tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-72541538243798058312024-03-13T03:17:53.219-07:00tangobabyLiving in This Crazy Little City By The Bay: San Franciscotangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.comBlogger849125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-22249714412667168952010-02-02T07:18:00.000-08:002010-02-02T07:18:45.278-08:00I got in trouble.The Boy said that was very bad of me to say that <a href="http://tangobaby2.blogspot.com/2010/02/tangobaby-is-dead.html">Tangobaby is dead</a> and that I should apologize.<br />
<br />
Apparently he was not the only one who thought my sensationalism was naughty. I'm sorry. I'm not dead. Even this blog isn't dead. I'm going to leave it here for posterity.<br />
<br />
So, I will try this again:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>Hi guys! I have a new site. Come on over and see me there because I won't be over here anymore.</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><br />
</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://julieliveshere.com/"><i>http:julieliveshere.com</i></a></div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-60476888791431903842010-02-01T11:00:00.000-08:002010-02-01T11:05:51.951-08:00Tangobaby is dead.<div style="text-align: center;">Long live <i>julie lives here</i>.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;">(<a href="http://julieliveshere.com/">http://julieliveshere.com</a>) </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;">***</div><br />
Maybe I'm being a wee bit dramatic but I hope I did grab your attention. ;-)<br />
<br />
It finally occurred to me that I needed a <i>different</i> place to put my stuff that's not <a href="http://calibersf.com/">CALIBER</a> or <a href="http://iliveheresf.com/"><i>i live here:SF</i></a> or <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/">HAMO</a>.<br />
<br />
Three years ago, almost by accident, I started this blog. My goodness, what a lot has happened since then. At first I wrote about movies I'd seen and then a lot about dancing tango. <br />
<br />
Blogger was very good to me, and being a Blog of Note in 2008 gave me a taste of what the wider world of blogging was all about. It inspired me to write more, share more and try to hone my skills with storytelling, idea generation and even be cognizant of good old-fashioned grammar.<br />
<br />
I got a camera in 2008 and that exploded my world wide open again. Now I could provide my own images to accompany my own stories. The avenues for creativity seemed to grow exponentially. <br />
<br />
And then the whole aspect of using the blog as an element of change and raising awareness happened in April of 2009. Learning very personal lessons about poverty, homelessness, friendship and hardship.<br />
<br />
Along the way, I lost some friends. I think I made more than I lost. Some people wanted the old tangobaby back. I couldn't summon her. She bored me.<br />
<br />
I have so many things to tell you. About the people I meet and the things I do and hopefully it's not the same ol' same ol' but stories and ideas you'll want more of. I just can't put them here anymore.<br />
<br />
It's funny how much something like a blog template or platform can be a hindrance or boost to your mind's inner workings. I realize now that I've outgrown Blogger and so have moved on to this new Wordpress site.<br />
<br />
It's funny, I had been so attached to my tangobaby name. I thought I wouldn't be able to be what you thought I was without that name. I agree, it's been fun. We've had a good run. I've gotten a lot of pleasure out of being tangobaby and there's a place in my heart where shiny stilletto heels and the mournful bandoneon music still lives.<br />
<br />
But I can be so much more by just being Julie.<br />
<br />
So, I hope you'll follow along. This tangobaby place has been good to me but I'm not taking it along.<br />
<br />
See you soon.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://julieliveshere.com/">http://julieliveshere.com</a></div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-28726627733621243202010-01-29T09:42:00.000-08:002010-01-29T10:39:00.561-08:00motherlove.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/S2MRKd2TBgI/AAAAAAAAFvY/HJC4uQ8l56c/s1600-h/IMG_8361.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/S2MRKd2TBgI/AAAAAAAAFvY/HJC4uQ8l56c/s400/IMG_8361.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i>Janika and Gabrielle (9 months)</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;">***</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">The two of them arrive around 1pm, just as lunch is being served. Proud mommy Janika tells everyone, <i>she's got a tooth! Her first tooth!</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Women of all ages, colors, sizes crowd around mother and child. The baby, in her light purple sweatsuit, is definitely a rock star. She loves the faces surrounding her, the attention, the laughter and arms reaching out to touch her.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">I'm at WDDC, otherwise known as the Women's Daytime Drop-in Center, in North Berkeley. The WDDC is a non-profit program that empowers women and children to move from the streets to a home. Not all of the women here are mothers. Some are single, older women: some homeless, some getting aid for housing. All are here for lunch and companionship.<br />
<br />
The WDDC is an unusual place. It's a home, literally. Situated in a residential neighborhood, there's a kitchen with two volunteers cooking barbequed pork and yams, a living room with sofas and chairs and books, a dining area, and then several rooms devoted for client consultations and offices. The home is old, but still, it's a home. It feels comfortable and welcoming. Instantly upon my arrival, at least three people bid me hello and ask me if I need help. I can't tell if they're working there or the clientele.<br />
<br />
I'm taken around and introduced to everyone. I tell them I'm there to collect stories, to listen, to take photos. I tell them I'm with <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/">Help A Mother Out</a>, and that we help donate diapers here. Women who don't even have kids thank me for the diapers. Everyone realizes here that any assistance and outpouring of help benefits them all. Janika especially is so grateful for the diapers. She says," I haven't had to worry about diapers at all since the baby was born. Thank you!"<br />
<br />
Some of the women are shy. They don't want to talk or have their photo taken. A couple others want me to teach them photography. We sit around the long tables while they eat their lunches and they talk about finishing school, finding new homes, getting jobs.<br />
<br />
I will be back.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">***</div><br />
<i>WDDC provides ongoing and intensive counseling, case management services, daily support groups, a comprehensive children's program, a variety of referral services, and a transitional housing program for for single-parent families.</i><br />
<br />
<i>Due to cutbacks, WDDC has had to lay off two key employees, one a counselor for the children. </i><br />
<br />
<i>You can read more about <a href="http://www.womensdropin.org/index.htm">WDDC</a> here and more about <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/">Help A Mother Out</a> here.</i><br />
<br />
<i>You can <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/donate/virtual/">donate diapers online to WDDC or other Bay Area nonprofits</a> here. </i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
<i>You can read more about <a href="http://tangobaby2.blogspot.com/2009/12/diapers-for-everyone-in-2010.html">our diaper drive and awareness raising efforts</a> here.</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-31650564913062948842010-01-20T12:24:00.000-08:002010-01-20T12:26:41.470-08:00I didn't do it.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/S1djCDyFizI/AAAAAAAAFvI/1L87bzTB3Qc/s1600-h/twit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="122" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/S1djCDyFizI/AAAAAAAAFvI/1L87bzTB3Qc/s400/twit.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">A few of you have been kind enough to tell me about this danged pop-up window that, well, <i>pops up</i>, when you come to my blog. (It happens to me too. Just click cancel and it will go away. I know, it's super annoying.)<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Of course, I assumed that I f'ed something up, but come to find out that it's a bug with Twitter and I actually I had nothing to do with it. <a href="http://help.twitter.com/forums/10713/entries/55047">See, here it is</a>.<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">***<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">However, I do have to tell some of you guys that have the embedded comments on your blogs... I can't leave comments for you. I still think <a href="http://www.bloggerbuster.com/2008/11/issues-with-embedded-comment-form.html">it's a bug that Blogger hasn't figured out yet</a>. What it means is that if you don't link your name to your email address or have another clear way on how to send you a message, then I might not be the only person who's trying to be in touch with you and can't.<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Just mentioning it, especially to those of you who might wonder why you don't get comments or emails back sometimes...<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">***<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I'm hard at work on stuff for our diaper drive and planning some photo shoots for i live here:SF. We have <a href="http://calibersf.com/manifesto/">a new group photo up on CALIBER</a> now... take a peek! You can see my haircut.<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">;-)<br />
