intellectual properties

dreamstate

i feel really out of sorts. just so much is……what is going on? the familiar turned uninviting, shifting and without solid ground. unsettled. uncertain. i’m generally into marginal, liminal, elusive, slipstream consciousness, but lately i feel like my whole life has been taken over by someone else’s dream.

this is an edge.

.::.

i just had a 8:15 ecstatic-dancing-with-myself to Seahorse.

if you’ve never put this song on (loud) and listened to the whole progression, i highly recommend it, either dancing free or still with eyes closed.

impressions of Alaska (travelogue)

day1/SatMay5: seattle
early morning departure from SFO, arrived early afternoon, took a cab to the 11th Avenue Inn B&B (highly recommended), settled in to the great little stand-alone apartment they gave us, and since it was a rare gorgeous sunny afternoon in Seattle, headed out for a walk to Volunteer park a short distance away, which was crowded with Cindo de Mayo festivities. wandered back, found Plum, an excellent vegan restaurant and had a late lunch.
later rendezvoused with longtime internet friend @OffbeatAriel and Andreas and little Tavi at Cal Anderson park, and then hit the bar/restaurant district for a long succession of beers and food. the night of Cinco de Mayo is a parade of trainwrecks, and we found most of it to be too loud and crowded, but Elysian Brewery was best, hands down.
fitbit data: 20,266/8.85 miles/33 floors

day2/SunMay6: seattle
slept in, had brunch, went wandering downtown/waterfront, found a nice little cocktail bar – the ZigZag Cafe – tucked away on one of the many sets of stairs that go between the bluff under the Alaskan Way Viaduct and to the waterfront. then walked back up to Capitol hill for vegetarian Thai food and off to bed.
steps: 16,249/7.1 miles/33 floors

day3/MonMay7: seattle
had breakfast at the B&B, where we met some cool people from Harlem who coincidentally also work in the fields of energy (he) and art (she) and talked to them for a long while about all that and New York, moved/walked to the hotel where the families were staying, went back down to the waterfront with Jay’s mom and stepdad, my family arrives, we all rendezvous for dinner at a pizza joint, took another walk to a comic book store and around town and then to the Space Needle before sunset. went to bed early for an early morning departure.
steps: 23,315/10.18 miles/26 floors

me, my mom, my sister, and my niece at the Space Needle

day4/TuesMay8: seattle, embarkation, out to sea
wake up, hustle to get everyone into the shuttle and to the dock, go through ship boarding process, settle into the room and boat life. it was another really gorgeous day for Seattle and we sat up on deck in the sun while the all the boarding etc happened. had family dinner, went to some shows (song and dance, comedy), and then late in the evening found that the on-board disco was 100% empty, and we all know how i love an empty dancefloor and so i danced my ass off in my own private disco for at least an hour before bed.
steps: 17,710/8.81 miles/78 floors

day5/WedMay9: at sea
this was a really long day. overnight we encountered a huge pacific swell, and the boat was rolling around all over the place. not only was it rolling constantly, our room also kept shaking like an earthquake (due to being close to the engines? i dunno) and we could barely sleep. tons of people got sick – the crew had placed little stashes of barf bags all over the place, stuck on doorways and elevators. i thought i was immune to the seasickness until i tried to go to the gym and run on the treadmill. WRONG ANSWER. had dinner, went to some shows on board and basically just lolled around on unsteady sealegs.
steps: 13,765/6.05 miles and 177 floors!

