pupusasconcurtido

woke up to paulina’s molletes, taquitos, salsa verde, scrambled eggs, milky coffee. molletes are mexican breakfast food made with soft french rolls spread with refried beans and cheese. kia usually decorates hers with pico de gallo. j.p., lolan and i rolled out of beds and rolled down the stairs into paulina’s cooking where caitlin, jules, roberto and josh soon joined us. i had a grapefruit for dessert. is that okay, to have dessert at breakfast? i think that’s how you know your life is really a lovely pleasure, when you have dessert at breakfast.

or when bryan proffitt drops by after breakfast and completes the circle. or when mom and her husband, rush, roll up with a new pair of shoes for you and you have mugs of masala chai ready for them, and they join your friends to discuss how much of racist/capitalist/sexist/heterosexist oppression’s existence has to do with human nature. i went with rush and mom to cary to visit little india. when we came back to durham, i introduced them to this big grocery store in the historic hayti district that has been turned into an international foods market. we sat down for delicious pupusas with curtido from the cafe. pupusas are like gorditas or arepas, fat cornmeal patties filled with frijoles y queso (o carnitas, si tu eres rush). curtido is a spicy cabbage carrot relish that you top pupusas with. i learned the delight that is the pupusa in the mission district in san francisco with the limpid-eyed amal mongia. in the pupusa’s home of el salvador, la día nacional de la pupusa is celebrated as an official holiday on november 13 (though, let’s be real, everyday is pupusa day).

when i got home, josh was hanging out working on a website, so i invited him to come hang out in my room and help me be excited about organizing/cleaning/discarding/packing belongings. he did work while i embarked (finally!) on that stupid pile of papers on my floor. why is it so much easier to attack an odious task when you have someone cool around? we called kelly-o and caught up on all her latest by speakerphone. we fixed up a meal of quesadillas, beans, salsa verde, hummus, kalamata olives, fried marinated tofu, and mango juice (and brought some up on a silver tray to paulina and lolan). back to cleaning.

grapefruit&agamecalledscramble

still buzzing from dancing the night before, and a little giddy about being back in durham, i headed to meet russell, my incredible organizing coach. we met at bahn’s vietnamese restaurant and wandered later to a coffeeshop. our fortune cookie insights: “even the longest of days will come to an end” and “consider your impressions: follow them once in a while”.

russell pointed out at some point that i was gushing with thoughts and questions about how to do the work, but that it may help to step back and state my goals. here are the raw notes from the brainstorm of what i hope results from the work i do at highlander (w/ apologies for streamofconsciousness format):

More youth-led youth organizations in the South (youth being people under 18). More development of our intergenerational organizing talent, with participatory democratic decision-making. More youth leadership in organizations that aren’t strictly youth. New appreciation and better instructions for the roles of mentor, adult ally, supporter. New analysis around ageism or maybe just more accessible education. More money for youth and intergenerational work, or maybe just a better plan for how to use our funds collectively and effectively. Fun. More work for youth happening in all kinds of spaces- rural, urban, poor, etc. Long-term work with youth. Would it make more sense to focus the impact of these changes on a certain sector of the work or a geographical region, or to work with as broad a group as possible?
Compassionate, just, loving world with dignity, health and just enough resources for everyone. Youth are not the most important in bringing this about, necessarily, but they are people I have relationships with, and a talent for working with. And they are more fun. How would I work with kids towards this just world? Is there a specific role for youth? I feel like every step we make needs to be in the direction we truly believe we oughta go.

and russell also suggested that this may be a tough time for me, even if i am pushing down those kinds of feelings- it is the first time i’ve made an indefinite move outside of the triangle in north carolina (though i’m keeping my room at the nest in durham). he encouraged me to make this list:

How to be gentle with yourself, especially when you’re going through a potentially hard transition

