Mixed Feelings

I'm starting training for the Bay to Breakers this week. Besides the actual running, the most important part of the race is the costume. It has to be fun yet easy to run in. Suggestions? I want it to be funny, not sexy.  I don't want to look like I got lost on the way to some frat's Halloween party.

Also as part of my taking charge of my health, I've lost a bunch of weight. It's cool, because I didn't put myself on a diet, I've just been changing my relationship to food. I'm eating a ton of unprocessed food, and cut out all processed stuff. Except diet coke, which is pure evil, but is well known to have magic powers.  At the risk of stating the obvious, I feel really good. However, I saw a lot of people I haven't seen since September this week, and I was overwhelmed at how many people commented on how I looked. It was nice, I guess,  but made me super uncomfortable, because I thought I looked pretty good before, and I'm taking care of myself because my body deserves to be treated well, not so I could look better for others. Hmm. I guess I need to think about it more.

We also just got back from a march for MLK's birthday. Only about 50 people showed up, which was really disappointing. It was especially hard to accept, since it was the ONLY MLK celebration happening in Berkeley. One of the city council members called Berkeley a "hotbed of hypocrisy" around social justice which was really highlighted by the pitiful attendance.

Whoo, this is really turning into a fun post, huh? I've been thinking a lot about this quote from Michael Silverblatt, the host of Bookworm:

I believe in the elaborate taking care of others. And we live in a culture where "I'm not my brother's keeper," "That's your responsibility," "Get a life" have become bywords, code phrases, anthems for elaborate indifference, selfishness, greediness, and the failure of empathetic acceptance. In the same way we need to repair the economy, we need to repair the effects of an economy of selfishness. And that isn't just the filling in of the big bucks that have fallen out of the system. The rescue that we need is emotional rescue, communicative, large-hearted.

Happy Martin Luther King Day. Hope yours was wonderful!

Perfect Balsamic Dressing

Try this:

4 T balsamic vinegar
half cup olive oil
large scoop of dijon
1 finely chopped garlic clove
a little more pepper than you think
pinch of salt

emulsify it, or shake it ALOT.

I think this is it for the perfect balsamic dressing. I tried it a bunch of ways, with a lot more stuff in it, but this version is totally delicious.

Blog Doldrums

I've been making a lot of "progress" on my list. My struggle is that I don't want to turn the list into a checklist - I want to use it as a guide to turning my life into what I want it to be. It feels a little icky to feel like I made my "goal" for spending time with friends, you know? Especially since what I wanted to foster was the connection that I want with friends and family.  And yet, I want to chronicle this year, as a way to maintain momentum. Hmmm. So here's the list for December:

1. Spent a lot of time with friends - we had an impromptu dinner party, I went to Vegas, we had at least one overnight guest every week, my old friend and roommate visited,  and we spent time with family and friends in CT.

2. Read Eat Pray Love. I have mixed feelings about the book, It's well written, and I loved the characters, but I really struggled with how self centered the author seemed. But shouldn't someone writing about self discovery and exploration be centered on herself? Hmm.

3. Went to two Furthur shows, and had an amazing time at both. This wasn't on my list, but it totally should have been. I think I'm going to add "Go to as many shows a possible" to the list.

So, there's the update. Let me know if you have any insight into how I can keep myself focused on my list without turning into a task master. Tomorrow I'm meeting with the woman who is going to tattoo me. I'm really excited to start working on it!

Happy New Year. It's going to be really wonderful.

God, I Love Langston Hughes

Go Slow


Go slow, they say-
while the bite
Of the dog is fast.
Go slow, I hear-
While they tell me
You can't eat here!
You can't live here!
You can't work here!
Don't Demonstrate! Wait!-
While they lock the gate.
Am I supposed to be God,
Or an angel with wings
And a halo on my head
While jobless I starve to dead?
Am I supposed to forgive
And meekly live
Going slow, slow, slow,
Slow, slow, slow,
Slow, slow,
Slow,
Slow,
Slow?
????
???
??
? 





Let America Be America Again


Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed-
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek-
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean-
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today-O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home-
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay-
Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America be America again-
The land that never has been yet-
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME-
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose-
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath-
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain-
All, all the stretch of these great green states-
And make America again!




I love how he references Whitman's Pioneers! O Pioneers!, another favorite of mine. I was really upset when Levi's used it in a commercial. 


Pioneers! O Pioneers!

  COME, my tan-faced children, 
Follow well in order, get your weapons ready; 
Have you your pistols? have you your sharp edged axes?  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
2
  For we cannot tarry here, 
We must march my darlings, we must bear the brunt of danger,
We, the youthful sinewy races, all the rest on us depend,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
3
  O you youths, western youths, 
So impatient, full of action, full of manly pride and friendship, 
Plain I see you, western youths, see you tramping with the foremost,  Pioneers! O
    pioneers! 
  
4
  Have the elder races halted?
Do they droop and end their lesson, wearied, over there beyond the seas? 
We take up the task eternal, and the burden, and the lesson,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
5
  All the past we leave behind; 
We debouch upon a newer, mightier world, varied world, 
Fresh and strong the world we seize, world of labor and the march,  Pioneers! O pioneers!
  
