This week, a lot of information was passed down from the Universe. Sometimes your job is to sift, stir well, and respond. Sometimes your job is just to listen. This post is sort of a combination of both. (Which, by the way, is what I have decided a blog is. Mostly.) So, here are all the things I am trying to make sense of this week:
--J.D. Salinger died. This is a tragedy.
--People at the market wondered whether Salinger wrote anything else. If, say, there were stacks of manuscripts tucked away in safe deposit boxes. People wondered if there was nothing.
--I saw in the bookstore that Knopf has published a collection of Nabokov's note cards, called The Original of Laura, which would have turned into a novel, maybe, at some point, had he lived long enough to finish it. He wanted the notes to be burned, but his wife, as the story goes, "could not bear to destroy her husband’s last work." Could not bear to see her future royalties disappear, if you ask me. Or maybe that is harsh. But art is personal. And me, at least now, I wouldn't want any half-done art in the world after I have died.
--An unfinished Ralph Ellison novel has also been published, Three Days Before the Shooting. Juneteenth, which was published earlier, was culled from this same material.
--My friend Jane wonders, in this post, if writers "become better and better at considering [their] audience not purely out of generosity or thoughtfulness, but as a strategy for getting what [they] want?"
--But there is my dear Meg, in videos of old Circus Amok shows, which are hosted on the Hempispheric Institute's website, streaming, for all to see, enjoy, study, relive. Even though she died some years ago--there she is, real again, her movements and gestures, her stature, her economy.
--Is seeing Meg on video anything like the Nabokov note cards? Or the Ellison novel? Or Jane wondering if writer's get better at getting what they want as they become better writers? Because what does it mean that these novels are published after the writer, ostensibly, isn't in control of what he wants?
Help. I'm not sure what to make of it.
Showing posts with label AMOK. Show all posts
Showing posts with label AMOK. Show all posts
Friday, January 29, 2010
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Recalibrating
Saturday, for me, was one of those days when I don't have patience for anything. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with me--the customers were perfectly tolerable, the weather was bright and unseasonably warmish, the day went by without incident. But somewhere, my molecules were out of order, shifted perhaps. Uncertain. This feeling has continued through the days, and I've decided that the only way to shake it is to clean out the closets. Literally. Or maybe figuratively. Both?
Jennifer said today on the phone, "That sounds awful, reliving every past moment with every old piece of clothing." But I feel the opposite. It frees me. I feel released from the promise to hold that memory forever. I feel released from the need to carry around the object that contains the history. The old, the unwanted, the style-less--notice that I didn't say unfashionable, and note the difference--will go either to the Salvation Army, or to the Greenmarket's textile recycling program.
The Get-Rid-Ofs:
--The Tommy Hilfiger plaid button-down that I wore every other day when Meg and I went to London. I wore it underneath the hand-altered sweater that Becky made for me when she was at RISD, which I am keeping.
--The woven white Oxford that I wore to Meg's memorial service.
--The Club Monaco striped thing which I wore only once, to a few compliments, I think, but which now strikes me as unlovable.
--The handmade, very expensive shirt that I wore to Amanda's wedding dinner. It was always too big for me, and looked a bit sloppy, but back then I didn't know better.
--Shorts, shorts and shorts.
The Keeps:
--The REI anorak that I wore every day in Iceland. It was lost for a few years, living inside an old coat that I never wear--like Jack Twist's shirt was folded inside Ennis Del Mar's. It might find a new life.
--The English Laundry shirt from a few years ago, before they went all too-too. Anybody have solutions to a little yellow around the collar? Bodies betray us, there, I said it.
--The train conductor's cap which was handed down to NYU by the costume department of the musical "The Capeman." Andrea thought I should have it, and I still do.
The Uncertains:
--The fabulous vintage Wrangler shirt bought from eBay for only $5.00, but which I can barely fit into now. Create a new, thinner you? Or accept the you that is now?
--The insane Edwardian overcoat, which fits me beautifully, but, like, can I work it?
--Some AMOK costumes that I've worn over the years. They are flawless, singular pieces. But do I need one more bit of frippery?
Next week, the chest of drawers.....
Jennifer said today on the phone, "That sounds awful, reliving every past moment with every old piece of clothing." But I feel the opposite. It frees me. I feel released from the promise to hold that memory forever. I feel released from the need to carry around the object that contains the history. The old, the unwanted, the style-less--notice that I didn't say unfashionable, and note the difference--will go either to the Salvation Army, or to the Greenmarket's textile recycling program.
The Get-Rid-Ofs:
--The Tommy Hilfiger plaid button-down that I wore every other day when Meg and I went to London. I wore it underneath the hand-altered sweater that Becky made for me when she was at RISD, which I am keeping.
--The woven white Oxford that I wore to Meg's memorial service.
--The Club Monaco striped thing which I wore only once, to a few compliments, I think, but which now strikes me as unlovable.
--The handmade, very expensive shirt that I wore to Amanda's wedding dinner. It was always too big for me, and looked a bit sloppy, but back then I didn't know better.
--Shorts, shorts and shorts.
The Keeps:
--The REI anorak that I wore every day in Iceland. It was lost for a few years, living inside an old coat that I never wear--like Jack Twist's shirt was folded inside Ennis Del Mar's. It might find a new life.
--The English Laundry shirt from a few years ago, before they went all too-too. Anybody have solutions to a little yellow around the collar? Bodies betray us, there, I said it.
--The train conductor's cap which was handed down to NYU by the costume department of the musical "The Capeman." Andrea thought I should have it, and I still do.
The Uncertains:
--The fabulous vintage Wrangler shirt bought from eBay for only $5.00, but which I can barely fit into now. Create a new, thinner you? Or accept the you that is now?
--The insane Edwardian overcoat, which fits me beautifully, but, like, can I work it?
--Some AMOK costumes that I've worn over the years. They are flawless, singular pieces. But do I need one more bit of frippery?
Next week, the chest of drawers.....
Sunday, August 30, 2009
What's Happening Now
I'm in Brooklyn, sitting on the couch with Kip's cats, who are doing that typical cat thing: putting all their energy into ignoring you. Kip is still in the bed, snoring a bit, sometimes sounding like he's drowning--not a lovely sound, but I'm used to it, and that's comforting, in some way. I'm eating a bowl of cereal and trying to decide if I should watch the new episode of Project Runway, or the Real Housewives of Atlanta--this TiVo is a gay fantasia.
The weather is turning. Or I should say, the seasons are. Fall is my favorite time in New York, and I always look forward to the evenings spent walking around the city, feeling a bit chilly, the air filling your chest. And Fall has the best clothes--yay for looking cute again!
Do you know Gilt.com? My friend Peter turned me on to it. It's designer labels for practically pennies, and I am addicted to it. I don't really buy much--I have bought one shirt and one pair of shoes--but every day at noon, some new crop of clothes goes up and people rush to see how they can spend their money. This week, there was an Alexander McQueen western-style shirt with this really interesting piping and a yoke that looked a bit like the squiggly bracket. It was $300 on Gilt, retailing for $1000. I didn't buy it. Sometimes its a good thing that I'm poor.
Today we're meeting some friends for brunch--I officially hate brunch, refusing to pay $20 to eat an egg or two and lukewarm side dishes that I could prepare better myself at home--but I'm learning how to order better, and I like to see my friends. This evening, there's a benefit party/concert for Circus Amok, starring a cavalcade of singing and honking wonders. I look forward to seeing everyone.
The weather is turning. Or I should say, the seasons are. Fall is my favorite time in New York, and I always look forward to the evenings spent walking around the city, feeling a bit chilly, the air filling your chest. And Fall has the best clothes--yay for looking cute again!
