Recap + Resituate = Renew

I decided to move to Savannah on a gut instinct--there were no rational or practical reasons for me to do so.  I didn't have a job lined up, no one to move here for or that it made sense for me to settle in this city.  I think when I left Los Angeles back in April of last year, there were a few things at work: my spirit was being depleted and I could feel it as I scrambled to do what was merely rote, hardly managing to create anything although I wanted to, my relationships with family and friends skimmed at the surface, the markings of an illogical love affair beginning to rear its nasty head, my skin breaking out from the pollution and exhaustion and combination of unwanted stress and general ennui that seemed to infect my life in LA.  I was curious to discover Tennessee or Atlanta or whatever else would reveal itself to me.   I think once I began my journey to The South and started to discover its beauty, its deep meaning and subtle revelations, a seed was planted to settle somewhere, here there, but somewhere in The South.

I love Los Angeles and I always will, but it was time for me to leave.  I drove cross-country by myself--the open road reminding me of the vistas and pulsing images coursing through my mind, as I slept in LA,  daydreaming or remembering past lives, future visions or present encounters.  I aimed for Tennessee, Ragmar's invitation was my only cause.  I only had to get to Tennessee, at that point, and all would be fine.

After eight days, I found myself driving off of a highway clearly marked on my iPhone Google map into roads that became smaller and smaller and less distinct as night descended--bends and curves melding into darkness and quiet.  I wonder still to this day: How did people navigate foreign roads before GPS?  Sure, there's a Thomas Guide--that's what I used back in the day to get from Point A to Point B, but what did they use before GPS?  Before Thomas Guides?  Instinct?  Sure.  Landmarks, markers.  That's what I had to learn, eventually, during the short amount of time I lived in the country when bends in the roads and darkness intertwined.  Thank Divinity that Ragmar met me on the road leading to his house when he did.  I would not have found the entrance to his kingdom otherwise...

[Note to Self and You: Ragmar's Kingdom shall be written about more in depth soon... I have much to catch up on, but his kingdom, The Retreat and its inhabitants not only deserve to be written about more in depth, but, also, because we have much to learn from them....]

After two months in the backwood country of Tennessee, I then set out to find my next destination: Atlanta.  I stayed with my friend, Charles, for a day or two.  He is my big bro--one of the sweet lights in my life--and his home will always feel like home to me, just due to his generous nature and the nature of our relationship.  I've known him since I was two years old... or, gosh, maybe still in the womb?  I don't know.  He and his sister, Leigh--our stories always get conflated.  The three or four of us (including my younger sister, Cleo) grew up with stories of our parents--how they met, how they grew up-- and his mother, Belle-- a beautiful Chinese American woman born in Mississippi, was always a comforting, familiar person/presence in my life, as were they.  I had already stayed in Charles' house in Atlanta for a long weekend when I was still living in the country in Tennessee and taking weekend jaunts to this place or that place.  After my two months in Tennessee seemed to come to an end I set out for Charles and Atlanta.

Atlanta reminded me too much of Los Angeles, but in a Southern way.  I loved that when going to the Whole Foods market in Atlanta, I was surrounded by Black people.  White people were the minority.  Actually, that was the only "cool" thing that stood out to me as an unusual and remarkable moment during my time in Atlanta--upscale, food-conscious Blacks checking labels and the ingredients of food as a few White people did the same.  Always, in the scheme of things--of White and Black--I was the voyeur, a mere Asian or "Oriental" to be looked at, studied or misinterpreted, and yet still looking, studying and [mis-]interpreting "them"--a weird, strange, beautiful, decadent conflation of necessity and privilege, but there was too much traffic in Atlanta--congestion, too many "city" people unsettled, searching, going, doing and masked by bravado or tenuous certainty.

Then, my friend, Fitz, invited me to Savannah... I was so close, why not?  When would I get the opportunity again to check it out being so far from home, so way out east?  Why the hell not?  My best friend, Ziggie, had lived here after she graduated from Vassar--her roomie was from an old Savannah family and it was the perfect post-college segway for her to gain some work experience before going on to grad school.  She lived here for a year during the 1990s.  When I decided to settle here, now, she asked me, "Why???"  The Savannah she knew then was so different from the Savannah I experienced now in 2010.

