Mediterranean

     After 4 years of swimming in lakes, I've returned to the beaches of the Mediterranean.  I feel the slippery salt on my skin and its taste on my lips.  I'm not bounced about in the waves or flung under, scraping my knees on the bottom like in the Atlantic.  And let's not even talk about the Pacific with its fierce waves and chilly waters.  For the most part, the Mediterranean is gentle. 
    When I step out of the water here I feel light.  When I get out of a lake something soggy stays with me, like from the mud bottom of a pond.  The salt of the sea is a great purifier, a healer in its way.  So I have one more day to enjoy if not the water, then the pastel colors of the sunsets.

   The classic song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNkcAUAv1kw

I have a poem from my first chapbook too.

The Senora is alive and well

     I'm pleased to report that modern life in the 21st century hasn't erased the figure of the Spanish senora.  The senora is the woman who wears housedresses and a special housecoat over them to do the daily chores.  I see her leaning out of the balcony window to wipe down the endless dust settling from Barcelona traffic.  She's the one in the market shouting out, "Qui es el ultim?" so as not to be deprived of one second of attention.  She's the fighter with mala leche who won't hesitate to run over your toes with her shopping cart in an attempt to get to the fruit stand first.
     It's been ages since I've been stared at.  Here it's the senoras who have settled in for their midmorning cafe.  They look me up and down, and of course I'm the stranger here and despite the saying to the contrary "Paris, Londres, Reus", this city, Reus is not a capital of the world.  I'm not the only one they dismiss.  The elderly gentleman who approaches their table is waved away.  There's no time for him.
     The senoras have their own world- the hairdresser does their special styles and there are even glasses for them as I found out when I was trying on a pair and the shop assistant pointed at them and said, "No, no.  Those are for senoras." Yet the senoras have their dignity, something that seems to be lost in the American world where at 8 or eighty, women are all wearing the same styles.  One thing to be grateful for is the fashion of very short shorts hasn't reached the US with  60% of its population being overweight.

Change and a poem for Father's Day

              Change and a poem on the occasion of Father’s Day

What triggers the major changes in our lives?  At what point does the marriage become untenable, the roommate impossible, the job intolerable?  We go on day after day until something snaps.  Case in point-  I was never planning on moving now.  I have a trip to Spain which falls smack in the middle of summer and which means a big expense.  So what happened?  One day my landlady told me her three grandchildren (they are a bit wild- one put a hole in the wall) were spending 6 weeks with her downstairs from me.  My apartment suddenly became a place I had to escape from.  I could have coped with the visit; after all, I’ll be gone some of those weeks but this was the crisis point.  All along I’ve been aware that I need more space- that I can’t spend any more time looking at the walls of this flat but I’ve resisted.  I easily could have been stuck here for years.

   We all resist change but it’s better to adapt and play a part in it than face a possible earth shattering event that really shakes up our lives.  I remind myself as I sit in the chaos of bags and books.

    Years ago a Peruvian shaman told me I had a “genetic muy poco vista” and that I had more genetic material from my father than my mother.  When I told my sister- she said she knew that.  I think I inherited the physical, the wanderlust, but fortunately not the character.

Father’s Day a la Sylvia Plath

Winter black and white

weighs down

until green spring erupts,

he searches the barn for the kittens,

his touch tames.

He shells peas,

lines them up in equal piles

for me and my sister.

The storms lash out.

There is no peace in this house

Wind whips through

tightly closed windows.

He’s the one I search for

in shapely dark madness. 

Moving and exile

Moving

I  am sitting in a room that’s in the process of being dismantled, bit by bit, box by box.  Where does moving fit on the scale of life’s most stressful events?  Somewhere up there, after death and divorce.  My many moves are bookended by long periods spent in the same place.  17 years in the farmhouse in Varysburg, the small town where I grew up, and then 15 years in the atico flat in Barcelona with its terraces and views of the sea as a distant blue line and Montjuic, the city’s hill off the port. 

Since my American adventure, I’ve lived in three places- my sister’s home in Atlanta, a sublet in Buffalo, and my present apartment where I’ve been for, hard to believe but four years now.  Four years of living alone.  Surprisingly except for one brief stint here when I was in college, I have never lived alone.  Now that I’ve done it, it seems easy.  Solitude doesn’t weigh but there is that occasional need to find a witness for the daily details of life. 

So now, encumbered by a lot more stuff, I’m preparing for move 4.  I left Barcelona after twenty years with three suitcases and a few boxes of my papers which I sent.  How is it possible that I have amassed more stuff in four years here than in all that time abroad? 

