colored queer waters

i just wanna note that i am not a person who uses measurements for too much of anything. i basically do things in layers to maximize flavour and taste 

also, is this shit perfectly raw? no of course not. i don’t care for the whole “everything must come fresh off the whatever for optimal health” all of the time. a vegan milk shake shouldn’t cost you $20 to make. it should come from the ingredients you buy and consume on a regular basis. i’m not really down for speciality ingredients on a lot of levels. if i can’t use it more than one way, its not getting bought 

so you gunna need: 

• frozen fruit of your choosing {i know books say use strawberries but if you’re allergic then don’t be about that life} 
• bananas
• some kind of non-dairy milk {i prefer soy cause everything else looks like milky water to me and it hurts my feelings} 
• vanilla extract {that was seriously a whim}
• chocolate syrup or chocolate cocoa powder {i literally grabbed the ghiradelli’s hot cocoa powder off the shelf that i use to make hot chocolate in the winter time. i am not about that 3 different forms of a product life. shit costs too much} 
• vanilla soy yogurt {that’s really optional. if you don’t have it then just add more frozen fruit so its cold and creamy} 

okay, so i do things in layers right? which means that in order to have a thick blended anything you gotta strategically layer things in a blender to make it thick or thin. if you like things thick, then follow my lead. if not just throw shit in the blender and pray it taste good to you. 

1. bananas go at the very bottom 
2. frozen fruit next 
3. soy yogurt on top 
4. vanilla and cocoa powder 
5. next pour the soy milk in the blender (for good measure pour it to the top of the fruit pile and a little extra so you don’t burn out the motor)

the beauty of pouring in the liquid last is that it takes up the spare space amongst the rest of your ingredients, keeps it thick while not burning out your blender. and if done well you don’t have to add more ingredients to make it thicker, which saves you money. 

if you’re allergic to any of these above then improvise based off this model 

1. frozen fruit of your choice first
2. some kind of sweetener {agave, brown sugar, ect} 
3. some kind of non-dairy milk {coconut milk, almond, oat, whatever else out there exists} 

#amillionhoodiesmarch

show me the day our children won’t bear the label “suspected” on their tombstones

justice for trayvon martin!

1. i ordered a chrome backpack because all my bible-related class books will not fit into my hipster trash messenger bag from urban outfitters. i swear studying jews and jesus in antiquity will be the death of my shoulders 
2. can we just meditate on how i bought a chrome backpack, which in amherst is the epitome of the hipster/biker/or privileged crusty punk riding a bike because they’re hiding the BMW kind of backpack….not amused in the slightest, but it has a better shoulder pad than the timbuk2 bags so i’m down with the “saving my shoulders and spine” cause 
3. i have to stay up tonight writing my division III contract, which will basically put in me on the fast track to graduating by the end of this fall
4. this also means soon i’ll be starting my novel, beyond the pages in my brain which have to be recaptured 
5. which means journal shopping!! or paper and pen shopping! 
6. i have a midterm for one of my bible classes, and i am so behind on the readings. but thankfully reading the dead sea scrolls and the Jewish annotated new testament isn’t a stretch of the imagination 
7. can i just take a nap, wake up in may 2013 and just walk it out across Hampshire’s graduation stage? k…cool!   

and to think i just dreamed this shit up, bought the ingredients, and then threw it down

recipe to come tomorrow 

me at the conference dinner where angela davis spoke, mingling with middlebury folk! 

so i went to food for thought book collective in amherst center, a place which gets lots of my money for having books about meditation, social justice, the occasional jewish studies book, urban gardening, homesteading, and vegan cookbooks filled with recipes.

i had only planned on getting a day planner to schedule my busy busy life when i stumbled across this book by Matilda Berstein Sycamore. I don’t know if you are familiar with her, but she is amazing and i read her book “thats revolting queer strategies for resisting assimilation” and i own “nobody passes” around here somewhere. i picked up a copy of her new book called “why are faggots so afraid of faggots: flaming challenges to masculinity, objectification, and the desire to conform”. 

i’m so excited to be holding this book in my hands and have it in on my personal reading list. i started reading it this morning. i always thumb through and read the essays by the POC first, just because i’m always amazed by the visibility and inclusion POC voices get in Matilda’s anthologies. 

