My Cicadafest Chronicle

When I was "16-year-old-Kathy-" (when shoulder pads and teased hair were in fashion) I took time out from my listening to my “Get the Knack” LP to participate in a battle of the bands in Fonthill. I don’t remember the name of the event, but the essence of the day is carved in memory. It wasn’t because our band (tragically named “The Gap”) won – (though we did), or because we got to open for some killer bands later that night (and we did). What I remember is my 4hrs as a spectator- the blue sky, the green grass, the cold beer, my friends sitting around me. I swear to you, that if I close my eyes I can feel the plastic beer cup in my hand and the sensation of the kick drum pounding in my chest.

Later "16-year-old-Kathy" wrote (in her sad little “JR Tolkien Journal”) “I wish I could spend my whole life playing music and hanging out with friends".

Move over Charlie Sheen. I’m also winning.

Some girls think buying shoes makes them feel good. Some people do drugs. For me the combination of music, beer and friendship will get me every-time. Drug addicts call it “chasing the dragon”- that quest to re-capture the original high. Music...unlike the actual bad habits doesn’t damage your dopamine receptors. Making the next big high actually achievable. Music in fact, increases your brains capacity for love, trust, happiness. I’m not bullshitting you. It’s science.

Over the years I have made an effort to recapture the rapture. It’s been hit-and-miss for me. Happiness is a delicate cocktail and its ingredients can be easily mis-measured. I’ve been to a lot of events, always leaving the house with a shameful amount of optimism. Mostly these attempts fall short. Sometimes the music was lame, sometimes the booze was too strong, sometimes the people were just assholes. Too much wine, too many drum rolls, too many side-burns. If I had a dollar for every time a great buzz was ruined because a blues cover band stormed the stage with a 45min version of "flip, flop, fly"...well I'd have at least 5 dollars.

However, my friend Thom used to throw this backyard party. It was awesome. He invited bands- good ones and some not-so –great, he built a stage and the yard filled up with hundreds of people. We were all gathered there for the same reason- strangers and friends, listening to music, having a few drinks, eating food with the waters of the Henley glistening behind us. It was always a fantastic time. In my mind I have those year chronicled as:

2002 The year I broke my flip flop walking home
2003 The year Barnhouse Static lost our kazoos (little kid in the front row, you know who you are!)
2004 The year "the accordion player" sucked tequila rose off a cooler lid
2005 The time I did a cartwheel and hurt my back
2006 The other time I did a cartwheel and hurt my back




In 2007, Thom’s little backyard party became “Cicadafest”. I have been lucky enough to participate in various capacities- sometimes as a performer and sometimes as an organizer. This year my band-mate Peter and I will be running the indoor stage, bringing some local favourites and new talent together with some of the main-stage acts. We’ll probably play a few tunes too. But if not, you can find us after the show in the campground. Just listen for the accordion and the sound of a beer can being opened.

Cicadafest will be held at Henley Island (the place where a red elastic saved "16-year-old Kathy"’s virginity...which is a whole other blog). Anyway, beautiful tranquil Henley Island where the sky is blue even when it’s not. There will be cold beer ($3 special on Friday night!) and music- great music on the main-stage. Music from Texas and the far reaches of Canada, music from New York and great local bands.

Here’s the line up:

http://cicadafest.com/acts.html

If you haven’t heard of any of these bands- fear not! That’s all part of your chronicle.
eg:
2009 the first time I heard Scott Nolan
2010 the year CR Avery blew me away
It’s a Cicadafest tradition. Come to our festival and you will leave with a new favourite songwriter.

Friends, come to our festival. Not because I’m telling you so, and not to see me do a cartwheel (I am not that good and have probably learned my lesson)

not because it is a labour of love, for me and for my friends
or because a lot of people have worked hard to bring you some great music in a great venue
or because young musicians will be there, starting their own Cicadafest memories,
or because hometown culture is essential
or because Henley Island is magical
or because last week I coulda died carrying those new drums skins on the back of a motorcycle
or because camping is fun,

Come to Cicadafest 2011 (July 8,9,10) because you deserve your own memories of green grass, cold beer and the kick drum pounding in your chest.

