My Fantastically Large Hair

Hello Boys and Girls.

I just arrived home from a quick holiday in Seattle to visit one of my love's Liam and his mom and dad are pretty cool too. Liam is two and half. He has blonde blonde hair and q huge smile and is constantly laughing, so obviously we really hit it off. Like most two year olds he can't say my name and reinvented it as ka-né. I can live with that.

I know I haven't rambled to you in a while, but my life has been pretty busy over the past several weeks. I realized that I drink whiskey more than white wine spritzers these days. I love my new hair color, Lucy red. I will be buying a car really soon. And I will soon be relocating (yes again) to Baton Rouge for 3 months and then New Orleans for a long long while.

As I was checking out at Trader Joe's with my dinner. Mac and cheese, cranberry sauce and a bottle of Woodford, the TJ dude asked, "you have really big hair, don't you?" "yes. It's big." "I love big hair." A much better come on then the other night as I was leaving a pizza place down the street and some guy approached me with "hey, you want to smoke some weed?" Not quite my style unfortunately. Commenting on my big laugh is stale, but the big hair was pretty fantastic.

I'm reading this great new book called Whatever It Takes. It's about the Harlem's Children Zone started by Geoff Canada. A South Bronx native who grew up poor but with a looming draft to Vietnam found a way to attend Bowdin College in Maine where he participated in a racial justice movement on campus to increase the tiny African American student body beyond 75. The story chronicles his efforts to change the story of black boys and girls growing up in Harlem. Realizing that in order to give any child a chance to succeed we need to restructure the society in which they are born, starting with making sure soon to be parents read and sing to their unborn child. It's a great book so far.

I'm also reading a book by Robert Putnam called Better Together. Putnam wrote Bowling Alone about the American trend to step away from community into a more solitude life. Better Together goes through stories of communities coming together to fight against injustices. It's a great book for anyone interested in understanding what community organizers do. And for community organizers who need some good reminders.

And a little reminder that just because you are recycling your old electronics doesn't mean you are actually doing anything to protect the environment. Hint: Don't buy crap you don't need, like iPads. Seriously. That's ridiculous. The coffee shop I frequent uses an iPad as their register where they email your receipt to you. Ridiculous.

Ciao.
Renee