My first trip away from home to Paris for my junior year abroad only required one suitcase and a small carry on.  With every subsequent voyage I’ve been weighted down with more stuff.  I have my books (heavy, aren’t they?), DVD’s, papers (way too many), CD’s, and more clothes than I could ever wear.  What do I really need?  Comfort is a way of life in America and every object is designed for that finality.  How much can I shed?  As I look around the chaos that is now my pre-move life, I’m going to find that out.

                                                                        “You can’t go home again.”  Thomas Wolfe   

                              

Exile

Cross the yard

to open the gate,

my mother stands

at the door.

Inside, the grey carpet

with faded roses,

consumes my breath.

The mismatched couches

 are covered over again,

a paint by numbers seascape

hangs on the wall.

I reclaim these rooms,

the medicine stained floor,

my father metes out drops

so he can breathe.

His voice, the backdrop

to my dreams,

as he reads aloud to my mother,

their secret night life.

Stripped naked

I try again to enter,

13 steps to my bedroom,

Petal pink, a girl long buried,

still wants the Barbie dress up world.

My mother’s closet holds two suits

from her past life,

strappy heels, red leather,

thick ankle straps,

I touch and identify,

She never wanted to be here,

in this farmhouse in America.

Yet she greets me,

we share for a moment

this white house,

this undersurface dream space.

Reading Moby Dick is a subversive act...

What does a whale represent to us?  In the 1850's the whale was a leviathan, a creature of massive proportions that inhabited a hidden universe and provided products of beauty and necessity (oil and ambergris).  For us, it's one more being in danger of extinction that "sings" and is part of a controlled world that holds little mystery.  Imagine confronting this huge being with small boats and harpoons.
   Two elements make Moby Dick subversive.  For the reader to understand the novel, Melville provides all the possible background information available to him in his day.  From a treatsie on the color white across cultures to classification and anatomy of the whale, this novel educates the reader.  And all of this requires DESCRIPTION and Melville is a master.
    Description has fallen out of favor.  Writers are routinely instructed to eliminate adverbs and all excess words.  Are we all victims of Hemingway's terse prose?  Or is it a lack of attention span?  Take the 6 word story as an example.  6 words are used to express an entire story and there are contests to do this.  Yes, it can be done.  But why?  We have a glorious vocabulary in English, one I particularly appreciate since English wasn't my first language.  A literary magazine I recently contacted now only publishes flash fiction.  Is this the path literature is taking?
    The other  subversion is that man is not the measure of all things as we've been led to believe.  What I liked best about Moby Dick was the ending.  Despite all foreshadowing and warnings, I was surprises by the ending.  Decades of the perfect Walt Disney type ending left me aghast and then thrilled by the last line of this novel.

Human Trafficking

Human Trafficking

On this beautiful spring day I am reading about human trafficking triggered by watching “The Whistleblower”, a film based on true events about a female police officer in postwar Bosnia who uncovers a trafficking ring involving UN officials and contractors.  The conditions of the young women who are lured abroad with tales of money and excitement (one can only hope that doesn’t happen as much now) are worse than we can even imagine. 

Mostly trafficking equates to female slavery.  Woman are still chattel in many parts of the world.  Even Turkey, a modern country, reports many cases of honor killings.  But let’s examine those UN officials and contractors.  What did they tell themselves to  make their actions possible?  Don’t men have sisters, wives, and daughters? Is it just another case of the brutality of humankind?  Woman is the other, and once you turn any being into someone separate from yourself, or even different, anything is possible.  Humans will never evolve until women regain a place of value in all societies.  It is precisely the femaleness, the feminine that our culture has deplored and tried over and over to eradicate, even to the point of making our own mother earth unable to sustain life.

http://www.iibuff.org/index.php?src=gendocs&ref=abouthumantrafficking&category=Human_Trafficking_Victim_Services

The Whistleblower

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Whistleblower

Purge- the wonderful novel by Oksanen

http://www.amazon.com/Purge-Sofi-Oksanen/dp/0802170773

Motherhood May 12th and a poem

The first love of anyone's life (reciprocated or not) is the mother.  These days mothers are called tiger moms and are expected to be perfect.  The very archetype of mother is so potent as to obliterate all other identities a woman can have.
  It's a role I didn't choose in this lifetime but motherhood is something I can visit on this day, May 12th, the birthday of my mother.  This was my first love and one that hasn't diminished in the years of her absence, now more than 30.
   Here's a poem:

Ma-Ya  (Not That)

No one will ever say -she’s the mother of my children, head bowed in homage.  Yet, I am the mother of many dreams and a few scattered kindnesses.

I have been the bitch of a litter of seven puppies, the taker of portrait photographs with the requisite puff of air, and a maple tree sending forth a seedling borne on air that settled in a small patch of earth and lived 100 years. 