See the website for advance ticket information.

And for the record:
My official Cicadafest Chronicle:
2007 The year I had to leave early (again...a whole other blog)
2008 The year of the underwear incident
2009 The year I drank and jammed with Susan Gibson at the camp ground
2010 The year of the best and biggest campsite jam in the history of the world
2011......tba

Flatware Love.

You know they want to be together!

(Remember last week when you caught little spoon on desert forks side!)
You know it wasn't the first time.
 You can't control this.
They want to be together.
It's time to tear down the plastic walls.


It's not your fault, so don't feel ashamed. But it really is time to move forward.

No doubt the cutlery organizer has been around as long as mankind. I'm sure it was the first thing the caveman ever carved out of stone, presented to his woman.
"Ooga  uga iga ooog" he said, which is caveman for "forks go on the right".
Cave woman was glad. This gave her something to do while she was secretly thinking about a stone-age version of Matt Dylan.
"Oga igo oooog" she said (which means "oh cool! Thanks and you can let go of my hair now")

  Cave woman had a small brain, so it seems like a time saver. She had not yet developed the intelligence to realize that while setting the cave table was about to become a bit simpler, putting the stone/flat ware away was going to take longer. The benefit had cancelled itself out. If she was smart she'd of said "ggoga uki oook", which means "what a colossal waste of time!" in caveman.

Time passed, the dinosaurs died, Jesus was born, explorers sailed the world, a million ideas and theories, tried/tested and dismissed. So what really is the point of the cutlery tray?

Why are we still trying so hard to keep the knives and spoons apart?
Why do we spend so much of our lives protecting the dinner forks from the dessert forks?

(My socks and my bras touch each other all day long...without any obvious consequences (that I know of). Sometimes I toss scarves and underwear in there.
Nothing bad has ever happened.)

Simply put, the cutlery tray is a weapon of suppression, a tool of the paranoid, an enabler to the obsessive compulsive.
The cutlery tray keeps the big spoons and the little spoons apart-(gulp.. it breaks up families!)

I know you want to control something- but you need to find something else. Let go of this primitive notion. This forced separation is futile.
Fork, knife and spoon we're meant to be together. They want to be together. They will be together!
Eventually, even IKEA won't be able to keep them apart.
It's time to dump them all into a heap and be done with it!

Friend, you and your cave-ancestors thought you were in control but you're not.
Put your ear close to the drawer.
They are laughing at you.
The spoon, the fork, the dessert fork, the butter knife, the ice cream scoop...the spatula...

 They've been doing it at the bottom of the sink the whooooole time!

Summer Job..Ooh Ya!

Dear Friends,
You keep telling me to “think outside the box” when it comes to creating summer employment for myself.
I think I’ve come up with something.
So just one question before I type up my business plan:
How much are you willing to pay me to not-talk like Russell Oliver all summer?

Now before you answer, let me first remind you that I am no Rich Little. Remember the summer I tried to talk like Paul McCartney; misquoting lines from the touching epic “Yellow Submarine" and getting all in your face with that song “Michelle”. Recall how when I lost my train of thought (which is a small train at best) I slipped into that slutty cockney accent that indirectly got us booted out of “ladies Night” at Gords’.

Having said that, imagine how annoying it will be next time we meet and I offer to “turn your kids into cash”. Oh Ya!

You’re going to hate that.

So what’s it worth to ya?

Huh??

I know you got tired of me saying “a jolly rancher is not a sprinkle” in that really unauthentic “Apu” voice I half heartedly attempt. That’s something to keep in mind next time you’re stopping at the ATM.

It’s not like my rendition of Russell is going to be any better. I probably won’t practice it before I use it in public and I am not even hell bent on quote him correctly. Remember, my standards are not all that high and I’m no perfectionist. (You do know I used face-cloths as dish towels and vice-versa right?) Okay, well as long as we’re clear. I can’t promise my summer-long impersonation will be funny. I can only promise it will get on your nerves. OH YAA!

