Washing the Ashes from Little Feet

At one in the morning on June 22, we no longer sit on the cusp between spring and summer. The solstice day itself is magical and indeterminate, an end and a beginning--spring, summer, which is it--but by midnight it seems more officially a new season. At one in the morning on June 22, I was still trying to negotiate balance, albeit on the edge of my bathtub, washing dust and ashes from my feet. I had celebrated this year's precarious day of in-between barefoot, inside a mausoleum, playing toy piano and accordion, and cutting moths from natural history texts.

Sidecar performed at Oakland's Chapel of the Chimes and Columbarium on Thursday as part of the Garden of Memory walk-through concert/event. Our set consisted of electronic soundtracks, Anne's recent composition Monoliths (for live and processed voice and electronics), radio feedback play, songs by Charles Ives and Hanns Eisler, and clapping games. This was the first incarnation of The Children's Hour, the show we will be presenting throughout the remainder of the summer. The lighting in our little Chapel of Remembrance--one of hundreds inside Julia Morgan's maze of sacred nooks and crannies--provided the perfect ambiance for our dreamy reimaginings. Were these reimaginings of Ives' song, of our own youth, of eras and childhoods that we did not ever know? Maybe. Perhaps. Yes and no. No and yes.

between the dark and daylight...comes a pause in the day's occupations...flightless...cutting moths from natural history texts...dying moths...making radios squeal and shriek...what if little girls took apart radios instead of dressing and undressing their dollies three...friends or enemies...dying moths...flightless...two little flowers...Edith and Susanna...scissors and radio stations...the children's hour...

I hesitate to write much more about the program or its concept. It would be like saying I Love You too soon--too soon to a new season that only a few days ago was somewhere and something in between. But perhaps I have something to learn from the dirty feet. Kids sit on the cusp all the time, but they are not afraid to leap off with grand, shrieking I Love Yous. Seasons and cusps be damned. The sentiment is sincere. Hmm...