For Grandpa.

Grandpa, I don’t know how to say goodbye.

It’s been nearly a year since we rolled you out of that hospital, into the dusty Mexican heat and soared back home, sweaty and uncertain. I remember the big black transparency the doctor showed us; we knew so little.

We’re all trying to look at this time as a blessing – these are the goodbyes you wish you’d said when someone is gone, but they don’t tell you how to go about interacting with someone so differently after a lifetime of habit.

You are the steady heartbeat in the center of this family – something so much a part of us that often you don’t realize how much work is being done to keep us all afloat. What do you say to your heart when it begins to falter? How can you tell it all that it has done, all that is has made possible?

I wish I were more like you, Grandpa. You always seem so certain, so strong, so true to exactly who you are. When I see old photos of you, it’s hard to imagine the other chapters of your life. To me it seems you have always been a big bearded man with wild hair and a mischievous grin, a laugh carried through cigar-scented smoke. No matter how big we’ve all grown, you have never grown any smaller by comparison.

I remember when we were driving back from the airport after we retuned from Mexico – everyone was so anxious to hear from you, and someone handed you the phone to say hi to Candace, I think. You spoke briefly and then said, “I love you,” handed the phone back, and asked, “Who was that?” And we laughed but you just shrugged and said, “I knew it was family, I love all of my family.” That’s exactly who you are to me.

It’s so hard to say goodbye, to find all the important things to say before our time is up, but I know you know the most important thing; that I love you. I think our relationship has always been largely non-verbal, it’s never been a complicated thing. It’s just as simple as love.

My first memories of you don’t even fit into a story, I just remember being in the old house on Brockhurst, and a feeling like a bubbling over of laughter, the kind that comes out of a child in a gleeful scream when they’re about to be tickled.

I don’t really know what you believe, or even what I believe, but I feel certain that you will be okay. I hope you are filled with that feeling of overflowing laughter; that you dissolve into it. I hope you get to see us, and that the next chapter is as adventure filled as this one. I hope you get to bring all this love with you.

Tressa

Grandma.

Grandpa is snoring with a blanket over his head.

“He’s in Hawaii,” Grandma tells us.

Lately he’s been going places that his body will never again reach. This afternoon we visited with his sisters and he told them in his low, quavering voice that he would be going golfing tomorrow. When he needs to be taken to the bathroom, to be hauled and shoved and cleaned and undressed and dressed, he goes to Hawaii, again.

Grandma sits back on the couch as we talk about the strange balancing act her life has become. We talk about death with dry eyes, it’s such a commonplace topic these days, now that Grandpa has begun to hear things that no one else hears, see things that are not visible to anyone else.

“In the hospice booklet they say illusions,” Grandma says, “I say illusions my ass, but to each their own.”

Last week, when Mom, Sis and Grandma took Grandpa on what may very well have been his last trip, he told Mom to go back into the hallway to see a painting that looked like me, but it wasn’t there.

Now, Grandma sits back on the couch and looks very tired.

“When people ask, you know, what I’m going to do when he passes,” she says, thoughtful, “I think I’d just like to rent a room somewhere…and just sleep for a week.” She shakes her head a little. “It sounds funny, but that’s what I’d like to do. No cell phones, nothing, just sleep for a long time.”

photo credit: natron dreaming via photopin cc

Grass stains.

Little brother had five medals hanging from his neck on colored ribbons when he squared off on the grass for one last competition. His opponent was a tall, tan boy; undecorated. And as they wrestled, little brother paused for a moment, thinking of his medals and the boy’s barren neck, and wondering if he should crumble and let the other walk, victorious. Instead he brought the boy to his knee, and walked away with six medals clanking from his chest.

But in the car, winding home as the sun slipped away, he was not victorious but ashamed and he cried for the other boy, imagining the defeated boy in his own mother’s car, wondering if the boy's friends would tease him, wondering if he, too, would cry when he arrived home with nothing but grass stains to show for the day.

photo credit: Hourman via photopin cc

A letter to Macy.

To Macy—

You were born during a strange and fleeting heat wave in October. The night before your birth, miles away, I dreamed of your mother, round and bursting with life. You were born after a tumultuous September, and we looked to you as a green promise, a warm wind of hopefulness and light.

You were born into a family that will love you not sweetly, but fiercely. In many ways, we are more like a clan, a tribe, than a family. We brandish our last name like a flag and we will hold you up and sing your praises. We are boisterous people, kind, intuitive people, deeply connected with the other world, with the family members who are no longer here, but who guided you into your mother's arms. They are all around us, and you will feel them- when you are afraid, when you need strength, when you feel alone.

If I could tell you anything, offer you some small piece of advice, it would be this: life is full of all the lessons you need. Be aware of what is being shown to you, listen, and hold your mistakes in your hands like precious stones before tossing them aside and moving on. They are your most valuable possessions, but they weigh you down if you dwell on them.

Your life is a unique experience and no matter how much a person knows, only you are the expert in your own existence. Be receptive to the knowledge of others, but know that you are free to adapt what you learn to your own idea of self, your own path. The singularity of your existence is amazing- you are unlike any creature to ever walk the Earth. Embrace this as an opportunity to be unapologetically and wholly yourself, whoever that becomes.

