Playing in my in mind: “The Way You Looked Tonight”, as read by Tony Bennett.

I took a few photos of the creepy tree with the craggy lines.  I’m not good with trees so I can’t tell you its name.  It wasn’t a typical looking tree.  I decided I would name it Spooky.  The craggy lines looked spooky, like a tree on Halloween.  Except of course it wasn’t raining or windy and there were no bats fluttering about and no witches cruising on brooms.

While the camera was doing its thing (each exposure was between six and fifteen minutes.  I’m one of those old boys who never went digital.  I stayed with my old Nikon F2 which I had mounted on a tripod and outfitted with a 16 mm Nikkor lens set at 2.8) I looked to the stars and wished I would see one fall.  Cause my being alone at that moment called up a wishing well full of wishes of Jazz Love, Tasha, and Tessa, gracefully, willowy wandering into mind.  No stars did fall so scratch one wish book full of lovely ladies/mega past.  I was also wishing I would see a U.F.O. because my friend lent me a documentary she taped off A&E about real life U.F.O. stories.  Stories about a pilot, back in the mid 40′s, flying his plane above the mountains in Washington and he saw spooky saucer shapes skipping by.  Then last week, “Roswell”, was on CBC and it showed how some aliens were found in some wreckage in the ranch lands of New Mexico, and how one was even breathing and walking around and generally messing about in his/her alien way.

So I watched the stars for about two hours and wondered why I never got to see a U.F.O., especially when I spent so much time on the open country and in the wilderness, running around out there at night.  Well I didn’t see a U.F.O. just like I never won the lottery.  So around midnight I packed up my gear, bid the old Spookster good evening, and came home, wondering why the Ojibway people never had any alien stories in their folklore, myths, legends, prophecies, or general daily hubbub ancient Ojibwe light conversation.

I arrived home and went straight to the upstairs and bed.  The yard lights were out and the room was dark.  Usually before bed, I calm down and pray with Chopin’s “Berceuse in D Flat, op. 57″, “Lullaby, Nocturne in E Flat Major”, “Prelude in D Flat Major”, and Debussy’s “Suite Bergamasque, Clair de lune”, in that order, and imagine flying away with Brancusi’s “Bird In Space”, to assist in flying me away to sleep and the mighty dreamlandscape, while the heat burns down the last bits of sage I have in a shell a little lady gave me.  Last night though, I forgot the music and the sage in the city and had to rely on the whippoorwill living in the trees in the east yard.  Dreams come calling…

I was driving down the government road from Providence Bay to Tehkummah, thinking yeah, I like stopping to smell the flowers, especially lilac and wild roses.  I like the sunrise, the sunset, the moon rise and the moon set.  I like the acoustic guitar, water colours, slow pow wow dancing, swimming out beyond the confines of the cove and into the deep water, swimming with the big fish and the rain.  I’ve designed my own tattoos, given away strawberries, walked a mile or two to get to the summer time evening carnival.  I like smoking the odd American brand cigarette.  I like drinking alone.  I love classical and jazz music.  And I was listening to the CBC and a cool story they had about this jazz trumpet player who was big in the seventies but was also a junkie and a bit of a nut bar, going off the deep end in his druggie day to day struggle.  His name was Chet Baker and his story was really quite bizarre, a jazz musician being such a torrid junkie.  I thought that kind of story was reserved for rock and roll stars.  Well I guess I was wrong about that!  The life story was entertaining and the music was night music, slow and groovy.  They had just played Chet’s reading of “I Fall In Love Too Easily”.

The road was lined with rabbits and road signs.

For no special reason I looked up and saw a star in the early evening sky, ahead of me, going my way.  It was bright like Venus but it appeared to be a lot closer than a hundred gazillion light years away.  This looked like it might be a few minutes away.  And it was getting closer.  I sped the car up to forty kilometers an hour, looked up and there it was, getting closer.  So I pulled over to get out and take a look.  It was up there alright.  A speck of light in the sky, like a star, only coming down, getting closer; making no sound.  I became very frightened.  I rattled up and down and started to shake.  I looked up and down the government road and no one was coming in either direction.  I looked back up and there it was just above the tree tops and I felt a fear like, well, I don’t know what it was, but the next thing I know I’m the car, behind the wheel and cruising east bound on the trusty and barren government road.  So I go home by way of Snowville and Sandfield.  And go up the stairs, into my room and into bed, to sleep.

And in sleep I’m dreaming I’m being beamed up this white ray of light, into a brighter white light that is above me.  

