Morning Conversation

"Hello! Would you like your room serviced?" chimed a skinny teenage girl, her hair tied up messy in a top-of-the-noggin pony tail. She was smiling. The boy standing next to her was not. The girl held a vaccum cleaner and the boy a bag full of toilet paper and some towels. It seemed as though they were offering these gladly, like a one might hold flowers up on a first date.

"Um. Well, um. So actually, there are still folks sleeping.." I said, gesturing pathetically with my thumb to the room behind me.

This is vacation. More cleary, this is Jack and I waiting for Rich to wake up on the first morning of our vacation. I'm on my second cuppa and Jack, though still PJ clad, has had his breakfast, watched some shows, and is hanging out in the fort he built out of pillows and imagination.

"Would you like us to come back, then?" the girl said, chewing on er bottom lip.

"Well. I mean. Maybe, but really we just need coffee. And sugar. And towels. And.. Gosh it looks cold out there."

They were shivering there on the porch of apartment 32, our home away from home. My eyes trekked behind them to the thick frost that had settled on the grass overnight. They were dressed in jeans and hoodies, and their hands were pink and shaky as they dug through the packets of instant coffee and sugar to find the cafinated sachets, as opposed to the decaffinated ones I turned my nose up at.

"Yes! It is SO cold," she said, chattering through a frozen smile.

"No, actually is entirely warm," he mumbled.

"Ha ha," she tried, while glancing sideways. They precariously balanced all of my requests, in a pile in my arms.

"OK. So, sorry for keeping you in the cold, guys. And thank you for the coffee. And the towels. Oh and the sugar!  And ok.. Bye. Thank you," I called as they turned to trudge back down the stairs, their towels and vacuum in hand.

Where has Sheherezade gone?

Today I shared excerpts from Azar Nafisi's memoir, 'Reading Lolita in Tehran', as a supplement to Marjane Satrapi's 'Persepolis'. I realized in the sharing that I am so in step with the feminine voice, especially the voice that has overcome the oppressive silence that the patriarchy has imposed on it. This is the voice of defiance and of regeneration, of cheeky instigation and that weighty mythological archetype of eternal justice: the Furies!  

I'm entirely concerned with and about the suppressed female voice: Why are there so few story tellers from the Arab world, for example? Where has Sheherezade gone? She told her stories as a means of escape and survival. I would argue that more important than duping her captor, Sherherezade crafted life in her stories. She revived humanity. So what happened to the rest? Have they given up?

To be fair, when I asked this question, I was given one title 'The Forty Rules of Love'. It was a beautifully written book that reincarnated Rumi. Still, I find such a deficit there.

 

If I were able to go back to school and even think about a master's thesis, I think I would focus my study in this space. I'm highly interested in female memoir-based literature: Mary Karr (my inner Texas voice), Anne Lamott, and Andrea Gibson (spoken word). I love Mary Shelly and Christina Rosetti, too, and am happy to go old school.  

Maybe some day. Maybe.

Keats meets the Beatles

We were on our way to Keats's House in Hampstead Heath stuck in a line of traffic. On our bus, the kids, having been still for an hour of travel, had fallen into a stillness, the hum of hushed voices accompanied the motor's reverb. It was drizziling, as usual, and our dream of picnicking on the Heath  for lunch and going on a nature walk  (in search of Keats's elusive voice, naturally) was soaked to the bone, and we only hoped the day would be worth it - the speaker somewhat animated, the house, at least, warm.

It was in this silent moodiness that we weaved our way through the London burroughs, expecting to once again be delayed by the choked London traffic that always makes everything irritable. We had been tracking our progress via satellite on our phones. Only 26 minutes until we arrive. No. Make it 28. Will we be late? Should we call?

Suddenly, my colleague turned to me and said, "Hey. This is Abbey Road." As the understanding was realized, she stood up and addressed the bus. "We're crossing Abbey Road right now! This is it! The famous Beatles album cover!" And the hubub got louder. Exclamations of "Cool!"  and "We're on Abbey Road!" and "take a Facebook photo" mingled into liveliness  as we passed.  And all of a sudden we were smiling. Because how cool is that?  

Of course there was no marker on the road. We didn't see the ghost of John Lennon and Paul McCartney was nowhere to be found. In fact, if we had zoomed out from our own experience, we would've had to acknowledge that we were among thousands who would cross the intersection that day without a second thought. But in the moment, and zoomed in tightly to our own little existences, we were happy and joined together in shared experience. 

The rest of the day was amazing.

A Rough Draft Reflection on Google, Patios, and Parenting

Today I got an English sun tan which is to say I sat outside in the sun for several hours and burned my skin into a shade of red that lobsters would envy. This was not the highlight.

