#THIRSTY WEDNESDAY FOR PIGEON

[thefreelanceangel]

[cantspelldragoonwithoutgoon]

Happy Birthday @ahollowgrave please take this cupcake <3

I hope you're having a wonderful day with all the treats you deserve (which is all of them)! Thank you for sharing your gorgeous characrters with us on this webbed site MWAH ^3^

[officialleehadan]

Pub Welcome

Knights of the Round

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Nothing was ever easy.

Lancelot kept his truck steady on the tail of the car in front of him, paused to question whether or not he was being creepy, and decided it didn’t matter. He had a task, and that task was to find his king.

Even if Arthur didn’t know who he was yet.

Reincarnations happened from time to time. Lancelot had known a few. Sometimes they remembered their past lives in glimpses. A few remembered more. Some never remembered anything at all. He assumed that getting Excalibur back would remind Arthur who he was, but there was always a chance that it would take more.

That, however, was Merlin’s problem. Lancelot’s job, his only job, was to get Arthur and Guinevere to Merlin however he had to.

They led him back towards town. It wasn’t a far drive, but far enough for Lancelot to pull back a little. He was more than able to follow a single car that wasn’t trying to doge him. Their was no point in getting them nervous when he would need to talk to them soon enough. It wasn’t a large town, but that was normal enough for Wales. Two pubs, one family-owned grocery. A handful of little shops.

Almost nothing to put this town on the map besides one crossroad and a great view of the lake that spread out below the town. It looked like a postcard and Lancelot stopped to take in the view. England might be home, but Wales had always held a special place in his heart.

Arthur and Guinevere stopped at one of the pubs and walked inside, arm-in-arm and laughing together. Lancelot gave them a minute to get inside before he pulled up and parked a few spaces down. He pulled dup the group chat of all the Knights, which most of them ignored most of the time. They knew what he was out doing, however, and they would be watching for his message.

It was much easier than sending a pigeon whenever he needed a letter to reach the others. Some days, he rather liked modern technology. Some days it was a nuisance. Most days, the good outweighed the bad.

The pub looked the same as every pub in Wales. It had the same, warm, comfortable, lived-in space that seemed welcoming no matter where it stood. Lancelot felt the stress of the day fall off his shoulders by old habit. He had spent many evenings laughing with one or the other of the Knights. Hell, he and Galahad had even had a few fun evenings in pubs just like this one.

Maybe it was a good sign. God knew he could use some good luck.

“Whatever you have that’s local,” Lancelot ordered at the bar, and waited for the barkeep to pull an amber-colored ale from the tap. As he waited, he turned and let his gaze drift over the crowd. It was a Wednesday night, but the regulars clearly had their favorite seats and were already drinking away their cares. There was a group of younger people laughing over some sort of board game, and a few couples clearly having a night out. His beer came, and Lancelot raised it to the barkeep before he took a sip. “Thanks.”

“Well, well, aren’t you a cool drink of water in a thirsty town.”

The accent was Scottish, and all Lancelot saw for a moment was red hair and bright green eyes.

Guinevere leaned against the counter, one hip popped and a half-empty beer in her hand. She was in a simple tank-top and jeans with riding boots that laced all the way up to her knees. She walked like she ruled the world and smiled like she knew what to do with it.

“I didn’t think anywhere in Wales was hurting for rain,” he replied before he managed to get his tongue under control. It was natural, even after centuries, to flirt with Guinevere. It was what had gotten him into trouble in the first place. “I thought it was usually the guy who swoops in with the pickup line.”

“Well, I won the coin toss,” she told him, and tossed her flaming hair over her shoulder before flashing a devastating grin over her shoulder. Lancelot followed her gaze and found Arthur watching them both. When he met Lancelot’s eyes, he smiled appreciatively, and raised a glass to him. “We saw you at the lake. Must be our lucky day that you show up here.”

Merlin’s warning raced through his mind and Lancelot gave himself a strong mental shake. He might hate the Wizard, but Merlin rarely gave useless warnings.

It would be very easy to repeat the offenses of his history.

