Welcome to My Living Novel

In my world, the plot is always thickening.

Sunday, October 30, 2005

The Future Looks Bright

This weekend I went to a Quantum Touch workshop to learn how life force energy can help someone heal. At first I was a little disappointed that the workshop was not very different from the material that was covered in the Quantum Touch instruction manual by Richard Gordon. However, by the end of the second day, I realize that the real gift of the workshop was being around so many interesting and delightful people who are all in search of truth and understanding of how the world works.

We were all a little skeptical at first because we were doing some dopey things such as placing our hands on one another's bodies and doing exaggerated breathing to try to move energy though our bodies and into the other person. I'm positive that if an outsider would have walked in on our energy sessions that they would of thought we were all loons, but regardless of the dopiness factor I can not deny that Quantum Touch really works. Bones do moves. Pain does disappear. Emotional traumas can be resolved and running the energy creates such amazing tingling sensations throughout your body. It almost makes you light headed but in a good way.

What surprised me the most at the workshop was when one of my fellow classmates pulled me aside after the class. She was a Reiki practicioner already and was looking for another way to use life force energy, and she was impressed by Quantum Touch just as much as I was. Anyway, because of her experience with Reiki she was very intuitive and told me that when she was running energy on my stomach that she could she my future son and that he says hello. I was floored by this because I'm not pregnant and do not hope to be for another 5 years or so, but reproductive issues have been a worry of mine. I've had my reproductive organ scares in the past where my ovaries and uterus were not behaving the way that I would of liked, and I was very frighten that I would not be able to have children. Somehow this strange woman sensed that fear in me and was kind of enough to let me know that that fear is unnecessary.

It's so strange to me that I actually believe this woman because Kendra from two years ago would have smiled in this woman's face and then called her crazy behind her back. However, the Kendra of today is so very grateful to her for easing my mind just a little bit and making my future look so bright. I could have a son people. A son that likes me enough to say, "hi" from the future. That's some deep love there. Though, I'm in no hurry to meet him anytime soon, I will be very excited to get to know him once he's arrived.

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

Black and White

Life is full of "what if" experiences that allow you to see how your life could have been if you took a different path. Last weekend was a big "what if" experience for me, and it allowed me to see how different my life would have been if I went to an HBCU (historically black college and university) as opposed to the predominately white college I attended in Colorado.

I was in Atlanta for Morehouse and Spelman's homecoming. I went to the Greek Step Show and a few of the nightclubs, and I was almost overwhelmed by how different the Morehouse/Spelman atmosphere and social life was to my college experience. I'm not suggesting in anyway that one experience is better than the other, but I feel like this black girl would never fit into the HBCU setting. I don't have the right attitude for it, and I would be afraid that people would walk all over me.

I am, as a general rule, a very quiet person. Everything about me is small from the way that I talk, to my style, and my attitude. I find that in HBCUs and in predominately black cities such as Atlanta everything is so big and over the top that there is no place for me to express my unique, more understated style. Being the anthropologist that I am, at the Step Show I was doing a mental ethnography on black culture and trying very hard to figure out why I am an outsider in my own ethnic diaspora.

While at the Step Show, I was reminded about the research that I did in Tanzania with the Maasai. During my stay with the Maasai, they had a major ceremony where one of the age-sets was moving up to a higher level to elder status allowing a new group of kids to take their place in caste system. The ritual was so beautiful, fascinating, and foreign to me, and sadly this is the exact same feeling I had when I watched the Step Show.

The experience was not foreign to me simply because I never pledged to a sorority or attended a HBCU. It was foreign to me because I can not understand the mentality of a person who wants to be a part of such a specialized organization or group. What makes a person want to turn away from diversity to commune with sameness, and what really gets me is that this sameness is not authentic. It's an invented culture that we wear as a mask to cover up any individuality that may exist. It doesn't even reflect any shared beliefs or spirituality. I guess that is what happens when your original culture was taken from you, but I can't help but to wonder if we couldn't do any better. Is the best we can do a trumped up peacock attitude that says if anyone steps on my foot I'll cut you? Is the best we can do elaborate street gear and a static form of music that has not progressed in over a decade? I surely hope not.

