The first day of  school our professor introduced himself and challenged us to get to  know someone we didn’t already know. I stood up to look around when a  gentle hand touched my shoulder.

I turned around to find  a wrinkled, little old lady beaming up at me with a smile that lit up  her entire being.

She said, ‘Hi handsome. My name is  Rose. I’m eighty-seven years old. Can I give you a  hug?’

I laughed and enthusiastically responded, ‘Of  course you may!’ and she gave me a giant squeeze.

‘Why  are you in college at such a young, innocent age?’ I  asked.

She jokingly replied, ‘I’m here to meet a rich  husband, get married, and have a couple of kids…’

‘No  seriously,’ I asked. I was curious what may have motivated her to be  taking on this challenge at her age.

‘I always dreamed of  having a college education and now I’m getting one!’ she told  me.

After class we walked to the student union building  and shared a chocolate milkshake.

We became instant  friends.. Every day for the next three months we would leave class  together and talk nonstop. I was always mesmerized listening to this  ’time machine’ as she shared her wisdom and experience with  me…

Over the course of the year, Rose became a campus  icon and she easily made friends wherever she went.. She loved to  dress up and she reveled in the attention bestowed upon her from the  other students. She was living it up.

At the end of the  semester we invited Rose to speak at our football banquet. I’ll never  forget what she taught us. She was introduced and stepped up to the podium.. As she began to deliver her prepared speech, she dropped her  three by five cards on the floor.

Frustrated and a little  embarrassed she leaned into the microphone and simply said, ‘I’m sorry  I’m so jittery. I gave up beer for Lent and this whiskey is killing  me! I’ll never get my speech back in order so let me just tell you  what I know.’

As we laughed she cleared her throat and  began, ‘ We do not stop playing because we are old; we grow old  because we stop playing.

There are only four secrets to  staying young, being happy, and achieving success. You have to laugh  and find humor every day… You’ve got to have a dream.. When you lose  your dreams, you die.

We have so many people walking  around who are dead and don’t even know it!

There is a  huge difference between growing older and growing up.

If  you are nineteen years old and lie in bed for one full year and don’t  do one productive thing, you will turn twenty years old. If I am  eighty-seven years old and stay in bed for a year and never do anything I will turn eighty-eight.

Anybody can grow  older. That doesn’t take any talent or ability. The idea is to grow up  by always finding opportunity in change. Have no regrets.

The elderly usually don’t have regrets for what  we did, but rather for things we did not do.. The only people who fear  death are those with regrets.’

She concluded her speech  by courageously singing ‘The Rose..’

She challenged each  of us to study the lyrics and live them out in our daily lives At the  year’s end Rose finished the college degree she had begun all  those years ago.

One week after graduation Rose died  peacefully in her sleep.

Over two thousand college  students attended her funeral in tribute to the wonderful woman who  taught by example that it’s never too late to be all you can possibly  be.

When you finish reading this, please send this  peaceful word of advice to your friends and family, they’ll really  enjoy it!

These words have been passed along in loving  memory of ROSE.

The doctors said piano definitely needed to go. So poof, there it was — my first form of communication and self-expression and my primary language out the door.

I then found poi, 2 years later, which became my second form of self expression.

I’ve done more to change the art form (and world) through poi in 10 years than I did with piano in 25.

Recently my RSI has been so bad that I wonder if I will need to give up Poi as well and not only do I feel the pain in my body from the RSI, I feel the deep pain in my soul caused by the fear and real possibility of that outcome.

I’m even more connected to it now because I just saw Billy Joel (and elton john) in concert. BJ was the largest influence in my life as I grew up as an idol, role model, artist, composer, musician and of course, pianist. I’m painfully aware of my deep, deep, deep well of sadness for the loss of that aspect of myself (pianist) right now even as I confront the possibility of having to lose another aspect of myself (poi artist).

So here I am… raw, scared, vulnerable and in pain…

The first section below is about the actual products and practices for external care.

