politickling

tweeted ideas for a debate drinking game!
had i money to buy alcohol, i would probably not be conscious to type these words right now, so consider yrselves lucky!

chatting to my friend Brandon about the first presidential debate (read: a huge disappointment).

so, if you didn't make it thru the debate, read B's and my commentary instead. it will probably save you the 2 hours of life we spent actually watching.

-stef

---

me: I MISS YOU!!!!!

6:11 AM i'm sending you a virtual hug RIGHT NOW

**squuueeeeeeeezzzzeeee!!!!!**

Brandon: and while we hug, I will nonchalantly and secretly work my hand over your luscious booty

6:12 AM me: ahahahahahha

i wouldn't want it any other way!

did u watch teh debates?

Brandon: sho did

me: i did too

but might as well not have

6:13 AM Brandon: for serious

me: i feel like the whole time they were just trying to make each other look foolish

mccain's whole message was "obama is naive"

and obama's was "mccain is a doddering old fool"

6:14 AM we didn't need 2 hours of "debate" to get that, come on!

Brandon: i was really looking forward to the part of this campaign when something substantial would happen, but I'm starting to lose hope that that would actually happen

me: yeah

i was actually excited, until i saw the debate

and realized we're pretty much screwed

Brandon: for serious

6:15 AM me: it's a pretty shitty time to be a politically conscious american

Brandon: agreed

me: on another note,

6:17 AM do you have Lykke Li?

that was the other one i was thinking of sending you

Brandon:

no, i haven't even heard such a crazy name!

me: oh yay!

then i can share some swedish goodness with you!

6:18 AM b/c of course, as with all music of the past 2 or 3 years, it comes from sweden!

Brandon: i have vastly been ignoring the swedes in my life and they need to come back

me: i'm seriously thinking i need to move there

YES

we all do

/ need swedes

6:19 AM OK

so you should listen to the album

it's dance-y

6:20 AM Brandon: ooo!

me: which means you will LOVE it

Brandon: i haven't had something dancey in a while

me: and come on, it's swedish

you should move here and have a dance party with me

we could drive away global warming with our amazing powers of dance

6:21 AM Brandon: that would be only the most amazing solution to our problems ever

me: woudln't it?

6:22 AM i think that we should propose that as the next debate topic

Brandon: i pine for such a resolution to things

me: "senators obama and mccain, if you could fight global warming with the power of dance, what would be yr best moves?"

Brandon: and what would you choose to dance to?

6:23 AM me: i imagine mccain would do the old hip, hand grind

you know, the butter churn

Brandon: if his hip lasts that long

me: hahahahahaha

Brandon: i was kind of impressed that he was actually able to stand for the duration of the debate

me: haha, i hadn't thot of it

6:24 AM oh man, i AM really excited for hte VP debate tho

Brandon: it should certainly be entertaining if nothing else

me: palin's gonna get absolutely thrashed

Brandon: in the post-debate thing when they were interviewing biden he has absolutely no reservations about what he says haha

it was great

me: i don't know if i like biden yet, but SHIT, he is out to embarass her

shoudn't be hard to do tho

Brandon: i like biden

me: yeah, haha, i know

6:25 AM wait, did the VPs already debate?

did i miss it?

Brandon: i think the ticket would be better if it was reversed

me: damn!

Brandon: no, they're next thursday

me: oh, sweeeeeeet!

Brandon: i wonder if the republicans are regretting it yet

me: i hate that ppl are actually more excited about th GOP now that she's on the ticket

haha

6:26 AM i heard some interesting commentary on Countdown with Keith Olbermann today

Brandon: i think that's starting to die down now though

i heard someone call her Caribou Barbie and i thought that was pretty funny

me: some conservative woman writing to say that Palin was an embarassment and she should step down if she knew what was best for her party and her country

i thot that was pretty apt

caribou barbie?

HILARIOUS.

6:27 AM Brandon: yeah, i've seen a lot of commentaries of people telling her she should step down

me: she's gonna fall onher face in the debate on thursday

Brandon: gosh i hope so

6:28 AM me: oh man!!!! (gleeful squealing)

it's gonna be so awesome

i'm gonna plan anight around it

wanna watch together?

Brandon: i thought it was really telling that after the debate they interviewed biden, but palin wasn't there and they interviewed giuliani instead who is just an arse

me: oh man, giuliani...

6:29 AM the GOP just can't catch a break

ha ha

Brandon: idont know what he was watching, but none of his comments made any sense in reference to the debate

6:32 AM me: yeah.. he probly just wanted to talk about 9/11 right?

oh rudy rudy rudy

the GOP's one-hit wonder
"play freebird!"

Sisyphean punishment

image source

i'm beginning to suspect i've done something to deeply offend the gods.

why else would they have doomed me to such a Sisyphean task? i can think of no better phrase to describe my experiences thus far teaching 6th grade special ed math and science in south central LA: the long days and nights of constant worrying and physical stress, the huge gaps in achievement meant to be overcome in one year, the endless lesson-planning for classes the next day that don't even see full implementation because of my students' eruptive behavior, the false sense of achievement and hope when my students finally understand a concept one day, only to feel extra deflated and dispirited when they come back the next day having forgotten it all again, spending 3 whole weeks just trying to teach the bare basics of math, while the students constantly scream and yell saying it's "baby work" and still get all the problems wrong, giving up my breaks and my lunches and yes even my dinners to meet with students, talk with parents, grade papers and write new worksheets, only to come in the next day and have to do it all again.

HUGE BOULDER + HILL = ETERNITY OF FRUSTRATION.

i am quickly growing to hate my job. i spend the majority of my day waiting for the day to end. when not thinking about that, my thoughts turn to trying to calculate the remaining days before i am completely free of my contract and can walk away. June 2010 just seems like too long to wait...

i'm wondering where my train derailed... i came here with good intentions, to take a teaching job so i could help people and feel like i'm making a difference, to avoid a life in corporate america and a desk job with no sense of purpose, to avoid feeling miserable all day and hating my life and my work and never seeing the sunshine.

i never knew my dream job would actually turn out to be my personal hell.

and this is only week 4. there are 32 more weeks to go. (my students could not tell you what percentage of the year is finished. they could not tell you how many weeks total there were to begin with.*)

welcome to the jungle!
-stef


*there are 36 weeks in the school year (32+4=36). i'm only 11.1% done (4/36=.1111=11.1%)

end of the line

tonight, in my grad class, Behavior Management:

Tim - “what if [a new teacher] gets assaulted by a kid? what can he do?”
professor - “press charges.”
Tim - “can he hit back?”
David - “you know, out of self defense.”
Kyle - “what if you choke someone out, you know, just to make sure they don’t hurt anyone else?” [makes choking gesture]

later: Milton - "i am not getting hit by a kid and taking it, i'm sorry."

three brawny, adult male first-year teachers, talking about their students.

clearly at wit's end.
-stephanie

save your day

"do what you must,
you need to be brave to save your day."

