Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Speechless? Writers, Raise Those Pens!

Beloved Writing Family, All Family, Everyone Everywhere:

This is the point. This is exactly the point. Today is the point. Today is the point to ask something different.

For those of us who are constantly asking why we write, what the point is, who cares anyway, where's this all going anyway? and all those familiar thoughts and doubts that crush your writing spirit when words become weaponry, now is the time to ask not what your words can do for you, but what you can do for your words. (Sorry, couldn't resist. But I mean it). 

 The words you love to write. The words you labor over. The words that create sentences that create paragraphs that create chapters that create poems and essays and letters and books and heck, even text messages sometimes, woven together with love and compassion, strands of kinship that will endure longer than a feral election. The spirit that lives in each word you write (let alone what they mean and how they sound when you stack them side-by-side, dancing together, searching for the little dot at the end of the sentence together) vibrate with infinite love and offer endless gifts. Somewhere inside you know this.

And that is the point. This is what you "do" with your writing. You see it as the gift it is and you give it away where it is most needed. You share your word gifts now with a hurting, confused world. That is what you "do."


Writing is a sacred process and practice. It heals. It always has and always will and the mystery and theory behind why this writing magic happens usually comes back to the intimate witnessing of self and one another. And that exchange is more than enough. And you know I can and will someday "write a book about this" (any day now...)...And on most days, process is the only thing; you will rarely hear me prioritize publishing and book deals, etc. And that's not what I'm saying today either. 

What I'm saying today is please get out of your own way and stop asking questions about the value of your writing that no longer serve you. Today is the day for writers to stand behind their own words, listen to them, and take them in.  Today our world is asking their community leaders, healers, ministries, buddhas, shamans, etc, for comfort and guidance. But it's up to all of us. Bikers. Bakers. Shoe makers. Bus drivers. Immigrants. Lawyers. Yogis (but they always do). Everyone. But writers have the advantage and liberty of doing it lyrically. :)

But seriously. Now is the time for writers to answer that call more than ever—not with perfection, not with promise, not with world peace, not with a best seller—but with truth, vulnerability, and soul. Maybe you do write the answers. Maybe you write what you love. Maybe you write your to do list. Maybe you write a love letter to Trump or Hillary or those forgotten indie folk. Maybe you write you have no idea what to say. Maybe you write that today, November 10, 2016, you had gluten free waffles for breakfast. It doesn't matter because it will be you no matter what you write. 

We offer and receive the simple first stroke of the pen or key to the screen that slowly becomes a roaring fire around which we gather and return to again (and again) for what we truly need. And there, around the fire, we remember how the sky is full of word stars and  how each word is full of light, by sky and by page; and in this exchange with one another, with the universe, we receive the gentle companionship, the familiar comfort for which we all hunger, the humble reminder of the timeless echoing of the human spirit that says, no matter what the actual words are, "me, too. I'm listening. I see you. We've been here for millions of years, through storms and bad presidents, through love and loss and a million sun ups. We're not going anywhere."

So raise those pens Writers (and you are all writers, by the way, whether you know it or not). Stake your claim on the page and rain poetry on this thirsty world. But first, write it for you and receive the love song that it is, feel its beauty and humanity as it enters and leaves your body and receive it as the gift of another day.

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Hi Everyone!

Hi Hi! Hi Hi! 

Big hi!  Low hi! High low, low high...

Hello! Howdy. Howdo?

How are you?

              How's it goin?


                                How's it hangin'?

                                What's up?

                                                                 Wassssssup?????   Wanna? Wannahuh?


Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi.

Hi hi hi hi hi hi hi hi hi hi hi hi.

HI   Hi.       Ih.  IH. ih. i.h.

hellohilloellohiellolliiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

ohilohi. lolilo. o. o. o. iloellihi. yoddleihu.

aren't letters cute? They're so obedient. They do what I tell them to do. Lie down this way and that. Shape up or sideways or sleeping beside the moon. Don't you love when letters say hi? And love you back? It's all the sweet (enough) I need in this life to be so unconditionally loved by the letter o.

bye.

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—For example...let's be Village People

You have probably heard me say hexteen gillion times that "stories are gifts" or some variation thereof over the years. In a more melodramatic way or day, you may have heard me liken the gifts of stories to the days of the oral tradition, where folk went from tribe-to-tribe sing-speaking all the village news— sometimes as entertainment, sometimes as prayer, sometimes as warning, sometimes  to make trouble, and sometimes because they were bored, or it felt good, or it distracted them out of their bodies— because, what else was there to do? 

Anyway, that's my smug understanding of it. On hormonal days, you may hear me get all high on my anti-literary culture/book binding, publishing horse because it warps the consciousness around creative expression and the love of writing as process and practice. It reverses the writing process from internally to externally driven, a labor of love detoured out of the heart into the big brain in order to present a well thought out, intelligent offering of perfection to the court (jesters).  It's an outrage, I'll say, because "we have lost so much of the spontaneity of the oral tradition, where we just said or sang our stories; we didn't worry how they came out or what they sounded like. But no, we had to go get all in our heads and start writing those stories down and lose our flow and intuition and before you knew it, one thing led to another and those living, fluid, stories were cryonized into books and wow, isn't that grand? Except if no one liked those books, especially literary critics and the other who-whos du jour, well then uh-oh."

So... what? I have my cranky days. Not every day is a Ram Dass day. Sorry.

You do realize when I quote myself I'm releasing trauma, don't you? A little narrative therapy goes a long way! Anyway, the point is, the whole twisted point, is the Prius. I was getting there.

