Are you ready to grow your venture or raise money?  We have another Taste of the Tribe on Monday.

Next month our Holiday party & Charity Auction features several treats for entrepreneurs.

• Lore Levin, the Queen of North Texas Investors, presents “Gotcha! CEOs and Managers Just Like You Are Going To Jail Every Day.” What you don’t know truly CAN hurt you and your business.

• How much would you pay for a 3 hour working session with an actual investor? $1,000? $250? How about $10? That’s the current price at our online auction for a Venture Consultation with Lore Levin.

• Is money an issue for paying for ongoing consulting?  We’re still taking applications for Tribe Blue scholarships.  Another option – we’re auctioning an entire year of the Tribe.  It’s now just $25!

We’re just starting to add charity auction items to our online auction and door prizes. What about you?  Do you have a consulting service or product to share with the community, not just here in DFW … but worldwide? If so, let us know.

Register for the party

Bid now at our online auction

Building Your Success,

Marc Freedman

Dallas Entrepreneurs

• Next Meeting - Blue Holiday Party & Charity Auction, Thursday Dec 10
• Blue Events

All Entrepreneurs

• Tribe Alert: Online media help
• Tribe Powwow: You don’t have to be a lone wolf
• Venture News & Tips: Get your free term sheets here!

   

• Venture Spotlight: Secure Spectrum
• New ideas: Pay-what-you-want hotel
• Free Publicity

The Blue Holiday Party & Charity Auction is our top event of the year and is held at a gorgeous art gallery. Our holiday cheer features a number of fun and engaging activities.

• Charity auction benefiting The Family Place, the top DFW family violence service provider, and the North Texas Food Bank.  Bid now (we’re just starting to add tiems), bid at the party, or both!
• Presentation – Gotcha! CEOs and Managers Just Like You Are Going To Jail Every Day. Ouch, learn what managers and business managers HAVE to know!
• Free Services. Get a business portrait, massage, door prizes, and more!
• Great Networking. Last but not least our events present great opportunities to mingle with the top business pros in DFW. Bring your friends and coworkers. Come relax, enjoy our food and drink, win a door prize, and meet other executives and professionals in person ready to learn about and help you!

Wednesdays 11:45am-1:45pm, Fridays 12pm – 1:30pm

Tribe Blue for Entrepreneurs & Business Owners

Application required

http://TribeBlue.com

Business coaching, consulting, and accountability that’s powerful and affordable.

Monday November 30, 11:45am-1:15pm

A Taste of the Tribe

Margarita Ranch at Mockingbird Station, Dallas

A Taste of the Tribe is your introduction to business success. Share your business and current issues and receive expert guidance and suggestions. Reservations required.

http://TribeBlue.com/taste.php

Thursday December 10, 11am-2pm

Blue Holiday Party & Charity Auction

Presentation “Gotcha! CEOs and Managers Just Like You Are Going To Jail Every Day” by Lore Levin

Hosted by Visual Image Fine Art Publishing, Dallas

14320 Midway Rd, Suite 300, Dallas

With auction, door prizes, FREE business portraits, FREE massages, and much more!

Info & registration: http://DallasBlueParty.com

Online auction (bid now!): http://AuctionsBlue.com

One of our members is developing an online media venture, including an Internet radio service.  We seek help with a business model and technology.  Please reply if you can help or can refer us to someone who can.

Last month’s Entrepreneurs meeting showcased three new social network and media ventures. They had one thing in common. Relationships are a critical business asset, whether used to find new contacts, share address books, or provide recommendations. That’s a core part of the Tribe Blue philosophy.

It’s easy to be isolated as the big dog on top or lone wolf entrepreneur. Lifeline relationships are critical to both your business and personal success.  Independent confidantes who don’t have a stake in your business provide guidance, balance, and perspective that you can trust. .

When you’re in the Tribe, you’re a part of a larger community. Tribe leaders and mentors directly coach and work with you. Fellow Tribe members act as colleagues for additional support and advice. Plus we give you access to the wider Blue audience of thousands of executives for specialized outreach.

You are never alone with the Tribe. Get a Taste of the Tribe, learn more, or apply now.

There is an imbalance between entrepreneurs with no money and investors with millions or even billions of dollars.  It’s resulted in agreements with complex terms that give investors great power in the relationship and generate huge legal fees that average $50,000 per funding round.

TheFunded offer a term sheet written to simplify agreements, slash fees, and protect founders.

Note that we are not attorneys and are not providing legal advice. This document should be used with caution and in consultation with your own legal counsel.

TheFunded Found Institute – Plain Preferred Term Sheet. From Adeo Ressi, founder of TheFunded. Eliminates aggressive investor terms, such as participation with preferred stock, a 1x liquidation preference, and single trigger vesting acceleration on acquisition.

Visit our free promo page to learn how YOU can be featured!

Secure Spectrum is a Dallas-based company that develops Dashboard Reporting Compliance Audit software. SecureFeed is a corporate mashup that aggregates and pulls data from internal and external data sources. SecureFeed replaces your existing Dashboards, Reporting, Compliance, and Security and Event Monitoring software.

Secure Spectrum seeks consultants for mentoring and a Board of Advisors/Directors, legal and IP help, sales staff, and funding. Contact Paul Hanson via email or 972-273-0510.

Pay-what-you-want hotel in Singapore

Travel & tourism / Marketing & advertising

The new Ibis Singapore on Bencoolen hotel just last week launched
a promotion that lets guests choose the rate they want to pay for a
night’s stay.

Pre-cut decorations for IKEA furniture

Homes & housing

Sydney-based Grippiks sells adhesive sheets in a variety of bright
colours and patterns for use on the surfaces of many models of IKEA
furniture.

Group buying for new parents

Retail

Regular readers are already familiar with the benefits consumers
can enjoy when they team up and buy as a crowd. A new site brings
those advantages to buyers of baby and children’s goods.

Tracking one’s sex life online

Lifestyle & leisure

An entirely personal application, Bedpost is a way for consumers to
keep track of the sexual encounters they’ve had by logging in and
entering some key details after each one.

Hotel uses tech perks to draw youthful travellers

Travel & tourism

Technology-enabled hotels seem to be popping up all around the
globe, and recently one of our spotters alerted us to one in Germany
that’s aimed specifically at budget-oriented youthful travellers.

Follow these new ideas and more in Iconoculture and Springwise.

Highlight your venture to 1,500 readers. You can be in Dallas or anywhere in the world. Submit your listing now!

Until 1960, no one had diabetes because people ate traditional foods that helped prevent the disease. But with the introduction of foods high in fat and calories, diabetes became widespread among the Tohono O’odham tribe…. From VOA. Full story

This site may contain information about: food. The blog is also related to: food.

Alright, so not a whole lot has occurred since my last post in Nice, France.

No… wait. That’s a complete lie.

