Marlin man

“Cactus Club Glass Bottom Boat Rentals in Cabo, can I help you” answered the voice.

“Um, can I speak to Roberto please” Kate said.

“Roberto—you mean the marlin man? Yeah just a sec I’ll get him”

“Hello?” said Roberto

“Oh hi. Uhh, it’s Kate”

“Rumour has it that you got your compass back” he said

“Well sort of, but not really, I mean it wasn’t me who retrieved it. I think someone found it late in the day and gave it to management to leave in my room last night. There was also something else left with it.” Kate paused.

“Something else, hmm let me guess a sextant?” he said

“No, I don’t know how to use one of those fancy things. It was a marlinspike with a rope attached”

“Ah, one of my favorite tools…” he mused

“Did you….I mean were you the one responsible for finding it?” she asked

“I guess I did help out a little bit”confessed Roberto

“I would say a bigger bit than you can imagine, thank you.”

“It’s your’s Kate, it belongs to you. If you learn to use it and if you don’t mind me sayin, hang on to it then, you’ll be able to go places you never imagined….” said Roberto

Yep this sounds familiar—been there done that—and this before. I came down here for a bigger break than I’ve had and then I go and loose it. No, I’m not going to whip myself for that again, it’s just something I tend to do every couple of months, I’m use to the pattern….

“So I guess you are pretty good at diving for things eh? And of course seeing things other people don’t see and thinking about things inside and out and up and down and all around….I’m thinking maybe you have a photographic memory or something.” Kate said

“Roberto ain’t the marlin man for nothing!” he said

Why does he talk about himself in the third person, I wonder. What an unusual guy. And why would he want to do that for me, I’m sure he has enough to think about like how many varieties there are of marlins and their breeding and feeding behaviours.

“Places I’ve never imagined eh? Sounds like fun and believe me I have been there before—just not for the last little while. In fact, I’ve had to do this circuitous route to get there most of the time. This losing the compass thing is nothing new” exclaimed Kate

“I know about that”

“Why, do you lose things too?” she asked

“In a kind of way that is the same, but a little different….see I’m really good at thinking about things and I am able to see things in my mind like other people can’t. It’s a little like viewing life through auto cad. You can see through, around, in and out every side of an idea, yet I have to admit it tires me out, and then I get lost and can’t find my way back to….” he was noticing a bird in the distance, he was seeing it as he described his thinking process to her, it brought a smile to his face as if it was a confirmation of secret knowledge then he fell silent.

“So how is that like me taking circuitous routes and losing things along the way that are valuable and irreplaceable?” wondered Kate aloud.

“It’s about remembering, memorizing and then learning how to unlock the way to where you are going” Roberto spoke like he was reading words in the sky.

“You mean life in general or a particuliar destination?” she asked.

“Both” he answered.

To Cabo San Lucas or ‘Catch of the Ghost Marlin’

This time I was determined, it had taken me way to long to find it in the first place.  No more half-assed efforts of fooling around with tourists in El Squidroe and Cabo Wabo while exchanging travel stories and fateful nights at local pubs. I was done with that. I needed that bloody compass!

I gazed through the glass bottom boat that still afternoon, feeling exhilarated and happy once more. I looked closer than I had ever before, there, on the ocean floor, was my compass.

I was relieved the water was still today and with the quiet, I was lulled deep into my soul and brought down to a dream state or was it just the effect of looking through the glass that magnified everything below? Toward the water I peered and I found myself pressing my nose up against the glass wanting to feel the fish—wanting to feel myself. All that mattered were those silky bodies that eluded me just like my compass. They passed by silently in continuous motion and there below the compass shone a brilliance I had not seen before.

Fish my favorite; the best sign—aka the ‘dooms day sign’, I call it….

If you are a Pisces you are doomed to a life of emotions and feelings that are so intense they want to burst out of you. Melancholy is often the close cousin to the intensity so you travel between the two poles drifting and riding currents and waves of e-motion. As in Physics where “a periodic disturbance of the particles of a substance that may be propagated without net movement of the particles, such as in the passage of undulating motion, heat, or sound”. Even standing waves are a “vibration of a whole system where some points remain fixed, while others between them vibrate with maximum amplitude”. Thanks, I could always rely on physics definitions to help me explain what it is like to be me.

I looked back to the man guiding the boat,

“You like those fish, don’t you” he said. “Yes”, I replied

I studied his face intently he seemed kind. Though I noticed that sometimes he went all quiet and would close his eyes as if he was going to a far away place, he must have done this many times before because it came so naturally to him. He sailed the boat with his eyes closed, he felt the wind on his face and slowly his lips curled into a relaxed smile.

The Cactus Club said that he was experienced at boating and fishing. He had come down to study the native animals and marine life of the region because he was a wildlife biologist but he ended up staying longer than the contract he signed. His quietness I didn’t mind because in between he would make me laugh with his wit, knowledge and humour and that afternoon it became like a balm for my soul. It seemed all was right with the world now. I was laughing in the Cabo sun, soaking in the paradise around me. Finding my compass returned me to my former tranquility which I had lost with the compass.

“Marlins….”, he trailed off. “I beg your pardon”, I retorted.

“I have known one”, he said seriously.

“What do you mean?”, I replied.

“Well there was a story in 2007 that said, marine biologists discovered a kind of living ghost — a giant predatory fish with a sword-like bill and a tail so blue it seemed to glow. The round scale Spearfish was documented just twice in the last century. Experts blame the case of mistaken identity, at least in part, on the Spearfish’s resemblance to the white marlin. It was in the news and everything on NPR as a matter of fact….” again he trailed off and looked towards Los Arcos, he was lost in thought.

“So what are you saying? Do you mean that you have seen one of those living ghost fish?” I asked him.

“Ok, can you keep a secret? Not just a small one but probably the biggest secret you have ever kept.” he said.

“Um, well—I’m not sure. I guess so. Your secret would be safe with me since I will be leaving Cabo and returning north shortly.” I quipped.

“I caught one a while back and now, I have the gift”, his face was beaming with accomplishment.

“The gift…?” I said in disbelief.

“Yeah, I’ll give you a clue. We’ve been doing it all afternoon in between the quiet moments!” he spoke quickly now yet his voice was hushed.

“Huh?”, I was dumbstruck to what was he referring to.

I started to feel claustrophobic, I wanted off the boat now, was this going to get all strange and go sideways on me like that time I went to that wooden boat show and was forever trying to get away from the conversation that would never end with Billie Gibson?

“Laughing, you know giggling!” he said deadpan.

“I’m sorry I still don’t follow you” I said confused.

“This is the secret part now, are you ready?” he asked with raised eyebrows.

“Ok, ready” I said hesitantly.

“The legend is that when you a catch a ghost marlin you are given the gift of humour then, you are able to make people laugh and giggle in a kind of supernatural way, anytime of day or night!” he said.

“Is that why that nightclub is called the Giggling Marlin?” I asked.

“Well, that story has circulated for a long time and I would say that establishment adopted the name after the legend. I mean who wouldn’t want to name their nightclub the Giggling Marlin!” he said smiling.

“So do many people know about this ‘famous’ catch of yours?” I wondered aloud.

“I only tell special people because most people cannot handle that kind of knowledge, you know the supernatural stuff and all. Of course whenever I start talking about it people think I’m a lunatic—you know crazy, nuts…. like as if all I think about are marlins…white ones, blues ones, even ghost ones…” he was a little quieter again and I noticed that we were almost back to town without even knowing that we had turned around.

We got back to port and started to unload. I asked him if he would be around since I needed a diver to retrieve my compass. He said he would be happy to help me since he knew the waters well and could tell that it was important to me.

“How can I pay you?” I asked.

“Would you go to the Giggling Marlin this evening with me? They have a great view of Place del’amour and they have this giant mural on the wall inside with the history of marlins and there is blue ones and white ones, black marlins and striped ones, ghost….” he noticed my face and trailed off.

I was feeling awkward now, I didn’t want to make this into a big deal. I took a deep breath. It had been a while since the last time I had gone in there. I wasn’t interested in meeting any local fisher folk. The Giggling Marlin was the place to party, every boat that came into port emptied regularly into the nightclub, somewhat like the Buck and Ear in Steveston.

I hesitated, he was looking off in the distance in that same way, somewhat contented with his thoughts yet patiently waiting for my response.

“All right, but only one drink, okay”? I said shakily.

“You do me honour, dear Lady” he replied respectfully.

So we met at the Giggling Marlin that evening. We put a timer on that he had brought, we timed how long it took him to tell me the entire story from beginning to end of the ‘Catch of the Ghost Marlin’! I remember giggling when he brought out the timer, since I was well familiar with them!

That evening I felt I had a permanent smile pasted on my face. My cheeks ached from laughing so much and from one glass of white wine I was flushed. He drank a beer from a local micro brewery called, Cabo Cabo.

“I want you to know it’s true, every last word of it!” he exclaimed.

I left the Giggling Marlin not long after, it had been a long giggling day and I was tired but refreshed from laughing so much. We agreed to meet at the Cactus Club in the morning about 10:30 am to set sail to find my compass but only after he had had his breakfast and Gazebo time, which until Cabo San Lucas he had never experienced. Now he made it a regular part of his day since in that place he always seemed to come out changed.

The man who was the wildlife biologist who was also into marine biology, walked down the pier into the night and I turned resolutely with broad strides back to my room.

Upon entry I struggled to find the light and hit my hip on the edge of the counter because I was moving so fast. Switching the light on an unusual reflection caught my eye.

There on my night side table was my compass, polished and shining and set carefully beside it was his marlinspike.

Painting

Painting the inside of the front door of the Cannery has been fun! Thanks to Rod’s Lumber and suggestions from Mika with choosing warm tones for the door, it will look great. Remember it is on the inside so you have to close the door and view it from the inside! From OSB board to funky heritage wood planks, yahoo!

The sun from the south

Brighter days lay ahead, even in November.

The sun from the south beckons many. A place such as Cabo San Lucas. It hasn’t been too long now that I dreamt I went there myself. Yet the only thing I can remember at this hour in the afternoon is the glass boat and while peering into the bottom of the one we sailed in to view the fantastic sea life below, I looked closer than I had ever looked before, there on the ocean floor, was my compass….

A Liger’s Tale, XVIII. The Timeline

It was not until much later that Kiera began her journey to seek out the one who would begin to teach her. She knew there had to be a place where she could learn so she left home. Her will drove her out onto the streets of Livan-drea, led by its current which was like a live wire under her skin. She could no longer stop the force of it or hold it back. Many have said over time that,

‘when the student is ready the master will appear’.

In and out of small grottos, up and down stairs, through entry ways and exits where long corridors were lit with dim light and filled with fumes, Kiera walked. Today the foundry was quiet yet it’s drone echoed deep within her. Before she stepped inside she stood on the banks of Livan-drea’s central mount and looked down the River south to see the outline of the foundry. It’s smoke stacks clear, the sleeping giant loomed large and did not recede into the background. It came ever forward while Mt Kab-ir formed a stunning backdrop of layers of frozen snow and ice with its pinnacle reaching just 1000 lengths above the foundry’s peak. Kiera’s insides warmed as she took in the black-gray patina of the foundry, even from this distance she could see the glints of copper and today the sun caught the jeweled windows framed by the impossibly intricate wrought iron work. The rust had formed so beautifully over the years on the those frames, she thought.

Turning North she walked not far to find a undistinguished building, surrounded by the trappings of the trade of the metal workers she climbed the steep stairs to the third floor where a door was propped half open. Patiently looking, she came across a character that welcomed her warmly.Was it that she knew him already, she thought?

“I know the purpose of his stride, I could have sworn that I saw him in the alley the other day. With the coming and going of many vehicles I remember a settling occurring. That is the moment when he morphed from animal to man. The settling must have happened in between the impossibly small walkway of the north path between structures. No, that cannot be right….why would he take such as risk….?” Kiera mused.

