Writing Rituals

I would usually write during my long commute home to Brooklyn, but since I live in the city now, I don't have that lux travel time on my hands. Instead, I created a little ritual this evening, since Rann is out, I walked about 10 blocks to Grumpy cafe for a delicious espresso and sipped on it during my walk home. I passed a Starbucks along the way and didn't think twice about compromising, despite the 20 degree weather and slippery NYC streets I had to trudge through to get there--nope didn't even flinch, just continued on the trajectory. Good coffee is good coffee and there are no substitutes, unless of course Grumpy's is closed. Then we all gotta make do.

I arrived home and started the laundry, rearranged the shoes, kitchen, butsudan, did some general tidying up. Sipped a little more of my coffee intermittently, transferred the laundry to the dryer, turned on all the lamps and then fired up the mac.

Maybe the simple fact that I'm writing is a sure sign of the genuine peace I'm feeling these days. I can't say when it all started, maybe when I returned from GA in Nov? Maybe. What happened since then? Well, for one I put a new priority on friendships. I was able to spend a great amount of time with a childhood friend in GA while I was there. We had these long talks about everything. She helped me, tremendously, to understand, in the midst of all the heartache I was feeling, what it was my life needed. I'm learning everyday that it's imperative to be clear about my needs in order to actively express who I am with confidence in a natural relaxed way. :)

First of all, I need friends who will be there for me. For most of my adult life I've been under a mistaken umbrella of thought that I have to give EVERYONE my whole heart and soul in every situation. But after about the billionth time feeling utterly empty and tossed aside, I realized that I need to be wiser about this sort of thing. So I quite decided that I need friends who are able to help me respect myself. With just this statement, I could feel a huge shift within. I never understood that this is a big deal. Already, I can feel the solidarity of these friendships, even if we're not physically together, which I see as a true treasure of the heart.

I need to dance. I started dancing tango last summer. I went to a milonga in Central Park around the Shakespeare statue and it was one of those amazing moments in time I don't think I'll ever forget. The music was loud, the weather was warm, and there in the park, surrounded by those lovely golden Central Park trees, people young and old danced. Tango lets me be as sentimental as I truly am, lets me move with intense emotion. Let's just say I'm happy to have found an outlet for all that. :) I still follow modern dance because it's a reaction to current events in the world and helps me get in touch with the power and ferocity I mostly keep hidden away within. Viva la danza!

I also started dancing with a modern dance company. I started two weeks ago and am really enjoying the rehearsals. The dancers are completely magnificent and sweet and the director is full of sunshine and focus. The parts I love most about dance is the process and the performance itself. Both aspects connect me to a cosmic grid of string and sound. The moment before entering the stage is a concentrated moment of pure creative energy. I can only imagine it to be like the moment right before an infant is born, for the baby that is, not the mum. Standing in the wings feels like a divine summoning, exhilarating as it is, geared toward a complete unknown. So I'm thrilled to be performing again. The rehearsals don't conflict with my work schedule and with that I am whole again.

Also, I need peace and quiet. I've enrolled in a yoga course at a local yoga center near my place. It's really nice doing yoga in a spiritual setting. I'm so used to doing yoga at the dance studio or Yogaworks, which is like corporate yoga, yoga-in, yoga-out, that to find this place just feels so welcome and right. They also have philosophy courses on Saturdays. Last weekend they had a lecture on "emotional maturity" which I was completely attracted to. So I enrolled, went to the room and sat on a little mat wondering what I was doing. The teacher, or guru, or, well I'm not sure what he's called yet, came in wearing all orange. I thought it was funny because he had on at least three pieces of clothing, a turtleneck, a long sarong type thing and a cable-knit sweater all orange. I thought it must be so easy for him to shop at the GAP, cause I could have sworn I saw that sweater there. All he's got to do is look for orange, and he's set! He sat down and seemed so full of peace and stillness that I was happy to have come. He said a few things that stood out for me and I took notes, which I'll copy here so I can throw away the paper:

• taking action is maturity
• maturity depends on the training we do in life or the practices in order to pursue true and rise above our likes and dislikes, transcending individuality
• lack of commitment and loyalty comes from fear of losing individuality
• emotional maturity is to act according to our convictions
• having an ideal works to energize and animates you, and spiritually includes yourself and others
• Romantic ideals aren't real
• stress comes from not accepting how things are (vs. how they should be)
• no need to feel guilty about things, just reapply the will.
• capacity for renewal is true strength.
• Emotionally mature people don't listen to others who ruin their convictions
• make new mistakes, it's training to help set a goal, practice until it feels natural
• believe you're meant for the conditions you're in
• how selflessly can you do something?
• it's not important what happens to you, but how you react to it
• our true-self doesn't change, our non-self changes
• what you say is important but what you do is more important, make sure words are not more intelligent than actions
• emotional maturity frees the self from false concepts

Afterward, I bought some tofu soup at a Korean shop and ate it quietly and happily at home. I like this ritual and will try to do this every Saturday. :) Rituals feel oh so good.

