unsafe passage

i'm rereading octavia butler's parable of the sower this week, and i've been telling my friends that it's hard to get through because the 2025 butler presents seems less and less farfetched every time i read about it.
there's an article in the times today that makes it that much more real. there are a number of high school children in chicago who are afraid to walk to school alone. this is probably not new news to people that know chicago, kind of like the random section in today's times article on KGIA acts like children bringing weapons to school or using racial slurs in the presence of teachers is a new thing. most of the sensation is a result of ignorance. but. children are afraid to walk to school for fear of being shot in the midst of a gang war. read parable of the sower and tell me what's different. tell me the world butler creates isn't possible, or maybe even likely.
these are troubled times.

sukh aur dukh ki kahani

the title of this post is also the title of a show i saw yesterday at the culture project as a part of women center stage. "sukh aur dukh ki kahani, a journey of love, risk and loss," brought on a sense of unknowing and/or not understanding was part of the entire process at the show yesterday. andolan, a non-profit founded by and for low-wage south asian women workers, brought five women together to tell their stories of struggle and to empower themselves through performance. the result of their own self-explorations is a powerful show that exposes the truth of the variety of immigration and u.s. living experiences of south asian descent. i think (and i know in my own experience as an imperfect and often ignorant person) that south asians often are placed in the model minority pool along with east asians. it is very rarely (if ever) that we see s. asians portrayed as financially struggling unless the movie or film is actually set in s. asia and the character is a beggar or servant, or it is wartime. in u.s.-set movies/t.v. shows/novels, south asians most often suffer from being overlooked in the professional sector, or are mocked for accents and cultural differences, but there is, as far as i know, no real portrayal of low-wage domestic workers of south asian descent. south asians are also often seen as legal immigrants, not illegal ones.
"sukh aur dukh ki kahani" explodes all of those stereotypes. there are four languages spoken in the show- english, bangla, hindi and marathi, and of those languages the director only speaks english. two teenage interns provided translation for the women across their language barriers, and the show was created by the women across their differences to speak out against violence. at the beginning of the show the director made a point to welcome the audience to fully experience the discomfort of not understanding, and to try to connect to the emotion in the women's performances without full translation. key phrases and words were displayed on a screen in english, and the program provided basic english translations for the five stories shared.
in the q-and-a, one man asked whose stories the women were sharing, and whether or not they were written collaboratively. it was explained that all of the women were sharing their own experiences, and the courage it took for them to get up in front of all of us became all that much clearer. to speak of being in the country illegally, to speak of escaping from your abusive former employers' home, to speak of losing two infant children to hunger in front of 100 strangers is, i'm sure, terrifying, and the grace and strength the women brought to their words was beautiful. andolan will be trying to take the show other places in the future, so keep your eyes open. they also take donations, so if you're looking for a place to share your resources, check out the website.
i thought of this poem by audre lorde as i left the theater yesterday, so i'll share it with y'all~

the brown menace
or poem to the
survival of
roaches

Call me
your deepest urge
toward survival
call me
and my brothers and sisters
in the sharp smell of refusal
call me
roach and presumptuous
nightmare upon your white pillow
your itch to destroy
the indestructible part of yourself.

Call me
your own determination
in the most detestable shape
you can become
friend of your own image
within me I am you
your most deeply cherished nightmare
scuttling through painted cracks
you create to admit
me into your kitchens
your fearful midnights
your values at noon
into your most secret places
hating
you learn to honor me
by imitation as I alter
through your greedy preoccupations
through your kitchen wars
through your poisonous refusal
to survive.

To survive.
To survive.

(1973)

ladies and gents, fr. michael pfleger

l'heureux did his piece with bill o'reilly, but father michael pfleger is a force to be reckoned with. the fox news reporter didn't have a fucking chance. there's definitely a reason they aren't streaming this one on the main homepage...

h/t to JJP

the surface of the moon is like:

grooving to your favorite DJ!

(insert booty-shake here) (this was our ItAG warm up tonight, and it swept aaaaaaallll the demeaning crap of my workday away...)

***

i was having a completely shitty day today until i got to ItAG tonight. to quickly give you a sense of what the last 7 weeks have been like...our goals:

*What do we want?*

We want ideas. We want resources. We want inspiration. We want to share
ideas. We want to be challenged. We want to be stimulated. We want engaging
dialogue. We want to use what we learn. We want to understand
theory/practice.