She said the Savannah she knew, then, was scary... and I could see or understand how that could be--a mere fifteen years ago.  Savannah is cast with the dripping grey tendrils of Spanish Moss--haunting, eerie, lovely and romantic.  Perhaps, fifteen years ago in 1995, the dirtiness of Savannah was even dirtier; the darkness, darker: spells cast from its Antebellum past, Blacks disenfranchised, even more close to the Eighties, the Civil Rights Movement, Slavery.  There is a dark history in The South--not ever to be forgotten or unacknowledged, misunderstood or not made right (if it can be made right), but the darkness that Ziggie may have encountered a mere fifteen years ago is not what I encountered or discovered in 2010.

Savannah, when I first met her, made me squeal on my Facebook page, "OMG.  I've been fucked and died and gone to fucking heaven!!"  Yeah, yeah... I know.  So crass.  But that's me, too (at times... I can't help it :-)).  But, I couldn't help it!  After driving for miles upon miles from the traffic and congestion of Atlanta, I arrived into a helping of trees and darkness and dripping Spanish Moss and I felt like I had been released into something beautiful  and dark, then delivered into something more... nothing I could wrap my head around then, just utter beauty.  Refreshing dark, dark beauty.

I have been fortunate to see and experience many different sides of Savannah since I've been here (some of my experiences to be recapitulated in another blog entry): the privileged, the Black, the White, the immigrant Asians and Latinos, the artists, the darkness, the light.  Most of my time thus far has been spent as an observer--always taking notes to write further about.  When, in October, my apartment was broken into and my beloved computer stolen, I had to nurse some wounds and learn how to live again without immediate access to the tool I've used to write, but I am blessed and a computer has been returned once again to my hands.  Though I wanted to write on my blog (and otherwise) I was forced to learn how to do so again using only the most simple of devices: pen and paper.

When my apartment was broken into and my computer was stolen and after having such a difficult time finding a job here, I thought "Savannah doesn't want me.  Maybe I don't belong here."  But other things, people and experiences have manifested since then.  The overriding theme, however, of my time in Savannah has been the generous, genuine hospitality of the people--they don't it call "The Hostess City of The South" for nothing.  I think it was the true hospitality I experienced over and over again that made me fall-in-love with this city and its people.  As the days grow since I've been here and I'm less of a visitor and becoming more of a settler, I still encounter people's warmth and generosity.  Though I've encountered difficulties since I've been here, it is the people and the heart of Savannah that makes me feel like I have arrived Home.

Getting Oriented to the South

It's a good thing that I don't have a problem with being "Oriental" anymore.  If I was in my twenties I would take offense at the label.  So archaic.  So cliche.  So not PC or haven't you read Edward Said?  I'm not a carpet. I'm not a thing, I'm not something for you to own or claim as your territory.  But, I'm nearly forty (OMG!) and can separate my own identity politics now from you or from the rest of the country.  Anyway, do identity politics even matter anymore?  It's rare that I meet people in their twenties who think about issues of identity or who are continuing an active, intrepid dialogue.  I can think of a hanfdul of some young people I've come to know, but they seem like a rare breed nowadays.

Here, in the South I'm still Oriental.  Now, rather than being offended, I'm charmed--by their ignorance, by their backwardness, by the rewinding of a cultural clock that tells me, "You're in a different world," and I'm not talking the 80s Cosby show spin-off (though, that would be frickin cool as shit.  Hm?  Maybe a visit to Morehouse or Tuskegee is in the future?).  I don't take offense or feel the need to be defensive when I've been called "Oriental."  I don't take it personally.  "Oriental" is just a word.  In fact, it's kind of a cool word.  It's so exotic. 

Although, I am sensitized to being an "Oriental" lady in the South, and a single one at that.  I wonder what I conjure in the minds of Southern people.  Something like this

or this

It's different being Asian in Los Angeles or New York or any other large metropolitan city.  There, I blend in and have many like-minded people to relate to or talk openly about differences with.  Race is still shrouded in mystery here in the South.  The legacy of slavery is a ring of guilt and pain that everyone wears on a finger, but no one talks about it much.  People are just simply polite about issues of race now.  I have found it difficult to speak with people about it, especially White people.  I have often wondered which bathroom I would have used if I had visited during segregation.

