The film history test and THE BRO JUD ON LOVE ENERGY SHOW

Thursday I have to take the final exam in my film history class. I really hate art history. It's really subjective, putting parts together that may not fit just to prove some sort of point about nothing. CASABLANCA was so boring. So was STAGECOACH. Actually the latter film was degrading to watch. Being human can't meant that one human has a right over another for grabbing land.

So, I'm not studying for my exam. I've been thinking about what I'm going to read on THE BRO JUD ON LOVE ENERGY SHOW tomorrow night. Also, I want to sing and play one of my songs. I have to work tomorrow. This is such a busy week. I should mention that I'm going to try to understand Jud's utopian plan with alot of love energy.

Studying for the film history test and eye disease.

This semester I took the first half of Film History 20 at City College. One thinks, CIty College...really difficult, huh? Actually, I've not studied so much for a class than since I went to UC Berkeley. I took my papers really seriously. In this class, I have to take the TESTS seriously. He gives us mass information about the early days of film and Hollywood and all that. Classical cutting, parellel editing, the master shot, medium shot, close-up, deep focus cinematography (CITIZEN KANE), reverse shot/shot editing (CASABLANCA), the musical (THE GOLD DiGGERS OF 1933), and etc. I did my paper on the films of the only woman director in Hollywood in the 1930's: Dorothy Arzner. She did melodramas, which, according to our instructor, starred women. My paper dealt with the class struggle depicted in two of her films: THE BRIDE WORE RED and CRAIG'S WIFE. My instructor found my discussion "interesting" but not "deep enough." I didn't make a big deal out of the fact that Dorothy Arzner directed women in films about women. To be honest, I'd rather not have to talk about LIFETIME television. I'd rather watch "Family Guy."

Speaking of what can befall a woman, I'm dealing with the loneliness of having NO BOYFRIEND and having been just diagnosed witih an eye disease--in both eyes. I've had an eyelid infection for almost two months now. The eye disease is in the back of my eyes. It's called "lattice degeneration." A lattice is a physics matter. Apparently, not enough blood flows to the affected area and it breaks down. On Friday when I return to UCSF for my follow-up exam to probe into what might help deflect the onslaught of retinal breakage that results with lattice degeneration.

Not a real font of good news today. Feeling like I want to write a personals ad, since I never meet anyone at work or in the usual places one meets prospective loves. Somehow I'm ready to face this week at work, because Friday after 3 p.m. means Christmas vacation!!!!

Thank God for Stewie.

What would an otherwise lazy night be like without "Family Guy?" IT is so crass and gross and disgusting and cliche but oh so funny--more than once in an episode. Tonight's show was on sexual abstinence for teenagers--especially Meg. The penises are placed next to the ears of the person one might be having an intimate moment with. Hilarious.

Speaking of sex, what is it without love? Someone was telling me today that Amma says that most couples today in lust and not in love. I wonder how she knows this. And, with all she has spoken of karma, wouldn't there be some destiny and payback involved in the whole sexual thing? We haven't even addressed the dharma also implicated.

Nonetheless, I keep dealing with my karma everyday. I worked today at the store. Played a 9 hour cd of Indian classical music after listening the Dalai Lama chanting and Amma's earliest bhajans. It was a good day for music and contemplation.

And, I thank the antibiotic for my eye infection might be really working to get rid of it!

Tonight I took video at The Beat Museum.

Why do I have friends I hardly talk to turn me on to such cool things? Mutual respect but not enough closeness, probably...for whatever reason. I hope we will be better friends after tonight. But my friend asked to shoot video at a performance of woman poets and musicians at The Beat Museum. The Beat Museum is on Broadway and Columbus, really close to City Lights Bookstore. This whole area has such a history of being a creative place. It also is home to the city's strip clubs. My aunt lived in this neighborhood in the fifties and sixties. She was an art collector--mostly California fiftes Abstractionists. I grew up looking at the many paintings in my house and the ones in hers and my other aunts. I loved this palette-knived oil painting of a grove of trees in a medum shot. The painting was quite flat for a painting and yet sculpturally so interesting.

