Still [Head] Standing
Just when I think it's all over, that all the mystery and adventure I live for is melted and burnt, I have one of those nights. We all just laughed and smiled and tripped out on each other's company. Catherine is so eccentric, so oddly compelling. The seven of us sat around the studio table drinking sips of scotch whiskey so strong it made our lips burn.
Catherine was wearing a loose white t-shirt inside-out and backwards so that the tag hung out in front like a dog's. The shirt was covered in all different colours of paint. She wore a fuzzy brown scarf around her head like a turban. She had a long box full of her small print templates: each rubber mat had a picture carved on both sides and was wrapped in a piece of brown paper. She offered them up like tarot cards, asking us to first have in our minds a question we would like to have answered.
I asked her, "how do you know what the answer is when you don't know the question?" And she just smiled and laughed.
I never told her my question, but she answered it all the same. I asked myself, could I ever really make it, for real, with the meager talent I have and all my social ineptitude dragging it down, could I ever earn money in a way that I could be proud of, or at least, not ashamed of? Could the thing I love to do be the thing I do for money? It's that question that keeps coming back. Long ago I learned that you can do anything if you set your mind to it. Shortly thereafter I learned that my mind doesn't work like an alarm clock: calm is not something you can just set and count on at the appropriate time.
Her answer was hard to follow. I looked into her eyes and tried to concentrate on what she was saying, I tried to block out the other voices in the room and just focus on her. She talked of the man on the subway...how he is and yet he isn't, how he sees everything and nothing at once. He sees that I am a beautiful presence and a hideous absense, how I am and I am not yet there. I am aware of power and beauty around me waiting to be realized but I offer it little to no acknowledgment. She said I have yet to understand my own greatness. Maybe I don't believe in its power or maybe I am just afraid to admit I believe the power exists. Maybe I find the display of power embarrassing. I am afraid to use my power, afraid to have that power recognized. I don't want to admit to that man on the subway that what he sees is real.
She knew I was skeptical even though I tried to seem open to her words. She told me how I want to believe, but I'm reluctant. I knew what she was saying was right in a way: it's all about attitude, it's all about just believing in your own magic. She knew I thought she wasn't for real, that she was just another drunk person mesmerized by something that would be lost by morning. Inside me something was coming alive saying yes, my magic is real, I am real, this moment is not illusory. But the moment never lasts and soon enough I was looking for the trick behind what I presumed was an illusion. Why is she doing this to me? I wondered. Why did she want to convince me that the moment mattered? Why was I so convinced that it did?
The print template that I chose depicted a tight-rope walker. On the one side she was teetering, falling off the edge, but on the other side she was walking the line in perfect balance. "Yes," she said, removing it from its paper shell, "this is you".
Catherine had a way of demanding the undivided attention of everyone in the room in a way that could not be ignored. Everyone had to stop their conversations and just wait for it. It was only ever a minute or two of our attention she would so humbly request. When the moment was over, she'd apologize and tell us to return to whatever we had forgotten by that time we had been doing.
I wished that I could have the confidence she had, to be able to insist that what I had to say was worth listening to, that I could be important enough to compel people to revise their intentions on my behalf. And yet, I was happy not to be her, not to have the others smile and humour me reluctantly like I was a school teacher. She was so excited to have us all there, so delighted to share her boundless energy with anyone willing to receive it. I couldn't help but wonder how she would react to someone who didn't receive it, who didn't believe in her magic. Would she still be able to fly around then? In fear of falling from the peaks of creative heights have I clipped my wings?
Catherine presided over the room she had hushed, the attention she had collected. She stood behind my chair. "This woman", she said, and already I had begun to shrivel under the weight of those six pairs of eyes. She was doing the thing I hate the most: forcing me into the spotlight. It was just like in school, when I had that question I couldn't hold back; the question the teacher was pleased to be asked; the question that revealed to my peers that I was actually interested in something as uncool as learning something.
My face tightened and the more I tried to relax the more tense I became. I tried to play it casual, to not make it obvious how hard it was for me to breathe under the pressure. "This beautiful woman, here," and I winced, "she said something to me tonight I want you all to think about. What she said was 'how do you know what I want?' Think about it."
"How. Do. You. Know. What. I. Want."
