Parka Lottery

During yesterdays mid afternoon under-the-weather slumber, I had a dream distinctly titled The Parka Lottery. Why it was titled like a film or an entry I know not, but even in sleep I knew it would be a good one. The dream opened with a visit to Rebecca and her disgruntled 'tween goth sister (non existent in reality) and their floating house in the middle of a marsh in the Woodlands. The feeling of a floating house was incredible and I kept testing the buoyancy like a child, running from corner to corner and rocking the hell out of each spot. The novelty! Rebecca was trying to make dijon mustard sandwiches but the jar would empty like sand from a broken glass each time the knife dipped in. Nameless goth sister sat sloth-like on the futon, annoyed by our antics.

As the sisters faded away the dream reopened with the appearance of my Uncle Jim, Sara as a child, my Aunty Daryl, my parents and siblings. The light table was stationed in the kitchen like an under-lit island marked with an X. Weird placement. The rules of the lottery were introduced with a pointer stick on a blackboard in the kitchen by someone I didn't know. It was explained that there was a winter parka for each hidden around the floating house. The last person to find their parka was expected to dismantle the light table and use the material to build a raft. The dream ended as I pulled a sleeve of a puffy jacket out from under a baseboard.

I woke to the phone ringing, Rebecca calling.

K&K

This photo of my mother was shot in what has always been referred to as the car garage. Her body split by the light of day. We got home from a painting job early and when I came back to get something from the car, this is what I saw. Quiet concentration. Photo ready, as they say.

KK cleans brushes in the light. January 2012.

Creature of a Hundred Natures

Double dog ear for this excerpt in an effort to remember:


All my life I have loved traveling at night, with a companion, each of us discussing and sharing the known and familiar behavior of the other. It's like a villanelle, this inclination of going back to events in our past, the way the vinallelle's form refuses to move forward in linear development, circling instead at those familiar moments of emotion. Only the rereading counts, Nabokov said. So the strange form of that bellfry, turning onto itself again and again, felt familiar to me. For we live with those retrievals from childhood that coalesce and echo throughout our lives, the way shattered pieces of glass in a kaleidoscope reappear in new forms and are songlike in their refrains and rhymes, making up a single monologue. We live permanently in the recurrence of our own stories, whatever story we tell. 

From Ondaatje's Divisadero. A book filled with beauty, one I will read twenty more times no less. The literature of Ondaatje's ages well. I am off to the concert hall for yet another dose of Icelandic music in a boy's hat. Bless these days, for they are good.

This split photo of June and Rouge is dear to me.

You are a Pioneer

Trains shake the house and in turn the house shakes the dogs and I. What a sensation. Ruby and June curl into each other while their mother is out. Low light with spots of red at the Barber house tonight. It's warm and comfortable in the house. I write from a huge desk, deep and wide. The surface area is so great that it houses Jessica Alba, a paper cutter, the red cookbook form from Chanel, a few pieces of art, new fenders lying in wait, a large lamp and my computer quite comfortably. That is one big desk. Not pertinent information in the slightest, but impressive.

Not going to the bush this summer. Damn. My hesitation over each open invitation said enough. Silence and stillness speak louder than words, in this case, in many cases. Liza, I am sorry. Wind in your sails Cook! One strong two-fingered salute to you with love, my love. Your love. You will see your nature space from a different vantage point this year I bet. Cooking in love in nature. No trump card there!

Something within me continues to tell me to wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Something will come. Aries within and the moon above rattling around in wordless conversation this week. Wait. Wait. Wait.

Want what is there, within and peace will come.

I painted for my crewboss Mother today. An auntie in one room, a sister in another, my mother down the hall. I love painting on her crew. It is an interesting vantage point as a daughter, watching a mother order the operation with grace and laughter. We work hard because we were taught well. Navaho White all up in me.

Last night I wore Navaho White to the symphony, no use fighting with dry paint. Icelandic music for dinner. I sat in my seat draped in low notes, cello, viola, stand up bass. Neck and mouth and ears open. Eyes closed, shining so bright within the darkness of my body. I don't know how to begin to articulate my love for live music. For classical music. For choral music. For strings all together now. For pitch perfect voices coming together in a room built for such.

