a storm in my heart.

i see myself disappearing.

i spent the entire day in bed.
half-crying and half-sleeping.

i haven't eaten.
i haven't been outdoors.

i'm not hungry. i'm not sleepy.
i'm not even tired.

my eyes are just leaking.

it seems everyday - i get closer to losing all that is dear to me.
it all seems to be disappearing.

it is my own passion that will be my very undoing.
i want to be indifferent.

death is here.
and he won't let me go.

and my greatest failure
is that i cannot make myself
care less.

to seek God unencumbered

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and melt into the sun? And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

my uncle has died.

i put this fact aside. so that i could survive the day. it meant nothing to me. i didn't feel it. it didn't connect.

until it did.

i was at my desk, analyzing a client portfolio. 12 asian currencies.
and i felt it - like an icicle through my chest.
a panic.

i wanted my sister. i needed to see her.
i wanted the dearest of my life close to me.
i thought of my parents, my grandparents.
my lovers, my friends..

and how all of it is so
tentative.

my silly puppy. the grass so green.
a warm & sunny day with a slight breeze.
all of my favorite things.

is heaven really better than what i've got
right this very minute?

for everyone i've ever loved
that has crossed that divide
i sure hope so.

as fucked as my life is -
and trust, it is a very fucked up thing.

i'm grateful for it's beauty
it's magic
it's wonders

and i'm sad that my uncle
doesn't have those things anymore.

heaven is probably much simpler than that.

it's just God
and nothing else.

the presence of God
and the absence of everything else.

that must be it.

birds in cages

"if only i could live and so serve the world that after me there should never again be birds in cages."
-Isak Dinesen (pen name of Karen Blixen)

no winter

there is no winter like death

i watch him labor to breathe, his face no longer his own, he has become almost a stranger to me now. perhaps, most certainly a stranger to himself.

lifelessness grows stronger in his body everyday. everyday we pray for a miracle and everyday that miracle does not come.

my aunt is a wife. she is at his side everyday. she is fighting with doctors and nurses and administrators to get them to do something, anything to save him. her love is fierce. i've never seen such passion. and she will not acquiesce.

it hurts to witness because there is nothing to be done. i cannot save him. i cannot soothe him. i cannot ease this transition.

if death is relief and transcendence to a painless realm, why does it wear such an unhappy mask?

and this is how i spend my lunch: teary eyes hidden behind dark sunglasses. walking back to the office, i take a deep breath and realize spring is here. the bradford pear trees are in full bloom and the cherry blossoms are close behind.

just when i feel completely forlorn, god sends me spring.

the juicy fruit effect

most things are great for about 30 seconds and then the taste is gone. for me, this tends to be the rule and not the exception.. people, places, ideas become tedious.

so, when you find someone, someplace, or something whose flavor is self-renewing it is indeed a beautiful thing. the juicy fruit effect in reverse - the more you chew, the better it tastes.

it's funny to me - so unexpected. to find that prolonged exposure can actually heighten curiosity and desire as opposed to extinguish it.

9. Cari Lynn: Leg the Spread

Leg the Spread: A Woman's Adventures Inside the Trillion-Dollar Boys' Club of Commodities Trading was a heady, intoxicating rush of a read. It details the author's flirtation with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, more affectionately known as the 'Merc' ("If you don't know who you are, this is an expensive place to find out"). She details technical terms and theories while sharing stories of women and men she met during her two years as a clerk. Most books addressing male-dominated arenas are written by men and focus on men. Lynn reports how it felt to be working there as a woman, and gives several intimate testimonies from women who have worked at the Merc.

"If your position is really going against you, you get to this level where you know you're fucked, then you start to realize you're double-fucked. But you also know everyone else in the pit is fucked, too, so it becomes all about how long you can withstand the pain. How long can you wait it out? Can you wait until everyone else says mercy? Because if you can, then you can rape 'em. That's what Bev does best. When the last Fed number came out, Bev lost $1.4 million in thirty seconds. Everyone panicked, but Bev turned around and let the all have it. She ended up making two million off it all.. She has the highest tolerance of pain I have ever seen. Even when everyone else is puking, she can hold out."

8. Anya Kamenetz: Generation Debt

This is grim but necessary reading.

Kamenetz reveals America to be the homicidal mother who drowns her own children in the bathtub. She dissects the policies and trends that financially depress our generation as a class.

