And we are at the final stretch.

In the last blog I suggested to myself I should get a tattoo. The next day, I did. The Adinkra symbol for TRANSFORMATION. Alas, I’m just that kinda chick… As Will (a Cali/New Orleans transplant) tattooed my arm in Jacci & Associates AART ACCENT: TAT-2 & BODY PIERCING (1041 N. Rampart, New Orleans, 504-581-9812), Alixa so graciously held up the laptop so that I could hear Concha Buika’s “Ay De Mi Primavera” on repeat.

We have lost family members while on this tour and seen long lost relatives and friends. We have slowly dragged one another’s menstrating periods closer together. We have used composting toilets and gray water systems together. We have fallen in and out of love together (and together). We have baked yummy things picked from gardens and created the most elaborate spreads over dining room tables across America together. We have watched the market go down, seen the nation demonstrate that “…we can…” and shared our own inaugural dreams together. We have seen audience members cry, stomp, cheer, and marvel together. We have listened to Fela Kuti’s “Water No Get Enemy” and every remade version together. We have experienced floods, torrential rains, snow storms, black outs, witnessed two hurricanes and an international terrorist attack. We have lost weight, gained weight, and waited on one another to complete morning rituals together. We have hurt one another’s feelings, made one another proud, and hugged more times than any tour crew on the face of the planet.

It has been an experience none of us will forget all the days of our lives. It has forced me to forgive myself and others. In long rides between cities, I have been still. I caught on sleep I’d been storing hours for from 5 years ago…

Concha Buika

We’ve slept on mountaintops, on beaches, in RV parks, at rest stops, in nests, on buses, in living rooms, and in mansions. We have discovered Concha Buika, gotten tattoos and videotaped Election nights hanging out of strangers’ cars. We’ve seen Mo’ Better Blues, Favela Rising, Sicko, Do the Right Thing, Wall-E, Hancock, Miracle at St. Anne’s, Trouble the Water, and What Democracy Looks Like on laptops, flat screens, and huge Zeniths.

We each have different stories we can’t wait to share with our loved ones. I, sadly, wasn’t as diligent about posting as I’d planned. Nevertheless, what this tour has meant for us – the crew – cannot be summed up in blog reflections.

Check the fotos!

I told Alixa and Naima (because I believe it) that I feel closer to God when I am with them.  What it is, is I feel more myself, more creative, when I’m with them.  It is a beautiful realization to have while on tour – to see the God in me.

My college friend told me during my Thanksgiving fast that “Coincidences are God’s way of remaining anonymous.”  And what did I see that evening, while using the men’s restroom in some hole in the wall spot in New Orleans but a message written on the towel dispenser that reads: “Here I am, Sorry.”  Okay, God, I’m listening.

So here it is.  We have two more Hurricane Season shows before returning to Brooklyn – Atlanta and Washington DC.  I am sure I will need a new tattoo on my left wrist to represent this journey.  Tattoos have been my way of marking chapters in my life.  Wonder what I’ll get…

Seriously, I walk off the bus some days, look down at my clothes and think, “Goodness, if anyone saw me like this at home, they’d ask me what’s wrong!” It’s bad. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still sexy. *wink* But I haven’t had to wear an outfit this many times since rocking a uniform in boarding school. And even THEN, I had like 15 polo and button-down white shirts and like 8 dark blue pants or skirts. It’s all good though, when I get to Cali to visit my family – I’m going on a Ross shopping spree!

I am so behind on catching you all up on what’s been going on during the tour. But another big shout out to all of you who are keeping track of us using this blog. Getting your feedback (via text and e-mail since I still don’t know how to allow you to do it on Wordpress) has made us all smile from ear to ear and laugh at our own ridiculousness.

One thing is for sure though, we couldn’t have picked a better time in human history to go on tour with HURRICANE SEASON. It’s a conversation about our economy, our government, our educational system, the prison industrial complex, our addictions to technology and oil, the unusually grizzly weather all over the world… and our apathy. On the flip side – the Finale, Naima and Alixa give us strength, remind us of our greatness and send us out to do the much needed work.

