Just Another Stat?

My grandma had cancer. My mom had breast cancer. My aunt had ovarian cancer. 

Looking at my family history I can't help but consider my odds in the matter. If I was a betting woman, I'd bet against myself; place my money on the other guy, the one who won't be on the receiving end of the cancer stick. 

I'd recently discussed this topic with my friend who then asked, "Are you feeling ominous about it, or just pensive?" 

Both. 

"The latter sometimes creates the former," I answered. 

Cancer has been on my mind a lot this year. I've seen friends and family go through it. Each time a new case arises I wonder when my time will come. I wonder if I'm eating the right foods, exercising enough, praying enough, loving others enough, the list goes on. And, I curse the genes that make me just another statistic.

I'm not afraid of dying, it's the way of nature and life. But I am afraid of closing my eyes for one final time without having made a difference in the world.

I don't fully agree with the saying "Live every day as if it were going to be your last." If I did this I'd end up homeless on the streets of Spain one day having squandered away my money on quick, temporary pleasures. I do believe, however, in living as if you were going to die. Period. Simple.

We are not created to live careless lives with no regard to others. That type of inward focus leaves us unsatisfied and unfulfilled. 

But maybe if we begin living each day as it comes, accepting the good, accepting the bad; we can begin to let go of our constant worrying of what's to come. Because no matter how hard we try to steer ourselves in one direction, inevitably we will be sideswiped by some unseen event. I could sit around and wait for cancer to infect my body or dwell in fear tiptoeing through life as to not interrupt the chemical balance that is holding off the cancer cells.

Or I could live as if I was going to die anyway, regardless of cancer. I choose this option. My desire to pursue my music is witness to this. My day job, the bills I pay monthly, my time volunteered at GenerateHope; they are witness to this. I've learned to travel when I can and take impulsive trips to music festivals in the backseat of stranger's cars for the weekend. But I also understand the necessity to stick with a job for longer than a year and the importance of fulfilling commitments with people, time, and money. 

This seems almost silly to list out and yet I am amazed at how little weight is placed on responsibility these days. We forget "Thank You's", we show up late to meetings and put off committing to anything until we know if there is anything better going on, forgetting to consider the host's plans. 

I may get cancer one day. And if so I hope to battle it with grace and strength as others before me have. Or I will live to be 100 with stories of travels from many different countries. Who really knows, maybe knowing this early about the women in my family is more of a gift. And the gift I've been given is an invitation to self-awareness. 



"I am. I am. I am." - Sylvia Plath

There's a Bluebird in my Heart

Spending time in front of a mic.

We Found Love - Rihanna Cover

OB Bathroom Sessions

"We Found Love"

To Make You Feel My Love Cover

Cinco de Mayo Weekend

Was a success.

Better at Walking Than Biking

I cannot ride a bike. As I am two years shy of 30, lacking this skill does not bode well for me. Yes, I consider it a skill. At 5'1" getting me onto a bike and expecting me to ride off into the sunset is no easy feat.

For starters, my legs are half the size of a normal human being. The first problem that arises is the seat height. After adjusting the seat to the lowest possible setting, I am met with my second complication. The bike is still too tall. So now I'm left searching through children's bikes decorated with purple and pink streamers. At this point I have no desire to continue. 

I've determined that my bike riding impediment started way back in my early years. Growing up a Latin American child in the predominantly Caucasian suburbs of Orangevale, California was challenging. This was mostly because I longed to be on the "other side." The other side being one of light-hair, blue eyes and milk served with dinner. 

An advantage to being on the other side? Straight hair. Straight hair that sat nicely on your head no matter the temperature, humidity or the wetness of your hair fresh out of the pool. Back in the day, flat irons were not a commonly used styling tool. This is how a picture like this, happens.

Such a pretty little ethnic child.

As a Salvadorian with curly-haired parents, I was never afforded this luxury. I have thick, black, curly hair and no one knew what to do with it. So my hair tended to resemble an authentic lion's mane situated on my head. As such, I took to ironing my hair with an actual iron and towel. In my own stranded-on-a-desert-island-scenario, a Chi flat iron would be one of the three items I'd take with me. 

I was never too interested sports. In part because I had no real athletic talent I could think of and in part because my family never stressed the importance of them. Sports were not a part of our Salvadorian household and that was fine with me. But while suburbia was out enjoying sunny days of little league baseball and football, I was inside learning all the songs to the classic Disney hit, Hakuna Matata. To this day I am incredibly uncoordinated and if balls are thrown my way, I duck.

My mom is a great cook. Her delicious recipes are made up of various ingredients typically thrown in by "pinches," "handfuls" or "un poquito de" (a little bit of). But, as you can imagine, for someone trying to appear to be just like everyone else in seventh grade, having pupusas and curtido hiding in my lunch bag was not ideal. Poo-Poo-Sas. Note:  If you want to be made fun of in school, make sure to introduce your friends to foods that sound like poo-poo when spoken. While other pre-teens enjoyed their Wonder Bread sandwiches and snack-sized puddings, I was opening up Tupperware filled with Arroz Con Pollo. In eighth grade I stopped bringing lunches all together.

