À Paris

19 days…and this girl will be on a plane to Paris! I have a passport, visa, some euros to start me off, and a new hardshell valise, yet I feel completely unprepared. I’m an excessive planner, and there’s obviously no way to plan my next semester – that’s not how study abroad works anyhow. I will take the adventures as they come. In the spirit of Madeline…

So “pooh-pooh” on my current anxiety. I’ll drink so many cafés and eat so many croissants, there’s no way it won’t be wonderful. It’s Katie heaven.  I hope to use this blog to catalogue my own “moveable feast.” I should probably actually read that book before I take off. J

à bientôt, Paris! 

Loose Woman

They say I'm a beast.
And feast on it. When all along
I thought that's what a woman was.

They say I'm a bitch.
Or witch. I've claimed
the same and never winced.

They say I'm a macha, hell on wheels,
viva-la-vulva, fire and brimstone,
man-hating, devestating,
boogey-woogie lesbian.
Not necessarily,
but I like the compliment.

The mob arrives with stones and sticks
to maim and lame and do me in.
All the same, when I open my mouth,
the wobble like gin.

Diamonds and pearls
tumble from my tongue.
Or toads and serpents.
Depending on the mood I'm in.

I like the itch I provoke.
The rustle of rumor
like crinoline.

I am the woman of myth and bullshit.
(True. I authored some of it.)
I built my little house of ill repute.
Brick by brick. Labored,
loved and masoned it.

I live like so.
Heart as sail, ballast, rudder, bow.
Rowdy. Indulgent to excess.
My sin and success -
I think of me to gluttony.

By all accounts I am
a danger to society.
I'm Pancho Villa.
I break laws,
upset the natural order,
anguish the Pope and make fathers cry.
I am beyond the jaw of law.
I'm la desperada, most wanted public enemy.
My happy picture hanging against the wall.

I strike terror among the men.
I can't be bothered what they think.
Que se vayan a la ching chang chong!
For this, the cross, the calvary.
In others words, I'm anarchy.


I'm an aim-well,
shoot-sharp,
sharp-tongued,
sharp-thinking,
fast-speaking,
foot-loose,
loose-tongued,
let-loose,
woman-on-the-loose
loose woman.
Beware, honey.

I'm Bitch. Beast. Macha.
Wachale!
Ping! Ping! Ping!
I break things.


"Loose Woman" by Sandra Cisneros

Sunday gems

The prospect of visiting this little bookstore in Paris.

The "Up" house in real life!

Literary tattoos.  If only I had the gumption.

These sweet shirts with hidden messages are my kind of feminism. 

 Pomplamoose.

Elizabeth Gilbert in one of my favorite Ted talks.

Marilyn

"I'm selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can't handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best."

Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt

Life Lately

Only a few weeks remain before I’ll leave the Ham and head west. I feel like this summer flew by, yet when I remember the beginning – getting my first real-world job! – it seems so far away. How did I spend this summer? 

Summer in Birmingham means Barons games at Regions Field.

And, of course, running through the color tunnel afterwards.   

Many, many movies with this guy. And many goofy pictures.

Trying new recipes and restaurants.

Alabama BBQ beats Texas BBQ hands down. Saw’s is delicious. ^^ 

Many hours on the road. Hanging out on Indianapolis rooftops. 

We visited the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library in Indy…and a super cool nonprofit bookstore, Indy Reads Books. 

Since we were already so close, we had to take a day in Chicago. Kory fawned over Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie house and all the pretty art glass inside, and I found more little bookstores to browse. We accidentally took a tour of the ghetto too! Not pictured are the two guys we saw being arrested and the crazy tricyclist dude winding through west Chicago traffic.  

Mmmmmmm Chicago pizza. We went for Lou Malnati’s and ordered more than we could handle (eyes much bigger than our stomachs…But I mean, look at that ^^)

And finally, we drove to Dallas to help my Dad move in to his new home. We stopped in Florence along the walk around the Rosenbaum house. 

We watched FC Dallas get their butts kicked by Aston Villa in Frisco. 

And Sugar and I got our hairs cut!  I sent a ponytail off to Pantene Beautiful Lengths. Two more weeks of freedom to soak up.

Little Wisdoms

Norway, from Krystkowiak on Flickr

"There are times when it will go so wrong that you will barely be alive, and times when you realise that being barely alive, on your own terms, is better than living a bloated half-life on someone else’s terms.” 

- Jeanette Winterson