Along the Harbour, Near Dusk

On My Knees: a "public divorce ceremony" by Cathy Gordon

A quick heads-up for anyone in Toronto: Cathy Gordon, a close friend and colleague, will be crawling across the city -- on her hands and knees -- on Monday, August 13th.



Cathy is a very gifted artist, and this should be a particularly interesting project. All I'll say for now is that I'll be there -- and I encourage anyone reading this in Toronto to see it.

For more information, please visit her website -- www.cathygordon.com -- and check out the article in today's Toronto Star newspaper: An Extremely Public Divorce.

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(Photo is from Cathy's website.)

Butterflies and Gnawing Locusts

After six months apart, we met on a park bench.

I sat in the sun, a flowing pink skirt brushing against my calves; he arrived with a guitar case slung over his shoulder.

We embraced.




And then -- what exactly?

It's so difficult to say...




We spent seven hours together.



He played a few songs...

We shared a picnic on the top of a hill in Riverdale Park (fresh multigrain bread, seasoned olives, Canadian brie, and smoked fish) while children tossed baseballs to each other on the fields below...

We trekked through the Don Valley, charting new paths...

We argued -- as we so often did.

But we stayed -- as we also often did -- and found points of connection: the words unsaid, and the real sense of words we'd each spoken.



I am learning to live with less certainty -- and more trust.

Pigeon-feeding, Popular Culture, and Echoes of the Freemasons

I intended to take a ballet class tonight -- but as I was stuffing my workout clothes into my backpack, a friend called to invite me to dinner. With my calves already sore, and already feeling a bit hungry and rushed, I pulled the workout clothes out of my bag and hopped on the subway to meet him for Thai food.

Emerging at Yonge and Bloor, I found a strange woman with a shopping cart piled with buckets of birdseed. As she sprinkled seeds on the sidewalk, she cooed at the pigeons and began speaking to them -- affectionately, it seemed -- in a language I couldn't understand.




Then -- with bellies full of mango chicken and green curry, I walked with my friend to a building on Yonge just North of Bloor: the headquarters of MTV Canada.




It's quite an exceptional space -- a former Masonic Temple that has been converted to various small TV studios. My friend (who runs lights for a few of the MTV shows) gave me a tour, and I snapped a few photos -- with a strange degree of trepidation.





Despite its conversion to a pop culture mecca, the building retains many original details -- which lend the space an incongruous sobriety. I felt like an interloper...

To see abandoned fragments of the masons' rituals, out of their formal context, felt surreal -- and perhaps even disrespectful. What right do I have to photograph the relics of the freemasons -- and to document something I do not understand?



So I've decided to do a bit of reading about the masons... and to go back again in the next few weeks.

I hope that a deeper awareness of their rituals may let me capture something I felt I couldn't really see tonight.

Poetry, Elliptical Orbits, and Heliocentric Lives

This was a truly lovely day.

I saw Ewan, after he'd been away from the city for a few days... and it felt so nice to take his hand and wander around the Annex streets. We stopped to sit and talk beneath trees, on campus benches, and in a small courtyard with a chessboard inlaid into the concrete tabletop...




He's delightful.




I want more of this: more poetry, more kindness... more afternoons with dark chocolate... more moments of connection, of slowly drawing each other back to the sun...

Iran, Afghanistan, and Remembered History

I wasn't looking for conversation; I just stepped into the Persian carpet store to pet the cat that was sleeping on a stack of wool rugs.



But as I hoisted myself up onto the top of the rug stack, I couldn't help but overhear a conversation between the store's owner, Ali, and an articulate woman with a British accent. They were talking about Iran -- and Iraq -- and Afghanistan.



I quickly shifted from a shy eavesdropper to an active participant. I learned that Ali had been born in Iran and spent most of his younger years in Kuwait; the woman (named Joy), had lived in at least three countries before immigrating to Canada. Their sense of history was impeccable, and they guided me through some recent history of the Middle East: the 1979 Iranian Revolution, various invasions of Afghanistan, and some information about oil reserves in Iraq. Joy recommended two books by Jason Elliot: An Unexpected Light and Mirrors of the Unseen -- Journeys in Iran.



