This is Annie. Isn’t she adorable? I love her a lot.
She is wearing a Metallica shirt and is covered in bees. This makes me love her even more.

A golden eagle, little puppet, and globe lamps.

I love this antler lady sculpture. I’m not sure who made it, though! An etsy-seller, I believe.

Doll-babies and a skeleton hand that I’ve seen Annie wear on her head as a fascinator.

More tinies.

I am very covetous of this Balinese headdress that Annie found at the bins for a buck and quarter!
(If you are not a fan of North America’s only marsupial, please do not look at the last photo!)

This is the famous Halloween hat that I adore. I wish she’d wear it all the time.

See also:
Feral Honey
and
Nectarine Dream

From the Ephemerata site:
This Museum exhibition is an earthquake that rends the ground to expose the UNDERGROUND.
A hole opens up, and we are walking down into the damp dark unknown. Descend into our show-cave
through normally hidden strata! Beneath our city is a crowded metropolis of graves, pipes, cables, tunnels,
sewers, and landfills, and as we travel down past the aquifer, a glowing lake of magma! The mysterious
corridors of our subterranean journey branch off into political undergrounds, the subconscious, and the
Underworld — lair of monsters, land of the dead. By spelunking through these passages, we come to learn
that humans are strange creatures like earthworms, ceaselessly dedicated to the circulation of vast undergrounds!
The earthquake of industrialized humans has reversed the strata of land and sky such that what was underground
has become our atmosphere. Please watch your head for low-hanging rocks.

The Museum is open Thursdays (4-7pm) and Saturdays (1-4pm).
We are also open for appointments — call 320-0566
or email mnae@mnae.org for availability.
$4 suggested donation

Beware the wasps at the entrance! Behold their marvelous architecture!

A panoply of stone gnomes are there to greet you when you arrive. I think they might bite.

A new addition to the Ephemerata family has been created this year: baby Kai, who is a player piano virtuoso!
We loaned them the piano a while back for their Wondrous Instruments show, and they’ve very kindly kept it
for us. I fear we’re going to have to figure out what to do with it soon! In keeping with the them for the show,
it plays “There’s a Goldmine in the Sky” – “Take your old time mule / I know you’re growing lame /
You’ll pasture in the stars / When we make that claim” Sad songs for desperate miners!

Enter the crystal cavern – but watch out for the troglodytes!

Some excellent mineral specimens – including the “dubious minerals” – Pyrite, Citrine, and Chrysocolla.

Some Civil War relics, old bones and blood-stained dice. Flotsam buried in ancient battlefields.

We also lent a Tailless whip scorpions from our collection, though I have no photo of the actual article,
the beautifully done guidebook illustrates the beastie. I’m not disturbed by spiders at all, but these guys
are actually quite horrifying to behold! They are extremely intelligent, and have developed brain stems.

The plastic descendent of stereoscopic viewers – a 3-D viewmaster depicting Carlsbad Caverns

In the Impermanent Collection you can view this death-defying feat rendered in ceramic!

Ephemerata Gardens out back are lush and overgrown with sunflowers and fig-trees. A bunny lives there.

As well as some very impressive spiders! Arachnophobes, I apologize for the spider-surplus:
they just seem to keep popping up everywhere I look, and I’ve always seen them as very good omens.

I want to go here very badly! I love caves and their beautiful stone formations so much.
We are lucky to have some really excellent ones here in Texas. Imagine how many are
undiscovered, or on private property? It’s our fantasy to have a subterranean nightclub
one day. We have dreams of excavating under our house and digging down. Oddly enough,
a guy in our neighborhood did just that – this 70 year old man dug 30 feet down below
his house, by hand! Just brought out buckets of dirt, one by one until he had created
three underground levels! Pretty impressive. Now the City is filling it all up with concrete.

