Saturday, March 18, 2006
On My Mind ...
.... purple tulip trees bursting with color and freshness, against crystal clear Carolina blue skies ... not wanting to go back to work after lunch breaks in the park ... dogs out for walks, eager to smell the wet, rotten leaves ... toddlers on a quilt in the park, having a picnic with their soccer mom ... lazy afternoons when the air is liquid honey: yellow and thick ...confused gazillions of bugs flying with no aim, dizzy from hibernation ...the birds, announcing to the world a new nest ... daffodils in the office in a dirty over-used vase so fresh! ... going home for Easter ... the Big Lent and the light weight of giving up meat ... Easter bunnies ... green beer ... lazy, snoozing weekend morning with bright sunlight peeking through the blinds, calling your name outside ... butterflies in the stomach before meeting someone new ... feeling 16 again?! ... new hope for the new year, fresh as the shy-green leaves of the trees ... connecting ... sushi ... reading a good book ... craving a better book ... Tracy Chapman ...purple ... pink... so much white ... blue ... green .... "April is the cruelest month" ... tax season ...new wardrobe and new heart .... new skies to fly to .... new blooms and leaves ... pink weeping willows, bowing to God, begging to touch the earth ... love ... out of breath with emotion ... dreamy eyes, imagining happier times to come ... opening the heart wide to the world, so afraid it shivers... Missing Maia and tasting tears ... smiles while reading e-mails from kindred souls - delicious! ... a new perfume ... a new friend ... a new kiss ... lips are tired and numb from waiting ... another new start ... the trees have gone crazy and opened their hearts to the world, vulnerable, in open scars of white and pink, bleeding life ... blizzard in Canada ... the sky is so clear it hurts the eyes to stare at the infinite - all frozen in a drop of the Now and Here ... all in one sigh and one breath ...
Saturday, March 11, 2006
Hungry for Far Away Places
Is it the spring?! Or is it my birthday?! Whatever it is, I get bitten by the travel bug every year, around this time, and I start planning for the road… After the hibernation of winter, I guess, I just feel like I am rusty and gotta move around… After the stagnant air of the winter, when all I did was gather moss from the cold and the rains, I get hungry for far away places to freshen up my eyes and my heart, and wash away the mold… It’s a return to my true nature, of a wanderer; it’s a return to our true nature of changing and moving… I read more travel magazines and sites now than ever in the year, and I dream… I dream big, and I dream far away…
I want my mom’s crepes in a sun-flooded Sunday kitchen and dad’s homemade pizza slices for brunch; I want to smell the freshly cut grass and gather it, and stack it in the pastures of the mountains of Bucovina; I want the taste of the first kiss after a hard day’s work at hay gathering, taste of wild strawberries and fresh spring waters… I want to go mountain climbing in search of mushrooms for dinner, and wild blueberries for dessert; I want to walk the streets of Iasi and eat funnel cake and laugh while flirting, and stop for coffee or a half liter bottle of beer; this time of the year, I smell the dirty Istanbul, a city with no public restrooms, that smells like an overflowing public restroom itself…; I want to climb the Pamukkale peak, and slide and fall behind, but still make it to the top, barefoot and wet from the thermal springs, but happy in the face of God’s miracle; I want to eat Turkish olives with every meal, and Turkish bread to go with them, and feel just…orgasmic pleasure…; it’s now that I start smelling the pot in Amsterdam’s bars, and eat the pizza in Vienna, and have some great, pure, smooth, light Austrian beer to wash it down with; I smell cow’s manure in the stables of Pojorata that I had to clean for years as a child; I dream of the one night stands without consequences, that I had when traveling in college, around Romania… the taste of the risk was so delicious! (I can’t say “sweet”, I hate “sweet(s)”); they tasted like freedom…
I miss roaming the streets of England, with the perfect curbs and the flawless asphalt (no potholes there!), the traffic on the wrong (yes! the “wrong”!!!) side of the street; the red brick houses everywhere, and the black iron gates of London; the polite English gentlemen who are still using “pardon me” to apologize for inadvertently stepping on your shoe while standing in “a queue”; the smell of the sea, at Margate; the stuffiness of the people of Cambridge and the openness of their “open” markets; I dream of burying my feet once again in the golden sands of the Bulgarian Varna; I even miss seeing the empty communist stores of Moldova, before the “Revolution”, empty and gray, and sad with the silence of the people bored. Everything I remember from my trips is so rich and I miss it so…I want to take it in all, at one time NOW!