I do enjoy certain parts of these trivialities. I would say the theme song of our entire trip was "Laffy Taffy" by D4L. I never heard the song until we started down the highway to Atlanta, but I think I heard it enough times to last a lifetime over the weekend. Although this song is not really my style, I can't help but to smile every time I hear it because of all the laughter and dancing the song brought our group. The day would not be complete without someone breaking out a "Dun, dun, dunt, Oh, Cuz you so thick." With a small chuckle I accept these few ounces of kinship that I have to my ethnic roots, but I'm glad that this one "what if" scenario never happened. I'm glad that I got out of Mississippi when I did and regardless of whether you think my disassociation with African-American culture is tragic or a joke, I am glad that I've made my life about exploring other cultures more than my own.

Monday, October 10, 2005

My NaNoWriMo Idea

Yesterday, I signed up to do NaNoWriMo also known as National Novel Writing Month. This is where thousands of people attempt to write a complete novel of at least 50,000 words within 30 days. It starts November 1st and I can hardly wait to begin. It should be fun. It’s unfortunate that I will have to put my current novel aside for the entire month of November to work on a new project, but I think that it will be a great writing exercise to have my sole goal to be quantity instead of quality. I know that sounds like nonsense, but sometimes when I am working on my current book I get so wrapped up in making each sentence beautiful and lyrical that I forget to focus on moving the story forward quickly and the beauty of simplicity. I know that an entire month of hammering away at the keyboard is exactly what I need to inspire productivity in my current project, because rereading and rewriting every sentence is not leading me to a conclusion any faster.

Since I am determined to do this new distraction, I need a great genre/subject to start creating my plot. I’m could do action, adventure, horror, mystery, humor, romance, or science fiction, but I’m not sure if I really fit into any particular genre. I want this book to be half way descent, but I keep coming up with the most ridiculous ideas. Right now, I was thinking about doing a novel about yetis. The anthropologist in me wants to create a false ethnography about yeti culture and how they are so much more technologically advanced than humans are. Maybe, yetis evolved from humans and they are a new breed called homo sapiens sapiens sapiens, and the yetis view us regular homo sapiens sapiens as an abundant species of gorilla.

I think these yetis shall live underground in the Himalayan mountains in a giant city that extends a thousands miles into the earth’s core. However, the yetis’ underground safe haven is starting to get overpopulated, so they are forced to look for ways to expand or to come to the surface. A very important election will decide if the yetis will expand deeper into the Earth’s core, if they will find another mountain range such as the Alps to occupy or if they come to the surface to conquer/live with humans.

I’m trying to decide how I want this all to be introduced to the reader. Do I want one of the yeti’s to be forced to capture a human, and let that human become the narrator of the story, or do I want there to be one kind-hearted yeti who disagrees with the yeti government and sends a message to the humans that they need to prepare for a yeti attack? It’s a tough decision, but I think it would be better told from a human perspective. Okay, I got! Since my yetis are going to be very big into space travel, I’m going to have one of my yeti’s returning from space travel, walking up the Himalayan mountain with his abominable snowman space suit on. He wears this suit because space is cold and inhospitable and he needs the extra warmth. Plus, it scares the shit out of any human he may see and makes it easier for him to overpower them because of their fear. My yeti space traveler will be spotted by a journalist from Weekly World News trying to get footage on the abominable snowman legend. Since the yeti code says that if a human sees a yeti that the human must be captured and taken back to the underground city, my space traveler will be forced to take the reporter lady back with him. The reporter is horrified because she thinks this big abominable snowman looking thing is taking her back to his cave to eat her, but she will be surprised when she sees the truth. Once the yeti gets to the entrance of the underground city, he will remove his space suit to reveal his true form.

So, how does that sound? It’s a weird combination of adventure, action, horror, mystery, science fiction, and hopefully a little romance if I can fit it in there. I know it’s ridiculous, but do you think you would enjoy reading a story about yeti culture and yeti’s taking over the world. Let me know, because if no one cares then I surely shouldn’t bother spending a month developing it. Also let me know if there is something that you want to read. If you always wanted to read about the secret life of silk worms, let me know. I might be able to weave that into some type of adventure.

One Hell of a Week

I have had a hell of a week. I don’t even no where I should start or how much I want to reveal about what I’ve learned. I’ll just say that on Wednesday, I was the lowest that I have ever been in so many ways. However, over the weekend, I’ve done a full 180 and I’m working on reaching highest point that I’ve ever been in my life.