“The magnificent underground cave system traditionally called Reed Flute Cave
and known today as the Palace of Natural Art lies beneath the city of Guilin, China,
and is over 750 feet (240 meters) long. The first recorded visits to the cave took place
over 1,000 years ago during China’s Tang Dynasty. Artificial lighting is used to enhance
the stunning rock formations in the cave, which has been officially open for visitors since
1962. One of the largest parts of the cave system is the Crystal Palace of the Dragon King,
which can hold up to 1,000 people and was used as an air raid shelter during World War II.
The grotto features a solitary stalagmite that resembles a human being –
it’s said that a visiting poet attempted to write about the beauty that
greeted his eyes but took so long to find the right words he turned to stone.”

The full set of photos from our Underground tour are up on Flickr: have a look…

Reginald the rooster.

A bevy of peacock feathers from Lone Grove.

This is where I do tarot readings. Would you like to make an appointment?

My favorite hour. I require this light. I arrange my day around it.

Little altar.

Genie, the wild child – made for me by Pandora Gastelum.

Fox bag.

This is who watches over the garden.

✸ Exciting news! The latest issue of Coilhouse is out now:
Coilhouse 05: Let All The Children Boogie is the juiciest, most glam-tastic issue yet,
and I am proud to have a piece on The Last Days of Gadjo Disko
included in those glossy pages! Grab one quick, because the sell
out fast – you can buy online, or at most decent booksellers.

For your daily dose of wonder, I highly recommend developing an
addiction to the blog as well – there’s just so much goodness there!
For the last few months, my life had become almost unmanageably
busy – to the point where I no longer had any time to read all my
favorite blogs. Now that things are a little calmer, I’ve been making
time to go back through some of the great articles I missed, and
was especially taken with these gems. Deliciousness, ahoy:

✸ The Anthropomorphic Glamour of Antoine Helbert

✸ A Decadent Parade of Outrageous Fancies: Alastair

✸ Rachel Brice: Serpentine

✸ Alt/1977: WE ARE NOT TIME TRAVELERS by Alex Varanese
I love this set of re-imagined mp3 players and cell-phones designed
and advertised as it they had been invented in 1977. Reminds me
of the tantalizing technology I used to gaze longingly at in my uncle’s
OMNI magazines! I miss OMNI, man! I’d love to look at some old issues.
Happily, the folks at BoingBoing read my mind! There’s a great post
up with links to some of my favorite covers and more. Too good.
Memories of Omni magazine

✸ I ♡ LadyFag!
StyleLikeU has a great tour of her closet and boudoir.
I think she’s divine, and I’d like to comb her armpit hair
with a painted bone comb and then raid her wardrobe.

✸ Latest booklust and fascination: Hugh Raffles’s “Insectopedia”
He’s an anthropologist who’s exploring our relationships with
the insect world. I have a feeling that reading about his work
might really help me with the revulsion and panic I feel at times
when confronted with particularly nasty bugs. Namely the giant
“palmetto bug” cockroaches that we have down South. They fly.
I am fascinated and delighted by all sorts of other bugs, but there
are some that just make me act like a shrieking child! It’s so silly.
I have a good friend who is an entomologist, and I could pick his
brain for hours about the complex worlds of these creatures.
I love this excerpt from the Times article:
“Insects are all around us. They are the most numerous animals on earth,
yet we pay them scant attention. Few of us attend to their innate beauty.
More often than not, they are seen as pests sent to plague us
(with the notable exception of the now threatened honey bee).
‘We simply cannot find ourselves in these creatures,’ Raffles writes.
‘The more we look, the less we know. They are not like us.
They do not respond to acts of love or mercy or remorse.
It is worse than indifference. It is a deep, dead space
without reciprocity, recognition or redemption.’
[....] Raffles’s entry on “queer” insect sex is more life-affirming,
and comic, sparked off by an image of a butterfly probing the
anus of a rove beetle, ‘just two little animals enjoying a little action . . .
and feeling pretty good about it,’ as Raffles writes, exhorting,
‘We need more queerness!’”
There’s also a great interview with Hugh Raffles here

✸ I recently fell in love with the Texas Invasive Species
website. It’s so well-designed and informative! Yes, I am
aware of my intense dorkness. Honestly, though – it’s so rad.
I mean: Emerald Ash Borers, Raspberry Crazy Ants, Tropical
Soda Apples (which are listed as a Federal Noxious Weed!)
I could spend hours poring over plants and bugs that don’t belong.

