Thursday, September 28, 2006
Buckle Up the Bible Belt
Girls can wear jeans
And cut their hair short
Wear shirts and boots
'Cause it's okay to be a boy
But for a boy to look like a girl is degrading
'Cause you think that being a girl is degrading
But secretly you'd love to know what it's like
Wouldn't you?
What it feels like for a girl...
-Madonna - What It Feels Like for a Girl
I've had a lovely couple of days.
I took the bus out to Claire's little hideaway in the Bible Belt of B.C. early yesterday morning. I got hardly any sleep the night before because I was absolutely vibrating with excitement. It's a nice little town in some ways, although some of its suburban characteristics like six-lane highways in the middle of downtown and huge malls right across the street from each other made it feel a little alienating. Claire owns her own place, a lovely and roomy condo (so spectacularly clean and girly) that she shares with her little strawberry-blonde dog, who is really as cute as can be and I fell in love with her immediately, even though I'm really not much of a dog person.
Her walls are covered with her paintings, these huge, amazing portraits that I absolutely could not get enough of. She left out all her sketchbooks from high school and college for me to look at while she was at work and I ploughed through all of them, absolutely blown away by these intimate sketches of people she knows, celebrities, and figures of complete imagination. I know it's a terrible cliche, but I want her to paint me.
I'm biased, obviously, and so you can decide for yourself whether she has any talent as an artist. I think she has a real eye for the human form. I just wandered went around her apartment taking photos. The one to your right is a good five feet tall in real life - it's huge - and she's only been working on it for a few weeks. It's as yet still unfinished, and I'm hoping I can gently prod her until she sits down and works on it until it's done, because it is far too beautiful a piece to leave incomplete. Plus, I think watching her paint would be sexy as all hell.
I have the most incredible chemistry with Claire, and while I hesitate to give you details simply because they're private, I will say that we decided to be stunningly mature and hold off on the really crazy stuff until we know each other better. We did spend hours and hours making out like high school kids, and somehow sleeping in her bed felt absolutely natural to me, even though I was sleeping in a strange place for the very first time with a girl I'd known for a mere six days. We shared a pillow, and it felt like the most intimate thing in the world. In short, we connect in a way I wasn't sure was even still possible. Several times in the past few days I've had to sit down and wonder if she's really made me reach my point of no return with girls, because she can do for me in ten seconds what would take a guy an hour, simply because she turns me on so much more.
She loves the cd I made for her, which I find absolutely thrilling. I even got her to like that Mirah song, Cold Cold Water, that no one else seems to get, and Tell Me Does she Love the Bass, by Lesbians on Ecstasy.
She is so breathtakingly beautiful, and she seems to be more so every time I see her. Something about her hair in the sunlight makes my heart do a little dance. We spent last night drinking wine and talking, and I made her dinner before she had to go to work in the evening. She's a real Carrie Bradshaw when it comes to cooking, i.e. she never does it. The girl practically uses her oven for storage. It was almost too easy to impress her with pasta and salad - easiest chef points ever.
Now that I'm home again I miss her. How can this week seem like such a long time to be without her when every week of my life before it has been without her? It's a mystery.
She sent me a text this week about how a married elderly couple she works with were so cute they broke her heart. I wrote back that I didn't want her heart to be broken. She wrote back: "My heart is feeling a lot better since I met you."
Aw.
And now I will go away before I make you all sick to your stomachs.
I just wanted to tell you that I'm happy, and I feel like this is real.
A note on the photos. To your left is an excellent example of a Bible Belt billboard. To the right is an unfinished stripper portrait which I find particularly entertaining. Below right is one of Claire's portraits of Marylin Monroe - that one hangs in her bathroom. And to the left is the girl herself, though that photo doesn't even begin to do her justice.
Time for bed,
-N
