email of encouragement

Here is an email I received from a kind-hearted woman I met on the plane from Tampa to Seattle. I wanted to talk to her more during the plane ride, but I am sometimes worried that the other person might not want to talk, so I did talk to her during the landing and got her contact information for an interview later on, (a book of American love stories that I'm contributing to) here's the email.

How are you doing? I hope this email finds you in the best of
health.You were such a sweet heart on the trip.It's hard to find
people with simple kindness and common courtesy.your parents raised
you well! I would still like to do the interview .right now I'am very
busy with settling in and trying to start up a business,and 4 kids ,so
I hope you can understand,but I'am very happy to here from you and
would like to talk.just give a little time if you don't mind, and if
you don't here from me, just send me an email reminder.again thank
you for being so kind.it takes a big person with a big mind to
overlook what the world says about people who's religion they
fear.thanks

-$108.00, a few errands and a kite

This day started out rather blue. With no money, I realized that...well I need to do something about that, but the thing is...is this..I find a way somehow to still do the things I want to do and not necessarily in an incredibly irresponsible way, no, but in a way that is rather seizing the time i have.

So, not it's not a total lie to say i was stressed, really stressed, crying stressed.

I made it through with the support of my amazingly loving family. And really it all last for just a couple of hours. The beginning of the day was cloudy and super grey, then when I knew it wasn't as big of a deal as I thought, the sun came out and life is good again.

I realized that I was more happy today than I might have been if this had not started out as a troubled day. How can you know it's good unless you have some bad?

I ran some of those errands that I spoke of before. Mail, bank, etc.. but I did get my digital voice recorder for my love story interviews and again thanks for my parent's investing in my life.

I stopped by the beach on the way home around sunset. It was beautiful outside, really windy, a little cold but enjoyable. I realized that this would be the perfect day to bring out my kite for the first time this year. I didn't think I could make it home and back in time.

I drove, as fast as legally possible. Made it home, grabbed a sweater and ran out of the house. Forgetting my kite.
Came back to the house, picked up my kite and made it back to the beach in such timing, it was beautiful.

I flew that little colorful kite for a good solid hour. And I made it down to this one beach where there is usually no one which was a great feeling sometimes.

I let the kite out all of the way, I'm a bit of a pro. And I started looking down the string with one eye, it was weird to see where the string seemed to just disappear and then a space and then the kite.

At one point when I was reeling in the kite, I was looking at the sky where the sun had set and it was such an amazing gradient of color that I felt like I could see what the color was made of, like fuzzy particles, I can't explain. It was cool though, I believe what I saw.

It all led me to this idea. I really believe it was all created by such an imaginative Artist. You know, how can you deny the creation of art? Do I doubt the photograph you took, or the painting you painted or the ad you designed? Do people not believe you when you show them your creations?

I also was trying to fly the kite so that it would be outlined by the constellation that I used to think was the big dipper, which is actually orion's belt, and the constellation that i believed to have been the little dipper is actually the big dipper and so this all leads to me needing to take an astronomy class of some sorts.

Orion's belt should be called the sky's kite. Totally doesn't look like a belt.

today i heard

while in the dentist's office, the next room over i hear the following:

Nurse: "Can you just sign right here and date it."

85 year old lady: "The 28th, huh?"

Nurse: "Can you believe it's already the 28th? Next thing you know it'll be Christmas already!"


just a little reinforcement to my time post.

And a sidenote: I dreamt I was experiencing an earthquake and remembered there were a bunch of nice ceramic coffee cups around me. coffee. reminds me to make my list of things i learned in and about Seattle.

the things we fill our days with

i caught myself standing at my bedroom window, staring into the backyard listening to my neighbors, who are undoubtably retired seniors, shuffling around their car port carrying in bags and shutting doors, talking some jumble.

Sidenote: I don't know them very well because they moved in after Steve & Ruth Lendl moved out, a couple who has known me my whole life...that's another story, I'm still a little bitter that they moved and that these new people moved in.

anyway

hearing them during my vacant stare led me to think about the things we do to pass the day.

