Author: mathdreads

With Much Gratitude

This was the first time in a couple of years that I wasn’t participating in an annual tango festival over the Thanksgiving holiday. Instead, I celebrated Thanksgiving four times with different groups of people.

The first was a monthly poetry potluck that occurs every third Saturday at a private residence in Dripping Springs. This was only the second time I’d attended and I’d even brought along another poet who had read his powerful piece about a life-altering accident at The Austin Writers Roulette just the previous Sunday. Of course, my favorite part of the evening has consistently been where we all sit around a large round table in the kitchen and enjoy each other’s food and enlightening conversation. What a perfect antidote to all the money-greedy logic that swirls around us on a daily basis.

The second Thanksgiving celebration occured on Monday at the studio where I train capoeira. Instead of having an actual training class, we had a berimbau workshop, where all of us capoeiristas sat in chairs in a circle (roda) and played the different rhythms (tocas) that our teacher led us through. Although I’ve been taking capoeira music classes for nearly a year, I could never distinguish one from the other. Yet, when our teacher wrote out the berimbau tablature on a white board, that made the music more tangible for me. I’m sure my understanding would greatly increase if I actually bought a berimbau and practiced at home. Yet, I don’t need one more instrument to add to my graveyard of untouched musical instruments.  I still keep my guitar in its case and my practice drum kit in its box with the promise that “one day” I’ll have time in my busy schedule to take classes again, which will motivate me to start playing again.

After an hour of playing, we capoeiristas slowly drifted away from the berimbau roda and toward the ever-growing food table, especially when our contramestre arrived with all the food he’d ordered, mostly red meats, beans, rice, but there was a curious absence of turkey…not that I am complaining!

Tuesday, my school hosted a pie contest, where the teaching staff and faculty were all invited to bring a sweet or savory pie.  Two lucky male teachers were recruited to be the judges, a job both foolishly thought was wonderful in the beginning.  Once they got to the tenth pie, they looked ready to vomit. Up until I suggested it, they didn’t even have a bottle of water to help them wash down the samples in between pies.  My pie didn’t win, but I enjoyed the brief camaraderie, which was sweet and fleeting like the best-tasting pie on one’s palate.

The fourth and final Thanksgiving occurred on the actual day. A fellow capoeirista who’s mostly been out of the country on a photography assignment breezed back to the States a few months ago and landed at a beautiful house out in “the country.” I’d love to make friends like he has with beautiful homes where I could just crash for a few months at a time while I worked on my art.

At any rate, the dinner guests were mostly capoeirista orphans along with some of the host’s other friends. One humorous trend among our capoeiristas is the fact that so many of them play chess and whenever we get together, an unofficial chess tournament breaks out. They talk far more crap than one normally hears during a capoeira roda! For some reason, I have never remembered to bring my go board, which is a strategically more challenging game than chess, but I think what I like the most about it is that every piece has equal value; it’s the strategy behind the moves that causes one piece to be pivotal to the overall winning of the game or not.

Nonetheless, my mind was focused on bringing wine, a bottle opener, my unique-looking wine glass, homemade cornbread and the corda I’d been working on.  The latter was an incomplete project that I’d started during a corda-making workshop three weeks ago. Every capoeirista wears a corda to show their skill level. Although some groups just use a rope, which is dyed as the player advances skill levels, in our group, we braid the cordas.  I almost have the skill, but at least I had my own entertainment in the beginning  of the evening when the host and contramestre played chess and I had no one else to talk to; so I braided.

I enjoyed the different social groups and mixes of food. It’s wonderful that the focus of Thanksgiving is now celebrated with a coming together of “family” and the food is the star. I’m such a foodie and Thanksgiving is my second favorite holiday, after Halloween, where everyone puts their best dish forward…then feel guilty about how much they’ve eaten afterwards!

I managed to avoid that guilt since I didn’t gain a single pound. I didn’t overeat even though I sampled all the food I cared to eat.  I stuck to my bikram yoga routine, which helped process and burn off the food. Plus, I made it to my regular Saturday morning capoeira class during which contramestre nearly trained some of us to the point of vomiting!

In addition to eating and exercising, I avoided the Black Friday shopping frenzy by making my own holiday cards.  This is the second time in a row that I’ve done this and I’m so pleased that I’m getting better at my card-making skills.  As a matter of fact, I was less motivated to cut up most of the paintings on my walls since I’ve also become a much better painter.

