The urge to explore was strong...

Shiny Shiny Love

LandYacht of my heart.

I have a love of Airstream trailers that began when I first saw one of the stream lined aluminum lovelies in a photo on a Ry Cooder album. It was so cool, so clean so aerodynamic... Airstream, my shiny, shiny love.
The first time I stood in one, I felt as though the Mother Ship had called me to home. I would love to own one some day, maybe a 16 or 24 footer- but until then, I dream and look at photos, and stop to take pictures whenever I see one at the side of the road. I have polished one particualrly lovely one with my boobs.

I would love to see pictures of your Airstream if you have one- those who have the same love will understand- like pornography for robots and pilots of the highways, the sleek lines of the Airstream are more sensuous than any fleshy curves. If I were a robot, I'd want to fuck an Airstream. Spaceships, robots, Airstreams, I'm a StarTrekkian product of the 60's looking for some Aluminium satisfaction. Write to me if you speak the language.

The 45

I wish there was some equivalent today to the 45- downloading MP3's just doesn't have the same weight, it's so ephemeral. By the time I was a money earning teenager, the day of the 45 was pretty much waning, but even so, if I heard a single I really liked, I could still go to the record store, head shop or The Met and pick up a 45. The cut on the "A" side would always be the radio friendly tune we already would have heard, but I always felt the greatest buzz of anticipation when I was lowering the needle on the "B' side. The B side was where it's at. The random cool track, the weirdo toss off, the song with the swear words...

I would haunt yard sales and flea markets for vinyl, but for some reason, the 45's always look like someone's brother played frisbee with them. Hmm, Truth rears it's ugly head. So that explains it. Last summer a friend gave me an old Hi-Fi with one working speaker, an 8 track player (That's fodder for another rant) and a brand new stylus.
Oh, and when I lowered that needle on a shiny 45, it was like sweet honey to my soul. Mmmm, sweet crackle and hiss of needle on vinyl, how I missed you.
Here - Look at these:
www.recordeli.dk/picsrecs/ 45r4591-nocover-big.jpg

Pow Wow 1972

Summers were infinite when we were small, stretching endlessly as the prairie skyline. I remember going to the Pow Wows at the Dene Nation reserve to see the displays and watch the dance competitions. The world is a sea of legs when you are so small, so my strongest memories of the Pow Wows consist of a tangle of legs and beautiful costumes, and the hard flat earth pummelled dry by moccassined feet.

The airmen from the base would intermingle companionably with the tribe, having established a friendly commerce of meat and skins and gorgeously beaded crafts for cash. I still love the taste of deer meat and the close smoky scent of tanned hide.

I was always the kind of child who was prone to wander off - an inclination of nature I have to this day, (only those around me no longer refer to it as "getting lost".) I never felt lost, I felt grounded and at home, willing to walk a little farther just to see what was coming up next. My parents would eventually notice my absence and there would be a posse of older brother and sisters sent out to round me up, but it was always Dad who could draw me back. He never really looked for me, he'd just rattle his keys and change in his pockets, and the familiar sound was something I could pick out in any crowded mall, party, or even over the steady beat of pow wow drums.

Dad could also whistle skillfully, complicated little birdsongs all seemingly founded on the Waltzing Matilda/ Oh My Darling Clementine melodies. I would gravitate back to Daddy with a sure homing instinct, and while the others were off distractedly looking for me, I'd slip my hand into his and he would just keep on whistling. If I wandered away at the Pow Wow, the posse would have no chance of rounding me up, with my long tangled dark hair, I blended into the Native band like one of their own, and I did feel I belonged there. Somehow I felt these kind and colourful strangers were my people and I was graced at an early age with knowing I belong to this world. I remember feeling safe when I wandered off, knowing that even if my family was lost somewhere, I was "here". The dancers were kicking up dust all around me, I remember sitting on the edge of a low platform/stage, feeling calm, solid, complete - waiting to be found, knowing I would be found.

Have this: www.501venisonrecipes.com

Old TV in front of a dead man's house

There was an old man who lived in a rickety old farm house just up the road from me. The weeds had grown up all around it and him too, I suppose. The farm house was the last of the really old houses in the district, a wooden three story structure that was built for a huge family, though now he lived alone with 15 or 20 cats that prowled freely like ghosts in and out through gaps and holes. The town and then the neighborhood swelled all around the property, encroaching upon it, waiting for either the old man or his house to succumb to time so the swell of progress could consume that last acre. In the three or four years I lived in the neighborhood, I rarely saw him, but each night you could see the blue-light flicker of a tv from his kitchen until late late at night.

