Atlas Lions Fever

 

 

 

 

World Cup season is upon us, and it’s always something I manage to forget about up until it’s happening again. And then the fever sets in: staying up all night catching all the matches at friend’s houses, heading to the local watering holes to cheer along with other patrons, etc.

Having spent 2 decades in the MENAT (Middle East, North Africa, Turkey), these World Cup experiences each have lasting memories. What do I remember the most?

·      White plastic chairs spilling out onto overcrowded streets facing giant projectors

·      The smell of shisha & cigarettes

·      Hot sweaty nights interrupted only by the sound of electric fans blowing useless breezes in rhythmic cadence

·      Fireworks, horns, chants, dancing in the streets with flags

·      How fierce national rivalries dissolve into regional united regional cheers as a team plays further up the tournament ladder

·      University camaraderie with students and professors watching matches together underneath starry skies on campus

This 2026 season I’m living/working in Morocco, so it is especially exciting as the Atlas Lions are on the rise. I’m noticing that within the A-L groupings that many of the not-as-well-known teams are under-represented- in terms of predictions about matches… As a result, there have been some interesting unexpected draws (Spain/Cap Verde, Portugal/DR Congo, Iran/New Zealand and even Morocco/Brazil). There is this wave of lower-ranked nations upsetting the tournament giants, and I’m here for it.  There is a beauty in this chaos that is equal to the tension.

I think many sports fans supporting the traditional giants are suddenly understanding the significance of AFCON (Africa Cup of Nations). So, this feels especially relevant to be here right now because I feel I’m located in the epicenter of this giant shifting awareness.

In my ideal bracket, I’d like to see Morocco and Portugal in the finals; AFCON grit vs European elite. Obviously, the 2022 quarter-finals between the two teams is still fresh in everyone’s memories. Watching this game on 19 July here in Morocco and then stepping into an airplane on 20 July to Portugal… this would be epic!

Option number 2, for different reasons- both cultural and political, I’d like to see Morocco vs Iran in the finals. Really, though, I’d like to see two MENAT teams compete in the finals. Why? Perhaps I’m naïve, but the reality on the ground of many AFCON nations consists of vague terrain (dirt lots or packed clay fields), improvised gear, or no gear at all (barefoot).

It’s 9 am and I’m lying in bed still riding the high of the Atlas Lions’ victory against Scotland last night – as well as the Brazil win over Haiti. Thus far, I’ve resisted watching many of the ‘giants’ but it’s time to start seeing what England is doing, etc. Tonight, we’re heading to the local watering hole, so I think I’ll focus on the Ivory Coast/Germany game that will be playing; another opportunity to test out the AFCON grit test the old guard.

Mid-Atlas Late Afternoon Thunderstorm Interrupted

  

 

 

From heavy heat to a cooling downpour,

thunder rumbling

 like the sudden sharp intake of breath

 before skin meets skin.

 

And just like that,

it’s over

just as it was getting started.

 

Heavy heat cloaks tense atmosphere.

Humidity thick, suffocating.

Somewhere a disappointed lover lies back

in damp silence.

Sticky skin.

 

Shivering in the heat of an empty sweat,

desperate for the flood that never came.

Phantom fingers tracing the damp heat,

left burning for a flood that never fell.

 

In time, a cool breeze settles,

cooling the skin yet clearing nothing. 

 

 

Exodus: Anthology of Romances

  

I’ve never really thought much about moving to a country, setting up my life, living my life, and then exiting that life for another one. I would further say that this feels very comfortable for me. I enjoy the challenge. I dare say I’m addicted to this ‘feeling’. There is such beauty in letting go.

Think about the stages of falling in love; it’s a long process and quite addictive. Falling out of love, again, a long process. Addictive? In a sense, yes. I mean to say, that the feelings resulting…they are nothing short of brilliant for artistic endeavors; writing, painting, etc. Staying in love… that’s the challenge, right? Is this why I run away?What do people write about when they are in love? 

So, I consider countries/working situations for the past 20 years as a sort of relationship, each one. I’ve written about this before, and it’s a constant consideration in my mind. For example, Istanbul was this boyfriend that I was addicted to- even though I knew ‘he’ wasn’t right for me. Istanbul was like what I (naively, I’m sure) think heroin is like. It was extremely difficult to leave, but I did — although it’s always in the back of my mind… New York City was a similar feeling; it was super exciting, but I knew that relationship would never last. It was an epic summer fling. Rarely do I think about NYC. But that’s okay. 

If you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with... Each country mirrors a passionate volatile lover. Infatuation turns into daily living turns into departure. Each departure, although exciting, increasingly becomes more and more difficult, though. Perhaps that’s not the right word choice, difficult. Maybe now, though, it’s that I’m remaining behind. I’m the lover that is being left behind. Of course, I know I will also leave this lover but not just yet…

Being an ‘outsider’ is never my worry, honestly. Or, it is never the reason to leave; this is more appropriate to describe each exodus. Each country is an unpredictable partner, and I think I’ve adapted to this frame of mind. After all, each country I’ve moved to has been about work. I’ve excelled at building family, work relationships, communities, and then exiting them. There is this lingering love connection with each intimate connection I make, and meeting up with these family members in other countries is the logical trajectory. Lovers reuniting. This is what we always tell each other- when we are leaving; the aftermath of the break-up. I’m already dreaming of returning to Turkey next winter. It’s been too long since I’ve connected with that lover.