“Afraid that I’ve not had the best luck with married women,” he said apologetically when he spotted a ring on Arthur’s hand, and another around Guinevere’s on a gold chain. They were already married, and he would not be ruining that particular marriage again. “My name is Lancelot.”

That stopped her dead, as he figured it would. It was rare for a reincarnation to have a different name in their previous life. Lancelot didn’t know why, but it was reliable.

“You’re joking.”

Arthur joined them and looped an arm around Guinevere’s waist. She leaned into him, finished the last of her beer, and stole his unrepentantly.

“Afraid I’m not,” Lancelot said ruefully. “Don’t get me wrong, I’ve thought about changing it many, many times.”

“We’re glad you didn’t,” Arthur told him as Guinevere kept on smiling like Lancelot was the prize to a particularly challenging game. He wasn’t sure how he felt at being a side of meat under her gaze. “I’m Arthur. This is Guinevere. What do you say we drown our mythological sorrows together and you tell us what brought you to the back end of Wales?”

+++ Knights of the Round:

King Arthur, the king of legend, died in ancient times. His Knights, however, drank from the Grail and became immortal. But the Sword in the Stone has gone missing, and the Lady of the Lake has once more been seen.

Sword and Beast (Subscriber Only!)

Cousins in Arms (Subscriber Only!)

Do Not Microwave

Four Knights and a Beast (Free on Patreon!)

The Lion of Lyonesse 

The Stone Table (Free on Patreon!)

Wizard Games

Lake Ghosts (Subscriber Only!)

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More Stories!

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[unorthodoxsavvy]

Whumptober Day 2: Starvation

Part 1

Monday Night 9:05pm

Sunshine sat on her perch and watched the door, waiting for Malcolm to come home. She knew that sometimes he was late, and it seemed like it would be one of those nights. She closed her eyes and nestled down into herself to wait for Malcolm to come home and feed her.

Tuesday Morning 1:57am

Sunshine looked around the empty apartment. Malcolm still hadn’t arrived home. She also knew that sometimes he didn’t come home at all, and that was okay. Maybe she would see him in the morning. She hopped down and cracked open a few seeds in her food dish and then hopped back up to her perch.

Tuesday Morning 9:54am

Malcolm still wasn’t home. Perhaps he would be home this evening. Maybe he would bring Mom or Ainsley with him. Maybe they would talk about Dad. Sunshine knew these words, and more. 

Tuesday Evening 8:26pm

The apartment was still empty. Sunshine hopped down to get a drink of water from her dish and then hopped back up to her perch.

Wednesday Afternoon 1:34pm

Sunshine preened her feathers. The floor underneath her cage was messy with feathers and discarded bird seed. Malcolm would have to sleep when he came home.

Thursday Afternoon 2:17pm

Sunshine pulled out a feather. She was hungry. She missed Malcolm. She was worried about him. She waited for him to come home.

Friday Morning 7:45am

Sunshine spotted a pigeon sitting on the window ledge. She was thirsty. Her water had run out.

Sunday Evening 8:09pm

Many of Sunshine’s feathers were pulled out. Where was Malcolm? Where was anyone? The apartment had been silent for a week. Sunshine had run out of food Thursday morning, and her water had dried up. She looked around and pulled out another feather.

Tuesday Morning 6:20am

Most of Sunshine’s feathers were gone now, littering the bottom of her cage or slowly drifting towards the pile on the floor. She was hungry.

Thursday Evening 11:59pm

Sunshine missed Malcolm. She closed her eyes. It felt like forever when she finally opened them again, but there was Malcolm. 

“Hiya Sunshine.”

She wasn’t hungry anymore, or thirsty, and all of her feathers were in pristine condition. She heard other birds singing, and she happily chirped along.

Friday Morning 9:38am

Jessica and Ainsley finally entered Malcolm’s apartment to clean up. It was with tears in her eyes that Ainsley removed the frail and nearly featherless body of Sunshine.

Saturday Morning 11:44am

The body of Sunshine was placed wrapped in a cloth next to Malcolm and slowly lowered into the ground, where they would stay for the rest of eternity.