Gathering her confidence and putting timidity aside in the moment she extended herself to him. Hmv, the man had long since left the quarry and turned to designing monuments and entry ways executing each project with mathematical precision—his work set apart a building or a street corner. All day he was happy to assemble and deconstruct and then re-construct models and maquettes, his accent and countenance intrigued her and while listening she saw in him an earnestness that she had not encountered in Livan-drea for some time. Integrity was about him and determination to pass on his knowledge to anyone who would agree to be his apprentice. His kindness and bright humour caught Kiera and it was from this moment she recollected in hindsight that the relentless passage of listening to the River beneath the River welled up within her.

Within a succinct period of time there was a transaction that easily occurred. The formalization of an agreement between them that would be mutually beneficial for both. She was enthralled and he delighted. She began her apprentice listening to him for 39 days. Sitting by his side she watched the gestures of his hands as his eyes welled up with passion the lines in his face deepened, he spoke in two languages and revealed his Timeline.

Kiera wanted nothing else than to listen and watch endlessly day in and out. She often hurried through her morning disciplines in order to arrive earlier each day at his side. Compelling stories of events that dated backwards and forwards of time travel infused with rejection, loss, greed, indifference and betrayal. Kiera noted beginning and ending successes that stood as bookends holding the Timeline in its precarious place.

“I will act now and not remain silent any longer I will tell a story, a Timeline….I will whisper, and inscribe your words to me for myself first and then for any one else who is fit to hear them….”Kiera decided.

A Liger’s Tale by Erika Koenig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.erikakoenigworkman.com.

‘D’

I am on a raft in the middle of a large ocean. There is no wind, days are hot and I am parched, days are damp and I am shivering. There is no fresh water only salt water. I have little supplies, I am anxious, sea sick from the constant movement. I see no defining shapes I float on a too small raft. Lurking about me are ocean creatures I am not familiar with. I am not sure what to make of them so I keep watching the horizon to see if I can spot some land. Still I see nothing and I have no sense of direction—I’ve lost my compass, perhaps it is in the bottom of the ocean instead of in my hand. I hold onto the raft, I struggle to hold onto myself.

Looking

I’m looking for a tree with moss that I can rest at
squinting my eyes to find some light
a direction—a way to go, I wait

I need to find myself in the thick of it all
there are blessings untold every day gifts
that parade themselves before me

In my sleepiness I catch a glimpse of them

The way is dark

In the middle of the journey of life

I came to myself within a dark wood

Where the straight way was lost.

Ah, how hard a thing it is to tell

Of that wood, savage and harsh and dense,

The thought of which renews my fear!

So bitter is it that death is hardly more.

—Dante’s Epic ‘Divine Comedy’

A Liger’s Tale, XVII. Keira to El Bajo

Out of Exile

It was the flat salted sea mounts that forced wandering upon hybred’s, mortals and wild life in search of the Clear Oasis, day in and out.  He had taken a self-imposed exile. Drawn from the conclusion that something had to be learned— ‘the very essence of the skills of life’ in order to survive in the outer reaches of the Fortress City of Livan-drea. For a very long time El Bajo wandered, until recently he had gone into a longer hibernation.

His caverns were his natural resting place, he had three. A small one nestled in the larger mother cavern beyond the outer reaches and one squarely on the east side of Livan-drea.

At least two winters had passed, still he was so very tired yet he practiced a daily self regimen of care for his body and mind. He taught himself everything from exercises, rituals to routines for feeding. It was from this order that he would live his life to keep everything in its rightful and proper place.

Roaming, timelines of feeding and teleporting were all the same each and every day. He found a peculiar rhythm that worked for him alone and he was damned if any Liger or mortal would disturb his carefully laid out plan. As was his custom he looked for travelers both strangers and well known Livan-dreans that he would make happy.

The circuitous Path was the one he preferred to take, he would not take the regular Path. Quietly, and as invisibly he drifted over the sea mounts into the sub plains. It was his appointed task and it had been a long while since the familiar cheer that he alone embodied which had loomed large in his earlier life, somehow now seemed to have long ago gone into hiding. Deep inside his barrel chested torso he could feel the distant visceral memory of cheer, his natural joy that he was commanded to give to those who crossed the—circuitous Path. He knew as he took this exact route that he would not see anyone or anything he did not want to have anything to do with. This feeling of certainty eased his innards, regular risk free roaming guarantees a stillness for the innards of any lion.

At the beginning of today El Bajo was aware of a small fretting that was lurking inside. Paying attention to the voluntary movement he looked into the distance far across the sub plains to see a tiny figure approaching with a familiar determination which he dare say he did not like. His eyes were razor sharp, keener than any eagles eye they were able to identify foreign movement, his vision could see beyond the borders of Livan-drea in all 4 directions, nothing escaped him.

 

Photo credit: National Geographic

Kiera knew this was the time so she painstakingly stepped from the sub plains to the sea mounts where El Bajo’s territory was staked. It was grey, sheets of rain poured onto the mud path and pooled under her paws. She regretted that the sun was not shining, for there was a time when their meetings would happen in full sun, in the brightness of an opportune timeline pregnant with possibility of a promising friendship. As always she brought a peace offering of food hoping he would receive it. The rampart was set in place to protect El Bajo from any unwelcomed visitors. Kiera ignored this and proceeded with courtesy and respect.

Few words were spoken while sad eyes exchanged confused glances. Kiera fearful, El Bajo anxious. The sky poured forth drops. Soon Kiera thought, we will come to a place of thanking each other. For now the earth being tender El Bajo’s nerves frayed Kiera’s feelings palpable, we will tarry for a little while and then I, Kiera turned and walked away in the down pour under the skies of the Great Fortress City, Livan-drea. The goodness in it meant that we would be out of exile together. El Bajo would remain alone in his self-imposed exile for a undetermined timeline.

In between the 3rd and 4th dimension, Kiera saw Yol’carn in the distance. This time in her night dreaming. Yol’carn had come with packages, flown in from the Isle of Wan, with books, paintings and materials that needed to be unpacked.

“Busy yourself now and remember you are not to interefere with the destiny of another. So while you have the strength in you before you turn back — go and find the place you are to rest from this time of exile”, said Yol’carn

Sadly, but with little surprise she circled back along the mud path to the border of the sub plains.

“How foolish I’ve become to think that I might test the patience of a lion or measure the courage of a royal beast. Who am I to breach such things? I have set my paw across the divide now I will return out of exile to a time of soul making, where I will carefully instruct my self with the help of Rhea Phoenix and the Elixir….”

Kiera wandered westward towards the Fortress City of Livan-drea, beyond the Clear Oasis, towards the Opal Gates that faced the rising sun, sheding tears that formed into crystals she buried them quickly underneath her paws into the sandy soil by the River. At that moment she heard the earth sigh with a finality. She closed her eyes and recieved the earth’s words to her.

It was the River beneath the River speaking, her eyes encrusted with salt and sand she watched as the wake on the River took all the memories of the last two winters. For as long as she could see it was not only her timeline that drifted, but with it, El Bajo’s. Replete with the waves came a song from the bottom of the River. The current eddied up and outwards and there in the wake she saw timelines that were like jewelled patterns. Long strings of lives lived in the 3rd, 4th even 5th dimension. They were being carried along by the power of the River and it was Good, all of it every last moment, was held by the Mercy of the force of the River—resided over by YHWH-el universaro.

The River Walker gestured to her in the distance, a long line of timelines seemed to be attached to a garment that was frayed and was being dragged behind him not unlike the gill nets on the fishing boats that Kiera watched every season, yet this, this was of a translucent material. Acting like a net but made of something invisible. Clear as the fullness of Luna it was. It reminded her of the Opal Gate on the east wall of Livan-drea.

“Was it seaweed or some sort of organic matter that flourished only in the bed of the River attached to the River Walker….?” she wondered.

At this sight she heard the throng of bellows and percussive instruments, she began to see a faint dance and a kind of celebration at hand. Today, she understood spoke freedom, in time happiness would return in full force to El Bajo but not with out the pain he lived to avoid.

Kiera maintained that she would listen with intent to the River beneath the River, while edging along the borders of  the Fortress City Livan-drea. Whose motto had long been known by foreigners and generations of Livan-dreans:

“Leave no stone unturned until you turn facing the West wind and it is there you will know the story of the Fortress City, which many have lost their lives in trying to gain….”

 

Footsteps

Down by the Sea

You may see people you know….the beauty of walking the ‘Path’

The regularity and familiarity of seeing the same people in the same place restores a kind of balance to your day

It is simply about saying ‘hello’ and ‘good morning’ that brings about a feeling that you are in your community, that you are in a place where you feel safe

Many times, most times—the lightness of the morning walk and the rhythm of your stride and the sounds that accompany your movement orient you into your day. A few minutes and you are there and you feel ready to face what’s ahead

Americano, medium bodied coffee or a latte move you into the next part of your morning and all of a sudden you go forward, adelante without a thought….is it the movement, sound or caffeine…. I imagine all three

Un prada

Georgia's Small and Purple Hills

Sweet anticipation can come at the most surprizing times. Natural flora and gentle geography meet you in this un prada. A most special place is un deserito where las floras and las aves abound. Arizona, New Mexico….Steveston?

The connection came yesterday after reminiscing Arizona or is that ‘missing Arizona’?  Memories: sounds, scents & colours. A conversation about geography, about Georgia O, about citrus and las aves in the desert came at Starbucks in the morning at #1 Rd and Bayview where Imperial Landing meets The River.

Georgia's Red and Orange Hills

Prometer

Jodie's Promise of Spring

La marea alta/baja in Steveston off Garry Point.

The colours always return we just have to be patient in the waiting. The promise of the season’s change brings renewed hope, and with it the excitement of what most consider the best season, summer.

Spring is gentle and kind with us not yet demanding that we committ to our passions. After a long cold winter, spring woos us back to our longings, the life we want to live is invited again to come forth.

This el paisaje by local Steveston artist Jodie Blaney echos a distinct contemporary canadian flavour. Blocks of soft and dark colour bring to life the beach, out to The River and beyond.

Once

Once

Once in a while or perhaps only Once in one’s life friendship comes along that brings with it unexpected happiness and joy.

The film Once portrays this so well.

Filmed in Ireland, directed by John Carney, featuring Glen Hansard and Mareketa Irglova.

For a good amount of time in the fall and winter months Once accompanied me late into the night.

Billed as a modern musical, the film exquistly portrays a friendship between a man and woman who meet in the town square both at crossroads in their lives. For a brief week they share profound moments of connection through their music and unexpected friendship.

In the most poignant moments of life one can pause and reflect and recall the beauty of Once…once upon at time….once when I was young….once when I was happy….once when we walked….once when we laughed or once when we held each other….

Beautiful memories are a kind of balm when a keen sense of sadness or regret is evoked from the ‘once’ we experienced. In all its beauty and sadness at the end of the day, a gift lies at the heart of the memory that has been given only once.

See  iconmovies.co.uk

Contemporary Lupine movement

From a dancer’s perspective I covet the movement of the lupines. Oh to bailer with the lupines! To bend and flow with such agility is the way to go! I could sleep in the una pradera and be happy.

Watching trees and flowers in all their glorious movement fills me up! Its like food for the soul to take in their splendour.

Everyday I feel I wouldn’t have it any other way…I rarely leave Steveston now….only when it is absolutely necesario.

The Compound in una momento

Geometry and symmetry happily co-exist here.

Paintings, drawings una idea for illustrations come to mind when walking around the compound.

Anything quotidian (everyday) can be made and re-created by using mediums that capture an aspect or quality of the subject not felt or experienced before.

And then the process begins. In a second in time an image is captured.

Hands manipulate the mediums adding layer upon layer of paint, pencil, pastel, paper, patinas, textures, old and new tools, artifacts and implements and then finishes that reveal the individual’s experience of the subject in that una momento.

Local

Thanks Frenchie!

Honouring el futuro

Gulf of Georgia Cannery

The trick of it is to stand in the middle and to stay there especially when it feels futile. Look back and look forward at the same time and stand right where you are.