1. Having good food
2. Keeping in touch with the people who matter to you
3. Writing
4. Stretching and doing yoga. Exercising, at least in theory
5. Prayer
6. Hot baths, particularly those with bubbles
7. Sleep
8. Not blaming yourself for not doing these things or for anything else
9. Coming to Durham sometimes {the source of all things wonderful}
10. Setting healthy boundaries early. Speaking up for yourself often- whenever there’s the least indication it might be useful
11. Being cognizant of the power dynamics in the space. Naming them
12. Dancing

i am so-o-o appreciative for russell’s role in my life. here is a love letter i wrote to his circle of supporters about him:

Dear Supporters of Russell’s Work,
I learned of Russell several years ago when I was working with some other young people to mobilize large numbers of folks from the Triangle to ride buses to D.C. for a protest against the IMF and the World Bank. We wanted to train our group in nonviolent civil disobedience, so I called an elder mentor and friend, Mandy Carter. She said that she wasn’t conducting those kinds of trainings these days, but she would refer me to another friend from her War Resisters League days, a fellow named Russell Herman. I felt nervous about making the cold call, but she reassured me that he would be happy to help. Indeed, we ended up talking on the phone for hours about my work; he ended up asking me if I benefited from our conversation and would like to try it again sometime. He conducted an excellent training for our group of young people and he didn’t charge us a dime- he just asked that we allow him to keep in touch with us through letters like the one you are reading.

My name is Manju Rajendran and I’m a 26-year old organizer from Durham. I grew up in North Carolina and I’ve been involved in movement work since I was 12. I am one of the many folks who directly benefits from Russell’s powerful and intentional coaching. I can confidently say: I love Russell, I have been moved by the impact of his efforts, and I am committed to the longevity and growth of his work. I am writing to you because I am making a financial donation this season to Russell, and I hope you will, too. I grew up working class, and I’m scraping by right now, but I’m convinced that supporting Russell’s work is an investment that will pay off in much-needed and often-dreamed-of social change.

Russell has been my personal organizing coach since March 2000. On a good year, I meet with him on at least a monthly basis. Russell asks me great questions, challenges my shortcomings, and cheers me at every step of my progress. For example, I met with Russell to figure out if I should accept an offer to come to South Carolina to be the media and communications director for an LGBT people-of-color-led statewide campaign against an unjust amendment this past fall. We agreed that I would gain skills and make connections that would be useful for my long-term goals for improving living conditions in North Carolina. While I was working on the campaign, Russell coached me over the phone every week, and his experience and wisdom were invaluable. Now, I am beginning a new job co-coordinating Highlander Research and Education Center’s southeast regional youth work, and Russell is continuing to support my leadership development.

There are some things that are immediately apparent about Russell. His skills as a trainer, mediator, facilitator and coach are awe-inspiring. He bears a quiet, calm demeanor and he carries a compendium of knowledge that he generously shares. There are also mysteries: where does he find the energy to pour so much love and attention outward? How does he find the time to write a thank-you note for every lovely thing that transpires between us? When I have given money to support Russell’s work, I have wondered who you are- Russell’s network of friends, the kin with a vision of a ripe, just world growing from this red clay land we love. We will meet each other in time.
Please join me in giving a donation to Russell’s work, as much as you are able.
With much respect, love, and gratitude,
Manju

if you would like to help sustain russell’s work, please tell me so and i’ll help make that happen.

i headed home with great hopes of tackling the pile of papers on my floor, but i got a call from my old friend dion tyler, my roommate from 9 years ago when i first moved to durham to work for youth voice radio as a public ally. it was so wonderful, as always, to catch up with him. he built muscle grating an immense pile of cheeses for my macaroni casserole. we used two sharp cheddars, mozzarella, and parmesan.

sally dropped by for a moment on her way to see the hushpuppies. she pulled a pimp-my-violin on the violin daniel gave me. she altered the bridge and made it more fiddling-appropriate, replaced the strings, and replaced a fine-tuner. it sounds so much better. i know cuz she played for me. now i have to find a fiddle teacher on the mountain.