[glittergummicandypeach]

How a Stars and Stripes Hijab on ‘Rupaul’s Drag Race’ Reveals America’s Troubling Relationship to Gender, Ethnicity and ‘That’ Religion | Religion Dispatches

Honestly, we blame ourselves.

We should have known that releasing an episode of Keeping It 101 (A Killjoy’s Introduction to Religion Podcast) about religion and RuPaul this past Wednesday meant we were in for some goopery when the next episode of Rupaul’s Drag Race aired two days later.

But how could we have known season 12 contender Jackie Cox would bring a freaking STARS AND STRIPES CAFTAN AND HIJAB to the ball? We. Were. Gagged. 

That said: if we had known Ms. Cox would be featuring this garment on tonight, we could’ve clocked Jeff Goldblum’s Islamophobic response from clear across the club. We would’ve told you that women who dress like Cox to express modesty are immediately racialized as Muslim, forced to defend Islam against accusations that it is uniquely hostile toward women and queer people, and especially vulnerable to violence.

The Persian Princess of Drag

Cox has made much of her Iranian heritage, dubbing herself “the Persian Princess of Drag” and tearfully thanking Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for her advocacy work on behalf of immigrants like Cox’s mother, an American citizen born in Iran. But so far this season—as we literally just said!—Cox has claimed her Iranian-ness solely in racial and cultural terms. Even when commending AOC for “working in Congress in solidarity with Congresswoman Tlaib and Congresswoman Omar,” the first two Muslim women elected to serve in Congress, Cox never said the words ‘Islam’ or ‘Muslim’.

L to R: Jaida Essence Hall, the now-disgraced Sherry Pie, and Heidi entreat viewers to vote in the November 2020 presidential election while Jackie Cox waves from the top of the runway. See? Subtle. (Screengrab from episode 12)

We assumed that Cox or the producers or both had decided to frame Cox’s story explicitly in terms of racism and immigration, which fit neatly into season 12’s pronounced emphasis on urging viewers toward increased political engagement. (In drag’s grand tradition of understated subtlety, every episode now ends with the remaining queens prancing down the runway waving huge “REGISTER TO VOTE” signs. Image left.)

As religious studies scholars, we were thirsty for more explicit engagement with Cox’s religio-racial heritage. But we allowed that the show’s glossing of anti-Iranian hostility as racism was still important political work: though classified as white, Iranians in the United States (religious or otherwise) often face anti-Muslim hostility, which is related—but not reducible—to American white supremacy.¹ American whiteness is fragile, contested, and—especially for folks associated with Islam—contingent on good behavior. On episode 7, Jackie Cox wept while outing herself as the child of an immigrant from a Muslim-majority country and claiming “this part of [her] heritage that [she] hid for so long.” We were prepared to leave our analysis of Ms. Cox at that: viewers might suspect their Persian Princess had a relationship with Islam, but the show left Jackie’s religious commitments (or lack thereof) safely tucked out of sight.

But then SOMETHING HAPPENED, America. 

Salaam RuPaul Joon

Episode 9, “Choices,” had contestants facing off in a debate to become America’s first drag president.² The pinnacle of every episode is the queen’s final runway looks; this week’s theme was “Stars and Stripes Forever.”³ And heeeeeere’s Jackie:

She’s giving us “a beautiful, [red and white] striped, flowing caftan” and “a midnight blue hijab that is outlined in fifty silver stars.” She’s insisting “you can be Middle Eastern, you can be Muslim, and you can still be American.”

In the immortal words of Latrice Royale: she said THAT.

As Jackie Cox swanned down the runway trailing her patriotic caftan behind her, guest judge, dinosaur Zaddy, and Woody Allen defender Jeff Goldblum let out an “oooooh” or a “nooooo.” Either way, it was clear Cox’s look evoked a strong response from Goldblum. Camera held tight on his face for reactions; Goldblum seemed fixated and (to our trained killjoy eye) bordering on disgust. 

