Sweater Eyes Photography Sketches, Experiment 15

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

TIPPING

She tipped over, like a glass at a party—see the drink splash—watch it fall—shatter. Like a curl in the air, her breath extinguishing the candles, she tipped the glass, and the remains of the wine dripped over her toes.

She looked down at the kitchen floor and sighed. It hadn’t appeared that he was coming home anyway, so she needn’t worry about the mess. Yet something lingered—a feeling of moisture on her skin, a cool sweetness on her lips—the result of her picnic lay broken on the floor, unnoticed by anyone except herself.

Summer was slipping away, like an ice cube dissolving in your hand, and she had tried to contain a small part of it, tried to represent it, or re-envision it, in—in, what? A backyard picnic as one last hurrah? A quiet evening under the stars, hoping the heat isn’t too much to bear—did she really think he was going to drink up the notion that this would work itself out? Even she knew that night had dawn and that dawn didn’t always bring light or relief. It would be impossible to recreate in one night their seven years of loyalty and love; it had slowly crumbled and this summer had seen the last of it. Now that summer was going, so was he.

She slid down to the floor, tucking up her knees and kicking off her heels. Liquid on the linoleum, swirling colours. She tipped her head down and thought, “It’s going to be alright, it’s going to be ok.”

As the colours run, the still waters of your heart break open.

Sweater Eyes Photography Sketches, Experiment 14

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

THE LEECH MAN

He hunched across my vision, leering his disfigured, distorted body and turning the sky uncanny. Already it had become a sickening shade of orange, a Creamsicle in the freezer too long, gone gooey and gross, and I stood on the sidewalk gaping at the sight in the heavens above me. This being of supreme and magnificent evil. His humpback I recognized like the monster who lived under my bed when I was a child; his nose reaching like tentacles, squiggly squid lips feeling for any life-form or bacteria/eggs to suck up and destroy.

Destroy me with his proboscis. Exterminate the leech babies.

The day had been weird all along, sky half-awake and shadows passing like everything was gonna fall down at any second—everything just come down and the world end. Sometimes I get these feelings. And when I went outside at about 4:30, I tripped on the porch stoop like I used to when I was really little, before our house became familiar. Tripping—familiar—used to the gap. Looked up from the sidewalk—askew—tilted—I felt nauseated, my stomach bloated.

They sometimes said bizarre things about me, things I couldn’t understand. Gossipy groups discussing what will come after. I think I get what it means now, but I don’t like to talk about it. I just pat my belly and hope everything will be okay.

Even if I know it won’t be.

They said I would be the first one to see it, that I’d be the eye of the future. And that it would come in the form of a monster, of a hunchbacked man in the orange sky, reaching toward me, reaching out to me—

Upon insemination there would be a choice; at the end of the world there will be a choice, one made by the frail girl on the cool concrete. Sweat forms in droplets on her skin. Time comes together. And if she is the future, she is either the future or nothingness, and she must choose. The leech man who sucks your bloodlife away—or you destroy the seed of darkness within you and create a world better than this—

less angry than this, less disappointed and ashamed. Melt away the clouds.

I went outside and saw the leech man and he was coming for my heart. God damn him to hell if he dared reach for me.

I went back inside and ignored the omen.

Risk everything and create anew.

Sleepover Experiments, 2: The Black Ghost

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

This is what I know about the Black Ghost:

He travels freely between our houses, amongst all our neighbour’s bedrooms and kitchens, but he is strongest in Jeff’s basement. In other houses, he changes colours, but when he is in the cool, dark basement, he is Black.

He also comes to my house.

He left us some clues when we were children, too naïve to truly understand them but ambitious enough to let curiosity compose our afternoons; now, adults, these messages remain: a key, a footprint, blood, and a light.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

(constantly trying to make sense of things).

A Black Ghost. A Key. A Footprint. Blood. A Light.

(those were my grades in elementary school—perfect in all except gym—my cowardice—small frame)

Black Ghost. Key. Footprint. Blood. Light.

BGKFBL.

I don’t think I know anything else.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

This is what I know about the Black Ghost:

He travels freely through my thoughts sometimes, randomly, while waiting for the bus or while doing the dishes. I’ll be taking a long drive, my mind wandering—always, it wanders, nomadic—and memories drift back. My childhood—I wonder if Jeff ever remembers the Black Ghost.

He haunted our daydreams and nightmares. My heart pounded whenever we went on the prowl, searching for the dark shadow that pervaded our houses. He was tall, large—we knew this—and his sense of humour was unnerving. He made disturbing offhand comments that you could only hear if you held your breath; and you held your breath when he lurched by. We knew these things—yet did we ever really, really, talk about them? About the wretched screaming we heard at night—or the deafening silence—the separate beds—the separate loves. I know that the Black Ghost scared the shit out of me, so much that I could barely even acknowledge it.

Sometimes Jeff and I just played HORSE in his driveway. For a while I had some semblance of aim—but those basketball games and excursions into his basement, armed with bats and brooms, ready to combat the forces of darkness—all those afternoons gradually disappeared, our time spent together less and less.

less and less—and little by little we grew up in our own weird ways.

Me, I sometimes think about the Black Ghost. Where did he retreat after we stopped worrying about him? I thought I saw him once, blue, like a beautiful scarf, in my next-door-neighbour’s upstairs window, but it was just a passing colour, an after image on the screen.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

I try to decode the old messages. The clues and suspects left behind. Rearrange the letters and try to decipher—what, meaning from my childhood? Ha. Take only what you need from it.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

What I know about the Black Ghost: the light turns on and off, the blood pumps and flows. There are some footprints made by you and me, in the sand, at the edge the world. And there is a key, which may or may not unlock the doors—but we keep trying, continually risking, and hoping the effort is worth the while.