1. First, and foremost, I always, always, always use a face cream with sunblock during the day. If you’re going to bother to put cream on your face, why not a cream that offers you the extra protection from the sun? I am particularly sensitive to this point as someone who has a sun allergy. I’m a HUGE fan of Murad products. For day cream, I use the essential C line which has SPF 30. It’s super expensive in stores, but you can get an 8 oz jug (which lasts especially well if you use the toner with it and I’ve had for my last one for about 9 months) for about $80 on ebay. If you buy it in smaller tubes it’s like $25 or something retail. It’s completely crazy.
2. Before I use the moisturize, I actually use a toner. I used to think toner’s were just a bunch of BS. What I found, after trying a sample for a while with my cream, was that the toner actually mixes with the cream and allows me to use *less* cream which more than makes up for the cost of the toner itself. Toner is relatively cheap and long lasting compared to cream, and something about the moisture of the toner I use (also from the Essential C Murad Line) combined with the cream really has me use just pea sized dollops of cream rather than dime or larger sized amounts. It makes a big difference in cost as well as the consistency of the cream as it is applied to my face.
3. After I tone and also before the moisturizer, I also use a skin renewing product. Generally I use the Essential C skin renewing complex from Murad, though I have used some of the capsules from Dermatologica and even the Walgreen brand capsules. They all work. That said, the Murad Essential C formula visibly reduces the lines on my face within 2 minutes of application. No shit. So while this stuff costs a lot (it’s $95 retail but again, you can get it on EBay for $50-$60 for a 2 oz jar) but goes a long way and has far better results than other face creams I’ve used.
4. Especially in the winter and when my face is dry, I use an additional night cream. Being the big fan of Murad that I am I actually use their Body Firming Cream. I LOVE it. I figure, if it firms my body, why wouldn’t it firm my face? I said that to one of the women at the Murad counter at PureBeauty and she said that she was surprised it didn’t feel problematic on my face — I guess it’s a more harsh formula.
5. Home Facials. They are a great way to do affordable self care when you can’t go to a spa and get a professional one — which I absolutely recommend!

Now there’s a whole other series of things which are less obvious about your internal care and how it impacts your face and its aging.

1. Hydration. Water cleanses every part of your body — inside out. So remain hydrated.
2. Reduction of daily stress on system. This means healthy drinks — dropping the coffee, the latte, soda and of course low alcohol consumption helps too. Low/no caffeine intake as well as low alcohol intake is one of the things I believe has helped me.
3. No smoking. ’nuff said.
4. Daily affirmation. My personal affirmation while I’m cleaning my face as well as applying my skin care products goes something like this: “I am young and healthy. I am vibrant. I have the cell regeneration of a peak performing human body. I look vital.” I have been doing this affirmation for years and I truly believe it has helped me to have the skin I have.

Having been a vegan, vegetarian to different degrees, pescatarian and meat eater, I can’t say that meat consumption has done anything negative to the look of my skin. I also think this is a personal thing. I know I started looking more healthy (less pale) when I reintroduced meat in limited quantities into my diet after taking a 10 year break. That’s just me — YMMV!

Hope this is useful!

The pants were simple — cut the seam, serge the purple up the side and then attach the ties. The ties are made from serged purple “leaves” tied in a knot and sewn with a few hand stitches to the top of the purple stripe just below the waist band. I intended this so I could wear the pants without wearing the skirt as well as with the skirt and also to wear with street clothes to make them just a little more funky. I have this long standing fantasy of every outfit I wear (except gym clothes and lingerie) is some sort of funky cool costume. So gradually I’ve been upcycling the pants.

I like the tie on the pants a lot with all the “leaves” hanging in a cluster — it’s short enough to work with fire. I’m particularly happy with the vintage broach I attached onto the top to give it a little extra pizazz. The costume worked well — I used it for a few gigs and the photo shoot featured in The City Exposed piece as well. it was well worth it, as a simple costume that took under 5 hours to throw together.

One of the things I liked about this dress which was only $25, was that it had a lot of fabric that was fire safe as well as the gradient in the colors.

I combined it with a dupioni silk that matched almost perfectly and then I added appliques of a brocade silk in white on top of the dress part as well as the leg cuffs and arms cuffs. Though I don’t have a photo of just the dress without the skirt, I actually had originally intended that to be the look. However, as art will be, I decided that the dress was a little too short and then ended up adding the patch work top and skirt. I’m glad I did because, ultimately, I think they look better. The top is made of more silk than the dress itself, with just those three patches in the front under the breast. The skirt is half and half.

The other thing that had the costume work better without the dress is that I sewed on some vintage bracelets on top of the white applique on the dress, leg cuffs and arm cuffs. Sadly, on the dress, the bracelets broke the first time I wore it, which, in and of itself would not be a problem if I had sewed down every link on the bracelets, which I did not. You can see the bracelets here in some close ups of the leg cuffs and arm bands.

Anyway, I got a message today from a FB friend — a beautiful woman whom I’ve met once who was reaching out and just wanted to see how I was doing. I was quite moved.

My response follows:

You know, I have this policy in my life to live as authentically as possible. I could give you lots of shallow answers — I mean, hell, we barely have met, right?

thanks for asking. you have no idea how much that means. truly.