I digress. The Beat Museum. There were original photographs of Ginsburg and Cassady and Kerouac and all the other players in the play. What a perfect place for a performance by women? Especially on Broadway? If I had performed with them, I probably would have shown quite a bit of skin. That's what Broadway--can be about or, at least include. The words were delivered very differently from woman to woman. There so much variety of voice and song. My friend's song was about the Black Panthers (sex included) and Courney Love's implication in the murder of her husband Kurt Cobain. I know that has something to with my avoiding formal wedding and the legal issues involved.

Digressing again. It was alot for me to take in. People were great in abundance as spectators. I tried to include them in the experience. I hate when people look at the camera. I don't want to offend anyone by not acknowledging their presence in the video credits. Nonetheless, there was not too much ego out there tonight. Every performer was quite understated in over-expressing their importance. Substance, what the poems and songs were about was tantamount everest.

I just regret not buying a cd from a young guy who had included his songs on a cd full of well-known rappers. I told him that I didn't really know any of the music. He said I could get into by listening to it. Then, I asked him which song of his was on the compilation. He said, "I'm the guy with that..." or something like that. What did that mean? He said, "I'm one of those kind of guys." Wink wink. "A player,?" I said. "You'll have to find out for yourself when you listen," he smiled. He was just so cute that I could't resist, right" No. I didn't dig his attitude. I kept on video taping and forgot about him. Then I remembered, and I went out to see if he were there. He had told me earlier that I looked like someone who could afford to buy the cd for $5.00. Yeah, maybe, not really, and I work too stressful of a job. Video is much more interesting than teaching--anything...even drumming. I was having tons of fun. Sorry, but I don't think I was ready to listen to the music he had offer or was just off in my own world like he was. The video camera is not even mine, if that's what made me look like I have any money. What is this, I need to make my own cd so that I can trade (barter?) next time. That's what another friend did who had performed. I'll ask her to make me a copy.

In any case, I paid $24. for 3 dvc tapes. I shot two tape's worth. It was a real excursion into the nightmares of having a camera the battery of which now only lasts for about an hour. I kept having to charge the battery there in betweeen the performers. I was sweating!! ( I like to shoot through a rack of t-shirts, camera angle from below. Ozu --

The week from hell has ended.

When does your week "begin"? For those of us who do the 8am to 4p--or whatever--the week begins on Saturday. No, actually Friday afternoon. My Friday afternoon was a resolution of much time spent wondering why November was such a difficult month. The US elections were uninteresting and more of the same to me. Boring. Scary.

My days spent at work were often extremely taxing. I stopped bringing my guitar to work to play for the kids. That's part of the problem. Not staying in touch with my inner rhythms. I NEED to play music and sing and dance. Children with autism also need to move and dance and hear music. Also, I took a week off at Thanksgiving and when I got back on Monday all these social workers had come by and undending social problems were thrust in my face.

Creatively, not much got done this month. I have been so apathetic. I started out painting and ended up doing nothing. The toilet still doesn't flush correctly. Shopping for clothes was uneventful and dull. I only saw Amma once. (I can say seeing Amma was the best moment of the month besides the video I took of my friend and my ex-lover shouting about the minimum wage in the U.S. I shot an hour's worth. (So dedicated, right?) I want to edit it down to 10 minutes or less. My friend couldn't get a word in. People don't like to watch others' frustrations for too long!

Frustration? Try dealing with a karmic debt you don't know how to pay. Your heart is pounding. You can't breathe. The stars are all tugging at your hair. Your hands move but not your voice. This all happened today. I put my forehead on the rug in the meditation room at Love of Ganesha. My face fell into the garlands in the singing bowl. Ganesh always hears me.

I saw Amma yesterday.

I took Monday and Tuesday off from work this week. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday are already holidays. So, I didn't go into work at all this week. I'm writing like this week is over!!! It started on Friday night when I felt really weird and tired but took a video of two friends arguing about the mininum wage. I woke up Saturday morning with a wicked flu. Stayed in bed until Sunday when I worked at a store in the Haight. Monday I cleaned the house and my clothes while I was still sick.

