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Archive for the ‘influences’ Category

I loved this song when I was, what, eleven years old? I loved the sound of it and the message was alluring, too, even if most of the words and allusions were beyond my ken. The invisible man in drag?

The video really doesn’t look familiar to me watching it now as a grown-up so I doubt it played a role in my developing appreciation for fetish (EDIT: actually I’ll bet I *did* see it on Night Tracks; we didn’t have MTV until years later), but the eighties seemed so much more fertile for that kind of thing than the 90’s and now the unsubtle yet even more repressed new century. Spandex! Stepping on toothpaste tubes in heels! Upskirts! Aggressive arm waving! Women shaving their faces! GLOVES!!

Guys in 80’s music videos seemed to want to wear makeup like us and be dominated by us and liked it when we were all weird and bossy and mercurial. And had strong prominent jawlines above their shoulder-padded triangular torsos. In that respect, it was a magical time to grow up. There were no lesbians depicted on tv yet, but there was Jo on Facts of Life and VIDEOS made it seem like being grown-up would be fun in a dramatic minor key with razor sharp cheekbones everywhere.

Have you noticed us getting up earlier and going to sleep sooner on our cams? That’s (partly) because starting September 3rd I’m going to get up early to head over to the cabin we’re (good news!) officially renting to do off-cam no-internet work sans distractions. Normally I quickly grow disgusted with a morning-person routine, but now it seems totally different knowing there’s a purpose to it.

It rained heavily on Thursday. If I hadn’t gotten up at seven in the morning, excited about the possibilities of such early rising once the cabin time begins, I’d have never known there was any blue sky to be had that day. I’d have missed seeing this moon:

Blessing Bestowed from the West

There’s a place – a real live place – where women artists can apply for residencies. Actually, there are lots of places like that, where those kinds of people can get free lodging in inspiring locations to focus on their work, but the one I’m thinking of is SUPER DREAMY . . . fucking storybook-land perfection in terms of its tiny private artfully-crafted houses (each resident has one all to herself) and woodland setting.

Most shockingly dreamy of all is the way the women are catered to; the small handful of residents (women, all of them!) have a chef who prepares crazily wonderful dinners for them every night. There are pictures proving how thoroughly stocked the kitchen is with racks of zillions of containers of spices and rows of carefully labeled provisions and specialized pots and pans used to make what appears to be an ABUNDANCE of food every night just for these six or seven women. Meats and comforts and fresh green things and berries and sauces and fanciness and desserts and lots of colors and textures on big plates and side dishes.

On top of all that, the chef ALSO prepares individual baskets for each resident full of her favorite foods to help sustain her throughout the day while she works in her perfect little house. And there’s a garden full of plants someone else tends that each resident gets to pluck and cut flowers and leafy things from. FOR INSPIRATION AND SHIT!

I know that being there wouldn’t be actual utopia, but it does provide a model to ooh and aah over. I think it’s awesome that a very teeny-tiny percentage (wish it were more) of talented women in the world get to experience opportunities like that, to be told that their own self-directed art is so valuable as to warrant a few days . . . maybe even a whole month(!) . . . of concentrating on nothing BUT the work she most wants to do and that she will be sheltered and reliably fed to delicious excess if she likes so she can take care of her work while someone else takes care of her basic needs with sensual generosity.

Same time as picture above, but looking 80 degrees to the south.

What an exquisite fantasy! But it seems so decadent, like I know that I personally could never warrant such treatment. It’s a nice daydream but it actually makes me nervous to think about having such a giant privilege bestowed upon me. I’m nervous enough about the idea of renting this cabin, feeling like I need to prove that I “deserve” it. That I’m worth blowing more money on when I already have so much.

And then I remember that my grandma made my grandpa dinner every night to his specifications. Dished it up and brought it out to him. It wasn’t fancy, but she SERVED him. And every day she fixed him a box lunch even on the days when he was only working in his garage out back, a one minute shuffle away from the back door. I know times have changed, but when I was growing up I never fucking once saw a man prepare and serve a grown woman food. NEVER ONCE outside of restaurants (which I rarely saw) and pancake breakfasts at the Masonic Lodge where it was a wonderful novelty to see the men with aprons on, coming out to the long tables to pour coffee and bring us our hotcakes.

