we're worth it

Already unthinkably wild things have been done and said (by my mom, natch) and wilder things have been said in support (by Big A who is her sidekick, sometimes.) 

Pic: Max and Huck aren't quite sure what to make of it all. I seem caught by surprise (and so, so much happiness) too.

under pressure

My mom and sis are on their way!! They'll get here tomorrow!

I'm still finishing up some last-minute chores. I guess I could do them after they get here, but then they'd want to help... and they don't know how to do things as they have a lot of domestic help. I don't want to make them travel all this way to do housework!

Big A sweetly tried to reassure me that everything would get done, and I snapped at him that I was aware of that as I was doing it all myself. Poor Big A, trying to be helpful. And poor me, so irritable. 

Thom Tillis of North Carolina and Rand Paul of Kentucky are voting with democrats to block Trump's horrible spending bill... keep up the pressure!!

Pic: Lansing Pride was lit this year, so many people!

Did I get this wrong?

The news seems so huge, I feel I must be understanding it wrong. Birthright citizenship ended in the United States today (or at least that's what it sounds like). So kids born here many not automatically be citizens of the state? And relatedly, each state can decide what it wants for itself, so we're more like a federation than a republic? We have no national laws?

Also SB1 (Senate Bill 1) prohibiting DEI in education was enacted into law in Ohio. So the Women's Center, where I worked before this (Wright State U in Dayton, Ohio), just closed and all the people I used to work with are out a job.

Pic: With Big A, Max, and Huck. In the grass, looking up.
 

to be able to see clearly

The day started with Jim Obergefell's voice on the radio to celebrate 10 years of marriage equality (how nice that it seems like longer!) and a long chat with bestie KB on her way to work. 

So it should have been a good day. 

But something KB told me kept haunting me. Apparently, an erstwhile colleague has been charged with sexually abusing a student. I've had this experience before where someone, who seemed like a good person and was exceedingly kind to me, turned out to have been abusive to the young people in his care. How completely unforgivable. And how sad, disturbing, and disappointing that I wasn't able to see it at the time and intervene before any harm was done. 

Pic: I can buy myself flowers... I  bought some water hyacinths and water lilies at Preuss Pets today (where I took this photo). Apparently, I can welcome veritable crowds to parties all year round without worrying about how the house looks, but I want things to look really spiffy for my mom and sis! (I also bought two lamps!)

memento amoris

A snake yesterday; zombies today. Only on film, thankfully. We picked At up from work and got a leisurely dinner and ice cream before seeing 28 Years Later, a franchise At and I are particularly fond of. It was unexpectedly tender for a zombie film. While the memento mori parts were predictable, the instruction--"memento amoris"--was not and it really resonated. Everyone will inevitably die, but will we have loved as much as we could?

While on love, here's an amazing poem I found this week. It's by John Roedel: on the days/when it feels like/I have no power/I serve others/you see/whenever I wash the world's feet/my hands/immediately/stop shaking. Wow. This is kind of true for me too.

And in the love department, we watched the Rick Steves tour of Esfahan ("extraordinary mosques and endearing people") because it's unlikely that we'll ever be able to see it for ourselves now. My love for that one particular shade of Isfahan blue comes from a picture in a book I had when I was eight or nine. 

And since the beginning of this year, EM and I and then Nu and I have been talking about Mississippi Masala--that movie from 30+ years ago with Denzel Washington and Sarita Choudhary, which won awards and hearts for depicting a love affair between an Indian woman and a black man. So that's one of the many, many reasons we're so happy that Zohran Mamdani has won the primary as NYC mayoral candidate--that movie was made by his mom, Mira Nair. 

Pic: At, Big A, and Nu in the parking lot. I love them a lot.

our tiny hero

Big A had been at work last night and I woke up this morning to him shouting about something. 

He was shouting about a snake. A snake in the puppies' room. 

He'd been refilling their water, but Huck seemed uncharacteristically uninterested in greeting him and then he saw that Huck's attention was on a tiny snake that had probably made its way into the house via the doggie door. 

I helped by holding Max, and spotting the snake as it glided under and out of furniture (all the stuff you can see here)  so Big A could catch and release it. But it was fearless Huck who really helped chase it out the backdoor.

I wonder... what would have happened if Big A hadn't been refilling the water bowls at that precise moment. Would the snake just be roaming the entire house? Do we already have other snakes who just live here?

Also... I don't know if this is the same Mx. Slithers I saw last year. But yesterday, I did drop a lot of clove powder in the garden where I saw them last year to drive them away. I wonder... if that smell drove them indoors. So is this, too, my fault after all?