Finally, the point of all this, my inability to ride a bike. During the summer leading into my Senior  year of High School I enjoyed a job at Rollingwood Raquet Club as a snack bar attendant. To get there daily, my mom bought me a bike. And I rode it, smoothly and confidently. From what I remember, that summer was the only time I allowed myself to feel the wind in my hair (under my helmet) on my two wheels. After that summer I have no recollection of my bike. I assume a caravan of gypsies stole it one night while wandering from town to town. If they're reading this, I hope you named it and loved it more than I ever could.

Years later, when trying to ride a bike again, I found that I could not stay in a straight line. My brain had no recollection of ever learning how to operate this piece of machinery. Underneath me, my legs quivered as though they were being forced against their will to take part in this absurdity. Numerous times I've been seen out walking a bike as if it were a pet. My friends are still trying to teach me this skill. So far, they have failed.

Well, there is always next year. The year of the bike.



By the way...as it turns out, I've become pretty fond of my own 'side' in my adult life. (I'll never get grey hair!)

I Am Online

I am an online dater. Correction, I was an online dater. My three month subscription ended this week.  During my time I realized that most of you are online as well. I know this because you are either a woman who opened up and shared your (many, many) online dating horror stories after learning I was also online. Or you are one of the men who popped up in my matches or on searches. Yeah, I saw you and you saw me. Now let's move along.

My feelings after it was over? Relief. Don't get me wrong, it was pretty entertaining at the beginning. My friend and I would scroll through my 'options' and discuss potential candidates like giddy thirteen year-olds. This pic is cute, oh this one is not, but these next two are. Aw he loves Jesus. 

I made her write my bio. It was strange for me to discuss myself in order to make someone want to date me. 

Waking up every morning, I wondered who had scanned my profile and been interested in me. This interest showed in the form of a virtual wink or a message from the bolder ones. Oh, five new e-mails this morning? Great! (Validation.)

This feeling, however, didn't last long. Mostly because many e-mails read like the ones below:

(These screen names are made up, but pretty similar to what's out there)

SDRadMan: I am not a spam although I know this is kinda like a random message to you. You probably get a lot of random e-mails like this so I understand if you don't write back but it'll be worth you're (apostrophe RE, if you know me, you know why this bugs me) while if you do. 

IAmThatCool: I think you should take me out on a date.. (extra period, maybe for effect?)

LoverOfLife: P.s. I can come with great references lol but can't tell them about the dating site because I'll never live it down lol (if you're wondering what he's laughing so hard at, I have no idea either). pps forgive grammer and spelling errors typing on my phone

and my personal favorite...

DoucheBag#1: I am a Christian but have no problem with premarital sex. It doesn't have to be right away, but if you are the no sex before marriage type, we probably would clash a bit in other areas as well. You still interested?

I was not.

I read "Downtown Owl" this weekend by Chuck Klosterman and a certain quote stuck out. "Society is so confused, Mitch thought. Everyone wanted to become the person they were already pretending to be."

To me, this is how I view online dating. Men who are potentially normal in the 'real world' created overactive personalities that made me uncomfortable. Others boasted of daily workouts, their love of travel, an appreciation of art and their great humors. The ones I did go on dates with were far from what their profiles and e-mails suggested. 

Of course, I was no different. Me? Oh I sing, no, correction, I love to sing all the time, I love to travel, I love to laugh, I love love, and whiskey makes the world go round...the list went on. Of course I do enjoy these things but what you don't see on my profile? My highly introverted self, my inability to communicate with new people without being incredibly awkward or the fact that I can't stand Iron and Wine. That confession alone just cost me a few music friends.

We all desperately try to be these people we create on social networks or dating sites. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, we are all guilty of it. I wonder what our networks would look like if we posted honest evaluations of ourselves. Probably not as picturesque. But then again, please don't take away my dreamy pink and yellow hued photos on Instagram that make me look incredibly artsy. No seriously, please don't.

So what now? My guess, is that as a shy 28-year-old my options are starting to diminish. Looks as though I'll have to give the old fashioned way a shot again. Meet a man, flirt, do that thing with my eyes that says I'm interested and hope I see you again somewhere. But maybe this time when I meet you, I'll hand you a business-sized card with my likes and dislikes and maybe a few extra photos of me (doctored to make me look artsy). 

Fingers-crossed.


Or there is always arranged marriage.

Guest Post - Joyce Huang's Gratitude Journey

Yoga is, for me, one of those activities that looks really good on Pinterest boards and sounds fun to talk about. When I actually do it, though, my mind starts to wander a lot, and I tend to start feeling hungry for my next meal. I doubt very much that I'm doing it correctly. 


My friend Tasha, God bless her, has tried her best on me while finishing her yoga teacher training practice. She's held bootleg classes on her rooftop and at the beach while practicing on myself and our friends, and she's made significant progress on her confidence level, I might add. However, while I enjoy the social hour and the skyline from the top of her house, yoga makes me feel distinctly how I've been generally feeling in life lately: that I am missing the point. Around the fourth or fifth chaturanga dandasana is when I start thinking about In-N-Out.