I can say that I did spend a few moments reading a book called The Shallows which is about the way technology has reshaped our brains. It tries to be unbiased by showcasing both the luddite and trekkie perspectives, but it fails to be completely dispassionate as it uses phrases such as "Still I miss my old brain" pre-Google.

The man who promoted this text (and it's opinion) is one of my colleagues. He does not know I am currently reading it, and I am only aware of its existence because he assigned as summer reading for his future students. I was curious. So. Here I am. Chapter 3.

I realized two chapters in that something did truly annoy me about the author's hypothesis. He argues that his brain can't focus the way it used to, that because we have every bit of information available, rapid fire, we cannot focus for long periods of time. Where he used to read for hours upon end, he now skims. And this is bad. Apparently he also allowed himself time to meditate upon arguments, enjoyed the voice of the writer, shared cognac and cigarettes with metaphorical characters after hours and hours of metacognitive masturbation, blaw-dy blaw.. and I'm like, "What? What the hell? Because I've read two chapters of your book on my gorgeously humble patio that I dressed by myself with plants and candles and a goddamn water feature (well, I'm working on it), and here I am taking a sip of coffee, and what interrupts my thinking is not the siren call of the World Wide Web, but that niggling thought in the back of my mind that my little five year old son is in the living room by himself watching his third episode of Bubble Guppies while I ironically read about the idea that internet interrupts one's cognitive process."

And I did feel lucky for a second or two that he didn't interrupt me to tell me he's hungry, that he wants to get dressed, that he needs to go tee tee, etc. And then came the guilt. What kind of mother allows herself the serenity of sitting on her (gorgeous, verdant, candle lit, fountained (coming soon)) patio while her little one might be lonely/ uncomfortable/ in a catatonic cartoon trance??  

Mothers have always had this sort of rapid fire distraction. Since the first woman said "Go play outside" or "I am not a referee" or "Give me one second. Please. Just one second..(so that I do not completely go nuts and do or say something I'll regret)" we have lived with this sort of distraction. We don't need Google to remind us that sometimes our thinking might be shallow. We don't need the internet to remind us that we once could read a book pre-children, but now we can only operate in two second intervals. Parenting supplies all the thought interruption that the internet does and more - forgetfulness, for example. And while screens do tend to make some of us feel more knowledgeable on the surface, I think we all end up shallow in the end. So. Cheers to Google, man! You. Complete. Me.

But I did catch some rays today at the park. Watching my little one jump into the paddling pool and the subsequently roll in the sand pit.

And I do look forward to Chapter 4.

Writing is more

I have taken a year long sabatical from writing. I've done this for all of the proper reasons, of course:

I am tired.
I have a new job.
I moved across the ocean.
I have a four year old.
My job is too much.
My time is too little.

And here I sit.
Believing it.

And because I believe it, I hid. I hid good. I hid behind insecurity and self-doubt, behind the guise of a simple Texas girl who moved to be among the international intellectuals in a school where people in the staff lounge talk about "What will happen politically in Kashmir" or " which theoretical 'such and such' is proof that 'such as that' is possibly real". I watch them pick up The Times and The Guardian, and make opinionated comments on 'this article' and see them laugh at the buffonery of 'that character'. They recite poetry, little snippits of Keats, for example, over their curry lunch, and discuss the relative validity of Margaret Thatcher in light of America's almost heretical worship and, as we all know, Reagan..

And I hid deeper.
Burrowed even.

Tonight, on a whim (read, an attempt to avoid ridiculous marking load under the pretense of 'seeing if my blog was still there, even') I looked back at some of my better blog posts. I found a little one, one that didn't get very much attention from my virtual community, but one that was most endearing to my heart.  In the comment section, I found this:
 

"You know how on those rare occasions that you'll admit to another living, breathing human being that, yes, you sometimes write a little bit, you almost always follow that with a demure look to the floor and say something self-effacing that sounds like 'it's just a hobby' but really means 'I think I'm only good enough for it to be just a hobby'? You know that moment? The next time you have one of those, you need to read this post.

'cause damn. You're good."

And then I cried. Because I can't hide anymore. And I can't be afraid. And tired is just stupid. And work is.. well intimidating.. but writing is more.

Not dead yet.

I realize this is all vanity but..
Yesterday I went to a Texas bar and grill and while I awaited the arrival of my darling family for the grill part, I had a drink in the bar part.
A man - a complete stranger - bought me a drink.
Yes, my friends. This 35 year old mamma's still got it. :)
And then I introduced Ken (yes, that was his name) to my fantastic husband and beautiful son. All were very gracious.

British v. Texican

British people say, "I hope you are well."
In Texan we say "How the hell are ya'?"