✸ Scouting New York is the wonderful photo-blog of a location scout
who has a knack for finding the strangest and most amazing places.
Hidden In An Abandoned Orphanage
The Wizard Of Park Ave
Decapitation at the Ziegfeld

✸ I’ve been contemplating a re-design of my studio,
and have been much inspired by Rebecca Kasner’s
tumblr of inspired rooms. So much to drool over there!

✸ It’s been storming like crazy here this week, and we’ve got lots
of interesting neon-yellow mushrooms cropping up everywhere,
but I wish we had glow-in-the-dark mushrooms like the ones that
are appearing in Japan! I bet the kodamas sit on those.

✸ A Journey Round My Skull never ceases to captivate me with obscure prints
and illustrations. Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy is an incredible series
of prints of Chinese opera make-up. They are so fantastic, do go see them all!

♥ I can’t get over these pearblossoms. Giant fluffy snowball trees exploding
all over town. I wish they had a nicer scent – our smells kind of awful, but
aren’t they heart-stoppingly lovely? I hope we’ll have pears this year, the
last few seasons it’s been the birds or passersby on the street who’ve
nabbed them. Oh, what I wouldn’t do for a homegrown Poire Belle Hélène!

♥ Advanced Style
This is such a fantastic fashion blog. Sometimes I think that the only people
who really know how to dress with real joie de vivre are the very young
(Here’s lookin’ at you, Tavi!) or the silver foxes. I know I plan on being the
most outrageously well-dressed granny ever. No sweatsuits for me- not now, or ever!
(Thanks you for this, Mlle. Amelia!)

♥ On that note, I know probably everybody’s seen this already, but
LY is a great style hero of mine, and this peek into her marvelous home
and collections of dollies and toys is just priceless. I want to go there for tea!
Lynn Yaeger on a Lifetime of Collecting

♥ This made me happy: today, we operate on objects from girlwonder
(Thanks for the link, to Mr. Warren Ellis.)

♥ Michael Bay to remake Rosemary’s Baby. Really? What a travesty.
I can’t think of anyone less qualified to do it justice.
I rarely am pleased by remakes of any films, although
I must say that we watched Alexandre Aja’s version of
The Hills Have Eyes, the other night, and were very,
very impressed. It’s seriously grim, but quite well done.

♥ If you’re an aspiring photographer, read this
and become part of the solution, not the problem:
For Photographers, the Image of a Shrinking Path
(Clayton Cubitt, on a recent article in the NYTimes)

♥ Stunning images of sleeping insects festooned in dewdrop diadems
(By an aspiring photographer – I wonder if he was paid for them?)

♥ On The Road With Dark Dark Dark Here’s a great playlist from Marshall
+ Nona + company. We got to see them again during SXSW,
and they were wondrous. They’re on tour, so see them if they
come your way – and get that new album, it’s so sublime.

So, something bad happened this past fall when I was recovering
from surgery. I developed a nasty habit. Not as bad as, say, crack-
but similar. I started watching Lost. Yeah, it’s true. You see, I don’t
have a television (I’ve never owned one, and never intend to) but
now you can watch these things on the internets, and that is very
dangerous indeed. While I was laid up in bed, I wanted to watch
something very absorbing, slightly supernatural and not funny
(because laughing with stitches in your belly is no good) and
somehow we ended up getting totally hooked. Two months later,
we’d made it through five seasons. Horrifying, I know. It’s like I
said: crack cocaine. If you’ve never seen it, then take my advice:
don’t. Not unless you are also laid up and high on darvocet
like I was. That being said, I am relatively unashamed of my
bad habit- especially since it’s very nearly over and done with.
Now we go to the Alamo Drafthouse every other week and watch
it with a bunch of other dorks (some who show up in Dharma
Iniative jumpsuits. Yes, really.) So, if you’re similarly addicted,
you will definitely appreciate the wonderful LOST Underground
Art Show that Mister Ales Kot alerted me to recently.
Great stuff. A few of my favorites are below:

Ben Strawn
“The Number 108″
acrylic on plexiglass, layered

Leontine Greenberg
“Smokey In Disguise”
watercolor, pencil and gouache on paper

Chris Ryniak
“Circle Of Ash”
acrylic on panel

It’s interesting to think about art being inspired
by something as banal as a television show, but
why not? Being a latch-key kid, I was largely baby-sat
by the television (and large stacks of true ghost stories
and books about the paranormal- not great for reading
when you’re eight and at home all alone!) and I remember
being hypnotized by it for hours and hours, and how tired
and sad I would feel afterwards. The commercials always
made me hungry and angry. So I’ve tried to shun it for a long
time. Kind of ironic, considering that my grandfather was a pioneer
in that world (he produced and directed the first televised operas,
as well as the first science fiction television show, Captain Video.)
I was just reading Rachael Gibson’s (Fur Coat, No Knickers)
confession about her obsession with The Tribe. Oddly enough,
I caught a few episodes of The Tribe when my grampa and I
were traveling though Europe. I think maybe we were in Spain?
I remember being totally captivated by this weird show about
raver-goth kids living in a post-apocalyptic shopping mall.
Now, thanks to the magic of the youtubes, I can see what it
was all about! Oh dear. Someone stop me, please.

Related posts:
☛ Fruit + Flower
☛ All The World is Green
☛ Strange Season
☛ Avgvstvs I.

These carved wooden hands are from the collection of my friend and
employer, Mr. Steve Wiman. We look forward to the Uncommon Objects
Christmas party all year long – it’s always so much fun, and there are so
many gorgeous things (and people) to peer at! We have been
attending lots of fun holiday parties – some tranquil, and some raucous,
but all full of convivial camaraderie and good cheer. We had an orphan
hexmas eve gathering for our friends Faith Delphi and Lex Land, who very
nearly share a birthday (the 24th and the 25th, respectively! So many hexmas
babies! Why, Chadling of Mon Petit Fantome has one today!
Capricorns, unite! All of these are musicians, as well!
Oh yes, and there’s also Patience Meliora, Hollybella and probably
a lot of others I’m forgetting right now. So many of my favorite people
are Capricorns, or earth-signs. Is that vain, or just a case of like attracting like?
Regardless, all hexmas-birthday darlings deserve extra special love
on their whelping day since they can get kind of shafted as far as celebrating
sans immediate family goes – so if you know one, give them lots of kisses!

Is this not the creepiest Santa ever? Well, maybe not if you go peruse
Santa, NO! (The Tumblr Experience), but beware – don’t get lost in the evil santa vortex!

(Photographer unknown to me – if it’s yours, or you know who took this one, do let me know! )

I’ve adopted the fly-agaric, or Amanita muscaria mushroom
as my official hexmas motif, and I’ve gone a bit crazy finding
wee amanita decorations to festoon my world. I also got my
sweetheart a copy of Shroom: A Cultural History of the Magic
Mushroom, by Andy Letcher, which I can’t wait to swipe from him and read!
It apparently disputes the treatise of John M. Allegro’s
The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross, which I nabbed
from my papa’s bookshelf when I was 14 (sorry Dad!)

The evidence. This year we got a real live tree – a potted
perfume cedar. Very exciting! I wonder if we ought to plant it
or leave it in the pot for next year? Anyone had experience with these?

I really wanted a Bûche de Noël covered in mushrooms this year,
but I arrived at the bakery too late! All gone to early birds, alas.

We made it through the holiday with only one major mishap, but it was
a pretty awful one. We came home the night of the 23rd, after a very long
day to discover that the evil kitties had knocked down our lovely tree,
and smashed many of my mama’s beloved spun glass ornaments.
I totally flipped out. Worst hexmas nightmare ever! Those delicate
things so precious, and to see them shattered on the ground was
so painful. I miss my mom a lot at this time of year, and enacting
wee tannenbaum rituals is a way for me to connect with her memory.
Luckily, my love is a hero. He swept up all the pieces, and put them
in a jar for me to keep, and re-instated the tree – securing it to the wall
and ceiling with twine! He really saved the day. I love him so!