I want to breathe fully the salty air of the Black Sea, and the dry hot air of the Turkish desert; the cold, humid and rainy air of the North Sea, the cold dry air of the Rockies, in January, so crisp, your nostrils bleed, the salty, stuffy and stinky air of the Atlantic on 4th of July in Charleston; the throw-up smell of New Orleans’s streets, and I want to hear the zydeco music hollering from the bars, while watching the kids dance in the streets, while I am getting a heavenly buzz form the “huge ass beers to go” offered in every street corner bar; I miss the stinky Boston seafood, so fresh and sea-stinking, your pee smells for days. I miss climbing at the top of the World Trade Center and feeling truly on top of the world, really feeling like I have, alas!, conquered my dream, of being an American.
But most of all, I miss the airports, and the planes, people watching, the sticky, sweaty feeling of being on the road for at least 24 hours, the crappy food, the espresso shots in the Amsterdam, Munich, Frankfurt, Vienna, Detroit, Newport, Chicago airports, and everywhere between home and … anywhere…
It’s food and smells and images of distant places that I don’t get to see everyday for me that I miss and long every year, around this time. And somehow, I know, each spring, that I will find the roads to take me back to these places, once again, or to open new doors towards new ones …
I am part Gypsy, and I know I will forever have the wanderer in me. I have a wandering heart and a wandering eye for sure … and I thank God for that! The minute I come home, I think of the next place to set off to… It’s a constant move, for me, just like life… And it’s freedom: nothing is stationary in this world, so should we be?! The settling is just temporary; being stuck is a temporary thing, just like the concept of “today”… Just like the river gets bigger with every drop of rain, so I get richer with every new trip I take. Fuller of life, experience, wisdom, acceptance, and love towards everything that moves and breathes and exists.
Yes, I get bitten by the travel bug, and a friendly bug it is. I guess it’s like the heroin needle (had I ever done it, I would know better…): gives you pleasure and pain, but more pleasure… :-) But unlike heroin, it doesn’t kill you, but it feeds you and enriches you, makes you grow and bloom, like the new flowers in the spring: makes you a new and whole person, once again.
This year, so far, I have these planned: Europe, Canada (new territory for me…), the beach, somewhere, and definitely some mountain trips…And the world was created infinite, so who knows what else…
I want my mom’s crepes in a sun-flooded Sunday kitchen and dad’s homemade pizza slices for brunch; I want to smell the freshly cut grass and gather it, and stack it in the pastures of the mountains of Bucovina; I want the taste of the first kiss after a hard day’s work at hay gathering, taste of wild strawberries and fresh spring waters… I want to go mountain climbing in search of mushrooms for dinner, and wild blueberries for dessert; I want to walk the streets of Iasi and eat funnel cake and laugh while flirting, and stop for coffee or a half liter bottle of beer; this time of the year, I smell the dirty Istanbul, a city with no public restrooms, that smells like an overflowing public restroom itself…; I want to climb the Pamukkale peak, and slide and fall behind, but still make it to the top, barefoot and wet from the thermal springs, but happy in the face of God’s miracle; I want to eat Turkish olives with every meal, and Turkish bread to go with them, and feel just…orgasmic pleasure…; it’s now that I start smelling the pot in Amsterdam’s bars, and eat the pizza in Vienna, and have some great, pure, smooth, light Austrian beer to wash it down with; I smell cow’s manure in the stables of Pojorata that I had to clean for years as a child; I dream of the one night stands without consequences, that I had when traveling in college, around Romania… the taste of the risk was so delicious! (I can’t say “sweet”, I hate “sweet(s)”); they tasted like freedom…
I miss roaming the streets of England, with the perfect curbs and the flawless asphalt (no potholes there!), the traffic on the wrong (yes! the “wrong”!!!) side of the street; the red brick houses everywhere, and the black iron gates of London; the polite English gentlemen who are still using “pardon me” to apologize for inadvertently stepping on your shoe while standing in “a queue”; the smell of the sea, at Margate; the stuffiness of the people of Cambridge and the openness of their “open” markets; I dream of burying my feet once again in the golden sands of the Bulgarian Varna; I even miss seeing the empty communist stores of Moldova, before the “Revolution”, empty and gray, and sad with the silence of the people bored. Everything I remember from my trips is so rich and I miss it so…I want to take it in all, at one time NOW!