</div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-91789651666223812042010-01-18T09:41:00.000-08:002010-01-18T09:42:39.503-08:00More Happy.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://iliveheresf.com/2010/01/18/gregory-and-xeno/" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2512/4131456517_8a2004bea0.jpg" width="356" /></a><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">It's still raining but I have more Happy for you.<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://iliveheresf.com/2010/01/18/gregory-and-xeno/"><i>Gregory and Xeno.</i></a><br />
</div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-89426908087287675382010-01-18T07:59:00.000-08:002010-01-18T08:01:06.087-08:00Before the tickle.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4283760884/" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/S1QgVgzD6DI/AAAAAAAAFvA/faDoNTZrlDA/s400/IMG_6870.jpg" /></a><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">I love her.<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i>(My sister made her. Good work there.)</i><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">It's rainy and grim looking outside but this little face has made the sun shine already today.<br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">You can see another image <a href="http://calibersf.com/2010/01/18/cooking/">here</a>. <br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-49626907435773407862010-01-16T23:02:00.000-08:002010-01-16T23:07:03.039-08:00On the Occasion of His 94th Birthday...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/S1KzeLlbsaI/AAAAAAAAFuw/maUNMfwxBY8/s1600-h/IMG_6943.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/S1KzeLlbsaI/AAAAAAAAFuw/maUNMfwxBY8/s400/IMG_6943.jpg" /></a><br />
</div><br />
<div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">Grandpa on his birthday, with his girlies.</span></i><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></i><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">***</span></i><br />
</div><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">"Other things may change us, but we start and end with the family." ~Anthony Brandt</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">***</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;"> <br />
</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">Today was one of those days that I wished I had a laptop, or even a scrap of paper, for a brain dump. All those hours in the car, coming back from LA, coming back from family, from the birthday and I had so many thoughts and ideas crawling around in my head and now they've disappeared like ghosts.</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">With my luck, they'll wake me at 3am and then I'll try to catch them, like fireflies.</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">We had a lovely time. Grandpa was happy. I think we tuckered him out but in a good way that I know he won't mind.</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">The girlies are beautiful and must be renamed as Little Curly Girl's hair is straighter now. Princess Chubness is getting long and lean and is not really so chubby anymore. She's walking and growing little teeth and is sporting about ten thousand long eyelashes.</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">It's raining and I'm home.</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;"><br />
</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;">I'm going to lie in bed and listen to it rain. Nighty nite.<br />
</span><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia,bookman old style,palatino linotype,book antiqua,palatino,trebuchet ms,helvetica,garamond,sans-serif,arial,verdana,avante garde,century gothic,comic sans ms,times,times new roman,serif; font-size: small;"> <br />
</span><br />
</div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-19142819213161659052010-01-13T19:34:00.000-08:002010-01-13T19:34:28.727-08:00Writing this post is not as easy as you might think.Hi all,<br />
<br />
Just a quick hello because I'm headed down to LA to see my grandpa on what has to be the fastest planned trip I've taken yet. He turns 94 on Friday and this seems like it's a happy/sad visit, kind of a hello/happy birthday/goodbye visit. I'm going to try to focus on the happy part and not the sad part, if I can help it.<br />
<br />
I didn't want to disappear without saying howdy, and also to let you know that I am typing this post on probably one of the most ancient laptops that still works. It's my dad's, and we actually have to preheat it, like a toaster oven, for about 10 minutes before we can use it. My mom says, "Sid, go preheat the computer so Julie can send an email to her friends!"<br />
<br />
And like 10 minutes later, I can use this thing, which makes little windy whirring noises, has a plastic floppy sticking out of the drive (remember those gadgets?!) and has the screen propped up because the hinge is broken and the screen falls over if you don't hold it up with something heavy.<br />
<br />
So while I am able, here writing on this preheated computer, I wanted to tell you that the interview I'm posting tomorrow on CALIBER is really cool and you should check it out. I have some "preheated" posts scheduled there so at least there will be something pretty to look at.<br />
<br />
Okay, catch you later, peeps. See you when I get back from LaLa Land.<br />
<br />
xoxotangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-71511249986973707912010-01-11T20:38:00.000-08:002010-01-12T05:40:09.318-08:00In Steinbeck Country.I happened to be on Cannery Row this weekend for a few minutes. Immortalized by John Steinbeck and now completely gutted of all history and sense of time and place, the conglomeration of "art galleries" (the Thomas Kinkade National Archives, and no, I am NOT making this up, is just a few blocks away), t-shirt boutiques and ice cream vendors are all that stand for what once was.<br />
<br />
I had to laugh, sadly. The <a href="http://kinkadegalleries.com/galleries.php?gallery=bmF0aW9uYWxhcmNoaXZl&title=TmF0aW9uYWwgQXJjaGl2ZQ==">Thomas Kinkade National Archives</a> made me chortle with incredulity while simultaneously making my stomach turn. (It is a hope of mine that The Painter of Light will disappear into history with the passing of our generation. At least Disney tried to infuse his view of what our saccharine world should be with a bit of humor, and I can't even imagine Uncle Walt establishing his own National Archive in his own lifetime...but I digress.)<br />
<br />
But what a very strange, feeble attempt to educate the t-shirt and seashell-buying tourist trade: the prevalence of banners on every lightpost up and down the street, rainbow colored banners sporting folksy caricatures of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Ricketts">Ed Ricketts</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Steinbeck">John Steinbeck</a>, the reverse sides of the flags bearing quotes about Doc and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannery_Row_%28novel%29"><span style="font-style: italic;">Cannery Row</span></a>.<br />
<br />
I don't know about you, but as much as I have loved reading Steinbeck, I hadn't even heard of Ed Ricketts and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Log_from_the_Sea_of_Cortez"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Log from the Sea of Cortez</span></a> until about six years ago, when The Boy took me on a trip. We parked by the ocean and we sat in his vintage Jeep; he read long passages of this book to me while we watched the gulls dip into the waves and kept on the lookout for otters. Since that time, <span style="font-style: italic;">The Log from the Sea of Cortez</span> has become one of my most favorite books. Not because it was read to me aloud, with much love and sense of sharing, but because it's a wonderful book about friends. And science. And the love of learning.<br />
<br />
People lurching full-bellied from the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company (to think that the legacy of Hollywood pablum <span style="font-style: italic;">Forrest Gump</span> is a seafood restaurant) to the Thomas Kinkaide National Archives will never know what those flags fluttering above their heads stand for.<br />
<br />
Traveling to and from the Monterey Peninsula this weekend, through what I call Steinbeck Country: Salinas, Watsonville, Castroville—reminded me of the reality of what he experienced. What he wrote about. His travels, the poverty, and the love he encountered along the way. I've posted some images on flickr, with the corresponding quotes below. I have to imagine that these quotes, this sort of brilliance will survive all Thomas Kinkades and t-shirt vendors, even if the places he wrote about will never be again.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">***<br />
</div><br />