paulina made cheese tortellini in tomato sauce, emily chavez made sweet potato fries, caitlin made fire lentil stew (a family recipe involving fire-colored vegetables), alexis and jurina brought herb-roasted chicken, andy pearson and lisa brought wine, josh reynolds and roberto brought more wine. i remember josh, now, though i didn’t place him from his name originally. i met him years ago when he was working for empty the shelters. it was during olympics summer, when kelly-o brought youth voice radio kids to meet organizations in atlanta. we met in north carolina and tennessee, later. i coaxed emma to help with the last of the mango-raspberry-strawberry-orange ice cream before he left. after dinner and some worst-embarrassment stories, i taught them how to play scramble, my family’s favorite game. jules, roberto, and dannette were fierce players. malcolm and afiya arrived late and lingered afterwards. tonight, grapefruit was my favorite fruit. brilliantpink, juicyplump, sweettart, sliced across the equator and scooped out of the shell with a knife and spoon. someone i used to love would spread honey across grapefruit before i ate it, but i don’t need the honey now. j.p., paulina’s little brother, after being in top shit-talking form all night, helped me wash and put away the last of the dishes. everyone adored j.p., lolan, roberto and josh, of course. sweet overlap of my bay area, tennessee and north carolina worlds. tonio was missed by many. rishi was too, but we played music he had sent, which softened the longing. coya and brandon were lost in iowa last i checked, but hopefully they’ll find their way to a visit soon.

thejourneyittakestogettoabathtub, thebathittakestogettothedancefloor

elandria called me this morning while i was having my morning cup of tea in my pajamas. pajama is a hindi word. pa. jaa. maa. that’s how you spell it. easy. i was reading, which is the best way to coax me from dreamstate into daystate. or ask me to make you a cup of tea. i hurried through a shower and walked down the mountain to the office. tonio, my roommate and gay wife, who is from alaska, says that he thinks we live on a hill, not a mountain. he says that the appalachians are only like six thousand something at the highest, but in alaska they have mountains in the twenty thousands, so he thinks of the appalachians as hills. i’m unimpressed. yawn. who wants to talk about elevation when you could be talking about ecological diversity? anyway, the appalachians are just short because they’re ancient. and you don’t make fun of short old people, do you?

elandria did a venn diagram of our contacts and relationships that have grown out of our past work. she headed to knoxville for the media justice conference. i took suzanne to the kentucky house, where we had that sweet potato carrot butternutsquash apple soup from last night and she offered encouragement about the work i’m doing. the snow was falling in large airy globules, and vanishing as it hit the ground. i wanted to hit the road before the conditions worsened, but my fears were unwarranted.

my meeting with thomas watson, southern rural development initiative staffperson, was the highlight of my day. we met at malaprops bookstore over yerba mate and green tea. he used to be an intern at highlander back in the day, and he worked with the summer youth program for a few weeks over a decade ago, back when ron davis was coordinating the youth work. we discussed the four main containers of work that elandria and i are figuring out how to strengthen and fill: the young and the restless youth program, including seeds of fire teen organizer summer camp; the internship program; the intergenerational new leadership institute; and the gatherings for folks in their 20’s. i talked about the frustration i had felt as a youth participant at highlander, feeling unclear what happened after a highlander gathering with all the work we had done, and wondering what kind of influence my thoughts and feelings had on highlander’s direction. 75 years is a geomorphic blink of the eye, but it’s long enough to make a powerful, incredible, lasting legacy for an organization that can be its greatest asset. and it’s long enough to build a behemoth perhaps not quick on its feet when it’s time for change. thomas asked me to ask myself what i would have liked to have had a vote on when i was a youth participant, and to carefully consider how to be accountable to our youth constituency in that vein. he encourages me to accept these good containers for our work that were designed before elandria and i joined the education team, work to strengthen them. trust myself. then be genuinely participatory about filling them. as he explains his thoughts, thomas draws rapid-fire. diagrams that bloom ideas, make them pulse with fragrance. my visual learner self appreciates this quality in a comrade.

