Summer at the Commune

I have a file of scattered unrelated pictures on my photostream that I want memorialized as part of our blog history.  Here we go.

Hanging out on the couch at the Commune.  Niya’s been staying with us for a few weeks as she transitions between apartments.  We call my house the Commune because people are coming and going and hanging out and playing music and swinging in the hammock most of the time.  There’s food and good company and I love my house.  Come on by!  You’re welcome!

Having your BFF around all the time is awesome because she supports my weird fashion choices and demands that I document them.  I love having people to dress up for who encourage rather than simply tolerate my outfit choices.  Fashion is fun.

Spreading the love of Shave Ice with my bud Anne.  We grew up in the same town, now she let’s me come to her fabulous community pool and makes the most delicious cookies. 

Makin’ projects.  I’ve been making punked-out vests for whomever wants them.  She’s crafty (she gets around!) she’s crafty! (she’s always down).  There’s your Beasties, NC. 

Another outfit shot.  Let me be clear here – this is not an attempt at vanity and I am not nor would ever would be a model because I am supremely uncomfortable in front of the camera.  I document my outfits because getting dressed every morning is like putting a piece of performance art together and it’s fun to remember how I paired things up because I never wear the same combination twice.  And I post them because I think you’ll be amused. 

   

‘Tis the season of Barbecues!  Since I’ve been in SLC we’ve had three or four barbecues.  I love having people around and feeding them.  I like being invited to things so I also like inviting people to my house to hang out.  I’ve gotten to know some amazing people already!  And sometimes there’s impromptu hippie dancing and it makes me so happy! Thanks to Hush, he mans the BBQ in the scorching heat.  He’s the party supporter and gets little acknowledgement for all the work he does, I appreciate it.

Mimi, Jude and Silas LOVE having barbecues with all of my adult friends.  Sometimes there are kids, but we always need more around.  Nonetheless I am always SO PROUD of how my kids interact with adults and what they’re learning from being included.  They are getting to know happy, interesting, not-too-cool-for-school people who play music, many of whom go to church, and all of whom are very kind to them.  They feel special.

The guys got the three kids going like spokes for a minute.

My parents entertained a lot when I was a child and it played a big part in my social development.  My mother is the hostess of all hostesses and I love carrying on that tradition.  We’re party people. 

 

Hiding in Hush’s hammock.  They look like Killroy to me in this.

Summer with garments (LDS/Mormon special underwear that covers shoulders all the way to knees) is always a fashion challenge.  It’s so damn hot.  How to be modest and reasonably cool?  I layer dresses with cut off t-shirts sometimes.  I’m still hot.

 

My kids love sushi and I love taking them.  Jude and Mimi in particular like Ikura – salmon roe. Jude orders it by the spoonful and he eats while I gag.

Tada!  I painted this.  It was a commission for a family of nurses.  So happy with the way it turned out and that they like it and understand it.

We’re an animal family.  Jude and Si have tiger pants, Mimi has zebra and I have cheetah.  Should I be embarrassed that we coordinate?  Because I’m not.  I like it.

 

I love that these kids are capable and interested in cleaning the floor.  They fight over the mop.

Some of the only welcome children at Savory Sunday.  Our friend Jory throws these events once a month and I’m special so my kids can come.  Also Niya’s sister Poeina was performing so it was a dance party.

Fireworks and more kids at another fun barbecue.

And finally, the day of the kitten.  I bribed the children to move to SLC by offering them a dog when we get there.  We went to the pound ostensibly to pick one out but the kids were (happily) too scared of all the barking.  Then they spotted the sweetest little kitten and asked to adopt it.  I struck while the iron was hot and now we are the proud owners of a sweet little kitten.

Remember Books?

I used to read books.  I used to be able to read books.  I quite enjoyed reading books.

I am a book failure these days, but I refuse to blame myself.  It’s the world’s fault that I am becoming less of a bibliophile.  I hate it, but it simply is not my fault.  Look at you – you’re as guilty as I am.  Sitting there reading online.  For shame!