I am not one to shy away from controversy or, more importantly, necessity.  One of the first things I did when I moved to Savannah was get in touch with my Oriental roots.  I went on a quest to find all the Asian restaurants and markets.  Food is always my touchstone for where I am in the world.  My friend, Fitz, warned me that there were no good Japanese restaurants to be found in Savannah and I took heed, but I was also baffled.  Really? There has to be a good Japanese restaurant!  I mean, we've been around forever.  I tried a handful of Japanese restaurants, but Fitz was right: there are no good Japanese restaurants in town.  They're all owned or operated by Chinese or Malaysian people.  I thought at the very least they must be able to make decent sushi; there's so much seafood here!  Spicy tuna roll is my barometer: chopped maguro and the fatty part of the tuna mixed with a bland, semi-sweet mayo and Japanese chili powder, then combined with green onions or  layered with julienned cucumbers onto well-seasoned, not too sweet, perky rice and crisp seaweed.  While in Savannah, I've been served sashimi chunks, literal slabs of fish on rice,  "spicy tuna roll" with tabasco, drenched with a questionable "spicy sauce," or, if they're somewhat inventive and know their Asian condiments, Sriracha.

When I was sweltering in the 95 degree Savannah heat, I had a hankering for neng myun--chewy, thin buckwheat noodles and delicately cut cucumbers, carrots, and radishes served in an ice cold beef broth that you flavor with a mixture of vinegar and mustard or in a sweet spicy Korean chili sauce.  I found Kim Chee on Montgomery--mind you, the only Korean restaurant in Savannah, but so good.  The fact that even have neng myun is an indication of a decent Korean population here and the fact that it's good is a revelation.

The Asian markets have been a fun mission to seek out.  There is a small store located next to Kim Chee that has a decent selection of a variety of Asian goods, aptly named "Asia Market" (Asian stores and markets in Savannah tend to be very literal or easily identifiable by the most popular food, hence Kim Chee.  I suppose, so as to avoid confusion).  Chinatown Market (with nary a "Chinatown" in sight, mind you) is a study in blind sightings.  You could easily pass the facade of the store because its sign can be overlooked--located off a "busy," one-way street and difficult to navigate into the compact parking lot.  Though you enter "Chinatown Market," you would not know that there is anything "Chinatown" about it by the merchandise that you first see (except for the Oriental man or woman at the counter).  As I ambled through the rows of canned and dry American goods, a Black man came from behind the meat section and asked me kindly, "Are you finding everything you need?"  I nodded, but asked, "Is this all there is?"  He knew what I meant and led me into a backroom--the stockroom.  I ventured cautiously as he led me into the backroom--a strange place to lead a customer.  I followed him and was happily surprised by rows and rows of Asian products:  Pocky and jelly candies, dried Thai rice noodles, wakame and konbu seaweed, fish sauce, Vietnamese profiteroles, pungent roots and stinky dried goods, frozen baos and har gow, and a refrigerated room full of Chinese longbeans, bok choy and daikon.  There is also a very good Korean market store right around the corner from my house--Han Le Oriental (of course) Grocery.

I don't mind being Oriental here and I like that the spicy tuna is to be desired.  Anyway, the shrimp here is marvelous.

Dark Chocolate and Roses in Savannah

I am a romantic. I watch for rainbows and moonshine, summer nights and stars, signs, gestures, moments of revelation. I like boys who know how to play fairly, guys who smell good and men who mean what they say.  To dance with him, to spend nights in his arms, to be admired and adored and to have heart-to-heart pillowtalks... I live for that shit. I can't help it. It's the way I'm made.

I also love getting presents. Thoughtful gifts, something made by hand, the presents that when received make you say, "Oh my god. You knew! How did you know?"--the ones that show you they were present all along... he watched and listened during carefree moments or when you had your glassy eyes on while shopping and talked crazily because you wanted this and that and oh god he's bored and you try to entertain him while still making mental notes about all the stuff you need. Later, he gives you a gift that says, "Here. I heard you. I know what you like."  Most of the time I get the best presents from my best girlfriends who just know what it is good, what is quality, what is fun and what we dream about most in our heart of hearts.  From guys, it's mostly chocolate and roses.

