Emotions

I have been feeling a lot if strong emotions recently. A lot of people who k ow me from my childhood either think I am extremely emotional, or extremely stoic. In the past, feelings were easy to express through various forms of art. Whether it was music, dance, kung fu, painting, or laughing and talking loudly and unreservedly with friends. I'm not sure if it is because I haven't been using some of these outlets, but all feelings seem to be boiling around in my mind and going toward only one direction. It's not that this wasn't true before. Even with all those outlets But making giant me I pun heads out of paper mage right now seems like somewhat of a bad idea. Why? The house is so full of stuff, that I do not want to fill it with more stuff. Sometimes I play piano, (I never really studied it) and I sing. But I realize that a good deal of the songs I like are sas and do not have a positive message. So I'd rather they not be my mantra. I write, because that can easily be stored online. No clutter. But I think I am longing for messy acrylic paint with other people to paint with, or belting it out in Gospel choir. Maybe even with all of this, the very strong feelings will not necessarily disappear, but at least there will be some release. It might also be that I don't have that adrenaline of teaching a Kung Fu class. I try meditating, which calms me down. But I have a hunger for something else. A hunger that makes me feel like I can do anything. The goal is to do the most positive thing I suppose.

Might have to write another novel.

I might have to write another novel.
Or a book of poems.

Something.


One would think that I an busy enough.

That I have enough to do between
Taking care of the kids,
And taking the paralegal course.


Yes I am busy.

 And yes I have been slacking when it comes to Kung Fu and studying.

But if I am not creating and moving
Towards something, the life seems pointless.

I simultaneously want to take a break
 From "everything" (though from what am I taking a break?)

And get wrapped up in
Something.

One could say I just need a job.

And beyond that, a purpose.

Chinese Checkers

Me and the kids have been playing Chinese checkers a lot recently. Mainly the cool thing about it is that it is a three person. game. To be honest I don't even know if we are playing it right. What is funny is that suddenly as Jonah was getting into the game he starts hum whispering to himself a song he made up.

"I have 6..

Baba has two...

He is So oooo stupid.."


So I started cracking up because Jonah totally did not realize that his little song was outside. The whole game fell apart because after that the kids couldn't even keep a straight face or focus on their moves.

I won.


We have been playing other games too. We found a book in the basement of 200 card games... including how to play French Tarot... the game that the fortune telling cards were originally made for.

I totally want to learn how to play Mah Jong because we have four people so why not.

In New Jersey... they actually play Mah Jong at the library.

"Do you have to know how to play already?"
I asked the librarian.

"Hmmmm I think so because there are a group of old ladies and they seem.... serious."


Well I know I will get yelled at... but probably they won't be playing for money at the library right?

Dream Mother

I saw my mother in a dream last night.

I was chasing around a cousin (A Chinese cousin who is not a blood cousin but has the same last name as me) and part of the dream was for some reason I was back in town for Dragon Boat... but there was no Dragon boat to be seen. I searched all night and ran into my cousin and my mother outside Castle Square, near the high rises.

I have seen my mother in dreams before but often I ignore her or she sends me on an errand. In the dream she was not well, but she was taller than me, which hasn't been true since I was 11 or so.

She shook my hand. Again she was weak, and in the process of moving some table with a friend. All of her friends were these young hot women who were then picked up by uglier men who were helpful to my mother in someway, through carpentry.

My mother had her own life going and was happy to see me, but her realm was somewhere in her own apartment.

"I like to be out and about... that's why I haven't been down there yet."

And down there... I take that to be where I am, New Jersey.

It's true, I have yet to see a rabbit here. Plenty of deer... but no rabbits. And not only am I superstitious, but I realize that I am Pagan to the core, if I can believe through a dream that my mother's spirit is something that is in a physical place. And that place is Boston, in the Castle Square projects to be exact... or at least the representations of these places that exist in my mind.


When I say Pagan, I do not mean either that I am not a Christian, or a the same mix of all the other stuff I belief in including atheism.

The atheist account for this dream is that it is all my mind processing events so spirits places and pictures are simply my mind's representation of them.

But in truth, these things have come to be more real to me than my actual surroundings as I adjust to living a life that before, I had only seen on television and movies... especially ones about the 80's.