But when we have access to a television, we watch MSNBC, CNN or for fun – FOX NEWS! Yes, the best example of freedom of speech ever exemplified, outside of the NY Post… and our good old friends over at WKKK (if you get my drift). We just sit with our mouths open watching all the back and forth that the media is creating while Lord only knows what is actually happening elsewhere in the world, elsewhere in middle America, elsewhere in our homes, elsewhere in our relationships…

Pippi asked me the day after we left NYC if I had applied for an absentee ballot. When I went to vote in the Democratic primaries I wasn’t listed at my local voting booth. So I filled out some other document, thinking, “Of course I’m in there, I was listed as a registered voter in 2004 when I last voted. And I haven’t moved!”) Today, I got a video from my boy Onician. It was really a good one for people like me who need to be cajoled into doing things. (Watch the video!)

So I go to the site that gives info your voter registration and lo’ and behold! I registered myself 8 years ago as an Independent! How did I not remember that?! When it came time for me to really define where I best fit along party lines 8 years ago I was most honest. *sigh*

Now I know, I can vote for the candidate of my choice November 4th in the general election. I got scared when I read on New York State’s Board of Elections Page that: “MAIL REGISTRATION – Sec. 5-210(3)
Applications must be postmarked not later than October 10th and received by a board of elections not later than October 15th to be eligible to vote in the General Election.” And went on to read that I can print and send a New York State absentee ballot and mail it to my county board postmarked by “not later than the day before election and received no later than the 7 day after election.” I think I will have it sent to Arcata, California – to whomever’s home we’ll be staying in for that tour stop.

Whew! I am cutting it extremely close. But it will get mailed today – I promise. Please, make sure you take care of whatever you need to. NOW!

Okay, now back to our regularly scheduled blogging! lol

Next tour stops, through to Cali, in case you are trying to come out to see us and Sugarcube:

MINNEAPOLIS Pi Bar
10.04.08 | 9:00 PM
Minneapolis, MN
This is not a Hurricane Season show. Alixa+Naima will be kicking some explosive and inspiring poetry alongside Black Blondie, Black Audience, and Carpscale Orchestra at the Pi Bar, 2532 25th Ave S, Minneapolis. $5, 21+

SEATTLE Langston Hughes Center
10.12.08 | 6:30 pm
Seattle, WA
104 17th Ave S

PORTLAND Pacific Northwest College of Art
10.15.08 | 6:30 PM
Portland, OR
Pacific Northwest College of Art
1241 NW Johnson St., Portland, OR

ARCATA Humboldt State University —-where I’ll be getting my absentee ballot!
10.19.08 | 6:30 PM
Arcata, CA
Humboldt State University

OAKLAND-BERKELEY La Pena
10.24.08 to 10.25.08
7:00 pm
Oakland / Berkeley, CA
3105 Shattuck Ave

SAN FRANCISCO Cell Space
10.30.08 | 7:00 pm
San Francisco, CA
2050 Bryant St

SAN JOSE MACLA
11.02.08 | 6:30 PM
San Jose, CA
MACLA
510 South First Street

SANTA CRUZ UC Santa Cruz
11.05.08 | 6:30 PM
Santa Cruz, CA
UC Santa Cruz

LOS ANGELES SPARC
11.08.08 | 7:00 pm
Los Angeles, CA
SPARC

See you somewhere soon!  Tell a friend.

I am just reading The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell – late, I know.  But while reading Chapter 2: The Law of the Few, I realized what a connector I am and the connectors I am surrounded by.  Seriously, I know folks that are committed to seeing a different world in their lifetimes and are taking actions toward that end.

Case in point, Sparlha Swa.   A singer, an intellect, a sexpot, a divine spirit guide, a friend, a lover of afro-beat.  Wait, wait, wait… you need some background.  In my community Fela Kuti (originator of afro-beat) is a God of sorts.  A party featuring afro-beat is one where you know folks are going to sweat, one where you need to where sneakers and sweatbands.  It’s going to be a party where folks are going to be smiling and shaking a tailfeather versus posted (as my boy Akintola would say) like a flamingo with a glass in hand and shades.  I’ve enjoyed those parties, but it’s only now that I’m learning about the music’s history and who in the hell Fela Kuti is. 

