pobrecito gatito (dos)

This poor old cat of mine was not very happy with the medicating (or me) today. He just stares out the window and doesn't even want to drink water.

Maybe he will improve after the surgery....

pobrecito gatito

Well, my almost 19 year old cat is sick. He has been behaving strangely lately. He does this thing after he eats where he puts both paws up and hits himself in the face. He did it a whole bunch after he got back in his carrier after he got examined by the vet. Its a very painful thing to watch. He's got ulcers and they think he has a tumor around his jaw. He's going in for a biopsy on Thursday if the bloodwork says its okay for a cat that old to go under anesthesia. So tonight, I fed him baby food. I coated a painkiller pill with butter, and I filled an eyedropper with fluid, that is the antibiotic, and I got both of those down his throat. He struggled but there is no biting or anything, he's being very good about taking his medicine, actually. I was pleased with myself I managed to do these things while seemingly inflicting a minimal amount of trauma.

afterschool talking

At first when these two friends talked to each other while walking home after school, it could be a little uncomfortable. In art class it was very relaxed and silly and they could say anything, but when they were walking home, she thought to herself, he can be a very nervous person. Once they were walking home from school and right before they got to his house she tripped over a curb. And if they'd been in art class maybe it would have been no big deal. But she started to get the feeling that he was going to try to make her feel better. He said, "Don't trip and fall. It would be very bad if you hurt yourself. I wouldn't want that." Which was a nice to say. For some reason she felt very embarressed. And she thought, "This world is so stupid." It was a nice thing for him to say, so why would she react that way (feel embarressed) and then think something angry (about the world)?

art class talking

So there were once these two friends (a guy and a girl) who used to have fun talking to each other in art class, amongst other people. She would talk about herself and her strange beliefs and about her friends on the far off island, including her old boyfriend who she still missed, even though he hadn't really written or called recently, or anything. Her art class friend said "I had a relationship with this girl once. We would see each other in the hallways, and be like 'Oh honey, I love you,' 'Oh honey, I love you too,' you know, like really great, right?" and he'd say it with a certain kind expression on his face. It was a kind of a sardonic smile, and the girl (friend from art class) would observe this smile with a kind of pleasure, because it seemed like there was something about it that was very familiar to her, because he just had to smile, of course, he was just warming up and getting ready to tell them all about the best part, that is, the part...where...it all just went so wrong....

Meatless Days

Interesting book by Sara Suleri.

Links: http://www.thecore.nus.edu.sg/post/pakistan/literature/suleri/gender.html

http://www.thecore.nus.edu.sg/post/pakistan/literature/suleri/sspublic.html

little notes

There was once this girl who moved from an island to a suburb outside of a powerful nation's capitol. She had a nice neighbor friend who she met in art class. But he was not actually, not actually the person she met on the very first day. She met another person on the very first day...a girl, who was very nice, and not shy, and she approached her right away. And wrote her a little note. We are both new, said the girl, so lets be friends and make each other feel better.

school connections (links)

Found an interview with the author who went to SUNY Binghamton, Alicia Erian.

I also went to Seattle University and so did this guy who was the father of some classmates of my sister and I when we lived on Vashon Island.

otro foto

On my friend's website, I found an old picture of me and my flaming haired tattooed little sister, who is off to Israel this summer and then Texas A & M in the fall to study archaeology, after she at some point visits me in Chicago to investigate the city for old bullet holes and otherwise indulge in her strange fascination with the (historical) Mafia.

Book!

I just read a book by woman who went to SUNY Binghamton as an undergraduate, (which is where I went for graduate school. The author is Alicia Erian. The book is called Towelhead.

(Its always fun to discover an author who also went to your same school.)

Here is one review of Towelhead.

Here is another perspective on the book.

Who knows, maybe after the girl stepped off the bus, she could have said something a little different (worse?) to this new friend of hers. Maybe after she went into her speech about religion, and he said "Well, I am Muslim," she might've said "You're Muslim? I thought you were Mexican." Maybe. Maybe if she'd gone home and told her parents, "I made this new friend and he's Mexican," they would have said "Oh, okay." Maybe they would have assumed he was Catholic.