Do you know Gilt.com? My friend Peter turned me on to it. It's designer labels for practically pennies, and I am addicted to it. I don't really buy much--I have bought one shirt and one pair of shoes--but every day at noon, some new crop of clothes goes up and people rush to see how they can spend their money. This week, there was an Alexander McQueen western-style shirt with this really interesting piping and a yoke that looked a bit like the squiggly bracket. It was $300 on Gilt, retailing for $1000. I didn't buy it. Sometimes its a good thing that I'm poor.
Today we're meeting some friends for brunch--I officially hate brunch, refusing to pay $20 to eat an egg or two and lukewarm side dishes that I could prepare better myself at home--but I'm learning how to order better, and I like to see my friends. This evening, there's a benefit party/concert for Circus Amok, starring a cavalcade of singing and honking wonders. I look forward to seeing everyone.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Vestal, Cracked Ice, & Other Details
First: "Swine Flu Spreading" is the leading headline on the newspaper that the man next to me is reading, coming home from a reading/signing by Vestal McIntyre at McNally Jackson books, on Prince Street--one of the world's great writers, at one of the city's great indie book stores. The audience is mostly friends, other writers, gay guys from around, a certain kind of community that feels right, even a regular maple syrup customer that I introduce myself to, officially, even though I've known him (in a certain limited context) for the last few years. He recognizes me, but doesn't know from where, and I explain. Vestal is fabulous; he is disarming and casual, and also willing to go there with it. The room laughs, cheers, quiets, listens. Everyone lines up for his signature. I get Kip to take a picture of us together. The book is great--what I've read of it on the train ride home, only a few pages. I'm going to take this one slowly, carrying it around a while, reminding me of itself in my bag, on my bedside, in my brain.
Then: The show is going well--more than well, great--big houses, small houses, it doesn't really feel any different. The circus plays this way--a few thousand people at some parks, then 25 people at others. It doesn't change your performance, but it does change them. More is better only because they feel more together, they function as a singular unit more cohesively. Smaller audiences are usually more shy, less fluttery, somewhat serious. This is part of the fun, actually. You don't really see people in Prospect Park, or Tompkins Square. But East New York, or Marcus Garvey, when you can really hear their individual squeals and squawks--that's pretty fucking fantastic.
A couple of reviews have been posted--only one of them what you might call a "rave." The first was so utterly off the mark, and so (I hope) unconsciously homophobic and classist that it made me think that perhaps the reviewer really enjoyed the show, despite himself, but in the end, felt outside of it, like he did not belong, and that colored everything. Perhaps understandibly. The next reviewer that came seemed to simply enjoy the show a lot more, really got what we're trying to do up there, but still said it lacked a something. I'm interested in reviews only in that they say a lot about the reviewer. And, also, how they can--if you do it right--let them become a point of dialogue between yourself and the theater you've created. You get to think about things differently, and ask yourself questions, think about images, essentially hear the show differently.
Next idea: There was a small item in the New Yorker about a woman who called the police because, she said, someone had broken into her house and vomited on her stove. The police reported that it was kitchen grease. I'm stealing this idea for my new novel--but turning it around slightly, like writers always do. I've been feeling so grateful lately, I'm trying to funnel that into the work--hoping that it infects the pages in some virulent way that it actually brushes off onto the readers fingers. I think about these kinds of things when I write--the physical nature of writing is so ephemeral, the nature of "having readers" is so obtuse, so outside of you, that I try to imagine a more direct link.
Finally: This whole Swine Flu thing feeling so strangely silly to me, the hyperspeed with which the news latched onto it, the hysteria--and yet people are dying. Aren't they? And reading my friend's book, seeing how he's poured himself out, more grown up than his first book of stories, but still so totally him. And being reminded, in such a fantastic way, how good theater feels, being a part of something hilarious, campy, draggy, fun, and loose.
I want all this to circle back around, be more cohesive. All these ideas feel like they have something to do with each other--performing, Swine Flu, vomit, audiences, books and readers. I don't know exactly what it is, but something is saying to me It doesn't have to be so difficult.
Then: The show is going well--more than well, great--big houses, small houses, it doesn't really feel any different. The circus plays this way--a few thousand people at some parks, then 25 people at others. It doesn't change your performance, but it does change them. More is better only because they feel more together, they function as a singular unit more cohesively. Smaller audiences are usually more shy, less fluttery, somewhat serious. This is part of the fun, actually. You don't really see people in Prospect Park, or Tompkins Square. But East New York, or Marcus Garvey, when you can really hear their individual squeals and squawks--that's pretty fucking fantastic.
A couple of reviews have been posted--only one of them what you might call a "rave." The first was so utterly off the mark, and so (I hope) unconsciously homophobic and classist that it made me think that perhaps the reviewer really enjoyed the show, despite himself, but in the end, felt outside of it, like he did not belong, and that colored everything. Perhaps understandibly. The next reviewer that came seemed to simply enjoy the show a lot more, really got what we're trying to do up there, but still said it lacked a something. I'm interested in reviews only in that they say a lot about the reviewer. And, also, how they can--if you do it right--let them become a point of dialogue between yourself and the theater you've created. You get to think about things differently, and ask yourself questions, think about images, essentially hear the show differently.
Next idea: There was a small item in the New Yorker about a woman who called the police because, she said, someone had broken into her house and vomited on her stove. The police reported that it was kitchen grease. I'm stealing this idea for my new novel--but turning it around slightly, like writers always do. I've been feeling so grateful lately, I'm trying to funnel that into the work--hoping that it infects the pages in some virulent way that it actually brushes off onto the readers fingers. I think about these kinds of things when I write--the physical nature of writing is so ephemeral, the nature of "having readers" is so obtuse, so outside of you, that I try to imagine a more direct link.
Finally: This whole Swine Flu thing feeling so strangely silly to me, the hyperspeed with which the news latched onto it, the hysteria--and yet people are dying. Aren't they? And reading my friend's book, seeing how he's poured himself out, more grown up than his first book of stories, but still so totally him. And being reminded, in such a fantastic way, how good theater feels, being a part of something hilarious, campy, draggy, fun, and loose.
I want all this to circle back around, be more cohesive. All these ideas feel like they have something to do with each other--performing, Swine Flu, vomit, audiences, books and readers. I don't know exactly what it is, but something is saying to me It doesn't have to be so difficult.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Cracked Ice at PS122
I'm seen, briefly, in this brilliant new play by the infamous, adored, and heroic Jennifer Miller. Be there, or be there.
The world premiere of:
CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS TO REGULAR PERFORMANCES:
Use code "FF12" to buy single tickets for only $12
Use code "FF241" to buy two or more tickets for only $10 each!!!
(2 for $20, 5 for $50, and so on.)
TICKETS FOR BENEFIT PERFORMANCE:
Benefit performance tickets are ONLY AVAILABLE at the AMOK website. Tickets are $50, $75 or $100 and include a post-show reception with the cast and creative team, as well as exclusive AMOK schwag!
The world premiere of:
"CRACKED ICE
or THE JEWELS OF THE FORBIDDEN SKATES!"
A new play by Jennifer Miller
with additional text by Deb Margolin
In this glittering theatrical extravaganza, the infamous juggling duo, The Liberty Sisters, have been fleeced by an evil ponzi schemer. Sybil and Statua Liberty embark on a mad-cap tour of revenge...but they aren't the only ones after the greedy crook. Mistaken identities, missed opportunities, star crossed lovers and variety hall numbers all combine to bring East Village high camp back home. It's tragedy, it's farce, it's mystery, it's mayhem...it's "CRACKED ICE or JEWELS OF THE FORBIDDEN SKATES!!"
