I'm on the plane now. reflecting on the previous two weeks. I am still just so in awe of the Avatar materials. Even though I was not on this particular course but just staying at the hotel working during the day and hanging out with everyone at night, as soon as the course kicked in i noticed that I immediately started processing myself as if I were on the course. when day one started I noticed that as soon as I woke up I started on day one exercises as if I were there and so on. This trip was all about being able to spend quality time with Princess Little Tree in the evenings and getting out of the city and into a clean objective large space by day, a hotel room in frisco in this case, so I could focus work on going through the sixty hours of video footage we collected for the TV show in order to get to the editing stage. I just couldn’t do it in New York. couldn’t find the focus.

So in frisco I set up an office and viewing suite right in the hotel and had no problem getting a lot of work done. More than normal I would say. Ps – bmg in London called our manager again. very cool. also great reviews still come in for NIC. And I noticed it get to #1,100 ranking on Amazon.com which was the highest I think it ever got (sales). I would like to see it get to number one. period. And I will do whatever it takes to make that happen. just got tons of good work done. kicked major ass in many arenas. Comforting to be in a relationship isn't it. any kind of a relationship... provides a sense of safety and security and stability and routine that can augment the rest of your life. now if I could just get by the pain fear and resistance I have of relationships breaking up, and how all of that goes away eventually and seems to become meaningless.... well that would be a good thing... because frankly its hard for me to enjoy relationships now because of this fear... just seems so temporary. Like why bother... barely listened to music and didn't watch anything for two weeks. just the TV show footage and wrote tons of great songs. My songwriting is kicking such ass right now. stellar. Completely enjoyable and satisfying for me as an artist. Scene in San Francisco part I and II, Thursday rain, and a new Indian sounding one.

Spent some time during everyday and night processing. Whatever was there that I didn't prefer, I processed. Cleaning house. clearing space. no holds barred. Becoming more and more expanded. More and more able to hold more space, do more, be more, integrate more. feel more, feel capable of more. the poet called. He is depressed lately, anxious, life isn't as much as he wants it to be. which is totally normal at 25 years old. He's seeing a therapist, traditional therapy. Stone ages stuff which is way beneath him. must find a way to relate to him the importance of not waiting but gaining the Avatar technology/tools now rather than later. I hate hearing him how do you say it... it would be like if someone didn't know that cars existed but you weren't allowed to tell them so everyday they complained about having to ride around on a bicycle... and you knew what they were going through because you too once had to ride around on a bicycle and didn't know cars existed... but now you know and so you're sporting around in a brand new M3 and your buddy doesn’t even know that beamers exist yet, but you can’t totally relate to them the benefits of the car. you can just mention the car now and then... but they just don't get it so they keep kicking their flat tires on their bicycle all the time and getting rained on and you feel sorry for them because you know it doesn’t have to be that way but they have to do it on their own. you can’t force someone to kick ass, you can try to motivate, but you can’t force them. you think of people who are overweight, who have drug problems, phobias, fears, mental or emotional problems, and ninety percent of them are totally unaware that the life that they are living, that the experiences that they are having, whether good or bad, are actually being created by themselves through their beliefs. we watch as most people, almost all people still, reach out to all corners of the earth OUTSIDE of themselves in order to try to find fixes for what ails them rather than going inside.

One of the new Avatars who was there learning the materials for the first time, this guy Mohamed (this name is actually spelled and pronounced Mohaamad’ in Arabic – in English we spell and pronounce it wrong – I never knew that...) wrote that he had always wanted to take the Jedi training, to become a Jedi, but of course that was impossible because that was just a movie, but now he feels like he has taken the Jedi training. Yes. exactly. that's what it feels like, on the course, and then off of the course in real life. man I totally forgot about that analogy, but its true.  you see that film and it reminds you of Avatar. So to the Poet if you ever read this, don't wait, stop fucking around with middle-lane-common-man stuff now rather than later and go for the Jedi training. Go to the left lane, put the pedal to the metal and go for it. do the Jedi training. I tell all my friends this now.

