Sorry for the lapse, again

Just a quick post to say that my computer access is limited of late, and so this will be a quiet blog until I sort things out, since I hate blogging at the library. The Sugar Shakers had their first, triumphant performance, and we are now contemplating a second, much extended show. Pics and video will be available soon.

Loves to you all!

It was like a dream...

I just spent a surreal weekend in Seattle. It was by turns a typical break there for me - getting rained on, going to Everyday Records in Capitol Hill - and perfectly not the ordinary, by far. Of course I managed to check off everything on my list, a feat which I rarely if ever achieve, but my list was four items long:

1) Eat Indian food. Check and check. I always eat at the same place, half a block down from Nordstrom rack where there is an atomic orange-colored mango lassi and a terrific and authentic all-you-can-eat buffet.

2) Buy a longer bass cable. Accomplished, although I did have to wait until noon until the bass shop opened. Figures. Musicians. I was suffering the effects of too much #3...

3) See live music. Preferably, rockabilly. Preferably, the Dusty 45's. Why? C'mon, you remember the slight obsession I was working on in the fall. Why do you think? Flaming trumpet. That's all. When we first arrived at the place the Vinyl Avengers (one of the many, many incarnations of the members of the aforementioned 45's) were playing, S. and M. nearly pulled me out of there bodily. The band was doing swanky jazz standards to match the late 50's steakhouse vibe the place rocks, and frankly they were a smidge ... Let's say disappointing. I made the girls stay, and by the last set they were impatient and I think rather bored. I'm sorry, ladies. It was so fun to be dancing and tipsy and to be greeted by the boys as if I were a good friend. Next time I swear I will either go by myself or forego the pleasure in a fit of martyrdom. I could go on and on, but I will leave it at the fact that I had a sufficiently good time to be grumpy while awaiting the bass store opening, and to be peaved when the guy behind the counter was in my opinion patronizing. S. said I was paranoid. I was hungover.

4) Try something new. This time was the Pink Door, the location of which I feel both reluctant to reveal so it won't be overrun, and also hyperexcited to spread, because if you are reading this, you are the type of person to love this type of place. Relaxed atmosphere, INCREDIBLE food - S.'s gnocchi were outstanding - a trapeze act, a burlesque act, pink tulle everywhere, and the cutest skinny, messy, vintage clad bartender with a perfect hand for a cosmo, which I hardly even drink anymore.

I could go on and on, but if you want deets, I guess you'll have to email me or something because I really don't know how to describe all the best parts - eyeliner powder the color of poison, being remembered by the boys in the band, going to Red Light Vintage and finding that there was vintage that was too large for me...

Anyhow, I have an irredeemable crush in a huge way on the city of Seattle in general, and in a certain trumpet player and a certain hostess in a red velveteen dolly dress in particular, and I had to come back to freezing temperatures, sleet, and a power outage at the airport. It's already fading away from me, even tho 24 hours ago, I was dressed to kill with M.A.C. Viva Glam I and my new ShadyLady poison colored eyeliner, eating handmade pappardelle, flirting the hostess and the bartender in equal parts, and feeling invicible. And tomorrow, instead of a cafe with back issues of Vogue Italia, I have to trudge to the corner to buy some coffee to make - myself.

La Reine et Moi

Oh, Sofia.

I knew. I knew, and yet I was hoping against hope that the movie that you made was somehow the movie I really, really wanted to see about Her Majesty, the last Queen of France. I wanted someone to show the heartbreaking truth of what it is like to be in a gilded cage, how it feels to have not the slightest decision to be your own, what real grace in the face of death may look like. Instead, what you gave all the world was a lovely, lovely, empty painting of a lost teenager being indulged in the fulfillment of insubstantial wishes. It is the same movie you have made before, and I am a little sad about it.

We have already talked, you and I, about my own attraction to the doomed Queen, and I thought perhaps I understood a little about your motivation. But I was wrong, wasn't I? You never lamented to woman she was forced to become, or regretted the woman she never was, but instead you identified with the child of privilege and wealth who wielded her power carelessly and frivolously. Don't misunderstand me - your movie was stunning. It was a crystal chandelier of a movie, though, a layer cake, and the Marie Antoinette who grew in my mind while making this costume was a whole meal, and the candles behind the reflections. She was a woman who I imagine loved her children and her country and feared death and perhaps welcomed it, at the end. She was a woman who was asked to be a woman before she was grown, after never really having been allowed to be a child herself. She was a pawn, and she was a player. She craved simplicity and loved luxury. She was a bundle of contradictions, just like you or me or anyone, and she was made an example of because of it. Didn't that break your heart? Where was that in this gilded plate of petit fours? Where was the woman who dared to have herself painted astride like the King himself, who dared to be seen sans corset? That is the portrait I was awaiting.

