The Shape of Braille Upon Your Lips

 

I.

This weekend we made dairy free ice cream by hand (Hands. Many of them. Perhaps more specifically: Fists.) This was a childlike first for me: I had never made any kind of ice cream by hand before. 

Nighttime and dinner and iced tea and breakfast and daylight and forests and wary legs.

So much good food made by loving hands.

(pause) 

Something I've been enjoying as of late is the feel of my body when there is no expectation to be anything other than what and who I am at any given moment. It is such a full-bodied relaxation. The space between my shoulder blades is pet by an invisible hand into a relaxed oblivion. 

I can't get enough of it. 

I used to hear people talk about "creating a feeling of abundance" and I never knew what the fuck they were talking about. 

I think that I am beginning (rather, continuing) to. 

 

II.

A conversation this weekend elicited the externalization of something I've thought of often for a number of years, now. An appreciation of a particular aspect of language and language acquisition. Something related to what I think of as linguistic ghosts:

In my observation and experience, I've noticed that our first languages can remain as ghosts in second and third (and on...) languages that we use as we learn them. And these ghosts can sometimes teach us many things. Like any ghosts, they can show us angles into life that we may not have otherwise seen.

Go with me, here.  

As an illustration of what a linguistic ghost might look like could include: When I was first starting to learn Spanish- and sometimes even still- if I'm aiming to express, let's say, that someone is two and a half years old, I may resort back to English structure and say Ella tiene dos y medio años (coming from the English description of age in the order of 'two and a half years') instead of Ella tiene dos años y medio. In this same vein, I'll often hear Spanish speakers learning English say She is two years and a half (instead of English's 'two and a half years') which fits with Spanish language structure. In both cases, while we may be using a language other than our first language, the ghost of our first language is pulling our new language into a familiar (and sometimes technically inaccurate) form. 

One of the linguistic ghosts that I have thought of often, and that came up this weekend, has to do with the English phrase of What's wrong? being asked with a concerned look upon the speaker's face to a person who seems upset. What I've noticed over the years is that many native Spanish speakers who are communicating in English may say What happened? (something that fits more with Spanish language structure) with a concerned look on their face in the context of someone seeming upset. 

I've thought about this particular linguistic ghost so many times over the years because I think it's fucking brilliant: Direct and genius and generous in its inquiry. So much so that I'd like to see What's wrong? replaced with What happened?, frankly. 

The question of What's wrong? pushes an assumptive framing that can create so many sites of breakdown in communication. A person can be upset or have emotions without something being wrong, afterall. What I've noticed within myself is that when I am upset, a person asking me What's wrong? causes a break in communication, somehow: A mental stutter. My mind tries to figure out if something is decidedly wrong. Is something wrong, or am I simply just feeling? Instead of expressing what I am experiencing, I feel the need to respond to some unasked for, external framework asserting that something is wrong and, in the process of that, communication can start to crumple up and shut down. 

In contrast, when I am upset and someone asks me What happened? a true, uninhibited and pure response is elicited from me. Easily and almost automatically. 

So, YES.  

What happened? 

A friend of mine looks sad? : What happened?  

A loved one looks angry? : What happened? 

A stranger looks wistful and has tears in their eyes? : What happened?

 

I love this question 

and 

I love the linguistic ghosts that glide from one language to another and back again to teach me something more 

about myself 

and the world at large.

 

 

 

be well; be loved,

 

k.  

[image: Johannes Plenio]

Sometimes the Simplest Move is Right

Come to me

with all your glamour and cruelty 

 

There was a one and only time I went back home for a family wedding. I wore a slim dress and wet-looking and pointed dark red stilettos. It was my little faggot wink to serving Dorothy; post-tornado. It was all so fitting.

I've been thinking a lot about the audacity of being oneself. How angry people can get about it. [Why are you wearing that tie? Where are your children? Are you a boy or a girl? Why don't you hate your job? Who do you think you are telling me no? Why don't you react to the mean things I say to try and bait you? Wah, wah, wah. Don't these people know that the spanking they crave isn't free?] 

It may be the one thing in common with all of the friends I have had for multiple decades, now. Whether it's brazenness, confidence, neurodiversity, or some wild combination of all of it, the thread that runs through them all is their uniqueness and unwillingness (inability?) to give a fuck enough to hide who they are or give you what you want unless (the brilliant unless)... 

wait for it...

...they want it, too.  

be well; be loved,

k. 

[Italicized words and title credit: From Art Pop by Lady Gaga] 

[image credit: porcelaine Tumblr]

What the Handle of a Garter Belt Dagger Touches

 

Lately, I have been in summertime mode. My annual craving for iced teas laced with berries or citrus, traveling to places that will slow me down but will not leave me sunburned, and enjoying the contrast of the cool of sheets mixed with the hot of skin a bit more than usual at night. 

Currently, I have been reading Lair: Radical Homes and Hideouts of Movie Villains (2019). Gorgeous photographs, drawings, explanations and commentary. Villains, who always have the more impressive color palette (such a seductive bruise they all are). Villains who, as it turns out, also dwell in the most incredible homes and hideouts (a purple and blue pearl hidden within an angular and perfect black widow made of pure obsidian). 

 

 

be well; be loved,

 

k. 

(Image: Aesthetic Academia via Tumblr)