Big Sur Buds

Hoop the Flow

One of my dear friends and ex roommate has come along way. Her interest in hoops began tentatively. We had to move all the plants out of the living room when she would practice and duck behind each other to avoid getting knocked over by hoops that would clumsily fly off her body left and right.

Years later she has become a well known hoop instructor and performer in the San Francisco community. She teaches classes, leads workshops and soon will be taking her hooping experience to Mexico to impart some more dance, body and mind awareness and hooping magic.

I'm a bit too stiff to even try to look graceful with a hoop. But this woman knows what she's doing!



For more on Hoop the Flow, check out her website here.

Patch Design

One of my closest friends is starting her own business! Congrats Hed! Printing, design, work with different fibers...all hand made! Very cool stuff! You can check out the website here and the Etsy link here.

Congratulations!

This is a salute to two of my dearest friends, Adam and Amanda. They are getting hitched today! Wishing you guys the best on your continued life together. Yay!

Circling the Drain (Appropiate Response)

After leaving Chile to live so far away I often considered what I would do if one of the members of my family I was closest to would become sick or die. Would I get on a plane and rush down? It's a day or so of flight time and the ticket is a bit more than say, going down to San Diego. What would that phone call be like? What would it feel like?
Well wonder no more.
Last October I wrote a mini short about one of my aunts who raised me during my teen years Chile, who had suffered a severe stroke and was paralized and probably not going to recover. Well she did for a while only to worsen again a few days ago.
I received some emails from cousins updating on her condition and now it seems nothing but a miracle can save her.
I called my cousin I'm closest to, she was in the hospital and needless to say it was an awkward conversation at best.
I remained silent most of the time, which isn't really proper phone etiquette. Since you can't see the person, you need some kind of acknowledgement that they are still on the line. But what do you say? What is the proper response?

Her condition has only gotten worse, for the last 2 days she's been vomiting blood and her condition is so fragile that the doctors can't even perform the appropriate exam to determine where the internal bleeding is coming from.

Silence.

She's at peace, she's ready. She called us all in and said her goodbyes one by one. We talked for 3 hours or so. She said she loves you very much. She said she wants to leave what little she has to you. She says she'll always be with us.

A gasp, then more silence.

Are you there?

Yes, I'm here.

The doctors say if she makes it through the night there might still be hope. But it doesn't seem likely.

I see.

Except I don't. I don't see. I don't see what you can possibly say to a conversation like that. What the correct response is. What the fuck do you answer, when someone tells you a person you care about is circling the drain and has been coughing up blood for the last couple of days? And you can't even go and say goodbye? Or support and comfort everyone else who is being put through the ringer?
Worst of all how do you end the conversation?

Yeah I'll call you later and check up. If you talk to her again before...if you talk to her later can you tell her I love her?

Then you hang up. When you hang up you're transported back to your cozy room in your San Francisco apartment. You hear your roommate laughing upstairs. Gone is the hospital, gone is your heartbroken family who is...waiting. Waiting for her to die.
Such a large distance plays such an important role. It's all happening so far away it almost isn't real. There's really no one you can really share this with. No one knows this person. She doesn't exist in your reality. So you can't really mourn her if she dies. Can you? It's such a bizarre mix of emotions bubbling up in that dark cauldron.
After reeling from probably one of the most intense phone conversations ever I got up from my chair and continued my day as usual. Running errands and preparing dinner. There's this strange feeling of cheating. Because I'm so far and not there, there's this odd sensation of feeling like a flake. I was supposed to be somewhere for something important but didn't go. Maybe also of being robbed.
So the day is coming to a close as every other day has. Except that it's different because someone I only know is dying or might have died already. For everyone in Chile everything will change. For me...very little.
There's not much to do except wait for the next phone call...I think a drink is order. It's suddenly really cold...perhaps a hot toddy.

Lazy hot days

There was a heat wave in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago. It was finally hot enough to visit the usually windy beach and jump in the ocean. This is quite rare, as the "high" temperatures here rarely call for dipping in.
It was a mini vacation paradise.

