June 1993

I'm in Modesto, California. Have had many visitors and Turkish coffee. Mom looks smashing. It's very good to be here. I feel safe. There's a simplicity here I admire. Mom and her guests talked about making sugar cubes and passed around a crusher that they complained did not work well. I watch and sigh, and write.

Reading J.D. Salinger's "Nine Stories". Went to church yesterday, which turned out to be an intense experience. Felt very strongly that my arrest, which otherwise preoccupies and worries me deeply, has a substantial purpose in the larger scheme of things. It reminds me what to be grateful for. The priest whose voice echoed in the church now was the same priest who baptized me in Iran. His voice reminded me of childhood in a different country. I pass my senior portrait which mom has framed, and say jokingly, 'I was cute.' Mom surprises me, "You're cuter now." She hasn't put me down, yet. She even likes my hair long, jokes that she's jealous and wants it for her own.

One of mom's friends read my fortune tonight after my cup had dried. She said there are two paths. One has obstacles. The other will take me to success. Whatever that means. I enjoy listening to mom and her friends talk about their experiences in Iran, the way things were there, and the way they are now. Such a beautiful language. It's nice to hear it again. It had been a while.

We're in Marin County visiting my grandmother and aunt Jackie. We sat in the yard, drank tea, and laughed at the turns our lives have taken. Mom-Suzie joked, "I don't even know who's getting married and who's divorcing anymore!" She was referring to the many divorces in our family. We laughed so hard our faces were red. It was nice to laugh at ourselves and not be so serious about the tragedies in our lives. I feel great love for and from my family. It's not like it used to be. I have changed. I have grown. And all I can do through life is love, write, feel, experience, fear, and age.

I don't want to be another queen wishing to be a goddess. I really want to be something.

Jackie and I went to Mill Valley and the young girl behind the counter at the coffee shop asked if we were brother and sister. 'She's my aunt,' I said smiling. Jackie and I are close in age and it helps. But I feel I can't come out to her. Not yet.

I want to explode. Something in me. I want to write, write, write. Throw away expectations and begin.

Reading Steinbeck's "Cannery Row".

What are mistakes?

I'm on the plane home, back to Chicago. At the moment Tennessee and California feel like they never happened. Did they?