The Missing Piece

"We must praise the god Love, who is our greatest benefactor, both leading us in this life back to our own nature, and giving us high hopes for the future, for he promises that if we are pious, he will restore us to our original state, and heal us and make us happy and blessed." Plato

How many hours of our lives do we spend in the search of that perfect one who would make our light shine, make us “whole,” “complete,” a perfect circle? How many years of my life have I spent convincing myself that I need no one else to be the fulfill-powerful woman I believe myself to be. “Everything is within you.” “You are complete; you need no one to be whole.” “There is not a missing piece.” “If you love yourself, if you are true to yourself then another just comes to share, not to complete.” Then, why in hell after all the work; “the drink this, read that, go there, do the other, don’t do the something else;” why after countries, therapies and meditations of days, I still feel that the ice cream taste better when is shared?

Could it be at last that Aristophanes was right, and that we indeed were originally two in a perfectly round body, with two faces, four arms, four legs and one heart, born attached to our other half, happily content for eternity because we were complete from birth, and no search, nasty dating or blind dates were necessary. Until one day we perfect humans threatened the gods, and Zeus as punishment for our insolence, separated us to make us weak and constantly restless, too busy to fight the gods while aiming to find the missing piece hopping to reestablish the original balance and glee now gone from our lives.

And if such luck is our truth, how can we find it, or better yet how do we know when we have found it? since it is not just anyone who would complete us, but it has to be that original half that was part of our divine perfect circle. Could it be then that the “soul mate” story is true after all?

God knows I have kissed frogs, rhinos, and lions, and tigers, and bears. I have followed my cousin’s advice like one of the ten commitments for years now, “you don’t denied a kiss even to a dog,” yet I still alone on Sundays and nights, and worst yet SUNDAY NIGHTS! … by far the most terrifying single time of all, or at least it is for me. I have also kissed frogs that I had believed to be princes, to later find myself yet facing another mirage on a “desperate” search, and a mouth full of frog goo. Could the gods be still playing merciless games at us simple mortals? Are they laughing at us somewhere over the rainbow? And when I say us, I’m not only talking about we single gals, but I’m including our male counterparts as well.

For years now I had believed that all this concern for love, The One, the happily ever after, the intertwine legs in a warm shared bed on a rainy night was solely a copyrighted hunt of my spice. I was almost certain that men just simply didn’t have the need for warmth; their thermostats were always in high. Their hearts just weren’t big enough to really care; therefore, they simply couldn’t feel like we do. They didn’t care for THE one, except for the one to fuck tonight. But trying to put away my sinicism, hard to tame after age 30, I heard a male friend’s call for love few nights ago. A friend who I consider to be very manly, straightforward, and even cocky, confessed to me, to me disbelief, how tired he was of being alone in the exhausting world of singles after 30. It got me thinking that although we may not have the same modem operandi, perhaps at the end we are all longing for that arm to shelter us from a cold winter night… attached of course to that desirable body that will bring up the heat day and night.

Lets face, it may be true that we females long for love, generally speaking, more than men. I have seeing even my most liberal, commitment free, love phobic female friends breaking down into famous lines like “where the fuck is he!!!??” I’m tired of kissing frogs! Just show your God dam face already!” But although that may be true, it is also true that we women want the whole package. We want the love, with sense of humor, stability, looks (whatever looks is for each one of us), taste, intellect, romanticism, connection and not just sex; we want GREAT sex. While men can be ok with just the sex, the ladies want the hot, juicy, heart melting, intuitive, imaginative, creative, unconventional, steamy, butterflies flying, with great foreplay, sex… We want perfect soft passionate kissing with the right amount of tongue, the accurate touch, the amazing lip service, the rhythmical body fusing, the sexy words, the complements, the dirty words, the hair pulling, the panties tarring, the push against the wall… and then… softly finishing the sexy love making with the perfect spooning, where at last the divine ancient circle is completed once again.

This makes me wonder, maybe it is only in those moments of intimacy, of complete body fusion that we can go back to our divine past, thus, we faithfully keep up the search. Or at least we do for a while.

In a world that is slowly falling apart by wrongly used technology, bad politics, environmental issues, sickness, hunger, and… well, you name it, could it be that the main ingredient to make us whole is L-O-V-E? Could it be that simple?

Doesn’t seem like it when we check divorce’s rates. Unless we are willing to believe that it can only work when you find your real half. But as life gets more complicated so it gets to find the one. In our teens we dealt with “he likes me, he likes me not?” then our twenties was “would he marry me, would he marry me not?” and in the lovely thirties is: “do we really match, can he offer me all I want and most importantly deserve, is he going to help me on my growth, does his job fits my life style, does he share my interests, is he single or am I willing to break up a marriage or relationship, or simple become the other in my “the one’s” life… our maybe that should be a signed he is not the one?… Oh whatever, lets just ignore those stupid signs!”

With so much a stake, is not wonder why me, as many others of my bread still single. Because really, what are the odds one can find all those needs covered by one human being? One in a million in your twenties I said, and probably one in 10 million in your thirties, and equally proportional the older you get.

Most of us exhausted of so much hunting simply throw the towel and just settles for whatever one can find, instead of sticking around for what we are really looking for. And just like that our other half, our rightfully divine “soul mate” is forever lost in someone else’s body, which will “kind of” fit the square, but will hopelessly leave few sad empty corners. We even go as far as to /married them just in case, because, “what if she or he was the one and we let them go?” However, undoubtedly at some point sooner or later after the magical wedding day is over, we’ll sadly recognized that our “what if” love was in fact the wrong fitting piece. Worst yet, to our horror we realize that we had not think through a contingency plan, incase of if the “what if” went sour. I’m not making this up, it actually happened to me. This “theory” -muy a mi pesar- comes from first hand experience of what happens when we say in a rush of spontaneity, “what if we say I do?” instead of “what if we leave the things the way they are and we don’t play with fire?”

Maybe we are not looking for any myth or any ancient stories. Maybe we all just have needs and desires that only few people in the world could fulfill, but unfortunately we wont stick around long enough to find that right person. Time, society expectations, loneliness, economy, excessive desire of belonging to someone, past experiences –mostly those bad ones,- and peer pressure (consciously or not) makes us rush into making bad decisions when it come to chose our life partner. With each year of maturity, the thought of "more time wasted in a fruitless search will be childish," increases, and inevitably sooner or later most of us will give up hope. Hopeless, we are left empty of the energy that kept us going, and the long years of neglecting our heart’s desires will shape our future. We’ll settle for what’s handy and convenient, and trade love, passion, desire, and magic, for friend and companionship. The butterflies?… Well, we tell them to take a walk into some naïve-young lover’s stomach, because really, at the end all would be left in every relationship, no matter how fiery it had started, will be in fact friend and companionship, thus, all we are doing is escaping one step.