It wasn’t just my family that was like that. Most people my age and older grew up seeing men (and children) waited on at home and women NOT.  I suppose gender-blind egalitarianism is the ideal I should desire (and I do in some ways) but part of me needs to experience the balance of intimate privilege tipped dramatically towards women to undo what I learned by watching. I wasn’t brought up to BE that kind of woman who waits on men — not at all; I wasn’t taught with words to do it  — but that’s what all the women in my family DID to one extent or another and the men DID NOT. You have to be crazy to think that kind of learning is something you can just erase with your intellect when you grow up or even along the way with words of “you-go-girl” encouragement.

Looks promising upwards and eastwards

Even though I never grew up wanting to be a woman who takes care of a man, once I outgrew the entitlement of childhood I came to FEEL that having someone take care of me wasn’t something I deserved or could expect the way a man in my grandparents’ and parents’ generations could and that the only way to live my life just-so, to my specifications, was to live alone. I didn’t think this on a conscious level, but I think the past ten years (and then some) of webwhoring have involved more conscious efforts to recognize and reconcile this conflict; I want to work — to do MY work and do it MY WAY — and have someone else take care of the housekeeping and cooking. For my work to be the most important thing I do and everything else to be relegated to the distraction pile which I should be able to demand someone else pick up and put away. To believe that my work is so important that I should be angry and frustrated when I do not have the tools or environment to do it properly. BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT MEN OLDER THAN I AM GREW UP EXPECTING AND DOING. And so what if their work wasn’t important or they would bankrupt the family with their business schemes? You didn’t fucking criticize the work, jobs or dreams of men. You just didn’t unless you wanted to be the evil villainous bitch in the story.

I shouldn’t feel guilty about wanting to have as many places to do my work alone as my grandpa did: a garage, a basement, a toolshed, a closet where he kept his Black Velvet and other private treasures, and a windowless office he hardly went into that nobody else was allowed into that was always at least 15 degrees cooler than the rest of the house. My grandma didn’t have any place in her house that was her own like that, just like my mom didn’t have a special place in our tiny house for herself like my stepdad had a whole room for his model train. And if Grandma fucked up some shit in the kitchen Grandpa would go ballistic on her ass. So I guess maybe I SHOULD feel guilty about wanting all that man-privilege since being an abusive asshole came with the territory. I don’t know. But on Friday morning I’m going to work alone in the cabin AND I CAN HARDLY WAIT!!

Also? I’ve drafted a new personal ad for a slavey-houseboy type. Not putting it up for awhile though as that’s a whole time-consuming process in itself. I also keep wanting to blog more about how going to college totally distorted my idea of money and assessing the worth of an investment in myself, perhaps making me approach financial risk-taking in a more “manly” way than I would have otherwise.

More morning moon pics to come?

*****

So. I don’t anticipate members and fans seeing a noticeable change in focus on our sites because of this and will probably see more exciting stuff on cam rather than less since we have to cam more to pay for everything. One of the good things (in terms of “earning” my cabin keep) is it’s already making me more disciplined and focused in how I prioritize things, clarifying what needs to come first (which is really REALLY challenging when you have boatloads of everything to do and have an easily-overwhelmed mind like mine). Right now at the top of the list is simply getting ahead on shooting and getting updates lined up, so that’s what I’m going to get back to work on right now.

I just used some of my webcam money to subscribe to one of my favorite radio programs ever, Hearts of Space. Nevermind the ill-advised acronym (so typical of nerds to make a hilarious mistake like that, god love ‘em).

Since our porn business operates on a subscription basis, it’s interesting to research other subscription-based internet products, their price points, and comparing the offerings. I loved reading the HOS: WHY PAY? page. Like porn, music is something you can get free online in a million places. Even when people don’t ask you to justify charging for it, many of us feel we MUST explain it (I’ve been criticized by adult webmasters for the times when I’ve disclosed similar information and confronted those questions when maybe I should leave them alone). It’s inspiring to read the way Hearts of Space explains some of their business approach (and costs outsiders don’t comprehend without being taught) because it’s so firmly rooted in a clear vision, one that I know DELIVERS an experience I’ve never gotten from any other radio programming. There is a certain personality, there are seductive, hypnotic voices I’m attached to, and there is a well-planned journey offered by HOS.

HEARTS of SPACE PRODUCER STEPHEN HILL’s CAREER seemed to take a sharp detour in the early 70’s when he abandoned his architectural career and opened a recording studio. . . . In retrospect, Hill realizes he never really left architecture. He simply became a sound architect who learned to build his castles on the air. “Architects create environments with physical materials.
I do it with sound.” - Stephen Hill

It’s also interesting to observe my own thought process in deciding what kind of subscription to get: I chose the $13 a month all-access plan because I don’t feel like I can shell out the money for a year even though I know it would save me money in the long run. Also, The internet radio channel only (no archives or playlists) probably would’ve been good enough for me, but if it wasn’t, I didn’t want to try to figure out how to upgrade mid-month. Out of laziness/a desire to be efficient with my time and not necessarily need or probable usage, I chose the more comprehensive membership. I know people go through similar though processes when deciding which membership plan to get for our sites.