Wedding Videos

Just saw these videos from our wedding (1 year ago already!) on youtube, thanks to Pam and Kai!!!, and they made me smile all over again. lublublub

The wedding dance

Rann Sings A Perfect Day

Exit

One More Kiss

Cutting the Cake

Remembering a wonderful celebration, walking forward happily with Rann.

Cheers!

It's all I wanna be

Like Mt. Fuji,

singular and radiant

even in the night.

At Home with Mama

I'm home, in my old room, fresh with tape marks from my giant WEEZER collage..did I say collage? I meant SHRINE of 'yore. It's taken me nearly a week but I've successfully and finally cleaned this mofun room. Rummaged through some old photos, notes, letters, notes on back of photos, lounged on memory lane for a bit too, enjoying the fruits of what's past, grateful to have experienced any of it.

I feel immense gratitude for being here, at home i mean. Something tells me I'm doing my part by cleaning up all my junk. my mess. I lived here too. One room at a time, cleaning this whole house, it's my privilege to come back and clean it up.

I arrived last Saturday, literally alone for the first time in the house, my whole emotional being on overdrive. Hello rescue remedy. It seemed to stand still in time, as I left it, every room still holding onto all the sounds and the anger, like no one ever came back to make things right, it just waited. The whole house made of tears, I thought, how do you clean a house made of tears? One room at a time, I guess.

I let all the anger and frustration and all the mixed-up-ed-ness flow through me, one little chotchkie and cluttered corner at a time. All that wasn't mine and yet mine at once, I just sat with it all, and continue, not holding on exactly, just allowing all that emotion to flow through me, so that peace can be made within. Me letting go of the judgement, and the anger and the sadness and the selfishness, just letting it all come and go so I can finally breathe again. and remembering that I'm a space explorer and a weezer fan club member (even if my membership card has long expired).

Mama's sick. She has lymphoma cancer and just successfully finished her high-dose chemo treatment. Though she made it through, the treatment has left her with hardly any life force left. It's painful to see her so frail and weak, how can I not cry?

I wonder why the recovery process has to be so slow and painful? What is changing here? For one, I guess, to be here this month simply to be here for her, is a profound benefit, I can't help but feel that cancer means change, for a whole family.

I miss Erica and Rann but I'm glad it's just me here, for now. I got to stop running away from the poetry in my heart. Got to stop depending on other people to help me see it, got to learn how to stand on my own and got to allow myself to think again. with sensibility. this time.

A Few Women to Admire..

Annie Leibovitz

I went to her solo show, a retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum around 4 years ago when I first moved to NYC. It was incredible because, despite all the chaos at that time, I was cosmically able to attend the opening. I viewed her incredible evolution as a photographer and as a woman. Her photos always tell a story, a real and honest one. And I intensely admire the ease of her subjects, its like they all trust her and in her or through her they can relax and just be. I want to be such a photographer one day. Also, she walked past me. Not with an entourage or associate, just herself. And I was by myself, loving that I could be alone at the event, I strayed away from the crowds and was just meandering. It seemed like she was looking for the bathroom or something or was just happy to get a breath to herself. My breath, however, was completely gone and I froze. Unable to understand the moment or to act or do or think anything I just looked at her and felt so grateful to know that yes, Annie Leibovitz is a real live person and aside from all her accomplishments and admirers, she probably just craves being alone sometimes.


Mariane Pearl

I saw her in Tokyo around 5 years ago. She was giving a talk about her new book 'A Mighty Heart'. I went with some friends to hear her speak. I didn't know much about her at the time, I just knew that President Ikeda shook her hand and told her he knew everything about her. I saw this on a video screen and I saw the joy in her eyes. I knew I wanted to hear what she had to say. She spoke very clearly even with her little son restless about her, the way kids do when they see their parents being serious and non-attentive. Despite her clarity she seemed exhausted and left promptly when her time was up. 'The Pearl' is SUA's student newspaper named after her husband. Emily who was an editor for the paper brought a copy with her and ran after Ms. Pearl and basically forced the copy into her hands before she disappeared from the crowd.
What I remember about her talk was the way she spoke. It was like she knew what she was made of, her strengths and weaknesses and was vividly aware of what she needed. She was very eloquent and smart.

