Tag Archives: sadness

Environment & Justice, Violence

Daily dose

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of tears over coffee, Haiti, I am entirely sadness and rage. Thinking about the way suffering on this scale is always political…the utter inability to deal with famine, flood, earthquakes is always a failure of government. Thinking about Katrina. This insane racism and fear of black people that in both cases has demanded blockade, occupation and armed soldiers rather than the provision of food, water. medicine, shelter…and thus they fulfill their own prophecies of hate and desperation. People know that the mobilization of 12,000 warm to bodies to guard and secure could more easily have provided for their actual needs. I watch soldiers stand around with huge semi-automatics filling their hands when there are bodies and medicines to be dug out of rubble, shelter to be built…as a human I find this utterly inconceivable. As a cynic, I find it all too believable. There is no middle ground between these two sides, which I find to be just another cost of the world we live in.

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/1/20/stream

personal

Hatred and Happiness

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Today I am hating LA.

There are few times I really hate people, very few. But EVERY time I try to get myself and my bike off of the train, and have to fight my way through a bunch of fat, ugly, morally bankrupt assholes who don’t have the common courtesy to let people off the train before they force their way onto it. Well. I hate them all. En masse and individually. And when people occasionally get a smack from one of my pedals or my bag I don’t even care, because damned if I get stuck on there and have to ride the train until the next stop. They always just stand there and stare at you when they’re directly in front. They don’t even try to move. And I don’t know what they think I’m going to do, I have far fewer options than they do if I want to get off the god damn train.

There are other things I hate about the train, but those have more systemic causes I know. I hate seeing kids the age of five and elders over 70 selling candy. I hate being around people drinking 40’s out of black plastic bags. I hate the simmering violence. Today in front of me there was an old black man spread out over three seats. And a rough 30-something  latino guy asked him to move his feet. And he refused. And so the latino guy pushed his way onto the seat beside him. And the interchange?

“You think that mother-fucking seat is worth getting your head blown off? I will blow your head off mother-fucker, and so tell me if your life is worth that mother-fucking seat. Just you reach for it mother-fucker, I dare you, I will shoot you in the mother-fucking head, all you god damn mother fucking beaners should stay on your own damn side of the border, stealing our jobs, I hate all of you god damn mother fuckers, I’ll shoot all of you…”

And so on. And me with my insides curling up with fear because people do get shot in this city for such stupid shit, and there’s no telling what the latino guy is going to do and there’s a couple of younger black kids drunk already and with 40’s in their hands sitting a few seats up and one stands up and walks back to see if he’s going to get into it, and so I thank fuck when the latino guy realizes he is dealing with someone crazy enough (and with little enough to lose) to actually hurt him, and moves away.  I hate it when poor people fight each other. It’s stupid, and it makes me angry. And I know that old guy has been kicked around by a horrible fucked up racist world, I hate that he let it beat him and takes it out on other people, other races.

And I’m still sore from getting hit by a stupid car, and I’m hating that too. I hate the stiffness along my right side and the ache in my shin. And i hate that people in cars don’t watch out for bicyclists.

And I hate the fact that I came home today looking forward to a wee bit of pasta, and all of the pots and pans have mysteriously disappeared. So I had to have tuna instead. And the can opener wasn’t really working. And there was no mayo. And i’m hoping that the pots will return with my roommate.

And you know, I started the day so happy. I’m not entirely sure why I woke up so happy, but I did. And then I wandered down to the liquor store for milk and tortillas and the old guy down there told me I was as beautiful as always even though I was all sleepy and tousled and entirely unwashed. He held my hand as he gave me my change and said he would love to marry me…what a lovely thing for the ego. Because he was very charming about it, and very respectful, and altogether a lovely old man. It’s not so nice when they’re lewd and creepy and look you up and down, I despise those guys, I’d have to hike up the hill to the Korean place.

And so this morning I sat on the bus surrounded by screaming children and wished happiness were contagious, that it could float around me to light up the grime and the dust the way afternoon sun sometimes does, set it dancing and spinning in tiny shining motes of light like golden butterflies. I thought that would be lovely. And then the day beat it out of me.

personal

punk rock 80’s prom and the aftermath

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Went to a party last night…a dress up party and everything! punk rock 80’s prom. Of course, not everyone dressed up. But of course, I did! Not for prom, one of those was enough. I remember it well, I drove me, Chrystal, and Veena…on the far side of town of course. We all went together and that bit was mostly fun, except for the truly embarassing moment where I had to cover the back seat with a sheet because it was dirty and covered with dog hair. But after the dancing was done, leaving the silly ice-sculpture filled hall and I think feeling slightly depressed, I took the wrong turn and drove the huge-ass family buick down a golf cart road. Then turning around I backed my car into a small tree. And then pulling back into the parking lot I almost hit Annie’s Cadillac which would have been an unmitigated disaster because my family was poor as dirt and she was a bitch. I pretty much felt like saying fuck prom back then, and still do.

