Sunday, October 28, 2007

Voice Mail

I woke up to an amazing voice mail this morning that was unexpected. I woke up lazily after a lovely night's sleep at 7-ish am with a voice mail message on the phone.

Convincing myself that 7 am was too early when I had nothing in particular to do this morning I rocked myself back to sleep by rubbing my feet together for another hour. A sliver of sunlight was reaching my curtain and I was bathed in a gentle orange light. My lids slightly opened, a smile was on my face and I remembered the message symbol on my phone, and so I listened.

It's contents were darling and my cheeks flushed with surprise and recognition.

I don't remember the last time I received a voice mail that was so unexpected and personal.

An amazing start to the day which ended up being a wonderful, relaxed Sunday that drifted into errands, activity, and ended with dancing.

The moon wanes.

Monday, October 22, 2007

Colocas


Colocas, originally uploaded by Eriqua.

This past Sunday was the Oakland Museum of California annual Dia de los Muertos celebration.

I almost missed it because i was in traffic coming back from San Francisco.

I caught the tale end, participated in the ceremony honoring the ones who have passed in the different directions - east, south, west, north. Each symbolizes the elders, the women, the youth, and the men. We shed marigold petals in each direction as we remember those who have left us.

I needed this ceremony. It has become an annual celebration for me to reflect those who have left me personally and as a way to honor loved ones of people I know.

The color mixed with the feelings of melancholy that erupt in me on a golden autumn afternoon make for a ceremony that closes the gap...we mourn, we celebrate, and we commune with others.

Friday, October 19, 2007

Rants and Raves for Friday

This week has been a little nuts.

Lots to prepare before I go back into the classroom on Monday.

We reconfigured the new lab because it was stolen about a month ago.

My coworker is giving a presentation on Saturday to report out on the grant my specific program is funded through and the progress of our program. The power point has evolved from still slides to some animations and graphics I was building. In troubleshooting the thing, I was sucked into the black hole of figuring out WHY the movies weren't playing in the darn thing. That had me working til a cool 2 am on Wednesday night (Thursday morning) and a parking ticket because street cleaning began at 12 midnight.

Crap.

Thursday morning I got a late start and was feeling a little drag on my step, but managed to pull it together for a program meeting, preparing for our monthly Tell It Like It Is event. I had to go over my part of the presentation and then prepare for this morning's radio program.

And I got stuck in traffic, so I got to do an interview while waiting in a cue of cars to the toll plaza, past the metering lights, and across the bridge...all without any call drop incident (Thanks to all the powers that be). About 8 blocks from the office, it was over. Phew.

God, all I want to do is take an extended nap, but it's Friday, I need to finish a survey/evaluation based on our training and we have an intern coming in and we're excited about getting ready for Monday!

Feelin' a little productive...and imagine all this without any java addiction!

And Trolley Dances is happening this weekend as well as the Oakland Museum of California Day of the Dead Celebration.

SWEETNESS!

Meanwhile...I'm upset about the whole S-CHIP thing, speechless about the noose epidemic seeming to grip the nation since the Jena 6 thing, disturbed about the Bhutto thing, disgusted by the Iraq war thing, incensed by the Armenian genocide thing and still feeling stung by the Yankees loss to the Indians. Can we get a less racist mascot, folks? I guess not if the nation's capital has a team named the Redskins...

Here's to the weekend...

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

(Inter)National Day of Reparations, October 10, 2007

America's infrastructure was built on a lot of free labor: slaves of the African diaspora, Native American diaspora, Latino, Arab, Middle Eastern, Asian, and South Asian diaspora have let the United States sit on the fruits of their labor interest-free.

Today is the first of many days to call attention to this irregularity of accounting. Reparations are a decent and immediate solution to this imbalance in balance sheets. Thanks to artist damali ayo for inspiring this international movement.

I did my part by standing in my shades and waving my sign.

So far I've made $0.00, but I gave $1.00.