> tapioca world tour

Last night I phoned my mother. I was trying to explain to her (a neophyte computer user/technophobe) how to highlight, copy and paste text. Basic. The conversation degenerated into argumentative banter, which degenerated into laughter.

“My friend is here,” Ma said. “He probably thinks we’re crazy.”

“Jorge?” I asked. “Is it Jorge?” I had just been telling E. about my mother and her Mexican landscaper neighbor friend Jorge, with whom she eats dinner every other night. He barely speaks any English; she barely speaks any Spanish. Nevertheless, they’ve struck up an indelible friendship based on flowers and food and memories of Durango. She handed him the receiver and Jorge and I had a go at a conversation, which was difficult for me since my mobile connection was fuzzy and my Spanish is poor.

“Is my mother a good student?” I asked him in my broken Spanish.
“Ay, si, si,” he lied. My mom’s an amazing teacher, but a tough student. She gets frustrated easily, a bad trait I’ve inherited.

“Y como está su español?” The real answer was muy mal, but Jorge said my mom was trying. Mom said she was too. She gave up on the copy/paste computer lesson in exchange for enjoying a Philadelphia evening with her neighbor friend on the porch. I can imagine them there, eating burgers or whatever, feeling the heat and inhaling that fresh lawn smell, with the blink of fireflies outside the seedy bar across from Mom’s house. In my mind, it’s almost close enough to taste.

I took a sick day today. A conglomeration of minor yet annoying physical ills combined with lack of sleep and, um, more [self-initiated] lack of sleep, so I decided I needed a day off. Ry and I ate bagels and then drove up to Manchester-by-the-Sea to Singing Beach. Or maybe it’s called Sing Beach. Not sure; I just know it’s named after the sand that sings when you step on it.

The water was FREEZING and it took 25 minutes until our arms and legs became numb enough to endure it. Then we jumped waves and floated on our backs and threw seaweed and tried not to get pulled out to sea too much. This is the first time I have legitimately swum in the ocean since, man, I can’t even remember. Probably since I jumped in the River Maas in Well, the Netherlands, six years ago. It was September and another girl and I rode those old fashioned bikes down to the water and sat with all the topless old women. But that wasn’t the ocean, and I don’t think I’ve been in the ocean since I was 17. So that’s ten whole years without the sea. That’s a long time.

Anyway,

then since Ry’s a rockstar and I’m not, we went to a fancypants restaurant in Gloucester where the chef and bartender and all the cooks are major fans of his. We had a big fat expensive dinner and it didn’t cost anything, except the large tip we left. During the appetizer, the skies broke. Thunder crashed and for 15 minutes, an intense downpour surrounded the restaurant. We had to tiptoe around a large puddle to make it back in the van. Driving through the town, I looked closely at the houses, how big and beautiful and colorful they were. I realized why my mother always loved Boston, its north and south shores, its colonial charm and cool ocean air and antique shops lining the coastal towns. I wanted to buy a decaf hazelnut coffee and drink it in honor of her and this memory, then I remembered mom doesn’t drink hazelnut decaf anymore and I hate flavored coffee.

I’m really content with this summer, but days like this remind me how much more I could be doing if I were actually on vacation. November in South America, a full month off. That will be nice, if it happens. Meanwhile it’s raspberries and beets, back to the Cantabridgean grind…

I can’t seem to write anything good for Round, even though I actually am trying. S. says: How about a nice piece about the sound that small animals make underneath your house? but there are no animals tonight. It’s July and the air is thick. I’m on my front porch, listening to the hum of the orange streetlights. The one directly in front of my house has a mess of tangled wires which hang down menacingly. I’ve gone all day feeling out of sorts with achey gums and now it’s so still and quiet, except for the few neighbors who are walking their dogs. It’s been a great week, overall, but I’ve started the habit of napping after work and I know I shouldn’t necessarily be doing that. It’s July and it’s night and I need to go to Ry’s house for toast, so I can try my new pear-lime jam from the farmer’s market. And then we can watch Hugh sing. Or I can watch. And walk home in the dark.