===

the end of summer came suddenly. here in LA, all the restaurants and pubs were lamenting the death of summer, trying to sell off the last of their summer wine collections and closing the patio seating. i spent the weekend walking thru thrift stores looking for a sweater that would remind me of the sweaters i have back home.

i watch the days pass thru my window in the apartment, watch the sunlight change angles on the tree leaves, wait for leaves to fall, wait for night to get cold, wait for december so i can fly home and lie down in the snow and grass and drink hot chocolate in the kitchen of my house and feel warm again.

this video captures the kind of sepia hues and nostalgic tones i meant when i wrote this post.

there are no words to describe how i'm feeling lately, only images. and i feel a little lost because i do not know how to produce them myself, only share them.

-stef

disgusted.

so today was a long day. my special ed students left school on friday and forgot ALL of the math they learned in the last week over the weekend. we came back today and had to relearn EVERYTHING about subtraction. seriously, everything. like, borrowing, taking away the one, dropping the decimal points, all the bells and whistles. and, they decided today would be a great day to pull out all the tricks: the name-calling, the getting out of seats, the extra hyper attention deficits, the annoying mouth noises, the pencil-tapping, the blank stares, and the gum chewing. all so that my supervisors (TWO of them) could come in to observe and think my classroom has been a complete mess this whole time (which, trust me, it has not been). then, to make it extra fun, the ppl in the office decided today would be a good day to play with PA system at school. imagine shrill squeaking so loud that it lulls you into mental and physical paralysis. and causes you to develop an eye tic. 

oh, and my aide decided she "wasn't feeling well," so she took off early (after, again, dawdling into class 30 minutes late). please, if anyone should be using that excuse for laziness, it should be me.

i didn't eat lunch today because i held my class for lunch detention and worked on their math problems with them, and then my conference period was taken up by two meetings, which lasted the entire time, so i went straight thru my day, 7 to 3, without any break, not even a bathroom break, and no more than 5 minutes to unwind. it's a good thing i decided to risk being late this morning to eat a quick bowl of cereal otherwise i probably would have fainted. oh, which i almost did, while i was driving on the fuckin 10 freeway to go to the bank. 

oh, but all of that was fine and dismissible, compared to this: i was waiting in the lobby of the bank, grading papers and prepping for my classes tomorrow, when i saw some douchebag coming out of there wearing this:

(image source)

i was revolted! those GOP fuckers have proceeded to offend me on yet another level, by appropriating the Rosie the Riveter symbol and superimposing Palin's face on it. i wanted to get out of my seat and beat him in the face with the 6th grade science book i was lugging around at the time, but my teacher brain remembered that "violence is not the answer." still, i was close. i was just that mad. 

so, great. in addition to having to teach my special ed students all the california state standards for 6th grade math, i need to add overthrowing the GOP empire to my list of to-do's. can't a woman just catch a break?!

seriously. i don't have time to canvass and help with voter registration drives (and doing all that in CA might not help that much anyway), but i can't sit down and watch this all happening. DO PPL NOT UNDERSTAND THAT THE WOMAN IS A FUCKIN WHACKO?!? seriously, check it. 

what scares me most is that ppl are actually MORE excited about the GOP now than they were before. whaa??? what kind of world are we living in if ppl become manically obsessed with an unqualified zealot and hypocrite? well, i guess i just answered my own question...

to close, i know that there was a lot of hullabaloo over Obama's pig/lipstick comment, and how the GOP is now accusing Obama of sexism. please, let's not be ridiculous. that's not what the man intended.

but if it looks like a pig, and talks like a pig, i'm certainly not calling it a duck, if you know what i'm saying...

-stephan!e

p.s. to give you a good perspective on the lipstick comment, listen to this segment from NPR.

p.p.s. UPDATE (9/15/08, approx. 10 pm PST): my dear friend Alex had this to say in response: "Stephanie, you live in California, the Democrats automatically win there. You can take a brief respite from trying to bring down the Old-Money, Oil-Profiteering, Fear-Mongering, and from what I hear, Massacre-Inspiring Tyrants of the GOP..." haha. thanks for keeping it real...

introduction

i can't stop listening to this song by Voxtrot. it fits my mood and the way i've been feeling lately, like flipping thru a stack of polaroids you found tucked away, all sepia tones and childhood memories, a feeling of loss and recovery – "i won't know how much i've lost until i've gone away."


i imagine all my childhood memories – raking leaves and jumping in the piles, taking bike rides to the park with my mom and dad, picking apples in the country on weekends, hanging Halloween decorations in the yard, the brisk chill of getting in the pool at the end of the summer – flashing thru a projector, reflecting off a screen and flashing on my face. there is jumping, there is running, there is dancing, and there is laughter.

it's getting colder as it slowly turns to autumn in LA, and i am having vestigial memories and longings for the changing leaves, cool breezes and indian summers, the look of grass (of bluegrass!) and the smell of my neighborhood at dusk, and the look of the sky, which somehow i remember seeming closer to earth and looking softer than it does here, where it is far away and tinged with gray, immense yet distant and always revealing itself to make me feel small and alone.

i listen to this and imagine driving home from school to surprise my parents, imagine stepping my foot in the door and seeing them emerge from the living room, running to hug me. or i imagine blasting this in my car late at night, as i drive thru the deserted streets in oxford, ohio, to meet a friend for drinks, to crash at someone's house for a sleepover, to go to my boyfriend's house and sit on the couch and talk. it's a rush to feel at home again.

this is music that makes my feet move. they want to hit the pavement, to start running, to put pedal to the metal and drive drive drive, to find endless roads and listen to this on repeat. as the music picks up, i get closer and closer to home.