April 25-May 10
Performance Space 122 -- First Avenue and 9th Street, NYC
Performance Space 122 -- First Avenue and 9th Street, NYC
Wed-Sun at 8pm
With additional late show, Sat, May 9 at 11pm.
Special performance to benefit Circus AMOK! on Sunday, May 3 at 8pm.
CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS TO REGULAR PERFORMANCES:
Use code "FF12" to buy single tickets for only $12
Use code "FF241" to buy two or more tickets for only $10 each!!!
(2 for $20, 5 for $50, and so on.)
TICKETS FOR BENEFIT PERFORMANCE:
Benefit performance tickets are ONLY AVAILABLE at the AMOK website. Tickets are $50, $75 or $100 and include a post-show reception with the cast and creative team, as well as exclusive AMOK schwag!
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
What I Learned in 2008
My parents were in New York this year for my 30th birthday. After two AMOK shows in Harlem we walked probably two miles along 125th Street from Madison Avenue all the way over to Broadway. It could have been a few blocks past Broadway. It was dark, there were hundreds of people out. I was cranky, hungry and dirty with glitter and circus grime. We ended up, about 15 of us, at a Cuban diner, late-ish, practically closing the place. Over dinner, Jennifer asked Jenny and I to talk about what plans, what resolutions, we might have for the coming year--it's Jenny's birthday too on 9/21; I could not ask for a more inspiring birthday twin.
I wasn't prepared to talk extemporaneously about my plans. I didn't have any. At that point, about 8 weeks into full-speed circus mode, I barely had time to plan a good breakfast, never mind reflect on the past year and the one ahead--and turning 30--this thing that everyone was asking me about. Jenny spoke eloquently about having attended a wedding and finding herself out of place, about being reminded of who you are, who you are not. We all nodded our heads; I felt humbled by the exactness, the clarity of her story. When it was my turn, I went on a few minutes about trying to live in the moment--whatever that means--and I wasn't exactly happy with the way it all came out. I knew that I was feeling so many other things, having so many other important, meaningful realizations, but that I felt unable to articulate the details at that time.
It's been a few months, and I think I've figured it out.
At Thanksgiving this year, we were asked to write down something we were thankful for on a strip of paper, and put it in a bowl. Everyone's papers were passed around, one thankful-for-thing was pulled out, read aloud anonymously, and the bowl was passed along. Here is what I wrote: "I am thankful for the realization that I am the only one who should define my career."
Somewhere along the way, 2008 taught me that what I want from the world, what I want from my life, is really nothing more than community. In my early 20s, I felt a pressure, partly from myself, partly from the outside world, to become a certain kind of writer. The benchmarks for this kind of writer are, I thought: a story about you in the New York Times Magazine, perhaps a scathing review, a glowing review, a mention that you are "one to watch." A member of the 20 under 20. Or the 30 under 30. (Is there a 40 under 40? Probably not.) I thought that this was the kind of writer I needed to be, even wanted to be. I picked up random books at the Barnes & Noble, read a few pages--clearly I was more "talented" than these writers. Clearly, I had more skills with language and more interest in making art than this schlocky waste of trees. Right?
Okay, sort of. Maybe.
Something has shifted in me. Reviews would be nice. Press would be nice. Magazine covers would be a fun experience. (But do writers end up magazine covers anyway? Are reviews actually nice?) I realized somewhere that the only thing conventional publishing had to offer me is money. Money and perhaps a certain trajectory--and, of course, none of it is guaranteed. My interest in the "book" world has waned. I'm less interested in doing the work that it takes to get published. I'm less interested in doing any kind of work that's not fulfilling. And that kind of work is not fulfilling.
What is fulfilling: Writing. Sitting at home, alone with the words and the screen and the voices in my head. Sharing my work with the artists that make up my community. My circus community, my friends, my peers, other artists whose work I have learned from, explored, been slayed by. Should a book deal come sliding under my door tomorrow morning, you bet I'm signing it. But the enchantment of publishing has worn off for me. The idea that things come from it has worn off. Yes, they do--many things can come from it.
But then, what else is fulfilling: The work I've delved into in the last two or three years. Bringing vital, community-building theater, all for free, with queer visibility, to the people of New York City. Sharing in the amazing, taste-bud-exploding bounty of the earth with the joyful, the ornery, the elderly, the children, the people of all cultures and races, with farmers and farmer's daughters. To be squeezed into shape by the seasons, watching flakes drop out of the sky one at a time until the branches are covered and the world is quiet and white. To watch children, third graders, fifth grades, talk about a painting that they've never seen before, something complex and wonderful, and say to the teacher "I feel like I love this picture because it has in it everything that I feel every day."
The other idea here, the one that has just occurred to me is this: I am grateful. My writing has slowed--mostly due to lack of bandwidth, and partly due to the current project, which is long, extremely difficult, and often (I think) beyond my creative powers, as if my eyes were bigger than my stomach. None of this means that I am not writing, or won't write, or have given it up. It only means that I find myself so honored and grateful and empowered by the work that I am doing, that the writing sometimes too introspective, too contained, too idiosyncratic. The only times I am pulled toward it, are the times that I feel the need to hold myself closer, to hide the flame from the wind. As it were. Those moments still happen, of course. (One is happening now!)
As I write this, I am flying north from Charlotte to New York City, on my way home from being in Tennessee for a few days, visiting family, feeling bored and loved, feeling happy and fed. I wrote this in an email on the flight down -- and it sums up how I'm feeling now, too:
Happy 2009!
I wasn't prepared to talk extemporaneously about my plans. I didn't have any. At that point, about 8 weeks into full-speed circus mode, I barely had time to plan a good breakfast, never mind reflect on the past year and the one ahead--and turning 30--this thing that everyone was asking me about. Jenny spoke eloquently about having attended a wedding and finding herself out of place, about being reminded of who you are, who you are not. We all nodded our heads; I felt humbled by the exactness, the clarity of her story. When it was my turn, I went on a few minutes about trying to live in the moment--whatever that means--and I wasn't exactly happy with the way it all came out. I knew that I was feeling so many other things, having so many other important, meaningful realizations, but that I felt unable to articulate the details at that time.
It's been a few months, and I think I've figured it out.
At Thanksgiving this year, we were asked to write down something we were thankful for on a strip of paper, and put it in a bowl. Everyone's papers were passed around, one thankful-for-thing was pulled out, read aloud anonymously, and the bowl was passed along. Here is what I wrote: "I am thankful for the realization that I am the only one who should define my career."
Somewhere along the way, 2008 taught me that what I want from the world, what I want from my life, is really nothing more than community. In my early 20s, I felt a pressure, partly from myself, partly from the outside world, to become a certain kind of writer. The benchmarks for this kind of writer are, I thought: a story about you in the New York Times Magazine, perhaps a scathing review, a glowing review, a mention that you are "one to watch." A member of the 20 under 20. Or the 30 under 30. (Is there a 40 under 40? Probably not.) I thought that this was the kind of writer I needed to be, even wanted to be. I picked up random books at the Barnes & Noble, read a few pages--clearly I was more "talented" than these writers. Clearly, I had more skills with language and more interest in making art than this schlocky waste of trees. Right?
Okay, sort of. Maybe.
Something has shifted in me. Reviews would be nice. Press would be nice. Magazine covers would be a fun experience. (But do writers end up magazine covers anyway? Are reviews actually nice?) I realized somewhere that the only thing conventional publishing had to offer me is money. Money and perhaps a certain trajectory--and, of course, none of it is guaranteed. My interest in the "book" world has waned. I'm less interested in doing the work that it takes to get published. I'm less interested in doing any kind of work that's not fulfilling. And that kind of work is not fulfilling.
