turning shanghainese?

in the past week, i've been mistaken for shanghainese on 3 separate occasions. twice by chinese girls and once by a french-brazilian guy (side note: CUTE saxophonist, was trying to flirt with me in chinese. awesome.)

am i turning shanghainese in my appearance??? granted, more and more articles of clothing from my wardrobe are being purchased here. i did recently get a more "asian" haircut (more korean than chinese, i think) and had eyelash extensions done for the first time (VERY chinese-girl thing to do).

well. chalk it up to reconnecting with my roots.


cups of coffee: 1 nicely chilled

mood:  *yawn*

and so it goes

i saw my brother off at the airport this afternoon. between cracking jokes and telling stories, there was a tender timbre to our time together, knowing that a chapter is ending and a season of life is turning. he left today a single man and will be returning to shanghai next month a married man, with his lovely wife by his side. this past weekend, he moved everything (well, almost everything) out of the apartment we've been sharing for the past two years. it didn't really sink in until after i got home from the airport--the empty kitchen chairs where his backpack is usually haphazardly flung, the bare couch where a pair of his socks usually lies--the noticeable void hit me hard.

last week, some dear friends who i've been working with since i arrived in china left as well. they were like family, really, and it's strange to think of holidays and get-togethers without their presence. summers in shanghai are revolving doors: people come and go with surreal ease. the emotional roller coaster coupled with the stifling humidity and relentless rain....it's almost too much to bear sometimes.

i'd like to think i'm resilient. i'd like to think that after living 8 years overseas, transition and change are as comfortable to slip in and out of as worn house slippers. but that would be a lie. change is always hard, from the lump in my throat to the mind and heart adjusting to certain emptiness. and yet life goes on. we grow accustomed to things once strange and unknown. we are constantly redefining 'normal'. we learn to move with new acquired rhythms, expand our relationships, weave the changes into the evolving patterns of our lives. and through it all, we learn to be thankful, ever thankful.


Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side.
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain.
Leave to thy God to order and provide;
In every change, He faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: thy best, thy heav’nly Friend
Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

cups of coffee: 1

mood:  melancholic for now

manifesto

a friend just posted this on her facebook...i love wendell berry.

"every day do something that won't compute." a beautiful and thoughtful poem to inspire the week ahead.



Wendell Berry - Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.

And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.

When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.
So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.

Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.

Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.
Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.

Listen to carrion -- put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.

Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.

As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go.

Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

more current fixes

my current obsessions. past fixes listed here and here.

- music from glee: i can listen to songs  from glee all day. literally, all day. it feeds my inner (and sometimes not-so-inner) diva. if i had more talent and guts, i would have loved to sing and dance on broadway. but dancing in my living room and belting along to glee will suffice.

- frederick buechner's listening to your life: reading his daily meditations provides enough food for thought to chew on all day.

- the tv show community: funny, funny, funny! a modern-day breakfast club (which they poke fun at in the pilot episode) with an ensemble of quirky characters who hilariously and poignantly learn and grapple with what it means to truly be a community of friends, even family. chevy chase stars in the cast - much, much older but still as funny as ever.

- olives from marks and spencer: oh my goodness. OH MY GOODNESS.

- headbands: still into headbands. slowly transitioning from wide bands to skinny bands, though, adorned with the occasional flower or ribbon. i know--i'm turning girly.

- my pilates personal trainer: i recently started with a pilates personal trainer and we meet twice a week. i LOVE her - not in a weird, inappropriate way, but in an oh-my-gosh-i-can't-believe-how-much-she-kicks-my-butt way. after our first session, i could barely make the walk home--muscles i didn't even realize existed were sore in ways i never thought possible.

