Immediate as Clay

Often while working on the daily pieces for NaPoWriMo, I am reminded of my experience of writing poetry in the Stone Age before the internet explosion. I would write a piece and many times it would feel like the page would burn my hands if I didn’t do something with it. Off to Kinko’s I’d go so I could make copies for poet friends or to send it off to the most suitable Call for Submissions. I would feel a kind of relief then, as if this urgent burst of energy now had some focus or reason to be.

The immediacy of my daily posts on the Facebook Fan Page and 365/365  more than fulfills that old urge, and is fairly confronting. I am taken aback at just how truly immediately other eyes are on these words. The commitment to write daily leaves no real time for revision, rethinking, retraction. I get to see my jagged edges, neuroses, loves, and incomplete thoughts. And so does everyone else. Really quickly. The swiftness of sharing this ongoing series of poems and the comments and conversations that come up around them is as soul-shaping as the writing.

I do feel shaped by what I write, as the inner and outer experiences shape me and prompt me to write. I have felt shaped quite literally lately, posing for a clay sculpture class. It is odd to feel sometimes like there are 10 voodoo dolls of me being molded before my eyes. I sometimes imagine that I’ll leave class subtly or profoundly different from the way I came in, and wonder about this as a metaphor for every interaction.

Here are the most recent poems:

April 6, 2011

Names

I think I’ve found the perfect candidate
for The Fool
in my personal deck of Tarot.
The role of The Devil has been taken.
I wonder what The Goddess calls me
when I can’t hear Her over the music.

April 7, 2011

Where no orgasm is unmemorable
Where the walls embrace wide auras
Where books and beings point out the Heart of Hearts
Where God sings the wailing blues
Where there are clean dishes and enough blankets
Where there are spent toys of pleasure
Where I sleep late
I begin to notice things
Where the forest holds love without need.

April 8, 2011

Uninvited

He left her a message today
Said he wanted to make amends
A sound beating never forgotten
gets icy silence in any decade
I remember being made to hear
the uninvited
My face in a journal thinking
I’ll just write
No, I’ll just sleep
How do I get out Try to
sleep
Her story my story
Any woman’s story told
is a cutting of the cord
Bloodletting
Our Burning Times
to purify
if there must be fire.

April 9, 2011

On the Lindenwold Train

On the Lindenwold train to Philly
you keep approaching to interrupt
an otherwise perfect spring fever.
Warm enough tonight
to feel cute on South St.
in jeans and short black jacket,
and at ease back home
where forsythia announce
the inevitable end to cold.
On my way to meet the poly people
same place we met once
at the inevitable start.

This train best get going.
Take me to my punk rock roots
and motley crew of a mockup family
so I forget how once last fall
I would have liked to catch you sleepy,
mojito in hand,
and me with knives in mine.
Luck held out for both of us.

Trees still bare.
I long to lie naked in the neighborhood
under natural cover,
but I will not rush this season.
It pushes me slowly along from last September,
when I lay trapped in a learning curve
of drinking and dreaming
your house demolition.

Woodcrest Station.
A musty man stinking
of B.O. and basement
chatters questions.
I am annoyed by my impulse to answer,
glad to break the tumbling thoughts
of broken intentions,
secret darknesses
that I find have left
strange nutrients.
I lap up new knowledge,
drops of blood to a ravenous bat.
I turn my head to breathe.

The box is open now.
There will be more weapons
forged with sparks of light.
I rest relieved
it is someplace else
your poisonous script will run.
My feet hit 8th & Market,
smooth in the rhythm of my streets.

April 10, 2011

Spokeswoman

Whatever ruptured yesterday
heals today
I remember or decide
there is no healing
without the wound
The wig display head
At the foot of my bed
May tell the stories better than I.
I may let her.

April 11, 2011

My bath, her shower.
Dreaming a bathroom conflict,
I caved. She’s first again.

