Mumbling Madly

Today people seem so friendly! I took a 2.5 mile walk near the water and people looked up from their bbq’s and waved. One fellow joked, “I’ll catch up to you in a little while!” Indicating that he would join me on what he perceived to be my running regiment. I got honked and waved at while walking near the water. The air is mild, smelling strongly of damp sun and passing thunderstorms. After a huge cherry bomb went off in front of our house 1/2 hour ago I brought Hobbes in. She is sleeping on my chair. This morning, Hobbes loudly protested when Josh moved her over. “Sorry Hobbes,” he said “No Bed For Old cats” a direct rip-off from No Country For Old Men.

Thursday night we went out on a date. We headed to Pioneer Square and hit up a few happy hours. We sat on stools and received poor service, $1 mini pizzas, and an excellent dry martini. Tipsily, we visited the former snowboard connection turned skate shop. I found a disturbing hoodie which I became obsessed with:

Later, we went to the best Art Walk I’ve ever attended in my life. Now I know why Pioneer Square is known for its galleries and artist lofts. An acquaintance invited me to his gallery space in the fabulous 619 Western Ave. It houses more than one hundred artists work from studios all in one six story building. I learned that it is one of the largest artist studio enclaves on the west coast and has been a workspace for artists since 1979. Upon my friend’s recommendation we rode the elevator to the sixth floor and then made the slow descent down. The building is ancient, raw, and slanted at a steep angle at the top floor; I experienced something like vertigo when exiting the old fashion elevator. Studios were laid wide and open for our inspection. Snacks and wine sat on homemade tables on every floor. The walls were cement and chipped, but the art hung firmly like faithful flags, the landscape gritty and punctuated with beauty. A little dog roamed freely on one of the floors, wagging his tail in and out of each studio space. The work was priced decently and varied. We saw graffiti art, portraits, sculpture, goth photography, nudes. We entered one studio and the very generous Dr. Johnny greeted us by giving away free art–’9 by ‘11 portraits sketched in charcoal. He had large murals covering his ceiling, the walls, and even the floor. “You should always leave an art walk with some art,” he advised. “I have so much of it I never sell so I thought I would just give it away.” A poorly shot picture in the middle of it all:

This morning I called my sister up and told her to request the first Thursday of August off. “We have to go,” I told her. “You have no choice.”

Everybody has that band, that special, special, band that summed up their adolescence, their angst, their heartbreaks. Some of you may think, for me, that would be Skiploader, the Portland based indie band I pursued with origami, or maybe you’re remembering when Courtney and I gave the lead singer of Guttermouth a ring to give to his girlfriend back home (he gave us tickets to his next show, backstage access, and beer in return). ‘Wait,’ some of you are saying, ‘weren’t you into really weird bands, like Big Daddy Meatstraw? Karen Black? Didn’t you see Tribe 8 before you really knew who they were?’ (Yes, and Lynn Breedlove really did perform shirtless, wearing a strap-on dildo). But none of those bands compare to The One:

Jawbreaker.

I love Jawbreaker. I was very lucky the first time my high school boyfriend leaned over and flicked on his cd player for some make out music, (specifically the terrifyingly sexy “Want” off of their first album, Unfun). Perhaps because of the make out association, the music of Blake Schawrzenbach became the narrative of my youth. It could have been anything, I suppose, Metallica, Sonic Youth, (Pearl Jam, according to Josh’s recollection of early make out music), but the language of Jawbreaker was so heartbreakingly well written that it stuck.

I had never been a ‘lyrics’ kind of person, preferring the poppy sounds of Erasure and Pet Shop Boys for their dancibility and maybe a little practical REM from time to time. With the introduction of a bad boy in my life, my music shifted specifically to his taste. Suddenly NOFX (which I embarrassingly pronounced Noff-ix), Bad Religion, and Screeching Weasel blared out of my station wagon. My bf moved to Japan for a stint in the navy and I was left with nothing but a bunch of cds; my loneliness made me reach for reminiscent music and the impact of Jawbreaker began. What better music to listen to on a rainy northwest afternoon wearing long underwear, doc martins, and a sundress? Jawbreaker remains the only band that I truly love inside and out to this day. From the popular “You’re not punk/and I’m telling everyone/save your breath/I never was one” to the obscure and painful “Beneath the neon sky/ Our moonlight/ Six a.m. the floor comes alive with lice/ The pan’s dried up so tight/ With hardened beans/ We’re hungry/ So I lean on you sometimes/ Just to see you’re still there/ Your feet can’t take the weight of one/ Much less two/ We hit concrete.”