What is fulfilling: Writing. Sitting at home, alone with the words and the screen and the voices in my head. Sharing my work with the artists that make up my community. My circus community, my friends, my peers, other artists whose work I have learned from, explored, been slayed by. Should a book deal come sliding under my door tomorrow morning, you bet I'm signing it. But the enchantment of publishing has worn off for me. The idea that things come from it has worn off. Yes, they do--many things can come from it.
But then, what else is fulfilling: The work I've delved into in the last two or three years. Bringing vital, community-building theater, all for free, with queer visibility, to the people of New York City. Sharing in the amazing, taste-bud-exploding bounty of the earth with the joyful, the ornery, the elderly, the children, the people of all cultures and races, with farmers and farmer's daughters. To be squeezed into shape by the seasons, watching flakes drop out of the sky one at a time until the branches are covered and the world is quiet and white. To watch children, third graders, fifth grades, talk about a painting that they've never seen before, something complex and wonderful, and say to the teacher "I feel like I love this picture because it has in it everything that I feel every day."
The other idea here, the one that has just occurred to me is this: I am grateful. My writing has slowed--mostly due to lack of bandwidth, and partly due to the current project, which is long, extremely difficult, and often (I think) beyond my creative powers, as if my eyes were bigger than my stomach. None of this means that I am not writing, or won't write, or have given it up. It only means that I find myself so honored and grateful and empowered by the work that I am doing, that the writing sometimes too introspective, too contained, too idiosyncratic. The only times I am pulled toward it, are the times that I feel the need to hold myself closer, to hide the flame from the wind. As it were. Those moments still happen, of course. (One is happening now!)
As I write this, I am flying north from Charlotte to New York City, on my way home from being in Tennessee for a few days, visiting family, feeling bored and loved, feeling happy and fed. I wrote this in an email on the flight down -- and it sums up how I'm feeling now, too:
I wonder if people -- People with a capital P, the gyrating human mass -- are somehow bettered for having been offered this perspective. This morning, on CNN, I heard that at 8:00am there were already more than 1900 planes in the air above the United States. What sort of amazing release would that collective sigh create if all 20,000 or so people looked out their windows at the play of sunlight on the clouds? I wonder if we'd fall out of the sky. Or lift right on up through the layers into space itself. Beyond, toward the horizon, the sky fades from a darker blue into a thin strip of bright lightness. Beyond that is the ocean. I can't see it, but I trust that it's there.Another thing I am thinking of--people on the ground should write messages on rooftops to people in the air. "Hang in there." "Good Luck." "We Believe in You."
Happy 2009!
Friday, December 12, 2008
Excitement!
-Someone graffiti'd on a wall along 34th Street "United We Stank."
-We're going skiing in Maine for Kip's 45th Birthday!
-We're going to see Sandra Bernhard at Joe's Pub just after Xmas!!
-We're seeing the Radio City Christmas Spectacular with my two favorite lesbians!!!
-Exciting things are happening at the Circus!!!!
-I unstuck a lid for one of the ladies at the jam stand today at the market--and felt like a hero.
-Then I came home and removed a splinter from my finger--and felt totally self-sufficient.
-We're going skiing in Maine for Kip's 45th Birthday!
-We're going to see Sandra Bernhard at Joe's Pub just after Xmas!!
-We're seeing the Radio City Christmas Spectacular with my two favorite lesbians!!!
-Exciting things are happening at the Circus!!!!
-I unstuck a lid for one of the ladies at the jam stand today at the market--and felt like a hero.
-Then I came home and removed a splinter from my finger--and felt totally self-sufficient.
Wednesday, October 01, 2008
What Happened on the Train
A few things happened on the train Tuesday morning.
1) I started reading again.
A Book of Common Prayer is my favorite of Joan Didion's novels, and whenever I've been struggling with concentration, with having no interest in anything written, with the desire to disappear into the games on my iPod--which I have been doing for the last 6-8 weeks--I go back to this novel. Every time I read it, I find new things, or things I'd forgotten re-appear. Grace Strasser-Mendana, the narrator, is stronger this time for me than she's ever been before; perhaps foolishly, I always thought it was a novel about Charlotte Douglas. Perhaps this is what happens when you read a good novel--but I started wondering if Grace and I are any different. We, Grace and I, seem to view the world as an accumulation of evidence. I could be projecting this on Grace, as well. I still feel that it's true.
2) I reconsidered my notion of bandwidth.
The circus takes up all of my energy: emotional, physical, creative. It uses up all my patience. It uses up all my critical-thinking skills, my sense of aesthetics, my concentration, my ability to simply decide between the lemonade or the Coca-Cola. This is not the first time I've discovered this, but it seems that every year I am re-learning it anew, as if part of what drives me (us?) forward year after year is the ability to forget what happened last year. There must be some medical term for this, some psychological condition--I think it has to do with the drug making you forget the reasons you need it, or something--although this drug is a hugely-important, amazing part of my creative and social existence. Not damaging, just exhausting. Anyway, all these things are the facts of the situation, without interpretation. And most of me would rather leave this story at that. Because, for me, the facts are the interpretation. (Just like Grace in A Book of Common Prayer.)
The other part of this idea of running out of bandwidth, was that, feeling all these things that the circus makes you feel, (plus a huge sense of accomplishment and joy,) I thought again about this argument I'm always having in my head with Virginia Woolf. "A Room of One's Own vs. The Truth of Modern Life." Think of working mothers, I always say. Think of those refugees who write memoirs in crowded, foul-smelling camps covered in barbed wire. (Hers always felt a bit like the argument delivered from a place of leisure. But yesterday I began thinking that maybe she's right. Maybe I'm being a bit too too.) I've not written anything of any substantial merit in months because I just didn't have any room of my own. My brain was full, the bandwidth had expired. Okay, Virginia, you win this one. For now.
3) The writing came back.
Poof, like magic. The words aren't pouring out of my fingers yet, which is the real work, of course, but the sounds of my characters talking, the textures of their pants, the lengths of their dress hems, the leafy, worn ends of magazines stacked by the toilets--all that came back. Quietly, insistently, easily. As if the fog just blew away.
1) I started reading again.
A Book of Common Prayer is my favorite of Joan Didion's novels, and whenever I've been struggling with concentration, with having no interest in anything written, with the desire to disappear into the games on my iPod--which I have been doing for the last 6-8 weeks--I go back to this novel. Every time I read it, I find new things, or things I'd forgotten re-appear. Grace Strasser-Mendana, the narrator, is stronger this time for me than she's ever been before; perhaps foolishly, I always thought it was a novel about Charlotte Douglas. Perhaps this is what happens when you read a good novel--but I started wondering if Grace and I are any different. We, Grace and I, seem to view the world as an accumulation of evidence. I could be projecting this on Grace, as well. I still feel that it's true.
2) I reconsidered my notion of bandwidth.
The circus takes up all of my energy: emotional, physical, creative. It uses up all my patience. It uses up all my critical-thinking skills, my sense of aesthetics, my concentration, my ability to simply decide between the lemonade or the Coca-Cola. This is not the first time I've discovered this, but it seems that every year I am re-learning it anew, as if part of what drives me (us?) forward year after year is the ability to forget what happened last year. There must be some medical term for this, some psychological condition--I think it has to do with the drug making you forget the reasons you need it, or something--although this drug is a hugely-important, amazing part of my creative and social existence. Not damaging, just exhausting. Anyway, all these things are the facts of the situation, without interpretation. And most of me would rather leave this story at that. Because, for me, the facts are the interpretation. (Just like Grace in A Book of Common Prayer.)
