the war torn left pointer

so apparently i'm starting to qualify as full blown accident prone, as opposed to the simple and less dramatic moniker of clumsy i'd formerly given myself.

no, i didn't slip on the wet linoleum, setting off a chain reaction of a clattering mountain of precariously placed metal chairs. because that wouldn't involve enough blood.

seems like lately i just can't keep from slicing my skin open. you remember the sub incident, right? about a year ago when i elected to pick up a million ton hulk of rusty steel with my bare hands, in the rain? brilliant. we all know where that landed me. in the doctors office after two days worth of people telling me i was going to DIE a painful death of lockjaw if i didn't get a tetnus shot, then getting yelled at by the doctor for not getting stitches before it was too late.

doctor doom took fiendish delight in explaining the consquences--a slow as hell healing process as my desparately trying to mend finger cracked open every time it was bent. how many times do YOU bend your finger in an hour? MORE THAN YOU REALIZE.

yet did i learn my lesson? no. yesterday i was out in the wetlands of queens bailing reeds. don't ask why, unless you want to get in on the fun next time. so i'm bailing reeds and the work gloves i've so poignantly learned from example to wear are driving me crazy. they're too big. they're flopping around and getting tied in the twine. as i chunk them into the bushes in exasperation, a flash of the night of blood creeps into my mind. a warning? a premonition?

but wait, there's a big difference between rusty steel and reeds. harmless plants. right? within five minutes i'm bleeding again, my hand having come violently and perpendicularly into contact with a hard and coiled vine stem. jesus! who knew they were making vines out of metal these days? because really, it felt like barbed wire dragging down my arm and through my finger.

i saw the skin flap open, and then the flood of red. my reaction? total and complete annoyance at what a FOOL i was for taking those gloves off. the clumsy kitty doll should come with a built in set of anti-cut-your-hand-open gloves. like barbie and her painted on underware.

i tried to stem the gushing blood falling out of my hand with pressure. had to walk, pale, hand over my head, trying not to drip blood on my hat, across two lanes of traffic, to get back to the project base and the first aid kit. my cut was pronounced 'not as bad as last time' but less than an inch lower than the last one. thankfully it's not on the joint. so i got all sterilized and neosporized and taped up tight and went back to harvesting reeds. and i didn't even lay down. i know. pretty tough for me. i think my annoyance overtook my squeamishness. but still, when someone said the s-word--you know, stitches--i ran the other way.

take me to your alien unicorn leader

halloween was 'take your visiting friend to work' day, at least for kiyomi. so i spent the afternoon supervising kids coloring on trick or treat bags and serving as the volunteer p.r. photographer for her organization. it's always great seeing your friends in action at work--such a big part of their lives that you usually only hear about. so it was i found myself surrounded by 200+ kids at a park in san francisco's chinatown, all hopped up on sugar and the 'ghostbusters' theme, which played every fourth song. the above photo is my absolute favorite. i can't tell you why. i just laugh every time i look at it.

not pictured: the unruly bunch of displaced elder chinese gamblers who trickled back into the area when they heard about the free dim-sum. sorry kids! have some carrot sticks.

seeing kiyomi wrangle all 200 kids simultaneously gave me total faith that she is ready to be a mom. of course, i knew that already when she was 8 years old, dealing with a little sister and triplet brothers.

case closed

on the airplane out to cali for my stealth kiyomi mission, i drafted that post about the yearbook mystery. the strange details fresh in my mind as my hostess welcomed me to her home, i brought it up as a strange curiosity. we sat on stools in her little sf kitchen eating the insanely delicious vanilla ice cream and lemon sorbet (lemon-sicle!) she'd made from the familiar fruit from her parents' sebastopol tree.

me: so, yeah. it's totally weird. my name is misspelled. who is going to send me a birthday gift who doesn't even know how to spell my name?!

kiyomi (face turning pink): hmmm...

me: and who has a sebastopool post office box?!

kiyomi: (face ever pinker): yeah, um...that's strange...

me: it's so weird!

at this point kiyomi's face is not only red, but also slightly shaking with the containing of a secret, her chin retreating back and down with the weight of a failed poker face.

kiyomi: okay, okay! it was me! i had skip write on the envelope and intentionally misspell your name!

aha! mystery solved. apparently, a mutual friend of ours who i'm no longer in contact with was moving out of the country, discovered my yearbook on her shelf, and passed it on to kiyomi. what, i gave it to her to sign and never noticed i didn't get it back?!

i have to admit, it was a little anti-climactic to get my answer so quickly, from the first person i shared the strange circumstances with. however, it was pretty funny to be reminded of what a bad liar kiyomi is.

