There was a strange wind-blown circuit

Howdy everyone how ya doin? Doin alright? How we doin? How yuz doin. How you doin.

(scroll to the big n the bold for EVENTS happening this & next week)

It’s September official. Sun sets before 7:30 now and last light is before 8pm. I remember checking the sunset and last light on my weather app at the height of summer and last light wasn’t till 9:15 and shit. AS THE PLANET TURNS.

I did a thing I’d been wanting for yearrrrs and took a long weekend summer vacation in Wildwood with my boo. Going down to Wildwood at the end of August was our big family vacation when I was a kid. Wildwood, if you don’t know, is/was one of South Jersey’s free beaches. My mom called it the working class beach one time. It’s one of those bastions of Irish/Italian/Polish 1950s vacation utopias of an era past, where every generation’s next immigrant wave (directly or indirectly related to US imperial war efforts) comes thru but the old timers try to act like white is right in these demoralizing patriotic fuckshit ways and it’s like FOR WHAT (i know for what). Wildwood has three piers and three rollercoasters and ––oh this was interesting~ apparently the city decided to pay a falconer daily to fly 2 falcons during the day and 1 owl at night over the boardwalk, to scare away (not kill & eat) the seagulls, which had become extra aggro trying to get food this year…. And now the city is trying to get the boardwalk merchants to cover the costs and everyone’s fighting about it. Anyway, Wildwood wow. When I was a preteen Wildwood was like …super peak 90s macho sexy corny MTV spring break teen cruising hell, with hot body babe crews and water guns and misfit headbanger freaks (like me) hanging around under the boardwalk & in the goofy Sublime t-shirt Operation Ivy patch selling combo bong skate shop (swirled whirld). Like my block in Olney, Wildwood as I remember it in my teen years was a mix of white families and Black and brown families, and it was definitely working class. People used to cruise around town at night with stereos blasting club music, and it felt virile and exciting as fuck to my shy gay freak ass. They eventually put some noise ordinance in place. ~_~

Every year there’s all these horrible crass ignorant shirts and other trending fashions, and this year I was nonplussed to lay eyes on all manner of outrageously SHITTY pro turnp meme shirts. I learned that there’s a Firefighter lives matter flag that looks like the cops one but with a red stripe instead of blue… and I’m like lol OKAY. The militarism and patriotism is SUCH a feeling and experience in these south Jersey beach towns (and swaths of South Philly and the N’east, m i rite?). This one Military Recruitment and Hollywood youtube really lays out some CONS to joining the military, which I found for real compelling and not just some shitty looking down my nose at you for joining the military liberal college educated type attitude – Dude in the video is like MANY people who join the military commit suicide, experience sexual assault, and you know the usual injury, addiction, PTSD and trauma shit AT EXTREMELY HIGH RATES compared to rest of the populace… I think he even offers alternatives to military recruitment? I forget. It’s a good thorough video, and as you all know I LOVE a deeply informative, easy to watch video about complex topics. Shout out to the synthesizers out there.

Anyway I was in Wildwood this weekend and it was giving me lots to reflect upon (like after I said out loud that Wildwood is where my mom and my dad met, working in the same restaurant and my boo was like no wonder ur obsessed with this place, and I was staring at the ocean like damn). Not least of which ALSO was that it was this Roar to the Shore biker rally… I was like oh I wonder… what kinda bikers… are gonna show… up. And by the evening when crews of hard looking dudes in Pagans patches and their women decked out in Property of so and so back patches were strolling all over town, Wildwood police posted up everywhere like rival gangs in a 50s drama, I was like maaaan…. What a fucking scene. Look up some shit about the Pagans if you don’t know. If you read Patrick Califia’s Doc and Fluff, witnessing all this managed to give me some deeper insight into the ruthless violence depicted in the biker crews in that dystopia. :squeamish flirtatious emoji:

I have an internal tactic that I won’t write about the violence capable of mobs of people heavily invested in whiteness and patriotic/nationalistic/outlaw-law identities. I won’t depict it or go out of my way to describe it. But you know I think about Parable of the Talents like fuck.