Next thing I know I’m in a dark, board room like place and in the company of a bunch of grey waxy looking dudes with huge black, oval shaped eyes.  They had no lips, just this line where their mouths could have been.  Tiny holes where their nostrils might be.  Spooky.  But not wildly horrifying or terrifically out of this world…

Because.  I’m talking to them about Chet Baker, the jazz trumpet player who died in the late 80′s from being a junkie, getting high and getting too close to open hotel room windows.  And they’re sitting around listening to me tell this story.  Casually too, some of them are leaning forward with their grey waxy elbows on the table, hands together under their grey waxy chins.  Others are favouring one side and have their grey waxy elbows on an arm of their big fancy board room like chairs.  The room is dark except for one big light above the table, casting shadows in all directions.  Every now and again a servitor alien comes in with a tray bearing assorted cigars and cigarettes, offering these main guys a smoke and a light, or a glass of something exotic looking.  And I’m going on like a crazed salesman trying to sell them some bullshit thing we all know they don’t need, about Chet Baker and how they really should hear him play and I ask them to tune in the CBC because he’s on right now.

One of the aliens gives me the nod and the next thing I know is the twelve of us, me and the eleven aliens, are sitting in box seats at the Montreal Jazz Festival back in 1986!  It’s closing in on eleven p.m. and Chet is there with his trumpet and his piano player, Paul, he’s there too.  Paul starts a tune and plays a light intro and Chet just stands there like a zombie, looking out over the audience, his trumpet up, almost ready to play.

Only he doesn’t.

So Paul tries another song and plays a light intro.  We all focus on Chet and still he just stands there and looks out over the audience.  No jazz coming from him!  Well by this time the crowd is getting up tight and the aliens dudes I’m sitting with all lean forward in their seats and look at me as if to say:  Have you gone mad?

Paul doesn’t give up.  He tries a third song and still no trumpet sounds.  So they walk off stage and the crowd is booing and asking for their money back and it really isn’t such a hotski Montreal Jazz Festival after all.  So the aliens all stand up to leave and I’m still in my seat saying, “Wait a second, maybe they’re just going back to double check their set list, maybe they’ll be right back out.”

I think the boss man alien was not impressed.  He just shook his big grey waxy head, no.  Next thing I know we’re back in the ship and near a small doorway.  We were cruising over a body of water, had to be Lake Mindemoya because I could see a shape like Treasure Island down there.  I was getting the boot and the situation was not good.  All the while I’m still going on about Chet and how it wasn’t my fault that he couldn’t play.  It was the smack, the dope, the junk or maybe even the flight over from Europe that afternoon, and the man was maxed out yes?

The alien dudes weren’t listening.  The boss man nodded to a big ass alien security looking guy who put his other worldly foot to my ass and out I went, falling end over end, accelerating and I’m thinking that’s it, I’m doing to drown tonight!  I see the water surface coming up fast and sproing!  I’m in my own bed in the room up the stairs.  I sat bolt upright waggling like a freshly sprung jack in the box, eyes bugging out, wondering what the hell is going on?!!  And really, I was back in my bed, back home at my parent’s house, back in Mindemoya, on planet Earth.  I’d come to in real time.

ah yes though Halloween in the city is a grand time with all the flashy Halloween costumes, trimmings, cool scenes, late night parties, and amusing conversations.  the 13th Annual Witches Gathering and the Zombie Stripper show were a million miles of fun and of course the kids, they managed quite a haul on Monday the 31st, the likes of which just wouldn’t happen out here on the range as there isn’t a neighbour or neighbourhood to be seen in any direction you look!

its the old flip side of the coin out here.  Wednez of this past the wind was howling like never before and i thought the roof was going to blow off this old farm house!  all night it was howling, snarling and carrying on and i’d know as i was awake through the whole thing!   finally i said to myself i guess we can start the day (turns out it was 4 a.m.) and i went out to split some cedar for the morning blaze, what a wild scene:  the full moon was blazing in the western sky, big spooky clouds were racing past, the roaring wind was rattling anything that wasn’t tied down…  i was standing in a blaze of moonlight one moment and in pitch black the next, axe in hand, thinking holy smokers you can feel “alone” pretty fast out here even though the gals were tucked away safely in the bunks in the house across the yard.  its times like this where some of the ideas for paintings come from and the lone raven you sometimes see in my pieces, could be one of them.  this photo was taken at the Cameron Street Co op in Cannington on Wednesday morning, November 2nd.