One of the most important things that’s happened is I’ve learned I can not go to India on this little excursion around the globe. Why? Well, I got to Barcelona and was only going to stay for one day. When the hostel reception asked me why, I mentioned that I had to go to the Indian Embassy in Madrid and get my new Visa for the country sorted out ASAP. They told me there’s an embassy consulate in Barcelona and I was like, “Hey, might as well stay and get it done here since it’s such a fucking beautiful place.” Because it really was. Las Ramblas is really cool, the weather is beautiful year round, it has a gorgeous beach and harbor, and the people are pretty friendly. That’s about how I can sum it up. Nothing too crazy happened there outside of the usual pub crawls, getting drunk and making an ass out of myself on the dance floor.

So the next day I wake up and manage to make my way to the embassy consulate. I take in the sounds of groups of school children playing in the schoolyards during lunch time and enjoy the fact that I’m pretty much in the suburbs of what seems like a paradise city. Finally finding my way via small side streets and checking the almost non-existent street numbers on the houses, I see a small, handwritten sign beneath the buzzer for the embassy. Back in highschool, I took three years of Spanish, but I’m not going to lie and pretend like I’m fluent. The one thing I could make out was the word “cerrado”. Fuck, I thought. If I remember anything from those three years, besides how to say “I like to eat monkey head in a cage.”, it was that meant “closed”. Fuck, I thought. But I rang the buzzer anyway.

“Hello?”
“Hola”
“Open?”
“No open, closed.”

Yeah, so the fucking embassy was closed. I arrived there November 12th, and the last day it was open was November 11th. I missed it by a day.

So off to Madrid the next day.

But wait… it’s not that simple. It never is.

Not with me, anyway.

I set an alarm on my phone to go off at about 7 A.M. the next morning, It was a three hour train ride to Madrid and I wanted to get there early enough to get my business done and have enough time to see more of the city with some daylight. But there’s always a problem.

Somehow in my sleep, I managed to turn my phone off. I don’t know how, I don’t know why. But they say everything happens for a reason, right?

Right.

If I had woken up on time, I never would’ve seen Josh and Claire (two of the group of Aussies I had met in Nice, who happened to end up at the same hostel as me in Barcelona) at breakfast that morning and the following event never would’ve occurred.

“Oh, hey Ryan. Where’re ya’ off to?”
“Ah, I gotta get to Madrid and I’m in a bit of a rush, I turned my phone off last night in my sleep and missed my alarm.”
“Oh that’s right, you need to sort out getting your Visa for India. Where else are ya’ goin’ anyway?”

So I run down the list of countries to which I’m going. This includes Egypt.

“Ah, I’m trying to get my nan’s (grandmother’s) ashes to Egypt.”

You see where this is going now.

So in a very concise, five minute conversation I manage to agree with Josh that I’m going to take his grandmother’s ashes to Egypt, spread half of them around in the desert and bring the rest back with me to Melbourne when I arrive there. I’m not sure if he’ll be there or not, so we’ll work out the details when the time arrives.

Anyway, it wasn’t until I got to Madrid that I found out I wasn’t going to be able to go to India. I get to the hostel late, not realising that the three hour express train from Barcelona to Madrid is an extremely popular route. Get to the train station at 1, and I don’t leave until 5:30. Kinda sucked. I did have time for a nice paella, coffee and some beer though. But I got to Madrid on a Friday night, and it’s difficult to keep track of days when you’re traveling. I was about to head to the embassy Saturday morning when one of the hostel staff members actually told me that it was Saturday morning. Shit.

So Monday rolls around and I head up to the embassy. Long ass line. One of the people waiting in line suggests I go to the consulate just a few streets away to save time and see if it’s possible to even get a new Visa before Thursday when I fly to Morocco. I do this and discover I simply don’t have enough time, even with a Visa in my name already. They’d have to cancel the old one and process the paperwork for a new one, which would take about a week and a half for a foreigner since the Spanish, American and Indian embassies all have to get in touch and talk about the situation or whatever the fuck has to go on when this sort of thing happens.

Farewell India.

I’m trying to look at it in a more positive light and am thinking that I am just not meant to go this time. This gives me more time in some other areas, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I can plan a trip in the near future dedicated almost solely to India and give myself a few months there rather than a few weeks. Whatever whatever, I’ll sort it out.

There’s a nice English book store in Madrid I would suggest for any travellers in the area, by the way. It’s called J and J’s Book store (it’s actually an ampersand but I’m typing this on an Arabic keyboard and can’t find the damned key) off the Noviciado (Line 2 – Red) metro stop. Great selection and very good prices. Many of the larger stores will be asking for 20-30 Euro for a new book, but you can get most used books there for around 4-6 Euro. Great coffee, friendly staff and they have weekly events like Intercambio night on Thursdays and Quiz night on Fridays. I spent a good day and a half there before I headed out to Morocco to recharge my batteries before I spend the next few months as far removed from Western civilization as I’ll probably be in my entire trip to come.

So… off to Morroco this past Thursday, the 19th of November, 2009.

I had no problems getting to the Madrid airport and getting on my plane. I was a bit nervous though, since when I was at the English book store, I brought up my story to some of the folks there. I asked if it would be immoral to open up the small tin of ashes I had been entrusted with, and they said it would be only normal to want to see what I was actually carrying. There was no reason for me to disbelieve Josh, but I wanted to make sure the package actually contained ashes and not some kind of drug he simply wanted to get rid of. So the moment of truth came…

I managed to cut through the tape binding the two halves of the tin together and slowly pried it open. You would’ve thought I was opening Pandora’s Box or the Arc of the Covenant the way the entire bar had crowded around me during the last few millimeters of drawing off the top of the tin.

It was fairly anti-climactic. No ecstasy. No cocaine. No heroine. Just some hardened ashes to be spread around in the desert. There be Nan.

So yeah, I was a bit nervous checking my baggage in the Madrid airport since it technically is illegal to do what I am doing. I did a bit of research the morning I was flying out and I am indeed transporting a dead body, or more specifically, a biological agent across international boundaries. I had it buried deep in my checked baggage and just watched it off towards the X-ray machine. Out of sight, out of mind. If worse comes to worse, I can just let customs remove it from my possession. So long as I manage to get it to the Egyptian desert and fulfill my duty.

So… Marrakech.

It was definitely overwhelming as soon as I got out of the taxi to Jemaa el Fna square. THE Square of Marrakech in the old Medina. Neither pictures nor words can describe the madness that this place brings within the first ten seconds of stepping foot there. You simply have to experience it for yourself.

I manage to find my way to Cafe Argana like the directions to the hostel suggest after asking a few local souk owners who try to get me into their shop. I follow the directions from there and come to an impasse. The street I need to walk down is closed off because they’re shooting a scene for the next Sex in the City movie. Fuck.