Some years ago I decided I was writing fantasy and not science fiction. Fuck the dreams and nightmares of imperial science. Imperial meaning empire. Like evil empire. All encompassing.

But fantasy is not escapism. We need magic and fantasy.

I’m still working on a zine about the crux of absurdities in being mixed European American and [something else/insert other heritage] white passing white person white assimilation cultural forgetting decrepit family ties secrets and loathsome positions of self-negation with ego’s ever present’ness under white supremacist social realities… The working title is The Void of Meaning. Anymore I’ve been feeling so fucked up stuck trying to talk about this shit ANY WHERE online. IRL is another story.

Here we go again with a full failure of words.

Well let me move on for now. September is busy for me. I’m doing an event every week and prepping for like 2-3 collab zines with friends, and still carving away at my own solo projects. I’m gonna wholesale repost the post description from my IG post about the same events:

EEEVVVENTSSSS

1) September/new moon greetings all. I've seen a good handful of posts from friends/neighbors lately about how not being on social is great for their health, and how they'd also be off IG if not for the news/event announce aspect of the network (reminds me of so many ppl's reasons for not leaving FB). At any rate, I'm just here to show my face (plus my fit) again and remind whoever that I post to my stories more often than my wall ~AND~ that @adifficultjoyce made this Some Events in Philly To Attend (SEPTA) Calendar for the people. Please submit your events & financial support to [*]septacalendar at protonmail dot com[*]

2) SEPT 12th /8~11pm/ ~ I'll be emcee'ing and performing at @pauline_darkstar's SIGNS OF AGING tape release show alongside Rainbow Crimes at Vox Populi Gallery. For the crowd that likes/appreciates that outer space odyssey shit.

2) SEPT 19th /7pm~midnight/ ~ I'll be vending at @hawkmothevents __Garden of Celestial Pleasures__ queer equinox celebration & magickal bazaar, w/ethereal costume contest & surprise DJ ft @bb_basura. At Bartram's Garden, wheelchair accessible

3) SEPT 21st /8pm~11pm/ ~ Enter into the dark and listen at the official release soirée for VENUS SATURN SQUARE. This trans-centered erotic zine unfurls from its printed confines for an evening to thrill and confound desires. Come ready to lurk-xuriate in low lighting and heavy listening. Listening masks and phone check will be on offer for a low-distraction experience, along with glow bracelets for anyone who'd rather not talk. Feat reading performances by yours truly, @spaceface2.0 @snaxho_ @theholyhawkmoth, also at VOX.

Every event is sliding scale $$ entry but no one turned away for lack of funds. VOX wheelchair accessibility ~ has 5 steps to the elevator entrance, which is 29-inches wide, so may not accommodate all wheelchairs or motorized chairs. Contact ahead for ramp at events@voxpopuligallery.org or 215.238.1236

~AND~ November 17th, Metropolarity will be at the Philly Zine Fest at The Rotunda, Sunday only (cause the tables sold out immediately). Word on the street is that Alex Smith’s ARKDUST will be back in print by then.

ONGOING

Mil Mundos Books in Bushwick, Brooklyn has started reading Metropolarity’s STYLE OF ATTACK REPORT for their reading group. So cool. Last week I ordered us another batch of books, putting it at 1000 books produced (and hopefully read).

And that might be it for now.

Writing this while listening to Chico Sonido’s latest radio show.

I binge watched the first half of that anime Carole and Tuesday (on netclix). Did you? Would recommend with caveats re: ambivalently negative trans depictions & unfortunate lapse into actual talent show format, but Shinichiro Watanabe (director of *clears throught* Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo, Space Dandy, etc) is behind this series so there’s that too.

In Wildwood I finished reading Nell Irvin Painter’s The History of White People and read (in a day) Cherríe Moraga’s Native Country of the Heart. STILL working on Testo Junkie… >_<

Next time I hope to offer up reviews, along with some finished projects, some new audio stories to ~listen~ to, and more deep thoughts. Let me know how you’re doing. I always appreciate those replies, no matter how seemingly trivial. If you’re in the area, would also love to see your faces at the Vox events, ~espécially~ Venus Saturn Square. ;^]

con amor y sore tendons

Monk @}-}-;———