These days I'm having to give presents to myself. I take long hot salt baths and I continue to try to stay open everyday... not to danger or intrigue, but to comfort, softness and revelation. Savannah has eased me into Southern time--going with the flow, not being so hasty or reactive, listening, dawdling, enjoying my walks, receiving and giving back in a gentle, kind way.

It's been difficult at times. I'm an L.A. girl. I'm used to moving quickly and making things move faster if I need to get somewhere or have something in by a certain time. I've had to adjust. It's all in sync, though, with everything else I'm trying to do in my life: be present, stay mindful, love myself, be kind to myself and others, do the hard work, accept reality and strive toward my future.

Dark chocolate and roses are my recent revelation. I admit, both are kind of cheesy. When I've been the recipient of such gifts I've always gladly accepted them, except there's always a small part in me that asks, "Really? Is this the best you can do? How cliche." Yet, secretly, pushing my inner jaded snob aside, I'll get tickled and think prom! first dates! awkward boys! cute... awwwwwwww.... Dark chocolate and roses are heartfelt gestures from sweet boys. I heart them.

Mostly because I love dark chocolate and roses. He knew! The bittersweet chocolate--dark, rich, swimming quickly along your tongue, settling in hidden recesses of your mouth--when roses coat the sharpness of the chocolate and lessen its bitterness. Petals wafting into your throat and softening, soothing, mingling the scent and taste of roses and dark chocolate, I inhale and taste.

While in Savannah I've been experimenting with dark chocolate. I'm open to all kinds of dark chocolate, but what I seek is that savory sweet bitterness and almonds! It's hard to find good dark chocolate with just the right amount of almond crunch, flavor and texture.  Almonds are woody and hard to the bite--they have texture and flavor, crispness.  I like dark chocolate with other nuts, too, but hazelnuts and macadamia can be too soft and buttery. I like bite and flavor with my dark chocolate. I buy different brands of chocolate bars at Parker's, a 24-hour gourmet gas station, or Fresh Market, Savannah's mediocre attempt at Whole Foods, and then store them in my freezer when I have a hankering for something sweet. Tonight was a revelation! Valrhona's Caraibe Noisette! The elegant packaging, with its delicate gold foil that makes you feel like you're unwrapping a winning Wonka bar, is just a slight indication of the treat you are about to indulge in.  Sharp dark chocolate, slightly bitter and barely sweet (frozen is the best: you bite off only what you can chew--crisp!--and then let it savor in your mouth as it melts), minced almonds... then let the goodness mix with Tazo's Wellbeing, Tazo Rest: "a lulling blend of rose petals, valerian root & citrusy herbs" and luxuriate in the blend. Let the flavors soothe you.

Dark chocolate and roses are the presents to myself now.

Lost and Found

Somewhere I veered off course.  When I started this blog, I thought it would be a mere documentation of my travels through The South.  I started off with a bang after I left LA and traversed Hwy 40, jotting down the kind of food I ate, the songs I listened to, the sunsets I saw.  Traveling opens up your world again and alights the senses--everything is anew and fresh; driving on an open highway is like automotive yoga--it clears blocked energy and attunes you to a greater body at work.  Using my iPhone as a compass and Ragmar's Kingdom as my destination, I thought that was where I was headed and where I would find Liberty.

My friend lives in Liberty, Tennessee, after all, hence the name of the blog.  I think I simply hoped that it would be my final destination and where I would realize a triumphant release.  I did jump off a 20-foot cliff into a river and I walked a mile on a winding forest road in the pitch black of night.  I became friendly with insects, the sultry heat of a Southern summer, and experienced the exact solitude of being human--vital and vulnerable--in a wooded world stirring with life all around.  I wrote about some of my adventures and discoveries, although I censored myself from writing about the wonderful world of faeries I had stumbled upon because I did not feel knowledgeable enough or qualified to write about them.  Instead, I wrote about or to distract me from what I was consumed by: these temporal fixations and hang-ups that came in the name of a boy, but were plagued and fueled by a demon much greater than him.