Years later, in South America, she'd be walking with a rainforest guide, giving her views on patriarchical religions, "like, I could never be Catholic and maybe he'd say "I am Catholic!" But anyway. No one objected to that. Her (West Pointer) stepfather and mother went to Catholic church. Her (West Pointer) Protestant father said "Oh, thats okay if he is Catholic," because a Catholic was still a Christian. No one had any objection to him.

There was that white van that used to always be hanging around the house, for some reason, after her father was sent to Korea. La de da. She'd run outside and play in the sandbox. Her mother shut herself inside her room for hours. The house was very dark. Her father sent tapes of his voice, reading stories to her from Korea. He went away, he came back, he went away again. One evening while she was listening to these tapes, she listened to one about a puppy in a dog house. She wanted to be like that puppy, so she backed herself into the high chair, in such a way, that she was stuck. Then she screamed and cried. Her mother could not figure out the way to get her out. Why not? Maybe she needed someone to show her how to take apart the chair? She called a policeman. He took apart the chair and the girl was set free.

God Bless Them All. The policeman, the little girl, the high chair, the mother, the father, the army, the academy at West Point, and the driver and the white van.

Interesting

Yesterday while flipping through a book I made a discovery regarding a person I used to know when I lived in Washington state. When I was a freshman in highschool, there was this blond girl who was a litle older than I was, who lived nearby, and we occasionally caught the bus to school at the same location, but I otherwise did not know her very well. However, according to this book, Behind the Veil, this former neighbor of mine, Michaela Corning, converted to Islam when she was older, and she is now involved in selling "Muslimah couture," as well as some political things. And she knows several languages. She sounds like she's grown up to be quite an interesting person.

conversations

So, maybe there were once these two friends walking home from school together, and although they weren't that great of friends in the halls at school, they were more talkative after school. He'd say things like "I love the Discovery channel. The Discovery channel is the only one I want to watch." She'd say something like, "Well, I used to live on an island where people believe that fairies actually exist. So, I believe that fairies can exist too." And this is not necessarily what he believes, but he says, it is kind of interesting sounding, like maybe it was something that people once believed in long ago. She says, "where did you get that idea?" "Oh I don't know, it just kind of came to me," he says. (And the fairies benevolently smile at them.)
And, they talk about songs from the musical, Cats. She is surprised to find out that he likes the Mr. Mistoffolees song.
She says "Really?" And she maybe sounds just a bit scornful because sometimes she is a little bit callous, perhaps because there is a little bit of West Point in her background. And she says, "But that song is nothing at all compared to Macavity. I mean, Macavity just seems like a cat with all this experience in life, and he just sounds so much more interesting. Mr. Mistoffolees is alright and everything, but I think he's kind of...boring?"
(The fairies shake their heads at her young foolishness and sigh. Or, perhaps, a few wickedly grin.)
"Well," she says airily, "see you later." Then she goes off to her house, and he goes off to his. And he thinks, "Great. Thats just great. She likes Macavity better than the Magical Mr. Mistoffolees."

Word Salad, etc.

Recently, I found an interesting link. I have a friend who is quite a nice person and yet sometimes the strangest things come out when he writes. Even if one does not have a diagnosed "mental condition" per see, it would be interesting to consider this if you ever do encounter a person who seems to sort of say a thing which could be jarring.

The album I was semi-forced to buy over the weekend is good...I like the first song on it. Which I was going to post the lyrics to. However, its impossible, apparently. Because I can't remember the name of the song and the album seems too new to have the discography out...so...maybe later...

Bookstore girl

"You have to buy this album," the girl in the bookstore said to me. And an hour later, I ran into her again. "This song that is playing, its on the album. You have to buy this album. Here, here is a coupon, now just buy it." So I bought it, and I found this Funny Little Frog song.

Spanish poem

On Friday I read La Guitarra by Federico Garcia Lorca.

Salem

Here is a link to a picture of Salem College, which is a very old, historical, all women's college which my mother attended/is currently attending classes (fitting because this is "Mother's Day.") Salem College is a part of Old Salem which was founded by Moravians. These were my ancestors on my mother's side. They lived in religious communities and had schools for men and women. They structured a society in which unmarried women could be economically self-sufficient, which was unusual at that time.