6
  We detachments steady throwing, 
Down the edges, through the passes, up the mountains steep, 
Conquering, holding, daring, venturing, as we go, the unknown ways,  Pioneers! O pioneers!
    
  
7
  We primeval forests felling, 
We the rivers stemming, vexing we, and piercing deep the mines within;
We the surface broad surveying, we the virgin soil upheaving,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
8
  Colorado men are we, 
From the peaks gigantic, from the great sierras and the high plateaus, 
From the mine and from the gully, from the hunting trail we come,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
9
  From Nebraska, from Arkansas,
Central inland race are we, from Missouri, with the continental blood intervein’d; 
All the hands of comrades clasping, all the Southern, all the Northern,  Pioneers! O
    pioneers!
 
  
10
  O resistless, restless race! 
O beloved race in all! O my breast aches with tender love for all! 
O I mourn and yet exult—I am rapt with love for all,  Pioneers! O pioneers!
  
11
  Raise the mighty mother mistress, 
Waving high the delicate mistress, over all the starry mistress, (bend your heads all,) 
Raise the fang’d and warlike mistress, stern, impassive, weapon’d mistress,  Pioneers! O
 pioneers! 
  
12
See, my children, resolute children, 
By those swarms upon our rear, we must never yield or falter,
Ages back in ghostly millions, frowning there behind us urging,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
13
  On and on, the compact ranks, 
With accessions ever waiting, with the places of the dead quickly fill’d, 
Through the battle, through defeat, moving yet and never stopping,  Pioneers! O pioneers!
    
  
14
  O to die advancing on!
Are there some of us to droop and die? has the hour come? 
Then upon the march we fittest die, soon and sure the gap is fill’d,  Pioneers! O
    pioneers! 
  
15
  All the pulses of the world, 
Falling in, they beat for us, with the western movement beat; 
Holding single or together, steady moving, to the front, all for us,  Pioneers! O
    pioneers!
  
16
  Life’s involv’d and varied pageants, 
All the forms and shows, all the workmen at their work, 
All the seamen and the landsmen, all the masters with their slaves,  Pioneers! O pioneers!
    
  
17
  All the hapless silent lovers, 
All the prisoners in the prisons, all the righteous and the wicked,
All the joyous, all the sorrowing, all the living, all the dying,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
18
  I too with my soul and body, 
We, a curious trio, picking, wandering on our way, 
Through these shores, amid the shadows, with the apparitions pressing,  Pioneers! O
    pioneers! 
  
19

  Lo! the darting bowling orb! 
Lo! the brother orbs around! all the clustering suns and planets, 
All the dazzling days, all the mystic nights with dreams,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
20
  These are of us, they are with us, 
All for primal needed work, while the followers there in embryo wait behind,
We to-day’s procession heading, we the route for travel clearing,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
21
  O you daughters of the west! 
O you young and elder daughters! O you mothers and you wives! 
Never must you be divided, in our ranks you move united,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
22
  Minstrels latent on the prairies!
(Shrouded bards of other lands! you may sleep—you have done your work;) 
Soon I hear you coming warbling, soon you rise and tramp amid us,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
23
  Not for delectations sweet; 
Not the cushion and the slipper, not the peaceful and the studious; 
Not the riches safe and palling, not for us the tame enjoyment,  Pioneers! O pioneers!
  
24
  Do the feasters gluttonous feast? 
Do the corpulent sleepers sleep? have they lock’d and bolted doors? 
Still be ours the diet hard, and the blanket on the ground,  Pioneers! O pioneers! 
  
25
  Has the night descended? 
Was the road of late so toilsome? did we stop discouraged, nodding on our way?
Yet a passing hour I yield you, in your tracks to pause oblivious,  Pioneers! O pioneers!
    
  
26
  Till with sound of trumpet, 
Far, far off the day-break call—hark! how loud and clear I hear it wind; 
Swift! to the head of the army!—swift! spring to your places,  Pioneers! O pioneers.

Poem of the Week

Not sure how I feel about the sentiment in this one. It's been making me think. Also, I started meditating again and now I have a zit right where my third eye would be, if I believed in third eyes. Coincidence?

Be Kind 

by Charles Bukowski

we are always asked
to understand the other person's
viewpoint
no matter how
out-dated
foolish or
obnoxious.
one is asked
to view
their total error
their life-waste
with
kindliness,
especially if they are
aged.
but age is the total of
our doing.
they have aged
badly
because they have
lived
out of focus,
they have refused to
see.
not their fault?
whose fault?
mine?
I am asked to hide
my viewpoint
from them
for fear of their
fear.
age is no crime
but the shame
of a deliberately
wasted
life
among so many
deliberately
wasted
lives
is.

Vegas Redux

Vegas was AWESOME! It was great to spend time with a dear friend:

We had lots of fun:

We even visited a national conservation area, so I hit one of my goals without even trying!

I did not, however, cross off "Get another tattoo":

Poem of the Week!

God, I love this poem. I want to kiss it. On the mouth.


Mother's Day Proclamation
Julia Ward Howe

Arise, then, women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts,
Whether our baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
"We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country, will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."
From the bosom of the devastated Earth a voice goes up with our own.
It says: "Disarm! Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe out dishonor, nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace,
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God.
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And at the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.