My degree is in English Literature and when I’m working I teach College Level Reading and Writing (cue panic by me: have I made any grammatical errors thus far?  No? Good, the state of American Education is okay).  This means I try to get my students to grab a book and read it cover to cover, left side of the page to right, top to bottom, page by page. For me this has become a nearly impossible task.  I have entered into a terrifying phase of illiteracy.

Same book for about a month?!  Good thing it’s a reread and my absolute favorite book of all time.

IT ISN’T MY FAULT!

The internet has changed the way our brains approach text.  We have become accustomed to approaching text differently simply because of layout, layout that is obviously not consistent through the cyber world.  We look directly at a page and float our eyes around to decipher what is the most important information on the page and WHERE to begin.  So now when I pick up a book my brain gets a little bit tired.  So many words!  Nothing highlighted! All one color!  No pictures (wow, that’s really embarrassing)! My eyes go directly to the paragraph breaks and I get distracted and overwhelmed without even being aware of it happening.  My brain has become a lazy reader without my permission.

My lifestyle has changed so that I cannot acclimate to books quickly enough to make reading them worth it.  When I’m sedentary (which is RARE) I’m only allowed personal thought/brain time for seconds at a time.  Supervising my children swimming seems like the perfect opportunity to push my way through a good book, even a fast read.  My kids are water safe enough that I should be able to commit to getting through a page at least before reengaging with them.  NOPE.  I can’t even get through a paragraph because the acclimation causes me reading lag time, even if it is milliseconds.  I lose my place, I read the same paragraph three times retaining nothing.  After ten minutes of attempting to read while observing my children I give up and toss my book aside.

Where does a book fit into this picture of me and Circe? People would drown!

Enter my beloved iPhone.  All hail the glorious smart phones!  Abandoning my gigantic book I can text, scan my boring facebook newsfeed, pin fabulous things to pinterest all while watching my minions with one eye.  Sorry book, you’ve been trumped.  It’s just too easy.

Alright, so that leaves reading time for right before bed.  I can probably do about 30 mins to an hour of reading before bed.  But my book and I are already in a fight!  Forget it, book!  Quit oppressing me!  I’m going to listen to the scriptures be read to me on LDS Channel while looking at pinterest and Instagram.  So there!  Take that, literacy!

Oy, the guilt.  The shame.  The stack of half read books on my bedside table.  The thrashing of books I drag around hopefully for weeks thinking I might be able to sink my teeth into them for more than 30 seconds.  They lay as sad monuments to my tragic decline of reading.

 

This actually happened and it’s so rare I took a picture.  Also, it was at Aspen Grove Family Camp so all of my kids were happy in their little camp classes and I read to my heart’s content.  Also, the internet didn’t work.

Ugh.  I need to go off the grid.  I’ll put that on my To-Do List.  Which is on my iPhone.

 Hush “reading” one of my required reading if you’re going to be my friend books.

 

It’s not all bad though.  Audible is my secret weapon.  I am in love with listening to books on my headphones; currently I’m “reading” Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. 

Benefits: can listen while my hands are busy, get all my jobs done while fully entertained, never have to remember where I left off. 

Drawbacks: people keep talking to me, I can’t actually hold nor smell the book, I have to take notes of amazing quotes by remembering and writing them quickly on my phone, the books cost one million dollars, I can’t put the book in my bookcase to show off how smarty-smart I am.

This is the best piece of fiction I’ve read in years and the audible guy narrating it is the best reader I’ve ever heard.  I am in love with Eugenides prose (though admittedly the story can be a little intense some times).  He is a Eugenius.  Middlesex is the name of the street the family lives on, it’s a multigenerational American story about an amazing Greek family I wish I belonged to.

 

 

(Note: I just ended this whole post about literacy with a sentence that ended in a preposition.  I disgust myself.)

The Soundtrack of My Life

My musical library has been expanding and contracting significantly in the last few months.  Lacking any major musical talent (I can play the piano and I don’t hurt people’s ears when I sing) I am primarily a patron of music.