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4268248766/in/photostream/">“A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find that after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.”</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4268244284/in/photostream/">“Many a trip continues long after movement in time and space have ceased.”</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4268239100/in/photostream/">“This I believe: That the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual.”</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4268241838/in/photostream/">“We are lonesome animals. We spend all our life trying to be less lonesome. One of our ancient methods is to tell a story begging the listener to say -- and to feel -- ''Yes, that's the way it is, or at least that's the way I feel it. You're not as alone as you thought.</a><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4268241838/in/photostream/">”</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4268284760/">“A dying people tolerates the present, rejects the future, and finds its satisfactions in past greatness and half remembered glory.”</a>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-65764985715605080812010-01-09T11:01:00.000-08:002010-01-09T11:06:52.687-08:00Party On.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3489/3779492874_20a05e81ef.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 500px; height: 281px;" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3489/3779492874_20a05e81ef.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>I'm packing up my stuff and heading out of town this weekend, doing some wedding photography in Carmel.<br /><br />It sounds so very wrong to say "I'm going to shoot a wedding party this weekend" or "It was so fun shooting all of those little kids, they were adorable", etc. etc.<br /><br />We have to come up with a better turn of phrase, us photographer types.<br /><br />Anyway, I hope you're having fun doing whatever you're doing. I'm actually packing more lenses than shoes. Boy, have times changed.<br /><br />This photo will be posted in all its gigantic cuteness tomorrow on CALIBER.<br /><br />See ya!tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-10795841741562898872010-01-04T01:24:00.000-08:002010-01-04T08:49:32.329-08:00Memories of Greener Days<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4057/4243330890_d93ee08931.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 500px; height: 470px;" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4057/4243330890_d93ee08931.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">When I was in the third grade, I had a green, short thermos. Wide-mouthed and plastic in that 70s avocado green that was so en vogue. The thermos was just large enough to accommodate one of the small cans of Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup, and for some reason, I was very aware that this thermos was lined with glass. I remember carrying it gingerly and worrying about it often. That I would drop the thermos and the glass would break. I remember that being a big concern of mine, although I was glad to have the soup for lunch. </span> <span style="font-style: italic;">One day, at lunch on the blacktop, a boy grabbed my thermos. To my amazement, he threw it as far as he could across the playground. I remember being frozen, stunned. Shocked. It seemed that he had thrown that thermos incredibly far, and then he ran away. When I retrieved my short, wide-mouthed avocado green thermos from across the playground, it was leaking soup from its threaded matching cap and when I picked it up, I could sense the broken glass moving around inside the liquid.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">In my little 8-year old mind, it felt like a huge violation and a random, unexplicable act that frightened me.</span><br /><br />Last year, reluctantly, I signed up for Facebook. To this day, I'm still not quite sure why I did. My sister, almost five years younger than me and more of a socially inclined person, encouraged me by saying things like, "You'll have so much fun finding your old school friends."<br /><br />Which always made me laugh because we both knew darned well that I barely remembered anyone from any year of school, K through 12. And probably college, for that matter. With whom and why would I reconnect? Even my mom would ask me periodically, after some mother of a former classmate said, "Tell Julie so-and-so said hello!" and I would draw a total blank. My mom would say, "Do you remember going to school <span style="font-style: italic;">at all?</span>" And we would laugh but it was pretty strange. I can remember my teachers, what we learned, what the classrooms looked like, but I'm hard-pressed to remember any given child besides their name. What I also discovered was how much I didn't remember about myself, which was a little more disconcerting.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />A few weeks ago, I looked at the people on Facebook who were in my high school. There were a couple of girlfriends there, girls I remember hanging out with after school, getting pizza and sodas with. They're married, they have kids now. They politely said hello when I sent messages to them. I complimented them on their families.<br /><br />There was the usual assortment of pretty girls I never spoke to, cheerleaders that annoyed me, and the boys especially that made me draw my accustomed mental blank slate. A few of the dorky ones seemed vaguely familiar.<br /><br />And then I saw that boy. The Thermos Boy. I sent him a funny note, something like:<br /><br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">Hey, you probably don't remember me but in third grade, you broke my soup thermos and I thought I should let you know. Happy Holidays!</blockquote><br />I didn't expect a reply. I guess I didn't expect him to remember me. Expecting that most people wouldn't remember me just like I didn't really remember them. I was just happy to have something to recall. I don't know what I would have written to anyone else (<span style="font-style: italic;">Hey, we went to school together but I don't remember shit about you</span> isn't worth writing.)<br /><br />But I was wrong. This person did remember me, with much kindness. In fact, he remembered me quite well and throughout our most of our school years. He recounted teachers and kids that were lingering in the back of my mind, dusted off and dimly seen again for the first time in years. It was charming, a sweet novelty. He also apologized about the Thermos.<br /><br />It was so intriguing seeing myself through someone else's eyes, someone who I barely knew but who seemed to know <span style="font-style: italic;">the-me-that-was</span> quite well.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />He lives in another state now, has a little boy himself. He mentioned that he would be visiting the Bay Area for Christmas, and I suggested that they come up for a visit, and I would take their photos together as a present. I was curious to see what we would talk about. I wanted more of my memories.<br /><br />We had a lovely visit. His son is a warmly engaging and friendly boy, who walks up to everyone he sees and says <span style="font-style: italic;">Hi!</span> and grabs your index finger in a tiny handshake. The child also walks around saying <span style="font-style: italic;">Hey, you! Look at this!</span> and points to all kinds of things he finds of interest.<br /><br />And all through that, like dictation, came little snippets of my life, not from me, but from this man who was somehow still a boy, too. We walked around the Conservatory of Flowers, a <span style="font-style: italic;">fin-de-siecle</span> confection of a building, humid like the tropics and full of mist and broad green leaves. In this greenhouse, the pale winter light was colored as it passed through the old stained glass, shining brightly blues, reds, greens, violets on us as we looked at the fecundity of the jungle.<br /><br />I felt like I had been given a gift. The gift of myself as a girl remembered, green and vibrant like a little precious terrarium and I could peer inside of it, and see the tiny girl's world that lived inside. The green, new and tender world of life before sex: before the body is changed, broken, before the heart has expectations too big to realize, before the mind grows up and thinks it knows everything.<br /><br />And no more of the memory of the broken thermos, with those sharp shards floating inside.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-7072897034854167242010-01-01T06:56:00.000-08:002010-01-01T07:05:49.758-08:00Starting FreshWhere I like to think a lot of my perspective comes from...<br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/MnFMrNdj1yY&hl=en_US&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/MnFMrNdj1yY&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br />I've posted <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot"><span style="font-style: italic;">Pale Blue Dot</span></a> before, and it's an essay that is worth reading often. I think when the words are juxtaposed with such beautiful visuals, it's incredibly powerful.<br /><br /><blockquote>"Look again at that dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives...."<br /><br />"...To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."</blockquote><br />Happy first day. Happy fresh perspective.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-21461137920475548782009-12-31T12:56:00.000-08:002009-12-31T13:18:58.415-08:00Seems Like Old Times.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2693/4169427408_fb327a0c88.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 338px;" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2693/4169427408_fb327a0c88.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="http://calibersf.com/2009/12/09/seems-like-old-times/"><span style="font-style: italic;">You can see the big image here.</span></a><br /><br />***<br /><br />I don't do New Year's resolutions. I might have in the past, in fact, I'm sure I did at some point in life. Somewhere along the way, I dropped that tradition. Probably wasn't making much headway in whatever I had resolved to do.