Moving............

I've got 39 days to pack three years worth of accumulated stuff...Papers and recipes and books and clothes and spices? The countdown is officially on.

Seabear play I Sing I Swim in Sindri and Inga's lounge room

More Seabear!!!!!!!!!

Odds and Ends

She pulled chunks of stained glass from the ocean (in my dream). His body flowing down the page. Gramp's old rotary phone on the wall by the cuckoo clock. That day held me prisoner. A ripening headache. An old tree covered in glitter. And tired. And how can I stand it? How can any of us? Everything under wraps--nothing decoded. Oh to run in the snow and be free and open. Grains of rice swell. Water droplets drip. I imagine my word swirl around you, the distance it brings. His burns will heal, but when did I stop looking at trees? This is the year 2134? Slip of thigh. The leaf of days. He showed me a picture of her when she was young. He'd had it in his wallet 65 years. We sat on brown swivel stools, arms leaning on yellow formica. (You are) an artichoke's sweet aftertaste. Want to preserve my thoughts like a bug in amber--the irony. At the sink, sun reflects off the blade of a knife.

Upstate

Endless fields and long grass and tiny blue wildflowers and deer and birds nesting in the grass.

And Holiness.

And the worst headache of my life. And nausea and tears.

Seabear - Arms

I'm Taking the Challenge

I have a deep dark secret.
It's something I felt no need to come out about--for years.
It was between me, Keith and my ideas of what is and is not okay.
I didn't want to like it. I don't want to like it.
My first time was in Texas, in Austin, in a motel room.
I was only 23.
And i liked it--I have to admit.
Keith and I were in one bed, Jamie from the Real World in the other...

It's been 7 years since then--can this really have been going on for so long?

But two days ago, a certain someone accused me of being too pretentious to post a certain video clip on this here highbrow blog.
It's not so much that I'm too pretentious...
It's that I just didn't feel it had to be common knowledge.
Maybe there are some who will be shocked...

Case in point, a few weeks ago I commented to my boss that during Typography class I feel like I’m on American Idol. “Oh Jenn,” my boss laughed, “you watching American Idol would be funny,” she said—or something like that….

But I have to admit it. It’s the truth.
I get Keith to do the downloading for me,
and then…I watch.
And I don’t even feel guilty while I do it.

Bore Me (Yawn) - Fantasia Barrino AIS7 [Kalin]

not a joke!

Oh Boulder

Jenn Keith and Seth circa 1997!!!

Oh Boulder how I miss you. Mountains covered in wildflowers or snow. Green paths and creeks. Clean clean-ness. And the bookstore! And delicious healthy food everywhere. Riding my bike to the Co-op on Pearl for tofu with sweet miso beet sauce and greens...Which brings me to the Ruscombe Mansion--another place I forgot to add on my Best of Baltimore list. It is the one place I know in this city for consistently delicious helathy meals. Open Tuesdays and Thursdays for lunch. You have to eat their delicious food--whoever you are--before leaving this city...

Today

A run. A clean house. Good news. Camping ideas. Chai. Off and on sun. A saw in the street.

Baltimore To and Fro

More...

Lau Nau: Pläkkikanteletar

yes, another...now i'm off to eat some frozen custard for dinner...

Just Me and the Meece

in the 3 hrs and 2 minutes since you've been gone i've felt a bit empty. i've ordered some travel clothes. i've gone through the stack of magazines on the topmost bathroom shelf (it's gotten gray now that you're gone. and i think i hear thunder--but maybe it's a plane). i've made a list of music to check out on myspace from the magazines in my bottom drawer, switched the laundry, brought the paper recycling to the basement, ate some really old forgotten chocolate form the freezer (which i think has made my stomache hurt), and some cereal with dried strawberries. folded laundry and hung your clean shirts in your empty-looking closet (who knew i'd be lonely?). decided i like marla hansen a little. just a little. looked through an issue of Best Zine ever and was inspired to make a zine. discovered the pretty nice icelandic band mum and thier song marmalade fires. talked to your cousin morgan who called from pimlico...decided to bike to blockbuster or join netflicks for a month and in a week watch all the movies you wouldn't like but remembered you have the only dvd player that doesn't skip...3 small strange flies circle near the ceiling and a headache brews. read jane delury's story refuge from an old urbanite-so sad. decided i like the band seabear. and really, someday must go to iceland. read an article about rhubarb (more on this tomorrow...stay tuned). fell in love with finnish singer lau nau.