My exposure to and history with music is a relationship timeline, life event processing tool, and bridge to friendship. 

As I meet new people I find that it is often our taste in music that creates bonds and helps me relate.  When I hear a friend put on a song that I was not expecting them to know it always floors me – not because I have superior musical taste or anything, but that some relationship or event brought that song into their life as it did mine.  A single song can make me a friend for life.

The other day Niya, Hush and I were in the car tooling around.  The Doors’ “Break on Through” came on and we all passed into revelries of how we became familiar with them and why The Doors were important in our lives.  For me the Doors remind me of three hour drives to Tahoe at dawn when I was about ten years old with my brother Nate in the front seat, Dad driving, and all my siblings sleeping around me.  I certainly don’t think anyone in the car believed they were creating a personality defining memory, but watching my older brother air drum along with the Doors infused in me a desire to be on the pathway to “cool,” because let’s face it, Jim Morrison is pretty much the embodiment of cool.  It took some development, but I think at least musically I was fortunate enough to be gifted coolness through music – the Doors, they may be flattered to know, were my musical entry drug.  I don’t remember the first time I heard them because they were the subliminal soundtrack of my childhood and I loved them by default.

 

At The Commune, June 2013

 

 

I hit middle school and gained access to my first CD’s right at the time when the early 90’s new wave was tanking out and grunge exploded with Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers and also Green Day.  Underground cool jumped to “selling out” and these pretty badass bands were the fare that complimented the Doors, the Police and the Rolling Stones (that I became interested in at the same time because my dad took my older siblings to see them and I learned I should be jealous), and of course the Beatles my mother blared while she did the dishes.  I remember on significantly validating moment of my youth was when my older brother noticed a Chili Pepper’s symbol I’d drawn on one of my notebooks in sixth grade and said, “How do YOU know them?  Right on.” 

Learning music takes research and time, though.  If I was going to get a little bit of credibility musically I had to know those bands inside and out.  I think initially the cart came before the horse and I was seeking out bands because they were cool, but because my musical taste had been established by the Doors it’s easy for me to understand the progression of my preferences.  The Doors were my tuning fork.

And then Kurt Cobain died in 1994.  I remember reading about it that morning in the paper because that’s the only reading material available at the table.  It was a huge deal, though before his death he was a minor celebrity.  Post death he gained Hendrix level fame.  But the event promoted this parent-hated music into a respectable art form.  I could even play In Utero in my mom’s car on the way to school.

At school the Top 100 was really varied.  It ranged from Guns and Roses’ November Rain to Boyz II Men.  Exposure influences taste, so I guess I have Boyz II Men to thank for leading me eventually to Jay Z and Kanye.  And, of course, Madonna was covering all the pop basics with the Immaculate Collection.

What do we have so far?  Classic Rock, second-wave punk, pop, grunge, R&B, 90’s alternative.

Then came high school.  I became friends with some hippies and hippies in the 90’s listened to the Grateful Dead, Phish, Pink Floyd, Lou Reed, and a bit of Bowie. Thank the Lord for the hippies or I’d have squandered my Doors tuning on the Macarena and Mariah Carey.

With the basics of my musical DNA in place, I started filling in the gaps.  I loved Lou Reed’s ‘Satellite of Love’ so off I’d go to learn about the Velvet Underground.  I dug ‘Ripple’ by the Dead so I went off to find Janis Joplin and Bob Dylan.  Where the hell did David Bowie come from?  Better go learn about Iggy Pop and Queen.  Green Day is second wave punk?  Off to find first wave punk Sex Pistols and the Clash (and fall deeply in love with this genre of music.  Punk is in my soul).

And so it goes. 

Of course there are the random throw ins that, for me, are unassociated with other bands.  I learned to dance in the family room listening to Thriller on vinyl.  I know every word to ABBA’s greatest hits.  Johnny Cash’s outlaw country reminds me of my mother rocking out in yellow gloves in the kitchen.  I know Rubber Soul because it was the only tape my grandmother owned.  The Smiths remind me of a terrifying ride through the sugar cane fields of Hawaii with my scary brother in a jeep. 