As I was typing just a minute ago I had this hit that Humanity has now evolved to the point where it knows this. so we can’t say that humanity has not evolved to this understanding because it has. This last Avatar course in San fran was the largest Avatar course ever in America so far, the biggest one. every one gets bigger and bigger. I think it was about 180 new avatars. nuts. On my Avatar course there were three of us. that's some serious evolution. So its not that we aren't already there. we’re there but the majority of human consciousness is still being held back by the middle majority and by the lowest common denominator among us who just aren't there. o.k. so that's the reality check. That's where we are now. but the good news is that everyday human consciousness is evolving and expanding. Everyday now somewhere in the world there is an Avatar course going on or some other cool course – Sedona method, Tony Robbins, Abraham hicks, Dan Millman, Lauren Holmes, landmark forum, to name a few -- that expands consciousness beyond traditional old school ‘God does it’ ideas. people are going crazy to expand their current idea of what they can do and achieve ... that's what its like I guess. Its getting better all the time. absolutely no reason now why people need to struggle and learn the hard way by first going through old school traditional methodologies before they go for the real deal. Especially not guys as smart as the poet. Anyway, feeling much like Neo these days.

There is a sentence I read the other day which struck me so much that I had scribbled it down, “The principle dilemma of existence is what to believe; the philosophical abyss between the known and the unknown that confronts everyone.” I thought, what a fascinating concept, the idea that it is up to us what we believe, what we know... (first problem to overcome with many people when you first start speaking with them about consciousness and belief management is that at first without a lot of reflection they tell themselves that ‘beliefs’ are something that they aren't sure about, but that they just have faith in...unlike ‘things that they know’ and that ‘things that they ‘know’ are not beliefs at all but things that are ‘real and irrefutable.’

This is a terribly impeding belief, because then the person walks through life feeling conflicted between what they ‘know’ and what they ‘want to believe.’ One of the first steps to enlightenment is to recognize that everything you know is a belief and that its up to you whether you hold that belief or not. this is huge for most people, the difference between your common victim of circumstance and the Gods that we all are.

[just thought of the sept 11th attacks in America. Which is a really good example of this. up until that time we did not ‘believe’ that anything like that could happen on American soil. If you asked someone about the potential of something like that occurring here they would tell you that they felt safe and secure and that they were pretty sure that that could never happen. if you asked the government they would say that they ‘knew’ that we were safe from something like that ever occurring. But then it happened anyway. so then our beliefs changed. Now, what we ‘know’ has changed. Now we ‘know’ that something like that can happen. we ‘believe’ that something like that can happen. To ‘know’ and to ‘believe’...]
[o.k. quick cause I have to run, but just got this due to opening up a new browser window, had CNN as my opening page and they had an advertisement banner on there for Billy grahm. He is a preacher for the Christian religion. You look at the picture and you see the militant and severe and serious look on his face, a proud man and a man who firmly believes in himself and what he believes.... and you come to understand, subtly but instantly, ‘this is a man who is operating from a very stuck and strict set of beliefs, although he doesn’t know it. he is defined by what he tells himself that he believes, although he may claim that what he ‘believes’ he actually ‘knows.’ which is common among humans. So its not like he's unique or wrong in some way for this. almost everyone is this way. he will defend these beliefs till his death (in case you ever wondered what could possesses men to kill other men or chop off their heads when they are not directly being threatened – its beliefs). he will without a stutter claim that what he ‘knows’ are not ‘beliefs’ at all, but irrefutable facts. And he knows it and it has nothing to do with ‘beliefs.’ once a person tells you that they ‘believe’ this about themselves, I have noticed that it is very hard to have a conversation with them from that point on, because people that believe this about themselves do not normally believe that things that they ‘know’ can be changed, unlike beliefs, so therefore from that point forward it becomes almost impossible for them to ever change their mind about anything. They are then ‘stuck’ in a box of beliefs but do not know it, or should we say ‘do not believe it.’ consciousness is tricky.

O.k. lets break this one down just for the fun of it because I just saw it on the back of a car yesterday driving into the city. a little bumper sticker said ‘Jesus is lord.’ That's a whole belief system right there. but again don't try telling someone who is operating from that belief system that that's what it is, because they aren't going to believe you. to them that's something they know, not believe, even though its clearly just a set of beliefs that they either adopted or were indoctrinated with, not dissimilar from how people in the middle east believe that Allah is lord or that Jews think that God is lord and that Jesus is not, or that people in India think that Krishna is lord. You know, it all depends on who raised you and what belief system you were brought up with or fell into so to speak. But that's not the point. We aren't downing any of these belief systems. Hell, I share most of them most or some of the time myself. I love the idea of God and Jesus and Krishna and Allah. Good stuff. but I don't limit myself to just these beliefs because God knows if you study your history that any day now a new God might appear, a new belief about God a new idea of God or who he/she/it is... who knows. so in case a new God idea is created in the mind of man I don't want to be one of the stuck people standing around shouting that I don't believe in him/her/it. I'm ready for anything. We are a very creative people and its been some time since we created any new ideas of God, well that's not entirely true, in the new age community there is a pretty awesome belief going now in human consciousness about who/what God/goddess is... its just that the middle majority hasn’t caught onto it yet... so yeah, digging that new definition... and also open to any new ones.