<br /><br />And I don't make those lists of things I did in the past, either. I can hardly remember what I did last week, let alone try to scratch out what I was doing a year ago, or heaven help me, a decade ago (this being a more pivotal, albeit still arbitrary date, people really seem to be taking this whole decade thing to heart).<br /><br />I just figure if I'm going to do something, for good or bad, I'll just do it when I decide to do it. That keeps it pretty simple for me.<br /><br />That being said, I wanted to give a HUGE THANK YOU to all of you who responded via email or on the blog about <a href="http://tangobaby2.blogspot.com/2009/12/diapers-for-everyone-in-2010.html">helping HAMO and the Diapers for Everyone 2010 Diaper Drive</a>. I have to say I'm a little behind in getting back to you all who volunteered to donate or help in some way, but know your offers are duly noted... and you'll be contacted soon.<br /><br />I guess I do have a sort of resolution process. It's called Looking Forward to Good Things. Some of those things, like the Diaper Drive and <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/">working with HAMO</a>, I know about. The rest: I'll just have to wait to be surprised!<br /><br />Wishing you the <span style="font-style: italic;">best</span> kind of New Year's Eve in whatever manner you choose to celebrate it. And mostly, a year full of Looking Forward to Good (Surprise) Things.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">xoxo</span><br /></div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-60665964584717738862009-12-29T16:22:00.000-08:002010-07-13T20:19:44.082-07:00Diapers for Everyone in 2010!<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SzqdNQy1h2I/AAAAAAAAFug/1PCUq0RBRp0/s1600-h/New+Year.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5420817952665864034" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SzqdNQy1h2I/AAAAAAAAFug/1PCUq0RBRp0/s400/New+Year.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 400px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 323px;" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">Can't start the new year fresh without a new project, right?<br />
<br />
Some (many?) of you might be familiar with the young homeless family that I was helping last year. I'm assuming that most of you know part or all of the story but if not, <a href="http://tangobaby2.blogspot.com/2009/04/please-please-please-let.html" target="_blank">the link is here</a>. Blogging about K's story is how I came in contact with a lot of you in the first place. ;-)<br />
<br />
Meeting K (the homeless mother and domestic abuse survivor) and her young children (ages 9, 7 and three months) was a life-changing, eye-opening happy/sad experience. I learned first-hand about the dangers, fears and daily life of a family living on the edge of society in my beloved adopted hometown: San Francisco.<br />
<br />
Right after I met K, a young mother named Lisa wrote to me and asked how she could help. She met me at a run-down hotel in the Tenderloin, 2 kids in tow (ages 3 and 1), and brought diapers, bags of clothes and toiletries and nursing supplies for this family. I can't tell you enough how happy and needed these donated supplies were to K. Especially the diapers.<br />
<br />
I came to know Lisa and also to help her when I could with her budding effort called <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/about-us/about-2/" target="_blank">Help a Mother Out (HAMO)</a> which she had just started with a friend. Through constant effort, Lisa and HAMO have collected over 130,000 diapers for shelters, crisis nurseries in the SF Bay Area. The Bay Area does not have a diaper bank and there is no other organized way of helping needy families get diapers for their babies.<br />
<br />
<i>Why all the explanation? </i><br />
<br />
When I was working with K and the kids over the course of several months, I learned a lot. Let me give you an example.<br />
<br />
</span><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">When I first met K, a</span><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">s a homeless mother, she was not on any sort of assistance at all. She fled an abusive, dangerous husband with all the cash she could gather and found a cheap hotel in the Tenderloin. That hotel was $60 a night. The day I met her was her last day in the hotel unless she could come up with more money (which many of you were kind enough to help with). The following month after I met her, she started to receive welfare. These are real numbers below. I became very familiar with them over the course of months last year.<br />
</span> <br />
<ul style="font-family: georgia;"><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">$583 a month for a family of four for housing (that means finding housing for $145 a week in SF. Try to imagine what kind of housing that will get you.)<br />
</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">$380 a month in food stamps for a family of four ($95 a week/$23.75 per person, per week. That doesn't go far, trust me.)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">The part that gets left out... <i>diapers</i>. If you're on food stamps, it doesn't provide for diapers, just food. So if you're already struggling, you don't have any extra money for diapers.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Also, diapers are expensive, especially in San Francisco where you don't have access to Target, Costco and big box stores or online. Small corner groceries, especially in the Tenderloin, means more expensive diapers than moms can purchase in other neighborhoods.</span></li>
</ul><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">I'm using K's situation as an example because it's really how things were. I saw it with my own eyes. This kind of situation is replicated in many families just in the SF Bay Area alone.<br />
<br />
<i>Why diapers? </i><br />
<br />
It doesn't take a lot of imagination to realize that a baby in dirty diapers gets sick more. Goes to the emergency room more. Means more stress and hardship for a child and a mother living under already incredibly stressful circumstances. Many parents can't afford diapers and food, so they get food. They try to wash out disposable diapers and reuse them. (BTW, laundromats have various rules about washing cloth diapers, and many do not allow it, in case you were wondering. And having enough cloth diapers on hand is obviously another expense most families can't afford either.) So if you're low income or homeless, odds are you don't have a washer and dryer for cloth diapers.<br />
<br />
These kids get sick and that <i>affects all of us</i>. (I know in K's instance, she must have taken the baby to the emergency room at least six times.)<br />
<br />
</span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">***</span></div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;"><br />
So now to the project at hand. What I'm working on with Lisa:<br />
</span> <br />
<div style="font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size: 100%;">The Mother's Day Holiday Playdate (sometime in May 2010). So even though this may not sound like a lot here, our success at this event will dictate the direction HAMO can play in helping families in a more established and meaningful way.</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br />
</span> </div><ul style="font-family: georgia;" type="DISC"><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">HAMO’s Mother's Day Playdate will be held in the Bay Area (most likely SF).<br />
</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">The goals of the event are:</span></li>
<ul><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">to physically collect diapers and</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">to raise awareness of the need for diapers, why families may not have access to them, and the health and social repercussions of going without diapers, and<br />
</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;"><a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/" target="_blank">HAMO online</a> gives people easy ways to help. (HAMO also has diaper drive kits that can be utilized in any city where someone wants to create their own event.)<br />
</span></li>
</ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">The event will be a 2-3 hour playdate at a location TBD.<br />
</span></li>
<ul><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">We hope to have a major sponsor to underwrite the cost of the facility rental (unless we can get a place to donate a few hours for the cause). We're working on it. But more than one sponsor is definitely encouraged and welcome.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Guests are asked to bring a pack of diapers in lieu of the normal per child admission price.</span></li>
</ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Attendance goal of 100 families.<br />
</span></li>
<ul><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Invitation list will include bloggers, entertainment professionals, and social media and tech-savvy locals as well as local mom and dad influencers.</span></li>
</ul></ul><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;"> What we need:<br />
</span> <br />
<ul style="font-family: georgia;" type="DISC"><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">A place to hold the event (SF would be ideal but we're open).<br />