Because I am a person who likes seeing patterns in things, I think about the inevitable break-up with my current country. Is Portugal going to break the pattern, the chain, for me? I fell in love with Portugal years ago. Portugal, though, I am realizing is not a lover. It’s a partner. Portugal has always been something separate. It’s just always been a stable relationship that I could always count on. So how does Portugal fit into my patterned existence? I’m not sure yet, but I kind of like the idea of staying in love there. Or, I think I’m up for the challenge.

Am I finally shifting from a series of torrid romances to a foundational partnership? I wonder. Is Morocco going to be my last goodbye love letter, my last exodus?

10 June, 2026 Internal Cartography Series 33° 31' 58.8" N, 5° 6' 0" W

  

It’s not what I say,

It’s what I’ve left unsaid.

 

It’s not what I write,

It’s what I’ve left unwritten.

 

I am an open book,

With a hidden language.

 

That which you cannot hear nor read,

Unless you are free.

 

Liberation flows from within

My root chakra.

 

I am free

Great Works of Literature are Capable of Temporarily Destroying Me Emotionally

  

Recently, in Portugal, I fell in love with a man.

His name? Nathanial Hawthorne, and he is 224 years old.

 

What do I adore about him?

His ability to absolutely fuck up my afternoons using only words.

 

We have unfinished chapters, him and I.

Although we’ve only just met, I anticipate quickly returning to him next month —

Where I left him, lying on the couch.

 

There, he can finish me off.

Seduce me with his weight of sinful guilt, his cruelty of isolation, his failed utopian ideals.

For him, there is no easy redemption; for me, devastation.

 

He is under my skin. Right now.

A haunting by the ghost of a man who likely dooms every soul that dare to read his works.

The ink from his pen slowly poisoning.

Soon, his centuries-old grief will ruin me completely.

 

How haunting it will be, to be so exquisitely undone.

Coming Home to Whose Moon?

Whose moon have I been keeping company with?

 

I am being swept off my feet,

 30,000' in the air

 

Two traveling entities

 sailing across the nighttime sky

 on different trajectories:  

Myself west to east - ocean to the mountains. 

The moon orbiting- sailing atop its celestial highway

 

Entwined in a personal dance with orbital mechanics,

 it feels as though we are moving as one,

yet we are spinning further apart

from each other 

 

Looking down from the window, 

village lights shimmer; a scattering of humanity

in contrast to the dark void of uninhabited lands —

a lonely mid-air Moonlight Mile

 

A road made of reflection, 

leading right back to somewhere I'm supposed to be.

 

I don't know.

 

The engines push me forward. 

 

The ocean has long faded in the distance, left behind 

as I am being propelled towards the mountains.

 

Standing on solid eARth in the Bewitching Hour,

I again seek out the moon's company.

 

But I have to wonder:

Is this the same moon I've been sharing the sky with?

 

Or has it changed,

It is growing heavy and full.

 

Perhaps tonight's rare Blue Moon will divulge 

if its light still touches your shore

while it illuminates my mountain peaks. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once Upon a Time-Machine: Dreaming in hypnopompic imagery

 Once upon a time machine: Dreaming in hypnopompic imagery

Praia da Vagueira

                                   
 

 Awakening at 10:00 am, for the second day in a row, I lay in bed for a few smug moments soaking up the totality of the situation. When I start waking up at 10:00 am, I know vacation is soon over...

Well, that's what 10:00 am means in this current life iteration. In a past chapter, far far away across the furthest reaches of the Pacific Ocean, waking up at 10:00 am meant different things due to different situations. Those were enjoyable times, for sure. 

Back to current reality, I'm slowly, quietly working out the day ahead: eat that luscious mango in the refrigerator with some Greek yogurt and fresh blueberries,perhaps even drizzle some organic honey on top; go into the garage and tool around with my bicycle; get the sewing machine fired up and put new elastic around my favorite bikini bottoms that I've had for about 20 years. Of course I have a plethora of bikinis — as anyone from Hawaii amasses because it's the most important piece of clothing to wear — but this bottom is my absolute favorite. 

The backstory of this bikini bottom: My boyfriend and I were on the mainland (San Francisco). We had just finished traversing the U.S. from San Fran to the Midwest and back. It was an epic odyssey— as they all were. We were back in San Francisco and had to return the van we were traveling in. We rented it and took out the back seats and put a futon bed in it and just drove... Anyway, we were somewhere in the Outer Sunset (district) and getting coffee early on the last morning, and a surf shop was next door. We walked in, of course, and there I saw them: exquisite. If you don't know #AaronChang, he is a famous surf photographer. I didn't know he had a surf clothing line as well.  This bikini bottom (no top) was the most beautiful fabric I had seen (well, that can't honestly be confirmed being that it is a major weakness of mine, fabric). I knew that it would be mine, even considering it was the last day of our travels and we had to head back to Hawaii nearly penniless. However, living in Hawaii, one is always in search of the bikini that no one else has. To add to its potential lure, I could tell that I would be able to surf and the bottoms wouldn't fall down when falling off a board (quite common, honestly). I think Ed went back into the coffee-shop, but I stayed... I coveted. I purchased. Back to the Islands we went. Now, all my bikinis are spread around the globe in my belongings — waiting for a permanent place to belong, but this one stays with me always.  

Back to the dream-machine...which is the point of this communique...which has nothing to do with bikinis, although Freud might think differently...