I keep trying to be happy. And though the black ghost hovers, I don’t think I should give him so much power anymore.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

Experiment 16: Octopussy

Of course the seas eventually revolted—but the revelation began with the octopus. Creeping up her leg, a twisting, tangled blend of colour and form—oozing its juices, smelling hers; surely this looks extraordinarily unusual—perhaps even kinky in your vocabulary. Let me assure you of one thing: it is fantastic in every sense of the word: a wildness within, a thrill of my senses, heated pheromones distinctly indicative of their desire: —

Can we not explain it somehow? Through art or pornography or whatever you choose to call it? Of course the seas revolted—they probably would have regardless of the home or the health or the heartbreaking—but perhaps, for some of the stranger of us, the turn of tide began somewhere with an octopus—on a girl—in a pen&ink sketch—in a screaming/exhausting novel? Maybe. Weird fantasies, atypical thoughts: wherever it started, arrest the perverts and plagiarists for planting the seed. Call them to trial, lay out eight lines of text and ask them to eat their own words.

They will, I can tell you.

We are hungry with desire—but we are not ashamed to stuff our mouths (or our cunts) with the strange and beautiful books that offend or concern, or with the art that so initiates, discovers, and eventually sustains this new life form.

The octopus curls—claim it—around my leg, and I am still getting used to the pleasure. But it is somehow familiar. Sucking, throbbing, rubbing—I remember what this feels like: text—ink—tattoos—tongues—

Touch me, touch my octopus.

Experiment 15: Means of Survival

Incidentally, cork sales were up due to deuterium figures sliding, which meant that May’s cork-and-pipecleaner-reindeer keepsakes weren’t as abundant this year, nor as affordable. The rest of the Christmas stock remained the same, as it always did, Yes, I always tried to keep my prices reasonable, but now one of her most prized items, the one all the neighbourhood kids bought each year for their parents and grandparents alike, was not as available as it had been in the past; O they’re still just a beautiful—so cute! and lively! May shakes her head a bit, amends Lifelike! Their spindly legs and googly eyes—they sometimes look as though they’re about to leap off the table, Flying Santa’s sleigh! And then there’s the accompanying mini-sleighs, made with heavy paper and wire, dotted with glitter, ribbon for reins—May’s so proud of this, as she is with every season’s best seller: Spring’s handmade robin’s nest with tiny, bright eggs, and a hand-painted bird house for the pompom-and-pipecleaner Mother Robin; Summer’s sunhats, decorated with ribbons of all colours and false flowers; Fall’s dried-leaf, ironed tissue-paper placemats in orange, brown, and green. Often her seasonal stock was different each year—she’d been here a lot of years—but these four items were a constant. My customers depend on me! May worries a lot. Especially after Anthony, creepy that he is, told her that something about hydrogen levels drying up cork the way the sponges we paint with dry up if we don’t use them—I haven’t painted with sponges in a while, haven’t I? Or with potato shapes either.

“May! What are you doing? You’re off in space again, y’old grandma, worrying about getting enough cork to make enough reindeer to please enough of the neighbourhood urchin. Doesn’t that seem a little, I dunno, stupid to you?”

Nurse Morrison leads away Anthony, and she turns her head around to smile blandly at May—who, startled and taken aback, twists some red pipecleaner around her finger and wonders if it’s possible to rehydrate cork.

Experiment 14: Mister Drunken Ramblings Again

Fuck you, I’ll piss wherever I want, Mister Lawn. You could stand a little watering anyway.  Nobody kissing in the shadows, at least. ’Member that time ’bout couple weeks ago, got my pecker out ’n then there’s these two kids, high school maybe, staring at me like I’m the perv. She’d even missed a button on her blouse in all her scuffle-cuffuffle. Nope, nobody here. Ahh. Time to move on. I don’t mind these walks so much anymore, these late-night walks. It’s quiet and peaceful, and if I’m quiet too, no one’ll bother me. I can stumble down these streets like a ghost. Like the ghost who’s with me. At first I couldn’t even go on these walks, though I wanted to so bad. Wanted Miriam with me, like always. I just stayed at home without any thought of the future—of how I would continue my daily life, pay bills, buy groceries—basically function. And I heard her everywhere, god I heard her all the fucking time. She begged me to join her, to follow her outside—into the wild depths of our old dreams and memories, into the bliss of regressing. I could no longer do it alone; not without her, not without some kinda help. Outside, I began walking our familiar ways, winding among the streets, searching for her—hidden in any tree or bush, under any car or porch. The retail district was no better, for she appeared as every mannequin and postergirl. Downtown led me to the best place Miriam’s ghost could offer: a place to sit—and laugh—and enjoy memories rather than cry over them—to drink with others than to drink alone. I haven’t got close connections with hardly any of them, but they let me in on their games—me, the wise old timer, the one who can’t take a shower without a railing to grasp onto but who can still flip a switchblade dead centre with a pint of rum under his belt. Goddammit, don’t you think I know it, I’m pathetic? There’s the part that stumbles home, that drags the bad leg and sees all the ghosts—that tries to dance—stumbles—and there’s the part that staggers home ’shamed, also seeing all the ghosts—trying to ignore them, trying to drown them. But where can I go if I must leave my empty, lonely home? Amongst these grim and gloomy streets, where once we walked—happy? Happiness. O yes, I remember that. But fuck it tonight. I’ve swallowed more liquid happiness than emotion can sustain—and so I am numb. I stagger homeward—without you, my love. Tomorrow night I’ll walk the walk again, hoping to find you and the old way. That I miss so very much. Fuck, it’s cold out here.