Okay, back on track.  How would I describe Sparlha Swa?… A star in the making.  A Sade, Celia Cruz, Miriam Makeba.  And she has now been called by NY Times, “Smashing…” in her part in Fela! on Broadway.  Read more about the show here: http://theater2.nytimes.com/2008/09/05/theater/reviews/05fela.html?pagewanted=2

She… is pursuing her dreams.  And I am sooooo excited for her.  If you are in NYC and haven’t seen this musical with the world-renowned band Antibalas performing live… ahhhh – you are asleep!

And then… if you didn’t know, HURRICANE SEASON is about more than the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, more than natural and unnatural disasters, more than water, more than environmental protection, more than displacement and housing rights, more than criminalization, the so-called war on drugs, and the prison industrialization complex – though all are included.  The major threads include water and the oak tree.  From the moment you enter the show as an audience member until you leave, you are a part of the journey – offering water as your contribution and as a metaphor.

The crew drinks tap water, our bus runs on recycled vegetable oil from restaurants throughout the country, we eat mostly… hummus/houmas/smashed chickpeas/mushed garbanzo beans… (Huey has this idea for a t-shirt that reads: I AM NOT ANTI-HUMMUS, I AM PRO-CHOICE for those of us who do the vegetarian-thing with respect for our veggie friends, but who want a turkey sandwich every once in a while… HILARIOUS!)

So when I get this e-mail that my girl Crystal Clarity – artist, educator, dancer, lover/fighter, spiritual warrior – has finished the mural she was working on this summer with students and see what it is, I just nodded in that universal “knowing”.

Not only did she help paint Sugarcube (as you can see in this picture), she helped paint a mural educating folks about NY’s tap water.  *sigh*

Then… while explaining how the entire crew got together to Mama Edali (the godess mom of Naima & Alixa here in Chicago, with a home called – NIRVANA!), I realized how I was connected to all of them. 

Naima (Mama Lou) and Alixa (Tetris) I met through Kahlil Almustafa in 2002.  Kyla (Huey) I met through Naima and Alixa in 2006.  And Lindsay – get this – went to school with my brother in 3rd grade, and her dad is my dentist!  Synchronicity…

I have had my eyes opened to many things while on this trip.  One being – reach out to your extensive community when you are out to fulfill on your dreams (Mylinia.com is the best resource for this in my opinion).  What you want, or need, is probably only a call, letter, or e-mail away.  In my case, maybe simply a blog.

artwork by Lichiban Blossom

I’ll reach back into Detroit and our Chicago shows in the blog.  But for now, I’m going to watch as many back to back episodes of Law & Order as I can catch tonight on my aunt’s couch and figure out how I can manage to get back to Chicago and my family during Obama’s inauguration (though he’ll be in DC, there’s going to be one helluva party here in Chicago)! 

I wonder what we’ve gotta do to tip “that” point!

Peace and love.

FIRST OFF:  Love, love, love to: rolando, jennifer, sparlha, tyrone, ayinde, jamel, atiba, cj, jullien, julia, caitlin, and kelli for reaching out!

Cincinnati continued…

HURRICANE SEASON is a pretty hi-tech multi-media piece.  It has visual collages, and audio testimonials interspersed with Climbing PoeTree’s poems, full-bodied Cat’s Cradle, and stick dancing.  It’s all perfectly timed.  And when/if there are any technical difficulties, it is extremely difficult to hold up the show.  Therefore, when the projector begins overheating, and screen goes blank during the show in Cincinnati – I can feel Naima & Alixa’s anxiety as I stand in the back of Bi-Okoto Dance and Drum Theater.  