This requires quietude, movement yet openess to change to what was and what will become. Holding onto an invisible reality, a passion or dream necessitates adding a little faith and trust to the mix. Shake it all up and you have the opportunity of a possibilty, a el futuro. Hold it lightly and gently yet with tenacity and zeal.

It is the ‘Invisibles’ that hold it all together. Maybe it is like catching a fish or better yet cleaning one – you need a good amount of gusto!

The ‘Invisibles’ are the V words: verve, vigor, vicious, vigilant and valiant.

Nothing Good is easily won or attained or given for free. Just fought for. Faith, form, hard work, timing and love apply themselves to the trade and to our industry.

The ‘invisibles’ have taken up home in men and women and have brought us to where we are at this point in history, here in Steveston in the 21st century.

“Me gustaria ser pintor”

Living Stone Studio

We come to the studio to rest and make art….it is not a sausage factory!

~Alberto Replanski

It is a kind of luxury to have a ‘place of one’s own’ to create, to take time to make art. As artists often we have a driving need to produce. If we have not made anything lately we feel unhappy or worse like fakes.

So we go to the studio to make things.

To susurrar our own intentions, our own truth of where we are in our art making for better or worse can free us from a self imposed exile. Riding the wave of the creative spirit is a perilous el viaje at times.

It is like being on a small raft that you’ve fashioned out of raw materials that you are not sure is going to hold together, you are floating down the fast and furious Fraser.

You have no shelter no protection. Absolute energy is mandatory to navigate uncharted currents. The elements can be friend or foe at any given moment. It’s unbelievably exhilarating and hell at the same time.

You gravitate to it and then you correr (run) away from it as rapidly as you can. Welcome to the artist’s life.

Steveston Artist Society Breaks Ground

The Steveston Artist Society is a group of local artists who promote and support emerging artists in Steveston Village. Become a new member and be part of a grassroots movement whose sole purpose is to create community & support emerging artists in the village of Steveston. Visit with us in front of the Gulf of Georgia Cannery on Sunday, June 7 at the Steveston Farmers Market.

Reconstructing Steveston

Reconstructing Steveston by erikakoenigworkman

How many times of late have you noticed in Steveston the reordering and reconstructing of buildings, sites or storefronts? Old to new everywhere you go. Everytime I see a new building going up I want to grab my camera and take a photo of the ‘evolution of Steveston’.

We are living in a time when significant changes are happening around us. So I call it “Reconstructing Steveston”.

There is never a dull moment except maybe in the dead of winter when the rain is pouring down and the wind is blowing and your best activity is to burrow in at the nearest el cafe. And this is good. Tourists have gone and those of us who live here get to have the village to ourselves.

El corazon or la cabeza

Movements and gestures come from el corazon.

La carne encases the dreams of the spirit. How can something once delicate hold an entire universe within it? Questions come from la cabeza.

El corazon or la cabeza…

“Oh you delicate heart, sometimes it feels hard to live, rain keeps on falling so hard, I forgot that I had some to give”–Hawksley Workman, Between the Beautifuls, 2008.

La voz

Most times but not always~

honesty best policy.

Una to unicyle

Walking in a farmers field off Dyke Rd 2 summers ago, I came across a birds wing fully intact. I took it back to the studio to draw.

Word association: single, una, flight, unicyle, alone.

Yesterday while playing with the boys in the green space, I got on the unicyle for the first time in well over a year. I was surprised because I was able to feel the revolutions without wavering, it made me happy.

Her name is Phoebe. I had to name her, it was important. She has flames up the side, she is orange, the seat is comfortable, much like but way better than a banana seat from 1972.

I call it the uni dance, hoping I can pick up its rhythm, and fulfill my dream of riding grassy knolls out at Garry Point.

Pressure

Pressure (Oil pastel, paint, and alabaster on steel)

From Shamrock Welding a piece of steel came to me, another find by the master Alberto.

There was a face I saw dead centre while the two opposing sides pressed into the figure. Forces or walls that cause a person to strain under great pressure. I wanted to capture the person struggling in this place yet I also wanted to portray hope or a way out.

Esperar

It is always possible to esperar (hope), when there are spirits and minds working together in unidad (unity). We naturally want to even though it is hell at times to engage in doing so. Variety, community is the spice of life. Without it we are left for dead. Without it we are in a desert or in exile fighting for our very existence.

“It takes a village to raise a child” is one of my all time favorite quotes. It takes a community to have a voice. It takes a cohort to raise the bar or to open the door to new dialogue and conversation.

The Steveston Artist Society (SAS) is poking its head up and looking straight ahead. The call has gone out and we will gather.

La Amistad

F

me & eastside johnny

Hello Johnny! Through the wonder of technology we can enjoy a moment like this…happy times…memories from last summer. I am so glad I met you, so glad we came to be la amistad in the short time before you immigrated from Steveston back to Ontario.

Viva Cuba…I want to go, Mark is taking a group in January, I will be in school and will not be able to nor will I have the $….but I hang onto my dream of going. Won’t you please send me more photos so that I can make more art.

I will wait for those, and I will see you soon.

Expresar

happy days

I remember the feeling of swinging, it was always such a expresar of freedom. Once you got on there you felt that everything else melted away. You were allowed to be totally in your body feeling the movement, the dizziness and the utter happiness of full out swinging.

Best of all you knew now how to make yourself swing. You had learned how to pump your legs and then you tried variations of it by standing tall on the swing and pumping with your whole body. And you felt on top of the world.

The freedom of being a child is to expresar.

Un ancla

photo credit by panoramio.com/merlin38

Her ship is coming in. She is a mighty fine tanker. Boats and ships are female I learned. How does she stay afloat? How does she contend with the force of the Fraser?

She creates a wake in her path as she steadily moves forward and I bet she is going against the currents.

Anyone know about that? I know nothing about the secrets of the tides and currents but I am happy to learn and listen to those who know about these wonders. In the front are un ancla it looks like two maybe more. I like to think maybe she has 3 or 5. But I don’t know for certain.

A study in this area would be interesting, are there retired mariners in Steveston who sit and speak of these things remembering stories, remembering the secrets. Are there young men and women who have everyday known nothing but the life of being on a boat, a ship a sailing vessel waiting to remember again the secrets that need to be spoken and passed on?

Her ancla keeps her alive, keeps her afloat yet keeps her tied down in a very good way and for necessario reasons.

Una margarita

I am in the process of learning plant identification. I do not know the botanical name of this lovely. I have always wanted to study botany. So I get my fix learning the odd latin name here and there and just learning one flower or plant at a time.

This looks like a kind of daisy, so I called it una margarita. The colours look like a senorita. This is yet another beauty I enjoy at the point and I know that summer is truly here when they appear on the una colina.

Found by The River

Found

Down by the River I sat and wept

Down by the River I sat quiet and remembered

Down by the River I gave over grief and loss

Down by the River I wait and watch

Down by the River  ”….there I am found safe and sound”

And we are so NOT

Michelle Mendes

NOT winning in Afghanistan.

She is the first woman to committ suicide in Afghanistan.

Seeing is believing… that something is not working with this mission with this project with this war and our part in it.

I suspect that Michelle experienced the highest level of stress any human can, any woman can in complex psychological circumstances.

Woman gives her life, her intelligence, her beauty, herself to the military, to her country, to a mission, to Afghanistan. Soldier Woman gives it a go, is willing to bring herself to the table and willingly offers what she has in a extreme set of circumstances.

Bravery and Courage are not engendered, for those who dare to accept  that B & C are the primary two ingredients to get anywhere in life and even in death, change will be kindled. Michelle gone is the instigate for some kind of change. Let it be some kind of good change.

Grief & sadness now, cost is too high,
the bar was raised and raised.

Questions. Was it about not managing her stress properly? Was it because she was an over achiever or way too ambitious for her own good? Was it because she was already breaking? Was it because she couldn’t hold it all in balance? How does one hold the secrets of military intelligence in balance? Who does one confide in when the complexities become too much to bear? Who knows her thoughts, his thoughts, the soldier’s thoughts?

I would venture to guess someone does.  Their thoughts are not on twitter updates nor on a facebook page. They are in the invisible place and space. No not myspace….no… in the Invisible place. From far away her thoughts were known and now are truly known.

In her death we are now sharing in those thoughts. We are party to the mystery of herstory, her very life her very struggle.

And we are weeping, we are crippled with grief and we will be for yet a long time to come.

Win Reason by ekw

Now, dearest Michelle, we are paying attention. Please forgive us that we did not listen….forgive that we could not enter into the hallways of “the puzzle palace” as you willingly did.

Go on brave Daughter, go on your time has finished here and you have given the best of all of yourself.

Soldier Daughter, beautiful girl…your life and death will change everything…for good…for bloody Goodness.

see globeandmail

I like the wild untamed

The flow is wild and untamed. The River is fast and furious. Ask any artist, inventor, scientist, mother, father, child, teen, labourer, fisherman or woman and they will concur.

You can agree with it, you can ride it out and put up with it or treat it with the utmost disdain. Disengaging is sometimes the way to go cuz…it’s wildness overtakes you and that’s why people commit suicide.

The River, the flow, the force of life creates a unstoppable wake within you. You like it, you hate it, you like it and then you hate it.

See saw, until you get to know its comings and goings and you observe it with the seasons with the cycles and then you thank mother earth because you are grateful that summer becomes fall becomes winter becomes spring and that you get to rest from the wild untamed fast and furious number that is playing with your head.

HSpirit susurrar, calls silence…. submit and confesor or wait until you are snuffed out….your choice.

Hummingbird I

You moved about quickly and energetically, I felt your jovial spirit and I was happy that you were happy

Lion before the storm

The term big cat – which is not a biological classification – is used informally to distinguish the larger cat species from smaller ones. One definition of “big cat” includes the four members of the genusPanthera: the tiger, lion, leopard, and jaguar. Members of this genus are the only cats able to roar. ~Wikipedia

Photo Credit: Nick Brandt

Attached

Gracias Paolo

Love

There is always someone in the world waiting for someone else, whether in the middle of the desert or in the heart of some big city. And when these two people’s paths cross and their eyes meet, the whole of the past and the whole of the future lose all importance, and there only exists that moment and that incredible certainty that everything under the Sun was written by the very same Hand. The Hand that awakens Love and creates a sister soul for everyone who works, rests and seeks treasures under the Sun. Were it not for this, the dreams of the human race would make no sense. ~ Paolo Coehlo

Lions and tigers and bears oh no

And this too shall pass and one day we will be somewhere over the rainbow, all of us, every last one of us

Laundry, dishes and Art

Amazingly enough

all of these can coincide

at the same time

Dance the light fantastik

A well familiar icon in the Village….its where you can go to dance drink get in trouble or not.

Probably the most famous icon I wish the la pista de baile to be more spacious but the smallness of it gives opportunity for creative movement or restriction.

Just in the last few weeks the smoking room is gone. I call it smokers hell but alas it has been demoted to a clean patio space!

Controversy, historical facts and fiction not withstanding stories are played out each night.

Here a continuation of yesterday’s memories abound in the frivolity that ensues when people gather to celebrate one thing or another. Ghosts from the past within or without number in the thousands. Thriller MJ would fare well here. Clear out all the chairs and you would have a set for more Thrillers. No doubt thrillers are created and recreated over and over again each fri and sat.

To dance the light fantasik with friends and strangers is the thrill and all manner of imagination is conjured dangerously or delectably.

All in a days work

Photo credit: bluegooseOfoxphotostream

Nothing Good is easily won or attained or given for free.

Just fought for.

Faith, form, hard work, timing and love apply themselves to the trade and to our industry.

For Tim, Letisha and the crew of the Sena II

Congratulations on your catch!