For two days in a row now, I've slept in until 10:00 am. Friday night was a late night out/early morning arrival home (however you want to analyze that one), and last night was just an innate desire to sleep for 12 hours. The second happens less frequently than the first..., so whenever the feeling arises, I just go with it. Somehow, somewhere tucked into those 12 hours I had a very strange dream. I mean, I guess all dreams are strange. I usually don't remember my dreams, so I started piecing this one back together. The gist:

I met a strange man while in a strange land. There was an empty old-style apartment (mine?). I think it was only a room- bedroom. It seems it was a recent possession. It had a cathedral ceiling, chipped paint/plaster, and a rustic smell. It was bright, though. After some time (?) I returned to it only to find four women occupying it. I told them they should leave because it was mine. They looked scared or lost- not knowing what to do or where to go. I apologized and said they should take their time leaving. I told some people the story- I think they were my family, for sure my sister as I remember explaining the room to her. The man I had met showed up to where I was staying (with my family?). Then I was on a subway and got off somewhere I'd traveled to before- Romania with Ed? (a different Ed, Istanbul Ed)). I recognized that it was somewhere I had visited before, but not the part of the city (Cluj Napoca) where I had been staying. I only accidentally had walked there (in real life), so the dream revisited this brief place, but I immediately recognized it in my dream. I met up with the strange man again. We kissed. I saw the strange man again in a field with 2 other men. One was bald and seemed to be his bodyguard. As I observed them from a distance I thought, "Who is this strange man? Why does he need a bodyguard? Why are they speaking in hushed tones? The sun is beating down on them. How does this connect to a (my?) empty room- which has nothing in it but a bed?" Then, I was somewhere outside and saw a pink Cadillac roll up. It parks in a field across from where I'm observing them. The chauffeur (of course) gets out. The strange man is still there as well. They are all standing/talking. The strange man gets in the pink Cadillac. As the chauffeur drives off, a dust cloud enshrouds the Cadillac- but not before our eyes briefly focus on each other. I smile to myself and walk away.

What would Freud do? That's too loaded of a question. How do I interpret this? Here goes: The room was something from my past? The observation that there was only a bed in the room- no need to unpack that one... The 4 women in the room with only a bed; all remnants of a (my) past life chapters- earlier versions of myself or more likely ones that still present themselves in various encounters? The Romania part; that's a deep memory. The subway makes sense; deep underground processing of thoughts. The strange man? I think he must have owned a carnival. The pink Cadillac certainly fits nicely with the carnival imagery. The whispering men; likely the masculine qualities of myself that I keep private. 

Back to reality. There was a carnival yesterday, in Vagos (or was it a religious festival... I'd like to think, in retrospect, that it was a carnival though) while coming back from Praia do Labrego. The lights were on, people were flowing throughout the venue, and the smell of roasting meat pervaded my being. I continued on, but not before catching glimpses of activity. Riding on, the brief image of that scene stayed with me for a few more miles. 

What does it all mean? Who knows. On an ending note, I couldn't resist... I asked AI what Freud would have thought of my dream... lol 

International Space Station (ISS) fly-by

Dinner conversation inevitably turns to strolling down memory lane. So, most apps are just time distractions, but a few are pretty cool, like the ISS app, the Marine Traffic app, and the NightSky app. It seems whenever I'm here in the village, more times than not we luck into an ISS fly-by. I, trying to distract from a failing chess match, ask about the night sky tonight. We both instinctively reach for our phones and open up our space apps. 

Mine was still set to Morocco so nothing showed up. Solo_ojo's showed that we had 38 minutes before a fly-by (22:23 - 22:34 pm). I still lost the match, and I learned that I need to take care of my rook's better. 

I digress. The irony of staring at our devices to show us what's in the sky... Rather annoying. Overhead, Arcturus. Its Hawaiian name, Hōkūle`a, was used by ancient Polynesian voyagers for navigation, and it was critical in guiding canoes to the Islands. The northern sky is very busy with the Big Dipper and Polaris. The west, the waxing crescent moon, Venus, and Jupiter all cluster together.

The ISS always traverses from west to east, so we walked down the path to get a better view to the west. Doubting we would catch it because it was a low-elevation pass (just above the horizon), I started listening to the cacophony of nocturnal sounds. And just like that, there it was. Distant and dim. No flashing lights. Moving fast, like a ship sailing along a distant coastline.

To think, 30 minutes previously, it was sailing across the South Pacific. Now (11:30 pm) it is over northern China. By the time I finish this post (maybe 1:00 am?), it will be somewhere along the SW coast of Africa. That is some celestial geometry! Space is profoundly trippy. 

The ISS app showed that 3 Russians, 1 Frenchwoman, and 3 Americans are onboard. How incredible their conversations must be. Do they watch movies? Do they play chess? I imagine they stay clear of discussing politics...

Curiosity gets the best of me, so I ask AI (Claude)... what data are they collecting. "Expedition74", Claude explains, is running "cutting edge biomedical and deep-space survival experiments." 

on a side note: OMG, I just quoted AI... wtf? I don't even want to know how to properly cite Claude...

Another digression... From what I deduced, the focus is pancreatic cancer research, cartilage replacement, and how spirulina can consume carbon dioxide that astronauts breathe out (in anticipation for longer trips to...Mars). 

I'm already making a mental note to purchase some super blue-green algae at a health food store here in Portugal to take back to Morocco...

So, curing diseases on earth and getting humans to Mars. 

Again, I return to the paradox of standing in the darkness staring at the sky while staring at devices trained to tell us what we are looking at. Basically using devices, tiny pieces of the space age, to track space. 