-stef

---

"Introduction" by Voxtrot
Open your eyes and stretch your hands
This house is clean but it is not my home
Did I make this bed
The two hands touch on two

Sometimes I think of some place colder
The sound of traffic and the way it's worn
When you feel yourself grow up inside of here

And you love me just like a stranger
But you love me just like I am

Remember we ran through lovely streets
We made our rules and then we broke them first
It felt like we were running all the time
When I wouldn't give one ugly moment
I'd wrap it up, I'd keep it in my sock
I can keep it, yeah, I know what's yours is mine

And you love me just like a stranger
But you love me when

I step into the sea, it let's me love some other day
We get bored of weakness all the time
Now I won't know how much I lost until I've gone away
Your sun sets when my sun starts to shine

rise above

oh sweet bliss...

i am listening to the dirty projectors sing "Rise Above" loud on my speakers, eating a big bowl of fruit i cut the other night just for a moment like this.

it's FRIDAY. i made it thru another week. thank the stars!

i did some yoga today. funny story: the class i went to is called "Sando Yoga" and i remember seeing that and thinking "huh, i've never heard of that kind of yoga before..." but today, in class, about halfway thru, i realize it's actually the guy's name. a large-ish Indian gentleman who wore linen pants and a golf shirt to teach us yoga, which consisted mostly of stretching forwards and backwards and calling everybody "his friend." good times. i might go again.

i took a swim afterward and then came home and made myself a delicious dinner (homemade salsa and guacamole with a burrito! i'm getting good at this!) and now i'm just about ready to crash. another funny thing about today's yoga class was that during the "meditation" or "resting" session at the end, i'm pretty sure i dozed off. when we were sitting in lotus pose, i started nodding off, and then when he instructed us to lie down on our backs, i took the liberty of falling asleep entirely.

i'm just so tired lately. all of today was spent tossing a beach ball around and teaching my students how to read number lines and factor numbers and subtract 6 digit decimals. now that's a mental workout!

i'm going to plan my weekend (make sure i have time to play/do nothing) and then, TO BED!

-stef

some thoughts from the classroom

hello hello! sorry for the lack of posts! between trying to figure out my first year of teaching and my first year of grad classes, as well as opening bank accounts, figuring out car insurance, stressing out about affording gas, groceries, teacher clothes, almost burning the house down, and trying to find time to eat, i've been busy!

anyway, here is a quickie update on my first few days of teaching. it's rushed and scattered, but it's HERE and that is what matters.

love and kissies,
stef

Tuesday, Sept 9th. DAY 5.
long day. this doesn't get any easier, but thankfully Tuesdays are early dismissal. i just don't know what to do with my classes: the kids in my special ed class are so behind, and so out of control, that i worry i'm never going to get around to actually teaching them anything this year. even the simple activities, like writing their names and thinking of words to describe themselves, are frustrating for my kids, who read at an abysmally low level. many don't know the difference between + and - (that is, that a + means to add), so i will need to spend a lot of time just developing math literacy.

what's really interesting about this whole experience is that i still have yet to learn who is on my case load, who the special ed students are (because i have a general ed class that seems to be mixed) and what their disabilities are. yesterday, i learned that my student Jordyn is autistic, but i only learned because i spoke with one of my colleagues who had him for english. my student Chantal is deaf/hard of hearing (DHH) but i had no idea, because she wears her hair so as to cover her ears! this entire time i was getting frustrated with her b/c she never understood what was going on and i had to constantly repeat myself to her, so i thot she just never paid attention. so i felt terrible when i finally learned that the real reason was that she couldn't even hear me!

it's amazing that as a special ed teacher, i am not informed of my students' disabilities before i teach them. it would seem to me that in order to ensure that they are receiving the necessary accomodations and the best instruction possible that i would need to have at least a basic understanding of what the student's situation is. it's been frustrating to find that reality is much different.

the general ed class is going really well though. i got the parent surveys back the other day and i plan on calling homes tonight. the students in there are all really great. we did an activity in science today where they had to bring in an object from home and keep it secret then get up in class and describe it for others to guess. it was supposed to help them with their observation and description skills. my favorite one was my student Frank (the one who asked me if he could have my old uniform clothes). he brought in a battery and his clues were so clever!

even though i'm almost a week into school, i keep getting new students. today, i got three students referred to my homeroom, who weren't even on my roster, because some bum teacher said "he only teaches magnet kids" and sent them out. i was livid! it was the same guy who's been hoarding teaching materials and refusing to help anyone else out. the students came in and i didn't have a desk for any of them, i already had students sitting elbow to elbow in the back and at my desk. serious overcrowding issues!

more later. MUST EAT.

check it

my 6th grade math/science class website!

does the dream seem true yet?

you tell me.
-stef

surviving middle school (again)

teaching has been fun! i started this wednesday, and tho was stressed and more than reluctant to go the first day, since then i've been getting the hang of it and i love it.

fun things i did with the kids today:
-had our first Fun Friday (the kids voted unanimously to play Heads Up 7 Up. we even did a lightning round!)
-kids were excited to play MATH RACE! (see, math can be fun!)
-taught them how to say hello in turkish! ("merhaba"...?) they LOVED that. they were walking around all day saying "merhaba, merhaba, merhaba" back and forth.
-my homeroom kids were really sad not to have me twice in one day today. they say they love coming here to unwind and they like talking to me about their day. that made me feel good.
-today is "scrub day" (the 8th graders - i guess - pick on the younger kids and stick their heads in the toilets and "scrub" them with it) so my 6th graders said they were scared to be bullied. i let them know that Ms. Lee has a zero tolerance policy and that if i ever saw them bullying or being bullied i would make sure to stop it. i also told them my no violence policy and told them the bravest thing to do is walk away. i also taught them the meaning of "escalate" and connected it to "escalator" which was a particularly clever and spontaneous teaching moment, if i do say so myself. :-)
-i also told my students that if they ever felt scared or worried, to feel free to come to my room (207) and that they could stay in my room and eat lunch or hang out and play games. i told them my room would always be a safe space for them. at nutrition and at lunch, my students Orlando and Enrique came by to play tic-tac-toe and to play with playdough and bouncy balls. we listened to music while i got my next class ready, and they shared some of their music interests with me. i have them written down to research later (tho i was really surprised to hear the kids are still listening to Slipknot and the Offspring these days. those were bands I listened to in middle school!)
-had a tough time with my SDC special ed class today. they were being rowdy, calling each other names and being generally disruptive. the entire class stayed after 4th period during lunch for detention, in which they were not allowed to talk and had to practice being quiet. i held a few even longer for being tardy, and then had 2 additional students stay even longer for being disruptive and disrespectful to the teacher and the aide.

= so far so good. i'm being a hard ass when i have to, and having fun when i can.

also: hearing the kids say "bye Ms. Lee!" at the end of class or "hi Ms. Lee" when i pass them in the hall is still one of the things that makes me inexplicably glad.

more later. must clean and plan before i leave school. and i'm really REALLY tired, wanting a nap...