The other part of this idea of running out of bandwidth, was that, feeling all these things that the circus makes you feel, (plus a huge sense of accomplishment and joy,) I thought again about this argument I'm always having in my head with Virginia Woolf. "A Room of One's Own vs. The Truth of Modern Life." Think of working mothers, I always say. Think of those refugees who write memoirs in crowded, foul-smelling camps covered in barbed wire. (Hers always felt a bit like the argument delivered from a place of leisure. But yesterday I began thinking that maybe she's right. Maybe I'm being a bit too too.) I've not written anything of any substantial merit in months because I just didn't have any room of my own. My brain was full, the bandwidth had expired. Okay, Virginia, you win this one. For now.
3) The writing came back.
Poof, like magic. The words aren't pouring out of my fingers yet, which is the real work, of course, but the sounds of my characters talking, the textures of their pants, the lengths of their dress hems, the leafy, worn ends of magazines stacked by the toilets--all that came back. Quietly, insistently, easily. As if the fog just blew away.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Sick with Circus
Circus AMOK played a show today in the gymnasium at Judson Memorial Church, which served as our rain location since Seward Park, where we should have been, was dealt a soft mist that seemed easy, but over time becomes a drenching cardboard disaster. I was, honestly, not looking forward to it at all. I've got some kind of head cold, going on 2.5 days, and the last thing I need to be doing is unpacking and repacking a truck full of circus stuff, and then of course, sweating through my clothes during the show, and running around being fabulous.
But I did it. It was a nice show. There were probably about 75 people in the audience--which is about 70 more than we thought might show up. Despite this being the circus's fifteenth season, and despite the fact that we perform for who knows how many people (1,000? 2,000? 5,000?) we still look around at each other before some of the shows and say "Do you think anyone will show up?"
I thought a lot about taking the show somewhere else, about touring. I wondered how the audiences might be different, how it could look more like theater to those other audiences, look more like a foreign spectacle. Because if you listen to our audiences, the way they scream and cheer, laugh and boo, all the right places--it really feels like the circus belongs to this city. If you took us out of that context, I'm not sure how it would come across.
I still think we should tour. Please, if you know someone with a few hundred thousand dollars laying around, or if you yourself have a few hundred thousand laying around, send it our way. We could use it wisely and well.
There is a moment in the show, just before the vaulting act, after a few "slower" acts--the animal bits, the wirewalking, the kind of acts that people really watch, and watch closely--where Jenny Romaine asks the audience if they are ready to see some of the something something (it changes every day, and I don't hear much of it anyway.) The point is, it ends with her asking the audience to scream their heads off like babies. And never fails--they do. It's easy to forget that they're out there sometimes. We are so focused on getting through the next costume change, the set change, the hurry-we-need-an-ice-pack-now.
So. Thank you for coming, for listening, for tossing money into the hat, for writing emails to unknown recipients about what our circus did to make your day better, for sitting your squirming, squealing children in the first row, for standing in the back and waving, for never failing to boo at the right moment. And for screaming your heads off like babies.
But I did it. It was a nice show. There were probably about 75 people in the audience--which is about 70 more than we thought might show up. Despite this being the circus's fifteenth season, and despite the fact that we perform for who knows how many people (1,000? 2,000? 5,000?) we still look around at each other before some of the shows and say "Do you think anyone will show up?"
I thought a lot about taking the show somewhere else, about touring. I wondered how the audiences might be different, how it could look more like theater to those other audiences, look more like a foreign spectacle. Because if you listen to our audiences, the way they scream and cheer, laugh and boo, all the right places--it really feels like the circus belongs to this city. If you took us out of that context, I'm not sure how it would come across.
I still think we should tour. Please, if you know someone with a few hundred thousand dollars laying around, or if you yourself have a few hundred thousand laying around, send it our way. We could use it wisely and well.
There is a moment in the show, just before the vaulting act, after a few "slower" acts--the animal bits, the wirewalking, the kind of acts that people really watch, and watch closely--where Jenny Romaine asks the audience if they are ready to see some of the something something (it changes every day, and I don't hear much of it anyway.) The point is, it ends with her asking the audience to scream their heads off like babies. And never fails--they do. It's easy to forget that they're out there sometimes. We are so focused on getting through the next costume change, the set change, the hurry-we-need-an-ice-pack-now.
So. Thank you for coming, for listening, for tossing money into the hat, for writing emails to unknown recipients about what our circus did to make your day better, for sitting your squirming, squealing children in the first row, for standing in the back and waving, for never failing to boo at the right moment. And for screaming your heads off like babies.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Some Circus Pics
As the circus arrives at its final four days of performance -- I've scoured the web for some pics. We just show up and do the show, and of course, thousands of people are out there watching and taking pictures. Here is the evidence. I stole all these from Flickr.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Some Updates
--The severely-talented Charlie Vazquez have an interview together over at BigFib.com, where we talk about our creative processes, music we like to listen to, the state of gays and gay marriages, and even blowjobs in expensive cars. You can check out the interview by clicking here, read an excerpt of mine by clicking here, and read one of Charlie's stories by clicking here.
--Who wants to see a queerly-situations, politically-themed, glitter-guilded, fantastical spectacle, all for FREE in your very own New York City park? You have only 8 more chances, to see "Subprime Sublime," Circus AMOK's 2008 fantasia on financial themes. Check out the schedule by clicking here.
--My parents arrive on Thursday, for a weekend of excitement, birthdays, food, food, and food. It's been years since they came to visit, maybe 4-5 years. They stopped coming once my brother had children. Who wants to spend thousands of dollars to come to this dirty, stinky, crowded, loud place, when the magic of your grandchildren are in sunny Orlando? I'm kidding. Maybe someone will take pictures and I can get them on Flickr. I've basically given up picture taking--I think I don't have the patience for it. More so, I'm just not that interested it.
--This idea that I'm not interested in things. I've been trying to figure out what that is. It seems to be my answer, or my initial impulse, quite often these days. So, is it indeed the crux of what I'm feeling, or is it some kind of laziness, some kind of apathy, some kind of fear?
--I'm also obsessed with this game Zuma, which I got for my iPod. Mary Steenburgen was on some late night show talking about meeting people on airplanes, and they were always catching her playing Soduku on her Blackberry. And she worried that this was such an uninteresting experience for the person who stopped to talk. I have the same thought when I play Zuma all day. My fans will find me so uninteresting!
--Kip and I had the best sushi last night, at Sushi Kyoto on Smith Street, near Atlantic. The highlight for me was something called the Tuna Tortilla. It was a small flour tortilla, layered with toro, panko, and who knows what else, then cut into pieces like a pizza. Oh, baby.
--Who wants to see a queerly-situations, politically-themed, glitter-guilded, fantastical spectacle, all for FREE in your very own New York City park? You have only 8 more chances, to see "Subprime Sublime," Circus AMOK's 2008 fantasia on financial themes. Check out the schedule by clicking here.
--My parents arrive on Thursday, for a weekend of excitement, birthdays, food, food, and food. It's been years since they came to visit, maybe 4-5 years. They stopped coming once my brother had children. Who wants to spend thousands of dollars to come to this dirty, stinky, crowded, loud place, when the magic of your grandchildren are in sunny Orlando? I'm kidding. Maybe someone will take pictures and I can get them on Flickr. I've basically given up picture taking--I think I don't have the patience for it. More so, I'm just not that interested it.
--This idea that I'm not interested in things. I've been trying to figure out what that is. It seems to be my answer, or my initial impulse, quite often these days. So, is it indeed the crux of what I'm feeling, or is it some kind of laziness, some kind of apathy, some kind of fear?
--I'm also obsessed with this game Zuma, which I got for my iPod. Mary Steenburgen was on some late night show talking about meeting people on airplanes, and they were always catching her playing Soduku on her Blackberry. And she worried that this was such an uninteresting experience for the person who stopped to talk. I have the same thought when I play Zuma all day. My fans will find me so uninteresting!