Yesterday morning I drove to San Ramon to see Amma. Every time I see I come back glowing with what must be love. She is the embodiment of love and compassion. There is something very nice about getting a hug from Amma. She has what must be divine love radiating from her pores. Although there were tons of new people there, the vibe was completely chill. No stress. I didn't do any seva, though.

I want to see her in a public program on Friday. The retreat that people are on up there didn't appeal to me because I did it once at this time of year three years ago. If you don't have a boyfriend or friend to stay with, someone of my means has to room with someone unknown. Hotels in general don't appeal to me, but the one I stayed in (for one night!) was right next to the freeway. What a getaway!!!

Negativity and the pull there aside, I am so happy to be able to see Amma at all this year. I've been sick. I don't want to pass it to her or anyone. By Friday I'll be strong enough to drive there and deal with the crowds!

Election Confection Smechtion

Have you every had candy that made you puke? Licorice is one that does it to me. The election coverage by CNN and CO. was so strange and uninteresting that it was not really eye candy (which tv mainly covers) but puke without the awful candy. I voted so completely other than most. I got so disgusted with the ballot that I sent 1 sheet in with no voting on it. As far as the legal people, judges and whatever, I voted "No" on all of them!

The good news was that Berkeley residents overwhelmingly voted to impeach Bush. It is a little known fact that many highly educated people live in Berkeley. There ware people who just understand that it's their right to vote as they feel.

Oh, the blood.

Just got back from seeing THE DEPARTED. WHY so many guns? Why Jack Nicholson as one of the gangsters in Boston who
made no effort to concoct a Bostonian accent! The only things that made this film not just another CSI:Wherever were the dissolves and jump cutting. At one point I had to go to the bathroom, and all I could think of was, "This film is not WILD STRAWBERRIES." But in its editing techniques and rhythm the two had something in common. In Scorcese's film there a lots of shoty adagios (almost like sound bytes sometimes) within the greater work, while in Bergman's film threre are just adagios that overlap.

So many films came to mind when I watched THE DEPARTED: RESERVOIR DOGS, KILL BILL, THE 400 Blows...

"Craziness" or "brattiness.

Tonight I should be videotaping at party that is newsworthy. The cable channel 29 is looking for news for it's upcoming show
November 17th. I got upset by the host of the Bro Jud on Love Energy show. When I told him I was tired from the week, he said "Stop making excuses...your'e a flake." I won't go into details, but he expect me to make copies of his show on my dvd burner from Apple. There was a huge problem with the mini-mac I bought initially last year. Now that they've put in a new harddrive,
I have to know how to transfer data from one harddrive to another. It's a long (and boring) story.

So, instead videotaping an event tonight, I am seeing Scorcese's newest film. It's just not my thing--the whole "gangster" thing. But a friend of mine who has never been verbally abusive to me wants to see it. I'll go. I want to talk to my film history teacher about the Scorsese film. I got an Q--no, an A on the last exam. Soviet, German and French cinema. I wrote about
the French film, though I loved Eisentein (we didn't see much of him). He was a painter on the film screen.

Saved it up for this Dance.

I'm in love with my cat but won't admit it. There, I said it. Unconditional love is so alluring. Now he has lost tons of weight and
had x-rays taken at the vet today. They think it's his kidneys. They want to do ultrasound testing. I don't think the vet is right.
But, then, what do I know? If I buy him some food he really likes and he starts to throw up everywhere, it will be a test.

Well. it's only our lives. He has been a punk, too. That's kind of what I like about him. But, utimately he's very sweet. He's all black (with white hairs in his ears) with green eyes. He is lovely. He's sweet. He's always gone outside and has never lost a
cat fight. He's nine and a half years old.

Right now I'm very concerned about him. It's hard for me to see him so boney. Maybe he will live longer than anyone thought. I believe it's totally up to him. He might be ready to leave. He may want to stay. Of course, I want him to stay. But I want him
to eat!!! He has to eat at least at the same ratio that I consume fattening foods. I feel pudgey today.


From Hairs

Celestial, gleaming, starry night
With fingers crawling up and down,
A tabla is seen but not heard,
All dressed in green, the suggestion
Of indentation is still present.
Another source. Be together.

Too tired to blog?

