Posted 10:47 PM by Blah blah

Rasee just wrote this incredible entry about her lifelong addiction to words and their power. This woman just breathes eloquence. She gave me permission to post it:

"You are bone of my bone, and breath of my breath."

It used to amaze me that I have chosen the unlikeliest path I could have for someone with my origins. I was born and raised in a country where English was used sparingly before it became important, yet used incorrectly and with little grace. I was born and raised in family where English was only a second language, used for business rather than personal communication. What were the odds of me growing up to love the English language so dearly that I would be willing to commit my life to teaching it and learning to weave words together effectively and gracefully to express and connect and touch and tell stories from the heart? Sometimes I will sit down in a corner of my house to read, sunlight pouring in through an open window and a gentle breeze playing with the pages of my books, and I feel like I have found a home. It doesn't matter where I read--in a cold library with hushed conversation around me, in a restaurant with one hand twirling strands of spaghetti around my fork, in bed late at night when I resist sleep to finish a story, or sitting on a couch in Starbucks, shutting out the rest of the world by losing myself in words. I can lose myself in a book quickly, drawing an invisible shield around me that blocks out thoughts and people.

Sometimes I ache to write. The urge will hit me at the oddest of times and I will search through my bag for the little notepad I always carry, pull out my favorite ballpoint pen, and scribble words fighting for release. Sometimes all I will write is a line that makes very little sense, but that I needed to see so I could explore the thought or discard it. Sometimes I will write long letters to people I would never give them to, feeling so full of emotion at the person but knowing I have no right to share so much with them. Everything I see and feel and experience is immediately transformed into words--English ones or Thai ones or sometimes even Hindi ones--and I capture each moment that way. I cannot take beautiful photographs and I cannot draw or paint or create a sculpture to express my feelings, but I can write. Sometimes I can write in a way that can change a little of the world. My world. Your world. Sometimes I struggle with words, abandoning them when they resist being coaxed to form a picture, but it's not their fault. There are times when there are no words--just feelings that wash over me or moments that are too precious to try to capture--and I give myself time to let the words fall into place. They eventually do. I can count on words.

I receive e-mails, regularly now, from people who have been touched by my words. They tell me beautiful things--sharing their feelings and stories, telling me I've made them laugh or cry or angry--and I want to reach out and wrap my arms around each of them because those are times when words don't do justice to the gratitude I feel inside. Or the joy. My love in life does not have a practical use. I cannot mend broken bones or fix a car. I cannot defend you in court or manage your accounts or tell you what's wrong with your computer. I can teach you a beautiful language, though, and I can touch your heart with mine. Or I can try. I can create a world for you to lose yourself in. I can remind you that there is a heart so similar to yours. I can show you that there is joy to be felt if you only look for it. I can help you learn to create joy on your own. I can light the path ahead of you so you don't feel so alone. I can show you my scars so you are ready for them and know that no matter how bad things get, you will survive. I can remind you how beautiful and precious you are, and how much you are loved.
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You express so well and poignantly what a love for words means and yet how out of place it feels in the practical world. I totally relate, especially to your talk about your family. Amen, Rasee.

This is why I call her "The Dreammaker."