In the most chilling part of the conversation, Ali described being pulled off the streets of an Iranian city for interrogation. Over the course of two hours, he was interrogated by 12 officers -- all under the (specious?) premise that he resembled a man who had passed a counterfeit travelers cheque...



As I left Ali's store and continued wandering through the market, I felt a wave of gratitude for my safety. Few can claim that the United States lives up to the democratic ideals of its founding (the US-led School of the Americas, also euphemistically known as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, has been a training centre for some of the most brutal Latin American dictators of the past forty years -- and who can hear of the Patriot Act without supressing a wary twitch?), but when I compare my safety in the US to this man's insecurity in Iran, I can't help but feel gratitude for my home.



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All of the photographs in this post are from Kensington Carpets (193 Baldwin Street) in Toronto.

David and Manjit at the Gladstone Hotel

A few shots from David's wedding reception at the Glastone on Friday night...

"His Eye is on the Sparrow"

We intersect at Bloor and Yonge: an accident on the corner. We watch medics pull bodies from broken glass. I try not to stare.

Fingers light on my wrist, you guide me down a quiet street. The barista greets you by name; you carry our lattes out the back, smiling over your shoulder from the fire escape.

I lean against the café wall beside the vent from the roaster (gentle smoke, deeply aromatic, arousing as any scent) and watch you pull a moleskin journal from your bag.

I am squinting in the sun as you recite Catullus – a translation you wrote this morning. Two millennia incarnate in your voice: gentle as the sparrow you tease from my breast, pecking wistful hands…

In your measured cadence, your sonorous voice, I hear us make love: rhythm of tides… ductility of gold… spinning of stars over hemispheres...

(I hear you moan, one octave below: content in my taste and your sweat.)

You’re closing the notebook, your hand touches mine, and we fly.

Injera, Four Used Paperbacks, and a Blues Bar

This was another delightful day.

I intended to see "Gladstone Variations" at the Fringe Festival -- but after waiting in line for an hour and a half, I still wasn't able to get a ticket for the show. So I ended up eating Ethiopian food on Bloor Street with Moses (a sweet friend I lived with in Madison seven years ago)...

Then I dropped by the bookstore to see Ewan, the lovely poet/translator who inspired another blog entry: His Eye is on the Sparrow. We wandered through a nearby park, sprawling beneath old trees and talking about literature and theatre...

Later in the evening, I arrived at the University of Toronto to stage manage the show in the swimming pool, and I found my friend John waiting in the lobby. I noticed his datebook -- scrawls of blue ink and fringe shows:



After another exceptional performance, I headed off with the cast to Grossman's tavern, the legendary blues dive on Spadina. The band (two guitarists and one drummer) was incredible, and the drummer was simply phenomenal; I watched the rhythm course through his body, and because I could see the music (instead of simply hearing it), I felt (and understood) the music on a truly intuitive level...

On Hanlan's Island, a Short Ferry Ride from the City

Yesterday afternoon, I headed out to the Toronto Islands with five colleagues and friends from Perpeual Motion Theatre Company. (They're a brilliant young troupe from Minneapolis; I'm stage managing their show at the Toronto Fringe Festival, and I'd like to encourage anyone reading this to please see it -- and to write a review on the bulletin board at eye weekly...)





While waiting for the ferry, Derek pulled out a pocketknife and began whittling...




And Mark pulled out his notebook, showing me the pages for the virtual rock / paper / scissors tournament that he recently hosted on his blog, Enriched White Bread...




I watched the boat's wake through a small porthole...




... watched small sailboats through tree branches...




... and smiled as I saw the CN Tower through the trees and summer smog.



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(The first photograph -- the gorgeous underwater shot -- was taken by Avye Alexandres, who documented an earlier production of "The Depth of the Ocean" in her fantastic photo blog.)

On the Beach with Colleagues and New Friends

(Thanks to Terry for taking these photographs -- and for amusing us with some of the funniest stories I've heard in years...)