It is true, the butterflies wont last forever, but as someone said once “at lest you will have the memory that you once had them,” and in difficult times, reminiscing about those first flying wings can fill you with the strength to keep the fire going. Because finding the one to love is tricky, and time consuming, but maintaining the love is a lifetime job.

So, maybe there is only that one half, that soul mate, or maybe we have few perfect matches to choose from in the market of love, but whatever the theory, the truth of the matter stays unchangeable; it will take time, perseverance, determination and hope to find our missing piece. In the mean time, all we can do is develop ourselves and our growth, hence, when the prefect actor to fill our lover's shoes walks into the room, we will be prepared to step on the plate and share our divine circle, smoothly rolling down together for eternity thru life’s bumpy roads.

Now… thinking of all this makes me wonder one more question. Why do we need this other half so badly?… Could it be a need for validation, or a desire to...? Ah!!!! Who cares? It feels great when you have it... so, go find it, and in the mean time, enjoy the ride!

A Superior Hijab (veil) Free Race!

Who made Us a superior race, whoever that “Us” maybe?

The Muslims think they have the moral superiority to call white women whores because the way they dress and handle their freedom. The Westerns think they are superior because their women NOW have many of the rights they were denied of for centuries and only until 50 years ago. The Jews think they are the chosen ones, and therefore, everyone else is inferior. Who the hell do we all think we are to think us better than others we don’t even know, much less even bother to understand???

There is a debate if Muslim girls should wear the veil at school or not in Spain. The argument is if boys can’t use their baseball caps, or beanies, or whatever is cool and hip in their heads, then Muslim girls should have no right to wear their veil. Where should we start… maybe by differentiating a fundamental difference? The cap is a fashion; the veil is a cultural-religious symbol. Who are we to tell others that wearing a cross is ok, but wearing a veil is insulting. Insulting to whom? It is pretended that the discussion has nothing to do with religion, and the truth is that indeed is more complex than just a religious affair, yet it can’t be that easily separated when the veil is use merely for religious reasons, therefore is the first thing we most face. If we fight against this tradition we are not only having a cultural or fashion or manners debate, but also a religious one, just like if all of the sudden the government decided to prohibited the use of crosses at school, or made orthodox Jews to cut their sideburn curls (peyos). The veil represents the culture and the beliefs of a nation that bases its everyday life in their religious book (The Koran), we may not like it but that is what it is, therefore culture and religion is one of the same, just like it was in Spain until not long ago, and in most “superior” countries for that matter.

Now, the problem here goes farther than a question of religious beliefs. It seems to me to be also a fear of losing battles already won in this nation. Women feel threaten that by allowing such a “disrespectful” custom to women’s right in this soil, they may lose freedoms for which they had fought so dearly. How is that we think we may lose those freedoms in our own country by letting this “oppressive” men from another culture “force” their women (from their same culture I remind you) into using a veil? Is it that we think they may set a bad example to our men? In which case it makes me wonder how much faith do we have in the values of our male population if it really troubles us that much? Do we think that by allowing such a “chauvinist and sexist” practice, our men could be “infected” forgetting all about our rights? Maybe then our men are not as advance and superior as we think they are if we find that by letting others profess their way of life, ours are going to put us back in the house with the apron and the flip-flaps. What are we so afraid of? If we are supposed to be so “superior,” the actions of others shouldn’t make us go a step backwards, but should only shine the light on our “enlighten” lives.

I’m sure there are Muslim women who are not happy and are even outrage with the use of the veil and in fact finds it oppressive, and I’m also sure for a fact, that are others who see it simply as part of their lives; just like at one point in time some of our women thought we should had the right to work, and others found it ridicules, or a bunch wanted the right of getting divorce, while others fought against it. And frankly, if the female Muslim population are so appalled by this practice, specially those living out of the borders of Muslim nations, where they know the will be supported and encouraged, then let them lead their battle. One day just like my mother’s generation did, they will summed the courage to fight for what they believe is their right, and no matter how horrible the fight maybe, they wont stop until succeeding, such is the spirit of women once is awaken, but THEY have to be ready for it. I’m not an expert in the subject, nor is it my argument here. I simply find it absurd trying to change some ones else’s traditions and life (which are not really hurting anyone) when the time may not yet be right, just because we think our ways are so much better.

It is well known that the success of the Roman Empire was in great deal accredited to their “openness.” They learned than fighting against other’s beliefs and culture was detrimental for conquering. Even if they had an autocratic form of government, which may have enforced people to adopt some of their traditions and gods, they also integrated in their pavilion the traditions and gods of the conquered nations. Hinduism is, next to Buddhism, one of the most peaceful religions, and the one with more gods, why? Same concept, adopt the beliefs of others and integrate them, in this way, others will be less threaten and more comfortable adopting yours. With this I’m not expecting Spain (or any other country) neither to pray 5 times a day facing Mecca, nor making their girls use the veil, but what I do expect from them is to give the respect to others they are asking for themselves. And if you want to take the veil away, then be French and take all religious symbols and celebrations out of school and politics, that means no crosses, not Jesus in schools, not religious class, no virgins, no celebration of San Mateo, San Jose, San Bartolome, etc as national holidays, and then we will have equality. Which brings me to the last step of the problem, immigration.

As a new immigrant’s welcoming nation, Spain is not quite sure yet how to handle the integration of new cultures, and it is by no means an easy task, specially in a country so culturally and politically polarized within their own nation. And I am definitely not suggesting that they must modify all their own traditions to fit all this new ones, but immigration does bring transformation at all levels of society. USA, a country of immigrants, built by immigrant hasn’t figured it all out yet and has being dealing with the issue for hundreds of years. People, cultures, nations have their own way; time and history, there own rhythm for growth and development, even within the boundaries of one country. We (all human race) want to insist in molding all other cultures to our own, at the same pace and time, just like we want to mold our friends, children, coworkers and lovers. Everyone criticizes USA for taking over a country and try to force them into democracy when they were obviously not ready for it (and we have seen the results), but most cultures try to do the same to others at one point or another, and Spain if we remember was the king of that at some point in time. Every nation and culture has there on way of living just like they had their own food, entertainment, or fashion depending on their geographical position, their past, their religion, their weather, etc and yes, when they move to another country they take all that with them. Some will integrate easier than others in their new society because preconceived shared views, language and traditions will allow a smooth transition, but to others integration will take longer because the differences are simply too great. And even the host country will actively part take on the process by helping one group to integrate, openly welcoming it, while shamelessly bulling another.