At the IRA, one of her professors gave a talk on ELL. These are some notes I took down in my notebook:

A Word of Caution:

Classrooms are—
1) complex social settings that can be guilty of “reproducing existing inequalities” (Bourdieu, 1977).
2) Replete with a “culture of power” with rules that reflect the rule of the culture of those who have the power. (Delpit, 1988).

Peer Status:
1)The most popular among his peers becomes the Event Captain.
2) Who the student saw as popular or not popular in the class only aligned with what the teacher said 30% of the time. Who she thought was friends with who was only accurate part of the time.

Identity:
--A constructive process that is fragmented, contradictory and context dependent
--A consequence of interaction between people; a process that is constructed in relation to the perceptions of others

singing

And one day, when they were all sitting in art class, this girl started to sing.
She said to him, "what is the matter, don't you know any songs, Why don't you sing?"
He says, "No, I can't sing."
She says, "Why can't you sing?"
He says, "Oh I can't sing, because I'm Muslim."
She says, "You can't sing, because you are Muslim? Are you serious? Well, I just love singing and...I mean...what kind of a rule is that? I mean...well..." all of a sudden she realizes that maybe she's going to start sounding closed minded again--"I guess I just didn't know that Muslims can't sing!"
He is smiling slightly and he gets up and walks away somewhere to do something, and then she notices that the other people at the table are kind of smirking and almost starting to snicker.
Then she's like, "Hey, are you playing with me?"

old story--day two

So the next day, this girl is walking home from school with her friend and she is talking about religion. And she is saying something like, she kind of doesn't really like organized religion, she thinks it makes people too closed minded, or something. And he seems to be listening very carefully. And for some reason, she feels as if they are almost of one mind, because maybe he seems very accepting, although perhaps she has not yet learned that accepting is not the same as agreeing.
So she feels like she can speak with him very freely about anything. And she says "I mean, there are some religions I think I could just never be part of. Like I don't think I could ever be Muslim." And he says "I am Muslim." And she's like, "What? Like practicing and everything?" "Yes," he says. And she's like, "I thought maybe you were Hindu or Buddhist or something." And he says, "No." And she's starting to feel very uncomfortable all of a sudden because she has a feeling that she's kind of implying that it would be better if he were one of those other religions, or anything except Muslim. And she thinks, well I have this new friend from my art class and he's my neighbor and I'm walking home with him and now I've offended him. And she feels a little defensive, but she really can't think of anything to say. But then, maybe its like a shaft of light kind of pierces through her brain, and she says something like, "I'm sorry, that was a very stupid thing to say." And he immediately says, "thats okay." And its like a huge weight lifts off her shoulders.

Then he also says something like "Some people just haven't been exposed to other cultures very much." And she thinks, hmmm, that seems to imply that I am a closed minded person. I most certainly am not a closed minded person!
So then she says, "Well, I don't know, I know I don't want to be one now. But who knows, maybe I could be Muslim one day. I mean, I never really thought about it. But," now she feels like she's kind of going off on a grand, soaring arc, "I guess anything is possible. Like, maybe if I married a Muslim, or something like that, what do you think?" And for some reason she just thinks he will say reply by saying something like, "Oh yes, that'd be great!" However, that is not what he says. What he says is more along the lines of, "Well, I definitely don't think that you should do anything for the wrong reason." And, in a way. this answer kind of disappoints her slightly because it wasn't quite in the vein of her spontaneity. But then they get to his house and they part and they both agree that they are glad that they are so young that this is not something they really have to worry about.

old story--day one

There was once this young girl who had just moved to a new town, about 3,000 miles away from where she used to live. She began to make friends with a schoolmate, who was also her neighbor and he was in her art class. He was quite nice and maybe even a bit shy, although she could tell that liked to be social too. In class she drew his picture, in which he wore glasses and a backwards baseball cap. Some people came around to admire it because although it was not technically 100% accurate it was a good likeness. "I like the earring," one said (She'd given him one, just for fun. She thought that it kind of made him look like a pirate.)