April 12, 2011

ROYGBIV

and so I looked relieved at the black and white 32 oz. shampoo bottles lined up
perfectly on the ledge by the tub facing one direction with no more price labels
bathroom is not bad today save for some sweeping that gets left for Saturdays
Order is like meditation, keep coming back to same things same places, a mantra of stuff
at least that’s what I tell myself sometimes and I mostly really mean it
Then I wonder if it is the loving order or the allowing disarray that is the real problem if there is one, but I do know
that the closet goes by item type and order of color the way nature paints rainbows and sometimes bills get so-called filed, forgotten in front of what used to be the Zen space with the new guitar strings candles and exercise bra
It is lonely when brain is frayed, never any-questions-fried but as if a little mouse were working away nest-building
from the outside in
Putting it back together I look for the real Zen space, the one that is always there in my head find it for real without pretense no pretending something about putting in order is holy aligning with the knowing of mystics flawless grace notes and good sex. I remember overhearing Rose and Lissa laugh about my alphabetical albums, I look
for something to wear and am pleased by the disproportionate sight of purple


www.robinrenee.com

Healing and the Love of Language

This month began with my taking on some overdue spiritual work. I have needed to release old energies – angers, fears, the psychic remnants of people no longer in my life for good reason. The first steps to opening wounds in order to heal them are scary ones, but I am appreciating the journey of the aftermath. Music, poems, passages from books that need be written are moving through me at a rate that allows me to tap what I can as it floats by and to hope the rest comes back around. Some good work was done this weekend on the forthcoming chant CD. Other ideas are at least making it to notes here and there, to be gathered when possible.

My work of release and healing began on April 1st, which corresponded with the beginning of National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo). I decided to observe the writing expedition, and the poems so far document and explore this inviting of rapid progress. For now, I am calling the collection-in-progress Cord-Cutting. I am remembering my love for language and my openness to love.

April 1, 2011

Cheese and Buttons

Phone number paper scrap 
Cheese and old buttons tooth-scraped pithless orange peel
think they have won the war by a show of sheer numbers.
I am no suburbanite in hipster camouflage,
not as lost in the details as the inanimates think I look.
The carnelian in my belly
Glows out beyond the fuzzy edges, my skin.
I remember lost chips among the ticket stubs and dishes,
regain them in bursts of confident orange.

April 2, 2011

The Other Side of Chaos

On the other side of chaos the vines grow all through winter.
Ensnared by one foot, caught before struggle,
it is easy to wonder how many years
of vines alone would erase all evidence.

There are stacks of board games
for the loneliest trek
of Monopoly or Clue in a crowd.

The everyday staircase
is worthy of a panic display
And the bathtub, of quiet avoidance.
Fear of stairs and water
cannot stop the spring.

Silence is kept at bay
With fluorescent light and Headline News.
No wonder the ones who whisper stories at night
bring Pride parade molesters
and dismal surgeons unexpected from the basement.

On the other side of chaos,
tired bones still arrive hopeful.

There is breakfast.
Cream of Wheat and honey
And time today to start again.

April 3, 2011

Cord-Cutting 1

Nervous stomach knows more
Than any other part still reasoning
Cord-cutting is a business of releasing
lead from soft muscle
What falls away might land hard
If you don’t get out of the way
Lead into gold, an old goal
And a good one
Cord-cutting, with breath and vision and incantation and
Finality
Ghost whisperer’s kinder, gentler “Get the fuck out.”
Lead falls from soft muscle
Lead into gold, coins
Tonight, to spend alone

April 4, 2011

Welcome Home, He Said

Babylon Sisters shake
Any other day, ambrosia,
Today, comfort like salt substitute
Ultra-smooth sound food,
Alone can be poems, mead, meditation, resolution
Alone can be mute, horny, & patternless
For a Brian Wilson descent
One first needs brilliance

My dull non-response to evening
Gets a break, caught
In a basket of Earth, Wind, & Fire
Seven more pages and love lost
Sorted and filed today

A meal of figs and seltzer
May be Charlie Parker chill
Or hanging on the words
Of the audiophile who will send XTC
Could be the firefly spark
Of it all reimagined
Alone can be mute, horny, & patternless
Alone
can be
a grand welcoming home