Hearts of Space is an inspiring model of how to create and sustain and love a “product” that’s not personalized for each individual listener but still manages to feel intimate even though it’s mass-delivered and not even live (except maybe one hour a week, I think).  It speaks of a void and manages to fill it –inside of me and outside of me — at the same time. I’m fascinated by people and groups who design and deliver stimuli producing what appears to be a relatively mundane experience (compared to, say, a roller coaster ride in a theme park or a provocative theatre piece, etc.) that manages to infiltrate people’s lives by being constantly accessible in private, demanding little of them but providing addictive stimulation. A little like a favorite diner or coffee shop. Something offering sustenance you could get elsewhere, but elsewhere just wouldn’t be QUITE right. I believe there’s something about the earnestness of the proprietors to deliver an actual EXPERIENCE they’ve envisioned in rich detail and feel in their own bones that makes Hearts of Space , some bookstores, a couple of Indian and Thai restaurants in Tacoma, and some porn sites exceptional.

I love music and I love feeling distant connections to people, but it’s impossible for me to listen to voices or most music and WORK at the same time. “Space music” offers me the kind of escape and transcendence I long for. It’s a spiritual salve for me that allows me to imagine journeying into a meaningful peaceful nothingness of wind and colors and stars and the smell of ozone. It gives me a lot of the feeling I get from imagining my ideal forms of church or prayer or sanctuary or space travel. It’s like having a lucid flying dream. That’s totally worth $13 a month to me. “Greetings, space fans . . . “

There’s a vibe on Hearts of Space that I’d like to infuse my own site with – that I’ve always wanted to be there and have maybe succeeded in transmitting some of the time (not the SAME vibe, but a quality or peculiarity of vibe). I think it will be helpful to listen to HOS on a daily basis to remind myself of the possibilities and how personality and vision and voices (even in very limited doses, more often without words) can combine in powerful, seductive, and soothing ways. How to make transportation out of your aesthetics and values to take people to a place they recognize as one where their belief systems make perfect sense. Or freewheeling careless nonsense. Where you look around and feel yourself and even though nothing has changed, you’re like, “THIS is it, what I was trying to remember that was bothering the tip of my tongue.”

Like, fucking psychic alignment, man!

Click here for an older post about new age music, porn and more.

*****

I know, you’re all like . . . post some porn, woman!! Are you losing your mind?

I can only answer in a predictably crazy way by insisting that no, I’m totally on the verge of genuine SANITY, motherfuckers!! Seriously, like, all is about to be REVEALED!!

I’ll try to post something porny and down-to-earth for you soon, mkay? I’ll TRY.

I am always trying. I don’t know if that’s apparent or not, but it’s true.

In first grade I was addicted to this story:

Every chance I got to go to the library and request that they set my friend and I up to listen to this, I WOULD. I remember it as an audio tape with a little paperback book hung in one of those baggies with plastic handles they had for mixed media, but now that my memory is jogged by this youtube video I wonder if it wasn’t a filmstrip because everything about this seems so familiar, but it’s probably just the narration and images, not the motion:

Anyway, I loved it. Couldn’t get enough of it and listened to it OVER and OVER again. I’ve always loved stories that take place at night, were dark, involved sleeping, criminals, loners, outsiders . . . dark escapism that’s sweetly menacing. It’s weird to look back on it now and see more adult elements in it and to read this New York Times review of the book and the author and the challenge of creating both art for children and erotica for adults. I’m glad I was exposed to The Three Robbers in the seventies in public school because I’ll bet that book would never see the light of day without a public lynching of the guy if it were to come out today. Nowadays you must either be 100% child-and-work-safe or resign yourself to being considered a 100% evil boundary-rapist. Take your pick. The only way people can fly under the radar is to be unsuccessful or too artistic for the general population to acknowledge you, and I’m sure this reissue of his out-of-print books is one of those things that will only be noticed by existing fans like myself.

I wish I had a magical blunderbuss to blow that bullshit right out of people’s assheads. But for now I’m going to add The Three Robbers to my wishlist so I can read it to my nephew(s — another’s on the way). WITH SOUND EFFECTS!