Square One

Times like these are why it's good to drink. "Drowning" your sorrows isn't a phrase that came out of nowhere. It works, and that's why people keep doing it. My problem is... the whole weight issue. I get fat when I drink beer. I've tried switching to red wine - as studies show it's also good for the heart - but it doesn't have that same cold, chugging satisfaction that beer has.


Clearly, I need an alternative.

Go Fuck Yourself

If it takes so much work to be grateful then you're doing it wrong.

It Smells Like...

...Spring outside. Usually in SoCal outside doesn't smell like anything year-'round but sage. But today, though, in the quiet late morning while everyone else is in school or at work, the air smells like the beginning of something wonderful.

Sometimes, on days like these when I was growing up, Mom would let me stay home. I'd pretend to be sick even though I knew she knew I wasn't. For some reason, because of the magic of the day, it was okay for her to believe whatever she wanted or needed to believe so we could stay together. Just like in love relationships, in life sometimes it's important, for your soul's growth, to break the rules a little.

Everything has meaning on a day like this, as if Time has stopped so you can make a note of things. In those times it's important to do something you've never done. And when you're in love, it's imperative.

I can't imagine what M. and I could do today - we both have so many commitments... but days like these seem to promise that everything will be okay even if you shirk your responsibilities. Days like these demand to be remembered.

I wonder...

It's Been A Month Since My Last Confession

Travel, travel and more travel. And more to come. We went to the east coast, I saw family, M. saw family and met her godson!!!! And then I went to work in Toronto. I never thought a film festival could actually be fun but I guess that's what happens when you talk to interesting people. My favorite interview was Mexican director Guillermo Del Toro. He is such a sweet, beautiful man that all of sudden, after talking with him, I can see his genius so clearly. It IS harder to see it otherwise. He's scarey. His films are scarey. Anyway, I got back a couple of days ago and am just now recovered. I had a blast and am so happy with my improving shooting skills. I can already tell that I'm writing this post as if my mother was going to read it. She has been very present with me in the last few days. There were a couple of days at the end of the festival when I felt her approaching presence. She was around, but distant. Then when I got home, there she was - all around me. I was cooking chicken stew tonight - her recipe, or what I gleaned of her recipe from smelling and eating it for 30 years - and felt her there with me, looking over my shoulder. Our relationship has changed a bit. She's more at rest, more at peace now, it feels like (or maybe that's me...) than ever before. Hence she was there looking over my shoulder and not kibbitzing. I was throwing this and that into the stew and into the rice as if I'd been doing it as long as she had, and maybe that's right, maybe there's some of her being channeled through me. It would be great if that was true. I certainly feel as though she's moving there through me when I cook, guiding my hand and my thoughts a bit. "A little lemon. Yes, a little lemon would taste good there."


M. had a dream the other night and told me the next day: "I know where we should go. For a trip. Peru." Instantly, my eyes welled-up. "It's going to be really hard for me," I whimpered. "I know," she said, "but I know it's right, and I'll be there with you. I'll take care of you. And we'll go to Machu Piccu." It's been this forever thing in my mind - that I am descended from the Incas. Maybe I am, but what's more important is that I'm the daughter of a woman who was born in Bolivia. My grandmother was Bolivian. I wish I'd known her, or heard her voice on an old recording. Wouldn't that be something? Antonia Guzman. Maybe M. would be okay with naming a daughter Emma Nilda Antonia, for us, for Mom and for Mom's mom, my gradmother. Mi abuela, Antonia. Maybe I could write something, or film something about what she might have been like. Or maybe my Aunt Nelly could remember something my Uncle Walter might have said about her. My mother died when I was 37, his mother died when he was 7.

So, more traveling. Keep the light on.