So, "for example,"  your stories tonight will be great gifts. So, tell, if you will, stories of your car: Is your car comfortable? Do you love her? If so, what is it? Do you, like me, have a sad, tragic, Prius story? I'll tell you mine... soon, for it is a story, a humbling story in fact, it is. But now, my beloved writing tribe, please share with my Beach Village, in any narrative tradition of your choosing (song, blog, image, recorded sound, type, big literary, with drum, etc) your Prius or bad back car stories (and what you did about it) or your awesome car comfort stories. I need em villagers. I need em like the days of the oral tradition, where your very life (or at least your back) depended on good news from the village two doors down. 

And don't worry about saying it loud and uncouth. It's okay, little Bear Cubs. In this village, this mighty Beach village, the lion sleeps tonight.

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Ye Olde Prince Stories

I know there are tons of Prince stories floating around out there, but feel free to share here!

I have been amazed, again, at the human need to "write it down.". If you google Prince, as I'm sure you have, you will find gagillions of stories written by "me" and "you" and everyone else about Prince. All different, but each touching something in us we can all relate to. So feel free to write and post ye olde Prince Stories here! Even if you haven't thought about it or think you have nothing to write about Prince, see what happens. Something will come; something you had no idea was there.

A little prince.
A story about Prince you heard.
You have no idea who Prince is.
You'd rather write about Prince Charming.
You don't like Prince.
You don't believe he actually died.
You remember the first time you heard his music.
I do. It was so-so.

I remember going to the Purple Rain concert with Ma in 8th grade in LA. She bought and wore the Prince and the Revolution concert shirt with the purple all over the place. Put it on right there at the booth and then danced all night. Everyone thought we were sisters that night, as they did back then, and the men in baseball caps with beer, smoking, looked at her then in ways that made me want to wear the same shirt. Only it didn't look the same on me and I didn't get the looks. And it wasn't the best night of my life. But Ma. To see her dance and let go in the dark purple lights of that faraway coliseum and say "Fuck, I love this! I love that Sheila E!" was worth the mediocre night for the memory. She still wears that shirt today, threadbare and all. And it looks just as it good, better even as she ages.

You?

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—The Hawaii/Ram Dass Story You Likely Haven't Been Dying to Hear

(So perhaps a few of you know I went to Hawaii last December to kvell over Ram Dass. I'm sure I'll be writing about that trip for the rest of my life, but the following is my first published account, which is only a teeny tiny itty bitty iota of an ioteye of what I could say and focus on. I had a teeny tiny itty bitty word count (750), which I bloated into a good 1,000 or so (they like me fine over at the Edge, bless their blissed out crystal hearts), which means I had to contort and trim and suck in my vowels and adjectives and tell a tidy story about a not so tidy thing, but you'll get the gist. I tell you this because this is a darkish story. I had a great time. Don't worry. Like you, my shit comes up everyday, my endless struggle to live whole, do my practice, love everyone, not get caught up in the drama, etc, which can be really hard and I can go down fast... but I still keep seeing dolphins and feel the splash of paradise on my skin. And I will write about that. But this story is about getting caught up in the shit, one itty bitty iota of an ioteye story in the spectrum of my Hawaii Ram Dass rainbow stories that happens to be in the shade of er... bruisy purple. )

You can click on the link and go to the Edge or read it here. Please feel very free to comment on what makes you cry for no reason, how unconditional love brings out your shit, what happens (ed) when you met your "guru," or about times you've been out of sorts in the tropics. Or anything else.

1.

Me the Terrible

BY ROXANNE SADOVSKY -- APRIL 1, 2016

"Love everyone," Ram Dass said, guiding us in the final meditation of the 8th annual Open Your Heart in Paradise retreat, where I found myself last December literally at the feet of my guru in a thatched hut -- among 350 other attendees blessed out in the Maui heat. (It was a rather large thatched hut). By then, I couldn't stop crying. In fact, as soon as I secured travel plans, the mere thought of eye contact with the legendary Ram Dass sprouted tears. I didn't think much about it at the ... Read More

http://www.edgemagazine.net/2016/04/me-the-terrible/

2.

“Love everyone,” Ram Dass said, guiding us in the final meditation of the 8th annual Open Your Heart in Paradise retreat, where I found myself last December literally at the feet of my guru in a thatched hut — among 350 other attendees blessed out in the Maui heat. (It was a rather large thatched hut).

By then, I couldn’t stop crying. In fact, as soon as I secured travel plans, the mere thought of eye contact with the legendary Ram Dass sprouted tears. I didn’t think much about it at the time, aside from the obvious: Being in the presence of unconditional love brings out the verklempt in a Jewish girl, especially given said Jewish girl was brought up by a Jewish mother in Los Angeles, where unconditional love, or love of any kind, was more of a sport.

Nonetheless, that sport ultimately did lead me to a particular pack of Hind-Jews and Bu-Jews, and then, literally to the feet of king Hind-Jew, so in that regard I am endlessly grateful for my upbringing, for following the clichéd path of my “unlovable” Jewish elders straight into the arms of Ram Dass.

The retreat was tropical perfection, what with daily yoga, meditation, dharma talks, vegetarian meals, kirtan, unbearably beautiful tropics, with ample lagoon and cliff to explore; the days were a welcome routine into being, away from the homeland of doing and I luxuriated in the stillness.