“You have to go around.” One of the security guards tells me.
“Can you tell me how?”
“No, it’s impossible. You will get lost, ask someone on the way.”

And he was absolutely right. Even if I had a map it would be completely useless. So I just kept walking, trying to stay on the main streets and using my internal navigation to get back to the street I had to take a detour off of. Shop owners keep trying to pull me in to look at their goods, but I keep telling them, “No… no… I need to find my hotel.”

“Oh, I know a hotel.” They would say.
“I already have a reservation.”

They would then let me on my way.

Finally a shop owner manages to get me in a small conversation and I tell him of my predicament. He tells me to wait a second and his friend pulls up on this bike that’s not quite a motor powered bicycle, and not quite a vespa. Some sort of medium between the two, very popular around Marrakech. The shop owner tells me that his friend knows the address and will take me there. I ask him how much and he just says I give his friend a tip at the end and come back to his shop to look at what he has to sell.

Fair enough, I figure. But I’m not coming back to go shopping.

So in a matter of only two minutes I go from complete distress in my wanting to find this fucking hostel buried somewhere in the snaking alleys of Marrakech to a euphoric motorbike ride (even if I was riding bitch), with a complete stranger through the same streets, zipping through the crowds, taking hairpin turns way too quickly to be considered safe with the amount of awkwardly weighted baggage I was carrying, and coming close to colliding head on with manned donkeys pulling over-sized wheelbarrows full of what looked like fruits and nuts.

Intense.

I get to the hostel, give the man a tip and decline my trip back to his friend’s shop. I imagine he was fairly pissed, but honestly I just wanted to check in and have a quick nap before heading out into the souks again.

It was a completely different world at night when I walked into the main square. Open-aired barbecues perfumed the air with smells of snails, lambs head and tajine. Bum-rushing waiters and stall owners vice-grip your biceps and wrists in an attempt to get you to sit at their restaurant. Vendors atop three foot tall platforms selling nuts and freshly squeezed juices (must haves!) wave you on and call out Hello in three or four different languages. These people, for as poor as they may come across, are very intelligent and know how to cater to tourists. I’ve met a fair number of men on the street who can speak conversational basics in English, Spanish and even sometimes German, along with their fluency in both Arabic and French.

But nothing really happens that first night. It was the day after when I got into the shopping mood and started trying to haggle.

I bought a couple of leather belts since the one I did have was starting to give way (it’s braided) and loosen up more than I would like. I thought I got a good price, but it wasn’t until a few days later when I realized exactly how I low I could manage to get souk owners to drop their prices with a few varied techniques.

But back at the hostel after my first full day in the medina, I book a tour (2 days, 1 night) to some Casbah’s, the Atlas Mountains, and the desert. It was quite the experience.

I wake up the next morning around 6 A.M. to catch the minibus for our tour at 7. We’re 12 in number and squeeze into this thing for a daunting 6 hour ride (with a few stop offs for lunch and shopping) to our final destination where an hour and a half camel back ride will take us out into the desert. I’m not going to go into any details about the people I met, since it was the general kind of talk that happens between backpackers. I will mention this one fellow though, Abdul, who was born in Yemen but lives in the U.K. currently and has for about half his life. He could speak Arabic and he was handy to have around when we needed information or wanted to converse with some of the people we came across.

I would love to describe the landscape we passed on our way to the “desert”, but it’s simply impossible. The tour driver took us on these winding (almost to a point of being terrifying) mountainside roads just barely wide enough for two vehicles, and in some instances with no guards to keep you from plummeting a good 500 feet straight down a cliff side should your tires catch some loose bit of dirt, or one of them pops, or an oncoming car forgets to turn and just decides to send both of you to what could only be described as hell after the vehicles’ gas tanks explode following the drop.

Scary, yet beautiful.

So the first casbah was cool, but really nothing intense and not nearly as authentic as I would’ve liked to imagine it could’ve been. It did have its old parts, but the people there weren’t too apt to let us just wander around their home without supervision, and we weren’t willing to dish out any money to hire a guide none of us understood.

So we move on after a good lunch (mint tea and a Berber omelet – definitely recommend) and buying a scarf for the desert sun. Eventually we get to where we pick up our camels and Berber guides, and head off into the “desert” after sunset. I keep using quotes to describe this for one simple reason. I thought I was heading out into the Sahara. I know it was only a two day, one night tour, but the photo was definitely misleading. There was sand, don’t get me wrong. There were sand dunes as well. But it just wasn’t the desert.

Oh well, I’ll get there when I arrive in Egypt.

Camels are rough to ride. You learn quickly to not be stiff, and that there’s a lot of gyrating going on in order to keep yourself minutely comfortable. Dirty jokes are mandatory.

We get to the camp site and sit down while our dinner is being prepared. It arrives (chicken tajine for 12 with some vegetarian side tajines) and we all chow down with strangers eating out of the same dish. Some more mint tea follows and we’re left to our own devices for about an hour. In this time we all go outside and lay down on the rock/sand mix and stare up at the sky.

There’s plenty of ways to describe the sky out in the desert using colorful adjectives and creative grammar, but I’m not going to try. I can only say this:

It was the first time I could actually see the edge of the Milky Way. A thick white band stretching across the sky just south of center and curving as it reached the horizon. Constellations became nearly impossible to pick out because of the sheer amount of stars covering the pitch black night sky. It became only more intense after the moon dropped beneath the horizon and allowed us a clear view into the world beyond the world. On our backs for a good thirty minutes, a group of twelve who’ve never experienced this before (mostly from Central Europe and the U.K., myself the only American as has become the usual case in my travels), we pick out a good two dozen shooting stars. About one every minute, yeah. Who the fuck needs meteor showers when you can see bits of space debris burning up in our atmosphere every sixty seconds?

I hope at least one of my wishes come true. It’s just playing the odds game, right?

I was the first to see the bonfire.

I stood up to go into our tent to grab a drink of water and see a bonfire being built behind us. The group gets called over and we get treated to traditional berber music played by our hosts on a set of old, plastic gasoline containers. It was great. Some of us danced and clapped along in rhythm and we were joined by another group on the same excursion as ourselves.

This comes to and end and then we sleep…

Or at least we try to.

It was excruciatingly cold. I had heard that the desert gets cold at night, but I wasn’t ready for this. The blankets did provide some shelter, but you really had to double up in order to get remotely comfortable. It takes me a good hour and a half or so in order to fall asleep the first time, but I was woken a few more during the night as some dogs, whether they were tame or wild I know not, near our campsite barked continually at only God-knows-what, and I wasn’t the only one struggling to find peace. The rustling of a dozen bodies cocooned in blankets atop sleeping mats was enough to assure me I wasn’t the only one awake. But I did manage a good four hours (I think) of sound sleep throughout the night.

