I was going to write something philosophical about creativity today, but got hit hard by the sadness of yet another mass school shooting, in Florida this time. I read the news stories, watched the videos, saw the memes, shared a lot. And it is hard not to be cynical, not to feel like there's nothing we can do about it. Because we've been here before. I thought that Sandy Hook would be a definite turning point. And it wasn't. Could this be? Do I dare hope that at the very least some good will come of it? That the consciences of the powers-that-be will be provoked and they will finally do something? That at least they will put laws in place to prevent mentally ill persons from getting guns? Ban AR-15s? 

When I started this website, I was newly retired, wondering what I was going to do with the rest of my life. It had to do with "creating," purposely trying to live a creative life. Again, I got busy. It wasn't a bad busy, but I neglected this blog. I did other things, mostly they have been passion projects. I try to only do passion projects. I find myself in this "space" again - a space where I don't have a lot of commitments or projects. So now what? 

I just read Austin Kleon's list of 100 things that made his year and thought that I could do that, but on a smaller scale. Let's see, using my photos to jog my memory, and without much explanation: 
1. The Women's March.
​2. Sunsets
3. Butterflies
4. Books: 1984, Handmaid's Tale, and many more. Not many newly published ones. 
5. Teaching my playwriting class for the first time.
​6. Making Almond Joy cookies several times to great acclaim.

New Year's Eve here is pretty quiet. Since we are all getting older, our family has, over the years, eased our way out of hosting big family gatherings. It's okay. It was always a good time when we had the energy, but it's okay to move on, to create different kinds of experiences, like making nishime. 

Today was the day the North Korean dictator said he would send out a missile to Guam, where I live. I really do not think it is probable that we will be hit by a nuclear missile. I refuse to take that in. When a friend tried to describe to me what it would be like if it were to happen, I had to tell her, I don't want to hear it. 

Dear Friend,
I have not seen you since high school. I did not know you very well back then, but I do remember being jealous of you because you "got" the gorgeous new boy in high school whom you eventually married, and later divorced. I am really getting to know you now on Facebook, in the Trump era, as we are on opposite sides of this ballgame. While others may un-friend those who are so adamantly opposed to their own views, I have not done that. You are one of a few friends I have who provide me with a window into the world of a Trump supporter. I wouldn't really consider you a true friend because we only are connected through FB, but I am worried about you. 

I wrote this to get a sense of how long it would take my students to write an exploratory essay on an issue that they are passionate about. I had been thinking about this quite a bit. If you have a reaction (even negative) please engage me in respectful dialogue. 

One (there were many) of the reasons why we have this current political environment in January 2017 is because “he whose name I can’t type” was supported by the Christian conservatives, or evangelicals.(pewresearch.org, November 9, 2016). The white evangelical vote was a major factor that contributed to the current president’s victory. 81% of white evangelicals voted for him. (The Nation, November 17, 2016)  This bothers me and I want to understand it. ​

The premise of my class is that you write plays about what you are passionate about. It doesn't mean that every play you write is autobiographical, but that there is something in everything you write that is about you, in one way or another. I do have a pet peeve when people who have seen or read my plays say, oh now I understand you, without engaging me in conversation about it. They could have pulled something that was antithetical to who I am. Here, I may be saying something very obvious, but I say it anyway. In order to write, you have to know yourself, or be in the process of knowing yourself. Therefore, I have an assignment that the students do a character study of self. I am modeling it for them here. 

Though performance is pervasive in all cultures, the form of "written drama" in the Pacific, is relatively recent. According to Diana Looser in her book, Remaking Pacific Pasts: History, Memory, and Identity in Contemporary Theater from Oceania, it emerged in the 1960s, a time of decolonization and self-determination movements.
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All across the Pacific, there are different histories, but basically it follows a pattern of autonomy, colonization, and decolonization as the indigenous people strive towards self-determination. As Pacific peoples emerged from colonization, art was used as means of exploring and expressing ideas about politics, identity and culture. 

I am writing this blog piece as a way of preparing for a class that I will be teaching at the University of Guam. 

I had a sense of myself as a writer probably in 8th grade when I got pleasure from writing poems, letters, and stories, both in and out of school. When I was in college, I shied away from an English major because I was intimidated by their reading list. But I did take all the Creative Writing classes I could, and wrote my first play in an Asian American Literature class.

That play became my first play, Wind Dances. Like most first plays, it was an "identity" play. Who was I as a Japanese-American creative woman, who couldn't break from from the expectations put on her by her rigid father? This play eventually was produced at an Asian American theatre company, the East West Players.