Bay
i find pieces of myself at the strangest times. strolling between farmers’ market stalls where the season’s first batch of cherries are sweet (though not as sweet as they will be in a few weeks), or basking in the 90 degree sun on an unsuspecting sunday. i think i’m solar powered. the blazing sun speaks […]
it feels strange to be so close to home and still so far. when i’m gone – usually – i’m so far away that visiting isn’t an option or i’m close enough to drive home in a matter of hours. this west coast reality has thrown me a curve. flying home is conceivable but expensive. […]
Sometimes it starts with boredom. A forgotten book or dead battery on my ipod. Other times it is eavesdropping – a conversation at another table and I hear joss whedon spoken with the proper amount of reverence. But mostly it is something I can’t help. A compulsion or tic. I have to talk to people. […]
In the darkened theatre, my breath melded into the breathing of hundreds, all waiting for something magnificent, waiting to be moved. It is a collective inhalation of expectation while the curtain rises. They stand in their many poses, muscles tight in anticipation. Waiting to move…waiting to move the audience. This was my first Alvin Ailey […]
i can’t dance. not really. not the way people expect a black woman to be able to dance. i spend a lot of time in my head. is this moving right? is that? my legs are fine as long as they are acting alone, but throw in my arms, my hips, anything else and all […]
i’ve been to the gym once in the past three months. once. the one time was last week when i woke up from a nightmare at some unholy hour and couldn’t manage to find mare-less sleep again. so i rose and found myself cursing the treadmill. today i thought i’d try something a little different. […]
free oscar grant was scrawled in black spray paint across the whitewashed wall of the bart underpass. i shook my head as i passed. irritated because this is new graffiti on the recently painted wall…irritated more that someone missed the reality that you cannot free that which has been killed. oscar grant isn’t being held, […]
massages can be intimate. naked skin with a stranger. dimmed lighting and rubbing. i didn’t think anything could be more intimate between strangers than a swedish or deep tissue massage like i’ve had a few times in my life. and today’s trip into san francisco for a thai massage seemed an implausible choice for something […]
Oscar Grant Protest Jan. 14, 2009
judge and jury
the thing about life is that in some ways everyone is judging. everything is a courtroom appearance and you will either be vindicated or sent away. and it isn’t always as serious as all of that. sometimes it is just the look of contempt instead of being held in contempt. but consider…job interviews- or board. […]
Continue reading about judge and jury