April 2, Wednesday evening -- Reading Ekhart Tolle

During her three hour gap between two web design classes at City College (Mission Branch)

Reading A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose, by Ekhart Tolle. When she began the classes she decided to make time to read more and this is what she chose, amongst a stack of novels--she wanted something that would lift her spirits. It's something she needs right now like, she said, medicine or, no, vitamins.

She told me that Oprah is now doing classes on Ekhart Tolle, on skype, and about 1.5 million people get online at one time to take the classes! But, she's at her web design class at that time, and, also, prefers not to spend too much time at a computer.

She is an artist. Before the dot com bust she used to paint and run a theater that would do political pieces. Now she has a business making paper cranes which she glazes and ships all over the world. The cranes symbolize peace, and sometimes she makes them out of things that people send her, like love letters or maps of their cities. You can see them at www.localcolorist.etsy.com. Sometimes the cranes are made with likenesses to favorite musicians or actors.

Her favorite book of all time--Magister Ludi, also known as The Glass Bead Game by Hermann Hess. She reads it about once every ten years.

And, a book from her childhood which she recalls fondly--Kon-Tiki, by Thor Heyerdahl, about an adventure on a papyrus raft to prove that it was possible that a nomadic tribe made the sculptures on Easter Island. She likes autobiographies.

If she were to write her own book, it would be about her mother. She'd have to do research. She was raised in the San Francisco foster care system and only learned, when she was thirty-five, when foster children received more access to their parents history, a little bit about her mother. She learned that her mother, who lived in San Francisco post World War II, was working as a change girl. What is a change girl? she wondered, and asked a coworker, who knows everything, at the Nob Hill Gazette, where she was working at the time. A change girl, she learned, would dress in beautiful evening gowns and work in the underground gambling houses of that era, making change....and more substantial money as the night wore on. Her mother was, most likely, she said, a "lady of the night." A lot was going on at that time. San Francisco was corrupt and a lot of fun. It was where poeple from Hollywood would come to party. She would like to find poeple to interview to learn more about her mother's life, ways to research this book.

In the background, down the street on the right, after the blue house, you can see the Revolution cafe--here's some shots of it with people reading. I love this neighborhood! It's a good place to find people who are reading the books they need! right now.

What sort of book do you need right now?