Since I’m still “allergic” to Facebook, this is about the only way that people who I hardly ever communicate with will get any word from me. And boy, what words they are getting from me!  I wrote out about half of my greeting cards during a tripy open mic and the rest, I’ll write out on location at a 24-hour internet cafe. When I spoke to my mother this morning about what I intended to do later this afternoon, she confessed, like so many apathetic people who I’ve heard from, that she’s cutting back her Christmas card sending.  She’s only going to send to immediate family and those who send her a Christmas card early in the card-sending season.

It’s ironic that she feels this way since she usually attends church.  I, on the other hand, hardly ever attend church, but I read the Bible every day and pray every night.  I just feel that the only gift I’m going to send some people will be my handmade greeting cards, which is a dying art and also one of many of my creative pursuits. When I reflect on what the purpose of my life is and how I spend my limited days on this planet, I know for sure that I’m not wasting my time using my talents pursuing happiness and sharing my art.

Between Bikram & Malbec

I don’t want to be “that teacher” who complains about the lack of vacation time, but for the fourth year in a row since teaching in Austin, the stretch between Labor Day weekend and Thanksgiving has been the worst time of the year. I’ve never noticed that before. Perhaps teaching outside the States for a collective 11 years, with a combination of American and host country holidays, have helped keep me sane throughout the school year stresses.

Over the past 4 years, I’ve absorbed the local culture and recreated my lifestyle, just like I always do when I move to a new place. Technically, Austin’s not exactly new to me, but every year feels nearly new since I explore another aspect of this wonderful patch of the universe. When I first arrived, I danced salsa at least once a week, trained capoeira 2-3 times a week, wrote every day and drinked a glass of merlot or cabernet with dinner.

Fast forward a few years and now I still train capoeira twice a week, drink malbec with dinner, write every day and I’ve managed to fit three bikram yoga classes into my busy schedule, which includes organizing The Austin Writers Roulette.

Despite my stress-relieving exercise schedule, writing outlet and wine consumption, my subconcious still slips me an occasional reminder that there are unresolved issues I still need to strategize. The most recent reminder came in the form as a familiar dream: I was driving a Landrover through a jungle. The road was bumpy, and adding to the challenge, the thick foliage. Nonetheless, I managed to maneuver well until I came to a sudden clearance, opening into huge, muddy canyon.

Since I was aware that I was dreaming, I allowed the Landrover to leap into the canyon, landing safely along one of the walls and continue rolling down. As exhilarating as the ride was, I woke up and instantly knew the destination: despair.

That word just popped into my mind. All the negotiating through the jungle represented obstacles that I face. The canyon of despair appeared because I felt tired. Not the kind of tired that comes from a few lost nights of sleep in a row, but the accumulative fatigue that sets in over a protracted period of time of working hard and feeling that very little progress is being made.

A bikram yoga class, glass of wine and good night’s sleep later, my new destination was hope. I’ve learned a while back that fatigue dulls my creativity and my best course of action was to rejuvenate myself as quickly as possible. In the middle of the next yoga class, I came up with a brilliant solution for work and a clever idea for the roulette. Two for one!

As this year comes to a close, I’m excited about the upcoming plans I’ve made and the new opportunities as they unfold.

Cocaine Spiders

I can clearly remember  back in 1988 when I was 17 and knew that I knew EVERYTHING. I’d skated through high school without having to study, had filled out my college applications by myself and was accepted to all three choices by October of my senior year because, after all, those colleges could see from my transcript, recommendations, and essays that I knew it all.

Even when I graced the campus of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with my presence and struggled with calculus and history, those experiences didn’t shake my firmly held belief that I knew EVERYTHING. Those were just two things that were boring anyway; so not really worth knowing. I had a less than stellar GPA, but I knew I could better if I’d wanted to. I was too preoccupied with newfound freedom away from my strict parents.

As a senior at the start of my spring semester, I finally acknowledged that this sweet  college life was about to end. I’d have to make a decision: either go to grad school or get a job. Instead, I became a Peace Corps Volunteer. One of my older sisters had the bright idea to organize a going away party and advertise the things that I needed on my packing list. I focused solely on those material items without once reading more about Tanzania or Swahili beyond the information that was given to me in my orientation packet.

I figured, with two months of training, I’d be all set with the language and besides, I was smart, adventurous and well-educated. I hit Tanzania like a typical wide-eyed tourist from a developed country. I was initially enthralled by the beauty of the country and the friendliness of the people. Even the exotic infrastructure of contaminated tap water, intermittent electricity, quasi-toilets and crater-sized potholes amused me.

