The Breath Isn't Just Deep, It's Also Wide

The Edward Gorey Garden Party at the Historic Overlook House:

In a swirl of black and lace, I made my solo singing debut after almost 7 years of virtually no vocal performances. With the generous aid of my trusty new accompanist friend, Adam, I rediscovered the power in my breath and belly, to soar through the notes of pain and passion in 8 beautiful songs. These songs are people to me, people who I know intimately, like the best of friends and lovers. It was wonderful to meet with them again. Like a wobbly revisit on a long forgotten bicycle, things my body once knew in every bit of flesh and bone came inching back into my consciousness as I reconnected with these song people. The most profound of these old knowings was the sensation of breath which supports truth and tone. This breath isn't just deep, it's also wide. To get the right support to release a high B or C or F, a singer must allow the breath to open and fill every little crevice of their core and let it become the fuel for inspired vibrations to emerge. It's the the play of breath and flesh and space that make the instrument what it is. Free, flowing, and alive, or pinched, frightened, and controlling. This breath is the ultimate Wu Wei, the art of non-doing, or doing effortlessly. In the the not trying, the magic emerges. It's about trust. When we trust, everything flows.

An Imaginary Friend Came for Tea

He took my eyes.  

"Because," he said, "Seeing doesn't give you Sight."

He put them in his pocket for safe keeping.

And now, I was under the influence of pure black.  My skin prickled every time he spoke, I could feel the caress of every word vibrate into my cells.  

"Listen quietly, my dear, and perhaps you'll come to know a small vestige of Truth."  

I nodded, then gasped.  My breath seemed to catch fire and blow out with every cycle.  I was afloat in infinite vitality.  There was a cool heat, radiating everywhere.  

He poured me a cup of licorice tea.  As I sipped, every droplet of that hot sweet liquid cast upon me a cataclysmic shudder, my heart leapt for the sounds of my swallows.

Silently, I gestured to him, hand reaching for his.  As his flesh met mine, I gripped and pulled him toward me.  I put my ear to his throat and listened for a rush of tea to drain, mouth to stomach, into his body.  The sound of it washed through me like the blue light of falling water.  The taste of it entered through my feet.  He and I were an obit of stars, our own separate Earths.  

It was then, I began to See.

Deep Gratitude

Two weeks ago, my new housemate, Divya and I claimed our new home by receiving the keys and filling the space with our multitudinous possessions.  I am deeply grateful for this change in space and location.  I'm more centrally located, I've got true artistic and sacred space and I've got a real kindred spirit to share it with.  While I'm still getting settled, I already feel a deeper peace.  I feel like my many dreams and goals are more attainable, my needs better nourished and fulfilled.  It's amazing what a physical space can do for one's mind, heart and body.  This place has real potential to become a home as the seasons pass (even though we don't have a bath tub!).  I can see myself setting roots, deep enough to be grounded, shallow enough to be transplanted to an even better place when the time comes (may it be graceful in coming).  While one can make the best of most any living situation, some places feed the soul more readily than others.  Whatever the reason, this place is one of those.  Despite being right on a somewhat busy street, in a city, this 1904 Victorian 4-plex, with all it's funky charm has a warmth within it that is at once intangible, subtle and deeply embracing.  Perhaps it's the woman who lived in my unit for 9 years who filled this house with such warmth, a woman who built beautiful garden beds along the side of the house, who according to legend passed to me by one of my neighbors was the "house mother".  Maybe the two women who were living here before us, added their own cozy imprints into the concrete, wood and plaster flesh of our new home.  And maybe the magic and intention Divya and I grounded into ourselves and the Earth have played a role in creating a new, yet longed for experience for me.  Certainly 104 years of human and animal presence has given this building a life of it's own.  I feel a pride, an ownership, a sense of dominion, a right to inhabit space, a nourishment and a welcoming in this new home.  It's beautiful.  It's a temple of love, life, truth, fertility, sensuality, passion, creativity, and nurturing.  It's a sanctuary from the bustle of the city, from the ups and downs of work and the otherwise disempowering chaos of civilization.  This home is someone I really want to get to know, someone I want to create a real relationship with.  I'm waiting to hear her name, so I can better hear her stories.  She is fertile ground for me, and I fully intend to take advantage of the blessings from such luscious nourishment!  My gratitude cannot be expressed with words alone, maybe with a little dash of dance and song, I'll manage to come close.  Deepest thanks to all (spirit and person alike) who helped bring me to my new friend, my new home.

The Whiskers of Green Faeries!

It's amazing what a little booze can do to relax social inhibitions.  I watched my resentments, negative energies, and anger melt away as I shared far too many drinks with my current housemates recently.  It could have gone a completely different course, but it thankfully allowed me to remember their humanity and my own.  It started with whiskey and chocolate and oozed it's way to cool sips of spicy absinthe.  I was able to remember that sometimes the things that rub and irritate and chafe in life are really very small when you step outside yourself and see the beauty in all the crap.  Ultimately, we're all relieved that I'm moving out, because of the small things that have added up to create itches that are awful tedious to scratch, but I'm happy to know that it doesn't leave us with unfading pits and scars.  In the hours that we lost ourselves to the "Whiskers of the Green Faerie", we rebuilt our webs of connection, which all of us so deeply desire.  Though I woke up the next day, feeling a little beaten up, I was happy to know that while I leave a house, I keep the fire of friends and heart, to lighten the hearth of my new abode.  