I was pretty shaken and after Big A went for a post-call nap. I had to emergency snuggle with Nu who was in bed and very sleepy and unsympathetic. ("Gawd, Mama--I bet it was just a little snake. If you want a garden there's gonna be snakes." Unsympathetic, but sensible?)

So grateful for Huck's calm and valiant work today. Our 12-year-old who, as our vet says, looks like a "perma-puppy" and acts like a kitty and is 100% hero.

Pic: Huck getting love in a friend's lap last week. 

the hits keep coming

I worked in the garden for six hours straight, with Max and Huck for company now and again, because I could not bear to be around the radio or my computer. I planted, replanted, cleaned the pond, fixed some fencing, and weeded a ton. They say we had a heat wave today. I guess? It was very hot and I was a sweaty mess by the time I decided to head back in. (I barely sweat usually, so this is kind of a big deal.) 

Also, I noticed flat white spots on my legs last week. I think I have IGH (Idiopathic Guttate Hypomelanosis). (Self-diagnosis via Google, and Big A concurs.) I thought it was age-related--like liver spots only in reverse, but no--it's because I'm such a sun-seeker. Also, as a proper Indian person, my first thought was leprosy, and it reminded me of the summer all the adults in the family tested me for leprosy with a safety pin.  

In serious health news, MIL had a mini stroke and has a cardioversion scheduled for next week. She would like me to enjoy my visit with my mom, but I wish I could go / feel like I should go be with her. In any case, this reminder of how quickly people's health can undergo a shift is unwelcome.

And world news continues to be awful. Children are eating dirt in Gaza while trucks with food to feed a million people are blockaded a few miles away. Plus we seem to be drifting into a war. I'm sorry for all the people in the bombed cities in Iran, but I was particularly devastated to hear Isfahan was one of them. I always longed to visit that ancient city known as "half the world." Also, I didn't think I'd be grateful for discrimination, but at least the military won't want my trans kids.

Pic: Yesterday I stopped by my office to pick up some books and water my plants and saw the college spirit rock had new colors. I wonder if it's the work of new Indian students or new Irish students. I've always loved how the mutual flag colors represent the alliances between the Irish and Indian independence movements. 

escape from injustice and war

Pic: Nu's photo of Max and me. I want to do only escapist things like read and snuggle and gaze into puppies' eyes forever and ever.

Happy SolsticeWeekend! 

Happy Free Mahmoud Khalil Day! 

I don't want to think about the Supreme Court's decision to ban gender affirming care to minors. I don't want to think about how the U.S. has bombed Iran... and if that means we're in another war now.

There are many poems about war. Here's Mahmoud Darwish's:

The war will end

The leaders will shake hands

The old woman will keep waiting for her martyred son

The girl will wait for her beloved husband

And those children will wait for their hero father

I don’t know who sold our homeland

But I saw who paid the price

It's quite cis-het normative, isn't it? I didn't remember that about the poem... 

Five for Friday (Cheer)

1) Blog friends: Jenny listed five cheerful things to buoy herself up after a bad week and I could feel myself slipping into a funk (as my dad would say), so I decided to follow her example. 

Something beautiful that has given me great joy lately is Nance's piece titled "Night Rides."  I've gone back and reread it many times since she first published it. It's got that magical childhood nostalgia and evocative writing--transportive... transformative. 

Also, Lisa kindly introduced me to Jeanie who blogs from my city. Jeanie has a brilliant smile and the kind of warm and intriguing personality that made me want to make up all the time I'd missed spending with her.  So I invited her to a gathering at my place a few weeks ago. As I was about to introduce her to L, L exclaimed, "I know that smile!" Turns out Jeanie is famous! SO many people at that party knew Jeanie from her work on public television. I didn't know I'd befriended a celebrity!

2) Summer break: Not only is it break time. I've achieved peak break-time brain. I had to stop and figure out what day of the week it was. Perfect!

3) Family: Big A has a new nickname at work; the nurses are calling him Dr. Zamboni. Apparently, the E.R. is usually full when he gets in to work, but they love how good he is at getting people care/referrals/tests/discharges, so they're relieved when he's on the schedule because he clears things up. Sounds like a superhero to me.

4) New students: Nu signed up for classes this week, so it reminded me that students are signing up and I peeked at my new student rosters.  And there are so many new-to-me students! Yay! (And also one student whom I've known since they were a toddler. We're going to their grad party tomorrow, actually. This goes against my self-imposed rule of no family or friends in my class. I'll work on dissuading them later this summer.)

5) Pic: From last October's trip to Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. If you asked me, I would say I like water views and green, lush landscapes... but I constantly find myself thinking about these majestic, arid, red formations. Their dimensions make me feel so small and their endurance makes me feel so hopeful. I think I'm besotted with them. I went back and looked through old pictures. 

second-best

My sister's two-week trip to visit me might feel more like a one-week trip because she'll visit two very dear friends as well. Those trips are as short as they can possibly be--three days each, one day to travel each way and one day there.

