my velvet curtain

#excerpt from Amber’s blog in a soon-to-be-released novel, Virtual Couch (tentative title)

Some conspiracy theorist said that Hitchcock worked with British intelligence and was a fed asset. I doubt it.

But he would've had access to elite circles of MK Ultra architects, maybe he dropped acid with Jolly West. Honeypots? Something to consider. In 1959, the CIA graced our screens in North by Northwest.

My father had every Hitchcock movie on a shelf next to our living-room tv. I noticed that the case for Rear Window was often on the coffee table. The title remains my favorite as it's an every day object and suggests peering in, or looking back on what has passed, or peeping.

A man stares at a girl dancing alone in pink underwear. Hitchcock is making us squirm. Tension rises. Anticipation tingles as she moves her perfect hips, but the delicate rub is not because we want to congress (ok, maybe, but that’s not what drives the scene).

My father had every Hitchcock movie on a shelf next to our living-room tv. I noticed that the case for Rear Window was often on the coffee table. The title remains my favorite as it's common and easy to notice and suggests peering in, or looking back on what has passed, or peeping.

A man stares at a girl dancing alone in pink underwear. Hitchcock is making us squirm. Tension rises. Anticipation tingles as she moves her perfect hips, but the delicate rub is not because we want to congress (ok, maybe, but that’s not what drives the scene).

The real tension is that she’s dancing alone and enjoying herself.

When she dances, she’s alone. Being alone lets her dance. Free play.

But once she notices the man watching her, then her dance will end. Her world will dissolve. Her freedom will end as she is shackled by the hegemony of male awareness. She becomes her tochus. An uninvited set of criteria penetrates and threatens to dress her in false consciousness, which is a form of erasure and distortion, as her true desires will be twisted to conform to leers and needs and insecurities.

Of all the horror that Hitchcock has given us, this brutality is his most horrifying. In some gross scenes a sickle liberates a head (yawn). In this harrowing scene, her free play may be snuffed by a voyeur. Because Hitchcock has skillfully brought us in, we empathize with her, we want to join her, and yet we are taking the POV of the voyeur. Hitchcock has us playing two conflicted roles. I found myself pausing as I want her to be uninhibited, yet my gaze violates her space.

Back to the refrain.

When she dances, she's alone. Being alone lets her dance. The dance is unscripted and free. It looks good because it's natural. I want to join because it lets me forget about who I am. It subverts modern consciousness and the self as a material object — MAKE ME THINK ME (Nauman) — and moves into non-me. It’s the absence of the ego self where I am free in unrealized archetypal forms, the play of an ambiguous signifier in an unfolding moment, not yet strangled in a reductive form.

It’s similar to what I love about babies, the lack of self-awareness and pure sense of play.

Play is a flow state where time passes unobserved.

Nietzsche recognized play in Thus Spake Zarathustra in his parable of the three metamorphoses of the the spirit: the spirit becomes a camel, then a lion, then a child. The camel endures, the lion overcomes, and the child is free to play and explore new meanings and create new values. Play allows us to transcend. “Lo, I teach you the superman,” says our cuddly German coach.

So what about not giving a fuck?

The greatest quest may be to transcend the self and dance uninhibited and without concern for what is around us. This goes against our evolution as tribal people who must appease the utilitarian good of the group. Appeasing the group makes us moral peasants. Our spirits die under the gaze of others. The camel realizes this bleak landscape. The lion thrashes it so the child is free to play. This comes with alienation and without security.

I want the freedom but I don’t want to be alone. I struggle. When people look at me, I immediately think things like — Is my Bells Palsy acting up? Did my eye flutter? Do I look fat? Am I fuckable for you? These and far darker thoughts tie me down and turn me into the groveling moral peasant that I loathe. But for all the lofty talk, I’m not enlightened.

I am free but need you to notice that I don’t care what you think.

So I’m evolving and need a safe space to dance alone. 99% is practice, as they say. I built a lounge in my attic with disco balls, lights, and a stage facing an elaborate velvet curtain. Behind the curtain is a wall. I put on fish-net stockings and a yellow sequin dress and thick wine lipstick and pull my hair into a tight bun. The music comes on and I dance for hours. I cannot define it because it goes beyond language. There are reds, blues, purples, drum beats, sweat drops, tingles, bubbles. The curtain might open and people will cheer. My stomach tingles with anticipation. Sweat beads percolate and roll from sequin to sequin under the rainbow lights and drip on my private stage. A puddle forms on salted rings. I’ve yet to wipe the sweat. Layers of cake in various shades of white and black and green have formed around the edges. Next time you miss a shower, think of me.

Today’s Play list:

Yellow Shark by Zappa
something by John Cage
Ballin’ the Jack, Chris Smith (think Judy Garland & Gene Kelly)
They Caught Us Doin’ It, Hokum Boys
tap dancing section from Gold Diggers of Broadway


until tomorrow

Amber