No matter what, you are loved.

—Tressa

"Home"

 

I’m back in California after what could very well have been the most wonderful year of my life. Wonderful, yes, insane, chaotic, full of lessons, full of scrapes and bruises, full of loss and gain in an endless surging flow, sorrowful at times, surreal, unbelievable, euphoric, terrifying, also. There is so much I haven’t had the time or the attention span or even the words to tell you about. And now I’m back “home,” toying with that word like a question in my mouth.

Northern California is a beautiful place—we are lucky to grow up here, basking in the mild sunshine and the fresh redwood and ocean air. When I returned I was struck by the expansive sky, spread out above the low building tops, by the wideness of the smooth, black streets, the sidewalks. Everything is low and flat and spread out, bordered by green. Everything is square and new. The graffiti is painted over in stern squares. That image has a lot to do with how I feel, with a certain specific blankness, a lack of stories. I feel my bursting, booming, blooming year fading inside of me, as if eroding upon exposure to this sweet foreign air. Was it all a dream?

There are things that feel right about being here, like seeing my lover’s blue eyes up close, like getting behind the wheel of my dusty, leaf-cluttered car, like my brother’s skinny ten-year-old arms wrapped around me. I feel like I can sigh into California’s temperate embrace and sleep off a year long accumulated hangover. But I also feel something missing—a big gaping half of my heart. Not a day has gone by that I haven’t been overcome with the urge to cry at strange moments, like at a stoplight, or while buying cider at the grocery store.

In Spain time moved differently. Every moment felt full of possibility. Life seemed like some wild undefined adventure, something to be molded and tossed around, something to plunge into with open eyes and an open heart. Every strange, surreal dream felt possible. Back “home,” all those elaborate unconventional dreams seem impractical. I am being re-acclimatized to something called stability. Routine. Planning. Where before growth seemed spontaneous and personal, now progress seems like something to be charted out on some kind of dull trajectory of compromise. This is called the future. Suddenly all your living is supposed to be stored up for later—right now you must work to build options.

There is a Californian girl inside of me, and she knows how to navigate this kind of lifestyle—she’s done it for many years. But there’s another person, maybe new and raw and uncertain and incomplete but thirsty for life and strangely strong and all of this change is pressing against her all over, crushing her. Even on a purely geographical level, my options are suddenly limited. I’m compressed into a cage of stale social roles and a lack of travel possibilities. I feel like I left a certain kind of hole when I left, and now I’m supposed to come back and fill it, but I’m not the same shape anymore. I’m trying to find a place where I have room to move on, but also to acknowledge that so many amazing things have transpired in the past year, and to find a way to examine how these things have affected the trajectory of my life and who I am as a person.

Morocco: The Desert Tour Begins

 

At 6am, it’s dark and the silence is punctuated only by the shrill call of some early rising bird. At breakfast, there is only one other group eating, and the birds that dive down from the rafters to pick at early morning breakfast spread—pastries and bread with goat cheese or jam, orange juice, tea, sweet cakes and muffins. The tour arrives half an hour late, but the receptionist says in Moroccan time, they’re early. One of the guys, a hungover Argentinean named Tomás, apparently slept though their 7am pick up time. We meet the two Mohammads, driver and guide, and three solo travelers; Tomás, Keith from Texas, and Joe from Canada, as well as Mirjam and Florian, a quiet couple from Switzerland.

The drive begins, first through the dusty outskirts of the city, then into dustier more desolate desert, and up until the view becomes lush, green, and mountainous. Our first stop is at a little café-restaurant called Tagdalt, for breakfast. Mom and I have already eaten, so we climb up to the terrace and snap photos of the red hills speckled with green clumps of foliage, the big sheer cliff sides and the trees. The café bathroom is grubby, the blue walls chipped and faded. Along one side are doors leading to what resembles a shower stall with medium sized blackish hole in the ground. The other side has toilets. It smells horrible, and as I’m pulling up my leggings, someone begins rattling on my door. I hear my mom say, “Someone’s in there,” and I say, “Occupied, one second,” and wave my hand over the door. Finally I exit to find a baffled looking Asian couple, still attempting to tear open my door.

The group of Asian tourist are dressed in a wild array of clothing and accessories—one lady wears a dress with a strange print of sloppily painted dolls with exaggerated red mouths, one or two of the women are wearing germ masks, like surgeons, and one man is even wearing a big black turban over his otherwise non-Moroccan attire.

After the group finished breakfast, we’re back on the road, stopping to photograph an older Berber village—it reminds me of the caves in the Sacramonte, but more square, a big neutral brown stack of houses growing out of the hillside. I watch a young man guide a sheep along a path, then scoop it up in his arm and carry it across a little river. The turquoise doorways and yellow, orange, pink clothing hanging out to dry stand out against the earth-colored backdrop.

As we drive, the snowy tips of the mountains loom closer and closer, and soon we see patches of snack beside the road. We stop again, up high, and a little cluster of men try to us sparkling stones and hand made trinkets. The road is scattered with little shacks displaying geodes and teapots, camel carvings and jewelry. At our next stop, a man places a snake around Joe’s neck. He offers it to us next saying, “Not poisonous,” over and again. The other men come up to us with foreign currency and try to trade it for dirham. “No bank,” they say.

