- William Gibson, Pattern Recognition (full quote here)

Yesterday morning (relatively speaking, to my current sense of time), I got on a plane in Barcelona.  It flew out over the Mediterranean, which was spectacularly blue, and then turned sharply and went directly over Sitges, a town I had visited just days before.  I wept copiously with a great sense of loss as the plane went over the entire length of the Pyrenees, until reached the Bay of Biscay and turned over the Atlantic, towards Philadephia.

I am presently too tired, too soul-lagged to tell you about it.  Indeed I may never getting around to writing a narrative of it, but I promise lots and lots of pictures as soon as I get all 500+ of them sorted and tagged and all that modern day nonsense that allows me to foist my living room vacation slide show on you.  For now my soul is still somewhere over the Pyrenees, perhaps, still dreaming of the Mediterranean.

What Spain Was Like

Spain was a taut, dry drum-head
Daily beating a dull thud
Flatlands and eagle’s nest
Silence lashed by the storm.
How much, to the point of weeping, in my soul
I love your hard soil, your poor bread,
Your poor people, how much in the deep place
Of my being there is still the lost flower
Of your wrinkled villages, motionless in time
And your metallic meadows
Stretched out in the moonlight through the ages,
Now devoured by a false god.

All your confinement, your animal isolation
While you are still conscious
Surrounded by the abstract stones of silence,
Your rough wine, your smooth wine
Your violent and dangerous vineyards.

Solar stone, pure among the regions
Of the world, Spain streaked
With blood and metal, blue and victorious
Proletarian Spain, made of petals and bullets
Unique, alive, asleep – resounding.

- Pablo Neruda

and

And of course if you’ve decided to have a week long mid-life crisis, then haircutting isn’t enough, you need to get a giant new tattoo as well:

Most of my blouses are more of a cutesy, 40s-ish style, which I love, but maybe I’ve been needing something a little more grown up lately.  So here’s the end result:

I’m actually fairly pleased with the fit and the drape.  A nice silk would have been better.  I might make another of these, though, because I’m actually pretty happy with how it turned out.  I think this will be good with jeans too and maybe even shorts in summer.  And this pic doesn’t really do justice to the colors of the actual blouse. It’s definitely more teal and purple, with nice neutral tan and grey in the alternating stripes.  YAY I SEWED SOMETHING ALL THE WAY TO THE END.  I think I can do this again someday.  Very satisfying.

Pattern (Simplicity 2594) and line drawing:

Perhaps the lines I don’t labor over mean the most, come more truly from me?  Perhaps there is no meaning in any of it and will just keeping spilling out words, looking for the turn of phrase that will free my soul and find it someday.  Perhaps Sherman Alexie labored over that line and still will never know will never know how his two sentences made me break my own heart.  I could write him a letter and tell him, but I would labor too hard over the words, I would lose the importance of sharing what he gave me.  I have always been writing this letter to him in my head, through out the years, every time I read his stories and poems.  A letter that never makes it to paper, to computer screen, never achieves more than some small form of therapy for me.

I am talking to Sherman in my head (can I call you, Sherman, I feel we are close enough now) about my homesickness, about how I cannot ever really understand where he is from and he cannot understand how I am from where he is now.  I tell him it is a continuum that no one but me can see, a story that can’t quite be told, but is important all the same.  And the The Butchies pop up on shuffle on the old mp3 player and I start to cry because this is more homesickness than a soul can bear.  But this makes me get up and start to cook dinner: fettuccine alfredo with smoked salmon (real, PNW smoked salmon), peas and caramelized onions.  Because I am homesick and if I lived close enough that I could call my mom and ask if I could come over she would walk to me to a restaurant near her house (one Sherman Alexie has surely been too) and I would order some variation of this dish because you don’t really find it anywhere else in the world, not the way we make it in Seattle.

And while I am chopping onions the mp3 player turns again and gives me Kevin Gordon singing Watching the Sun Go Down, and I remember how I stopped at 6:42 am, on my way to work, to photograph the sunrise over an electrical power station, and got distracted by some horses too.  I think of how the redbuds are surely more beautiful this year than they have ever been before, blooming riotously, everywhere, making the edges of every roadway glow purple.  I think of how  the heat in Tennessee makes me feel warm all the way through to my bones, like I’ve never been warm before.