And the ignorant questions Tanzanians asked me because I happened to be black: Did you come to Tanzania because of that Eddie Murphy movie, “Coming to America”? Do you know Michael Jackson? Which one of your parents is white?

Now that last question, I thought was the strangest of all, since although I’m light skinned, both of my parents are black. I firmly told any Tanzanian who cared to ask, but it seemed to be a national concern since among the things delighted Tanzanian children would yell at me when they saw me walking by was “half-casti” or “half-caste.” Just how many half-caste people had there been in Tanzania for young kids to know that English-derived taunt? (Nearly twenty years later, I finally asked my mother who was the white person in our family tree and it turned out to be my great-great grandfather. Since that was during slavery times, we don’t know if the encounter was a result of sanctioned rape or forbidden romance. So in conclusion, I’m 1/16th white, which means that I’m STILL 100% black.)

Just as I was entering stage two of culture shock where the mental walls started to cave in and everything foreign to me became frustrating, the first crack in my arrogant shield appeared. As Tanzanian after Tanzanian tried to engage me into a political conversation about the United States, I was at a loss for words. This was more than me not taking a general interest in politics. I couldn’t even talk much about American history. The average educated Tanzanian knew far more about American history and geography than I ever cared to know.  For the first time in my life, I was embarrassed about how little I knew about EVERYTHING.

I’d grown up in the land of plenty, but it was mostly material things and pop culture with very little substance.  I’d received the perfect Cold War education: heavy on math, science, and literacy. Those fluffy subjects such as PE, art, foreign language and history were just there to make me more well-rounded.

Tanzania was my first experience with working abroad. Since then, I’ve worked and traveled in several different countries and I’ve read as much as I could to prepare myself before living/traveling in each prospective country. Now  I’m painfully aware that there’s more information about more things than I can possibly read about or experience during my lifetime.

For all my research, travel and varied experiences, I look back and laugh at that arrogant 17-year old I used to be. Every day, I’m reminded of something I don’t know, but can quickly look up on some reputable websites. And I’m humbled everytime I attend trivia night at a local bar. I proudly boast to my team in advance that my best contribution will be giving the team a name. The best team name I’ve come up with so far is “The Cocaine Spiders,” which describes how my best effort to braid a capoeira belt looked like a spider on cocaine trying to spin a web. The team name was a hit and another teammate came up with a little move to go with it. Just put your hands beside your ears and wiggle your fingers.

No trivia team I’ve ever been a part of has won first place. My 17-year-old self would scoff in contempt within the safe confines of her big happy, ignorant bubble.

Corda-Making

Similar to other martial art traditions, capoeira has a ranking system that is color-coded. Instead of using belts, we use cordas (cords or rope). With the first group that I trained capoeira, we used undyed rope as our cordas. As capoeiristas advanced, the rope was dyed to reflect the skill level.

With the group I train with now, the cordas are braided using several strands of yarn, which are divided into four equal parts. I must admit, I originally thought that I’d have no problem picking up the technique since I know how to braid hair. Ha! That may have caused me more trouble. During our corda-making workshop, I undid my pitiful-looking corda, which reminded me of the picture in my high school Biology book of how badly a spider spins a web when on cocaine. The other capoeiristas eventually got the hang of it and advanced.

I didn’t mind being the slow kid in class since I’ve had other successes in life and realistically knew that I wasn’t going to catch on to every new skill quickly. As a matter of fact, right beside me, was the whiz kid of corda-making and he completed one and a half  cordas by the end of the night to my one fourth of a corda.

The best part of the workshop for me was when the capoeirista who was teaching us sat down beside me and had me mimick exactly what she did. Turned out, I was making it more complicated than it needed to be. I took my unfinished corda home with the promise of completing it. The ironic thing about the entire evening is that I had requested the workshop and turned out to be the least talented at it.

Here I go again, making another analogy between capoeira and life, but it’s one of the ways that I analyze my current situation. As I contemplate a change in career, I have taken an inventory of the skills that I have, but more importantly of the skills that I lack and want to acquire. I realize that any new career that I embrace, I have to start at the entry level. The trade off for me is the opportunity to learn a new set of skills. I may not catch on quickly, but with the right mentor to guide me, my desire to learn will see me through any learning curve.