(sidenote on all the steps: yes, we were on a boat. but it was a BIG boat, and i made it a point to not sit still too long, and to never take an elevator, which on a boat that was 11 stories tall with stuff on every level can be a lot. so many of those steps are up and down, up and down stairs and through the many long tunnel hallways of the boat trying to find the other 8 members of my party. and then in every port city, we weren’t much for the tourist attractions so we just WALKED.)

day6/ThurMay10: Tracy Arm Fjord, AK (on boat)
on this day the boat took a trip up into the Tracy Arm Fjord to South Sawyer Glacier. a beautiful scenic trip, though the weather was quite drizzly and cold on deck. the boat drove right up into the ice. it was pretty cool. evening was more shows/bar hopping on board.
steps: 11,186/5.08 miles/77 floors

day7/FriMay11: Skagway, AK
Skagway is a tiny port town of about 10 square blocks and 800 people, but for some reason, despite there being almost nothing there, this was one of our longest ports of call. we got off the boat around 11am and wandered into town. by this point i was really really really really ready to get off the boat. all the swaying/moving and constant vibrating was killing me. after a run through town we went back to dock, met up with all the rest of our families, and boarded a train to the White Pass & Yukon Route for a ride up into the mountains. it was nice and scenic, albeit freezing cold. the landscape quickly turned from spring by the coast to fresh piles of snow over the pass.

back down the mountain and back into Skagway. not only was the boat motion making us physically ill, but the food and beverages on board were also not quite up to our foodie-par and my mostly-vegan gastro-intestinal sensitivities (the only saving grace being that we sat down to formal dinners every night, not eating from the neverending fast food buffet, and the food in the dining room was good, AND they had vegetarian indian food for an option every night, which i had 5 out of the 6 nights we ate dinner there, so THANK YOU TO WHOEVER DECIDED TO PUT THAT AS A PERMANENT ITEM ON THE MENU!) and so we were eager to 1. stay on land as long as possible and 2. get some good beer and food in us, so we headed for the local brewery – Skagway Brewing Co. – that we had spotted earlier. this place was great – we had a few good microbrews and decent dinner, and then it was time to get back on the boat.
steps: 15,387/6.72 miles/74 floors

day8/SatMay12: Juneau, AK
we woke up early in port in Juneau and the weather was still really crappy, so we wondered if our Big Adventure scheduled for that day – helicopter to a glacier, and then wintery dogsledding – was going to happen. we called, and were told that indeed the higher altitudes were socked in with fog (which we saw going up only 2800 feet on the train in Skagway) and that they had gotten over 10 feet of new snow in the last 2 days. still fully winter up there at altitude. so there wasn’t enough visibility for them to take us up to the dogsledding camp in the helicopter, but they did downgrade us to just a helicopter ride to a different location. a little bummed, but still excited!!

we got off the ship around 8:15am and were shuttled from port out to the Juneau airport. after a short briefing and some gear additions, we were separated into groups of 6 and piled into the helicopters. we put on the headphones, he started the copter, and woop! up we went! i think because i was the smallest person in our crew, i got the best seat! jay was sitting right next to the pilot in the front seat, and then i was right next to him, next to the window, which in a helicopter is like one big bubble so i could see everything around and below me. we went up and all of the bays and riverways and valleys and mountains around Juneau appeared. really quite amazing, and we could see for quite a ways even though it was misty/foggy at elevation. jay says the helicopter was going 140 mph, but it sure didn’t feel like it. it felt like floating. we then arrived at the valley where the glacier was, the pilot swooped around a few times, pointed out the mountain goats, and then landed us right on the glacier. it was pretty slippery, what the the drizzle/rain, but the pilot said that the ice looks even bluer when it’s overcast (if it’s sunny all you see is reflected light/glare) and we were able to hop around a little bit and look down into some chasms. we spent about 15/20 minutes on the glacier, and then got back in the copter for the trip back. so all in all, only about a 45-minute trip but super cool.

we got dropped off in the town on the way back at around 11am, and it was pouring cold rain by then. we hung out at the famous Red Dog Saloon for a bit of beer-for-brunch, and then set out to see if there were any suitable places for lunch. we ended up at the one asian restaurant in town, a chinese/sushi fast food place, and when i ordered a plate of just plain steamed broccoli the guy was kind of confused. was alright anyway, and then we headed back to the boat for another evening of entertainment and wandering around.
steps: 13,246/5.79 miles/100 floors

day09/SunMay13: Ketchikan, AK
the weather had funny cleared up, but we only had a few hours in Ketchikan so not enough time to go hiking or get into the wilderness at all. so we set out on a long walk through and around town, and just enjoyed being outside, on land, and not in the rain. back on boat, where the food/entertainment combo of the evenings were starting to feel like groundhog day.