For those of you who haven’t seen it, HURRICANE SEASON, is a call for transformation – for self, for community, for humanity.  Pre-intermission is heavy – with a focus on environmental injustice, policing and criminalization, and land rights & displacement.  Post-intermission is focused on solutions people and communities world-wide have created and practiced.  So when during intermission a young man who had helped us to unload and build the set has what appears to be an emotional break down, Pippi comforts him.  He was guided outside and offered water.  He threw the cup back as if a beer mug in a saloon, but instead of chugging, the water pours out the corners of his mouth and down his clothes.  Pippi later says, “When you see a grown man crying in public, you’ve gotta take notice.”  She later goes on, “Man, I need training for how to deal with folks in crisis and with mental health issues – I’m a magnet for them!!!”  Tetris recounts, “That poor man…”

At the completion of the show, members of the audience have candles lit and I ask them to make a wish.  I urge folks to take their time and formulate a wish that would be significant for them to make, urgent, meaningful and to avoid rushing through it.  Once I blew out my candle I watched as each person blew theirs out, silently praying that it not occur to them as an unimportant exercise, but the first action in what I hope will be a life of acting after professing intention.  And ultimately, we were left with three flames still burning, spread through the room.  It was three women – each representing for me a generation.  And elder sat in the front.  She had paid what is the maximum amount asked of folks to donate – twenty dollars.  She had purchased merchandise.  She had signed the mailing list.  She had come from the suggestion of a friend in California.  And her eyes were open, watching as the wax melted down the sides of her candle.  The second was our host, Suriah, a twenty-something new mother, committed to organizing.  Her eyes were closed and she held her candle’s base with both hands.  The third, a nine year old girl.  She had asked about the set, the bus, and was visibly excited before the show.  As each of their flames lit up their face, and others remained virtually in darkness, tears began to form at the rim of my eyes.  “Of course,” I think, and smile, “of course it’d be this way.”  What feels like an uncomfortable silence is bearable when the elder blows out her candle.  When Suriah blows hers out, I turn to the little girl with a smile on my face.  She has her eyes closed, then opens them and looks to the ceiling.  Then she looks around and closes her eyes again – almost afraid to see if others were looking at her.  And I breathe a breath of strength, directing it to her.  She opens her eyes, blows – darkness.

The next day, before going back to Bi-Okoto to break down the set, Huey, Pippi and I watch early episodes from a season of In Living Color.  I was one of those kids who loved to watch the Fly Girls, thought Fire Marshall Bill was hilarious, learned what I thought was a Jamaican accent from “Ay Mon”, and for whom “Men on Film” was a guilty pleasure.  And though watching it on Hakiym and Suriah’s floor was surprisingly far from humorous, the pride I had while watching Keenan Ivory Wayans come out at the start of the show with a big smile on his face – as if to say “Hell yeah I have a show and I pray that y’all love it!” – remained the same.  It made me think of how proud I always am when brothers and sisters succeed in accomplishing their dreams – but specifically when artists, social architects, and cultural ambassadors “do the damn thing!”  And again, I am reminded of my own contradictions and the messages I send to the youth that are watching me.  Am I a good example?  Am I on the right path?…

Speaking of contradictions – we have this running joke on the tour.  Huey’s creation of course.  If you are on a blind date, or a first date, and either they don’t look the way you thought or it’s just not going so well, you can always all of a sudden fake a peanut allergy.  Begin a fake shallow breathing and say, “Oh my goodness, do you smell peanuts?  There has to be peanuts in here or something made with it!  I am deathly allergic to peanuts!  I have to go… no no, I don’t need help getting home… I can’t talk about …” and start a fake shortness of breath, and run out.  It’s so hilarious when something is happening we don’t like or are uninterested in and someone breaks out saying, “Uh oh… I… think… I… smell peanuts!” and run like hell.  I have done it once when Huey started playing Fela Kuti as we began breaking down the set – she is always playing Fela when we have to do that manual labor and I told her she is going to make it so that every time I hear Fela I start looking for grunt work. (lol)