Before you dismiss this as another Kathy-esque pie- in- the -sky get rich quick scam- like my ongoing 30 year fling with the music business (and that time I worked at Zehrs), let me say in my defence that desperate times call for desperate measures and “I’LL BUY YOUR USED JEWELRY NO QUESTIONS ASKED!”

So think about it pal, and let me know how much to put you down for.

If you’d rather not, that’s okay too.

I won’t be mad and I’ll still come to your she-she-foo-foo dinner party next month. I’ll be the one dressed as the “Loan Arranger.”

Stalking Jack

Jack, you’re on my mind: You, of magic bean myth, jumper of candle sticks, tumbling down the hill with Jill, the guy who could eat no fat and stuck your finger in a pie (snicker).

You’re everywhere man, and since no press is bad press...you Sir are legend.

I was thinking the other day about the time you traded your family’s only food source in for some magic beans. When I read this as a kid I thought it was a great move. Who wouldn’t want a magic bean stalk?
In reality, your judgement was poor. It would have been like me spending my father’s entire salary on “The Amazing Live Sea Monkeys”...and I’m not going to make that mistake again. It was risky business Jack, sacrificing your family’s security on a whim. Did you ever stop to wonder why a farmer with access to magic beans would need your cow in the first place? Then you climbed that stalk without a cell phone or a buddy to help you out. Glad the magic harp lessons paid off, but I gotta wonder if it was a smart move. You’re lucky golden eggs were even recognized as currency in your township.
Exactly how many six-pence’s is a golden egg worth anyhow?

I guess you became a bit of an adrenalin addict. Dodging a child eating giant should have been enough for you, but there you were not long after, making the headlines again jumping over candle sticks. I’m glad you’re nimble and quick but it only takes one small miscalculation to end up in the burn unit at Mother-Goose General. It wasn’t a very good example to set. Did you ever once consider your audience? How many 21st century tots have laid awake wondering how to get a hold of some tall candle sticks and their father’s Bic. Every time I see “house fire” in the news... I think of you.

Which brings me to your next escapade: Are you or are you not the same Jack who was depicted on page 235 of my beloved Mother Goose Anthology in short pantaloons putting your thumb in a pie?
You’re a cheeky boy Jack. Perhaps your mother should think twice about letting you snack during a punishment.

It’s no wonder you grew to be lard-intolerant, changed your name to Spratt and married a girl with serious fat potential. Serves you right really.

And this woman...is she Jill? The same tart you took to the top of the hill? Did she really love you or was she just after your golden eggs (so to speak)? And how is it someone claiming to be “nimble and quick” found himself tumbling down a simple hill? I saw that hill in a cartoon series. I’ll admit it was a stupid place to put a well (Mother Hubbard could never have navigated that slope), but it was nothing compared to the stalk you had famously mastered. Perhaps you should have lined the hillside with candles and leapt safetly to solid ground.

And back to Jill: did she stick around to mend your crown? Or did you turn to the Lamb-owning-Quite-Contrary-Mary for comfort?

And finally I need to know; what is your connection that notorious Pumkin-eater known as Peter-Peter? Surely it is no coincidence that two lads for the same era, found themselves in possession of giant vegetables (so to speak). Did you grow up in “The Shoe” together? Did the two of you combine your interests (pumpkins, candles) and develope a little something called the "jack-o-lantern"? And if so, where is the wife-he-couldn't-keep now that her residence has been carved up? Is she baking black-birds in a pie? Building London Bridge up with sticks and stone? Taken up with Georgie Porgie?

And one more thing Jack, do you know or know of a fellow called "Wee Willy Winky"? I read a report, (a rhyming report actually), that he once ran "up and down" the town in his "night gown". Oddly enough there is a group of young people around here that wear thier pajama pants about town and I was wondering if perhaps he might have some relatives in our shire.

Are You Married To Your Phone?