note: i would not say the entertainment was bad, just not my style (a lot of campy cover bands, broadway-style shows, showtunes etc). there was one music act we really liked – a solo guy with an acoustic guitar who sang classic rock songs at the bar in the beautiful atrium of the boat nearly every night until midnight, and we sat there at least 3 nights with jay’s mom and stepdad for hours, singing along and making requests. so thank you to him (Scott the Guitar Player) for being there and being so enjoyable.
steps: 16,680/7.29 miles/86 floors

day10/MonMay14: Victoria, BC
it was finally a really sunny on deck as we headed back south, and so we were able to bask poolside for most of the afternoon, as our port call time wasn’t until evening. once in Victoria (the capitol of BC and “City of Gardens”) we just took a very nice long sunset-into-dusk walk along the seaside, through the park, through downtown and all around the harbors until time to get back on the boat.
steps: 19,611/8.57 miles/44 floors

day11/TuesMay15: Seattle, WA
disembark in Seattle, cat-herded everyone to hotel, walk downtown to a lunch my mother arranged with my Great Aunt Mitty and a whole slew of extended family members i have never seen before and probably never will again, except for (my 2nd cousin once removed? i don’t even know) Jeremy Gregory, who lives in Tacoma and i was ordered to sit next to and for good reason: he’s an amazing artist working on really cool projects with puppets and photography and stop-motion animation. we talked through the whole lunch.
back to the hotel to grab luggate, and then to the airport to go home.
steps: 17,511/7.65 miles/20 floors

In summation:
2500 miles from Seattle, WA to Skagway, AK and back on an enormous boat, floating through glacial fjords, a train ride into the snowy mountains, a breathtaking helicopter ride, playing on a glacier, fields of spring flowers, endless ocean vistas, mountain views, lots of time with the families, lots of songs and dances, Seattle adventures to start and end, and many many memories.

Conclusion:
it’s clear that me and boats don’t play well together. all the motion, all the noise – i just can’t be comfortable. i have a pretty long “bucket list” for life, but “sailing around the world”, or even sailing anywhere, ever, is not on it. i do not plan on “cruising” again. i had wanted to get a lot of excercise per day, which i did, but not in the way i expected . working out like i usually do in the gym on the boat was not going to happen with all the motion. and the only yoga classes were at 8am every day. uh – no. so i readjusted to walking laps around the boat and using our time in ports to take really long walks in the towns. i had also wanted to read for an hour a day, but that also couldn’t happen because of the motion so i’m a little behind on my reading list.

HOWEVER, this was a really great thing for us to do with our families, and it was really great to spend time with all of them, and yes: without fail, the scenery was majestic. i hope to get back there someday and get into the interior. the coastlines were nice, but i like to climb mountains!

i think the most surprising thing was that i did almost totally check out and unplug from thinking about the rest of my life. i didn’t think about work, about our upcoming Enormous Life Transition (please stay tuned for that important announcement, and NO: we are not getting married), i didn’t turn on my cell phone while in ports, and i didn’t read a paper or watch the news. i think the permanently unsettled feeling of just being on the boat (sea sickness, constant vibration, not-my-usual-diet), combined with the craziness of being on a cruise ship for 7 days with 8 members of your family and the amazing awesomeness of the Alaskan scenery was physically and mentally enough to deal with. in a good way.

me, a soy latte, the sweater cape my mother knitted me, and Ketchikan (AK) harbor

DSC01149, originally uploaded by jayober.

