meandering thoughts

a remembering people. spider-catching girl. shove me in the ocean, let me breathe like fishes do. breathe with me, like fishes do.

the city is covered, now, in a haze of white and heat. it quiets us, subdues the noise of our cars and our humming air conditioners. gives a sense of ending, of quiet apocalypse, as if we had built all we could build and then we fell asleep, leaving the rows of white stone buildings to entertain themselves without us.

i am unsatisfied with everything these days. missing something, wanting something, not ever knowing what. not ever guessing quite right. writing takes such effort now, it flows from my mind all the way to my wrists, stops before it ever reaches my fingertips, as if my veins had gotten tangled in a traffic jam and life only trickles out of them.

if i am home, i want to be out, if i am out, i want to be at home, usually laying on the floor rolling about. i want everything. to eat and to not eat, to write and not to write... i dont know. and i can't believe im leaving this place- forever it seems, even if i come back, but i am glad to be going home, i think. i am everything at once about leaving, happy and sad and worried and confused, but mostly just in denial.

let's go write about adoption in islam. that should be fun. :D

alleluia boy, bridges and unfolding cranes

we are back. here again, and invincible again, and the words just never come fast enough.

it occurred to her, it occurs to me, that everything is beautiful. talks of god and mind and body and how there's no such thing as a line between them. there's no such thing as lines. i want to read big books and think big thoughts, i want to think things bigger than thoughts. fill me up, breathe me in, lift up inside me until i expand and float away like a hot air balloon. smoke me out, fill me up with apple and lemon juice until i'm too big to fit on the ground anymore. there's not enough earth to hold all of me. never enough sea to sail.

and i look out the secondfloor window, there's a boy on the street. i love that boy, i wonder what his name is. i wonder how we all manage to be human at once. full of pretty toxins, we all are. sunrise prayers and walking contradictions. big thoughts, too big to be called anything but god, like watching a paper crane unfold itself and seeing the creases.

nostalgia for nostalgia, broken things that are happiest that way. burnt bridges only make it that more important that i swim across to see you. it's hot out, i could go for a swim.

live me love me leave me breathe me afraid is nothing we are atoms. and the tiny space between them, whirling around like wind without a voice. whispers of old things.

alleluia boy, a symphony of feeling. never, ever leave me, little song.

if life was a coloring book

we write because we have to, because words are what we are. and i have nothing to write, but i have bubbling, bubbling, toiling troubling thoughts that have no words today.

to be alone with you. oh, sufjan.

and i think that maybe the reason there is so much judgment here, so many uncrossable lines, is that there is no forgiveness. there is love, so so much love, and all of it conditional. you can't have forgiveness if your honor is your life, if reputation is all you are. and you don't need forgiveness if you kill anyone who steps on the borders of your family's reputation.

i've been trying to research this, trying to figure out why my birth and my family and my life are so immutably unacceptable here. but what am i supposed to do, google "arab culture obsession with bloodlines"? trust me, none of the results are helpful. all i get is geneology websites and dating site offers. find an arab husband in minutes? no thanks.

but it makes sense i guess. i am impossible here. my situation, my life, is unforgivable, and if it cannot be forgiven it does not exist. it's like a coloring book where you color everything inside the lines and then cut out the picture- every little red and purple crayon mark outside the thick black lines is lost. we are so zero sum, so black and white, that we can't accept anything out of the ordinary. so of course, i am illegitimate. because if it doesn't fit into our idea of "how life should be" and "how women should be" and "how a family should be", it is wrong. there is no should be, here. there is only what is.

and i love this place, i love it to the moon and back. which is pretty far seeing as how i'd have to hold my breath the whole time. but i wish we could forgive, and forget, and call things mistakes, and have regrets, and accept each other with all our faults, without some pretense of what we should be. we are what we are.

it just seems so unfair, that with everything that i disagree with, i accept this culture. but it can't accept me. there is no agree to disagree in any head but mine.

well-adjusted (ha)

so you know what we haven't had up here in a while?

a rant. and today, i think, it is about time. samira, once again you have inspired my fingers to their angry typing. what would i do without you?