Brooklyn rooftop, 2002

Boston rooftop, 2005

BB is moving out of her flat soon, the same apartment building we inhabited in 1999 with other pals. It feels like the end of summer, although it’s not over yet. Still, a photographic commemoration was necessary, especially since BB and I now have a history of jumping up together. I will miss that roof.

Sometimes I picture my professor of English literature, magically transmogrified to some distant future, lecturing retroactively on blogs and online magazines, lamenting the loss of so much material. From what we’ve been able to piece together…she’ll say, and present lengthy extrapolations on the meanings of notes that have been miraculously saved from the ravages of time. People will write doctoral theses on the few issues of roundonline that were backed up on floppies and saved from flood and fire.

SDR, California

Found on a streetlight across from my office:

I can’t believe you fell for it! You called the “Boston Garden” the Fleet Center? Now you’lll call it the Bank North bla bla bla. Are you STUPID!?

I love Boston for its smelly harbors and hamburgers that make you ill an hour after you eat them, but taste so good going down. I love it for its weirdo sports fanatics (case in point, above). I even love it for its insufferable humidity. I love riding my bike home from peoples’ houses at one in the morning, over the railroad tracks by the textile factory, up a ridiculous hill that will out of necessity make me buff. I love that I can live here and, despite what I say every year, not get sick of the place. There are always new people around. I love the David Bowie Movie Marathon that we’ll see next week, and the patience of my film crew, and the happy complacency of losing high-scoring Scrabble games to strangers, and routinely losing in darts every Friday to my coworkers. Bla bla bla, Boston is great.

Found last night:
“LOST FRIEND: PHIL M.
Saw you last weekend on Somerville Ave. We should totally hang out. Call me. Anna M.”

Dear Anna M.,

I just wanted to publically acknowledge and applaud your unabashed and creative attempt to reconnect with someone without using the internet. Seriously, posting a flyer on Somerville Ave.? That takes balls. Most ladies don’t have balls. Not like yours, anyway. I wish more women would take the bull by the horns like this. If “Phil” doesn’t call you, let me set you up with other guys who will value your assertiveness.

Sincerely,
A. in Porter

********And in completely unrelated news,

I had a dream last night that Bush appointed the chic who works at my favorite coffeeshop to be the new Supreme Court Justice. “Wow,” I thought. “That’s a progressive and interesting move — she’s a woman, a Democrat, and gay. The tides must really be turning in the administration!”

And then I woke up and heard about John Roberts. I guess one can dream, and that’s it.

There was this one morning last fall during video production class at U-Manchester where we broke for coffee. I walked nextdoor to the museum cafe, which had the best dark coffee in the city. They had a £2 special every morning, where you could get a tiny coffee and tiny chocolate croissant for a mere $4 USD before 11a. Phil, my moody 30-year-old professor, sat outside smoking and asked where I got my coffee. “In there,” I told him, pointing. “It’s only a pound.”

It had been raining earlier, I think. But the sun had just come out and my rain jacket was no longer necessary.

I have these sporadic photographic memories of living in England. They come and go. It’s always the little moments, too — the double-decker bus rides from Chorlton, the way the hallways smelled on the 5th floor of the Granada Centre, the pink of the bathroom stall doors, the loud bloop sound of P.’s mobile behind my wall when he got texts from his girlfriend in Peru. The blooping sound would continue throughout the night sometimes when P. fell asleep, beeping in increments of five minutes while I tossed and turned. His girlfriend must really miss him, I thought. Separation is tough.

Listened to some soul & hip hop last night. Good people, cool decor, tart cranberry juice. I’d like to play scrabble with E. again, but he’s gone for a bit. In fact, I’d like to play scrabble right now.

Why is life so awesome?

My ritual weekend campout at Ry’s ended with Me and You and Everyone We Know, an arty indie film I recommend, followed by a rowdy evening at the Burren. Tom & Larry & Ryan and The Other Ryan did crazy viola-viola-guitar-harmonica jams. Got invited to Hugh’s instrumental afterparty, as usual, since somehow they don’t understand I am not a musician (in the same way they are) and I actually have a dayjob to go to at 9am. But the bar was a wonderful time — people danced tonight, random strangers dancing together, I mean wow, it was rowdy and great. A part of me wishes I were exhausted, but I’m not at all. Hence the lateness and el internet. I really have to stop writing on this thing and start reading, and writing For Real.

