Wow.

Just read back over the entirety of "The Holy Moment"- a large portion of my writing over the past 3 years or so. I started at the very beginning and read through to the most recent. pretty incredible.

What a Beautiful Journey I have been on. So many beautiful places, people, experiences, and lessons. I could hear my voice more clearly too, for some reason, on this read-through. Exciting.

Writing is something that I love. That I want to always be a part of my Life.

Going to spend this next week or so, focusing more on preparation for the Road ahead. I am truly looking forward to it. That and spending some more time with Joe. :)

May you all have a blessed week. May you cherish the last few days of this year and reflect on what it has been, what it has brought and taught you. May you spend some time thinking about the year to come- your hopes, dreams, and intentions.

Love to All-

Reinaldo Arenas

I just watched "Before Night Falls," a movie about the life and writing of Reinaldo Arenas. I highly recommend this movie. What a beautiful man and artist. I'm starting his memoir by the same title.

Also, I just saw "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button." I was a bit skeptical, due to it's cast including the obscenely famous Brad Pitt, but truly, it is beautiful. I feel as though I haven't fully digested it yet, and may need to take myself to see it again. :)

The premise is that a baby is born with a rare disease- he is born old. He is born with all the ailments of age, and yet as he gets older, he grows younger, and dies an infant. The metaphors and ideas expressed and insinuated are too much for me to write about just yet. I think one more viewing and then...

Have had a head-shift of late. A good thing. My upcoming travels are beckoning and asking for my attention.

I finished my year at the Literacy program. An accomplishment with many repercussions and reverberations, one of them being I have found myself with more time on my hands. This coming week especially.

I am grateful. Grateful to have time off for the beginning of the new year- time to contemplate, take stock, prepare. I hope to spend a lot of time in my truck- fixing her up, getting her ready, packing, sorting, getting rid of that which I really don't need. And writing. Much writing.

Tonight, I am drinking honey beer (yum), listening to The Be Good Tanyas, and reading and writing. I am hopeful, anticipatory, quietly excited.

I am both looking forward to what is to come and enjoying exactly where I find myself to be.

Gracias a Dios.

PAINTING.

images and visions are surfacing
faster than my brush can move
across the canvas.
i
am
revelling
in
it.

A Post from 2005...Wow.

A Dancing Heart.

I have lived on the lip
of insanity, wanting to know reasons,
knocking on a door. It opens.
I've been knocking from the inside!...

Dance, when you're broken open.
Dance, if you've torn the bandage off.
Dance in the middle of the fighting.
Dance in your blood.
Dance, when you're perfectly free.

-Rumi

As the worries, excitements, joys, sorrows, pain, and elation wash over me i sit very still. I can feel their movements around me, surrounding me, in me, through me. I grope for nothing, grasp nothing in my hands or heart. I honor each emotion simply because it is. I do not force, i do not resist. Breathe, breathe. i can feel some rhythm arising in me. It is quiet and steady, constant, welcoming, and warm.
My heart is dancing. She is free. Because she knows what my head cannot, will not:
Life is full. Beauty is the simultaneous existence of the greatest sorrow and deepest joy. To live mindfully is divinity manifested.
I've been searching for home, i have found it to be an elusive ideal, trying so hard to track it down. I've had this inner struggle, is home something we create by being? Arranging things, situations and people around us in such a way? Or Is it something we have to cultivate within ourselves?

My heart smiles, she's been waiting patiently for me to catch up. Curvacious and supple, i watch her naked silhouette as she leaps up to show me the way. She knows where home is: i watch her, she's running ahead of me, looking back to see if i'm following, to see if i am captivated. I am, and i watch as she slows her run to a walk, and with deliberate movement, confident and graceful, she steps in and curls up to the space where the very breath of God breathes in me.
She snuggles in close, like a child in wonder, in adoration. Like a lover, fully known, vulnerable, real and purely her Self. In the holy moment, she has lost herself, almost forgotten i was there- following behind, waiting. When she senses my presence, she opens her eyes slowly and looks at me warmly. She doesn't say a word, but the warmth and depth hidden in her large green eyes invites me in and says, "Didn't you know? The Divine One dwells within you- you are God's Creativity, her Compassion, his True Expression- our Beloved will never leave you- for he cannot! She is intricately woven into every fiber of your being."