Anyways, it was fun dressing up, so much fun! Though the green streaks I put into my hair haven’t quite washed out as promised, and as it did way back when, my hair refused to achieve any sort of respectable height or messiness. And I wore my boots and they made me about 10 feet tall, felt as though I was the tallest there and I sort of hate that. Still, Happy birthday Evelin! Here we are in our outfits, I know you’re jealous of such cool friends, and I also wanted to show off my moral strength, the stuff required for me to go to a play in Boyle Heights and then out for sushi in Little Tokyo before we ever hit the party. I think I must be discovering an exhibitionist streak in myself the older I get. And this was the end of the night, I think we all looked much better at the beginning when the eyeliner was in place and the crazy eyeshadow still present! But I was happy, not as happy as evelin, but happy

And I stayed over with Bev and Jose…though I’m moving into my new flat tomorrow or Tuesday so I’ll be able to stagger to my own home at the end of a long night! Happiness indeed. But for some reason I left my friends and plunged into sadness…probably the damn train. And now I’m going to moan in Spanish a bit because I’m sad and tired of moaning in English. Funny how I somehow feel like it’s a step up as far as privacy goes, but it’s in my blog, so is still really entirely public. Just points to the silly nature of my own contradictions.

Me siento totalmente profundamente triste, no se porque, hace mucho que no he sentido tan feo asi…me quite las ganas de trabajar, de crear (y creer), de hacer cualquier cosa que sea util…y tengo tanto que hacer.  Es el peso del mundo sobre mis ombros, me senti atrapada en el tren, paredes de sufrimiento y debilidad humana mi carcel, quiero estar con los que luchan ahora y olvidarme de los demas. Es que en veces no puedo aguantar, sin saber porque pense ahora en Mark y ya estuvo, senti todo de nuevo el dolor de mirarlo matarse poco a poco con alcohol y drogas y la vida de alguien sin un hogar aparte de su silla de ruedas. Poco a poco. Y no habia nada que yo podia hacer por mas que yo queria. Nada. Menos esperar, esperar este momento en que el quisiera aceptar ayuda. Nunca llego, se murio en la calle. Y veo tantos mas, con sus futuros tragicos escritos en sus caras, y hay dias que no aguanto. Estoy entre rabia y depresion.

Quisiera correr. Me pregunto porque he regresado a esta ciudad. Tantos que yo quiero aqui, y tantos que me quiebran el corazon. Y el peso de una ciudad fregada, chingada, encabronada. Una ciudad victima y matadora de una vez, en veces yo no se que tiene la culpa. Son los seres humanos que crearon la ciudad como es, y la ciudad que forma los ninos para una vida violenta y dificil. Pues supongo que la culpa tiene los ricos que benefician de todo.

Que se yo? Solo se que soy triste ahora y me duele todo.

Everyday

evening

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I sit in the conservatory and the light is liquid gold, luminous, impossibly beautiful in those few minutes at close of day when magic seizes your heart and makes it whole…too whole, almost overflowing and the overflow is what you hunger for through your mundane hours, but this moment, glorious and still, like the culmination of passion, the peak of happiness, the eye in the storm it holds you and wraps you round and whispers to you in the falling rain and the world is perfect beauty even with you in it, as flawed and hungry and uncertain of anything as you are, and the moment fades to be replaced with a sadness, and dusk comes on surely now, the darkness creeping over green fields and the flowering apple tree, clouds lit up from behind in pale yellow and silver move swiftly across the horizon and just as you wonder if it is just over there that your destiny lies, the world lights up again with the moving clouds, a reprieve and a second golden time, a hint of blue sky on the horizon, golden light pouring like the rain around you, I love these days of rain and sun, love gold filled light and the pounding of water, it is luminous again, magical again, more beautiful after having prepared oneself for the dying of the light, it gives me hope. For what I don’t know, just hope is enough, a quiet undemanding sort of hope, the hope that carries peace with it, not the demanding torments of passion or desire or blind need.