El agua

Liquid

Force

Rapture

Steady

Lonely

Steel

Fraser

River

Shape

Destiny

Solace

Solitude

Silence

Ir a dar una vueltae en bici

Goin for a bike ride in the Vill and beyond hoping I won’t fall off cuz I’m just hangin on

Goin for a bike ride uptown and then down ridin all over cuz I wanna get around

Goin for a bike ride to the places I don’t know strugglin to make a livin tryin to figure it as I go

Goin for a bike ride all over this town stopped for tea & cookies ….and at least 2 americanos….

Goin for a bike ride learnin how to ride alone I like my life while balancin the things that I don’t own

Vintage

Photo credit: bluegooseOfoxphotostream

Uptown in Steveston is a place that we all know from the past it lingers….

We remember it well we see and we know that those times are past. Yesterday into tomorrow is always the way it goes moving forward into the future so now we call it vintage….‘the time that something of quality was produced’.

Secretly we all long for this time when life was slower, when we could spend our work day mending, attending to important matters of quality not quantity. It was so much easier we say because we knew time was valued for time.

What we put our hands to was good and it was recognized as such. This industry, a trade and a honest days work spent in activity with your hands. Yes those were the days the good old days and now we are here looking back and moving forward into el futuro.

All due respect to bluegloose this is his photo.... just 3 clicks in photoshop for a futuristic look

Level of cuteness

Off the map.

No way to measure this level of cuteness… so just enjoy every moment imagining yourself getting hugs or giving hugs

to or from this loveable loveable!

Meanwhile down in Van @ the Pendulum Gallery

RareBirds_MediaRelease_June09

Nothing short of magical and fantastik

The show, the pendulum, the women

The camino, the way to it

Rivets welds strong hands

Oil oxide stone and steel foundary craftswoman assemblage

~Sandra Bilawich~Fia Cooper~ Stefanie Dueck~Tam Harrington~Corrine Hunt~Mimi Law~Amber Lyn~Sage MacGillivery~Lori Mairs~Claire Murgatroyd~Nancy Smith~

a thousand thank yous

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Oh Canada Day

Oh Canada

We stand

Guarding thee

True love

Sons and Daughters

Hearts aglow

Thankful for this land this people

And history that has made it possible

Sacrifice of hearts for oh Canada

Time to go

Getting ready time to go

~ Marking time and listening for the sound of the beginning of the found

I like metal, I like steel, I like people who work with it and this is what I feel

Scorched on the edge standing on the cliff looking into the river channel readying

~ Watching waiting wanting to be nothing but real maybe I can accomplish this if I wear steel

The Battle cry has gone out the moment is at hand ready yourself for victory I can taste it in this land

Horses are my friends they listen with their eyes make no mistake about it they will not be taken by surprise

SAS is sassy

Inagural meeting of the SAS at the GOG

Exciting dreaming scheming together

Whos who whats what

Baby steps to giant steps

Begin the beginning

Members in attendance: Loren Slye, Carmen Kietsch, Raymond Chow, Erika Koenig-Workman, Jody Blaney, Britt Falkes, John Darcus, Ly Wright, Dave Davis, Joyce Mah, Dominic daAssuncao and Julie Northey.

The SAS logo represents Water, Fire and Earth.

Edging

Edging swerving dizzy all things considered we can cling to the stone the rock it is our best bet all told all round out of the ruins on the plateau

seeing clearly is best

id rather make art than eat because this is my food the word fills me up i savour its juices and it feeds me

tears are food they come up and out salty and new better to cry than not better to feel than not

Hummingbird II

You remind me of brighter days I love your quickness and your speedy ways

Your sound of helicopter wings catch me by surprise…. and I love them

You bring a gift which I receive…. it is a mystery yet I perceive

Nothing I can do on my own it just comes from the plane of unknown

And so I wear a copper bracelet a native symbol of your beauty

I have to remember because I forget so that is why I easily collect

Images letters objects found no shortage of lovely things that abound

I remember I recall I remind myself still that this life is a gift and love it I will

la merienda (afternoon snack)

….#22 or london fogs & mistos will do too ~ I remember cups of tea la merienda in the afternoon with you

oh to enjoy a cup of tea with a friend I have not seen I look forward to the easy time to know the places you have been

I know that all good things do come to those that wait and then

Only when you think back to the times that were the best and some ~ you’re ready you’re steady for something that is about to come

In the moment in the end you never miss a beat ~ you recall you remember you wait ….#22 or london fogs & mistos will do too

Long and Winding

Look out the window of your home watch small boys become big boys ~ ten years watch wait observe time moments go by slowly painfully time quickly you feel the rush moments escape swift cry grieve

I drink white wine and clear dishes after dinner I talk to my father in law who wants to connect 85 faithful steadfast living a consummate life of moderation at the mercy of time and a greater story

I trust that Mercy is wider and grander than anything else cuz life is a mystery I have been given so much let me not forget in my forgetfulness that remembering is the most important discipline let me be ever waiting for the mercy of the Merciful

Ever wakeful that beyond this time when the waiting the struggle to understand will be gathered reconciled held gently with resolve a remedy will be given and received

then all will be well yes all will be well

A Fine emerging

I like pioneer women like Georgia O, Fine Frenzy, Kate Bush remember her….women who go, start stay and end things. Look up and out and around and get on their horses and go. Every day it seems like there are not moments to waste. Life is going by quickly for us and our time is short. So we need to act swiftly yet we need to be calm, gentle and patient too. There is no secret formula for living some sort of good life.

There is now and then and el futuro though. I wish for courage for you and if hope be deferred then let it be so. It comes up and out of me for you and it comes at unannounced times and yes it takes me by surprise. I keep giving it back and over to the place I do not know in my waking life. I know it in my dream life and in the realm where mortals dare not tread.

All we need to do is ask and it will be given, raise a voice ask a question and it will be heard and answered. Courage and Bravery  c & b again….it is given….then received then practiced by the apprentice and then laid down over and over again. Everyday I remember you, I recall a time when you were brave if only in a distant dream. Yes indeed there was a time.

Soon in it’s right season a time will come again and be upon you and your emerging will gently flow to a place you did not know and it will be a gift to the world because you will be freed from a hostage heart freed from that frozen part.

Coffee tea and me

First I l isten then….

I love coffee I love tea I love the Java Jive and it loves me coffee and tea and the java and me a cup, a cup, a cup, a cup, a cup

Photo credit: podcast

I love java sweet and hot whoops Mister Moto @ Robusto Im a coffee pot shoot me the pot and Ill pour me a shot a cup, a cup, a cup, a cup, a cup these are my pleasures a cup of tea or java by myself or better yet with a friend who I can laugh and cry with

Listening

Im listening my ears forward and upright to sounds I haven’t heard each time I think I almost have everything figured sure glad I have 9 lives cuz this is taking forever

Oh well such is life say la V I think is what some humans say or de ja Vu or something like that I prefer carpe dium especially because of the fish connection did I mention my favorite is carp

Ella’s favorite is tuna everyday and night she will never refuse it I wonder about Kitty Witty how she is doing these days haven’t see her for a long while I trust she’s hangin on cuz that’s all a cat can do good thing we have claws I pity my friends who don’t

24

Somewhere deep inside the cavern a tremor slowly rose winding upward to the place where small cracks and eruptions begin to leek out. It came without forewarning everytime. Minding my own business I was enjoying the long awaited moment with an new old friend when it started.

Within the space of 24 hours I was in hell again.

Load the trigger get your gun reach for the handle. Fight it or fly or hardest yet remain glued to where you are, still, wrestle and prepare for combat with your heart.

Earthquake tremor a ground swelling opp abounds before you have time to think and lo and behold you are in a stand off. Much like the ones in the wild west down south. Southern Tucson purple hills and big sky country surround while you face the enemy.

There is a beauty about the moment. You wonder how passion can exist so equistedly with danger ~ fear abide so closely with desire. This is the moment you have waited for and your heart is a fury flurry bound looking fear in the face while holding onto heart preservation at the same time.

Preserve….are you familiar with the word with the action with the force that commands Preserve for those who hang on? One day you may have the opp to become familiar with Preserve. Like a buoy in the water bobbing constantly up and down and by its nature refusing to stay beneath the surface is Preserve. It reserves while it preserves and it surrounds while it abounds.

White water caps roll waves thrash here and there and the Preserve is fastened to your raft. You know the little one floating down the Fraser.

Uneqipped for the journey ahead learning to navigate as the moment dictates. Nothing no fisher man or woman has not experienced….

A Liger’s Tale, I. The sextant made of alum-ore

Soon into the journey she realized a sextant was necessary. The golden compass was in the post she had called her trusted friend via cell to verify that indeed the compass was hers that she intended  to journey alone.

All that was required now was the sextant made of alum-ore to complete the set. Spied by the most notorious navigators and stolen by pirates off shore the coveted sextant made of alum-ore would be helpful in this next part of the journey. She taught herself to use every useful tool and instrument that came before her. There was no easy way just the acceptance of the Path and what was presented to her on the journey.

She had met strangers who became friends who then became strangers again. A curious morphing happened when she met these strangers. Some were genuine friends others mere shadows, hollow to the core. Chronos was true and indeed would offer clarification that she could be sure of.

Applying herself to the wisdom of silence and setting out to navigate new territory she trusted her instincts, her intuition and her broken heart. All things come to those who wait she remembered.

Within the hollowness of hidden memories she recalled words that were spoken by her friend whose presence was now lost to her ~ “remember your true self” ~  “you must have strength for the journey” ~ “you must learn to conquer your fear”.

And so it went…. a reel of a song played when her mind was focused and clear. The words would come with remembrance of her friend whom she hoped she would cross paths with when the time was right. For now she made herself happy by recalling a sweetness she had experienced once with this friend with whom she shared laughter and curiosity along the Path. A natural happiness had begun so unexpectantly yet easily with the beginning of that beautiful friendship.

Ahead lay further transformations, evolutions that brought shifting shadows. She would further encounter stranger beasts and beings that had morphed and had not yet finished their own transformations. The sextant made of alum-ore would indeed prove timely.

A Liger’s Tale by Erika Koenig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.erikakoenigworkman.com.

A Liger’s Tale, II. Hmv

Liger, Photo credit: National Geographic

It was perilous but she sensed within herself a readiness now, she was morphing herself as was the natural course for all creatures on this terrain.

 

Happy, excited yet a little timid she accepted her new destination. Finally and fully it was time. It had been told to her many eons earlier by the ones who had raised her.

Her mysterious descendants gave her nothing they had neglected to listen to silence.  Her beginning was in the monastery where the origins and use of metallurgy had been alive for generations within her adopted tribe.

The place she came from and was going existed in the present as much as in the past. El futuro was not yet written she surmised. The path unfolded in a most terrifying way as she stepped forward into her camino marking her steps unearthing revelations and remembering her master’s voice:

“Kiera, every person will want something of you….watch and see….wait and listen….go back five times and go slowly all things are unfolding as they are meant to”. The reel of the song played on and she applied herself to the master’s voice. Soon it would be time, the sextant would be hers and the set would be complete.

Even so her challenge would be to learn the ways of the soldier~warrior and for this she felt ill equipped. The physicality of the challenge lay before her a determination she had previously lost. Nothing appears as it is she was willing to be surprised. By choice she took her place among those who had gone before her.

Metal workers, artists, liturgists, healers, herbalists, and those who spoke and listened to animals. A long line of her people followed the Path long before she was born, she need only listen carefully and use the power of her vision to recognize her place in the story. Without a doubt this required her discerning heart and a willingness to leave behind everything.

It was the beginning of fantastik and terrifying journey yet already she had been given companion guides along the way and for this she paid homage to the master and to the way that was unfolding.

A Liger’s Tale by Erika Koenig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.erikakoenigworkman.com.

