on all kinds of leaving
This last 6 months has been full of letting go, leaving spaces, and packing up. What part of yourself - dreams, desires, memories, grudges, fates - do you carry with you in your back pocket, in the corners of your mouth, the tucks of your ears?
It has been re-learning my body, re-navigating the way out the front door to that patch of green I always walked by before. Now taking the time to sit down & breathe.
I’m going to be posting up entries, both from my current travels (& from my recent wanderings & reflections) to document my journeys.
Thanks for listening.
6.13.06, from North Country Institute for Writers of Color, upstate NY next to a lovely lake:
Reconnecting to some of my old dreams in a different way. This time spent away from e-mail & phones & the drudgery of life. I am reaching out for support, guidance, teachings, a place to rest my head & nurture your soul. & it doesn’t always get easier. You just come into another phase of your life with new struggles & challenges. Even here I don’t always feel I can totally be myself, being the only Asian (& like Ethelbert says, cultural ambassador for your people). How I am, yet I am not. But it feels different to be in a room full of people of color even if I’m the only Asian than a room full of whites. But for now, I feel peaceful & calm & I have space to breathe & take in the beauty & tranquility here. A space to pause & listen & soak & smile. Feel the sun warm on your shoulders & relax & pour your hearts & soul on the page. Peel back layers & scabs & let them fall. Speak. Memory. Valued. I will be entering a space where I can devote myself & I hope I can develop that practice of discipline to tell & witness the times, my community and people. When I hear about all the bullshit, I feel like that’s why Kundiman - so full of heart and love - is so magical and beautiful a space & time. It’s like family where we can laugh & joke & tease & read & write. It’s the kind of place I would want to help build & be part of. I also need to ready myself for those spaces where I am going to be the only one in the room & have to fight for my voice & perspective to be heard & listened to & respected.
Today, from New Orleans:
Walking down Magazine today, everything calm, it almost seems like it could be any supertrendy street in a city. Sunburnt white folk roaming in & out of vintage shops. Spacious houses with peaceful green lawns and home security systems. Only small signs of the storm that came before. The house across the street has the dark markings I’ve seen on TV. It says 5 dogs, x/o. The house next to it is a pile of rubble. S, the woman I’m staying with, says that the bit of red brick chimney I can see peeking through used to be slave quarters. This is still slave country. All along Magazine, if you look closely, you see permits for the restaurants to re-open post-Katrina. S says that her street is being gentrified as it’s being rebuilt. Someone from San Francisco bought the house I’m staying in & is charging double the rent it would have been pre-storm. But I know that things are very different from what they seem. Yesterday, someone said to me that this is a city where everyone is a survivor and is dealing with trauma. I’m wondering what old ghosts will surface for me here & how they will interact with the ghosts that are already here, imbedded in the lawns & rubble & faces of those who call this place home.
