Well some people wait 3 years to feel their 1st San Francisco earthquake. But we just had our first one on the dot for our 1 month anniversary of moving here.
Ha.
It was a 4.0 and very very short.
We were having dinner and it just shook side to side for just a second or so ( even less according to reports).
I was so ready to dive under the desk !

What a week, friends, what a week.

You know when you get to that point when everything is so out of control that none of it really matters anymore and you just kind of laugh ?
Yeah, that's where I am.

Focusing on the positive.
I want to start this morning with a gratitude list. I will update about my teeth/gums later but it will be an involved post and it's going to be a long healing process. For now I want to embrace what I do have. :)

*Jeremy's infinite love and support and his coming to the dentist with me.
*We have the ability to heal ourselves.
*We (I) have tools and means to heal and lots of trained people to help.
*I have lots of tools to be present and work with pain and wholeness.
*I have a great supportive community of friends, classmates and teachers.
*I collaged this week.
*Our downstairs neighbors picked up packages.
*I am a fast reader.
*Financial support from loved ones.
*Fascinating articles to read for school.
*Package from loving naturopath back in Seattle involving sea coral calcium, which made my little boat girl so happy ( and probably my gums!)
*The vastness, quirkiness and location of our apartment.
*Short and sweet scooter rides to school.
*A school schedule that allows for free days to do homework and have a life.

It makes me feel kind of cynical that I don't really see myself as dancing in the streets if/when Barack gets elected. Not that I don't think he should be elected, because I really want him to, but because I honestly don't believe that it's going to make that much difference. No, I mean, of course it's going to be huge to not have Bush in power and if it's McCain, well I 'll be kind of devastated, so... why is it that I am not seeing myself dancing in the streets if Obama gets elected ?
Hmmm, maybe I just don't see myself dancing in the streets for any reason.
Hmm.
Maybe I should find reasons for things that make me want to dance in the streets.

Lately, though things are good, I feel like death or ilness is always looming or something.
I don't know, I am trying to process something here...can you see it ? Can you see what it is, because I can't sem to get at it.

I read a blog yesterday of a women who asked people what things they would do if they had 37 days before death. You know...there are lots of different versions of this. On this blog, a man that I kind of knew as a theatre blogger said that he had realized by doing the project that he had always thought he would die when he reaches 60, because his father died at 60. So he was living his life as if. Until he reached 60 and lived and realized he wanted to live his life as if it was eternal. He said time expanded for him and he was amazed how much more he was able to do and take on.
When I read that post, I started wondering if I think I only have until 59 in this life.
Which means that I would have only 23 years to live and considering all that I want to do, that would certainly be anxiety inducing at my age. I am sure on some level, I think that.
But I don't really know how to shift that except to remember that it's probably not true and that we really don't know when we die and it could happen at any time really.
So... is that why I don't feel like there is anything that is worth of dancing in the streets for ?
I don't know.
Is everyone else just pretending that they want to dance in the streets for things ?
Is this an American thing that I will never understand ?
This perpetual search for and display of happiness unleashed ?

Children are in touch with that.
Children are in touch with this dancing.
But they don't do it because this guy got elected or because they won the lottery. They do it because their body tells them to do it and because they don't know they're going to die someday. They do it because the moment is right. Without reason.

What am I trying to get at ?
Can you see it yet ?
It's almost the same thing as this thing that simultaneously repulses and attracts me to Burning Man ( though you wouldn't catch me dead saying that I am attracted to Burning Man - but really I am, it's just, that, well, it repulses me at the same time).

I'm seeing themes here.
Push vs pull.
French vs American.
People who still have their mother vs people who don't ( ie , me).
Togetherness vs aloneness.
Alienation vs belonging.
Love vs hate.
Life vs date.

I know these themes run my life. But don't they run most of everyone's life.
It is the stuff that makes for good theatre but as far as living, it makes for anxious living.

We are close to the day when ( 3 years ago) I watched my mother's ashes fly into the wind and dissolve into the oceans. That kind of image never really leaves you.
That we can be so little and so much all at once.
That we can be flesh and blood, talk, laughter, limbs, sweat, dance, dreams and fears... and suddenly... powder.

I'll never know what I am getting at here, but the exploration of it is what makes my life worth living.

When I get to the dancing, I'll let you know.

Hi all...
For school, I have to keep a lot of journals and process notes.
I have figured out that using a blog is going to be a great way to keep it all in one place so that I can actually refer to it by using tags and categories.

So... without further a-do...
My Grad School blog !!!

This might not be of interest to very many of you. Comments are disabled on it, since it is mainly a tool for my use, but in case some of you are interested in adding it to your rss reader, there it is !

I really like wordpress, so that's what I ended up going with.

Love to all.
I still have to post about school and how it is going... I know, I know.
But I am actually trying to get my desk to a place where I can use it so that is my priority at the moment !

Ciao from San Francisco where it is currently 87 degrees and sunny.

All of you who are moms or moms to be, or like children and/or good writing, should go read this post by writeanya.

In fact, scratch that, all of you should just read it, period.

Finally, here is the journey of our move. Watch until the end to see the amazingness of the golden gate bridge upon arrival !

This is my new favorite place to set the camera in this new house. Up top, on the beams.
Look, we even looked kinda moved in !

I was not able to sleep very well the night before orientation.
Hence the bleary eyed look.
But it went fine nonetheless. The school has great coffee.

The program coordinator at my school is awesome. He has a Phd and is super smart and nice and they call him the glu of the program because he really is. This is what he put on the back of the orientation packet, hee hee.