A smiling Cox faced the judges with a cheery “salaam RuPaul joon!” Veteran judge Carson Kressley called her outfit “beautiful and touching” and said it “makes a political statement;”4 guest judge Rachel Bloom celebrated that Cox’s “simple outfit…says so much” about what “America really is.”5 This presentation primes the viewer to see Cox’s eleganza as boundary-pushing and indicative of something essential about Jackie Cox as a performer.

If you watched the show or you study religion or you exist on the internet, you already know what happened next. 

“Are you religious, may I ask?” Goldblum inquired, because OF COURSE HE DID, eyebrows raised above thick black nerd glasses, elbow propped on the judges’ table, supporting a face slouched casually against his hand. Cox replied that she’s not religious and insisted that the importance of her outfit lies in “the visibility religious minorities need to have in this country.” 

“Isn’t this an interesting wrinkle, though,” Goldblum continued, waving his hands around his face with pre-COVID abandon. “Is there something in that religion that is anti-homosexuality and anti-woman? Does that complicate the issue?” (emphasis added, and Reader: feel free to pause and hit the shade rattle button if you need to). “I’m just raising it and thinking out loud and maybe being stupid. What do you think?” he concluded.

We’re so glad you asked us that, Jeff Goldblum. Here’s what we think:

Seeing a hijab-wearing woman and dribbling half-baked, anti-Muslim talking points from out the mouth atop your admittedly striking and grizzled jawline does not make us think you’re interesting, Jeff Goldblum. It makes us think you haven’t done your homework.

Islamophobia is Not an “Interesting Wrinkle”

Here’s the T: religion has always been messy on Drag Race—which makes sense, since religion is messy in general. Keeping It 101, like Marie Kondo, loves mess, so you know we had to get into this gig. Whether it means to or not, Drag Race has always given us characters with complicated relationships to religion: Monique Heart’s devout Christianity despite undergoing conversion therapy; Valentina claiming la Virgen de Guadalupe as her drag mother; debates about whose religiously-inspired garments are culturally appropriate and whose are appropriation. 

Religion should be messy on Drag Race, we’ve argued, because religion is what people do, and people are some messy bitches. Lived religious experience changes as people change; rarely are people just one thing or one thing all the time or one thing throughout their whole lives. Jackie Cox has been bringing the complexity of her Iranian identity to us every week. But despite Cox asserting her Iranian-ness in terms of culture, national origin, and ethnicity, the judges read her “Stars and Stripes Forever” outfit exclusively and explicitly as religious. 

As RuPaul’s longtime co-host Michelle Visage would say: meh.

Look, we’re not surprised. Americans know disturbingly little about pious fashion, which has led to some truly tragic and dehumanizing feature items on nonwestern modesty practices. Most Americans still seem unaware that how people cover their bodies has far more to do with where they are than whether they belong to a particular religious community (though students always nod when we explain that folks going out on the town in New York City dress differently than in, say, Tuscaloosa). Folks who wrinkle their noses at Muslim modest fashion seldom express the same concerns about conservative Christian women in long skirts and long-sleeved blouses. We know how you do, America. We work on racialization and religious intolerance.

As we discussed on our “Religion Is Not Done with You” episode, we also know that Muslim-coded people don’t get to opt out of Islam: “Arab-looking” folks, folks with “Muslim-sounding” names, Sikhs in turbans, folks who dress in “Muslim garb,” all get read as Muslim. Identifying as atheist doesn’t get anyone who can be read as Muslim out of “totally random” TSA pat downs. This is how we racialize Islam, distilling a billion-person millenium-old global religion into one (terrifying, not-American) thing.

So yeah, when Jeff Goldblum looks at Jackie Cox in a hijab and says “that religion,” of course we know what he means. Goldblum doesn’t say “Islam”—in fact, no one says Islam or Muslim for the rest of the episode. No one has to. With this question-cum-critique, Islam became what was happening On Tonight, and Goldblum became every white dude in any audience or classroom who doesn’t think he’s racist, who doesn’t realize he’s part of the problem, and who definitely didn’t do the reading. 