Experiment 13: The Remnants of my Recipes, #1

If you squish his brains, the head cooks slower, but you can collect the juices without tapping into it. The skull, I mean. If that sort of thing interests you. I’m not really one for the runoff, I must say; sloppy food isn’t really my ideal. Thanksgiving fatties who pile on three cups of gravy, let it drip its way to their mouths. They go around tucking each other’s napkins into their shirt collars and then burping with a hearty sigh. Expanding waistbands.

The interesting thing about my method of cooking is that I know how to enrich the body’s natural, low-fat and tasty nutrients. My technique is stellar, though I must be a bit modest.

And there is the added bonus of settling. Not many chefs realize that the brain juices—the bloody, mineral-rich, fluid which seeps throughout the cranium—will coagulate, or jellify, when put under extremely acute heat whilst still in the skull. Like a bowl, the skull will be the hole-in-one, homemade casserole dish, into which one inserts a blow torch tip; the juices gather, the brains cook, and the outside flesh remains untouched so that the final product can be created without chance of burning. The juices gathered upon the cooked grey matter should also be bubbly without boiling dry. After we finish torching the meat, allow twenty minutes for cooling. And this should ensure a good sauce.

After cooling, add the rest of your spices to the gelatinized layer and stir into the brain. This is probably when you want to scrap the sides of the skull for any stuck-on bits, as the second heat application often makes the thin, extra pieces of meat too tough to chew through, let alone scrape off. Cover mixture with a layer of cheese, some fresh parsley, and ground pepper, then cover the entire head with aluminium foil and put in a pre-heated oven at 350° for 45 minutes.

What, you say you can’t make something like this? That you don’t have the flair or the stamina? That’s mere proof of your dedication.

Let me see your FDA stamp of approval.

And in the meantime, please try a bite of this brainstew. I’m pretty sure you’ll like it.

Experiment 12: The Sickly Smile

I laugh [staged and practiced], I smile [perfectly]. I shoot witty one-liners [stolen from obscure movies and lyrics (but no one here will know that)]. A specially crafted monster of attention. What’s bred in bone [what has been taught] and [what is obeyed]. I am such a good girl. I tell the right stories with all the important, heavy pauses [dramatic exaggeration reels in the audience and pulls on their precious heart-strings (barf)]. Sometimes the lights make me sick and I’m led offset to rest up [I am such a diva and have learned to take advantage of hypochondriac and psychosomatic indulgences] meaning: [impressions and pressures, inside my head and all around me (infecting everyone else, but I think I might be the only one who realizes it)]. I lie on the couch with my head in my mother’s lap [her hand holding a cool cloth to my forehead]. My knees are arched up [and anybody who walked by could see up my dress (heavy, poofy, flowery dress), see my white tights with the little hearts stitched in them (hot and unnecessary)]. I don’t care, cannot care, about anything right now. The lights are everywhere [so bright], their glare is what I will remember most. For some reason my father walks into the greenroom and starts taking pictures of us on the couch [flashes of light], emphasizing the pounding [put a little girl in a box and play her a recording of a jack hammer (at deafening volumes)]. My mother shoos him away [with a hiss and a glare], asks what she can do for me [always asking what she can do]. I have another four or five hours to go. I must put on my face again. Stand up straight and ask sweet questions instead of complaining [I do complain a lot, I’ll admit (but I get away with it)], I even convince myself [so dramatic]. I go to the sink and I wash my face [cold water against hot skin]. My mother brushes my hair a bit [long, blonde, done up in braids and bows (triggers)]. We return to the set, the lights on me [the miraculous] and my mother [the brave]. The audience is on the edge of their seats [bleachers] because that’s the cue [look excited]. We tell the story [again], play the video [again], broadcast my history [bodily, emotionally, unconsciously (unintentionally wounding / creating a monster)]. And smile [perfectly] through all of it [even all these years later].

Sweater Eyes Photography Sketches, Experiment 13

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

DRAMATICS & SECRETS OVER TEA

My o my, am I exhausted! From dawn til five o’clock shadow I’ve cleaned this house—our cozy, two-storey house, so quaint and yet so sophisticated, with old toys and new robots mingling amongst each other—I’ve cleaned this house and paid the bills and gotten the kids safely to and from school. Phew!

I throw myself down on the antique sofa to rest. Actually, we’re not supposed to sit on it; I move aside the doll collection when my husband isn’t home. I should tell you about my husband! We’ve been married eight years in October—I just love fall weddings—and he has given me the two most adorable children. They’re in kindergarten and first grade, my oldest being considered for the gifted program! He looks just like my husband, I tell you—the eyes are the same. Our youngest looks like me, but the older one is just a spitting image of his father.

We didn’t imagine we’d have both children quite so close in age; in fact, we hadn’t actually planned to have both at all. After several years of being newlyweds, my husband and I tried to have children, but my uterus wasn’t receptive—though I’m not really supposed to discuss matters of that kind. Anyway, we finally agreed to allow my husband’s wiring to be replicated for familial purposes.