Catholicism- My Take

     I haven't had too much of a problem with Catholicism, not after a dream I had when I was a teenager.  In the dream I was trying to kill a robot nun as she crossed the lawn.  My uncle finished the figure off for me.  It obviously represented my freedom from the doctrine, much of which I absorbed by half-listening to sermons.  One sticks in my mind because when I was a kid, it made absolutely no sense- something about tight sweaters and short skirts.  It was the 60's and these must have been dangerous.
     Years of living in Europe kept a benign image of the church alive.  I loved cathedrals and ritual.  One of my first published poems was "Lighting Candles is a Solitary Act".  But living in Spain led me to the Inquisition and when I visited the Vatican I was horrified.  All of this wealth was what my parents (on their limited income) tithed for, not the mention the poor around the world adding to the collection basket what they couldn't afford.
     So I was one of the people who sought the spiritual elsewhere. I don't think I ever considered the church as having much to do with my ideas of spirit.  There was Buddhism, astrology, and Jungian psychology to explore, mostly on my own.
     This week two things came up which show once again how disconnected the church is from reality.  The Pope reprimanded nuns for being "radical feminists" and focusing too much on social justice.  Kristof and Down address this brilliantly.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/opinion/sunday/kristof-we-are-all-nuns.html?_r=1&hp&gwh=A464DB3CB34756D533F78F20921F5AD4
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/opinion/sunday/dowd-bishops-play-church-queens-as-pawns.html?hp&gwh=6DB0AC29FFE1D8D9799B80DAAE700534

     And on Friday I took immigrants and refugees to a health fair.  Catholic Charities (which no doubt runs some great programs) had a stand dedicated to what the church does best- sexual education.  There was information on natural family planning.  If that works for you, I'd love to hear about it.  That was the most innocent.  One pamphlet denounced Planned Parenthood as promoting promiscuity while another warned that condoms cause cancer.  Something to do with talc. Where do they get their science? I was grateful most of the attendees didn't have the level of language to understand this dangerous misinformation.  Dangerous for people who deserve accurate information on how to protect themselves from disease and how to have fewer children if they so choose.
   Where to go from here?  What's next?  The writer, Anna Quindlen has formally renounced the church.  I'm coming closer.  The only thing that keeps me is the hard work of those chastized nuns.

The European Debt Crisis- My Take

A friend of mine in Spain travels often from Barcelona to the Priorat, a wine growing region about two hours from Barcelona.  On two Saturdays he experienced the horror of someone leaping onto the tracks and committing suicide.  Suicides are hitting the European countries that are subjecting their citizens to severe austerity measures.  Even the American press has published articles on the subject: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/15/world/europe/increasingly-in-europe-suicides-by-economic-crisis.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

Of course, reading about a suicide and witnessing one are worlds apart.  The same way that from a distance we are viewing the debt crisis in Europe from the perspective of what the media wants us to see- the result of corrupt spending by lazy wastrels.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  In my years in Spain, I had longer work hours and higher quality jobs than I have had here.  Not to mention the healthcare.  Here I was recently quoted a health insurance plan from Cobra that was $200 a month with a $10,000 deductable.  Insane!  Another indicator of the cost of US healthcare was a price for eyedrops I was prescribed for conjunctivitis- $460.  Needless to say, I didn’t get them.

What stands between workers in the United States and the Chinese economic model (no rights, no pensions, any work schedule up to 16 hours a day) ?  Europe, of course.  Europe has a social safety net and workers’ rights but these are being threatened.  We are fed the propaganda that the European worker is bloated by those social benefits. Universal health care, reasonably priced higher education, and pension plans are requirements for a society, not luxuries as we are being led to believe.    Meanwhile, public workers in Spain are taking large pay cuts and we’re not talking about high level politicians, but teachers and office workers (some of whom earn the equivalent of 1000 euros a month which would be about 1300 dollars).  That would be below poverty level here.  These are the people bearing the cost of the housing and banking scams that originated on Wall Street and spread throughout the world.  

The consumption that identifies life in the US is not present to such a degree in Europe.  Though there is wealth in Western Europe, it is never as conspicuous or as obscene as it is in America.  Sometimes I feel like I’m witnessing the decadence of the last years of the Roman Empire.  Turn on reality TV and be prepared to be disgusted as the “wealthy” bicker and consume.  You’ll see them rent $20,000 a month apartments in New York or take private jets to Morocco.  In the Sunday section of the NY Times there was an article called, “Bridal Hunger Games” describing a woman who spent 4 days on a feeding tube so she could fit into her wedding dress.  Decadent or what? http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/15/fashion/weddings/Losing-Weight-in-Time-for-the-Wedding.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

And, my tax rate is higher than Mitt Rommey’s.  