--Kip and I had the best sushi last night, at Sushi Kyoto on Smith Street, near Atlantic. The highlight for me was something called the Tuna Tortilla. It was a small flour tortilla, layered with toro, panko, and who knows what else, then cut into pieces like a pizza. Oh, baby.
Saturday, September 06, 2008
Okay, I'm Back
Not very much of a break, maybe. Just a few days. But they were thick days, long hours, with huge meaningful leaps taken in various directions. I've just come out of the shower, with water much hotter than is perhaps necessary or healthy for the skin, but I needed it. I needed to just stand there and stare at my feet. I seemed to have forgotten what that was like.
Kip and I went through a pretty intense crisis. Things were teetering on the edge of ending there for a while. Among all the lessons that I learned in those hours between our initial breakdown and our subsequent apologies and mending conversations, I learned that everyone has these conversations--some people have them every week--but it felt like I'd never had this one before. It also occurred to me that perhaps the fact that I've never had this conversation before is really just the proof that when this conversation comes up, I've steered it, or whoever has steered it, into a different place. And then there was a different outcome.
I have bread in the oven, three loaves that I let rise earlier after having come home from the half-performed Circus AMOK show in Riverside Park--as much of it as we could do before the rain came. That meant, Stilts, Chari, Juggling, Lectures, Interruptions, Singing, Blue Jay, Wire-Walking...and then the sky opened and everything went under a tarp. Well, everything except for us. About 5 hours ago, I was changing my clothes in the ATM area of the Chase Bank on 79th Street. As in, stripping down to the nearly-nothings and putting on whatever I could find in the bottom of my bag that wasn't soaked. As much I love to look fabulous, I just don't have the courage to ride home on the 1 Train in my tutu. (This paragraph is meant to transition into the next one, but also meant to make you excited about seeing the AMOK show--wire-walking? Singing? Tutu? You can see the schedule here.)
So, back to the bread. I needed to do something earthy, something that would feel simple, healing, and also beneficial. I needed to complete something. It's possible that they will turn out terribly--I don't make bread often--but it's more about the process than the product. For me, that's always been the truth.
Kip and I went through a pretty intense crisis. Things were teetering on the edge of ending there for a while. Among all the lessons that I learned in those hours between our initial breakdown and our subsequent apologies and mending conversations, I learned that everyone has these conversations--some people have them every week--but it felt like I'd never had this one before. It also occurred to me that perhaps the fact that I've never had this conversation before is really just the proof that when this conversation comes up, I've steered it, or whoever has steered it, into a different place. And then there was a different outcome.
I have bread in the oven, three loaves that I let rise earlier after having come home from the half-performed Circus AMOK show in Riverside Park--as much of it as we could do before the rain came. That meant, Stilts, Chari, Juggling, Lectures, Interruptions, Singing, Blue Jay, Wire-Walking...and then the sky opened and everything went under a tarp. Well, everything except for us. About 5 hours ago, I was changing my clothes in the ATM area of the Chase Bank on 79th Street. As in, stripping down to the nearly-nothings and putting on whatever I could find in the bottom of my bag that wasn't soaked. As much I love to look fabulous, I just don't have the courage to ride home on the 1 Train in my tutu. (This paragraph is meant to transition into the next one, but also meant to make you excited about seeing the AMOK show--wire-walking? Singing? Tutu? You can see the schedule here.)
So, back to the bread. I needed to do something earthy, something that would feel simple, healing, and also beneficial. I needed to complete something. It's possible that they will turn out terribly--I don't make bread often--but it's more about the process than the product. For me, that's always been the truth.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Away in Chestertown, Part 2
Art-making is mysterious. It's not alchemy, it's work. But the moment that the work really becomes art is actually quite unknowable, or if it's not unknowable, it's always shifting, and with each new moment, new directions emerge. So nothing ever gets pinned down. All this is (I think, maybe) one of the reasons that writers are so cagey about talking about how the work gets done. We'll talk about what we need nearby, the music we listen to, our process. But those odd, magical weird moments where you finally have made something amazing--those we don't really understand. And we writers get to do the art-making all by ourselves, which is maybe why our implosions are felt less in the larger artistic communities.
Theater-making is even more mysterious. Everyone has to run on all cylinders at the same time, with the same intentions--basically--and eventually everyone on stage begins chasing that thing that you all made together. Weird.
Am I rambling? It's been a long day.
I'm home now, returned from Upstate with the circus. It took only about 4 hours to get from there to New York, and then we spent about an hour and half going around the space of about 5 city blocks, because of 1) the Holland Tunnel, and 2) Who knows what else. It was a fruitful, eventful, sometimes beautiful, sometimes maddening trip. Like art-making is.
Theater-making is even more mysterious. Everyone has to run on all cylinders at the same time, with the same intentions--basically--and eventually everyone on stage begins chasing that thing that you all made together. Weird.
Am I rambling? It's been a long day.
I'm home now, returned from Upstate with the circus. It took only about 4 hours to get from there to New York, and then we spent about an hour and half going around the space of about 5 city blocks, because of 1) the Holland Tunnel, and 2) Who knows what else. It was a fruitful, eventful, sometimes beautiful, sometimes maddening trip. Like art-making is.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Away in Chestertown, Part 1
I am sitting in the kitchen of the big house upstate, where Circus AMOK comes to put our show together every year. It's a flurry of work and conversations--work happening amid conversation, conversations about work, working through misunderstood conversations. I often forget, since most of the year our circus is a smaller team, just how many people it takes to get the thing on the road. Three, maybe four others arrive tomorrow--mainly "art people" which is our code for people who paint, sew, make things, design, or any combination of those skills. I'm not one of them.
We arrived on Thursday, after a horrendously long day of packing and travel--none of it was particularly impossible in any certain way, but everything took longer than we had planned (duh) and eventually, 14 hours after I woke up, we arrived at this beautiful barn, which they made into a house years ago. It feels like we've been here for a week--but it's only Saturday evening. The time is compressed--the same faces, the same images, the same geography. There is no "going to work" or "coming home," and in that way the entire week feels like a single experience. You don't move in different social circles up here, know what I mean? You are never invisible to the rest of the group.
After our afternoon work sessions, we go swimming in the lake, which is just cold enough. It's bracing, but welcome. I like how we sort of take over the small beach there, with our crazy gender-bending troupe and people of all ages. I see the locals watching us, unsure of who we are, what we are, what to make of us. Most of the time I think that, in the end, they think nothing that concrete.
I managed to talk our cook into letting me make a carrot thing tonight--she had the idea, and then I sort of knew a recipe that I thought would work out better--and so she let me go for it. Carrots, yogurt, olive oil, garlic, cumin, cilantro, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Oh, the carrots are steamed and then it all goes into the food processor. I don't know what the exact recipe is. Just everything to taste. The troupe sort of scoffed at it -- but it's all gone.
Now they're serving up the peach kuchen--plus a blueberry sauce made with the syrup that I lugged up here from the city. Work, in the right form, is so fulfilling.
We arrived on Thursday, after a horrendously long day of packing and travel--none of it was particularly impossible in any certain way, but everything took longer than we had planned (duh) and eventually, 14 hours after I woke up, we arrived at this beautiful barn, which they made into a house years ago. It feels like we've been here for a week--but it's only Saturday evening. The time is compressed--the same faces, the same images, the same geography. There is no "going to work" or "coming home," and in that way the entire week feels like a single experience. You don't move in different social circles up here, know what I mean? You are never invisible to the rest of the group.