Is that six members of my family doing the Thriller Dance?  Yes it is.

I think my most memorable musical event was going to a concert at the famous Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco.  The Monkees were playing, it was the early 2000’s some time and my dad and I went to see them, just the two of us.  While Davy Jones and the other dude rocked out on stage my dad took me to the upstairs room where all the old school concert posters hang in order of performance.  He went through and pointed to all the concerts he had seen there: Hendrix, Creedence, Joplin.  I went to the other side of the room and pointed out a few of the bands I’d seen there since I’d been allowed to go to concerts.  The soundtrack of his life had become the starting point of mine.

Jim.

 

Mimi and Jude dancing in the psychedelic 60’s room to the Grateful Dead.

When we rock we rock hard.

This week the songs that struck the right chords were:

Paper Planes  -MIA

Moonlight Mile – Rolling Stones

Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth – Primitive Radio Gods

I’m Your Man –Leonard Cohen

The Organ Grinder – Watkin Tudor Jones

Rebirth of Slick – Digable Planets

Teenage Dirtbag – Wheatus

The Beautiful People – Marilyn Manson

Debaser – Pixies

212 – Azealia Banks

The Black Jack White – Spirit Animal

Carry that Weight – Beatles

Crimewave – Crystal Castles

Manhattan – Cat Power

Feelin’ Alright – Sweatshop Union

The Late Greats – Wilco

 

With The Paul Duane at the Marilyn Manson and Alice Cooper Concert. (feed my frankenstein!)

Just cause I love the colors in this picture.

And the people in this one.

What’s life in Utah Like?

I was reticent about moving my little people away from their lives in Dville, but this week my fears proved unfounded.  The little boys couldn’t be happier.  The pictures in this post mostly feature Jude because he is the guy getting the most out of our new digs.  Also Silas and I are in a little fight today because he’s been hissing at me. 

People always said that Utah is very family friendly and has tons of kid activities, but I didn’t know that the best way to get into them is with a guide, specifically an expert Hush-type guide.

But first stop was the super rad pirate pool with Anne.  Lazy river (and mothers) included.  Only one issue with this pool is there are too many beautiful people there.  Why is there an over abundance of beautiful people in Utah?  I want to punch these skinny blonde girls in the face.  Why do they produce so much rage in me?  I have issues.  Moving on.

Last weekend was Gay Pride!  If that isn’t a good transitional activity into conservative Utah I don’t know what is.  All the freaks were out and we felt right at home.  Thankfully they had a few hours that were family friendly and not over-sexualized like Gay events frequently are.  Jude and Silas had their hair spray painted. 

Hush taught the boys to play hacky sack and now they can’t stop kicking it around.  They’re terrible but at least they’re close to the ground to pick it up. 

Apparently we’re hikers now.  We hike places.  Turns out hiking is just walking uphill in the dirt.  Why does it get a special name?  This hike was up Immigration Donner Cottonwood McParley This is the Place.  Or something like that.  Perfect length hike for the kids with a big marker statue at the top. 

There was a second incident at the top of this hike.  I tend to have incidents in Utah, the first being in church a few weeks ago where I was shushed because some dude who was late to church thought I was not giving him sufficient quiet to think about Jesus.  I told him that that was my first day at an LDS church and how surprised I was at his condescension, and do they treat all investigators that way.  This time the incident involved me teaching Jude how to do some rock climbing holds on the base of some nondescript marker.  I was then accosted by a nasty older dude who got on my case saying we were “desecrating” the landmark.  I bit my tongue, but was very hesitant to obey some big jerk guy who was obviously targeting me because I look abnormal.  Even when people don’t say exactly that I can always tell if that is what’s motivating their irritation with me.  Anyway, Hush made peace and I didn’t have to knock out an old dude.

Hats.  The boys have adopted newsies hats and it makes me love them more.  They’re the same size right now and I dress them as alike as possible.  People ask me every day if they’re twins and I tell them no, but they feel like they are and I like getting credit for having twins.  I’ve started to feed Jude a little bit less and Silas a little bit more to keep them the same size.  Just kidding.

