nomadic tendencies

Giving thanks

2011-11-28T08:43:00.000-08:00

Travel is rarely innocent. At least not in my case. I refuse to take simple trips that don't satisfy multiple needs on multiple levels.My most recent trips include a jaunt across the country, with the girl, for a yearly conference at my Alma mater, which, served also to drive the last nail into the coffin of my dying hopes, and permanently slam the door shut on my wounded heart. Alas. Not

El tiempo pasa

2011-07-14T18:33:00.000-07:00

2011-07-03T21:19:00.000-07:00

Driving out of the dense valley forest, we arrived at the wind-ravaged coast line. California I whisper, under my breath, trying not to be in love, to calm the trembling in my soul and the queasy dizziness in my solar plexus. The oak-dappled golden-grass hills roll out before us, the redwoods, their secret groves, quiet, dark, suspended in fern-green eternity.We shiver and snap photos. Still

Last day of classes

2011-03-10T07:21:00.000-08:00

Today is my last day of teaching. As a graduate student. I'll likely be a teacher the rest of my life, try as I might to swerve from my vocation. Its laughable, really, to think of myself as anything but a teacher, when you consider that as a 12 year old, in homeroom, when most people just desperately wanted to fit in, I refused to let people copy my homework and instead offered to help them do

Persimmon Bread/ Cake (let’s be honest!)

2011-01-06T12:42:00.000-08:00

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Letters to Santa (Update)

2010-12-20T21:21:00.000-08:00

"Mama, do you think Santa exists?" she asks knowing the answer as she sits across from me in the Indian restaurant that we decide there is a reason we never come to.I arch my eyebrows at her. "What do you think?" I smirk.She grins back, "No?... Yes?... No?... Yes?" there is a hopeful upturn to her voice, as she knows quite clearly that this is about her consumer thrust and not about her

Letters to Santa

2010-12-20T16:26:00.001-08:00

Just in case you were thinking that because we are Jewish, we escape the Santa clause... a not-small, sheepishly-grinning girl delivered this missive to my hands for my "review."Dear Santa,I hope you don't mind me asking, but could you possibly come to give me presents? All I really need is to know you exist. The thing I really want is a "how to draw everything" book and a good set of

Literary thoughts from the almost 11 year old

2010-12-16T19:06:00.000-08:00

So, I. and I, as we know often frequent (free) lectures on campus, colloquia on literature (Mexican and otherwise) and films of every sort imaginable. It makes me smile when she claims that she "loves" reading subtitles, for example, or when she has particularly poignant and insightful things to say about the talks that we have attended. I'll admit, she is as likely to snuggle up and sleep on

Caldo tlalpeño

2010-12-16T12:44:00.000-08:00

This is a "caldo tlalpeño" so named for the city of its origin, Tlalpan, now a zona in the southern region of Mexico city. Its most notable features are the use of a piquant chipotle broth, and melted cheese. It would typically eat as a meal, but can be served with heated tortillas, quesadillas or even warm bread.To make this soup, you begin with a large (Large!) pot of broth: I always use

Thanksgiving

2010-11-30T10:20:00.000-08:00

The cold has settled in over California. Last week's epic journey and food-preparation feats were nothing to be scoffed at, and the darkness that hovers above our heads seems fitting for the season.I have discovered that I am truly a Californian, now. The micro-variations in climate both seep into my bones, and comfort me with their cyclical flow. I don't like the cold, but the bright sunshine

Deadlines

2010-09-14T19:38:00.001-07:00

I work... best under pressure, so if I... wait 'til tomorrow... I should, start working now...From my childhood classic: So... I have a week and a half of no teaching, and a promise to myself to finish my penultimate chapter before Friday... and it seems almost impossible to nail myself to the (metaphorical) chair. I had all day today, and perhaps I got 4 good hours in (which amounted to a net

crankiness is a ...

2010-08-30T20:37:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I am a bit crankier than usual these days. I can feel it in my lack of finesse, my curt answers, my failed smiles. I'm tired and cranky and just generally disappointed in my fellow human being.Strike that.I'm disappointed in the majority of human beings. There are still a few that have not disappointed me. My child, for one. There is nothing at all disappointing about her, ever. And

Mexico Journal: July 28, 2010

2010-08-24T09:03:00.000-07:00

My hard drive crashed. Something as simple as an unending script. And then the white screen of death. And strangely, I don't care. I mean, I care, because it means that despite my headache, despite the fact that I have other (thankfully non computer related) work to do, I need to take Pietro in and have him revamped. Forget about the cost. I don't care. I have all my written files backed

Mexico Journal: July 22, 2010

2010-08-24T08:38:00.001-07:00

Under the steady patter of rain on the plastic awning in the penumbra of a stormy afternoon, I find myself scribbling away, face to face with a complete stranger - also scribbling away - a mirror that is not a mirror. He is light-skinned, of European descent with dark hair that tinges grey at the sideburns. He is thin and nervous with a triangular goatee beneath his lip. If we were in the

Mexico Journal: July 18, 2010

2010-08-23T22:53:00.000-07:00

It is early Sunday morning and the city is sleepily rubbing its eyes, yawning, stretching. My footfalls are familiar and I navigate with precision. I, too, am tired, but the latent pulse of DF calls to me, whispers my name with each step. My feet know the way over cobbled stones, cutting across almost empty 6 lane circuits. I jog a few steps crossing Universidad as motors rev and truck grills