Una la amistad

Thanks to ambitiousdeliciousness.com

All it takes is one good friend

To be in the spot you always knew

You place your foot you don’t look back

With faith and tears & your fav Dayton shoe

You have to laugh cuz if you don’t

The other is not so pretty

Id rather eat sushi and drink up at El cafe near by

With friends who once liked me in the middle of may

One friend is always a good friend

Id have it no other way

Cuz if you can count friends on one hand

Its always a brighter day

Gracias

Kopio before it was the Blue Canoe corner

Im happy to know there are a couple of people visiting me

Gracias and thank you for stopping by

A note about coffee

Before I grew up I only drank tea, before I met the Workmans I drank tea mostly, before I was a mother of 3 boys I drank tea and ate toast alot…infact I still do …but after I met Alberto, after I worked at Starbucks and after I started to hang at Steveston Coffee Co and Rubusto… I started to drink dark strong coffee and then it turned to americanos, that was the same year I worked at Phoenix Art Workshop

Whenever my sister visited me from NFLD she didn’t know how I kept up with the children so our code word was destination coffee

Toast

Old time toaster

launch
take off
get going
follow the trail
walk the path
don’t think too much
go with your heart
summon your courage
call for bravery

watch the universe move and respond to your voice

then wait drink tea and eat toast

sometimes

its better to seek forgiveness

than ask for permission

Women who Weld

Women who get their hands really dirty, who turn screws, weld and take risks to use their muscles and their bodies to make their art are my kind

Working with materials that are hard, substances when manipulated magically become beautiful but not without blood sweat and tears. The strong hands have to do with pioneering, striking out into the frontier, out in front going forward into new territory

There are giants to slay battles to be fought, lost and won. That’s why I choose to morph into someone like Lara Croft and I want to drive a volkswagen beetle with special features

Remember the film Flashdance? Well that was informative for me. She danced by night and welded by day

In my case I design by day, weld on weekends and dance anytime and drink cups of tea in between 2 americanos and then later I enjoy some vino with or without friends

A Liger’s Tale, III. 90 years dreaming~Kiera remembering

there is a place that I don’t know~but someday I hope I do~it is a time when Im 49~when Ill wear shades of blue~Ill sit in a car and eat lots of sushi~play chinese checkers too~there will be a time when ev’ry thing will be fine~Ill look through the window to see things we said we’ed do~Itll be just before 50 when all neat and nifty~my life will be turned around~near happiness waits ‘cuz Ill walk through the gate~to see that you have been found

Im 90 years dreaming my life almost done~looking back from where I began~Ive trusted the wind river path and the sea~Ive looked to the north and listened to the land

I will wait for you to come from the desert~from the place where you have lived~all I can do is muster my strength to surrender you to the stars~the universe bides its time each day from chronos to kairos and back~I swear from cradle to grave you’ll be loved

with a heart that is willing to give

(in memory of King)

A Liger’s Tale, IV. Kiera

Kiera

So it began.

Kiera learned she was summoned to the monastery’s Other room which represented, The forth power: Time.

One fact remained she knew the name Ciara whom she was named after was an Irish saint who established a monastery at Kilkeary in the 7th century. Hmv began telling the story.

A carpenter and his apprentices were traveling through the province of Qi in search of building materials. They saw a giant tree; five men holding hands could not encompass its girth, and its crown reached almost to the clouds.

“Let’s not waste our time with this tree,” said the master carpenter. “It would take us forever to cut it down. If we wanted to make a ship out of that heavy trunk, the ship would sink. If we tried to use it to build a roof, the walls would have to be specially reinforced.”

The group continued on its way. One of the apprentices remarked, “Such a big tree and no use to anyone!” “That’s where you’re wrong,” said the master carpenter. “The tree was true to its own destiny. If it had been like all the others, we would have cut it down. But because it had the courage to be different, it will remain alive and strong for a long time.”

The master spoke this story through silence Kiera listened ears forward eyes fully open. She stood still~ difficult it was. Today extra effort. She understood without words exhanged.

Often timidity got the better of her today she felt strength within.

A Liger’s Tale by Erika Koenig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.erikakoenigworkman.com.

A Liger’s Tale, i. Kode

kaleidoscope

A Liger’s Tale by Erika Koenig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.erikakoenigworkman.com.

El agua

Photo credit: Jamie Gilles Mageau

Is able
to make one stable
Agua changes the mood

Waves make movement to liven the body the mind the spirit soul food

Look at Stone island
Know el futuro let go of all that is past

Dreams exceed every waking wish el presente will speed up fast

Un poco fierce one

Kagen

Un muchacho

ocho into nuevo

un poco fierce one

feliz una hoguera

bueno curioso encantador

gracioso hablador ingenioso

salado sensible sorprendente

timido tranquilo valiente

felicidades!

(Photo Credit: Doug Workman)

Path

Path

This one is winding and circular.

Kites fly in its middle and it is surrounded by water.

It has small grassy knolls.  I meet my friends on the path.

It is my favorite place in Steveston.

As fate would have it

some of us were lucky we found our hearts down by the river in time

others left their’s behind they were found on the shore with various pieces of debris which had washed up from the river

there was sadness cuz he knew they had forgotton or lost them so the River Walker went to the Buck and had a few looking to find those ones who were true

Photo credit: kaboodle.com

in the gathering there was one or two who recalled a better time ~ suddenly a hush came over them and with that another round ~ “life is good said the River Walker slapping them on the backs, he exclaimed F—k yeah! I wouldn’t have it any other way and I think you guys would agree with me so let’s drink up and enjoy the day ‘cuz I have a feeling it’s easy to go the other way, if you catch my drift – LOL”

A Liger’s Tale, V. Left in a muddle

Kiera had been walking all day Chronos had suspicously left her hanging again she hated that. It was time to rest.

Images reminders of scents and sounds came, she was waiting for it all to fade. This piece would not exit from her the ache became a dull pain the longing become a wound covered over and all words still would not go.

She wanted a clean understanding that bled no more. Better to have desire fall or be rekindled than be in this terminal hell. Unrequited love sooner or later would step aside and a signal grace would appear like lines in the sky or drops on the ground.

Her foolishness haste quandry and silliness would halt she reckoned, she knew better not to deny the knowing of the heart. Cutting out the wound was not safe. Protecting it would be best. It was her own lack of judgement that had caused the wound it was hers to sort out.

The Foundary was only a day’s journey from ’The Desert Rose’. The gypsum rock that was like the alabaster she loved. This one was different it had become a monument to one of the legendary masters whom locals claimed had lived just before the greatest time of his life.

If only she could hear a susurrer once clearly perhaps it would set the course for the path ahead.

Away to the river to the place where all things are found safe and sound

Surely upon her arrival at the Foundary there would be food and drink.

Yet her thoughts still wandered to envison what her protection would be made of. Only the finest metal would do and she was determined to discover the elixir that none had yet found. Her dreams were filled with the form her protection would take slowly the materials would come she trusted and with the acquired elixir.

She had heard the news… the ‘Invisibles’, Verve, Vigor, Vicious, Vigilant and Valiant were journeying onward Yol’carn’s words were true, this she knew. Chronos had given her the knowledge that it was only a matter of time. She winced, Chronos was a trickster she took his words with a grain of salt but was still careful to attend to the matters Chronos presented to her. In previous days she had learned the hard way, “was there ever a easy way with Chronos” she wondered.

Gathering her senses and waiting until stillness passed she remembered that Chronos would not leave her forever surely the muddle she was in would soon be behind her.

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night to day

martini shaker, vintagemartini.com

 

Impossibilities present as problems to be solved

like mathematical formulas you need

to know the language the code

figure exacting measures

prepare like a martini

shaken or stirred 

 certain chemisty occurs

In other words do what you can with what you have

and wait and see what happens

visit pravdavodkabar.com and reservoirlounge.com

A Liger’s Tale, VI. El sueño del diálogo (the dream of the dialogue)

Photo credit: cats-chitchat.org

In the dream the dialogue came, slowly at first and then with screaming clarity.

“But I’m in training to navigate the I don’t knows as they come and go” !

Hardest part Hmv says: “Success will come in time but not without struggle, then one day you will wake up and move things that you could not before”

“I feel so unequipped for the journey, I’m learning to navigate as the moment dictates” she screamed in reply.

“Good that is your work for today, now go and drink a potion that is made from white fruit made by Kings River, but remember to moderate your toxins, you have a long journey ahead of you”.

“Yes master let me learn as a child and let me be happy in doing so” Kiera left the room annoyed.

La ventana et  la persiana were still. She listened for any movement for a la manera de andar. El Bajo was sleeping. With a soltero descision she reached for el valor. One of the close cousins of the ‘Invisibles’, Valor would be roused but not without preparation.

“Fine all right then, I will do as you ask” she was talking to herself now.

El Bajo was right all along. She recognized that every affirmation given was with respect and good intention. El Bajo was not master but friend along the way. She knew El Bajo desired the best for her, in this she sensed his care and with that knowledge came a happiness. This was the preparation for el valor.

“Now rest and be still go into el futuro, because all things will unfold as they are meant to” echoed his words.

“I will”, she said.

Yol’carn’s councel observed the strong link that Kiera shared with El Bajo. As Kiera gathered knowledge she bagan to unravel the gift El Bajo gave her. It was something like a young happiness, sweet, tasty and joyous. In return her strongest desire was for El Bajo’s release from the place in the desert.

However this would happen was un gran misterio. Deep within el corazon not a day went by without susurrer palabras for El Bajo. It felt a gift yet carga at once and daily she disciplined herself to leave it to YHWH~el universo

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A Liger’s Tale, VII. Yol’carn’s Farewell

Original art work by Julie Larm, 2007

Yol’carn fought ferociously the power within to leave the Abyssal Plains and move on to the Isle of Wan.

‘Choose now and swiftly without thought for el futuro.’ she heard within.

She accepted the challenge and in the blink of an eye went forward, adelante. As a healer she was well familiar with the tides of change and evolution within the mind and body. And now it was her turn.

It was the portal that presented itself. Yol’carn in her wisdom was accustomed to openings, to doors that opened with exacting pressure. For years she had worked with and observed it in humans and animals. Not afraid any longer her wings unfolded slowly and now with an exactitude that enveloped her.

‘Oh how I love to ride the wind, you can’t take me I’m free’

The song etched into her memory rose with the opening of her wings. Movement, generous, wide and circular her entire being took the shape of an energy that exceeded any form she had known. Like a child in a playground clumsily at first and then with steadiness Yol’carn galloped until her wings took flight with effortless rhythm.

Yol’carn nearly looked back for a moment, leaving behind associates in wisdom, apprentices in training and friends she turned resolutely looked straight ahead, head erect and wings in full flight she recalled saying

“It is yours, your Life as it is mine she told her apprentices, you must take hold of it and not be afraid”

Excited, the Blue Stallion flew along side her she knew the way and he followed and within a short time they landed on the Isle of Wan. Their colts were already there, Yol’carn and the Blue Stallion flew to join them. As she touched the earth on the Isle of Wan, which was accustomed to mortals than flying horses, Kiera appeared in her memory.

One last time she saw herself speaking to Keira:

“This is your time do not be afraid accept your nature, if you fall to temptation to deny it, you will forever be a slave to that which is not your own”

These were the last words spoken to Kiera and she had listened intently. Time was cut short with ferviente words, with delight Yol’carn recieved the unexpected gift. Kiera’s words were spoken to Yol’carn,

“Spread your wings and without further fragmented thoughts prosper so many will seek your guidance”

And with that Yol’carn belly laughed, knowing the truth of Kiera’s words they were as a catalyst that ignited her fire and she rose without look back up towards the Isle of Wan.

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skyline

Steveston skyline III

home is best for you to rest to open your eye to see the sky to know where you have been

tomorrow will come without much thought the rest will appear in a dream

open grassland open sea rough river burrow deep inside of me

Im living to love and loving to live the people the land the river the sea so with passion type materials, heat metal oil, steel & stone Ill find a way to bring all things together light as a feather what matters will happen Ill see to make it so

this poem is not a limerick nor could it ever be cuz the wit is out the window the reason off to sea

In the end Id rather be poor eat less and live here to adore all that’s been given spoken and said through history laughter and lore

ferviente (fervent)

flame

having or displaying a passionate intensity

A Liger’s Tale, IX. Kiera and Enna

Kiera with Enna

Everyday we sat together and after playing in the grasslands, we would clean ourselves because the rough blades and burrs would stick to our coats. Enna and I were close like an extension of each other we observed, listened and waited together. That was most of our day except when we got sidetracked by a snake, spider or worse those horrible creatures that are not a bird but act like one –bats (murciélago)!