After our afternoon work sessions, we go swimming in the lake, which is just cold enough. It's bracing, but welcome. I like how we sort of take over the small beach there, with our crazy gender-bending troupe and people of all ages. I see the locals watching us, unsure of who we are, what we are, what to make of us. Most of the time I think that, in the end, they think nothing that concrete.
I managed to talk our cook into letting me make a carrot thing tonight--she had the idea, and then I sort of knew a recipe that I thought would work out better--and so she let me go for it. Carrots, yogurt, olive oil, garlic, cumin, cilantro, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Oh, the carrots are steamed and then it all goes into the food processor. I don't know what the exact recipe is. Just everything to taste. The troupe sort of scoffed at it -- but it's all gone.
Now they're serving up the peach kuchen--plus a blueberry sauce made with the syrup that I lugged up here from the city. Work, in the right form, is so fulfilling.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Circus AMOK 2008!
Coming Soon....Circus Amok's 2008 spectacular:
Can Dorothy find her way home from the tornado of foreclosure and debt? Our heroine embarks on a journey with the Liberty Sisters, the sassiest all-female juggling act since the Flying Karamazov Brothers, crossing the Alps via tightrope and encountering a magical lost flock of alpine zebras. Dorothy and the Sisters stumble across a Keystone Kops bank heist, only to fall into the world's hottest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider. All manner of mysteries are revealed, with the Circus Amok Band throwing a disco party for the smashing atoms and spectators alike.
Four weekends of Fun!
Sat, 9/6 - Riverside Park - 2pm & 5pm
Sun, 9/7 - Coney Island - 2pm & 5pm
Mon, 9/8 - Martin Luther King Park - 5pm
Wed, 9/10 - Ft. Greene Park - 5:30pm
Fri, 9/12 - St. Mary's Park - 5:00pm
Sat, 9/13 - Socrates Sculpture Park - 3:00pm
Sun, 9/14 - Prospect Park - 2pm & 5pm
Wed, 9/17 - Columbus Park - 5:30pm
Fri, 9/19 - Sunset Park - 5:30pm
Sat, 9/20 - Washington Square Park - 2pm & 5pm
Sun, 9/21 - Marcus Garvey Park - 2pm & 5pm
Wed, 9/24 - Bedford Playground - 5pm
Fri, 9/26 - Battery Park - 1pm & 5pm
Sat, 9/27 - Seward Park - 4pm
Sun, 9/28 - Tompkins Square Park - 12pm & 3pm
Sub-Prime Sublime!
Can Dorothy find her way home from the tornado of foreclosure and debt? Our heroine embarks on a journey with the Liberty Sisters, the sassiest all-female juggling act since the Flying Karamazov Brothers, crossing the Alps via tightrope and encountering a magical lost flock of alpine zebras. Dorothy and the Sisters stumble across a Keystone Kops bank heist, only to fall into the world's hottest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider. All manner of mysteries are revealed, with the Circus Amok Band throwing a disco party for the smashing atoms and spectators alike.
Four weekends of Fun!
Sat, 9/6 - Riverside Park - 2pm & 5pm
Sun, 9/7 - Coney Island - 2pm & 5pm
Mon, 9/8 - Martin Luther King Park - 5pm
Wed, 9/10 - Ft. Greene Park - 5:30pm
Fri, 9/12 - St. Mary's Park - 5:00pm
Sat, 9/13 - Socrates Sculpture Park - 3:00pm
Sun, 9/14 - Prospect Park - 2pm & 5pm
Wed, 9/17 - Columbus Park - 5:30pm
Fri, 9/19 - Sunset Park - 5:30pm
Sat, 9/20 - Washington Square Park - 2pm & 5pm
Sun, 9/21 - Marcus Garvey Park - 2pm & 5pm
Wed, 9/24 - Bedford Playground - 5pm
Fri, 9/26 - Battery Park - 1pm & 5pm
Sat, 9/27 - Seward Park - 4pm
Sun, 9/28 - Tompkins Square Park - 12pm & 3pm
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Waterfalls / AMOK / Busy Busy Busy
--A few of us went yesterday to see Olafur Eliasson's "Waterfalls," which is a very large, very expensive public art installation on the East River. I decided earlier in the year, upon seeing a horrible but earnest dance performance, that I was going to see if I could spend 2008 not hating on other artist's work. But: I just don't see what's impressive about them. Firstly, they are, if you ask me, quite ugly. Scaffolding? Really? Eliasson says on the project's website that he used scaffolding because it is a "common part of New York City's landscape." OK, so it's part of our landscape, but it's also ugly. When the wind blows the water back through the scaffolding, that's when the work really starts to look cheap. Also, these oil-spill-style barriers at the base of each waterfall? I'm not feeling you, Olafur.
--Circus Amok is in full swing. At least my side of things. The shows run September 6-28, in fifteen different city parks throughout the boroughs. Do you fear for the health of your mortgage? Do you love Glinda the Good Witch? Do you ache for the pumping dimensions of disco? Are you party to particle physics? It's all here, baby. More updates soon....
--I'm busy with a few of projects that I hope to share with you soon. Some writing, some reading, a new idea for my old novel. It occurred to me that I'd like to give it some kind of life, whatever life it might be able to have. Look for that happening in the fall. There's also some September happenings, with my friend and fellow queer writer, Charlie Vazquez. And then more publishing ventures in November--two somehow opposing, and yet complimentary anthologies.
Apologies for the slowness of the updates. It's that time of year.
--Circus Amok is in full swing. At least my side of things. The shows run September 6-28, in fifteen different city parks throughout the boroughs. Do you fear for the health of your mortgage? Do you love Glinda the Good Witch? Do you ache for the pumping dimensions of disco? Are you party to particle physics? It's all here, baby. More updates soon....
--I'm busy with a few of projects that I hope to share with you soon. Some writing, some reading, a new idea for my old novel. It occurred to me that I'd like to give it some kind of life, whatever life it might be able to have. Look for that happening in the fall. There's also some September happenings, with my friend and fellow queer writer, Charlie Vazquez. And then more publishing ventures in November--two somehow opposing, and yet complimentary anthologies.
Apologies for the slowness of the updates. It's that time of year.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Upcoming Excitement
Here's what's on the horizon that excites me:
--Cyndi Lauper, B-52s and the Indigo Girls at Radio City Music Hall
--Circus AMOK! planning and stuff.
--New AMOK! executive director.
--A friend says Amy Ray has a new record on the horizon.
--I'm taking a day off to see August: Osage County.
--Jeff Koons on the roof at the Met.
--Memorial Day picnic in the park with all the peeps.
--4th of July in Chattanooga with my family, and Kip!, and Nephews.
--I'm gonna be in two more queer anthologies in the fall. (Maybe that first novel does actually get published, only one chapter at a time, in 30 different volumes.)
--Cyndi Lauper, B-52s and the Indigo Girls at Radio City Music Hall
--Circus AMOK! planning and stuff.
--New AMOK! executive director.
--A friend says Amy Ray has a new record on the horizon.
--I'm taking a day off to see August: Osage County.
--Jeff Koons on the roof at the Met.
--Memorial Day picnic in the park with all the peeps.
--4th of July in Chattanooga with my family, and Kip!, and Nephews.
--I'm gonna be in two more queer anthologies in the fall. (Maybe that first novel does actually get published, only one chapter at a time, in 30 different volumes.)
Monday, May 19, 2008
What She Said
I'm always thinking of Virgina Woolf and her "Room of One's Own." See, artists, I think--me especially--are always struggling with the big questions about what works and what doesn't. The question of whether words are the best possible way to explore an idea, to once and for all break patriarchy, to annihilate capitalism, to touch another person's soul, all these things. I think each of them are real, possible things, and I struggle with the idea that lining up words on paper will actually do any good. These big questions get in the way. They are paralyzing.