The veil is just a veil, WE are making it mean so much more than it needs to be. I feel the problem is being faced by impulse instead of reasoning and most importantly, true understanding. These immigrants, with there on set of beliefs and moral codes are not coming here to purposely change us, although unintentionally they will. They are not telling our girls not to walk around with very little clothes covering themselves when they obviously find this fashion inappropriate. They are not asking for everyone to do as they do, they are not expecting Spanish women to wear the veil, they are just asking for a little respect to their culture and values, which as far as I can see they are not hurting anyone, or at least not the issue in discussion. We have the Opus Day tangle around our society with a set of very strict values, including long skirts to avoid showing skin (just go to a job interview to teach in one of their schools) and no one seems to care because at least they believe in the same God. People, it wasn’t so long ago when we Catholics had our women using veils, and long skirts, and high necks to cover themselves, in fact most of our nuns still have to dress like that and cover their heads at all times for that matter, and I don’t see any priest doing the same. And it wasn’t long ago either when daughter number X was expected to become the nun of the family, wanted it or not, while the daughter number Y was supposed to stay single to take care of the mother and daughter number Z was supposed to marry so and so to safe the family’s name or fortune. And was not long ago either that we had to be virgins until marriage, or at least fake we were, and I’m talking my generation here. It wasn’t long ago when talking about masturbation was something evil and shameful, and many of the girls of my generation still have fights between the ghosts of the conservative past vs. the liberal present. We just have a very short memory of who we were only 50 years ago. So, we are 50 years ahead of the veil, and?

All I want to express is that we need to stop feeling so superior because we are not, our divorce rates, and drug addictions, and teen violence, and murdered, and our priests’ problems for God’s sakes, show us better. So why don’t we live and let live? Is that veil really ruining your life? Something tells me that not in the least, but we just want to be right over those we think are wrong. We want to force a square into a circle, when maybe we should just let the circle be a circle and the square a square, and maybe learn from the beauty both shapes can offer to this world.

Is just a veil, no a clitoris clipping.

Merry Christmas to all!

What a year my dearest friends!

January: India-Los Angeles
February: Los Angeles
March: Los Angeles-Miami
April: Miami
May: Madrid
June: Madrid
July:Madrid
August: Miami-Georgia
Sept: Miami-Madrid
October: La Rioja
November: La Rioja
December: La Rioja - London

With all those places came a set of different homes, beds and warm arms ready to help...

Sometimes even from the most unexpected places... like a friend's mother home, or a stranger on a plane, or a friendship built within few emails, or a backpacker tired to walk with no place to go, or a friend met in silence, or a childhood friend reunited by technology, or an old love that has always been there even if I didn't know, or a clone that mutual love ones thought them to be soul mates and made them walk the walk together...

And of course in the nest under the wing of mother bird!

Experiences, tears, laughs, encounters...

Pain, decisions, change of minds, break ups, heartache...

Seldom waves of certainty...

Jumping without parachute to life adventures...

Leaving things behind, leaving love ones faraway, searching for new meanings, dreams and ways...

Looking through different glass shades, trying other people's shoes, eating others foods
(soul, body, and livelihoods)...

Searching, searching, searching... What for?... I'm sure no more...

But a drawer full of experiences and some conclusions I have... they may be of no more help than building some perspective... or maybe they have hidden meanings that I'm still suppose to decipher and decode!

Life has a bizarre way to speak to us, much like Dumbledore to Harry Potter... in clues that are meant to take us to the "Horcruxes" of our souls, which we need to destroy before we can find that which we all so fervently seek for ... whatever that may be for each one of us!

That was the last year of this decade for me... a year of change one could say... I like to call it a year of reinvention, of closing and opening, of recharging, of gaining while losing, of going back to basics.

Thanks to all of you who have share this ride with me, who have been one of those expected or unexpected shelter in the storm, and warmth in the cold... to the ones that gave me that right word even unconsciously...

To those who I have left behind, you know that you are not... you are all carved in the grooves that composes myself, so how can you be far when you are part of me?!

Have a very Merry Christmas and I hope we get to cross the path again someday!

DAY 19: The Day I met Miss Emmy Part II...

     Where the hell was the Fashion Police when I needed them!

The Super 007, now even happier with his date selection, grabbed her hand and proudly walked in. The girl was bewildered, she could not believe her eyes, and much less her luck. The whole “Soprano” cast, all the “Sex and the City” chicks in their fabulous dresses, a rock star here, a movie star there. Wherever she walked, wherever she looked there was a BIG celebrity with a smile welcoming her as part of the team. No one knows whom you could be, if you are with the big you most belong, and so you should be treated! Spago in Beverly Hills was the host of the event, so food was superb. Stars here, champagne there, orderves everywhere, and Cinderella went from aspiring-actress/waiter at day, to a Hollywood “starlet” at night!

Then, as all good stories should end, or began, Prince Charm entered the picture. While 007 was somewhere with someone else, the girl was about to experience the first celebrity flirting moment of her life; and just like normal mortals’, the flirting ceremony began.  She eyed him, he eyed her, and eyelashes fluttered like butterflies wings. He smiled at her, she smiled back at him, and shiny pearly teeth held the gaze. They both turned to see where their dates were, and little by little he walked towards her. Her legs were shacking, “thanks God for long dresses” she thought, as he kept moving across the room to talk to her. When he was finally closer, maybe only five steps away, like in a movie montage, 007 got back. “Well, Bruce Willis can’t take his eyes of you” he said. “Really? Where? I hadn’t notice it,” she calmly replied, and turned to see Prince Charm, who for last time raised ceremonially his glass at her, cheering for a moment that could have been, just before his date stepped in front of him, curiously looking back at the girl, who had already turned away.

After waking up from her slumber, her and 007 went right to the buffet table. Classy was her walk, making sure that if Prince Charm was still looking he could at least leave with the memory of this “superb” girl with the best walk on earth. A Venezuelan talent to be precise, I mean the walk, like Guaco would say: “esta manera de caminar que me hace suspirar!” And walking she was when all of the sudden the clock turned to midnight. And we all know Cinderella most leave before then, or tragedy will strike. Well, this Cinderella forgot how the story goes and tragedy stroke! Walk, walk, walk, crack!… She almost fell, but Super 007 rescued the moment. She looked down, and pulled up her long-to-the ground, A cut-flowy skirt that covered her feet, and confronted the inexplicable truth, Cinderella was turning into a pumpkin. Her fabulous Gucci shoes where BROKEN! “You have to be kidding me” she said, “this shit only happens to ‘Pretty Woman.’ ” “The only actual piece of clothing I have that resembles a star, brakes!?” She loudly thought in her burning oven like head.

In tipi-toe she walked to the bathroom to see if there was a way to perform a miracle, but nothing, it was broken beyond repair. “How is it possible that a $500 dollars pair of shoes can break after only few years, and how can it happen on this F..ck night!!!” And the thought crossed again, “thank God for long dresses, because this is my night and I’m not leaving… you hear me, you funny joker God!?” She joined 007 with the thin metallic heel on her hand, because the purse was too small to hold it, but the shoe stilled on. The skirt covered her feet, so for the next hour she worked out her calf muscle, secretly tipi-toeing all around. When finally was the time to go, she walked out again through the now empty and “gloriousless” Red Carpet so charmingly alive just few hours ago; and like that Cinderella left the party.