You may think I have lost my mind.  Writing about faeries and demons and such.  Crazy.  No, I actually encountered them in the woods of Tennessee.  I found a delightful group of faeries who nurtured and tended to me during my two months there and I also began seeing the demon growing inside me as I was left to my own devices deep in the backwoods, 2,000 miles from my loved ones in Los Angeles.  I became bosom buddies with a regenerating bottle of Bullit--a fantastic bourbon whiskey from Kentucky--and drank myself silly.  I dealt with some issues around my father, this boy, and mostly myself and my own inequities during my time in Tennessee and in order to cope with the pain of going deeper and deeper, I drank.

Somehow, I stumbled into my car (not drunk, just hungover) and made my way to Atlanta to visit my dear friend, Charles.  Then, I got back into my car and made my way to Savannah to visit my good friend, Fitz.  Fitz said I could stay at his mother's house, who was away for the summer, and I arrived at a lovely row house in the Historic District and parked my car.  I stayed there for three weeks, slowly losing my mind to Bullit, but the gentle arm of Savannah cradled me and helped me to regain my senses. I stopped drinking and decided to stay.

That is all I will write for now.  It's been two months since I've had a drink.  I've gotten an apartment.  I've made some wonderful friends.  I feel at home here, at peace, and I am happy.  The Boy and I are still talking, but he becomes more and more distant as he continues with his shenanigans and I continue to tread a more honest path.

I will write more about faeries and demons, but I will also write more about The South because that was my intention to do so when I came out here.  I was derailed for awhile, but I am back on track.  I still don't know what this blog is really about or why I even bother to write it, but I do know that on each step of this journey I am coming closer and closer to finding liberty.  Also, I promise to include more photos.

What I Love About Men

I've been grappling with a lot recently--about what I get from men, why I stay hooked, what it is about men as opposed to women that I love and cherish and stay for.  I become infused and intertwined--with their journey, with their grapplings about life, with what they are seeking and wish to fulfill within themselves.  We are all imperfect creatures, but men don't have the same kind of emotional support network that women do.

I love sensitive men.  I love men who are grappling.  I love men who are willing to share their innermost fears and desires.  I love men who show me through our exchanges and soft, quiet moments what they need or what they might be struggling with.  When we break on through to the other side and there is a moment or accelerated journey through true identification of what we need or what we are really seeking in life then I am released.  I feel like my job has been done... for the time being.  Women do that naturally, willingly, I think amongst ourselves and with the ones we hold dear.  Men, however, especially if they didn't get that from their families or ones who are closest to them will hang on to whoever they can get that from--friends, lovers, family members, or true loves.  There is just not the same emotional support network for men as there is for women.  Men have to show and share amongst themselves true care and love--what they did not get from the men in their lives while they were growing up and move beyond the bounds and limitations of what "macho" love is and just share and engage in true understanding as friends--as men who "get it" and are there for each other as guys struggling on this journey of life and love.

I put a lot onto my men.  I expect a lot out of them.  I test and I challenge and I make them work for me--for this love, this deep, deep reservoir of love that I have and hold for them, maybe, if only, because women have always just been the reservoir of love and understanding that men cannot get otherwise.  If I see or know that they love me as deeply as I love them, my love will know no bounds.  I will go the distance, the extra mile, the absolute limits of what I believe love can be.  Love is unconditional.  Love is family.  Love is an endless journey of giving and taking and knowing and breaking your limits--and then, taking it all back and opening yourself up back to what you thought love could not deliver.

I've loved so many men in my life.  But I have never quite been willing to deliver myself completely to them, even though it may seemed like I did.  My Love is Great.  My love is too powerful.  And most have been overtaken or overwhelmed by the power of my love.

And then I have my own inequities and insecurities and inability to voice or show my true fear or discomfort about where my true fears or disquiet lies.  I want to, but I am scared.  I still haven't met the man that I can do that with.  Most of my fears rest in my body--as temporary as this physical place may be.  It is what is.  Most men have been drawn to me because of it, but then have never wanted to stay or love me despite it.  This physical body is a novel telling--a journey of what we have all gone through in life.  The problem is that most men (and women nowadays) are full of porn and/or the "perfect" girl/body/woman/man/guy and can't tell the difference between desire and real love.  Do we just want the "body" that is going to give them what we want at that time--that particular moment... or can we go the distance?  Because goddam, our bodies change!  Women's bodies make babies!  We expand and contort and scar and release and never stay the same.  We change. Can you deal with that change?  Can you still love us and hold us despite your own needs and desires, even though we may not embody what you really want physically, psychologically?