We continue on for lunch, where we stop at a place called Labaraka, and sit together around a circular table in a room covered in colorful cloth, with a tent-like ceiling. The menu is in French, but we manage to order a Moroccan salad, a delicious and refreshing combination of green peppers, tomatoes, red onion and black olives, and a Berber omelet, in a tagine. It’s accompanied, of course, by the flattish bread that resembles a cross between pita and sourdough. The food is delicious and the waiter is a smiley man who has acne and seems shy, but bemused. We follow the meal with bitter mint tea.

After lunch we walk to Ait-Ben Haddou, a fortified city along the Ounila River, where movies like Gladiator and Lawrence of Arabia were filmed. It’s a big sprawling stack of reddish earthen towers coming out of the hillside. We cross the water on a footpath made of sand back and head into the maze of earthen structures, winding through the chunky cobbled streets, under big arches, past painters and souvenir shops, up crumbly stairs, past little homes, carpet looms, and donkeys, and finally through a faded pink doorway into a Berber home. The walls are textured earth, covered in fine cracks, and the rooms are illuminated with big squares of natural sunlight. We climb up a narrow staircase and follow the pungent smell of hay and wool to a little sheep enclosure within the house. The animals eye us suspiciously. Next we follow Mohammad to a little terrace where we can see the desert, the mountains, the little river, and the rest of the village. Outside are colorful pots and terracotta tagines. We enjoy the sun for a moment, and then descend into a little room that once served as a prison. It’s decorated with trinkets now; teapots, swords, vases and pots, and illuminated with candles. We sit around a low table and drink tea. “Berber whiskey,” Mohammad jokes.

We head back outside and begin to work our way uphill until we reach the top, where we have a perfect panoramic view of the snowy mountains, the red desert, the sprawling town, the river with it’s patches of lush green. We stop for photos and enter the little building perched on top. 

We head back to the van and drive onwards as the sun slinks down out of sight. The streets are suddenly full of foot traffic, women covered from head to toe walk alongside their more modern companions in jeans and head scarves, children and men in robes on and motorcycles alike. It’s dusk when we arrive at our hotel for the night, and a chill has set in. Our hotel is adorable, adorned with busy tiles and geometric shapes. We settle into room 30; it’s dimly lit with a low little couch and two small beds with thick woolen blankets. We freshen up and rest for a moment, then head downstairs for dinner.

The dining room is heated with a smoky fire tucked into a hearth in the corner, and we are served delicious soup with big pointed wooden spoons, the typical triangles of bread, vegetable tagine with chicken to the side. Afterwards we peel big cold oranges for a messy dessert and chat sleepily for a while.

The beds are small and a little stiff, but the wooly blankets are thick and heavy. I fall asleep almost immediately.

Morocco: Day One

The Red City is mostly a faded kind of putty pinkish brown. In the Square, Djeema de Fna, we are approached by men who offer to be our guides—Good price, they say. A well dressed, thin little man in a neat black pea coat tells us to follow him. No money, he says, I’m paid by the hotel. We are hesitant but it feels rude to blatantly accuse him of lying. He shows us where we can exchange currency, we walk past skinny horses tied to carriages, palm trees and pruned back roses and cross the wide seemingly lane-less street where cyclists, mopeds, trucks, taxis and horses speed along together.

In the bank we stall for time, hoping he will leave, but he doesn’t. Back outside, in the dry smell of exhaust, he tries to guide us down a side street, away from the busy plaza and the marketplace. He says it’s better, but the road he indicates is much more quiet and empty. Trust me, he says, and a little signal goes off inside of me. We tell him we want to see the souks, wander through them without a guide.

The plaza, across the street from the foliage-filled square, is a strange mixture marketplace and street. There are no marked pathways, but mopeds and bikes zoom through pedestrians; the loud squawk of horns fills the air. A woman with a hidden face comes towards us, her voice is loud and demanding and she tries to push a book of henna photos into my hands, just to look, she keeps saying. She grabs Mom’s gloved hands, saying, look, look, yanks back the glove and pulls out the little henna syringe, lightning fast. Mom pulls away just as the woman squirts henna onto her hand. She follows us for a moment, but falls back when we ignore her.

All around are identical looking white and blue carts with stacks of oranges piled high. Behind them young men call to us, Bonjour, hello, orange juice? No? Next time, eager optimistic, determined. A man with a monkey on a leash steps between us. gestures at the sweet animals, more vendors offer us dates, spices, coriander, they say, saffron. We step into a covered street, the reds seem to deepen here, and we are engulfed in a mass of colorful slippers, silver teapots and jewelry, mounds of spices, leather bags, stacks of carpets, little wooden boxes. Women with covered faces crouch against the walls with outstretched hands, a soft faced boy fixes his store front with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, and all around us are the cries of the English phrases picked up through the marketplace—just to look, just looking, maybe, good price, take a look, top quality—they outstretch their arms, try to herd us into their cramped little shops to point at their goods. Here, silver, here, red stone, they show us their earrings. Genuine leather, they boast, holding a lighter to the surface, you want smaller? You want different color? They zip and unzip the pockets in their bags to show the durability.