We all wake up to a nice sunrise behind the nearby mountains and a simple breakfast of bread, jam and tea and head off back on our camels to our minibus to head back to Marrakech. The second ride was easier than the first, even if we were a bit sore. With some experience under our belts, I think a fair portion of the group was comfortable with riding the smelly, spitting beasts of burden. I can still feel it as I type this, but the biggest pain isn’t in your balls, you learn to put them in the right spot to avoid any painful slapping against the camel’s ridge-like spine, but at the inner joint of where your legs and hips meet. Having to straddle an animal that large for extended periods when you’re not accustomed to it simply does a job on you.

So off to another casbah, again I cannot recall its name. It was where the arena scene from Gladiator was shot, so I could easily Google it and give you a more accurate idea of where I have been, but I simply can’t be bothered right now as I’m in a rush to catch a train up to Casablanca. This casbah was much older and more authentic than the one we had seen the day before. One of the men still living there gave us a tour (and didn’t even ask for a tip at the end, he was simply proud of his home and his heritage and wanted to tell us all about it), and took us up to the top (maybe 300 ft?) where we could see the groves of date and palm trees stretching for miles upon miles to nearby towns and villages. This place was nearly 3,000 years old and still had people living in it. So far removed from western civilization, and so dependent on the income from tourists who simply want to walk through a real piece of history, but simply cannot comprehend the level of depth which lies within the adobe walls. 10,000 people once living there had thinned to less than a thousand over the millennia, but it was still a civilization with language, crafts, religion and all the other minute variables which give culture to a people.

So we have lunch and head back off to Marrakech, but not before stopping at a small shop along the way.

It was definitely worth it as it was a shop where oils (both for eating and washing) and soaps were created using an old process (or at least we were led to believe it was so with the process being shown to us as soon as we entered the doors – they very well could’ve had machinery in a back room or some basement or factory down the road where the goods were made with a much higher rate of efficiency) of grinding the pulp of nuts into a sort of cake which was then squeezed by hands to produce the oil used to make the products.

I bought some rose scented soap and we all hopped back into the van to Marrakech. We get there and split off for an hour and a half for a shower and clothes change, but before I do that I sit down and have some snails. It wasn’t that exotic for me, as I have had escargot when I was in France, but these were honestly a bit of a let down. There were no spices and the snails were a bit bland; think of them as salty, boiled mushrooms that have a face staring right back at you in a state of despair, as I’d imagine that’s how a snail being cooked alive must feel.

Anyway, we regroup and head off for a bit of shisha (flavored tobacco smoked out of a hookah) at an off-the-beaten-path one of the guys with us had visited earlier in the week. It was a welcome smoke and then I head off to bed.

The next day was more of the same (window shopping and passing on), except I was walking around with these Swedish girls and Australian boys who were sleeping in the same 8 bed dorm as myself. Some coffee on a terrace looking over the medina and another go at practicing my haggling skills.

Wait, I missed something.

I did entitle this blog “In Marrakech: Deaf people die an exotic cuisine for me!”, didn’t I? Right… so here’s why.

The overwhelming number of bicycle riders, whether they be motorized or push style, is just incredible. They use their horns, bells and whistles of all sorts to let you know when they’re coming by down a busy side street. Just stick to the side, walk in a straight line, and you will be fine even if they brush past you lightly. If you can’t hear this coming, you might just step out to the side at the wrong time and get clipped by a bike whizzing by, or a small truck, or a donkey pulling an over sized load – that’s really the last thing you want to happen here. So yeah, deaf people die if they’re not careful.

Exotic cuisine? Let’s just say that my last full day in Marrakech was accompanied the most awkward thing I’ve eaten thus-far in my life. I didn’t even know you could get this. Earlier that morning I was out on the top terrace of the riad I was staying at and was having conversation with some British guys on a short holiday taking off back home later that afternoon. What did they eat the night prior?

Sheep’s head.

Yes… and let me tell you, it was fucking delicious. Though it might not seem appetizing at first, it’s a must try if you can stomach the sight of a a man chopping the flesh off a freshly boiled head of an animal (and it still has the vague shape of a head after cooking, by the way) right in front of you, toss it into a bowl, and spice it with some flavored salt. The salt is delicious too.

So yeah, that’s pretty much my story in Marrakech and my short excursion out into what kind of was the desert but still wasn’t quite the desert, and the Atlas Mountains and its casbah’s. I have to go rush to the train station to catch one up to Casablanca, take a flight for a night’s stay back in Madrid tomorrow and then head on off to Cairo on the 26th. From there’s it’s overland travel through Egypt, Israel and Jordan for two and a half weeks and then flying out of Amman (spelling?) to….

Well, I’ll save that for when I get there.

Two days until Egypt!

Peace out and take care

-Ryan P.

I hope no one that works airport security reads this, or if they do, after I’ve already left their country! I’m only transporting ashes because I’m a nice person!

Your reputation and the reputation of people you partner with and represent is increasingly important.

In the online world our activities and comments are a Search away and we can be judged by the company we keep in a matter of minutes.

Social and professional networks and other online media allows you to very easily put up information about your interests and much more. It’s very easy to connect with people with similar interests and share your thoughts and feelings.

Education about creating and managing a professional relationship is only just emerging and evolving. Make sure the reputation that precedes you is one that you are in control of.

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Yemeni tribesman release a Japanese engineer kidnapped in Arhab, north-east of the capital, Sanaa, officials say…. From BBC News. Full story

This site may contain information about: japanese culture. The blog is also related to: japan music.

It is commonly assumed by the public that Communism (also called “Marxism”) was created by the German philosopher Karl Marx. Nothing could be further from the truth. In reality, a young Marx joined the already existing Communist movement and, after publishing several works on the subject of Communism and Capitalism (a term he coined), he became such a central figure that the term “Marxist” became synonymous with the term “Communist”. In much the same way Adam Smith did not create Capitalism but rather created the authoritative work on Capitalism (The Wealth of Nations) and yet is still considered the “founder” of Capitalism.

So who did create Communism?

Like most things in life, there is no short and simple answer. Communism, or at least the primitive ancestor of Communism has existed for thousands of years. At the dawn of man, humans lived in tribes, working together for survival. What one man killed was food for everyone, the spear or hammer made by one person could be used by another. The concept of private-property did not evolve until much later in human history- the reason being that selfishness and individualism simply could not mesh with the harsh realities of the time. One human could not survive on his own, the tribe as a whole could not waste time and energy on creating twenty individual hammers for the twenty men of the tribe when one could be shared just as easily. At the same time, the shared property (combined with the need for everyone to pull their own weight) eliminated any chance of a class system evolving. Without any difference in wealth or workload, society was more or less egalitarian.

So what happened?