- jimmy, my cat: he has feline asthma, he's rebellious and likes to bite, he scratched up my poor couch to shredded oblivion, he sheds ginger-colored hair over everything....but i LOVE my cat. especially when he sneaks in my room in the morning and licks my nose to wake me up.


cups of coffee:  1

mood: deeply, deeply thankful

alice and destiny

finally watched tim burton's "alice in wonderland": WOW. besides being visually stunning and incredibly imaginative, the plot revolves around this interesting theme of destiny. in this version, according to an ancient scroll that foretells the future history of wonderland, alice is the champion who will slay the jabberwocky terrorizing the inhabitants of wonderland. alice doesn't believe she is the prophesied champion and struggles throughout the story with being "the wrong alice."

i think the storyline poses an interesting question: is destiny out of our control or do we have the free will to choose our paths? i struggle with this when pondering the will of God and my capacity for free will. if all my days are ordained, then where and how does my free will play in the midst of it?

without spoiling the ending, i found the film's approach surprisingly satisfying, holding both the forces of destiny and our freedom of choice in tandem. we see alice struggle with discovering who she is and the path to choose while simultaneously being shaped by the hand of fate. destiny is bigger than all our days and the decisions we make--and yet each thread, each moment of our lives seems to run with meaning and weave miraculously and effortlessly, without contradiction, in the fabric of the Greater Story.


cups of coffee: 1 + 2 cups of green tea

mood: relieved

mission accomplished

i did it. i completed 'the goethe project'....give or take a few days. for the most part, i blogged every day for the past 30 days, reflecting on beauty and meaning through some aspect of art, music or literature.

what did i learn from this practice?

1) beauty is everywhere. everywhere. this is nothing new but all too easily forgotten. as cheesy as it sounds, sometimes we really are too busy to stop and smell the roses. maybe we begin to find the roses annoying, or we just tell ourselves we hate roses anyway. and we barrel onwards, frantic and frazzled.

this past month was one of the craziest months i've ever experienced, in the sense that all things personal and professional culminated in one massive consuming storm of a schedule. how fitting that the goethe project forced me to stop and meditate each day--even for a few minutes, on things beautiful and life-giving.

2) insight comes with discipline and the rigor of intentionality. surface observation is easy: the grass is green, the water is cold, the cat is fat. but to connect the dots between the details, to analyze and slice through the obvious to reveal the core - that is quite challenging. i sometimes have the eyes to see but not the heart to feel. other times, i feel things strongly but totally miss the forest for the trees. i think practicing both capacities in tandem and learning to give things time (such a valuable trait!) builds insight.

3) both beauty and despair point to the world that ought to be. both feed the sour ache inside us, the longing to be where all this beauty comes from or where sorrow and despair have no place.

4) it's fun to be writing more consistently again, even it's just a blurb here and there.


i hope to be blogging more...even if not daily, then at least more frequently. more than that, i hope this practice began building a more consistent habit of appreciation and meditation particularly in the throes of busyness.


on another note, happily searching through amazon.com for books i want to purchase this summer when i'm home. here's what i have so far:

voluntary simplicity: toward a way of life that is outwardly simple, inwardly rich

a way of working: the spiritual dimension of craft

the $12 million stuffed shark: the curious economics of contemporary art

four seasons in five senses: things worth savoring (i am especially excited about this book - reminds me of writing assignments in college where we had to write descriptively about mundane activities such as making a peanut butter sandwich, eating a peach, etc.)

hmmmm. apparently all the books i want to get are non-fiction and possess super-long titles.


cups of coffee: 1 1/2

mood:  fidgety

simplicity and work

"Simplicity (as greater directness, clarity, and unpretentiousness) can transform our approach to work in a variety of ways. . . . First, our relationship with our work is enormously simplified when our livelihood makes a genuine contribution both to ourselves and to the human family. It is through our work that we find opportunity to develop our skills, relate with others in shared tasks, and contribute to the larger society. If our work is directly contributory, it can be a source of great satisfaction and great learning. It was Thomas Aquinas, I think, who said: 'There can be no joy of life without joy of work.' Our relationship with our work is enormously simplified when we move from an intention of 'making a killing for myself' to that of 'earning a living in a way that contributes to the well-being of all.' . . . . Without the clarifying frame of reference provided by sensing the contribution of our work to the well-being of the world, it is immensely more difficult to find satisfaction and fulfillment in our work."

-- Duane Elgin, Voluntary Simplicity: Toward a Way of Life that is Outwardly Simple, Inwardly Rich

"There can be no joy of life without joy of work."  hmmmmm.......

cups of coffee: 2 1/2

mood: sleeeeeeepy