Speaking of ornaments, every year at the Uncommon Objects
Christmas party, it’s a tradition to create an ornament on a theme:
this year’s was recovery – very apt for me! Mine is the gold
thread- wrapped sweetgum seed with the poppy pod sprout.

Here are the perpetrators of the tree debacle. Bad brothers.
Anyone want a couple of very ill-behaved felines?

Clearly, they need to start livin’ by this edict.
This is one of my favorite things at the Wiman’s house -
and I think it’s very good advice indeed.
DO RIGHT AND FEAR NOT, y’all!

One day, when I have a functioning oven, I’m going to be a holiday cookie
makin’ demon! It’s one of my favorite things to do! Mostly the decorating
part! How do you like my blue stars and uterus lady? Red hots for ovaries!

Oh and also, just so you know – the holidays are a time to dress your
animal friends up in your clothes. I think Grrizelda looks pretty perfect
in my sweater, don’t you? I would give it to her, but she keeps trying to eat it.

A very Siouxsie Christmas to you! I love it when she says her favorite
things about this season are the colors and the fairy-lights.
She’s so elegant, even when being pelted by plastic snow
and harangued by morons. I really wish she would adopt me.

I hope your holiday was very merry, warm + bright!
Mine was really perfect – golden and filled with good company,
songs around bonfires and pianos and a wealth of delicious
delectables (tamales, tortilla soup and queso! Hell yes, Texas Hexmas!)
I am feeling super content at the moment, and I am sending sincere
wishes that you and yours are as well – if you have some time to relax
here are some tidbits for you to peruse:
♥ More photos from this year’s Hexmas
♥ Tinsel Tales: NPR Christmas Stories
♥ Verhext’s Tinsel & Diamonds
♥ Gala’s current bevy of links + delight + magic will keep you busy
and amused even through the thickest blizzard, go peek!

& from days of yore:
♥ Happy Hexmas!
♥ Imps of Winter
♥ The Last of Winter
♥ send me your flowers of your december

Savage Lipstick, baby. Wicked red. Isn’t this just the best? J’adore.

Oh pink cupcake of death, your edible glitter was so alluring,
and yet – you were not so tasty! I could only eat half, and to my
way of thinking, there’s not much sadder than a half eaten cupcake.
A cupcake should be something you gobble up, and then immediately
start wishing for another. The cupcake glut has left us awash in inferior
specimens – but I ask you, how the hell do you screw up a cupcake?
It’s not that complicated, so when you have a bad one, it really
seems like a travesty. I’d rather have pie, honestly. Thoughts?

This beautiful embroidery on sheer lace panels made us think
of Miss Dawn from Boudoir Queen – expect to see it transformed into
a gown or fantastic bit of frippery soon, unless of course it’s gracing
the walls or windows of her legendary boudoir, eh? Ooh-la-la!

Pink stars + glad tidings to you, kittens.

Merrie, merrie! Yet another year that I for the most part totally neglect
to send out any sort of holiday cards – though I do have some now!
Ah, next year! I am really endeavoring to not neglect my correspondence
in the coming turning. Stamps, sealing wax, stationary ahoy!
I love letters, and all the accompanying accoutrements,
and I love receiving mail more than almost anything.
I was instructed in my youth that if I wanted to get mail,
I’d have to send some, and that is very true advice indeed.

What a pretty and demure (though very stained!) little belle.
I’d like to see the Gibson Girl hairstyle come back into vogue sometime.

I could not believe my eyes when I saw this Victorian blouse
covered in laceworked swastikas. I knew at once that it had
to be mine! Here it hangs in my studio, where the sun is
probably going to dry-rot it – but it looks so lovely in silhouette!

In the 1900′s (and for about 3000 years before that)
the swastika was good luck symbol used all over the world.
It’s sad and strange to me to think of how symbols and sigils
can hold so much power, and how they can be perverted
and changed to mean something quite opposite.
A lot of my recent work concerns transitive meanings,
and this delicate blouse is a good reminder of that.
By the by, my lineage and personal political views
are about as distasteful to the Third Reich as a soul
could get. Had I lived during the Holocaust, my jacket
would be covered in so many various star and triangle
patches they would have run out of room. Very glad
I live in the time I do. There are some interesting articles
about the swastika symbol out there: Wikipedia’s of
course is very thorough, and Lucky Mojo has some
great images of Victorian postcards and beadwork.
One time we had an old bottle of Swastika brand
whiskey in the store. It attracted a lot of questions,
until one day someone ripped the label off.