So, back to Woolf. I used to think she was full of crap. I knew, and still know, plenty of writers who have children tugging at their knees even as they plod away at their chapters and memoirs, or scrawl notes back and forth on their bus trips to and from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, for example. Writing doesn't really happen in a "room of your own," but it happens constantly, continuously, even if you want it to or not. But, of course, it occurred to me later--as obvious as this observation is, you still have to arrive at it yourself--this room of your own is really the space in which you have to force yourself to work without hearing these impossible-to-answer questions. (The questions that only lead to more questions, or return you back to the same old questions.)
If you sit down to write, and begin to wonder about how your tiny work of semi-skilled fiction will make any difference in the universe, you'll have no reason to continue. It's not about a physical place as much as mental space--room enough in your own head not to be bogged down by your own hideous bullshit. None of the rationale matters. But all art is like this, in general. Words or paint or opera. Right?
And a person like me, who has his hands is a few different big ideas--sustainable agriculture and localized economy, free political theater in your very own neighborhood, and equipping children to deal with the increasingly impossible future--I wonder sometimes how my writing has anything to do with any of it. I worry about how slow I am. About how I can't seem to move forward. About how sometimes I just don't give a shit about the novel and I'd rather go to the new Chronicles of Narnia movie. About how I want to lay in bed and think about food all day. About whether or not I want it enough. Do you know what I mean when I say, enough?
So, back to Woolf. I used to think she was full of crap. I knew, and still know, plenty of writers who have children tugging at their knees even as they plod away at their chapters and memoirs, or scrawl notes back and forth on their bus trips to and from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, for example. Writing doesn't really happen in a "room of your own," but it happens constantly, continuously, even if you want it to or not. But, of course, it occurred to me later--as obvious as this observation is, you still have to arrive at it yourself--this room of your own is really the space in which you have to force yourself to work without hearing these impossible-to-answer questions. (The questions that only lead to more questions, or return you back to the same old questions.)
If you sit down to write, and begin to wonder about how your tiny work of semi-skilled fiction will make any difference in the universe, you'll have no reason to continue. It's not about a physical place as much as mental space--room enough in your own head not to be bogged down by your own hideous bullshit. None of the rationale matters. But all art is like this, in general. Words or paint or opera. Right?
And a person like me, who has his hands is a few different big ideas--sustainable agriculture and localized economy, free political theater in your very own neighborhood, and equipping children to deal with the increasingly impossible future--I wonder sometimes how my writing has anything to do with any of it. I worry about how slow I am. About how I can't seem to move forward. About how sometimes I just don't give a shit about the novel and I'd rather go to the new Chronicles of Narnia movie. About how I want to lay in bed and think about food all day. About whether or not I want it enough. Do you know what I mean when I say, enough?
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Success! New York Times!
The Circus AMOK benefit, GLAMOK!, held on Monday night at PS122, was, in a word, fabulous. In all, I think we raised a fair amount of money--perhaps an extraordinary amount of money for an organization of our size. (We have a full-time staff of 1, basically.) I think we're both extremely lucky to be given the reception that got--meaning, people came happily to party, drink, take in the performances, and donate their hard-earned cash to the cause. But I also think that we 1) know about throwing a party, and 2) we know how to work really hard.
Baby Dee is extraordinary. I felt glad that she was able to drive all the way from Cleveland, where she now resides, to grace us with her harp and her music and her presence. Her performance on Monday night was simple, powerful, honest, graceful and seemingly effortless. Check out her new record, "Safe Inside the Day," at her website. She describes it as: "This album is very much about the street I grew up on. Where The Earlie King ruled without mercy. And Bobby Slot and Freddy Weiss invented the Dance of Diminishing Possibilities." What's not to love about that? Also, she said something in the dressing room, which is not dirty or salacious or gossipy, but I shan't reprint it here. It was most certainly the quote of the week.
We also had Reverend Billy and some of the Stop Shopping Choir--they were a huge hit and lovely to behold in all their rag-tag (and yet not rag-tag at all) glory. Amen. Julie Atlas Muz presented a glorious, live performance that left the audience speechless, and then left them screaming with joy and begging for more. I think every time she graces the stage that happens. She's just so marvelous. I love the sheer energy and love that Carmelita Tropicana brings to the room; so present, so funny, so in-the-moment, so real. And, of course, Fabio Tavares; who will forget his extra-faggy take on the Houdini escape? In a tuxedo tee and tiny black briefs? Of course, The Dazzle Dancers were splendidly glittered and gorgeous, in all their naked, peace-spreading eminence. I love everyone in this community. I feel so glad to be a part of it.
Huge, incredible, deep, genuine thanks to all my peeps who signed books for the silent auction, and thanks to all the peeps who attended, bought drinks, put money in the hat, got drunk, hollered, dressed in something absurd and gorgeous, and helped Circus AMOK bring our bawdy, raucus, queer, one-of-a-kind, award-winning, one-ring spectacular--ALL FOR FREE--to city parks throughout the boroughs.
AND, AND, AND!!! We're now featured in the arts section of The New York Times. Go and check out the video in the multimedia section at the bottom!!!
Baby Dee is extraordinary. I felt glad that she was able to drive all the way from Cleveland, where she now resides, to grace us with her harp and her music and her presence. Her performance on Monday night was simple, powerful, honest, graceful and seemingly effortless. Check out her new record, "Safe Inside the Day," at her website. She describes it as: "This album is very much about the street I grew up on. Where The Earlie King ruled without mercy. And Bobby Slot and Freddy Weiss invented the Dance of Diminishing Possibilities." What's not to love about that? Also, she said something in the dressing room, which is not dirty or salacious or gossipy, but I shan't reprint it here. It was most certainly the quote of the week.
We also had Reverend Billy and some of the Stop Shopping Choir--they were a huge hit and lovely to behold in all their rag-tag (and yet not rag-tag at all) glory. Amen. Julie Atlas Muz presented a glorious, live performance that left the audience speechless, and then left them screaming with joy and begging for more. I think every time she graces the stage that happens. She's just so marvelous. I love the sheer energy and love that Carmelita Tropicana brings to the room; so present, so funny, so in-the-moment, so real. And, of course, Fabio Tavares; who will forget his extra-faggy take on the Houdini escape? In a tuxedo tee and tiny black briefs? Of course, The Dazzle Dancers were splendidly glittered and gorgeous, in all their naked, peace-spreading eminence. I love everyone in this community. I feel so glad to be a part of it.
Huge, incredible, deep, genuine thanks to all my peeps who signed books for the silent auction, and thanks to all the peeps who attended, bought drinks, put money in the hat, got drunk, hollered, dressed in something absurd and gorgeous, and helped Circus AMOK bring our bawdy, raucus, queer, one-of-a-kind, award-winning, one-ring spectacular--ALL FOR FREE--to city parks throughout the boroughs.
AND, AND, AND!!! We're now featured in the arts section of The New York Times. Go and check out the video in the multimedia section at the bottom!!!
Thursday, April 10, 2008
The Return of GLAMOK!
PS 122
150 First Avenue
NYC
Baby Dee, Julie Atlas Muz, Sarah Jones, Reverend Billy,
Peggy Shaw, the Dazzle Dancers, Fabio Tavares of STREB, and The Liberty Sisters!
Carmelita Tropicana!
The Circus AMOK Band with Surprise Guests!
featuring goodies from Heatherette, Town Shop, Brics, Spoonbill & Sugartown Books, Pure, Yogasana, Inner Princess, plus theater tickets, fine art, travel and more!
BUY TICKETS by CLICKING HERE:
$50-$75 (Sliding Scale)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