-"Ms. Lee"

emotionally disturbed

today, in my grad class on students with emotional disturbances:

the prof: "i worked at a psych ward. in california, we don't lock em up, we just close the door. one of my students had multiple personalities. one of her personalities was a hooker. so, one day she got up to leave. i told her she couldn't go, she had to stay. she told me she was off, she was going to make money. so to get her to stay in class i asked her how much she cost. she said $10. so i gave her the bill and told her she couldn't leave, i just bought her for the hour."

wow.

really puts my day into perspective. (details forthcoming on my first day of teaching – today!)

-stef

searching for home

that's my room last year, 2 or 3 days before the end of the year. i took this picture in a fleeting moment before i ran out of the room to meet friends to eat lunch at the dining hall, and something about the light that morning, the way my bed looked, the wood of the floor, the look of all my senior project books stacked up on my floor, all read, annotated, and waiting to be returned to the library, made me halt, smile while fighting back the urge to cry. it was the first really gripping moment i remember knowing i would miss moments like these, these significant pauses before a sudden leap.

---

i've been dragging my feet around my apartment in Los Angeles for the past week, remembering how happy i was just a few days ago, thinking about how funny it is, these changes in moods, the feeling of safety and completeness suddenly rushing away from me, like a parachute that won't open, just a useless backpack – dead weight.

i find myself trying to preserve some memory, some trace of a past self, a past life, a vestigial existence, in order to live thru my present. i'm collecting all the salvagable bits and pieces – the smell of the linens on my bed, the warmth of sunlight thru tree leaves coming in my window, the look of shadows on wooden floor, the smell of an old book and the feel of a hardbound in the crook of my arm as i walk around town, the tune of a Billy Bragg song i used to hum, the slight hum of a harmonica – and trying to weave them together, trying to create a home from them, some shelter for my troubled mind, some comfort to retreat to when i forget how to fall asleep at night, when i get tearful and remember that there's no one home to eat my dinner with, again.

the time in LA doesn't move. it never rains. it never gets colder, so if it weren't for the shortening days, i wouldn't know that we were heading toward december.

i feel an onsetting depression: i try to celebrate small successes – a tasty self-cooked meal, finding textbooks online for almost $100 less than bookstore price, fixing the broken printer at home, finding my keys after absent-mindedly misplacing them, crossing the street without getting hit by a car – but i find i'm pretty good at realizing when i'm trying to fool myself.

it's funny: when i would go back to school in Oxford for the fall, i would always get bouts of seasonal depression with the change in weather. the sudden cold, the lengthening nights, the accumulation of work, all would make me miss the summer and my family, and home.

but today, and yesterday, and all the many days before, i've been wondering what life in Oxford is like, missing the closeness of everything, the convenience of having 20 or so friends in walking distance, of having constant company, of never feeling alone. i miss going to class and being pleasantly surprised to bump into a friend on the way over on my bike. i miss my bike. i miss classes i enjoy. i miss having friends.

i had a post in mind when i came here, but it seems i've already written it. over a year ago, i wrote these two posts back to back and they, as reflections on my present state, echo and project my distress.

i'm listening to Billy Bragg now, and i'm pining for home.

-stephan!e

celebrate!

i'm going to try this blogging business again. i feel awfully sad that this little sight [sic] has fallen by the wayside while i've been traipsing around the west coast with my family, trying to forget about my job and responsibilities, but i promise i had good reason for it.

anyway, in celebration of my renewed fervor to keep this updated, i'm throwing confetti! (can you see it? it's raining party paper everywhere you look these days!) this is a permanent addition to the sight, unless a seasoned (or saucy?) reader complains of eye strain. BECAUSE EVERY DAY SHOULD BE A CELEBRATION.

hard to always keep that optimism, but today i'm feeling festive and happy, so let it be!

updates, they are forthcoming!
-stephan!e

(the confetti gif from here)

restart, repower

hello hello -

so i must admit, the blog has gotten boring. i don't know what it is, but i don't like it. blame business, ha, blame busy-ness (funny how busy-ness and business are the same!), blame corporate teacher training hell for sucking the life out of living, blame my separation from friends and how i've forgotten to have fun, blame it on the water and the air and the heat and the weather and yes, let's blame global-warming.

the sad truth remains: i've run out of things to say, and a certain personal flavor that used to be oh-so-savory (a friend of mine told me the meaning of savory is salty and sweet at the same time. now that i'm looking at a dictionary, i can't confirm that her interpretation is true, but i like the idea of my writing being savory, so i'm going to keep it.)

also: the internet's been down. and no matter how powerful my little laptop is, it can't continue stealing wireless from neighbors with such success.

and: family business is a muck. lesson-planning looms. summer is running out.

thus, a hiatus is in order.

hopefully when i return, there will be more interesting things to say.

love,
stephan!e

homesick

(from july 24th – 10 days from the end of Institute)

misses the sound of rain on rooftops at night.

misses seeing the stars in the sky.

misses the feel of soft bluegrass underfoot.

misses enjoying her work.

misses human heat.

...

glad that's done!
-stef

the civil war

dream - friday morning, 8/8/08

i was outside, i think a group of us were talking about something, implementing a plan of action as a group, we were talking around a tree, i think we were in an arid place. we were talking when all of a sudden we hear a whirring sound, and someone holds up a hand and goes 'was that a bullet?' she shoes us her hand and it's got a small puncture wound on it. moments later, it happens again. we realize we're under gunfire. there's some war happening around us.

we go inside this really old wood cabin behind us. there are slits of sunlight shining thru the pieces of wood and thru the bullet holes. we lie on the floor so as not to get hit. we realize that they're coming soon, and that we should be ready. but rather than fight back, we develop a plan for when they get here. we are going to go out bravely, singing "Swing Lo, Sweet Chariot" (for some reason we thought we were in the civil war - maybe it was the log cabin?) we practice singing it and then we lie on our backs. these are ppl i've never met before but we're singing and preparing to die in such solidarity.

i'm lying there on the dirt floor (and i remember this part being weird, because i think i was watching myself/ experiencing everything from a third person perspective, like, i could SEE myself) and i can hear the whirr of bullets outside and my heart is racing and i am swelling up with anger and pride that this is the way i am going to die. and then i realize, my family is outside. they are in the house, the house i live in in lexington, and the bad guys are going to go into my house, and they are going to shoot my parents and my brother, and all of a sudden i am scared, and i want to run to be with them, and suddenly my death seems meaningless, seems cowardly, seems unfair. i want to be with them in my final moments, want to scream civil rights songs in the face of our oppressors, and want to be scared and defiant and brave one last time with my family around me, rather than these strangers.