As humans became more settled and as the barter system emerged (to be discussed in a later post), shared-property died slowly out and the class system arose. While today the vast majority of hunter-gatherer, pastoral, horticulturalist, and nomadic people groups still live in classless, shared-property systems, the majority of the world’s population began moving away from this system after the establishment of permanent agricultural communities. By the fall of the Roman Empire, most of the world’s people groups practiced Capitalism in some form. It was not until 1516 when Thomas Moore, one of Henry VIII’s closest advisers, published his work Utopia that the concepts of shared-property and classlessness were reintroduced into society (albeit merely as subjects of intellectual discussion). Only in the early 1800s were the concepts developed into actual political/economic theories. Henri de Saint-Simon, a member of the French aristocracy, created several works on the subject and while never implementing them in any major way, laid the foundations for what would become known as the Communist movement. It was not until 1848 when two young Prussian authors named Marx and Engels published their collaborated work The Communist Manifesto that Communism (or “Socialism”- at the time the two words were more or less interchangeable) became a concrete theory. Between the two men’s works, the entire Communist philosophy was created, though it was not implemented until 1871, when Parisian Socialists revolted against the imperial French government and established a short-lived attempt at a Communist government until the Commune (revolutionary government) was wiped out by the French military. While Communist philosophy spread across much of the Western world, there were no major attempts at Communism (baring the establishment of Amish, and later, Hutterite, communities- which are closer to the primitive classless/shared-property practices of various tribal societies). There was a brief attempt at Fabianism (a British Socialist movement), however it quickly devolved into a philosophy, rather than a physical attempt at the implementation of Communism. It was in Russia in 1917 that the first major attempt at a Communist revolution (since the 1871 revolution) took place. The Bolsheviks (the Russian Communist party and revolutionary movement), led by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Russian monarchy and the feudal system. After Lenin’s death in 1923, a split ensued that left the USSR divided between the followers of Leon Trotsky (creator and commander of the Red Army and Lenin’s second-in-command) and the followers of Joseph Stalin (the General Secretary of the Communist party). Stalin, despite the efforts of Trotsky and his followers, assumed control and eventually exiled Trotsky in 1929. Under the despotism of Stalin, the USSR, while maintaining the facade of Communism, devolved into a semi-Socialist dictatorship (Trotsky referred to it as a “deformed workers’ state). While Trotskyism grew in popularity in the West, the general Communist movement was marred by the atrocities committed by Stalin and the imperialists policies pursued in Eastern Europe after his death. In China, Mao Zedong led what is generally considered to have been a Communist revolution, but the later policies of Mao have caused many other Communists to doubt whether China could be counted as true Communist country since the mid 1950s. While the revolution itself is considered to be beneficial, the vast majority of modern Communists hold that contemporary China is no more a true Marxist country than Stalin’s USSR (this opinion is viciously opposed by Maoist factions of the Communist movement). While Communism was quickly becoming popular in the third-world (due largely to Western neo-colonialism) the next major advancement of Communism occurred in Cuba after Fidel Castro and Che Guevara defeated the dictator Batista. Once again Communists are split on the subject of whether Cuba may be considered a true Marxist government- much like China, there is popular that the revolution was a positive event but the movement is split on whether Cuba did or did not devolve into another deformed workers’ state. Indeed, the same could be said for almost every country where a Communist revolution has taken place (though almost all Communists are united in believed that North Korea is not a true Communist country). While the collapse of the USSR in 1990 has led many to believe that Communism has been defeated, the Communist movement is technically as active as it ever was.

In short, the history of Communism is far from simple. Much of its history can be interpreted depending on your sympathies and opinions.

Then again, the same could be said for any aspect of history.

Author’s Note: Since Communism isn’t merely an economic or political or social theory but rather a combination of all three, you can see how describing the theory itself- let alone its history- is a massive undertaking that could easily fill a book. Considering my space and the attention span of the reader is sorely limited, I have been forced so skim over the major events of Communist history. Don’t be ticked off at me if I missed some (though if I have something that might be wrong, please correct me).

Wild Tribe (58 MB download)
In the teeny tiny village of Tribesville, a group of little creatures called Wobblies have lived peacefully for thousands of years, hanging out by the beach and basking in the tropical sun. But a dark cloud has formed over their happy village. The food and water supplies are diminishing and Hyenas are stealing resources. Can you help evolve the Wobblies into a tribe of foragers, doctors, builders and guards before it’s too late?

My cousins daughter is the closest thing I have to a niece.  There’s enough difference in our ages; that’s how I think of her.  She too has inherited the family magpie gene.

T-shirts from Targét, to which I added a little more sparkle.  Her favorite colors are lime green and electric blue (thank goodness she’s out of the pink phase!) so I did my best to follow that with the green shirt.

The shirts are not decorated with crystals, but something called rhinestuds.  They are faceted metal, and also hot fix.  Not quite as sparkly as true crystals, but much less expensive, and more prone to staying affixed through multiple washes. Sewing for teenagers is, at best, a temporary thing as their tastes change so frequently.  Decorating something already assembled seemed a much better, and easier way to go.

I am sorely tempted to keep the grey shirt for myself, since it is very much my colors: silver and purple.  So, we shall see what the holidays bring. Maybe she’ll get it, and maybe, she won’t!

Mojo Update: still missing!

Puck scales new heights!

[Scrisa luni dimineata pe telefonul mobil. Amintit de ea astazi]

Tu la inceputul saptamanii (in al doilea ceas al zilei) dormi sau urmeaza sa ceri ajutorul tv-ului pentru indeplinirea acestei nevoi fiziologice. Eu ascult o “refulare” muzicala. Pe intuneric sunetul doboara orice adversar. Il aud, e impunator si totodata venit de undeva din viitor… Boom… Boom… Pow.
The E.N.D – The Energy Never Dies este “extraterestrul” adus in lume de Black Eyed Peas si expus riscului de contaminare cu A/H1N1. The E.N.D, un album pe care daca nu-l asculti cu optiunea Open Mind activata, exista probabilitatea ca a doua oara sa nu mai apesi butonul PLAY, chiar daca acolo pe CD se afla si I gotta feeling, una dintre cele mai reusite melodii cu care se poate mandri anul 2009.

Daca-ti este cumva dor de mesajul pacifist a lui Michael Jackson, asculta One Tribe, piesa asta aduce cu stilul Regelui Muzicii Pop.

Wild Tribe (58 MB download)
In the teeny tiny village of Tribesville, a group of little creatures called Wobblies have lived peacefully for thousands of years, hanging out by the beach and basking in the tropical sun. But a dark cloud has formed over their happy village. The food and water supplies are diminishing and Hyenas are stealing resources. Can you help evolve the Wobblies into a tribe of foragers, doctors, builders and guards before it’s too late?

Indian Captive: The Story of Mary Jemison by Lois Lenski

My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Civil rights and equality have made a lot of headway against racism in the last century.

“Well, duh,” some might say.

