triggers.
doing clinical shifts at the psych word. a man who rationalizes his abuse toward his filippino wife. someone he  "met" on this internet websites. moved to the phils with american money. his dollar went a long way. bought him a wife, a house, air conditioning. he was doing her a favor because he didnt try to get her deported even tho she wanted to leave him. she got mixed up in the wrong company. rationalizations. jesus. white supremacy. militarism. third world womyn. the dumping grounds of american military trauma. womyn are bought and sold. marriage is a contract. US visas is a reward. abuse is a bonus. children are an anchor. not being deported is a favor.

a friend tells me of his conversation with a pedophile. survivor of childhood abuse. perpetrator of childhood abuse. 14 year old boy whom this person thinks of as a girl. hidden secrets. shame. trauma reliving regenerating. the cycle doesnt end.

a friend calls me. they had been sexually assaulted. someone i know. this is the 4th one.

anger. rage. desire for resolution. trauma is painful and trauma strikes. people rationalize. trauma embodied and becoming human dehumanizes us.

then israeli attacks on gaza. collateral damage in the form of one year old toddlers, months old babies.

can't even go there.

Migration

I haven't found a writing home for a while. But now, I revived an old blog that had existed way before this one. It reflects more of the mindspace I am in. I find myself unable to write on this blog without thinking of the context in which it began, where I poured so many heartfelt thoughts and angry vents. That context is different now. I no longer work full time as a CNA. I do home care now, and only part time. I am also a nursing student now, and dealing more intimately with the emotional/mental/financial stress of my mother's own medical condition (a product of medical malpractice, so fuck the medical industrial complex and insurance and sickening lawyers. I hate corporate lawyers. Passionately.)

So, I have migrated to a different blog space: www.hojindetroit.wordpress.com. <3 Thanks for reading.

I love travelling. I love the feeling of new worlds placed side by side in my mind. I am the constant that exists, walking down new streets, resting my eyes on the configurations of buildings spread out across varying widths of streets, sitting on bus seats patterned within varying fades of colors. If it makes any sense at all, I watch myself travel. I feel like a character out of Motorcycle Diaries, filming my own adventures in my memory. If one man's travel can be made special, into a film, so can mine. 

I saw an art piece recently, where an undocumented mother holding a child says, "You travelled around Europe and they called  you adventurous. I crossed the border with my child and they called me a criminal."

Adventurous traveller. Criminal. Adventurous traveller. Law breaker. Adventurous traveller.

Such powerful distinctions.

im back.

I feel ready to be back, again. Coming back to the page is the physical and visual expression of me connecting with myself again. I go through waves and cycles of being ready to reflect and be connected. In the past few months, I have felt a new kind of disconnection from myself. It's new because it wasn't something I necessarily lamented, even though it was not easy. There was something inside me that was not able to control myself, and neither did I want to. Sometimes, I go through such phases of disconnection and feel extreme emotions of depression. But this time, things feel like they are floating by. There is sadness, there is death around me. And maybe it's my way of distancing. I don't know. But, in these periods, I appreciate, and miss the moments of connection with myself.
I miss translating thoughts into words, I miss trying to capture how I feel into language, I miss images that come to mind when I try to express myself. I miss writing without being self conscious. I miss a quiet night where all I want to do is to be alone with myself.
Why this doesn't happen more often, I dont know. But one thing I know is I have stopped writing, when thoughts are circular. I remember when I was around 16, and I looked at my diary and realized that each day, I was expressing the same angst. And I felt silly :) And so, I am going to try not to do that when I realize that I am doing it. And I hope my friends can be honest enough with me to tell me when I do too:)
There are some circular thoughts in my mind. I have found myself needing to talk about certain things alot. I have found myself not moving forward. And I think I am not moving forward because I havent changed my perspectives on certain relationships. I am stuck. I want to move on.

So much about me on this post. So many "I"s. Yes, I am curious about myself these days. I am allowing myself to change. It is something I havent done in a while. It is a change that is happening within myself because of the changes that have taken place in my political life in the past 2 years. Not all of this is good. I am trying to figure out how to make the best of this. But I am changing, and I am realizing that. It's a weird feeling. I dont have control, and I am curious. Sometimes hopeful. Sometimes not. I have some people around who ground me. I am thankful for them.

Also, I wanted to recommend this awesome piece. I hope to return to these precious words later:
http://blackgirldangerous.tumblr.com/post/23492833416/10-things-us-queers-and-the-rest-of-yall-can-do

processing, reinspiring

i always keep things inside till they well up and i have no choice but to write
i'm waiting for their swelling of emotions that make it inevitable for me to crack open some of this sadness.
but, maybe that's what makes me so unpredictably emotional. maybe i should learn to be more measured in how i express these intense emotions that i have...

recollecting myself.

i am having a hard time in nursing school.
i just had to admit that to myself.
the discipline is hard, the not working is relaxing, but guilt trippy and stressful, and...the culture is rough.
i'm just not very cut out for passive aggressiveness. and the racism in the school., in its explicit and implicit ways, really affect me.
be tougher, be stronger.
and, just say, fuck em. cos all that matters in the end is that im a good nurse, not them. not these petty peons.

on a positive note, im going home to visit my family w M
i'm excited about that. about the break. about not having to go to school.

i taste the thrill thumping in high school dance halls,
i shrink from the sharp pain racing from my father's tough callous hands
i hear his distance as stress sucks him ever further away
i smell the crisp fresh air of duino, blue, deep, clear, clean
i feel the way my mind is frozen, shocked, sudden, static.

i am searching.
for a way amid this confusion.