i imagine the last time i hugged my dad, which, in my waking life was last night, and i remember it feeling strange since it'd been so long, but very comforting and relieving to know he was finally near enough that i could say "bye Dad" and wrap an arm around his neck, and in my dream that sense was a very urgent need. in my dream i suddenly feel the urgency of death and a paralysis, as i'm stuck to the floor of this cabin, singing slave songs, waiting for death to come. i remember thinking how symbolic every last moment becomes when you realize your actions are limited to a few brief moments, and i wondered if this was really how i wanted my last actions as a living human to be.

soon i would lose control of my nervous system, my ability to move limbs, to navigate the equilibrium, to practice volition and act with deliberation and intent. i felt guilty that i wasn't with my mother, ailing as she was, and that i didn't give my father a longer hug when i was near enough to do it.

---

i wake myself up from the dream with a slight scream, my heart racing from tossing around in my sleep.

gold mine gutted

my friend Chels sent me a picture of the dame's demolition. she's sweet and keeps me updated on the state of things back home. she was right to warn me not to cry (but it still didn't stop me from being sad).

the dame in its glory days:
and the vibrant life that once enjoyed that space:

that's me and Chels enjoying our last night at the dame together

me and Ben
enjoying the breeze on a hot summer night.

and this is video of one of my favorite bands, animal collective, playing a show at the dame 2 summers past:



and the dame now:
UPDATE (9/15/08): and the dame now:

(but soon to be revived!)

so it goes, i guess.
-stef

way w k

(say it out loud: "way w k" = w'A W K = WAY AWKWARD!)

my initiation into LA denizenry:
moved into new apartment without a refrigerator (apparently all LA housing comes sans fridge. what do you crazy CA ppl do? why are you all so possessive of your huge ass kitchen appliances? if we could all just agree to leave those things behind, we could all have fridges in our new housing.)

sitting in apartment, roommate left to go to work an hour away, taking the car and the only working set of keys with him. thus, i cannot leave the apt to walk down the street to buy food from the store. working all night and all morning on my grad class's papers, i'm getting light-headed from lack of nourishment. between yesterday at 3 pm and today at 2 pm, i've only had one apple and a small box of raisins.

i look online for food that comes to me. i try Green Truck first (environmentally friendly organic gourmet food service based in Culver City! how delightful!) – BUT, they don't deliver on Mondays! bummer mother. so i try the next thing i can think of: Pizza Hut (haha, total 180).

so i'm on the phone with Pizza Hut. i give the guy my name and phone number and address. he makes some unintelligible joke about my name –
guy: "Stephanie Lee? Are you related to *mumble mumble* Lee?"
me: "what?"
guy: "mumble mumble"
me: no response
guy: "nevermind."

so i'm trying to get the cheapest pizza i can. i ask the guy on the phone if there are any specials, any $5 pizza deals or anything that will save my hard-earned (and quickly depleting) money. he asks if i have any coupons and i explain that no, i don't eat a lot of pizza and i just moved here, so no coupons or anything of the like. he asks me where i'm from, i say KY. he asks if i'm here for school and i say no, "i'm here to teach." he says he's surprised b/c i sound so young and at that point i'm wondering how the focus has turned away from the pizza and onto me.

i redirect: "so, how about that pizza?" and he says he'll give me the discount anyway and i wrap up my order. i don't feel good about giving him my credit card number and was really defensive when he asked for the expiration date. i'm thinking i don't want him to steal my identity after i reject him for a date. he tells me the order total and i say "great, thanks."

he asks me if i like going to concerts and i say yes as a knee-jerk (i'd just finished ordering tickets to a show at the Troubadour, so i have concerts on my mind). he says his friends are dj's and it'd be cool if i wanted to go to one of their parties some time. i tell him that'd be cool, my friend Tara is a dj too and she'd probably like to meet other ppl in the business. he gives me his phone number (which i write down without thinking but now keep so i know which call not to answer) and then tells me he'll call me some time. i tell him not to call after 10pm (thinking that a pretty unreasonable time), "because i teach in the mornings" (even though i don't start for almost another month). he says he'll only call on fridays. great...

i hang up the phone. i'm not even hungry any more. now i'm worried about this guy having my phone # and my address, knowing way too much about me without me really volunteering the information. i feel like my privacy has been violated. i feel sad, confused, overwhelmed. memories of a horrible experience in an airport hotel resurface. i feel guilty. i think about my boyfriend and how i miss him right now. i try to devise plans to diffuse the situation and avoid any further awkward exchanges. i swear off pizza delivery from now on (next time, i'll just wait until Tuesday and order the healthy stuff!)

Ben is coming to visit in just 11 more days! my family comes in only 3! i think i can be resourceful and clever enough to hold off any creepy advances from Pizza Boy until my family is in town (my mom just broke her foot. = fiberglass cast to groin anyone?). and then, if he is still persistent enough to call, i will take him up on the party offer, and bring Ben along. that should take care of things.

20 minutes later, the pizza came. i hid behind a wall while my roommate Michael picked it up. the delivery person was a cute little old lady. i asked her if the tip money went to her or the company. she said the company. i gave her a tip in cash, put it in her hands, and then told her to have a great day. she scampered away (thank god she didn't try to hit on me – i wasn't her type).

and the pizza? too salty.

-stef

happy august!

let the BEST MONTH EVER begin!

let summer actually begin! let FuNTIMESFOREVR finally begin! let stress and work cease for a few weeks, while i move into my new swanky Culver City apartment, let beach parties and bon fires and porch barbeques and sitting on rooftops lesson-planning commence!

let going to the movies and going out to bars and riding bikes to the beach be my priorities for a week!

i'm finally done with TFA and it's time for a party!

woot!
-stef

the day the earth moved

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

i was wrapping up my lesson today and collecting assessments, trying to quiet everyone down, when i felt a sudden jolt. the ground felt like it was moving in waves. it was amazingly wavy. i never thought an earthquake would feel like this. i didn't notice shaking, like i'd expected, but felt it most in my feet and my legs. it felt like i was getting dizzy from the feet up, my head and torso were where i wanted them, but i felt my feet moving on their own. i thought i could hear the earth moving, the whole world around me creaking.

