I'd Like to Give My Thanks

This post is dedicated to two characters, and really to two writers. I'd like to send my deepest gratitude to Mma Ramotswe and Detective Harry Bosch, authors Alexander McCall Smith and Michael Connelly. 

Mma Ramotswe is an amazing individual which might sound funny given that she is a character of fiction. She is always above fair in her judgement of things to be done; she was once on a case where patients at a particular ward of a hospital in Botswana were dying at precisely 2pm on Friday afternoons. When she learns that the cleaning staff at 2pm clean that particular room in that ward and unplug ventilating machines in order to plug in a vacuum, her client insists the maid should be fired for causing the deaths of three people. 

Ever in her wisdom, Mma Ramotswe judges that no good will come from the firing of a maid, who's husband has died and who has three children to support, for doing something she didn't even know was wrong. Wasn't it the duty of the hospital to train the cleaning staff on health code procedure, Mma Ramotswe asks?

After staying with a family who do nothing but yell at each other and cast snide remarks at one another, Mma Ramotswe was almost poisoned to death. She insists that her fee has gone up to the tone of 100,000 pula, but it's not until the end of the episode (or book) that we find out she doesn't ask for the money herself, but for the orphan farm outside of Gabarone. 

When a woman comes to her certain that her husband has bought a Mercedes he knows was stolen from South Africa, the woman asks Mma Ramotswe for help. She doesn't want to turn her husband in, merely, she wants the car returned to its rightful owner so that God will know the right thing was done. Mma Ramotswe figures she will "steal" the car from her client's house, drive it across the border and give it to a police friend of hers who will return it to its rightful owner. Who, may I ask, commits such a creative crime? Only the wonderful No. 1 Lady Detective. 

Harry Bosch is a damaged character, and it's for this reason that I love him. His heart is in the right place, although he makes some judgement calls that place him in charge of a person's life, instead of a court of law. He speaks for the dead because their lives were taken, and with that, their voices. He takes the matters into his heart; he doesn't just feel or handle his cases on an intellectual level, he feels them, and in this, he lives an extremely rough life. 

His depth of character and emotion are nothing that I can replicate with my words, which do nothing but vaguely describe a diamond without illuminating all of its facets. At the end of the day, Harry Bosch is a man seeking justice, a bird with a broken wing but a fearsome bite, a smoker, a lover, and most of all, one who looks to right the worst of wrongs. He kick an ass and send a zinger as instinctively as he puts long-forgotten pieces of a case together, and he does none of this because of personal glory--only because it's his mission in life. 

 

to be continued......

Gentleman

I'm such a gentleman, I thought to myself, as I leaned into him, pulling up the hem of his shirt and covertly slipping a 10 into his front jeans pocket. I couldn't really afford to give up the 10 dollar bill, but I figured I should give him a little for paying for the taxi and the drinks.

Somewhere between the second and third shot of Patron I figured that I could probably order myself a Red Lion or a grapefruit martini on his open tab, and I probably deserved too as well. I was the third wheel with two other people, one an acquaintance, the second, even less so--and the "third wheel rights" probably would have afforded me some personal indulgence on his dime. After all, I'd kind of been ditched by my friend and left behind in the third wheel configuration--one that was supposed to be more platonic, but the booze was working on the two of them, so they ended up lip locked against the wall. Luckily, I didn't have to be the killjoy, because she was the first to suggest we go back to her place. After dancing with the both of them in a bar atmosphere not quite ready for dancing --taking my arms away from his neck, we went outside where his sister drove us all and we reconvened with our mutual friend.

It's a good thing I didn't have that fourth shot of Patron--or I'd have been as wasted as them. I got to enjoy my tipsy buzz, with just enough drunkenness to be silly. Luckily for me, the only thing I regretted was taking my top off back at the house, wandering around in a bra in front of a few people I didn't know too well. They were lucky enough to see hints of a nice rack--a thing not every one of my paramours have seen. If I'd had that fourth shot of Patron the bra might have been lost when he said "let's all take off our tops."