The American CIty

            So far this year, I’ve visited three American cities, four if you count my Christmas holiday trip to San Francisco.  The first city I lived in (and visited frequently as a child) was Buffalo, NY.  Over the years I watched its downtown transform from a busy place with department stores, shops, and restaurants into an after work ghost town unless there’s a special event taking place.   That’s increasingly the way an American city functions- it’s a place to escape from to a suburban home or it’s a place to go for entertainment like seeing a team play or going to a play.  The idea of including activities with living space has largely vanished except in larger cities like NY. 

            In a smaller city like Buffalo many essential needs can’t be met within the city.  My neighborhood has a café, restaurants, and boutiques.  For all practical concerns, I have to take a bus.   Contrast that with my neighborhood in Barcelona, called Gracia.  It had all of the above plus a supermarket across the street, a gym minutes away, and a medical center and cinema all within  walking distance. 

            “City Life” by Witold Rybcznski addresses how American cities have changed, and why, and how some may even thrive.  All the American cities I visited required a car thought if I lived in one of them, I’m sure I’d find a way to manage without one just as I have here in Buffalo.  I think that’s because they’re older cities (Philadelphia, Charleston, and Pittsburgh) all created before the car was the measure of all things.  I might not be able to manage in the newer cities like Phoenix and Dallas.  Let me know if I’m wrong. 

            In any case, I’m still clinging to my image of what a city should be, perhaps formed by the second city I lived in, Paris.  Need I say more.

http://www.witoldrybczynski.com/

Semana Santa- a re-visit to my post on the theme

Religion, Myth, and Magic*

The writer, Chris Albani says you can come back from torture, rape, violence. He should know having survived Nigerian prison, not once, but three times. Resurrection is the theme of this week. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rECVyN5D60I

That leads me Palm Sunday. I was raised Catholic but for decades only attended church for weddings and funerals. Since I returned to Buffalo, I reconnected with an old friend from my UB teaching days who had since become a priest (progressive, of course). Mass is familiar from a childhood of mouthing the words. Yet there are some differences: no male pronouns are used and the Holy Ghost has become the Holy Spirit. I’d forgotten Palm Sunday is a solemn celebration. It touches on the modern themes of betrayal (Judas) and abandonment (my God, why have you forsaken me?)

Albani was also raised Catholic which might help account for the theme of redemption in “Graceland” where as he puts it, “everyone is redeemed”. From there he went to Buddhism. As my Korean student who attended a Buddhist university put it, in Buddhism, you become the saint. Instead of the “I am not worthy to receive you” you have a pervasive basic goodness and the goal of an enlightened society (in the form I’m familiar with). As my Iraqi student says there is no God. You’re on your own. And my question is where is the witness that has been part of our modern therapeutic culture?

In the end, Albani tattooed the traditional Igbo deities on his arm. Besides Catholicism, I was raised with the distant remains of Pre-Christian Latvian culture with spirits inhabiting all of nature. My personal gods are my grandmother and a polar bear. I like to think of the polar bear as a totem animal from the far north of my mother’s ancestors. My grandmother is the muse of my first published poem.

Yet, I still love the saetas- the songs of love sung to the statues of Mary (or Jesus) in the processions of Andalusia and the shouts of “guapa” (pretty) when she passes. The processions go on all night and the drums are heard long before they appear. They can be solemn or the waiting time for the procession to appear can be spent in a bar. My apologies to the faithful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4rxmnHj62U&feature=related

I love the geese of the 16^th century Barcelona cathedral and the L’ou com balla- the egg dancing in the fountain on Corpus Christi.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoMp6kbydhU

Ritual, tradition, and repetition. Does one ever really escape them? Or even want to?

* the title of an anthropology class I took

The Perfect Job

What's your perfect job?  Mine would be sitting at my computer and writing each day.  Well, since I do that but still have to earn my living, I am now on the eve of attending the TESOL conference. TESOL means thousands of people from all over the world, hundreds of talks, and very few jobs posted. What's always shocked me is how a profession (ESL) that is filled with low salaried jobs holds its yearly conference in pricey hotels with high conference fees.
 The last time I went began my Spanish odyssey, first with an interview for a job at ACHNA in Madrid.  Gary interviewed me and he was so charming, I immediately took the job though there were others that were higher paying.  He was a great director and unfortunately was lost to AIDS. 
   Madrid was one of those defining moments in my life.  Many of the friends I made stayed with me and the job teaching adults English was great with an endless supply of stimulating materials. Madrid itself was fun too but I moved on (and stayed) in a more peaceful Barcelona.
   I don't expect any life defining moments at this conference except to reconnect with old friends and look and see if that ever elusive perfect job is out there.