i stopped at a cracker barrel restaurant and had macaroni and cheese, carrots, mushroom brown rice, and corn. both sally and jonathan asked me why i ate at this racist establishment. jonathan was particularly disgruntled about the faux-country bullshit. i was just so excited about reading unearthing seeds of fire over macaroni and cheese. i’ll bake a macaroni and cheese casserole for the dinner we’re having tomorrow for brandon, coya, josh, lolan, and roberto.

came home and saw kia, paulina and lolan. it was so wonderful to see lolan again! she is rishi’s homey, and i met her fantastic, creative self at the national youth organizing institute that SOUL put together with some other organizations (including highlander) in nashville, TN. i unpacked my things, sank into a steaming bath and, by phone, helped snehal plot a special secret adventure. andy, caitlin, serena, paulina, lolan and i headed to tennessee watson and fiona barnett’s crib for a birthday party for fiona, emily chavez, tennessee and bea. i had received diva dress-up feedback from the crew, so i was dressed to the nines, or at least the sevens, and i had spent a week on the mountain, so i was eager to dance dangerous. dancing with ubuntu sistas is my favorite activity on earth! dancing with ubuntu while sammy is deejaying is my most most favorite. now i’m fabulousstupidexhausted. mmmmzzzzzzzz.

thekillingfields

just watched the killing fields with tonio. it is a 1984 film about the story of two new york times journalists, a u.s. american- sydney schanberg, and a cambodian- dith pran, reporting on the atrocities committed by the u.s. and by the khmer rouge in 1975 in cambodia. schanberg makes it out and wins the pulitzer prize for international reporting, but his comrade, pran, gets trapped in a khmer rouge workcamp and has to conceal his journalistic education while he plots an escape. there is so much violence and psychological trauma in this film. i feel so shaken. tonio commented that a couple decades after all the hundreds of thousands of unjust deaths in cambodia, laos and vietnam, we are watching such a similar scenario play out in iraq. how will we stop the war on iraq? how many times has this story of unjust suffering of extraordinary proportions been lived? who are the monsters who think war is ever a good idea? how will we dismantle their form of power and start anew, on principles of love, justice and compassion? i feel impatient sometimes. sometimes i don’t want to hang in there for the long haul. i want to stop war now. i wish the fact that the majority of u.s. americans are sick to the gut with this war meant something to the people in power.

tonio and i made a little feast for dinner. stuffed delicata squash (filled with chopped apples, brown sugar, salt, clove, cinnamon, ginger, orange flesh and topped with bread crumbs, mozzarella, asiago cheese); sweet potato- butternut squash- carrot- apple soup; crushednut and herb-encrusted fried fish (from alaska, tonio’s home state); edamame; lazy homemade bread with butter.

today there was snow falling when i woke up, so i began my day with catching up on reading all the things i need to have in my head for work. i spent my whole day reading, mostly, with a couple breaks to talk through some questions with elandria. it was our first real chance to connect one-on-one since we got here (since i met her at the STORY collaborative to stop the war on iraq), and i’m looking forward to more of those.  

talked with a friend this evening who is going through a hard time at work. sigh. there’s a way that working for something you really believe in convinces you to put up with stressful crap you wouldn’t put up with elsewhere. my friend has been frustrated for like a year, but keeps trying to make it work out of a sense of dedication. obligation isn’t the word. it’s a stubborn (maybecrazy) belief in trying again.