I Could Not Take a Photograph

thick fog:
streetlights twine
through maple leaves

softly, in pace,
past teens on the swings:
(2 a.m.) pendulums swaying...
haze of the night
like stratified time

(your hand in my hair)
(knees damp on the grass)
(overexposed)

moment replayed:
lines overlaid

Sunjye on Bloor and Brunswick: A Healing Ritual and a Delicate Balance

Walking toward the subway last night, after finishing a dress rehearsal with Perpetual Motion Theatre Company, I wandered around Bloor Street: tired but happy, a particularly delicious beef shawarma in hand.

When I reached the corner of Bloor and Brunswick, I stopped, curious; all along the sidewalk, someone had stacked bits of concrete, transforming utilitarianism into art:




Soon, Sunjye appeared. He was just starting to dismantle the sculptures for the night, loading chunks of concrete into a metal shopping cart:




I asked him to stop for a few moments while I took photographs. He was kind enough to oblige...




He said he'd be in the Bloor/Brunswick area frequently for the next two weeks (since the Fringe festival headquarters is nearby). If you see him, please stop and admire his artwork. (And then, if you're able, please toss a bit of change his way...)

A Country Girl Becomes a City Girl Again (Until the Harvest)

On Sunday, I leave for Toronto; I'll be there for roughly six weeks (and may spend a few days in Montreal and Ottawa, or elsewhere in Eastern Canada). I'm excited and very happy...

Through a Small Glass (Brightly)

David Duclos: are you reading this?

~ * ~

No?

Good...

~ * ~

Yes?

Then please stop now -- and please return after July 13th. :)

~ * ~

I am working on a stained glass piece: a gift for David and Manjit -- to celebrate their wedding. I've been thinking about it for a couple weeks, and yesterday I sketched out a preliminary design.





This morning and afternoon, I started to add detail to the sketch (and remove some detail from the dress):




Then I added colour:




(There's much more to do, of course -- but I thought I'd share the progress here. I'll post an update with new photographs in a day or two.)

The Angel of History

I have been folding my grandparents' clothing.

This is an intimate task; they died several years ago, but their clothing is still a corporeal presence. We have a closet full of fabric no one wears: Grandma's modest cotton sun-dresses... Grandpa's polyester slacks (some with wear spots at the knees)... a dozen pairs of white long johns (because he was thin and always cold). At the back of the closet: pairs of shoes that still hold imprints of their feet.



There is so much history here: a Christmas photograph from 1955... Grandpa's lunch bucket from the years he worked in the coal mine... Grandma's driver education card -- granted in 1939...

The objects they chose to keep are notable signs of what they valued -- but also interesting is what they didn't keep; neither grandparent wrote a journal, so I have no direct window into their most personal thoughts.



There is such history in this small town as well: the town where my great-grandparents immigrated and raised their families, where my grandparents had lived all their lives, where my father returned to raise his kids (and work with his sister, who has also lived her entire life in this town). My brother and I are the first generation to leave; though we're both home temporarily, he has spent the last decade in Austin, Texas, while I've been away at college and then off working in Toronto and New York.

I am humbled by how often I meet someone here who I don't remember. Often, they are people who knew me as a child... or who know my father or grandparents. Some simply recognize me from articles in the local newspaper, and they congratulate me on my academic and artistic achievements. When I tell them how I've failed -- perhaps not as often as I've "succeeded," but surely more spectacularly -- they dismiss failures instantly. What is most important to them is that I've followed my aspirations and trusted my own dreams.

When I find myself in conversation with old friends (even those I didn't know particularly well), the dialogue is so fulfilling. I am still thinking about my talk with Tom, who has worked at the local newspaper for more than five decades... I am thinking of the joy of running into Angela at the library -- and seeing how happy she is with her spouse and child. I am thinking of the waitress I worked with while I was in high school; her husband recently left her, and despite her obvious pain, she's much better off alone. I'm remembering my grocery store conversation with one of the "girls" (all must have been over 50) who sat at the gossip table at my restaurant, drinking coffee and fawning over the local "heartthrob" (who was also in his 50s). And then there's J.R., my closest high school friend -- who recently reminded me that we made a pact as kids to marry each other if we didn't find other partners by a certain age. (I laughed -- then thought about it -- then revised the age slightly upward -- but agreed that we'd probably do quite well together. So the marriage pact is valid...)