The set includes these bamboo stalks that are 8′ long and 5″ in diameter.  You can carry 3 max at a time – and you have to have skills and strength to pull that off.  Each has a name etched into it to identify its role, its place in HURRICANE SEASON.  Some hold screens, some are the base of the water zampona, candler holder, and cloud chamber, one holds the projector.  I would smile each time I was asked to hand someone James Baldwin or Harriet Tubman.  On our bus ride to Yellow Springs – a rest stop for some days – I asked Naima (Mama Lou) to share all of their names.  They are James Baldwin, Harriet Tubman, Frida Kahlo, Audre Lorde, Janet Cyril, Sitting Bull, Eunice Brie (Yvonne Etaghene’s recently passed g-ma), Nina Simone, Octavia Butler, and Sojourner Truth.  So ILL!!!  Naming- words in general – are suddenly illuminated for me, and I begin pondering how our next destination came to be known as Yellow Springs.

Naima (aka Mama Lou) and Alixa (aka Tetris) are extraordinary women.

Background:

I met Naima and Alixa at the African Arts Festival after having seen them briefly on a BET commercial. Kahlil Almustafa introduced me and he apparently had MAD respect for them. Then I would see them at various events throughout the city. A couple years later, my friend Sparlha started our Full Moon Circle – my lunar sisters include: Julie, Sparlha, Crystal, Naima, Alixa, Samara, Grace, Maria, Wizdom, and Heather. It was in this circle that our beautiful spiritual bond was discovered. The rest, as they say, is history.

The Hurricane Season tour stopped in Cleveland. It was in Pilgrim Congregational Church. Yeah – a church. With “White Jesus” in the main sanctuary and everything. We debated as we unloaded about the meaning of the word “pilgrim” and its connotations.

Kyla (aka Huey formerly Bobby Fischer or Fisch) went to Notre Dame College (not to be confused with Univ) and interviewed students for the HURRICANE SEASON documentary. She found that it’s hard for these young people – our future – to define their community. Nope, they didn’t immediately claim “LGBT community”, “people of color”, “organizers/activist community,” “WASP”, nada. Huey expressed in her post-shoot talk-back that she senses a sort of apathy, with our youth having an expectation that information is to be fed to them versus initiating the search for knowledge oneself. Her solution: “[We need to] relearn them children to think!”

*sidebar* it’s at this point that I get an e-mail from the person I thought was all set to sublet my apartment that says she’s “had some time to think” and isn’t going to sublet my apartment, and apologizes for “any inconvenience [she] may have caused” versus apologizing for the inconvenience she IS causing. At this point I’m a wreck and not really interested in what epiphanies anyone’s experiencing. *end sidebar*

Huey goes on to make what she believes will be best sellers for t-shirt slogans: “I (heart) my white friends.” “I (heart) my haters.” “I am a youtube millionaire.” I go on to tell her that millions just ain’t what they used to be…

Before leaving Cleveland we are told to go to this market. Whew! I swear in all the best ways it reminded me of an open market in some other country – the fruit and veggies all sold stand after stand with the same prices and different faces behind them. I thought that if I lived in Cleveland, I’d shop regularly at the WESTSIDE MARKET (besides it’s closeness to my regular party cry) and would probably shop with the grocer whose personality I liked the best. As we wait to get our falafels, Huey backs up and knocks some little kid down (whose head is right at the crack of her buttocks) with her badoonkadoonk! This kid looks up and all you see is the whites of his eyes. A woman who appears to be his grandmother says, “That’s all right, he’s strong!” more for him than for us. I’m trying not to die laughing, as he sticks his ring pop back in his mouth and continues on his way. I tried to create a new nickname for Kyla based on this experience, but couldn’t think of anything… alas… Huey is definitely more fitting.