The Limo drove them to his apartment because the rental was over. Super 007 was going to drop her off. Yet, “lets have one more drink at my house” of course he said. The girl liked 007, but not wanting to put-out just yet, declined the “indecent proposal.”  Dracula insisted, it was time for dinner, but encountering resistance he agreed to just go up for the car key. Playing the best of moves he “passionaly” kissed her in the elevator, and she kissed him back for the first time. Confronted with one of those “don’t choke me please” kind of kiss, a mix between an Iguana and a dog tongue when down her throat. Happy she was when the elevator finally hit the right floor, “ting.” And the kiss was over with a huge and deep inhalation on her part. They went in, and knowing better than to sit, she waited standing while he looked for the keys. Rapidly he came to kiss her again, knowingly that she would lose control once in the coziness of his flat and the warmth of his arms. Once more, however, he was wrong, and she… gasping for air. In a soft and kind tone and push, she slid away from him. Nervously giggling, hoping not to show the discomfort, she walked to the door and asked him please to take her home. Super 007, known to be a playboy, couldn’t believe his ears, but nonetheless he did the right thing and followed her wishes. He dropped her off back to the same steps where hours before he had sighed at her sight. A last kiss and off he went to never be seen again!

And that was my first meeting with Emmy, a fascinating moment of fantasy that will forever live in me like the best of chasing-romantic-realistic-flying dreams.

Moral of a story: Don’t spend $500 in a pair of shoes, they break just as the $100 ones. Don’t go up to a guy apt unless you have kissed him previously. And don’t trust a Califirnicator who tells you “I don’t care about those parties” unless he/she is a start and therefore sick and tired to be in one, because he/she is lying… admittedly or not, it is all part of the dream!

 Guapo: Venezuelan Music group.                                                                                                                                                Lyric: “This way of walk that makes me sigh!”

DAY 17: The Day I met Miss Emmy Part I

It is madness how quickly we human beings get used to things in life. It has only been a year since I have been off the Hollywood's loop, and I already forgot what is important… at least for us Californicators!!!! The Emmy’s were on today, and if it was not for a mobile Facebook download of a very sharp looking Super 007 Ex of mine, and a casual click of the TV control, I would have never known. What a traitor! But there was a time when these things were cool, and even important to me; to know, to watch, but more importantly… what a disgrace, I must confess... I can’t believe I’m saying it. Please God make my fingers stop!!! Here it comes… most importantly of all was… TO BE INVITED! If not for a nomination, well… what the hell, at least to the Red Carpet and the party.

During my years in La, la, land I only got to be part of this glamorous day twice, never directly invited, always as the date of one with the connections. But hey no complains, most people don’t even get in as the date, so I guess it is “touch down” for me! Anyhow, my first Emmy’s party was actually a night I will never, ever, forget, for more than one reason. But as every story, we most start from the beginning.

Once upon of time there was a girl with big dreams, like all the girls who move to the land of Oz; and the best description of Los Angles I ever heard would reiterated this: “The smog in Los Angles is created by evaporated dreams,” because La, la land may have absence of many things except dreamers and their big dreams. Once Alice went thru the Rabbit’s hole, or Dorothy realized she wasn’t in Kansas no more, or that girl moved from humid east coast to dry 7450 Hollywood Blvd, life was destined to never be the same again… and for neither of the three ladies never was and never will, even after being long gone and back home. The girl had only been in the city for less than a year when her Red Carpet fascination became all too real, for… well… not merit of her at all.

A friend had recommended her to a Super 007 for representation, and so she ended up in the Super 007’s office one day. The handsome, suit ready, Richard Gere’s hair like Super 007 was not sure about much, but as a good vampire he was certainly sure of one thing: he wanted some of that new blood. He presented his best façade and pursued the   –by then- almost “retardedly” naïve girl. On her 26’s birthday she got roses at her work, and presents at her door, and pretty words in a card, and a dinner with all her love ones. Yet, one more present under his sleeve he had when he dropped her at her steps, and no it was not the year exclusivity contract for what they had first met, it was the invitation to the most important party of that years Emmy’s, the acclaimed HBO party. That year HBO had launched the first season of “Sopranos” and also had the second season of “Sex and the City.” HBO in less than two years had managed to change prime time Television forever, and the girl was going to be there to celebrate it. She was part of the biggest, and for a minute the Cinderella story didn’t feel all that impossible.

She couldn’t hide her excitement, although she tried to play cool. She does that a lot you know; “less not show too much emotions, I’ll scream in doors.” But next day the search for the perfect outfit started. There was no much time, nor too much money, and no connections yet to the rich and famous’ wardrobes, so it was time for improvising. Black always does it, and long always fakes it, and a good pair of Gucci shoes always makes it! She pulled her shorter hair in a tight ponytail, and wrapped a longer extension-hair around it, got make-up ready, and dressed to kill. The limo with Super 007 waited outside her door, and a sigh of surprise unexpectedly escaped his mouth when he saw her at his side. Limo got them to the party and down to the Red Carpet they went. The girl’s heart was pounding fast when she saw Sarah Jessica Parker just finishing her glorious entrance in a flame of flashes and screams in front of her. When the fire was down, the couple when up, and grabbing hands they started the walk. Seconds after, the fire regained slowly its intensity; screams, and flashes blinded the girl, and in the chaos of fake summer sunlight, the friendly hand just let hers go. For a second confusion crippled in. Where did the 007 go? Why she was just left alone in an ocean of strangers? What was going on?  When suddenly hit her that the screams, the flashes, and the hands with microphones stretching out were all for her. For no apparent reason all this people wanted her. She was not a star, she hadn’t even work in Los Angles once yet, she didn’t even have a 007 for Gods sakes, but the press was crazy about the girl. 

After few minutes, which seemed to last an eternity, she got to the end of the Red Carpet, but the madness was far from over. The HBO’s camera was fully interested in this new "star" who they had never seen before, but apparently all those other photojournalists had. “It is so great to have you here… You look as beautiful as always… How was the show, what do you think about the winners… And tell us please, how did you prepare yourself for such an important night.?” Now she really was about to crack up in tears of laughter. “Who the fuck they think I am, and what in life should I answer? How did I prepare myself for a night like this?… ‘Well, just like everyone else, took my dog for a nice hike to Running Canyon, and got all dress and ready when the time came'…” smiles, smiles, smiles. “You have a lovely evening, enjoy the party Miss…?” And her face was a big question mark, Miss…? 

Once the girl finally finished the unexpected, unbelievable, incomprehensible, glorious walk, there it was the Super 007 waiting for her with another Super 007 colleague, both with mouths open and the same question mark face, “what was that all about?” he asked. “What do I know,” she answered, “but see, I’m not even famous yet and they already love me, I told you, you should’ve sign me,” laughter, laughter, laughter.

To be continued... Read DAY 19 

DAY 14 & 15: Becoming a Slave!