I found the sections on education and employment of particular interest. She discusses the outrageous cost of higher education, how it is funded and asks the dangerous question of whether or not it is worth it. Especially considering that jobs are increasingly entry-level: the largest private employer in the 70's was General Motors with an average wage of $17.50 per hour, the largest private employer is now Wal-Mart and their average wage is $8 per hour.

"With the decline in need-based financial aid, academic competition is becoming a game that the ruling class plays largely against itself, like tennis."

Only 10% of college students come from the 'bottom half of the economic spectrum.' Diversity efforts have increasingly focused on race and less on class. Joining the military has become the defacto choice for ambitious working class kids.

This is the first book I have read addressing the economics of my generation. I highly recommend it.

I. Will. Not. Lose. Ever.

a piercing blue, cloudless sky is draped above the coliseum.

her lacerated hands and knees press into the earth. dirt cakes weary arms and legs. a rivulet of blood snakes her anguished countenance.

her opponent has turned his back and raised his arms in premature victory. a swarm of faces smirk and roar at the indication of her defeat.

but the beast inside of her, though weary, will not sleep. a zephyr blows through the amphitheatre, cooling her face, stirring the dust.

tears speed down her cheeks. her eyes close. she sees herself, a tiny girl in braids, bright eyes, wide smile.

this is not her destiny. this is not what has been written.

she rises from her untimely grave and moves toward he who has underestimated. the cheering has become a cacophony of laughter. she is their joke and this fortifies her.

she appraises her nemesis. his face twisted in an arrogant sneer.
she has one opportunity. and it is sufficient.

fury forces her fist through his jaw. his neck snaps and his lifeless body tumbles to the ground.

the coliseum is silent.

dear friend,
if the score is not in your favor then the game is not over.

I. Will. Not. Lose. Ever. Fucka.
Jay-Z, U Don't Know

The Color of Genocide

Public Pensions Review Investments in Sudan

"How could it be possible for them to burn people, children, and for the world to keep silent? No, none of this could be true. It was a nightmare."
Elie Wiesel, Night

While American corporations are forbidden to conduct business with Sudan (except for humanitarian missions) through Bill Clinton's executive order in 1997. Many Americans are tied to Sudan through investments in international stocks. States and Public Pension funds have begun to reconsider their links to Sudan through their portfolios.

Third-party research firms, Institutional Shareholder Services, Conflict Securities Advisory Group, and KLD Research among others compile lists of companies involved in Sudan. KLD's Sudan Compliance Service has isolated 124 companies including eight U.S. businesses linked to Sudan. Inclusion on these lists can be ambiguous at best. 3M was included and claim their association to Sudan is limited to selling Scotchshield Ultra Safety adn Security Film to the UN.

New Jersey, Illinois, and Oregon have passed laws that obligate public pensions to divest from their portfolios any holding of a company with investments, facilities or employees in Sudan. Money managers have responded. Northern Trust has created six index funds that ostracize Sudan-linked stocks for its institutional clients. Illinois has already invested $8 billion across the six funds.

Funds meant to mimic the performance of American indices such as the S&P 500 or the Russell 2000 aren't as likely to be impacted since American business are prohibited from involvement with Sudan. The most vulnerable funds are those meant to parallel foreign indices such as the MSCI EAFE (Morgan Stanley Capital Int'l Europe Australasia Far East). Over 25 companies (+9% of the index's market cap), including Royal Dutch Shell, Toyota, Siemens and Ericsson may be excluded from the fund. Vanguard is still considering if it will create Sudan-Free funds while Fidelity has yet to take the contention under advisory.

Will divesture lead to change? American divesture of Talisman Energy, led the Canadian company to abandon interests in Sudan. PetroChina's IPO in 2000 was largely ignored by college endowments and public pension funds due to oil extraction in Sudan. The larger pension funds, Calpers and the New York City Comptroller view divesture as a last resort and are talking to the Sudan-linked companies directly about their involvement in Sudan.

American Idol: Since I Fell for You

No one will ever sing 'Since I Fell for You' like Nina Simone.

14 February 2006

"Happiness comes more from loving than being loved; and often when our affection seems wounded it is only our vanity bleeding. To love, and to be hurt often, and to love again - this is the brave and happy life." -J.E. Buchrose

Yearly Spending Habits Rich vs. Affluent

The rich are those earning $390,400 on average per annum and have at least $10M in investable assets. The affluent earn $152,000 on average per annum with $1M in investable assets. The rich spend almost 4x as much as the affluent.