Black Angel Halloween

For this month’s Austin Writers Roulette, I dressed up as the Angel of Redemption, which worked because I introduced myself as such and then read my short story, “Renouncing the Devil.” Yet, when I put on the same costume yesterday to celebrate Halloween, my favorite holiday, I just told people that I was a death angel. Short sweet and no further explanation necessary…of course no one guessed that.  Instead I was asked if I’d dressed as Lady Gaga or Nicki Minaj.

My first stop was at a friend’s apartment where many of us started our night.  A group of them got together to be dress like lucha libre characters. Another was a power ranger and I was amazed to see the flamboyance of the Mad Hatter. That got me into the Halloween spirit.

Unfortunately, none of my friends from that party were going to the Zombie Ball with me. One of the days, I’m going to convince at least one other person to attend. Nonetheless, this being Austin, I was immersed into a friendly, creative crowd of Halloween revelers who enthusiastically posed, sometimes for multiple shots, given my shitty camera.

I had a great time dancing and watching groups of people strut their stuff down the red carpet to have their picture taken.  I conveniently stopped them to take their picture as well. Some costumes were cleverly from the neck up like the fish head couple,  but others were far more elaborate such as the samurai and geisha couple. The scariest couple was the zombie prisoner and a woman who just looked like voodoo incarnate. 

When I finally went inside, a pole dancer was in the middle of her routine. Unlike last year, this performer entertainer wowed the crowd with her skills without taking her clothes off. At the risk of sounding prudish, I think it’s sexier to leave something to the imagination…

Unless you’re a burlesque performer! Those ladies cleverly worked in the big reveal after three or so minutes of singing, dancing and teasing the crowd. What was so refreshing was the confidence the women had strutting their stuff without a care in the world–or plastic surgery.

Then a three-member troupe of circus performers contorted their bodies, danced with twirling lights and hula hoops.

Around midnight, the costume contest commenced. The female winner was a skeleton showgirl and the male winner was a zombie, but he won not just for how well he did his make up, but he had the most impressive zombie walk, truly adding another layer to the whole costume.

In between pole dancing, aerial dancing, costume contest and burlesque, a couple of bands played.  The first one I wasn’t too impressed with and went back out to the red carpet to oooh and aaah over the costumes, but the second band was edgy and threw in jazzy tunes and quick syncopated rap. The last band of the night were from Brooklyn and had lots of percussion. I listened to about half of their set before my age caught up with me, dreaming about what I want to be next year.

Spirit Week 2012

This is my favorite week of school: Spirit Week.  Granted, I love celebrating Halloween; so this is almost the “warm up” to that. Monday was “Crazy Hair Day.” Most days, I fight with my hair to minimize its craziness.  On this particular day, I upped the ante. Several Halloween celebrations ago when I still lived in Monterrey, Mexico, I had enough time on my hands to design and assemble several snake headds out of felt in order to be Medusa. Although I took a huge creative license, I did a great job conveying “snakeness.” Medusa needed her snakes in order to turn people into stone.  I, on the other hand, with a close up of my morning face, can stop people cold in their tracks!

Tuesday was “Twins Day.” Last year, I wanted the other teachers in my academy to wear one of our academy Tshirts and I also asked if they would wear a dreadlock wig. I’m sure there was a collective laugh over that request.  Well, this year, I loosened my net and invited the entire school to wear their HS rockets club Tshirts and dreads. This time, one other teacher took me up on my offer; so I had a twin this year!

Wednesday was “Wear Your Class Color Wednesday.” Students were quite enthusiastic, dressed in their assigned class colors: black, pink, yellow or green, depending on if they were a senior, junior, sophomore or freshman.  I dug up on of my Class of 88 Westover Wolverines Tshirt.  None of my students seemed to noticed that I graduated from HS before they were born.

Thursday was 80s Day. As much as I’d like to forget the horrible fashion of the decade, people still love to dress up like clowns. About the only thing I had to contribute to my look were the black spandex pants. A friend lent me the chain belts and for some funny reason, she also lent me several banana clips.  As if I’d bother fighting with those things in my dreads.  Instead, I spent far too much time, putting my locks into a series of elastic bands to form a ponytail.  That was pretty authentic since I’d used to wear my hair like that in the 80s–predreadlock days.