When the old guy died some nephews came from "away" to sell off his house to land hungry developers and they carted all his stuff to the curb - boxes of rags and newspapers and a few personal possesions, including a tv like this one. I passed the house on my way to town one morning and when I saw that tv in the garbage I felt an actual lurching in my stomach - I've never wanted anything so earnestly in all my life, but I just couldn't bring myself to stop in front of the house of my dead neighbor to pilfer the chattel of his passing. I drove away and was of course seized instantly by a sense of loss and regret - it seemed more wrong to leave that beautiful old tv there in the garbage than to take it away. "Greedy tv lust" overcame "dead neighbor guilt" and I slowly circled the block and drove back to get the coolest tv on earth. It was gone by the time I circled the block. I still wish I had seized the opportunity when it came to me. Dead is dead, but cool tvs are forever.

Hey: Look at this:
http://www.deadpeoplesstuff.ca/

I remember this...

I remember when I was little the best part of Christmas was always the Firemen's Christmas Party held every year for families on the base where we were stationed. It was not a glamourous event, we were not the families of officers, so it wasn't held in the mess hall, it was held near the air strip in one of those quonset buildings that looked like a giant tin can half buried in the snow, which is way more cool. There was a huge Christmas tree and the place was filled with picnic tables where the families would sit. Well, mostly the grown ups would sit there with their coats on and the kids would tear around like crazy, waiting for Santa. Santa would sit at the very front of the hall in a giant wooden office chair with hard arms that would dig into your back when you sat on Santa's knee to get your gift. Santa smelled good like my Dad, of Old Spice and Irish Spring soap and he sounded just like Dad's best friend, who always seemed to arrive to the party late. He would "Ho Ho Ho" and heave you up on his knee and ask if you'd been good, and he always knew your name. Santa had two sacks of gifts, one labeled "Boy" the other "Girl" - I knew this was a trick. I always asked Santa for a "Boy Present" because the gifts for girls were always cheap crap, like dolls that were supposed to be Barbies but weren't; their legs didn't bend and their arms and heads pulled off so easily they barely lasted to the end of the Christmas Party. The best gift I ever got was a blue see through plastic ray gun that had a metal trigger and the gun shot sparks when you pulled the trigger. I loved that gun. Here, look at this:
http://www.neatstuff.net/guns/Guns.html

Bowling for Nostalgia

Bowling, I remember you well.
I had a boyfriend I was only passably fond of- I used to think having sex with him was like going bowling. Bowling is something I didn't want to do very often, it seemed like more trouble than it was worth. I'd have to wear someone else's shoes, and I never knew whose warm damp feet had been in them before mine. So it might take some coaxing, but I am a good sport- so I would go bowling, usually only slightly reluctantly. But then I'd find once I was actually at the bowling alley, it was quite alot of fun- I'd even enjoy myself and remember that I'm a pretty good bowler. So I'd go, I'd have a pleasant time, I'd enjoy myself, even. Then once I was home I'd think "it'll be a long while before I do that again..."

That boyfriend and I have long since split- amicably- he deserved someone who was more than only passably fond of him, and I'm glad for him he found that. But the next boyfriend, the one I adored to a tragic level, was only passably fond of me, (oh bitter retribution of love) and now I'm alone and have yet to find someone to love me the way I deserve to be loved. And as perverse as it sounds, I want to find someone to go bowling with. For fun.

See, I haven't been bowling since the end of 2004. I miss it. I miss the shiny lanes, the balls and pins, and I miss the companionable rumble and clatter noise of the alley. I love the kitschy "throw back to Happy Days" feeling of nostalgia that bowling gives me. I even bought my own brand new bowling shoes - pretty two toned pink and blue, they rest unworn in a polka dotted bowling bag. Who knew I'd miss bowling. I guess I liked it more than I was willing to admit- I just hadn't found the right bowling partner yet...

I know I could go bowling by myself- I have my own shoes, afterall. But really, bowling alone isn't as fun, it seems pointless and lonely without someone to cheer on your strikes or slag you for the gutter balls. I'm in the bowling prime of my life, I don't want to go another year without it. Oh Fonzie, where are you?

Hey- look at this:
www.worldofkitsch.com

Well Seasoned

I have an old set of cast iron pans that hang near my stove. Sleekly black, they are well oiled, well seasoned, and industrially beautiful. It's true, as Mike suggests that they are tempered and seasoned by each meal prepared before- to scrub them and rid them of this layer of seasoning would not only destroy the delicate flavour which is infused in each meal I prepare, but it would render the pans unprotected, and impart only a bland ferrous sharpness for flavour.

I have learned to accept that all the experiences of my life have seasoned me as well, to make me the salty/spicy/sweet woman I am today, but sometimes you do need to re-season the pan, scrub away the shards of burned onion to make the pancakes sweet. The catharsis I seek has less to do with accepting the pan as it is, and more to do with my desire to be metaphorically clanged over the psychic head with solid flat black iron, to start out fresh and new, and see my beautiful future swell before me like limpid pools, like Wilma Flinstone's eyes.