In my personal opinion I would venture to say YHWH-el universaro made them for torment. Let me tell you why.

One night I was sleeping, which is unusual for me because Im normally up at night. It must have been the day that Enna and I had traveled the longest we ever had. I was exhausted. That night I felt disturbed in my sleep by a draft and by a scritch-scratch sound. At first I ignored it and didn’t think much of it. But as I came back from sleep I was hit on the side of my ear with a leathery wing. It felt like a flap of skin that was alive. Fear arose within me not knowing what this creature was and half asleep I reacted, recoiled, then I got angry.

I roared, got up and threw myself against the side of the cave. I was thinking surely whatever this creature is will move away from me as propel myself forward. It went but not with a flurry nor without at fight.

murciélago

Enna says “Bats are confused, that’s why they behave so, they are not sure as to whether they are a creature of the air or land”. Night into day was a welcome moment let me say. Fact: the bat is nocturnal, is it insect, bird or mammal? Precisely, I am confused about this creature. No wonder it is so erratic in its movement and ways ie. hanging upside down! This is a childhood story.

“Where is Enna now I wonder?”, since she moved to the nether reaches (my name for the Calattin Region). I have not seen or heard from her in far too long. I know like any proper Liger that she is ‘roaming’ fulfilling her destiny. I have always admired this in her. She came into her destiny early, discovered and acted upon that which was rightfully hers. From an early age she took hold of the Matrix, being the formula of her destiny.

“I was naiive, unaware of the Matrix, yet she knew and journeyed steadily onward in it. Naiive, gullible and unknowing. That describes me then and now”….

“You cannot erase history Kiera and you cannot undo what has been done” she heard Enna’s sussurar (whisper).

Very well, with pity and many tears Kiera accepted Enna’s words which rang true like the bell at the foundary tower of her childhood. The sound of the bell triggered the odour of the grinding metal and all at once she was certain Chronos was tricking her again. And so she remained in el presente patiently expectant of the arrival of the sextant made of alum-ore.

“Matrix is the tool given to Enna, mine will be the sextant” she quietly mused.

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A Liger’s Tale, XI. I find the map~enter Rhea Phoenix

With some luck, space and time I will find the map…. I will have enough sense to not act in haste. Speed is my enemy it causes me to make further mistakes than I’m aloud in one day….

“How many blunders are you allowed” asked Rhea, “ad infinitum my lovely” Hmv replied.

“Oh I see, you mean to say as many as I like until I krack the Kode?” guessed Rhea.

“Yes that’s it, now you are on to it, you are becoming wise my apprentice, and I am happy with you” he said.

“But if I make mistakes in the same way over and over how will I ever Krack the Kode?” asked Rhea.

“That my darling is the mystery….” said Hmv

“That’s why I love you master you keep me guessing, yet you are kind, thank you” replied Rhea.

“Now go and beware of the Bluebeards of this world for there are many” he warned.

“I will remember your words but let me see what is behind the eyes of a stranger, friend or lover so that I may be wise” said Rhea.

“You will, since you so desire it….” he promised.

So Rhea ventured forth tired, weary yet a little lifted by her exhchange with Hmv.

I wish he was still here I miss him so, felt Rhea.

At the very least I have been given a encouragement and stern warning that is worth something. It is better than not being given anything at all. I will rely on this as good and when I encounter silence or strong words from strangers, friends or lovers I will be mindful. I will not take their silence to heart nor will I interpret it as a sign of some sort. I am so sorrily worn out by the goings on around here and just because I have a brain that detects gesticulation in others doesn’t mean I’m giddy.

There are so many parellel stories being lived at the same time that sometimes I just cannot bear the weight of it all. I wish I did not have this brain sometimes, or this feeling heart…. yet I know for certain that I cannot turn away from either for if I do I will go back to the deepest darkest dungeon and then who will give me the key to get out, is there even a doorknob on the inside?

I want to go far away from the parallel stories I want to be rid of them. With a little help from wise ones, sages, and gentle elixirs a clearing will come I know it. I can feel it in my bones! Oh did I really say that! Do not mention this to my man Blue it will give him further reason to lock me up in his secret room.

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Hummingbird III

Thanks to animalwebguide.com

If I could stay long enough to watch you in flight~I would be happy

If I could still myself long enough to catch a glimpse of you~I’d of had a thrill

If I could see you from afar and watch you near by ~my day would be complete

I see you out of the corner of my eye with a teeny bit o’ luck Id feel utter joy at your coming and going

You wee, teeny weeny, itsy-bitsy, little-bitty, mini and infinitesimal bird~you rock my world

Here

There comes a point in your life when you suddenly realize there is no place you would rather be.

Dorothy’s (of The Wizard of Oz) sentiment is mine “….there is no place like home”.

Jkothephotoguy has the unique gift of being able to remind me over and over again that the best place indeed is here~home.

In my life I have moved about 18 times and so the question has always been where is home?

The answer is here.

And you know what Im talking about those of you who live here.

By the sea the river the banks you walk talk muse and refuse to live anywhere else.

Geography, people, history, legend, industry, labour and lore are what keep me coming back for more.

I live to hear the Cannery whistle cuz it gives shape to my day and Id have it no other way.

Its good to dream. At first teeny weeny dreams then medium to large dreams. Ill share one of my teeny weeny ones….you can imagine the rest because more than anything I want you to use your imagination so that you will feel happy.

Jkothephotoguy and I will be riding off into many sunsets and we will laugh because it will take us a while to believe our good fortune.

Shieldmaiden (woman warrior)

And each man kills the thing he loves,
By all let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword.

by Oscar Wilde from (The Valkyries)

Valkyrie in Norse mythology “chooser of the slain” is one of a host of female figures who select from those who have died in battle ~Wikipedia

A Liger’s Tale, XII. Kompact Kargo

It had been long in coming the sextant made of alum-ore had finally arrived. Heart rapidly beating Kiera held her breath and opened the crate. She had expected not to be able to lift it herself but to her surprise it was astonishingly light, well designed kompact kargo.

It came with a traveling case and a complete repair kit, instructions for use and a concordato (a treaty-agreement). The ingenuous design allowed it to fold in two and tuck into a velvet traveling case that measured eight inches wide by twelve inches tall. Feeling relief Kiera took three long breaths while she let her eyes and hands take in its exquisite beauty. Its form, functionality and design excited her.

The altitude of celestial objects now would be measurable not to mention the angles between objects on her nautical and aeronautical charts.

Altitude and latitude was what she was after. More importantly, the sextant allowed direct observations of the stars and celestial beings.

“That was all that I asked for the sextant made of alum-ore, gracias.

I must not forget in my forgetting or I shall never attain the elixir, its funny how you remember at times of forgetting and that you forget at times of remembering!”

She held deeply onto the knowledge that the elixir would restore her remembering since this was the key to el futuro remembering the past and emulating the journey of those that had gone before her. Keira’s mind stirred and slowly a image appeared with a memory of a kind of knowing.

The image pulsated revealing a lion with a tiger. A particular purr resonated in their chests with deep breaths the cats closely sensed each others presence without any physical touch. The sound was gutteral not harsh, ancient yet soulful. A primal stillness kept company with their breathe as if at any moment a revolution from within were to begin a long held fascination with each others species that would cause each to enter fight or flight….

“Ah–now I see and know the instrument is mine to use rightly to measure the distance between me and you…I will not give up my chance to remember where I have come from and where you are going”, she mused.

“Testing the authenticity of the image now will be given to the next leg of the journey….”

Kiera was well familiar with rogue images which were as clever as any rogue mortal. Combining the elixir with the sextant’s methodology would give her the answer. Closing her eyes she saw the now distant image fading it was only a matter of time until it’s authenticity would be verified. The concordato would be followed with the exact prescriptive.

“There will be no second guesses since the use of the elixir’s chemistry will only allow for one resolution, one chance to know the identity of the image bearer–of this I am certain since Rhea has taught me so” Kiera giggled.

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Tea and Chocolate Cache

shades of blue tea for two

Earl Grey tea with chocolate blueberries
Cookstown General-Ice cream store
Winding highways by air or road

Lead me always back home
You lead me always back home

A Liger’s Tale, XIII. Suited Up

“There is no better time than now–precisely, wonderful, done”, Kiera thought.

The Foundry was open from sun down to sun up, closed in the day and working and active through the night, she liked this. Incredibly, it was happening again as she approached, the visceral response to the odour exuding from the Foundry.

It took her back to the beginning as always yet here she was coming full circle back to el futuro,  to the Foundry for her suit of armor (armour). She understood the process of extractive metallury was lengthy, but well worth it. All it entailed was for the metal to be converted with either oxide or sulphur, from ore the extraction came chemically or electrolytically. Ionic bonding had always fascinated Kiera, that is, the bond formed by the attraction between two oppositely charged ions.

She called ahead to give forewarning of her arrival, remarkably cellular technology had advanced so rapidly in the last 45 years that animals used it as easily as humans, and liger’s at that!

Remembering vividly the time she called El Bajo to confirm that indeed the sextant made of alum-ore was hers, how happy she was to share the gift of that knowledge with him.

These days it was not a paw or hand held device it was an implant. Of late the implant had persisted to give her trouble, it was not always like this. There was a time when the implant was invisible to her eyes unfeeling to her skin. It had only been in the last 18 moons that there was agitation with it. Still she continued to make use of it for now, it was a convenience and a welcome one.

Kiera thinking…Metal: an ordered collection of positive ions surrounded by a fog or cloud of delocalized electrons.

The thought of it aroused shivers, a discernable physical luxury she relished each time she contemplated metal.

“Enough, I am going to be suited up and that is excitement alone for one day” she chided herself. “one last thought and this will be the end of it and then I will concentrate I promise Hmv….”

“The ‘beauties’….Metals and Alloys….they are in this order….

~aluminum~gunmetal~solder~antimony~iron~stainless steel~brass~iridium~steel~bronze~lead~tin~cast iron~magnesium~titanium~chrome~steel~mercury ~tungsten~chromium~nickel~uranium~copper~pewter   ~white gold~cupronickel~platinum~zinc~gold and last but certainly not least silver”

“….very well done, now go into the Foundry they will be waiting for you.” said Hmv.

Food and drink, refreshment after the seditious journey was at hand. Best of all the suit, her suit custom made to fit with the utmost precision aligned to every contour of her body was awaiting her arrival. She would not be disappointed, the Foundry never duped its own.

One last look behind her, the sun was down, the gates open to the city, into the lovely Livan-drea, the sounds of the Foundry drew her into the night of her suiting the time of the quickening of Kairos. Night light surrounded her entry through the city gates, past the positioning perils–there was no movement in their presence. At this she took note and said,

“Gracias” to valor, vigilent and verve, passing the first level she continued onwards. “That was easy….”, she reckoned.

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Mixing and mashing

Brett

Today we raced down Granville Street to watch a screening of RIP: Remix a manifesto by Brett Gaylor, ripremix.com.

Photo credit: wired

It reminded me of the time we raced down to see Georgia O, the feeling of now or never. Determination, passion and a little wildness all mixed or mashed together, to do anything because you really want to means throwing caution and copyrights to the wind and then see what happens. Its a cool adrenalin rush without any toxic substance involved.

Its risky but worth it, in the end you land somewhere you haven’t before, you’ve gone through a door or portal and inside you are different. The thrill is pushing past fear and that’s why extreme sports like unicycling down a mountain side and the act of making mash ups exist. Improvise and see if you become wise.

Deep inside we want something so totally new and fresh and alive, jamming the culture and pushing the boundaries to unearth lively questions so we can make loads of room for creativity. All to often it comes down to 3 things: money, sex and power in one form or another. If it is not this that you’re living for then maybe you should mash things up a little and see what happens, push the boundaries to see what gives or doesn’t.