It feels like a sensory whirlwind—toothless old men with canes, stray cats cleaning themselves in the sun, slinking around little lamps and carved boxes, round faced women cooking square pancakes, butchers slamming down their knives, young boys rubbing their hands together, relishing the prospect of a sale, vegetable vendors crying out their wares, restaurant owners shouting out their menus behind us, shop keepers offering up their soaps and cedar wood to smell. We have this moss, good for the hair, mix with other things, lavender, chamomile, they tell us. Where you from? England? Ireland? We have herbs for snoring, too. This is Moroccan made, no China, Marrakech made. Artisan. We buy nothing, wind our way through the confusion until we find a quiet courtyard outside a museum.

It’s still and peaceful. We order tea and sample Moroccan sweets, breathe in the sun, chat with the friendly man at the counter, marvel.

When we plunge back into the twisty little streets, we feel rested, energetic, ready to take on the leather shops. We become bartering machines, or Mom does, picking our way though the bags thoughtfully—No it’s too big, no I don’t like the stitching. Finally she finds a little brown burgundy bag with a flat bottom and silver buckles. The shopkeeper is a boy about my age with a sweet face in a long gray robe and shiny black tennis shoes. He asks for 750 dirham and she offers 300. He offers 700 and she stays firm. It goes on like this—he says, I’ll give you a plastic bag for free, and we laugh. I want to make you happy,  he says, Madame I cannot sell it to you for that. I am an artisan, he tells us, proud. 350, maybe 400. We walk away and another man, whose shop we’d stopped in before, comes running up to us. 350, he says, it is okay. We return to the shop and the boy tells us, 400, you promised 400. Mom tells him, I want a long strap, 400. He ushers us into seats and disappears into the maze of leather. When he returns his hands are greasy and he has a shiny leather strap that is being stained darker. Artisan. Then he turns to me.

I want a backpack, and I tell him so, so he begins to show me little packs. I say no, bigger. I’d seen one earlier, in a different shop, and suddenly that other man reappears, and seems to remember the bag I liked. I have, they keep telling me. He disappears.

The boy chats with me. Is that your mother? How old are you? He is also 21 but finished school five years ago and has picked up all his English in the markets, with the people, after leaving his Berber village to work in Marrakech. The man returns with my bag, a big, brown leather backpack. Handmade, they tell me, good quality, good leather.  The bartering begins again, Madame, this bag is much bigger. Mom tells the boy she wants him to come sell insurance for her and we laugh. He has straight teeth. I want to make your daughter happy, he says, working the charm that seems to come natural to Moroccan men. We finally agree, 350 this time, no plastic bags. We all laugh, all happy, all defeated. Next time come visit my shop, he says, waving from the doorway, come and have tea.

Shit in the Streets

Casey is gone. I was really sad to have him leave, and even contemplated what sorts of serious injuries would render him incapable of leaving, but on Thursday we went and had churros and chocolate with Leah and then I took him to the bus station and he headed off to Madrid. I cried a little but made myself go to class so I couldn't sulk and be bummed out all day. Now that he's back home with the MooMoo dog, things feel pretty normal. I miss him, but a normal amount, so, it's okay. We crammed a lot of last minute fun into those last days; we had a night picnic up by San Miguel alto, and had pasta and salad while watching the Alhambra glow and all the little lights flicker all throughout the city, and the stars were clear and it was pretty. We went out to tapas with Courtney and Mauna, had mediocre Chinese food (which strangely included a watery flan for dessert), went discount shopping (I finally got some much needed sweatshirts!), got coffee and pastries, and Casey got to skate a bit more, plus we watched movies (all of the Narnia movies!) and made good food and did other cozy things that make us feel normal.

Like I wrote last time, the semester is coming to a close and things are getting pretty stressful, but I was talking to my friend Sydney the other day and it was a really simple, casual conversation, but we were talking about how little grades and academic success really matter in the long run and it made me feel a lot better. Obviously school is important to me, but that's always been because I enjoy learning, primarily, and even though my grades may matter if I try and do grad school, it's not worth panicking over. So basically, I'm doing my best but remembering to breathe. I've never failed a class before, but if I do, fuck it, I'm not here to get good grades in classes where I'm learning nothing, anyway.

I have been pretty studious this weekend, finished up a big unit planning project in my methodology class, for one, but have also been having a lot of fun. Friday I met up with Christina and we went and picked out a birthday present for Karim. He's into comics and graphic novels, so we thought about getting him a gift card since we had no idea what to get, but they didn't have any, so we made the shop keepers help us pick something out based on the few books that we recognized from his collection, and our personal preferences (some of their suggestions were kinda ugly.) We also made him a card, and then later made dinner and met up with some friends at Laurel's house. We didn't do much that night, but we eventually got pretty extremely drunk and mostly just goofed around at Christina's until she got sleepy. Then Syd, Michelle and I went to the Mirador San Nicolas until we froze a little, and they walked me home and tucked me into bed. Literally. How cute is that?