Mexico Journal: July 15, 2010

2010-08-22T15:44:00.001-07:00

Jenny, the curandera, said that San Cristobal was magical and that if it had kept us there longer than we had expected, it would give back what was needed. I thought about it for a good long while, making my attitude fertile land for adventure, or whatever it was that I might need. My conversation with Palermo followed, and it was just what I needed. He reminded me of the "Little Prince" and it

Mexico Journal: July 12, 2010

2010-08-21T22:59:00.000-07:00

Self-involvement is a given when writing in a diary, but part of me wishes I could just be outside my head. Yesterday was the close of the World Cup and the close of a cycle. We stayed on in San Cristobal because Emel got a gig for the guys - they're probably there right now, as I write.I decided that I would just enjoy my "life" and what it looks like in San Cristobal, so today I came to get an

Mexico Journal: July 10, 2010

2010-08-20T17:59:00.000-07:00

Jorge and Manuel came home very drunk because of a near-death experience they had with a car-stereo thief and his knife. Pedro, apparently, went right to bed, but Jorge was full of love and good energy while Manuel, on the other hand, made every effort to avoid eye-contact with me. I don't know why that feels so hurtful, but it did. The next day I had every intention of being alone, but we all

Mexico Journal: July 8, 2010

2010-08-20T17:37:00.000-07:00

It is a rainy afternoon again. The weariness of travel is hitting me. I feel (perhaps unreasonably so) as if my presence is a burden on others. I would like to disappear, not feel so defensive. The last few days have been lost in sleeping late watching the World Cup at Bar Revolución and wandering around the markets: vegetable (popular) and Santo Domingo (hippie). I have genuinely been content

Mexico Journal: July 5, 2010

2010-08-20T17:29:00.000-07:00

Iván, Pedro, Manuel and I went for a hike up into an ecological reserve, past an old molinero to the "Peje de oro" caves. About 10 minutes in, it began to rain and was pouring with rage and fury within minutes. It made for delicate foot-holds, but was a grand adventure nonetheless. On the first part of the river (creek) that we had to cross, we all bit it on the last rock across, and then

Mexico Journal: July 4, 2010

2010-08-20T16:50:00.000-07:00

Shortly after the game and my wanderings on the "andador" 20 de noviembre, I grew tired of looking purposeful. I watched small boys play soccer in a muddy corner of grass by the kiosko in the Santo Domingo plaza. The ball was hard, dirty and small, but the boys playing were so full of joy that it didn't seem to matter that in a little while, on the sunny Saturday morning, they'd likely have to

Mexico Journal: July 3, 2010

2010-08-20T16:38:00.000-07:00

Sitting in San Cristóbal de las Casas in a gelateria "nice". I arrived at 8:30 am and Jorge was nowhere to be found. Perhaps he came and left? More likely, he overslept, or thought I was supposed to get in at 7 pm. I'm not worried. I left San Juana at the bus station. If I don't find Jorge after the game, where I left him a message to meet me, I'll call Nacho. I'll wander with my camera,

Mexico Journal: July 1, 2010 (night)

2010-08-20T16:30:00.000-07:00

Tonight, because of your words every cell in my body wails for you. I want to claw at the walls of your venn diagram and stake my claim on your deepest, darkest, innermost demons.Instead I stand huddled in the sleepless midnight window clutching my notebook to my breast, stealing light from a lonely street lamp with the artificial buzz of flourescence mixing with the organic hum of cicadas.

Mexico Journal: July 1, 2010

2010-08-20T16:16:00.000-07:00

In the languid heat of the late Xalapa afternoon I awaken with a start. I struggle through the torpor, smell the air. No, the frijoles have not burned. I close my eyes and listen hard to their bubbling boil. I lay back into the mattress on the floor of Elissa's house and think how it would be nice to have a lover here, right now. But then I think, nah, too hot. But I close my eyes and envision

Mexico Journal: June 29, 2010

2010-08-20T16:05:00.000-07:00

"For excuse, for our being together, we sit at the typewriter, pretending a necessary collaboration. He has a book to be typed, but the words I try to force out die on the air and dissolve into kisses whose chemicals are even more deadly if undelivered." (p. 25, By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept. Elizabeth Smart)I read these words and the story tears through me, a mortal wound that

Of Mexican odyssies

2010-06-29T09:27:00.000-07:00

So. Last time I was in Mexico, it was for the Morelia International Film Festival. Seems like ages ago, but it was just in October. The violence has escalated in Michoacan, though, and my ex husband implores me not to even consider going there now. I won´t, but not necessarily because of the putative violence.It isn´t that I don´t believe him, I just don´t plan on being in that part of the

It's summertime...

2010-05-28T10:16:00.000-07:00

And time for the summertime blues.Yesterday, on the steps of Campbell Hall, while awaiting our stage call for the dress-rehearsal of this year's Reel Loud Film Festival, Tomás began a walking blues in a major scale.And after several bars of "faking it" I decided that I would just sing the summertime blues, in that strange juxtaposition, minor sentiments, major scale, the paradox of easy living,

La carretera panamericana

2010-03-15T15:31:00.000-07:00

Sucede que me pregunto, muchas veces, será, que me pregunto: en qué consiste el deseo, y en qué consiste el confort, en qué consiste el intelecto puro... y si la confluencia harmoniosa de estos impulsos o necesidades, al parecer contradictorios, es precisamente el equilibrio que una busca, a diario, a cada momento, y que al encontrarlo lo pierde, eternamente, como el vaivén del mar.No lo sé...

6 x 6

2010-02-12T00:10:00.000-08:00

(Six word stories, times six = Fun!)