arcade fire



Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.
She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita

Vladimir Nabakov, Lolita 1955

pilfered from nabakov, inspired by melora, written by sugar power


Melora, my lady of fire-storm, the light of my loins. My skin, my swirl. Me-lo-ra: "the tip of the tongue" taking a plunge down the palate to greet me. Me. Lo. Ra. Hello Rosebud. Welcome back into my world.

She is just plain Mel, when she is driving. She stands five foot one in socks riddled with insect patterns, precocious as ever as we arrive at the chateau in France. She is Melo, when we are waiting for our back stage passes. And she is Ms. Koepke on her credit card which gets us, just about, everywhere en Route.
And then she is Melora, to me, dancing to the arcade fire in the pouring rain and thunder, flitting about danger, like school-girls, like an inside joke, just outside of Barcelona.

Melora. Try it. It feels so good to say it.
Whenever you are with her it feels so very NOW. Not yesterday. Not tomorrow. Not this afternoon or this evening, you lose track of time and everything else. In fact everything is so just very, very, very NOW.

So you might be wondering how this story started? Well, I cannot tell you all of it of course. It would be tasteless, take forever, and we do not kiss and tell now do we? Nor do we divulge our ages, though here is a hint…we have been friends for some 18 years. Good Christ.

NOW. It is mid-summer. It is Barcelona. I am working on an illustration and I receive an email from a much over-worked and much under-slept but very happy, determined and ever so sexy journalist I had not heard from in seven years. The subject line is, of course, the familiar: "What are you doing tomorrow?". The message is: I am covering the arcade fire for a piece in EnRoute's in-flight magazine you wanna tag along? My response…SHIT YES!

So here she is…just hours later. My beauty, Melora. Overburdened, overwhelmed and just as gorgeous as ever brimming with an energy known only by the gods. She arrives in the only way Melora can. After 5 days without proper sleep in a rented car she has just retrieved from being towed within her first hour of arriving in Barcelona. My goddess. Descending upon us in a whirlwind of style and haphazard grace. On the edge of renegade, teetering always on genius. A bright light shining on how to live exactly. And that, for Melora, is always doing it large.

Devi, with all her arms.

Not only has Melora arrived after getting her rental car towed within minutes after renting it, but for the first time since I have been living in Barcelona she has dragged along a crazy thunder storm the likes of which have never been seen. At least not this summer. And she has ridden in on it. Or summoned it. Or perhaps it follows her everywhere she goes. Who knows? A fire trail is not so hard to imagine from this electric girl. Ruben's muse ( and not so secretly mine ).

So we have now set off for our concert in France. Not a long trip. Just Barcelona two hours or so to France. Romantic yes. A map, no, not truly, to speak of. Just a vague idea of our destination: someplace on the naughty coast of France. Meow.
Someplace wet, fecund, thrilled with lightening and this doesn't even begin to describe the band.

Now Melora is driving, smoking cigarettes, checking her iphone, with the rental car consistently remaining in, at the very least, two lanes at once the whole way. It is a beauty to behold.

She is thirteen places at once. I swear. Go figure. I struggle to remain in one.

We finally arrive at the concert to nothing we could have ever imagined although I should have anticipated this.
The entrance box is closed. It is after midnight and our prestigious red carpet back stage passes scenario has been momentarily suspended.

We stand like waifs in the rain. Getting wetter.

Finally it gets the best of me and I revert to my teenage years and sneak us in. Which isn't too hard
considering everyone is running for shelter from the storm.

Melora has just put on fresh red and shiny lipstick new as a candy apple and given me such a wink in the pouring rain I will
have great difficulty not retaining the memory f-o-r-e-v-e-r.

Now we are two hussies in wet skirts. Umbrella-less, dressed to the nines, and in the game again.
This time, finally, on the right side of the fence. And the band is awesome. ( Since we are teenagers again ).

The chateau itself is tripped out in purple lights. The french boys are flirty, tipsy, and very pretty as an added delight.

We trade pink little coins for yellow curry and beer that soon fills with rainwater.

We have on only sandles in the sticky mud and our dresses are becoming rapidly more transparent to our despair
( not really ). Everything feels good now.