But a lady never loses all of her clothes on a first date, gets too drunk or too loud. After all, I'm a gentleman.

Movement

I'm often in the car these days, or on my bike. Anything to keep me moving. I like being on that tennis court and wish I could come up with a system to get me on the court more often. I love anticipating that ball, matching its trajectory and placing my racquet at just the right place to hear the sweet spot sing with that onomatopoeic "phut." I love the feel of stretching out my arm and catching the ball and smashing it to the other side at that spot, down in "no man's land" that opponents can't get to. 

It's the movement I like. I feel that if I can keep my feet moving and my body tilting forward in air long enough, other parts of my life will follow suit and I'll move out of my lull. It's not good to be a ship stuck in still water, no wind in the sails. 

Looking back through papers I wrote while I was at Cal State LA, I realize how far my writing's come. It's one of the things I like so much about the creative process. I once had a young journalism professor of mine tell me in college that my class's work inspired her to be a better writer and that her writing was constantly evolving. I wonder if Edward Robert Hughes or Albert Bierstadt or William Hogarth felt that way about their painting. 

I read through these papers and I see little things I would change--an altered word or phrase there, a grammatical mistake here. And I realize, as I did then, after coming home from Paris, the trip I wanted so badly, the one I dreamed of for years, the one that didn't happen--that I wanted to be a writer. I'd known that for a few months. Now, in a time in my life where I am feeling creatively blocked, having no new ideas or pitches, not having my voice heard, I look back on these papers and see all that I've done since. I was merely a student then. I've been published in four periodicals since. I was a Senior writer for one of them, a paid freelancer for three, and made the front page feature of a major city paper. 

Onward!--I say to myself. It'll happen again. 

Until then I must follow suit and keep moving, as Tom Petty says "...I dig you baby but I've got to keep movin'/ on...gotta keep movin' on"

Scales

There is a theory that by thinking of something with a lot of focus, you attract that thing to you. This concept has been espoused by many people, including Oprah, and has been written about in many a book, including the bestseller The Secret. 

As a Libra I'm constantly trying to balance things, to weigh them, and to give each side its fair time with arguing its theses. The romantic, hopeful, optimist in me wants to say that I believe in this theory. Maybe it really is as simple as mind over matter. After all, Einstein's genius is attributed to the fact that he used 7% of his brain instead of the 3% we mere mortals use; this seems to suggest to me that the human mind is full of potential that is quite literally above and beyond. And if this is true, then if we think about something enough, isn't it feasible that it will happen? There are enough testimonials from wealthy, accomplished, experts who say they've used the Law of Attraction, and this indicates that the Law may really work. 

And yet, the doubter in me wants to believe that it can't be as simple as that. I dream of being a successful freelance writer. I have been known to have extraordinary powers of imagination and focus and I have literally focused on the picture of myself in an office, about town, with a Blackberry ringing off the hook from editors that want me to write for them. I come home to an apartment that I like, feeling tired, and there is my cat, happy to see me. Best of all I invite a boyfriend, just the kind-hearted, dark and handsome, humorous gentleman I imagine who makes me laugh and wraps his arms around my waist as I stir the dinner I've got going in a pan. 

I can imagine it. And yet, it isn't here. Instead, I've gone many years without the kind of love I want and imagine, and I find that at almost every turn, I run into a wall when it comes to making money through writing. Journalism is changing; it's moving from objective, fact-based, edited news, to bloggy shit written by anyone who has google. If an internship is how one is supposed to move up into a field and make money, then I'm screwed--because I'm too old for an internship. I have enough experience to know what's what, and to deserve pay and yet I haven't been hired yet. I have too little experience for the LA Times or another news service, but I don't qualify for a media internship because I'm no longer in school. I made the mistake of succeeding and graduating, instead of bumming around in college longer than was necessary. 

I have faith merely because life is easier to live when you look on the bright side of things. But that doesn't mean I don't get consumed by fear and disappointment and rage at life every once in a while. 

Hair

Her eyes are dark brown and slightly slanted, with only the most kind of crows' feet crinkling at the edges and above her high, circularly sculpted cheekbones.