We want to talk about classroom management & negotiating roles. We want
positive & constructive dialogue without denying experience or truth. We
want to know, where are all the males?

*What do we need?*

We need common threads. We need resources. We need active listening. We need
real conversations – with respect, love, and safe space. We need to be open
to ideas, each other, difficulties, and discomfort. We need to find purpose
in education. We need to negotiate the bureaucracies. We need to be a part
of a larger support network. We need realistic application with limited
resources.

*Why are we here?*

We want to get involved. We want to continue prior experience. We want to
share best practices with like minds. We want to empower classroom though
social Justice. We are here to figure out how to negotiate the gap between
politics/intention and practice. We're angry (and there's reason to be.) We
want to look at the works. We want pure enjoyment. We want to reinvigorate
ourselves in practice. We want to talk about empowerment & be a part of
history. We want to analyze the dangers and risks and conflicts
(generational, institutional, cultural…). We want to understand the
potential for symbiotic (reciprocal) relationship between student/teacher.
We want to grow and continue being fighters for our students.


to find a beautiful space in which you can let go is a blessing. NYCoRE did that for me this winter, and i am, like i am so often, very thankful. i've made new connections that touch my heart, and i feel fulfilled. now i just need to throw a party and get everyone together! :)

ay yi yi

this article on the hutto family detention center and others like it hurts my heart. why do we jail people who have committed no crime other than seeking safety?

grrrr. beginning of article after the jump, complete text found here.

The Lost Children
What do tougher detention policies mean for illegal immigrant families?
by Margaret Talbot March 3, 2008

In the summer of 1995, an Iranian man named Majid Yourdkhani allowed a friend to photocopy pages from “The Satanic Verses,” the Salman Rushdie novel, at the small print shop that he owned in Tehran. Government agents arrested the friend and came looking for Majid, who secretly crossed the border to Turkey and then flew to Canada. In his haste, Majid was forced to leave behind his wife, Masomeh; for months afterward, Iranian government agents phoned her and said things like “If you aren’t divorcing him, then you are supporting him, and we will therefore arrest you and torture you.” That October, Masomeh also escaped from Iran and joined Majid in Toronto, where they lived for ten years. Majid worked in a pizza place, Masomeh in a coffee shop. She dressed and acted the way she liked—she is blond and pretty and partial to bright clothes and makeup, which she could never wear in public in Iran—and for a long time the Yourdkhanis felt they were safe from politics and the past. Their son, Kevin, was born in Toronto, in 1997, a Canadian citizen. He grew into a happy, affectionate kid, tall and sturdy with a shock of dark hair. He liked math and social studies, developed asthma but dealt with it, and shared with his mom a taste for goofy comedies, such as the “Mr. Bean” movies. In December, 2005, however, the Yourdkhanis learned that the Canadian government had denied their application for political asylum, and Majid, Masomeh, and Kevin were deported to Iran.

Upon their return, the Yourdkhanis say, Masomeh was imprisoned for a month, and Majid for six, and during that time he was beaten and tortured. After Majid was released, the family paid a smuggler twenty thousand dollars to procure false documents and arrange a series of flights that would return them to Canada.

Then, on the last leg of the journey, the family ran into someone else’s bad luck. On February 4, 2007, during a flight from Georgetown, Guyana, to Toronto, a passenger had a heart attack and died, and the plane was forced to make an unscheduled stop in Puerto Rico. American immigration officials there ascertained that the Yourdkhanis’ travel documents were fake. The Yourdkhanis begged to be allowed to continue on to Canada, but they were told that if they wanted asylum they would have to apply for it in the United States. They did so, and, five days later, became part of one of the more peculiar, and contested, recent experiments in American immigration policy. They were locked inside a former medium-security prison in a desolate patch of rural Texas: the T. Don Hutto Residential Center.

Hutto is one of two immigrant-detention facilities in America that house families—the other is in Berks County, Pennsylvania—and is the only one owned and run by a private prison company. The detention of immigrants is the fastest-growing form of incarceration in this country, and, with the support of the Bush Administration, it is becoming a lucrative business. At the end of 2006, some fourteen thousand people were in government custody for immigration-law violations, in a patchwork of detention arrangements, including space rented out by hundreds of local and state jails, and seven freestanding facilities run by private contractors. This number was up by seventy-nine per cent from the previous year, an increase that can be attributed, in large part, to the actions of Michael Chertoff, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, which runs the Immigration and Customs Enforcement division. In 2005, Chertoff announced the end of “catch-and-release”—the long-standing practice of allowing immigrants caught without legal documents to remain free inside the country while they waited for an appearance in court. Since these illegal immigrants weren’t monitored in any way, the rate of no-shows was predictably high, and the practice inflamed anti-immigrant sentiment.