And everyone was there. I mean everyone: Ram Dass, Krishna Das, Sharon Salzberg, Jai Uttal, Mirabai Bush, along with a handful of other Das’s I didn’t know, who were all basically saying the same thing: do your spiritual practice, avoid getting caught up in the drama, and love everyone. Or do the best you can.

Ram Dass, among those I am eternally grateful for showing me the path of love, spent the majority of the retreat gazing dreamily at the attendees below, telling us in his predictable cadence, “I…Love…You,” reminding us that we are all “souls,” an image I could glimpse and embody for exactly one second: an entire room full of sunflowers, smiley-faced yolks waving in the wind, an endless field of golden warm at his feet.

“Love Everyone,” Ram Dass repeated, as he is known to do, just as we devotees are accustomed to hanging on the sweet vine of emptiness that bridges one word to the next. “Love Everyone,” he says again. “Even terrible you.”

By then I’d been crying for good reason, but “terrible” me? He’s not supposed to know; while I’m well aware that my own sense of terribleness is an outdated story I needlessly carry, it’s still a private matter, between me and my shame! And when I have a chance to ask about it, standing face-to-face, in passing, I am speechless. I can’t talk to the man, to whom I want to tell everything. All I can do is lean into him, cry and babble an awkward “thank you, Ram Dass,” before running out of the room. A knowing attendee looks at me and nods, offers a hug. Guess what? I cry into her arms.

Later when I ask author Parvati Markus about the relentless tears — which she references in her new book Love Everyone, a compilation of stories told by Westerners transformed by hanging out with the famed Indian Saint, Neem Karoli Baba (Maharajii), in the ’60s and ’70s, (without whom none of this “loving everyone,” heart opening in Hawaii would be possible) — as having a lot to do with “bringing out the darkness,” I figure there has to be more to it than that.

But her answer back is brief: Recalling her experience with Maharajii, she says, “Many of those tears were from an overflowing heart opening wide, while others were from seeing your own shit.”

What? I wanted the tears to be about enlightenment.

But I know she’s right. I know that sitting so close to love so pure elicits a relief so humongous it is almost too much to bear and the “dark” is how little of that love I am able to take in. Because I came all this way and darn, it’s too much. And even though I get that the whole point is to recognize that transmission of love from a universe that, when in wise mind, is all “souls,” I berate myself for coming all this way to open my heart and I cannot.

I know I can try again, to be with unconditional love that is all around; I can try with the trees, with my boyfriend, with my breath, my Durga, my son, my friends, my enemies, and by golly, myself, for I, too, am a “soul,” but by then I’m way too up in my head and I can neither let the love in…nor out. I come home in a funk.

I stopped meditating. Who was I kidding going to Hawaii to see Ram Dass? I became careless and shut down. And then the holidays. And the real dark: One morning rushing to take my son downtown to see Santa, I snapped at him and he retreated into his room, hurt. Then I beat myself up about it with guilt, and carried on like that until I happened to randomly catch sight of my little cheap plastic smiling Buddha, laughing on my altar. He was smiling at me. He didn’t care.

And then I thought back to Ram Dass and “terrible, terrible, me” and I realized that even when I turned on myself, he didn’t care. He still loved me and always would. I suppose it might have been a Jesus moment if that were my religion of origin, but the point was clear: Buddha (Jesus, Ram Dass, Baba — who have you) loved me no matter what.

Eventually I wiped away my tears and went to the den where my son was laughing, watching Sponge Bob.

“Still wanna go see Santa, honey?”

He nodded enthusiastically, zipped off the set.

Tentatively I made my way beside him on the couch. He let me. I outstretched a hand.

“Sorry I yelled at you, honey… I –”

“Whatever, Mama. Let’s go.”

Apparently he didn’t think I was so terrible either.

http://www.edgemagazine.net/2016/04/me-the-terrible/

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Spending days, spending words

You know how every once in a while you hear something that you already know, but someone says it in a way that you didn't realize you knew it, even though you already knew it, and it suddenly makes even more sense than you thought it did and you realize you never really knew it, even though you already knew it? 

Sure you do. 

That's one of the reasons why we write together... because someone says it for you in exactly the right way at the right time. What used to be fuzzy or underdeveloped or not yet even verbally formed (as in the photo above), is suddenly brilliantly alive.

For me it was, Annie Dillard, who I haven't thought of since Evergreen in the early 90s when we read "An American Childhood," whose words reappeared for me last Friday (though this time from "The Writing Life") in a coloring book gifted to me by a dear student, swimming opposite page of a color-hungry outline of dolphin. Can't see it? Okay... Let me help... get ready: "How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives."

Right?

And not to steal credit where credit is so obviously due, thank you so much Annie Dillard, but I might add, "how we write is, of course, how we spend our lives." Do we over think? Do we under think? Care too much about the little things? Worry? Laugh? Care what others think? Get lost with no sense of time? Lose ourselves? Fret? Love?

Writing as we know, can be so much about the process. 

How do you spend your time writing? Your days? How do you write your days?

Is Annie right? Is there another quote you heard recently that tilted the frame back into alignment for you? Helped you remember?

Of course it happens every week here at the Beach as we remember, reawaken, and so much more when we write together. Thank you writers, thank you readers. I'm happy to say, of course, thanks to you, that I spend a good portion of my days in gratitude.

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Passing Notes

This time of year, like you, I go through the old stuff, amazed at what I hang onto. I'm not sure how it works, but suddenly all the old stuff starts to look really old, stale, dead on the vine, and I know it's time to let it go. I wonder how some of these things ever had a place in my life, so un-me to me they suddenly appear. 