Returning to the chessboard and relating it to space exploration, there's a lesson to be learned: high stakes psychological battles governed by strict geometry where a single structural vulnerability can collapse an entire empire. By this I am referring to the white queen coming out of nowhere to take my black rook. Chess and the ISS. The connection? Different expressions of human instinct: the drive to be calculating, control (both yours and your opponents) space, and minimize errors under pressure. 

I realize that I under-utilize the rook(s). When I want to use it, there is still pawn in front of it. Then I forget about it. I moved the pawn and I didn't even catch the trap. I was able to recover, but what a blow to lose that piece so early on.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Impermanence: ponderings on love, loss, and soil

I spent some time this afternoon staring at a fingernail that has been slowly falling off. It's been maybe two weeks that I've been observing the inevitable. I'm not consumed with it, and I'm quite fine to let it go (literally) as I've come to accept the impermanence of IT. Of everything? No. Letting go of permanence is a struggle for our species. Why?

Why do we seek out permanence in a fluid universe, I ask the moon. Acceptance of the loss of a fingernail- is it acceptance of (my) ultimate impermanence? I mean, the nail will grow back. Do we grow back? 

Waiting for an answer, I ponder: we don't mourn the loss (death?) of the (new) moon each calendar cycle because we know it comes back. It has a history of coming back. There is an understanding of permanence within impermanence. Death without tragedy. 

The moon silently understanding; it has a permanence of cycles: waxing, waning, disappearing... My existential riddle remains unanswered tonight. Is the answer only to be found in the dissolution of consciousness and ego? Could it be this is 'true love', death? Love is in the soil...

What about a wave in the ocean, traveling incalculable distances only to crash on some distant shoreline? Does the wave die? I understand it to be fluid. Can there be a wave that never crashes?

 The act of burying as an act of planting. Earth (literally, dirt) treats both acts the same. A sudden realization leads to a rare moment of clarity. I did not possess this clarity earlier this evening, as I watched the dirt fall over a small patch of disturbed earth. A seed. A corpse. It's all the same to the soil. 

I'm not the same person that I was when I woke up this morning, I understand this.  My dying nail? It's still holding onto a permanence I've already let go of. I want it to fall off into the soil. Tonight. Let it grow back into something wild. 

 

Driving back from visiting some friends tonight, we took the cemitério road (rua da eternidade). I noticed that the same road at some point changed into rua da paz. It makes sense, I get it. Anyway, it made me smile. 

 

When Things Aren't as They Seem (on google maps)

 

Preparations. I do my research. I researched the route, downloaded the maps, charged the extra battery pack for my cell phone, packed gear for an all day ride, bla bla bla. It's amazing to be so organized beforehand that when it comes to stepping out the door, I let it all go, most of it anyway. This is not the first time... 

Article of evidence #1

I had a huge list of things to get while in Lisbon that I can't get in Morocco. All of it having to do with cycling, running, yoga, etc. So, you know, the fun stuff. I get up to start the odyssey across various neighborhoods in the city and don't take the list. I mean, I KNOW the list. I OBSESSED over the list for a few weeks beforehand. I did well without the list- as I knew I would. But still, I forgot one or two fairly important things.

Articles of evidence #2-5

Everything I needed today was organized beforehand. I didn't know where I was going, really, so I knew I'd be using a lot of battery power. I brought the fully-charged battery pack but forgot the cord to attach to the phone... 

While I was up late looking for waterfalls,  I was keeping track of basic kilometers to cycle. But, did I overlay the map with 'terrain' to include for topography and elevation? No... 

I knew there would be a lot of çesme (fontes in Portuguese) because they seem to be everywhere, so I *knew* that I wouldn't have a problem re-filling my bottles... All those fontes that I saw, while descending, on the way out... didn't have water in them for the uphill battle I incurred. 

I had my Plan A (to find the very CLOSE waterfall that I couldn't locate on Saturday while out biking AND on Sunday hiking) and a Plan B (a cascata/praia fluvial a bit further away in Vimieiro). So, en route to Plan B (yes, I aborted Plan A because I wanted a longer more technical ride), I happen to see a brown sign "praia fluvial da Moura Morta") and made an on-the-spot decision to go rouge with a Plan C... This is where the topography and elevation is definitely not in my favor (for the return voyage), but am I thinking about that in the moment? No. However... I did stop to look at google maps and saw that it wasn't *too far away* from Plan B, as well as it *looked* so close to Penacova- which suddenly became Plan D - for the voyage home... Again, the elevation... 

In the end, I did not jump into any waterfalls today, but I did manage to find a spot in the Alva River to cool off. Today's odyssey absolutely kicked my ass, and I pretty much limped back to Poiares and crashed out on the couch, where I am still lying down, recovering. Was it worth it? Yes. 100 percent. 

Nightmoves

There's a highly active nocturnal ecosystem that I'm privy to here- cradled in between the Serra do Carvalho and Serra de Magaruffe ranges. Fireworks in the distance. I wonder what the occasion. Queima das Feitas? The Feira Francas? It's midnight so perhaps a wedding and cutting the cake ceremony? 

Time slows down. Exhaustion turns into exhilaration just by lying down and listening. Journeying here today, each segment of the journey is so familiar. Coimbra-B train station (what happened to Coimbra A- did it just disappear?). There was a cliché train moment when I broke out my computer and finished up yesterday's writing/posting. Is this every writer's dream; typing out a manuscript whilst the moving picture show goes by, frame-by-frame? The countryside is bursting with colors from all the rain. 

Onto the next scene; the mad dash to get to the closest bus stop for the 238. Each twist and turn brings back memories: jumping in the Ceira River over there, hiking around the Mondego River here, looking at houses years ago in Sao Fruitoso, etc. 