The DNA sat for months and we were told that if the reproductive process hadn’t began by now, there was little chance that the cells would ever divide and create a new being. So my husband and I returned to our daily lives without hope of children. Perhaps we’d adopt? We weren’t sure.

About a year later, my unpredicted, miraculous pregnancy was predicated by an even bigger surprise: there was also a mutation from my husband’s cells, already into the second trimester! Somehow, by some trick of fate, our baby in the womb was younger than the baby in the tank, but it didn’t matter; my husband and I were thrilled.

Ooh, what lovely children we have!—so bright and clean and inquisitive. I tell them it’s good to ask questions, it’s good to know where you came from, but to mind whom you ask and when. My husband and I may disagree on some issues, but we always encourage our children’s obedience in this world. I mustn’t tell you this, but my husband nearly lost his job because of an offhand comment to a co-worker at the factory; you never can be too careful. After the close call, I wanted to relocate, for the threat of unemployment was unfair when his very creation was conditional upon being put to use—but my husband just closed his mouth and shook his head.

He told me to keep my lips sealed, and here I am, yammering on like a mad woman! Perhaps my husband is right, that he and our oldest will survive the extermination because of their encoding—because they’re encoded, because they are not human—but I just can’t imagine not having this sweet little life! If I just curl up here—on this old sofa, centuries and centuries preserved by a local company specializing in antiques before the 3000’s. They have the most interesting things. For instance, the other day I went into the store and saw a bed with tall iron posts at each corner; the salesman called it a canopy­-style—but I was too embarrassed to ask what that meant. Sometimes I feel so much more unlearned than the rest of the community. I know there are other female human beings in my neighborhood, but I doubt they get quite so much pleasure from their housewifery as I do. I simply love the old way of things, the manual way to clean a floor or to dust the bookshelf.

Imagine: If I just stay here a little longer, on this island from long ago, will I remember the old times? Beside woven ragdolls and knitted blankets, will I connect with where I believe I came from? Or am I eternally in this present—the glossy, automated makings of a dream.

I am: one of many sent through to this world from what you call your present. Maybe it would be mine—if I were not in this particular pink and green-polka-dotted dress, with this specific checkered apron—but those circumstances differ only slightly. Maybe that’s why I’m so chatty today, feeling like an old neighbour dropped by for tea.

Imagine, if that’s what we were—so close in time, our neighbouring selves—from my future-present to your past-present, one moment comprised of us in all places.

Experiment 11: My Dear, Deaf Country: Wake the Fuck Up

I don’t understand why people use dubious disclaimers. When I say something mean it’s because it is mean and I am a cunt—or maybe I’m just being honest: I want a fucking revolution and it’s going to start regardless of your ignorance; I’m not going to sugar-coat it for anyone, especially you. Just because you’re blood doesn’t mean I have to like you; just because you’re police chief doesn’t mean I have to agree with you; just because I’m an English major doesn’t mean I have to be a teacher—or a giver—or am somehow more capable of explaining our circumstances to you. I tried for a philosophy minor. It didn’t work.

Because I am a writer, I make my life from what I say to you, but I cannot do it in the way you may like (read: understand). Sometimes we have to make our voices heard through t-shirts and signs, buttons, posters, and handbills—sometimes we use loud-speakers or megaphones—or I might write my own protest, my own way, even if I know that you usually can’t read my fragmented, pornographic texts. You don’t know how to read them—I cannot speak your language: your self-righteous, ass-kissing, finger-pointing dialogue.

Sometimes people protest. Sometimes people protest when I say, “I think there should be more funding for the Arts rather than for the construction of another Ivey building.” Sometimes people protest when over 1,000 arrests were made, many of which were unnecessary and unexplained, violent and violating—when age and race and gender were exploited for the amusement of some power-tripping pigs—when a group of journalists and protestors and bystanders were walled in by grim police officers and made to stand in the pouring rain for several hours—simply because they didn’t believe that one billion dollars was necessary for a world-summit that should not even have occurred in downtown Toronto—because they were asking questions about their country, talking about civil liberties and exercising their right to free speech when officers disregarded them—because they were singing songs and anthems, doing cartwheels and taking photographs.

You have not sugar-coated it for me: I hear exactly what you are saying: You don’t live in a democracy anymore. Go back to sleep. You have masked your words for others; submissive, lazy people, ready to accept whatever excuse offered, so prepared to believe in a government which has manipulated its conservative agenda so much that its own ignorance truly is bliss. You believe yourself when you say that your police did an excellent job—even the ones who kicked senior citizens and punched unarmed, unthreatening civilians—even the ones weren’t wearing visible identification. You believe yourself.

But I don’t. And I know there are others. We share a common lack of faith in the current political system’s security of peace, management of money, chain of authority, and preservation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

I am a writer, just as Strayer and Trudeau, just as those who drafted our rights—not privileges. People may read the same words, but if you’re actually aware of your place in this country—actually aware—then you may read something different.

And it isn’t sweet. It’s just how we feel.