I easily toss the usual suspects:  shirts, shorts, pants (lowrise? wtf?), butter, past "good" date meds, creams, hair products; magazines, cds, jackets, shoes I never ever wore nor ever will, cleaning products, Christmas lights, tupperware, cables, chords, and wires which attach to who knows what device or decade, water bottles, empty file folders, yoga pants, yoga tops, cat toys (I have no cat, but just in case one should drop by...), pennies,  baby toys, catalogues, twist ties, chopsticks, flip-flops, tea, canvas/grocery bags, frozen food, etc.

What's harder: Sheets, blankets, books, pillows, shoes from Schueller's I still haven't worn, cute lone socks for which I am certain there is a mate somewhere, voicemails, emails, to-do lists, "memorable" canvas bags/t-shirts from events, cute wool socks or sweaters, even though I can no longer wear wool, etc.

What's impossible: Anything Jude creates or comes into contact with—a drawing, a note that says "open the door," stuffed animals,  a paperclip that he's bent into the shape of the letter L, clothes that are too small and now useless—as well as anything he has given me, right down to the drawings mostly drawn by his preschool teachers, where it is impossible not to spot his one contribution in the single slash of an orange crayon milling around the otherwise too orderly page. Can't do without that, now can I?

And then there's the category of handwritten notes, one which I never actually consider categorizing as toss, save, deal with later, or anything. Notes, simply are. Like air, earth, fire, water, yoga, breath: it is what it is. They don't go through the filter of thought and decision, notes don't; they just stay. Most of you have seen my bathroom and know what I'm talking about: the walls are wallpapered with handwritten notes to accompany the ones inked into the walls. Notes also dot my cabinets and bookshelves: "Thanks Rox! Hi Rox!  Here's $50! See you soon!" All in glorious shades of post-its, accompanied by hearts, smilies, ellipses... The goldmine of notes are the ones on loose leaf, sometimes accompanied by a stick figure drawing, notably the ones by Too Cute of his dog-self in profile with deadpan loyalty. But even a simple note from a stranger taped to a check for a workshop that illegibly scrawls: "See you March 8th!" signed by unknown is a keeper without question.

Oddly, I suppose texts fall into the same category. I rarely toss them, but then again, that could be laziness. But I suppose it all comes down to that old thing about human expression, the need to write it down, the need to relate to one another,  the simple, organic need for reciprocity in the human condition— to hear and be heard, touch and be touched,  see and be seen, giving and receiving, the same way we breathe in, breathe out. And to see the trace of humanity in the artistry of a handwritten note, each letter of each word containing its own unique beauty and vibration, an artful message in itself, long before the contents line up to "make sense" in the conventional way.

Or perhaps notes are a crucial reminder of life in this age of stuff, where "we" all to often get buried and flattened beneath the dull death of our clutter that "we" can never get rid of, so duped are "we" into believing that our stuff with its many nostalgic and promising portals to the past and future are the only things that can save us.

Write with me! Do you save handwritten notes? Do you write them? What do they mean or not mean to you?

What I saw ( and what saw me )walking this early afternoon on a most unusually warm autumn afternoon in Minneapolis just off Lyndale

Two turtles
A white tailed deer, looking at me
A Gartner snake swirl and stop in the dry leaves
 a Robin
Inside the onyx eye of the Gartner snake, glossy, murky, but a portal
A man dressed in bright orange shirt, watching me watch the snake, then kneeling beside me to watch beside me
Other humans watching the water closely
A school of teeny tiny fish near the sunny surface, en mase, a giant fist
One of those teeny black fish jumping out with all the arc and grace of a dolphin, one one millionth it's size
The manifestation of footsteps
Two upward climbing black spotted woodpeckers, bearing no resemblance to woody
A lone baby duck, mid lake, encased in its on water ring. Rippling out and out and out until it became a wave
Many sleeping ducks
The white tailed deer running along the fence
A red dragon fly
Mid aged women wearing work out gear and new tennis shoes
A businessman on a bench in the sun, texting, smiling, earphones on
A baby Robin
Back to that baby duck, perhaps  the  most moving thing of all and how that baby ring was so perfectly circular in the middle of the lake, a perfection we cannot replicate but at times try so hard that we miss it when it shows itself so purely and vulnerable asking nothing of us, not even ever
My other younger self missing all of this, too afraid to make eye contact with the unknown
My thirty year old self running quickly through all this, too fast to see this
All of this seeing me
My love
My soft edges
And yours
A duck waddle onto the dock. Hop off the dock, waddle toward me, smile, quack and waddle away back to the dock upon which he hopped before jumping back into the water
Really seeing a duck waddle for the first time
A man with a professional looking camera
Stillness
Endless gifts given when we stop and be, not so much as waiting, but receiving
My gratitude
The endlessly clear rooted path my breath both carves and follows before me, behind and beneath me
And how the breath is root and tunnel and the portal to all things
The endearment of my striving thoughts
My truth
An airplane that I mistake for an egrit
A group of autistic kids crossing the wooden bridge over water, passing me mid bridge
A gnat in my peripheral vision, too close
The wings of something large
And two bluebirds

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Way of the Peaceful Writer

"The inability to keep up, combined with the inability to slow down, and feeling inadequate either way -- that's the Millennium, baby."

And speaking of time and where I've been, does this resonate as much with you as it does with me? But more on the brilliant Michael Ventura in a moment.