So I tell Sherman that he is lucky indeed, to be able wait in line at Bartell’s, but he has to go through cold rain to get there and I am saved by the sun  and the green in spring and the sounds, all the sounds, here in the dirty South.  Perhaps I am homesick for a place that no longer exists.  A place I visited, moved through in childhood, that is just a fairytale now, I can not go back.  My adult self does not have the magic to cross back over the boundaries of the places I’ve been before, I can only go to new places or create them myself. And I’m still crying when I sit down to eat my dinner, but not because I miss anything.  I am so lucky to have been so many places, both real and imagined. Lucky to be me and to be still so full of emotions good and bad (love) about all of those places I have been and the people in them.  Even the rude lady in the Bartell’s line that you have to tell to fuck all the way off.  So thanks, Sherman, for reminding of my home, the past one, the new one, the one that is always me and goes everywhere inside my heart.  I’m certain that you never knew that namedropping Bartell’s in a story would make some girl in Tennessee break out the fancy smoked salmon from way back home and cook herself a good dinner on a night when she would otherwise have been too tired, too worn down by work, to do more than make a quesadilla.  Thanks for dinner, Sherman, I really feel like we are close now.

(Pictures taken early this morning in Tennessee, when I stopped, before I even had coffee, to remember that there is beauty in the world.  Even when you feel like you break to pieces because of the stress that swirls around you and puts the anxiety inside you, there is still the color purple and leaves that were not that green yesterday and sunrises.  The redbuds really are spectacular this year.)

The term Ides comes from the earliest Roman calendar, which is said to have been devised by Romulus, the mythical founder of Rome. Whether it was Romulus or not, the inventor of this calendar had a penchant for complexity. The Roman calendar organized its months around three days, each of which served as a reference point for counting the other days:

Kalends (1st day of the month)
Nones (the 7th day in March, May, July, and October; the 5th in the other months)
Ides (the 15th day in March, May, July, and October; the 13th in the other months)
The remaining, unnamed days of the month were identified by counting backwards from the Kalends, Nones, or the Ides. For example, March 3 would be Five Nones—5 days before the Nones (the Roman method of counting days was inclusive; in other words, the Nones would be counted as one of the 5 days).

Used in the first Roman calendar as well as in the Julian calendar (established by Julius Caesar in 45 B.C.E.) the confusing system of Kalends, Nones, and Ides continued to be used to varying degrees throughout the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance.

So, the Ides of March is just one of a dozen Ides that occur every month of the year. Kalends, the word from which calendar is derived, is another exotic-sounding term with a mundane meaning. Kalendrium means account book in Latin: Kalend, the first of the month, was in Roman times as it is now, the date on which bills are due.

It doesn’t change as often as a hairstyle, maybe, but it’s a similar inclination.  I like the outside, the label, to represent the work I’m doing.  Even if the reasons for that name choice are only clear to me it makes me feel like I am properly presently myself.

So in line with my other projects this year, this space, is now evereadysmile.com.  All previous domain names will still redirect here, so no need to do anything your parts, really.

Of course I did all of this yesterday while this site, and my others, were intentionally blacked out in protest of SOPA and PIPA.  Which means you probably missed everything I posted at Love Letter for an Occupant yesterday as well. It wasn’t an intentional taunt, but I got a new camera and was all excited to start posting pictures, the fact that my site was blacked out be damned!

I’ve only had the camera for a couple days, most of which have been spent at work, so I haven’t even had time to photograph anything that wasn’t inside my house (or my office I guess, but that’s even less interesting).

If you thought my web page layout was bright and jarring, well, it’s a reflection of my house and maybe the inside of my brain too. I can’t tell if this is good picture exactly, because when I look at it I simply think about how much I love my bed and how I wish I was in it reading a book instead if in my cold, cold office, or just about anywhere else.

Though everything is starting slow (and thus properly) I think my current projects are going well, both the public and the private.  I posted a large self portrait without make up on yesterday on Love Letter and I’m still having pretty conflicted feelings about it (which was the point, pushing limits).  It’s funny because I only wear make up, hmm, maybe 40% of the time? Events, any time I have to meet or talk to a lot of people or if I’m feeling either particularly insecure or particularly badass.  An astute friend once said to me, “You don’t give a fuck today.” And I thought for a second and said, “No, is it that obvious?” And he said, “Well, you don’t have any eye make up on and you only do that when you don’t give a fuck.”  Which is a pretty good summation of the entire situation actually.  And yet, while I’m fine going bare faced into the world most days, it feels different to capture on film and leave it up for everyone to always be able to see.  As Lyle Lovett says, “Here I am, yes It’s me.”  Take from it what you will, because what you see will never be what I intend you you to see, which too, is as it should be.