Grrizelda chewed my bra in half. Who could be mad at
that face for long, though? I think she did it intentionally,
as if to say, “Dang, mama! Your draws are pitiful!
Man oh man, do you need some new lingerie!”
My underthings are in a sad state of affairs.
Obviously, I’d love to have nothing but Agent Provocateur
and Kiki de Montparnasse, or especially the delicious
frippery from Hopeless Hotel, oh wouldn’t I just?
My drawers-drawer needs a makeover, people.
Send me frilly things, toute-suite! For real.
I was raised by my dad, and am not a busty lady
so I never went bra shopping until I was an adult.
I can actually still fit in my first bra ever!
I still have it! Crazy. I think I need some sort of
intervention. Is there an underwear makeover
show out there for me? Oh dear, I bet there is.

(p.s. I just noticed that the formatting on the
following photos is wonked, but if you click
on the title or comments, you can see them
nice and big and not all squashed, okay?)

Ghosts of Shopping Past
(Photograph by Brian Ulrich)

Driving down the highway recently, we were having
a conversation about the death of the shopping mall,
about our early memories of seeing the first outdated
dinosaurs succumb to desolation, and now the mega-
malls go too. Fluorescent lit juggernauts of excess,
crumbling into disrepair, wishing wells moldering,
atriums and kiosks all abandoned. It’s interesting.

Remember this? I can’t say I’ll be missing the
food court, or the shops – I honestly haven’t really
been in a mall in years, save emergency in-outs
to the Apple store that end in me being hustled out
of Sephora by my fella, who hates being in malls
even more than me. Way more, actually.
So what will become of these hulking behemoths?
Disintegration or re-purposing? It’s hard to say.

(This and the following photograph, both by Palani Mohan)

Mr. Saturnic is always a great source of
incredible photography spreads, I was
swooning over Palani Mohan’s
Vivid – Colours of Asia series he posted over there.

Out of them all, she is my favorite.
I wish I could hop inside the frame,
and be her friend. I would already
speak Tibetan, and be perfectly
acclimated to thin air, and dressed
warmly. Out to milk the mountain
goats and welcome home the
honey hunters! One day.

✷ Stoat uses hypnotic weasel war dance.

✷ Making Ferrofluids work for you!

✷ Jewelled butterflies and cephalopods
from John Coulthart’s Feuilleton

✷ Coilhouse Issue 04 is coming out soon -
I cannot wait! In the meantime though,
check out all the intriguing small businesses
that have taken out ads (especially excellent
if you are still hunting for last minute treats
like I am…) there’s a lot there to pique + delight.

✷ One last thing from the lovely
Joanna Ebenstein at Morbid Anatomy
My New Favorite Magazine : Lapham’s Quarterly
I must get my paws on a copy, soonly!

Especially when the first one was this disembodied, burnt
human hand delivered to me in a fancy marshmallow box!
Just what I always wanted! No, really – it’s true. I’m thinking
this guy was part of a medical model, judging from the
articulating spring and wires and such. Lots of those floating
around New Orleans, from whence this one came – hand
delivered by flame-haired courier, a gift from the illustrious
and beautiful Miss Nina Carolina! What a sweetheart!

Right after that, another wee giftie was delivered!
Yes, it’s a keychain from Dollywood with my name on it,
so killer. I adore Dolly Parton extremely, and one of
my lifelong dreams is to get to Dollywood sometime real soon.
My friend LuCretia went there, and how cool is she for
remembering me? I jumped up and down and squealed
and did a happy dance. If you’re in Austin, go check out
LuCretia’s bad-ass vintage store Room Service on North Loop!

Let the lustful coveting commence with this latest addition
to the very top of my good-girl wishlist: a big black rooster!
We’ve been making lots of naughty jokes about this guy,
which I won’t repeat here – in the interest of good taste, ha!