Moving and Moving and Moving Again!

Ah!  I've made it almost 6 months!  I've clawed my way through to this moment, finding myself full of anger and resentment, mostly at me, for not standing up for myself, for not fighting back.  The day I moved in here, I felt unwelcome.  I thought, "Perhaps it will pass and things will get better."  Ever hopeful, that's me.  Well, better it did not get.  Worse it got, worse and worse and worser.  Now here I sit, anticipating a total revolution in my life.  I'm moving out of this prison house and into what I hope will be a more liberating and freeing social experiment.  I will begin a new home with strong and clear intentions.  I will begin a new romance in the same way.  I will begin my work as an artist in a way I never have before.  Everything is falling away on a grand scale and I'm letting it all come tumbling down.  As I claw my way through the rubble, I look to the truth of my heart to guide me through the rebuilding.  There are things I feel meant to do in this lifetime, many of which I've only scratched the surface.  Now I'm being called to live my life in a dramatically different way.  Dramatic it is!  I'm being called to trust in time, in space, in the unknowns of life more than ever before.  I am stepping into uncharted territory, and I'm finding it both exhilarating and contracting.  Despite the contradictory and paradoxical nature of my situation, I feel utterly compelled to dive right in.  I can't seem to stop myself.  My friend said recently, about my current happenings, that he thinks there is too much changing all at once, and that I will probably drop some projects from all the pressure.  I countered that I've been under even more stress in the past and came through it all, having accomplished all of my goals, only slightly modifying a few of them in the process.  No, I won't have to drop any of these "projects" as he calls them, it's the stress that feeds me and pushes me to move through.  These are merely labor pains.  In the end, I get a brand new life, more unbelievable, more amazing than the last.  I'm finally in the birth process.  I've died, I've replanted, I've ripened, now I let forth this new life.  So Be It!

Big Adjustments and Harsh Realizations

I'm adjusting.

Recently, I moved out of my roomy, 1 bed apartment into a shared household and a smallish blue room and now, I'm feeling the labor pains of squeezing both my physical self (and all it's various material extensions) and my energetic self into a much smaller space. I'm also having to negotiate my place on the hierarchical rungs of my new home. See, I live with the owners of the house, which in my experience, does not lend itself easily to the egalitarian ideal. No matter how anti-authoritarian and communally minded said owners may be, the cultural concept of ownership usually subverts the best of equalitarian intentions. Just like the territorial spats that are frequenting the lives of my two cats and the other animals of the house, I am acutely feeling the stubborn pressure of people having to create space for me. Space which they occupied previously, and didn't have to share or stretch or compromise on. I sincerely hope that they actually want to share this space, no matter how painful it may be for them to relinquish it, because I sincerely want to feel welcome, cherished, and wanted by those I co-habitate with. I want a home, a place of solitude and sanctuary, a place to freely express myself, my needs, and my ideas, a place to connect with others and feel a part of something real.
Over this first week and a half of living at my new place, I'm finding a mix of feelings ranging from disappointment, uncertainty, self-doubt, defensiveness, joy, relief, and connection.
I've really been enjoying living with kids. I wasn't sure how I'd react to it, but I'm finding that little people bring such a refreshing energy into a living space, a newness and a rawness, which cynical adults can't seem to muster quite so often. I'm interested to see how my relationship with the kids will progress as I continue living in their midst. I'm also finding that simply having others around is making me more productive, and I don't feel so isolated. That's definitely something I missed while living alone, where I cloistered myself from the world, communing with my personal demons and considering various universal conundrums.
Unfortunately, I've also had some harsh realizations. A big one being that I neglected to truly consider the physical creative space that I require to pursue my art. My new house is extremely ill-equipt for the things I want to do. I don't have any real space for messy and/or long term projects like mask-making and costume building. I also feel a little more inhibited when it comes to experimenting musically, especially in the later hours of the evening. While I'm disappointed in myself for not considering my desires more closely, my self-neglect also incites a question about my real needs for space. Looking at myself clearly, in an undeluded and painfully honest sort of way, I can see that I subconsciously ignored my need for creative space because it is a need that is based on the dream of Mlle. Nova as an artist. What I mean is, my desire for a certain type of creative space is based on a vision of my future self, a self which resides in the realm of ideals and dreams, not in current reality. I am not yet the artist I fancy myself to be. I only need specific creative space when I actually commit to doing the work. When that happens, perhaps I will move, or find an art studio or some other arrangement conducive to achieving my goals.
My challenge here is making the best of what I have, by letting the restrictions of the physical and energetic space that I currently occupy, inspire creative action in and of itself. If it is art that I truly need to pursue (and in my best moments, I can honestly say that it absolutely is) then I will find a way to make it happen, in this very moment, against all odds.