Latin Dancing in Chicago
Alhambra and Latin Street Based on my limited experience dancing in Chicago, Alhambra and Latin Street have great turn outs. Alhambra Thursday Nights Salsa Lesson:
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While reading ‘Lamentations’ by Liz Amore, I was reminded of the power and often OVERpowering nature of our internal thoughts and feelings. We are dynamic, ever changing concoctions of emotion, thought, and past experience. On top of that, we are dutifully interpreting the rapidly changing present and processing it in fractions of seconds as we move through the world into unknown futures.
Just holding my copy of ‘Lamentations’ and looking at the cover, I got the sense that it would delve into the emotional depths of the soul. The face made of words beautifully illustrates that although we often present as a singular person, there are dozens of emotions and thousands of lived experiences just beneath the surface.
As I looked at the Table of Contents and back at the cover, I realized the words in the face are the titles of the book poems and not just random words. That was a cool touch!
Liz explains early in the ‘Introduction’ that she turned to art, writing in particular, as so many people have, as a coping mechanism for dealing years of challenge like bullying and low self-esteem. Turning to art in its many forms is without a doubt one of the most common shared human experiences across generations and geographies. In a sort of perverse way, some of the “best” art comes from some of the most tortured souls. Of course there is beautiful art to speak up, art that is instantly and undoubtedly masterful in itself, but there is also art that represents, embodies, expresses, and in fact was created by the pain within. Art made in this way is, in my opinion, ever more impactful as it speaks to us directly about our own lived experiences.
‘Lamentations’ is such a work. Delving into such themes as lost love, depression, infidelity, addiction, self-harm, feelings of worthlessness, suicide, and also renewal and rebirth, Liz tells parts of her story and reminds us we all have our own story to tell.
Lines like ‘Heavy burdens are on my mind‘ describe the unmistakable mark of depression. As someone who just experience a really challenging break up, I found myself feeling incredibly sad, thinking about my ex, thinking over and over about things I had done, wishing I could do things over, wishing things were different.
The phrase ‘I just fake it, and no one even knows’ describes how we expect ourselves to put on a happy face and interact with others as if we are fine.
In this day and age, the topic of mental health comes up often. Do we have enough support when we can’t fake it?
While a short book of poems, ‘Lamentations’ alludes to death as an escape, as an exit, as a place to find sleep, a dream, and ultimately peace from the pain of life.
I found this incredibly sad and touching, clearly the thoughts of someone very depressed and on the verge of suicide.
One of the poems that resonated with me was “Feed Me Forgiveness”. It starts out with ‘It wasn’t supposed to be like this.’ It resonated with me because at one point in my life, I felt that things had happened in my life that I hadn’t planned on. Things like that weren’t supposed to happen, but they did, and all of a sudden, I had to face them. And I didn’t know how to face them. Things happened that I wasn’t prepared for, and I had to face them and learn how to do so.
The piece ‘Littering’ made me laugh because I also hate litter. There’s a lot of litter here in the US, and yet, we have everything we need – all of the infrastructure – to handle litter and garbage. We have trashcans, garbage pick up, and landfills. So the litter isn’t a problem of lack of infrastructure, it’s a problem of effort. We don’t care enough not to litter.
And this is similar for other environmental issues like Climate Change. We have everything we need to act on Climate Change, but we just don’t care enough to make a real effort.
Reading ‘Lamentations’ after my own hard breakup in which a partner changed their mind on me helped me feel not alone. The words described what I was feeling, and it helped me feel like I wasn’t the only person going through challenge. What really resonated with me was the theme about missing a past partner and the pain of needing them and not having them. I am grateful to have met Liz and to have read this wonderful work.
About the Author:
Liz has used writing as a coping mechanism since she was sixteen years old. When she was seventeen, she attempted suicide and was luck to be unsuccessful. The publication of this book is dedicated to those who were less lucky than she was. She now lives in the Midwest and works in mental health.
Alhambra and Latin Street Based on my limited experience dancing in Chicago, Alhambra and Latin Street have great turn outs. Alhambra Thursday Nights Salsa Lesson:
A ‘Jumbo’ Cut? While troubleshooting internet issues today, I typed cnn.com into my browser and saw this “YES!” I thought, “Finally!” I was super excited.