Rest, dear heart, you are home.

Ay, de mi Sarita.

One of my favorite things in the whole world is long-distance phone conversations with friends in faraway places.

Unfathomable distances apart, somehow in one moment you are reunited, one again. There are those with whom I share, and then there are those with whom I share the entirety of my being, and Sarita is del segundo.

I miss my friend.

Madre, te doy gracias por amigos como asi. Dos cuerpos con la misma espiritu.
Somas muchas, somas una.

Eres una hermana mia, amigita. Te adoro y te quiero mucho. Gracias a ti.

Death.

"For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?
And what is to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides,
that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?
Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.
And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.
And when the earth shall claim your limbs,
then shall you truly dance."

-Khalil Gibran, The Prophet

Life-Death-Life.

My heart is aching. My Grandmother-Friend, Joanne, passed away this weekend.

I find myself crying off and on, throughout the day. Grief has always been this way with me, washing over me in waves. Her death, resounds in my heart, reverberates somewhere between flesh and soul, though I find myself still standing. My foundations have not crumbled at their core. I find myself crying more in wonder and awe at her life, at the breadth and width and depth of this human experience. What a Woman. What a Life she lived.

Well over a year ago, Joanne gave me some of her writing. A most precious gift. I spent the day yesterday at Dia de Los Muertos, my favorite cafe in Oakland, reading over what she had shared with me. It felt appropriate and honoring to do so there among las calaveras, La Muerte, y las flores, with the rain falling steadily outside.

The aching is deep. And though there are searing moments, even deeper is my gratitude for having known her.

As we head into Winter, I am reminded that Death is a part of Life, and a necessary part of the Cycle. I find myself looking forward to the dying to come in the next few months. The discerning, the sorting, the leaving, the taking, the giving of Life to that which I long to see grow, and the giving of Death to that which no longer serves anyone.

I have a feeling that this Winter will be hard. Hard and wet and cold and soggy.
But I'm not afraid. I look forward to it's challenges and the transformation to come.

Mourning Morning.

Salman Rushdie

"For a long while I believed that in every generation there are a few souls, call them lucky or cursed, who are simply born not belonging. Who came into the world semi-detached, if you like, without strong affiliation to family, or location, or nation, or race. That there may even be millions or billions of such souls, as many Non Belong-ers as Belong-ers, perhaps. That in some the phenomenon may be as natural a manifestation of human nature as it's opposite. But one that has been mostly frustrated throughout human history by lack of opportunity.

And not only by that. For those who value stability, who fear transience, uncertainty, change- have erected a power system of stigmas and taboos against rootlessness, that disruptive anti-social force. So that we mostly conform. We pretend to be motivated by loyalties and solidarities we do not really feel. We hide our secret identities beneath the false skins of those identities that bear the Belong-er's seal of approval.

But the truth leaks out in our dreams."

A Little Hungover....from all the Fun, of course

What a great night!
We had a gathering for my Mom's 50th birthday last night! She decided for her 50th, to throw a cocktail party. :) Friends, old and new, family, a million appetizers and much merriment. Everyone looked incredible with good times had by all.

Pictures to come!

God, Yes.

Friends that are willing to lend you their guitar, are the best.

The. Best.

Thank you, Jeremy. With all of my heart.

....new songs to come!

Question(s).

Does it make you pause?
Does it make you think?
Does it make you feel??
Do you come back to it later?
Do you ponder it when you're done?
Does it move you?
Does it change you?

Funny.

Joe: One thing I know, it's that '9 to 5' is never gonna work for you. Never.

me: I know it.

Joe: Of course, 9 to 10 might.

I Hate Thursdays.

Truly, I do. I try to love them. I've even tried pretending to love them. But I don't.

It is the only day of the week that I wish I had the power to fast-forward through. I know that that's awful. But it's true.

Sigh.

Also.