To be able to write that down calmly without bursting into tears has taken me all of a week. It felt so petty to begrudge the other visits, but I imagined two whole weeks to ourselves with lots of downtime. Now it'll be a slightly busier schedule, but still so good.

Anyway, trivia today--just me, Big A, AH, and SD. We got second place after leading until the final wager round.

Pic: A shelter in progress? Along the banks of the Red Cedar.

Three Things from Tuesday's to do/done list

1) Trip to Ikea with Nu this morning. Our plan was to blast our Indian (Hindi, Telugu, + Tamil) playlist and I would translate key parts of the chorus for Nu. But the first few songs had predominantly English lyrics. "Oh, are they saying, 'Take the world and paint it red'?" Nu asked archly of this song, for instance. So we were laughing about that, and then Nu fell asleep. On the way back Nu played me their new fave artist--a Swedish rapper called Bladee (who raps in English). The auto-synth gave me a headache, but I was a good sport because the lyrics provided ample cues to talk about mental health, relationships, drugs, and sex.

2) I fixed my bad record of not submitting any poetry this year by turning in a submission last week... and received a rejection. (And immediately began to worry that I'll NEVER place another poem EVER again.)

3) In yet another marathon gabfest this evening with the CUN(ext)T(uesday) friends, I got excellent advice as usual. I need to work on making those long overdue (by years and years) medical appointments. I feel I'm very in tune with my body and don't need preventative tests, but I'm probably just telling myself that because I find mammograms and pap smears very uncomfortable. And while vaguely on medical subjects, I have to say the woman who helped me place Nu's contact lenses order was an absolute gem--not only did she find a $150 rebate, she called me five minutes after our call to say she'd convinced my patchy eye-insurance to pay up another $120.

Pic: Three canoes on The Red Cedar from my long walk yesterday. 

Joy and Power

I've been wishing people a joyful and powerful No Kings Day. And by all accounts, it seems like it was both of those things for everyone who attended. Some of my favorite signs were "No Faux King Way" (say it fast!) and a "No Parking" sign with the "Par" part crossed out. Gathering in large numbers with united purpose and creativity is joy and power.

I went with people, but was still a bit nervous about being grabbed off the street and sent off to a jail somewhere. It's just that crazy out there these days or I'm just that crazy these days. Either way. 

Just to make sure I looped in some joy, I hit the Farmer's Market and went to a graduation party as well. 

Pic: The crowd of protestors at the Capitol this morning. 

I got my way, but not the puppy

The third puppy was an impulse wish, so things may change yet again, but for now--I don't think I'm getting Legolas (Lego). 

Friends were uniformly supportive in their encouragement. To Big A's caution that three puppies might be excessive, LV scoffed that SIX might SEEM excessive, but not three. That still makes me laugh.

Big A, At, and Nu came around. (My mom used to say that I like to test people who love me. That sounds awful, and I probably do. But I don't think I was yearning for a puppy to test them.) 

Ultimately, it was another family member who changed my mind. We had a lot of visitors last week, and I noticed Max is a bit shy and seems to need his mama more than Huck or Scout did. He's usually rambunctious, so this public persona is a bit surprising. It made me feel like he's still a baby and needs more time as the baby of the family. 

Pic: Baker Woods with L. It was an explosion of green the moment I stepped in. So different from two months ago when I was last there with Lisa.

Feeling the Bern

Nance asked if the kids were jealous that we went to the concert. Not really. For one we'd offered to take them. For another, they had major plans. 

Nu had been excited to attend an online college orientation. They did attend and seem even more oriented and ready now. 

At was scheduled to facilitate this zoom webinar on organizing in the workplace with Senator Bernie Sanders and Harini Sudhakar. 

I got a kind of shout-out. When talking about the importance of socializing with coworkers, At mentioned how one of his coworkers had been an Indian woman with kids who didn't socialize in the usual way outside of work. But At's "Indian mom" (me!) invited her over to dinner and At was able to get to know her better that way. I guess I'm part of labor history now!

Pic: I couldn't watch the event live because I was at the concert, but At just sent me a recording of the webinar, and this was the moment Senator Sanders thanked At for her work before he left. At's text to the family chat was right--Bernie does pronounce At's Sanskrit name perfectly.

what we have here

(here) is the door I promised, my darling

the moon growing full with welcome

late in the evening as our day turns

it is holy to need someone so

(so) scrutiny doesn't concern us anymore

our breath weakening in the breaks

like a broken stone collecting 

freedom, opening

(opening) trust deep as the release of cicadas 

from earth--their rising a resurrection

from the profound time of dreams

and dirt and promise

_____________

Pic: It's the one month of the year our rhododendron is in bloom; I'm in awe every time I glimpse it.