It is a joy to return to this small Midwestern town -- two and a half decades after I was born into it.

I see it differently now; I can appreciate what it is, rather than demeaning it for what it can never be.

For years now, intent on succeeding in the (cannibalistic) arts worlds of major cities, I have neglected my own heritage and the many friends and relatives and teachers who helped me grow into the woman I've become (and am still becoming). Yes, I'm still the urban artist -- but I'm also the Luddite who can read for hours in a clearing in the woods... the girl who -- at dusk last night -- went for my first (spontaneous) swim of the season: stripping off dance clothes and wading into the lake. I'm the same girl (woman) who -- more than 15 years ago -- waded into that same lake to rescue a frightened fawn from our overzealous terrier. As a child, I was so in touch with the rhythm of this land that wild sparrows would land on my fingers to eat birdseed.



Whatever else I do in the next months and years of my life -- regardless of what happens with my novella or the recent job offers from New York -- I want to cultivate this powerful tranquility: to be so serene that birds might choose to perch on me again.

Five New "Fragments"

I've just posted five chapters of Fragments:
* Magnolias
* The Musical Term for the Process by which Out-of-Phase Elements Slowly But Deliberately Come into Synchrony
* Entrainment
* The Front Moves Through
* Then

All can be read on my website (on the main page for the novella): Fragments of an Intended Life, Whispered to an Absent Lover.

The Front Moves Through

Over the last day (and night), a powerful storm forged new elements of the Midwestern landscape. My family’s home emerged unscathed, but the wind was awe-inspiring: a raw, sustained assault.

Yesterday morning, while I was upstairs writing, a branch snapped off the locust tree and struck the window, near my desk. The wind held it there, pressed to the glass, for more than a minute until the gust abated and the branch dropped to the twig-littered grass two stories below.

This morning appears gentler but reserves chaotic intent. The dank air is unnervingly dense; the sky: an eerie blend of rust and grey.

Birds are colliding with our windows at a startling rate. Are they simply blown off course by the wind? Or so disoriented by the rigors of mating season that they dive headfirst into their own reflection, entranced by themselves in another’s guise?

This storm – literally and allegorically – reminds me of another one that passed last year, while I was staying in Toronto with a man I loved; that night became the basis of a couple chapters in Fragments, the novella I’m writing…

(I may post those chapters soon…)

Thoughts on Artistic Inspiration -- and Hunger -- and Advocacy

I am writing a series of articles about the sources of my inspiration: the people and companies that have shaped my artistic vision.

I have a rather eclectic aesthetic... so writing about inspirations is an inherently interdisciplinary task. I intend to touch upon contemporary dance, interdisciplinary text/image collaborations, performance art, writing, and film. Geographically, I intended to focus on two of the cities where I recently lived and worked: Toronto and New York. (Occasionally, I will venture outside of these geographic boundaries -- especially when writing about film, which is a migratory art.) For the most part, I'll omit high-profile influences who have well-established funding structures; I'm more interested in writing about early- and mid-career artists: people whose work I have seen live (not just in photographs or archival videos), and many of whom I have been fortunate to work with in some capacity.

~ * ~

I feel it's important for me to articulate what inspires me -- and then distill that inspiration -- to see if I can apply my passion for the arts to another field -- perhaps one that will place me above the poverty line (for the first time in my adult life). I am thinking seriously about graduate school in 2008, and there are several fields that interest me; I think writing may clarify my choice.

But I also have a pragmatic motive, and I want to make it quite overt. I want to celebrate gifted artists who -- despite pathetic underfunding -- manage to create inspiring work. While I lack the financial resources to be a "patron," my voice is unfettered; I hope (perhaps naively?) that my advocacy might increase awareness of their work. And even if the impact is negligible, it is still an impact. And if someone reads about a choreographer in my blog and then supports her/him by attending a performance (or slipping a small donation into an envelope for any of the artists who so desperately need the support) then my words will help a hungry dancer afford to eat.

~ * ~

I'll begin with a post about Susanna Hood, a very talented Toronto dancer/choreographer.

(Posts about other artists will gradually follow, over several weeks.)