What to do if you fall through

I don't actually like laws, since they are applied inconsistently, usually in order to control and disenfranchise communities of color and poor people and queers. But if I thought laws were more useful than violent, I would be tempted to say things like, "Can we outlaw February already?"

Seriously, why do I live in New England right now? I feel overwhelmed by my everyday responsibilities, I'm questioning all my life choices, I can't handle being around people. All because the world is buried in snow and I forgot what green looks like.

17 Words About Crossing a (Metaphorical) Frozen Pond

listening for the moment the ice starts to crack
send word of what's on the other side

This video is the very literal response when I tell a friend of the metaphorical frozen pond. Except, to my delight, it beautifully extends my metaphor:

1. Get your breath back. Seriously, just breathe for a couple of minutes.
2. Go back out the way you came in. The last ice you stood on can hold you.
3. Kick like hell and pull yourself out.
4. Roll away from the hole, then crawl. Stand only when you're sure it's solid.
5. If you see someone else fall through, stay back. Talk them through it. Throw them something to grab onto.

Seven Days of Catsmas

For various reasons, including the high cost of airfare and the high stress related to certain family members, I stayed in the relative vicinity of my New England home for the late-December holiday season this year. While it is unusual for me not to spend Christmas with my family of origin, it is not unprecedented. A few years ago, I visited a friend in Austin, TX, and spent my vacation drinking whiskey and watching peacocks wander around a park. But usually I am with one of my parents and at least a couple of siblings and some kind of brightly lit tree, etc.

This year I decided that rather than just sit around my house alone during my time off work I would make myself useful, so I asked around to see if anyone in the area needed house or pet sitting and if I could live in their house like it was my vacation home. It just seemed like a good way to take care of myself and also my friends and also their animal friends. And I got so many responses! In the end, I booked myself at four places with the intention of riding throughout the land, spreading joy and petting cats all along Rte. 5 or I-91 or whatever.

As I write this, I'm in the middle of Catsmas Tour 2014, in a rural VT schoolhouse with a wood stove and two furry friends chasing each other around. You have left me candy, eggnog, play-doh, vets' phone numbers, and more. I have scooped poop. I have listened to your Wu-Tang tapes. And I have written you a song. Good luck trying to sing it.

On the 7th day of Catsmas, you all gave to Cat Santa:
7 furry felines
6 Goose Island Festivity Ales (okay I got those myself)
5 logs a-burning
4 wifi passwords
3 hours waiting (for takeout from the Chinese restaurant on Christmas Eve)
2 cool keychains
and a fish on top of a fridge.

Also, this happened:

If Santa Claus (1959) has taught me anything, it's that visiting homes at Christmastime
means occasionally getting in prank fights with gay, joker-pants Satan.

Quiet...Too Quiet

This post has been generously donated to our friend-blog City Mouse Country and can be found there. You should totally go read it.

Robert Frost, Re-revisited Again Some More

This year, I attended the Royal Frog Ballet's annual Surrealist Cabaret and Pumpkin Walk. I went for the first time last year, and I thought it was lovely, but I also had a bad attitude that evening and tried to blame the event. Like, I decided it was ableist that attendees had to walk all over the farm from one performance space to the next, and all the performers appeared to be able bodied, young, and attractive, and that gave me some kind of self-righteous angst about the whole thing. Still, it was beautiful, and I appreciated how it ritualized and made meaning out of the season changing, the darkness growing, the earth shutting down.

So, I went again this year because some friends had an extra ticket. Actually, because I had previously ranted about my discomfort with last year's experience, the invitation was, "I think we have an extra ticket for the inaccessible white supremacy performance tomorrow night if you wanna come." Winky face totally implied. Maybe knowing I was in company that could hear and tolerate--if not share--my cynicism allowed me to relax a little, and I had a decent time, even though tall people in audiences need to be more aware of when they're blocking folks, I'm just saying.