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north to alaska

Oh hey btw for those who might be reading this but not reading my twitter/FB posts, we are currently in Seattle, rendezvousing with both of our families here, and tomorrow heading out to sea on a cruise to Alaska/British Columbia coast. No laptops no internets for 7 days! Yes!

finding your art of protest (occupy post #16)

i don’t have a lot to add to the  post-#mayday commentary about what happened (or didn’t).  some people are still really into #occupy. some people are over it.  some people can take it or leave it.

(and if you are still wondering what exactly HAS #occupy accomplished?  visit http://occupydidwhat.tumblr.com/ - you might be surprised.)

i’m with those who think it is probably more important as a cultural movement than a political movement.  i hope #occupy is changing how people -Americans in the Land of the Free in particular – interact with their world – what they expect, what they want, what they see as possible.

for me personally, even though I have not been that directly involved, #occupy has proven a lot of what i assumed i knew about social movements, but it has taught me more about what i don’t know, and where i am weak in that regard – in really understanding and not just assuming things about the current dynamics of law, justice and politics, and then that intersection with my world of art and the creation of meaningful experiences (not just entertainment, catering to artificial mass taste).  so much of how the world works now is unnatural, nonintuitive, not what it seems – we get sold values and the definitions of what things are or should be just as readily as you are sold a can of Coca Cola.  the way things are framed, how they are defined and by whom (especially the by whom) create our perception and experience of the world.

we all know this – it’s part of becoming an adult, realizing that almost everyone is trying to sell you something, and not just person-to-person.  that capitalism has produced a systemic, institutionalized, government-sponsored snake oil culture industry, influencing everything from what you eat and where you shop to who you vote for and how you feel about all of it.

but what is harder is figuring out what to do about it – and that is where i have really struggled with #occupy on a personal level. how to join and fight in a way that feels right, that uses our talents and desires and makes us feel empowered and engaged and excited and productive in our own way.  not all of us want to take to the streets and fight the riot police.  not all of us want to work tediously in committee meetings or court rooms.  some of us just want to #occupyart:

“The marches are very powerful and motivating for anyone who begins in the march,” said 27-year-old librarian Jeremy Bold. “For passersby, they see people who are very vocal and angry.”

…

“Personally, I don’t like labels,” said 25-year-old musician Dotan Negrin. “So I don’t consider myself part of Occupy Wall Street. I’m not a protester.” Negrin has been travelling the country with a musical project called Pianos Across America. He has driven and dragged his upright piano as far as LA, Seattle and Chicago to play in open spaces and welcome people into the the performances. For the past few months, he’s been playing in Union Square Park, which has become something of a second home for the occupiers.

“I always play Union Square, so I figured I might join them,” said Negrin.

His goal in life, he said, is to “try to do something really extraordinary while trying to make the world a better place.”

“That’s my sort of protest,” he added.

.::.

YES to that.  yes.

and i do know that Occupy has space for this.  that if you build your own movement,  it will be supported.  it’s one of the great things about decentralized models. everyone can play. i think that is what makes it strong. but i have still struggled to find my voice here, through no fault but my own.

.::.

i still support #occupy 100%, and believe that we all do need to fight what is going on in the U.S. — that complacency and entitlement are social evils and killing us. i might not be in the streets, but i have put a lot of energy into this and  i need to let myself stop feeling guilty – and peer pressured – to participate in #occupy in ways that don’t feel comfortable for me.  i wish the same for everyone else out there who is interested and supportive of the movement, and that we all find a way to fight the good fight in our own ways.

.::.

