Cold Spaghetti

Via Exodus, I found the photography of Dulce Pinzon, and her “Real Life of Superheros” photography collection.  The exhibit showing Latin American immigrants in their everyday lives in jobs that are often overlooked… with a twist that highlights their important work and contributions.

All of Janine King’s MOD DOTS bags are on sale.  I’ve had a J.K. computer bag for several years and love it.  I’ve also given her purses as gifts.  Everything is wonderfully made — and to order!  She personally confirms all sizing for computers.  HIGHLY recommended.

Janine King on Etsy

Janine King’s sale items on Etsy

Yesterday, I spent a few hours in the park photographing some friends.  A family, actually, who we met when they started at Abeona last fall and who remind us of Helen and Paul.  There is just this glow about them — their happiness, their manners, their causal and friendly approach — that reminds us of the friends we miss.  My mind goes there anyway this time of year.  My eyes linger a little longer on the photograph taped to the fridge, the one Helen took of our kids and husbands together in Music Together class.  Seeing it presses the work of being a better person, living more fully, and being grateful into my daily grind.  Then there was a random email about the need for our community to take a stand, again, against crime.  (For those who aren’t up on NOLA news, our Mayor showed up long enough to cut funding on anti-crime activities in a petty hissy fit that the City Council wouldn’t sign off on the ridiculously high salaries for his sycophants.)

These thoughts have had me feeling a bit lost for the past day or so.  Just… off.  Questioning, again, why we work so hard to be here?  Thinking, what would happen if we just… ?

But it’s no point thinking about it, really.  There is no other place for us in this country, we know that now.  Even as I dream of a home near the beach, I know that this could only be a weekend escape, a summer retreat.  Not home.  Not New Orleans.  But still, I question my faith.  I wonder if my longing for this place puts us at risk or inflicts undue hardship.  If life were easier, would we be happier?  I think that I don’t know the answer, so the question remains, plaguing me.

So the affirmation and support from other writers was a huge boost to my spirits.  Especially to see that Lisa, a vineyard owner in California, made the space to so elegantly write about New Orleans and several bloggers — even me, who she pinned so neatly and squarely you’d think we’d been buddies for years.  Amazing, timing wise.  A little holiday cheer so neatly placed right before me.

My favorite thing?  The award is in Portuguese.  (The Spanish would read something like ‘Este Blog invierte y cree en la proximidad.’  Although Jenny or Alejna could probably do better than that with the English, Spanish, and Portuguese translations than I have.)

I’ll pass on the love shortly; once my thoughts settle and clear.

I’m trying to figure out where this award originated?  Any one better at the google search for this type of thing?

Fogonazos has a collection of photographs of Hurricanes taken from orbit.  The second link at the bottom has NASA photos of New Orleans on 9/15/2005.