When I was about 15, my best friend Kenny lent me his new copy of Dan Millman's Way of the Peaceful Warrior, which, as promised, did change my life, perhaps the first masked self-help book I ever read, declaring itself on the front cover to be "a book that changes lives." Glancing Millman's webpage today makes this point glaringly obvious. 

Then again, as I write this, I realize that's what most memoirs are: self-help in disguise. Heck, most everything written ever could be viewed as such—for better or for worse; isn't everyone vying for a spot to change someone's life? To be seen and heard and taken seriously enough to have a meaningful impact on another?

Now, 30 years later, comes along the movie, that also guarantees to "change lives," which I refused to see until recently, well knowing it would only change my life for the worse. Well. Let's just say it wasn't as good as the book (duh), but it didn't entirely suck either, likely because it had one of my old heartthrobs in it (no, not Scott Mechlowicz). 

I don't remember much about the Hollywood interpretation of this magnificent book, and in all fairness, it's hard to translate one's inner journey to the screen without putting your typical Hollywood, movie-goer (adrenaline, drama, thrill-seeking) to sleep. But, what does stand out is the scene where Nick Nolte (older guru type) points out to Scott Mechlowicz (young Dan, egomaniacal, thrill seeking, hot young college type) that there is "a lot going on" all the time if you choose to wake up and notice it. Apparently, young Dan is disgruntled with his young life, complains that he is bored, ("There's nothing going on!") which is a spiritual assault to his older, wiser new Buddha friend. 

The camera (ah, the camera!) then goes into slo, slo, triple slo-mo and pans across the perfect Berkley campus landscape, pausing to zoom right in and illustrate all the "goings ons," both internal and external: Students necking. A ladybug crawling on a leaf. A man studying a text book. The clouds. Friends laughing. Jovial hacky-sacing. A long, flat, cloud striped sky. The shining sun. Someone in deep thought. A Golden Retriever mid-air, catching a frisbee. A furrowed brow. A screaming toddler. Blood pumping through veins. Motorcycle reving.

There's a lot going on. All the time.

Of course this led me to write about the inchworm that Jude spotted (those youthful eyes!) on the way home from the bus stop a couple weeks ago, inviting us to stoop down and squat ourselves on the summer sidewalk and do nothing but devote ourselves fully and entirely to watching this keylime green half-inch inchworm expand and contract across the concrete en serious route to the lawn. Of course this led immediately to a craving to blow bubbles, those huge ones that roll down big green hills in their own time, an excuse to stop and watch, give myself fully to the pace of sanity.   

I gave as much time as I had, never enough, to the whole debacle of wanting to slow down, caught between the sweet allure of slowing down, mindfulness, not being bullied into rushing and the reality of the pace outside my window. All of this led me back to one of my favorite articles of all time, wherein lies one of the best quotes I ever read that sums all of it up—everything there ever was or is about anything—perfectly so why bother writing any of it? 

And it is this, what Michael Ventura says so much more eloquently in his article "Millenial Nudity": 

 "'Am I going too fast for you?'" is now a common phrase. People and nanoseconds going too fast for you -- that's the Millennium. Trying to keep up with people going too fast for you is also the Millennium. The inability to slow down is the Millennium. The inability to keep up, combined with the inability to slow down, and feeling inadequate either way -- that's the Millennium, baby."

In the meantime, I'll be slowing waaaay down up North for a while. I'll be back; I always am. In fact, I'm never really gone now am I? 

Happy summer everyone! Hope to write with you again real soon and please, please, don't forget to write!!!

What do you do to slow down?  

What slows you down? 

What is your relationship to slowing down?

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Where does all the time go?

worrying
laughing
wondering
eating
cooking
cleaning
looking for the perfect raincoat at a thrift store
finding other things at a thrift store instead

running down the trash
running up the mail
running down the recycling
taking out the compost
looking for the lost thing I need right now
and that other thing
forgetting my...
walking Jude to the bus
walking home
running up the stairs
locking the bike
unlocking the bike
parking
backing out
stopping
walking back to the bus stop
waiting...

I thought I would have time to do that today
I'll do it tomorrow when it isn't raining
when I have more time
But wait: I don't have time tomorrow either

time is time no matter what; don't you know that by now?
yoga 
breathing
finding time to breathe and be with time
finding time
booking time
knowing that time is a social construct
but not doing anything about that

time out
sleeping
recovering from the weekend
where there wasn't enough time
what time is it? 
oh shit. really? 
already?
is it bedtime already? not yet?
shouldn't i be hungry by now?
what? time to get up? No.
Five more minutes.
Five more
five more
five more

Okay. I'll skip washing my hair.

washed away with the rain?
in my memories?
on the page?
everything at once?
what time is it? 
Now. 
But I'm forgetting something I need to know right now
like:
check email, the weather, reply to a text, eat, check, check, check.
notice
take my time
hurry up

running late
last minute

wow.       early is really weird.          really, really weird. 

time        is not as i know it when                    I'm         early. 

where am i?                 It's as if I'm moving backwards.

 I     gotta        do             this                    more. often. 

More often. 
I gotta more often. 
I gotta more do. 
More often. 
More do. 
Often do more.
Moredo. Gotta more.
I often. I often. I often.
Do you often?

standing in the elevator
waiting to go up two flights seems like it will take forever... hurry!
until I rest my chin downward, see my belly going in
going out
and it feels so good, so delicious, from inside
to out
and I say to myself I hope this elevator ride
never ends 
because I could do this all day long and be happy


WRITE WITH ME?
Where does all your time go? (or mine for that matter?) :

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Is your moon also in the 8th house?