"How do you know, what I want"
"How do you know what I want..."
We repeated the question to ourselves and I wondered, did I really say that?
I'd lose my head if I wasn't standing on it.
Catherine was wearing a loose white t-shirt inside-out and backwards so that the tag hung out in front like a dog's. The shirt was covered in all different colours of paint. She wore a fuzzy brown scarf around her head like a turban. She had a long box full of her small print templates: each rubber mat had a picture carved on both sides and was wrapped in a piece of brown paper. She offered them up like tarot cards, asking us to first have in our minds a question we would like to have answered.
I asked her, "how do you know what the answer is when you don't know the question?" And she just smiled and laughed.
I never told her my question, but she answered it all the same. I asked myself, could I ever really make it, for real, with the meager talent I have and all my social ineptitude dragging it down, could I ever earn money in a way that I could be proud of, or at least, not ashamed of? Could the thing I love to do be the thing I do for money? It's that question that keeps coming back. Long ago I learned that you can do anything if you set your mind to it. Shortly thereafter I learned that my mind doesn't work like an alarm clock: calm is not something you can just set and count on at the appropriate time.
Her answer was hard to follow. I looked into her eyes and tried to concentrate on what she was saying, I tried to block out the other voices in the room and just focus on her. She talked of the man on the subway...how he is and yet he isn't, how he sees everything and nothing at once. He sees that I am a beautiful presence and a hideous absense, how I am and I am not yet there. I am aware of power and beauty around me waiting to be realized but I offer it little to no acknowledgment. She said I have yet to understand my own greatness. Maybe I don't believe in its power or maybe I am just afraid to admit I believe the power exists. Maybe I find the display of power embarrassing. I am afraid to use my power, afraid to have that power recognized. I don't want to admit to that man on the subway that what he sees is real.
She knew I was skeptical even though I tried to seem open to her words. She told me how I want to believe, but I'm reluctant. I knew what she was saying was right in a way: it's all about attitude, it's all about just believing in your own magic. She knew I thought she wasn't for real, that she was just another drunk person mesmerized by something that would be lost by morning. Inside me something was coming alive saying yes, my magic is real, I am real, this moment is not illusory. But the moment never lasts and soon enough I was looking for the trick behind what I presumed was an illusion. Why is she doing this to me? I wondered. Why did she want to convince me that the moment mattered? Why was I so convinced that it did?
The print template that I chose depicted a tight-rope walker. On the one side she was teetering, falling off the edge, but on the other side she was walking the line in perfect balance. "Yes," she said, removing it from its paper shell, "this is you".
Catherine had a way of demanding the undivided attention of everyone in the room in a way that could not be ignored. Everyone had to stop their conversations and just wait for it. It was only ever a minute or two of our attention she would so humbly request. When the moment was over, she'd apologize and tell us to return to whatever we had forgotten by that time we had been doing.
I wished that I could have the confidence she had, to be able to insist that what I had to say was worth listening to, that I could be important enough to compel people to revise their intentions on my behalf. And yet, I was happy not to be her, not to have the others smile and humour me reluctantly like I was a school teacher. She was so excited to have us all there, so delighted to share her boundless energy with anyone willing to receive it. I couldn't help but wonder how she would react to someone who didn't receive it, who didn't believe in her magic. Would she still be able to fly around then? In fear of falling from the peaks of creative heights have I clipped my wings?
Catherine presided over the room she had hushed, the attention she had collected. She stood behind my chair. "This woman", she said, and already I had begun to shrivel under the weight of those six pairs of eyes. She was doing the thing I hate the most: forcing me into the spotlight. It was just like in school, when I had that question I couldn't hold back; the question the teacher was pleased to be asked; the question that revealed to my peers that I was actually interested in something as uncool as learning something.
My face tightened and the more I tried to relax the more tense I became. I tried to play it casual, to not make it obvious how hard it was for me to breathe under the pressure. "This beautiful woman, here," and I winced, "she said something to me tonight I want you all to think about. What she said was 'how do you know what I want?' Think about it."
"How. Do. You. Know. What. I. Want."
"How do you know, what I want"
"How do you know what I want..."
We repeated the question to ourselves and I wondered, did I really say that?
I'd lose my head if I wasn't standing on it.