at the same time, i have 30 young pairs of eye focused completely on me. i see their expressions changing to mirror mine. i imagine my face and the look of horror that must be on it.

as soon as i realize what is actually happening, as soon as i can find the words to put to it, the kids are already there too, screaming "earthquake" and doing the drill we practiced just the other day. duck and cover! everyone scrambles to fit under a tiny middle school desk and get themselves as close to the ground as possible. i make sure all the kids are properly tucked under their desks and then dive under one myself, trying to calm everyone down as i try to gather my own thoughts. "keep calm, even tone, don't panic or you'll make things worse." the kids are screaming, some of them are shaking their desks. a voice comes over the loudspeaker, "this is not a drill." how could this be a drill?! i wonder. some things you can fake, but i can feel the tile and concrete rippling below me and rest assured, the last thing i was thinking was that this was a drill!

crouched under my desk, my shins flat against the classroom tile, a million thoughts are rushing thru my head: first, amazement at the seismic waves, which in that moment, i can actually feel. when i'd imagined earthquakes before this, i always thought of – what else? – the movies. i thought of The Land Before TIme, the earth erupting and shifting around itself, huge columns of earth and rock jutting out around me, huge chasms appearing suddenly to divide and separate people. i was imagining a textbook hypothetical earthquake – the kind that separates populations and results in genetic drift.

instead, what i actually experienced was quite different, and thus probably more terrifying and confusing ("what is this strange feeling?") but in retrospect, my confusion was merely a product of my fascination, my pleasant surprise: here was something far more pleasant and less violent, more a rocking than a shaking. never would i have imagined such fluidity – i could feel the building's materials actually undulating under my body. i can feel the pulsing of earth and steel and concrete below me, and for a moment i am painfully aware of the earth's mantle and the layers of pulsing magna on which all of us float – unaware – everyday.

then, sheer wonder at the elasticity of the ground below me. i can practically feel it stretching with the moving earth. things i once thought were solid, immovable, dense and hard were now apparently bending with the flow of the earth below. i'm amazed and surprised by the newness of my understanding of the earth and the materials around me, interacting with and witnessing it in new capacities as i wait for the ground to split around me.

i imagine the earth opening up and swallowing us whole. i imagine my parents freaking out when they hear or see it on the news. i think about Lexington, KY and that sweet foundation of limestone on which it sits, and how growing up i checked earthquakes off my mental list of things i had to worry about/ natural disasters/ unfortunate ways to die, b/c limestone bedrock basically meant 2 things: 1) SOLID AS A ROCK; and 2) strong horses (limestone = calcium-enriched bluegrass = strong and healthy bones). i tell my students Fernando and Lillie about it on the way back from the gym blacktop to our classroom, and they tell me that KY sounds nice right now (no truer words, Fernando. no truer words...)

i remember kneeling on the floor, seeing all my summer school students huddled down with me, looking to me with large, pleading eyes, watching to see what i did. never have i been so scared or worried, feeling at once that child-like instinct to look for protection, to call home, to curl up in a fetal position, but also feeling suddenly adult, the gaze of 30 children's eyes.

i remember, as i felt the rippling earth below me, thinking that we'd gotten the drill all wrong: in an earthquake, the ground is the last place you want to be. i kept thinking, if the ground splits and opens up beneath me, i don't want to be close to it, i want to be by the ceiling, dangling monkey-style from the fluorescent lights, watching it all open up beneath me. sudden panic gripped me: in all other situations in which safety is an issue, your first instinct is to run, to get as far away from the thing causing you stress and harm as possible. crouching on the floor, i realized that i was staring my immediate danger in the face. i was basically eskimo-kissing it. the earth – the way it was moving, these disconcerting waves, the unpredictability, the unknowing of how long it would last, how bad it would be, what to do besides wait – had me trapped. i was struck by a sense of paralysis, vulnerability. i could run, but no matter where i went, my feet would be on the ground. i cursed gravity for keeping me earth-bound.

i manage to get the students lined up quietly inside the room. we walk single-file to the blacktop in the middle of Watts, me counting students and accounting for everyone (my heart nearly stops when i remember that i let Javier go to the bathroom just moments before the earthquake, and the thought of him getting hurt or lost in the chaos is enough for me to justify a stricter no-bathroom policy). we walk onto the steaming blacktop, and sit down in a group. an administrator comes by to take down numbers and names, while students are clamoring for information. teachers are frantically calling relatives and loved ones on cell phones, only to find the lines jammed. i try to keep my students calm by talking to all of them. they ask me if i'm scared. i tell them i'm being honest when i say i've never been more scared in my life, but that i also knew things were going to be ok, and that i'm glad it happened at school, that it's probably the safest place to be right now. they begin telling me how scared they were. Kevin is anxious to run home and see if his granny is ok. Miguel wants to go, he doesn't want classes for the rest of the day. Deandre is complaining about the hot hot blacktop and how his legs are burning. i tell all the kids to pull out their journals and write about the earthquake today, how they felt, what went thru their minds, to write about it so they could remember years from now and tell their kids about the day they were at summer school with their new teacher Ms. Lee when an earthquake hit. i told them that this made today special, that because of what happened today, i would never ever forget them, or forget Markham, because we shared this scary moment together. i told my students that when i got home, i was going to write a journal just like the one i was asking them to write, so i could share it with my own kids when i had them.

Lonnisha looks at me and asks "do you have kids, Ms. Lee?" i pause, i smile, and i say, "not yet, Lonnisha. but some day, i hope i do. and i will tell them about my first earthquake, and about all of you..."

-stef

earthquake!

this happened today:
an earthquake of 5.4 on the Richter scale. (when it first happened, we heard reports of it being a 5.8)

i'm ok, just a little shaken (no pun intended).

thoughts in a few,
stef

Aladdin from Compton

couldn't resist.

should we pretend?

from Dr. Dog's "The Rabbit The Bat and The Reindeer," off their new album Fate (2008):

Well, I don't want a thing to do with your kind
And I ain't got no time to kill on your dime
Strung up, hanging 'round
Looking like you're upside down

Well, I ain't wanting to shed no blood, that's your crime
And I ain't wanting to sling no mud, I clean it up
You ain't what I'd call a friend
I wouldn't even if I could pretend
Man, you ain't like anybody else

As night becomes the sun to rise
As dirt becomes the butterflies
As sure as though it always seems to stay the same
And I'll be waiting anxiously
And I'll be falling fast asleep
And I'll be dreaming of the day the dream died
Uh huh

No sticks, no stones could break my bones like you can
If I knew hate, I'd call it love for you, man
High up on the hill, cheaper than a dollar bill
Man, you ain't like anybody else

Should we pretend that it's the end?
Are you my curse or are you my friend?
And if we got hit to the end of the road
Will you be there to carry my load?