That Religion

Goldblum’s use of that here—making Islam “that religion,” unnamed and unsafe for women and queer people—belies the disgust we clocked on his face as Cox brought modest fashion to the runway. He’s asking (though it’s really more of a comment than a question) whether the religion he projects onto Cox’s queer, feminine-presenting body hates her queer, feminine-presenting self; hates all women and queers. 

Goldblum is asking Cox if Islam hates her, the beautiful queen standing before him, who chose to wear this clothing to represent herself and her communities. Goldblum begs the question of Islam-as-oppressive, as though expecting Cox to thank him for liberating her with his tired, basic question. 

Dinosaur Zaddy, WYD? Why are you proving our point by assuming folks who look like Muslims must be religious—immediately racializing and pigeon-holing literal billions of people? Why would you assume you already know everything you need to know about Islam? 

Oh, right. Because you’re American, and America is that girl. We knew she was. 

Cox, to her credit, ignored the bigotry and argued for complexity: “I’m not [religious],” she told Goldblum. “I have my own misgivings about how LGBT people are treated in the Middle East, and at the same time, I am one. But…when the Muslim ban happened, it really destroyed a lot of my faith in this country, and it really hurt my family.” (Jeff Goldblum, open-mouthed, nodded along as Cox spoke.) “I’m here, and I deserve to be in America as much as anyone else.” 

In a challenge meant to celebrate American inclusivity, Cox had to share her personal trauma and champion religious freedom (very American of her, no?) so as not to have to defend a religion of 1.9 billion people (Islam), a nation-state of 82 million (Iran), and an immigrant community already under siege. 

Goldblum’s comments are dangerous. Characterizing Islam as inherently anti-LGBTQ, anti-women, anti-anything, really, falsely collapses the complexity of Islam and Muslims into a conservative anti-American monolith—while letting America off the hook for the very real damage it’s doing to women, LGBTQ people, immigrants, and Muslims every day, and with increased urgency during our nation’s public health crisis. 

We the People

Standing on the stage in front of the judges, Cox—like so many women who cover—found the complexity of her identity reduced to the fabric on her head. Despite not being religious, Drag Race stripped her complicated performance down to its proximity to Islam. It might be too much to expect a campy televised game show to give us realness about religion, except that historically, that’s exactly what Drag Race has done. 

Shepard Fairey’s “We the People Are Greater than Fear.”

RuPaul loves a reference, but no one on that judges panel seemed to get that Cox’s caftan and hijab were inspired by Shepard Fairey’s “WE THE PEOPLE are greater than fear,” part of a poster series created in response to the 2016 election [image left].  

Many people carried this image during nation-wide Women’s Marches in January 2017 to protest the 45th president’s inauguration. The poster inspired praise (for including a modest Muslim woman as a symbol of American patriotism) and criticism (for implying Muslims need to support American militarism and imperialism to be “truly” American). 

Not all Muslim women feel liberated by the image Cox is referencing; as Muslim fashion blogger Hoda Katebi says, “Know that Muslims are tired of having to ‘prove’ they are American [and] know that one does not need to be American to deserve respect, humanity, dignity, equality, rights and freedom from hate and bigotry. An over-emphasis on being American as a prerequisite of deserving respect is harmful for immigrants and refugees.” 

How a woman (or a man dressed as one) engages with religion (or not) is not something you can tell by looking at her. Muslim women are more than what they put (or not) on their heads. Looking at a woman who covers and assuming she’s an observant Muslim contributes to the racialization of Muslims—the fear that Muslims are too different, too dangerous, to be allowed to be fully American. Asking a female-presenting person who covers her head with a hijab whether Islam hates women or queers implies that the woman needs saving, that she hasn’t chosen to dress herself in a way she knows makes her a more likely target for hate speech and violence. Assuming Islam hates Muslim women or queer Muslims is some white nonsense: Islam hates nothing; all religions are made up of people. 