I’ve been obsessing over this folk carved shelf for a long time.
Of course, the picture doesn’t even begin to do it justice,
but you can make out the deer and the squirrels –
and at the top? Angels with trumpets. Yeah, that’s right.
This thing really needs to be mine. It’s so perfect.

I collect paraphernalia from the Order of the Eastern Star,
and I’d have to say that this giant lit up sign is the crown jewel
of any Eastern Star collection I’ve ever come across.
It’s hand-painted with flowers and arcane symbols,
and it kind of needs to live in my parlour. One day!

These guys are just creepy. I don’t want them at all, but I can’t
stop looking at them. Clowns really are disturbing (I know lots
of them, so I can say this from first-hand experience) and that
chubble head is just hilarious. Hilariously creepy! Yay.

I love these wonderful string stars. There’s quite a few of them
in the shop right now. I just went to see The Road (so amazing,
and brutal), and something about this man’s face reminds me
of an amalgam of some of the faces in that film. I loved the book,
and I thought they did a fantastic job converting in into film.

Look at this little lady, with her dirty, dour face. I love her
pensive, almost mischievous expression. How’d you get
so filthy, little boudoir doll? Somehow, I must resist her!

The eye imagery on Oddfellows gear always gets me.
Eyes, the heart in the hand, and the beehive are really
powerful symbols for me. The linked chain is great too,
symbolizing the FLT of friendship, love and truth.
This embroidery popping out against black velvet is
so strong. This tunic will be on a plane to Tokyo
soon enough, no doubt – the Japanese vintage buyers
always snap these up lickety-split. They make great
winter coats, if you wear them backwards, I find.
What are you coveting right now?
Have you been good this year?
I certainly hope so!

I became friendly with the ghosts of 807 Esplanade
not long after I moved into the building. The house
held so much history, it would seem strange if it
weren’t haunted at least by a few souls. The place
was huge, and there was some heavy energy
out back by the the former slave quarter apartments
where the drunks and dealers and recluses made
their sad lairs in little garrets connected by a very
rickety and dangerous wooden staircase. The whole
place was falling apart, long neglected by the owners.
I originally moved into the tower, alone at age 20,
a new resident of New Orleans. One night, my neighbor
who had lived in her apartment for years decided she’d
finally had it with pieces of the ceiling falling in, and
trying to raise her little daughter, Aurelia, in such an
unsafe house. She stormed out in a screaming fury,
and I ended up moving into her much larger and grander
apartment on the third floor. Two balconies, a clawfoot
tub, a gorgeous chandelier and two Italian Carrera marble
fireplaces (outfitted with freaky, fire-spitting gas heaters).

(Photographer known, but I’m afraid I’ve forgotten his name!)

The ceilings were 15 feet tall, and there were leaks in
every room when it rained, which it did nearly every afternoon.
We were plagued with rats, mice, giant flying cockroaches,
stinging caterpillars, noisy drunks from Bourbon St., and
general decay – but none of that mattered at all. In fact,
none of the hard things about living in New Orleans
really affected me, as long as I was living in that marvelous mansion.
We called it “Crumblydown Manor” or “Bramblebee Estates”
but mostly I called it the “We Have Always Lived in the Castle Castle”,
because it reminded me of something out of a Shirley Jackson story.
It was the ultimate in Southern Gothic dilapidated opulence,
and I felt like a queen surveying the hoi polloi, hidden behind
massive oaks on the balcony overlooking the neutral ground.
I still feel like it’s my house, and I always will. I go there in my
dreams all the time. I can’t even begin to tell you how much I miss it.