Luxury Jewelry & Watches
$17,185 by the Rich vs. $5,163 by the Affluent

Luxury Pet Products
$12,831 vs. $1,316

Luxury Fashion Accessories
$9,931 vs. $2,898

Luxury Wines and Liquors
$7,703 vs. $1,880.

and how does one begin to rack up $12 G's for the pet?
Try an $1,800 Disco Bed for the dog.

making change in your life

"It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things."
Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince and the Discourses

5. Ann Packer: The Dive From Clausen's Pier

I've been meaning to read this book for a while now. Carrie seems to be having second thoughts about her engagement. Then, her fiancee becomes immobilized when he injures his spinal cord in a diving accident. She flees Madison, WI where she has lived all her life for NYC without so much as a good luck to anyone even her mother.

A few of my favorite quotes, without context:

Isn't it obvious? You can't leave because you're the person you are, and I can't want you to because that would be wanting you to be someone else when I want you to be you.

People have this idea that what they do changes who they are. A married man had an affair and he thinks, Now I've become a bad person. As if something had changed.. Meaning bad isn't the issue. Meaning you do what you do. Not without consequences for other people, of course, sometimes very grave ones. But it's not helpful to regard your choices as a series of right or wrong moves. They don't define you as much as you define them.. You could just as easily have stayed. But that wouldn't make you a good person any more than leaving makes you a bad one. You're already made, honey. That's what I mean.

I really enjoyed this, and recommend it. Chick lit with an edge. I liked it because it illustrates people making hard choices in their lives, changing things, changing who they are. Only to realize, it's not as simple or as difficult as one may have thought.

a very strange dream, indeed.

we were on the river terrace at the kennedy center.

it was winter. december. maybe my birthday. it was cold. cold enough to see your breath, but not too cold to be outside. it was a clear night, the stars were sparkling like vegas diamonds, making the chill almost bearable. the potomac stretched in front of us, the gurgling fountain silent beside us.

it's been a great night. i'm giddy and bouncy. obviously happy, obviously satisfied. perhaps we've been to the ballet or the opera. maybe even the theatre.

he is telling me something. i can't hear. i'm an observer not the participant. i'm watching his face, looking into his eyes, but i can't see who he is. only a dark wool coat and a brick red scarf. he is excited, nervous, sincere. i am flummoxed, suprised, elated.

he has proposed and i have said yes.

-------------------------

this is quite strange, not only because the fountain is turned off in the winter, but i am decidedly single.

2. bell hooks: all about love

as a society we are embarassed by love. we treat it as if it were an obscenity. we reluctantly admit to it. even saying the word makes us stumble and blush.. love is the most important thing in our lives, a passion for which we would fight or die, and yet we're reluctant to linger over its names. without a supple vocabulary, we can't even talk or think about it directly.

chapter one begins with the above quote from diane ackerman.

this is an achingly beautiful book. it's for those who persist in dreaming of love. differently.

one of the ironies of the culture of greed is that the people who profit the most from earnings they have not worked to attain are the most eager to insist that the poor and working classes can only value material resources attained through hard work. of course, they are merely establishing a belief system that protects their class interests and lessens their accountability to those who are without privilege.

hooks talks about how america has 'privatized' family, "most world citizens do not have, and will never have, the material resources to live in small units segregated from larger family communities."

she illustrates how our culture has elevated the search and seizure of a romantic partner above all other loving relationships.

many of her observations had profound meaning for me - but nothing touched me as her commentary on 'loving into death.' our society encourages isolation in both the process of dying and grieving, "we are taught to feel shame about grief that lingers." she repositions grief as an expression of passionate loving. in a society that resounds with the importance of remaining unfettered in all dealings especially love. she reminds us that our most passionate relationships sometimes portend a commitment beyond life unto death.

sleeplessness

in bed i watch red numbers begging them not to change. it's been another 80 hour work week. i come home, draw a bath, go to sleep, then back to work. tonight i am unable to sleep. is it still a weekend if the week doesn't end? 14 work days in a row. in bed, motionless, my heart races. silently, i repeat my to do list. reprioritize. there isn't enough time. this is crazy.

how do i spend this adrenaline? i cannot sleep. i am dancing on the edge of oblivion, terrified to look down. i have to sleep fast and my window of opportunity for rest is closing, closing, shut.