My talk about power does not rest in ego, though.  It does not rest in the chaos of love.  My love rests in the quiet and sweetness of being and sharing--as most women's love do.  The difficulty, usually, is that egos come into play, someone is more busy or caught up than the other, both are too scared to reveal what is truly going on in their minds and hearts, both want what they cannot have, but may have found it in the other completely and are too afraid to accept that love is what it is: plain and simple.  It's just love.

The love that I have for women is different--it's easy and fun, yet also layered and complicated by another deeper expectation of deliverance of who you really are and what you really are doing or embodying in your life.  With a man, they expect less, and they give you the softness that you might not get from the women in your life.  Men have given me a respite from the challenge and pressure I have felt from women to be or do certain things by a certain point--and that is, to say, simply by nature of where we are as women on a certain timeline, not necessarily because they are being bitches and making me feel bad about where I'm at or where they're at.  I have very supportive, amazing women in my life.  Truly remarkable, intelligent, beautiful women.  And, they, always, give me the unconditional love and support that I need when I am struggling and grappling or hurt.  A woman's love--no matter in what form: as friend, foe, lover, family or random link--is powerful and good.  A woman's love nurtures and forgives, reminds and fills, tests, challenges, pricks and then soothes and protects.  But a woman will always call you on your shit and do so point-blank; a man may not.

A man's love is different.  It challenges, surely, but it fills holes and gaps and finds its way into fissures and cracks in a way that a woman's love does not.  It soothes an open wound, it bathes tired skin, it lingers and gives where a woman will not.  If a man is truly a lover, he will linger and love and see and bathe in your open wounds, take them in and cherish still and then take the time to try to help heal what he can, as discomforting or painful as it may be for him, if only because he loves you.  Even when a man is trying to test you or his love for you, if he really is in love with you, he will be gentle.  All of that other madness or bullshit or anger or whatever is simply his own shit that he needs to work out despite you will eventually dissipate and become something else (if he finds his proper expression and release).  He will find another way to expend that frustration or anger, but then, you, as his love, will need to stay attentive and available in order to hold onto his love and you must not buckle.  You must stay there in order to love him truly... and it's difficult when they continue to hurt you.  But love between men and women is difficult: plain and simple.

That is why I stay hooked.  I've experienced that from men.  A few of them, not all of them.  But when I have it's sucked me in and made me give more and more.  Maybe I've known a few good men.  I don't know.  They've had their shortcomings, too, but where I appreciate them over the women in my life is that women want results.  Women want to know and see and believe that what they are doing and why we are doing this now is eventually going to see results.  The men in my life have been more forgiving.  I am probably over-generalizing, as I am prone to do, but this is just my take on things and gender roles and how I've perceived or experienced life and love to be between men and women thus far.  Men, actually, seem to be more forgiving and loving in the sweetest, most gentle of ways; women are more hardcore.  Women want results NOW,  men will be willing to see results later.  If you are a passive woman and don't know yourself yet then you will be willing to wait, but the older you get the less patient you will be to wait for the men to catch up with you.  Yet, love is this: initially intoxicating and inherent and then felt and longed for and met 

But, I don't know the first fucking thing about love or relationships.  Love is what it is and relationships are always in the making.  Love is what it is--and it's a goddam beautiful thing.  The rest of it is just life and living and figuring it all out...

All I do know is this: Love is beautiful.  Love is to be cherished and honored.  Love is rare.  Love is a good thing.  Love is something to tuck under your belt, hold close to your heart and then keep there forever and ever.  Love is good.  Love is forever.  Love is so goddam complicated, but gaddam, makes me so happy and full.  Love is worth it.

The Drunk Geisha

I can't seem to get my head together enough to write the blog entries I want to write, but I am starting to piece through old snippets of writing to try and put this huge jigsaw puzzle of a novel that I have together.  In the meantime, I came across this old "poem" I wrote years and years ago that I thought I'd post just for the hell of it.  I would never call myself a poet--just having fun and playing with words and form.  Enjoy!