i also have another LGBT related book that has been a hot topic in the queer muslim universe, but that warrants a special post all on its own one of these days

lately i’ve been taking space from certain people in my real life. stepping back from those intimate conversations and moments of playing therapist over the phone or over skype or over whatever social medium is necessary. taking space from putting other people’s emotions and struggles into a knapsack that i carry across my back daily. that knapsack is hanging in my closet somewhere until future notice. i can see its tan colors billowing in the wind that occasionally makes its way through my room. 

i’ve been taking space because I’m stressed out beyond repair. i stay up late writing writing writing to no end in the hopes of finishing my Division II and moving on to my Division III (senior thesis). i wake up early to pray, and then hopefully go back to sleep for a couple of hours, but sometimes my mind is so racked with what i need to do that day and two days from now and then five days from now until i am contemplating uncertainties. i think about the many ways in which i can fall short of the mark i draw for myself on life’s height chart but also where other’s have sharpied in their expectations. 

i’m so stressed my lower back has begun to spasm more. i can feel the bones pressing tightly against my skin to not only show recent weight loss but remind me that my spine is struggling to support everything that i take on, so its time to slow down, but when? when is there time to just lay in bed listening to show tunes or something fun but to the busy bird leisure feels frivolous. when is there time to read for myself and write for myself? there never seems to be enough time. there isn’t even time to answer the phone call of a good friend who has designated me her support system.

yet in calling her back two days ago i damn near burst into tears on the telephone. i lamented about what its like to have a committee of privileged, college educated white women who don’t care to acknowledge my racial identity outside of the context of “you’re unique for being black and doing Jewish Studies since you’re not Jewish”. who don’t seem to understand that how they experiences eastern Europe will be totally different than my experiences and i tread predominately white spaces with caution. that i just can’t go home to “find a job” to pay for a summer program because have you not seen people occupying wallstreet? would they really be out there in the snow if the recession finally hadn’t hit white middle class Americans like the black death of the middle ages?  i told her how i didn’t feel supported in my decision to graduate early, to put eastern European Jewry behind me in entering graduate school, that i found my heart and soul in studying Talmud/Rabbinics and my chair just overlooks my attempts to tell her i’m not going to be the black crusader for Yiddish language and culture like she wants me to be. She thinks nothing of my desire to study religion and actively shows it, and i find myself hiding my true intentions and seeking refuge somewhere else for academic advice. 

most importantly, I almost cried because i feel as though i have put stock in people and they have disappointed me. i have shared my emotions and inner most yearning with the wrong person, and it wound up slapping me in the face big time. it only confirmed my notion that you don’t lay your heart to rest with just anybody, no matter how much they beg and plead because if they aren’t ready for the truth then they don’t know what to do with the testament once it has been received. and i can’t do that anymore. i can’t place myself in people who don’t take into account how their actions could hurt me, and then wonder why my silence is so deafening.  

i am drained worse than the last drop of molasses in a glass bottle. i have sought refuge in people whereas i usually seek refuge in no one.

so if you know me in real life and feel as though i have neglected you, its because i’m taking space from you. i’m drawing the line of demarcation light years between us so that i can accrete the words i didn’t have access to before on the tip of my tongue. so that the next time we talk i don’t go to pieces and continue to fall apart. 

GPOY: the face of a happy queer muslim who is adding folks to the LGBT list left and right while she sits through a boring seminar on how to be a good Hampshire student group leader, that all of us have been too every semester since we took on the role. 

Thank you for making this monotonous process more interesting and keeping my hands busy! 

@notyourkinddear

see, very matchy matchy as well! 

And on the fourth day, God gathered his children at the bottom of the mountain. And from on mount high he decreed “all those who have engaged in the folly of blackface must destroy their face paint, apologize to those who have been egregiously wronged, and vow never to do it again. those who don’t will be eternally marked with the stain of my disfavour.” And those who paid no heed to his words committed the grave sin once again. Soon after they found themselves marked with a plague which slowly ate away at the flesh of its host until there was nothing left. The sinners were punished, and the righteous upheld their covenant.