I think that I need some rest. But it seems that everything needs my attention--RIGHT NOW. For example, one of the cats left feces stains in about 4 places near my bathroom. At work, I did some social work...after hours. At noon when I went to a cafe with one of my friends, I could have fallen asleep right there. I got a large chai and kept going! I hope that the month of November will be balanced and healthy. I tried making dahl tonight (another task--but it was good).

There's a book I haven't started for my Latin American Art class. The film text goes unread, too. I wonder what film we're going to watch tomorrow night. It happens to be GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933...OK, that's enough.

Time to lie down or do some yoga.

I have an eye infection.

Tuesday I stractched my eyelid near the inner eye area. It got infected. First it was a flat red, then a pink mound of almost
one half an inch..running down onto my inner nose. All you have to think about is what the Kilingon's look like. This creation
took about 4 days until Saturday. I went to the emergency room. Got a shot in my butt muscke (!) of antibiotic.

Now I am still dealing with it. IT itches. It burns a little. I should be resting my eyes. It looked better after I'd had some sleep.

Happy DIwali

I think it started on Friday: Diwali, the Festival of Lights and the New Year in India. It goes on for several days. I have a friend
from India who took me out to Diwali dinner. Usually Diwali is spent with family and friends. But my friend has no family here
and his car is in the shop, so he didn't feel like going down to the San Jose area to be with friends of long standing. Actually,
I've know him for almost six years.

We went to DOSA on Valencia. They serve DOSAS which are crepe-like, long and filled with vegetables. They are dipped in
some sauces. Yum.

I also went to do a video shoot and forgot to charge the camera battery. Oh well, I got 5 minutes of my friend's performance.
It was at LIfetime Books which is on Polk Street. What sweet place! It has a staircase winding down into it from the second
floor. The book emphasis is metaphysical mostly. The performance was interesting. My friend sang about Huey Newton and the Black Panther Party and then went on to Mary Magdalen.

Forgot to mention the Bridge School concert I went to last night. I loved the Trent Reznor ensemble. He has a string quartet
behind him...heavy on the cellos. Everybody else rocked hard and soft, but with Neil Young at the center of it all, the message
was often political. Yay. Does anyone think that Trent Reznor's music is political? Should there be a difference?

It was supposed to be a haiku.

I've been having trouble with blogger.com recently. They haven't posted my latest
blogs to the blog. It's weird. Can anyone explain why this is happening?

Meanwhile, I tried to change the heading with a haiku. It didn't print out the way
I wrote it. It looks kind of dumb. But maybe I should write more haiku. I miss
writing poetry.

Port of Shadows

Grey, white, black, fog
Swirls by you in fashion-
Like sweetness, a new
Flavor of obscurity.

Nelly, you stand in a
Cellophane coat. White.
You just happen to be
There at the rendevous.

He sees you and it's
Instant passion, love not
Unadorned with past surrender
And soon-to-be death.

Let's play where's the blog?

Last night I blogged about painting...sort of. I was thinking about so many things that my original idea left my mind when I sat down to write. This happens now and then and makes for a writing exercise, at the least.

I'm wondering if anyone else who blogs has found their most recent blog in another area than the actual blog. When I went into "search blog" and typed in the title "About Painting," the blog came up--by itself with my little picture in there.

Today it was really hot. I was so happy. Got to walk around the room for a while in my barefeet. Yay. Not many kids. Didn't have to go out to the recesses except in the morning. Made bats from stencils to teach color.

Tonight I need to read from some texts for my classes. Tomorrow night we'll see UN CHIEN ANDALOU which is one of my favorites. I used to love Dali. I still do, but I can't paint like that myself. I'm more of an Expressionist...black and white and colors. Tablas.

I have two choices: read about the Maya or about the technology of early sound films.

About Painting...

I was lying down on the couch and looking up at one of my old paintings on the wall. It's from 1998, and I did it in the garage of my old house I used to rent. I lost that house after having lived there for 9 1/2 years. The landlord sold it to a woman with enough money to buy it. By the time he sold it, I was painting upstairs in the dining room. That was so great. The garage could get really cold!

