The cleaning crew steadily vaccumed up the water while we continued to re-decorate the room. Still in wet shoes and clothing, our audience started to arrive. The drummers decided not to play for us since they didn't want their drums to go out of tune. So we knew we had to start the show without them. Amazingly, things came together, and in the stillness of a few well placed candles, we began to perform The Vagina Monologues. We will never forget the two gay guys who were so sweet, and yet so embarrassed to be in a room where the word vagina was said or yelled every few seconds! They were there for their mothers, sisters and other females in their lives who they loved. Then the ones who had never seen the show, but had this delicious smile on their faces as they enjoyed the rapture of being somewhere where the word v-a-g-i-n-a was not a curse word!
I will probably be in The Vagina Monologues every year for the rest of my life! I love that amazing feeling I get, from debunking myths about women and their anatomy, I love (yet feel sad) when we ask the question, "How many of you (or women that you know) have been raped, or attacked, or abused, and surprisingly, almost everyone raises their hand. It is at that silent moment of time when we know without at doubt, that we have made a difference in someones life.
And each man or woman who was there in the audience...all 26 of them, had this special light in their face that reminded us that we were there in the rain, "standing in the flood", because what we do has a very big impact on their lives.
After the show, many of us went home to flooded homes that night.
Moving along, I am still finishing massage therapy school. I have make up hours and a few tests to make up, and then I need to pay a large amount of money to pay for the make up hours. I hope to be finished by September...next month. With some luck, and hard work, I will have my license by December, and be able to start practicing as a Licensed Massage Therapist.
The kids are doing wonderful. In fact, Ravi is doing better that he has ever done in the last two years. He is happy, most of the time, is doing well with his school work, (and is now in school again..more on that later). All three kids have matured a great deal in the past year, and I am finally seeing that I may be able to get a bath without one of them, or even read a book in the near future. It is hard to imagine, but they are growing up.
Lakshmi and Priya have recently tested very high and are functioning academically as 6 and 7 year olds, instead of 4 year olds. While they are 4 years old emotionally, they are so smart otherwise!
Four years ago this month, Lakshmi was "referred" to our family. It was only 2 months later that she actually joined us. More later!
August 28, 2004
My kids are going to be involved in a Sai Baba Sunday School class starting in January. I am looking forward to this as there are MANY kids in the classes, and Lakshmi and Priya will be able to start even tho they are only 4 years old.
I found a wonderful bread baking cookbook recently at the library and now I am getting back into baking bread. I feel so happy when I bake bread. Something about it just keeps me balanced. The latest loaves where wheat and oat flour bread, a basic white (which the kids and I made alphabet letters out of) and a rosemary onion loaf. UMMM! If you have a bread recipe you would be willing to share with me, PLEASE DO! I want to try them all!