Month: December 2006

Don’t suppose it would be cool if we hung out.

plasticacid_poster_SM

Knots like riding a bicycle. Music louder than necessary, sitting in a drift of letters, this apartment doesn’t feel like home. To be fair, neither does his, though I almost lived there once. I can’t manage to properly wake up. A framed moment of the sound of how he moves in his sleep. My hands smell like boy and soap. My clothing slept on his floor. Contact points. A brief repair of desire. Nothing’s changed (except that I’m better at this than I used to be). We still love each other. We’re still unlikely to call.

Film 1.

I got my kittens yesterday. Two sweet black females, two months old. Tanith is fluffy as all hell and curious as an antique shipwreck, and the other one, whom I haven’t named yet, is sleeker, with eyes that look like they belong to a fantasy painting. I’m addicted, but they have to live at Andrew‘s until I get the theatre, as my roommate is allergic.

It’s Media Monday there tonight. You’re invited. How The Grinch Stole Christmas, show up any time after 6:00pm, movie starts at 8:00pm. at 13th & Clark (5 blocks from Broadway & Commercial). Call 778-229-0942 for directions if needed. I’ll be there, visiting my kittens.

Film 2.

My darling Mishka is in town for a concert – this poster here on the right – Bryan’s Plastic Acid Rock Orchestra. My comps are for Tuesday, anyone want to come? Beth is in it too. The band played Vancouver in May too, but I missed it. A farcical error – it was near my birthday, part of the gig was dedicated to that, so everyone involved assumed that obviously I’d already been invited. Whoops. I love that girl.

Eight years later and Bryan’s kept the name. (Makes me feel almost loved, that does, excepting that I know him too well). Our original incarnation was named Acid Reign, which is what we thought might be kind of cool when we were fourteen. Thankfully, we’ve recovered. Or at least, Marissa and I have. We’ve all known each other since I was ten. I was the girl that moved in next door. They were playing with garbage can lids in the back when I found them. She was sitting on one end and he was jumping onto the other, launching her into the air. It looked fun, I said hello.

Film 3.

I really like this song

Heart of the World now has a rough Flickr.pool.

If you know of someone who should be contacted regarding Heart of the World – this is critical – you do not require my permission, so stop asking. Take initiative! This includes friends involved in community radio, parents, nice waiters, favourite baristas, interesting looking strangers on the street, and your place of employment. Post it to groups, message boards, communities, mailing lists, whatever. We need to be slash-dotted, farked, and on BoingBoing. Anywhere you can think of, it’s important. The Globe & Mail interview won’t be out until January 5th, it’s not going to help as much as you can.

Remember, our deadline is January 15th. We raise half a million dollars by then and we’ll have a new venue. This is not impossible. Even ten dollars from everyone who visits Foxtongue.com would be a significant amount. We can do this, we just have to work. (And pass this on).

in this rain, I miss someone more than I thought I would

The trip into the theatre today went well, in spite of my almost complete lack of sleep. My interview with Dorothy from the Globe & Mail went far longer than I expected it would, as did their attempt to get the perfect “girl gazing vaguely over the red chairs” shot. This means I didn’t get a chance to go over any of the theatre with the people who came with me, but something, more certainly, was accomplished. It’s just that I’m a little too tired to figure out precisely what, exactly.

Or write a sentence that doesn’t take three or more commas to read correctly.

Adam, my webmaster, has uploaded his pictures already, here.

I didn’t get a chance to take any, but Scott and Alastair did.

I’m sure their photos will be posted soon too.

my sparrow tongue in aspic


TV….
Originally uploaded by natalia*.

A beloved friend of mine, (who will remain nameless), inspired by the anonymous love letters I was receiving last spring, has been sending me his own letters. They carry me more than I have the ability to tell him. They paint me as I feel in my most glorious moments. I have quite a collection of them now. I spread them across my room, tuck them into books, and generally leave them where I might re-discover them later. I’m not sure why I’ve decided I should start posting them, but this one came today addressed to Dr. J. Holmes Esq.

Dear Jhayne,
&nbsp &nbsp Once upon a time, long, long ago, there was a girl who made herself out of wires, feathers & tiny silver bells. Precious thing that she was (& she was) she was ill used by the winds of fortune, tossed hither & yon by rapacious storms ’till one day (a day like any other) she said
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp enough
& thrust half of her wires deep into the soil & wrapped the other half tight around a nearby tree & screamed in pain and defiance as the winds tore at her feathers & set her bells a-ringing & the cacophony was almost as unbearable as the wrenching tearing straining & then it wasn’t, and it wasn’t.
&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Here I’ll stay
&nbsp she said & the trees all bent to listen, for precious thing that she was (& she was) the peal of her voice was like fresh fallen acorns gone to root in spring sunlight & they bent their trunks & spread their boughs low & she slept in the shade for a century or three until the raggedness of her feathers receded & her cables grew back thick & strong. Precious thing though she was (& she really was), memory is not forever & she spread her wings one autumn morning & flew straight back up into the waiting arms of the storm.

And this one is a favourite. It lives next to my bed, where I don’t have to read it, but simply know that it’s been carefully folded and placed there in memory of something that almost was as well as what most certainly managed to be. I refuse to admit how much of this I have actually spoken.

