My weekends out of town have pushed me out of the habit of writing. Potential words are constantly spilling from my mouth and mind, but not landing where they’ll stain page or paper and stick around awhile and have a drink. Instead I find myself busy and busier, living a pace just this side of insane, and never in front of a computer when I need it most, but wrapped instead around chocolate curls and blonde exhaustion, tangled in too many things to set out straight.
The best I can do is point form after-the-fact, small glimpses into moments that stuck, like snapshots taken from a moving car, anecdotes I tell over tea or as we walk, hands carving out the expressions in our bodies as we did this or that, laughter infectious, haltered to speech.
Memories of the Mercury, wrapped in cigarette smoke and surrounded by black, dancing with Dee like the first time we really met, physical strangers in L.A., when he was still from London, and we had never lived in Montreal. Of Tony curled in my lap, days later, slightly drunk at Grahame and Becca’s, explaining ‘performing’ as my partner in front of my mother at Gasworks park, “See my patience!” He says, “how clever and kind a teacher I am! How carefully I’m showing Nick how to spin these poi, how I’m responsible, understanding. Look how perfect I am for your daughter, because I’m AWESOME!” Of Folklife and music and Richard’s music just for us, letting us play, the video we took, the glitchy, delightful beat. I think of Rafael dipping me in time to marimba music, all wrapped in tie-dye and a purple skirt, and Tony on the ground leaning forward to kiss me precisely on the lips, as if the entire moment had been perfectly rehearsed. I think of standing in front of the Circus Contraption audience, faking desire, shuddering with it, breaking my plastic glass with the heated deep breaths of my theatrical orgasm, ready to beat the band. The warmth and depth of my smile. Of flying my pocket Pirate kite, of limping gladly, of free hug signs and breakfast and pliers and giving a necklace away. Of sound effects and posed photographs and doing the tango with only my hand, two fingers for legs, stepping along the ground so prettily it was like we could see the invisible held-in-teeth roses glowing alive in our love.