Resurrection

2013 – terrific and terrible.

The year I lost one of my best friends.

The year I started writing again.

The year I left a small town behind.

The year I went back to Thailand.

The year I started my PhD.

The year my grandma stopped to breathe.

2014 – a mystery.

Blank pages in the journal of me.

So many dreams yearning to be set free.

The painter, the poet.

I am so afraid to show it.

The dancer, the healer.

The undefined over-feeler.

Will I find a direction

or will a direction find me?

Blank pages in the journal of me.

Waiting to be filled with what I crave to see.

New friends and lovers.

Oceans to discover.

Disasters and broken dreams.

Silent cries and the loudest screams.

2014 – a mystery.

I can’t wait until it fills up

the empty me.

Reclaiming Christmas

Six years ago, my mother committed suicide six days before Christmas. Needless to say, the holidays weren’t exactly jolly.

In my world, Jesus’ birth never brought anything but broken promises, lumpy gravy, dead pigs, and reindeer sweaters. Adding funerals to the list didn’t make it any better.

As an anti-commercialist vegetarian, the month of misery usually serves to strengthen my position. December forever reminds me of dead family members, despair, and disillusionment. I know I’m not alone. Thousands of people fear the most stressful time of year. At every corner you turn, America’s multi-billion dollar advertising industry gladly reminds you of your inadequacy, lack of money, family, friends, or love of meat. This time of year, there’s no room for you inside society’s norms of normalcy. Here’s the season for depression, heart attacks, suicide, and sorrow.  

As a child, I remember crying desperately outside my mother’s door for hours, hoping she’d come out to share the Christmas meal with grandma and me. Sometimes she emerged from her dark cave right before my dad rang the doorbell. Then she rushed back into her abode of misery. Cursing me for letting the devil in. Other times she stayed in her room until we went home. I left my neatly decorated and carefully selected gifts outside her door along with my tears for years.

Until I realized, I make myself wallow in misery. I don’t have to keep telling myself the same cruel Christmas carol every year. I hold the power to change. The past remains the past, but the future’s all mine. This year, I start making new traditions. I’ll immerse myself in yoga and meditation instead of Macy’s madness. I’ll design cards with personalized poems for my friends. My marinated Tofurky will make meat lovers reconsider their dead birds. I’ll even light a candle for my mother, and pray I can forgive her after six sorrowful years. This year, I reclaim Christmas. Meditation, creation, forgiveness, and flow. Now if that’s not a proper way to celebrate Christ, I don’t know what is.

I work out for me! Or do I…?

“Damn girl, keep doing what you’re doing! If you keep it up you’ll be married within a week. I know, you got that look. But make sure you don’t burn, ain’t nobody want no red chick..!”

As I ran around the lake, I passed by these motivating fellas, shouting me along my path. I laughed all the way home (while I put on my sweater to block the sun’s burning rays), thinking of how far away from the truth they were. But then I started reflecting on it. Am I really working out just for me?

I love to think I work out strictly for myself: “because it makes me feel good,” or due to its health benefits. But how good do I really feel trying to get up from that tenth pushup, and how healthy is blacking out at the end of a spin-class?

And then we have lunges. I honestly believe the devil created lunges. Would I really suffer through these hellish moves if I didn’t expect someone to look at my bare butt once in a while?

I sure don’t think I’ll attract a husband by running around the lake a couple of times a week. But I don’t think it pulls down the odds either.

Memories of suddenly falling in love with the stair-master every time I fell in love with a new man started emerging. Reluctantly, I had to admit that maybe, just maybe, I work out for others too.

Thankfully, I do yoga just for me. However, I can’t deny I like answering “yes” to “so, you’re a yoga teacher, are you like really bendy and shit?” A comment that probably counts more as a warning sign than anything else.

Damn it! At least I still have pole dancing. I’m sure that one is just for me..!

Stripper poles, twirling dudes, and new love

It finally happened. A guy fell for me. For real..! (Well, at least he fell right in front of me, and that ought to count for something, right?)

There I was, minding my own business, cuddled up on the couch with my beloved new partner Netflix. Little did Netflix know he was about to face some serious competition.

Five minutes before midnight two people came rolling into my living room. And yes, rolling pretty much describes it, as summersaults and semi-unsuccessful headstand-attempts on the floor quickly became their favorite activity.

That’s before they noticed my big, shiny stripper-pole in the middle of the room.

The unsuccessful rolling quickly switched place from floor to pole. The girl had some drunken moves, I must say. But when it came to the guy, things got, well…interesting..!

I smelled disaster the moment he tried to twirl, but in fear of sounding like an old lady, I kept my mouth shut. (Now people, sometimes that inner old lady is actually intuition).

It only took one quarter of a twirl, before the guy came crashing down. The shock made me oblivious to the noise and pieces of glass spreading all around. All I saw was the dude landing right in front of me. Staring up at me like a lost duckling from inside the hole who once served as a table. Thankfully, the guy had manners, and collected the glass and vaccumed the floor before he ran out, never to be seen again. Leaving me all alone with Netflix, who now seemed pale in comparison.  

Maybe next time, a straight guy will notice my otherworldly charm and fall when he gets blinded by the sparkle in my eye.

Until then, I’ll cover the hole with a poster of Johnny Depp, and pray Netflix will take me back.

Halloween – Misunderstood Pianos and Bare Butts

Halloween’s right around the corner, which means I have a thousand costume ideas and very little time.

Two years ago I tried being “yin and yang” and ended up looking more or less like a piano.

Last year, I didn’t realize it was Halloween until the day before, and due to my Goddess fascination, and deep love of the ocean, I ended up with “Sea Goddess” (or what became referred to as “the blue girl who forgot pants”.)

I always attempt to tread the lesser-walked path of originality, and therefore drove straight past America’s pop-up Halloween Warehouses (yes they exist, everywhere…all hail consumerism).

At Michael’s (craft-store) I grabbed a ton of seashells, blue glitter, and sequins, and hoped I would have a revelation later as to their usage. Next stop TJ Maxx, where I grabbed a semi-sheer aqua blue sweater-thing with a bunch of spangles. Done, and done.

On the big day, I started drinking wine long before I started thinking of what a proper Sea Goddess should look like. Somehow, I made it through more than half a bottle before I opened the bags from the night before. Turns out the see-through sweater reached barely below my butt, which I now thought was awesome. Then I could put on my blue bikini-bottoms and be done with it. I threw on some shell-necklaces, and contemplated gluing the rest of the shells to my naked legs, but quickly decided it was a lost mission. Instead I smeared blue and green eyeshadow all over my face, glued some sequins on my forehead, and headed out the door.

This year, things shall be different. My outfit will be planned weeks ahead. Every minute detail knows its place. Intricate body painting will cover any bare limbs. Everyone will instantly know that I’m a Snake…or Medusa…or Lilith…or a reptile... Damn it…! I don’t even know…maybe Reptile Queen…people will get that, right? One thing’s for sure, I’m getting yellow contact lenses, something awesome ought to develop out of that!