Early one morning

She looked up at the cracks on the wall. It was a mirror. Her reflection was sometimes hard to see. So many wrinkles, so many spots replaced a once clear, smooth, dark skin. All these creases in her body and face represented a story. The lines around her mouth were heartbreak. The bags under her brown eyes were regret and loss. The deep crevices on her forehead were worry.
She didn't care for any of them. Her jet black hair continued to thin, the skin on her hands continued to reveal more veins and arteries. Walking over four blocks she would be out of breathe.

As she was drying herself after a long shower she paused in between her legs. That part of her body had been dormant for so long. Delicately tracing the folds of her skin with the yolk of her fingers she tried to remember...remember
the last time she had been touched...
the last time she had been fucked...
the last time she had been loved....
She had ceased being a sexual being long before her body had. Only ashes remain where the flames of any passion could ignite. So be it.

Several years ago with every puff of her Malboro Lights she fantasized about how wonderful it would be to go to sleep and never wake up. She was just fed up. Didn't care for anything or anyone.

Sometime between then and now something shifted. Despite feeling tired most of the time she was able to find a reason to keep going. After her divorce she never remarried and never had children. A retired teacher, she had lost contact with most of her students. Just like her nieces and nephews they had all moved away and created new lives far away from her classroom. She was but a vague memory that would only surface when turning the pages of old pictures and yearbooks.

Despite all this she had begun to take pleasure in simple things. The crisp air as she stepped out of the house in the morning. The bitter taste of her instant coffee. The giggles of her youngest niece when she would visit.
She was excited again.
Being at an elderly age gave her power she wouldn’t have otherwise. No one could force her to do anything. She had lived long enough that she could speak her mind and not care about others opinions. She also had gained the power of invisibility. At family gatherings she could just sit back, amused and entertain herself watching the dramas of a younger generation without being noticed. At that age she just didn’t count for certain things. Being alone, she could do and go as she pleased. It was comforting. She had stopped trying and she was at peace.

Excited about starting her day and making herself breakfast she hastily finished getting dressed and opened her blinds. It would be a routine day, nevertheless a good one. She had the crossword puzzle to finish!

As she turned to leave the Earth suddenly spun off it’s axis and sent her stumbling forward. Caught by surprise she tried to regain her balance and gripped the bed frame, but with the loss of balance came loss of strength. The sun disappeared. Everything became dark before she hit the ground. Laying unconscious on her bedroom floor, she would never stand back up.

So I dedicate this story to one of my aunts in Chile. She was one of the aunts that raised me during my teen years there. Over a month ago I was informed she suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. One morning she just fell to the floor in her room. When she was found hours later she was lying in a puddle of her own piss and shit as the hemorrhage caused her to lose control of her bodily functions.
She stayed in the hospital for a month, drifting in and out of consciousness. Although she is better she will never quite recover. She can barely mouth words, has lost most motor skils and can't do anything by herself, needing 24hr. supervision Other age related problems make her situation worse.
We were never really that close. She was a lonely woman who didn't know how to love without smothering and would end up driving you away.
As it happens commonly with young adults and their parents I didn't really appreciate her until I moved away to college and wasn't living with her anymore. Our relationship improved greatly over the years despite never becoming extremely close.
The last time we spent together was when I visited in February. She took me to lunch and asked me if had met any nice girls, if I planned on getting married or have children soon(gay is synonym to pervert in her dictionary. Although this is something that might have changed in recent years, my sexuality was never discussed). This conversation amused me.
I hope I don't see her again. If I do this means it will be years from now after enduring years in a practically vegetative state. Everyone around her will grow old and weary feeding her, bathing her, wiping her. That's no way to live. Certainly not for her. So I hope that if she doesn't improve drastically that I will one day get the phone call that she passed away.
I won't be suprised because in a sense she died that morning on her bedroom floor and as hard as it might be there comes a time when there is no choice but to let go.