Assuming a Muslim woman or a queer Muslim must be especially at risk because of their religious belonging collapses a long, complex history of gender relations in Islam into a soundbite that makes the internet yell at you, Jeff Goldblum. It ignores that many religions, including Islam, can and do contribute to both the empowerment and the oppression of women. Because religion is what people do, DinoZaddy, and history has shown us that people oppress women. 

When you look at a woman who covers her head and assume you know everything worth knowing about her, Jeff Goldblum, you make an ass out of you. And us, as it turns out, for releasing our hot take on RuPaul and religion too early to yell about this on the air. Better luck next season, we guess. 

In the meantime: salaam, Khanoom Jackie Cox joon. Thank you for not turning your pious fashion runway moment into a reveal. We stan.

1 Check out the Islamophobia Is Racism syllabus and especially Neda Maghbouleh’s excellent Limits of Whiteness (Stanford 2017) for more on this religio-racial tension.

2 Again. Season 4 episode 9, “Frock the Vote,” featured precisely this format — but that was before the show hit basic cable and expanded its mainstream viewership.  This is probably for the best, as Chad Michaels’ “LadyPimp” platform has not aged well. And PhiPhi O’Hara’s calling Black queens “the help” didn’t play well even then.

3 Personally, we would have gone with “Amer-I-Can!” but we’re still waiting for our recruiting call from the show’s producers.

4 Speaking of political statements: don’t even get us started on Carson telling Widow that she came off as an angry Black woman, or on the fact that the lipsync for your life literally pitted a Black queen against a hijabi queen while declaring the white queen in ACTUAL IMPERIAL GARB  safe. We cannot even.

5 Bloom called America “a nation of immigrants,” which obviously obscures the genocidal violence perpetrated against the Indigenous peoples of what is now the United States and against those forcibly removed and enslaved to become the bedrock of this country’s economy.

This content was originally published here.

[katef-m]

daily reports (wed, thu, fri)

Wednesday is all bookshops - sorry, bookstores, American google maps doesn’t recognise the word bookshop - and citymapper. There’s a food market in Union Square and from the subway I emerge, blinking in the thick of it, disorientated. When my family visited NYC in 2014, my brother began calling me ‘meerkat’ because of my confused facial expression every time I stepped out from a subway and didn’t know which direction the blocks were going, which way was east. The name stuck, probably because I tend to look confused most of the time. Meerkat. Meerkate. I go to Strand books first, kind of eye-rolling myself and all the tote bags they flog, but they have @durgapolashi‘s book and I cradle it all the way to the cashier (picking up a Springsteen postcard on the way). I’ve got some trendy coffee place all lined up from the app I downloaded, but there’s a Pret opposite Strand and suddenly its promise of home creeps like vines around me, pulls me across the street. The drenchingly familiar smell of the honey-maroon interior, the London-ness of it, so pervasive it is enough to wrench the heart of one who has never felt homesick in America. Honey where you been so long? The smell of a Pret branch is always penetrating yet light, almost cloying were it not for its irresistible lilts of health and colour. Pret smells of a soy cappuccino after a visit to an art gallery on a rainy afternoon, of a packet of dried mango slices on a long train journey, of fresh wood shavings. Pret smells of rainbows and falafel. Of rainbow falafel, if such a thing existed. Pret smells of the golden glow of getting home earlier than expected, and it smells of the  snack decisions you make quickly before a gig or a play. Pret smells of the gathered -aah- of a mid-shopping break, of puddles of spring rain, and sunshine condensed into planks of balsam and coffee stirrers. Pret smells of London on that first warm day some time in late April, and it smells of compromise - everybody likes Pret - and cucumbers and comfort. And when I smell Pret, in the middle of New York City with everybody I love on the wrong side of the ocean, the interior drenches me in all of this, the way a bellyflop drenches you, smack, and I almost have to walk out, except their iced coffee is half the price of the trendy places and I’m thirsty.  Then to Greenwich Village, again, to two more bookstores. I buy a screenplay about Robert Johnson that Greil Marcus recommended. I walk all the way to Trader Joe’s for hummus and salad, and catch the subway. Home, Mum calls. It’s late evening in London. Later Dad wanders in from a ukulele social, his ukelele strapped to his back. He is flush with the night warmth (the UK got a heatwave too) and he looks younger than I remember. It’s not a ukulele, actually, but a baby guitar, he informs me, and then they go to bed. My room is so warm that I re-watch Force Majeure, hoping its snow will cool me down somehow. 