 

 

Our friends out here have motorcycles.  This is the only time my children will ever be allowed near motorcycles.  Learning to ride is on my to-do list this year, for no other reason than to say that I know how to ride a motorcycle.  I don’t want one.  Too dykey.

 

SHAVE ICE.  So it turns out Utah might have more to offer us than originally expected.  Not only do they have shave ice, they have the REAL KIND not just lame snow-cone flavors.  AND they know what SNOWCAPS are!  Shave ice isn’t shave ice without sweetened condensed milk.  Last night Hush and I took a walk in the evening to the shave ice place down my street.  There is shave ice within walking distance to my house.  The weather was lovely and the shave ice cheap (because Utah is a foreign country with foreign exchange rates rendering everything pretty much free).  Dare I say it felt like an evening in Hawaii.  Fragrant flowers, warm breeze, shave ice, flip flops, sunset, and a hammock.  I’m trying not to love it here but secretly I do and I feel like a big fat traitor to California.

Next fabulous element of life?  Music.  Specifically, guitar.  Want to know what my life is like these days?  Think laying on your back singing ‘Wish You Were Here’ and the Grateful Dead.  Turns out we have adopted a juke-box!  I had no idea Hush could play guitar, not only play but play well and just about anything I demand.  I love unexpected talent.  Hush holds the chords and lets the boys play.  And I die of the adorableness.

 

Next activity?  Baseball! Hush scored free tickets and we went to the Salt Lake Bees game, except my children don’t understand that baseball is anything but the Giants.  Baseball = Giants, thus they called the team the Giant Bees.  It was the first time that Jude was really engaged in the game and I sat there and taught him all of the rules.  Val would be proud.  He was into it for a few innings, and then the real reason to go to baseball manifested itself:  food.  There was a lot of action being that it was minor league, but both team had problems keeping the ball on the field.  Dummies.

And now for the main event.  The feature of Utah we’ve been enjoying most is rock climbing. 

I learned to rock climb as a teenager at my hippie school.  My older brother and Ellie and I were pretty into it, but I hadn’t been in a long time and I’d forgotten how much I enjoy climbing.  Climbing is like dancing – it’s hard and graceful and I love watching talented people do it so much better than I ever could.  Hush I’d put in the professional category.  If you own your own ropes and look like this because of climbing you’re professional in my book.

 

 

(Yes, that was gratuitous and you like it.)

Anywayz, Hush and I feel sufficiently confident in our abilities to feel like the kids are safe climbing, but we didn’t know what they would think about it.

First we started at the climbing gym.

 

They were scared at the beginning, but then I watched as the climbing fever took over Judejude.  He screams and yells in frustration sometimes as he climbs, but he pushes himself and he’s actually pretty good.  He understands how to hug the wall and match his feet and use his legs to jump off.  Silas can’t figure it out yet, but he tries and enjoys hanging out.

So we took the boys outside for a real climb.  Jude got his own little harness.  And up he went.

Belaying my little kids is one of the best experiences of my life.  I’m militant about it of course and err on the side of hefting them up the rock by keeping the belay so tight.  With Silas I actually yank him up because he prefers to be lifted, lazy kid.

 

So we thought that Judejude would just climb a bit overhead and get frustrated.  But he just.kept.going.

 

You can see there’s a bit of a vertical overhang right above Cubby in this pic, but he just climbed right up it like a little spider monkey.

I went up the trail by the rock to try to talk him into giving up and coming down, but he wouldn’t.  It was scary high for me, not being on a rope. But check Jude out in this video.  He looks at me, looks at the ground, and keeps going up.

 

Climbing, baseball games, shave ice, playing music, hikes, killer pools, hacky sack and a bunch of other fun things.  Yeah, I’d say Utah is kind of growing on me. 

Hush Intro

This pretty much tells you everything you need to know about Hush, right?

Crystal Castles Crimewave.