good old Debbie and Ya'el

constructing the identity of someone posthumously is hard work, let me tell you.

everyone seems to have a slant on what their personality was like; often towards what they would have wanted that person to be, and most likely erring away from who they actually were. 

i'm no exception to this. i'll openly admit it.

it doesn't help that memories are such a fragile and malleable component of life - often wrought with inaccuracies. yet still, beautiful.

i like to frame my father as having been somewhat of a feminist - in the true sense of the word - someone who advocated for principles of gender equity. i know in some ways, i may have found evidence to the contrary - though, much like scripture, isolated lines of a letter that is barely legible must be interpreted in context. 

but. today i want to share a memory.

it's a bedtime story i remember hearing on more than one occasion. i think i even remember requesting it. i always pegged it as obscure b/c it contains a gruesomely depicted and crafty murder (like many of the biblical bedtime stories my father would read). but maybe this one was told with intention?

from the book of Judges, always read from his decrepit red letter NIV bible. Deborah - a badass and competent female leader overthrows the army of Sisera, with a little help from her buddy Barak, as well as another strong female Jael (pronounced Ya'el), who eliminates Mr. Sisera himself by driving a tent peg through his temple while he was taking a nap. my father would always stop at this point - not to do a classic parental explanation of contextual violence, but to explain the medical implications of this technique ("the temple is located at the weakest portion of the the skull, near the pterion, where four bones of the skull meet, thus allowing a tent peg to quickly and easily inserted all the way through the brain, destroying the necessary structures to maintain human life" - or something to that affect. don't quote me on it. i'm trying to remember nearly 20 years back). 

today i wonder: did he fixate on this point to express that Jael was one smart cookie to know where to shove in that tent peg to efficiently end the life of her enemy?

and, side stepping the possible glorification of gore and murder (as a pacifist, i am by no mean advocating for nor am i fascinated by that - i do believe that life is sacred) - these were badass women! what a story to pick to read to your 4-year-old daughter. in a book full of patriarchal and borderline-misogynistic language, my father found a story that demonstrates powerful and effective female leadership, and read it to me on multiple occasions. 

whether he was a feminist or not, that is something i can appreciate - and it deepens my respect for him.

there's my ramble of the day.

first days of the school year: outside of studenthood

on principle, i try to stay away from sharing my own poetry largely because it either ends up being
1. total garbage, or 2. overly depressing.

this next chunk is quite possibly both, but likely more of the latter:

scream silently to keep the peace
drown secretly and crave a rescue
waiting for impossibilities
lying to myself to create hope so that i have something to hold onto 
because even if it isn't functional, it's still something to wrap my hand around
something to embrace 
something to grope for


i sat with a group of first year students last wednesday evening and honestly remarked how much being a student and having that sit ahead of you as the next four or so years of your life can become a formative piece of one's identity. then i took a more-vulnerable-than-necessary step forward and expressed how graduating can initiate a void in place of that identity. i subsequently ate my words and tried to pull out positive aspects, focusing back to the other, to their current stage of life, and instantly regretting the projection of my own - especially coupled with the panicked looks on their faces.

but i'll project it here. b/c it's true, and i need to be honest in some facet. 

responses to casual questions of "what year are you in?" and "what do you study?" are no longer relayed so easily. i find myself spewing off some sort of half-assed elevator speech that i barely believe to try to placate the further questions about what i plan to do with my life. "do you want to do this forever?", "do you want to go back to school?", "are you using what you studied?", or worse "when will you get a real job?" have somehow become more common place in conversation. especially in small talk. which is incredibly ironic, because i find it hard to consider such questions to be accurately labelled small talk, when the scope of the answers that these questions should elicit if i were to be blatantly honest require way more vulnerability than i am willing to dole out to any near-stranger...

it's fall. this is usually my favourite season. a leaf just fell across my keyboard. there's a slight chill to the breeze. but instead of the usual anticipation, instead of joy and excitement for the unknown and unformulated, i feel nothing.

maybe this is normal in such a state of transition. maybe this is standard for life post-undergrad - but already, i'm sick of feeling whiny and ungrateful. i feel like i'm at an existential standstill, and life purpose has evolved into extreme apathy.

i wish to end this ramble on a note of optimism. 

the sun is shining as it sets. the birds are chirping, as are the eager crickets. i'm siting in a rocking chair on my porch. we're about to have our first house meeting of the year. a dear friend is coming to visit me this evening. perhaps tomorrow will bring a greater sense of purpose. perhaps there is joy in establishing routine.

but even that feels akin to a half-assed elevator speech, perhaps in response to the all-too-popular question of "why don't you count your blessings?"

reflecting...

Death is a constant theme in life. Semantically, the irony in that is nothing short of ridiculous. In reality, it's nothing short of truth.

Death is elusive. Some fear it. Others crave it. Others too struggle with a delicate balance of both. Some face it daily - whether facing their own, or death of another and confronting that loss; whether resulting from the nature of their profession, or from their family and social circumstances; and others still rarely experience it so directly.

It's baffling. People simply cease to be. One season they are there and influential, and then they are gone.

It's destructive. Causing ripples of pain, dysfunction, assumptions, and pretending.

It also can be enriching and beautiful. Causing ripples of honestly. Necessitating care. Vulnerability. The act of confiding.


In summary, it's weird.

summer

cue the consumption of strange concoctions... such as this toasted dumpstered freezer-burned slice of sourdough bread topped with homemade pesto (made from garlic greens, kale, pea shoots and basil):