(use the #ows tag to see all previous posts)

deep breathing

last week/end’s performance was magic.  and i mean that in a very grounded way – a very real-and-not-imagined way.  once we got on stage for rehearsal wednesday night, in full dress but with no audience, and the music started, and julia’s operatic voice lifted to the rafters, and the hands of the musicians hit their instruments and drums and strings, i sat there and it really hit me and i realized how amazing it was, and how the music was so beautiful (huge props to musician and musical director goyo aranaga) i could listen to it for days. and then i realized…..i could.  there were 3 days of rehearals and performances. and i could be present for all of them (it was my choice how many shows i did, as mine was only a supporting role). and i decided i would. and the music only got better.

in the 4 performances over the next 3 days, between going to work in the daytime and then going to the theatre and putting on our white make-up and amazing costumes and everyone in the cast being fun and talented and wonderful and amazing and getting on stage and for 90 minutes creating a dream, an offering of bodies and tears and music and sculpture and art and dance, and having the audience respond so well and participate in that with us – it was magic. the real kind.

we gave everything and more.

it was hard, sometimes, standing there in the middle of the stage, believing that that’s where i was, who i was with, what i was doing, who i am.

i was and am so grateful for everything Bad Unkl Sista has given to me.

and thank you so much to everyone who came out to support.  seeing your faces, hearing your reactions – it was so important to us for you to be there.

some photos are here:  Shoot That Klown: First Breath-Last Breath and here (same photog,  flickr link)

First Breath-Last Breath – SF World Premiere

butoh contains all of the things that i usually avoid.  group activities. games. rituals. prayerformance. contact dance with other humans.  separately, in other contexts, i do not often engage in these things.  but the philosophy, the intention, and the aesthetic of butoh makes these activities therapeutic for me, like yoga.  extreme mindfulness.  patience.  stillness. giving your all with every breath, every movement.  putting it all out there, especially the things you might not want to show.

i had no idea what this was when i first met Anastazia in 2006.  our first interactions were fashion related, as she was making and selling costumes when she first moved to SF. but time went by and she moved her focus back to her primary art, performance, and i moved with her.

and now this weekend we are in the midst of the largest production in SF to date – First Breath – Last Breath: a full theatre production, all our own, sharing the bill with no one else, 90-100 minutes on stage.

this cast is really amazing – seasoned butoh dancers, aerialists, a contortionist, an opera singer, sets by SF artist Shrine, and the live music with is incredibly unique and beautiful. i feel so lucky to be a part.

the title refers to the cycle, and cycles, of life, but it is also personally very fitting for me right now. BadUnklSista was my first real breath as a non-fashion-performance artist on a stage, and due to life shifts, this is likely going to be my last performance for a long while.

shows are tonight @ 7:00pm, tomorrow at 2:00pm and 7:00pm.

reviews so far: SF Examiner + SF Chronicle 4/26

“about the liminal spaces between the defining moments of our lives.”

rolling in the past (re:childish gambino)

re: my tweets about Childish Gambino last night: i want to clarify that i was not just being a hater. i went in with an open mind.  random experience! i was ready for something new.

the Fox was all lit up for a show, and watching the crowd walk by in the time we were having dinner outside @ Rudy’s, i was trying to guess what kind of music it was (since i had no idea from the name on the marquee) based on the superficial look of the crowd – age, gender, race, fashion = 20ish, 50/50, super mixed, hoodies and skirts . collegiate. i realize that this is a tricky game, stereotyping.

there were a lot of flannel shirts, which doesn’t really scream hip hop to me, but maybe that’s because i’m a generation too old, so i guessed something grunge/punk-ish. jay said, no, it’s hip hop. so then we googled it. and yes, it is hip hop. and then a staff guy came out of the Fox and asked if we wanted free tickets to the show, and we said YES! but when we got inside, they were singing a version of Rolling in the Deep. the whole crowd was singing a capella. it didn’t seem hardcore is what i’m saying. it felt a little…..awards show.

also, my observation about the punk/grunge element was not wrong – 3 out of 4 dudes in the live band (not pictured anywhere on the websites) looked like Dave Grohl and they were playing hard rock as the backing for the MC. one was a guy with a violin. as a plus, i did totally appreciate the live band element.

there was, also, as visual reference to the tour name/theme, Camp Gambino, stage decoration in the form of some tall but fake pine trees and a small tent staked at each edge of the stage, and some background visuals of the moon/sky now and then, so as to look as if the band were playing at a campsite.

i’m all for mashups, but at a certain point i feel like the patchwork of cultural references/sights/sounds is too much. too overtly mimetic. like one of those spoof movies where the visual and character references come at you in a heavy stream of hyperbolic pop nostalgia, but with strobe lights.

i think Donald Glover is maybe overacting the part. and that is sort of where i start to define the essence of hipster: unabashedly revisionist.