Experiment 10: googoo gagod

Slithering around our legs were dozens of limbs—no, tentacles. Up along the binary ridges were strange hanging vines which oozed purple. When I finally gazed across the the sludgy horizon is when Karen spoke, Where’s god now? But it was I who spoke—I am the speaker. The seer. There’s nothing slithering around our eggs. We have none, no meals to eat, as our own arms turn a sensuous shade of green and begin to ooze thick, bubbly jelly. The sun feeds my addiction and I turn my face toward its rays, stretch and press my face against glass, warm. In that sky, there’s nothing but heat and extreme cold, there’s nothing but. When Karen or I muttered all of a sudden a moment ago, I looked up and saw the entire endless sky, gargantuan and void. Look back the void stares long enough. I’ll deliver the wisdom here, if my mouth doesn’t get swallowed up in violet liquid first. We’re being drowned by our own fluids, uncontrollably pouring out more and more goooo. As it rises around us, Karen tries to swim upward, making useless motions with her tentacle-arms—no, not useless—she pulls me along through the river we create. She’ll pay my toll. Keep your head above the gurgling, googling stream, keep your face turned upward—keep searching the skies…

For what? What do you think you’ll see that will change the order of the universe, recreating our society as the first with true knowledge—scientifically, theologically, and philosophically—not to mention send loads of new meaning into your personal, individual life?

I don’t think so.

There isn’t a universal truth.

So either find your own and keep your head above the gooey, viscous, swirling liquid that engulfs your body—drain your apartment of the mysterious blood seeping from your addicted arms and your hungry mouth and your lusting—reset the pretences and comb back Karen’s hair—or realize it’s your own creation and you’re bound by it, fatally. You bleed art—and you don’t drown either.

Experiment 9: Nostalgia

I am no longer sure if I dream about you because you are a relic in my past, no longer tangible but a one-dimensional, static memory, or because I miss you and wish you were here sometimes. Sitting beside me on the sofa, the television casting a blue light on our cheekbones—standing beside me in the kitchen, chopping up a multicoloured stir-fry—walking with me, down our street, with our handsome watchdog and our bright, happy children.

They say that the death a child is the hardest loss to endure, even more so than a spouse. Whoever they are, they’re wrong.

I birthed another being—two, actually—and yet I feel that my bones extend into yours—that you finish where I end off.

That is not to say that I don’t love my children—how could I not? How could I possible overlook the tender life I have created, these two broken bodies producing whole, human babies without a scar or a lie. Children, perfect innocence? That I cannot believe—but they haven’t a responsibility to the pain or destruction of this world, not yet at least. That comes with the baptism—with the birthday—with the graduation from high school and the advance into adulthood—I mean:

You and I created, body to body, two beings. These we set upon the world our own created way—but our love was created first. The first two beings were us. And that is what I miss—through the flood of memories, the insomnia, the years since you have died.

Sometimes I sit up at my kitchen table, the bills piled on one counter behind me, the stove with the busted pilot light next to me—my company for the long night? Appliances. Two by two, each set divorced itself; parents separating, children coming of age. Sometimes I sit up at my kitchen table and envy my children, they who do not know the pain of sitting here alone, without you.

Experiment 8: derp

I thought it automatically, naturally. All these months of knowing you and learning your language, then suddenly it’s as loud as your voice in my head. All my ridiculousness summed up in one silly word.

*

We have been sitting around doing nothing.

Or rather, you two have been playing video games between rounds of discussing politics and art and dabbling in the excesses. She’s been napping and editing photos and I’ve been taking in the toxins of the text.

Family portrait:

The two of us.

And the two of you.

Then our black sheep and the dinosaurs, ready to battle—whether lame or outcast, they still represent courageously—though the robot may insult them and the monster simply glows.

Glows in the night when we’re lonely. I won’t lie, I won’t say I don’t get lonely for my family sometimes.

There is a world. And there is another world, but it is older, gone now.

*

There’s a ghost behind everything. He’s been there since the beginning, since before our beginning even; surprised me one night by making soft noises in the room next door, my gentle companion. Invisible.

Sometimes he leaves his socks around.

And there’s a plentiful, whorish plant overlooking the brood, even though it may appear that we’re tending him. We have our pasts simultaneously chronicled—the green elephant ear my friend through it all.

Something to remind me that there’s always life in here—there’s always something breathing.

*

What’s my word, as good as nothing? Whoever’s reading this—if anyone’s reading this—knows I’ve gone off the deep end. Follow me through my drunken ramblings. There is structure to these fragments.

The memories in my life—the past connected and disconnected from where I sit at this moment. Whether the word is derp or family or love or creation, I don’t know. But it is where I am gazing—

through my foggy eyes,

through this muddled text,

in my bed next to you,

everything and everyone I need in one place.

Sleepover Experiments, 1: How to Catch The Tooth Fairy

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

Ella’s over to play, even though we’re only friends some of the time. But she lives down the block, so if there’s nobody else around we’ll play together. Once I threatened to punch her in the stomach because she was bugging me, and she ran home to tell on me so fast that my mom was waiting, really angry, on my front porch. Ella’s mom had already phoned.

Anyway, she’s over and her tooth is loose—her bottom one to the left—and we decide that we should yank it out and then try to catch the Tooth Fairy that night. She could be our secret friend. Well, first we have to get out the tooth and convince our moms to let us have a sleepover.

Ella sits on the toilet seat while I wrap her loose tooth with a Kleenex and try wiggling it in her open mouth.

She looks up at me with doe eyes that I really can’t stand.

“Ez et oerking?” she says.

“Yeah, I think so,” I tell her, twisting the tooth a little. Ella winces a little and I let up, watching her squirm and then regain composure, her jaw hanging slack. The Kleenex is getting a bit bloody.

Whatever. I’m the one pulling it out, not feeling the pain.

I twist the tooth again, stronger this time—and let up again immediately. Coax it along.