I want to breathe fully the salty air of the Black Sea, and the dry hot air of the Turkish desert; the cold, humid and rainy air of the North Sea, the cold dry air of the Rockies, in January, so crisp, your nostrils bleed, the salty, stuffy and stinky air of the Atlantic on 4th of July in Charleston; the throw-up smell of New Orleans’s streets, and I want to hear the zydeco music hollering from the bars, while watching the kids dance in the streets, while I am getting a heavenly buzz form the “huge ass beers to go” offered in every street corner bar; I miss the stinky Boston seafood, so fresh and sea-stinking, your pee smells for days. I miss climbing at the top of the World Trade Center and feeling truly on top of the world, really feeling like I have, alas!, conquered my dream, of being an American.
But most of all, I miss the airports, and the planes, people watching, the sticky, sweaty feeling of being on the road for at least 24 hours, the crappy food, the espresso shots in the Amsterdam, Munich, Frankfurt, Vienna, Detroit, Newport, Chicago airports, and everywhere between home and … anywhere…
It’s food and smells and images of distant places that I don’t get to see everyday for me that I miss and long every year, around this time. And somehow, I know, each spring, that I will find the roads to take me back to these places, once again, or to open new doors towards new ones …
I am part Gypsy, and I know I will forever have the wanderer in me. I have a wandering heart and a wandering eye for sure … and I thank God for that! The minute I come home, I think of the next place to set off to… It’s a constant move, for me, just like life… And it’s freedom: nothing is stationary in this world, so should we be?! The settling is just temporary; being stuck is a temporary thing, just like the concept of “today”… Just like the river gets bigger with every drop of rain, so I get richer with every new trip I take. Fuller of life, experience, wisdom, acceptance, and love towards everything that moves and breathes and exists.
Yes, I get bitten by the travel bug, and a friendly bug it is. I guess it’s like the heroin needle (had I ever done it, I would know better…): gives you pleasure and pain, but more pleasure… :-) But unlike heroin, it doesn’t kill you, but it feeds you and enriches you, makes you grow and bloom, like the new flowers in the spring: makes you a new and whole person, once again.