of course none of the pieces are ready.  i have three 24×36 inch pieces and one 30×40 on the operating tables plus a bunch of smaller ones, all in the 60 to 85% complete stage…  there might be an all nighter coming up!

even out here in the boon docks sometimes its tough to stay focused.  i have the work all over the living room but these windows!  there really is something to look at out of each and every one.  out the north window i have these 2 big bluejays hustling Shelley’s feeders.  they’ve been going to work on those sunflower seeds all morning.  when you can see them up close like this, well, i for one can’t help but stop to watch.  then there are two large hawks circling, hovering, swooping in low, scaring up the meals ready to eat in the tall grass.  these hawks are big ones!  and they have that hovering action working for them this morning which, i know its bird watching, but hey, that’s quite a scene unfolding out there.  then there is that giant east window and the river flowing past…  all of this with the classical music backdrop pouring in from the upstairs sound system.  oh boy what a day at the office.

now if you’re in the Cannington area, this weekend is the last chance you’re going get to see “A Self Portrait on November 30th”, 30×40 inches, live and in person.  that war horse is going to be officially retired.  the next stop for that one, outside of here on the range, is going to be the National Gallery of Canada in which case you’re going to have to pay to see it!  right now you can see it for free at the Cameron Street Co op.  ”Feeding the Evil Wolf”, 36×48″, is now long gone to an address way out west and in factola, most of those 2008 series paintings are now long gone.  i can’t believe “November 30th” made it through 3 years of shows without anyone getting wise.

well here it is in postage stamp size.

anywho.  i was boo’n through cause i wanted a quick snap shot of that entry of mine in Debajehmujig’s 6 Foot show, a short term group show full of surprises!  we stopped in with some friends visiting from England, this was on Saturday, and got the tour.  beauty works hanging and some dandy 3D in the main space.  tricky too:  some of the work was further along the line than my standard issue acrylic on canvas, and the way the Debajehmujig folks had it displayed, at times very tricky!  i walked through the display and came upon some black chairs stacked in a black and dark corner, with one black chair standing alone, in front of the stack.  i looked it over and thought genius!  and they way it was displayed too, in the corner, at the back, in the dark, with no lighting.  i looked for the artist info card and it wasn’t to be seen anywhere.  so i asked one of them, whose the artist?  they replied: dude its just a stack of chairs…

oops.

well anyway.  i was surprised to see my pieces hanging in a public space.  that big one is “Killers: A Self Portrait on January 24th”, acrylic on canvas, 36×48 inches, c. 1990.  the other is a sketch, “Presence”, acrylic on canvas board, 8×10 inches, c. 1985.  extremely freakish when you consider where we are today.  i don’t know if you’ve ever read the book “The Secret”, but there are pieces in that book that ring loud and clear around this camp.  loud and clear in that Halloween spooky kind of way…

here is a photo of the display.

Debajehmujig Theatre Group

here is a painting full of warm colors, 24×24 inches, Stevensons Acrylic on canvas, painted over the summer and…  well.  it is a new color scheme for an older idea.  i’ve painted this character in blues and greens often but here it is in warmer tones and we’ll play with the idea between now and Easter and see what comes of it.

hope you like!

so the gals have split!  they’re “gone to town”.  i’m out here alone, surrounded by… gosh.  how many of them are there?  30 paintings on the operating tables!  you see we have 2 shows coming up.  the first is at the Cameron Street Co op in beautiful downtown Cannington, Ontario.  that one is going in on Tuesday of next week!  good thing the venue is cosy with room for 7 or there abouts pieces because that’s all i’ve got!  we’re stretched pretty thin out there.  the other show is going into Debajehmujig Theatre Group’s gallery just down the street in the town of Manitowaning.  the Debajeh boys were out here yesterday taking a looksie and we decided the best thing to do was make it a group show cause there is just no way i’ve got the goods for a one man show-ola.  so that one boots up on October 21st.  plus two “industrial’s”: that being the Northern Aboriginal Festival this coming weekend in the town of Sudbury and an education conference just down the road at the great Wikwemikong Unceded Indio Rez, late next week.  so its big time paint mode!  not a bad way to go either, fussin over which brush and what colour goes where.  what we need out here on the range though is a studio proper.  one with a view.  we’ll work on that idea…

well anywho.  its a beauty autumn in peace.  the colours out here are fantastico.  that one maple right next to the river is a beauty.  i sat on the south side yesterday watching the world go by and snapped this picture!  hope you like!