tomorrow morning, suzanne is coming to visit, to give me a housewarming gift to pass on to paulina. suzanne was the first woman director at highlander, from 1999-2004.  she and her partner were awesome coaches for the south carolina equality coalition staff this fall when we were working on the fairness for all families campaign. speaking of south carolina equality coalition, my buddy coya hope artichoker, co-field director at the campaign in south carolina, and brandon who used to work with NC lambda youth network, are coming to visit on their way from minnesota to south carolina. roberto and his roommate josh are going to come down and stay with caitlin. we’re going to have a meal saturday night to introduce them to ubuntu folks. i need to give my friend the car i borrowed. and i need to look around for a car to buy-aah! and then i will get a ride back to the mountain with roberto and josh on monday. 

movingpeople&placesouttapoverty

last night, tonio fixed dinner, including maria ana’s butternut squash recipe: thinly sliced discs of butternut squash rubbed with olive oil and sea salt, baked until the edges are crunchy and the flesh is tender and sunset orange. we watched six feet under, new to me and very funny. the morbid humor made me think fondly of my sister, anjali.

i woke up feeling ucky. woke up with the sunrise, and went back to sleep until a groggy 9.45. met with susan and elandria at the library to talk about the calendar of work leading up to the seeds of fire youth training camp this july.

tonio and i walked to the workshop center for lunch. mama nina had fixed food for the crowd of grantees who had come for the mary reynolds babcock meeting that assistant director sandra mikush had convened. yum, peach cobbler with plump raisins. the mary reynolds babcock foundation has refined their guidelines for funding, so they wanted to meet with east tennesseans and get a better sense of what existing networks are, and convey the foundation’s planned changes. the discussion was fascinating, and it helped me get a much better handle on the landscape of local progressive work. here are some of the foundation’s beliefs about what it takes to ‘move people and places out of poverty’.

elandria and i lingered and talked with linda parris-bailey and marquez rhyne of carpetbag theatre of knoxville. linda was involved with the early youth programming, maybe 25, 30 years ago. she remembers arguing with myles horton that it was worthwhile to devote highlander’s energy to working with youth. he felt like teens were too immature to bring the experience in the room that is needed for highlander-style collective decision-making, popular education and participatory research. huh. i feel like what youth don’t bring to the table in experience, they bring in gumption*spunk*energy*fire, the shit we adults need desperately. they realize what’s at stake. they still have some ancient memory of freedom in their bones. they have vivid dreams of justice that experience hasn’t had the chance to whup out of them yet.

today i recalled, even more than usual, my first visit to highlander. kelly overton, director and co-founder of durham’s youth voice radio, had brought a carload of us teens. darnell was there, too. my memory says that i came back later in 1998 to co-facilitate highlander’s first adult ally training with kelly-o. i was eighteen. it was small, and fun. there were only something like five or six adults (we were drawing away the adults who had come to chaperone the young&therestless youth gathering, so they wouldn’t stymie the kids’ participation). kelly introduced some co-counseling techniques to my facilitation repertoire that weekend, like inviting the adults to explore empathy with youth oppression (along their transition to solidarity with youth) by talking about their first memories of being told that they were too young, and therefore not good enough. it was my first time identifying as an adult ally. i want to get together with some folks and try and craft an instructional manual for that art.

i also cooked up some ideas with thomas watson of the southern organizational development initiative (project of southern rural development initiative) about working together on supporting youth work in the black belt of alabama and in the coastal area of georgia. i may pay him a visit in asheville later this week if the snow and ice don’t tempt me to wait.

this afternoon, elandria and i met at my kitchen table to draw venn diagrams about who we are, how we work, what kind of work we want to do. i am an ardent fan of the venn diagram- so simple! so connected! so circle! i fixed us orange-tulsi tea and masala popcorn (butter, turmeric, cayenne pepper, “curry powder”, sea salt) and we made a to-do list to last ourselves until we get a better sense of what we’re doing here.