So I decided to have my astrological chart done. It was hard to follow, since what do I know from houses in Jupiter and such, but apparently I am in a restless phase and something big is supposed to come along in the next month. Additionally, turns out I'm not done with Pluto, I am obsessed with living, communicating, feeling, and expressing only the deepest, core, truths (I believe this is the Uranus in one of my houses speaking?), and I am basically doomed when it comes to relationships... unless I can... now what was that again?

But isn't this true for everyone, I asked?

Well, not really. Because my moon is watery and this lifetime is all about getting back to the womb.  Because my sun is friends with Mercury and Mars is my buddy, but my Venus doesn't get along with Saturn, unless Neptune is visiting. And, by the way, I'm an old soul, born in the final phase of the moon. The sliver, am I? The crescent? Now, this does explain my tendency to doodle out moons, crescents in particular, all over the place, perhaps accounting for the tattoo on my ankle, which is, likewise, in its final phase.

Oh, you too, you say? Well.

My feet are very, very tired. Are yours?

My job is to grow fins. Is yours?

My job is also to go back home, return to my roots, to origins, to God, to Source. Is yours?

I'm always trying to find home. I'll get there, but it will take some time. It will be complicated, but my job is buck up against dogma and find out what my origins did with their struggles along the way. 

You too?

The good news, the very good news, is I have a guardian angel. And my midheaven is up to something exciting and a big party is on its way.

Today in writing we wrote about what our "normal" is and what our "not normal" is. This exercise was further inspired by a student who came in and said she would never consider putting magnetic paint on her wall, which was shocking to me. Again, doesn't everyone paint on their walls?

But thankfully it isn't her normal. Because as we wrote and shared, I got to hear about her normal, her childhood tubing down the Rum River all the way to her doorstep. And about someone else's normal, full of mystical sin eaters and emerald majesty. Someone else's normal was begging to change, hungering for a new normal.

And that is why we write. Because my normal, crazy as it is, is normal to me. My normal is magnetic paint on the small wall, film projector paint on the big wall. My normal is getting my chart done just for the heck of it. My normal has mother issues, is vulnerable, addicted, allergic, compassionate, codependent, sensitive, drawn to instability, yet overly stable, committed, searching for freedom, out-of-my-body, in my body, creative, intuitive, passionate, apathetic, homeless, everchanging...

...isn't done with Pluto.

And sharing these normals when we write together—in their varied phases of bloom—we linger there until we recognize our miraculous belonging in this moment in time, amidst this vast, infinite, lonely, weightless, universe with multiple moons, heavens, holes, and empty houses, where we so easily could have gotten lost and disappeared behind the fallen stars.

WRITE WITH ME?

What is your normal?

What house is your moon in? 

What's doing with your horoscope?

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—On the Radio

Yesterday, say late afternoon, Jude and I dangled our legs over the cement slab of  Lake Harriet to go see the Loons. It took some convincing. "They're the ones that go 'Ooooooooooooo?Ooooooo' like that little black and white speckled bird stuffed animal you have goes when you squeeze it," I attempted when he wanted to know what the big deal was. Of course I knew Loons was a long shot, that it was likely those fake Loons you see around this time of year, but up at the playground I overheard some more-mom-looking-and-sounding-mom-than-I tell her kids "Let's go see the Loons," so I acquiesced to the fantasy. 

Hope, maybe, and possibility create tension not only on the page, but off it as well. While I had every doubt, I held out hope a long time, even when the Loons looked a little suspicious with their clownish white beaks. Of course that made me feel horribly guilty, extremely un-Buddhist, clearly so overly attached to Loons that I could hardly recognize the individuality of this not-quite-Loonish flock. Still, even as we patiently scoped the bird clown invasion, as the setting in of that "this isn't quite right" feeling thickened, I didn't want to abandon the possibility. 

"Mama, why aren't they makin' the 'Oooo?Oooo' sound?" Jude wanted to know. 

"Give it a minute, honey," I said, "it needs to get darker." I looked around for the know-it-all-mom, but she wasn't around to back me up. "Loons like to call out at dusk."

"What's duksk?" Jude looked around as though dusk would be rounding the corner or emerging from the deep sea, for that matter, along with the Loons.

"Nothing honey. It's just poetry for getting dark." Like I said, I'm not the most momish mom at times. On good weather days, I'm selfish about enjoying the moment without having to break it down.

Still, all too soon, the moment changed when appeared a mid-aged fellow and his Golden Retriever, who kept nosing his tennis ball back into the water. At one point the other mom materialized and her toddler joyously kicked the ball back into the lake after the owner had retrieved it for the third time. Josie howled on the ledge. What was I thinking believing her about Loons, what with a toddler who does that? Still, Jude was amused and I got to go back to feeling the sun on my skin, waiting for that sacred Loon song. 

"Those aren't Loons are they?" I asked Josie's dad as we finally stood to go back. And that's when he broke the news about the Coots. I didn't ask him what sort of sing they make. It didn't matter at all by then.

"Huh. See Jude? Coots. Sort of sounds like Loons, though, right?"

"Sure, Mama. Let's go." It didn't much matter to him either.

Back in the car Jude suggested I put on a song really loud. "I'm tired of all that ram ram hare aaaaaah hare harry aaaaaaaah..." he trailed off, perfectly tired. "Turn on the radio," he ordered. "And turn it up. Loud."

"Good God, the radio? Really?" 

Like mother like son. But really? The radio? What a concept. 