Chaturanga Dandasana Sequence

I do love Tasha, though, and I was glad to receive her invitation to the final "graduation" class of her yoga training, taught by herself and her fellow trainees. I always enjoy Tasha and just about anything she does, because when we're just hanging out, sprawled on her living room couches, she has an uncanny ability, with her slow Texan drawl, to inject wry humor into very astute and matter-of-fact observations. We can spend hours talking about work, the ups and downs of dating, the psychological makeup of our various friends and co-workers, all while self-medicating with frozen yogurt. We're both easily crippled by uncertainty and indecision, and often feel the need to discuss many things in minute detail. We're both Christians who know God is holding the steering wheel, but we are also backseat drivers with a number of suggestions. 

When Tasha is teaching yoga, however, everything about her changes. Her body straightens and her voice rings out clearly and calmly; she owns the room, she controls the pace, the tone, the music playing on the speakers through her iPod. As I sat in her class on Saturday, breathing in and out with my eyes closed, I listened as her voice washed over me: "Helen Keller once said, 'The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched - they must be felt with the heart.' I encourage you all to pay attention to what your heart is telling you during this class." I wanted, instinctively, to do better, to pay attention. 


My body had felt tight like a spring all week, holding in the stress of work, and the feeling that what I was doing in life lately wasn't enough, and yet also the fact that I was running on fumes. I listened closely to my body. During the class, I felt the trainees' hands on me, adjusting me, radiating warmth into my tense muscles. I felt myself engage, my shoulders relaxing, my body both stretching and resting. At the end of the class, one of the trainees intoned, "Happiness does not create gratitude, but rather gratitude creates happiness." 

Tasha's Yoga on the Beach

In the last few months, I had not only forgotten to be grateful, but I had also forgotten my God to whom I am meant to be grateful. I go to work everyday, focused on what I don't like about it (but grateful for employment, she hastens to add), and then I go home too exhausted to do anything but eat dinner and watch TV, feeling vaguely like I once had interests and hobbies, and indulging in self-pity that I was too tired to do them. 


Concentrating on the lives of my friends, enjoying their company, being fascinated by THEIR hobbies, being concerned about their problems, has been my way of dealing solely externally, never addressing the dissonance inside. This weekend, I took time to remember my God. I took time to read the Bible, I thanked Him for all that He had done on the cross, and for my many, many blessings, I sat quietly and enjoyed His presence. I took time to remember that life without Someone to express gratitude is empty indeed. And, I resolved to engage in a fuller life, and not forget so often to be thankful.


In short, when someone asks me what I did this weekend, I can finally and honestly say, "I did some yoga."

Tasha (left) and Joyce (right)

Written by Joyce Huang

Musician's Daughter

As I finished up my vocal exercises tonight, I opened my computer to find my friend's new blog post. Reading her journey through her third album tugged at my heart. She spoke of a truthfulness in her lyrics and described a vulnerability in her songs that she had not known she could produce. And through all of it, she has found her love of music once more.

With the same feeling of love, I've come to realize my own potential in my music. I've been taking vocal lessons this past month for the first time ever. Repeating scales, exploring "guh's" "gah'" and "nah's", while adding "dumb cries" (as my vocal coach calls them) to my songs, has my voice responding to me in a way I've never experienced.

And through it all I've fallen in love with the voice I didn't know existed. Just like any other art, learning to sing well takes practice and discipline. It takes frustration over the high notes that I still can't seem to reach, and, heart-pumping joy when I hear a sound come from inside that is rich, strong, and all mine. 

Singing has been a passion of mine since I was young and I'm thankful daily that I was created to sing. Every inch of me loves music and while I may never sing for large audiences at Carnegie Hall, I am still just as excited to pursue the depths of my voice. Singing has always been just for me and never for others. It's a place I go to make sense of life and to praise the good times.

As I write, I feel embarrassed to write so candidly about my own voice. I do not mean to decorate my voice or its abilities, but rather to celebrate the way singing has made me see beauty in myself. Many times we focus our attention on the things we want to change about ourselves or the negatives we see. But tonight, my words are open and free and without abashment.

I am thankful to the One who created me and for His own love of music. I am a Musician's daughter. 

C.S. Lewis

Forgotten Places

In dreams you visit.

This day you sit amidst a crowd,

The years have matured your brow.

Quietly you listen to a man speaking of our God.

Our eyes meet beyond the doors.

A heavy tone fills the blue.

But love beseeches to color your view.

“Blessings!” you shouted

“Release me from your grip,

For our years have been counted”

Free from his rule,

Unwinding from its tightly wound spool,

Your heart races through forgotten places

And familiar spaces.
Until you find me once more.

Under the shelter of the tree

With letters on a page, your love spills free.

In that moment I awoke.

An echo of words you spoke

Fill the empty room.

Close my eyes again

Wait for your return.

Sunday

There was a boy.

And a $20 bill.

There was a smile.

And a spark.

Does fate exist?

I hope so.