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somewhere over the rainbow (and other stories)

  Exactly two years ago I found myself flying through a corner of a rainbow, and landed in Oaxaca, Mexico. It was the last film festival I traveled to, a brutal and sweet experience in the harshest of realities, trying to wrap my arms around the slipperiest industry and failing magnificently. Surrounded by fresh faces and eager eyes I ran from the rooms and into the street time and again, wandering off with the camera in my bag as a companion. I took pictures of a blind man that sang on the same corner every day, of wedding parades, of an old woman waiting to see the dentist.  Literally somewhere over the rainbow, I met the ugliest answers to questions I had been dragging my feet towards for years. Cramming the most delicious food into my mouth, joking at the nightly rooftop cocktail parties, grinning like the Cheshire Cat it was all coming to an end. Actually, it had ended before it even started though - and on the plane back to New York and finally Moscow the bone-crunching undertow

molecules and potholes


There is a rift between daily life, and the news that trickles across. In our little bubble, this quiet neighborhood, the price of a bouquet of roses does not change. The eggs are painted in shit and feathers, but taste the same. The little fresh market works on the weekends again, now that the weather is not terrible. Here, they sell overpriced red onions, stalks of broccoli, maybe some green basil if we are lucky.  The potholes sit  half-full with murky water. New buildings grow slowly as construction workers stare into the horizon on cigarette breaks. None of this changes, not a molecule.

But the rest of world is upside-down. Wild laws are passed. Prime ministers become dictators. Bombs are dropped here and there, like rainbow sprinkles on a doughnut - the more the better. Great decisions are made over dessert now, fueled by whim.

Being an expat means more than living far from home. There are many distances to bridge each day, and in times like this I want to throw my hands wild in the air, toss all of the news out the window and just think that everything is fine, that there are nothing but tiny tempests in tiny teapots we are missing. "Oh did you hear - they changed the tax on sneakers" or They are going to limit the number of flights to Cuba". That would be some news to miss, some drama to step around, like those potholes in the street.

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