“But there’s still so far to go!” others might protest.

I personally grew up without any particularly scarring incidents of racism. Sure, I got made fun of for my small eyes and flat face, but so did the white girl with the big nose and, personally, I think she took it a lot harder than I did.

It’s great that the social norm is no longer racism and that we’re seeing more diversity in media, arts, and culture. It no longer amazes me to see unbiased news reports about minorities or television shows featuring more ethnic characters.

What amazes me is when I find fair treatments of minorities from books written over fifty years ago, before the civil rights movement was in full swing.

Lois Lenski wrote and illustrated Indian Captive in 1941. The new cover makes it look all modern (and kinda creepy, actually), but the story is old.

It’s based on the true story of Mary “Molly” Jemison, who was captured and then adopted by Seneca Indians. Her family was killed in that very raid. Instead of fighting against her captors and hating them and escaping at the first opportunity (although she certainly did try), she learned to love them and appreciate their culture. After a while, she adopted the Seneca right back.

The real Mary Jemison lived with the Seneca for the rest of her life. She married twice, to Indian men both times. She finally gave an interview at the age of eighty to describe her capture and eventual assimilation into the Seneca tribe.

The book is a pretty faithful treatment of Seneca life. The Indians that adopted Molly were mostly kind, but there were certainly some exceptions. There were parts of their culture that Molly learned to love, but other parts with which she was unable to reconcile herself.

It’s a children’s book, so don’t expect to see any gory scalpings, and some might argue that the book is biased toward Native American culture. But considering when it was written, I’d say that it’s pretty remarkable that a book this kind to an Indian tribe that kidnapped a young white girl and killed her family was even published.

Is it the most compelling book ever? Probably not; it was a little plainly written, even for 1940s children’s lit. But it was interesting and educational and a darned entertaining read.

Mary Jemison would approve.

View all my reviews >>

Have car, will travel. This map shows Tricia’s Travels.

Shown here is a random selection of the places I have worked, stayed or visited since becoming single. Pink flags indicate places I could stay if working away from home. Best viewed on the larger map, perhaps, if you’re going to click the icons for more detail. View Larger Map

View Larger Map

I Fought
I’m the chief of my tribe
A follower of my people
shall I fear to stand for their cause
I will not be quiet to call on the Great Spirit
I will not be carried to the skies
My path is not on bed of ease, my path is for my people
While others fought to win, I fought for my people and my nation, I will not be carried to the skies; I will not be quiet to call on the Great Spirit
©2008

CNN reports that the Washington Redskins on Monday got a glimmer of a win contrary to the team’s performance on the field. (3-6) The U.S. Supreme Court, refused to intervene in an appeal first initiated in 1992, where a group of Native Americans state the team’s mascot “has been historically a disparaging racial epithet”. The NFL franchise argues that they have spent millions in promotion and advertising as well as “protecting its (trade)mark”.

The team has had a formal trademark since 1967 and the organization has been the Redskins since 1933. Prior to that they were known as the Braves.

This debate and argument has been ongoing in college sports where the NCAA in 1995 advised some schools to remove “hostile or abusive” nicknames or mascots. Hence the search for a new mascot for the College of William and Mary and the saga of Chief Illiniwek. Currently Florida State’s Seminoles have little problem in its mascot use, since there is an agreement with the Seminole Native American Tribe. CNN continues in its article, that a state judge last week temporarily blocked efforts for a mascot change for University of North Dakota’s Fighting Sioux, and like FSU, Central Michigan University Chippewas will be allowed to continue to use their name.

The gal and I just came back from the GTA Rope Social, a monthly event in which kinky folk get together to fuck around with rope: a demo, some hands-on practice and some socializing. It’s not a play party, no scenes, just… practice.

The people out and about in the kink scene are very gregarious, but it’s a bit of departure for me. I find myself have to balance my shy, introverted tendencies with the desire to get out there and meet people. It’s getting easier, though, and it turns out that, as well as getting my rocks off, it’s having a therapeutic effect for latent social anxieties.

We’ve been going to a few munches with a group called Toronto TNG and meeting some cool people. A couple months back we went to a private play party at someone’s house, a friend having got us on the guest list. That was pretty strange, not entirely enjoyable. We chose to go because of the invite and the opportunity to break the ice of playing in public: it was a femdom party, and we don’t have a D/S dynamic in our relationship. Also, my gal’s a bit reticent when it comes to taking the reins, so I was having to whisper shit to tell her what to do while trying to make it look like her idea — house rules states that men were not supposed to speak out of turn, take a domineering role, etc. We also tried playing in one of the dungeon play spaces, but found people crowding too close while waiting for their turn, talking too loudly about taxes and home renos, and generally being inconsiderate douchebags. Tacky! But good to get out and demystify some of this world of public kink.

In October we went to NorthBound Leather’s Tribe party; if you live in Toronto, you’ve doubtless seen the flyers featuring a guy in a black leather, spiked hood posted all over town. It’s the world’s single biggest fetish party, hosted at the Sound Academy and with over 4,000 in attendance. My gal said it reminded her a lot of Fashion Cares: snazzy DJ, massive and elaborate fashion show, booze and dancing. Seems that, for a lot of people, “fetish” is a matter of style rather than sexual practice: a lot of people there, especially the gay men, were decked out in leather harnesses and whatnot but expressed ambivalence about kinky sex. There was a public play space set up there, and we spent some time there, joined by a friend who lent some helping hands. It’s incredible to see the range of outfits and personae that people adopt at an event of this scale: wildly creative, totally banal, formulaic, original, slutty, uptight, classy — it’s quite the carnival.

We’ve also been playing privately with a third. Not going to get too much into that here, other than to say it’s been a great experience. While I’m touched by all the concerned friends who think that bringing a third to bed is dropping a bomb in the relationship, I assure you that the worry is unfounded. The partner has been wonderful and has shared our curiosity and willingness to explore the dynamics of three-way play and sex, and I’m delighted to report that it’s been going every bit as well as I had hoped.

The challenge in coming months will be to balance interest and growing commitment to the scene with work, school and life — not to mention the impending return to schooltown in January for the next bout of learnin’.

Edit (19 November): there was a glitch when I first posted this blog and the line “We chose to go because of the invite and the opportunity to break the ice of playing in public” was repeated four times at the bottom of the post. Odd, and a little eerie, that that line amongst all the others should have been chosen and repeated like some creepy mantra.

Tribal reservations can be found in a number of areas in Southern California, notably in areas such as in or near the cities of the Coachella Valley such as Palm Springs, Rancho Mirage, Indio and Coachella as well as in or near Anza, Cabazon, Temecula, San Jacinto, El Cajon, Pala, in the counties of Riverside, San Diego as well as in Santa Ynez in the county of Santa Barbara.