A big wuttup to friends in the UK, by the way. Wuttup UK people! Go Manchester United! And Hawaii. Wuttup Kailua Kona! Think of me when you eat pineapples.

It’s noon and I’ve just had brunch with D., an old ghost from the past. He looks the same, though time has worn a bit at our spirits. Neither of us have the same mindset as we did in college, that get-up-and-leave-the-country inertia, the impetus and ability to move without a blink (not to say that I don’t continue to get up and move without a blink. It’s just more of a practical struggle now). I’d like to see all the photos D. took in 1998 so I can remember what we looked like then. We looked very young and a little scared.

Ry is sleeping. I can only hear the birds, and the sound made from punching in the pop-up holes on the top of my iced coffee lid like I did to my mother’s diet cokes in the 80s. Poomph! It sounds like that.

Am torn to frustration over Adobe Encoder video compression and problems with Premiere, so instead of video work I’m just sitting, wondering when it will rain. There’s some construction going on around the corner. It’s the Davis Square Lofts they’re building. What a cool place to live. I just can’t understand how Boston isn’t filled with only millionaires, because property everywhere costs millions. Maybe it is, though; maybe they’re millionaires masquerading as white collar software professionals, pushing their babies in those awesome three-wheeler bike-style strollers, the kind I will buy or build when I have a kid simply because they’re too cool not to own.

It’s a zen day. Time to do some reading or something. I hope the rains hold off for a few more hours. The cool air is nice, even though it’s sticky. I have to write about July a lot — too much, maybe — because it’s so nice and intense and it disappears so quickly.

Another series of fragmented phrases to recap my Saturday:

three cheese tortellini. with artichokes. madrugada. street fair. breakfast, ryry. video encoding, georgio. relationship talk, my coworker. cora on couch with watery eyes. harvard. park. guatemala. a happy calm. mosquitos. sitting in a sea kayak in a millionaire’s garden at midnight.

costumes at midnight; indian
food, music, someone & someone &
someone’s sister; photographs of
geysers & spiders, pigs & flowers, oh
i love the swelled ambiguity
of this strange summer;
i love this easy congruity of july.

And my favorite author friend in San Fran writes:

I’ve been having fantasies about you, me and my old friend Leon doing some kind of guerrilla journalism in exotic places, calling ourselves the Gemini Triumvurate and uncovering the Truth about ______. Whattaya think? These times need a literary schizophrenic threeway, right? We have a Jew, a Christian, and an atheist.
See you in Baghdad!
S.

I just realized the comments function doesn’t work on this blog. Sorry, technical/spam-related problems, I suppose. There’s always email, anyway.

Have started visiting S.’s photography site, Eykoma, again. S. is a brilliant photographer who lives in Belgium. In college we hated eachother, or maybe we really liked eachother. I had intended to visit him in Brussels earlier this year when I lived in the UK. Now what? What do I do for my vacation now? I’m less and less hopeful about language school in Guatemala for a month, especially since I don’t have a full month off. It’s looking like Europe might be the most realistic alternative, in terms of knowing enough people in various countries to stay with. I guess I can’t complain about having a free pad in Paris, or London, or Brussels, or Berlin. Berlin! Perhaps Berlin after all. My residence is Germany is unquestionable; timing is the only issue. I am torn between buying a flat in Philly and borrowing yet more imaginary money to finance international grad school (again). Instead I’ll probably end up staying in Boston and sucking on mangos, the latest activity of summer. Why this insistent urge to travel? Why? Because there is nothing more unbearable than knowing there’s a huge world out there and you’re not exploring it. It drives me mad to think about what people are doing right now in Moskow, in Croatia, in Belize, in Hawaii, in Singapore, in Cape Town, in Tokyo, even back in Manchester, where M. lit his cigarettes in the toaster. Shiva is still stuck there, contemplating her future, and I wish I were there to buy her a hamburger.

