Nothing Doing

Dear You,

I’ve been thinking of you, and of course, I know I should write, or at least send a message.  But, I am busy now, doing nothing.  I was planning to meditate, but doing nothing is so much more genuine.  If you ever meet someone you can do nothing with, clear out your spare room and invite them to live with you.  Of course, no, I am doing nothing, yes, but I am thinking and seeing much.  I need all this time to do this thinking and looking. 

I am doing nothing, but not thinking nothing- I am lousy at thinking nothing, so I never bother with it.  I am thinking of the Changing Face of  Feminism, and of the birds, and the wind, and of tattered books.  Also, I am considering less lofty things, like how I just threw out all the pencil shavings I was saving in a champagne bottle.  Was that right to do?  Perhaps it was nuts to collect the shavings to begin with and now I have set things to right by tossing them?  These are the issues I confront in the pursuit of what might matter.  And besides, you were right; I did have too many glass jars.

I am watching the house finches pick up fallen seed, and as I gaze at their movement, things on the edge of vision become blurred.  Substance flattens and becomes indistinct; it all seems to be one: the space, the ground, the sky-  I knew a wonderful professor once (a feminist as it happens) and she told me once of seeing the ‘etheric web' from her vantage point on a hill, or a slope.  She described her awareness of the interconnectedness of everything in a visual way.  I am pretty sure my lack of focus could be revealing the etheric web.

I have been thinking of you, wanting to send my greeting and thanks;  I know you are up north now, or out west... I will get a message to you soon, but for now, I simply must do nothing!

Together Today Only

Dear Special Listener,

My DJ played these two songs for me recently, and I know you will want to hear them too.  I like them together, but I don't know if they might be better in reverse order.  Play the one, and then the other, and then play them again, the first last and the last first, and let me know what you think.

One

Two






PS 
One more time, because there's a little more gravitas in this version.

Quintessential.

Dear Band Mates,

Imagine the most beautiful acoustic guitar you can- of course, it has mother of pearl, and that edging, which I believe they call purfling.  What else?  A sunburst?  Dark wood, light wood?  What of the wood's character?  Bird's eye, curly, quilted, flame, bearclaw?  Is it black and from the '30s?  Is it worn, or shiny new?  I imagine a lot of nice guitars, and I think I sent you out once to pick up a parlor guitar, but now, I have a new errand for you to run:  Go and get this, because it is the most beautiful guitar I can imagine.

My desire for this thing, and I have spent a lifetime desiring, so I know what I am talking about, moves me to the ultimate act:  Saving money.  Actually, no, it moves me to wishing and considering purchasing a lotto ticket, which is what I usually do when I want something absurdly beyond my means and uses.  Still, a girl can dream, and this is about as dream worthy an item as I have seen this decade! 

On the topic of dreaming and the proper tools for the task, don't you think, don't you know in your heart, that your fingers would play better, that your voice would sing sweeter, with a guitar like this?

While we are wishing, let us play this song on our ordinary, daily use, right here right now, trusty old guitars.  The chords are easy, but don't forget to get louder as the song progresses.










PS
While you are out, pick up a shirt to wear with this guitar:  A frilled tuxedo shirt would be grand.  Oh, and I know you are worrying that I will be too nervous about scratching this opulent instrument to play it, and I assure you that I would play it and bang it and scrape it just as heartily as I do Little Blue.  The only thing I might hesitate to do is take it camping- sitting in a hot car while you stop for tacos en route to the lake is hard on a guitar's laminates and neck.



PPS
By the way, the fifth element that the word quintessential refers to, is that element beyond the air, earth, water, and fire: that highest element which permeates all the universe; ether.  As in, "Dude, that is one sick, filthy, and ethereal guitar!"

Space Coast

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Roller Skating Pilgrimage Site

Dear Little Darlings,

Watch this film, look me right in the eye, and tell me this isn't a fabulous world we are living in!  We visited this special place, just last week- enchanting Doris Jenkins was at the entrance, she put our money in the register, she played "Elimination," she skated with us at the end of the evening; the wooden floor was just exactly as you see it, and you can go there too! 









I am absolutely ready to begin building my roller rink.  I imagine it will be open for you to visit by 2020 at the latest.  I hope you will come by!  I think I will serve apple juice, and maybe popcorn....  Oh, and we will have Cheerwine for sale, too.  And long lost candy bars, like Ice Cubes and U-No Bars and Rocky Roads and Abba Zaba.  I simply cannot wait!








PS
On second thought, I guess the taffy might stick to the floor, so we can't have that last one!

AI Don't know Nuthin' about the Finer Things.

Hello Loves,

It’s car upholstery, it’s old nails; museum objects from around the world, Twombly, and Motherwell, and knitted holey sweaters, and shrubbery, and discarded lumber, and old envelopes, and pencil marks, and dripping paint on the edges of cans, it’s everything I ever saw, it’s everything that ever was:  All this, synthesized. 










PS
Is what an artist sees and tries to paint, to make, to build, to write & to play.  Sometimes, here at the Dodo, we post an answer to a question that you may not realize you are asking, and in point of fact, it may be that very few of you are asking it, but the Dodo exists for these few- for you, in point of fact.

The Temporal Lines.

Dear Stockinged,


They are making now, with their super-high-tech-plastic textile stuffs, stockings that do not run. The Brits call them ‘ladder resist,’ and I wonder if I will need to start to hoard the old kind, the kind that run, the kind that hold a record of wearing.  Of course hosiery is fragile, and short-lived, but isn't this part of what we love about it?  Would we have them 'wear like iron'?

The run in the stocking is the sexy near-end of a pair of hose- and let's pause here, to think of Lady Chatterley’s Lover’s vermillion hose....

A woman, a girl, always works a bit to hide the early runs- with a longer skirt or boots, and often just the tiniest section of a run will show as a person turns, or leans. The run is a line that leads someplace you cannot see, and it is the most titillating part of stockings, and it is also the very end of them, the most precious last wearings. The run is especially lovely in black stockings, because it is the most visible.  The wearer sometimes puts a daub of nail polish on the runs, the ladders, to stop them, and it might show as a red or pink dot on the stockings.

The thing I am considering here, as I so often do, are the traces of time's fleetness, the ineffable marks of wear, and the very nature of being.  May the mundane and short-lived continue to endure!







PS 
A place you can go to plan or make manifest your hoard.