We pull into Cincinnati later in the evening. With our foam bench covers/beds, we walk through downtown to Hakiym and Suriah’s home – a four floor walk up. Folks on the block are asking if we are having a slumber party, the more bold are asking if they can come. After a *ahem* cipher, we got into a conversation that included the Georgians (not ATL, but near the former Soviet Union), kissing White Jesus, the mythology of Santa Claus, Burning Man, the mythology of the man on the moon, which people still believes is true versus the Truth of it being a Hollywood/government play on the American people, the safety of personal items in a car in the city versus what I deem the woods, Swedish police having to go to a type of University to become police and the love its citizens have for them, and our trip being The Real-er World – complete with the Columbian artist and activist (Alixa) & the biracial artist and activist (Naima) who are in love , the tech savvy one from the Midwest who moonlights as an itunes deejay (Kyla), the white fire twirler with the locks from a weller-to-do family out of California (Lindsay), and lastly, the Kwanzaa celebrating-monolingual-Black girl with too much “swag” to do things that are clearly more kind to the earth, like… um… composting toilets (where you pee or poop in a bucket, cover it with leaves, and it gets taken out when it’s full to the compost to eventually become fertilizer for the vegetables in the garden after being turned over for hella long)… yeah, that would be me (Sallome). Folks didn’t like my breakdown of them. But, ahhh, who cares?! It’d be the MTV spin on it anyway.

We are eating popcorn and Alixa & Naima tell us that the indigenous would pop popcorn and offer it as a peace offering. We all giggle over the resounding simplicity of that gesture, while considering how beautiful it is. I start conjuring up all my memories of popcorn sharing – and each is matched with smiles, buttery hands slightly touching while cupping small portions of the fluffy good stuff. Note to self, I think, bring popcorn to all house-warmings, potlucks, brainstorming sessions, and conflict-resolution ciphers. Messiah – Suriah and Hakiym’s 5-month old – starts scooting toward the popcorn. ” And how cool it would be,” I say aloud, “if Messiah learned to crawl out of his overwhelming desire to be a part of the cipher?!”

This is also the night Kyla is renamed Huey – since she goes way beyond the strategy of a Bobby Fischer and has demonstrated her sociopolitical, economic, and cultural analysis. We wanted something to munch on (at 3AM) and were told that nothing in Cincinnati is open at that time…. EXCEPT the gas station. Suriah and Hakiym warn us of the “long line” that will probably be out there. Tetris exclaims, “We worked so hard for this tour… We are in a vegetable run bus for crying out loud! Don’t go to the Shell!” We tell her we aren’t going to buy anything, just check out the line. On our way there Huey says, “As she said that, I had this memory of me walking down the BP aisle, hearing that gas station music,” she is bobbing her head slowly from side to side with the most hilarious walk, “picking up the cranberry juice she finished yesterday, and the tortilla chips y’all killed!” I am crying laughing so hard. And the internal dialogue begins regarding what a walking/talking contradiction I am.

The gas station scene in Cincinnati is a blog in itself. Initially, there was solely one man pacing back and forth across a parking area. He is completely freaky. I see a police car pulling up, to get “snacks” too I presume. I say to Kyla, “Yay! The police will save us!” Kyla reminds me of Timothy Thomas – mentioned in HURRICANE SEASON – a 19-year old brother who was pulled over and due to his fear behind a warrant he had around a traffic violation, ran. Unarmed, a father of a small child, he was murdered. I am considering the piece in HURRICANE SEASON in my imagination when the officer driving the police car shouts to a brother standing behind me, “He, how ya doing?” “Oh, hey!” he says, “I’m good…. good.” His blackface grin pulls goose bumps to the surface of my forearms. I turn away abruptly. “Yeah, yeah,” he goes on, “can’t complain.” He then begins swinging his arms as a small child would do when being asked about school while wanting to run to play with Legos. As they drive away, Kyla and I hear him say, “Muthafuckas,” behind us. I turn around to see his smile has changed to lips turned in to clutch his teeth. “I hate those muthafuckas! Always wanna fuck with me!” He is speaking to no one and everyone. And I want to scream.

