The plane lands in Puerto Rico, where I will spend the next three months. I’m staying with my tía, who doesn’t speak much English. She has scars where one of her breasts once was and yells at me when she discovers that I’ve used her scar cream on myself. Realizing what I’ve done, I fear that I too will lose my left breast, even before it has had a chance to develop.
A year before the house with the animated inanimate objects, I’m on the jet-way in Orlando, excitedly nervous for my first flight. It’s summertime, the plane is stuffy, and despite the adventure of flying, I’m fighting tears. The stewardess checks on me, bringing an unnecessary blanket, as I stare out the tiny window towards the terminal at the hazy silhouette of my father waving a white handkerchief. He has made arrangements for me to stay with an aunt on the island. For my own safety, he is sending me away.
The first time the toilet flushes on its own, I dismiss it as an issue with the plumbing in the new-to-us house. I have other things on my mind: navigating our newly integrated family, figuring out what to call the woman who is not yet legally my mother but who doesn’t get hung up on such technicalities as she lays down rules and seems to be aware of my every move. I’m leery not only because I don’t want to lose my freedom but also because some of the rules — such as being in the house by sunset — are contrary to my survival instincts.
It is our failure to become our perceived ideal that ultimately defines us and makes us unique. Steal Like an Artist by Austin Klein Of course, this is not THE thing that defines us and makes us unique. But it is ONE of the experiences of what it means to be human. We each fail uniquely (ala The Anna Karenina Principle). Perhaps it isn’t how we fail but how we respond to the failure that…
While it is already obvious from the title of this series and from the intro to this post, let me state clearly that the event I ran for Ness Labs did not go according to plans. It started off with the odds against it.
I woke up to my alarm at 6 am that Saturday morning. This is not a typical Saturday occurrence…
For the past seven years, I’ve had a file dedicated to a series of writing workshops that I’ve dreamt of facilitating. The first workshop in the series is a prompt-based generative writing event called Leap! The idea is to do a series of timed prompts with a focus on creating new ideas and rough starts of works during the session. For the next workshop, each participant would pull together a more focused piece and create…