* from the issue
* cartoon bank
* e-mail this

Private companies began making inroads into the detention business in the nineteen-eighties, when the idea was in vogue that almost any private operation was inherently more efficient than a government one. The largest firm, Corrections Corporation of America, or C.C.A., was founded in 1983. But poor management and a series of well-publicized troubles—including riots at and escapes from prisons run by C.C.A.—dampened the initial excitement. In the nineties, C.C.A.’s bid to take over the entire prison system of Tennessee, where the company is based, failed; state legislators had grown skeptical. By the end of 2000, C.C.A.’s stock had hit an all-time low. When immigration detention started its precipitate climb following 9/11, private prison companies eagerly offered their empty beds, and the industry was revitalized.

One complication was that hundreds of children were among the immigrant detainees. Typically, kids had been sent to shelters, which allowed them to attend school, while parents were held at closed facilities. Nobody thought that it was good policy to separate parents from children—not immigration officials, not immigrant advocates, not Congress. In 2005, a report by the House Appropriations Committee expressed concern about “reports that children apprehended by D.H.S.”—the Department of Homeland Security—“even as young as nursing infants, are being separated from their parents and placed in shelters.” The committee also declared that children should not be placed in government custody unless their welfare was in question, and added that the Department of Homeland Security should “release families or use alternatives to detention” whenever possible. The report recommended a new alternative to detention known as the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program—which allows people awaiting disposition of their immigration cases to be released into the community, provided that they are closely tracked by means such as electronic monitoring bracelets, curfews, and regular contact with a caseworker. The government has since established pilot programs in twelve cities, and reports that more than ninety per cent of the people enrolled in them show up for their court dates. The immigration agency could have made a priority of putting families, especially asylum seekers, into such programs. Instead, it chose to house families in Hutto, which is owned and run by C.C.A. Families would be kept together, but it would mean they were incarcerated together.

oh my god i LOVE this!!!!

Hollaback NYC!

one ferry, three men, lots of anger

**sorry, long post!**

i took the staten island ferry and to and from SI today for work. both trips started calmly, with my head buried in reading material, and both ended with me in the midst of a good amount of anger. the first time (on the way there), i scribbled a poem in the back of the book i'm reading, almost running into the two men that inspired its writing (it needs revision, badly); the second time (on the way back), i wrote a blog post angrily on the margins of a piece of paper i found in my bag. i'm going to share both pieces here.

i don't know what's up with me and anger lately. there's something, though, about constantly feeling like me and mine are being openly dismissed/used/abused by others that just makes my blood boil a little bit. i bite my tongue, i don't fight, but my silence doesn't erase my anger.

i write my anger, and hope that it will resolve itself.
(there)

tears of rage, or
my brother always says i cry too easy


90 miles,
they say

two white(?) men.
the Staten Island ferry.

90 miles?
yeah, yeah
90 miles from Miami to
Coo-ba

yeah.
so close, they get
here
and their feet are
still
wet!

yuk, yuk.

90 miles.

as a tear of rage
seeped out of my eye,
i neglected to share
that cuba is 90 miles from
key west,
not
miami,

and when they
shouted out
the aryan nation
as the only
"solution"
to miami's
"problem,"
i didn't say
that the problem is
ignorant bigots like them,
wearing 9.11.01 tee shirts.

i didn't say that
i'd prefer
wet feet
over
ignorance and hatred
any
day.

i didn't say
that our country
was built with
wet feet,
or that

it would seem that
along with
drying feet
come
shrinking brains and narrowing
minds.

i didn't insult the
man's
accent or
intelligence,

i didn't make
sweeping generalizations
about the group of
people
i believe he most resembles.

i didn't blame him and
his "kind"
for my lack of
comprehensive health insurance
or my
$60,000 in
student loans.
.
.
.
.
i didn't expect him
to understand
my tears
or my
language.

///
there are just so. many. things. i
didn't say.