Of course we don't do it intentionally to pass time but we legitimize these dealings with feelings of assuredness that the tasks we are undertaking are of great importance, and i am not belittling these events in any way, of course, i find myself lost in this blur of random tasks- but i cant stop to think of how we can realize that they are not the things that should define our lives.

So, what should? i guess it falls onto every individual to define that among other things we have to define for ourselves. I just wonder if people thing about this fact of life on a daily & hourly basis. I do and I'm not sure why or how that came about.

I don't know when over rationalizing and over analyzing about my daily activities plagued my mind?

I love these jumps of the mind. They are interesting to say the least.

We feel accomplished when we make lists for the post office, selling something on ebay (my guilty pleasure) finishing a book even if we don't like it, reply to emails, runs to the bank, the ends of the work week, etc...

We fill our days with these things, then the next thing you know, we find ourselves saying, "Wow! Christmas again! It feels just like yesterday was Christmas, this year has really flown by."

It's an interesting thing the way we cannot grasp time. I read in this book, A Severe Mercy, a true love story by they way, how we are always so surprised by time. We have been around for so incredibly long, why can we not get a hold of years, or months or weeks, days, hours...we just don't feel comfortable in a time constraint.

I'd say we were eternal beings because of this. Beings that cannot grasp something that it has lived so long with is an oddity. It's like, waking up next to someone you've been married to for 36 years and saying, "Hey! That's weird, I didn't realize you were still here?" Okay, maybe that's not the best example.

I digress.

The things that fill our days. They aren't necessarily mundane or unimportant, for everything in this life has its reasons of existence and ways that each fit in with the next moment, but I pose the question to you of what you fill your days with-what is the material that you choose to weave your life's foundation?

I challenge you and myself, not to make a list of things to do today, but to pass the time in total spontaneity, involving things and thoughts that drift from the daily workings of our material, business life.

thai food dreaming

I had another funny dream last night. I credit it to eating at a great vegetarian thai food place that Andrea & Jim took me to here in Seattle. The spicyness definitely gave way to some crazy dreaming.

I was in my front yard walking towards the door in the garage and I caught a glimpse of a tree in the backyard and this crazy little creature climbing up the tree, which happened to be a fruit bearing tree (which by the way, we used to have a mango tree in our backyard).

It was this white, shaggy-looking monkey type of animal, but it was as tall as me at the time. It was climbing up this tree and so I started watching it on its ascent.

It got to the top and if you can imagine a very un-proportionate creature amongst some long lanky branches-funny.

So it's up there at the top, then all of the sudden, it starts to fumble around, looses its balance and tumbles through the branches to the ground below. I don't usually laugh at the expense of others, but this was a funny looking creature and the way it fell was humorous to me, so this time, I did laugh.

Shaggy monkey hit the ground, looked up, saw me giggling at its fall and got up. I had an all of the sudden stint of fear.

It was not happy. It got up, started walking towards me in a fast manner and as it approached me, it grew, bigger and bigger, taller and taller. Oh shit.

I felt like I could not get into the house fast enough as this thing made its approach. I jumped in the door and shut it as fast as I could, my Dad happened to be in the house and I told him about this monster that was getting bigger and bigger.

When I say big, I mean like 3 or 4 times the height of an average door.

My Dad was assuring me that it couldn't get through because the door was locked and it wouldn't want to get through that badly to break through the door. Well, it was pushing the door for sure and with some serious force. I was pushing it back and telling it to stop as I reached for a spray bottle of alcohol. I started to spray it through the crack of the door and as I did that, I heard my Mama. She was saying, "Diana, what are you doing??" With a sort of humored tone to her voice.

Oh. Hm. It was my Mama on the other side of the door. My Mama that had become the monster for a moment. My mother the monster.