</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Catering or help with getting food and beverages</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Donated shwag for gift bags</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Media coverage – local print, web, radio, television</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Other nice to haves:<br />
</span></li>
<ul><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Door prizes</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Live entertainment – musician preferred.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">Funds or talent donations to cover additional entertainment (ie: crafts, body glimmer art, balloon animals)<br />
</span></li>
</ul></ul><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">So that's the purpose of this post (if you've read this far, thank you!).<br />
<br />
If you can and want to help in some way, you can do one or a few of these things.<br />
</span> <br />
<div style="font-family: georgia; margin-left: 40px;"><ul><li><span style="font-size: 100%;">You can go online and purchase a pack of diapers on Amazon through HAMO's donation link that will be sent directly to one of the shelters or nurseries in the Bay Area. Now, or now and again in May.</span></li>
<ul><li><span style="font-size: 100%;"><a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/donate/virtual/" target="_blank">http://www.helpamotherout.org/<wbr></wbr>donate/virtual/</a></span></li>
</ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">You can come to the event in May and bring your kid (if you have one), a package of diapers and meet us.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">If you have kids and know other parents that can help, please pass this on to them. Schools, nurseries, day care, churches, synagogues, other organizations... all around us are people who can help if they knew about it.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">If you have access to catering or food to provide...</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">If you know people in the media or can help us network and get more exposure...twitter, facebook, blogs.<br />
</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 100%;">If you would like to be involved in planning the event, let me know! We would like to have a host committee because Lisa and I can't do this all by ourselves.<br />
</span> </li>
</ul></div><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">Any or all will be most appreciated. I'm just getting started on this but you can't plan too early, right?<br />
<br />
<i>The Big Picture.</i><br />
<br />
The Big Picture is that this event will kick off a month of awareness and diaper donations online through HAMO. Lisa has picked May since it's the month of Mother's Day. I have signed up to help her make this event as successful as I can. I'll be working on other projects with Lisa, mostly photographic, that will illustrate what we're doing, but this event is the most important part of the puzzle right now as far as the future direction of HAMO is concerned.<br />
<br />
I am open to <i>any</i> sort of suggestion, advice, connections and help. Please contact me about any questions you might have, too (tangobaby2 AT gmail.com). Whatever it is you can do, and for some, a donation isn't in the cards (I can totally understand). But even passing this post along to others you know creates the snowball I'm looking for. I've experienced the snowball effect before and because of that, I know it can happen again.<br />
<br />
</span><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;">I'm not a mother. I've never had kids. But even I know how a little something like a clean diaper can make a child's life better.</span><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;"><br />
</span><span style="font-family: georgia; font-size: 100%;"><br />
I look forward to hearing from you!<br />
<br />
Julie<br />
<br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">ps.</span>: Facts to keep in mind</span><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 100%;">:<br />
</span><br />
<ul><li><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 100%;">In the San Francisco Bay Area, there are over 60,000 children under the age of five who are living under the poverty level.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 100%;">The cost of a healthy change of diapers for one child is about $100 a month.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 100%;">Food stamps and WIC program do not cover the cost of diapers</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 100%;">In low-income and homeless families, babies often spend the entire day or longer in a single diaper. Inadequate diaper changing leads to numerous health risks and problems.</span></li>
</ul><span style="font-style: italic;">pss.</span>: If you live outside of the San Francisco Bay Area, you can do your own diaper drive. <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/donate/start-your-own-diaper-drive/">There's info on HAMO's website on how to get started! </a><br />
<span style="font-size: 85%;"><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">Charming naked vintage baby photo found on </span><a href="http://calamityjanescottage.blogspot.com/2009_01_01_archive.html" style="font-style: italic;">this blog</a><span style="font-style: italic;">.</span></span>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-26460645838976576472009-12-28T05:42:00.000-08:002009-12-28T06:23:54.238-08:00The Tolerance Tribute<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/Szi2BGA3xuI/AAAAAAAAFuY/naHIYZoDNOA/s1600-h/cartier.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 192px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/Szi2BGA3xuI/AAAAAAAAFuY/naHIYZoDNOA/s400/cartier.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5420282281450784482" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;">I don't know what it is about me and the writing lately. It's like I left the brain faucet on again. I should be sleeping.<br /><br />***<br /></div><br />The Boy recently found out what a "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Push_present">push present</a>" is. (To be fair, I only found out what a Push Present was not so long ago, too. If you don't have kids, and don't plan to, there's just a whole entire vocabulary that you'll never acquire.)<br /><br />He asked me if I had ever heard of the concept, wide eyed. To which I replied that I thought perhaps the concept of the Push Present is something akin to a Hallmark Holiday, wherein deBeers and Harry Winston, plotting in an evil jewelry cabal, cooked up a diabolical scheme to create another reason for an unsuspecting populace to buy fine diamonds.<br /><br />I'm not sure when the Push Present hit the mainstream consciousness and I'll never be familiar enough with the demographic of new parents to know if this is the totally middle-class/ upper-class American phenomena that it seems to be at the outset. Did this particular gift find its start on the pages of <span style="font-style: italic;">People</span> magazine? Anyway, I'm guessing that in the olden days (i.e., when you and I were born) that the Push Present was basically... the <span style="font-style: italic;">kid</span>. Now it's the kid AND something encrusted with diamonds, which for an earlier generation of moms who never got a Push Present must be a little bummed to say the least, there must be some sort of retroactive compensation, to be fair?).<br /><br />I'm not one for owning fancy jewelry, or even real jewelry. (Which is a good thing as I live with a guy who doesn't believe in buying it either.) I have a box full of costume jewelry and I'm BIG on rhinestones. First of all, rhinestones can be just as sparkly and exciting (and due to their being cheap bits of glass, you can have lots of them), and secondly, if a rhinestone falls out of a ring or an earring, you won't throw up thinking about how much that just cost you. I don't want the pressure.<br /><br />However it did get me thinking about us non-child producing females. The Boy asked me what kind of present we should get. I don't know about the rest of you, but I decided that I should get a Tolerance Tribute (it's all about alliteration to make a catchy and lasting impact on the mind). For putting up with daily shenanigans more akin to living with someone who's part Spanky from the <span style="font-style: italic;">Little Rascals</span>, part Harpo (as in the Marx Brothers) and the rest Calvin from <span style="font-style: italic;">Calvin and Hobbes</span>. In short, <span style="font-style: italic;">trouble</span>.<br /><br />The Boy can be a full-time job, too. I just didn't give <span style="font-style: italic;">birth</span> him.<br /><br />Yesterday we went to the "<a href="http://www.famsf.org/legion/exhibitions/exhibition.asp?exhibitionkey=1051">Cartier in America</a>" exhibit at the Legion of Honor. It's one of those things that you go to, thinking <span style="font-style: italic;">This will be cool. I'm glad I have a membership so I don't have to pay and stand in line</span> and end up leaving saying, <span style="font-style: italic;">Yeah, I totally need a tiara</span>. Even if in your wildest imagination you had never considered a tiara, when you leave this exhibit, you will feel like owning one now is pretty much a necessity. And, that it should be a real tiara, with real Cartier-style diamonds in it. Granted, you might not have anything to wear with the tiara, but that's not the point.