I think I’m the only white Gen-X girl who enjoys going to church. Where are the other chics, the Moliehis and Concettas of Boston who like spirituality as much as I do? Tonight was great. Often I want to cry in church when something is super inspiring; I had that again this evening. Readings were all on Truth and power and fearlessness and protection and the nothingness of seemingly all-encompassing world problems and threats. Obviously, it was in response to events in London. I left penitent, aware of the things I’ve said or done that haven’t been right, eager to be a better person, cognizent of my own ability to conquer the world. I think this is how faith is supposed to make people feel. I hope everyone feels this way sometimes. For me it’s most frequent on Wednesdays.

It’s a gorgeous night in Boston. I rode to Ry’s alone and got ice cream alone and sat in his flat alone and spoke cellularly to people in faraway states. M. is returning next week for excursions involving me and Irish chicken and documentaries. Which is exciting. And there’s thunder tomorrow. Also incredibly exciting. I booked a flight home to Philly for next month. [Exciting.] Things are, on the whole, positive and happy. Which I couldn’t be more grateful for.

red rooibos; blood; cool
cotton; japanese desserts:
july is full and

filling — even the
bees are bleeding; even the
bombs receding now

into the long pale
memory of summer. some
people are angry,

which pains me; others
take me nearly nowhere and
it saves me. days of

rain have left without
evidence. resentment leaves
the same way, i hope,

and i hope, and we
bike home in the short grey night
like wind through smoke.

Nada sino esa pulpa de los seres,
nada sino esa copa de raíces.

Nothing if not this mush of beings,
nothing if not this grail of roots.

Yes, I’m still reading the Neruda book. It’s long and something to take up and leave again, like tennis in between breaks of rain. I could read it all at once but then I’d only ingest a little; like everything good, I’d rather ingest a lot in small doses. Except ice cream. That can be ingested in pints.

I love the bamboo in my room. And 85-degree humid nights. And corn chowder, actually.

Lying in the bathtub tonight (my only meditative time), I was struck with the realization that there was all this clean water in the tub, but virtually none in Iraq. At least not enough, and not flowing regularly, except for US troops. This was disheartening. Just another daily reminder that the idea of domestic revolution isn’t insignificant or ridiculous, and it’s essential that we organize, because I’m sick of this regime. Also I’d prefer not to blow up on my subway ride to work.

Which reminds me, Cee, if you’re reading this from London, please please please call me so I know you’re alive.

The worst is over, friends. At least that’s my naive assumption.

So I went back to the ortho yesterday to get the fourth and final tooth pulled. “Are you serious?” asked D., the other assistant at the desk. “He’s really going to pull another tooth? “Yes,” I answered. “I think his secret strategy is to slowly pull every tooth in my mouth, then replace the whole thing with new dentures.”

Doc got nervous in between giving me shots, because I kept telling him how much I hated this. To make me less anxious, he decided to flirt with me, without knowing how lame and overdone and ineffective that strategy actually is. “You know I love you,” he said, novacaine needle in hand. “I DON’T CARE,” I said, and meant it. By the time he had to do five shots to my upper pallette, he leaned down and whispered nervously: “Now listen, there are other patients here. Please don’t scream.” (I have this tendency to scream and/or cry and/or shout if I start experiencing pain. I find it’s a helpful and expedient way to alieve said pain, and increase the doctor’s precaution and gentleness.) “Promise you won’t hurt me,” I told him. “I can’t promise you that,” he sighed.

At least he doesn’t lie to me. I can’t stand liars.

Long story short: fifteen minutes and several pairs of pliers later, my tooth was out. Then they changed the upper wire, pulling it tighter (which again made me cry, although I tried really hard not to), then he attached a practically invisible clear plastic elastic band between my high-up exposed tooth in the gum and a molar in the back. The intent is to pull down the impacted tooth into the place of the tooth they just pulled. All of this merely validates my assertion that fast and effective dental health is gained not by a year at the ortho when you’re 27, but by slamming your teeth into a fire hydrant when you’re in your teens so you can get dentures and never have to worry about anything ever again.

But now for the absolutely awful news of 2005: Hot hot ortho assistant Gael is moving back to Brazil. In a month. For four-year dental school. “Your next appointment is August 5th,” he told me. “That might be the last time I ever see you…”

[Enter my self-centered heart breaking like crooked teeth against a fire hydrant.]