Saturday, Christina and I bused to Jun with a bunch of Karim's other friends and we had a barbeque at his dad's house. His dad was really sweet and had a bad ass cane. It was great seeing him and Danielle, who just got engaged in Dubai, and of course my big slobbery dog pal, Leto! We had grilled veggies and salad, humus and pita bread, and they made sausages and burgers, too. I was miraculously energetic despite only sleeping about four hours the night before, and that night met up with Hannah and this Spanish guy, Carlos, whose in my North American Lit class, to have a few beers on Pedro Antonio. On our way, we ran into one of his friends, who was on his way to meet up with more friends, so we went to a little bar called Pub Venom and had a pretty awesome, mellow night drinking beers and hanging out with some really chill Spaniards. It was fun 'cause a few of them are studying or at least practicing their English, so everyone benefited linguistically. They were a really cool group of kids and I felt we had a lot in common and we were able to have some pretty worthwhile conversations. We talked about American consumerism, car culture, vegetarianism, veganism, the value of life, abortion, overpopulation, social anxiety, language...

However, last night I also witnessed literally the worst thing I've ever seen when we walked by a homeless guy sitting in a corner with his pants down, pissing and shitting on the sidewalk. Yeah, I saw dick, balls, piss and shit all at the same time. So. There's that. I tried to write a more well rounded title for this but, I just couldn't. Too traumatized. I want everyone to suffer with me. PICTURE IT.

Anyway, despite the night's disgusting end, I had a lot of fun, and ended up sleeping for about a million years by the time I got home (around 5:30 or 6:00am). Today it is raining, which is kind of a bummer because I still have clothes on the line, but was also good because I stayed home and worked on my methodology project and on transcribing a conversation for my pragmatics project, which I'm honestly not sure when is due... Shit. I also got to Skype with Michael Baba, and we had an online tea party and I got to hear about the silly shenanigans I've been missing out on, and it was grand.

By the way, the lack of photos is mostly due to the fact that I dropped my iPhone in Gypsy's water bowl the other day, so it's sitting in a bag of rice in an attempt to not ruin it. Or what's left of it...it's kind of already a total cracked, scratched, fucked up disgrace.

Oh, and I don't think I've yet mentioned that my mom is coming in slightly less than three weeks and I'm SUPER FUCKING PUMPED. We are going to have all the fun. All of it.

Pet Passport, Package and Planning for Portugal!

Are you excited? I'm excited. Why am I excited? I'm going to Portugal, mofuggah, that's why!

Updates: Sunday dinner was tasty and successfully not that expensive. People were nice and things, yay!

Monday I went by the vet's office and got some info on what needs to happen to take my Gypsy King home. It's gonna be pricey, but today I went and got things started. First, the vet cleaned his ears and showed me the mites in them through a microscope. EW. Then she gave him a few vaccines and clipped his nails and gave me his pet passport! Hilarity!

I actually carried him to the vet since I haven't bought a carrier yet, which was a little ridiculous but he handled it well. The vet told me to get a carrier, but... I'm being a cheapskate. I don't wanna buy a carrier until I know what specifications the airline has for me! She said I could just get a cheap one and then get the airline one but ten euros is still ten euros...Urgh. She was also a little baffled by his name.

In other news that is great, I got a lovely, lovely, wonderful, amazing package in the mail today from the combined efforts of my mama and my lover! The contents:

Sriracha hot sauce, tasty little mini hot sauces, green tea and Duchess gray tea, 90% cocoa dark chocolate, hot cocoa mixes and an assortment of tights and leggings along with an adorable little worry doll and a lucky bean! THEY ARE THE CUTEST!

Speaking of cute, I have to leave my Gypsy King in the hands of my housemates for a week whilst in Portugal, and I was nervous about how thorough their care taking would be so I made a chart to make sure he gets water, food, and a freshly cleaned poop box everyday. Behold:

Agua/comida/caca.

I even added an extra day in case of some weird unexpected delay. Ugh, I hate to leave him. I wish he could be a traveling kitty! I mean, he has a passport, after all...

Well, tomorrow is my last day to wrap up some homework stuff, pack, and (knock on wood) go sign my new lease(!!) before heading off to Porto and Lisbon! Wish me luck!

