THE MYTH OF THE MYTH: VALENTINO

Social psychologists and anthropologists were employed by several of the major studios to help them find a hero like Valentino, a man who could be all things to all women. Women accepted Valentino in any role: costumes merely added to his height, boots contributed to his swagger, and dancing pumps gave him feline grace. When he kissed a woman's hand he was Sir Charles Lovelace or Don Juan, the Earl of Rochester or Casanova, Launcelot or D'Artagnan, never a lounge lizard. When Valentino kissed a woman's hand her body juices heated and she shuddered down to her darling pink toes. 

The studios were aware of the specifications; the task was to find the man who fitted them, a man who could persuade a woman to free herself from the inhibitions of the Protestant ethic. Here she was, trapped in a trackless desert without friends or family, by a booted man who carried a whip. What could she do, except submit gracefully . . .

THE CITY SHIP

This city block of 3-flats, mirrored back-to-back with buildings across the alley, rose like a ship in a surrounding sea of streets. The backyards created internal space, guarded by their protective wall of apartments. The stern was flanked with sturdy courtyard buildings crosscut by an alley at the end of the block. The frontispiece bow was a magnificent 5-story flatiron. It was complete with curved windows and it towered like a hawk over 6 converging streets. On foggy days the other city dwellings, or cars parked along the curb, and busses unloading people from work -- disappeared in the mist beyond the ship. Wet surrounding streets reflected like silvery water.  

The resident crew set sail for years. Myself included, we were ambivalent to change, holding sway against time and place and circumstance.

Margo Cuisinier

"MY MY MY" said the SPIDER TO THE FLY

conversation 

Kirsten confides to Jill: "Ya know how like when you were in 6th grade there was always a group of mean girls"? The ones who always travelled around in a pack. Walking down the street together, popping a volleyball to each other. Pointing at you, Yo! Glancing at one another, then laughing. Smugly, like she was proud of it, Kirsten admits that she had been one of them. 

Jill is now a customer of Kirsten's. Kirsten admits that she's childishly meanspirited. That she's made a life of being a browbeating, bulldozing, intimidating, teasing, tormenting pest who has no qualms of arbitrarily sticking it to any of her customers (uh, that would be Jill) at any time, for any reason. Kinda for the sport of it . . .

"Hmmm. My. Indeed" reflects Jill.

Jill knows she should high-tail it out of that relationship as fast as possible, but remains passive . . . in disbelief . . . like she didn't hear what she just heard.

Margo Cuisinier

GIRL IN A CHAIR 

from Jude the Obscure

About 6 o'clock he awoke completely, and lighting a candle, found that her clothes were dry. Her chair being a far more comfortable one than his, she still slept on inside his great-coat, looking warm as a new bun and boyish as a Ganemedes. Placing the garments by her and touching her on the shoulder he went downstairs, and washed himself by starlight in the yard.

Thomas Hardy

Joshua Reynolds painting

THERE IS WHERE I FUNCTION BEST!

Annotated dream

Dream

I am back in the old grind: freelancing as a graphic artist in Corporate America. The company I'm at is disorganized, moving me from one computer station to another. Nobody seems to be working; everyone shifting and shuffling around. The officious supervisor was eyeing me, looking to blame; but each time I set up to work, she moved me somewhere else. This last time she said I would work on the second floor, so she led me downstairs. The stairs, however, were a minefield of feces. I had to carefully pick my way down.

Annotation 

I spent years in freelance jobs: working for large corporations, getting nothing accomplished (except for them; for me, no), shoved around, supervised by middlemen, and expected to pick my way through shit. The dream, however, uses this personal history to lead me to my current state. I'm in a tough spot right now: a victim of rotten circumstance, not in control, and only able to respond (to ugly events) by selecting the safest route. 

There's a resolution in the dream, however. I am forced to work downstairs, which is to go down into my subconscious (funny, I'm led there by the supervisor, who of course is me, too). Interestingly, the subconscious is where I function best. There is where I might find a solution.

WHAT DO I CARE FOR WHAT THEY SEE?  -- performance selection

From Sometimes a Great Notion

Willard stepped back from the laundry window to leave and was stopped by his dim reflection in the glass: hardly there at all, a ridiculous little character with a receding chin and eyes swimming nearsightedly behind glasses out of style years ago, a cartoonist wash drawing of the capital H henpecked husband, a satirist's two-dimensional strawman designed to convey at first glance a two-dimensional personality that everyone knows everything about before it even opens its mouth.

Willard wasn't shocked by the image; he been aware of it for years. When he was younger he had scoffed to himself at all those people who treated him as though he really were this image he projected, "What do I care for what they see? They think they know the book by its cover, but the book knows what it is."

Now he knew better; if the book never opens up and comes out, it can be warped to fit the image others see.

He took a parting look at the reflection then moved on off toward the street light on the corner. This funny paper image is so complete and so consistent, he thought, it's a wonder the rain doesn't wash me away down the gutter like an old paper doll. Yet when he turned the corner and walked away from the light, his shadow stretched before him, black and solid. So he wasn't quite disengaged from this world. There was still something.