The Drunk Geisha


Sitting with knees bent
and archless feet
tucked under a heavy bottom,
draped from the shoulders
with layers of onerous silk.
Her hand cups a wrist to pour
placations, inebriations
for men
wrestling with temptations.
They watch the stillness of her movement
listen to the slumber of her speech.
They wonder what the smile hides
what her mind may know
and what her beauty
will not tell them.
Onyx strands fall
against niveous skin
and guarded lids
cover lashes that slash her heart.
She administers alcohol or tea
to soothe their spirits
laughs at their jokes
and makes smalltalk
to fill the silence.
She is doing a job
that was assigned to her
by a male God
and taught to her by women.

When the evening is complete
and she has purged the men from her hold
she will consume the last drops of liquor
that made her so bold.
Tranquil bitters coat her tongue
Her head hung
Sitting, now bent
and hunched with repent
full of the woes
of being in the throes
of men, those damn men,
who tell her,
"You are simply a rose."

Her sister, the Dragon Lady, scoffs at her kin
says, "Girl, what's your problem?
Why you trippin?"
The Lady flicks her red nails and slugs from her drink,
tosses her black tress and gives her a wink,
"It's business, my friend.
You're not selling your soul.
Get off it, move on...
it's taking it's toll."

2/6/99

A Place Called Home

I've just landed in Savannah, Georgia--leaving behind certain travails and tribulations in Tennessee, having encountered a few glorious faery souls, encountering the dark and the quiet and the lushushness of the woods--and pulling into the park-like neighborhoods, trees draped with Spanish Moss, and the breathtaking Colonial, Federal and Victorian architecture of buildings and homes that have been here for centuries.  I walk past wrought iron gates and find my footing on sidewalks of uneven bricks, concrete and broken shells.

I'm mesmerized by this place, I'm mesmerized by the South.  I've been indoctrinated and seduced by each place I've encountered.  Whether it's the winding roads that by night look like a dopppelganger of another road I had already driven by day or the animals I've come to know and love, the insects I've been forced to accept, admire or endure, the different personalities or ways of living, the familiarity of loved friends who have welcomed me into their homes and given me a respite or place for me to gather and absorb and partake in their world and livelihoods... I have been mesmerized and truly grateful and yet still wondering.

When strangers ask me, "So, where are you from? What are you doing out here?"  I reply in a fashion that is now becoming staid: "I'm from LA.  I'm a writer.  I've never experienced the South."  Sure, my response, at the moment of discussion, may not be that bland and there are moments of more interesting conversations where I'm able to insert other anecdotes or supplementary information about why I am here or what I have experienced thus far, but the longer I am out here, just simply traveling (as much as I LOVE traveling and going from place to place), there are times when I have to ask myself, too: "So, where are you from?  What are you doing out here?"  Why am I here, where am I from, and what am I doing out here, anyway?"

It dawned on me tonight that I have been a hobo for way too long.  I've been basically couch-hopping (or rather beautifully bed- or home-hopping), HOPING that maybe I might find my home or my place if I went... to that next place.

Part of my problem is that I convolute or intertwine my feeling of security or home with a man.  Which, actually, I find curious when I'm one of the last women standing!  I'm a single woman here now--almost 40--by choice.  I did not or never wanted to be "that," I never thought I would turn "that age"... it just happened, and then being single at my age also happened by choice.  Mostly because I never found the man who I wanted to be with and I think I held out for that for most of my twenties and thirties, despite my personal beliefs.  

It was like this: if I had my druthers, I would be the single, accomplished woman who didn't have to rely on a man for my happiness or well-being, but if the beautiful man came along I would go there and love him completely, which I did for most of my life.  I've always been boy-crazy: I was that kindergartner who got benched during recess because I was always playing chase with the boys and who wrote about my "boyfriends" in my first diary in first grade: one, a red-haired mop-headed Jewish boy from the San Fernando Valley and the other, a dark-skinned, gentle immigrant from Tanzania.  I just always loved the boys.  

I tried.  I held out for that ideal of being the single, accomplished woman, but I always buckled because I love the boys just too damn much.  I came up in the 90s with collegiate-feminism and inaccessible, pretentious theory and no utilitarian practice.  That was my big gripe whenever I had to read these texts in college and then had to translate their ideas into what I had experienced or how I saw the world.  Academia is all theory and fuckin bullshit brain power---there's no practice or immediate use for all the great good that the privileged few can do anything with.  And if there is anything good, it takes eons and years for it to trickle down to the masses.  There was always that struggle between reading, learning and processing and then applying it to my life or experience and what I have known or observed.  