Anyway lets break it down real quick and then I'm outta here. “Jesus is lord.” Would first imply that one believes that ‘Jesus is lord.’ Simple enough. But also, implies that the person believes that ‘there is a lord,’ that ‘man is ruled by a lord.’ You see? Tricky. You go up to someone from central Africa and say to them ‘Jesus is lord.’ And they are going to look at you like ‘so what?’ because there are so many accepted/assumed/indoctrinated beliefs inherent in this three-word saying. its quite fascinating and also a little scary because of the implications of what humans can do with it. again, go up to someone who has no idea what this means and say ‘Jesus is lord’ and it will mean nothing. But say it to someone who knows exactly what it means and who actually believes it and then listen to what they tell you. they can and maybe will go on and on and on about it. check out this recent conversation, the “beliefs” being in “quotes” to illustrate the point.
The African says: I'm sorry “I don't know what you mean by this.” I'm busy roasting this lion meat I just killed... do you want some? “Its delicious.”
no thanks. “I don't eat lion.”
O.k. so what do you mean by this? Jesus is lord?
“well Jesus is God”
what is God?
“he rules over us” “he loves us” “he controls everything” “he guides us” “he created everything” [lots of beliefs there. a whole belief cluster. Would have to take them out one by one.]
wow. I thought “it was just nature.”
No. “its God” “he does everything”
So what is Jesus?
“he was a man like you and I are but he was also God”
wow. So God is a man?
No. “God was a man” “But now God is in heaven.” But “Jesus was God on earth for a while.” “then he died” and “then he resurrected” and “now he is heaven too.” “with God.” “his father.”
Tricky stuff. thanks for sharing all of this. I'm going to eat some lion meat now. you sure you don't want some?

Three words and you open up a whole system of intricate beliefs all intermingled within one another. Try looking at a picture of Jesus next time you see one. not that there are any actual pictures of Jesus but I just saw one of those renderings of Jesus at the Chinese dycleaners I go to, thought to myself, ‘what the heck is that doing there?’ goes to show sometimes just a picture can trigger a whole belief system all on its own. a picture is worth a thousand words they say. What is meant is that a picture is worth a thousand beliefs all wrapped around that picture.

Now the weirdest part is that for a lot of people who are operating within a belief system like that its not enough to live through/within those beliefs themselves. They feel a very strong urge to get others to also hold those beliefs. the Christians along with the Muslims used to just kill and torture people to get others to believe what they believed. That was the easiest way to go about it. for thousands of years that's how they did it. but for the last few decades save for a few people here and there, they have changed methods a bit and started instead going out on these pilgrimages doing what they call ‘witnessing’ which is their way of saying ‘sharing our beliefs with others in hopes that they will believe what we believe.’ Much like what I'm doing here now actually when you think of it. because all I'm doing is typing a bunch of beliefs. no truer that I write there and no truer than anything else I might ever write in the future. Its all just beliefs.

[I remember for the last few weeks I have been reading Gary nulls newest book on health called ‘power aging’ which is a great read if you are into health and wellness and anti-aging theory etc... but again, in the bigger picture its just a huge collection of beliefs. “vitamin c does this” “n-acytel-cystein does that” etc... have to remember this so we never so caught up in belief systems that we can’t get out.]

current spin: groove armada, lovebox from 2002. LOVE this CD. I don't even know what you call this music. but dig it.

You know, I think you get to a point when you get so in the know/so rich/so there/so relaxed/so content with yourself/so at peace that you loosen up so much that you just don't care about the things that we do when we are ‘middleclass everyday joes’... I can see a time when no matter what we do or where we go it won't have the impact the charge the importance as things did when we were just kids struggling to pay the rent each month. Everything seemed so important... the achievement of all of these simple life things... but then it all seems to slip away... once you know that you can do all that stuff.... I'm watching it happen already. I used to care so much about “the house” and “the stuff” and now I am more content to have everything I own in storage and just travel as much as possible. You become content with just being you out in the world. without the need for a lot of the stuff that people think they need or need to do or have... most of all of that is so transient anyway... comes and goes. Only thing we have is the stuff we can keep with us, bones and blood and our ability to communicate with others. so for me the important now seem like keeping my mind and heart and body healthy and learning languages. And of course continuing to create, always trying to prove that I am here... that I was here...