TESOL- teaching English to speakers of other languages

The Old First Ward

The old first ward in Buffalo is one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city.  It's where the Irish first settled when they came to the city to work in the grain mills that are now imposing hunks of metal shading the small houses.  Since the neighborhood is still home to Irish bars and neighbors, it's the place to be for St. Patrick's Day with its annual neighborhood parade.  Nothing could be more welcoming than seeing the mix of floats commemorating deceased community members, police and firemen unions and a variety of other organizations that remind that Buffalo is still a union town even in these times.
    Attending the parade makes me realize everyone except me and my friends know everyone in the vicinity, and greet each other effusively as they march by.  I have a flash of that feeling I know so well, that of not being a part of a place.  And that leads me to the disturbing story of a Congolese refugee and his family who moved to the First Ward and were victims, not once, but twice, of arson. 
  A long time resident of the community was indicted for both incidents of arson.  There were the usual expressions of disbelief, and fortunately, great sympathy for the victim who had survived the horrors of Congo only to suffer in the First Ward. 
   This crime tainted the sweet camraderie and charm of St. Paddy's Day in what is called, the old neighborhood.

http://www.buffalonews.com/city/communities/south-buffalo/article748930.ece

International Women's Day

Today I was pleased to read my friend Raquel's FB post about IWD in Latvia- she said women were carrying flowers on this beautiful day.  In China, women have the day off!  Here we are moving backward in a frightening way.  The state of Virginia just passed a requirement of ultrasound for woman seeking an abortion.  And we all know about the horrors of Rush Limbaugh.  So much hatred  against women. 
   This is a poem of witness I wrote that appeared in my first chapbook:

Birthright

Past knots and tendons,

I look

through bone

and see,

in centuries past-

my face shrivel

as flames rise higher.

The point of a sword

slashes my belly.

Today, head to toe in black,

I barely breathe,

walk the required

steps behind.

The open hand

of my husband

reddens my cheek.

In  India, China girls

form the Greek chorus,

and chant,

Never born,

Never born.

The business of writing

     I'd like to ask my writer friends how much time they spend writing and how much time do they spend on what I call the "business of writing".  I long to get back to the unfinished short story or the possibility of a poem.  Instead I'm focused on promotion, sending out work to perhaps be published, e-mails, preparing for poetry readings, and spending too much time applying for elusive grants. 
    Of course, I'm aware that I shouldn't complain and I'm lucky anyone would read my work at all.  It's just that I'm overwhelmed.  How did they do it?  Those writers who put in a full day at some office and came home to write long into the night.  I can't shake off the day jobs of which I have two and I need some time to do nothing when ideas may appear.  And I don't even have a family.  So I'm impressed by those of you who manage.   Any hints?
   After my trip to California, I've become fascinated by earthquakes.  Here's the Chronicle's page that shows how many and when they occur.
http://www.sfgate.com/earthquake/
   I have a poem 18 minor quakes that perhaps I've posted before but need to edit.  Did I mention editing on my list?
  

The Low Country- a visit and a bit of the past

     Long stretches of marshland extend in all directions from Charleston's harbor and the surrounding barrier islands  The landscapes are marked by water, church spire skylines, and the beauty of the Atlantic with miles of beaches illuminated by glorious sunsets.
     Charleston itself is called the holy city for its array of churches reminding us of the religious past (and these days, present) of this country.   Houses in town have the porches we imagine when we think of southern mansions, but because taxes were based on frontal space, porches often face the sides of the buildings giving an off center feel to the streets and an insight into economics, even of the wealthy who could afford such structures.
     And that leads, as it always does, to slavery.  The slave museum stands on the site of the slave market of Charleston, in operation until the 1860's.  As recently as the 1960's it was occupied by a car dealership.
     Here you can peruse copies of the records of sales with listings of human beings with their traits (good breeder, half worker, cotton and rice worker, butler, healer) and the cost of each.  Shocking to say the least.
     Not to forget that New York City had a bustling slave trade into the 1700's and in the 1990's construction in the financial district unearthed a slave cemetery.  Slavery is the dark spot on all of America but it's here in the South that the marshes remind of the slaves struggling to clear this land for the rice and cotton plantations.  Slavery is still present in the beach resort where not a single African-American face appears.  It's in our hearts as the landscape leaks the blood of those who came before us.

Siberia and me

"Why did our father grow up in Siberia?" my sister asked.  One more unanswered question in his life filled with more unknowns than knowns.  My father died long before we were curious enough to ask such things. 
     All I knew was his childhood took place long before the Stalin deportations of Latvians to Siberia.  In one week in March of 1949 over 27,000 Latvians were sent to the gulags, including my mother's brother.  For an incredible book on gulags, I recommend "Gulag" by Anne Applebaum.
    So back to the question.  Enter Google where I actually found some answers.  The Latvian colony of Lejas Bulana settled in 1858 (aka Bullanas) still exists in Siberia.  It was rediscovered in 1975 by filmmaker, Ingvars Leitis who traveled there never expecting to find the language and culture still existing.  Roberts Kilis wrote his anthropology dissertation for Cambridge University on the Latvian community there.
  Bits and pieces is how I cobble together a past for my relatives.  Latvia was under the rule of the Russian Czar who offered free land to those willing to make the trip to Siberia.  And it turns out Catholics in Latgale (the province and religion of my father) had great difficulty in acquiring land in other areas because of discrimination. 
   So my grandfather must have been an adventurer.  Even today any journey to Siberia is hard.  Imagine it with a family a hundred years ago.  What I do remember were my father's stories about his childhood, included here in this poem.