case closed.

why don’t i just get a subscription to AARP and get it over with?

last week my sister, amy, and i traipsed my niece, allyson, through a shopping tour of manhattan. as i’ve mentioned before, now that allyson is thirteen, her interests have radically changed. not surprisingly, therefore, my suggested activities based on yesteryear produced only scoffing and eye rolling. planets and dinosaurs at the museum of natural history? BORING! ‘miles and miles of books’ at strand bookstore? NO THANKS!

so up and down snooty fifth avenue and through the flatiron district we did traverse, the imposing facades of prada, fendi and louis vuitton sneering at us along with the uber cool and unaffected sales people, giving even gung-ho-allyson pause and reminding us, she’s still our little girl, ‘mommy, you go in first!’

this inspired a rule that excused us from many stores: if you want to go in, you have to open the door yourself. once inside, i marveled at what these labels can get away with selling as such ridiculous, out of nowhere prices. a whole line of shoes looking identical to the trashy end of a bridesmaid heel line wore $1000 price tags thanks to the red sole branding them laboutiens. many items amy and i had to restrain our facial reactions to, knowing for a fact allyson would wrinkle her nose at if they were purchased from the goodwill (as it would appear). instead, these drew excited gasps which were only last year reserved for the latest nancy drew mystery novel. where does she learn about this stuff? why does she care?

the answer: project runway, miley cyrus and the likes of other ‘tween idols.
it’s an incredible thing to watch a younger generation evolve. especially when you sometimes still remember of them as toddlers like it was yesterday! having not chosen the path of motherhood, this is something that’s only recently snuck up on me completely unexpectedly.

suddenly you go from the cool auntie who can do no wrong to just another adult. actually, most of the time i was a little too cutting edge for her, prompting her to beg as soon as she could speak, “take that nose ring OUT!”

enter uncool auntie: at juicy couture, where i felt surprisingly much more at ease, allyson said something teasingly to the effect of, “i’m the only one of us dressed stylishly.”
a quick survey of my outfit yielded nothing embarrassing in my perennial standards, the kitty classics, if you will. i sported grandma’s costume jewelry and vintage blouse offset with designer jeans (a gift!) knee high boots and a cropped black leather jacket (another gift!) akin to those recently showcased in ‘us weekly’ (i know, i should be proud) by Katie holmes and even the young gossip girl crowd. the whole ensomble struck me as rather pulled together. and did i mention my super cute new STYLISH haircut?

such comments from a thirteen year old are to be expected (though a new milestone for me) and easy to shrug off. i remember saying similar things to my own mother. except i’m pretty sure her year-round uniform of biker shorts and oversized animal t-shirts (love ya mama!) were worthy of such commentary.

yet, i noted with amusement, that my ego was still stinging the next day. perhaps i am unrealistically tricked into picturing myself as vaguely and eternally hip and youthful due to the fast paced city environment i live in, combined with my tradition of careful consideration my own unique and funky style.
weird, i’ve been called. ad naseum.
unstylish?! never.

as i performed one last hotel room check after amy and allyson departed for the airport, i discovered allyson had forgotten her new black trench from forever 21 in the closet. on a whim, i put it on, imagining a cloak of style would envelop me and inspire me to go shopping to update my image. but eh, no change really. still looked like me, like auntie kitty. that’s when the realization came.

i hadn’t necessarily become UNSTYLISH, rather, i’d simply become OLD.

Sherlock holmes returns to Greenpoint

package arrives in the mail for me. it’s a couple days past my birthday, so it’s not anything super suspsicious or unusal. but we all know how much i love to analyze my mystery mail. so, without further ado, the clues…

1) there is no name on the return address. cause for suspiscion.
2) the return address is indeed from my hometown of Sebastopol. but a po box? my peeps are from the boondocks--the outskirts of this already small town. we don’t have no city slicker post office boxes.
3) what’s more, my name is misspelled on the puffy, beat up, media mailed envelope. again, not a freak occurrence. we all heard about katty joe stemarce. even the misspelling is totally common. st. marie is the way my parents spell their name. my sister and i reverted to the true french canadian spelling back when i was fourteen, just to ensure my life was a total pain in the ass. coincidentally (?) my sister took a married name soon after. nevertheless, even my parents have taken to the ‘new’ spelling. i think.

i open the package, and sure enough, it appears to be a gift, wrapped as it is in birthday paper and ribbon.