At this point all I want to do is live in different places around the world. I don't have any desire to settle here, or anywhere really. And I have no desire to travel as most people do in those little one and two week jaunts where they never rise above ‘tourist’ anywhere. Not my thing at all. thank God I have the kind of career where I can do whatever I want to for the most part and make money from the inspiration I derive out of doing whatever I want to. and thank God that I never settled down and got married so never was restricted to being like everyone else and having to limit travel to the status of ‘a vacation.’ the only things I don't have in storage now are my clothes guitars and cds. doesn’t sound like much I know, but trust me its enough to fill up an entire apartment where you have to shimmy sideways around boxes to walk anywhere. Over a hundred boxes of clothes and cds and 27 guitars that I never play except for one now – the brilliant ‘68 Hofner flat top is my constant companion and inspiration. crazy. I thought I was just taking the basic essentials to New York with me.

so the thing is that once all this shit with Cleopatra is complete, once the TV show is edited and picked up and once the new album is recorded and in mixing I want to take off for a while. Put everything I own in storage – o.k. multi-dimensionalize here, maybe I can just sublet out my apt...  better... cause in New York its fucking impossible to find a place, o.k. so that's the plan. Will head to France to immerse in order to fully integrate the French language. Really want to be recording there too. hate the idea of having to compromise my music when I'm now kicking such ass just to learn these languages but I don't want to give up speaking many languages fluently. That's a major primary of mine. I had created ‘I speak and understand many languages fluently.’ Lt asks me how many is that. and I tell her I'm not really sure. Maybe ten or eleven is good. but I'd hate to put a number to it. who knows in an entire lifetime how many you will want to learn... would like now to take a basic language/linguistic class to understand the origin of languages and the roots of all of them. I have a feeling that would be about the only place I could get this kind of a class, a college, but I hate how regimented they are. always telling you when you your class is and all that. I have always hated that and hate it still. I like to come and go when I please. but that's just me. so college of any kind is just not my thing. I'm a rambling man. Can’t be boxed in.

Anyway as far as the languages go I want to step it up a notch now. kick it into overdrive. I am extremely unimpressed with the progress I have been making. Especially with my retention which I think has been sucking lately with all the languages. Trying to do everything all at once is very challenging. Juggling the songwriting recording business promoting TV show journal writing language classes homework relationship family friends living etc all in one sixteen hour day is grueling at this point... [The Pimsleur language learning programs are the best by the way if you are wondering. There are a lot of them out there. but I found that the wealthiest and smartest road warriors all eventually go to the Pimsleur method. Expensive but worth it. when you say Pimsleur to someone who knows they will give you a double take because its like the Rolls Royce of language learning. I told someone recently that I scored the Pimsleur French I for a hundred and they couldn’t believe it. normally go for four hundred for each level. But I got it on eBay. I get everything on eBay at this point. Or Amazon. [and I don't even think its to save money. for me its about the convenience of just showing up at the office everyday and having everything you want show up there so you never have to go anywhere to buy anything.] In any case, load the thirty cds into your ipod (which you also get on eBay for about half the price) and then wherever you are you are pounding out a language. It takes this kind of dedication and commitment I realize now. its not easy. it sucks. I am on the subway mumbling French along to the ipod and everyone is looking at me like I am crazy. but you have to do it if you want to be a Neo because lets be honest here, we’re not to the point where we are “plugging in” yet, so were still stuck learning things the old fashioned way  --  using our fucking memory. And that's just too bad.]

Again, ever since the integrity course I really do feel like neo from the matrix. Constantly processing, constantly learning, constantly upgrading, refining, and improving my system. it all comes down to how kick ass do you want to be. what kind of a life do you want to have. you can think about it or you can set out to do it.

Loving clay for the hair still. Sebastian makes it. with clay you can set your hair into place with your hands and it just stays like that for days. its fucking great stuff. you don't even have to shampoo for days, maybe even weeks. I'll let you know. sometimes it’s the simple things in life that make it worth living. For me right now its all about hair clay and clarins and l’occitane toiletries.