His Life

Ed hopes his father

had a secret life.

My father had many;

two wives before mother,

a son left behind.

The war years

spent in Europe´s darkness,

in uniform,

rooting through trash

for food.

His secret languages

Russian, Polish,

we imitated in childish babble,

I learned sister, pillow, dream.

Siberia of childhood

giant summer fruit,

green winter lights

He brought to a farm,

half a globe away,

leaving a pile of unknowns

a lifetime to decipher.

Pre-sales for my chapbook are now starting:

Memories, Dreams, and CG Jung

Saw the film, "A Dangerous Method" which gave a most unflattering view of CG.  Thought the film had to have been made by Freudians who have mostly fallen out of favor except for when Jeffrey Masson analyzed Freud's seduction theory in the 80's.  Anyway, there's nothing sympathetic about Jung in the film.  He has no financial worries because of his wealthy wife who worries about being attractive to him while he carries on with a brilliant patient.  Freud (in the film) claims that relationship was the reason for his famous break with the man he had considered to be his successor.  I wonder if that is true or just the writer of the script taking liberties.
    Despite the portrayal, I've always been a fan of Jung and how he dabbled in the esoteric and found meaning in connections, not to mention the archetypes that make sense of our unconscious.  And that leads me to dreams.  I found an old journal from when I was in Malaysia and a dream  I 'd written down- I was in a small plane crossing the creek in Varysburg (the small town where I grew up).  I wanted to pay the pilot but only had foreign coins. 
    When I read that, I thought of how much meaning it held.  It took me two decades to return to this place where I began this strange and beautiful journey. 

Where is home?

    One of the themes of my writing has been the concept of home.  An astrologer might say it's because I have an emphasized fourth house or it may simply be status of "spiritual refugee" that is part of my  inheritance.  This week I lost another home- my ex partner is moving from the flat where I lived for fifteen years, the second longest I've lived anywhere except for my childhood farmhouse.   I have attached part of a grant application.  For those of you who might say, how personal and indulgent- I agree, but then again I just attended a Pecha Kucha event where almost every video and every piece of art included the artist him or herself.  That will lead me to another one of my pet discussions- what is art?  But that will be for another time.  And this is an essay!  Don't judge too harshly.

When I returned to the United States after many years living abroad, I found myself in Buffalo, not more than 30 miles from Varysburg, New York, where I grew up.  A search for a home that took me to Europe, Asia, and South America has come full circle. My parents were refugees fleeing from Latvia after World War ll and they ended up living in Western New York.  As a result of their experience, I have internalized the refugee nostalgia for a home that no longer exists, an idealized view of a home we are all searching for, whether it is an unattainable fantasy or the tangible place we construct and painstakingly decorate. 

Home in its infinite visions and possibilities has been a defining element of my writing and by extension, so has finding my (or my characters’) place in the world.  My first homeland existed only in a dream space.  Sleighs floated silently across snowy horse paths, saunas were built on hillsides next to lakes, and wedding celebrations lasted for five days straight.  This was the Latvia I grew up with, cobbled together from my parents’ stories and which probably never existed.  This place was my starting point.

     Growing up on a farm combined with the customs of a Latvian speaking culture gave me a unique view of the world.  That combination in the pre-ethnically diverse US gave me the role of an outsider looking in.   There was a bright shiny life that as a working class child of immigrants who had an eighth grade education, I didn’t have access to.  Yet it is precisely this background that has allowed me to live simultaneously in two different cultures and be open to experiencing many different lifestyles.   This has served me well whether I’m writing about immigrant life in the US or life as an expatriate in Spain or looking at how things work in small town America.  In my novel, “The Whisper of Silver Birch” I include dainas, the ancient poetic form of Latvian folk songs and in “Summer Scaffolding” I use details from my apartment  in Barcelona.

     I am a writer with deep roots in that farmhouse in Western New York, but one who has had the opportunity to move with ease in different cultural contexts and languages. I speak Latvian, Spanish, and French (fluently at different points in my life). I’ve had the opportunity to live and work in Colombia, Spain, and Malaysia and have used many of my personal experiences as a starting point for my fiction.  These places also came to represent home for me. 