*****
(back)

why is it that black middle aged men so often consider my body their property? at least once a week i am confronted with men old enough to be my father commenting on/trying to touch/eyeing my black female body.

there is something in their attention, too, that is about my youth. the way they comment and gesture suggests that i am, at once, their daughter and their concubine, simultaneously innocent and deviant.

today, one man decided that his avenue to interaction with me would be schooling me on manners. after he sat next to me, staring at me for a number of minutes, i yawned without covering my mouth. i felt warmth near my cheek, and i realized he had raised his hand to almost touch my face! "cover your mouth when you yawn," he said. "you're so pretty!"

i gave him the stinkeye and went back to reading. after assuring me that he wasn't "trying to teach me anything," he decided to model the correct yawning "procedure" with his newspaper. i asked him to leave me alone and promptly called my mother, telling her loudly that there was a crazy man next to me. he continued to stare openly and smile creepily throughout the (too long) SI ferry ride, and to place his coffee cup as near my thigh as possible without actually touching me. he protested when i rose to move away.

why do men, black men who are supposed to be supports in my community, alternately ignore and abuse this idea of me? i can't get the attention of an educated black man under 35 for my life, but granddaddies are in large supply for the position of fetishist.

i don't understand what is both so alluring and off-putting about me. is it my independence? my unwillingness, as one friend put it a few weeks ago, to "pretend to be weak"? is it my personality? my expectations? because none of those things are on display. i don't know how to erase myself enough to lose the attention i don't want and to gain that which i so desire. to be honest, it depresses me to think that i will never be fully attractive to the men that are most attractive to me as myself. it depresses me to think that in order to find a life partner i have to deny parts of myself. it depresses me to think that i either have to give up on finding love, or be willing to define love as old men touching my face without permission on a ferry, or young men cheating on me and refusing to call what they feel love. youth breeds man-boys unready for relationships, and age breeds man-boys who want 25 year olds like the woman i am now, "ripe and fresh."

ugh. what a freaking day.

i need a man, part 1

so do you remember this blast from the past? p. diddy and usher sharing a laundry list of the things their "girl"s needed to be in order to make them happy? well i think it's time we ladies made a laundry list of our own.
i had two somewhat disturbing conversations this weekend with female friends who have decided that much of the abhorrent behavior displayed by men is "to be expected." you know, things like lying and cheating, using women for their bodies, being arrogant and selfish, needing the women in their lives to pretend to be weak in order to highlight their "manliness." i have trouble with that notion. i don't know why i would be interested in settling for a partner (for life or for a week) who isn't interested in doing the sort of self-maintenance (mentally and emotionally) that i do. i don't expect anything from a man that i don't also expect from myself. so this morning, i've decided to make my "i need a man" list.
(funnily enough, my dad told me to make a list like this a long time ago and i thought the idea was crazy. silly me. dave is no fool.)

be this, or be gone list

1. honest. and by honest i don't mean just when it suits you. i mean respect and love me enough to tell me the truth, even when the truth is not about you being disappointed in me, but rather you being disappointed in yourself.
2. able to admit that you're wrong. this is actually a challenge for me. it's something i work on, and something that most of my friends struggle with as well (ahem, friend-of-mine out there! mark-paul gosselaar??). it's natural to want to be right, but sometimes in a relationship your partner needs to hear that you know what you did was wrong and that you'll work on it.
3. well-groomed. and by that i don't mean that you have to get man manicures. but please wear a decent pair of jeans, a matching shirt, and have a pair of cute shoes. i like a man that looks and smells good. just don't bring the pretty-boy arrogance with you.
4. in possession of a nice smile. there are things i can deal with-- awkward movement, lack of rhythm, slightly effeminate affectations...it's all love. one thing, though, that i'm not down with is a man who doesn't know who their dentist is. figure it out. and halitosis is not a terminal sickness. you can cure that shit.
5. not broke. no need to be uncle scrooge and swimming through cash in your personal safe (did anyone else ever think that looked painful?) , but have enough to be comfortable picking up the bill every once in awhile. i don't require especially expensive restaurants with a dude, and i'm happy to cook at home (with you, not just for you), but when we have a nice night out, don't get stuck trying to tabulate your bank balance in your head, asking if i have any cash for the tip.
6. knowledgeable about the hanging of mirrors. i have a mirror that i've needed hung for about 4 months now. glass makes me nervous, so i haven't wanted to chance it with just my google-knowledge. and, unlike my life in cali, there's no home depot around the corner with do-it-herself classes. i need you, man.