<br /><br />On a less shallow note, the exhibit is pretty gorgeous and extraordinary. While your eyes are dazzled and you take in all of the exquisite detail and workmanship of these artisans of a bygone era (yes, because the newer Cartier pieces can't hold a candle to the <span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belle_%C3%89poque"><span style="font-style: italic;">Belle Époque</span></a><span style="padding: 0pt ! important; white-space: nowrap ! important; float: none ! important; text-decoration: none ! important;"></span></span> stuff), you also can't help imagining the subtle pressure and competition amongst the elite who commissioned, bought and wore these items. Who will have the bigger tiara, the heavier brooch, the more elaborate cigarette case? It didn't mention on the descriptions which of these jewels might have been Push Presents, but you can use your imagination there too.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-92106295289562903872009-12-27T18:36:00.001-08:002009-12-27T18:49:13.823-08:00The other one.<div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SzgZtvBIp7I/AAAAAAAAFuQ/qZo3AQjbgSE/s1600-h/Rubber1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 400px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SzgZtvBIp7I/AAAAAAAAFuQ/qZo3AQjbgSE/s400/Rubber1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5420110425046427570" border="0" /></a><span style="font-style: italic;">Her name's Julie Michelle, too. And she got <a href="http://juliemichelle.com/index.html">the domain name</a> before me, dammit.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">***</span><br /></div><br />Since I never seem to have enough online presence lately, I looked into registering my name as an idea for my online store, which has been way too long in the making. A smart person would have done this BEFORE the holidays.<br /><br />I think anyone who's been blogging long enough, and the reasons for doing so morph into other avenues over time, probably realize late into the game that perhaps their first chosen blogging name doesn't hold up in the long run. Certainly my blogging friends <a href="http://bethspotswood.blogspot.com/">Beth Spotswood</a> and <a href="http://calibersf.com/troy-holden/">Troy Holden</a> have found this out. You grow out of your blogger name because eventually it's your real world name that most people need to relate to, not your alter ego/superhero name.<br /><br />I feel like I'm confusing the hell out of myself, let alone other people who might decide to follow me. First it was tangobaby. Then TangobabyinSF on twitter. i live here:SF for the eponymous site. femmefotographie for my "real" website. And now Julie Michelle on CALIBER.<br /><br />So when it came time to see if another Julie Michelle had beaten me to the punch, I was a bit bummed. It's not really that big of a deal, I could be JulieMichellePhotography.com or something similar.<br /><br />I showed The Boy <a href="http://juliemichelle.com/index.html">this other Julie Michelle</a> and now he seems to feel like he's gotten the wrong girl.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-5681117189048303292009-12-27T09:01:00.001-08:002009-12-27T09:24:45.451-08:00And now back to being completely shallow...Thank you all of you who commented on my last post. This whole issue with K and the kids became a litmus test of sorts for me, and not intentionally. It surprised me to see who came out of the woodwork and expressed some amount of care and support for me and the situation. It was certainly disappointing to see those people who I thought would do more to help end up doing nothing at all. This definitely colored my view of certain people and who I thought they were, and made it hard for me to keep in contact with some of them because of it.<br /><br />I couldn't get past my disappointment. But then when I thought about it, I didn't want to. It surprises me how many people talk a good line... but that's it. It's so easy to rant about what everyone else is up in arms about and then live a life completely isolated from what one is so riled up about. I think this happens a lot in the blog world because the platform is so easily accessible. So passionate about political, social and religious issues but then how far do you take it? Do you walk your talk or just like to spread the flames about? I've decided personally that I'm not going to be one of those people if I can avoid it. I'll write about something if it affects me and my life personally so that my experience is what informs my opinion, for right or wrong, because it's what I directly know. There's too many directions one can be pulled in already, and too many distractions.<br /><br />You can't save the world by writing about it and then hoping other people will do it for you.<br /><br />But enough of that.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;">Well, after all of that, I thought I might have something else to add, but apparently I'm all out of ideas!<br /><br />Guess I'll have some breakfast instead. Enjoy the rest of your weekend!<br /></div></div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-56980338291253096172009-12-24T18:12:00.000-08:002009-12-24T18:27:47.658-08:00The Not Full Circle<div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4043/4211574991_cd26d7f8e0.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 500px; height: 281px;" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4043/4211574991_cd26d7f8e0.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-style: italic;">I wonder where she is today. I miss them very much.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">***</span><br /></div><br />This is the post that I've avoided writing for months. Mostly because I've <span style="font-style: italic;">so</span> wanted to have a different ending to this story of K and the kids. But in fact, this story only ends with a mystery and that is very saddening and dissatisfying to me.<br /><br />I am not one for uncertainty, as most people aren't. I expect explanations and causes and reasons and facts. I expect to get the answers I'm looking for.<br /><br />But in order to feel like there's not a shadow hanging over me anymore, I'll post this <span style="font-style: italic;">non</span>-end, <span style="font-style: italic;">non</span>-story and hope that after I finish, I'll have picked up some sort of lesson learned.<br /><br />Shit, now I'm crying as I type this. I didn't want to cry but I can't help that now.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />Many of you were so kind and generous to support <a href="http://tangobaby2.blogspot.com/search/label/K%27s%20story">K and her family</a> when I first met them on a cold sidewalk in April. I can't even begin to backtrack this story but most of you who will read this already know the journey of this little family. I think it's because of you that I've been holding out on wrapping things up, mostly because I know that you as well as I wanted to end this story in the manner that we had envisioned.<br /><br />It's not like there's a bad ending to this story. It's just that there's <span style="font-style: italic;">no</span> ending, <span style="font-style: italic;">no</span> satisfaction I can give you. My goal had been to help them get set up in their new home, which they may very well be living in by now. I had many of you onboard to donate household items and things for the kids. All I needed was the address to send these things to.<br /><br />At the end of July, early August, right after my grandmother passed away, things were coming to a definite direction with K and the kids. They were days away from moving into their new home. Just about at that time, I lost contact with them. K's second cell phone was broken and supposedly it was getting repaired. I had no more money to give them, but we tried to keep in touch. She gave me an address where they would be moving so I could set up the wishlists for people to send items to. But the address was incomplete, or wrong.<br /><br />Long story short, I could not get back in touch with her to confirm the address. I had made K promise not to leave town without saying goodbye and she had given me her word that I would see them again. But I never did. I've looked for them downtown so many times and in not seeing them in places I would have expected to, I can only hope that for whatever reason I do not know where they are, that they are warm and safe and healthy.<br /><br />I did not think that K's birthday would go by without me seeing her and giving her a present. She turned 29 this past October. Her daughter's birthday is two days after mine. And now here it is, Christmas Eve, and my heart just breaks. Not because I can't be with them, but because it makes me sad to think that I won't know how those kids are, what will happen to them. They're beautiful, good kids, trust me. Those of you who met them know this.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />I haven't written this post because I just couldn't bring myself to do it. For the longest time, I blamed myself for failing in some way. Which is ridiculous but it still didn't keep me from feeling like a total loser. If you know me, you know I don't like to do anything half-assed and I don't like to fail. And all this felt like was a total FAIL.<br /><br />And I still get emails from people who want updates, which is totally normal and expected. It's not normal for someone to disappear from your life like that, poof! without some reason why. I can't explain it myself and the last thing I've wanted to do is cause others to doubt K and the fact that she truly needed us, and that we truly helped her. Because we did and that is something I DO know.<br /><br />I've had different reactions from people, some who are angry at her on my behalf <span style="font-style: italic;">("after all you've done for her?!")