So I took a leap of faith. And where there's lack of Loonsong, there is cheesy 70s music; waiting for me was that perfect sentimental summer song that goes "something something...love isn't always on time! Woe oe ooooe..." which I blasted and belted along with the 3 others just like it to follow. Oh, I was flooded with memories and feeling and drives with Ma listening to radio in LA traffic way too loud, each song better than the last.

When I looked in the rearview, I expected to see Jude conked out, but he was singing right along with me, making up his own perfect words, which never would have happened if the Loons had come down to sing.

Write with me? 

Favorite Radio Songs?

Loon Stories? Er, Coot Stories?

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Ah Sugar, Sugar...

The other day Jude and I were hanging out making paper mache masks with our awesome artist friend and her boy, who is a couple years younger than Jude. In the way of most kids, he and Jude entered in and out of their running imaginary worlds and at one point the worlds collided; full of giggles, her boy announced "I'm smooooking..." and began pantomiming with wide gestures, waving paper strip cigarette to his lips. 

"Now Avi," my friend declared, containing her alarm more then any Jewish mother I am or know, "what do we know is worse for us than any other thing in the world? What's the absolute worst thing we can put into our bodies?"

The boy dramatically paused, posing in deep thought of finger to chin as modeled by our thoughtful elders. "Hmmmm? Hmmm... Ring Pops!"

I couldn't contain my glee. "Yes! Right! That is absolutely true! Don't ever get hooked on Ring Pops or dark chocolate M+M's or Bottle Caps or any other beautiful irresistible sugary thing, kids." I could've gone on. I could've said "at least when you quit smoking you get to have sugar!"

"Okay," his mother said, reigning us in, "yes...Ring Pops are not great for you, but no... what else? That's right. Smoking..."

"Of course," I agreed, "smoking. Don't smoke kids." I mumbled something out the side of my mouth about how it's still debatable.

Cigarettes extinguished and back to the task at hand,  my friend asked, "So why is it you're giving up sugar again?"

"Well, it's only for a month, first of all..." I said, because, first thing's first, after all. "And, well... I just want to see if I can do it." 

"Mama eats candy all day!" Jude chimed in, with which I couldn't argue.


As a kid, my dad literally had to drag me out of the candy aisle, while I anchored myself, lanky blonde ball and chain to the metallic grocery cart at Gelson's. He may have given in once or twice, consenting to say, Gatorade Gum or Good N Plenty, his downfall,  neither of which really counted. As a doctor, he balked at any compromise when it came to sugar, identifying it repeatedly as "chazari," Yiddish for junk, trash, rotten, in the same category as messhuga or mishegas, which he often trioed together in the same sentence.

I don't know how much psychoanalytics has to do with my lifetime tithing to sugar, but I do know that dad was right in that there is nothing good to come of sugar, except maybe vodka, which he was indifferent to. Everyone knows the truth about sugar; I get it, I know it and for the most part I maintain a functional relationship with it. And yet... every once in while I have to give it up for a while. 

I know it's time when I start dreaming about sugar. And lo, Monday night, the first day into a thirty-day white sugar fast, I dreamed of sugar. It appeared as a crystal, red ruby gem, which I kept knowingly both in my mouth and in my hand, the way you can in dreams; I was being chased in a labyrinth, not unlike the one from the childhood board game Shoots and Ladders. All along I knew said treasure was a red cherry Jolly Rancher, those tiny oblong hard candies that always melted a bit inside the cellophane that we got as kids on the penny shelf at 7-11, which I hadn't thought about in years. No way anyone was going to get their hands on my treasure, no matter the danger. Some dreams are embarrassingly clear. 

In Donald Miller's recent memoir A Million Miles in a Thousand Years,  he talks about an inciting incident, both on and off the page, as a moment in time in which you walk through a doorway of no return. Though I realize I am making myself way more literary than necessary in this regard, the week before Easter, one of my amazing Friday Writers declared she would be giving up sugar for one month, beginning April 6, waiting until after Easter so she could have jelly beans. We understand each other, this fella sugar fiend and I, commiserating often on the lifelong love affair we've both shared with the crystalline vampiress, right down to the methodology we similarly apply to eating Whoopers, so at first her proclamation felt like a betrayal; what do you mean you're giving up dark chocolate M+M's? You're just going to knowingly let me continue poisoning myself while you go cold turkey on me? 

I had no choice other to invite myself in. "Can I do it with you?" I practically begged. Kindly, she agreed, proceeding to outline the rules. "No artificial sweeteners, but sugar already appearing in things I already eat is fine," her intention, like mine, to stay away from processed crack-like sugar—in my case, nightly dishings of vanilla SoyDelicious with a chaser of dark M+Ms, hers something in the jelly bean family. 

By then, I was long past the point of no return. I had to do it. I didn't know why. I still don't know why. But I'm doing it and it's fucking way harder than quitting smoking, especially with Ma in town suggesting we go back to Perkins to get a sugar free mixed berry pie. (Her intentions are good; she swears it has no sugar in it one way or another).

Since Monday, my student and I have been supporting each other via daily texts and emails (see? another reason why writing heals!), ranging from the mundane to the bizarre (mine, not hers).  Man, I need her. I've also been calling TCF multiple times per day, as well as when we're together with, "can I have sugar now?" 

For the life of me I cannot understand why he does not have the same cravings as I do and I'm grateful for his patience. "Where exactly do you crave it, honey? Where in your body? In your mouth?" I get squirmy and fitful trying to explain an addiction he does not have. In turn, he encourages me to do something sweet for myself. "Do some gentle yoga, breathing...lay on the floor and remind your body to relax, honey." 

