The gusts are supposed to reach 60 miles per hour tomorrow in NYC. I searched my photos for “wind” and found this picture from a year ago this week. Happy anniversary, Crystal and Eric!
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Photo: Near Dangerously Delicious Pies, Washington, DC, Feb. 2011.
This reminded me that my grandmother would get very annoyed when anyone would talk about “the power of love.” Love, she insisted, is not power, which she considered always very coercive. To love it to be vulnerable; and it is only in vulnerability and risk—not safety and security—that we overcome darkness.
- Charlotte Jones Voiklis (Madeleine L’Engle’s granddaughter), afterword, 50th anniversary edition of A Wrinkle in Time
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Photos: New York, January 2010; Princeton, August 2006.
My Grandmother in the Stars
By Naomi Shihab Nye
It is possible we will not meet again
on earth. To think this fills my throat
with dust. Then there is only the sky
tying the universe together.
Just now the neighbor’s horse must be standing
patiently, hoof on stone, waiting for his day
to open. What you think of him,
and the village’s one heroic cow
is the knowledge I wish to gather.
I bow to your rugged feet,
the moth-eaten scarves that knot your hair.
Where we live in the world
is never one place. Our hearts,
those dogged mirrors, keep flashing us
moons before we are ready for them.
You and I on a roof at sunset,
our two languages adrift,
heart saying, Take this home with you,
never again,
and only memory making us rich.
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Photo: Misahualli, Ecuador, Dec. 2010. Poem here.
Thank goodness the sun is out.
Photos: Bronx, NY, June 2009; Manhattan, NY, May 2009.
Photos: New Jersey, May 2009; Portland, OR, August 2010; Madison, WI, 2009.
(And yes, I just realized all of my friends have freakishly gorgeous teeth. To read about the Brooklyn periodontist who would probably use these as “after” photos to sell me something, click below.)
An adventurous person I know left for Antarctica a little over a month ago. She works long hours as a Dining Assistant and spends the rest of her time hiking around sea ice and getting to know the McMurdo subculture. Her blog is fascinating, and for her one-month anniversary there, she wrote a post about “wonderment” that I highly recommend.
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Photos: Wonder Wheel, Coney Island (summer 2010).
On Friday my mom wrote on Facebook: “Happy birthday to my mom, who would’ve been 82 today.”
My maternal grandmother died when I was a toddler. A few months later my mom wrote an essay about her and won a contest sponsored by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. My Uncle Steve has the essay framed in his house (and carries extra copies in his glove box; apparently it comes up in conversation with strangers enough that he likes to keep a stash on hand). He recently gave me a copy to keep, and my mom gave me permission to re-post her essay here. Her title was “Those Pittsburgh women” and she never knew why the editors changed it. At any rate, you can click here to read the whole thing.
Uh, and common sense should tell anyone that cancer screenings should be affordable and accessible anywhere, including and especially at Planned Parenthood.
In case you haven’t been following the hullaballoo, check out this blog and the “Komen Can Kiss My Mammogram” Pinterest board. Or read the stories at Planned Parenthood Saved My Life.
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Photo: Visibility volunteer Darcy B., summer 2005 (when I was an intern at PPFA).