3. Morris & McGann: Condi vs. Hillary

Great fucking book. But towards the end it was a bit redundant.

Before anything, I must acknowledge that one of the authors of this book is Dick Morris. Morris, who was President Bill Clinton's political guru until a high-priced hooker revealed his toe-sucking fetish, has made a second career out of bashing the Clintons. This book should really be titled, The Case for Condi.

I have recently become fascinated by Condoleeza Rice. I read this book more to learn about Condi than to hear about Hillary. I already have my views about Hillary. This book did little to influence that.

It gave an interesting history of the Republican party and it's commitment to civil rights. Beginning wiht Abe Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclamation, etc.. It was a Republican Congress that passed the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments: making slavery and discrimination illegal and granting black men suffrage respectively. Republican President Eisenhower appointed Warren as Chief Justice. It was the Warren court that decided Brown v. Board of Education. When the Democratic Governor of Arkansas moved to block the integration of schools, Eisenhower sent in troops.

"My father joined our party because the Democrats in Jim Crow Alabama of 1952 would not register him to vote. The Republicans did. I want you to know that my father has never forgotten that day, and neither have I."
Condoleeza Rice, Republican National Convention in 2000

Well, what happened? FDR waged an imped an impressive war against poverty and unemployment. When DAR refused to allow Marian Anderson to perform at Constitution Hall, Eleanor Roosevelt organized a rally at the Lincoln Memorial where she sang in front of a modestly estimated 75,000 people.

The challenge for Republicans is to win enough votes among whites to offset the black vote for the Democrats. They never campaign among African Americans, except to convince white voters that they are not racist.. The segregation of the black vote into the Democratic corral is deeply pernicious to our democracy. It eats away at the fiber of our freedom and creates an unchanging mass dedicated to one party regardless of policy, personality, or priorities. It has created a political atmosphere in which neither party cares much about the needs of the black community.

Morris and McGann argue that Condi can challenge the democrats for the vote of unmarried/single females. The two most important issues to female voters are abortion and education. Condi is pro-choice. Her experience as both Professor and Provost at Stanford more than qualify her on the issue of education.

"I am myself a beneficiary of a Stanford strategy that took affirmative action seriously, that took a risk in taking a young Ph.D from the University of Denver. The president of the university did, after all, appoint a thirty-eight-year-old black female professor provost who had never been a department chair."

"I support affirmative action in higher education. It makes the student body and the administration more integrated. It's accelerating the integration of all strata of society... we don't have to wait one hundred years."

Rice was very affected by the 1963 bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, only a few miles from her home. She knew 2 of the victims personally, "I remember more than anything the coffins, the small coffins, and the sense that Birmingham was not a very safe place."

Aside from the myopic view of Hillary, the authors feel, "white people may be eager to vote for an African American to expunge our national legacy of racism." Electing a Black President is not going to end racism nor should it signal that Blacks have 'arrived'. This is a most dangerous notion indeed.

happy birthday, my darling.

happy 93rd, Ike. my darling, darling grandfather.

at 93, you are still the most informed man that i know. you watch the news, both ny (consequence of direct tv) and local. all the sunday morning shows and read the paper everyday. you are still incredulous that elton john got married. you look for soul train on tv because 'you like to watch them bounce.' you are a republican but recognize bush is a complete ass. even now at 28, you still correct my speech, speak random phrases in french, and tell me about the cocksuckers running the world. and you've been married to an amazing but difficult woman for 66 years.

it is my pleasure to love you.

i love to hear you reminisce about your days as a philly firefighter. i love to hear you talk about something you will always love. when you started as a fireman in 1940, whites and 'colored boys' had separate firehouses. it wasn't until '49 that you could apply for a transfer into a white firehouse.

what breaks my heart is that one day you will disappear. and i will be destroyed. no one will ever love me the way that you have. and a part of me will die. petal and pollen falling lifeless beside the vase.

so, last night instead of seeing the banker i was here. while gram slept, i listened to you talk about the firehouse and elton john and how condoleeza is probably a 'lezzy'. you ask me if i'm going to see big momma 2. you saw enough in the preview, "a big chick running on a beach in a yellow bathingsuit. she looked like a sherman tank. but i couldn't tell if it was a man or a woman."

i brought you a philadelphia tribune and we sat in the livingroom reading in happy and intimate silence.