</span> and the expository questions <span style="font-style: italic;">("do you think she went back to her abusive husband?", "do you think she was lying to you?")</span> and after a while, that stuff just made me extra crazy too. Honestly, I kept waiting for the phone to ring. And I didn't want to feed anyone else's imagination when I didn't have the facts.<br /><br />In my heart of hearts, I know K is a good mother. She had to be to take her children away from such a dire and dangerous situation. I am trying to be okay with the idea that this is really where the story ends, as far as I am involved. It's hard. It's not what I wanted.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />At the end of the day, what I hope most for them is that they are happy and well and taken care of. I know I played a tiny part in their lives to that goal. Along the way I made new and wonderful friends that I still cherish.<br /><br />Perhaps someday that phone will ring and I'll know more. K has my number. Perhaps, but I won't wait on it anymore. It's time to move on and let the story be what it is: unfinished. I never thought a story without an ending could be a good one but I'm going to hope that this one is.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">***</span><br /></div><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">ps. To all of you good hearts out there who are reading this and understand, thank you. I do feel better for writing this all down now.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">pss. I have to thank <a href="http://www.helpamotherout.org/">Lisa at HAMO</a> for inspiring me this morning to sit down and write this post. Like me, she is just a regular person who wanted to make a difference, and in her way, she is doing amazing things to help mothers and children in need. </span>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-19352172717185203562009-12-22T07:15:00.000-08:002009-12-22T16:45:08.827-08:00The Internet TantrumI'm up early for what looks like another marathon day of nose blowing and figuring out which corner of the sofa I'll be foxholed in all day.<br /><br />Apparently, yesterday was the Solstice, so had I not been so self-absorbed (not possible, really) I would have written introspective and heart-searching things but dammit, I missed all that. I guess now it's too late. I'm still in mourning that very soon we will not be able to get Egg Nog Lattes from Pete's, which is a terribly seasonal injustice.<br /><br />Nobody guessed what the brown thing on a stick was from yesterday's post (although some of you surmised it was chocolate: close, but no cigar). And then I got all hung up in reading my own past posts that bear the tag "<a href="http://tangobaby2.blogspot.com/search/label/bitching%20and%2For%20whining">bitching and/or whining</a>". Not surprisingly, there are quite a few posts in this vein. A preponderance of illnesses, work gripes and public transportation fiascos, some of which I barely remember. But at the time were all foot-stompingly, indignantly worthy of the tag.<br /><br />I guess in looking back at my past internet tantrums, all I can say for myself is that I'm grateful they weren't really significant. A cold, yeah... we all get them. And if you live in SF, you LIKE making fun of MUNI, no matter what you say. And jobs? What are <span style="font-style: italic;">those</span> again? I'm broke as hell but I love not having to deal with a dysfunctional group of prima donnas anymore. (I guess I'll have to delete this part of the post when I start sending out resumes again). So life is good, despite the tag I give it.<br /><br />So, here I started out making wads of used Kleenex on my desk and deciding what to bitch about this morning... and still got all (slightly) introspective despite myself. I'm sure I'll get over it soon.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-43130602282275261542009-12-21T19:32:00.000-08:002009-12-21T19:38:49.663-08:00I am my own Grinch.<div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SzA5fmWcFQI/AAAAAAAAFuI/veZknxtMerw/s1600-h/IMG_3878.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 267px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SzA5fmWcFQI/AAAAAAAAFuI/veZknxtMerw/s400/IMG_3878.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5417893566760097026" border="0" /></a><span style="font-style: italic;">If you can guess what this is, I will give it to you. (A hint: it is not a poo on a stick. But it is something on a stick.)</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">***</span><br /></div><br />I am trying to figure out what happened to me today.<br /><br />My mood has gone from zero to 60. Zero as in this morning I was going to walk up to the Carmelite Monastery of Cristo Rey at the corner of Fulton and Parker and sit in the pews. No joke. I was. It was misty and grey this morning but I wanted to walk there to smell the incense. I know you must think I've lost my mind. But I like churches, as places. I can't even explain it right now. (I could perhaps trace it back to watching Audrey Hepburn in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nun%27s_Story_%28film%29">The Nun's Story</a>, but that would mostly be making it up.)<br /><br />In the meantime, between wanting to be a pretend nun and sit in a pew, I have come down with the cold (again, WTF?!!) that I had last week and now I hate the holidays. I don't celebrate them, but I'm so <span style="font-style: italic;">over</span> them.<br /><br />And zooming to 60, as in now I feel like writing terribly sarcastic letters to tangential people I know that annoy me and am feeling very badly that I don't own a typewriter. All of a sudden, I really <span style="font-style: italic;">really</span> want a typewriter. I want to smell the typewriter ribbons and the dust that gets inside the keys. I want onion skin paper to type on and those crappy eraser thingys with the little fan to brush the eraser crumbs off at one end. And I want a real phone. A phone with a twisty cord and a heavy receiver, the kind of receiver where you could screw off the end of it and see all the wires and shit inside of it. The kind of phone you can slam down in the cradle. I also want a Texas Instruments calculator, like the kind I had in 6th grade, where the keys made these clicky sounds and the numbers lit up in little red LEDS. I want a transistor radio so I can take off the back and look at the circuitry that looks like itsy-bitsy buildings and roads.<br /><br />I'm tired of iPhones with their slick, smarmy screens.<br /><br />I want buttons I can PUSH.<br /><br />I think what I'm trying to say is that I want things to be real. Like they used to be.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-84914856956060639992009-12-19T08:02:00.000-08:002009-12-19T08:18:37.838-08:00Fairy Godmother Photographer<div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://15.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kut1l4yt6e1qzci0qo1_500.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 439px; height: 285px;" src="http://15.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kut1l4yt6e1qzci0qo1_500.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-style: italic;">My </span><a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/4162391606/in/set-72157622856610397/">original image</a><span style="font-style: italic;">, with a very nice crop and rounded edge provided by Melissa, who is writing </span><a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://dearbaby.tumblr.com/post/287639650/letters-to-everly-last-night-i-was-feeling">a magical baby blog for the daughter she will be meeting soon, Everly</a><span style="font-style: italic;">.</span><br /><br />***<br /></div><br />I've decided that January is my month. It's the month where I'm going to make things happen, photography-wise. Networking, marketing, whatever I can do. Like I mentioned before, it's not enough to just take the pictures now. I have to try to do something else with them.<br /><br />I'm hoping that some solutions and ideas will come naturally to me (mostly because I really don't know where to start) and also because what I want to do most is take the pictures.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />A few weeks ago, I did a maternity photo shoot with <a href="http://iliveheresf.com/2009/04/06/melissa/">beautiful Melissa</a> (who was one of my early adopters for i live here:SF) and her <a href="http://iliveheresf.com/2009/12/18/brent/">handsome and talented husband Brent</a> (who is the latest subject). I'm loving how their set came out and found <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/sets/72157622856610397/">the shoot to be very inspiring</a>. I'm also enjoying taking <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tangobaby2/3946304624/">photos</a> of <a href="http://iliveheresf.com/2009/10/03/rachael-and-lili-bean/">parents and their kids</a> and I have a few more shoots like that coming up. And some parties, a wedding. Maybe more in the hopper, who knows? Let's hope so.<br /><br />Anyway, there's something very sweet about being on the sidelines of someone else's life. You get to peek in, share some beauty, and then give them something to remember forever. Kind of like being a fairy godmother. <span style="font-style: italic;">Bibbity bobbity boo!</span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">So if any of you have ideas for me, business wise, networking wise, client wise: let me know. I'm looking for all kinds of connections and advice. You never know where the next great meeting will come from.