It's hard to take in what seem like platitudes those first few days. Sure, I love yoga, but really, you can't compare a forward fold to a bowl of vanilla with chocolate chips... not this late at night anyway. But I'm beginning to see the value of the nothingness left when the anticipation and ritual of ice cream and chocolate is no longer there. That same nothing is beginning to illuminate the sweetness that is there all the time: my son's smile, the lick of moonlight on my comforter, the feel of tired on my eyelids, TCF's kindness and compassion... not that I ever took these things for granted, but perhaps recognizing them for the genuine sweetnesses as they are—offerings from the heart rather than the pastel manufactured ones masked in the toxic illusion of love—is the real reason I jumped at the chance for this sort of nonsense.

Then again, it's still early. Perhaps this is still the denial phase. What I do know is that writing, as always, continues to be my sacred go to, whenever I need to battle another craving and remind myself all these melodramatics are going to ease up over time. If you'd like to follow my occasional rantings, I've made myself a nice little sugar shack at My Chazari, but it a'int a piece of cake. 


WRITE WITH ME?
What is your sugar story?
What have you had to give up?

Writing with Rox WEEKLY—Out of Character

It was strange. 

I'd like to think it has something to do with the antibiotics, the oddly warm weather we're having, the surreality of spring break. Whatever the reason, I must have looked like something washed up out of the Sahara this morning to the kind BP station manager, who greeted me with a welcome wagon, while I recoiled behind my wide infinity scarf, shielding myself from both sun and smile.

"How you doing?" he announced, heading directly toward me.

What does he want? my body wondered, long before any thought-forms appeared. I looked around the deserted station. Is he talking to me? 

What led me to be pumping gas at a surreally vacant BP at ten this morning on Excelsior Blvd was a missed eye doc's appointment, which if you can believe, I showed up too early for. Unable to swing the extra hour and a half of Jude care, I  picked up some Sudafed for my sinus infection, grabbed a Caribou, an apple fritter, and headed home, feeling displaced. 

Earlier while pulling out of the clinic garage, a Somali woman was trying to anchor her SUV in a compact spot beside me as I inched out. I felt the familiar heat, the seed of a tirade, the useless righteousness that begs the same questions in times like this, "Why don't other people follow the rules? Why do I get punished when I do follow the rules? Why oh why did I get a small car? And who the fuck needs such a gargantuan car?  I'm like a minnow out here!" She squeezed further in, obstructing my vision of oncoming cars, who honked at me when I attempted to back out. And finally I just stopped. I gave up. I surrendered to the uselessness and helplessness of the moment. I could've very well put my head in my hands. What am I supposed to do now? I'm sure the poor woman recognized the fury in my eyes when I finally made eye contact with her;  instead of proceeding in the ineffectual passive aggressive way, I raised my eyes for the challenge. I felt myself bristle and buck, awaiting the crossbars on her face. In defense, I raised my eyebrows with petulant inquiry. 

But the woman was not angry at all. In fact, what I dared to see, when I dared to look, was a smile so sweet and opening, I felt something like a flower petal dropping inside my heart. Quickly, I smiled back, the humble sort, as she waved me out of my spot, directing me with the ok sign against any oncoming happy honkers.

Of course all of this took place in under a minute, but her smile stretched timelessly. I berated myself for being so caught up in my drama, my sinus infection, my hard day, for not having more faith in people. For not being kind first. I hate it when people beat me to kindness. It's like a daily showdown: who's going to smile first, me or you? I won't if you don't, but if I do it first I really don't care if you do or don't because I don't have an ego. What? It's not conscious and I don't like it, but it happens, especially during certain times of the month. 

And on certain days of the month or whatever reason why, a random unexpected kindness only goes so far, and by the time I get to the BP Station, I'm back into my contorted form, feeling like an alien pulling into a ghost town. 

Still, I did return the greeting to the manager who was coming right at me. "I'm good," I lied, "how are you?"

Without breaking stride, he seized the nearest squeegee and slapped it smoothly across my grimy window. "As the station manager, I like to greet my customers with a little kindness..." was the gist of what he said, as he continued to iron out my windshield.

I fumbled something in response, my animal body anticipating a sales pitch, or something to posture against. Thankfully, my domesticated side knows better. "Wow. Thanks so much," I said, "that's really sweet of you."

I felt compelled to make small talk after that. "Great amazing sunny..." I attempted, but trailed off when he smiled and headed back inside. He had no use for my throw away afterthoughts. 

There's no point to this story, nothing to share about writing or memoir; there certainly isn't a "happy" ending (it's actually rather anticlimactic: I came home, ate pastries with Jude and Too Cute Face, and did the neti pot). 

Of course it all got me thinking. Whenever I act out of character—belying all sense of self I recognize and rely on—I tend to call  myself out as a phony. Even though I realize it's this type of narrow thinking that gets me in trouble and keeps me stuck, not to mention exhausted, I fall for my thoughts way too often, believing I am exactly the person that I think I am, which gives me very little wiggle room to be an animal... and animal I am.

Of course this is getting wayward, but what I really want to say is that my instinctual withdrawal from kindness scared me a little bit. Sure, I'll regroup and get off the antibiotics, but I have to wonder  because, after all, I'm not the only one who's afraid every so often when kindness comes bulldozing through with a squeegee. 

WRITE WITH ME?

WHEN WERE YOU LAST OUT OF CHARACTER?