This is where I would lock up my bicycle every day. (Photographer unknown)

Alas, I digress! On to the ghosts – they mostly congregated in the stairwell,
playing little tricks on the other neighbors, and making mischief.
I felt quite a few presences there, and I felt that there was something
about the liminal space of the staircase, the landings and the halls
that kept them there. I would generally greet them warmly and politely
when climbing up or down the three flights as I did several times a day.
They repaid me for my good manners by saving my life on more occasions
then I can count. I am not the most coordinated lady, and was frequently
in ridiculously tall heels and often quite inebriated. I was constantly
taking a misstep on the steep stairs and nearly toppling to my death,
but somehow- it never happened. I would trip, and start to fall backwards-
that horrible, slow-motion slant backwards, arms wheeling, a slave to gravity
preparing for the worst until I would feel hands on my back pushing me forward
and back up onto the step. Sweating and gasping, I would thank them profusely.
Lucky for klutzy me, to have such kind and watchful ghosts looking out for me, eh?

(Photographer unknown – Melissa G., are these yours perchance?)

One afternoon, I was locking my bicycle up to the big mahogany post
at the base of the stairs. As I bent over to attach the lock, I felt someone
standing near me, and I glanced to the side expecting to see a neighbor.
Our of my peripheral vision, I saw a man standing there, wearing an olive
green wool army uniform, I reckon 1940′s WWII era. He was solemn and
sad seeming, standing there very straight, almost at attention. His hair
was blond, and curled over his forehead, looking almost marcelled.
Blue eyes. I think he wanted something. I think he wanted help finding
the way out, or just desired company. I only saw him that once, and it
was so short. As soon as I turned my head to look at him head on,
he was gone. I sensed him lots of times after that, though. His energy
reminded me of one of my favorite descriptions from the His Dark Materials
Trilogy, by Phillip Pullman:

“How much easier if his dæmon had been visible!
She wondered what its form might be,
and whether it was fixed yet.
Whatever its form was, it would express a nature
that was savage, and courteous, and unhappy.”

(Photographer unknown)

It was not too long after that that my friend Miss Carrin
came to visit. After her first night staying with us, she
informed me that our house was haunted. I was shocked to
find out that the ghosts had crossed the threshold! They
generally were very respectful, and stayed to the stairs
and the landings. She was drifting off to sleep, when
she suddenly sensed someone standing over her.
She opened her eyes to see a man staring down
at her lying there. He disappeared after a moment,
but not before she got a good look at him. I asked her
to describe the man she saw, and she told me that he
was wearing some kind of greenish uniform or suit,
and had blond wavy hair. I had not told her anything
of the ghost I had seen prior to this. A while later, a
guest told me that something in that room had kicked
him in the ribs while he slept. Perhaps the blond man
took a disliking to him, or maybe it was some other
mischievous phantom. I wonder how that soldier is
these days- if he’s crossed through, or if he’s made
any news friends. I imagine him still heartbroken,
searching. Maybe angry that I’m not there, and
making trouble for the filmmakers that are renovating
my old home and turning it into a production studio.

This is the house a long, long time ago.
When the turrets were still in place, and the
oaks and ivy had not yet sprung up to clothe
her bare and sienna-stained edifice. Nary
a single tree in what I knew as a somewhat dank
and shady leaf-clogged courtyard. Dirt roads
and women all in white, men all in black.

To know what my room looked like, and
to know the story of the terrible things that
happened after, when everyone who lived
there was given the boot, and the house
was desecrated, please see: Mutatis Mutandis

I also advise you to find out what happened
after that, to know more about the angry ghosts,
do read: Ghost Story – it’s quite creepy.
I still can hardly believe it. So strange.

☛ Some recent photos of the house from Gairid.

☛ What is the history of 807 Esplanade Avenue?
- from Blake Ponchartrain at The Gambit

☛ Tod Seelie’s photos of our mutual friends and various stompin’ grounds
in New Orleans are truly magic. He’s damn good, and his pictures
make my heart feel funny. Longing, and laughing.
Especially check out his post from the The Day Of The Dead
parade and Viking funeral for Colby – they are breathtaking.
DRAGGIN’ SOMEDAY OUT TO SEA
and a perfect visual explanation for me,
of what it means, to miss New Orleans:
NEVER SANG A LOVE SONG, NEVER OWNED A CAR

☛ Details of cornices and murals from the house,
in a book I want very much: New Orleans Architecture Volume 4:
The Creole Faubourgs – By Roulhac Toledano & Mary Louise Christovich

☛ More news about the renovations.