memories of better times

At times, a memory from a past experience wanders into my deep subconscious as I dream. For instance, one time as I awoke in the morning, I hear a crushing sound on the rocks in my mom's backyard garden. The times I spent looking for her to pick a call or called her on the road only to realize she was in her garden.

crush. crush. The splash of a bucket into another bucket. The pouring of water.

The smell of wet soil and sink water submerged in kitchen refuse and other strange materials like soy grounds from making soy milk or water after peeling shrimp.

Her garden abounds in produce, from spiny English cucumbers, yellow green zucchinis, and crunchy green beans.

No wonder I get nauseated when I encounter frozen or processed foods. As Marvin and Tammy sang in 1968, 'ain't nothin' like the real thing...' You can't beat home grown and hand picked veggies. Especially that sound of them stir fried with olive oil and minced garlic in mom's wok.

I suppose I am fortunate to have a green thumb mom, who balances work during the day and tending her garden at night.

At times, I wonder if I have the patience and persistence to 'cultivate' my own garden. Orange and persimmon trees in the back and a lemon tree in the front. To be surrounded by fruits and veggies yet living in a suburban landscape devoid of fauna and flora, except maybe the occassional shade tree or runover rodent. Take your pick, raccoon, skunk, squirrel.

They scurry just to get by on the fence or to cross the road, only to realize that the evening commute is on as they face the onslaught of mid size luxury cars and oversized SUVs.

I wonder who weeps and mourns for these lost ones. Rather than stare and feel remorse, who takes the initiative and removes the carcasses and ensures that they have a resting place for their tattered and ruined bodies? It brings great sadness in my heart when I see a runover stray cat or a indigent crossing a railroad track. Perhaps at one time they were a part of a family once. But now things have changed.

Life is difficult and hard. But I know there is time for everything under the sun as the Good Book says. Time to live, a time to die. A time for everything.

So let it be written...

Strumming on my Guitar while it Smiles

I find that there is some thing ethereal about music. Sometimes, I see the singer telling it as it is, like a story. It takes me on a place, a journey to somewhere foreign but also familiar.

I'm trying to learn how to play some songs I intend to play at camp but I'm stuck on a chord. It doesn't sound just right.

Ok, I'll be honest. I'm trying to play Baby by Justin Bieber. But its cuz I just remember the first time i heard it. From the mouths of first graders who are in adoration of the teen idol. they'd keep seeing 'baby baby baby noo'

Then the teacher would say "No more justin bieber!"

But then at the talent show, some middle schoolers, both girls, one stood and sang while the other strummed a ukelele. And I heard the song unfold.

And it brought me to a place where I was a young boy, enamored with this one girl. And that crush, that broken heart feeling that it could never be real only alive and ok in my mind.

I remember her magenta pink head band and her crooked teeth. How her grandma would pick her up from school walking her to the car as her hand clutched that pink Hello Kitty metal lunch pail that no one has anymore.

I recall messing up a print out on a computer and she said 'it's ok' with such a gentleness that was more out of courtesy but for me it was so intimate. I was a first grader then, but my feelings persisted.

One time, i went to the old library, when it was still open. And I hid behind a concrete column and saw her reading a book. I was in fourth grade mind you but she still looked the same.

Well, I guess Baby lyrics bring me to that sad song feeling when I'm poised in front of a mic, singing depressing pop songs like ' I'm With You' by Avril Lavrigne, "I Want It That Way' by the Backstreet Boys and ' On Bended Knee' by Boyz II Men on karaoke. The crowd cheers but in my heart, there's a place that reminds me that memory.

sigh.

I'll go strum up the guitar and lay down some riffs.

see ya in front of the mic.

steam

As the water comes to a boil, I place the platter of prepared fish,

a clean, descaled fish sits in an arrangement of scallions, ginger, pickled turnip and sliced jujubes

Soon, this will become a meat dish to the stir fry, the white rice, and the mustard greens just picked from the garden and quickly blanched.

This force that propelled industrialization, the growth of the railroad and the cost of many lives (primarily Chinese and Irish workers) from east to west. The concept of heating water and coals and engines created the basis of the locomotive engine.

A loud outburst that has no rational purpose.

'It just came out that way. I was upset.'

Or 'just let her be. She just blowing off some steam.'

I hear the steam cooker whistling away as it maximizes hrs of cooking into one hour.

It's fast, saves energy but is it the same?

I hate it when I forget to let the leftovers from dinner cool and the steam condenses on the saran wrap. The droplets of water are very unappealing....

cookies

baking cookies is messy but they all pack such flavor and sustenance.

perhaps in a short while, I will complement these sweet morsels with a cup of hot decaf tea.

I know, i know. its just that lately caffeine has become a habit. And when I try to wean off it, it gets tough.

Maybe I'll switch to decaf. I like the flavor but don't need all the caffeine.

I'm listening to interesting music right now. really mellow and farscaping.

I am so eager to just sit and mull over the dull moments of life.

But such time is wasteful and when the cookie's eaten, the moment's gone. Time to get back to work. Get that 2:30 feeling outta my mind so I can focus.

Corn: Neither Salt nor Sweet

Seems like each time I nibble and chomp on a cob stuff gets stuck between my teeth.

ok disclaimer, sorry if this grosses people out.

You know I hear there are different schools of eating corn kernels off the cob. Some slice em off, some pick em up, other use the lower mandible and nibble off rows while others just 'taz' (like Taz from the WB) through 'em but just munching off what they can and what's left is the fuzzy stuff.

You know eating corn with butter or drizzled on a Cajun sauce after a round of crawdads, I like how fresh corn is so versatile. My mom used to make this superb egg drop soup using salted egg whites, Knorr chicken boullion and Green Giant canned sweet corn.