In fiction, revisionism is the retelling of a story or type of story with substantial alterations in character or environment, to “revise” the view shown in the original work. Unlike most usages of the term revisionism, this is not generally considered pejorative.

i would agree that this review seems hella jaded/youkidsgetoffmylawn, and maybe it is, but i am not the only one feeling it. see: the 40-year cycles of pop culture nostalgia (kottke):

If you combine this with Kurt Andersen’s recent piece about the slowing rate of change of pop culture, perhaps there’s another lesson here other than Gopnik’s assertion that we’ll be nostalgic for the Obama age 40 years from now. Maybe we’ve reached Peak Nostalgia and in an effort to find more and more nostalgia for an ever-increasing audience, culturemakers are mining more from those eras outside of the appointed 40-year era and as a result, pop culture is feeling more timeless, echoing all eras, until it becomes a culture that can’t draw upon anything but itself.

anyway, we left before the show ended.

embedded

i have been along this path countless times
a well-studied microcosm
known so well, for so long
i remember the road used to bend differently,
before they changed it,
or that there didn’t use to be a fence
or where there used to be a tree
-a single tree; a single, silent stationary life, forever remembered-
until that morning the storm took it down
or where the sun comes through in afternoons
or how much different it all looks through the summer fog

like an old country woman who has never been farther from her birth place than she can walk or ride a horse
this is the world i’ve known

this path, this commute
these comforting memories of trees
this is what i might miss more than anything

.::.

i feel really young and naive.

this is what you get

last night we went to see Radiohead for the first time since 2001. i got the tix from a friend as a birthday gift for Jay. Radiohead has been a part of our relationship the whole time! we listened to it while staring out the windows of the train in the Andes on the way to Machu Picchu in 2010 and i don’t think i will ever forget that soundtrack+that place+that time.

i’m not too hot on the HP Pavilion in San Jose as a venue – it’s just never gonna sound good in a hockey arena – and our seats were pretty far away so Thom Yorke looked like this weird little dancing seahorse way down there on the stage, but i have no complaints about Radiohead. they are stellar. they don’t phone it in. they are not resting on their laurels. i think it’s hard for some people to interpret when you say that music like that – hard rock music – is beautiful. but i think it is so beautiful. the music pushes all the right buttons for me in terms of what’s in the soundscape and how it’s composed together, and the lyrics. oh, thom yorke. such unapologetically romantic levity and despair.

the visual set-up was also pretty amazing, with a waterfall of programmed LEDs and moving projection screens that made for intense but beautiful designs. so kudos to whoever the lighting/visuals team is.

i realized somewhere in the middle of it that it’s been a pretty long time since i went to a concert and actually didn’t care at all what they played. they could play any of it. they could play things i’ve never heard before. didn’t care. all of it good.

but i got pretty excited when they played There There (“just because you feel it doesn’t mean it’s there” – which i’ve quoted many times), and when they played The Amazing Sounds of Orgy (“i want to see you smile again the day the banks collapse“, which I still have on an old t-shirt from 2001).

i was looking back through my old blog posts about radiohead, and laughed when i saw the post from 2007 about In Rainbows, complaining that it was getting too electronic. i wasn’t sure about that move – it has failed for so many other bands. but oh, they made it beautiful and now some of my favorite tracks are the most electronic ones.  Idioteque was a the final encore and that was pretty intense.

in short: great show.  i love radiohead. 4evar.

(setlist) (photos+review from SFBG)