April 5, 2011

The Wedding

When I meet my lovers on the edge of the brown clay shore
I will join a circle, not a crowd
The river will carry its weight in lotus blessings
And the trodden park grass will know the sound
Of three or four or five hands clasped
In holy union
The sun will warm our skin to its most sacred state
Beneath sari or skirt or handsome butch pressed slacks
The sun will reach skin that knows
Our bare feet will thank between-toes pebbles for being
And there will be a noisy picnic in the next grove over
With a swing set I would jump on were I not taking vows
When I meet my lovers by the oaks and pines
It will be summer and the air will smell of ginger and sweet tomatoes
Charcoal and soccer and the purple petals strewn on every blanket
I will look out and believe in the power of colorful friends
I will become a partner and believe in the power of confidence
And celebration
Stillness will multiply ninefold and there will be a kiss and a kiss
and a kiss and a kiss and a kiss

Naked Truths

One of the things I have been doing over the last few years when not writing, touring someplace, or off on some other adventure is working as a figure model. When I mentioned to a friend that I was looking for an interesting sideline, she made the suggestion and I felt that it fit very well into my life. I always want to spend more time where art is created. I am also a longtime nudist, so there is nothing strange to me about posing for an art class. It seemed like a fun and fairly perfect thing to check out.

Though I am comfortable without clothes, it is more common a situation in my life that everyone is nude – on my favorite beach, camping in clothing-optional space, or at some other naturist event. Being the only one who’s nude in the room did take a little getting used to in the beginning, but is no big deal at all now. Most art class’ protocol is strange and a bit frustrating. Students are generally not to speak to the model. That feels cold to me at times, and can be the least appealing aspect of the job. I’d rather be spoken to like anyone else in the room. When there’s an opportunity, I try to ask someone a question, show some sense of humor, and just keep an easy-going energy flowing as much as possible.

I feel my Zen sensibilities more strongly while holding a pose than in most other circumstances. In sitting or standing still for long periods, I find meditation. 20 minutes of posing divided by short breaks leads me to settle into stillness, to follow the breath. Posing is a time to experience my current reality. It is a profound opportunity to release the habit of hiding. It is like saying “Here is all of me, World, with my bundle of irrational fears, body image issues, joys, aspirations, ideas, boredom, peacefulness…” Whatever is going on that day and in that moment, there I am. Exposing the body combined with time to watch the mind is a powerful exercise.

I often simply notice and release thoughts in meditation mode. Sometimes I follow the seemingly significant ones. Here are some of the random thoughts that float through my brain while modeling:

Oh! Here come some titles for the dual CDs that I am working on this season. Need to write them down on break… The hypothetical book I mentioned in The Steve Forbert Chronicles really does want to be written… and it wants to be fiction. Research road trip? … How will I manifest time to create all that the muse is pouring through me? … Grateful to have the ideas flowing… Hmm, a sexy thought – Wow, if I were a guy that thought might have just become a lot more obvious! … Will I wear the gold sparkly spaghetti strap shirt out dancing on Friday? … Sad memory of an ex – We used to meet after my Philly modeling gigs sometimes… I really want to finish painting the basement… There is only this moment, right now. Sat Nam… Why the heck did I dream about playing pool and going boating with Hall & Oates?! …

I sometimes wish I were learning to draw, too, but listening in on classes has helped me to at least see so much more. I notice the light and the shadow and the planes that make up people’s faces. I am starting to imagine drawing without outlining, but finding the shapes that make up the figure. I get how it is important to see more deeply into how the body works and the structure beneath the skin in order to render something realistic. I take so many things as metaphor anyway, and these are useful additions to ways to find life lessons.

Lately, I’ve been learning quite a bit posing in Moe Brooker’s class @ Moore College of Art and Design. I can’t say that I would enjoy being in his class as a student. He dishes out some intense critique and hardly gives students a moment’s rest. If he wants someone to add the face to the drawing or redo the knees or a make the feet bigger, he means pronto. The door generally gets shut on you if you are a minute late. He doesn’t particularly care whether or not students like him, but he cares deeply that they become better artists. I suspect that even though it’s fairly clear some students can’t stand dealing with his class, they’ll be incredible artists one day and will thank him. I have the easy job in the class; I just get to stand there and observe the varying mix of intensity and comedy.