in a particular class of mine, we are discussing the implications of islam and its doctrines on modern issues. or, at least, we pretend to. mostly we talk about fantasy marshmallow worlds where everything is perfect and everyone lives in peace and harmony in an islamic state. but for the sake of argument (and my course credit) we're going to pretend that the class is generally informative.

well, today was informative at least. 

we have been discussing the islamic point of view with regards to human life and reproduction- birth control, abortion, genetic engineering, euthanasia, artificial insemination, etc. and our professor explained that in islam, it is absolutely imperative that a child be produced by a married couple, with no "3rd parties" involved. Thus, in vitro fertilization is acceptable as long as all components of the baby are from the husband and wife. surrogate mothers are not permitted, and neither are sperm banks. so. me being me, the natural question is what about adoption?

can of worms, my friends. can of worms.

i mean i guess she wasn't quite as offensive as she could have been. she is entitled to her opinion, and her culture is entitled to their opinion, and her religion is entitled to its opinion. that's as diplomatic as i can be. she explained that adoption was seen in islam as a great deed of charity, "to take in an orphan" is seen as a great sacrifice and makes you a great person and katha katha katha. but, of course, those "adopted" children cannot take their (adopted) father's name, and do not receive inheritance. also, women must veil in front of their adopted children and/or siblings, because since they are not actually blood relations, they are probably going to have an illicit sexual affair if you dont keep that hair under wraps. 

and again, fine, have your opinion, samira. you and everyone who thinks like you can keep your  obsession with blood and lineage. but dont talk to me about how everyone wants to have a real son or daughter (but probably not daughter), dont talk to me about how "real children" can be trusted to take care of their parents in their old age, unlike adopted children, dont talk to me about the "complicated issues" that arise because parents couldn't possibly bond with a child that wasn't theirs, and don't you dare say the word "illegitimate" to me ever, ever again. my cultural assimilation switches are strong, but they're not that strong.

i dont think anyone has ever used the term "illegitimate child" to my face before. well, check it off the list, it officially infuriates me.

and i dont usually play the walking-identity-crisis, sensitive adopted girl. i really don't. i consider myself well-adusted (ha), i'm happy to have met my birthparents several times, and my parents have always been really good about it. they told me early, i have no recollection of ever not knowing where i came from. i mean, i had baby books about adoption. this is not a complicated thing.

class, is a family people who look the same?

(the class shakes their collective kindergarten head): nooooo

is a family people who have the same blood, and hair, and noses, and stuff?

(another head shake): nooo

oh. than maybe a family is people who love each other and live with each other and annoy the hell out of each other?

(the class cheers wildly).

thank you, class. like i said, not complicated. and usually i dont get so offended by things like this; i mean people have been asking about my "real parents" and "the orphanage" since i've been talking. but maybe it was the awful, awful word choice, or maybe it was the fact that it was coming from a professor, or maybe the fact that she at least made it seem like an entire culture that would disapprove of my existence, but today was a day of sitting quietly in my chair, hands folded, burning holes in my professor's head with my brain.

i swear im going to send samira my baby books. or i would, if i didnt think it would be such a waste of time.

"but how can a father truly love his adopted son the same? of, course, it is impossible. strangers in the house only complicate things."

i. am thinking it's a sign.

 that the freckles in our eyes are mirror images.

and when we kiss

they're perfectly aligned.

i am currently avoiding work. granted, it's my own laura-assigned work, i.e. making a massive master list of every vocab word i have learned this semester in both my arabic classes. wow, i must really want to learn arabic.

everyone always asks me why i want to study arabic, and i didn't realize until this semester that i have no idea. i mean now i study it because i love it, because it's beautiful, because i love the middle east, because i think maybe arabic is the language of my heart-- works translated from arabic into english sound much more the way i write than english texts. the metaphors are so much deeper than english. every word means something, every noun is also attached necessarily to a dozen verbs and adjectives, and everything means more. 

and i think maybe arabic and i get on well, and maybe we're meant for each other. but thinking back, i have no no no idea why i thought this was a good idea in the first place. i mean what was i thinking? i can't remember ever having a reason to study it in the first place- i didn't know anything about arabic, or arab culture. and here we are, 3 years later, and i am in jordan studying arabic like it'll save my life, a middle east studies major with no recollection of life before i knew what "assalaamu a'laykum" meant. it makes me wonder what i knew about it at the time, what i thought it would be like. 