&nbsp “Intelligence cannot be a one way street,” you lazily alleged, more to pick a fight than because you really believed it. Or anything.
&nbsp &nbsp (Your hair, burnished copper, framed your face like the latin in a sermon, painfully bright against the cool ebony of your naked shoulders)
&nbsp “When we think about things, things think about us,” you continued blithely, “Think about it! Why does genius die young? It’s not simply that nature abhors a smartass. nature abhors everything, but only in the presence of brilliance does it have the wherewithal to do anything about it.”
&nbsp &nbsp (I traced the lines of your stomach, the graceful curve of your hips as they levered you upright with that gentle susurration of rock on metal.)
&nbsp “It works with people, too. Intelligent people don’t cluster, have no real power to attract each other; they make each other, force each other up out of the endless sea of stupid, form conversation partners out of, effectively, dust.”
&nbsp &nbsp (The clack of gears is the voice of angels as you stand and look down at me, amber eyes glinting, teeth glowing gold in the firelight)
&nbsp You add, offhandedly, “Of course, this applies doubly to us.”
&nbsp &nbsp (You may be right, but I’m not listening, am too wrapped up in the wonder that I could ever build anything as beautiful as you.)

not sure what to

HeartOfTheWorldLogo

I would do terrible things to have a website this good.

It’s been a strange week, cradled in stressful days. I walked a city block today with my eyes shut and didn’t make it into work. Tomorrow I will, tomorrow I will be farther away. The Globe and Mail want to talk with me.

Wednesday I’m going to the Penny Arcade Child’s Play 2006 Dinner Auction.

Thursday, a group of us are going into the theatre building.

It’s the small carved lines that I still see, like when I look at him with my glasses on, all I can see is his age – the distance between us for all that we’re very much the same.

as soon as the sun sets, all bets are off

According to Jason: “Jhayne Holmes has long been a fixture in the Vancouver progressive arts community, energizing flash mobs and zombie walks alike. Seeing the Raja Cinema building go up for sale drove her entrepreneurial initiative towards creating a next-generation arts space. A relative newcomer to running a business, Holmes has been able to turn ingenue into ingenuity in opening Heart of the World by launching a website to harness the power (and dollars) of the web 2.0 world.”

I’m impressed. Also, tired.

The next step is to shop the business plan out to investors and raise a minimum of $500,000. Not as bad a goal as one might think, when that’s only 2500 shares. Two thousand shares and some change, that’s what we have to sell. If we can raise more, getting the theatre on its feet will be a lot easier, but I’m not counting on it. Our numbers have been worst case scenario for a reason, not only out of pragmatism, but to count on having less than expected, so when we succeed, we will already be ahead.

Re: already sold shares. Can everyone who sent me money send me their address? I’m slowly working through my e-mail to match deposits with people, but it’s slow going. If you send me your info, you’ll get yours first.

And for those people still asking – yes, you can still buy shares. It isn’t too late. I’m sure they make great gifts too.

I find this photo hilarious


looking into the future
Originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

I didn’t get home until four in the morning, but I finally got to sleep at my own house for the first time in something like twelve days. I woke fully dressed, pigtails still in, one forlorn glowstick still clasped around my left arm, remembering only at first that Antonio has pictures of me that will further guarantee – “no career in politics”. I think I was on a table or maybe in a cage. Either way, I look like I’m a lot of fun.

Now to go drag Breakfast out of bed. Alastair, Duncan, Andrew, and Dani. Yes. We’ll be there for awhile, different people at different times. You’re invited too.

Metal Walls.

You know the way.

paying (back) different people

Leisure Alaska, like a love child of Kashmir and the Polyphonic Spree.

I would like to meet you in a coffee shop somewhere. Accident instead of design. I want that moment of feeling my heart leap in a mix of pleasure and terror when I see you. My stomach stabbed with ice, your face suddenly unreadable. I want us to look like a badly cut piece of film, staggering and awkward and so cold. There might be ashtray weather outside, there might be sun. Either way it doesn’t matter. After painfully polite conversation, we would escape from the public glare of the cafe and find a place to sit and stare out at the world. It would be too cruel to stay where anyone could overhear us.

If you do nothing else this week, click here for music.

Someone else, someone who’s just heard of you.

A restaurant, we’re friends with odd flashes of intimacy that don’t lead anywhere. You walk like a drumbeat and I appreciate how your large hands flutter around your anecdotal stories, pale birds battered by how you frame your history. We’re talking about melodrama, how you declared you would never love again at age twenty-five. I thought that was charming in the way that embarrassing young mistakes can be until I realized that twenty-five is older than me. Then I looked down at my plate.

Later, in your antique apartment full of follow-the-instructions furniture, the music is wildly inappropriate, a random playlist shuffled from a little white box the size of a nineteen thirteen suicide. The urge to write is distracting, but my fingers stumble when they dance across the keys. Instead I get up to watch the miracle of your pencil outlining something that only had a blurry reality inside of my head. I’m caught in a chemical loop, scales of thoughts playing my spine for kicks, ignoring my more rational decisions. It would be unfortunate if it weren’t only two days a month. I think of clockwork, how the victorians made mannequins that played chess. Spinning brass gears and crystal eyes dyed as blue as yours. Hands that held pencils, that could only draw one figure. One figure, perfect, for ever. I think of hands.