4) the wrapping paper is worn and creased, like it’s been used at least 10 times previously. this definitely makes a case for a family member. if my grandmother were still alive, i’d swear she was behind it.
5) disposal (and not reusing—gasp!) of the veteran wrapping paper reveals…..my yearbook from 1991. my junior year of high school. all the signatures are there. eddie’s telling me i’ve taken a beating for my brave sense of fashion. kiyomi talking (still!) about how long we’ve been friends. all kinds of other people i haven’t talked to in years, not even on facebook are telling me how much i mean to them. there’s an old, dead and yellowed flower pressed in it’s pages. it’s a time capsule.
6) there is no card. there is no note. there is no return addressee. i am obsessed. who the hell had my junior yearbook? and why? i don’t recognize the handwriting. amy could have gotten a po box in Sebastopol, but she wouldn’t have misspelled my name and never would re-use wrapping paper.

what. the hell? come forward anonymous yearbook sender, you!

the above photo is my most prominent photo in the book that particular year. the art club. i LOVE the description of how pathetic and non committal we were as a club. clearly i started early on in my career as a misguided artist.

phew!

thank you, america, for restoring my faith in my country and my people. really, during this entire campaign, i felt so terrified and cynical, shell-shocked from the previous two elections. america, i thought you were stupid or blind to your own self-interest for electing (kindof) george w. bush.

in the past couple of days, despite my dour election outlook, i started to feel elated by the possibility that obama could win. and i knew that if he didn't, i would again be crushed, but all the harder.

halle-frickin'-lujah. that's all i have to say.

oh, and i know it's kind of late, but i only just saw this last night. must share. take 4 minutes to watch both.

it is decidedly so (best halloween costume ever)

hopefully you're all too busy voting to bother looking at my blog.
but just in case, i have to share kiyomi's ingenious halloween costume.
kiyomi is 7 months pregnant. not only did she brilliantly use her round tummy to perfect effect as a magic 8 ball, but cleverly, she used it to broadcast her feelings at this timely pre-election halloween, as a magic 'no on prop 8' ball.

for those of you who live in california, you know what i'm talking about. others who don't: it's a frightening proposition which aims to write discrimination into the california constitution by making gay marriage unconstitutional. illegal. it's a giant step backwards in civil rights and wants to tell you what 'traditional marriage' should be. back up a few decades and replace the word 'gay' with 'interracial' and let's all take a lesson from history.

unfortunately, kiyomi's costume was a bit undervalued, as the 200+ kids she led in halloween activities at work aren't too familiar with the propositions. and no, it didn't get the chance to end up front page of the sf gate as kim had expected, as the 8 ball was feeling a bit exhausted, and we opted to lounge on the kiyomi-sized pink sofa and watch the ancient black and white version of 'little shop of horrors' instead of going out. my jet lag didn't complain.
vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote
oh, and by the way--i voted at 7:30am this morning. expected scary lines but instead waited for two minutes. don't delay! go vote.

more celebrations--it's too insane!

today is as good a day as any to share the photos from maria's baby shower. actually, today is a better day than any as (i think!) it's eddie and maria's seventh wedding anniversary. and clearly they got the seven year itch...to have a baby.

may will be bittersweet, as eddie, my high school friend who's been living in new york for 5 years, will graduate from medical school. sweet because--duh--he'll be a doctor. bitter because eddie and maria will pack up their 6 month old baby diana and leave new new york city forever and ever. and my how i've loved having them as my hometown oasis in this big city.

oh, and by the way eddie, i expect you to act like more of a 'virtual' friend when you get wherever you're going, and look at my blog!

for a better look at these pictures, click on my flickr play link to the right and go to maria's baby shower set.

colin in light

sometimes there’s photography and lighting and planning and careful exposure and painstaking composition.
and sometimes there’s magic.
photo by naomi campbell (my cousin—not the crazy bitch supermodel!)

in lieu of a baby shower card...

there’s been this post in my head for months. it’s such a major post that i put it off and i put it off some more, because it’s so major, and so important that i fear not devoting enough energy to it. and i don’t know if anyone’s noticed, but since i’ve been in this whole school thing, my attention span has been less than stellar. my following up habits are nil. my dedication has been kidnapped. i’ve caused friends to doubt me, and other ones to give up on me altogether.

i’m hoping once i graduate this can change. of course, then i sometimes think that maybe there is no catching up. maybe i’ve taken on too many interests, made more deep connections with amazing people than one can possibly maintain. will i always be known as the crazy multi-tasker who can’t slow down long enough to be there? i hope not.