Thanksgiving

I am thankful for a season that has crimson red and crisp clean air, yellow leaves and brown and blue yarn. I am thankful for a place that is a little labyrinth, a place like home, but older, but newer. I am thankful for thrift shop sweaters, for incense, plane tickets and technology, for chocolate, for rosemary and for Polaroid photographs. I am thankful for two long legs, for lungs and something similar to freedom, at least. I am thankful for the stirring, shuddering, all across the world, and the people who have thrown themselves headlong into hopefulness, and been hurt for it, too. I am thankful for boots, for five-subject notebooks, for salt. I am thankful for Gypsy King, my MishkaMoo, Daisy Dooper Dog, serious Buster with his mustache, and Badger with his blue eyes, too. I am thankful for markers, cereal boxes, scissors. I am thankful for open-late Chinos, full of beer and bobby pins, chili sauce and glue sticks, full of junk and everything else. I am thankful for my tongue, for words and words and words, even if they never seem like enough. I’m thankful for a boy who is patient, that dog whispering boy, for breakfast in bed and shower sex. I am thankful for blankets, for poetry, for literacy, for tomatoes, music, what little patience I have, for the redwoods. I am thankful for the ocean, for dreaming, for dish soap, body lotion, for driers, when I had them. I am thankful for a best-friend mother, that unbreakable bond made of different kinds of love, for four parents, really, strange and different and wonderful people, artists and adventurers, I am thankful for their logic and their passion, for their quirks and their lessons, for their homes and their heads. I am thankful for twenty years and almost one more, for waking up, for phone calls, I am thankful for a voice, for my copper ship necklace, for comfortable silences, raspberries, collarbones, chapstick, and cider. I am thankful for windows, for eggs, for leggings. I am thankful for a grandmother who read me Nancy Drew and taught me how to knit, I am thankful for my family, for a spider-web of support, for love that comes steady even miles away, even though I am as strange as a deep sea creature, and almost as pale, too. I am thankful for a brother with big deer eyes, a brother with a mind as raging and curious as the sea, who can draw airplanes and tanks, volcanoes and castles, a wild drumming fiend. I am thankful for wings, for films that make my heart ache, for friendship, mail, my faraway car, reusable grocery bags, freshly made bread, graffiti, strangers, sales, coincidences, surprises. I am thankful for open eyes.

Helping Hands

Things are good. Friday was surprisingly sunny and beautiful and warm, so Laurel and I met up and took a walk up to the Alhambra and wandering around this beautiful secret garden type place. We got a pretty late start, though, so we caught a lovely sunset but it got dark pretty quickly. Leah had promised to make dinner do to the moneylessness thing, so Courtney and I went over to her place and we had an excellent feast of stir fry veggies with tofu, rice and bok choy. I got a migraine that night and went home to sleep, but Casey was online so we Skyped but with my lights turned off, since I was super light sensitive. The funny and tragic thing is that he was also really sick, like feverish and whatnot, so we were both just really unhappy and unwell, laying in bed and complaining to each other. Sometimes that's just what you need, I guess.

The snowy mountains look so beautiful at sunset!

So much yum!

Saturday I met up with Valentina to watch a movie, but it was beautiful day so we went on a walk instead and she went with me to the phone store to kind of decide what I'd want ahead of time and then we hung out at her place for a good while. I feel so lucky to have people that are so useful and kind in my life! That night I went to Camborio and Ben talked to his boss about getting me a free bottle of vodka since I was robbed there, and they actually made me drinks all night with it, so I just fed all my friends a bunch of vodka and ended up staying until the place closed. Needless to say, I was having a good time. Sunday I was that kinda goofy post-late night partying sort of sleepy and I went and hung out at Leah's and convinced her to go see a show at Vladimir Tzekov, which due to sleepiness we had a hard time understanding but it was really interesting, anyway. Next Sunday is an Alice in Wonderland show, so I'm really excited to check that out. Gotta get there early, though, this week it was PACKED.

This lady is all kinds of wonderful.

Despite the fact that Case and I were both basically incapacitated Friday night, he did open his weekly gift...

Pac Man candies! These reminded me of Casey because before I left, when we were working on a screen printing project with my mom and brother, he made a Pac Man T-Shirt.

In other news, I was finally able to buy groceries, thanks to my mom transferring money to Courtney's account, and Courtney getting money out for me! I was in pure edible bliss until I got home and realized that my kitchen is a shithole again. Thus far I have not had the will to deal with it, and so I am blogging instead of making my normal eggs and potatoes for breakfast.

Also, I want to say a huge thank you to my lovely aunt, Sis, who actually donated to the feed my travelin' belly fund, specifically to help me out with taking care of Gypsy. Thank you, Sis! Gypsy and I really appreciate it and it will really, really come in handy, especially since I'm hoping to take him home and I know that vet fees and stuff might be a little bit of a nightmare.

Do you see what I mean about being lucky? The Universe has surrounded me with amazing, generous people.

Shitting Bricks of Ballerness

Today is my bitch.

Seriously. Today and yesterday are both my bitches. Wanna know all the great shit I've done in two days? Well I'm gonna tell you:

First of alls, I went to class, like a good kid, turned in my ficha (ID card type thing that professors often ask for), then I went to the store, I got Gypsy a real litter box and some flea drops, I bought an umbrella so I won't have an excuse to skip class every time it rains (like I may have done on Monday), then I came home, made my bed (with my freshly cleaned, piss-free sheets), swapped Gypsy's litter box, and sat my ass down, got all my homework done (instead of going to the bars!), did some work and passed the fuck out. Then this morning, I woke my ass up, made an omelette with some muthafuggin veggies, popped my laundry in the washer, put flea drops on Gypsy, cleaned up her poop, walked to the oficina de extranjeros and picked up my student residence card thang (which looks snazzily official!), walked to Inma's office, picked up a letter that had arrived a billion years late (thanks for the bracelet, mom!), picked up this official looking piece of paper that is important to school stuff (or something), turned in my extension form, bought groceries on the way home, and then hung all my laundry up to dry.