“What are you two doing?”

My mother’s standing in the bathroom doorway.

“My tooth is loose!” Ella says gleefully.

My mom narrows her eyes and asks if we’re twisting it. We say no, and ask if Ella can sleep over.

“Please, mom, please? We’ll be good!”

“I’ll call my mom and ask!”

“No,” mom says, “I’ll phone your mom and ask.”

We all smile innocently at each other and then mom goes back downstairs. As soon as we hear her start talking, Ella opens her mouth again, and I go in for the kill.

“Ohhwww.”

Success!

Ella grins with a gap, eyes shining, blood dribbling down her chin, and the tooth in a soggy tissue. So far so good. Ella runs to the top of the stairs and yells down at my mom that her tooth came out, will the tooth fairy know to visit me here?

Ella goes home shortly after that to collect her overnight bag. My mom and I put a fresh spread on my top bunkbed after clearing off all the stuffed animals. There are a lot. I have a collection. I don’t like sleeping far off the ground, which is kind of funny considering I have a bunk bed and most kids like to be up high. I like to climb trees, but other than that, no thanks.

Anyway, my mom and I finish making up my room and then go downstairs to make supper, me plotting all the while.

*

After dinner Ella and I write down the plan in my notebook. It’s from Thrifty’s and is made from the seat of a pair of blue jeans. The pockets hold pens and notes and really any kind of paper you want to hide in there. It’s pretty cool. My older sister has one too.

“We need to make a house for her to stay in,” I say. We’re sitting on my bedroom floor, on the rug with a howling wolf on it. My door is closed.

“It should have a lid so she can’t fly out.”

“She’s not a prisoner.”

“I know.”

We both look around the room but see nothing that would be a suitable house—any kind of container big enough for a fairy.

“How big do you think she is?” I ask.

Ella stops looking around and sits still for a second. “Um, probably pretty big, cuz she has to carry teeth.”

“That makes sense.”

We get up and go to the playroom. There’s lots of stuff in there—there has to be something for a house.

In the bottom of the games closet, under a basket of plastic dinosaurs, there’s a square, pink box with a snap-on lid. It’s pretty big.

“How’bout that?” I point, but Ella’s already working on weaselling it out. We take the blue box and the tub of Barbie clothes back to my room. Before shutting ourselves away again, I look in the craft cabinet at the top of the stairs. My mom has spent years collecting the soap beds from her Clinique face soap, saving them in case she ever builds a dollhouse that requires tiny green beds. I find the box of soap beds—far too many of them, holy moly—and choose the largest. I also find some foam scraps to use as a mattress.

Back in my bedroom, we’re picking out pretty Barbie clothes to offer to the Tooth Fairy and decorating the empty inside of the blue box “house.” We layer the bottom with a nicely folded scarf my mom bought me from a global goods store. It’s pure silk, I think.

There’s a knock on my door. It’s mom.

“What are you girls doing?” she asks.

“We’re going to catch the Tooth Fairy tonight!” we tell her excitedly, each interrupting the other as we explain how we’re going to hide Ella’s tooth so that the Tooth Fairy won’t know where it is right away. Then we’re going to fake sleep. When she flies into the room, I (on watch) will signal to Ella who’ll throw down a blanket to cover the fairy. Then we’ll shut the window and try to convince her to stay. We’ll show her the house we set up and the clothes we’ve picked out for her—some really pretty dresses, shoes, and capes. And we’ll tell her how nice we are and how close we both live—just down the block from each other—which means Ella can visit and play all the time.

I never mention that I don’t really like Ella all that much and probably won’t have her over again, which means that I get to play with the magical Tooth Fairy all by myself.

My mom might suspect this, which is why when we’re finished telling her about our plan, she raises her eyebrows and says, “Really? Great.” She sounds a little tired and looks at me funny. She tells us to have fun and then leaves.

*

Ella and I are “ready” for bed—meaning that we told my mom no, we weren’t going to stay up all night long, that we were going to go to sleep. As soon as my mom says goodnight and leaves, we whisper in the dark to each other:

“I’ll keep watch.”

“I won’t fall asleep, don’t worry.”

We are both so intent, believing so honestly that we can actually catch this secret dream.

*

We both fall asleep.

And in the morning, Ella looks under her blanket at the foot of the bed, where she hid her tooth, and there a shiny Loonie wrapped up in the Kleenex instead of Ella’s gross little tooth.

“You fell asleep!”

“So did you!”

I shrug. “There are other chances, I guess.” More of Ella’s teeth I could pull out, if I could stand her.

“We better go show your mom and dad, I guess.”

Downstairs, even though we’re slightly disappointed and a little annoyed with ourselves for falling asleep, mom’s chocolate chip pancakes in animal shapes cheer us up. By the end of breakfast, we’ve lost interest in the Tooth Fairy endeavour all together.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

Look at this scrawl. The plan.

And yet, it is only now, after all these years, that I realize we didn’t write down Catch the Tooth Fairy, the most important part of the whole operation. A rather vital step, don’t you agree?

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

Experiment 7: Metamorphosis

Outside: stars blinked through shifting pockets of clear sky, clouds pushed around by early autumn winds. At times the moon interrupted the swirling darkness below—the serene, celestial divided by the horizon from the embittered, landed. And that space between our world and the infinite unknown, from my words to your ear.