And he beats you, he hurts you, he makes you worthless, he breaks your spirit, and empties your soul. Since his “glorious” arrival the mirror only shows a shadow of the heroine that is now gone. You forgot what you liked, and how you were like. If the eggs were better scrambled or fried. You cry, and only his touch will bring a slight smile. His approval is God’s love, his disdain apocalyptic flames. For your “lover’s” kiss you will condemn yourself to centuries of shame. But what to do when Cupid’s arrow strokes in? There is not hope for such a girl, because the truth will simply be … she’s… just…in LOVE… with him!

You gracelessly move your disfigured body, and harshly inhale with a forward step. You feel ghastly and sick with your reflection, your self-esteem vanished and so has your health. Diabetes took over, and shooting the leg became a normal affair. Your feet are so swollen that no shoe will fit. You fear your friend’s presence, and depression rooted deep. No clothes can now hide it, no mirror will lie, and grotesqueness has your identity kidnapped. And all that it’s due to stop the destruction is running some miles, eating what’s right, kicking bad habits, finding a new approach to life. Yet… you simply can’t!… the LOVE for food has you by the hand!

You spend more nights in an emergency room than in your own living room; gasping for air you contaminate. Your clothes, your house, your car, your hair, anything that surrounds you distils the fatal smell. Your husband is disgusted with the gray cloud above. Your neighbor complaints that it’s even creping his walls. Your cough is well known all over the place, and even your kid gives you the face. The ash dry thin skin that covers your body replaces the beautiful athletic woman you once were.   You saw your mother die with her lungs tired to fight. Yet, you still say, “sorry it is just stronger than me, I guess I LOVE Marlboro much more than to live!”

Your credit card has lost the magnetic band, but you don’t know why. You hide all those bags in the trunk of the car; your fiancé mustn’t know that once again you were back. There are bills to pay and a wedding to prepare, but with lost control you go from sale to sale. If the tag is red, it just can’t stay! What is so wrong if the price is right? ... Oh wait, yes… maybe that I have no way to pay all this credit back. But how to restrained yourself you ask, if I just really LOVE to buy!

Love?

Then what is it with that little thing call love that decontrolled your senses to the extreme of self-destruction? The more you love something or someone; the more harm it seems you will self inflect… That first love, remember? The one that took your breath away if the air wasn’t share, the one that made you feel million butterflies and the empty stomachache. The same one that after many dreaming moons brought you down to hell, showing what dreams may come once the love has been spent. Its sole memory still today makes you faint, or at less weakens your legs. And yet that twister that twisted the grief, and set a Hiroshima whole in what once was a green fertile field of grace; it is now shamelessly the ruler by which you measure every creature who painfully strives to conquer what’s left. You keep searching for that sense of lost, emptiness and abandonment of oneself, as profoundly as if it was the quest for the Holy Grail. Wishing you didn’t know that you like fry eggs best. And your days are spent looking for the savage feeling that made your heart break, because life was lived the deepest when you were an addict of Him.

LOVE: All addictions start with that imprecise, delusional and fragmented four-letter word, a tiny utterance more prevailing and supreme than the last prolific uterus on Earth. When you truly, madly and deeply love something, someone, anything, you fail to remember the most important love of all… love to oneself. And it is right then when you lost the war, and become a slave.

 

 

DAY: 12-13 A fight for Land... "The Garden"

On April 29 1992, the United States armed forces confronted one of the biggest riots the country ever experienced, known as Los Angles South Central Riots, or Los Angeles Civil Unrest. A year before, Rodney King, a black motorist on parole, was brutally beaten by four white Policemen after a high-speed chase. A year latter, the court finally acquitted the four Policemen. South Central in responds to what they felt to be a racist based verdict, rioted non-stop for three days. The result was 53 dead, more than 4000 injured, and 1 billion dollars in material loses. Looking for ways to appease the people of South Central, the City gave 13 acres of land for public use as an Urban Garden.

“The Garden” tells the story about a plot of hopes and shutter dreams. Since 1992 about 347 families, mostly of Mexican origins, adopted this public land as their own. Like all immigrants, they came to America searching for a dream, and they had found it in this uncultivated soil.  The city gave them a land full of rubbish and waste with what was left of the foundation of an old warehouse. 15 years later they took away the largest urban garden in United States, a green lung in a concrete city, years of people’s hard work and the pride they took on doing it, food for many low-income families, a way of life which they were trying to pass along to their new generations, and the trust in justice and a government they thought to be “of the people, by the people and for the people.”

In 1986 the land was privately owned. The City had bought it from mister Ralph Horowitz for 5 million dollars to build a trash incinerator. Because of the efforts of a group of women, the City was forced to stop the project since it was detrimental to public health. However, almost two decades later corrupted politicians, including LA Council of 9^th district Jane Perry, in a bureaucratic conspiracy sold the land back to its old owner for the same price paid 18 year earlier. In 2004 the farmers of The Garden got the first, of many notices of eviction they would get in the up coming years.

What the City, Miss Perry and Mister Horowitz didn’t expect was that the farmers were determined to fight for what was morally and legally theirs. They got united, they got organized, they got informed, and they look for help in all the right places. When they thought they had almost won the war, after founding the sale to be illegal, the court turn the verdict around and again gave the right to Horowitz to take the land back. Once more this ultra capitalistic system was proving that land was more valuable and had more rights than people’s hard work. Horowitz gave these humble families 60 days to raise 16.2 million dollars, at which price he promised to sale the land; a price that was more than three times what he had paid for it, and realistically impossible to achieve in such of conditions. Against all odds, the farmer with the help of Hollywood artists and activists like Daryl Hannah and Danny Glover, in two moths raised the asked price, 16.2 million dollars. They had won; they had proven that perseverance and will makes impossible dreams come true. They achieved the unachievable. Yet, they still lost. Mister Horowitz, for “unknown” reasons rejected the offer. In 2007 the last drop of hope hydrated for one last time what once was a green paradise in the middle of a concrete jungle, and was soon to become a storage building. Until today the land still empty, and the project in blueprints.

Kids, adolescents, adults and elderly cried and screamed and fought the entrance of the tractors in what they consider their temple. But they just simply came in and destroyed in an hour what took years to build. All the now grown and strong apple, guava, banana and papaya tress said their last goodbye. The cilantro stunk the air, and the beet and carrot juice colored the earth of pain. The beautiful flowers were stepped on just like the powerful stepped on the poor. Once more injustice prevailed, unfolding an unwelcome truth; no matter how hard and honestly the humble and powerless work, and how many battles they win, at the end the will rarely win the war.

The Garden is a documentary about bravery, family, pride, love, strength, perseverance, hope, pain, achievement, lost, laughs and tears. It also taps in important subjects as racism within minorities. The incapacity or unwillingness of Politician’s to fight against capitalists for the well being of its citizens. The power Hollywood has to support important causes. And lastly, reflects on the importance of education, activism, community and reform. Yes reform, because until the world doesn’t understand that we most learn to utilize the little land we have, until the world stops giving importance to all the wrong thing, until the world ends discrimination in bases of raze, gender, class and religion, the course to destruction will continue. The experts say global warming is a consequence of industrialization, pollution and many other things I don’t need to list here because they are of general knowledge. Yet, I say Global Warming is the conflicted heart of Mother Earth who sees her kids becoming Cain and Abel in a constant war to destroy each other for power and greed.