there's more, i'm sure, but i need to get dressed for work. so, like p. diddy, i'll be back with number two and a little ginuwine. :)

how do you say "skin" in science again?

oh yeah, yeah! epidermis.

well today i made my first trip to the dermatologist, ever. funnily enough, i actually used to work at a dermatologist's office back in high school (at the height of my acne challenges), but i was one of those feminist grrrls that didn't know they were feminist at the time but still managed to ignore most of society's misogynistic messages about who girls should be, how they should want to look, and what makes a girl "worthy." so even though i worked in a superstar miami dermatologist's office, where the dr. was actually featured on the news every week to give skin advice and star's relatives came in for botox (while still in high school!), i refused to take any of the free/discounted treatments i was offered. i figured that the world should have loved me simply because i was a nice person, had lots of extracurriculars, volunteered, never had sex, and scored really high on the SAT. what are a few pimples and acne scars in the face of all that, right?

um...a deal breaker basically. :) so 7 years later, here i am. going to the epidermis doctor to see what we can do about making me the clear-skinned fabulosity my fellow receptionist at dr. c's always hoped i would be.

she was cool! and black! and young! and totally got my concerns! i've never been huge on requiring that my doctors share my race, but i have to say that working with a black dermatologist made me feel comfortable in her suggestions for treatment. she gets what's going on, and knows how to help.

cool!

if you're looking for a black dermatologist in new york, check out dr. jamal. you'll be glad you did...

sexy sexy

South Carolina Unofficial Results
Democratic Presidential Preference Primary - January 26, 2008

Statewide Results

	Joe	Hillary	Chris	John	Mike	Dennis	Barack	Bill
	Biden	Clinton	Dodd	Edwards	Gravel	Kucinich	Obama	Richardson
Totals	78	14317	33	12263	22	63	28566	90
Percentages	0.1%	25.8%	0.1%	22.1%	0.0%	0.1%	51.5%	0.2%

this really just gets me going. i cannot WAIT for february 5th, and my turn in that booth. ugh, it's so nice to be excited about politics in this country for a change!

welcome to the good life

that kanye jam has been in my head all day, for good reason. kinda like nsekuye, i'm feeling really good about the coming months. i don't know what it is- maybe the new sense of career direction, or the newly reacquired belief in myself, or this incredible feeling of my world expanding in all of the right ways...i don't know.
what i do know, though, is that the next year should be challenging, rewarding, and full of good hard work. all those things i love so much.

the hair journey

come august 2008, i will have marked the 7th anniversary of my embracing my hair. it was almost seven years ago that i took out the first braids i'd ever had and, upon trying unsuccessfully to get them fully out, decided to cut my hair short without giving it the touch-up my mother so badly wanted for it.

i still remember the night i decided to go for it. my mom literally got my aunts on the phone, and each of the pleaded with me--
"you don't really want to do this, girl!"
"don't you want someone to marry you?"
"but you have such beautiful hair! why would you want to do that to it?"

funnily, the perm i had to beg my mother to give me in 7th grade was the same process that i was begging her to support my leaving behind. the process was slow, and definitely not sure. my father has spent 3-5 of the last 7 years asking me when i was going to "get over" this phase, and even now, in his acceptance, he has his setbacks.

i find myself reflecting on hair this morning because i think i may have finally found some products that i love (!). curl junkie was, until recently, my answer. but lately my scalp has been feeling a little raw, so i thought i'd look for something that's a little less harsh. my oyin handmade order just showed up at my doorstep, and not a moment too soon!

the honey wash- my hair has never been happier. soft even before the conditioner comes to visit! and my scalp doesn't feel stripped and raw, either.
shine and define- adds shine and definition without making my curls hard, and is so light that i thought i'd opened the wrong container.

i know this probably feels like a bad ad, but i can't help but share the wondrousness that is oyin. my head is soooo happy!

mentally fatigued

i've spent the last week and a half working really hard. my coworker kinneret and i have been editing/revising/rewriting a conflict resolution curriculum nonstop, and we were starting to go a little crazy. the project wrapped up around 2, and i've been useless ever since.
this job...kind of sucks. i was working on christmas morning. i was working on christmas eve.
it's time for me to hit the lists.
i was on idealist just now and started to try and remember the last time i was actually really happy with the way my life was going. i realized that it was probably 2 years ago. before pam left new york, before i stopped loving teaching, while i was happily single and dating. that was a loooong time ago.
i need to claw my way out of this rut.

