clearing clouds

I’ve had twenty four professors at Fuller, only two of them women. 2 out of 24. This is bad, well, for a number of reasons, one of them being that it’s important for women to have female mentors and role models. Which is obvious. So I’ve been frustrated here in that regard.

But it only just occurred to me that I miss having role models or mentors of my own racial background. I hadn’t really thought of it because I’m so unused to the idea of anyone having the same racial background as me (other than my siblings). I know only one person outside my family who is of half European, half Asian descent (and he’s half Filipino, not half Chinese).

But now at Fuller I’ve had two biracial professors: one Caucasian and Salvadorean; another Swiss and Lebanese.

I was surprised to realize how much this matters to me. For some reason, it doesn't matter what mixture of races they are--just meeting someone else who is biracial is a happy occasion. And taking a class from someone admirable in Christian faith and scholarship who happens to be biracial also--that’s inspiring, that’s encouraging. Heck, they even kind of look like me in being--how to put it--whitish? Off white? Sort of Caucasian looking but not exactly.

I guess I'm one of those glass-half-empty people. Unlike one of my brothers who has said he thinks of himself as "both/and," I see myself as "neither/nor." And my perception that I don’t fit the normative categories leaves me with a loneliness so pervasive I don’t even notice it most of the time.

but the clouds begin to clear
I see two stars
the ground feels firmer

looking like a fool

I’ve always liked the saying, “better to say nothing and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt”--but it's not really true for me. I keep quiet and people think I’m really smart.

I should live more by a saying something like, “Better to be loved for the fool you are than to remain respected and aloof.” Too bad that’s not very catchy or humorous. Still, it's something important to me. Even though I’m afraid of looking stupid, I know it’s better to take a risk and be engaged than to retain my dignity. It's better to take a humble part in some kind of communal entity than to stay "above it all."

I realize this is all highly abstract, but I'm too embarrassed about the situation where it came up recently to tell you about it. And it's not very interesting, anyway.

ARABIC TONGUE TWISTERS!!!!!!!

So, I had this incredible thought last night: what if I could learn some Arabic tongue twisters?!?!!!? Oh, my gosh. That would be so awesome, I would keel over and die. So I looked on the internet and found this website. It's hard to learn the correct pronounciation from the transliteration, or from the ones in Arabic letters since they don't have vowels, but look at the translations at the bottom of the page! Don't you want to learn how to say "Put the sour vegetables in the policeman's pocket"? Or "A cardboard in a cardboard, can you, the master of the cardboards be a cardboard?"

Just Like in the Movies!

We had a little excitement on the train this Sunday. As the train approaches the Chinatown station, it crosses over the L.A. "River." The train came to a stop on the bridge and we heard the conductor talking to people outside (the intercom broadcasts both inside and outside the train). She said something about the police chasing a guy down the tracks. A few people started glancing around, out the windows, but we couldn't see anything.

"Don't do it," came the conductor's voice. "That's a suicide jump, you moron!"

Now heads were really turning. There was a pause. Then, "He's down, guys. He made it to the ground."

Then silence. The train was still stopped. Out the window, we could see a freight train passing by below. I thought, "Maybe he'll make his daring escape on the train!" So I watched. At first I didn't see anything. But then, there he was. Some guy wearing a white t-shirt and black shorts standing all cool and non-chalant between two of the cars. Off he went. We waited another little while.

"I'm gonna go by you guys really slowly, okay?" said the conductor. The train slowly passed by about five police officers. The conductor informed us, "The police were chasing a suspect down the tracks and it looks like he jumped onto the freight train."

And that was it. Crazy, eh?

relativity

the human heart is fickle
mine especially
that woman
so irritating six months ago
today in a sea of unknown faces
my heart leaped at sight of her
blazing light of history shared
no matter contents half forgotten
there among strangers
my cherished best friend

[Some at best mediocre poetry. But I wanted y'all to know I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. I am enjoying the exquisite torture that is learning Arabic. Woot woot!]

Doctors Can't Be Trusted

There are some things on which Brandon and I fundamentally disagree due to differences in our upbringing. One of them is our attitudes toward medical professionals. Brandon, whose father is a veterinarian and whose mother works for an orthodontist, is willing to place implicit trust in doctors. My mother, on the other hand, is a former childbirth educator and birth doula who, in the course of her former career, was often frustrated by doctors and their pig-headed notions.

And so when I go to the doctor and they take my blood pressure and they say "60 over 102. Very good!" I say to them in my mind, "You people are so unhelpful. All you think about is whether someone's blood pressure is too high. It never occurs to you that someone's blood pressure might be unhealthily low. I'll just have to go home and find out what the actual ideal blood pressure is, because I know it's not 'as low as possible,' contrary to what you cotton-headed ninny muggins think."

So I looked up ideal ranges for blood pressure on the internet. Based on numerous attestations, it seems 60 over 90 and below is unhealthily low blood pressure. So actually, I'm pretty close and I probably wouldn't feel so lightheaded and weak just before dinner if I drank more water and ate more salt.

And the moral of the story is, doctors can't be trusted implicitly, so look things up for yourself on the internet (which can be trusted implicitly). (-;

Eine Kleine Nacht Fishen (A Little Night Fish)

Here is the painting I mentioned. It's the first real painting I've done and actually been excited to hang on the wall.

And yes, that's a little guy with a fishing pole. He seems to have been out for a little night fishing. I don't think he caught anything. Probably because all the fish are in the sky.

Perhaps another reason I loved Ponyo so much: I've always thought of slightly anthropomorphized fish as being all happy and exuberant, just like in the movie.

I also like this painting because it's kind of in the style of children's books illustrations. I remember seeing an exhibit of illustrations from some award winning children's book in a museum in Washington D.C. and realizing that illustrations in children's books are often fine art with as much merit as the stuff hanging in museums. And in fact, I often find illustrations in children's books more compelling and accessible than stuff in you find in museums or art galleries.

Oh, and for those who are curious, the stars are indeed meant to imply the constellation Pisces.