Lau Nau: Painovoimaa, valoa

All I can say is WOW! What a beautiful discovery this Finnish singer is!!! I'm in love.........

Headache Cures and More Etsy

So, everytime I go to practise with Ralo Rinpoche's students in Virginia (as I mentioned in the previous post)--someone always has a new headache cure for me. I want to share them with you:

1) have someone burn a hole in your head

2) soak your feet in salty hot water before bed

3)ALWAYS make sure you dry your hair after washing it

4)drink boiled ginseng every morning

5)put thin lemon slices on your forehead when you have a headache

and last but not least

6)eat ten black raisins every day between the hours of 10-1

It's not that I don't appreciate their advice....

Okay, also, my friend Talia has just opened a shop on Etsy where she is selling her lovely jewelry. You can see it at http://www.justbeejb.etsy.com/. Oh, and the picture at the top is one of her necklaces!

Something About My Face?

So last night Keith and I drove to McLean, Virginia. We were going to a tsog with Ralo Rinpoche's Taiwanese sangha. I was pretty grumpy as I hate racing home from work, gobbling dinner and then driving in traffic (while Keith studies in the passenger seat) to get there by 7:30.

So we'd arrived and made our usual stop at some grocery store I don't know the name of. As usual, I'd gone in to get something to bring for the feast we have at the end of the night. As usual, I was wearing my white shantab and was receiving lots of stares from kids and adults which I pretended to ignore.

I chose some tiny sticky looking donuts and stood in line. While waiting for my turn, I vaguely noticed that the cashier was an older asian man and exuded a really nice calm feeling. And then it was my turn and we said hi and I told him I didn't need a bag. I was noticing that his name tag said DOI and thinking that sounded like a Vitenamese name when he said, "There's something about your face....I can't explain," in heavily accented English. "Oh!" I sort of chuckled.

"Are you still in school? Are you working?" he hurriedly asked. "I just graduated..." I gleefully replied. "I see you are going to have a very good future..." he said oh-so-mysteriously. And goosebumps rose over me. "I hope so!" I laughed. "Yes, I see this," he said. "God bless you, have a wonderful night..." "You too," I said...

And he wasn't strange or creepy. I'm really not one to believe in fortune tellers. Like when my friend Sal who's going through a divorce insisted he had to stop and talk to the gypsy looking lady on the sidewalk in DC (and pay her money). But this felt different. He seemed so sweet and peaceful and true. Maybe I just want it to be true. I want it to be some sort of auspicious sign.

But I can't stop thinking about it. What did he see in my face? And what would "a very good future" mean anyway? Right now, I'm not sure what that would even look like to me. What would make me happy? Would it mean I get a book deal and somehow make enough money to pay off all my student loans? Would it be that I have a baby who makes me unbelievably happy? Is it that in the future I'll be able to live half in America/half in Asia? Does it mean that someday I'll become accomplished in Buddhism?

Keith said it must mean I'll be happy. And I'll take that. I'll more than take that.

Actually, Etsy

Actually, I've put my book up for sale on Etsy.....http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11766840

Maria Taylor/Xanax

Books For Sale

I still have a few books left. If you'd like to buy one, you can email me at ngawangpadme@yahoo.com........................

Hooray!

It's official--at 10:15 this morning I finished gluing the pages into the very last book! I feel so free and so relieved and so excited to be done all my school projects--forever!!!!

This is It

Finally, my last week of school is here! I've been so busy these last few months with three classes and work (and putting a manuscript together and making books)! And yay--now I'm almsot done--inching my way towards days of free hours--book reading here I come! I'm so excited--I already have two books waiting inthe wings: The Concubine of Shanghai by the beautiful writer Hong Ying and the Creative Family (even though I don't have kids--I could do with some more nannying ideas...)by Amanda Blake Soule of the beautiful blog Soule Mama.

PaperPinwheel Journal!

My online journal is now up! You can check it out at http://www.paperpinwheel.com/!

May Day and More Books

Two More Things

In my best of Baltimore list I forgot to add two things...

They are:
1) BlueHouse--if I was the type of person to work at a coffee shop, this would be the one. As far as the store goes, everything is beautiful and yes, expensive--but right now they're having a sale. (Fells Point? same as below)
2)HarborNews--best (only?) magazine shop in Baltimore--they also have really sweet cards and candy and chocolate and notebooks... (Fells Point--well, maybe not technically Fells Point, but close, right behind Whole Foods)

Open Your Heart Music Video

this camp video has got to make you smile...