Rags No.1

Dear Rags, thank you for attending and photographing the best date I have experienced in a very long time. It will not be soon forgotten. You are good, very good.

M Doc.

Casa Madge.

This weekend, handfulls of tears spent quietly from my position on the lone yellow towel spread evenly in the middle of a field dotted with hippy mamas and their hippy babies and hula hoops and babe baby-daddies went unnoticed underneath the incredibly giant brim of my straw hat. A father-daughter gospel band was playing on stage at the edge of the field where it dipped conveniently and I sat listening, and weeping. I was homeless and alone and sad with said disposition and my lack of joy. I found such joy over summer, over the course of two contracts completed, over the journeys there and back, there and then back home again and all joy was lost in translation/transition. (Joy was never lost, it was merely misplaced I think).

The father-daughter team kept singing and eventually I stopped crying and just sat and enjoyed it quietly. As the evening progressed, I felt more myself as the dark crept in and Sula and I strung stars in the most beautiful tree in the field. The Celestial Tree. We spread a blanket and tossed pillows, set out food and wine, hung a lamp from the branches and waited for the people. The people came. We had people from the festival come from far and wide. I am not sure if it was the twinkling stars or Rich and Sam's bass and tenor voices stringing lines of old songs together or the general lure of Melissa Trainor hula hooping (my god what a beauty), but the people came. Sula read their cards and I sat and poured wine and sliced cheese (I will always be the wine and cheese lady at parties I suppose, never the tarot card lady; but I am okay with this) for the masses. When it became quiet and the singing died down, Sula handed me the cards and I shuffled and fanned them out and drew a single card: Sharing. Sharing? What? I scoffed and she said "wait" with her eyes and then gave me another look that said "you are about to be told by the Universe" and I was. I was told by the Universe.

Five days passed since I was told underneath the Celestial Tree and then I received a letter from Sula presenting me with an opportunity that will surely mark my twenty third year. A chance. A decision. A whim. A home. Sula presented me with the opportunity to have a home. An idea so unattainable and unfamiliar that I hardly knew what to say or do other than to cry. I think I have found a home. It is beautiful and warm and the windows are majestic and the ceilings are forever high and I am five minutes from the studio and the best part is that there is enough room to ride my bike around in a loopy figure eight. I have my winter's work cut out for me and that work is exactly what the card read: sharing.

Home at last.

Yes.

Yellow face.

Yes.

This is how cool all of my babies will dress even if they are ugly as sin. Good style overrules ugly faces, right? I hope so. Anyway, this jewel of a gem girl buoyed my miserable state. Kim's bangin' perogies also helped a shit tonne. Thanks ma, thanks Garance D.

Traveling band.

Last night I slept in a t shirt that smelled like summer. There was a fire in a firepit and lemon ginger martinis and beet borscht with sour cream. There was lots of laughter, a pair of ridiculous glasses, and many familiar faces. Pretty good combination in my books. I woke up this morning in Rebecca's bed (sans Rabbi) with my arms outstretched, searching, searching, searching. But then it registered why and where I was and my arms recoiled softly back into my chest. I miss K, I miss Liza. Deeply ache miss. Miffed, I got out of bed and pet Sophie who was sitting like a queen beside the bed.

Today Sula and I are driving in very big hats to the Harvest Moon Festival (stay tuned for photos). We have cheese and wine and crackers and prom dresses and loud floral prints and obnoxious sunhats. We are a traveling band. I have never been before and am going with no expectations and ten rolls of film. Should be interesting.

I am still sans job.
I am still sans home.
I am still okay with this.

My shirt still smells like the bush and fire and summer. Indian summers are the new black. Thanks for letting me sleep in your bed Rebecca. You are the best in the west.

Home alone with.

Cat Power in the basement.
The National in the basement.
The Beatles in the living room.

Fleet Foxes in the kitchen.
Grizzly Bear in the laundry.
Joanna Newsom in the dark.

My Brightest Diamond in the hall.
DM Stith in the office.
Iron & Wine in the garage.

Andrew Bird in the basement.
Jana Hunter/Devendra Banhart in all the spaces in between.
Neutral Milk Hotel in the stairwell.

Bon Iver in bed.

Pollution solution Pt.2.

I really like the look of pollution. This is a series of photos taken of the disgusting mill in Dryden, Ontario. Enjoy.

Cupped hands of abeyance.

There’s a dream that I see, I pray it can be
Look cross the land, shake this land
A wish or a command
I Dream that I see, don’t kill it, it’s free
You’re just a man, you get what you can

We won’t have a thing
So we’ve got nothing to lose
We can all be free
Maybe not with words
Maybe not with a look
But with your mind

You’ve got to choose a wish or command
At the turn of the tide, is withering thee
Remember one thing, the dream you can see
Pray to be, shake this land

We all do what we can
So we can do just one more thing
We won’t have a thing
So we’ve got nothing to lose
We can all be free
Maybe not with words
Maybe not with a look
But with your mind

But with your mind

But with your mind. With Cat Power in mind, filling my mind. Cat Power is a very reassuring lady. If we were friends I think I would be a little scared of her, but would admire the hell out of her demeanor. I wish I was more like her sometimes. Just now I caught a fleeting smell of roasted potatoes browning in the oven and as quick as it came, the wind changed on a dime outside of the window screens and took it. But I know the smell of roasted potatoes as sure as I know the smell of my closet, of a new baby, of my mother. My disposition leaves a little to be desired today. It is a good thing I spent the day in complete silence in the house I grew up in doing quiet things. I didn't even have the energy to write or to ride my Surly or to clean it the way it deserves. I just sat, sad. Very sad today.

I read Beth's blog and cried because I understood completely when she spelled out the words d-e-a-r-a-c-h-e that the rest of us were too timid to write. It is okay to dearly ache sometimes. I am dearly aching as I write, right now, rightfully so. It is okay. Thank you Liza for acknowledging this, for writing it at least and warranting my own heavy heart by doing so. I dearly ache for you and have been for months now. Hi, I miss you. I am dearly aching for Mel's kitchen filled with the faces of the women that I love savagely, wine glasses in hands, open mouthed laughter, hands skittering around steaming plates. I dearly ache for JJ's kitchen filled with things that I wished I had the insight to decorate with, with Richard's presence (what a man), his crossed legs at a mint green table, JJ running around with an apron (girl after my own heart) and a fresh mountain of french crepes. I dearly ache for the yellow light filling an ageless beauty trailer that was my home for a flash in time, for give up pants and candy and so much laughter coming from the most beautiful mouth I have ever seen, for the pure and clean joy that came from watching someone doing nothing at all or doing something important, or while cooking or working, simply living in front of my eyes. I dearly ache for that joy.

Now I am quite pathetic (my mum will read this and tell me not to use that word) in my sister's childhood bedroom tucked in between the two single beds that take up majority of the square footage of the room as blue as the Indian ocean. It feels so weird to be home again (and yet not home at all in a home that was once my home). I guess this goes to show that my community is real and quite important, and quite a ways away from here. In a few weeks, the stone of the fiscal year will be in motion and rolled away from this dark cave of limbo and the strings of my life will begin being plucked at and pulled like a harp. Forward motion music, just from living and doing again. Limbo is an interesting place. I dearly ache for a normal lifestyle again.

I am scared that I will not find a job that I like. I am scared that I will not find a home that feels right. Change thrills and terrifies, simultaneously. I am in midair. The only thing I know is that we are having roasted potatoes for dinner, beyond that there is nothing certain.

Which is okay, if not good.