I used to have every single song on every single Jawbreaker album memorized. Each song had special meaning to me, a special inner-narration, a deep reflection on my life at the time. I listened to Jawbreaker on the bus, on the train ride from Seattle to Portland, at home while wallowing in self-pity. It’s as if Blake Schwarzenbach reached inside and rewrote my inner brain dialog better then I could write it myself. I also thought it was incredibly sexy that he had a degree in Creative Writing. I actually found a guy in the English department who I dubbed the “Sensitive 70’s Shirt Wearing Guy” and lusted after him in a way a girl can only lust after a Creative Writing major. (He must be so in touch with his feelings! He must be so tortured and in need of my help! He must write in a journal! Every night!) I saw Jawbreaker twice in concert: once in 1995 (they opened for the brand new Foo Fighters) and again in 1996 (after Dear You, their major label release). The second time I was so distraught in my personal life that I cried during the entire concert.

So obsessed with this band, I would write down the lyrics to certain songs (Chesterfield King) and create crude illustrations for them, (later publishing them in my zine “Well, I Swan”).
If MySpace had been around or any sort of social networking device I’m sure I would have been all over Jawbreaker’s page. So impressed was I by the idea of a man being able to capture his feelings in such gorgeous text that I shared his music with anyone who would listen (when Courtney had her car broken into the first thing she told me was, “they even stole all my Jawbreaker cds”). I may have succeeded in getting the attention of the lead singer of Skiploader but I was never bold enough to even write a letter to my favorite song writer.

I thought my love for Jawbreaker was because I really loved Blake , (my high school boyfriend said his friend, Christina, claimed to love Blake so much she wanted to ‘marry him,’ a sentiment that I realized I shared and jealousy recall saying, ‘well, I want to marry him too’), but I could never get into his second band, Jets to Brazil. As much as I wanted to love this band, I found it lacking. Perhaps, like myself, Blake had grown from the angsty, heart-wrenching, writer to a more grounded individual…by the time Jets came around I was no longer a pioneering, single, twenty-something living in the U District on $500 a month. My high school boyfriend was long gone, having abandon me for hard drugs in 96,’ and subsequent guys couldn’t really match those feelings.

Sure, the lyrics of heartbreak, betrayal, and tragedy still helped narrate the harrowing events of my early 20’s. But as those difficult times dissipated, my clinging dependency on this band softened, and when they quit in 1996 I barely noticed. Sure, I still dragged out the old albums from time to time. Recently, I sat in front of Wikipedia and thought, “What is one my favorite things?” I pulled out an old favorite: Jawbreaker. I looked them up, reading anything I could find about the band, and found a picture of the lead singer. Oh my gosh! He’s aged! (All that sexy emo smoking) I found a link to a tribute album that came out in 2003 and purchased it off of Amazon. I’ve been driving all over Seattle with this cd in my car, listening to all of these classic Jawbreaker songs sung by other bands. “None of these other singers have the heart,” I thought to myself, “They can’t be TRUE fans, listen to how badly they’re singing ‘Boxcar.’” The remixed version of ‘Want’ is so terrible I have to skip it every time it plays. I went home and pulled out the originals, playing them, writing about them…(maybe channeled my high school boyfriend a tiny bit). Back then I didn’t have a real job, stayed out until 4am, and entertained dangerous men. Life was so exciting back then!

“I love you more/then I ever loved/anyone before/and anyone to come/someone said your name/I thought of you alone/I was just the same/twenty blocks away.”

It’s time to announce the creation and work-in-progress of my jewelry website:
www.marahelena.com
This website is primarily to showcase my work, a reference point for other crafters I’ve met, and is certainly less about making “big bucks off” of web sales. In fact, if you live locally, don’t order off the site and pay for shipping…talk to me and I can save us both money by hand delivering.

The site leaves room for lot’s of improvement, so any feedback you might have would be really excellent. This project has been a bit overwhelming, what with the holidays sneaking up on me, and I realized that it doesn’t need to be perfect. I will be regularly fine tuning and adding new and exciting things.

Enjoy!

I really love this Halloween costume one of my older students designed for me. I am really impressed with the accuracy of my hair and the spot on recognition of my personal style.

I was walking around the neighborhood today and right in the middle of the sidewalk was a distraught young couple. They looked about 15, the girl had dirty white jeans on, the guy had an enormous coat. They were talking intently and seriously, standing very closely together. They stopped talking when they saw me coming and the girl coolly stepped aside a few inches to let me pass–it didn’t matter, the whole neighborhood new they were in terrible love. A few feet away from the couple lay a torn up letter. “Aha,” I thought to myself. “Love’s truth laid out in a note.” On my way back from my walk I found the couple gone but the letter still on the ground. The first page was torn into little biddy pieces, but the second page remained intact:

“So when your in tacoma don’t talk to no guys, or you will break our love and our love will die. I’ll do the same and not talk to women, so it’s just gonna be Mark-n-Fern to the end.”

Yesterday…
I assisted in helping babies learn the joy of paint. The class was for ages 12-24 months old and you just have to imagine six babies lined up on a plastic tarp with six pieces of gold paper and five tubes of paint. There were brushes…sure…and a few kids actually enjoyed holding the brushes and swirling them around their paper. This is the time when personalities reveal themselves, the intricacies of human preference, the humor that makes up a person. One baby diligently painted swirls on his paper, another refused any tools and used her hands, and one baby ended up using her entire body as a canvas: she sat on top of her paper and smeared paint all over herself. This particular baby comes from a very conservative household, or so I was told by her nanny, “She’s not allowed to make a mess, not ever…I want to do more art with her at home but her parents would freak out…their house is immaculate and not very ‘baby like.’”