Friday was School Spirit Day.  This was the least creative day for me. All I wore was a school Tshirt that I would have normally worn on a Friday. Yet, something miraculous occurred. One of my students had hinted earlier in the week that he had a gift for me. This morning, he brought the gift.  My jaw dropped when he handed me three Bob Marley LPs. Vinyl!  I didn’t even know my students knew about vinyl.  Over the years, thanks to technological advancements, my students barely know how to tell time, using an analog clock, the concepts of clockwise/counterclockwise and how to write in cursive. I hugged my student for gifting me the albums and said that I’ll now have to buy a record player at Goodwill. One thing’s for sure: I’ve now got more interesting art work for my walls at home.

Burning Away Illusions

For a change of pace, I met a small group of people at a park in Georgetown for “camping.”  Granted, we were at a campsite and even had a beautiful view of the lake, but none of us had brought tents, much less sleeping bags. We had food to share, plenty of drinks and a surprising amount of chopped wood for the campfire.

I had originally planned to leave at dusk so I could take advantage of the fleeting sunlight to help guide me out of the park, but I was enticed by the beauty and warmth of the fire. As conversation swirled around me amongst my companions, I stared at the lively flames and mediated.

At one point, an unbelievably huge tree stump was ungracefully plopped into the fire and I witnessed the bark burn away followed by steam, unlike the smoke of burning wood, the steam arose from the wetness of a light drizzle earlier that day.  From my perspective, the stump appeared to be smoldering from within.

Just the night before, I’d been seized by a poetry attack  and had written a series of haikus; so I was not surprised to find myself in a philosophical state. I related the burning of the bark to the shedding of outer appearances and the smoldering as the passion from within rising to the surface. Again, as I’ve asked myself many times in the past couple of years, “What can I do differently to be fulfilled?”

I’ve been short-changing myself for a while and like the lively flames, I’ve been in motion the whole time. My energy consumed, my ashes environmentally disposed of, but like all machines, not all of my energy has been used for productive work. Some has been lost into the atmosphere. Some has been inefficiently used for dead-end pursuits. Some has been drained in order to satisfy others. When I reflect on the amount of my potential energy that has been used for pursuing my own happiness, I’m still optimistic that I’ve at least attempted to do my heart’s desire–all with varying degrees of success.

What remains, what the fire reminded me of, was a lesson that I’ve been aware of, but not completely learned. My fire, which fuels my passion, needs to burn away the illusions. I’m still trapped by the illusion of not being free. Everyone has limitations, which are human attributes. Yet, I’ve become too caught up in the daily grind of work and my busybody social life to mediate on what are my actual limitations and what are the limits other people have put upon me. I have allowed some people to toss me into their own fire pit because they are well aware of how much energy I have to offer.

Yet, lively fires such as mine have sparks that can burn as much as the flame itself. The greatest fires consume a lot of oxygen and leave the room breathless. Fires cleanse, leaving an area fertile for the germination of the next fruits. Fires can warm you, burn you, cook your food or destroy it. Fires command respect.

I’m thankful for that campfire for reminding me of the power I have to transform my situation.

Opening the Third Eye

Toward the end of teaching my most behaviorally challenging Physics class, I paused my explanation of how to use the kinematic equation, which displayed on the powerpoint, so students could jot down some notes. One of the biggest disrupters, both in size and “spiritedness,” took advantage of the silence and said, “Ms. Roberson, let me know when you’re ready to open your third eye.”

I was geniunely impressed by this particular off-topic statement, given the fact that not 10 minutes earlier, he’d grumbled under his breath, “I don’t wanna be in this f****** class,” presumably because he’d learned that after scrambling to turn in some last minute late work, he’d still fallen short of a passing grade for the first marking period.

I smiled at his invitation to help me open the portal to a deeper enlightenment. Later on, I wondered if he’d just heard about opening one’s third eye somewhere or if he actually knew the depth of what he’d said.  I would’ve loved to discuss spirituality with him and I’m sure the rest of the class would have enjoyed an off-topic discussion since that would’ve taken us off the apparent subject at hand.  Also, my students would have been pleasantly surprised to learn that there are theoretical physics concepts to explain consciousness; it’s just not on the curriculum so I don’t teach it.

Over the weekend, I did a little research to better understand the ramifications of opening my third eye. I’d already known that the third eye housed intuition, but I didn’t know that opening that particular chakra would cause me to have visions in vivid purple, gold and intense white. Some people with open third eyes can see the souls of people who have committed suicide and are ashamed of what they did, but are too afraid of being judged to move on. Others become more sensitive to the energy of the people around them. Often times, if someone with an opened third eye is in a crowd of mostly negative people, then the enlightened person feels drained.