</span><br /><br /><a href="http://femmefotographie.com/">I'm still updating my site, and will be as more shoots come along.</a><br /></div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-75425809705295889622009-12-17T09:04:00.000-08:002009-12-17T09:07:25.197-08:00TONIGHT! Blush Wine Bar! Meet Us!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://calibersf.com/2009/12/03/group-photography-show-121709/"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 272px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SypkuIL_a2I/AAAAAAAAFuA/jjqBzgoF5KE/s400/headofthepackflierweb%282%29.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5416252245500980066" border="0" /></a><br />No joke. Me, Troy and Stuart...we want to meet you! Hang out, chat. That sort of stuff. (I mean, you can buy things if you want. But I'm all about having a reason to dress up a little.)<br /><br /><a href="http://calibersf.com/2009/12/03/group-photography-show-121709/">Hope to see you tonight at Blush!</a> (476 Castro @ 18th.)<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">xoxo</span>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-72936772667342121912009-12-16T19:22:00.000-08:002009-12-16T21:47:38.595-08:00The Beating<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SymigEbnnSI/AAAAAAAAFt4/a5-vXJv_tPo/s1600-h/photo%284%29.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_RnZheVYBZWo/SymigEbnnSI/AAAAAAAAFt4/a5-vXJv_tPo/s320/photo%284%29.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5416038698718829858" border="0" /></a>Just the other day, The Boy paid a man $25 to beat me up.<br /><br />***<br /><br />To be fair, he paid another guy the same to be pummeled from head to toe.<br /><br />***<br /><br />We went to the Relax Feet Spa. (Actually I'm playing with you. They didn't beat us up. It only felt that way. Sometimes. Sometimes I liked it.)<br /><br />Actually, I'm <span style="font-style: italic;">still</span> playing with you. Mostly I liked it except for the few times where I thought I might have a fractured bone and had very bad thoughts about the man who was wreaking havoc with my entire nervous system. I did check the following day to see if I was covered in bruises and I wasn't.<br /><br />This little reflexology foot massage place is a few blocks from our house. I had passed it several times on errands and took this photo with my phone. I was so excited to see this place, meaning that I didn't need to go to Chinatown for this particular brand of exquisite torture. I have a feeling that reflexology massages like this have some sort of healthy outcome, if not solely for you being super grateful when they are over with. I do want to think that other modalities of health care have merit even if we Westerners don't understand them because we only go to doctors once something is messed up. We don't go to them to prevent illness.<br /><br />(On a somewhat tangential side note, I don't know about you but I keep getting a lot of emails from Barack Obama and friends about last-minute lobbying for the health care public option. You might notice that I have stopped entirely cold turkey about blogging about politics since the election. I have given up. I now think both parties are totally useless. But I digress...)<br /><br />When we walked in, a young girl handed us a laminated menu with several exotic selections for our foot baths. We both chose the Chinese Medicine bath. Not only did we get foot baths and foot and leg massages, but that $25 entitled us to entire body massages. The man beating The Boy was the one in charge. He pointed at The Boy after our massages and said bluntly, "Too fat." To which we both stood silently, with big eyes. I did not tell the massage man that we had a grocery bag full of melting ice cream, a big bag of marshmallows for cocoa, and some other things that aren't super healthy.<br /><br />He kept repeating it. "Too fat. Too fat." We nodded to say we understood. "Broccoli," he added. "Good poopy. Broccoli." And then preceded to trace imaginary veins up his forearms. I'm not sure exactly what that signified, but it wasn't looking good. Anyway, we'd managed to make some small talk with him ("Charlie") just because, in his direct and concerned way, despite the beatings, we liked him. He was sincere and so hard working. He told us he came from Peking (he said distinctly Peking and not Beijing, which I thought was interesting). He had lived in Alaska and Minnesota and Southern California, working in Chinese restaurants wherever he went. Now he was "too old" to work in a restaurant, so that is what brought him to San Francisco.<br /><br />Despite the language barrier, it was obvious that he wanted us to be healthy. Despite the feeling that we had been punished for transgressing the physical needs of our bodies, we got a golden VIP Card so we can go back to Charlie and his silent buddy Michael for more pummeling. Perhaps they'll help us get healthier, who knows. At least they care more than the people in Washington DC about that sort of thing.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-82194551272396705022009-12-15T19:56:00.000-08:002009-12-15T20:24:48.135-08:00The Advisor<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family:georgia, bookman old style, palatino linotype, book antiqua, palatino, trebuchet ms, helvetica, garamond, sans-serif, arial, verdana, avante garde, century gothic, comic sans ms, times, times new roman, serif;">Nobody can give you wiser advice than yourself. ~ Cicero<br /><br />***<br /><br /></span><div style="text-align: left;">So this morning I gave an interview to a writer for the SJSU alumni magazine, <a href="http://www.sjsu.edu/wsq/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Washington Square</span></a>. She had found me via the <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/10/01/DDCP19OTUO.DTL"><span style="font-style: italic;">San Francisco Chronicle</span></a> article that came out on October 1 about <a href="http://iliveheresf.com/">i live here:SF</a>. I'm going to be part of a <span style="font-style: italic;">laid-off alumni finds new direction in life</span> kind of article. It's flattering just to be found and contacted, let alone think that someone would actually be interested in 1. my story, or 2. my pearls of wisdom. But it still feels quite odd, mostly.<br /><br />I think part of my dilemma is that I don't really feel qualified to give much of a chat about anything...<span style="font-style: italic;">yet</span>. I'm not an expert on photography or even portraiture, nor an active alumnus, or even someone who really feels down-and-out even though technically I am unemployed. When we talked about my major and my school days, it seemed like an achievement made by someone else. I vaguely remember going to school at this point. Lord knows where my diploma is. (Last time I found it, it was with a bunch of old CDs under my bed. I did not mention that to the writer.)<br /><br />I thought back to <a href="http://tangobaby2.blogspot.com/2009/12/julie-julie-julia.html">my previous post about Julie & Julia</a>. One of the commenters there pointed out that Julia has probably misrepresented her connections and qualifications in the publishing world, as she started her blog on Salon.com and that's not really where the newbies go to get their first blog. And here I am, thinking I'm totally the opposite. It makes me wonder really what it is that people see in what I'm doing. To me, the purpose of blogging personally hasn't really changed, and although i live here:SF is a blog written by other people, I still see it as a local thing and <span style="font-style: italic;">mine</span>. Even though other locals (and some not so) seem to love it, too, and I'm really grateful for that.<br /><br />I get the <span style="font-style: italic;">you should do a book/video/other creative thing</span> advice a lot from people lately. I guess I will. I mean, I know I will. Someday. But why push it? When the writer asked me for what advice I had for other laid-off people who are struggling at this time, all I could say is that they needed to have hope, to hang in there. That something good would come of all of this eventually but to try to force things to happen just makes life harder. That's probably the most experiential advice I could give. And to have fun, if you can.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />I'm basically getting by. Scraping by is probably a better way to put it. I've had some inquiries about other gigs, and have sent out some estimates, and am waiting. If these jobs come to pass, then that will be awesome. I'm finally looking at how to market myself, and use my recent experiences to carry over into something bigger and-- well-- <span style="font-style: italic;">paying</span>. Now I feel like I'm the newbie.<br /><br />I've been taking pictures, pictures, pictures. But after that, where to go next? How do I take the next quantum leap?<br /><br />I should probably take my own advice.<br /></div></div>tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7254153824379805831.post-88435196185145652462009-12-15T09:02:00.000-08:002009-12-15T09:05:33.042-08:00You know who you are.Yesterday I asked you to read a beautiful story about a breast cancer survivor and new friend named Sonia. At the risk of repeating myself in two places, <a href="http://calibersf.com/2009/12/15/an-act-of-human-kindness/">you can read the followup here</a>...<br /><br />I do believe that human beings make the best angels, and so you know who you are.<br /><br />Thank you.tangobabyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01288974184200212536noreply@blogger.com1