Tuesday, November 30, 2010

The last light of the day

It's time

We'd gotten to know each other over the course of two nights back in August and this is what I wrote the morning she returned to New York:

"Robyn sat across from me, moving and speaking with such purpose, such exuberance. Her skin was fair, her eyes were dark, her lips painted red to match the red bow in her dark hair. She looked like a wicked snow white and I was taken with her beauty from the first moment that I saw her. I’m certain that she knew it, because it was hard for me to take my eyes off of her.

She’s a ballerina and she’s grown up a performer, so there’s a vibrance about her that I adore, an easiness with people which I appreciate. She described to me a photo shoot she’d done recently, just for the hell of it, and I knew that she was going to be hard to get out of my head even after she’d gone back to New York.

Evangeline (who’d introduced us) sat nearby, smiling knowingly as she watched us inch closer to one another. She gave us moments alone and played the perfect(ly devious) chaperone. It’d been her intention to bring this lovely creature to New Orleans to make her fall in love with the city. I was more than happy to help her in her cause.

When the night was over we stood in the front of their hotel. Evangeline left us alone when she went to get room keys. I hugged Robyn, thanked her for company while she thanked me for my hospitality. We parted for people coming through the doors and then we were back together again, having the kiss that we’d been building up to all night.

The doormen at the front laughed and yelled at us to get a room, but we kissed again in spite of them, before finally saying goodnight. I looked back through the closing doors to watch her go, watch her slip away gracefully through the lobby of the beautiful old New Orleans hotel.

I stepped out into the night air and walked down Bourbon Street. The things that I usually find so obnoxious couldn’t affect my mood. The raucous crowd, the music, the lights, the general rowdiness of the night couldn’t wipe the happiness off my face, couldn’t make me stop thinking of her lips, her eyes, her smile."


She came back to visit last week and we had a wonderful time together. She'll be back again two weeks from now and I'm looking forward to her return. In January she's moving here and I have to say that I'm quite thrilled about that. I don't know that I've so thoroughly enjoyed every moment that I've spent with someone like I have enjoyed my time with her...

Saturday, November 20, 2010

I put my phone back into my pocket just as M. approached. She smiled and looked just a little puzzled as she studied my face.

“Are you in love?!” she asked.

“What makes you say that?” I responded, caught off guard.

”You look like you are. Whoever you were just talking to has you glowing! You look very happy right now and I think it’s awesome how obvious it is just by looking at you!”

I smiled and studied the red flocked wallpaper as I considered it.

I wear my heart on my sleeve so I shouldn’t be surprised that she could see the happiness in my face, even if she overstated it by referring to it as love. I was surprised however that something was apparent to M. before I’d even realized it myself; that no matter how much I’ve tried to not have any hopes until R. actually moves here this winter, the fact that she’s coming to visit in a few days has it’s place in my smile and I’m very (obviously) happy that I’ll get to see her again soon.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Supporting the arts



"Ahhh... the freewheeling, liberated 1920's... women finally get the vote, but apparently publishing anecdotes about childhood abuse, your brothers' sexual exploits with the family livestock, and sincere wishes that death and destruction might be visited upon all the members of your backwater Texas family would still get a girl institutionalized and kicked out of Great Britain.

Edna Gertrude Beasley is the most incendiary feminist author you've never heard of. Her autobiography, "My First Thirty Years," was banned upon its publication in 1925 for "gross obscenity," and most copies were destroyed in U.S. and British customs offices. Some eventually made it into circulation, though the governor of Texas later sent the Texas Rangers to seek out and seize any copies that had managed to infiltrate his great state."

This one woman show stars Veronica Russell who is a friend and fellow Noisician Coalition member. She's taking the show on a six city tour across Canada next summer and has she's started a Kickstarter project to raise money to participate in the Canadian Fringe theater festivals.

I saw the show performed here in New Orleans and it was wonderful. I believe in it enough to have donated to it and also to pander shamelessly to you. Have a look at the video and if you feel so inclined, follow the link and support the arts by donating to her KickStarter project!