One strategy for dealing with negative energy is to avoid negative people. Another suggestion is taking a cooler shower than one’s used to and visualizing the cool water washing away the negative energy. As soon as I read that, I better understood how lap swimming helped relaxed me.  I always visualized my stress dissolving into the water and in that relaxed state and in motion, I could usually come up with creative solutions to problems I was having, usually teaching-related.

I never associated this phenomenon with spirituality since it made so much sense corporally. As a matter of fact, I’ve developed such a thick skin, I don’t know if I can afford to shed it and become more sensitive to other people’s energies. I certainly don’t want to open myself up more of the tragic-draining energy that my students bring with them to class. I get enough of that when I call their parents when my students’ behavior gets  out of hand.

At the same time, if I better understood how to channel my students’ energy into something positive, then that would be well worth it. Even if the effect wasn’t assessed on one of those soulless standardized tests, in the long run, my students would benefit from learning how to discipline their energy constructively.

Writing Transformation

Nearly two years ago, I joined a professional writing group, which had the main objective of fostering the talents of writers who were serious about persuing a romance writing career. My first novel, Tribe of One, is about 30-something, single, Black woman looking for Mr. Right; so I thought perhaps I was a budding romance writer.

I learned a lot about craft, the publishing industry, agents, filing taxes as a small business and many other things that I had been previously ignorant about. Each month, I’ve eagerly looked forward to every meeting (and so far, I’ve not missed a single one!) because I always walk away more informed than when I came.

A few months ago, I entered my current work-in-progress (WIP), The Adventures of Infinity and Negativa, into three different contests, all sponsored by various chapters of the professional writing group of which I was a member. My scores were in no danger of winning, as I knew they would not be. I’d only entered them for the critiques that I’d receive. The most hostile judges’ opinions were the best.

All the critiques about punctuation, grammar and the such I can pay a professional editor to help me clear up. The most hostile contest judges helped clarify the biggest obstacle that had produced near writer’s block symptoms: I am not a romance writer. Once that conclusion was brought to my attention, I knew I would not renew my membership. I got a good night’s sleep and woke up knowing exactly what needed to happen to transform Adventures into what it needed to be.

I felt free and rejuvenated. Once I abandoned how I thought the story should be written in order to fit within the romance genre, I dedicated myself to making Adventures into the math-based, action-packed story it is. Thanks to the months of craft that I’ve learned, I see all the errors of fakery that had weakened my WIP.

Some of the most painful revisions have involved deleting several paragraphs in a row. I cheer myself up, knowing that I’m strengthening my WIP by getting rid of what does not belong in the story. Plus, it’s always a good exercise to write up things about the characters so that I know their history even if the reader will never know.

Now, every morning when I sit down to write while drinking my smoothie, my cursor hovers over what will become the day’s casualty that makes room for the additional paragraphs that should be there. Next time I think I’ve come down with writer’s block, I’ll have to take a long look at what I’m attempting to do to make sure it is inline with the story I’m writing. For this latest enlightenment, I thank the two contest judges who hated my unromantic WIP, but thought my writing skills showed promise.

Creative Expansion

Frederick Douglass believed that with literacy, one would forever be free. So, how is it I, a highly educated and avid reader, have managed to feel trapped?

I just lived through another aniety-filled week where I may have slept well for two nights, but not in a row.  I used to be able to exercise my way through stress, but I believe my middle-aged onset sentiment is causing me to take things, both good and bad, more to heart.

I know the pitfalls of thinking that I can only employ one strategy to remedy a situation. As much as I want to explore my options, I am still  limited by time. I’ve recently changed my schedule in order to do different things, meet new people and have more meaningful conversations with some of my closest friends.

At some point, inspiration hits out of nowhere and I suddenly know how to edit and advance the story that I’m working on. By chance, I hear on the wind an idea that I need to try to improve the event I organize, the Austin Writers Roulette. And I germinate the seed of a creative lesson that I’ll have to find the time to write and by some miracle implement even though I’m behind in going over the scripted lessons and obligatory assessments.

In addition to literacy, I believe creative expansion will help me to be free. As long as my mind can think its way out of situations, then I won’t be trapped for long. The trick is not to simply deliver myself from undesirable circumstances, but to land myself in more fertile grounds.