Huey and I choose to sleep on the loft bed (about 8 feet off the floor in a rectangle that’s about 5′x8)’. We take the air mattress – as it’s a perfect fit – and try to blow it up. After taking DD batteries from their 5 month old baby’s swing, another baby contraption, and out of the bus, we decide “that thang just ain’t gon’ get blown up tonight!” After resting our heads for about 15 minutes the possessed air mattress blower-upper starts making some crazy sounds and I try to turn it off in my half awake state and instead throw it to Huey. She miraculously is able to get the batteries out – after waking up the entire house – and discovers they are so hot to the touch “They almost blew up!” she exclaims.

It makes sense to me – the brewing frustration I had around Timothy Thomas, and Sean Bell, and Amadou Diallo, and my girl Jamilah Seifullah (who was given a ticket for walking between NYC subway train cars and gives her entire measly teacher’s salary to ensure that her students have afterschool and Saturday programming), and my girl Crystal Clarity (who was given a ticket for having her foot on the pedal of her bike while on the NYC subway and works with youth to create murals all over the city), and my aunt and cousin who were beaten by San Francisco police officers after attempting to save a neighbor from domestic violence, and Emmett Till, and Abner Louima, and… though no one knew – I cried myself to sleep.

Cincinnati continues… in the next blog.

DETROIT Furniture Factory 09.12.08 | 7:00 pm Detroit, MI 4126 3rd St ANN ARBOR William H. Trotter Multicultural Center 09.15.08 | 6:30 PM Ann Arbor , MI University of Michigan CHICAGO, IL Center on Halsted 09.18.08 to 09.19.08 | 7:00 pm Chicago, IL 3656 N Halsted URBANA University of Illinois 09.24.08 | 6:30 PM Urbana, IL University of Illinois IOWA CITY The Wesley Center 09.27.08 | 7:00 PM Iowa City, IA 120 N. Dubuque St. MILWAUKEE Black Historical Society 09.30.08 | 6:30 pm Milwaukee, WI 2620 W. Center St. MADISON Goodman Community Center 10.02.08 | 6:30 PM Madison, WI Goodman Community Center 149 Waubesa St. MINNEAPOLIS 10.04.08 | 7:00 PM Minneapolis, MN TENTATIVE SEATTLE Langston Hughes Center 10.12.08 | 6:30 pm Seattle, WA 104 17th Ave S PORTLAND Portland Northwest College of Art (PNCA) 10.16.08 | 6:30 PM Portland, OR ARCATA Humboldt State University 10.18.08 | 7:00 PM Arcata, CA Humboldt State University OAKLAND-BERKELEY La Pena 10.24.08 to 10.25.08 7:00 pm Oakland / Berkeley, CA 3105 Shattuck Ave SAN FRANCISCO Cell Space 10.30.08 | 7:00 pm San Francisco, CA 2050 Bryant St SAN JOSE MACLA 11.02.08 | 6:30 PM San Jose, CA MACLA 510 South First Street SANTA CRUZ UC Santa Cruz 11.05.08 | 6:30 PM Santa Cruz, CA UC Santa Cruz LOS ANGELES 11.08.08 | 7:00 pm Los Angeles, CA Stay tuned for venue ALBUQUERQUE 11.15.08 | 7:00 pm Albuquerque, NM Stay tuned for venue AUSTIN 11.19.08 | 6:30 PM Austin, TX Stay tuned for venue HOUSTON 11.22.08 | 7:00 pm Houston, TX Stay tuned for venue NEW ORLEANS 11.26.08 | 6:30 PM New Orleans, LA Stay tuned for venue TALLAHASSEE 12.02.08 Tallahassee, FL TENTATIVE ATLANTA 12.05.08 | 7:00 PM Atlanta, GA Stay tuned for venue ASHEVILLE 12.09.08 Asheville, NC TENTATIVE WASHINGTON DC 12.13.08 | 7:00 PM Washington DC, DC Stay tuned for venue

We’ve already deduced that it could be the weight we are carrying (five women, cinder blocks for the set, the weight of the full set itself, merchandise, our personal travel needs, and our newly crafted seating – which is also a compartmentalized storage unit AND folds out into a bed thanks to Pippi), it could be some aspect of our steering (we’re in a 1990 Ford E350 Diesel; Pippi likes to say, “Ford International 7.3 Liter Diesel!”), it could be our tires… who the hell knows?!  But we have to figure it out or cancel Pittsburgh.  Etta is our activist coordinator and location scout in Pittsburgh and she calls up Johan – the mechanic saviour.  Together, at 9pm, they drive the 2 hours and 45 minutes to get to us in the middle of Pennsylvania.  As we wait, we pull out the bed and all five of us lay head to foot in a tentative slumber.