I opened the door and although it was her, she was super, super tall. I laughed. It was good, I had had some strange conversation with my Mother last night on the phone where I felt that she was being a little monster-like. I'm glad I could see this in a more imaginative way. I think I want my friend Lisa to illustrate it, she has a very eccentric way of seeing images.

Hopefully you can see these in a visual way soon.

Until then, I'm making a list of things I have learned in Seattle.

dream recollection from 25 june 2008

I had the craziest dream... let me just try to recap the ending that i remember...
note to reader: this is INCREDIBLY unimportant, you might even waste part of your life reading this because it has no meaning, and so just a little warning...i just woke up and wanted to write it somewhere i would read again.. hehe

on a boat with some people i think i knew, going through a city like new york, but the streets were wider, all the sudden two dolphins came by the boat but we could see them in the water way before they got up to the boat, then the next thing i knew we pulled up and there was this HUGE dinosaur?!?!?!! HUGE, i mean really...a lot bigger than they probably were, and it was a bronciosaurus and it was all different colors but just ridiculously huge! then there were a bunch of people playing soccer but these people were really big-headed, then i was walking with one guy who i ithink i was dating and he was from another country and he didnt even know but he hit the soccer ball without looking and everyone wanted to talk to him, and i told someone that he was from ____ country, i dont remember which and he started speaking in another language saying that he didnt understand, and we kept telling the guy, no comprendo, haha then i said, he's my foreign exchange student....then we found this huge room that had ice cream and desserts but everything was covered up so we didnt know if we could buy anything and then there was a lady who was like, yes of course you can do anything here, and so she gave us something but then wanted a $9 donation given to her from each person, even though it was free, but then the guy i was with said he couldnt pay because he was from french switzerland and they didnt have the euro yet, so he couldnt pay and hten the other people paid... then all of the sudden, i was spending the night in some room that was kind of scary, like i had heard people talking in the room the night before but my friend amy was there with me, with some other girl i didnt know, and they were going to share a bed, and i was like, well how about one more person and we will be really warm because i didnt want to spend the night in the living room by myself, but then OOOOOOH then thats when we decided not to sleep because we saw the dolphins, and we were actually on the boat!! and we got our bathing suits on and there's where it all makes sense... at some point too, i was leaving for another country and my family was all there and my sister made me give her my snorkeling stuff so that i ddnt have to carry any more stuff with me... so weird... but i kept wanting to go back to this dream because it was so absurd.

to be honest..

I still feel the same way. I wrote this back in December 2007 after my experience with the Farmworker's in Southwest Florida.

to be honest

i went down to miami on thursday night. walked around south beach solo the first night. very fun actually. but there is a limit to the amount of fun one can have alone...so enough said there.

the next day, friday there was to be a 9 1/2-mile walk from Goldman Sachs office to the Burger King HQ in Miami where a rally would start until around 6pm.

I awoke from my hotel room close to where the walk would start and joined the large group of yellow shirts. The usual BK logo was slightly altered to a more appropriate slogan.... EXPLOITATION KING.

I arrived alone and sought out an acquaintance of mine, Greg Asbed, who is an organizer from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. I found him and we spoke about a current project I am working with concerning fair foods and a corp. It was good to finally put a face to an email address.

We walked and I made friends and short conversations as I meandered through the crowds, especially when we got to the halfway point. On the last leg of our walk (there were about 600-1000 people marching along the streets of Miami and at the rally) I met a young man who happened to be one of the workers from Immokalee.

So, I cannot tell you his name. Not for any protection reasons, I just really couldn't understand him when he tried to tell me what it was. But with what little Spanish I know, "cuantos anos?" he was 28. "donde estas?" he was from Acupulco, Mexico. He was not married and had been living in the United States for 8 years. He only had one more year left until he went back home. He also liked to dance.

We walked along for the last 3 miles together, often saying to eachother, "muy caliente" and "si". He would hold the sign I had and then he'd give it to me (it had a double use, to display a message to onlookers and to block the hot, hot sun).