Insect sounds intensify. The sound of an owl's wings flapping nearby. And then quiet. My body, my being thirsts for THIS. Who can sleep with all these nightmoves? Not I.  

The night doesn't want me to sleep anyway. I am connected to this dirt.  I am connected to this skyline. There was this one incredible night not that long ago, maybe six months ago? Last summer? Anyway, there were SO many satellites racing through the sky on this single trajectory. It was awesome. Researching it the next morning, it was Starlink. A train of internet steel cutting through the cosmos. SpaceX had launched a quiver of new satellites, and they all deployed at once and were visible. 

Okay, it's getting cold. 

 

Ode to ancient Lisboa (Alis Ubbo)

 

 

Ode to ancient Lisboa (Alis Ubbo)

 

O Alis Ubbo, where once Phoenician traders anchored up and down your maritime shores.

Their oars skimming, eyes searching, moneybags awaiting.

Quietly settling and trading from the shelter of the Tagus —

before the cacophony of Romans, Greeks, Carthaginians, and Moors followed your footsteps.

 

O Alis Ubbo, your safe harbor bustling with footsteps from ancient foreign tongues —

much as it is today — alas… grieve.

Grieve for who, for what?

What shelters you from the masses descending onto your maritime shores today?

 

O Alis Ubbo, I drink up your essence late into the night.

I roam your labyrinth neighborhoods like a phantom searching out your ancient harbor for a soothsayer to cast my fortune with a roll of the dice.

Following relics, stealing glances with only a sliver of moonlight to witness.

Listening for echoes of past foreign tongues bringing stories from unknown oceans. Merchants negotiating wares from your Maritime Tin and Amber Routes.

I wait in the shadows ready to steal your secrets along with your golden bounty.

To entomb them in written word as insects entombed inside your amber. MY word. My foreign tongue.

 

Ode to Alis Ubbo, mortal elder, surviving such calamities as earthquakes, empires, crusades. And for what?

Surviving the tides of change brings forth today’s calamities.

Are you patiently waiting out this current wave of digital noise?

Salt Spray to Thin Air: It's Complicated, My Granite Crush- (rough rough draft)

 

NOTE: This is in draft form, but I didn't want this communique to fade away, so I'll just post it and work on a 2nd draft later in the week at Casablanca Airport, where I have the unfortunate luck to have a 10+ -hour layover...It's been a busy week, and I want to do justice to these words, so I wait. 

 To add to writing style, drafts, etc., I like to outline my work by starting with headings for whatever it is I am feeling like writing about. It's usually a mix of things that happened during the week, encounters with people, thoughts while cycling, music, da kine, etc. Anyway, it's centered around road-tripping through the high-Atlas Mountains and Jebel Toubkal ('mount' Toubkal) — the highest point in Morocco & North Africa. It's a love story, actually, but not a deep love story...

Music to accompany my words: Gordon Lightfoot's 'Sundown'

falling into lust w/a mountain: Jebel Toubkal 

sea level to 4167 meters of your raw intimidating granite slicing through the sky, your rarefied air I greedily breathe in

A mountain fit for fleeing Titans, after Zeus's fury. The Pillars of Heracles (2 mountains straddling the Strait of Gibraltar)  stands as testimony of Titan strength   Heracles wasn't a Titan... only a Demigod: remove this

up close & personal

• 1st date 2024: unexpected immediate physical attraction
• lingering feelings somewhere in the back of my hard-drive
• 2nd date: remote 'coffee' meet-up
• 3rd date: Can this really 'be' something? No, but I enjoy a good challenge, and at over 4000 meters elevation, I enjoy that you manage to take my breath away. I will train. I will prepare. I will see you again in October, 2026... 

Now, I just have to convince Mohamed to join in. I'll need a 'wing-man' to keep me in check...  

• UPDATE: he said YES!  

 my heart belongs to Poseidon's tides, but I'll check you out, Toubkal; let's see what kind of music we can make together: a symphony, a solo, a fado   

in search of this mountain's tides, rhythms; allow me to flow within your high tides

• bikinis for base layers 
• surfboard for trekking poles 
• salt in my hair; snow on my Hoka One Ones 

mutual attraction

• let's let it play out for what it is: a high altitude fling w/no strings attached, just delicious memories that hit harder than any sea-level riptide

reminds me of a Gordon Lightfoot song: Sundown. 

He wrote it, as rumor has it, about a groupie that enjoyed hooking up with famous musicians at concerts in the 70s. She always left him at sundown- 'creeping down my back stairs.' There is this one opening verse that gets right to the heart of the song/emotion

"I can see her lying back in her satin dress in a room where you do what you don't confess." 

This one as well:  

"She's been looking like a queen in a sailor's dream, and she don't always say what she really means." 

sunrise union

a vertical one night stand with the eARTh itself (2 days to summit from Imlil)

temporary fixation

• this jebel doesn't want to hold my hand; it wants to see me sweat, to scrape my knees on unforgiving prickly shrubbery, to see me beg for the summit sunrise

I wrote this for you — extending late into the Bewitching Hour while just a Moonlight Mile on down the road — because I felt your presence. I saw your outline in the shadows as I was creeping down your back stairs. Just as Gordon Lightfoot's hook-up left him each day at sundown, creeping down his back stairs and onto other conquests, I will return to the sea. I could never give up King Neptune, after all. 

