Quietly Shakin Things Up

After a short hiatus from this here blog scene (for which I apologize, I’d retreated into the depths of my mind for the month due to anxieties and lack of sleep) I return to transpose the latest happening put forth by the Tenet Collective which has accumulated a momentum and reputation and a solid base of groovy dudes and gals and everything in between, who are down with what the group can do and has done so far this year.

It was the core group of aforementioned hooligans that kept things together this time around, as the temperature drop into degrees reminiscent of the dreaded polar vortex must have (understandably) anchored other attendees to the warmth of their homes and couches. The third progressive revolution began again at the Fuck Boys’ Lair, with vijjy screenings showing a variety of bohemian types: there was one perplexed custodian with an iPhone taped to his welder’s mask, recording himself sweeping up the remnants of a gingerbread house, his real-time vision impaired by the mask so that he ended up taking much longer than necessary to clean up those crumbs, a metaphor for vision if I ever saw one; there was a girl who painted convulsively, sporadically, rolling and throwing reds and blacks onto canvas repetitively, the video a layering of this process so that at certain points there were two or three of her painting and overlapping and swaying into one another – the composition and process having to do with psychological tendencies and actions that come up without us knowing, things bubbling to surface subconsciously, her acknowledging this loss of control over own body, coming to terms with control; lastly a lone naked spiky haired lanky fella with only his boots and gloves and a pair of glasses on, dropping a monologue about a trip home to his parents’ house in a dream while the vid cut between him speaking and boxing with a big red balloon, where after confessing his broken heart due to a love affair gone sour the dad, in perfect form, went into how there’s a lot of heartbreak in this world and a lotta sad people out there with cracks in their sad hearts, but also how there is also a lot of joy and love and sunshine around if you look for it right, and maybe that’s what life’s about – and the naked man in the boots and glasses having it out with the balloon that just might have been his own cracked heart, telling his tale and rubbing his face and growling out his syllables in such a way that the whole story was genuine and honest and not played out or cliche or washed up, and I shed more than one tear at this point here and a wave of emotion swept through the room.

There was a small procession over to a house on N. Division where the living room had been transformed into a cuddle fort with blankets draping from the ceiling in the fashion of a billowy circus tent, there were pillows and blankets all around layered on the walls and floor and in the entrance hung one particular old holy worn out blanket from someone’s childhood years, whose sentimental qualities emanated from its softly ragged folds and provided an entrance to this parallel dimension with glowy lights and sounds seeping in from the corners, and the room was full of good vibes and people sharing stories and touching each other in friendly affection, and there was no judgment there, only the kind words and feels remained. And downstairs the music played, Yada Yada stringin along smooth melodic jams, a comfortable kind of funk that made me think of nights on the beach or out in some greenfield at dusk, and the crowd swayed and dipped in agreement of the jive they laid down – and when the sounds of Yada faded into the voices of the crowd more bands took that corner stage which sat in front of a Thomas the Train tapestry, and into the night the music went and the ups and downs of the party people on the stairs mirrored the noises down there, all becoming the Night, all parts of the Time.

And I suppose the moral of the story here is that you don’t need two hundred people chanting and stomping down the street to have an effect, that sometimes a low-key interaction leads to more intimate relationships and connections with old friends and new friends alike, that despite what the commercials and television faces say maybe less can be more, and maybe building up our expectations about how big or how many something is only ends up ruining the outcome, that maybe we can be content just going with the flow, and quietly shake things up in our own kinda way.