Rebirthing
Ellen, at age 4 days, laying around being fed; what she hopes to be when she grows up (someone who lays around being fed. for free at that. )
I'm going back to Los Angeles on Sept 29 to do what I call Starting Over 2.0, since just like after graduation, I'll have to start all over and find a job, move out, and figure my life out. I will once again be unemployed, confused, and residing with my mother in her senior-living community. In Walnut, CA, home to nothing special except my mother, who is quite special.
But. Before then I will go to Yuan Lin in Central Taiwan for 5 days to attend an unofficially Buddhist, vegetarian organic-living, how to be environmentally conscious retreat with 900 Taiwanese and 9 hua qiao, ABCs, overseas Chinese, or whatever else they call people like me, then to Hong Kong for 3 days to see my sister and stay in her fancy hotel, hopefully meet up with Liana for an afternoon of sticker pictures and shopping, or better yet a buffet, then back to Taipei for a few weeks to finish up my Chinese class, then to Thailand for 10 days to reunite with a long lost Michael where upon seeing him for the first time in 6 months I will judge and criticize him just like the very first time! (you gotta sing that part) and if the judging and criticizing leans in his favor (or when I realize he's the only person I'll be able to talk to for the next 10 days), smother him with attention in a way he forgot I was capable of that makes him want this leech called Chen Yun, I mean Ellen, off of him, now! Also, in Thailand I hope to take a cooking class and maybe do a farmstay, get lots of massages, eat a lot of deliciously spicy food, lay on a white sand beach in hot humid weather, and did I mention get massaged? Then I will go back to Taiwan for one last order of stinky tofu and last minute souvenir shopping, and finally!!!! :
the United States of America, one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all unless you are gay, old, poor, a member of the 'we menstruate' club, colored, disabled and of course fat, because remember when Southwest wanted to charge fat people double airfare for taking up more than one seat on a plane? I'm no lawyer like Carmina, but take it from me, a fully uncertified illegal English teacher that works 3 hours a week, that's injustice!
AMEN