I daydream: intermittent scenes from 'the big kiss' float through. I will rise at 4:00 am. I will witness the sun rising over the Sahara. You are, after all, the both the root and roof of Morocco and North Africa beyond. Our interaction, brief. Let's move on from one another. I have other mountains to fall in love with, and I've set my sights on Portugal's. As I creep down your back stairs, I'm already focused on another's embrace. Think of me fondly, though, from time to time as I will you: your ruggedness, your height, the danger — from the solace of my beach towel... 

 Sometime, during some sundown, my future self might lament that our sunrise together will have ruined all other sunrises

I made you a mix tape. (SO Gen-X) Yes, I'm smitten:

Rebel Rebel- David Bowie

I can't get no Satisfaction - Stones

Smooth- Santana 

Steal my Sunshine - Len

In the Evening - Led Zeppelin

Grace, too - Day for Night - The Tragically Hip

Still - Macy Gray

Deeper Shade of Soul - Urban Dance Squad

Learning to Fly - Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

Take Me Home Country Road - Israel Kamakawiwo`ole 

Just the Way You Are - Milky

Dreams 1977 - Fleetwood Mac

My Sweet Lord - George Harrison

Harvest Moon - Neil Young 

 

Extispicy on the Massage Table: Reading the Knots of a Long Semester

 

 I could feel that the hour was nearly up. There's this little 'tap' he does when he wants to let me know that the massage is over. It wasn't nearly enough. What I thought was needed was to work out the muscle tissue. However, I realized even before lying on the massage table that the red flags had more to do with my mental capacity. My brain is grieving from the past few months! This semester nearly took out the joy in my life. The glue holding it all together was good friends and cycling- at its very basic essence. 

Moving through my work day today was a slow-burn exercise in mustering my strength to keep my shit together and just get through the day. That was easy enough. On the ride home, my mind was racing through various scenarios: emotions, lesson plans, AI bullshit in the curriculum, Portugal, summer school (ugh), upcoming bike trip in August, upcoming bla bla bla. Anything. Anything to think of in the future rather than being in the moment and trying to navigate through the spiritual vomit of letting go of this unending semester. 

A blur of scenery and suddenly I was inside my apartment. Safety. Food. I never eat 'food' at work, and it's always been fine to go until 2pm without eating but a cucumber or banana, etc. Something about this semester had me crawling up the 4 flights of stairs each early afternoon in search of immediate nutrition. Today, though, after satisfying myself with an omelette (I ingested a total of 15 eggs this week. I counted. Overkill much?), I did the unthinkable. I took a nap — for 2.5 hours. It was all I could do. No resistance. My body was shutting down and needed silence, and I simply accepted this. It was divine. Waking up groggy, I willed myself to get it together, again, for the rest of the day's regiment; the good stuff!

After what seemed like hours of hot soapy steam, I hopped on my bike and at a snail's pace made it to Linda's place. Our masseur always sets up there as she is on the 1st floor and I'm on the 3rd floor — which is quite a steep climb, especially with a massage table in tow. I already knew I was falling apart. Hot steamy water has a tendency to do that; infiltrate the cracks in my shell and start to soften my being. It served as the precursor to my confession; a Baptism of sorts. If the semester had calcified me into a hard defensive shell, the steam was the needed solvent. 

Working hard all semester. Playing hard all semester. Cycling hard all semester. It all dripped off me and onto the massage table as each long inhalation 'it' resisted until that long exhalation forced it out of me.  

The mantra: fuck this cortisol clinging to my body while basically performing an extispicy on myself, letting my masseur 'read' my knots like an ancient priest/priestess would 'read' animal entrails in his/her temple to predict a future where I'm fully relaxed, renewed, elevated. 

The 'animal' sacrifice; purging my elevated cortisol levels (surely they must have been).  What does that knot in my right deltoid mean? Does it mean 4 more weeks of winter or that I should just quit my job? Hah!

Scrambling to find discarded clothing, I disappear a ghost of the person who walked in. This violent shift from the sacred oil-slicked silence of the massage table back into the structural reality of donning clothes, of putting back on my armor that, thankfully, no longer 'fits' quite right. 

After hanging out, eating some light foods, and talking story with friends, I think about my faithful bicycle that is going to carry me home, to bed, to think, to drift, and to ultimately wake up during the Bewitching Hour and go forth from there. 

I hop on my bicycle and reflect back to that familiar 'tap' my masseur gives each time. Perhaps the cruelest part of this ritual, signaling that the sanctuary is closing and the real world will soon rush back in. An hour is never enough. It's still light outside but the light is fading, as I am.  

It feels different, biking. I'm just a body in motion, content to give into my exhaustion for the night. I am vanishing into the quiet stillness and don't need to be found, just yet...

I am healed, for now. I am not fixed and don't need fixing. I just want to allow for the spiritual vomit to happen until I'm empty enough to be filled again, which is generally a once-a-month process. For now (tonight), emptiness is divine. 

Now, I need to drink a gallon of water.  

 

 

 

When the Project Becomes the Presence

   

 

 

 

Self-Care

What have I done to my self? To my body. To my armor. My project, my protective shield, that I’ve honed and harnessed to keep me at a distance from dis-ease. While my methods deliver trustworthy results, at the same time, my armor is so strong that it blocks joy and vitality- perhaps as well. No bueno.

The Cost of Maintenance

Building and maintaining healthy armor is the (a?) point. A journey from protection to presence. Find the (a?) path. Go deep into chakra points and follow the (a?) illuminated neural superhighway of energy channels. Hit up every waypoint and hang around long enough to pay homage. Watch the flower bud unfold. Melt the armor. Resilience emerges. No toll booths.