Moe Brooker often says that there’s no point in being almost anything. If you want to be an artist, be an artist. Don’t be an almost artist. In the past, I have resolved to stop almosting. I am inspired to revisit this, find my inner hard-ass, ferret out the almosts, and achieve.

The Steve Forbert Chronicles

I went to see Highway of Sight, Steve Forbert’s cell phone photo exhibit, this past Saturday at the ART629 Gallery in Asbury Park. I had been feeling a little anti-social all day, so it really was a good thing to hear from Nancey, my good friend and concert-going buddy, who convinced me to quit cocooning and come out and play. Thanks, Nancey—I appreciate that! The two of us have such fun hanging out and being Forbert groupies together- How could I miss this one?

As I came in the door, I was surprised by Steve, who said hello, remembered my name and that he had seen me the week before at his show at The Record Collector in Bordentown. I am not sure he remembered that I interviewed him for the 2008 Songwriter’s Market. He couldn’t have known that a few years ago I was contemplating using the title of this blog entry as the title of a book. The book would be based on a slice of autobiography – soul-searching in the years around my father’s passing and other lesser life complications – with the backdrop of my strange pursuit of this quietly enduring folksinger. For a long time I have also wanted to write about the power, mostly positive, I think, that exists in music hero worship, and the bonds and creativity borne out of fandom. When I heard about the recent publication of I Think I Love You  I felt scooped, but whatever—I have different insights and stories to tell. There are quite a few books living in my head. One day, some of them will escape and find themselves written down, I promise.

The photos were simple, telling bits of Americana and curious things found along the trail of a touring musician. In this show, Forbert seemed to favor repeating items – like soda bottles or rows of eggs – that reminded me of early industrial innovation. I was checking out the images, wondering why an artist finds a particular fascination, or vice versa. The artist himself had been affable and talkative with attendees all evening. He managed to surprise me again and out of the blue walked up and asked, “So what’s the deal?” He wanted to know about the town I live in, and which photo was my favorite. My fave of the moment was “Glass Stems in Case.”

His question got me to confront something I had only idly mused over before:

Seriously, what is the deal?

Why this cyclical fixation (and the requisite goofy crush that goes with it) on the unassuming Steve Forbert and his live performances? I have the records and CDs, but it is mainly about the live show. I’ve seen him more in concert than quite a few of my other fangirl obsessions like Steely Dan, Gary Wilson (I know, he doesn’t play that much), and even Devo.

Though it is fun to revel in the mysterious nature of my adoration, I can say a little about what draws me:

Storytelling. Forbert is a solid craftsman of songs of struggle, love, work, and everyday greatness. He is afraid of neither politics (“The Baghdad Dream,” the ever-evolving “Oil Song”) nor humor (“Strange Names – New Jersey’s Got ‘Em)”. One of the surprising byproducts of the emergence of kirtan chant into my life was a lessening of the impetus to tell stories in song. When you are at OM, what more is there to say? I feel the stories reemerging now, and can look to the art of cutting to the core of basic human experience in Forbert’s best tunes for guidance.

He loves his career. I have heard him say more than once that he is grateful for the early success of “Romeo’s Tune” because it has enabled him to do what he likes for all these years. Another artist might be forever angry that meteoric success didn’t continue unabated. Steve seems to get that he has a good life and a really cool gig going on.

Perfect timing. Honestly, I believe this all started back in the day the first time I heard WMMR play “Goin’ Down to Laurel.” My heart melted and I was changed in some intangible way. Later, “Romeo’s Tune” was the summer love theme playing in my head as I would travel hours by bus and train to Connecticut to see a girl I was crazy about who I’d met at summer camp.

He is earnest. The language he uses is often matter-of-fact, sometimes cute, and may deal with pain, but is not meant to cause pain. He can write a personal or cultural critique without the cutting cynicism that I actually love from other artists. A Steve Forbert song is like an antidote to an overdose of bitterness. His body of work tells us that he really wants the best for the world and all of us in it, without even so much as a devolutionary twist.

Inspiration. Whenever I’m nervous about whatever it is my next move ought to be, I remember these immortal words:  “You Cannot Win If You Do Not Play.”

F*!k Tolerance. Practice Love.