i am feeling so thankful for my family, jonathan miles, sally mullikin, paulina hernandez, caitlin breedlove, russell herman, snehal ishwar patel, ivan broida, kim diehl, rishi awatramani, boots riley, afiya carter, jessamyn sabbag, ray eurquhart, morgan fitzpatrick, emma skurnick, anar, kia carscallen, matt paden, yashna padamsee, viswas chitnis, chris crass, kriti sharma, rajiv mohabir, mae-belle mehra, anna carson-dewitt, daniel heart, lillian bayley, isabell moore, jona khaosanga, nego crosson, steve theberge, kelly overton, terrence, andrew pearson, madonna sang lee, notyosoulja fam, ubuntu fam, song fam, future5K fam, highlander staff, and all the support you have offered to make this transition a joyful one. you’ve softened the agony of being away from durham. i’m so looking forward to being home this weekend. i’m already plotting the hindi film i will watch at the bollywood theater with my brother, rajeev, if i can coax him. it’s three and a half hours, and it’s not an art film, so there’s no way mom would come.

i wish i could describe the ineffable beauty of the night sky as i make the walk from my office to the kentucky house. lush dark. moon waxing gibbous, opulent silver moon. stars so sharp they splinter the pupil. the night ripples in anticipation of the snow on the way. quiet. even the wind whispers in reverence.

mangobuttercream,baby

having piled the covers on thick, i woke up much warmer this morning. i stretched, and tried out the white cake recipe snehal patel read to me over the phone last night. while it baked, i showered. it came out perfectly moist and pretty. 8″ round (the cutest shape for cake, i think. except for a guglhupf bundt).

i strolled to the library, clutching my cup of tea, and met with susan williams, roberto tijerina, monica hernandez, pam mcmichael and elandria, the other members of highlander’s education team. i learned some history of highlander’s youth work, names of folk i need to make connections with, some of the goals at hand, and began to explore the role i will play here. some of the goals at hand:

• to support local grassroots organizing in marginalized communities
• to strengthen cross-constituency and intergenerational movement building 
• to build regional capacity

tonio and i hosted the ¡buen viaje! lunch potluck for maria ana and it turned out to be the perfect housewarming. i frosted the white cake with a little mango buttercream (yes, my invention: 2 tbsp. butter, 1/2 cup powdered sugar, a tsp. vanilla, a couple tablespoons of mango pulp) and drizzled mango pulp over the top. tonio made adorable stuffed mushrooms. i didn’t watch carefully, but i think he blended the mushroom stems with something like bread crumbs, pepper, salt, parsley, olive oil, garlic, and parmesan and romano, filled the mushroom caps, and broiled them. susan fixed raspberry-orange iced tea, potatoes o’brien, and lasagne. pam made beans and corn chili. elandria’s dad is a gourmet chef and she brought an amazing sweetbread he made. there was talk of pitting him against my mom- apparently talk of my mother’s culinary prowess knows no state line.

i moved the treasures with mr. johnny’s help and overhauled my office space. took some time to read. wendi o’neal, ricardo, paulina hernandez, caitlin breedlove, felicitas, and other past youth program workers poured so much heart and detail into the documentation of the young and the restless program, its contacts, its victories, its challenges, its process. spent the afternoon with elandria and susan working on a timeline of highlander’s youth work for the last several decades (i believe we tracked it to c.1957) with the help of several good published histories and susan’s sharp memories. susan recalls stories well, but she asked mama nina if she was good with dates. mama nina: “i wouldn’t be much help. don’t recall the last date i went on!”. nina has been the main chef at highlander since 1978, i think. poring over the long haul, an autobiography of highlander’s founder, myles horton, i retrieved a passage revealing a very different way of looking at youth work than our approach today. i will enter it later, when i am not so ravenous. what to eat for dinner? maybe we will eat our house mouse. or the wandering cow.

snowstormarrival

yesterday, jonathan apple and sally mullikin helped pack the boat and pushed me off to sail from durham, north carolina to new market, tennessee to begin my adventure at highlander.

i stopped by the tate st. coffeeshop in greensboro to celebrate jona khaosanga’s 19th  birthday. i brought her a pint of homemade mango-strawberry-raspberry-orange ice cream. i needed to thank jona, cuz her exuberantlyhelpful coaching before my interview last fall scored me the job i began today. highlander’s interview for the education team:

1. resume, letter, phone interview, the usual.
2. questions and answers with the entire fantastic staff- groundskeeper, cook, director, librarian, education crew, development folk, your mama and e’rybody.
3. sample workshop, complete with prep notes and plans for follow-up.

jona’s sweetie, steven; nego (joan jett); and isabell moore met up with us and we chatted for hours.

tried to check the fluids, but my borrowed car has mad issues. example: oil stick snapped off in my hand when i tried to check the oil. i stopped at a thai grocery and bought coconut milk, galangal, kaffir lime leaves. driving into the mountains at sunset: exquisite. squid-inky blue clouds edged with blazingpink on a peach sky. getting to highlander is a straight shot west on I-40.

just after crossing the border into tennessee, icy star pellets surged through the night towards the windshield.  suddenly, fade to white. i measured my visibility in inches. i hung onto the brakelights of the car in front of me, gliding forward slowly, attention riveted, praying. twenty minutes of this, and my hands began to shake. i thought of taking the next exit and checking into a hotel. suddenly, fade to night and normal. the storm was over, and i made it to highlander, following roberto tijerina’s directions.

i found my way to the kentucky house, where tonio had posted a sign welcoming me. i fixed a cup of tea and lugged in my belongings. about an hour later, tonio returned from the march in d.c.- united for peace and justice estimates 400,000 folks marched against the war on iraq, and my friends who went all report a huge, diverse crowd. tonio chopped yellow peppers and onions, i chopped shallots, we sauté in garlic paste, salt and pepper, we doused with olive oil and pear vinegar, threw over kamut spirals. we talked about romance. i tell tonio it has failed me sorely, unforgivably (and i do crave forgiveness- giving and receiving). tonio set up an elaborate, humane trap for the house mouse and we headed to our sleeping nooks.

this morning was bright and excruciatingly cold, rims of reality sparkling with icicles. house mouse eluded us- we will prepare a better meal for him next time. i wandered down the gravel path, past the cowpatch, past the library, to the office, clasping my cup of tea. hugged elandria. met everyone all over, enjoyed breakfast and a morning of orientation. discovered that the anasa who highlander just hired to work on the 75th anniversary celebration (yes, it’s going to be incredible and i really hope you come aug. 31-sept. 2, 2007; highlander center, new market, TN) is the same anasa i met in st.louis through nat’l hip hop political convention circles.

at lunch, i connected with mama nina, who has been cooking delicious food on the land since forever. everyone introduced their work to elandria, anasa and i, told us what sorts of questions they will be able to answer, told us what they needed from us.

after a cup of coffee, anasa, elandria and i drove down the hill. a cow ambled across our path and i declared the omen auspicious. perhaps she was pleased. she loosened her sphincter and let a heavy load of shit spill. aditi devi showering welcome and blessings.

in the afternoon, i filled out a thousand forms. highlander is uniquely just among social justice organization in terms of fair pay, health care benefits, and ample holidays and vacation. this is the first day in my life i have had health care. i live in the one major industrialized country in the world without health care for its people.

with anasa, i explored the treasures stored in the old farmhouse, the oldest structure on the land. we squirreled some away for mr. johnny to help us carry to our offices and living quarters.

i like my office, simple with a window.

tonight i went with pam, tonio, ann, maurice and maria ana to a mexican restaurant called sazon about 20 minutes from town. we compared kerala and cuba’s dilemmas in holding communist feminist ideals against cultural machismo, and how people challenge domestic violence in those contexts. this opened into a broader conversation about capitalism. maurice: “we convince ourselves that luxuries are necessities. and the things we really need we think we can do without.”

if i can rifle through my things and find my new favorite white cake recipe, i will wake up early and bake before work for maria ana, since tomorrow she returns to argentina.