Is that a cell phone in your pocket, or are you just not all that happy to see me?
You seem distracted. No really...go on take that call.
No seriously, I don’t mind.
I’m sure whatever it is, is really important. Could be the kids wondering if there’s any milk in the fridge.
Maybe it’s your boyfriend or girlfriend just checking to see where you are. Nice!!
Perhaps your mom wants to tell you about that funny thing she saw on Dr. Phil.
You’d better take the call. Your Grandmother might be out of Werther’s or there could be a really funny squirrel in someone’s backyard. You’d better answer.

Someone might need to tell you what they had for lunch, or that funny thing the dog did at the park. It might be someone calling to apologize for calling earlier.

If it’s my dad calling, he’s hit dial by accident. You’re about to hear him eating a blue-berry bran muffin while taking a country drive. He wouldn’t call you purposely. Not, while barrelling down a gravely road at 30km and hr. That’d be dangerous.

Maybe I just have a habit of hating things I can’t afford- but I’m having a hard time embracing the cell phone. I’ve yet to receive a call from a cell by anyone who is; in trouble, in hospital, in labour, incarcerated. Mostly they just seem to make contact when they are out-and-about, running out of battery charge, slightly-out-of-range, outnumbered by “hot chicks”.

Still, we all know the panicked look of someone who realizes there phone is out of power. It’s horrible to watch. They start sweating and eyeing your outlets for a charger...

My friend Laurie Boese sent me a song idea and some lyrics. I finished it off. Sound bites to follow someday.

ARE YOU MARRIED TO YOUR PHONE?

Does your cell phone have a wedding ring?
Do you always have to bring that thing?
Every time we meet
Get together to talk or eat
Do you need it everywhere you go
The concert hall and the picture show
Would it pout if it got left at home
Are you married to your phone?

chorus:Are you married to your phone
Does it ever let you out alone?
Do you live and breathe for the dial tone
Are you married to your phone.

Does your cell phone have a wedding ring?
Do you always have to bring that thing
Every time we meet
Get together to talk or eat
I smiled and asked you up to dance
I brushed my fingers cross your pants
But it seems my hopes were cursed
Motorola got there first.

Chorus

You turn it on first thing each day
While I try to look the other way
Do you ever wonder who owns who?
Should I comeback when your contracts thru?
I don’t think we’ve been alone
Since you said I do and brought it home
The other day when we were sexting,
I looked up and you were texting
Are you married to your phone?

What’s the big emergency
do you sell Avon, or ecstasy
are you Chief of Neuro-surgery?
or just married
to
your
phone.



Photo by J. Ferguson

Letter to a Former Bicycle

In the 70s we hung posters that proudly proclaimed
“If you love something set it free. If it comes back to you its yours, if it doesn’t...it never was”
The person who came up with that never owned a dog,
or had a boyfriend who needed to see Quebec,
or a grandfather who sometimes got confused,
or a parakeet and a cat at the same time
... or a bike.
I, on the other hand, have had all of the above. Make no mistake; If you love something carry a lock and keep close tabs.

I remember that time I loved my 10 speed mountain bicycle enough to give it some freedom on the back step. Off it went in search of adventure never to return. Maybe it was looking for my boyfriend in Quebec, but more likely it snuck off with that bike-thievin’-upstairs-neighbour to trade itself in for small quantities of smack. Either way, my bike never had that “I really miss her and I’m heading back” epiphany that the slogan promised.
But it was mine.
It was definitely mine.
First I mourned, and swore off mountain biking. Then I began to hate other people who had bikes. But secretly, I missed it. I went to places we used to go together- hoping to catch it with someone else. I imagined seeing it everywhere- disguised with black paint.
I tried to convince myself it had nothing to do with me. I’d bought it from someone else, so maybe that bike had been given a little freedom in past relationships. Maybe that bike had problems with commitment.
THEN, a few months back I saw it whoring itself on Craig’s-List of all places.
I’ll admit to a slight heart flutter, but to tell you the truth I was shocked by how little I felt.
Though I instantly recognized it, my bike didn’t look quite the way I remembered. It wasn’t as large and robust. It looked thin and tired. It’s front suspension had been replaced (which didn’t surprise me- he’d always had “issues” in that department).
I saw its picture and finally felt nothing.
See, I’ve moved on.

