The Icing

Last weekend, I drove around northwest Fresno looking at Mexican restaurants. I'm ashamed to say that in 8 years of living in Fresno, I still haven't found a Mexican restaurant that I love. For awhile, Plaza Ventana came close--but there have been too many misses over the last few years. So I'm now in search of a favorite Mexican restaurant. There are many, many to try, even without the ones I've eaten at before my search became more formal.

Samina and I ate at El Toro Tambien today. It's a windowless, brown building in a strip mall--but since it was in the same area as Max's, a restaurant I like, I thought--perhaps--it might be a contender. Samina had a busy schedule, so we met at the restaurant at 2:45--I was surprised to see that the bar area was already occupied by a number of barflies. In any event, the staff was friendly, the decor was dull, and the menu had few surprises. Of course, our lunch began with chips and salsa. My first bite of the salsa wasn't thrilling, but it got better over the course of the meal: a light tomato sauce with just a bit of a kick. However, the chips were a little thicker than I usually like. I ordered a bean tostada with guacamole. Since my first impressions were so poor, I figured that was a safe dish (much safer than the enchiladas verdes which in Fresno seem to always include green gravy rather than a nice, light green sauce). The tostada wasn't bad, but it was also far from great. Its base was a crunchy but small corn tortilla. The beans were fairly banal, and most of the plate was thinly sliced iceberg lettuce. I did like the guacamole, although it was a little smooth for my taste. Samina's Huevos Rebueldas (note to self: write things down next time) were a little bland, by her report.

Overall, an inauspicious beginning of my search. Please post suggestions about restaurants to visit and dishes to try if you live in the Fresno/Clovis area. Fresno has to have good Mexican food . . . and I'm determined to find it.

10 years ago I was desperately unhappy, so unhappy that I wasn't sure I could ever feel anything positive again.

I love life, how it moves in such unexpected directions. The ups, the downs, the cycles. And I love that I'm in such a satisfying and joyful space right now.

Do you remember those cartoons from the 70's? Happiness is . . . being me.

It's that time again, the beginning of the school year. When I was younger, I'd go school clothes shopping with my mom. When I was a middle school teacher, I'd decorate my room (since I had a new classroom each year I taught) with colorful bulletin boards and books. As an academic, the fresh beginning takes other forms. This year, I've been thinking about the energy that our new hires bring to our department. This year, our department has three new tenure track professors; all of them have different strengths and different styles, but I can see so much potential in each of them. I look forward to seeing how their presence will change our department, how we will learn from them and grow in new directions. I hope that the department will be a healthy and supportive home for them, just as it has been for me.

I've also been thinking about those whose responsibilities have taken them away from our department temporarily or permanently. I already miss Sam a lot--although I hope that she's happy with her new job. And I miss Toni, John, and Chris who are on sabbatical this year. I'm glad they have the opportunity to work on their research, but the department seems incomplete without them.

Classes start on Monday. My syllabi are copied and ready to go, but I still have prep to do. The end of the summer crept up on me this year. My mom's feeling a little better. I miss my grandfather. And J.'s in Ohio. This year's beginning is bittersweet.

My favorite recurring dream involves a house, usually mine, in which I find rooms (or, less frequently, closets) that I forgot were there. I wander around the house, surprised by the vaguely familiar but unanticipated extra space. Sometimes the rooms are accessible through a forgotten door, sometimes they are in a wing of the house that I've been too busy to access. Usually the rooms are large, roomy, expansive. But they are also filled with "stuff" that belonged to a previous owner of the house. In my dream, I'm excited to have extra space in my house . . . and I look forward to sifting through the detritus that I've inherited: furniture, clothes, books. Usually the decor is old fashioned and cluttered--so I eagerly anticipate not only recovering the space but renovating it.

I interpret this dream as being about undiscovered (or forgotten) personal qualities or interests just waiting to be developed. To me, it seems to be a dream about possibilities, the ways that I can use what's useful and throw out what isn't . . . the ways that I can change and become something new. I'm always really happy when I awake from this dream; it lingers for a number of hours and gives me a sense of well being.

Clearly, I've stolen my title from the Elizabeth Bishop poem, a poem I love. I think of this poem when I travel, especially the last two stanzas which read:

"Is it lack of imagination that makes us come
to imagined places, not just stay at home?
Or could Pascal have been not entirely right
about just sitting quietly in one's room?

Continent, city, country, society:
the choice is never wide and never free.
And here, or there . . . No. Should we have stayed at home,
wherever that may be?"

The questions that Bishop poses here resonate with me. I love to travel, but I sometimes wonder, especially right now, about the tensions that my travel decisions involve. Those tensions often lead to feelings of dislocation, wherever I am. I think there are times when I actually find comfort in feeling dislocated. It's so much a part of my life.

As I was watching an episode of Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations, I was struck by how all human beings seem to need ritual of some sort, so much so that many of us create rituals that we live by each day. With the word "ritual," I don't necessarily mean the religious rituals that may come to mind but the repetition of certain acts. Rituals seem to bring us comfort, whether they involve certain acts that we perform before we go to bed, for example, or things we must do before we leave the house. Rituals make us feel safe, they bring to us the sense of the familiar, even when they occur away from home.

So what are my rituals? I walk the same route almost every morning. That's not to say that the route never changes--in fact, I have changed it somewhat over the years--but it pretty much stays the same. My morning walk brings me a great deal of peace. It is a time when I can reflect on life, make plans for the day or the future, daydream, and/or just appreciate my surroundings. As I walk, I often mark the progress of home renovations, houses for sale, or gardening updates. It's a way of mapping myself into my surroundings.

As I think of other rituals I've created (reading the morning paper, checking email, thinking about my day before I go to sleep), I realize that they all make me feel connected to something other than just myself. Sometimes that connection is to something amorphous and undefined, yet, like my walks, they position me in a specific place, they help me understand where I am geographically, emotionally, intellectually.