I finished To America With Love: Letters From The Underground this morning, what a beautiful memoir!! I want everyone to read it, but for now I will simply leave two last & defining quotes.

“The act of women grouping is the beginning of the revolutionary process. In China when Mao’s army liberated a village one of their first acts was to bring women together in “Speak Bitterness” sessions, where women recounted the horrors of their past. These sessions gave women the courage to renounce their former roles and to become activists on behalf of other women. They were the beginning of the women’s movement in China. This happened in a nation where foot binding was practiced for a thousand years and outlawed only a generation earlier. Foot binding actually persisted into the forties, when the communists had difficulty eradicating it. They succeeded only after they abandoned a punitive approach and educated people about the practice. The contrast between the Arab countries and China reminds me that the future is all in our heads, and I choose to be optimistic. I don’t usually share these thoughts with you and I sense a certain reluctance because feminism is so, well, personal. To me it’s more a state of mind than a set of well-articulated principles. It’s the realization that you’re not a piece of shit, that you are indeed, first-rate; it’s falling in love with yourself and being the hero of your own adventures; it’s knowing you’re not the moon’s pale reflection but the sun, burning. It’s being aware that you can change your life, and doing it. It’s believing women can change the world. Understand, man?” [anita]

“Time freezes. I’ll never change the way I feel toward you. I would love to run my fingers through your hair and my tongue over your nipple. I’ve done it in my thoughts a thousand times. Your happiness is equal to my own. Feel my heart, hold my hand. I am with you as time floats by your window like waves of gentle ocean caresses, licking the walls, creeping in the windows, crawling across the floor to our bed. The child is our gift, our work. He will be the future, he will lead us into a new century and he will fly on horse’s wings like a dashing cowboy and comfort the poor and the lonely. He will be a world-shaker, a champion of all that’s right and good. He will be our star. The future is ours. Love and wet licks, your party comrade.” [abbie]

[buy the book]

…another day of reading on the porch, smoking cigs and drinking coffee. Michelle and I are going to pick up lost packages at the USPS pick-up center, and I am going to run to the grocery store to buy the components for a baked salmon dinner. The salmon’s waiting in the fridge…

It’s so beautiful out; the plants are loving it and the tomato plant is growing every day. This morning I noticed little yellow flowers beginning to bloom… It smells so good, and so does the lavender. Next season, I think I am going to research plants (veggies, herbs, and flowering) that all smell amazing and I will have more of an aromatherapeutic theme to the garden. I never knew I’d be so into this sort of thing…

Enjoy the long weekend! “love & wet licks…”