I wanted to take a blogging break - but there is something about writing that is such a necessity that it aches within me like the feeling of an errant amount of dairy through my gut - get it out. Maybe it is like I said to Shawn in regards to his absence of blogging purely a necessity to bring form to the haze, the fog that is confined within the cerebral spaces of my mind. A visible attempt to articulate that process which we often hide from each other - the process of fumbling through this life - of doubt, of fear, of love or lust, of confusion, of the simple joys and the complex pain.

I watched the second Suheir video again after reading Jocelyn's comments and I had a moment of retrospection - How did you get here? How did you become the woman who in 2001 sat in a lecture hall while Dr. Brown instead of teaching functions chose to spend an entire semester talking about how the American's deserved this fate - to a woman today would have likely not only stood up but of most likely in front of 300 of her scared and confused peers told him off. Even at minimum would have written a scathing letter to the department, come to think of it, maybe I still should. I like to live my life in the blacks and whites wherever possible, but I am also fully conscious that there are things that I don't have the authority to determine black and white, and as such must live in a sphere of grays - and shades of those grays. And yet there is a distinct part that doesn't believe I or we should accept those grays - that I shouldn't be out there trying to with my every act move something towards one side or the other - that justice can be pursued in the littlest act like not buying produce from Florida - Tropicana or any of the larger companies, that buying food from fast food restaurants and bargain discount stores like Walmart or Target perpetuates the sweatshop market or that even in the larger more meaningful things - realize that my life once moving in that direction becomes a litmus test for others - to say I'm vegan - is to by relation care about the environment but even more so about my fellow humans - that if I affirm the life of a cow than why would I not affirm the life of a human - and not just affirm but seek to uplift - and in the process humble myself?

I don't know what the future holds, I don't think that in this blog that I've developed anything more concrete than to say I'm becoming aware that He's been working on me and I've been completely unaware lost in the fog of poor romantic choices, parental strife, work and yes school - and I'm curious to see where I end up - I know where I would love to be - where Suheir is - in front of people talking and not just behind this screen or in a book (though I wouldn't pass that up), to be in line with the likes of Arundhati Roy and yet maintain the one thing that has brought me through this all Christ - to show the world that you can affirm all life - not just the ones that look like you or that Dobson thinks are okay - but all life - broken, beautiful, poor or popular whatever the case maybe and say that we don't need to live like this - subservience and slavery are not okay, weapons and wars are not okay and fears and false doctrines are not okay.

The picture? MCC blankets in Darfur, yes I'm still looking at working with the Mennonite Central Committee - realizing that maybe they may accept me...