Yeah. Are you exhausted just looking at that? Cause you should be. Oh, what's that I just nonchalantly slipped into a paragraph that probably no one is going to read? Oh yeah, "turned in my extension form." What's that mean? I'M HERE UNTIL JULY! It's official! Sorry California, I love and miss you, but these semester shenanigans just won't cut it. I love this city and I feel like I need to stay longer and pound my Spanish into submission-- YOU WILL COME OUT OF MY MOUTH AND NOT SOUND STUPID, DAMMIT. And besides that, the opportunity for travel here just can't be passed up. I'm thinking Morocco in December and maybe Portugal and Ireland in the Spring?

Luckily, Casey has sent in his passport application, so hopefully we will be able to sell our souls and get him a ticket over here as soon as that comes in. And if you say need a few "good deeds" points to boost your karma for the day, you could always click that little donate button on the right and send us a few dollaz in the name of love and travel and awesomeness. Just sayin. That shit ain't cheap.

Also, if you're reading this and you plan on seeing my bbygrrl Zella anytime soon, you should probably yell at her until she decides to buy a ticket and come see me, too! And family, if you're reading this, figure out when you're coming and GET YOUR DAMN TICKETS.

And speaking of the loves of my life, SatAmrit and Mailee are going to be here in FIVE FUCKING DAYS and I'm shitting fucking RAINBOWS OF GLEE.

WHY DOES MY LIFE RULE SO MUCH?

Okay. I'm done shouting. I promise. But really. Gimme money.

I don't have any relevant pictures, but here is me wearing a cat scarf, just to spice things up:

RIP Duke

 

Such a sweet pup, I love and miss him so much.  So sad I didn't get to say goodbye. So sad I'll never get to cuddle up with him again. 

I know Mishka and especially Badger will miss him, too.



RIP

Merriment and Misfortune

I think this slackerishness may be a new theme for me. Life is just too busy to be properly expressed in neat little paragraphs every few days, it just moves too fast.

The deadline to drop classes is fast approaching and making me nervous as HELL. The professor for my two Spanish Lit classes has yet to arrive to a single class, but these are the classes that I suspect will be most important for me, since they are the only ones that really pertain to my major. I'm loving my Pragmatics class, it seems challenging yet doable, and the professor is really helpful and sweet. Last week I made sure to go to her office hours, and I've already begun our first paper in the hopes that I'll get it done in time to revise a little and try and make sure my grammar isn't totally fucked. I have a presentation today for my Methodology of Teaching class, and I'm stupid nervous, even though it's in English, which is obviously an advantage for me... My North American Lit class is a little bit ridiculous. Last week we had our first "discussion" on Rip Van Winkle, and the political commentary went completely over my teacher's head. A few of us are wondering if our essays for that class will have to be a regurgitation of her ideas or if we'll be allowed to argue for different readings...

This weekend was, of course, total madness in the best way possible. Friday night, I really wanted to go see a cheap metal show, and had a bitch of a time finding someone to come with me, but at the last minute, my Santa Cruz sista, Michelle, returned my call and we had a fucking AWESOME time listening to this bad ass woman sing the most beautiful lyrical type stuff and then scream the most guttural brutal screams while rocking a sexy red dress and a pair of Converse. Yeah. Karim and his adorable girlfriend, Danielle, met up with us afterwards and took us on a whirlwind of Granada barhopping friend-meeting awesomeness. At one point we tried a kind of rum ONLY found in Granada, at another point we visited a Western style pub and munched on sunflower seeds and at another place we tried a kind of alcohol that is consumed by pouring a stream from an awesome little tea pot into someone's mouth. They let me crash at their place, which was great because I got some Leto-lovin (he's their enormous, sweet, slobbery Great Dane mix!) in the morning. They are seriously the sweetest couple ever. They even tried to feed me in the morning, but my stomach protested.

Karim and Leto in a loving embrace!

Directly after arriving home from their house, I realized I had to get my shit together and bake some cookies STAT because I was scheduled to go hang out at Leah's with a group of Spanish pals to chow down, play some drinking games, etc. Luckily, I was actually the least late of the bunch (ohhh, Spanish time) and we ended up having an amazing tinto de verano (or in some cases beer) drinking marathon that began somewhere around 4pm and ended around 1am. The group of boys that came over are these hilarious Granada natives that have all known each other for a billion years and are all madly in love with each other, the result of which being lot's of man-on-man lap dances, tons of goofiness and lot's of affection. Later on, Fran came and brought us tortilla de patatas, which he made with the help of his grandma (awwww) and when everyone dispersed I decided to go to a bar with him and a few friends and he took me on his moto! So much scary thrilling cold fun!

Group photo! At this exact moment, the chair Pablo was perched on broke, hence my awesome facial expression.