On Thursday I wake up at ten and run four miles. Not in that quick a succession; waking up is a long ordeal for me. The fancy Flatbush streets are 100% dapple this time of year, like I accidentally wandered into a Monet, the sunlit negative spaces between leaves obscuring the details of houses and cars. Except for the middle-aged bearded man in bright green rollerblades. He gliding up and down the road, up and down. He looks like your average Brooklyn hipster dad freelance writer. Maybe his air conditioning broke down and this is the only place he can find cool. I run in a sports bra, feeling triumphant about patriarchy and my own pitiful self-esteem, until I remember that my as-yet-unexposed stomach is an entirely different shade to the rest of me. Cali-ombred. Post-run malaise upside down from my bed, and then the subway to Dumbo. When I come out of York Street station I’m a momentary meerkat again, lifted out into a tangle of bridges and intersections and buildings stacked against each other. I like the environment immediately. I join the tourist posers on Washington Street for the shot that repeats itself in squares on Instagram, and then I hunt down Brooklyn Roasting Company, and clutch cold brew along the water’s edge, taking the meandering path park, under the bridges. The other side of Brooklyn Bridge gets a bit too ‘boat tours and melted ice cream’ but just past that there’s grass and shade. I read, sat in the hulk of downtown New York, its presence comforting, like when I was fourteen and overjoyed just to be sitting in the same room as my crush - I’d never actually talk to him, of course. Later I continue walking along the water, until I can see the curving underside of the city, and New Jersey folded up into the horizon. Peach salsa, and ice cream, and how I miss my friends. 

Details from today: Chinese boy smoking on our doorstep, the city so ‘soft summer rain’ I want to take my shoes and socks off and find a Dodge and warm beer. Rushing in from the damp to Happy Bones. The woman next to me talks so loud about her ‘wellness tree’. And her bullet journal. The colour-coded charts she has drawn to reflect her mood, her food, her sleep. I turn a squawk-laugh into a barely disguised cough. How my book cover perfectly matches the coffee shop interior. Half a bagel in Washington Square Park (I’m broke and rationing/giving myself leeway before the glut of home food), and pigeons like a giant flag, and a march with a brass band. Finding Yayoi Kusama at the MoMA, and the static celebrity of Starry Night. The predictable characters of free Friday night entry: the young Spanish couple nervously trying to live up to their romantic getaway, the bemused stylish elderly couple, the parents arguing about what makes something art while their kids trail behind, the long-limbed girl pretending she doesn’t know how artily pretty she is, the middle-aged dad using the limb of his spectacles to read a long caption. Louise Lawler. ‘This will mean more to some of you than others’, and ‘Once there was a little boy and everything turned out alright. THE END’. All of my body pulled towards Rothko’s No.10 and Rauschenberg’s Glacier (Hoarfrost) and even Sheeler’s Bucks County Barn. Reductive abstraction, reductive geometry, my favourites. Heart-eyes in front of Agnes Martin. Her grids are clouds, pools, outdoor pools on days of light cloud. I could swim in them for hours. Steve McQueen, the room with the waterlilies. I flop in the sculpture garden, planning to read awhile - if I wasn't alone, we’d get beers probably, and fall into early-evening tipsiness - but I can't think about that. It rains anyway, and they close the garden.

[thefreelanceangel]

[thefreelanceangel]

"Happy birthday, little priestess..."

[thefreelanceangel]

[thefreelanceangel]

[thefreelanceangel]

"Trust me, the shop is closed for the night."

{HAPPY BIRTHDAY @ahollowgrave! <3}

[thefreelanceangel]

[thefreelanceangel]

[thefreelanceangel]

[thefreelanceangel]

[thefreelanceangel]

Happy Birthday to our beloved @ahollowgrave!