       Presently, I teach adult refugees and I hope I can provide them with some of the linguistic tools to be able to make their home in the United States much as my parents did.  I hope they will be able to tell their stories in a way that gives them acceptance and respect in the community. I have come full circle in the immigrant experience, now working with refugees.

Slows down to a crawl plus poem

Life slows down to a crawl- almost a week of a particularly virulent cold.  My activities have been reduced to lounging on the sofa watching Downton Abbey, one of those dress up dramas that can't compare with "Upstairs, Downstairs".  The predictability of the plot is reassuring and perfect for lying around. The one day I ventured out to the store I was behind an elderly man and realized I was buying the same things he was (orange juice and milk). This slow pace could be a foreshadowing. 
In naturopathy a heavy cold is considered cleansing.  Our teacher said illnesses in children often resulted in growth spurts.  I had a growth spurt of a different kind, new thoughts came to me, things I had discounted or put aside and now can re-visit.  Does anyone remember the TV series Ally McBeal?  I always found the baby that appeared in scenes ridiculous but I have found myself having similar dreams.  Often there are neglected kittensthat I've forgotten to feed.  Last night it was a baby I found on a countertop.  I asked it if it was hungry- I was pleased to tell everyone it answered yes in English.  I fed it a bottle and spared it a few moments of play.  The symbolism is the baby represents some part of yourself you have not been nurturing.  At least in this dream, I gave it something to eat.
    So today, I can emerge slowly (even reluctantly) from this space I've inhabited for so many days.

Here's a poem I wrote ages ago but have reworked for some drama.

THE CENTURY TURNS

            Amphibious we swim

            some of the time,

            emerge sticky, dun colored

            from the murk of our ancestry.

           

            You are too much mine.

            Erased by foreign lands,

            too much acquiescence,

            for us there is no tomorrow,

no promise of children.

Your suit hangs,

shoes polished to the sonance

of Paris streets.

Your country, Congo,

is left behind.

At night,

the distant drip

of blood

seeps behind our walls.

Do things work in America?

I'm no stranger to bus travel and could relate grueling bus stories from trips in Mexico, Latvia, Colombia, Greece, etc. etc.  But America?

Buffalo- Toronto, Saturday morning.  First surprise.  I arrive around 6:15 (early as usual for any form of tranportation).  Already there was a line at the gate.  First clue- the man in front of me was ranting about Greyhound's terrible service.  I said, "Oh, no, you're a pessimist.  The bus will be here at 6:45."  The line grew longer and the crowd started to get impatient.
     Yes, there was a bus but the driver got out and announced, "Room for 3 passengers."
    I was shocked.  The image of American efficiency was something I always held dear in my years living abroad. 
    An hour later, another bus arrived.  This one was shoddier and older than the first one.  People started to push and I told one man he couldn't cut in line (as if this was my job). 
     Finally most of us got on- about fifteen people were left behind to who knows what fate.  Next, the driver went to get a coffee while we all sat waiting, too broken to complain.
   I'd chosen this particular time because it was supposed to be a direct bus.  Well, our first stop after the border (another ordeal) was the very first town, Fort Erie, where the driver picked up mail.  We stopped in every other town en route.  At one point there were passengers standing- something that I thought wasn't allowed.
    My return trip was quite different.  The bus left on time and though it stopped everywhere (my ticket was for a direct bus), I was mentally prepared.  By the time we got to Niagara Falls, it was just me and the driver.  I got a spectacular view of the Falls lit up at night.  He was from Montreal and we discussed gun control, elections, and Quebec referendums until we pulled into Buffalo.  When I got off in Buffalo, we shook hands. 
    My idea of American efficiency was shattered but I had a sense that humanity wasn't lost even in this impersonal world.


My bus poem which has appeared on this blog before:

The Lake

Something in me

loves a bus.

Starting at birth.

my father brought me home

in early November snow

on a bus.

There was Marilyn, circa 1956

all Bus Stop glamour,

and in Cleveland,

the sleek Greyhound sign,

recalls Edward Hopper

and the dusty 1930’s.

 “You have a blessed day”

the new goodbye as I board

wondering how to do just that.

Ashtabula, Erie, Buffalo

and all points east,

their vowels satisfy.

Something in America

so hates the city,

it bleeds out

 a slow death

 of the  light

and sound

and life

of this lake.

Rebirth, Change, Possibility

Like almost everyone else, I'm evaluating my habits and trying to restart my life.  After all, it is January 2nd .  So far, I've already made it to the gym and avoided having my lunch while lying down on the sofa.  And despite a small slide with chocolates (Christmas leftovers), I'm feeling good.  I returned from a wonderful trip out west- so much beauty and kindness!  So 2012- let's see what happens. 