Elizabeth Gilbert

She's a great storyteller and one thing I've learned is that everyone loves a good story. She gave a fabulous talk on the Ted Talks program about the curse of creativity. Of course she didn't explain it as a curse, only her journey to understand her own creative spirit and to even make friends with it. She's so open, not by nature, but by her own accomplishment. I understood from her that creativity comes in many forms for all people, but it can always be found in a woman.





Tali

I admire all my friends--incessantly. I learn from each of them and love them without boundary. Tal, however, has gone through what I can only describe as a monsoon of experience, seeing much more than I ever have. She's the kind of person that anyone is happy to have met in a lifetime of meeting people and she creates a memory there. Tal really helped me (and still does) to understand the value of working to help others. I could see, from her life, that it actually heals open wounds within. Supporting other women, as a woman, I flourish and continue to grow and have all my needs met.

I love you Tali!

Monologue

I recently finished performing with the show, GAIA, directed by Ritsuko Sato. It was a great production and all in all I'm thrilled to have been a part of it.

Ritsuko asked me to write a monologue to act out in one of the scenes. At first I was not motivated to do anything of the sort. The show dealt with such deep themes and a cascade of landscapes that it was challenging enough just being present at the rehearsals. I sensed that creating a monologue meant I had to dig, if even a little bit, within and expose something--anything. LIFE has been asking this of me for quite some time and until then I put it off simply because I could.

So after a series of drafts and early morning rehearsals after work, with Rann as my acting coach (:)), I came up with 'something':

Myself, my neighbors

They walk around me, faceless
along the path where I've fallen.

witnessing what they cannot see.

Where's the core of my truth?
Exhausted from excitement,
Overwhelmed by dread.

An apple falls from its tree.

-Aw man!,
well..
-that way then.


I want to find that thing
he said about the 'good dancer'.

The part where he goes to the
hilltop and danced
and danced!

And he felt so free.
And it was exhilarating.

That's my favorite part of Nietzsche.


There's only a path --
good and friendly,
cheerful and real.

I'll know because the ground will be hard and
an apple tree will grow there.


_____________________________________________

So I'm terribly grateful for Ritsuko's vision throughout the production process and for gifting me an opportunity to shake hands with my creativity.

"I Still Love You" ~ F.M.

My dearest friend Y asked me what I think is an enduring question, a question probably passed down through out the ages of yore and that is: "how did you get to be so perfect?"

Before I continue, let me just say that I would

love to ask this question to many a mind, like Walt Whitman, for example. And you know what? I'm sure he'd just laugh at me and say, "dear one, perfection, perhaps, lies in wakefulness." That's what he says in my mind, at least.

Let me backtrack 6 years ago to the day I met the family of my dearest friend A. I was more or less interrogated but

in a wildly enthusiastic fashion that I could only come to love deeply. A's father asked me standard questions like 'what's your father's name?' 'what does he do?' Brothers and sisters gathered around and pulled up chairs to hear how I was doing. The whole scenario was so wonderful and bizarre that I enjoyed every minutia of it.

'how old are you?'

'22'

Then A's father asked me what my strengths were. At the time I was a very confident little shit so I said my thing. Then he asked what my weaknesses were..and truthfully I told him I didn't have any. If you

can believe it. Then almost like a habit of his, he leaned in and looked me stern in the face and said 'before you go to bed each night you must say aloud one strength and one weakness--that's how you will grow.'

Simply speaking, there's nothing more perfect than a humble human being. Needless to say, I've taken his fatherly advice to heart and have done my best to resolve my weaknesses (after, of course, being open to fact that I had any), sometimes being compassionate with them, and sometimes fighting the hard fight--especially when they turn into mighty

little demons. I'm talking about constantly needing for plenty of attention and nurturing, waking up completely paralyzed with fear of the unknown and facing cold hard facts, like some if not most people will not reciprocate my love for them and that that has to be ok somehow. ughhcringetearsigh.

Yet, I can confidently say one of my strengths is the ability to look up at the ceiling after a day of chasing perfect and quietly say to

myself "I still love you".

(deep breath), and then goodnight!