This weekend I went to the New Age and Wholistic Fair with my mother. It comes to Nashville ever so often and it’s our favorite outing. It’s a cool set-up with lots of booths selling different goods and new age services, and a lot of free seminars teaching everything from self-hypnosis, astrology, dream interpretation, and Feng Shui. It’s always amusing to listen to several different ideas and recommendations on how life should be lived and how to heal yourself.

The one booth that impressed me the most was the Quantum-Touch healing booth. These people believe that everyone has the power to heal themselves with the life-force energy that exists inside your own body. This energy renews and rebuilds new tissues accelerating the healing for any illness or disease. They suggest that when a person is sick or injured, their life force energy is low but being in between high life force energy can bring that sick person’s energy up so their immune system can heal itself. They claim to eliminate pain, both emotional and physical, reverse deformities like scoliosis, and bowed legs, and facilitate a virtually pain-free childbirth. These are no small claims to make, so I went to their seminar and I was still very impressed with how they work and how they are able to provide relief for the people that are in the audience.

I decided that I had to try this for myself. They offer 5 minute healings for $5, so I figure why not. I’ve wasted $5 on less. So I told the man that my old dancer teacher said that I had scoliosis in my back. I have not been able to see it and it’s never been confirmed by a doctor so I asked him to check it out. He did confirm that scoliosis diagnosis but that it was so slight that it wasn’t a priority. He focused solely on my hips, which he said were 2 inches out of alignment. He even showed the difference to my mother and she had to agree that my hips were dramatically off.

Now, I’ve always known that my hips were crooked. It’s very noticeable when I look at myself in the mirror naked. I always say that when I get a lot of extra money that I would waste it on a chiropractor to fix my spine and hips. Had I’d known that my hips were a full two inches off, then I might of considered going a bit sooner. Anyway, he did the quantum-touch healing on my hips and it was the strangest, most subtle feeling ever. I could feel little vibrations of energy pulsating on my stomach and I felt my hip moving and pulling but he was not touching hard enough to cause such a movement. When he was done I didn’t really notice a difference, but when I got home and looked at myself again, I was amazed at how even my hips were. I don’t think I’ve ever seen my hips be so symmetrical. My mother tried their services the next day and she also said that the pain that she had from standing and walking all day was gone. I am usually a very skeptical person, but I can’t find a bad thing to say about these people. I know what my hips looked like before the man did the healing, but my hips don’t look like that any more.

They are offering a workshop to teach others how to do this type of healing, and I’m seriously considering taking the class. It fits in so perfectly with the quantum physics theories that are in What the Bleep Do We Know that it’s a little eerie. I love it when new ideas come into your life and build off of something else you’ve already learned or experienced. It’s the universe’s way of letting you know that you’re on the right track I guess.

Anyway, I still haven’t decided whether I will take the workshop or not. I have some more research to do on these people before I give them anymore of my money. I’ll make sure to keep you posted if I do decide to go and I become a world class healer. Then, all of you will have to call me Guru Kendra, and I kind of like the sound of that.

Wednesday, October 05, 2005

Will Someone Take My Credit Card Away Please

I know I said that I would stop being wasteful and that I bought the last of the presents to myself on Saturday, but I've splurged again both today and yesterday. Please don't be mad at me.

Tuesday, I had to go back to the mall to pick up my order from Saturday, and what do you know I was left with over two hours to kill. Kohl's had a sale and I needed some cute club clothes and the rest was history, so was that money. Today, I remembered that Fionna Apple's new cd just came out, and I had to have it. I normally don't buy cd's at regular retail price, but I simply couldn't wait the 6 months it would take my music club to get it in stock and then another two weeks to deliver. I've been waiting for it seems 28 years for Ms. Apple to grace us with her music. So far the cd looks pretty cool. It's one of those Dualdisc cds that have one side that is a dvd and one side that is her actual cd. It's an interesting idea, and I figured since it only cost a dollar extra why not get the extra features. I've only listened to one track as of now, so I don't have a review for you yet. I will just say that the first track "Extraordinary Machine" was fun, playful, yet a little weird. We'll just have to wait and see if I grow to love it or grow to hate because it's extremely rare for me to like any song the first time I hear it.