Along this path, there were a couple of college students I had gotten to know a little. They passionately and awkwardly chanted our staple phrases, "UN CENTAVO MAS!" and "Get outta the way King, Get outta the way!" they urged my new friend to chant along with them but he politely declined and stayed silent during most of the walk.

I started feeling out of place. Here I was, staying at a nice Marriott (thanks to my discount from work) going to sincerely support a cause I feel passionately about for a day. I was supposed to walk, cheer, yell, hold signs, and then go back to my hotel and have a great time in Miami...wow, sounds like something is missing.

Maybe I am being too cynical of this situation, I mean, what am I supposed to do? I can't help the fact that I am not a tomato picker. I felt as though if I was one, I would have a right to yell for JUSTICIA!! It was almost as though I was an outsider, wanting to be the one who WANTED JUSTICE, the one who DEMANDED FAIR WAGES, the one who wanted UN CENTAVO MAS!

I started looking around me, looking at my new friend. Wondering what he made of all this. I started wondering if I wasn't here: no one would really notice (not in a woe is me type of way!) just the actual presence of one more body. Then I thought- Diana what the hell are you saying, if you honestly believe that for one second, what does your life mean from this point? I then QUICKLY realized my momentary lapse of beliefs; what if everyone else pursued that thought? There would not have been such a HUGE turnout!

We got to the BK headquarters. Never had I felt such a sickening feeling at such a big building. I had a mix of emotions. I looked up to the glass offices and saw outlines of individuals looking down at the huge glob of yelling yellow. Maybe they were completely unaware? I can imagine the embarrassment. I can't feel bad for that long though. Many different groups and individuals spoke on that flatbed truck that served as a stage. We were there for about 3 hours. Robert Kennedy's daughter, Kerry Kennedy, was one of the speakers as well.

After my new friend and I said our goodbyes at the end of the night and I got on the bus to return to my car and safe hotel on the bay (please understand my sarcasm here) I realized that although most of us there that day could not necessarily understand how grueling the work is as a FL tomato picker, and could not understand the frustrations they have, we are sympathizing with them. Maybe we had been "exploited" (definition suiting each individual, of course) at one time in our life, or something close to it, or maybe we had seem a family member treated unfairly.

We were doing what humans should do for each other. Instead of man being a wolf to man (a quote I read from John Bowe's book: Nobodies: Modern American Slave Labor and the Darkside of the New Global Economy) we were expressing compassion for their struggles. We were disgusted by big corporations like Goldman Sachs (one of BK owners) whose top 12 executives earned well over $200 million in BONUSES ALONE in 2006. More than twice as much as 10,000 FL tomato pickers made in a year. We were outraged by corporations who underhandedly and sickly sell us the slogan that we can "have it our way".

I felt it all. I know I do not have to worry about the workers from Immokalee thinking we were just poster-children from middle to upper-middle class America, "doing the right thing" and feeling the rush of a great march and rally. That is just an evil thought trying to seek its way into hearts to prevent change from happening. People know sincerity, even if it's not in their language.

To be honest with you, never before in my life, have I felt more compelled to look at my possessions and think of where they came from, of who made them. It is such a difficult thing to get used to. I know I have been an advocate of "fair trade" and human rights for some time now, but maybe I was being passive and still "growing up".

It's hitting me hard now. Like a painful growth spurt. I think more and more consumers are also in their "pubescent stage" if I can loosely use that term. ha.

With great hope, I believe more and more in the power of an individual.

I saw this tattoo on this guy's leg. It looked like a math problem. On the first line it said "Compassion" the next line, followed by a plus sign, was the word "conscience". A line followed under that word. Okay I have to say this tattoo was located on this kid's calf and it was in Spanish, so sue me, I could not see what it all equaled, but if I took some time I'm sure I could think of a good word. Either way, what a great combination.

Today I hope you will move others to also have a compassionate conscience.