Anyway, each year's performance has a theme, and this year's was "crossroads," which felt meaningful to me personally, and they printed Frost's "The Road Not Taken" in the program. This is a poem that has inspired plenty of rants from me, too, since people seem to remember only the last three lines and miss every shred of its irony by a mile. The same friend who sent me the snarky invitation to the Surrealist Cabaret distilled Frost's poem as follows, and I approve 100% of this interpretation and hope to live my life every day according to its wisdom.

two roads diverge in the woods.
wah wah wah. just fucking pick one.
it's gonna keep happening.

(Readers will remember from this instructive post that authentic haiku don't need to have 17 syllables and honestly I have not been writing authentic haiku at all this whole time, so don't worry about counting anything up there.)

Crossroads is also a 1986 film in which Ralph Macchio sells his soul to the devil to learn
blues guitar from an old black man so he can shred better than this other white boy.

Knock, knock. Who's there? Broken hearts.

It is surreal to be doing this again, so soon after the last time. It's not fair to me, and it's super unfair to those who were closer than I was to either or both of them.

I just want someone to tell me all her favorite jokes, because I never was any good at remembering jokes. And I want someone to hug me just a little too hard. And I always want to remember the sound of her voice the way I can right now.

She was the star of this magical adventure, which I think characterizes the kind of excitement and wonder and joy that seemed to constantly flow from and around her.

I started to write a song today, thinking about the people who leave us and go somewhere we can't follow. This is some of it.

Poem from a Song About Too Much Loss
for M.D.

Don't know where they go.
Can't be there, so I'll be here,
Picturing your face. 

In particular, this face right here.

RIP Jimmy Crochet

Last night I attended a candlelight vigil for a beautiful person who passed away Saturday. Way, way too soon. We weren't super close, but I was crazy about him anyway. Everybody was, it seems.

I gave him a crochet lesson once. At first he was frustrated with the awkward, new feeling of the hook and yarn in his fingers. I invited him to think about other skills he had mastered--drawing and skateboarding--and how long it took his body to memorize those movements, and to have patience with himself.

As he practiced the chain stitch, we made up an elaborate history and etymology of crochet. He also told me about a high school girlfriend who had tried to teach him. It didn't work out (the relationship or the lesson), and he was determined to learn it now to spite her. I think he was mostly kidding.

Before long, he was on his second row of fairly even single-crochet stitches, so pleased with himself he didn't notice the time. He jumped up suddenly when he realized he was late for an open mic a friend of his was playing at.

Today I just want to be home crocheting mustaches in his memory.

Haiku for A.F.

You learned the chain stitch,
Which was invented in France
By Jimmy Crochet.

This looks a lot like the mustache he sometimes wore.

Sons of Death

Last night I had the extreme good fortune to see a great Vermont band with a very cool history. Rough Francis is three brothers from Burlington who got together initially to cover Bad Brains. Somewhere along the way, they discovered their father's band, formed in Detroit in the 70s with his two brothers, called Death. Rough Frances started covering them, and then writing and recording original music, with their first album coming out a year ago (which you could maybe get from Riot House if not your local record store).

All this I learned from my current mystery bandmate earlier this week (more "mystery band" here). I am now even more excited to watch A Band Called Death, which has been collecting dust in my Netflix queue.

Haiku for Intergenerational Afropunk

Rock is in their blood
From Detroit to Burlington
Long live Death and Sons

At SXSW. Photo by Greg Beets.

Earth, Wind, and Fire (and Ice)

Last night, a friend was talking about winter and how it's been so freaking hard. They were explaining how it's particularly bleak for certain signs, like fire signs ("Help, it's cold!") and even water signs ("Help, I'm stuck!").

Leaving on foot, I was struck by the feeling of my relatively thin-soled motorcycle boots (compared to my snow boots, which I've lived in for months) on bare pavement. I thought about my own earth sign and how I might be adapted or not to moving on frozen ground buried beneath ice and snow. I'm looking forward to connecting to my source again.

Haiku for an Earth Sign

Walking on water
'Til the ice melts, now I feel
Ground under my feet.

It's too damn warm out.