Here's the link to a story I wrote on the theme:
http://www.fictionaut.com/stories/teresa-peipins/new-years-resolution

  I even found an old poem which shows New Year's a theme I have always been attracted to.  I have a new poem too- still in progress for a later posting.

New Year

Erase the year
with alcohol dampening
the brain and
as the custom of this foreign land,
race the block
at midnight,
empty suitcase in hand,
assuring all voyages succeed.
Against the night sky
filling with debris and rockets,
I cling to an age-old illusion,
rebirth-change- possibility.

Ghosts of Christmas Past and Three Kings

When I was celebrating Christmas in Madrid many years ago, a friend (Patricia) asked me why Americans got so depressed and weird about Christmas.  Now, while spending my first complete holiday season in the US after years abroad, I have the answer.  Expectation.  It's in the crazed shopping and the pressure of obligation to get everything right from gifts to treats.  I feel overwhelmed.  The encroaching darkness, the chill to the air and too much sugar, alcohol, and salt don't help.
     Nothing can ever live up to the idealized media image of a holiday celebration.  When I was a child, my sister and I (having learned this in school) waited up for a Santa Claus who never arrived.  My Latvian parents weren't up on that tradition.  Christmas meant a tree, midnight mass, and a big meal.  Gifts we received from relatives were things like fruitcakes that were never quite right.  Gifts were a regular part of my life, just not at Christmas so I was never deprived in that sense.  My father always returned from his visits to Buffalo with books, chocolates (he preferred Swiss) and paper dolls.  My uncles spoiled us with bags of candy. 
     I'm over the hump and starting to relax.  I look out at the neighbor's cloth snowman swinging like a dead body from the porch next to the illuminated reindeer and smile.  My class of adult refugees is practicing "Jingle Bells" for our party.  Shopping is done and I can stop running around.  And, on Saturday I escape to Berkeley where I get to spend the rest of the holidays with my Jewish friends.



Here's a poem about King's Day- a fun holiday in Spain.  I am missing my past visits, the great friends and glorious meals.

Epiphany

The Three Kings are lost

in whirling snows.

Camels sink unsure

in lands

past sands and tropics.

My door has no shoes

Waiting for favors or coal.

My favourite, Balthazar,

for the name

and stately beard

shakes his head no.

Here in white

crusted snow,

ice fills each empty step.

The good life with bicycle

First of all, I don't drive.  I can hear the cries the disbelief- what? No way? It is by choice.  I took driver ed back when I was 17; I was never one of those who drove on their 16th birthday. I never kept it up or even got a license.
 There is a precedent to this behavior-neither my father or mother drove.  In his case, he did drive a tractor but I'm not sure that counts.  My parents came from Latvia to the US in  the '50's when public transport was widespread.  And I spent ages living abroad where a car isn't essential.
That brings me to my bicycle.  When I returned to the US, to Buffalo, NY, one of my first purchases was a bicycle.  For a city with an interminable winter, it's a challenge to see how long into the cold I can ride it.  I usually last until the first snowfall.  This year I may break my own personal record.  It's December 10th and my bike is still locked to a post (covered area) in the backyard waiting for the next ride.

My short story 'Midnight in Barcelona' is in Ride, collection of stories about bicycles!

http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=httppeipinsbl-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&asins=B006JULSGK&ref=tf_til&fc1=000000&I

How connected are you?

    How old are you?  Where do you live (I work with a woman who can only get dial up in her neighborhood)? With this information it's easy to determine how plugged in you are.  My number one electronic device is my laptop.  I panicked this morning when it struggled to start up and the screen went black.  What would I do without it?
    I work on it (job 2 with ETS testing), write daily, watch movies and an occasional TV show, listen to music, and manage my ever expanding virtual social life.  Without it, I'd be lost.  Far less so are the other devices in my life.  I've taken to leaving my phone (gasp!) at home when I go to job 1 (teaching) so I get a break from texts or voicemails.  That and the fact I have an MP3 say a lot about my age.  I only use the MP3 on long bike rides or when I'm travelling and can't get to sleep in a strange room.  I remember the endless loop of music in the hot Miami apartment of a friend's while sleeping on a blow up mattress that even through sheets made me sweat.  AC, like heat, is expensive.
     Then there's my kindle.  I haven't decided yet what role it will have.  So far, I'm revisiting old (free) classics like Moby Dick, Little Women, and for some reason, freebies in  Spanish.

The great divide is greater with the electronic world:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/opinion/sunday/internet-access-and-the-new-divide.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss


Transit morning traffic,
truck stopped
cars workbound,
a child, coldproof in mittens,
waits with his father.
Inhale, at this moment,
in this tableau
no one escapes.

No cryonics,
no tucks or lifts,
nothing will free
you from what waits.