My what a web I have woven. I am guilty, at times, of:

Staying in logic to avoid the mess of emotions. However, I always find my way back.

I instinctively approach getting from Point A to Point B in a straight trajectory. This is solid. Reliable. Logical. Is this what I desire? What is illogical? In converse, when I take the extra time and effort, of becoming effortless, in getting from Point A to Point B in a convoluted manner… this. This is when I flourish.

The Tipping Point

Embrace it. I dive off the deep end, now, comfortably, knowing metamorphosis is imminent. Be patient. Be malleable.

The Body as a Project vs The Body as a Home

Feeding my temple mana from the gods and goddesses: The ambrosia of various herbal tinctures and supplements. The nectar needed to keep the hearth fire burning. What do I do with all this energy I’ve harnessed?

Testing out the Waters

When I drop the mana into my system, what transpires? I no longer care about HOW I get from Point A to Point B. I only understand that the alchemical process is unfolding. I trust. Blind faith built upon science. Structural reinforcements melds into high-vibrational fuel. Base metals turning into gold, from the tactical to the visceral. Ascension.

Mantra: I watch the drop fall. An amber spark of the eARTh dissolves a wall. Marrow is saturating, dissolving rigidness. A door opens. Step inside.

The (a?) goal, I see clearly now, isn’t a thicker armor; it’s a more malleable armor. It’s possible to have both a life that ‘works’ and a life that ‘feels’, but I need a bridge to cross over into thresholds. I don’t need to refer to the map’s waypoint enroute to Point B because I am the journey.

I honor myself: time for a hammam to wash the semester residue from my being. One of my favorite things I’ve learned from this part of the world; hammam time. I purify myself and call my masseur to dissipate all the build-up of shit that no longer serves me. I become whole.

I am woman. Hear me roar.

"Sometimes I want to burn a candle for you" : The Rolling Stones Meet the Titans

Music to accompany my words to:

                                               "Winter" 

 It is my hypothesis that everything experienced in life can be explained through 2 things:

1. The Rolling Stones

2. Classical (Greek) mythology

I have research, raw data, and high hopes...

So, I'm sitting on my couch listening to  the Stones. I should be grading more papers, projects, AI-generated word salad from wayward students... It's a melancholy day: low ground fog this morning, billowing gray-black clouds obscure an otherwise cerulean-blue sky, the crush of final exams week (and all the grading still to do), and, and, and...

Listening. Feeling their spoken words. There's NOTHING like a Rolling Stone ballad to put me in a pensive mood. A resistant tear pools up in my eye, and I'm not sure why. Does it refuse to fall because suspension between dual worlds is more logical? Is this an existential crises between the mid-Atlas Mountains versus Mount Olympus? Just as Odysseus clings to a rock to avoid being swept out to sea, a teardrop holds steadfast on the edge of my consciousness. 

Just as Mick and the boys belt out, 'It has been a cold cold winter', indeed.  Blinking away the moisture, I'm in awe. I'm in awe that I reach this state of consciousness.

 Tell me you can listen to this song and not shed a salty tear just begging to be gently brushed from your face.  Maybe, just maybe that exquisite teardrop insists on blazing down my cheek, carving a deep ravine down through my chakras, igniting the roadmap of my soul — like a beacon lighting up the highway for another traveler (Hermes?) to stumble upon out on the open road.

 Winter

Moonlight Mile

Wild Horses

Angie 

Every ballad is a fucking banger, so here goes: The Rolling Stones Meet the Titans and gods, demi-gods, goddesses of Greek Mythology.

Winter: 

Demeter and her grief over Hades taking Persephone. Surely if Demeter shed tears, the world would not have experienced drought, though. Instead, her grief turns the fields 'brown and hollow', as the Stones say. Winter is easily one of my favorite Stones songs:

"It's sure been a cold cold winter. And the light of love is all burned out."  

"And I hope it's going to be a long hot summer. And the light of love will be burning bright."

 Sublime...

Moonlight Mile:  

In Greek mythology, Selene personifies the moon. Steering her chariot across the sky, she falls in love with a mortal and, selfishly, puts him into an eternal slumber so she can look down on him forever and he will never leave her. Intense, right? A radiance of loneliness or just a goddess doing shit messing up mortals lives because she can? 

Mick wrote Moonlight Mile while on tour and pondering life on the road; a journey towards something beautiful yet distant all the while thinking about (what is) home. 

"In the window, there's a face you know. Don't the nights pass slow."

"I've got silence on my radio. Let the air waves flow." 

Wild Horses:

Poseidon, definitely. His (sea)horses as untamed steeds. Beautiful but impossible to control.  

"I know I dreamed you. A sin and a lie. I have my freedom, but I don't have much time." 

"faith has been broken. Tears must be cried. Let's do some living after we die." 

 Angie:

 A bittersweet ballad of salty tears and saying goodbye when the soul of a relationship has moved on. We've all been there, and when reaching that turning point of realizing just how beautiful it is to let go of something we've held onto for too long, there's an understanding of freedom. It's fucking heartbreaking yet sublime, each time. Sublime because of emotions ocean of vastness, bordering on divine-ness, like being in the middle of a thunderstorm or standing before a tragic god/goddess, awaiting your fate — perhaps from the Fates themselves. 

 "With no loving in our souls and no money in our coats, you can't say we're satisfied."