Last night, after a rock show in a small venue full of stinky young people, a friend brought a bubble machine into the space and pointed it out the window. We scrambled down the stairs and into the alley to chase the frozen bubbles.

The cold made them more durable, not solid but gummy. We could catch them without popping them, and they would cave in but not disintegrate. After a while, they started collecting on the pavement, sticking to each other and rolling down the street in clumps of bubble-tumbleweeds.

We screamed with laughter and staggered around the alley like sugared-up toddlers. And wished it were even colder so we could see what the bubbles would do.

Seems like that's the value of magic, even the silly type of magic that makes soap bubbles into something strange and wondrous: that we are willing and even glad to give up what's comfortable (relative warmth at 20 degrees F) in exchange for possibility.

Haiku for Barely Frozen Bubbles

I stayed out too late
Breathing body odor and
Chasing bumbleweeds

Climb Every Mountain (Even If You Hate It)

My grandpa had a saying: "I like banging my head against the wall because it feels so good when I stop." I always took it as a joke. Because you know what feels better than that? Not hitting your head in the first place.

Last weekend, some friends were climbing a mountain under the "full moon"* following several successive snowstorms. It's considered a relatively easy hike without snow, maybe 2 miles of switchbacks and nothing really steep. So I went along (I really like the moon).

But it was late, and overcast, and my companions' legs were about twice as long as mine, and the dog kept stepping on my snowshoes and knocking me over. Overall, it was kind of an ordeal.

At the top, someone shared their beverage with the rest of us, who had not thought to bring anything to drink. I was sweaty and out of breath, and that first sip tasted like sweet, delicious heaven.

That seemed to be the general reaction to this quenching of thirst, and a conversation arose about the merits of deprivation. Someone told a story about some guy who had been without food in the wilderness for days and when he arrived at his food supply, a chocolate bar made him weep with joy.

In the days that followed, I saw that mountain in the distance and thought about how nice it was to be doing whatever I was doing then instead of stumbling uphill in snow, silently cursing my fate. I still have not decided whether I'm glad I went, or whether I believe that hardship can be gratifying enough to seek it out on purpose. Life is hard enough. Or is it that, for some, it's not hard enough?

Haiku for a Difficult Climb

Sure, this sucks now, but
What is the point of comfort
If that's all you've known?

*It was two days after the full moon, but don't tell that to a certain hike organizer who didn't believe me.

Chip off the old block?

One of Us

Before coming to this tiny New England town, I couldn't have guessed how welcoming and restorative it would be after more than a decade in major cities. As much as I can claim any geographic place of origin, it was rural and suburban Minnesota, which I experienced as oppressive and depressing. Cities provided the noise, distraction, and adrenaline I needed to feel safe and alive. But I still felt isolated, in love with something I was not a part of.

Friday night, after a screening of Rock-n-Roll High School, I helped lead a Ramones sing-a-long in a church-turned-theater, the pews filled with friends and assorted weirdos belting out "Sheena Is a Punk Rocker" at top volume. It was one moment of many over the last two years that have felt like my life come full-circle. You don't even know in how many ways.

I might grow restless here and find my way to broader horizons, but in a world where connection and community have been so hard to come by, I'm content for now to just soak up the love and wear a mullet wig at every opportunity.

Haiku for February 7, 2014

In a former church
I finally feel at home
Gabba gabba hey

Circa 2002, Chicago. Foreshadowing.

Rock/Stars

Last night I slept on the day bed (in case my mattress is what makes my shoulders hurt all the time), which is near a large window with a view of the town I live in, and the mountain that stands above it, and the sky above that. And in those long, lonely minutes before falling asleep, I had the following thought.

Haiku for February 3, 2014

Someday I will stop
Thinking about my damn self
And dream about stars.

36 Chambers of Woo

Probably, the less said about this, the better.

Haiku for My Nonexistent Infection

Um, I'm pissing blood?
"Try some homeopathy."*
I. Am. Pissing. Blood.**

Oh, Vermont medical care.

*This line could have also read, "Maybe it's your period" or "Bet it's the testosterone."
**The bleeding has stopped, so please do not be (as) alarmed.