In any case, this painting could use some work. But I'd rather leave it as is because it's part of a gallery project sponsored by an organization that used to exist in San Francisco for people who had suffered physical and emotional abuse as a child. The place was called The Morris Center. This painting was selected as one of about 70 that
they chose in all to represent feelings of recovery and bliss.

To me the painting is unfinished. However, it does give a sense of calm. I want to take the painting down and start working on a new one RIGHT THERE. My landlord would freak. He has very inexpensive carpet on the floor, and I paint in oils. Oh well.

I've been painting in a little watercolor book. My subject matter for the past three or more years has been the two drums that make up the "tabla." To me this image allows rhythm to flow through the painting in different ways. Color has alot to with the sense of time and space, too. But painting a musical gift is fun for me since I play guitar and love to play music with other people. My tabla playing needs a lot of help now. In the old house I used to play all the time and for a short while had a trio (guitar, tabla, didjeridoo) called BHAKTI. We played at Day of the Dead in 2002 at a gallery in the city.

I feel tired. Got to get up early for work! Earlier in the evening I thought I had something to say about painting. I did, and now I'm remembering how I was going to start writing about it. Tomorrow.

Oh....Love.

Harold Pinter is a great playwrite. Whenever I forget my proper ways of conveying
meaning through this medium, I find myself often so full of it that I can't find
anything. Thank you, pinter.

To remove any suspense, I will expose the goal: to convey the deepest feelings one
can have about karma and what it feels like to always be in debt. Amma says that karma
is like having a debt to pay. Even in this life we accrue more debt. Thoughts are
what get me in trouble, I think. I'm not the kind of person to express verbally what
I'm thinking about too often. Writing used to be the best way for me to let it go--especially in high school and university. The kind of writing I do now is for
individualized education plans. I try to be objective. I don't write, "So and so is a cute 5-year-old..." Stay away from comments that subjective. The way any person looks
is a matter of opinion. Not everyone agrees that Bush looks like a liar. Do you know
what I mean? There are so many cruel people in the world that it is often very
difficult to distance oneself and ignore it all.

Oh yes. Back to karma. Debt is pretty cruel. The Buddha was correct. Dharma should be something welcome. I often consider dharma and karma the same. It seems that I'm constantly paying back as I go. Well, there's my job, for instance. Working as a schoolteacher is very difficult work emotionally and physically. This is the only profession that pays its members to take over 2 months off--paid!

Meanwhile, my love life is such shambles. I know I have to let the Moises thing go.
Tonight I went to a party where this woman who's supposed to be my friend wore one
of his set of earrings. She said, "Oh, he's a cool guy." My response was less than
casual: "There are cooler people in the world than him." The whole Love of Ganesha
crowd seem so caught up in who is holier than thou. Why do I feel so distant from them? Why do they all make me feel so lonely?

It's now close to one year since Moises and I got together. I was very vulnerable.
I hope after this past year since January that I have become less accessible than
I was last year at this time. The space between lovers was great a year ago. Such has not been the case this year, and I'm happier for it, but I lost someone, too (the eccentric guy from London). I have a friend I see now and then. I like him. He has the same birthday as I do. We are from different countries and different religious traditions. My birthday is December 24th. In this country, no one's around on the 24th. One year, about 3 years ago, I spent my birthday totally by myself the whole day and night. I wanted to do it because I never had. The birthday always had to be spent with family up until I was 30 (and beyond that) and then it's been spent with
friends.

I am digression-free now. Sorry for the interruption. This was supposed to be about Love. This is where Moises, Amma, the Argentinian guy I met today who is a friend of Moises, the woman wearing the Moises earrings, all this stuff comes up as a test. Am I over the weirdness of still thinking about someone who is a karmic test. The debt has been paid. The way I can keep the creditors at bay is to stay neutral to anything that has to do with this man. Earrings? Who cares? My love is for myself first. Being a faerie is really hard on the plane of the humans. If you've ever read THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A YOGI, you will know what I mean. The faerie world is where I've come from. It's still possible to be human and not get caught up in what
humans do to hurt themselves and others.

Using the camera.