I'm in love with The Beautiful Girls.
Love, I say!

(the lyrics I posted the other day were by them.)

from "Learn Yourself"-

"Everybody thinks we'll fall apart.
Everybody's quick to point their fingers at what
they think is causing the problem.
And what they don't see is what they won't see my friend.

And we've all got to learn ourselves
before we can judge someone else.
And we've all got to learn ourselves
before we can judge someone else.

Just like the holy scripture talks
of a road to redemption in amongst the thorns,
The path is beset by ego and greed
and if we don't see then we won't ever be free."


There's a lot of folks I know, or know of, that are deep in the discussion of the current ills and issues of the Christian church. One intriguing traveler has differentiated between "the Church" and "the church." Which I really like. (One, because I think it is an important distinction to make, and two, because I love how the capitalization of words can entirely affect the meaning.)

Personally, I find the discussions interesting, thoughtful, genuine and honest. I admire the struggle and desire that these folks have to reconcile the tradition that they grew up in or transplanted to, with what they believe and understand in their hearts.

Many of them choose not to attend church on Sundays, but seem to be trying to live out "Church" in their daily lives. Community, family, kindred.

I think on the spectrum between Radical and Reformer, I fall strongly on the Radical side.

But, I have great Respect for the Reformers I see at work- they are very beautiful, deeply honest in their pursuit. I watch them, from a distance, curious to see what they will create with all this love and desire and pureness of heart.

Cheers, Reformers. Hope it's okay with ya'll if I sniff around, just outta sight, on the edges and outskirts. Curious and watching.

And So...

back again, to this question:

How many clothes does one girl need???

...por el amor de Dios, Mujer!!

Conversation

"Where does it all come from?"
the little brown-haired girl asks.

"Where does what come from Child?"
asks her Mother.

"Where do the words come from? And their order?
Where do the forms come from? And their colors?
From where the melody, the movement?
Where does it all flow from?"

Her Mother pauses, and replies,

"From Me, my Child, from Me."

A Place of My Own.

...if only for the weekend. :)

On a Hope and a Prayer....

....things may be changing once again!! :)

I love it.

Say a little prayer for me!

More updates when the dust settles.

Love.

Rough'n'Tough'n'All the Rest

treading water
in a sea of self-pity
while simultaneously rolling
in a sty of self-disgust

i look at my face in the mirror

and tell myself that i am strong
and tell myself to be grateful to be here
at all

hard days are a reality
it's just rough
when they hit so hard
after a night
of dancing away all thoughts of worry
healing myself with the
medicine of movement-

yesterday feels like miles away
from where i sit now
in a house that is not mine
with a friend i don't know
saying things in a voice
i don't recognize as my own

and i know it will pass
that nothing is permanent
and that i'm well on my way
on this last stretch
before the Road,

it's just that i'm not quite ready
to feel this much unrest
when there's still so much ahead
so much to do
before i go.

Just Feelin' It Today.

This day is getting older,
in fading light it's beautiful.
This wind is blowing colder,
and too soon I'll feel it's pull.

Still, I took all my chances,
earned myself an even score.
Try to learn my lessons well.
And I don't have the answers,
for those questions anymore.
Only love can be both heaven and hell.

So sturdy up, sturdy up your heart,
for the road is long ahead.
I'll be with you even though we're apart,
but your road is yours to tread.
And so it goes, and so it goes,
and so it goes, slows your mind, mind, mind,

Um.

playing kitty-referee this morning
playing back conversations
in my head
i am cringing at my own heart
bleeding
on my sleeve
making a mess on the floor

forget it.
i hear myself say
just forget it.
but i'm not listening
and the words, still ringing in my ears-
that awoke me like an alarm clock
harsh and jarring
that came in without asking
that crashed into my cortex
and cracked my heart
i am reeling
somewhere between broken and not-feeling
it's one of those days
where your hands seem so far away
and i move
without thinking,
without really knowing
that i am moving at all.

and i don't have anything to say
and i can't hear your voice
over the static in my head

just don't say things without thinking
and then tell me
not to take it personally.