This 2008 Oscar nominated documentary has a special place in my heart because it was the result of years of hard, frustrating and devastating work of a dear and always inspiring friend of mine. She, as a producer had to live this fight as an observer of constant injustice against her own people (she is a proud Mexican). 5 years of work didn’t give the farmers their land, but at least their story is now history and a precedent that may help change the destiny of many.

If you want to watch the documentary it is now available in stream video at www.netflix.com. You can also rent it in Blockbuster.

Writer, Director: Scott Hamilton Kennedy

Produced by: Scott Hamilton Kennedy, Vivianne Nacif, Dominique Derrenger

DAY 10-11: Finding Neverland!

Who do we really are? What makes US? What determines the truth of oneself?

When you become a traveler the “truth” that you have carried around your whole life, in the form of a presentation card, disintegrates the farther away you go from home. What has defined us dissolves like raindrops al contacto con el mar, and vanishes in the infinite blue horizon. Can you really define a person by the job that pays its bills, instead of by the dreams they may have had, or still even dream? Do we have the right to determine how a kid will grow up to be just by judging its parent’s life choices and behavior, or by the friends that surrounds them? Should we pint point the kind of being someone is simply by scrutinizing their off spring’s successes or failures, instead of by the closeness of their relationship and the love they cast for each other? The amount of school diplomas and Honors one has achieved it’s what’s paramount; being actually inspired by the path you have chosen is just for losers. “Be a Doctor darling, you’ll make money” “I know you hate the sick, but you will get use to it.” Dreams are measured by their size, instead of by how much pride and joy they will bring the day you finally fulfill them. With how many and how often one has fucked, determines more accurately who one is than how profoundly one has loved. The cash accumulated in the vault represents hard work; how it was accumulated… who cares! 

You are your job, your bank account, your university degree. You are who you married not how hard you work to make that commitment to LOVE -not to social expectations- last. The more tangible things clutter your space, the more admiration you will receive. It is the accumulation of crap, instead of wisdom, adventure, love and friendship that shows how good you have done for yourself. Yet, while pursuing all this quantifications that are supposed to determine you, you lose your true nature. One day you wake up and you just can’t recognize the reflection in the mirror. Who is this person, and when did it take over? If your seven-year-old self could see you now what would it said to you? Would it keep on living after confronting its future?

When you are a traveler. When everything you own fits in a backpack. When your profession means nothing unless you are a doctor in a life or death experience. When your beauty is covered with pounds of dirt. When clothes become only something that covers you. When languages become your most precious possession, and instinct your most profound and important piece of wisdom. When those who you meet don’t care about where you live, what your family do, or how much green bills you have in your pockets. Instead, they are fascinating about why are you there, for how long, where are you going next and why, what your dreams are, and what are you searching for; then you really start finding the kid that still leaves somewhere beneath the roughen skin. People likes you, or don’t because they can connect directly to your soul; and souls know better their perfect match because they are pure beings. There is not, “well, I’ll be his friend because I can get something from him,” because what are you going to get really, a better train wagon, or a $2 dinner for free??? There is no more profound interest than finding the right play buddy. You become a kid again; you let your instincts guide you, and you start listening to the voice you had shot down so long ago. Everything is new, everyday is an adventure, every color is a new rainbow, every sound an unchained melody, is like start walking again. Have you seen how babies get totally lost on that little dry leaf they found in the ground while crawling to mom’s arms? That is how you become, lost in all the beauty nature can offer, lost in all the share stories, laughs and tears, lost in all the miracles that are around you every day, but we are just too busy showing off to notice.

I always say that India taught me to see with my heart and not with my eyes; to feel with my soul, and not with my senses; to close my eyes and find the best of friends within me. Traveler’s friendships are based on this description of oneself, and that's maybe why you make the best, the most unconditional and most long lasting friends during this adventures, because what takes many years for friends in your regular habitat to know and understand, takes hours for two open souls to attain. It is this freedom of being what I think most of travelers miss when we are back home, when we have to change the backpack for the briefcase, the “what I like, I love, I dream,” for “what I do, I have, I will,” for “how much green” instead of “how much feel.” And even for us, fortunate ones, who have at least tasted how life was really supposed to be, find it almost unrealistic to keep the just reborn child alive. Thus, traveling becomes an addiction because is the drug that brings you back to bases, lets your true self out, and the seven year old you buried time ago under layers of adulthood, comes again out to play.

So, in my book, true happiness can be attained when you don’t let life kill the kid you can still be. Ask your mom today who were you, how did you interacted, and what did you dreamed off before your heart started to shrink, and see the difference between now and then. Otherwise, just grab that dusty backpack, or buy a new one if you never had one, and go on the search for Neverland!

DAY 9: Smashed!

Once upon of time, in my early 20s, I lived in a humid, hot and then frantic fun crazy place call South Beach. It was a booming place, filled with the most exiting and alive people from all corners of the globe, who were looking for their notch in the glamorous world of Fashion Week. I was part of this team of maniacs, eating lettuces and sushi to keep the line, and partying for exercise. Still, I was never a full member of the madness, First, I was married for parts of my years there, which slow me down, at least in the party scene, and secondly I have never been a social butterfly. As an active member, I was up and down Lincoln Rd, Ocean Drive and Collins Ave. all day long, with my Book permanently attached to my hand, praying for the next gig that would pay my rent, or at least make me happy. Very short I have always been, so Fashion Week was never going to be my ending goal, although I would lie if I told you that I didn’t pray for a miracle to happen when short became in and tall became a thing of the past. As we know today, that never did happen, tall still cool, and short doesn’t get into Fashion Week, unless is in a piece of clothing. Therefore, I was very thankful when a Venezuelan Producer moved his production company into town and gave birth to the“wonderful” world of television production in Miami, especially Novelas. After him, some others followed including the biggest Television Networks, and a new work market was born. Today, just like South Beach, the powerful machine of lights and action are in their way out from Cubaland, but I was there for the Golden Years, and it was fun!

Many stories I could tell you about those years of work, love, heart break and simple growth, but today I will share one that caused an explosion of laughter out of me when last night I was reminded of it. After probably 9 years of not seeing each other, a dear friend from those unforgettable days and I went out for dinner. Last time we hanged out he was a young kid, full of unclear dreams and aspirations, of something he couldn’t fully point out by then. He was vibrant, and funny, and sweet, and girls just loved him. He was the best friend you could ever have, the one whose house door was always open, and a shoulder was always ready. His heart was soft and always wrapped in love, for you, for life and for the lucky girl. And I also remember a fine six-pack framing his slender body, covered by a cinnamon skin body suit. This Colombian Cinnamon Bun and I met working on a pilot, and an electrical current created sparks from the first day.