Antonia, you were there somewhere. The candyfloss and fairydust they spin around you, the curses and the punchlines that still accompany your name down through the annals of history, they are the stories we always weave around the women we don't or can't understand. You are there in the heart of the tales, and perhaps someday, we'll see your face instead of your reflection.

It's out on Tuesday!

If you haven't been obsessively waiting for Marie Antoinette to come out on DVD, like I have, then you may not know. But it's coming out on Tuesday! It's the perfect way for me to spend my Valentine's Day...

I am going to make a t-shirt for the occasion. Anybody want to come watch this with me?

I have lapsed, I know it.

I always mean to add a little smidgen of something to this blog, because I don't want to leave my readers wanting (ha!), and I know I also promised to keep all of you up to date on the status of the band.

Well, I don't mind telling you that the band is going SWIMMINGLY, thanks very much. As a matter of fact, that is a good part of the reason why I haven't been blogging - all the time I usually spend typing mindlessly on the computer is spent practicing my bass instead. I fell like I'm really getting somewhere with it.

And remember when I was whining about wanting that pretty purple acoustic? Well, I went ahead and took the plunge, and I've been playing it. I like it a lot, even tho it's harder to play by a long shot than my tiny Daisy Rock, because it's manufactured for grown ups and not 13 year old girls, which apparently I am. The acoustic is still too small for the Fender flatwound strings I accidentally bought in a long. This is distressing because the strings were a little on the pricey side, and I was very interested in hearing the difference in sound. Apparently, the flatwounds give you a warmer, more "upright" sound when they're on an electric bass. Since we're playing straight-up rockabilly and punkabilly type stuff, I thought the upright sound would be most apropos. Eventually, I would like to play an actual stand-up bass, but I will bide my time as far as that is concerned.

If anyone happens to be here in town on April 21st, come to the Monthly Grind. It'll be our premiere performance, and I think we're gonna rock the house. Otherwise, we know we're in this for the long haul, and there will be other performances, but the real question is when. I think that I would love to lean toward a more dance-y sound, and H. wants us to go a little more hard-core, so there's bound to be something good that comes of this.

And at some point, I am going to work up the nerve to finish both the Rosalind Russell-y wool dress I have (in fuschia wool flannel) and the black western shirt with leopard accents. I'll post pix when I get around to it.

A Lady of Distinction

While I was on my trip to visit family over the holidays - the reason for my conspicuous absence, if there was anyone who didn't know - I had the very good fortune to see my Grandmama again. I had thought that I would never see her again, and this will almost certainly have been the last time, and I wish with all my heart that it had been different.

My Grandmama (that's Grand-ma-MA, not GRAND-ma-ma) is not really my grandmother. She is my sisters' paternal grandmother, from my mother's first marriage. But she has always been a big part of my life, from the time I was born. She was one of those adults who never really learned to deal with children, so inadvertantly paid them the great compliment of treating them exactly like anyone else; that is to say, like adults. She never condescended or talked down; if anything, she would talk over your head and act rather impatient if you didn't understand her. She was intimidatingly small. I'm sure you know the type of person - their lack of stature invites a proportionally imperious character. She was fond of travel, delicious things, particularly if they were white, and good skin. The last time I saw her, in fact, she imparted three bits of wisdom to me, as at the age of twelve I was, in her eyes, on the brink of womanhood. The pieces of advice were as follows:

1) No matter how imploring the interviewer, a lady never reveals her age.

2) No matter how inviting, a lady never succumbs to the rather plebian habit of exposing her skin to the sun. This means very large hats and glasses, and in later years, the sort of sunblock that is reserved for those kids with ultraviolet allergies.

3) No matter how tired or uncaring she may be, a lady never, and I mean never, under any circumstances, appears in public in deshabille. This means less than perfectly coiffed, less than perfectly dressed, less than perfectly made up. And my Grandmama was always an arbiter of style. Photos of her from her youth, and her waning youth, and even her middle age show a woman with good taste and restraint. Her trademarks were her impeccable skin, her tiny (23"!) waist, and her waist-length jet-black hair. Nearly as well known was her biting wit.

This last was sharp was a knife at times. The edge of her tongue could scar you for life if you weren't careful. Luckily, I was never the object of her well-known put-downs, but I heard about them, and heard them in person plenty. Once, in my defense, she said to her own son, "Stop being such a pig to that child, Joey. She is only a girl - something you might understand." He turned beet red and said not a single word to me for the rest of the evening. I thought for sure she was an angel. I adored her for the way she seemed to look down her nose a the people she needed to tilt her head to see, I admired her coronet of raven braids, and I marvelled at her sheer loveliness. My mother was pretty, in a careless, farm-fresh way, but I never saw elegance until I spent time with my Grandmama.