anyway!  i wanted to tell you about the 8×10 inch, framed and matted pieces of mine over at the Ottawa School of Art!  i took in 8 new pieces last week and the good folks there have them displayed either in the front window or in the shop!  the Ottawa School of Art is located at 35 George Street, right there in the Byward Market.  the pieces were painted here on the range!

here is a photo of my old buddy Jazzy Moon in front of the Ottawa School of Art!

i’m glad it rained.  i planted 25 maple trees around the yard the other day and kept my fingers crossed the rain would come along and help those lads along.  well here it is, rain soaked.

it didn’t rain at all over the long weekend up here on the island which was perfect for  the Wiki Pow wow.   it went off in good style and order as seen from the side lines during those first 2 days.  more than 200 dancers were registered and the drums, well i don’t know how many of those were out there but there was no shortage of good music at this festival.  and no shortage of sun either as i said:  it was hot and dry and dusty down there on the field.

my old buddy Jazzy Moon and I made the grand entry on Monday and i was thankful for that!  you see i started dancing in the summer of 88 and i’m still wearing the same feathers i wore back then.  we’ve rounded a few corners indeed since Civic Holiday weekend in 1988.  none of that makes any diff to my old buddy J, she was up there whooping it up in grand swirling fashion, sporting her cousin’s fancy shawl dress, perfect for the junior dancer.  she was doing the step as handed down, with no worry, automatic and in freedom, quite unlike someone i think i know, who had to fight through hell to get there.  she on the other hand got a good start and the dance step is definitely coming along.

it was the final contest round on Monday and we snapped a few photos of those slick dance moves.  i’d forgotten how much i enjoy watching those fancy shawl and jingle dress dancers.  one of those jingle dress dancers in particular caught my attention:  she had the moves ultra!  so here are a few pics taken from the southern side lines.  chi miigwetch!

while i was out there, very much alone, (Shelley’s on the road and Jazzy Moon is at the Ranch sleeping over), i was thinking about this book i’ve seen at mom’s over the years:  Simple Abundance, A Daybook of Comfort and Joy, by Sarah Ban Breathnach, published way back in 1995 (my have times changed since then).  while they were playing music and singing songs i picked up that book once again and opened it to where the book mark was placed.  these words by Calvin Coolidge go like this:

“Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence.  Talent will not; nothing is more commonplace than unsuccessful men with talent.  Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb.  Education alone will not; the world is full of educated derelicts.  Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”

let me tell you, the way the page was marked, i felt like someone was pointing a finger at me!  i guess you could say its time for me to pick up my guitar, pick up my paints and brushes, and my pen and paper…  3 of the biggies in my life i’ve left alone far too long…

on the upswing, mom let me take the book and so its here on the range for a few days.  and the river is running clear and cool, perfect for the mid summer heat wave and peace!  we have peace out here.  tons of it.  peace to spare.

it has been a wild adventure with that trip to Ottawa over the weekend and in very particular, that show at the Babylon on Saturday night!  yes indeed a show it was with all the flashy trimmings!  i was so glad to get in there and see that.  and also had a very good time with some of the other patrons, beautiful scenes through out the evening.  but that crushing heat in Ottawa had me dreaming of my own scenes down along the grand Manitou River!  and so i split that city, 1 a.m., and rolled on down the highway very much alone, for 7 to 9 hours of peace and good will and the late night AM radio shows.

part of the Ottawa plan was to see Joe Satriani at the Bluesfest on Sunday night.  i wanted to see Soundgarden and missed, not happy about that!  so i put Joe on the agenda but while i was standing there on Bank Street at 1 a.m. with all the other party cats i thought dude in 9 hours where do you want to be?  bottom line:  in the river, floating down stream…

turns out it was a good choice as the Bluesfest had troubles of their own and i know you’ve likely seen it on the news or youtube or wherever.  but it seems Cheap Trick brought down the house!  those old rock and roll boys must still have the goods to pull.  so Joe never got to the main stage.

by that time we were settled in nicely down along the shallow part of the river.  the storm did arrive after midnight and wow!!!  we could hear a weird “hissing” sound before BOOM!!!  3 of them landed pretty close to our house.  wow what a night.  and what an 80 hours under the sun and the moon and the blazing street lights of the good city of Ottawa.

last night, Monday, July 18th, after a tasty bbq with family, we had the pleasure of watching a sunset perfect for the history books.  here is one of the photos of that beautiful scene.