American Dream- june 2007

A few events have occured that have led me to think more about the "American Dream". Tonight, as I was watching CNN, there was a segment on border control. There was a report from this city in Texas that is near the border. This city conducts all of its city meetings in Spanish.

The reporter said that nearly everyone in the city speaks Spanish, and hardly anyone speaks English.
Well, Anderson Cooper was interviewing that reporter and some other guy (I can't remember exactly who he represented) but Anderson asked if either of the men thought it was good for the city to be conducting their meetings in Spanish instead of English.

One side said that it really was too insignificant to be an issue and the other man said that it was important for the children of that community to know English. He said it was important in reaching the "American Dream"...he kept mentioning the "American Dream" and I started remembering all of the things I have been reading lately that deeply considers the "American Dream". 



I'm currently reading a great book by Shane Claiborne, called the Irresistible Revolution, and he refers to this term and really reinforces what I have been hearing more and more lately, and believing too. 



The "American Dream" needs to be updated.

The A.D. (As I will refer to it) is old. It doesn't know about the state of our world now. If everyone in the world wanted to reach this ever-so-admirable A.D. then the world we live in would be destroyed. There is not enough resources for everyone to live the A.D. 

This does not mean that this A.D. should be limited to us here in the good ole USA...but it really means that we should think about giving the A.D. a makeover. Maybe even rename it.

The new A.D. should take into consideration our resources and our precious Earth. It should take into consideration basic human rights and needs of everyone. It should revolve around the opportunity to live a life of true equality. Sustainability for both living beings and the living sphere of mass we live on. 



But what a double edged sword this life is. To obtain a life of comfort and ease is just what Jesus wants to get us out of. He tells us to become the least to become great, to throw away everything to gain everything. (maybe not His exact words, but you know)

 what do you think about all of this. it is such a struggle to want to be successful and live in comfort but then to remember that if we have an extra shirt we should give it away.

I think there are different measurements of success, as in, successfully happy, or successfully...rich, poor, what have you.

It's certainly an interesting concept to consider and re-evaluate.

a dream recollection for you

Here is an excerpt from my dream journal...going back to last March...

March 8, 2007
i had a dream last night that i was somewhere in europe, the map in my dream was really distorted. anyways, we (my mom dad sis bro-in-law and bro) and we saw these people who were floating in the water singing some song, there was some sort of injustice in why they were in the water all linked together. the next thing we knew a little girl jumped into the water to float with them and then the next thing we were all jumping in the water with them, i think it was some sign of protest but im not sure exactly. we floated for a while and then we started swimming together. we swam until we got to this beach and that is where jim, my bro in law, was trying to get this crab to come out of its whole and my sister was telling himto stop and then he had the crab on his hand except the crab kind of resembled a scorpion too, then it turned into this little tiny crab and i took it from jim and it was like stuck on the top of my pointer finger and i was trying to blow it off but it wasnt so i think i killed it because i was freaking out and it was like pinching me. but then i didnt even get all of its pinchers out of me and they were stuck in the top of my finger. then i think we realized that we were swimming across the meditteranean or i think we might have called it hte black sea, either way it was really geographically incorrect but we looked at a map and saw that we were swimming from some country in the middle east to italy. wait ashley was there too because i remember we were so excited because we were like, when we are done swimming we arent going to work out for a long time because we had to swim so much. then we all had to go back to swim the rest of the way but we had gotten some raincoats, but i had lost everyone while we were on shore and this lady made me a jumpsuit kind of thing, that had pants and she said it would keep me warm, it was pretty weird looking and a bunch of different materials sewed together. whne i got back with everyone else they were in a parade that went to the water where we would swim again, then the leader of us said, i knew someone would be different and make her own jacket! and he was talking to me and i said, no i didnt make it! but everyone else had the same long rain jackets on so he said it was good that i had something different on. then we kept swimming but i remember thinking how calm the water was and we couldnt swim in the gulf because of sharks and there were no sharks in the water. my dad wasnt there because he didnt like to swim or seomthing.
That's all I remember.