I had gotten divorced not long before. The life I had gone through until then, made me feel so much older than I was that I felt him to be so much younger than me, when in reality the difference was only a year. In this pilot, like often happens during filming, many love affairs took place, and Cinnamon Bun and I didn’t want to stay behind. We started to spend many hours together, always hanging around, doing random stuff that made me feel like the girl I really was. He was fun, real, unique and in a way even naïve. But our relationship had a shade of friendship that was not turning into red passion. We loved each others company, and I remember having a nice crush, but his loving heart was broken from a recent break up. Electricity was still flicking sparks, but he made sure to quickly put down fires before they could damage our fertile green friendship. He was good at that shit, and it frustrated the hell out of me, since I of course wanted the flames to burn me down to the ground. So frustrated it was, that yesterday I couldn’t even remember if we had actually ever kissed, and after a memory exercises we both came up with details of heated moments in his cave-like apartment on Pennsylvania and 8^th. His fractured heart was still so kind, that it didn’t want to smash the heart of another, that is more that I can say for must man at any age. Still, I was determined to win him over, and cure the cuts with bandages of kindness and patience.

One day I had a plan. Since my grandma and mother always said that all men were win by their stomachs, I went to the best market in town to get all kinds of delicatessens to make two scrumptious sandwiches, and a refreshing fruit plate, combined with a good bottle of wine, all packed in a picnic basket for a perfect evening under the stars.  I called him to ask if he could be just mine for one night, since we were always hanging with other friends, because indeed he was, and still is a social butterfly. He curiously and merrily accepted the invitation. I picked him up, and to add some excitement, I blindfolded him the whole drive. When we got to the beach, I helped him out of the car. We were jijiji-jajajaj (English version hihihih-hahahaha), giggles, giggles all the way. I had a RV4 truck then, and I open my back door to take out the picnic basket. Him, still blindfolded, grabbed himself from the edge of the door trying to keep balanced. We were talking as I got the picnic basket, and distracted by the conversation, and the excitement of the night to come, I didn’t notice his cute little fingers firmly clutched around the door’s edge, and in one defiant motion I accidentally slammed the door on his fingers. The full moon fell from the sky in horror, and the starts collectively screamed at me “you screwed it up girl.” His scream was quieter, but more excruciating. I cannot describe his pain, but I don’t think is necessary, we all know what smashing fingers feel like, throbbing cycles of brutal pain. The blindfold when off, and I could see a mix of agony and anger in his eyes. I didn’t know if he would cry or simply smack me silly. I was clueless in what to do next. I looked for the dry ice in the basket and I gave it to him. I told him we should go to a doctor or something. I told him to call the whole thing off and go home to take care of the pain. But he firmly said, “NO we are having a picnic.” And we did. Moon got back up into the sky, and the starts shined again, but the night couldn’t be farther away from the original plan. I don’t remember a lot of details, which it is a sign that things didn’t go all that well. My mind always does that, it blocks less than perfect memories. It keeps the worst of hurtful fights, and the most beautiful moments of love, but anything in between is erased, until someone helps to recreate the moment, and the flash back comes to front, letting me tap into a forgotten story.

Yesterday, when Cinnamon Bun and I evoked the past,I almost pee my pants recalling this moment. He told me that that day he was ready to let go, and if the picnic had gone out right, I would have remember the following hours, but it didn’t. As much as he found my gestured to be, quoting: “the sweetest thing a woman, until then, had ever done for me;” the incident had created an instant short circuit in the electrical current we had shared until then. Soon after, I left to LA for good, and we never saw each other again. Now Cinnamon Bun has found his voice, he found what he was searching for then, and he is goooodddd!!! Music is his path, and I love to see the happy smile on my friend’s now very manly face. The kid had grown up into a perfect soul of radiant light ready to radiate the world, and I’m happy I didn’t permanently damage those talented musician’s fingers.

Day 7: Part 3: On my way to the Taj Mahal: A B-day experience! Part III

A glass of perfectly formed small snug bubbles, in the beautiful hotel visited by Lady D and Prince Charles during their own Taj Mahal adventure, living my dream… but alone. It is always strange when you are alone on your B-day, for some reason it feels wrong. I love being alone; I enjoy a lot my own company with only the frequent sound of the voices in my head. No, I’m not squizo we all have voices in our head, shot your month and you’ll see how strong they are. But there is something about being alone on your B-day that just feels lonely. I was about to write some thoughts in my dairy when three Americans walked into the bar. About ten minutes later I just went to their table and asked them to cheer with me because it was my B-day and it wasn’t feeling like such. There is something special about finding your countrymen when you are far away from home; an immediate bound is created with people you probably wouldn’t even cross paths in your everyday life. They were a nice group of Marriot corporate suckers, who with their corporate credit cards were traveling in India for a week or so. We sat outside with the view of the  flawlessly manicured garden around the big refreshing pool, and the Taj as backdrop, constantly reminding us why we were in this ugly, unfriendly, hot and sticky town. The group grew, as the afternoon became evening. The sunset came and went, and I was gifted with another $26 dollars bubble glass. They invited me to join them for dinner, but if the bubbles were that expensive, I thought, I didn’t want to envision what the dinner bill was going to look like. By then my trip around India was planned to last a month and half, so I had to be careful with my cash flow. Little I knew then that the original plan was about to be extended into a five month life time adventure. In any case, I thanked them for the drink and the invite and took off next door to my $30 dollar hotel and its terrace’s restaurant, beautifully decorated with top of the line plastic chairs. However, we had a even better view of the Taj, and I just couldn’t get enough of it.

The Brits were up in the terrace having dinner, so I decided to join them. We had almost no light up there except for one bulb and few candles. The bulb attracted a lot of little bugs, nothing too scary, but annoying nonetheless. We had dinner, and stayed a little longer enjoying a nice cold beer, when all of the sudden something brutally crashed inside my shirt, right on my terrified boobs. Then something else joined the first one, and there came a third crash. It was like the ambulance and the police got to the crime scene faster than you can say 911. These things, whatever they were, were crawling inside my bra, and my chest. I could fell their little skinny legs tickling me as they moved from boob to boob. I immediately prayed to God, and all the hundreds of Hindu gods that partake on any Indian altar: "please Ganesha just don’t let it be cockroaches." Here I was, jumping up and down in front of my friends and the confused waiter who hopeful eyes were waiting for a reluctant and savage striptease. In a country where showing a little bit of leg can cause traffic jams and fist fights, my modesty had grown stronger faster than I could imagine, so with cockroaches or not the shirt stayed on. Like a manic, and not exactly of the floor, I ran down the stairs straight into my room. Once there I took off the shirt and the first intruder jumped out. Bra came out, and the other two followed. I was almost avoiding seeing the crawling creatures that had just taken a nice evening walk around my own Mount Everest. Oh, what a relief it was to realize that Ganisha heard my prayers even that early in the game. They were not cockroaches but crickets. “Now wait a minute, where did they go?” I couldn’t see where Jimmy Cricket and his friends had run for safety, which meant that I had three little strangers sleeping with me all night. Who knew if this perverts after having a taste of divine boobs, were going to be looking for some more of it later. That was one of the worst night sleeps I had in India, which comparing with many of my friends stories, was not bad at all. Yet, I spent the whole night in my silk bag, covered head to toes, and feeling creatures massaging my tired muscles.