in the meantime, there is this year. this has been an exciting year, a busy year, a frustrating year, a sad year, a blissful year. this year has been all over the place. and yet, i have not. at least, where all over means 'back home'. in fact, were it not for the surprise weekend trip i took to my neice’s first birthday party back in may, the bulk of this year would be spent with nary a visit to good ol’ californ-eye-yay. homesick? terribly. but what makes being absent from california worse, is the fact that my dear friend kiyomi is pregnant.

she announced her pregnancy to me back in may, during my comet-like stay in cali. i saw her. she was pregnant. but….she could have been lying. since then i’ve seen some pictures of a cute little belly. but….she could have stuffed her clothes with pillows, like we used to do at wendy’s house, then ‘jump the pounds off’ on the trampoline. i wouldn't be any the wiser.

kiyomi, like so many of my peers, is really taking this leap, not just pretending, into territory unfamiliar to me, territory where i’m not headed. that’s what the bigger post was supposed to be about (i’m hoping i’ll get to it later). it’s all about my peers going through with traditional roles that i’ve been talking for over a decade about shunning. it’s just, now that they’re here, it’s trippy to watch it all go down like dominos.

but the awesome thing is, even though i’m not choosing this path for myself, and perhaps, because i’m not choosing this path for myself, i’m so frickin’ excited about each one of my friends who walks down that aisle or brings a baby into this world. it’s not my thing, but it sure is a lot of fun watching it happen and bathing in the glow of that radiant light that comes from it.

but the thing with kiyomi is this:the thing with kiyomi is that we’ve been friend since kindgarten. since i was four years old. time in and time out we played together. we built forts. we tortured her little sister (amazing she’s still throwing kiyomi a baby shower!). kiyomi was a sassy little girl. at one point she was banned from my home. so i went to hers a lot. we invented really crucial things together. like strings that turned your bedroom light off from the comfort of your bed. who didn’t need a LAZY LIGHT system? and then there was VAMPISM. together we decided to forever dress in black, worship martin gore, spell out anti-sun-worshipper messages in the grass outside our high school in acorns (yeah, our geeky male counterparts had dungeons and dragons, we had acorn public service announcements), and be KOOL. except it was kind of me imposing my obsessions on her and her doing what she did which was quietly nodding and backing me up, then thinking i was crazy, and running off to an island in the caribbean for peace corps and a really big tan.

all thoughout our childhood we were a big part in each other’s lives. even in fourth grade when we spent all of our energy hating each other. even in seventh grade when she lived in japan and we talked into cassette tapes about the profundities of our pre-teen lives, like the locker-cleaning fairy. god damn we were nerds! that’s right, we used to go up to the junior high school on weekend, since i lived down the street, and break into people lockers. i had swiped the master list of combinations, being a devoted member of the student senate (ooh…corruption!). and how did we use this knowledge? did we steal lunch money? snoop on the boys we had crushes on? well that one would be an automatic negative, since in all of our years kiyomi would NEVER admit to having an impure thought about ANYONE to me. until skip. skip, i love you.

oh, but back on track. we broke into the lockers to organize them. to ORGANIZE THEM. are you hearing me? we straightened the books and threw away the candy wrappers and left little notes signed, ‘the locker cleaning fairies’.

and then, one day, on our conquering of the west road trip, while driving somewhere in the middle of montana or some such rugged territory, post high-school graduation, i said something about how life would be at our school. our new school. UC Santa Cruz.

and then we were quiet. that quiet came with the realization that uc santa cruz wasn’t OUR new school. it was MY new school. hers was University of Oregon. then Japan. and then i went and moved to new york city.

that was the moment that we both realized, really felt that our built-in reality of taking each other’s constant presence for granted was over.

it would be this catching up on holidays and forever wishing we could stay in better touch.

it would be almost missing her entire pregnancy even though i’m thinking of her nearly every day.

so all summer i’ve pined for a visit with that round kiyomi. that rare kiyomi. that mother-to-be kiyomi, my life long friend. and it hasn’t happened. this weekend is her baby shower. she’ll be nearing her final days of pregnancy just as i’ll be nearing my final exams. the thought of missing her whole pregnancy when i’ve tried my damnedest not to miss a phase of her life—even flew down to dominica to visit her on a 15 x 10 mile island—has been killing me. so, other factors in homesickness out the window, obligations out the window, a few hundred bucks out the window, come hell or highwater, i’m gonna be there.

i’ll spend two days with my kioymi. it won’t be enough. my phone will be off because though it drives me crazy, it surely isn’t enough to catch up with everyone else. but i’m shoving my guilt to the back burner and being frivolous and san francisco here i come! rocky, pk, kiwi, twin sister, save me a cupcake!