This year, so far, I have these planned: Europe, Canada (new territory for me…), the beach, somewhere, and definitely some mountain trips…And the world was created infinite, so who knows what else…
Sunday, March 05, 2006
An A.D.D. World – or : An A.D.D. America, Revised
I have discovered that we cannot get frustrated or in the least bothered by the A.D.D. in our co-workers, partners, family folks, etc I believe we all are, to some extent, somewhat A.D.D. Think about it?! It's the society we live in that REQUIRES us to be that way: you hardly ever see a job ad in the paper that does not require us to be "multi-tasked". Well, you cannot be multi-tasked unless you're paying attention to 10 things at the same time: answer the phone, while reading a new e-mail, while opening the postal mail, while talking to your boss who's giving you yet a new task and all these have to be done efficiently and fast, so that we all can meet the deadlines! And it doesn't stop there: we drive home and the cell rings while we have to drive, and yield, and look for a jay-walker or another jackass driver who's cutting us off, and grab a snack from the purse since our blood sugar is low from spreading ourselves too thin in the first place, and we need an afternoon jumpstart, because we're driving to school, after a 10 hour work day! Then we get home, and we have to feed the pets, while opening the mail, and turning the TV on to see what else has been going on in the world, while the phone rings and it's our friend Alice who wants to go out for a drink tonight or maybe Saturday, and we're listening to the news while trying to figure out what in the world is on our calendars for Saturday anyways, while the cat decides to flip the water bowl and make a mess on the carpet, and oh, shit! we have a "sales" party tomorrow with a bunch of "fancy ladies" and the carpet is now wet and stained"Sorry Alice, let me call you right back"! It makes my head spin just to think about all this, although it's pretty much an accurate description of my (and many of the people's I know!) daily routine. And our brains get "trained" to constantly LOOK FOR the next thing to do. Never for the "what's here and now", but for "what else" I need to be doing to keep up...
The opposite of A.D.D. is focused, but you cannot be focused on ONE thing alone anymore: you would be stampeded on by the world, run over and left behind! The only way we can keep up, we think, is by rushing onto the next thing on the list while still doing the one before. I wonder sometimes where and if all this will stop one day?!
You know, Napoleon was so unique because him doing 5 things at one time was really a RARE, and indeed special talent: it's not customary for the human brain to function like that! (I am obviously not a doctor, but I don't think it is). By pushing our bodies in this manner, to make something so rare be part of our usual life, we're defying nature in the first place, and something, somewhere, is gotta snap! And therefore, we're all "diagnosed" nowadays! (man, wouldn't Freud be proud of me??!!). We should all be, anyways. Should we all be on Ritalin then?!
I go to Yoga class, and I lie in Savasana and the instructor says "let go" and you're supposed to LET THE HECK GO and just focus on breathing and just being and I am thinking: "Shit! Bills need to be paid tonight!" and "I haven't vacuumed since 2 weeks ago" and I hate myself right then and there. And yet I move on. Gotta catch up!
The only thing we don't do while doing other things that "have to" be done is relax, and breathe. We never think of that as a part of our "multi-tasking", and it's a shame. I read in one of my Yoga books one time, that "the giant turtle breathes 4 times a minute, and is calm, and lives many hundreds of years, whereas the dog and the monkey breathe 40-60 times a minute, and are restless and excitable and live 10-15 years only." It seems to me, we all have a lot to learn from the quiet and calm turtle. Don't you think?! Happy new week, everyone! And PLEASE, remember to breathe, amongst all the other things ...
The opposite of A.D.D. is focused, but you cannot be focused on ONE thing alone anymore: you would be stampeded on by the world, run over and left behind! The only way we can keep up, we think, is by rushing onto the next thing on the list while still doing the one before. I wonder sometimes where and if all this will stop one day?!
You know, Napoleon was so unique because him doing 5 things at one time was really a RARE, and indeed special talent: it's not customary for the human brain to function like that! (I am obviously not a doctor, but I don't think it is). By pushing our bodies in this manner, to make something so rare be part of our usual life, we're defying nature in the first place, and something, somewhere, is gotta snap! And therefore, we're all "diagnosed" nowadays! (man, wouldn't Freud be proud of me??!!). We should all be, anyways. Should we all be on Ritalin then?!
I go to Yoga class, and I lie in Savasana and the instructor says "let go" and you're supposed to LET THE HECK GO and just focus on breathing and just being and I am thinking: "Shit! Bills need to be paid tonight!" and "I haven't vacuumed since 2 weeks ago" and I hate myself right then and there. And yet I move on. Gotta catch up!