It was lowering, then, to see her in the nursing home. She has Alzheimer's, and it has taken so much more than her memory. Her hair is gone now, cut into a fluffy white bob that is easily cared for, I'm sure, and pink at the roots where an aide "prettied her up" with an auburn rinse. She was wearing polyester, and not the expensive faux-silk she would have chosen thirty years ago for an intimate dinner at home with her grandchildren, but double knit pants and an undistinguished shirt that hung on her too-thin frame. It was the very first time, after three decades on this earth, that I have ever seen her without a smidgen of makeup - never mind full powder and eyebrow pencil, the woman didn't sport so much as a swipe of lipstick. The only thing that was unchanged about her was her skin. It was finely lined, since she is very, very old, but it was still soft-looking, even, and white. The older people I have touched often have skin that feels like fine paper, like tissue. The skin on her hands felt like she was wearing gloves of some sort - kid suede, perhaps, or heavy silk twill. And her cheek was the same: impossibly soft.

I thought there would not be much of her left when I spoke to her. I thought she would not even have an inkling of who I might be. But when my sister brought me to her attention, she said, "Why, child, you've grown!" And I knew that some deep spark fired in her brain, and I was there, even if it was only for a moment. Something inside me broke, because until then I could pretend that this was some other woman, an imposter masquerading as my Grandmama while the real one laughed herself silly on a Brazilian beach somewhere, busying herself with the cabana boys. But no, I was there in her mind, and she really was the woman who loomed so mythologically large in my own mind, made small by the ravages of time.

Before we left, she asked my sister, as she apparently always does, how old she is. My sister replied in all honesty, breaking one of my grandmother's cardinal rules. The number she named is impossibly high. Grandmama thought so, too. "Dear God!" she exclaimed with a look of horror on her white face. My own mother, in a moment of tenderness, replied, "No, Monique. She's confused. You are fifty, but no one knows that except me. Everyone here thinks you are a very well-kept thirty five."


I did not know her when she was fifty. She was already heading into her sunset years, to borrow a terrible euphemism, when I came along. I wish I had, though. I wish that there were another fifteen or eighteen or thirty years I could spend taking the bits of wisdom she offered me and slipping them carefully away like the rhinestone ring she once gave me, right off her finger. I wish that I could say that I believed I would see her again, even in the state she's in. But I can't - this was the last time I will ever see her, I am sure. She isn't really here anymore, and her body is going to figure that out sooner or later. I just hope that there is a decent shoe repair place where she's going, and a pharmacy that sells Pond's cold cream and Coty Airspun powder in Alabaster, because she'll be out to make an impression.

'Tis the season

Bea will prove it.

She has recently begun to assert her personhood in ways that kind of surprise me, because I didn't really expect them until later. The talking in full sentences was a shocker. And bigger than that was:

getting dressed her own damn self.

Now, I have to say that I approve, within limits. For example, I do not care that she chose to wear leopard print pants with a fairy princess dress. In fact, when I asked what pants she wanted and she answered, "Ummm, leppid p'int" I nearly applauded. It was the choice of the size 12 months fairy princess dress that I objected to. I practically had to corset the child to get her into it, and she couldn't lift her arms above her collarbone all day. The moral of that story is of course, that Momma needs to get on the ball and make a fairy princess dress that fits, preferably one in fuschia and lavender. I also feel the need to draw attention to the socks, barely visible, which she insists on wearing every day, since they have penguins on them.. Bea likes penguins. A lot.

She even got a stuffed chick from Sarah R.R. for Christmas. Sarah is Bea's hero. You will notice,please, that my darling's outfit in this picture is just as charming, tho not as individual, as the one in the preceding picture. This was taken a mere three hours later. She wouldn't let me wash her hair, so I gift-wrapped her.

Changing the subject, I hate slippers. I hate them because I would rather be sewing impractical 6-yard New Look circle skirts out of hot pink shantung taffeta, and cowgirl shirts with tattoo fabric yokes and pearly snaps, and retro style dress coats in deep violet wool melton. I have all those patterns, and even some of the fabric (the wool cuts a little too deeply into the pocketbook), but instead I am making slippers. Pair after pair of slippers. Sigh. After the New Year I am going to embark on another project, which I think will be a shirt to wear while I learn to play slap-bass. I am asking Santa for a double bass this year. He hasn't gotten me what I wanted since he brought me a cat and Huey Lewis's "Perfect World" when I was twelve. He has some making up to do. In addition to the bass, Santa, I want the complete Sun Records Story, and a pair of cowboy boots. And a motorcycle jacket. And a new stereo receiver. And I hope you liked the cookies last year and say hello to the reindeer and I love you and do you like me too? I like eggnog better than cocoa, so that's what I left you and thanks for the neat stuff last year,

Love,

MarieAntoinette