You know that part of a kiss at the very end when you make the smack sound. Well is a kiss a kiss if you never make the smack sound? I mean if you sit there holding your lips together for like five minutes but then you never make the smack sound, you never seal it off with that, you just separate lips, well is it a kiss then?

And what about making love. Often times a man may have an orgasm but the woman won't, I mean, I don't know this from personal experience of course but I've heard about it from others you know... but I was thinking, if the man cums and the woman doesn’t is that still making love? And if the woman does but the man doesn’t, is that still making love? And what happens if nether have an orgasm? What is it then? what if you stick it in for a while and then pull it out and neither of you come, what is that?

An amazing ride home from JFK. I arrive and my driver is late, stuck in traffic. So he calls to let me know and apologize and eventually I just decide to hop in a cab. I get in with this Indian guy with a turban and this moustache, the whole look. His name is Syid. I tell him I'm hungry and we need to go through a drivethru somewhere. Now remember that from jfk its all flat rate at 45, no more or less, so he doesn’t really have to stop for me. but he tells me that instead he will take me to a secret taxi driver stand. At first I'm like ‘what?’ but I agree. So we go through a few tunnels and security gates and we end up at this huge lot filled with taxis. Must have been a few hundred of them parked all around this building. And then he hustles me into this building and it’s a giant restaurant and restroom area. Where all these hundreds of taxi drivers are waiting in line to order their food and they have everything in here. any kind of food you can think of, all just for the taxi drivers. I had chicken briani because I was with an Indian driver. Then he gets me in the car and off we go and as if it couldn’t get any better he then stops at dunkin donuts to get some gas so I'm able to score a few double chocolates for the road. then he tells me ‘please, please sir sit in the front, its so much better there. and here I am driving in the front seat which is what I prefer, eating this lavish Indian feast, a few donuts and coffee on the side, and he's playing this great CD of Indian music by ravi shankar and zakir Hussein. What a ride. he went down side streets the whole way so we never sat in traffic once. And then to top it off even more he gives me the CD we were listening to as a gift. New York. gotta love it.


New York is unbelievably beautiful right now. just out of this world weather. you forget how many beautiful people live here. you can feel love everywhere in New York right now. just gorgeous. Spring. I will never live in a place that does not have a spring. One understands the need for winter now.

Last screening: to have and to have not. starring Bogart and Lauren Bacall. Good stuff. will try to see the rest of his films.



In the mailbag from Arabia from her current travels in India. Interesting stuff:

Greetings from Chennai, the sweltering city of South India.  One would think that it would be comfortable to
have the ambient air temperature be identical to one’s body temperature, kind of like swimming in the womb
once again, but I guess back then, we got to romp around naked and suck our thumbs and sleep all day.  It’s
just not the same anymore.

This place has always struck me as so sensual (or is it sensuous?!, let’s ask Professor Norman!).  It accosts the
senses – smell, tastes, sound, sight.  Ravi and I are using the decadence of film-less digital cameras to catch the
street scenes as we maneuver our way through traffic, riding in the back seat of mom and dad’s car.  By day, the
city screams, car and scooter horns honk ceaselessly, the air a thick cloud of exhaust.  By night, the lights of
temples and restaurants and stores illuminate the dark-skinned crowds and we sit tight in that back seat,
praying.  “Look out!” we cry out, hoping Dad can see through the humidity-streaked windshield the invisible city
bus driving toward us in our lane with no headlights or reflectors. 

Ravi and I landed at 2:20 am Thursday morning and by 6:00, we were on our way to my uncle’s for the kickoff
of cousin Ramki’s wedding to Ramya.  They met for the first time six weeks ago - matched according to Hindu
caste, status, income, height-weight proportions, and astrological signs - and agreed to spend the rest of their
lives together.  They’ve hardly seen each other in the interim; he didn’t want her to discover that he drank and
smoked, and surely she had her private habits as well.  When he later found out that she has terrible vision and
wears contacts, he felt betrayed. 

The first morning was just the groom’s family and a handful of priests, a rooftop gathering under a temporary
thatched structure that gave rest from the already-strong morning sun.  From this roof, a good arm could toss a
hefty stone and reach the beach where the tsunami’s wave struck five months ago and snatched fisherman’s
homes and many lives.  Lakshmi, who helps keep my uncle’s house clean and combs my grandmother’s hair
with a loving hand, and her mother, who did the same, lived in that fishing village on the Bay of Bengal’s edge
across the street from my uncle’s solid concrete house. Lakshmi’s dad is a fisherman who was safely at sea
when it hit.  They lost their home and everything in it, but everyone was ok.  “All my dresses…” she says,
“everything.” 