I guess I really can't consider a music purchase as an unnecessary buy. I almost need to get a new cd every month just to maintain mental sanity. They always help me see the world in new ways, and the fascination that the music and the lyrics bring me will stay with me for years. I guess anything that inspires your fascination in the world can never be considered as a waste. As for my club clothes, I'll suppose that I'll just have to wait and see how many heads I turn to know whether they were worth the cost or not.

The Flying Enigma

Last night my mother was so quiet on the way home from work that it startled me. She is normally a raging chatterbox, truly believing that I need to know every ounce of the day’s ridiculous events. I listen because it gives her pleasure to keep me informed, but I really could care less about what the president is doing or how FEMA missed up for the umpteenth time. I let last night’s silence pass as if nothing was unusual, because I figure we all need our quiet days, but I was soon to find out why my mother was so quiet and it was not a pretty picture.

As it turns out, she was upset about a conservation she had with her brother that same night. He told her that he had a conversation with their mother, my grandmother, that day about death if they were ready to die. At the nursing home where my grandmother lives, all of her friends have died and she’s afraid that she might die too. She’s the last of nine brothers and sisters, and she’s the last of her old lady pack at the nursing home. She told my uncle that she wasn’t ready to die, yet because my aunt and uncle still needed her. When my uncle asked about my mother and whether my mother still needed her, my grandmother said that my mother has always been strong and has always been able to take care of herself. To my ears this sounds like a compliment, but this comment truly hurt my mother. For me, if my mother ever told me that I had everything under control and that I could take care I myself when my other siblings couldn’t, I would be proud, but somehow my mother feels misunderstood.

Of course, my uncle has his own special way of making a compliment sound like an insult, so I’m sure there is more to this story that my mother is not telling me. She did privy me to one of his remarks though. He said that my mother doesn't need anybody, and this comment really put her over the edge. She was so wounded by this comment that it showed all over her face. It was so strange for me to see my mother upset. She has always been the rock I could depend on to always be whole, but last night I saw that she can crack just as easily as anyone else.

She is right about one thing though. It is hurtful when the people you love don’t believe that you need them just because you can be strong and stand on your own two feet without them. Such a facade of strength is deceiving because it may look like her life is unaffected by the people around her, but the reality of the situation is that everything she does is for those cherished people. When the reason you live is for these beloved people and not even for yourself, to have one of the people you cherish tell you that you don’t need anyone would break your heart a little if not entirely. I know that if the person I adore doesn’t even understand how much I need them, or how much of my life I live solely for them, that I would feel like a complete failure, like all these years I spent loving them were wasted because I’m still misunderstood, still misjudged. Oh wow, when you look at it that way what my uncle said last night is almost unforgivable, but knowing my mother as the strong woman she is she will shake these beads of misconception off her feathered back and soar above us all again. She may still be a flying enigma to the people she loves but that will not stop her from loving us that much harder.

Monday, October 03, 2005

October's Resolution

Well, at long last I have crawled out of my laziness hole and have started to be both productive and wasteful at the same time. Productive in that after two weeks of completely neglecting my writing, I gone back to it in a significant way. I've also gone back to working on my clairvoyant abilities and meditation, which makes a happier more smiley Kendra. Last but not least I'm learning how to knit. As of now I have only created what looks like a mass of knotted cat fur, but I can tell that very soon I will be able to torture everyone I know with scarves, hats, mittens, and other completely hideous trinkets. I know all of these activities are kind of random and none of them really go together, but I like the way each activity works a different part of my brain, which I really need because I've gotten so dumb over the last year. I can't even subtract anymore, which might be part of the reason why I was so wasteful this weekend. I am ashamed of how wasteful I was with my money. I went on a shopping spree like no other on Saturday, and while it was very fun and I'm happy with my purchases, did I really need to spend $200 in one day? I think not. (Wow, I didn't do the math on how much I actually spent until just now, and I'm quite disgusted with myself. Shopper's remorse I guess.) One thing is for sure though, I won't be going on anymore shopping sprees for many, many moons. Since I got all of that wastefulness is out of my system, I can make productivity my official October resolution. No point in putting off til January what one can do in October.