Red lights engorge the stage and the arcade fire roars that pretty soul searing roar that only great musicians can create.
It is other-worldly and innately good. Plain and simply. Good.

This is the moment, I get that feeling that this is that moment. That moment that lingers long after, that you cannot
ever re-create or forget. That lovely moment of unfettered happiness. Nothing is spilled. Just joy.

Later, on the way home we are laughing, pulling rabbits from a hat, smoking, chatting,
trying to read an iphone map and doing origami all at once. I swear. Okay, I might of exaggerated
about the map.

A woman like Melora, only comes into your life once. And you must grab her. Not forever but for the moment
on the red carpet and in the rain. The mystery and the hysteria that comes with it, reminding yourself of only one
great thing: LIFE itself.

The beauty of not knowing and being so caught up in trying to know is you don't even realize you miss out on
what just being feels like. And it is good.

so is the arcade fire

playground



i have updated the PLAY section in my NEW folio
and i might warn you to stay away from it if you
have a tendency to smoke pot or tend to overly
romanticize everything and have to sway from the trees
in a breeze of forlorn and unrequited love from
time to time.

nfb



too good to be true.
i finally had time to take a look
at the national film board of canada's website today
and their arsenal is available for online viewing.

three gazillion hours later i am here
to share it with you.

the first one i watched, "The Agony of Jimmy Quinlan, was not only great for its content and the insight it provided,
but that great old-fashion canadian accent reared its beautifu, graceful head again
and blanketed the entire documentary in pure chic. ah, how i much i do miss it. eh?

yes, canada!

jen vaughn is the bomb!



A new agent!

Joined Jen Vaughn's group of amazing artists
and am still pinching myself.

Take a look at her lovely group here

forget passion, good octopus chairs make us stronger



i love deb mclean's blog

she seems to have her finger on the button of everything and never
ceases to intrigue me. thank the baby jesus for women like her!

(and all the artists she has time to promote along the way)

merengue



my favorite shop in barcelona
is both an artist's studio & residence
with the shop in front
called merengue

now

some people might think
it is too much work all these
things overlapping into a giant
work/life sandwich, i say
again

if you love what you do
why not live inside

the oyster

anado mclauchlin



i love richard and anado
two of the nicest blokes
one could ever know

and handsome too!

this picture particularly haunts me
with added love because you can see
the homage i created for the two love-birds
at the top of the stairs in the top center
of the photo

i am the microcosm of the macrocosm
which is a microcosm in the macrocosm
of the great unknown. except i know

i love knowing i am part of their
other-worldly abode

i know
i love knowing them and i love knowing
that every succulent glowing and divine
detail of anado's shimmering work
makes me make more non-linear sense
(my favorite kind)
of my very own life

not only that but i am grateful for
their willingness to share so much
of their lives together

hallelujah & deja-vu

my first ad!






today i am expanding my blog and posting my first
of many new ads

the ad is for sark

now most people have heard of sark
before they could even read, ha
but i came to her later in life. i don't know why.
maybe i needed the surprise that day.

i love sark's endless optimism and diy attitude
i love that her books have that handmade quality
like a friend made a gift for you
and i love that she is a sister.

i also love people who love what they do
for a living. it is invigorating to me.

and the same goes with posting ads
i was never really aware of the idea
or maybe it is more honest to say
i just glazed over them until now.

so i got kind of excited to post my first ad
and hope that you get excited too.

so, here is one interesting program
the life coach, sark, has conjured:

http://www.planetsark.com/DreamBoogie.htm

and more to come
surely!

eerie green



my new favorite
iphone app is available

and i am ruined for anything else

dark light dark
green where it shouldn't be
red where there is already too much

and god i love you and god i love loving
seemingly

random mistakes

balthazar



balthazar
made my day

just yesterday i was wallowing
swaying saying handwritten letters
are so romantic that i physically
and psychically miss them

miss pouring over them
holding them

examining the letters, the craft
the odd mistake

now i find balthazar
who will not only write you a letter
but send it to you too

he is an imaginary sailor

i think i am in love

monica cook




monica cook
is doing my head in

i have not seen painting like this in a long time
if ever

let me know what you think
personally, i am floored

in a very strange way