I'm getting it back with that terrible feeling
My vision is cracked, but it looks like it's healing
I'm getting it back like it's four in the morning
When the sun only shines as if it's giving a warning
I'm getting it back with the rest of the leap year
I'm keeping the rabbit, the bat, and the reindeer
I'm getting it out, whatever I've gotta keep in
I'm telling the truth, said it don't win with pretend
Should we pretend?
Should we pretend?
Should we pretend?

check it: [mp3]
(and check out the new album. it really hits home in the second half, makes me forget to move at high speeds, reminds me to take 'er easy and wind down for a sit and stare on a windy porch...)

love-ing it. it's thursday night, which means i'm probly gonna be awake to greet Friday morning.

never have i been so eager to Thank God for it!

-stef

just had the shittiest day.

no, make that: "having the shittiest month."

EVER.

i welcome june 2010 with open arms!

(but will settle for august 2008 for now...)

sleep-deprived and depressed,
stef

"in" love

i'd like to have a conversation with the ppl who put words to the feeling "falling in love."

i'd like to know what they were thinking. i'd like to know if this strange consuming empty feeling – this gripping helplessness and vulnerability, this confusion – is what they'd imagined for people in such a state. or, am i getting it all wrong? is this really "stress-induced fever"? "vertigo"? or perhaps "stomach flu"? maybe i need my appendix removed?

did they know that they were articulating a feeling very different from simply "loving someone"? it scares me because there's a preposition: "in" – i'm inside it(?!) – i've fallen – "fallen in" – was there a trip wire i didn't see? was this the result of some trickery, some carelessness on my part? must i be hurt at the end? or is there a mattress i can rest my head on at the bottom of this tunnel? maybe a trampoline?

and is there a way out?

summer breeze

sitting on my bluff today, watching the sun set into a line of fluorescent smog (or whipped mountain top), my toes digging into powdered dirt and sand while my hands feel the bulge of dinner and overindulgence in too many cups of milk and hibiscus tea settling in my tummy

the air is perfect, the breeze on the edge of this cliff smells and tastes like salty sea air, if i close my eyes or unfocus them on a distant point in the mountains beyond the city, i forget that i am not on the keel of some tall ship, the gentle rocking of the earth below me like the pulse of soft sea waves at night

it's a feeling i wish i could knit into a summer sweater. i don't have much use for sweaters in the heat of summer, but sometimes a sweater is just what you need, you know? the interwoven tangled wooliness reminds me of hands, delicate fragile veiny old woman hands, remind me of my grandmother and toggle buttons and pastel pink rabbit hair yarn, and remind me of the sea, somehow. i think it goes like this: when i was little, i was fascinated and horrified by the story of the Titanic. i was terrified of the sea and of boats and of drowning, i imagined sinking - my lungs filling with water - was the worst way to die. but then i insert a small pink sweater into the scenario, and there's warmth, there's temperature control. the sweater has pockets for little hands (somewhere there are mittens waiting to be matched) and a hood with ears, and the smell of home and dry coziness. i imagine floating on icy water all night waiting to be rescued while my grandmother wraps me in layers and layers of hand-knit sweaters, and it's like she's building me an island beneath my feet to stand on.

i don't need a life preserver; i just need something soft and warm.

wtf moment #239

this was me on thursday evening, ~10 pm PST, in my dorm room on the LMU campus (click to enlarge):

(the last/first one reads: "i haven't slept >4 hours in 5 fucking days and they're going to blast music right outside my door and try to convince me it's a party?!
OH HELL NO!!!!!")

vital stats:
cumulative sleep for the past week/ 5 days: 7 hours
number of lesson plans to write: 2 (1 final, 1 rough)
number of visual aid posters to make: 2
number of assessments and worksheets to create: 3 (1 end-of-class quiz, 1 in-class-note-taking worksheet, 1 mid-term)
number of hours remaining to finish work, try to sleep, shower, throw on some "business casual" and hoof it to the bus: 8
cups of green tea imbibed: 3
physical affect: delirium - in the form of uncoordinated stumbling, slurring of words, sleep-talking and bouts of narcolepsy

= h8s tf@ and their confusing doublespeak. (DON'T TELL ME TO DROP THE LESSON PLAN AND STILL EXPECT IT TO BE FINISHED ON TIME IF YOU DON'T GIVE ME TIME TO SLEEP OR BREATHE!)

fin.
-stef

updates on the fly!

yo!

quickies:
-i started teaching 6th grade summer school English this week (this is only day 2 of instruction. huzzah!)
-it is going well and i love teaching and feeling like i did a great job when all my students are getting the answers on their assessments right. that is pretty cool.
-also: getting used to introducing myself as "Ms. Lee" and being called by that name. weird at first, fo sho, but def growing on me.
-as much as i love teaching and i love the kids, i am getting to hate the routine. and it's not a teaching issue, it's more of a corporation/management issue. i'm pretty sure that no matter how hard i try to love "the man" the more "the man" hates down on me. *shrug* i'm over it.
-totally sleep-deprived today. only got 2 hours in-between running to make copies, drawing posters, assembling work packets and writing 4 feckin lesson plans last night. this shit is bananas. teachers need to sleep!
-so much work to do tonight: grading tests and worksheets, entering data into a tracker, ANOTHER lesson plan and set of worksheets to make (WTF?!) and they also expect me to go to an evening session from 7:30 to 9?! i couldn't even stay awake during the day sessions...

in sum: being in california and not sleeping and maybe slightly because of my company, is wreaking havoc on my english.