What I mean to say is don’t just live for the 3 biggies there is a whole lot more worth mashing (living) for! Find what it is because before you know it you will be dead, Chronos says.

“Me I live for imagination in my dreaming. Im looking to re-generate my imagination to use it for Good for people, for community, for telling stories, because I have to.  Mixing and matching and mashing, collaging my way to the end, that’s my thing. That’s re-generation how the rest happens is mystery” –Rhea Phoenix for salonunidad

Mash amendment

What I mean to say is don’t just live for the 3 biggies there is a whole lot more worth mashing (living) for!

Find what it is because before you know it you will be dead, Chronos says. -Rhea

A Liger’s Tale, ii. Kode

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Confiteri

“I want peace and friendship….I never meant to hurt anyone. I was following my heart and I listened and went with it.  It has taken me to strange and wonderful places.

Previously, I lived in the deepest darkest dungeon, I was frightened, I wanted out of Chronos, this time, I longed for Kairos. It was not until I was ready to face myself that I could see light in the dark.

Even then the map was indiscernible. I am half-fool half-wise, on any given day I am a mixture. I know this is how I am made, I have a love-hate relationship with my heart and its contridictions, you may with some luck along the way discover the same, that we are indeed identical in a opposite kind of way!“-Rhea on the subject of the journey of Apprenticeship

Rio (river)

I start the day with the River listening to its movement eyeing its textures surveying the length of its reach gazing up into the sky at clouds going by uttering words for today being caught by the cry of a heron I turn to look

to see if you are there

It is a good day the air being warm I lay back on the rock reading words and ruminating tears of gladness ev’rything given to the River since it is mighty strong and always flowing

I let ev’rything flow into the deep sea into a destiny that is free

Into

Intoxication scares and for good reason.

Yet humans have a long time on-going history with substances that intoxicate.

‘To lose control of one’s faculties or behaviour or to excite or exhilerate….‘

“So what is the point you say…well, we need toxicity, the truth is, its a harsh world that we live in and ev’ry little bit helps”!

“Hey, not so fast there…I live my sobriety everyday I know its effect on me, it straightens me out, it gets me to the place I want to be, this is good”

“Yes, indeed this is good….”

I think perhaps one day we will be seated ready to celebrate, ready to enjoy wine with one another without thought of tomorrow.

To live in el presente for the sheer joy of it. Knowing the experience of being ourselves while knowing each other, we will not lose ourselves nor will we be someone else, we will be our selves. Some will drink wine and some will not.

You know what I mean? Its like this. There are many days that say, that shout–

“do not pass go, do not collect 200 dollars”, too many to count.

Then there are those days that herald–

“get out of jail free, go ahead collect the jackpot, its yours, take it and run….”

I use these these two well known phrases, to describe the feeling that mortals experience while living here, on this planet.

When it is time to take the jackpot and run you can’t believe your luck or is it fate? Lo and behold you are given the go ahead, some sort of permission. You vacillate and waffle. In the end you have to go weather you are on one leg or two wobbly ones, you go like a child, a adolescent becoming a young adult separating from what you have always known because that is the way.

Like a caterpillar in a cocoon you sleep, stay and slowly emerge into the time of your becoming. All at once you are frightened while absolutely ecstatic.

“This is Chronos, here now, like it or lump it get used to it or dump it. Living on earth is a messy endeavour, it is all a giant collage that’s the way I see it….no one, not one can escape its ways…”.–Rhea Phoenix

studio

I once met a longshoreman who was done with boredom he lived in three cities at the river by the sea

Inside a studio adorned with fountains a place where you will see the lovely distant mountains

He waited there until the salmon were in season then promptly moved out so I could live in Steveston

Cave

A cave or cavern is a natural underground void large enough for a human to enter. Some people suggest that the term cave should only apply to cavities that have some part that does not receive daylight; however, in popular usage, the term includes smaller spaces like sea caves, rock shelters, and grottos.~Wikipedia

Viente (wind)

Photo credit: Kyoko/picasaweb.google.com

you cross my face

to trace a place in the middle of my soul

I welcome viente

following waiting following

chasing the invisible

its the only way

I want to live

Living

“What do you do for a living?” he asked.

“Paid or unpaid?”, she replied.

La amistad II

You know you are having a good day when you have had 2 americanos listened to children laugh watched cartoons in the morning had a good heart to heart talk at the River visited with a good friend then listened to beautiful music by another good friend

you start to anticipate a good el futuro…sometimes the day doesn’t get any better than this….and that’s fine

A Liger’s Tale, XV. Apprentice

In the evenings it was complere (fill up).

A filling up before the end of the day. The last ritual before night dreams. Rhea fully expected Kiera she sensed her entry was eminent. Rhea hurried ‘fini complere, finish the filling up finally’! After sun down there was no food, except for Kiera! The taking in of words ‘the filling up’ sung or spoken interspersed with voices that echoed through every chamber.

It would take 8 minutes to walk to the Foundry from the Monastery she saw herself already taking leave.

Visioning herself running towards the doors of the Foundry to greet Kiera.

She closed the book impatiently and looked to the Northex,

“Right finish already” she thought.

Dismissing herself in haste she left and walked quickly onto the cobblestone streets of Livan-drea. The stones were wet and as usual it required all of her agility to balance on the uneven stone. She had not been given the physical gift for nothing. She used it well.

“Balance, concentrate, centre….” Rhea remembered days upon days long passed in the studio where repetition was the order. “Again, again, 5 times 7 times–clap clap clap”, Madame yelled.

Quicker and faster until her heart beat so fast she felt that it would burst within her breast. Walking the beam, the tightrope lengthening out while engaging the core of herself, she loved the feeling of the contractions, the power in her muscles that enabled her to bailer.

“Oh to move with an exacting pleasure, is my happiness” Rhea’s feelings spoke to her. When she danced her intuition was at its keenest. This was the beauty of the art form.

“When you train the body you train the mind” Madame says. “I will as I have strength to train this body….” echoed Rhea.

Livan-drea was lively with night light, shrill with the call of the merchants wares. The night market was just beginning and Rhea took the shortest route to the Foundry so that Kiera would not be waiting. Rhea loved this medival city with its many doorways and footpaths to shops and grottos where tables were set for ‘co-horts’ (socials), those small groups ‘….yes they were chemistry holding a recognizable identity’.

The gatherings of mortals and animals, and with hybred creatures that defied definition. Rhea was glad that she had been given a liger, correction–ligress now, she thought! Generally they were good natured, sociable and even water bound! The rain didn’t bother them which was good since Livan-drea was in rain 7 moons of its 12 year round.

Keira

“Oh timid one, you have travelled so far and now you are at the beginning of a beginning do not doubt your suiting. This is what you were called to, quiet now….Hmv told you without words. Remember, remember the Other room where you have learned The forth Power: Time….” Rhea susurrer words for Kiera.

Kiera was ready for refreshment. El agua, some carne (flesh) but not too much. Her mouth watered as she craved the flesh, the taste of the blood on her tongue.

“Liger’s need meat and this one needs a good filling!” she muttered to herself. Where is coraje and valentia now she wondered, I feel them far away from me. “I need you I tell you I will need you….” uttered Kiera.

The need for carne, for food for el agua was playing with her mind she began to doubt, she was forgetting she was not remembering any longer.

“A suiting or is it a filling or is it….” Kiera fell unconscious and lay on the cold stone.

Rhea entered through the door way to the Foundry. Seeing Kiera on the stone floor she walked slowly and knelt beside her.

Rhea lay her hand upon her apprentice’s head marveling at the size of her skull caressing her ears and drawing a long line to trace the length of her whiskers.

She lowered her mouth to Kiera’s ear to susurrer the ancient word.

A Liger’s Tale by Erika Koenig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.erikakoenigworkman.com.

Dance

The Dance Current : Canada’s Dance Magazine

Shared via AddThis

A Liger’s Tale, XVI. Kairos: a brief explaination

“Kairos you are shifting changing and I cannot pin you down. I hope I never will. If I have you under my thumb then I will die of boredom. You defy description, but this I know of you—that for me, you are the discernable moment when ev’rything lines up ‘a time in between’”

It is the time when all and ev’ry little and larger thing feels seems sounds and fits right. Doubts and dilemmas have no weight. This is not bliss or magic please do not mistake it as such—

Kairos is an ancient Greek word meaning the right or opportune moment (the supreme moment). The ancient Greeks had two words for time, Chronos and Kairos.

While the former refers to chronological or sequential time, the latter signifies a time in between, a moment of undetermined period of time in which something special happens. What the special something is depends on who is using the word. While chronos is quantitative, kairos has a qualitative nature.~gracias Wikipedia~Rhea Phoenix for S

A Liger’s Tale by Erika Koenig is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.erikakoenigworkman.com.

sing

music makes the heart grow fonder when for days in between you have gone for a yonder

you listen you speak you sing susurrer—notice change of mood thought and ways the great thing is this will last for days

sing a song don’t wait any more especially if the song is yours in the meantime keep on singin other songs when time is ripe your song will eclipse an other song theirs will eclipse yours —harmony you thought not possible will make happy your day

thks Beat Merchant

The idea becomes the material

Materials found or salvaged can be transformed into una idea.

The idea becomes the material — becomes the idea.

Steveston artifacts; found objects, industrial materials and pieces of stone….Beth my favorite welder in Steveston now gone to Alberta, practiced her welding and master Alberto salvaged the aluminum piece and gave it to me to make something with.

91 is about being on the edge. The stone represents ruins, a fortress on a cliff. In Hebrew ‘metzudah’ translated is “a fortress on a cliff”.

fortress on a cliff; ruins, open, hiding place, protection, shelter, fort, structure, dwelling

Precipice; noun
a very steep rock face or cliff, typically a tall one: ‘we swerved toward the edge of the precipice’

angles accentuated by the paint, the working of the metal, and textures are meant to give the feeling of falling, straining and extreme pain

Pressure (Oil paint, pastel and alabaster on steel) ~e 08

K

“a passing instant when an opening appears which must be driven through with force if success is to be achieved.” (E. C. White, Kaironomia p. 13)

today

I give my life to

Re

Reconstructing Steveston by ~e 08

re~build

re~create

re~order

re~construct

re~use

re~capture

past

present

el futuro

re~member

re~call

adelante

close aquaintance with or knowledge of something, unfortunately breeds the feeling that a person or thing is beneath consideration, in other well known words—familiarity breeds contempt. I have no patience any longer with mortals, half breeds or hybreds that remain in this I am done with it—I advance forward adelante….I gaze at Goodness I wait for it and even though you believe it not—I say to you that Goodness is certain to happen at the most unexpected momento, indeed it is unavoidable~Rhea Phoenix for S

antes dea

before loving you, love, nothing was mine: I hesitated through streets and things: nothing mattered or had a name: the world was of the air that I awaited

I knew ashen halls, tunnels inhabited by the moon, cruel hangars that bid farewell, questions that insisted in the sand

everything was empty, dead and mute, fallen, abandoned and decrepit, everything was an inalienable other

everything was of others and of no one, until your beauty and your poverty filled the autumn with gifts

Sonnet XXV, Pablo Neruda, poet and Nobel Laureate

ad party

Q

“The question of whether or not art will change the world is not a relevant question anymore. The world is changing already, in inescapable ways. We can no longer deny the evidence at hand.

The need to transform the egocentric vision that is encoded in our entire world view is the crucial task that lies ahead for our culture.

The issue is whether art will rise to the occasion and make itself useful to all that is going on.”