One afternoon on Facebook, Preetamdas Kirtana posted something like “F*!k tolerance!  What if God practiced ‘tolerance?’  Practice love!”  “That should be a T-shirt,” I commented.  He said I ought to go for it – and so it is. => here   Thanks, Preetamdas, for the inspiration.  The Coexist movement is headed in the right direction.  I hope this bit of in-your-face yoga inspires many more to approach life from a place of love.

Last week, I was at Jack and Jenn’s working on the preliminary recordings for the next chant CD.  As the day to begin work drew closer, I felt as though I was cramming for kirtan.  I had to solidify ideas that had been floating along for months.  I needed to make decisions about instrumentation.  I wanted to strongly suggest to divine inspiration that a visit would be more than welcome.  “This is no way to approach bhakti,” I thought.  These sounds should emerge whole from pure love, unabated.  I was angry with myself for my process.  All music should be effortless, right?  I was angrier that I had been letting relationships and meekness and random distractions throw me off my game for too long.  How long ago had the trail branched off?  I realized that Virgo Obsesso, my inner critic, was at it again.  I noticed that sometimes I manage to coexist with the process it takes to live and grow and create.  Sometimes it feels farther off than that, and I barely tolerate my own mind’s changes.  Life is a meditation.  The point is to notice the straying, and return to center. 

Recognizing that the shirt’s message must first be realized internally – spiritually – emotionally – was a revelation.  Seeing this brought on an immediate shift.  There is time to remember the breath and time to extend compassion to the inner struggle.  Time to remember that music and art and awareness of spirit all show up where there is kindness to self.  All of us woo-woo types talk about “You have to love yourself.”  It was good to actually get it in that moment.  I’m sure I’ll forget again and remind myself.  Again.  As with any practice, the hope is that the cycle becomes gentler as we move along the path.

I am now quietly excited about allowing the new sounds through.  Seven new chants and spiritual songs are in the works.  Recording felt easy, as if it was happening of its own accord.  I love one song that I am so far calling “Blessed Be – Namaste.”  It is exceedingly simple and is a blessing that seeks to make a bridge where the Pagan and Hindu traditions in me meet.  The words and melody were sweet enough to show up the night before the recording session.  I believe that often the best thing one can do for anything musical or poetic is to get out of its way. 

Blessed Be and Namaste.  May we be good to ourselves and practice love in our travels.  May the reminders harm none and lead us back in those moments when love has been forgotten.

Beefcake on the Ceiling

I’d been searching for a while for a succinct way to describe the essence of this blog, when I mentioned it to my friend Bill Lutz (author of The Shark Tank).  Personal impressions, contemplations, general stuff of life, and of course, the music is its vehicle, but it needs to speak to all those who travel the in-betweens – those not necessarily gay or straight, black or white, of one particular gender – those who skate easily through spiritual paths and feel integrated through the journey.  I talked for a while about life other than the culture of either/or.  Bill cut to the center of my concepts with “Welcome to Tweenerworld.”  I like it.  I think this recasting of “tweener” could be to blended and both/and culture what queer is to the growing alphabet soup of alternative sexualities.  The Dream Between may have a moving target of a tagline for a while and might not really use “Tweenerworld,” but I have to thank Bill for getting to the point.  Not a bad summation.   

Sara Parks of Great Balancing Act (“It’s no secret I love that band”) recently posted a Facebook status regarding feminine hygiene and caught some flak from guys who thought it was not only TMI, but actually inappropriate.  In response I was duly inspired to show my support for frank conversation and the demystification of women’s (and everybody’s) bodies by reporting this “tweener” moment:

So there I am at the routine gynecologist appointment last month.  The nurse practitioner goes through the basic questions.  No new medications, no surgeries, nothing particularly new happening.  Breast exam.  No problems indicated.  I mention that as a matter of routine I like to have all the STI tests.  She makes a mental note to send me down the hall for blood work.  Then she asks me to lie back for the rest of the exam.  Just when the speculum hits, I look up and see a picture taped to the ceiling.  It is someone who looks very much like this guy:

 

What the heck?  I was stuck in a processing loop.  I can at least now begin to sort out what was wrong with that picture. 