Nobody told me the hot orthodontal assistant would be leaving! This is a tragedy! What’s the point of going now? Where’s my incentive, other than straight teeth and a normal bite? We were supposed to start going dancing and trading cds and, and…and…
At least all the awful surgery is over. They won’t have to do anything too dramatic to me anymore, so I won’t be too emotionally destitute without Gael’s supportive presence (also hotness).

So that’s life, eh? I’m toothless and foodless and stuck in a Somerville flat until the swelling goes down. Aint that always how it is…

oh Capitán, en nuestra hora de reparto
abre los mudos cerrojos y espérame:

oh Captain, in our hour of distribution
open the mute latches and wait for me:

(Neruda, from Nocturnal Collection)

Church rocked tonight as usual. I fought back the incredibly insistent urge to slump over dreaming during the first fifteen minutes, then everything was great & inspiring. My director and I ended up chatting about religion and spirituality for a while in his office after everyone had gone home. I love people who believe in things. It almost doesn’t matter what; just as long as they believe in something.

My borrowed SUV died today. Or seemed to. It just won’t start again, and I don’t know why. I drove it carefully. Maybe its insides got really wet. Who knows, but I’m gonna try and jump it tomorrow. I’m going to jump an SUV!

I heard from an old friend tonight. She remembers me for my poetry, which I rarely write anymore. It was a chilling reminder to take inventory of the things I say I stand for, then start representing. Or reprezenting. Which reminds me, my 15-year-old surrogate bro Josh is in Costa Rica for half the summer, living with a host family and studying Spanish. He’s in the cloud forest I visited last year, chillin with monkeys and parrots and eating organic platanos. I am so proud of him for the man he’s already become. Such a great kid, that one. I got all my pennies on him, which will probably yeild a much better ROI than my own career will ever afford. We creatives, we gotta stick together, if not for artistic solidarity than at the very least for financial stability. Ok?

Did you know that a large gap between your two front teeth will close within 40 minutes if you attach a little plastic band to them? One of the many things I discovered this morning on my seventh trip to the ortho.

“It’s my favorite patient!”
I love going to the ortho, even though every time I leave either crying or bleeding or both, because hot assitant Gael says things like this when I walk in the door.

Today we were supposed to continue with fun fun exposure surgery. Regular readers will remember the disgusting details from last time, when they tore open my upper gums trying to expose an impacted canine tooth, and then the novacaine bled out, and I started crying, and the doc flipped out and sent me home. It was messy and dramatic — woo! So this time they intended to cut more gum away and expose the tooth again and bond a metal thing to it. As it turned out, I’d been making sure the gums didn’t grow back over the tooth, so they didn’t have to cut anymore off. Hot Gael merely went to work cementing a metal thing onto it and making excuses for not giving me the Brazilian music mix he’d promised to burn. I am the only sicko adult who gets her teeth straightened for the sole purpose of hitting on the doctor’s assistant.

Doc was more interested in my interior design opinions about whether or not postmodern paintings would add to or detract from the pristine ambience of the office than in talking about my teeth. “It would bring the postmodern design theme to higher level,” I told him. “Hmm, I really value your opinion,” he said. “Now we have to pull your other tooth.” No! “You can’t do that today! I knew you were gonna say that! I have to have several days to be mentally prepared,” I said. And so, the last and final extraction happens Friday, and I better as hell get a Brazilian cd as compensation.

This means, however, that I will have an emormous gap in the front right portion of my mouth until the impacted tooth gets successfully tugged down. “Realistically,” I asked, “how long will it take? A few months, or a long time?” “What’s your idea of ‘a long time’? Because it could take a few months,” he said, “or it could take nine months.” NINE MONTHS?

“You think nine months is a long time for a tooth to come down?” Gael asked me, holding my jaw. “Nine months is a pregnancy,” I told him. “It’s an entire school year.” Certainly an unacceptably long amount of time to wait for a tooth that’s already had 27 years to simply hang out in the gum. The word demasiado comes to mind as appropriate: Too much. Too long to wait.

And so, we pray. And we buy smoothies and burn jazz piano cds for Gael, and we refrain from smiling too wide, not only because there are large holes in our mouth, but because when we do the awful metal things on the molars slash awful gashes into the sides of our mouths. Again, I better look so hot when this is all over.