If you have a Tribal law issue not involving a casino, visit our law firm website at http://www.SebastianGibsonLaw.com for more information and call us at any of the numbers easily found on our website.

Unless you’ve been practicing Indian Tribal Law for some years, it is difficult for most attorneys in the United States to know how Tribal Law works, much less to find useful resources to help explain this unique area of law.

Most tribes vest their legislative authority in a tribal council. Some tribes call it by a different name, but the council members are usually elected and for a specific number of years.

Most tribal constitutions call for there to be a tribal chairman who is alternatively sometimes called president or governor. Some tribes elect the tribal chairman by a vote of their council. Others elect the tribal chairman by the voting tribal members.

Tribal bylaws often state that it is the chairman’s duty to preside over the tribal council. The role or power of the tribal chairman differs from tribe to tribe.

Indian tribes also have a long history of tribal courts. Today, most tribal courts administer tribal codes passed by the tribal council and which have been approved at some time by the Secretary of the Interior.

Tribal court systems can by highly structured with tribal prosecutors and defense advocates. Others are made up of informal single judges who work only part-time. Many tribes elect their tribal judges, commonly for a fixed set of years.

Indian tribes also often have a tribal attorney who often has a large influence on tribal affairs, particularly in dealings with non-tribal parties. The tribal attorney has responsibility to the entire tribe, not to its individual members.

Some tribes are incorporated under the provisions of the Indian Reorganization Act. Some tribes have voted to reject application of that Act.

Indian Tribes have sovereignty which means the inherent right to govern themselves. Tribes, however, have no authority over non-members on non-Indian fee lands, and no criminal authority over non-Indians anywhere.

Tribal sovereignty acts as a shield against state law intrusion onto Indian country. States may not directly tax reservation land or reservation Indians. Tribes enjoy sovereign immunity from suit except for suits by the United States. A tribe does not waive its immunity by bringing an action on its own. A tribe may however waive its sovereign immunity by contract. It is for this reason that we don’t handle cases against Indian Casinos in California.

If you have a Tribal or Native American legal issue not involving a casino in California, visit our law firm website at http://www.SebastianGibsonLaw.com and call the law firm of R. Sebastian Gibson for a consultation today.

Yemeni tribesman release a Japanese engineer kidnapped on Monday in Arhab, north-east of the capital, Sanaa, officials say…. From BBC News. Full story

This site may contain information about: sea of japan. The blog is also related to: population of japan.

My Tribe (55 MB download)
Shipwrecked on a beautiful tropical island, your brave little tribespeople must build a new home! With your guidance, the tribe will uncover mysterious secrets, research new technologies, and construct massive wonders! Come back often to feed your tribe, clothe them, and look after the babies and children! Play this beautiful simulation game now!

Seven years ago, almost to the day, I was fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to spend some time in the Peruvian Amazon, near a place called Puerto Maldonado.

It was my gap year and I travelled to Peru to teach English with an organisation called Teaching and Projects Abroad.

As well as arranging teaching placements, TAPA also had ties to a jungle lodge where you could spend time volunteering to help catalogue the wildlife in the surrounding area and generally lend a hand to maintaining the property as well as caring for animals that they had rescued from poachers.

I’ve always been fascinated with nature and in particular rainforests. As a young boy, I remember watching David Attenborough explore some of the farthest reaches of the Amazon and immediately knew that I had to go and see it for myself. So when I found out I could travel out to the lodge once my teaching placement had finished, I jumped at the chance.

I still vividly remember flying into Puerto Maldonado, looking out the window and seeing the jungle unfold beneath me. Then there was the intense, wet heat that hit you as soon as you left the plane. It was very much like stepping into a greenhouse on a hot summer’s day – the humidity and the clamyness of the air.

And then there’s the rain. I was there at the beginning of the rainy season and it would pour at around four each day for about an hour. Always on time, never ever late. I remember the first time I was caught in one of the downpours. The rain was so warm. Like nothing I’d experienced before. Not at all like the spine chilling cold rain that we get in the UK. This stuff was like taking a shower.

When the rainy season really started to kick in it would rain and rain. In one afternoon, all it took was a couple of hours for the river to rise about a metre. After a particularly stormy night, we woke to see huge trees floating down the river, uprooted by the force of the rain.

Anyway, I spent a pretty interesting two weeks working out there and came away in love with the Amazon. The sights and the sounds. Seeing parrots fly overhead was a daily occurrence. Monkeys swinging from tree to tree each day…check. Caimen..check. Piranhas..check. The list goes on and on.

So, I’ve always found it to be very depressing opening up the papers to find yet another story about the deforestation and destruction of such an amazing and magical place. We are cutting down one of the planets most precious resources.

The ‘Lungs of the planet’, as people call the Amazon, it is home to countless animal and plant species making it the most diverse and bio-active natural phenomenon on the planet.

Yet each year we are losing an estimated 50,000 plant, animal and insect species. Rainforests used to cover 14% of the planet’s surface. This figure now stands at a mere 6%. 150 acres are lost every minute.

The rainforests are also home to a considerable number of medicinal plants. Currently, 25% of Western pharmaceuticals are derived from rain forest plants. Yet, it is estimated that scientists have tested a tiny 1% of tropical trees and plants. Scientists have identified 3000 plants that are active against cancer cells. 70% of these plants are found in the rain forest.

Add to this the impact deforestation has on tribal populations and you have a cultural and environmental genocide. There were around 10 million Indians living in the Amazonian rain forest five centuries ago. Today, there are fewer than 200,000.

It is agreed that by leaving the rainforests intact and harvesting it’s many nuts, oil-producing and medicinal plants, the rain forest has far greater economic value than if they are cut down to make way for grazing land or for timber.

So, news that deforestation is at a record low is extremely welcoming. Indeed, the BBC reported this week that the rate has dropped by 45% and is at its lowest since records began 21 years ago according to figures released by the Brazilian government. Just over 7,000 square kilometres was destroyed from July 2008 to August 2009. It must make President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva very proud. He has put green issues at the top of his government’s agenda as he seeks to boost his country’s eco-credentials. The government’s attempts to stem Amazonian deforestation are at the heart of their climate change strategy.

Lula da Silva’s government wants an 80% reduction in destruction by 2020 so these latest figures are a sign that the country is moving the right direction.

Next month, Copenhagen welcomes delegates to the climate change conference. It is thought that the event will see the Brazilians pledge a 38% to 42% voluntary reduction in their greenhouse gas emissions. Half of those cuts will come from the reduction in deforestation. Their chief of staff, Dilma Rousseff, says that this is about sending a political message. They want to press developed nations into making similar pledges. Will the pressure have an effect? So far, offers of greenhouse reduction fall well short of the required amount to have an impact on climate change. We shall see.