First project started: Love Letter From an Occupant.  This will be predominantly a visual project.  Go follow it with your own Tumblr or add it to your feed reader or bookmark to read later and then ignore it.  Or you can ignore it right out, I don’t mind.  I will probably set this up so it streams to Facebook directly, though hopefully not intrusively.  Probably I will add a wrap up of what happens over there here periodically as well.

I am actually glad for Facebook’s existence.  It’s allowed me to better keep up with my family than I ever could, and brought me back in touch with people that I am thrilled to have found.  But frankly it makes me lazy on the internet.  I have been actively participating in online communities in a variety of ways since about 1992.  It has opened doors to me, introduced me to many of my friends and made me creative in ways I never could have imagined.  I think Facebook actually damages a lot of that.  It’s easy to thoughtlessly toss up a picture, or a quick status and stop thinking about why things are being shared or taking the time to really write about things.  I can’t give up Facebook because it is my main connection with some folks and that’s okay, but I am spreading out more this year than I have for the past couple years.

To some extent I’ve been locked up inside myself for the last 30 months or so.   I am thankful that I’ve had the time for introspection and the chance to find myself again.  Now I need to stretch a little creatively and a little personally.  The Tumblr project is personal.  I know from past year’s experimenting that I can’t do a picture a day or anything that requires specific time commitments, but there are pictures, narratives and imagery that I’d like to be sharing more thoughtfully and hopefully this project will be the beginning of that.

I am ready to go, are you? Let’s go! Let’s go!

Seattle horizons. December 23, 2011.

In 2011 I got better.  I recovered, almost completely, from 2010 and 2009.  I reconnected with some amazing, beautiful old friends who I am so very glad to have back in my life.  I reconnected with my old online community which is no different than sitting down with old friends.  I learned, I changed, I stayed the same, I became more me, I remembered who I was, and who I want to be.  I think I managed to find myself again, or at least the creative center of myself, even if the rest of me seems much changed than who I was even a year ago.  I am glad to be moving forward, looking forward, and carrying on with the people I have around me.

In 2012 I plan to take myself less seriously.  I want to worry less about external pressures and ask less of myself.  I want to write more and laugh more and sing loudly even when I’m out of tune.

I have an extensive list of new projects I want to work on in 2012.  I’m not sure yet which will make the cut and which will fall by the wayside but I am going to strongly commit to one or a few and be dedicated and vigilant in my work on what I do choose.

I will be smarter and more me by the end of the 2012.  I don’t think that’s too much to ask of myself.

I am so grateful for my huge, wonderful family, for my mother and my sisters.  I am so very thankful for my friends and my community.  I wish I had the words and time to tell each of you just how much I love you and how much you mean to me.  I will carry that love in my heart every single day, I will use it to bolster myself against the hard times.  I will do my best to love you all even more, every single day.  I will trust you all and work to to learn to trust myself and my instincts more.  I will try harder to be worthy of the love given back to me.

Here we go!

Today in the Northern Hemisphere we round the corner on darkness.  It is the Hibernal solstice when the sun is near its greatest distance from the equatorial plane, standing still as it were.

Today Marduk tamed the monsters of chaos and for one more year we are safe as we move back into the light.

Today we light candles and keep them lit.  Though darkness is already on the run, we must continue to chase it away so spring can come faster.

Today the Oak King is apparently dead, his branches bare and cold.  We thought the Holly King had won, as he remained green,  but long live the Oak King as he returns to rule us into Midsummer!  Go, hang the holly, let it catch bad spirits on it’s tiny horns, protecting us in the months of darkness when the border with the shadowlands is permeable.

Today is the Saturnalia where we eat and dance and decorate the evergreens with red berries.  We will reverse all our roles, switch with our opposites and see the world from the other side, through other eyes.

Today and for the days to come, find joy in each other, celebrate, kiss beneath the mistletoe, feast in the light of candles.  Celebrate the darkness and the joy we have as  it washes away.  Tonight we breathe and meditate on our lives.  We breathe out the things we want gone, we breathe in our wishes for the coming year.  Tomorrow life begins again.

Before:

Silk blouse, pretty but boxy and just not quite me.

After:

I shortened the sleeves and used the leftover over fabric to put an elasticized panel around the waist, lengthening the top and making it more fitted. YAY, I love it now!

Before:

I got this beautiful silk dress for $3.50.  It’s really lovely silk, but not at all my style.  I feel like I’m auditioning for Little House on the Prairie.

After:

I shortened the sleeves and re-purposed the ties that held the waist back into trim for the hem.  I have enough of the silk from the dress part left to make a skirt, or more likely a little sleeveless shell.

As soon as we get through the holidays I’m going to make a concerted effort to get at least one project a week photographed so I can get it up here.