Tonight I worked as a camera person for cable access channel 29 here in San Francisco. The show was their "open mic." What a joke. Now, I don't make fun of musicians unless they're just too stuck on themselves. Such was not the case with this group. They were humble people playing instruments. There was a female impersonator singing to a couple of songs on cd. There was a guy who imitated Jeff Buckley's style of singing who wasn't too difficult to listen to. But Randi and Jack of the trusty Bargain Basement Band stole the show in terms of heart. Randi does not have a good voice. But she can wail like Janis and was around when Janis was around. She sings songs about people taking over their governments and leading themselves. She sings about medical cannabis. She herself has mild cerebral palsy.

I don't know. I guess I had fun playing with the camera and getting a good shot. But I hope that next time there will be some variety in the musical people represented. The guy who soloed played in the band the last time. And the jazz band had the same bass player that played the last time. The only women represented was Randi.

This past weekend I went to a show because I was invited by friends. I saw John Mayer, Sheryl Crow and Marjorie Fair. I liked Marjorie Fair best. The commercial sounds of the other two didn't move me. Marjorie Fair sings about life with underdistorted guitars. They had put together some lyrics which one could relate to.

Tonight I heard and saw Kurdestani music.

What does it mean to say that you "saw" music? You cut it in half (no, fifths)? Have you ever heard Kurdestani music? I saw the film CROSSING THE BRIDGE set in Turkey and about Turkish music. (There is one Kurdestani musician represented.)

Tonight I was supposed to usher at Cowell Theatre in Fort Mason with my friend. She kind of gets on my nerves sometimes. It's probably the fact that she says weird, under-handed, competitive comments that makes it so. Now, I realized when I got home (I never went to the bathroom while I was at the theatre) that my butt-cleavage was showing most of the evening.

Perhaps I was inspired to wear my clothes thusly because I was so full of desire. There were many men I find attractive at this event. I met the first one backstage. At first, we had to sit with a man from Persia, and he and my friend were talking politics and he was using the word "us" for Ablurrika and my ears were literally begging for prozac until my friend found out we could go backstage and eat the food for the musicians before the show.

"Do you play doumbek?" I heard a woman ask someone to whom my back was turned. He answered her that he did play a drum. I was fascinated by that and the fact that his spirit was so open, so faerie-like, that I was confused. He was in his early thirties with shoulder-length wavy hair. I had never met anyone from Turkey nor had I met someone who whose culture was also Kurdish. This was all too much. He gave me this really genuine smile and I sort of let loose this snarly smile that I never encountered in or on myself before. What was this about?

So, as I sat and heard the lecture before the concert, I pondered my earlier ghastly behavior. The lecture was given by one of the musicians who described the soul of the music and a particular song's message. One of the songs was prescriptive for human interaction: soul meets soul and repects it on that deepest level. Later on, I was talking to a person who was working there and said that I thought Ablurrikans were the most self-indulgent in terms of bad moods and being unfriendly. He agreed with me. I'm looking for a discussion.

Still processing the ashram.

I read the post from last weekend pre-ashram visit. Forgot to mention the good things. There was a spot on the floor for me to sit and meditate. When the bhajans started, I was dancing as a sat. It felt so relieving. My meditation was on joy: the bliss of freedom from worry or care but still involving them in the process of being in the moment. Perhaps that was what was so helpful about this time. I really stayed in the place where I went in my mind and that was where I was.

It really helped when I had to talk to the old lover who is a young guy from Nicaragua. What he told me didn't bother me, but he seemed so ready to jump on my balloon when when I talked about some of my housemate problems. He's living in a commune. He sleeps with someone different every other night. At least I don't even have to say hello to this housemate who is one of 3 that I live with; four people and three cats.
But, in any case, I was happy with myself that I didn't trip or wonder about this person anymore. I saw another guy I kissed AT the ashram back in 2002. He is from Montreal but has been in this area off and on. He said "Hi" and that was all that was good...seeing the soul of the other person and greeting it.

The ride back to San Francisco was fused with talk of free and fun sex at Burning Man. One of the guys from Love of Ganesha (is it a coincidence that he's from Paris?) was recounting all the woman he had sex with in the desert. There were also the women who wanted to have sex with him. He and my friend were talking sex. Amma
knows there are many forms of love.