One little girl is not interested in the paint. She finds the roll of blue painter’s tape that I used to tape the sheets onto the canvas. She carefully affixes several pieces of tape onto her paper, creating blue curly-q’s and x’s. This child leaves the canvas spotless, ready to move on.

I am in charge of cleaning these babies up…I have a big bucket of warm soapy water and lot’s of rags. One by one each baby is dropped into the bucket, the water coming up to their chubby knees as we carefully avoid getting the diaper wet. I wipe down the multi-colored streaks of paint from their legs as their grown-up holds them diligently–eventually every baby leans over and puts their hands in the water. They splash the water around with their fingers and make bubbles pop. I encourage them to do this because it cleans their hands. One little boy lingers a long time near the water. He trails his finger through the water’s surface, making little paddling gestures with his hands, and splashes around. His mother claims he is obsessed with water: fountains, puddles, wading pools. “Your hands are sparkling!” I proclaim as I dry his fingers off again and again. The baby who has immersed herself in paint is stripped of her onesie and plopped in the tub. She bitterly complains as I scrub off the paint. The paint is everywhere: on her back, in her hair, in her elbows, on her ears. She spends the rest of the time padding around in nothing but a diaper; I notice her masterpiece drying on the rack: one single solitary piece of paper covered completely with several layers of paint. Not a trace of gold, the colors creating a beautiful muddy brown.

As many of you know, I’ve been gone for almost a week doing the following: Attending the PDX Zine Symposium, celebrating my fourth anniversary in Seaside, OR, and attending my brother’s wedding. This was such an amazing, packed, week of wonderful events! Because over 500 pics were taken I’m currently weighing through them and posting them on my flickr page.

I’ll start at the beginning: The Zine Symposium

Basically, my sister’s lengthy interview-bases zine, Ten Feminists, killed. She sold so many copies! Perhaps it was the hand painted cover and/or it was evident she had spent a year on it. She charmingly was selling it for a sliding scale: $3-4 dollars–even though it was worth much more. Everyone paid $4 and I felt like I could only fleetingly piggy back on her success. We sat next to the twins from Fuzzy Lunch Box fame who I wished I could have talked more with since the zine I traded them for is excellent! We also sat right next to the door with the handmade sign: Food. We thought we would get a lot of foot traffic if we sat near the food door but alas, it actually made us less visible.

I wasn’t as exuberant this year. Last year I was much more hungry for the ‘zine experience’ of meeting, shaking hands, trading (hoping to God it’s not a poetry zine), and getting to know fellow artist submersed in the DIY culture. Some zinesters were very friendly, others were reserved and obviously reluctant to trade. I looked up TugBoat Press who thoughtfully reviewed “Kindergarten Underground” last year and thanked them–also submitted “Kin” and “Ten Feminists” for review. (Incidentally, check out this spread on Stranger Danger Distro!)

I tried cute incentives this year…like giving anyone I traded with a flower pin. Some people were very into it but many seemed confused and unwilling to put it on. There weren’t any prints/tees that I HAD to have like last year. Sure, I rummaged around the bin of used t-shirts that had the 2007 Zine Symposium logo on it and cheerfully coughed up $5 for a gently used Old Navy Tee. There were really cute shrinky dinks for a quarter and plastic pendants I couldn’t resist. But the high quality prints, the quirky photos, a lot of that was missing this last year. Perhaps they were pushed out for vendors who were more ‘zine-y?’

I can’t express to you all how absolutely lovely the movie “Once” is. I saw it on a whim and just loved it. Don’t let the term ‘the new musical’ scare you (it did for Josh), this is nothing like “Showboat.”  Imagine your favorite album layered over scenes, monologues, and scenery shots. The result is a goose pimpling, smile resulting, unusual film experience. There is easy-to-follow narrative, so don’t be alarmed, in fact it’s a bittersweet love story. Bare bones, renegade shooting in public without consent of the city, shot for a mere $150,000 budget, we need more of these sort of movies in the states. Songs from the movie are on their myspace page.

Widely received, “Once” received a whopping 97% on Rotten Tomatoes , critical acclaim at Cannes, and is sneaking up on the states to be a sleeper hit. (OK, stuck-up indie rag The Stranger didn’t like this movie, so please, read their terrible review with a grain of salt. It’s almost like the reviewer felt like he had to be all hardcore and go against the grain, because, you know, The Stranger is so cutting edge with its hideous pack of angst-ridden staff). This Irish love story is magnificent, my only regret is that I will never be able to experience it again for the first time.
So, my dear readers, just GO…GO SEE THIS MOVIE.