"We gon' be alright/ Do you hear me, do you feel me? /We gon' be alright"

We've had tickets to the Kendrick Lamar + SZA show since before the Superbowl. I think it was Big A's present to me/himself (I forget). Anyway, that was today... and it was awesome. Like really awesome. The production was a treat. 

I love Kendrick Lamar's work. I don't know SZA's work other than the bangers and her duets with him, but the young people seemed very into her. It's kinda an odd professional pairing--he's a poet and... she's a different kind of poet, I guess.

In any case, I was reminded how much the lyrics to "Alright" had become an anthem in the first phase of the Black Lives Matter protests (before George Floyd). (Lump-in-my-throat moment.) It's a great reminder for our present. We've been here before: "We gon' be alright/ Do you hear me, do you feel me? /We gon' be alright."

Pic: We had very good seats, but I couldn't see much. In the picture, the real Kendrick is in the center (really tiny), and I contented myself with the screen versions most of the time.

next week will be better

I saw a thing somewhere that said adult life is about telling yourself that next week will get easier and you'll get to relax when it's over... over and over again... that's depressing.

I'm back in the classroom this week for a workshop with Kevin Gannon of Radical Hope: A Teaching Manifesto. And the thing is, yes... it's supposed to be summer break, but it's so wonderful being in a classroom 'cos I'm so nerdy. And being in this particular workshop makes me feel like things really could get better for all of us, you know?

Also, admin reminded me that I hadn't submitted my annual report, so I started on it... and whoa! I've done a lot!

Pic: I asked Kevin Gannon, who's facing the camera, if I could use his picture--but I wanted to keep my colleagues somewhat incognito. 

justice and care

As armed National Guard troops are called to push back on unarmed civilians in Los Angeles protesting masked ICE agents (why on earth are they masked like they're the KKK???!?!?!) who are conducting workplace raids and storming elementary school graduations, this passage from Kelly Hayes and Mariame Kaba's Let This Radicalize You: Organizing and the Revolution of Reciprocal Care comes to mind:

"If your tactics disrupt the order of things under capitalism, you may well be accused of violence, because "violence" is an elastic term often deployed to vilify people who threaten the status quo... Conditions that the state characterizes as "peaceful" are, in reality, quite violent. Even as people experience the violence of poverty, the torture of imprisonment, the brutality of policing, the denial of health care, and many other violent functions of this system, we are told we are experiencing peace, so long as everyone is cooperating. When state actors refer to "peace," they are really talking about order."

And I like what Rebecca Solnit said today to people in L.A. about creative resistance: "Shut it down. Slow it down. Wake it up with decentralized protests. Military people are good at violence; that's what they're trained for. But Angelenos greatly outnumber them, know the city intimately, have a thousand ways to make a ruckus and gum up the works. I hope people will appeal to the California National Guard that they're on an illegal mission and should never act against their own people like this. Also, Hollywood, pretend you're in an action movie. Because now you are. Deploy your stars, your special effects, your set designers. Maybe a stunt woman or two."

Pic: The bushes by our front gate were so overgrown, they were hazardous. When driving, we just couldn't see traffic while we were turning into the street. Big A started to trim the bushes the other day and stopped when he realized that there was a nest with baby birds. He was upset because one baby had fallen out and he hoped the parents would still come back to the nest and take care of the rest. Yesterday, we peeked, and it seemed like the babies (we think robins) were doing well. I can't say how happy it makes me that he cares about things like this.

A Diamond Birthday in D.C.

My M.I.L. was so excited when I sent her the link to the NYT article on the Minè Okubo exhibition in the Smithsonian. Given the family connection, I knew we had to take her see it and that it would make a lovely 75th birthday celebration for her.

It's working out nicely. Both her kids, grandkids (my human kids), and I are planning to head to D.C. the weekend before the exhibition closes. 

I have D.C. friends like SD, whom I met nearly 30 years ago in Jerusalem, I'll want to see while there. And I'd LOVE to see blog friends StephLove and "Subway" Steph, if they have the time+inclination.

Pic: This seagull(?) who stayed perched up there the whole time we were on the beach yesterday.

beachy thoughts

Beach day with E.M.

Grateful for an easy drive, a beautiful day, perfect weather, and a spectacular sunset...

Grateful for a friend with whom there can be seven hours of continuous talk and 45 minutes of companionable silence as we watch the sun set.

Grateful I no longer think beach days must be family days--they can be just me days too.

Pic: Lake Michigan sunset at North Beach, Ferrysburg.