so they always ask, and i always say that i have no idea. i just did. and i just do. and i had to, and i have to. i'll never escape this language for the rest of my life. if i believed in fate, or something like it, i'd say we were meant for each other. 

but i wish i knew how to say that in arabic. and i wish i had a reason that made any sense to people. then again, the things that are most important to me are the things i have no words for. so maybe it's better this way.

do you know what i love, in arabic? the dual. if you want 2 books, you ask for kitaabayn. not itnayn kutub (literally, 2 books, the english way), but kitaabayn. i dont know if that makes any sense if you dont speak arabic, but it's really, really cool. like today my argileh flavor is 2 apples, tofehtayn. it's gorgeous.

there also isnt a word for is, really. i mean there is a verb "to be", but it's not used in the sense it is in english. like if you want to say "i am happy", you say ana sa3ida. literally, i happy. so every time you say i, ana, you say "i am". and i dont know why i think that is so beautiful, but it really, really is.

alright enough rambling about the language i should be studying. none of this makes any sense in english anyway.

bitter lemon and two apples

i really think that dress looks nice on you. i can see a lot of life in you.

bitter lemon and two apples argileh today. that's a change.

today i am a pirate again, but only because i never went home to change my clothes. and i really like the way i dress, but i wear such strange and conspicuous things that everyone i see knows i haven't changed my clothes since yesterday morning. that's what i get for tying massive gray scarves to my head. 

i was thinking, the other day, walking around on campus, that me in jordan is like that weird quirky girl in junior high. the one you read about in books but never knew anyone like her, never knew anyone who would actually 

wear big neon green and rainbow headphones over the scarf tied around her head like a pirate 

(and everyone else wears trendy tight jeans and hijabs and lots of makeup and black eyebrow liner), or 

sing to herself all the time in a language no one else is speaking 

(and everyone else twitters in a language she doesn't speak), or

dance a little bit when she's feeling particularly awake

(and everyone else stalks around like robots, afraid of moving their body in the slightest unnecessary way), or

smile at strangers

(and everyone else's eyes are on the ground or on their friends, or on that weird girl with the headphones), or

walk around alone just to think about things

(and everyone else is divided into clubs and posses, why would you want to go anywhere alone?)

i was always a little different, even in isla vista a little different. but here i am an alien, content to be an outsider. i dont try to fit in because i dont want to fit in, because i dont have to fit in, because this place isn't real life for me. and again, that has always been true-- my head has always spent more time in the clouds or deep underground than it ever spent on the surface. i'm not interested in dry land. but here, here they think i am absolutely, batshit effing crazy, because this isn't a place that likes differences. and everywhere i walk i am the center of attention, twittering girls and staring boys, whispering confused questions in quick succession-- she must be crazy. not even the other americans so what she does. and i just smile to myself, which confuses them even more, and hold my chin a little higher and walk a little more purposefully. 

if nothing else (and really, it is everything else too), jordan has banished any doubts i ever had that i like myself. haha.

2 days ago i decided to wear a skirt. and a KNEELENGTH skirt at that. oh my goodness, i have never in my life scandalized so many people at once. but i kept catching my reflection in the mirror, a long baggy sweater and a kneelength skirt, scarf tied around my head, and i just couldn't bring myself to think i was anything but respectable; not all the glaring college girls in the world could convince me otherwise. 

it's interesting living here, necessarily disconnected from social scenes and social norms, too far outside the bell curve to even see it in the distance. 

and some people might not think that is a positive thing, but i didnt come here to fit in-- i couldnt if i tried. i came to collide with the bell curve, and i am every day succeeding. and, regardless, i dont think there's a single jordanian, not even the skydiving, palace-living-in, blog-commenting, bubbling jordanian king, who has as much fun here as i do.

they dont like acoustic anything here, and i am acoustic everything. they like glitter paint on their hookahs, and rhinestones on their cell phones, and plastic things, and poetry with abab rhyme schemes, and high heels to make them taller, and lots of makeup, and synthesizers and many singers in every song, and shiny cars with stickers on them of the king, and big ipods, and zebra print chairs, and-- 

ok pause i think the waiter just tried to kiss me, cool. dear god this country, haha. it doesnt even surprise me anymore.