Then, I saw too many intelligent, beautiful, accomplished women settling for unrealized, unformed "men." Ugh.  I looked at them, observing these intelligent, beautiful, accomplished women settling for unrealized, unformed men, which is easy to do from afar and also desire as an observer or lover-of-being-in-love, but the problem for me was that I could never get my own shit together enough to even  be that.  I was still just grappling with my own demons and then meeting these random guys who wanted me and then who I got involved with in these two-year long relationships that went nowhere because, honestly, I didn't want to be with any of those guys from the get-go, but they were just, maybe, the next best thing to make me feel more whole or sure about who I was and... well, then, they usually disappointed and I did, too.  Me and them.  I didn't have my own shit together or was unformed and unrealized myself and these two broken parts would always come together--never enough wholeness to make a whole functioning unit.

There are two kinds of men: either they want their cake and it eat it, too, and can never settle down fully to commit and not wrestle with those other "I'm -scared-of-committing-demons" (and they'll always "dabble" even if they say they are done with that part of their lives) or they are the staid, regimented, boring types that freak the fuck out whenever you suggest or insert something new or different into their lives.  I don't care if you try to be loving or understanding or work with their insecurities or whatever, whether they are the terrified single dude or the terrified regimented boy they just freak out and either begrudgingly partake in your suggestion or they just won't do it and will stay set in their ways.  Either one is mind-boggling and frustrating and makes me claw at the walls.  I'm probably not picking the right men to be involved with, yes, but I also just get to a point where I get sick of the bullshit and would rather be alone and single than constantly having to put up with someone who needs so much work and isn't willing to do it on his own.  I want someone who has worked on their shit apart from anyone else, someone who has gone through the ups and downs and difficulties of life, but who has taken quiet time out for themselves to learn about why they do the things they do and how these patterns erupt in their lives or who may have figured into that picture and what they can do to change it now. I want to feel their substance and worth--wrap my fingers around their grace and beauty and linger there, dawdle and slip and slide between knowing and unknowing.  I want permanent press with the romance of silk, the durability and contention of hemp, the familiarity and sweetness of cotton, the sexiness of satin, and the modernity of bamboo.  I want to recognize that hodgepodge of fabrics that creates the one I love, but then feel the substance and delight that we are made of the same material.

I want adventure and fun and anticipation of the unknown in my life, but I also want security and deep-felt love and the comfort of knowing and understanding with a man.  Unfortunately, I am not a lesbian and sometimes I wish I was... if only because the alternative to loving and wanting and being sexually turned on by men is loving and wanting and being sexually turned on by women.  I think women--especially beautiful women--are HOT and even though I've gone there it's never dawned on me to get involved with a woman or to be in a relationship with one like a man.  It's simply not appealing to me.  The roles and gender things are just too confusing.  I want to be involved with a man--my best friend, my alter ego, my lover, that person who has different parts than me and is just the one who I find gorgeous, wonderful and endearing... and also the one who will travel the ends of the earth to be with me no matter how difficult the circumstances or obstacles.  He will climb through the tundra or battle windstorms, hijack a 747 or become a stowaway in cargo on a ship, fight a duel to the death, scale tall buildings with a single bound.  But, hell, I know Superman doesn't exist.  Maybe the problem is that there are too many women out there trying to be Superwomen and there just aren't enough Supermen.

PJ Harvey's "A Place Called Home" is ringing in my ears.  She has always been my bitch, my kick-ass chick who fuckin calls it as it is and still makes beautiful, intelligent music.  I always have to have a muse, especially when I write, and Ms. Harvey is my muse right now.  The music lingers in my ears from way back when and then I remember a random title here or there: A Place Called Home.  It is what I am seeking.  I want a place called home.  I want to find my home within myself, maybe with a good man, definitely somewhere--whether it be within myself or with another loved one--that is beautiful and functional and secure.  A place full of romance and love and continuity and belonging.  A place that I, myself, can call Home.  I will be there.  I will get there.  I will find my home soon.  I know it.  It's just around the corner.  I just have to keep having faith, keep loving and keep walking on these broken shells and uneven bricks...