Anyway, back on topic. I have my doubts that the fall in deforestation is completely the result of Brazilian governmental efforts. I suspect that it is mostly, if entirely tied to the dismal economic climate which has seen world manufacturing and industrial output fall over the past year or so. Demands for raw materials has declined. I wouldn’t be surprised if the rate of deforestation was to rise again once we come out of the recession. Hopefully I’m wrong. Only time will tell.

i think there are a lot of choices about embodying and/or displaying queerness beyond identity politics or hiding. there’s a place i have found for myself only very recently.

to preface this with some background. i came out initially as bisexual in high school. probably when i was 15. it is hard to remember how extensively i was out. i was definitely writing about it in my journal. i was definitely arguing with my parents about it. i was definitely hanging out with a lot of queers. i definitely made out with a lot of girls in high school.

my first year of college, i got involved with the queer group and went to my first queer bar. in bangor maine no less! i went on a birthday date with this girl when my boyfriend was in mexico. by 2000 i was out to most  and dating a girl for the first time. while i experimented in high school… fishnets, plastic skirts, piercing, cutting, making out with boys and girls, this really tapered off my senior year of high school. i became increasingly political and decided political expression was more important than personal expression(!)

i grew up in a political household, commie parents, started my first organization in 5th grade. but it took on new dimensions. and in the realm of mostly male, mostly straight activists, i basically gave up a lot of myself to prove my priorities. i think this was a massive mistake. because caring about stuff meant passing. it meant not making ‘the people’ uncomfortable by my eccentricities. also code for my queerness.

i eventually left politics. too much bullshit. to many people i knew sexually assaulted by activists. too much talk and action and little confrontation of fears and prejudices that prevent community. the feeling that i couldn’t mesh my political life with my life, my family life. the feeling of hypocrisy.

i eventually ended up working as a secretary in an incredibly hetero-normative hospital. this combined with my girlfriend’s semi self-hating relationship to her queerness and queer presentation led to me really passing. finally losing much of myself there. it took a good 2 years to start to recover.

i was at idapalooza in 2008 and again in 2009. ida is queer land in tennessee near short mountain, a radical faerie community. each year they host a weeklong queer music festival. it was while there that somethings began to come together for me. my relationship w g., working w nayland. working for visual aids, having so many queer teachers in my mfa program (learning simultaneously about contemporary photography, my practice/life/self, and radical queer NYC history), etc.

i had this amazing conversation with this person at Ida. we were talking about family and community. he grew up with radical parents and his father is gay (i’m not sure how he identified when his son was younger). his parents hated the culture of his grandparents so they moved him faraway from them to Texas. he didn’t know them until he requested to meet them. he grew up really isolated with just him and his parents.

we began talking about what it means to strike out on a path different (dramatically or slightly?) from the life of our parents. and there is a big difference between a path chosen or a new path forced… or perhaps then it is the choice regarding what you were forced to change in your life.

my father grew up in a middle class, educated jewish family in brooklyn. i gather that my grandparents had fairly high expectations for the children. though it seems with a lot of room to determine what that means given that one became an artist (my grandma was an artist as well), one an acupuncturist, one a labor organizer. my father began school at city college, studying astronomy, but dropped out halfway through to work full time protesting the vietnam war (with the youth wing of the communist party, the web dubois club.) it is complicated what ended up happening… but i would say that the vision was to NOT do what my grandparents had done. but what would that look like? i don’t think my father really had much of a vision for a radically different path. which makes it really easy especially once you have children or face poverty or trauma… i mean perhaps these things could also spur a radically new way but it is also equally or even moreso possible that there will be a default into the comfort of what had come before.

my mother was one if 13 children from an extremely poor farming/coal mining family in central west Virginia. she along with half my aunts and uncles fled the lands of silent coal shafts and dead industry for ohio. to work in a factory! all my uncles have professions- mechanics, factory workers, rental car managers. almost all my aunts are wives and mothers. my mom and aunt j. are the only two to finish high school (many quit at 6th, 8th grade). they are also the only two women with professions. my mom is a housekeeper (until she retires thankfully from a thankless job next spring!) and my aunt j. is a medical assistant. i am fairly certain that my siblings and i are the only cousins to go to college. fairly certain that i am the first on that side to get a master’s degree.

anyways, my mom had her first kid at 21. was chased out of the house by her husband who was wielding a shotgun, took my 10 month old sister and never went back. she raised my sister for eight years alone. til she met my dad.

it is sad to me to see my mom who is definitely a rural woman at heart… with no way back. stuck. as so many women who were not raised to guide their own way. to make the choices for a life of our own. i see myself at times not sticking up enough for a life i could love. i understand. especially if nothing ever showed you that you would have a better life if you fought for it. and even moreso when you have to fight just to survive.

i think it is not enough to not want what came before. you have to develop a sense of what you do want, a very personal idea of what you want (even if it is bound up in larger political spiritual etc ideas) and find the ways to commit your self to it. fight for it, make it, not just survive it.

so i swear this circles back to where i began this post.

when i was at ida, i met radical faeries from short mountain. i also began researching radical fairie land once i returned home. a lot of these lands have existed in some form for thirty years or more! then there is lesbian land and queer land and feminist land. many created around the time that my father was choosing something else, when so many were choosing something other than what came before. but my father had a lot going for him. a hetero normative culture to welcome him and his relationships. whiteness. education.

queer people did not have a cultural space given over or as a given. it had to be created. it doesn’t mean that all hets have it all or that white people do or men but that there is a privilege there that allows easier movement or taking up of space. it also makes it easier to find or make what you want. if you don’t choose something radically different then it can be easier to find your place and comfort.

even now with so much lgbt representation in mainstream pop culture. who does that really represent? who is that providing space for? the class nature of the L Word is appalling. where are our multivalent sexualities and sexual practices and complex representations that could start to get at the complexity that is queer?

i see another road around identity. it is not so much about identity politics as it is about family and tribe.

wearing signifiers on our bodies has been the way for queer visibility since early closeted times. not to show our queerness to straight people but to find each other! (buzz cuts, mullets, earrings, hankies, etc)

i used to downplay dress and expression. but i’ve come to realize that it may help me live more the life i want to live.

if i feel more loved, supported, challenged, moved, inspired etc by queerness then the best way to find it is to display my own queerness. it of course is not clear cut. there are infinite ways to be or display queer. and not all queer people are my people. not all straight people are excluded. but i have found at times that it can be really hard to find ‘my people.’ if i am passing as straight, it is all that less likely. and it isn’t easy because i am often coded as more feminine so i have to find ways like piercings and shaved hair and butch touches to put it out there.

and i decided his simultaneous to wanting to make collective queer space/land. to live off of. make art. hold gatherings. build the life i want.

it is just something i’ve found might help me collect those around me that i want to work with in life. at least it is the place, queerness, where i’ve found the most.

and far better the way to ‘my people’ than to this mythology of ‘the people’