fighting takes too much energy

i spent part of my day yesterday, and too much of my night last night, upset about something. i'm sapped of energy this morning. the conflict was with a person i dated for a long time who broke my heart. it's been six months since i last saw him or heard his voice, and yet we still have things to fight about, apparently, and knowing how little he cares/cared about me still brings tears to my eyes.

you would think (like i have) that we could find a way to (really) forgive each other and move on, but you and i would both be wrong.

not so good

so i'm considering ending my consumption of red meat for awhile. yesterday/today represent the third or fourth time in the last few months that my stomach has revolted against red meat i've eaten, and i'm starting to think that it's a bit of a pattern. funnily enough, the only thing that is holding me back from crossing it off of my list of foods is the thought of my favorite ethiopian dish at the neighborhood spot, zoma. :( i like my tibs wett. i want to have a last hurrah with it, but i'm in too much pain to want to chance it.

maybe swearing meat off will help with my dieting/weight loss goals. i sure hope so.

also, thanks to sonja for this

link, but what i want to know is, where is my (white) dude? i know that's a controversial statement. granted. but this whole black men thing is getting real difficult when we're outnumbering them 7-to-1 on college campuses in this nation. i think i need to branch out. anybody have suggestions?

not sure why i do it

sometimes i catch myself wondering where the balance lies in our information-rich tech world between knowing to know, knowing to remind yourself of a purpose, and knowing to demoralize.

i find myself reading blogs, books, and news articles that remind me constantly of the negativity that surrounds me and people with whom i try my best to be in solidarity on a regular basis. i read blog posts that "reveal" the negative acts, then i often subject myself to reading the nasty comments that accompany them. and sometimes, all i can feel is down. like, seeing all the negativity of people manifested in ignorant comments or pantomimes or articles is just more than i need. because i already know it's there. i have the facts in front of me. much of my college education showed me where it all lies. and, being of color, i see it myself all the time.

on monday i wore a necklace-- black and white beads, from gap, could be construed as "ethnic-looking," i guess, if you were so inclined. someone commented on how beautiful it is, and i said, "oh, it's only from the gap." the someone replied, somehow, with "oh, i guess i'll have to go to africa, then!"

short example. but definitely shows me that i don't need to go looking for proof of my status in this society. so why do i do it?

i know that one reason is that i don't want to be my parents-- so focused on staying positive in the face of the negativity that surrounds me that i cocoon myself into a world where none of it exists (or so i tell myself). that is the world i grew up in, and while ignorance is bliss, in this world leaving the cocoon then becomes a dangerous mental act. when someone finally jolts you into reality with a comment, or a glance, or by spitting in your face, you don't have any way to understand what's happening.

i also know that in order to keep myself going in the various jobs i take i must remind myself of my purpose. why do i put up with working very hard for very little money? because of all of the horrible things i see around me. i want to be a part of a movement for change. i want to do what i can to make this world better for my children. i want to know that i can go to sleep at night knowing that i am helping others beyond myself. i want to know that i'm helping me. it's almost therapy. my way to fight back on all of the ugly things i see. is it terribly effective? no. but as long as i know the "evil" is out there, i continue to want to do what i can.

finally, i know that there's some premium in our day and age placed on knowing...everything...because you can. if you don't know the latest youtube video, political snafoo made by a presidential hopeful, the latest hot song on itunes, and where the protest was at last week, you're behind. woefully so.

so what to do? i try to get away by writing at this "personal reflection" blog every once in awhile, but i'm not sure where else to take it. what to do. maybe take a break from the information overload for awhile, and then find a blog that will do a full recap of the daily show, the project runway premiere, ANTM, racialicious, the ny times, the post's education series (SO GOOD by the way-check it out), keeping up with the kardashians, i <3 new york, and everything else that makes it onto my radar every week.

ha, that rundown of obsessions didn't make you feel very good about me, did it?

you didn't really want to know this, but

the last time i was in california i was with him. we flew into LAX, just like i did last night. we drove the same stretches of road.

just those facts were enough to have me crying in the shower this morning.** to wake me up with bad dreams of missing him, of wanting him back, last night.

when will it ever end, i ask.


**fuck it, i'll be honest. i'm crying right fucking now. i can't stop fucking crying.
someone is going to have to fucking pay me to trust a man again. it just ain't happenin' of its own accord.