Resolve

* Finish the dissertation already.

* Take the next step in adopting us a couple more kids.

* Get to yoga on Tue &Thu.

* Take completed projects to publisher.

* Perhaps, maybe, possibly think seriously about applying for U.S. citizenship.

_

A Happy 2007 to All of Us

Li’l A is DDR-ing with his friend Nuri in my bedroom. Big A can’t tear himself away--if we had an extra mat, I just know he’d be bopping too.

Nuri goes home after the chicken and salad that‘s coming up. Then Li’l A and Big A and I are going to hang out in bed with the cashews and almonds that I roasted not ten minutes ago, watch LOTR, and toast the new year with margaritas/fizzy apple cider. This year, that’s how our party rolls.

However you celebrate your NYE, a very Happy New Year to you and yours.

Love.

Hugs.

See you in '07.

_

TOAST

C’est la vie
So they sail away
Waving and winded
Their hair like
Unfinished stitches.
Inheriting our hands
Our bloodied history
Our layering of apology
Like noise upon snow.
Carpe diem, grab them,
Hold them. Hold them and sing.
Hold them the way you’d mean to
If you knew there was no mourning.


_

THEN FIRST THINGS

What begins with a Bee
Doesn’t always sting
It can soar, stare, sing
Like so: b. i. r. d.

What begins with a No
Is not forever loss, veto
Nap-tossed, it meets to moan
From either side: NooN. NooN.
_

Sometimes life is indeed like a Bollywood movie

The family of _____ no longer talk to him following his wedding to his long-time girlfriend _____, a member of ____’s lower caste Yahar community.

Total Bollywoood ishtyle, no? Except it takes place in Somalia and reads:

The family of Sahal Abdi-kafi no longer talk to him following his wedding to his long-time girlfriend Zamzam Ahmed, a member of Somalia's lower caste Yahar community.

Most delightful points of note in the article are:
(a) the wonderfully-named Zamzam.
(b) that the title of the post isn’t me, but a quote from the bride.

Seriously. See last line of the linked article. Now i'm off to see if my sister will indulge my desire to be called "Zamzam."

_

Conference It

Yup. It's me, and i'm still awake. I'm taking the earliest train to Philly for a conference in a few hours--obviously, there's not much point in going to sleep now.

The good news is that the thorough comprehensiveness of my paper title just about slays me.

The bad news is that saying "Falling Outside the Tracks We Laid: An Exploration Through Prose, Pictures, and Film of the non Assimilation of Indian-Africans During East-African Nationalism and British Colonialism" a modest seven or so times will inevitably exhaust the twenty or so minutes i'll have to present.


_

www.savedarfur.org

Once there was this. Now, messy with kindness and love, there is this:

Thanks, Big A.

_