I love rock-n-roll. And Halloween.

See my previous post wherein I bemoan the struggles we underwent in coming up with the Ultimate Cover Band for Halloween. See below for how entirely we nailed it. 

If you're in my town tonight, I fully expect to see you at the show.

Haiku for My Halloween Cover Band

Do you wanna touch?

Do you wanna touch me there?

Yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah.

(Not pictured: my band mate, also Joan Jett.)

Homo in Noho, or, On Second Thought, Let's Not Do the Time Warp Again

Despite protests that it is a horrible place and wry laughter in response to my invitations to join me, I went to a certain gay bar in a certain New England college town last night for a Halloween party. There were no fewer than three unicorns, two Catwomen, six Power Puff Girls, and two Rockys from RHPS.

My favorite costume was Carrie White as interpreted by a cute guy wearing just a pair of trunks, a tiara, a corsage, and head-to-toe fake blood. He was accompanied by a woman dressed in black carrying a Bible and a knife. They didn't win anything. Pfff.

The cop who pulled me over on my way home for having a tail light out sounded incredulous that I would drive 45 minutes each way to attend such an event. I wanted to tell him, "I'm from the Midwest. I've gone farther for much less."

Haiku for a Small-Town Gay Bar

Flannel shirts and beards
Back it up and drop it down
Massachusetts queers

Hitch yer wagon to a dyin' star

Haiku for Freezing Temperatures in This Week's Forecast

Only trouble is,
When your soul's like autumn leaves,
Be prepared to die.

Oh, the humanity.

Falling on my head like a new emotion

Because it seems I can't stop thinking and writing about how mind-blowingly sexy and tender autumn is:

Haiku for October 16, 2013

Sleeping in the breeze
Last night the leaves fell so hard
I thought it was rain

O My Sharp, Trifoliate Heart

Sure, I could have arranged the following lines into a more traditional haiku, but this is the way the phrase sprung, fully formed, into my head yesterday as I walked past this tree, on my block, under foggy, gray skies. Only later did I realize it was 17 syllables long.

I never claimed to be a purist.

Haiku for October 7, 2013

F*cking neon pink-
orange maple tree, you are
what my soul looks like!

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility.

Almost a couple weeks ago, someone gave me (as in, "Hey what's this thing I just picked up off the ground? Here ya go!") a green, spiky orb on a short, thick stem. It was sharp enough to cause a delightfully tingly-ouchie sensation when I held it in my hand (after I had twirled the thing til the stem fell off).

I left this magical alien plant life on the dash of my car (like ya do), and over the course of several days, it dried and split open, revealing a shiny, dark brown nutshell with a light brown spot.

And it seems like a theme of this blog, and of my life (I guess there's some overlap there): transformation, a very solid, beautiful thing hidden inside a bizarre, prickly thing, which is also beautiful and thrilling. And sure, I could have researched any and discovered that it was a (SPOILER ALERT!) horse chestnut, but why take away the mystery?

Haiku for What the Last Two Weeks Gave Me

Do I like it more
When it's new, strange, and pointy
Or smooth, dark, and hard?

DEEZ NUTZ LOL

All in a day's werk.

Yesterday I was running a booth for Homo Promo at Future Fest. My job was to get carnival attendees to write suggestions for a monthly "random act of queerness." To further this aim, I decided I would need an outrageous outfit. (Slash I will take any opportunity to wear suspenders with no pants.)

So I was checking out my costume in my roommate's full-length mirror when my landlord knocked on the door. I bolted upstairs and grabbed my bathrobe, then came running back down to let him in. He was there to fix a door that was backward on its hinges or some shit.

While he was doing that, I went back up to put on more clothes, then I left for the tabling gig. As I was driving across town to pick up a banner, I realized what I must have looked like as I answered the door.

Haiku for My Random Act of Queerness

Bathrobe and bow tie.
No wonder he looked confused.
Poor Mr. Landlord.

I am not really comfortable showing the Internet the front of this outfit.