My last few months have been something like this:

• March: Rebirth
• April: Uprooting
• May:   Opening
• June:  Reconnection
• July:  Crazy

So I call forth for my August: Grounding

• how come when it’s us, it’s an abortion, but when it’s a chicken, it’s an omelet?
• if a fetus is a person, how come the census doesn’t count them?
• any woman who has more than one period is a serial killer.
• Catholic, which I was, until I reached the age of reason…

Warning: Adult Language!

RIP George.

The costume is designed to be worn in layers over a black shirt and pair of yoga pants for easy costume changes in public as well as less wear and tear on the outfit, as it doesn’t need to be washed as frequently and can simply be used for performance and taken off since all the sweat is on the bottom layer. In addition, having had many challenges over the years with costume malfunctions (especially breasts that just seem to have a mind of their own and want to be exposed to the cool night air), I have taken to wearing a bottom layer that I’m confident won’t spill out any of the good and will hold my body in the ways I want it to be held for fire. Bras simply have never worked that well for me, so shelf tanks are my thing.

The idea was to create something that had contrast and would show up better in the fire than black alone might — the cactus color (lighter green) is going to be especially effective at that.

For my body type, working with something tighter under the bust is often best with flowing fabric that is not fitted over the hips, stomach and butt. In this photo shoot, I’m not wearing the arm fringe. These are pieces that look like the knee fringe only they go above the elbow. (I hadn’t put the elastic in yet for this photo shoot.) Photos are taken at Samovar in the Castro by Addrianna.

The rosette in the bust area was inspired by my days at the Renaissance Fairs over a decade ago when I did bodice and costume fittings. Part of the process was to make rosette’s out of these long pieces of gauze cotton, so I learned that back then and was happy to apply it to this costume. I did not use a pattern and this was really the first thing I did with this serger, though I had some experience with Devin’s serger for the gauntlets I made while I was in Chicago. I’m certain that having a dress form would make this whole costume creation process much easier — doing the back of a shirt is really challenging when you can’t see what’s going on.

The other day, Michael forwarded me this clip of the US Naval Academy performance from the Kings Firecrackers, an all girl jump rope crew. The caption on the bottom of the video is really great: “Girls Do Incredibly Intricate Jump Rope Routine. At one point, the only way to explain their fancy moves is CGI.” This screen capture, for example, shows three girls jumping on their lower legs — yes, while they are kneeling!

Hope you enjoy this clip as much as I did.

In February 2001, I left my corporate job — the reasons for which I’ll leave to another post. Over the course of the next year, I went through many changes and lots of development. I began exploring my Self as an artist, communitarian, dancer, DJ, event producer and more. I gave up my “normal” life of stability and I opted to explore living from a place of authentic expression of my deepest truths even if (perhaps especially if) that did not include a normal job. I was determined to find a new job that allowed me to wear glitter to work since it was not okay at my corporate job. For me, that expression was one of the base criterion for my next full time job.

In Spring of 2002 I did an open studio’s show in Hunter’s Point. As I was preparing for the show on 4.20, I met a woman whose name was Hetana. She and her partner were using our warehouse space for a 4.20 party, which is how we met. I had enjoyed interacting with her and I went to say goodbye to her before leaving the warehouse and she said to me, “Nice meeting you Isa” or something like that. I mentioned my name was Lisa, but now that she’d said “Isa” I was thinking I was going to change it. Something about it just rang true to me.

Being a bit more conservative than I am today, I wasn’t as willing to trust my instincts, so I decided to sleep on it. For whatever reason, that night I slept in the loft over the kitchen. When I woke in the morning I looked down into the kitchen and, as if it was a sign from God, I saw my roommates girlfriend’s back have a tattoo of the letter “I-S-A” on her. Now, you have to understand I’d been living here for 4 months and Green (my roommate’s partner), whose name is also unusual (though that is her birth name also), had never worn a tank top while I was around the entire time. The letter in her tattoo are easily a few inches high.

Thinking I must be in a daze or dreaming or hallucinating or something, I call down to her and we have a conversation that goes something like this:
Me: “Green, what’s that on your tattoo back?”
Green: “It’s Isa.” (Pronounced e-SA with the emphasis on the SA not the E)
Me: “What does it mean?”
Green: “It means the one in Tagalog.” (Filipino language)

In that moment, I thought, “Wow. This is a sign from God. What are odds this would happen?” And so clearly seeing my name in writing on Green’s back was the clincher.

I had been having challenges actually feeling comfortable with my choice, but it seemed God was certain this was my choice. Less than two weeks later, one of my best friends at the time calls me up to tell me, “Do you know what Isa means? It means “Jesus” in Farsi.”

So I changed my name, dropping the “L” along with my corporate jobs, my preconceptions of who I should be and the limiting beliefs that had held me back in the past. I’m so glad I did.