 anyway they like shiny plastic, things made in factories and glittering vases. i think this is a place full of high school kids, boys who can't get enough of their cars and girls who just discovered that everything comes in hot pink. 

it is a strange existence i have here. 

also, the waiter just came back to ask if we were friends. would it be weird for me to get a guard dog?

jerusalem- day 1: my heart, where are you?

oh, jerusalem, jerusalem, why do you pull my heart out through my throat in heaving gasps? how are you in one moment so beautiful and so tragic?

shy boys with ringlets and old women in hijab, teenagers in tshirts carrying m-16s, blocking off tiny streets at random intervals. they don't let the old women pass by. what are they so afraid of, with their guns and suspicious eyes?

i dont even know what to write about our trip. we went to palestine and israel- jerusalem, tel aviv, jaffa, and the west bank. it is, like damascus, too big to write about. but i will attempt to narrate it in a semi-comprehensible fashion.

since when have i ever managed to narrate anything in a semi-comprehensible fashion?

this is day 1.

we started off as usual: insane. having spent 7jd on a bus from amman to the israeli border, we had to meet the bus at 6am to leave. my host grandfather (he's far too old to be my father and far too sweet to be my landlord) kindly drove us to the bus station, so as it turned out we were right on time at the wrong bus station. oh, traveling. no matter, we were herded by no less than 15 men onto a bus which, they assured us, was the right bus, and was going to jerusalem.

it was not the right bus.

but, really, we were doing well-- we were on a bus at the time we were supposed to be on a bus, going to the destination we were supposed to be traveling to. all's well with the world? well for most of us haha.

we did in fact get there, where our extremely unhelpful bus driver directed us to the jordanian arrivals building. no matter that were clearly not arriving in jordan, since he had driven us to the border... from jordan? the man was confused. so we went inside and pointlessly put our bags through the scanny thing and then were directed right back out to the departures side. elhamdelileh someone knew what they were doing.

the border was ridiculous, as, i have discovered, are all borders in the so-called "middle east"
(a term i have grown to despise, really, for its utter inadequacy). but it was ridiculous in a different and possibly opposite way than the syrian border. we got off the bus to see, first thing, a man-- no, definitely a boy-- maybe in his 20s, maybe, in a pastel yellow polo with tiny blue stripes, aviator sunglasses, and cargo pants, carrying the biggest gun i've ever seen in real life.

set the tone for the trip, i must say.

we made it through the border in 40 minutes (WITH NO PASSPORT STAMPS ELHAMDELILEH), although they did pull daylily aside and question her because her name is "arabic". in real life, her name is hebrew too, as well as very very very american. they told her she couldn't go through, then later changed their minds. just being jerks, in my opinion. we then waited 3 HOURS for our other friends, who were detained and questioned for the entire time because one of them wears a hijab and her family is iranian. i was thoroughly annoyed by the time we finally got out of there. 

i can't even explain what we did in jerusalem. walking, looking, feeling overwhelmed, damascus gate to jaffa gate, the old city. stone corridors and so, so, so many different kinds of people. orthodox jewish scholars, with their giant hats and ringlets, americans in shorts and tshirts, palestinian boys running in packs, chasing bikes. shopkeepers calling, welcome to my shop. beautiful girl, welcome to my shop. welcome to jerusalem. take this dress for free, come have coffee with me. do you like coffee? welcome, beautiful girl.

women in hijab, with them i feel more comfortable. tank tops and shorts confuse me, scandalize me. corridors, covered, inside outside in the same place. hallways full of millions and millions of things,  scarves and shirts and dresses and dried fruit and spices and sandals and toys and necklaces and bracelets and pottery and plastic dolls and flashing mini helicopters. welcome, beautiful girl. please come in, do you like tea? everything free for you, beautiful girl.