Little changes take place every day. You either realize and acknowledge them or you don’t, but life continues more or less the same as before: the same as yesterday—or two hours ago—or the last moment that passed. Moment to moment. Larger changes, the less frequent occurrences: they are also either acknowledged or not—but far more intensely, either extremely embraced and personally treasured or equally denied, rejected, and distinctly ignored.

You step around a flaw in the system—in the marriage—but that one change was going to happen one way or another, whichever way you pushed the energy—whichever way you shouted, “Move.” The sky seethes with an eternity of choices, but you must choose and be bound by one only. You step around the manner and refuse to acknowledge its relevance, or you accept it and step forward.

No time to think of consequences.

Inside there is turmoil brewing, twisting your heart & your gut into true recognition of your place in this world. Because we only live in this world. We only have this chance. The transfiguration won’t be gradual this time—it will shake your entire life and perhaps those of a few others—but it will not affect the outside.

This system was built for metamorphosis. Your desperate decision, or your petty obliviousness, comes down to the physics of space—space and spots of light—the inner spark between us—the humanity either blazing or extinguished in your eyes.

Experiment 6: Mother

She was the Cake of all Cakes.

My mother, the most beautiful, well-spoken, and intelligent of any of the Susie Homemakers. Truly, she was exceptional in every way—and exhibited this through her exquisite desserts. Lemon Tart, Peach Pie, Blueberry Cheesecake—and of course—her famous Marmorkuchen. The desserts were only icing to the grandest Wedding Cake in the bakery.

Memories I have are few, however I retain a fairly constant sense of her presence. I remember: learning to bake my first Chocolate Chip Cookies. I was about 2 ½. Mother, glowing as usual, had me cracking Eggs in her soft hands and getting Flour on my cheeks. She instructed me carefully—but not at all in a condescending, parental tone—she sounded like an angel. A light and fluffy, sweet and good-looking angel from the great bakery beyond this world.

The Cookies turned out perfectly, as expected. Soft and golden brown, chewy with great gobs of Chocolate.

We made Brownies next.

And continued to make desserts all morning, eventually filling up the glass display case  behind the counter. All together they looked radiant—so colourful and appetizing.

Of course, I don’t remember the entire day. But I remember the Chocolate Chip Cookies; the smell of my mother—a mixture of baby powder and baking powder; and my father saying, “Cheese!” There is a photograph of my mother and me, mixing bowl and wooden spoons in hand, gleefully posing for the camera. It once hung in the restaurant; now it hangs in my kitchen.

My memories, I keep them as close as her.

Experiment 5: turngreen

He looked up at it in silent fury, his fists already balled.

The traffic light, red, stared back at him.

“If only we’d made the light,” his mother muttered. They had been abruptly cut off by another car. He saw it happen.

“Don’t worry,” he told her bravely. “I’ll take care of it. I’ll use my powers.”

“O, would you!” she said breathlessly. “That would be terrific.”

He hunched up his shoulders and leaned forward on the seat a little, getting into position. Then he squinted his eyes and began chanting, quietly but forcefully: “Turn green. Turn green. Turn Green.”

He lost awareness of his mother and the other cars. There was nothing but the light and himself. That red light, so strong and stubborn. Would he be able to do it? Would his special powers change the light? He clenched his jaw and sneered through his teeth, “Turngreenturngreenturngreen,” barely taking breaths now. He could do it, he could overpower it. The other drivers would wonder why the light had changed back to their lanes so quickly, but they would also step on the gas. Grinning at their luck. Yeah, well it’s mine, buster. You’re not gonna win this time, you dirty bright light. You’re gonna turn for us instead of them, you’re gonna let our car through. Mom’s encouraging me, you’re about to turn, yes you’re gonna get green, you’re gonna turn green this instant this very second nnnnnnnnow!

The traffic light changed from red to green and the boy’s mother drove forward with the other cars. He unclenched his fists and relaxed his shoulders.

“I changed the light for you,” he said proudly.

“You sure did! Thank you,” she said, careful not to let her son see the curl of derisive, uppity laughter in her mouth.

Sweater Eyes Photography Sketches, Experiment 12

NOT YOUR AVERAGE

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

People look at scars and almost without fail think pain is unwanted. They see my arm and envision a suicidal 16-year-old girl—skinny and melodramatic—black eyeliner running and pop punk on my iPod.

They take a look at The Catcher in the Rye and think, Yeah, I remember reading that and identifying with troubled youth at the time. But that’s old hat. I’m an adult now.

So am I. But I will always remember what it was like then.

It is late afternoon. I only woke up about 40 minutes ago and I’m already feeling unconquerably lazy. The boy is at work until 6 and has to bus it home; I have several hours of summer sunshine left to play in, but there’s no way I’m getting out of my pajamas or leaving the house.

I probably look a little ridiculous. My daisy bra and my Hello Kitty boxers. Plus extremely long, rainbow-striped socks.

You know what, fuck it. I look so fucking cute. It’s my sexual weapon. That, and my artsy, fake nipples.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

Curled up in a corner of the sofa, wondering how to spend my afternoon. Stretch out my legs and flex my toes—so  perfectly matched to the end of the sock, black toes and a rainbow foot—lean over and work out a small kink in my left ankle, then roll onto my stomach. My belly, slightly cramped and sore, feels good against the cool suede. Looking over my shoulder, I see my small self stretched along the length of the loveseat.

