Conversation Between Two Tripping Kids

Girl: (offers boy a cup of ice.) Here, take some.

Boy (looks confusedly at the cup of ice, and then back at the girl.) What is it?

G: It's ice.

B: (continues to look confused)What?

G: Ice.

B: Are you sure?

G: Yes. Here. (puts some ice in his hand. Boy looks at it flabbergasted.)

B: But what is it?

G: It's still ice.

B: Really?

G: Uh-huh. I swear.

B: What do I do with it?

G: Put it in your mouth.

B: Why?

G: It'll feel good there. Really it will. Trust me, I would not lead you to falsehood. (maniacal giggle.)

B: But it's ... cold, and wet ...

G: Yes dear. it's ice.

B:It's a solid but also a liquid! It's amazing!

G: Yes, ice does that.

B: What did you say this was again?

G: Ice. It just keeps on being ice. Well eventually it will be water and then vapor, but for now its still ice. Barely.

B: I just... I just don't know.

G: I do. It's ice. Put it in your mouth. It's good for you.

B: Are you sure?

G: Very sure. Remember I would not lead you to falsehood! Not intentionally, anyway.

B: (takes deep breath) Ok, here I go. (puts ice in mouth, face lights up with joy) Oh wow, you were right! This is so awesome!! What is this again?

G: It's ice.

B: It's amazing!

G: Good. Here have some more.

B: (hesitates) ... are you sure?

So

So, I think I'm gonna start a new religion. Kinda just your garden variety functional morality, with some neo-hippy glitter. Lots of music and substances of various kinds and love and joy and frolicking, and volunteering in homeless shelters and orphanages. Kind of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance meets the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. If any of ya'll are down for joining up, let me know; we're gonna be doing some festivaling come spring. :)

I am a starball of Awesome. You should be too!

Conversations With Me Father

F: Did you know that watching too much tv smooths out the wrinkles in your brain and turns you into an orange?
M: An orange?
E: Brain wrinkles?
F: An orange!Brain wrinkles! It's true! You know, take out the sound and basically you're sitting there, staring at a box!
M: Yeah, but - an orange? I mean, there's a pretty large genetic discrepancy between people and fruit....
E: Yeah I'm pretty sure that's physically impossible...
M: To begin with, oranges don't have brains.
F: It's true! Did you read the study?
M: Did you?
F: I made up the study. I couldn't read it because it hasn't been published yet.
M: Oh, well, as long as the scientific data is verified and reliable, sure. Oranges. Yeah.
F: Oranges. It's true.

Hell

My current vision of hell involves wandering endlessly between terminals 3 and 8 of JFK, intermittently sprinkled with 5 hour spurts of Russian karaoke. To quote my friend Chanie: This is what an aneurysm sounds like.

Also: I'll be in NY until Sunday. I'm considering moving here. Or maybe Philly. If anyone is around and wants to get in touch, give me a holler! Or, since I won't actually be able to hear that, let me know in the comments.

Turkey''s Moral Authority

So: Turkey genocides an entire people, and illegally occupies the north of Cyprus for some 36-odd years. But they are the voice of morality when it comes to Israel and Gaza. Maybe? I mean this is just a thought, but maybe? They should shut up until they get the fuck out of Cyprus and set up an Armenian State.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armenian_Genocide

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_invasion_of_Cyprus#Ethnic_cleansing

A Note

So, thought I'd give anyone who's still out there a bit of an update. It's been 4 and 1/2 years since I started this blog (ishly) which is kind of cool, and it makes me sad that I haven't written much lately. There are many reasons for that. But I do hope to start posting with some sort of semi-regularity again because, to be honest, all I've ever wanted since I was a little girl was to have my own publication in which to put rants and nonsense and poetry. Blogs are kind of 10-yr-old Miri's wet dream. Also, abandoned warehouses, but I am as of yet unable to realize that one. So it's a shame not to exploit this opportunity more than I do. And since in the near future I intend to have a spate of free time in which to create more nonsense, because there really isn't enough in the world, this seems like a good method.

Also, I started this blog when I was making aliyah, and I am now leaving Israel for awhile. I have to go home and earn money. And also .... I just need a break. I have spent 23 years in a world that is only a fraction of what this planet has to offer and I think it would be healthy, prudent and wise of me to step out of context for a bit. Shift the perspective. See some mountains. That sort of thing.

Part of me knows that I need this, that I've been needing it for about five years. But I've paid my dues, (almost) won my degree, been the good girl, and it's time. It's time for me to be who I need to be, and not who everyone else needs me to be. In short, I have absolutely no idea where I'm going or what I'm doing next. And like all unknown things, that's scary. But the possibility implied is so immense. What would you do if you could do absolutely anything? (within the parameters of reality, according to the laws of physics and whatnot.)

That's the question that's been keeping me up nights these days. Although, past a certain point, who knows what is the cause and what merely an amusement with which to pass the time? As things go along it gets harder and harder to tell.

Oh! And also, I'll be spending some time with the family, which is usually fodder for blog silliness. So stay tuned.

The Carnival Was Here

the house itself is barely there, concealed above the street
the garden hovers behind, a shy child in his mother's skirt
and while the wild festival weekend of drums and feasting
begins to politely take its leave of us
in perfumed shades of blues, greens, and purples

priests and acolytes gather in a garden that floats over the alley
and suffuse it in the haze of a holy rite

the herbs dance haphazardly around the ring

glancing over the spindly ironwork

that suspends us all in the least of likely corners

and dusts the faces of the congregated with the intimacy

of an open secret
sanctifying and sacred

we palace children exulting in privilege
embroider the evening in song and lace it with laughter
insolently entreating the festival to remain an hour more
and though we cannot keep her from slipping demurely away
she consents to tag the gathered pilgrims with a kiss