Next morning, I’m glad to inform, my dramatic Agra experience ended when I jumped in the train that would take me to my next destination in Rajasthan, the home of the famous Monkey Temple, Jaipur, or better know as the Pink City because all the building in the old city were and still are pink, creating the illusion of eternal pink sunsets.

Day 6: And It Finally Came...

Another day of reflection and not finishing my previous story... but I'll finish it tomorrow... 

What can I said, today, my B-day was one of those days you wanted it to finish as soon as it started, and it had nothing to do with becoming a year older! Time booms exploded, old resentments were explained and hopefully understood. I was forced to realize how much every life event have two sides of the story, no matter how much we want our side to be the right one. Men and women are just by nature fully and total opposites, and I don’t know who had the great sense of humor of matching us together. Timing is everything. Men sometimes do things that women find impossible to understand, and they do it like is nothing wrong with it. While we in the other side have our mouth open, about to pass out of anger, or in simple and pure disbelief. Why women have to just follow men’s need? Why do we have to wait for them to be available to us? Why do we have to ask them permission to hear our voice, or our true feelings? Why after they ask us for the truth they have such a hard time taking it? Sorry guys, I’m just a girl; I will let someone of your own breed to bitch about mine.

Why is so hard for all of us to just say what we feel? Why is so hard for the other side to really listen to what is been said? Why mothers and daughters have to always fight for independence, from others and from each other? Why it is so much miss communication in this world? I’m sure that at least 70% of all problems come from someone saying something that was later missed interpreted by someone else. Yet, sometimes is even the person itself who does not understand its true feelings, desires and needs. It is always easier to blame the other, taking responsibility is just too painful.

If this year is going to bring me a gift, I hope is the gift of acceptance and true listening. Acceptance of myself, my mistakes, my past doings, my brilliance and my darkness. Listening of my own inner self, needs, feeling and desires. We all have an internal voice; we just chose not to listen. Come on, how many times your inner voice has told you, “this is the wrong choice” “what are you doing,” “no, don’t do that, do this instead” “stop, stop, stoooooop!” and WE have chosen not to listen? To really accept, listen and finally love others, you have to become your biggest fan first, and truly find the beauty you have to share. Until then we’ll just keep making stories of what we thought it happened, with no real clue of what the truth was, yet creating one that could better fit our purposes. We wont love anyone for who they are, but for their potential to be what we want them to become. It is said by all the enlighten ones that expectations and desires are really the root of all our unhappiness… But how we, normal mortals, are supposed to live without motivating our simple minds with expectation of life and future, as well as to nourishing the desire to make those expectations a reality? Being Buddha seems harder and harder the more you try. So first I want to find what my desires and expectation really are, to then be able to detach from it, because how can I detach from something I can’t recognize?

If this day is any example of what the year may bring, it will be a year of profound reflection and secluded personal growth; time off from the world of many, to submerge in the world of one. And with so many doors closing, many are promising to shine new light.

All you people that sent wishes of better days and dreams come true, and all the ones who called from all corners of the world, I thank you, because you and your love was by far the best part of my day! And beloved “Hank Rearden,” if you read this thanks for being on the line and clearing the way.

Day 5: Dysfunctional Land!!!

Sorry guys, this is a parenthesis from the story I had being telling... I will finish B-Day in India later today... This was just a morning thought!

Last night, trying not to die from boredom in this house where the gloom seems to have enclave for good, I stumbled over a little great show that kept me up until 4 am called Californication. I know, I know, I’m a little late, the show has been on the air for a while now, but the truth is that when I was living in the city of “Lost Angels”, the last thing I wanted was to watch a show that depicted my dysfunctional life. Who in their right mind wants to spend the very little leisure time one has in a city like LA watching the life you are already living? Well, I guess a lot of people do, but not me, I “try” not to be such a masochist… or at least not with my entertainment time. However, after almost a year of my self-imposed exile from la, la, land I find it refreshing to  watch my own dysfunctionality. It is kind of sad and scary, but last night I went to bed feeling that maybe LA is after all the only place where I truly belong. It is a breathing town of my own breed, crazy, depressed, creative maniacs that feed from chaos and sorrow. The injection of eventual little success becomes the heroine that we keep searching for and that maintain us alive. I think we should open an AA of LA addicts, you can’t live with it, you can’t live without it!

Is dysfuntionality becoming a normal way of living? Looking around and around, crossing oceans trying to find “normality,” whatever that means, I’m staring to believe that indeed dysfuntionality is the functionality of the 21^st century. Yet, nowhere in the world “fucked upness” is embraced so humanely like in LA. People in my city, because even away from it still feels mine, assume their nature and just let it run wild. “We are different, we are fucked, lets just go all the way… who cares, my neighbor is worst than me, so I guess I’m not doing that bad.” A kid making more money than his parents it is “totally” normal. A dog eating better than a kid, having health insurance when no one in the family does, going to spas, having a cook and a hotel room with flat screen TV is “totally” indispensable. A women bleaching her asshole is not a prostitute or simply crazy, just cares about her well being. A macho man wearing jeans tighter than mine and spending more time in the mirror than any girl in town, making his hair look fucked up, is “totally” sexy and truly desired. A grandma dressing like a 15 year old is “totally cool.” Having a “totally” social line of cocaine is just fine, but don’t light a cigarette please because is descanting, it kills you and is something that only the new comers from New York do, just “totally gross.” No red meat, white meat, soft meat, dark meat, no fats, no cholesterol, no sweets, no carbs, only organic, combined with lots of buzz, pod, and the occasional E is the best diet to keep you in shape so one day you can finally drop “totally” dead in the middle of a very healthy yoga class. My bittersweet city has become such an Alice in Wonder Land that getting a job as a waitress has become as hard as getting a TV show. We creative geniuses furiously fight for that one spot open at “Koi.” For the chance of even competing, we have to ask our powerful friends to sent our headshot and put a good word in for us. It must be followed by a call from our agent who represents one of the investors to give us the last push in order to get in the “cattle call” casting to have a chance to win the precious prize to serve crispy rice tuna rolls and cosmos to the cream of the cream. Yes, you got it right, we find it “totally” normal to be called “cattle,” livestock, pieces of meat waiting for a A list director, agent, manager, producer, writer, actor, film festival, studio, or a Rock Start, to make us B and C creatures into a A list agent, director, producer, writer, actor, film festival, studio, or Rock Start. So, why in life would I be blue for such a fucked up place? Maybe because only user and abusers can understand one another?