When I was sixteen I was unhappy with my body, but wasn’t every other teenage girl? (Even the really popular ones, though they won’t admit it). Now it gives me its grieves and pains, but I in turn give it pains and pleasure. The needle brings me my own beauty and the knife gives me my own desire. Even when I didn’t understand and was unhappy, thinking of my body now brings comfort to my memory of that girl. Look at me: ridiculous, decorated, art- and sex-scarred—this beautiful, sweet, mysterious face:

I only show part of myself to strangers, even if the camera seems revealing.

And that is how I’ll spend the day, I think. Revealing pieces through photographs, exposing traumas through text. But what I’m not showing you? How I love. That is reserved for those who deserve it.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

My cats trot into the room, interested by a passing bird on the back porch. One heads straight to screen and sits down an inch away from the glass. He’s still, intent. The other cat was distracted at the sight of me and has wandered over to say hello. I lie flat and put my face out to his furry one. He nuzzles me for a moment and then stops to yawn.

I roll back onto the couch and look up at the ceiling.

Parents stink. 32-year-olds shouldn’t have mohawks?—maybe more should. People look at the scars and the tattoos on my arms and torso, think, why would you put yourself through that? Hey stranger asking about my tattoo, don’t you realize pain reminds you that you can still feel something, even during the hardest nights? Hey stranger asking me about my body: this is mine. I can do whatever I want to it. And I’ll like it.

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes.

If you haven’t been to Katie’s 365 blog, you should.

Sweater Eyes Photography Sketches, Experiment 11

Photograph by Katie Vanderhaeghe, Sweater Eyes. Click to enlarge.

PICKING OFF THUGS

This isn’t what they look like anymore.

They wear black and have shields and nightsticks. They come at you like a wall. They aren’t protecting you; you are the enemy.

Gauge my distance. He is in the open street—the old wooden tabletop—and has his back to the prisoner. The protestor. She is far away, hazy. We’ll get to her in a few minutes. Systematic terror first. I could take him down in a single shot, rubber bullets flying. He looks armed, but he isn’t. Even though he stands there, green and innocent—chanting, singing, smiling at pedestrians—I could take away every right he has. Within reason, of course. But this is without reason at all.

A senseless act repeated over and over throughout the days, a continual stamping of the foot, insisting, “There is no problem here. There is no reason for an inquiry.”

But I’ve got you in the eye of my lens, I’ve got you pinned. You have nowhere to go but where I tell you, and I’m not going to tell you anything. Just move. Stumble back across the tarmac, keep your gun or your camera or your cell phone steady, disbelieving the scene you are seeing. The place is the intersection—the park—the table. The space is closing in. Cries go unanswered, seemingly unheard as stone faces march forward. Their adrenaline is too high. They must love this. They won’t hear you.

If people are asking for an inquiry, that itself is a query and should remind you of the service you swore to uphold. There is something seriously wrong with picking off civilians as thugs. If you accept this, get out of our office.

Experiment 4: Dysfunction

And the shake didn’t discourage or subdue the monster.

Dysfunction was immediate, but it maintained its infantile howling throughout the prolonged build-up and inevitable, unimpressive death.

*

She had felt the pains during sixth period and asked to be excused, dragging her weary body to the lavatory. The halls were empty and quiet as usual, and her feet made the familiar flap-flap on the tiles. At the end of the hall she waved her pass under the monitor light.

Inside the stall, completely alone and without the threat of cameras, she sank to the floor.

Pain.

She knew that something awful was turning inside her, heaving in her womb. Sweating against the cool porcelain of the toilet, she climbed onto it just in time for big globs of blood and mucus to fall into the water. Less than a moment later the dead foetus dropped into the bowl in two spasms of the girl’s uterus.

Collapsed over herself, underwear still around her ankles, she slowly braced her body with straight arms on shaky knees. She didn’t want to see or be around it any longer than necessary. Her panting gradually subsided, and once her head gained its rightful orientation, she stood up from the toilet, gripping the walls. She pulled up her underwear and began to straighten her dress, but stopped as she heard a low groan emit from the toilet bowl.

She looked at the baby in absolute horror.

It was not a baby.

The veiny blue and purple creature was covered in a thick layer of pale yellow slime, somewhat like corn syrup, which was spattered with pieces of the placenta. It stretched its many arms toward her and opened its mouth, letting out a wail that gargled with saliva and snot.

The girl’s first instinct was to run, but the creature sounded so pathetic and sick that she remained frozen, unable to look away from the warped, underdeveloped tentacles reaching for her face. The cry grew louder and she began to worry about somebody overhearing. Up til now she had been as silent as possible in hopes of rejoining class. She could have cleaned up her dress. Nobody would have noticed.

But now the creature would not stop. She was sure someone would hear. She didn’t know what to do, didn’t want to touch it. As her panic began to set in, the creature leapt out of the toilet, landing on the girl’s face. It hugged its arms around her, and the momentum threw her against the stall door.

She couldn’t be its mother, not in this kind of world.

Summoning all the strength she had left, she yanked the sobbing monster away from herself and shook it as hard as she could, heaving her weak frame against the walls and eventually slamming the thing in the corner behind the toilet.

There was a pause in the hideous noise, as it lay still on the floor. It lifted a tentacle and blindly grabbed at the air. The girl looked down at what had come out of her body. Was this her creation or theirs?

Then she noticed a tiny board of controls mounted to the back of its head, hidden beneath a chunk of stringy black hair. It had already killed itself before it had even left her womb, but now it required a second death. Holding the monster down with one hand, she pressed the abort button, and as its wiring finally gave out she listened to one last alien wail.

It had already killed itself before it even left her body