Fisch and I secretly plan our escape back to New York – sharing what we’d take and what we’d leave behind (me – I’d take my Samsonite fanny pack with my brand new Blackberry, Playboy lip gloss that’s a gift from Raquel, my i-pod, tea bags, ultra fine point Sharpie, tampons, to do lists, id, and debit cards; Fisch – she’d take her brand new MacBook in it’s cardboard box). 

 We laughed it off, knowing that hitchhiking as single Black females back to New York is far more dangerous than eating like Naima and Alixa, using grey water bathrooms with their friends, and unloading and loading sets is challenging.

Johan says it’s our right front wheel bearing and sway bar bushings (whatever the hell that is!), and tells us to get some sleep – we’ll try to find an open car parts place in the morning – LABOR DAY!  

Alixa and Naima go off to find a place near this rest stop to pitch a tent, now that we’ve got two extra people who have driven so far out to save us we have to do a bit of camping.  When they return they tell us, “Your suite awaits, second tree on your right!”  Amazingly, it can fit two full sized air mattresses, and we rest our heads for 3 hours.

Up again.  We’ve seen three different shifts at dear ‘ole Blue Mountain Travel Lodge.  And we’re off to get wheel bearings in a place called Shippensburg, Pennsylvania (40°2′58″N, 77°31′26″W).  Johan and Etta drive behind us as we sway to and fro trying to stay below 45 or above 55 to avoid the most dangerous side to side action.  As we drive through some of the most beautiful farm country we see plenty of Amish folks. 

 It makes me think about how little I know about the Hasidic Jews I see so much of in Brooklyn, and that I don’t know anything about the Amish outside of how much they remind me of the Hasidic Jews.  

We get the part, Johan and Pippi do the damn thing and off we are to Pittsburgh, still swaying – yet telling each other, ”Oh, yeah, it’s a little better.  Can’t you tell the difference?” I’m in the back with my internal dialogue saying – “HELL NO!”

Grey Box Theatre.  It’s complete with Gina and Doug (who I’ve nicknamed Christopher Robin due to his stories of his life sounding like adventures with Winnie the Pooh and he’s nicknamed me Bomba since my new way of cursing has been shortened to a bastardized version of a West Indian bad word). We have our first home cooked meal – compliments of Bekezela.  Alixa exclaims, “These are the best chick peas I’ve had my whole life!”  And truth be told, I wasn’t sure if it was that I was starving or was happy for warm food – but they were slamming!  The place is cool, but the best part about Pittsburgh for me was the woman who lives above the theatre.  She appears to be a normal, youthful white lady, but she’s got tools and equipment cleaning gum off the corner of the joint.  At first I thought she worked for the theatre, but then I saw her plastic cup of red wine left chilling on the sidewalk…  Doug and Gina tell us that the woman has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder AND… insomnia!  So she spends her nights making sure this one corner is immaculate.  Deep…  I told them I’d love for her to come visit Brooklyn.

Awe… Brooklyn.  Right as I am greeting folks from Pittsburgh to HURRICANE SEASON, I am hit with this overwhelming feeling of nostalgia for my beloved Brooklyn.  I started dreaming about the Halal spot on Bedford and Fulton, since I’d been eating pita, hummus and avocado for two days.

Some dude tells Pippi, “A woman covered in grease, it’s so HOT!”  We pack the bus in record time – 3 1/2 hours – GO TETRIS GO!  And we sleep to get ready to head to our next stop – Cleveland, Ohio – where great food, loving friends, and our first performance of HURRICANE SEASON in a church awaits!