Never fancied creamed corn though.

Remembering Michael Jackson

I was moved last weekend when I saw two quarter aged Chinese American adults jamming to Michael Jackson's music strictly using their two acoustic guitars and personal voices. It seemed like they were in this vibe, just belting out numbers from the times when MJ was in Jackson 5 like "Ben" to his more popular solo numbers like "Smooth Criminal," "Human Nature," "Rock With You," and my requested number "Don't Stop Till You Get Enough." I still laugh cuz it reminds me of that scene where Chris Tucker steals the scene at the karaoke club. Well, digression aside, here's the down low of how I was introduced to MJ's music.

It's the early nineties. I'm a first grader at my quaint suburban elementary school. There was this White kid name Mike who loved to sing PopEye the Sailor Man and had an older sister in an upper grade. He showed me this book about "Thriller" and he'd talk about that music video where MJ, wearing his signature red jumpsuit, had these eyes that turned like opaque. I was like wha?

Then one time when I was in sixth grade, there was this fifth grader who was dressed up in this black and silver marionette uniform. People thought she was MJ but she'd be pissed, stating "I'm JANET Jackson, MJ's sister! Gosh!."

Moving forward, it's sophomore year in high school. It's the class competition and every class from frosh to senior has to do this dance number. We shuffle into the large auditorium back when the bleachers were wooden and varnished. Now they're plastic and safer. I suppose there were tiny cracks where people's stuff could slip through or people could fall down. Anyways...

The lights dim, and the voices start to 'simmah down,' as Conan O Brien used to say when he had his show, and then the snare starts the vibe and the electronic organ throbs like a heartbeat. The tempo sets the scene and some strings come outta nowhere, indicating some mystery and pretense. Then MJ's voice starts to tell his story about this girl, "Billy Jean" .

Then the vibe changes into a cautionary tale, and the sophomores, my class, start to synchronize, twirling their plastic bowlers and meeting each step with the tempo in the background as MJ keeps telling it as it is, this tale of broken hearts, undetermined patrimony and denial. The song lyric that draws my attention is when MJ's say "remember to always think twice." Then his own voice revertebrates and says otherwise "DON'T think twice." Then there's the cool guitar instrumental that's all bass. Not as cool as "Beat It," but still swell, pretty swell and cool.

So rewind, its fourth year in high school. I'm a senior now and those I Love the 80s episodes on vH1 are pretty popular. I start to think I was alive during the Eighties but I wasn't. I watch 80s flicks starring the Brat Pack, wanting to Feris Bueler and trying to tell the Principal that I think he 'stole his wardrobe from Barry Manilow." So I'm watching all the Michael Jackson music videos, and I must say my favorite by far is "Beat It." That Van Halen guitar solo. Hands down awesome.

Then cue to the near present, I hear about the sad news, the sudden and tragic death of MJ and the world is in mourning both far and wide. Ultimately, it reminds me of how MJ still survives in my memory, as an entertainer, an artist, and most of all as a musician able to manipulate sound and translate it through his dance. A pop star that shines despite the dark emptiness of space.

One time I walked through a busy intersection donning my slim black fedora and this gentleman muttered " Like that hat, you look like MJ." I suppose there are copy cats, wanna bes and imitations of MJ like those generic marital arts films that proliferated after the master Bruce Lee

As I sit here and listen to this computer interpret the grooves on a compact disk using a laser beam, it all starts to collide, these moments listening and processing MJ's legacy, his music and how he made an impact on American and world pop music across the seven seas. Everyone know's MJ's songs. In fact, I still remember hearing "We Are the World' playing all across the school on them horrible 70sish loudspeakers with that crackle and static.

When the essemble starts to fade out, MJ's siren-like voice chimes in 'we are the world, we are children, we are the ones to make a brighter day, so let's start giving...it's true we make a brighter day just you and me....' What a powerful message for world unity.

You know, I remember that time when Leslie Chung left our world and my Cantonese teacher C.M. played one of his songs to memorialize him. A bunch of ABCs like myself probably didn't know what he was saying but I just remember the whole class being entranced by that voice.

I suppose the next time I hear some off key person trying to cover an MJ song on karaoke, or a group of people are doing the electric slide to 'Beat It' it's like MJ the man may be gone, but his music remains in our hearts, in our voices and our thoughts as we ponder and interpret his music. Which reminds me of writing and how it records our experiences and thoughts but it can only be seen and read. Whereas music can be sung, it can be recorded and it can be performed. Brings it all to whole another level.

So I guess I'll listen to some more of MJ's music spanning his musical career from the Jackson 5 to his solo artist days of Thriller.

There's a quote from a Japanese film I saw way back where a musician mutters something along the line of how artists can write their own endings. Pretty subversive and yet interesting in a critical perspective.

Just thought I'd blog about MJ since I'm listening to his music. That's all for now.

Podcast, NPR and Blogging.

Dear Audience,

I've been doing my time unemployed, cramming for the RICA, the Reading Instructional Competency Instruction Assessment, test, and all the while trying to stay current.

Listening to NPR has made me think about contemporary issues and podcasts are great cuz you get to choose things you want to listen to and download em. The thing I don't like is when the stuff eats up memory space.

Blogging has kept me busy typing up my life and trying to see examples of good writing and expression. Some say that writing takes away from a memory or experience. But, i feel that for myself, I tend to forget things like what to get for groceries, what I was supposed to do today and who I am supposed to meet. I gotta write it down. Writing helps me think and process my emotions and experiences. I suppose being forgetful and absent-minded, I writing stuff down.

Ok, I guess I'm all blogged out. Tune in when inspiration and randomness hits me.