~Suzi Gablik, The Remembrance of Art, p. 141

bollado

leading up to the beginning of the end of the beginning she broke herself on the craggy rocks pebbles stones the glass cut her and she bled all over herself

it was a unhappy day not quite what she had expected

but she soldiered and warrior~ed her way through a portal that called her into a destiny marked by a identifiable force within that she could not stop

it was the flow the stream that took her to the edge

excite~able, mall~able, sad happy all at once she believed herself to be closer to the truth than she ever had been and she was loving the river the wind the invisible

how did she get to the path to the golden divergent

chasing the invisible had always been the way known from the beginning of the beginning it would remain to the end of the end until the river beneath the river be found

frivolous forlorn a wee bit frantic she stood still and observed paciencia

~a gift given not a merit earned

112 fire woman

Hummingbird IV

petite

diminutive

pocketsized

wee

elfin

playful

my kind of bird

There is a common misunderstanding among all human beings who have ever been born on the earth that the best way to live is to try to avoid pain and just try to get comfortable. You see this even in insects and animals and birds. All of us are the same. A much more interesting, kind, adventurous and joyful approach to life is to begin to develop curiosity, not caring whether the object of our inquisitiveness is bitter or sweet. ~ Pema Chodron

libretto

libretto~the text of a long vocal work

words for hire please ~enquire

im good with words, im good with my mouth…and i mean Good—ive discovered im like a cat with nine lives and i intend to live all of them

what was

what was once stone

what were once tears

flow into the river

and wash away to sea

energy never disappears

it becomes redistributed;

tears turn into happiness

and negativity into stone

the day will come

when your tears and stone

merge into the qi

of the little dancer, E

aut art

random togetherness ordered otherliness associations

with a dose of ocd add ts cluster not speaking till 5 maybe makes you thrive

brain is aut and thats okay by me ive lived a long time with you

now i understand a little bit

another 20 years and i will know you really well you are a funny guy jko

with whacky sense of humour and big smiles all round uroc and you know it i am glad and happy you are my son

raw

end of the deal

means

its not better than

a poke in the

eye

with a sharp stick

image the pain

of the poke

ouch

yes raw end

is worse

than the poke

if you are

wondering

about

launching

visit someone

who has

fought

hard

or

visit someone

who has

fought

hard

for someone

who could

not fight

for themselves

then

apply the

same

conviction-strategy

verve

vigilance

vitality

to where

you are going

whatever

you do

don’t

remain a

passive

indecisive

cuz

you

will

turn to salt

or stone

then they’ll

be no one

to phone

it will be a

very sad day

waiting

for

happiness

to spread

into

your

life

I

resolve

to be

resolved

faV last words

its all good

going

“to make industrial art—

fk the fk-ers”

it will

all work out in the wash in the end again what looked like a mistake was fake it till you make it and hold tight ev’rything will be alright roll over beethoven make room better to wait than second guess be calm and carry on don’t whine but drink wine make it your tonic be on it but not all over it grab a few at your fav place with friends who will see your face they will concur as Billy Joel sung that life is a hard race that many cannot face better to sit with the piano man than throw it all in the can recall that the temptation is great to pass it all up to fate but you will see it through and poof most things will be new tis a mystery a wonder to be sure and i for one am slightly ready for all to be resolved in a minor chord that does not harmonize with my music better to face reality than live in a fantasy and on and on the story goes where it stops nobody knows

terminado

Photo Credit: Danielle Hebert

done terminado fini complete

when your life was done I was undone I remember it all so quickly—so vividly your finish wrecked havoc

threw us into a sphere that we knew not

friends became friends and enemies

misunderstanding took over gone was the master

I will always remember your goodness to me in my life I point to your steadiness, your masterly ways that brought out the best in each of us at Living Stone Studio

I look adelante

Ever forward that is what you wanted that is what you understood for the artist “to make your way as you go”

In memory of Alberto

so

in the

quiet

i see

your face

you left

without

a trace

all ok

today

is

new

for me and you

on

a cliff

you

will

be

deeply

loved

fold

up

all your laundry

again

evry time

you see

the miracle

its washed

its clean

even though

in between

you scream

so fold up

your laundry

again

steel

you are my friend I won’t pretend otherwise show me your ways

I am at your disposal you are not disposable to me so I will take you

and make you we will have fun and a go at alchemy

there

was not

time

to gather

ourselves

we just

stood

still

and

faced the

terminal

loss

of you

when

a fish

gets

caught

in the net

it struggles

for its life

today I

enter

into the

stream

like salmon

in the

Fraser

I fancy to

fight

the currents

life in its

struggle

struggle

in its life

and that

is why

the salmon

tastes so

sweet

I

am

navigating

the currents

barely

narrowly

cutting my teeth

on the flesh

of

administrative

processes

I

seek to

gain what

I might

attain

A passport

to be in

the running

Milk teeth

are precious

yet

they must

go

firsts become

seconds

become lasts

and fast

the fury

of the Fraser

sharper

than any

razor

In order

to run with

the horses

you have to

learn the stride

and so

I entrust

my ride

with a certain

strained pride

to the Master

sandblaster

tilde

to indicate

a similarity

in logic

to indicate

negation

217

In the middle of a pile of paper

I remember a certain happiness

distant now closer

waiting to be clear

I watch the distant mountains from the place with fountains

open studio place aptly known by the lion’s face

Roger A

Like a scene from a film I guided you through the magic market ride at the Steveston Farmers and Artisans Market.

You appeared all sparkly and began a trek with your eyes full of liquor gleaming with hope for something special we waited in line for the fish taco and then you bought 30 dollars worth of fabulous pickles and chutneys.

We went back to your net loft and I sang you songs and you talked about how you were not good at anything we laughed and you showed me a photo of a little girl.

It was the best part of my sunday being with you listening to your funny sounds and ways and taking in an old fisherman’s stories you told me that the swallows had left and that they had not come back.

I left you to go to sculpt at the Beat Merchant and marvelled at my chance to be with someone like you—a little old guy full of fire and fishing stories from PEI—Frenchie

Gaze at Goodness

If you keep

looking

at Goodness

you can’t help

but remain

open to

possibilities

Do not turn your

gaze elsewhere

For if you do

it will be like

Hallowe’en

All kinds of ghosts

goblins demons

and creatures

will assail you

It will be later

and you’ll have

spent a long time

mucking about in ditches

Stay away from that

narrow channel in the ground

Eventually you will be found

in the light

walking along upright

as you gaze at Goodness

listen

to the

water

at the River

sounds

wash

clean

evry

thing

mean

Lose

We lose many things simply out of our fear of losing them.

Brida~Paolo Coelho

Women Welders

Line Up of Some of Women Welders Including The Women’s Welding Champion of Ingalls [Shipbuilding Corp., Pascagoula, Ms]., 1943

Photographer: Beebe, Spencer

Subjects:
World War, 1939-1945
Labor
Women

Arc

Out into the light the spots were black popping here and there.

I lifted my mask and got that ring around the head feeling. My hair pulled from the strap and I kept adjusting it while scratching my scalp. I felt fun, dirty, dangerous and neato.

Sparks ordinarily flew to the floor where the oil puddles had congealed long ago and were next to impossible to suck up. Sawdust or cat litter maybe would do the trick, and then I could figure out the way to lift up that poison. Solvent would evaporate in the saw chips so I would throw it in there any chance I had. Into a large metal trash container that in the middle of winter doubled as a fire pit.

As I practiced the lines I took extra care to slow down which is hard for me ‘cuz I seem to like to go quickly especially when I am excited. You see, I have a lot of energy and it needs to be channeled into lines or fillets, not the fish but the shape. Like I was taught, I went back 5 times over it. I mean I kept checking my work and even though it was tedium all I could think of was titanium.

Watching Tom pick up and weld without effort was like magic for me. I marveled at how all the guys were so comfortable with their tools. I had a slim hope that one day I would be too, not afraid of the arc or the spark and no longer silly about the heat. Gone were the days of being afraid to light the barbecue. Now I was lighting bigger and better things and it was a groovy feeling.

Once I knew a man who had the strength of patience like the steel he welded. He was a kind of master at slowing down. He worked with razors to perfect a surface he was capable of creating a flawless sheen. He worked alone and he liked it that way. He was able to sand like no one else and clear coat a finish to its end. He was very good at his trade, I told him so and then he felt happy and went home.

It’s been a little while now and I’m happy wondering if this is going to take me to fantastic places like public art or building scaffolding as high as the CN Tower! Imagination is good for soaring and at the arc of my inspiration the sound of the fire and heat met my desire and I danced, it was sweet.

On the flip side of it I figure I am a fool for such things. I will have to take every precaution to be safe and the only way I want to learn this trade is school. The shop guys will give me tips I wouldn’t learn in school but all the other stuff will have to be learned there. I beg myself to ask the question: why would you want to risk so much?

As I pondered my fate in this environ I took stock of the needed considerations, and let me tell you there are many. Upside and down the other side, I guess I was doomed to writing all the pros and cons +’s and -’s on a long sheet of paper.

So I began. Wishing I had the patience of the man I once knew I took off my mask and walked out into the light and it was there that I decided who and what I would become.

Thanks to Hawksley Workman for ‘arc of my inspiration’

exhume

metal scratch inside my head

I want only to go to bed

anger the rivulet into

the River
up and out of me

I seek to exhume you

balance is balance is starting

beginning again
over and over always forever

if you clamp down control

on a vice it will treat you

not very nice

you will want to stay inside a cave and spend your day having a shave

the mirror will be your best friend all said and done in the end—you see the dragon beast is real and he’ll do all and evrything to steal

fear mongers come out to play

the best way to deal is look and stay acknowledge the bugger is real straight in the eye face it trace it keep circling back

remember: you learned to ride when you were only five keep doing the shaky wobbly later today you’ll be upright on two wheels

better yet one

after you have afternoon tea and cookies you will see feel touch noticeable relief it will be ‘cuz you stood still then refused to back down

your spine column will be there you’ll have come home to yourself

and no one else

I had a dream

that the world wasn’t so mean and I found a place I could go to know gentleness and kindness sometimes it felt like the very geography I walked on was weeping I would press my ear to the earth and listen

don’t be fooled—gentleness exists in loving relationships kindness exudes out of people in their faces smiles and embraces you will know a tree by its fruit if it is sour or barren observe if it is good there will be fruit to abundance and it will be sweet

pandereta

The pandereta (tambourine) has always been one of my favorite instruments.

It’s the Janis Joplin gospel funk soul motown connection that’s always been on my radar screen forever ‘cuz it’s a happy sound and brings smiles to all round.

It’s call to celebrate is what I love best about it. So Ive decided its time to pick it up again and use it in all contexts.

Concertina is slow going and of late I have acquired a accordian which Id like to learn a few tunes on!

One of my favorite experiences has been in the gospel realm of singing in choirs and small groups that have shaken the sanctuary or nearly burned down the theatre rooftop with the amount of energy, verve and soul put into a single song.

John William Godward

There is no better feeling than singing from the heart and letting it all out!

The pandereta girl waits for opps and its worth it in the end to be with trusted friends to celebrate life in all it’s contradictions. Living in Steveston is living in a different time zone truly beyond compare as friends say.

There is no other place I’d rather be.

ahora [now]

For the longest time I did not know I had so many words inside of me that needed to come out. I have always written ever since I can remember. My first poem that was recognized was by a grade 3 teacher who claimed that I could write well. My mother was standing beside me when she spoke the words and in that moment something happened and it changed me. It was one instant, only one circumstance that someone recognized something special in me and had the courage and maturity to express it.

The poem was about clouds, the wind and the environ. I spent a lot of time in those days looking at the sky. I liked to see all the shifting shapes and moods that came and went.

For a very long time I went underground and dwelt in the deepest darkest place.

It was safer to do so, there was less hurt there and for the most part I could be with myself and I liked that.

The sky and land has always meant so much to me. Calm waters and quiet meadows I am drawn to. I am grateful that I can look upon the quiet grassy knolls of Garry Point from studio 217 and the (sometimes) calm waters of the mighty Fraser.

It takes me back yet it also calls me forward, adelante.

between the lines

“Faith is what someone knows to be true,

whether they believe it or not.”

—Flannery O’Connor

“Faith is being sure of what we hope for

and certain of what we do not see.”

—The New Testament, Letter to the Hebrews, chapter 11 vs 1