A few recent photos

Near Catedral Santo Domingo in Oaxaca

Monte Alban ruins near Oaxaca

Guanajuato by night

Mercado Hidalgo in Guanajuato

View of the lovely Guanajuato

Thoughts turn familial on a soft September eve

As our bus rolled out of Guanajuato, my mom pointed out to me a woman walking by. Her t-shirt said, “Home is where the heart is NOW” I wondered if she knew what it meant, and hoped that she did.

I’m thinking about how family makes you feel cherished, and at the same time lonely. Took my mom to the airport, and on the metro ride home felt bereft for this first time this trip. Returned to find surprise letters bundled up on my shelf, and the toothbrush I had insisted I didn’t need innocuously nestled in the cup holder. A tangible reminder that there are some gifts we cannot refuse. Reminded me of how she used to tuck love notes into my lunches and send me boxes of fresh daphne or favorite autumn leaves in college. I love that through our letters we are sharing more of our complexities, and a lot of our sadness, which goes hand in hand with our strength. There is so much we forget to say on a daily basis, we’re at times so adept at simply existing together.

The book I just finished says that to understand a woman, you must understand her beginning- her own mother and her mother’s mother. I take pride in how unique these stories make us: a young divorcee when that was no chic thing to be, turned fairy tale; a woman of epic independence who moves cross country, wants to be a mother and makes it happen; a baby girl born far too early who fits in your palm, but who is strong.

My family has become a tribe of women- one boy, who looks like our grandpa, among our ever-diminishing family. When my Aunt Sue died I remember my soul getting all twisted up. I thought we were going extinct. What is left? We’ve come together so often in the last ten years that maybe the elastic that’s supposed to jerk us into unity has gone soft, and rotted. I love my family, dead and alive, literal and created. I love too the startling moments in which I see myself perfectly reflected in them, and also those in which I realize I am completely separate.

"My Vagina is Angry"

How to start? I wasn’t going to write about this, because it’s “not a big deal” and it “wasn’t sexual assault”. And then I realized how many times I have heard women say these same words about experiences that whatever their definition were wrong, and made them feel powerless. I am angry, I am fucking pissed off.

I gave dozens of more kisses than I wanted to. I felt pressured in a million ways, and understood in a real way how many factors go into feeling like your power is taken away, into feeling vulnerable and manipulated. I have a fucking open mind, and I do seize the moment, but this does not necessarily lead to me fucking you on the beach, believe it or not, American or not, cabrona woman travelling alone, or not. I didn’t want to make a big deal for fear of escalation. Only to find anger still rippling through me a week later. And just like the time that asshole molested me on the street when I was visiting my friend in Bellingham, my instinct was to not tell anyone. And I hate that silence seems to be the natural reaction. Because meeting a handsome stranger and having a romantic interlude on a August beach would be preferable to the reality- but, wouldn’t be true.

First of all, I don’t have that many close friends to tell here, but more than that, there is this sense of dirtiness. As though there is something about ME that attracts these creepers. As though it was my fault for letting him kiss me in the first place, for drinking whisky on the beach, for just wanting physical contact. So just now, I wrote him, saying, “I don’t want to see you. You pushed me too far and you scared me. I don’t forgive you for having taken away my power. Don’t write me or call me ever again.” And guess who is calling me right now, making my phone vibrate off the table. Fuck him.

So I’m trying to immerse myself in work. Interviewing audience members, and seeing their utter relief at finally talking about these things reminds me why I am here. I met seventy-two year old twins who adored the show and told me how they couldn’t have imagined a show like this being possible in their lifetimes. Tonight is the 5,000th performance “Gala Event”, to which I was informed by a snooty ticket seller that I needed to wear a ‘traje de noche”- something between a cocktail dress and a ballgown? Did I pack something like this along with my flipflops and yoga pants? Nope. BUT I found a sexy black dress for $4.50 at a flea market. So I’m going to shave my legs, put on lipstick, and go celebrate. And turn my phone off. So what if I rejected 5 phonecalls just while I was writing this. I refuse to let my righteous anger overtake my joy tonight.

The Sum of My Parts

I’m thinking a lot about change, about the seasons, about the meaning of family. Kelsi told me how the autumn is making her nostalgic. It made me miss the seasons, and hope there are some falling leaves in London. Writing an old friend also made me ponder internal change. How do I account for the last two years? I found myself reiterating all that I had done, but what sum do all these parts lead to? I can’t put my finger on the real change, although I know I feel stronger, more thoughtful, more compassionate. When so many of the key players remain the same, though the cast has grown, I fear many of the same dilemmas fill my neutral head-space.

I feel oddly adrift, and so distant from all that “I did” that I need to realize who I am without these activities. Or what they have made me. I am so proud and happy watching S.A.R.A. take flight- thinking of all these allies forming community and just being Present on campus. I feel much of who I am is located in the people I love, but when these people are scattered literally around the globe as they are, I am left with a vague sense of longing, but no location, home, or life on which to pin my missing. I am so proud of my friends for all they are doing. And so this has become a very different kind of travel, in which I feel even more present than ever, as I have no “life’ to go home to. This is it. And when I “go back” I will have to recreate a life there as well. Wherever ‘there’ is.

It seems appropriate to me that we “make” or “forge” homes, as it really is an exhaustive and highly creative experience. Like art, the preconception plays a role but is often unrecognizable in the final product. And also like art, the final product is rarely Finished. Rather, its’ meaning is constantly evolving, and there is always more you can add to it. Makes me think of the constraints of photography and ceramics, as there is always that final moment when you put it in the kiln or slip it into the fixer, and call it good. How this imposed “end” challenges you to hone the piece. And also how in life there is only one final reckoning, and by then its too late for revisions. I wonder if that’s why we make much of anniversaries, birthdays, celebrations of time, to give ourselves an ‘end’ from which to reconceive the project, or rework the themes. Maybe this is why I am so adamant about this kind of celebrations. The validation of myself and others and the perspective, if from a fabricated realm, can be startling.

I bought a cheap bracelet and had the artist engrave on it: “live with intention.” Now I’m reminded hourly. I think maybe this philosophy is the only way to be conscious that every decision we make is a stroke of paint, an etching in clay, another few seconds of exposure that in some way changes the art piece; and though not guaranteed to improve it overall, the intentional choices make our life authentic.