Here are a few of the assumptions in operation:  It assumed that the woman having the exam is straight.  It assumed that this particular masculine expression is a universal turn-on to women.  It assumed that the woman having the exam is uncomfortable with the exam and in need of a distraction.  It assumed that nudity and genital touch in a clinical context is conflated with erotic or sexual feelings. 

All I could think, after the disconcertion brain delay, was – Wait, why did you think I wanted to see that guy?  Was I supposed to be having a sexual moment?  Personally, I had been feeling neither nervous nor sexual about having a PAP smear. 

I get the humor.  At least I think whoever decorated that office figured a hunk on the ceiling would be funny.  The surrealist in me finds it more and more amusing.

It also tells me that they weren’t expecting me in that office.  No one imagined a queer-identified bi woman who prefers feminine to androgynous or interestingly gender blendy people.  No one imagined a person who prefers not to be asked psychologically to feel aroused in the middle of a simple exam.  It was invisibility in living color.

Being one who naturally falls on the in betweens means it’s rarely ever you who people expect to show up.  They’ve mostly prepared a place for someone else.  But surfing through and between the spaces where others see hard lines drawn is a sweet, layered source of creativity and the place where I find the deepest expressions of love.  I would never trade it.

You Turn Me On, but I’m So Not a Radio, ok?

I recently checked out the open mic at Coffee Works.  I am still thinking about the evening, and how much value there is in musical spaces like it.  I seem to remember having left the open mic thing back somewhere when people were moving away from Joni and Dylan songs to cover Oasis and Ani.  I’ve been missing out, so I’m glad to get back to the possibility of coming out on a random Tuesday night and sharing tunes, maybe with friends, mostly with strangers. 

There were some very good lyricists there.  A decent mix of the young, the nervous, the regulars—a nice version of everything one expects an open mic to be.  As for the inevitable cover tunes, I find them either a comfort or a curiosity.  I don’t mind at all sticking around to see which oddball or overplayed tune people will pull out, and how they’ll decide to change it up.  That night, there was everything from Paul Simon to Otis Redding to Taylor Swift, which says something (positive, I think) about the fairly wide demographic.  I played “Into the Fire,” a song that has every intention of making it to my next CD, and the harmonium version of “Holy River.”  I hazard a guess that the harmonium is an instrument not often played at Coffee Works.  I had to push myself a little to not just settle for being the appropriate and expected “girl with guitar” in that context.  I’m glad I did.   

It has been a long while, but I did have a few gigs at Coffee Works, at least one where I may as well have been a radio.  Not long after that, I decided that I had learned enough from coffee house type gigs where I was likely to be treated as a soundtrack to conversation and grinding coffee beans.  Deciding to force myself into situations that demand more intentional listening or participation was a good thing.  Forgetting that there might be something good about future events in coffee house venues or even (gasp) trying again at this same place was an oversight. 

Granted, it is a bonus that the place has increased dramatically in its cool factor in my humble opinion now that people like Jeffrey Gaines, Graham Parker, and Steve Forbert have been gracing the stage.  Perhaps I shall wax poetic about my love of Steve some other time. 

In the years just after I sang and played keys in Spy Gods, there was a uniquely moving period for acoustic music – and particularly women’s acoustic music— in New Brunswick, NJ.  I played in the local cafes there sometimes, but was in a deeply quiet, incubation period of life.  I remember myself then more as a proverbial wallflower, growing internally but not quite ready to bloom with new words and music.   That time period feels remarkably similar to what I‘ve just been through, though it seems like a little more wisdom is hanging around.  Can one trust the mind that thinks it is wiser?         

I’m ready to go back to beginnings in the open mic environment to start playing some works-in-progress, even if they’re not Virgo-perfect.  That scares me, which is precisely why it is going on my Bold Steps list of things to do.  Ego-self would rather appear only on grand stages, and feels like open mics are stepping backward.  Sinking into the deeper knowing, there is value waiting for me in creation outside of a vacuum, the sounds of others daring to be excellent or imperfect, and even in the risk of being ignored in lieu of a mocha soy latte. 

