Dear Erika,

So this Duende thing. I bought this book, over a year ago, Garcia Lorca's In Search of Duende, because it's eyes turned on me in the aisle at the Barnes & Noble and followed me like one of those creepy antique portrait's, and was whispering, and so finally I said yes yes I see you and took it home. And tried once, twice, over again and to no avail. Then one day the other week on he is, on it turns and I soup him up like we were made from the same broth, and in moments all these other ideas collide and the secret cave door opens and like that, in I go. Lorca's Duende, same as Gilbert's (or the Roman's) Genie. Invoking of presence, and or descent-ion of presence. How Hem came to you that night in the dream.

Today I went walking on my break in the sunshine, I was supposed to meet Jason my work buddy for a hike but we had to cancel because of, well, work. So I stole an hour and walked in the sun and ended up blocks away at the Library. I dont have a library card and had no mail on me with my new address and my ID is old, too (they make it hard to use the free library) so I just sat in the back of the poetry aisle where the french section was and read Baudelaire. And guess what? Here it is again, the Genie, the Duende, the sweeping power. O imagination, in-road to the magic graces. But he calls it Guignon, "the evil spirit of misfortune & disaster!" And true, for him, then--to follow such Zest, to answer the call did bring him all matters of outcast status and leveling of home life and reputation.

Aaaa-I've been there.

What would Liz Gilbert have to say of that?

I feel lost out here grl, and at once so so at home. Afloat on this ocean and aloft on clouds I am spinning and the gold mists I am using to spin with are my own and yet a grace I am not able to summon but gifted at this time with which to use, able to evaporate or hydrate at my very touch. But if I focus on it, too much, like the Tao, it is gone. It is odd, this sensation of being alone, and home. On my own. What Jazmine my college roommate and first yogi I ever knew and I meant when we came up with Woman, Ascending. It's just how I knew it would be, so natural there are no words when it just comes as easy as this is, and at once so odd--like the sense of lucid dreaming, that moment, upon recognition, that you are dreaming, that sheer moment of wonder doubled, heightened, by the awareness of power. Responsibility. That surge sense of constantly being on the widening edge and not having control but just widening it with acceptance, and a smile...

I miss the men. My best friend who knew me better than anyone, and the other the best friend who compelled me more than anyone. And yet even that too has neutralized, is part of the common background that simply adds to the freshness of my ever increasing day by days. It's all so new, but yes, as I knew it would be. But it adds a strangeness to my status--a newness I've never before encountered. My creativity grows and as it, my intellectualism. New friends and men turn up, but I dont want to give away this new thing that I am finally, for me, just getting to own. My belief and faith returns to myself in a way I haven't before known, at least not since I put academy down in the back of Mrs. Scotts class all those years ago and instead picked up pencil, page and Poetry! When she favored the boys--remember--her love of Dominic and Matt Jerzyk? When she took me aside once, and, under her breath, told me you have a 98, the highest grade in here right now, do you know what that means? It was pre-SAT time and everyone was starting to talk about College and where they wanted to go.

I did know what it meant, but I pretended I didn't care.

I do! I do now! I do, again. Like I did the last time we last exchanged notes in class. 7th grade Ms. Fouse, underneath our desks those musty yellow basement rooms of Arthur Slade. Hormones boxer shirts and Brian Dietz!? The same year I started smoking and stealing wine coolers and booze. How weird it is for it all to come back round again, and for the themes all to be the same?

And that is the point of this letter, these Musings. This recap at the end of the NaNoWriMo thing. I Have So Many Threads. So many with which I want to weave. Letting the quantity come out rather than focus on the quality--well most of it was just shit. But little golden seeds ready to grow, too, in all that detritus! So many threads all coming out of, all re-creating, this great tapestry of me. So many threads I dont know which way to go and it is overwhelming and I miss you, who keeps me tethered and right. Riot Grrrl & Wise Women Ways, the instinct injured feminine self and epidemic of wounded youth as result=deadened imagination. The death! Death, of the Duende, of the Art, the Call. A new Ethics of fearlessness, like Liz Gilbert says. Reliance on the Genie. Faith in it All. Not Kicking against the Goades, as is my interpretation of the condition of Baudelaire's Guignon, but full-bodied acceptance. What, and you'll love this, Ms. Faback (sp?!) taught on my first day of religion in the third grade. That Amen means simply, to say YES.

Looking forward to our next exchange,
Happy Holidays and gratefullness to you,

xoxoo
k