The only thing we don't do while doing other things that "have to" be done is relax, and breathe. We never think of that as a part of our "multi-tasking", and it's a shame. I read in one of my Yoga books one time, that "the giant turtle breathes 4 times a minute, and is calm, and lives many hundreds of years, whereas the dog and the monkey breathe 40-60 times a minute, and are restless and excitable and live 10-15 years only." It seems to me, we all have a lot to learn from the quiet and calm turtle. Don't you think?! Happy new week, everyone! And PLEASE, remember to breathe, amongst all the other things ...
Friday, March 03, 2006
The Taste of a Lonely Friday
You work overtime on a Friday, that’s when you know you have no life! Everyone’s going home, with plans, even the little ol’ lady who lives with her grandma, and you’re stuck at the office, entering data, because you were too busy answering requests all day… And you get an extra one hour of overtime at the office, ON A FRIDAY!!!! – that’s when you know you’re lonely. It can wait till Monday, but… you have nowhere better to go to, so you don’t mind staying over! In the process you run into problems, and you gotta call your co-workers for advice, and they’re out drinking at the bar, giving you instructions on how to fix stuff… They’re at the BAR!!! That’s how you know you’re lost! Un-redeemable!
You drive home and all the cars around you have one person in them. Just the driver. Of course, we ALL drive in America, but it’s Friday night, and people should have dates, family gatherings, birthday celebrations tonight, as a Friday… No, this particular Friday it’s all single person’s cars…And they all look either sad or indifferent. Staring at the road like into the hopelessness of single-hood: empty and bare, and scared; driving along… full of thought… And the music in the cd player even sounds empty, like it’s not playing for me, but just to fill the silence … It’s sad, in a way, too…
And you go shopping alone, and you come home alone, and the pets are so tired and bored, they find their own corner and want not to be touched. They’re lonely, too. It’s a Lonely Friday. Except for the fish! They’re crammed together in this small bowl! They HAVE to be “together”… They “socialize”, ‘cause they have to… Forced by the circumstances, they will NOT feel alone… So, there’s hope!
My dad always said: “Never drink alone. Call your neighbor for a glass of wine, just never drink alone”… Well, I am just doing that. And let me tell you, dad, you were right: a drink doesn’t taste good when you drink alone. It tastes bitter, just like loneliness… That’s what alone is: drinking alone on a Friday… and letting Aerosmith fill the silence. There is no tomorrow. There is only a very empty and lonely Friday Now…
And the cd is playing: “and we’re saying a prayer for the desperate hearts tonight”. I hope they are. I know that the desperate hearts need it. :-)
You drive home and all the cars around you have one person in them. Just the driver. Of course, we ALL drive in America, but it’s Friday night, and people should have dates, family gatherings, birthday celebrations tonight, as a Friday… No, this particular Friday it’s all single person’s cars…And they all look either sad or indifferent. Staring at the road like into the hopelessness of single-hood: empty and bare, and scared; driving along… full of thought… And the music in the cd player even sounds empty, like it’s not playing for me, but just to fill the silence … It’s sad, in a way, too…
And you go shopping alone, and you come home alone, and the pets are so tired and bored, they find their own corner and want not to be touched. They’re lonely, too. It’s a Lonely Friday. Except for the fish! They’re crammed together in this small bowl! They HAVE to be “together”… They “socialize”, ‘cause they have to… Forced by the circumstances, they will NOT feel alone… So, there’s hope!
My dad always said: “Never drink alone. Call your neighbor for a glass of wine, just never drink alone”… Well, I am just doing that. And let me tell you, dad, you were right: a drink doesn’t taste good when you drink alone. It tastes bitter, just like loneliness… That’s what alone is: drinking alone on a Friday… and letting Aerosmith fill the silence. There is no tomorrow. There is only a very empty and lonely Friday Now…
And the cd is playing: “and we’re saying a prayer for the desperate hearts tonight”. I hope they are. I know that the desperate hearts need it. :-)
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