One evening, she was talking about him to the people she lived with, who were kind of like family, and they were also kind of like her guardians. And these guardians said, "So you have made a new friend, that is very nice. What was his name?" And she said it and they said, "Oh, that name means he is Muslim. Well, we do think that it is very nice that you have a new friend. But, you seem to talk about him a lot. You were not thinking about dating him, were you?" And she said "I don't know, I haven't really thought about that yet, I'm just getting to know him." And they said "Well, those cultures do not treat women well, so we're just letting you know that we really don't think that you should." And she said "Well, you can't generalize about everybody." But they said, "No, we're serious. We do not think that men from those cultures treat women well and we really don't think that you should."

The girl had never been close friends with someone who was Muslim and most of what she knew about "the culture" came from a Social Studies class, which brought back images of things like a video of this guy getting run through with a sword in public and a large parade of men who had cut their heads and were marching down a street, bleeding and chanting. And, maybe there had been some discussions about the oppression of women, too. So, then she said, "Actually. I don't think that he is Muslim." Although a part of her felt wrong when she said it, as if it were some sort of a cop out. And the guardians were like, "No, no, he is Muslim, that name is definitely Muslim," and then she was like "You know what, forget it, I don't ever want to talk with you about this again." And she felt very oppressed and angry with them. And they were like, "What is wrong, we are not trying to control who you are friends with, we are only just trying to express that we are concerned..." and she was like "Just forget it. Don't ever talk to me about it again." And they were very amused with her for being so dramatic, but maybe they were also a bit distressed and could probably tell that she felt they were being wicked guardians.

Not as uplifting as Cats, but...

I'm remembering that The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien was a good (though painful) book that I read when I had to T.A. for Ol' Profesor Pobrecito Sexual Harrassment while I was in graduate school.

He (Profesor Pobrecito) did pick some good books, although I think he could have treated the "dumb coz" stuff a bit more sensitively. ("Why does he call the woman a 'dumb coz?'" he'd say, and the students wouldn't answer, so the air was heavy with silence, except that he kept saying the phrase over and over again, until I felt incredibly annoyed and stressed out and I thought, 'gee, maybe you're just focusing on this because you enjoy saying that phrase so much.'") I was tempted to write the author a letter about it.

These are fun too!!!

The Naming of Cats

Grrr...the link is not working!!! Well here are the partial lyrics...

The Naming of Cats

The naming of cats is a difficult matter
It isn't just one of your holiday games
You may think at first I'm as mad as a hatter
When I tell you a cat must have three different name

But I tell you a cat needs a name that's particular
A name that's peculiar, and more dignified
Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular
Or spread out his whiskers, or cherish his pride?

An Invitation to the Jellicle Ball

Partial lyrics...

Jellicle Cats meet once a year
At the Jellicle Ball where we all rejoice
And the Jellicle Leader will soon appear
And make what is known as the Jellicle Choice
When Old Deuteronomy, just before dawn
Through a silence you feel you could cut with a knife
Announces the cat who can now be reborn
And come back to a different Jellicle Life
For waiting up there is the Heaviside Layer
Full of wonders one Jellicle only will see
And Jellicles ask because Jellices dare:

Who will it be?

And...

A more recent photo was uncovered...

some very old pictures...

I forgot...there are a few rather old (was it back in 2002? No I think it was the Summer of 2001) pictures of me lurking about on one friend's website...

This one is a picture of Me & Gina in Yusef's Pants.

Here's another and a
second and a third and (you can barely see me) a fourth. And a fifth.

Cats songs lyrics

The Old Gumbie Cat
and
Old Deuteronomy were undoubtedly among the songs sung.

And what else did this girl sing to her dearest, almost-like-a-good-older-brother-neighbor friend?

She sang: Maria. (From West Side Story.)
She sang: Michelle. (by The Beatles.)
And from Cats, without question, she sang: Macavity!

One day, this girl is sitting in art class across the table from her friend.
They do not have the same friends in the hallways at school. Nor do they have the same amount of friends.
Maybe this girl is like: The Callous Hippie.
Maybe her friend is like: The Conformist NonConformist.

