Sandra Steingraber
Lila Downs
Kate Bornstein
These are inspiring people. Amazingly, Lenya has had the opportunity to see them here in the past week - Kate Bornstein is in Bloomsburg tonight - and they are just reminders of what can happen when discipline combines with courage and a deep sense of human integrity. Humans just shining forth like in Cocoon when the aliens took their fake skin off.
Where does Lenya fit into all of this? She beholds herself in the mirror and her eyes look tired. There are little stray hairs everywhere. Her marks are average, she trudges along. She is pulled aside by her professor, who is surprised that she is not performing better on her exams. She is focusing all of her mental energy on following along in the lecture, then in the two hours of extra office hours. She is working hard at something that does not come naturally to her, and she admires herself for this. There is a strange satisfaction that arises from it, like from developing a relationship with a new and challenging asana. Also like asana, it is exhausting and it causes the eruption of several unexpected emotions.
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