we walk down the corridor, never even so much as looking at them. that's when they think they've got you, when you look at them. eye contact here is very meaningful, very sensual. looking at a man means he thinks he has possessed you, in some small way. so it depends on the day, some days i refuse their black and white terms of combat, and stare right back. what are you looking at? what right do you think you have to even look at me? and whisper like that to your friend? but other days, many days, i accept the terms and look straight ahead. sometimes it is a bigger victory to let them think what they will. 

we walk the whole of the old city, stumbling into armenian chapels and gaping more at the girls in tank tops than at the ancient walls. tired of carrying our bags, we make our way to our first home in this new city. dani's house.

dani is pronounced "donnie". he is our first couchsurfing experience, and already now feels like an old friend. couchsurfing, first of all, is exactly what it sounds. there is a website (couchsurfing.com, go figure), and you go on it and find people in the area you're going to who are willing to lend you a couch for a night or 2. be sure to pick someone who has had several references, and good ones, in order to avoid the natural sketchiness that comes with staying with people you've never met. it sounds a little dangerous, but there were 3 of us, and we made sure to pick people who had previously had girls stay with them, and all given them good references. i'm telling you all, im never staying in a hostel again. couchsurfing is awesome, and dani was the first.

he lives in the german quarter of west jerusalem, which looks very much like downtown saratoga. really, israel proper looks like california. and the sun was shining and i was wearing flip flops and jeans and a tank top, and utterly, utterly confused as to who i was and where.

we met our host, who cooked us spaghetti and gave us blankets and couches, and let us use his internet.  we then went out to a bar in city central, which is now my favorite in the world. if any of you ever go to jerusalem, i will direct you to the coolest backdoor bar in the world. 

parked on the sidewalk (oh, amman, some things are universal) and hung out there for quite a while, talking to dani's actor friends and drinking goldstar, a very good and cheap israeli beer. this was our first experience with israelis we knew, so it was an interesting night. by interesting, i mean weird.

"what are you doing in israel?"

"well, we're on a break- we study in jordan, in amman, and this is our spring break".

"wait you study in jordan? why would you ever want to do that?"

and so it goes. wait you study arabic? why dont you study hebrew? wait do i speak arabic, no why would i? i live in israel. i speak hebrew and english. why would you ever want to study arabic? i mean i guess it's a good tool if you wanted to work for the american government. they do need help catching the terrorists.

dear god. where where where AM i?

and that was day 1. 

another, slightly more relevant, confession.

jerusalem blog + pics will be up in the future, i promise. but until then, i have a confession to make:

i love the yin yang twins far more than is healthy. 

and, all of you UJ students? when you see me walking around campus with my headphones in, head high and eyes straight ahead, the way a girl has to walk around here, you should know that, in my heart of hearts, 

i am secretly breakin it down.

الأمومة

this is a poem i wrote for arabic class. it is called motherhood, أمومة; it is about my mother. and i can't translate it because when you translate it it sounds stupid. but it is beautiful, and probably thoroughly confusing for my arabic professor.

الأمومة

أمي

هي من تطبخ الطعم الذي آكل

من تغسل الملابس التي ألبس

من تصلٌي لصوني كل أسبوع فالكنيسة

هي مرتبطة معي بدون الدم

 أقوى من الدم 

هي أمي

ولكن عندي أم أخرى، أم سرٌية

أم عظامي و دمي

أم ولادتي، مستتر من يوم يومي

هي في شعري، في عيوني، في مكان عميق في قلبي

وأنا إبنتها سرٌية

مع اسم سرٌي

اسم ما سمحت في كل حياتي

اسم سرٌي، هي فقط تعرفه

و يسألونني، من، أين أمك حقيقية؟

لا يفهمون، ولااحد يفهم،

أمومة ليس الدم، ليس لون الشعر

أمومة حب

أمي، هي من تطبخ الطعم الذي آكل

من تغسل الملابس التي ألبس

من تصلٌي لصوني كل أسبوع فالكنيسة

هي من سعدني أن أخذ خطواتي أولى

و أتمنى أن تعرف

أن في قلبي، ليس هناك سؤال، أبدا

أتمنى أن لا تتعجٌب

هي أمي، مرتبطة معي بدون الدم

أقوى من الدم، من العظام

ستكون داءما أمي. 

for the first time in a long while,

i feel like i have nothing to write.

and i feel like that's worth writing.