 2009
|
Category: Life
Yesterday, my older children and I attended a local Japanese festival. If there is one thing that my flock can agree on, it's that we all enjoy Japanese food and culture.  The girls had a chance to paint their names onto scrolls. We enjoyed photographing the rock garden, and the hand-made crafts such as dolls and ichibana.  We waited almost 40 minutes in the quiet chapel for a story-teller to begin telling children's stories. My attention wandered while she told the story of "The Peach Boy," but when she began the next tale, I could not tear my eyes away from the story-board-- a friend of hers had recently created a story for children about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 64 years ago. After listening, we felt dazed. We stayed a little while longer, appreciating all of the organization and preparation that went into the festival, but the crowds became overwhelming in the huge outdoor tent, and I kept thinking about the anniversary that is not an occasion to celebrate. v At home, I asked the girls to take some photos of the 1000-crane mobile my 15-year-old is creating (inspired by Sadako!) as a gift for a dear friend, since the crane is a symbol of peace.  May this week be a blessed one for all of you.
--Flame & FamilyP.S. I'm not sure why the photos appear so tiny in this blog -- Myspace must have changed their editor again and I will have to adjust how I do things! : ) Sorry! Below is a link to an online letter to the survivors, or Hibakusha, from "September Eleventh Families for Peaceful Tomorrows" that says it better than I could. I tried to insert it into the blog but then the formatting went all haywire.  Peaceful Tomorrows
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|
Sunday, August 02, 2009
|
I hadn't seen my eldest for a long time
and things weren't going as I had hoped
but when she asked me the hard questions
I gave her tearfully honest answers
then I asked her if she remembered
the time that she and the neighbor boy
snatched every single puzzle off the shelf
and scattered the pieces, creating "snow"
or the time that she and her cousin
dusted all of the stuffed animals
with cocoa powder, acting out the cartoon,
101 Dalmations (puppies covered with coal dust)
those are the memories that stand out,
not airbrushed portraits with fancy frames
but the truly messy times, when all you
can do is throw up your hands and laugh
it occurred to me to be thankful for
the kittens who peed on my bed
because it meant that her sister had a chance
to mother me with her own blanket
she just slipped it over the top of my bare toes
while I curled up to a pillow on the couch--
it's the one with, "life is good"
scrawled across the center of it
Powered by | | English | | Albanian | | Arabic | | Bulgarian | | Catalan | | Chinese | | Croatian | | Czech | | Danish | | Dutch | | Estonian | | Filipino | | Finnish | | French | | Galician | | German | | Greek | | Hebrew | | Hindi | | Hungarian | | Indonesian | | Italian | | Japanese | | Korean | | Latvian | | Lithuanian | | Maltese | | Norwegian | | Polish | | Portuguese | | Romanian | | Russian | | Serbian | | Slovak | | Slovenian | | Spanish | | Swedish | | Thai | | Turkish | | Ukrainian | | Vietnamese |
|
|
|
|