However, for some reason, when she is around him, in art class, she always sings. She is quite silly. She is not like this in her other classes or with other people. She is quite subdued in school, otherwise. But Art class is her big escape. She sings the Beatles a lot. Today, she sings "Paperback Writer." She thinks he glances at her when she sings "And his clinging wife doesn't understand."
"Don't give me that," she thinks grouchily. "I'm not you're clinging anything, I am your friend, you know we could be better friends, and you could actually acknowledge me in the hallways when I try to say hello to you."

She sings, Help and
A Hard Day's Night and Hey, You've Got to Hide Your Love Away

But then a strange and unusual thing happens. She notices that he's not looking very well, and she hears him say "Will you please stop singing, I'm getting a headache."
She stops and she says, "Are you okay? You look like you're not feeling well. What's wrong?"
"Nothing, nothing."
"What is it?"
"Oh its nothing."
"Are you sure? Is anything wrong? You can tell me."
"No, I don't feel like talking about it."
"Are you sure???"
"Yes."
"Well...okay..."

And then it is quiet all the rest of the time until the bell rings, and maybe he says "That helped with my headache, when you quit singing, thanks," and he bolts for the glorious freedom and safety of...his hallway friends.

Train Station

One day, this girl (she is a lot older now) is alone, sitting outside of a train station. A man smelling of the liquor approaches her.
"Hi, how are you today?" he says, inches from her face.
She frowns (and maybe glares) behind her sunglasses.
"Excuse me," the man says more belligerently.
"May I sit here please?"
She says, "Go ahead."
"Thank you!" he sits beside of her.
"Would you like a drink?" he holds out the paper bag. It seems to have a tall can of beer in it.
She says, "No."
"Well, me neither!" he says to her.
She frowns.
He says "Hey, please tell me if I start acting like too much of an f-----g asshole, I mean," he looked pained, "not an f-----g asshole, but..."
She starts to gather her belongings.
"No, please don't leave. I'll leave," he says.
"No, thats okay." She gets up and walks towards the escalators, disappears down into the train station. She walks into the women's restroom and there are two young girls talking about whether or not they will be allowed into a bar.
"I mean, we're not f-----g sixteen anymore," they are saying. Its "f---" this and "f---" that. That is the language of the intoxicated and young, she thinks.
She is thinking of this memory/story she has of a time when she might've said something truly awful, and shocking. She wonders if it could be true, and if so, if what she said might have been like the straw that broke the camel's back.

mucho song lyrics

There was once this girl who liked to sing incessantly in art class.

She'd be sitting at a table with several boys and a girl. On a West Side Story kind of day, she'd sing
I Feel Pretty or
Maria (making her voice sound very low and dramatic) and
America and maybe some sections from
Officer Krupke or Tonight.

Or, she might sing some songs from Cats. "I have a Gumbie Cat in mind, her name is Jenny Any Dots" or "Jellicle Cats come out tonight, jellicle cats come one, come all..."
"That one sounds stupid," any of the boys might have commented.

She'd sing Growltiger's Last Stand.
"I like that one better," one of the boys said.
"How come?"
"I don't know, I just do."

She sang some of
Gus the Theatre Cat and said, "That one is interesting because at the end he says he used to play Growltiger."

And she'd probably sing Grizzabella the Glamour Cat and Memory. Grizzabella was her favorite and the other girl at the table really liked Memory.

She liked to sing some Beatles songs. Like Eleanor Rigby.

Also Norwegian Wood,
Michelle A Hard Days Night, And I Love Her, Back in the U.S.S.R. etcetra.

The other girl would sing some of those Beatles songs too.
The boys mostly listened.

whale things

While staying in a hotel in Chicago for the IRA conference, we discovered that it has a large mural of whales by an artist named Wyland. Here's a picture of it on someone else's blog...

Link to Chicago Wyland Whale Mural

However, the commenters on that particular blog are quite negative about it...well, whatever. We liked it!

Also met Jerry Spinelli (author of Night of the Whale) briefly. My friend snapped our picture and I purchased two other children's books by him. Stargirl and Milkweed.

For a little while, at my job, I was actually compelled to read a passage about a whale over and over again. Also I used to know of a website that had pictures of the four legged ancestor to a whale, a very strange-looking beast, but I've forgotten where it is.