The next morning (well...if 1:30 is morning...) I went back to Leah's (unannounced, of course) and shortly afterwards Courtney arrived, also unannounced and we tried to book a hostel for our upcoming trip to PORTUGAL and SEVILLA which I'm really fucking pumped about. It took us a billion years to do so, because we were all semi-deliriously sleepy and we discovered two untouched bottles of tinto de verano, which we promptly consumed. Eventually, inspired by our mellow tinto buzz, we began to clean the house, but only after taking some fantastic photos, of course:

All in all, success. After all this, I finally returned home. It's gotten so disgusting in this apartment. I clean the kitchen just about everyday, since I have to cook in it, but I could give a fuck about dealing with everyone's mess in the living room, so it's gotten pretty heinous. Last night I firmly resolved to not deal with any of the horror accumulating, but this morning I just couldn't bring myself to make breakfast in the scum, so I washed alllllll the dishes, even the ones growing mold in the living room, threw everything that was laying around away and swept the floor. Ben promised to take out the enormous stack of beer cans, soda cans and bottles and booze bottles away, but, well, that was two or three hours ago...

On a much more unpleasant note, I finally got to Skype with my dad and Karen last night and was told that my lovely fluffy pooch, Duke, will probably not be around much longer due to the fact that he has some pretty serious cancer in his knee that has probably spread through his bones and into his lungs, etc. I got to see him on Skype and it was really sad to think that it may be the last time I'll see him. He obviously recognized my voice, and was cocking his head and looking around, but he also looked a little doped up. I guess he's in a ton of pain. It's hard to feel so much at once; I love him so much and am absolutely devastated that he will probably be gone by the time I'm home, that it almost makes me feel guilty to be having such a great time here.

Duke, 2010.

I know he's not gone yet, but it's still been a pretty tearful day for me. Duke has been my fluffy friend for the past ten years; he's family.

In slightly more uplifting yet darkly humorous and relevant news, last Friday Casey got...

A mini lint roller. Why? Because our pup is white, and her fur dominates ALL. Seriously, I'm still finding puppy fluff on my clothes and I've been gone over a month.

Anyhoo, class in an hour, time to make the trek to Cartuja. Hopefully I'll be able to write a little before next week, but Wednesday I should be Portugal-bound and I don't think I'll be back to Granada until Sunday!

Last Day in the USA and Being an Awesome Girlfriend

Well, folks, it's my last day in the USA. Unless you count tomorrow morning, which I don't because travel days are essentially nowhere days. Airports simply don't count.

As many of you may know I've been crafting a nifty little advent Calendar type project to give Casey while he awaits my return. And it turned out awesome! It was super fun to make, too, and last night I finally gave it to him. Check it out:

Awesome, yes? It basically a little hanging curtain of pockets, each of which contains a little weekly gift! There are a LOT, because I'm going for a semester but I have the option to extend for a year, so this calendar has enough pockets for a year's worth of weekly gifts. Potentially this means extras but hey, extras are better than falling short, right?

I've preemptively photographed all the items, so you can see how awesome they are. The first one is, in fact, my transnational heart, the inspiration for the poem, this sweet little hanging map heart my stepmama made me for Valentines day:

In less adorable news, I'm all packed up and ready to go. 46lbs of luggage, just barely missing the 50lbs mark! This evening I got to say goodbye to my fambam during a conveniently timed joint birthday party for two of my cousins. Also, since they were having chili dogs, and I'm a veggie, I brought a burrito and killed two birds with one stone; saying goodbye to the loud, lovely Fessendens, and saying goodbye to the joy of Mexican food. Oh, burritos, how I will miss you.

In closing, I'm super tired and Karen made me an awesome copper ship necklace that I forgot to post a photo of in the last blog. Behold:

Stoked! Good night!

Packing is Poopy

Some people like packing. I'm not one of them. Packing sucks. I think I've pushed it all to the last possible minute, too. I guess that's because in addition to packing up what I'm taking, I also have to pack up what I'm not taking to put in storage. Yuck. Luckily I had Casey and Kelsey around; they made me put on all my clothes and then voted on them to the soundtrack of the Knife, which, if you're wondering, is an excellent soundtrack for that kind of thing.

Handy dandy voting cards. Kelsey added smiley faces to the "NO" cards so it'd seem less judgmental.

Turns out the majority of my luggage is socks.

Strangely, these past couple of days have been more or less calm. Rather more calm then the ten day mark, I'd say.  Deep breathing, etc. But I'm still at least a little bit freaking out. Luckily, my friends and family are awesome, so I've been having a lot of fun not packing. For example, Casey and I went to the Jelly Belly Factory on Friday, which was awesome. Everyone should go. It's free! And they feed your face.

Om nom nom nom.

And I had a tummy-stuffing taco night with Karen's family that was super yummy. Especially since Karen brought my favorite ice creams (raspberry sorbet, coconut and dark chocolate gelato, ahh!)

My super sweet goodbye ship from Karen!

Ten Days Till Takeoff

When I woke up this morning, I realized I've reached the ten day mark and it's finally starting to dawn on me that I'm leaving really fucking soon. There have been all kinds of winged creatures in my stomach today.

I'm officially in list mode (more so than usual, even), but I haven't actually begun packing yet. I have been doing the "quality time" thing though. This Friday, for example, I spent the day screen printing T-shirts with my mama, brother and Casey, and last night we had a nice pig-out sesh, complete with berry crisp Uly made himself. Impressive.

 Printing with Uly.

 Super sweet awesome printed shirts. And Mishka.

 The doofiest "fambly portrait" you ever did see.

I am going to miss my fluffbutt puppy dog so much. Any ideas on how to make sure she won't stop loving me while I'm gone?