When you are actually living the American Dream, the one that is presented to you on television....and you had since rejected that idea as illusion, I suppose it becomes difficult to adjust when that illsuion becomes a physical reality.


In any case... I will compensate by doing Kung Fu and making my kids do it against their will. The way I see it, it is better than screen time all day.

Bow to Amah

I guess when I was not here the kids has camp....but now that I am here, they have just been staying at home. I tried to sort of just sit back and let them be because after all, they have spent more than a month without me and have done just fine. But yeste rdsy I just got sick of the tv watching and said "4pm we're doing Kung Fu!"

I realize that in writing that can sound like U am an energetic camp counselor that us great with children. To picture my tone, imagine some f words thrown in there. That's right. More than one.


4 turned into 5 and we went to the deck to do basics. I took off my shirt.


" The neighbors will think we are crazy", complained Amah... until as we began to end a round of basics with the breathing exercise...she saw an opportunity. She has seen us enough times to know that the kids would now bow to their Sifu.. ie me.


"Bow to Amah." She said. And he'll it's her house and yes I knew that she would get into the Kung Fu spirit as long as she got to be a Sifu or perhaps some sort of sorceress on the dark side of the force.

"Bow to  Amah" I said. The children laughed and did as they were told.

See I bet me and Amah could open a school together, once she realizes she could have followers.....

New Jersey

After attending a family reunion in Connecticut, I have finally arrived in New Jersey for real. The family reunion wa la nice. It was interesting to compare it with say a Chinatown Family association, And The banquets that are those reunions.

We took a picture and I put my arm around A man, which Grace thought was funny and awkward. I said I wanted to put it as my profile picture.

Today I followed Amah around learning variois household chores. I think she is stressed out about leaving her routine.

Today I want to do some "work" ie blog posts, some script writing, studying for my paralegal course....


But I also have some things going through my mind that really can only be dealt with through fiction and poetry. It will have to go in Deer Dancer...

Of course today is the day of the eclipse as well, and I should make a contraption with the kids to allow them to see it without going blind.

I am beginning to miss aspects of Boston, that are not part of my past... they are actually new connections I just made.

I was wrong about the march

When I first heard of a counter protest.. a "fight supremacy" I thought that such a thing would only draw more attention and give more if a platform to that hate group. But then I saw some of my friends who I feel connected to not only through ideals, but also yi hei, were going. And I felt that even if it was a bad idea I had to go....

But then there was the added problem of logistics. I was leaving for Connecticut the same day and showing the house to be renters. In the end, I could not go.

Seeing all the pictures on. Twitter of my friends from various groups and seeing that mostly it became a celebration of diversity, showed me I had been wrong. Granted I did not agree with all chants and there was some urine throwing, but this was as small as that hate group.

What happened, is that a despicable ideology made us realize how much we care about each other.


Let me put it this way.

I hear that my grandfather was pretty racist.


But he also fought at the battle of the bulge and was there for the liberation of some of the camps. He gave some food to a starving man, and then saw him die after eating it too fast. That memory does not go away.

He also had a black friend.... but my mother said she had told him when it came down to a black friend choosing between his people and you, he would have to choose his people and that you can't blame him for that. (This was not the 60's this was BEFORE the 60's)

All I'm saying that when kids today just start pointing fingers and saying, "racist" especially the white kids... it's more complicated than that.

My grandfather would spout racist comments and then slowly, as one son married a Jewish woman, and then his daughter married  a Chinese man, and the family started to even look different, well what can you do but go with it?


Boston has a lot of problems with race.

No doubt.

But most people will realize that they love the people of different races. Becasue they in one way or another part of their family. Whether through blood, sports, work, or economy... despite whatever political or cultural difference they may have with someone of another color...  they love each other more than they can tolerate racism.

 Conscious or subconscious bias and prejudice, they will be able to set that aside when it comes down to it. Especially when the alternative is siding with Nazi ideaology.

Now I will say I saw one drawback to the March. DSNI held a multi cultural festival on the same day that had little turn out. In truth, it would have been possible to have both and it would have been nice for Dudley Square to get some of that economic support from the 40k in the march.

But hopefully the general take away is that we will do better in the future.

I had been sad that the day that I left my home city was going to be a day of a demo that was going to be like Charlottesville, a tragedy. But instead u saw a Boston of all colors (on Twitter, on the train) filled with friends of many stripes whi came together to show love.