Personal ashram life is allowing space for me to be more observant, more appreciative.  I have been noticing things worth exploring that have been nearby all along.  I’d believed the hype that if it’s in South Jersey it can’t really be that cool.  This was an incorrect and not so helpful an assumption.  I have a few more amusing ASSumptions to ramble on about next time.

Preparing a Place

It has been unbelievably quiet here.  I am not complaining.  Mornings begin around dawn and I land my butt on the meditation cushion before the monkey mind gets too busy.  Exercise has been mostly swimming and yoga, though I hope my body will like the weight training once again before too long.  My body has reflected the break from health and happiness I took this summer.  It feels good to be back, present, and ready to rock, as it were. 

 My personal ashram is coming along nicely.  Oppressing myself with ultra strict time constraints has not felt useful.  The intention is what’s important, and that is sticking.  I am awake hours earlier.  I find center.  I work with diligence and new shows for 2011 are beginning to get booked, which promotes a sense of accomplishment that keeps an entrepreneur going. 

I open up time to clean and organize.  It is hard to explain how a freshly polished dresser in the bathroom (“The Amber Lounge,” as I like to call it) that was once my Grandmother’s translates to a mind at ease, but it does just that.  Seeing that the basement will soon be ready to receive much-needed repainting is exciting. 

 I have been eating moderately and well, loving cooking once again.  I tend not to cook when I am living in a space that is somehow energetically off.  Rediscovering the process and simple enjoyment of making fresh, vegetarian meals is one joy of no-housemates that I had forgotten would re-emerge.  In the evenings, I’ve been making sure there is leisure time.  I mostly catch up with my friend Brian, and I’ve been reading the brilliant book by Heidi Durrow, The Girl Who Fell From the Sky.”  Heidi Durrow along with Fanchen Cox are the hosts of Mixed Chicks Chat, a podcast where I have found an emotional home and sense of cultural identity in so many ways.  Lights out has been purposeful and a bit earlier on its own accord.  No more falling asleep trying to make one more connection or watch one more thing on You Tube.  There is a tomorrow for that. 

 All this personal ashraming is absolutely positive.  I am also aware of it as a state of preparation.  The mind is rediscovering focus for the pursuit of spiritual awareness and wisdom.  The stability of quiet joy that is emerging will be the bedrock that allows the new songs to come through – the ones that hold all the anger and feelings of loss that I’ve been avoiding.  I am preparing for the inevitable birth of those, and the light that comes after. 

 I am preparing for family.  What I said about the wighead knowing more about her family than I do is true.  She is certain that she wants the man and the woman who she loves to form a poly triad.  I would love such a scenario, though the partners are not evident.  For me, three doesn’t have to be the magic number.  All need not be lovers.  All need not live together.  I do believe that my friend Brian is one of us. 

The polyamorous family of my dreams has an unequivocal heart connection.  We are friends and partners who know in our deepest selves that love and freedom are not incongruent.  Queerness and gender fluidity weave a wide swath of our tapestry.  We explore the divine, creativity, and intellect.  We give each other space.  We have each others’ backs.          

Last Samhain, a woman who came to my ritual asked me if I wanted a family.  I didn’t have a short answer for her, sensing her likely cavalcade of assumptions.  Yes, I really do want a family.  And today, I am enjoying incredible near silence. 

 How will I find enough singlehood and enough togetherness?  It is one of my lifelong quests to find and stay in this balance.  The living room will soon ring with my current favorite sound of OM.  Today, I am happy and serene.  There is no need to chase after answers.

The Secret Lives of Wigheads: She Dreams the Triad

I am not sure why wigheads are my usual canvas.  Maybe it stems from the new wave aesthetic that is so imprinted on me.  I find them strangely beautiful, sometimes eerie, and when I work with them it feels like sculpting.

 I wrote a novella in 1993.  That was the first time I discovered a phenomenon that I’ve heard fiction writers talk about frequently since— Characters take on lives of their own.  This new wighead has definitely done that. “She Dreams the Triad” portrays one woman’s jumbled musings of love and desire and her ultimate clarity about pursuing partnership with a man and a woman.  Creating her was peaceful in moments, and also an emotional challenge.  I, too, am seeking poly family.  I believe she is more certain than I of the people who will be together and the structure of the tribe.  Here is a look into her mind.