Here are some recent photos shot with the Kiev. Walking around my room, the river, Chinatown, the Bike Dump.

Visual report

A collection of photos shot from Montreal to Winnipeg. So many tiny people to capture in those quick windows of growth.

Get Our Guns

Here are some new things I have been working on. Ladies in hats on my mind. Light table in the bedroom. Basking in the glow of late night Vitamin D. Work standing up then sleep. Drink coffee all day. I tried to print within my work room last night and must have looked ridiculous with knees splayed in equal pressure on the frame, pulling a way-too-long squeegee loaded with art school ink in the space between. It was not pretty.

Today I am going to print at a new place. So exciting to see new workshops, the first glance at layout home to machines and presses. Multiples of things. Neat lines.

Studio fever.

'Been getting my hands moving in the name of Le Taudis. My friend Rhayne is on the cusp opening a new space for art viewing and production. Le Taudis can be anything. That is the beauty of open space. Rhayne is one hell of a woman. It takes incredible gumption to open an artspace on Selkirk Avenue in Winnipeg (in winter). Poor, rough and hard. She has the right attitude and a good handle of the reality of the neighborhood to make something amazing out of it. Faith in the future!!

The Stinker

Dear Poulet, salut.

Ca va? Cooking up a storm over there, I imgine?

My friend Leo, I need you in my life. Je m'ennuie de toi. You would like my new room and tear it a new one. I wish we could walk around together. There are lots of dogs around and a great Splash Park near my house. Good view and light from a floor up. Pots of ink to spill all around. You would dig it. Your ma sent me these photos and made my day. Thanks V. This is us alright, clowning around and making an omelet.  Miss you buddy.

Love, Megan

* all photos shot by Jeremy Spry

75

Miss you, you crazy bird. Today is Sara's birthday. In some strange way this balloon is definitely for her from you, her mom. Odd that I even came across this in the stacks today. Feeding missing with looking. I shot this photo at Grandpa Reimer's 75th birthday in 2008 in a mud room of a gerhiatrics apartment. A laughing matter then. I can hear your laughter when I look at this.

Love you.

King's Cabana

After Christmas passed us by, my dear friend Lisa invited myself along with three other wonderful women to her cabin on Beaconia Beach. It has become a tradition and this year was the second year running. Great laughter, great adventure, great freedom, great fire.

I just came across Brit Willacy's photos of the weekend and they are nothing short of incredible. Thanks woman. All photos below shot by Brit W. As a photographer myself, it is rare to be captured in such a way, not to mention pictured mid shot. The comfort of friendship is obvious here.

White House report

Up from the grave He arose.

That song of calvary is stuck in my head. I am beginning to understand the reality of life amongst ongoing renovation. Whoa la, respect. I have been painting various parts of my imediate environment Cloud White. Clothes are coming tomorrow, bits and bobs are here waiting. The blank white is so incredible I am tempted to let the walls speak for themselves, unadorned.

Today I unwrapped my Omega B22 enlarger that is just a swinging door away from my bed. All parts in fine form. The studio has taken a shape. Nothing beats a studio put together. Things in their place.

This home.

Is a good one.

While I am taking my sweet time adjusting to the switch, so far so good. January is zipping on through. Dragon year woohoooo! I rode a large tricyle through aisles upon aisles of bicycle parts this evening. It was thrilling, a true thrill to find grace around those corners standing up in painting clothes in child's play.

Steve, I don't know if you read this but I made your simple sauce today, slow and low. With miniscule vegetables to boot. Not as good as yours but good enough to remind me of you. Simon, I will miss the ease of walking to your bed when my eyes fail me and all I have is my feet. I miss you both so dearly.

Glass was smashed for waste and process in between the trip through the aisles, shopping for new drop bars with my eyes. Steel all the way.

This is an exciting time in life. Piecing the darkroom together bolt by bolt was exciting. It won't be long. Just a few more things to paint white.

Shlope shien.