The blue sky is now encircled by clouds, deep black heavy laden ones running low, a thin line of glowing white ones above. This place is beautiful. I am glad I am here, there is nowhere I would rather be. That makes me smile, it might be a bit sad my smile, bittersweet is life, I taste it on my tongue. I am always amazed at how fast storm clouds move, I remember watching them before the monsoons hit in Arizona, amazing that they race the same over desert and green farmland. Another thing bringing these two worlds together besides me, I have trouble sometimes reconciling myself with myself, I am too many things to exist in one person I think, but watching the clouds race calms me down, I lose myself in them like I lose myself in the light, my inner voice stills and finds silence and I am content. Even as the dusk falls surely now, the darkness comes…

City Unseen, Struggle & Movement

remembering the Morrison

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Sitting at home, watching the documentary Jeff Kauffman did for us on the Morrison Hotel…such a crazy time of my life, all-absorbing life-changing really, I am watching Maria Rivas open up her phone and seeing it crawling with roaches, one of my most disgusting horrific memories…the hallways with their boarded up doors, Mark talking about pulling himself up four flights of stairs, Mark pulling himself out of his wheelchair, he lost a leg because of that damn building, when you’re paralyzed you can’t feel the roaches crawling over your legs, your genitals, can’t tell you have an infection that will mean amputation. I remember the smell, the mold, the fleas that attack you as you walk in and you know are from the fucking rodents, puppy rats the tenants called them because of their size… I remember sneaking in late at night to take photos and document conditions and talk to our folks, the fear and adrenalin as I walked past security dressed in ridiculous clothes. And damn, I remember the day we had our first action and got into the building after months and I have never in my life been so happy, so high really, it lasted for days. I remember the manager sitting on the floor on the 4th floor rocking back and forth with his head in his hands…a small payback for threatening tenants with his pit bull and throwing people into the street but it was something…the remaining tenants cheering us as we roamed the hallways like champions.

I’m sadly one of the stars of the documentary…I wish I spoke better, I feel things so deeply but can’t seem to express myself well out loud, perhaps that’s why I’m a writer I suppose. I am fueled on pure fury, much more so than hope, and I think there’s no way to tell that, funny that you can’t tell how angry I am all of the time…And I look tired, I think I’ve been tired since I first started working, first started fighting with every ounce of strength for a little piece of justice. It’s funny to watch yourself speak. I am so glad, though, that there is some living record of such a long struggle, so glad to see everyone I love, everyone I worked with. Even John Krusynski, he makes me laugh because he is just so ridiculous at times, he’s a psychic you know, and Nasa has been picking up his thoughts by satellite for years. He actually said in his interview that we were a bit annoying at times, that somehow didn’t make it into the finished film. I’m going to miss him. Nor did my stunning analysis of the role of property rights over human rights but that’s alright. Elvis is also missing, he sold out early on and bought some beautiful new clothes we heard…His room was like a tunnel between stacks of papers and sheet music and plastered with music posters of Elvis and the Doors and even a picture of the real Elvis’ mother. he came to all of our meetings with his guitar. Mr Brown is there at the protest, a crochety old veteran who was lost as well when he lost his room, his own place, his home. It was a horrible day the day we had to move him out, I cried. And Sebastian is there at our meeting, an old Italian fisherman, he will never know how much I loved him and I think he left believing we had sold everyone out by taking a deal and that hurts like nothing else. We would have fought all the way if the other tenants had wanted us to, I wanted to fight…but with their kids getting assaulted in the hallways and 90 boarded up rooms and drug deals in the bathrooms…they couldn’t fight anymore. And who were we to demand it when legally we were finished?

The documentary is almost done, nice to see Mark as he was, without his home shithole as it was, he’s lost. He’s been on the streets since then, in and out of the hospital, looking worse every time I see him, how hard is it to understand that a home means more than money and cannot be replaced? There was another tenant with severe mental problems who lived there, we tried and tried to talk to him, other tenants tried to help him, but he would never accept it. he was the last to leave and I don’t think he got any money…He’s homeless now and lives on 30th street near the freeway, only blocks from our office…I wonder if he knows it. I pass him on my bike coming to work in the morning and it makes my soul hurt.

I wonder if the Morrison has given me more hope or less…I know I didn’t have much left inside to give after it, still don’t, definitely need to rest, to recharge…the ending of the Morrison with everyone moving out, a small win more bitter than sweet…and the shooting of Maria’s son, those two unconnected things together have killed a piece of me I think, I wonder if it can come back.

I’m packing this evening, getting rid of more stuff, I suppose it’s a good time to think on all that has been. I am sad, and nothing seems real this evening, even all that I have done, the documentary proves it happened, the tiredness in my bones does as well, and I suppose the hole inside me that appears whenever I cry. My ipod is magically matching my mood on shuffle…shutting the cover on years of your life requires a good soundtrack, did I say I was fucking sad as all hell?