Dear Stolen Haro mountain bike,
Well you never came back. I waited, but you didn’t come.
I’ve moved on. I have an awesome new green Norco- Cruiser. 3 speed. He’s retro. Ya, I thought that’d bug you. You know how I always had that secret thing for retro. (You were always accusing me of looking!)
Sorry to tell you, but he’s the coolest bike ever...and I do mean ever. Pedal breaks.
So I guess it worked out.
I hardly ever think of you (except when I go uphill).
I held on to your water bottle and lock key for a while, but I didn’t know where to send them, so I tossed them last spring.
Best of luck.
Kath

THE DUMB THINGS THEY MADE ME SAY

Warning: This blog entry contains the word cervix 4 times. My apologies to sensitive readers.

Sometimes you find yourself stringing together words that you never thought you would have to use in the same sentence. Things that seem so ridiculous to say, that you can’t believe they are coming from your mouth. I don’t mean the dumb things we say voluntarily- I’m talking about the stupid things you have to say- because the moment calls for them and they must be said. For me these sentences stay like embroidery on the fabric-of-my-being.

I think when I was a kid everything I said and did, happened and then dissolved. Maybe when your 7 you had to interrupt the odd game of hopscotch, to tell your mom, to tell your brother, to stop calling you a “tramp”. But you don’t realize how non-sensical it is at the time. By the time you find out what a tramp is, you’ve forgotten he called you one, (or maybe you are one), so no harm done.
When you get older you have higher expectations of what you should and should not have to say.

The first time I remember having to say something earth-shatteringly messed-up was when I was in labour with my daughter. In the course of the day’s wondrous events I was put in the position of needing to utter a request that went a little like :
“Um...The next time you abruptly ‘check my cervix’ could you first ask the visitors to leave?”
It is a miracle to me that there are even a series of words that could effectively form this request for an event that seems wrong on so many levels. Whoever developed the English language clearly thought of everything!
Now, since then I have watched a few episodes of “Birth Story”. Public-cervix-checking seems to be common place in this forum, probably because my sentence didn’t make it through the ether to birthing centres world-wide. The women on the show seem disinclined towards stating the obvious.
Cervix dilation status =Confidentiality
If anything goes without saying, it must be THAT.
Riiiiiight?????

About 18 months later I found myself at a petting zoo calmly reminding my new daughter not to “lick the pigs”.
Surely no human ever came to this world thinking a time in their life would arrive when they would have to turn to another human (small though she was) with her tongue wedge through a rusty/dirty frost fence and remind her (FIVE TIMES) that licking livestock was not a part of what we were here on earth to do. God invented lock-jaw and swine flu for these reasons-So mothers, instead of forming the warning, could just give their kid (the pig licker- who eventually came out of the-cervix-everyone-knows-about ...even before they read your shameless Blog!) a knowing glare upon diagnosis.

You allow you self to say these kinds of things, and eventually you are explaining to a grown man- that ..........
Wait for it!.....
“Your black nail polish is on the dresser beside your earrings”. Marilyn Manson years, I hated you!!!
More than more!


Other things I heard myself say that didn’t make sense:

To the dog- “Stop licking your sister!”

To my friend- “You left your accordion at my house. I tried to play it. Hope you don’t mind”

To my grandmother- ”Well, I see your point but I’m not sure my marriage broke up because I wear jeans all the time.”

To my dad- “When you’re done cutting shampoo bottles up into tiny pieces and stuffing them into a bleach bottle, would you mind giving me a lift home?”

To Phil (my former neighbour)- “Ya, so the plumbing’s broken again and when you flush your toilet it comes into my tub again. If you guys could not throw up again tonight... again, I’d really appreciate it.”

My favorite, To anonymous-“ Why does it say ‘NANCY’ on your ass?!!!”