 

The images click along like an old school slide show.   They make trails as they shift through brainwaves.   She follows. 

She thinks of him, and for a moment he is red-splattered.   She is shocked to envision him bloody—Could her anger be so great inside this many-layered romance?   Then her cheek flushes red with wanting him and thick desire outruns all turbulence.   Another image flashes.   It is her closest friend— punky, blonde, intellectual, more social than she.   Yes, she loves her, but she is startled that snapshots of her have erupted so suddenly into her raw passion fantasy.  

The slide show click click clicks.  She sees herself.  Who am I now?  She sees her; she sees him.  What would he say? Sure, he could have a romp with them, but could he love them both?  She sees them all wildly distorted as if they’ve fallen into a kaleidoscopic abyss of color and dreamscape and alchemy.  Then they return in a picture clearer than any before. 

They are stylized and static, yet their emotions seep through in spite of themselves.  Her third eye shines with the knowing of what they could be, and her throat is jeweled just where she will form the words to speak her truth.  She knows that soon there will be the messiness and sublime potential of words and flesh.

The Yoga of Order

A few years ago, I noticed that I occasionally had dreams and idle fantasies of throwing things away – nearly violent images of picking up old clothes, old papers, random electronics, and broken stuff—and tossing them all haphazardly and mercilessly out of an open window. Sometimes I’d break the window in the process. It felt great to care less. What a crazy, cathartic forced way to affect clarity, well beyond the fabled “letting go.” The fantasy may be a bit on the extreme side, but it speaks to things that need doing, and perhaps a bit to my Virgo Obsesso nature. My living space has been incongruent with the order that I long for inside and out. I am pleased to say that is changing.

These last two weeks have been the beginning of reclaiming my home as temple. I call my place the Arts Ashram of Atco. I am dedicating my current practice to continuing to move the energies closer in line with the name. This morning in the middle of working peacefully in my room near the main altar, cleaning the kitchen, and in brushing the light layers of snow from the car, I felt the yoga coming back into my home and my being. As of a few days ago, an area that was once jumbled storage space is now “The Yoga Nook.” Next— on to the office. It doesn’t have a clever name yet.

A lot of people seem to think that the best thing about being freelance is that you get to create your own hours.  I find that what has actually been most beneficial so far is that I create my own days.  If it is time to tour through to Detroit or Sarasota or Kansas City, I can plan the dates, pick up and go. The hours within a day of writing at home can be a lot trickier.

Creating one’s own hours can be a joy provided that it is actually done in a way that promotes order and balance.  When I have been good at creating my own hours, I am up at least by 6:30am, meditating by 6:45, in the gym by 7:45, home and hitting the day’s work by 9:30.  I think that what some people believe would be so great about creating one’s own hours would be having the liberty to stay in bed ‘til 10, and work most of the day in pajamas.  I have sometimes taken that kind of liberty, but when it happens, it usually means that my mood is slipping.

When I’m happiest, I’m up and at ‘em.  At the lab where I used to work, I was so much the morning person that I was forbidden to play Uz Jsme Doma, the then #1 on my personal playlist, until everyone else could handle it—usually after noon. I love all kinds of sounds, but right now in my realigning phase, #1 on my chart is The Eternal Om (but there’s always room near the top of the chart for Steely Dan and Gary Wilson).

I resonate with the evenness that a monastic-style schedule creates – there is the potential for quiet joy with little tribulation. Here in my own space once again, I am very much in the midst of the multitasking world, but I have decided to add a lot more structure- to make my own hours for waking, exercising, working, eating, creating, socializing, and sleeping.  My friend Tom Limoncelli, activist and time management guru, advocates making your life “boring” through routine. I think it’s a good trick: Get basic life stuff done, time and mental space is available. Life is less worrisome, and in truth, not so boring. I am taking that advice to heart.

I believe in the Arts Ashram of Atco and what it can become, or not, as I choose. After this time of returning to center, I expect to invite in the kirtans, parties, retreats, and other gatherings I’ve wanted to host. Some will be reminiscent of events past and I have many visions of new ones making their way to fruition. So far, these visions don’t involve any SCTV moments, but I remain open-minded.