But today the sea is clam and up on the rooftop, cousins and aunts and uncles and one beloved grandmother
(Paathi) all reunite.  Paathi has already asked me a couple hundred times about when I’m getting married. 
“Apparam, apparam,” I answer. “Later.”  After the priests have Ramki repeat after them in Sanskrit for hours
(what could they possibly be saying, I think), after ghee has poured on the small fire that burns, after gifts have
been presented, and fruit blessed, and children and fertility prayed for, cooks displace the priests and it’s time
to eat.  Eighteen separate dishes are ladeled out onto fresh green banana leaves, which we scoop up with our
fingers.

The real wedding begins the next morning, early the next morning and the groom’s house is chaos.  I sit in the
main room, wrapped up in eighteen feet of green silk with gold thread trim, drinking the coffee with the creamy
water buffalo milk that I so love here.  Around me, Ramki pulls freshly laundered underwear off the drying rack;
(aunt) Ambulu pulls a plastic comb through her long hair and then distractedly weaves it into a braid; and
Chandran chittappa (literally little father, my dad’s younger brother) does morning prayers at the puja corner,
where a large wooden wardrobe is filled with pictures of deities and burning oil lamps. The flower garlands from
yesterday hang on the cabinet’s door.  I relieve his wife Santhi of cutting fresh jasmine garlands into eight-inch
lengths to give to the women so that she too can finish getting dressed.  Oh the smell of fresh jasmine!  There
is a rush to leave the door by 5 am, an auspicious time to begin new endeavors.  Of course we don’t make it. 
Although it’s only 5:10 when we leave, I wonder if anything that may go wrong in their lives could be traced
back to this very moment, when we were ten minutes late.

The rest of day is a blur of more priests, more Sanskrit incantations, this ritual where Ramki leads the bride by
the big toe of her henna’ed feet across the stage, that ritual where Ramki, then cousin Kala and I (as sister-in-
laws) each tie a knot in the symbolic string he has placed around her neck.  They have now officially “tied the
knot,” so to speak, and at this moment in the days-long wedding, the deed is done.  As the ceremony goes on
for hours, the bride in her nine-yard sari, and heavy gold jewelry, sits sweating next to Ramki as they go
through the motions. Neither of them seems to have a clue what they’re doing; they’re following instructions. 
Ramki has never been a practicing Hindu and Ramya works at a call center answering our American 1-800 calls
until three in the morning five days a week.  None of the three hundred guests pay much attention, visiting with
each other in the stifling room and roaming about, trying to find a breeze or an effective ceiling fan.  Every time
I’m ready to complain about the heat, I just have to look up on stage, where they sit in front of a FIRE, for Lord
Ganesh’s sake, a smoky fire, dripping sweat.  Ravi and I bring up water to Ramki and promise we’ll get him an
ice-cold Kingfisher lager as soon as possible. 

The guests drift upstairs for another huge meal of rice, curries, sambar and rasam, pappadams and pooris,
chutneys and pickles.  Down below, they’re still getting married. 

After an afternoon siesta, I put on a fresh sari and we go to the reception. This meal is up to 24 dishes, and
cousins complain about the loud musical performance that features two saxophones doing south Indian musical
things that I didn’t know saxes could do, warbling and drawing out the reedy notes.  Finally, a dj puts on Tamil
film music and then we are all dancing in a bouncing clump of sweaty bodies.  I didn’t know we could get any
hotter, but here I am, my eyelids sweating.  Being the sister-in-law, I have authority over Ramya, and I am called
upon by other cousins to use this power to drag her onto the dance floor, although she is begging me “Please,
Meera, nooooo.”  I am torn, wanting her to feel comfortable and respect her wishes and wanting her also to
come join the circle, to feel welcome in this new family that she has just joined.  Earlier, she sat on her father’s
lap and relinquished her family’s lineages for this legacy of the PR Mahadevan clan.  There is no turning back.  
Tonight, she will go to Ramki’s and sleep in the two twin beds of different heights that are pushed up against
each other in the house with his parents and grandmother. It is a new life. 

Oh, shit, I meant this to be a short little update and now it’s two pages long.  The abridged version: It’s hot and
I’m relaxing, now that the busy wedding is over.  Oh, and it’s mango season.

Lots of love, Arabia