WANTING TO SHOOT MYSELF IN THE FACE (cuz i've already shot myself in the foot!)
-stef

+ smells!

in continuation of my Venice Beach post, i was delighted to find in one upscale boutique a display of Chris Brosius's I Hate Perfume collection. i thought CB's scent philosophy was so fascinating, i always resented the fact that Brooklyn was such a far distance to travel, or that modern technology hadn't discovered a way to transport scent across the internet.
my favorite was Winter 1972, maybe more the concept than the scent. i love the idea and the way the smell kinda helps me put that memory in mind. that's all i really want in a bottle of expensive scent, anyway. i'm not buying the commodity, i'm buying the memory...

the interesting thing about CB's perfume is that, despite how much i love the concept, i have absolutely no desire to buy it for myself. and, i think, ppl who do, totally misunderstand CB's perfume philosophy. to them, it's still a perfume; those memories aren't their own.

i wish instead that CB specialized in bottling those scents we wish to keep, and that you could commission him to travel to your home and sit in that closet with you, taking deep breaths, and he'd write in his notebook the ingredients he'd need to distill this place into a scent: aged fur, your mother's leather purse, the silk scarves from Spain yr father bought yr mother when they were dating. the smell of untouched old clothing and what you've always supposed is the smell of moth balls but still aren't quite sure. the smell of tarnished metal jewelry and belt buckles, the smell of soft light sifting thru plastic garment bags and winding thru sleeves, a sliver of light shining on your face as you sit on the floor of your parents' closet, your arms around your knees, pulling yourself in tight and feeling hugged by all your parents' clothing, hanging down around you like a willow tree. (we'd call this one "In My Parent's Closet, 1990-2000").

if i could, i would create scents named after particular instances in my life, like "April 2007-Spring is Almost Here" and "May 2008-The Summer is Almost Over." and they would remind me of love and precious, urgent friendship, the smell of humidity and muggy Oxford air, the swan pond and sunsets on the roof, sunlight thru tree leaves in the woods and the sweet warm smell of cottonwood blooms lining the streets of Oxford and the smell of sprinkler dew lingering on the grass at night. and i would create another: "Every Summer Before This" and that would smell like sunlight shining in thru curtains and blinds in my room at home in Lexington, old dusty books and wood wax, sweat and pool chlorine and my mother's homemade lemonade and the smell of gas grilled steaks and crisp romaine in a wooden bowl with blueberries and freshly cut apples. and lightning bug luminescence after a summer evening rain, bare feet on soft carpet, VHS tapes, tennis balls and tennis shoe rubber, sunscreen and sun-exposed skin after a cold shower, and my bed at home. the smell of softness and peace.

and there'd be others i'd want bottled too, like "The Windate Writing Center - At Night" and "Serious Relationship #2". and there'd be another called "A Hug", which would be the smell of someone you love holding you tight, your face buried in their chest or your cheek against their neck, and the smell of their laundry and their hair and the warmth of their skin thru their shirt. and there'd be another called "Bike Ride - Spring/Summer/Fall/Winter & Lexington/Oxford/Suburbs/Woods/Chicago" which would remind me of open air and my hair blowing around my face, and the excitement and anticipation of adventure. clean, crisp air filling your lungs and your hair, billowing your clothes like a parachute around your body.

with fond memories and olfactory sensations,
stephanie

now that you're gone...

"now that you're gone, things don't seem the same.
i may just have to give them different names...
like 'soaking wet blanket,' for the sky.
and 'faded black stars,' for your eyes..."

-from Eef Barzelay's "Song for Batya"

i really liked listening to this song this afternoon after i came back from a 1.5 hour run. i just kept running, starting on LMU's campus, the doors of my dorm, and it felt like the sidewalk opened up before me and i wanted to run until i reached the edge of everything and could peer over the side, maybe sit on that edge and dangle my feet off the end of the earth. i imagine the expanse of space feeling like a cool stream tickling my toes...

i ended up running through one parade, an outdoor concert/festival (there were men dressed as army men, singing that song that goes "living in america..." and there were people clothed in american flags eating hot dogs and cotton candy), a block party, a cookout, a grocery store (where i realized i could buy apples for almost $2/pound cheaper than where i'm going now, though it's a far longer distance to walk), a pool party, someone's garden that i thought was an extension of sidewalk, to the roof of a greenhouse where i stopped for a while under a gnarly tree to think and look out over the expanse of L.A. city and wave at the Pacific, then kept running and running until i realized i'd reached the airport and there were planes landing overhead and decided to turn around.

i came back, not any less frustrated or unhappy (no runner's high this time, which was an unfortunate disappointment, the last time i ran for far less and felt like i'd just gone to the moon! - though my shin cramps the next day felt like punishment) and decided to keep walking until i cooled down. i went to the bluffs, where i like to sit and watch hummingbirds in the trees, but this time i found a lawn chair waiting for me on a rocky ledge, away from the trees but on the very brink of the bluff, and sat there and looked across L.A., wondering what the ppl of this city were doing to celebrate their country.

i came back and did some stretches in the dark, and listened to Eef, and for some reason, those words stood out.

and now, again, i hear Eef's words over the whir of my mind and my laptop:

"...but i still want to jump..."

happy independence day
-stef

the army had half-a-day...

i'm not a huge patriot, but, i gotta say: i'm particularly grateful for the July 4 holiday this year. in fact, it may be finding its place as my favorite holiday of the year so far, because TFA is only doing half-a-day tomorrow.

which, thankfully, means a slew of awesome things for me and my currently lamentable social life:
1) i get to sleep in!! (i get to wake up at 7, rather than 5 am! WOOT.)
2) i don't have to wake up early and get on a fucking school bus (and then proceed to try to sleep thru blaring top 40 radio music. yes, it's like middle school all over again...)
3) i don't have to fight thru 9 hours of physical shutdown, and i can actually try to enjoy the teacher training sessions, rather than worrying about the next time i'll get to use the bathroom or having to sacrifice food or sleep time to get work done
4) i don't have to ride a bus back from training, which means i can high-tail it outta there as soon as we close, which means as soon as we close, i am grabbing my weekend bag and hitting it on foot, walking to the closest coffee shop to drink an iced tea and read a book, and taking a nap until my friend Mike picks me up for our July 4 non-patriot plans (we're both film nerds, so we'll be having a film night and maybe some Thai food... maybe heading to a hipster dance party in Echo Park)

with work being exhausting and not feeling like i'm in a stable, safe, or comfortable mental or emotional state, all i really want right now is to go home and be safe and warm and taken care of for a while. i want a bed that feels like it's mine and be able to lock myself in the bathroom and take a warm bath and listen to my music loud and run around barefoot and make myself tea in a clean kitchen. and of course, more than anything, i want my mom's home-cooked meals and the privilege of not having to explain myself to anyone or feeling like i'm constantly being judged. yes, that would be nice.

i'm going to spend the weekend with my uncle and aunt, maybe go for a long walk and think about things. when i started this post i was extremely happy and thursday felt like a friday and tomorrow felt like a weekend, but now i'm remembering there is work still to be done, confusion still to surmount, and now feeling insecure and unsure of something i never thought to doubt (and feared having to doubt the most) and there's no way home to see things right, so i'm facing the painful realization of being stuck.

-stephanie