 

 How does this all relate to me in this moment? I suppose final exam week is like the 'Sisyphus' of my semester.  Grading papers is my boulder. The foggy day is the mist rising up from the Underworld, where Hades holds Persephone hostage — or is she now content to be his forced bride? The Stones are the Oracle at Delphi as they speak in riddles to be deciphered.

That salty tear, it's ichor — the blood of the gods/goddesses. Because why? Because the Stones make me feel immortal. Break on through the ravine and behold the River Styx. A pool of water whose reflection defines who I was, am, and am becoming.  Mick and the boys are one, as my ferryman, my Charon, and they are guiding me through this foggy week.  

BOOM. Back to grading 

 

Oh those liminal spaces that fill me up with pleasure: I am an addict

I recently stayed in an apartment in Vila Nova de Cerveira, and this was the artwork in the bathroom... I added to it to create this performance piece... 

  
 

addict.addiction.addictive

What's your pleasure?  

I confess. I am an addict. To what? To whom? For what? For whom?

 

I'm in my dream-state of consciousness in this moment. I'm awake yet not fully. It's that 'fuzzy' state of mind that not even a hot cuppy joe can quickly eliminate.  

In a mad mad mad world, it's somewhat difficult to find the time to devote to my cravings, but for the past two days I was able to put in the efforts. My goal was to put in two 50-mile days of cycling. I'm not sure if I achieved this 'number' — as I prefer to focus on 'time' instead, but my body relayed the message to my brain that IT was feeling groovy. Result: I had the most amazing sleep last night, and it has me thinking this morning; What is IT? I know IT. I feel IT. How do I describe IT?

Just as we can become enslaved to what harms us, on the flip side we can also be deliciously tethered to what makes us stronger.  

I tether to my cravings: 

* Waking up to birdsong 

* Morning stillness

Time to soak in it. Let it seep into oneself. Let the hypnopompic awareness linger. There's no rush. I confess: I am addicted to slow-burn endorphin release — whenever possible

* Endorphins that very s l o w l y filter into serenity

This one... This craving invades my body like an army of euphoric warriors. There is a rhythmic addiction to exercise, so my devotional worship rewards with vitality and a glow from within that bursts through body armor. My body is my temple. I devote my life to the temple. We all do, right? 

Euphoria is the only mandate in this temple. Stepping inside, I hear my blood humming. Vibrations resonate throughout. Friction. Mutation. Atmosphere shimmers from the heat of my devotion. Chemical romance is real. 

Maybe it's the resulting vaso-dilation that I crave. I'm not sure. This 'glow from within' feeling; there's only a few ways that it produces results... 

I have memory of lying on my couch back home in Hawaii. I was living in the jungle, in Haiku. I had just come back from yoga class, and I took a Niacin (Vitamin B3). Niacin is known for producing a 'flush' where your skin becomes 'red' from the dilation of small blood vessels coming up to the skin's surface, thereby flushing out impurities. It felt like butterflies surfacing and releasing through my skin. I believe the problem was not eating food before taking the B3 (meaning I didn't read the directions regarding dosage). I recall just lying on the couch & noticing the feeling of the butterflies shifting all around. It felt like falling in love, I think. My legs were weak, I was warm (from the dilation of blood vessels as well as just living in the humidity of the jungle), I was comfortably uncomfortable. I had a phone conversation with my boyfriend and remember describing what I was feeling and that I couldn't drive my car to the other side of the island, where he lived, because of the butterflies in my legs. I'll have to ask him about it next time I'm in Hawaii.

To summarize, THAT feeling arrives after a good long sweat. Sweat from sport. Sweat from saunas. Sweat from intimacy. It's all good.  

* Hunger for creation

I watched my father and brothers creating things when a child. Our garage... in retrospect was a wonderland, but at the time, I wasn't so interested in its content. Curious, yes. I clearly remember when Curt told me to stick my finger in this round electrical socket-thing at my father's work bench, and it gave me an (electrical) JOLT.  I mean, it didn't look like all the other electrical outlets in the house, so... I don't know. He was a little punk; we all were.  

From my mother and older sister, I got a hunger for design. We had an old Singer sewing machine. There were knitting needles. Still today I am designing. I am writing. I am reading.  

With design comes textiles. Scents on fabrics from journeys deep into the labyrinths of souks, medinas, kasbahs, etc. Each piece of fabric draped against my body reeks of ancient Silk Road caravan stories, cardamon, saffron, oud — and likely doses of camel dung and cat piss. Outside of those last 2, adorning myself with these delights simply delights me. Each piece has a backstory and add that to my backstory and a bond forms that is etched into memory as well as tattooed onto my carcass. 

* Intoxication for knowledge 

Books. The bane of my existence, moving them around from country to country.  Akin to leaving a lover in every port, I fondly reflect back to those lost loves. The pages read, the scent of paper...

Nothing more to say here. Lifelong learner 

* armor

I'm talking of the semi-precious stones type of armor.  More. More. More. Especially silver, turquoise, Tahitian pearls... Perhaps I need to add a blue sapphire to my quiver. No diamonds, please.

* laundry

A strange craving, indeed. Perhaps more so a sense of accomplishment that results from doing laundry. I find a meditation in such things as:

finding money in pockets before doing laundry

realizing that some weeks I have more sports attire to wash than work attire 

hanging laundry outside to dry: very gratifying — especially if can can get the perfect lines going, thus not having to iron afterwards... 

ironing... Yes, this can be very meditative. I so enjoy attention to detail. I get over this task quite rapidly, though. 

Generally, for this list, much da kine is involved. #IYKYK

 

Alright, time to soak up this rest day.