I have known her eyes for more years than I can remember. Her hands have trimmed and cut and shaped my hair for more than a decade. As I sat back in the booth and looked across at her, I realized that this woman has seen me grow up--transforming from a knee-high thing with stringy golden brown hair, to a curvy woman with thick auburn hair . She says that I am like one of her babies, like one of the two daughters she's raised. I feel blessed to have this woman in my life, however peripherally she might be.

She, more than I, knows what the real American dream is: I was born with a bronze spoon in my mouth. She emigrated from China and came with no money, eventually had two children, bought a house in South Pasadena, learned an entirely different language, owned a business, and sent her girls to college. She came from not much and ended up with a home, love and a family.

There are few people I have met that give with so much whole-hearted kindness and humbleness. She is one of them. I wonder what other ways she'll see me grow up in. How many more years her hands and scissors will trim away bad men, failed relationships, hopes, dreams from my life. I'm like Sampson, in that I hold a lot in my hair; for him it was strength, for me it is experience. Cut the hair, change the life. Much shorter bangs are punctuating this part of my life. I wonder how many different hairstyles she'll see me wear.

A Note To Myself

my curious mind wants to know
i spin words but feel like I want to hit the ground running
so stop writing and fucking do something already!

First Responderst: City Honors Civilian, Officers for Heroic Rescue in St. Johns Car Crash: Portland Sentinel Article 12

First responders: City honors civilian, officers for heroic rescue in St. Johns car crash

Submitted by Sentinel News Service on Tue, 09/30/2008 - 12:54pm.

FOUND IN:

• Neighborhoods
• St Johns

SENTINEL NEWS SERVICE

By Carolyn Neuhausen

It’s not every day that a civilian is honored for being a hero, but that’s just what happened the afternoon of Sept. 5 at North Precinct. Civilian Seth Russell and Officers Ryan Derry and Christina Hansen-Tuma of North Precinct were commended for their role in responding to a vehicle accident and fire.

At 12:35 a.m. on Aug. 30, Russell and his girlfriend, St. Johns resident Wendy Martin, were driving across the St. Johns Bridge and noticed that a car had crashed on the hillside just west of the bridge. While another civilian was attempting to pry open the passenger side door, Russell ran over and saw that a passenger was trapped in the vehicle, which was quickly filling with smoke.

“There was someone [another bystander] screaming, ‘They’re still in there!’ ” said Russell, a 45-year-old Windermere realtor.

St. Helens resident Larry Dankin, 42, was already on the scene when Russell arrived. Dankin, who served in the U.S. Navy in both Iraq wars, had approached the smoking vehicle.

“I had my hesitation that the car might explode,” said Dankin. “Then all of a sudden this guy in Bermuda shorts [Russell] came running past me and jumps up on top of the car and starts prying the door open.”

Dankin and Russell managed to get the door of the SUV open. The car was filled with smoke. As they tried to remove the front passenger, the seats of the vehicle caught fire.

“There was smoke pouring out of there,” said Russell. “We couldn’t see anything.”

When the officers reached the scene, Hansen-Tuma went to the driver’s side of the car and found that the back seat passenger had flown head-first through the windshield and died. The driver was crushed by the collapsed frame of the vehicle. Efforts shifted to extracting the front-seat passenger from
the car.

Officer Derry quickly cut the seat belt from the passenger. As the passenger was pulled from the car, the vehicle burst into flames.

Two men, Carlos Zuniga-Isais, 31, the driver, and Jorge Erazo-Banegas, 21, the rear passenger, died. The third man, Abilsai Morales-Roblero, 20, was listed in critical condition on Sept. 5 at Legacy Emanuel Hospital. At the time of this report he had been upgraded to serious condition.

Officers Hansen-Tuma and Derry and “Citizen Russell” were awarded a medal and a certificate from the Portland Police Bureau in front of North Precinct officers, their family members and Police Chief Rosie Sizer.

“This was certainly very meaningful for the person you saved,” Sizer said to the officers.

“And to the citizens, thank you for stopping [and] thank you for acting.”