Tyler Yoder's Blog, page 8

Post the Sixteenth: In Which I Describe My Ideal Date

In a dark-lit corner of the bar I sit, Gentle Reader, staring into the middle distance, nursing a Gimlet; from time to time, I’ll bend to my open notebook and jot something down. Not poetry, as such, at this stage – just a scribbled portrait of passers-by. As I lay down my pen to step outside for a brief cigarette, an impossibly beautiful young man will approach. He’s dark-haired, scrawny, scruffy, and shy – and insists that he’d like to get to know me better. I demure, and he pursues, until I’m sure it’s him and not the liquor talking. We exchange numbers, and I step outside for that cigarette.

We’ll have talked incessantly all week, ignoring all that wait-three-days nonsense that conventional advice decrees, further confirming what he claims to be true. On the appointed day, we’ll meet again at the bar where we met; we’ll wander around downtown enjoying a singularly sunny afternoon amongst the public art and little shops. Eventually, we’ll stop for supper at a fascinating little restaurant where they know one or both of us, and perhaps stop for a cocktail back at our favorite bar.

Where else would I be talking about? Please.

At this point, he’ll bring up that he’s gotten word of a private poetry reading someplace – would I like to go?�� – or else there’s a new art exhibition downtown, or a play or a musical or a symphony – and he’s got tickets. We’ll attend; the sheer beauty will make him cry for love of Art. At that moment, overcome by his passion, I’ll grip his shoulders – he’ll look up at me questioningly – and I’ll ask if I may kiss him. Sparks, naturally, will fly.

A dramatic re-enactment

Then we’ll go back to his, Gentle Reader, and you need read no more��about��that.

Except that it isn’t what you think – we’ll curl up on the sofa, amidst copious bottles of wine, and recite poetry at one another – I declaim charmingly. I’ll punctuate the sorrow of The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock with amorous intent, and the juxtaposition will light up his eyes. He’ll call out To Amarantha, That She May Dishevel Her Hair while running his fingers through mine. Finally, we’ll recite Cooleridge’s Kublai Khan together, going faster and faster, alternating stanzas until we rhythmically finish in perfect unison. Another glass of wine, perhaps, and then one of us will fall asleep in the other’s arms.

The next morning, we’ll be lying awake, intertwined, and he’ll start singing – The Bed Song, by Amanda Palmer, perhaps. I’ll be enchanted, all over again, and join in on the bits where I know the words. Surprisingly, our voices are both of such timbres that we harmonize well, and that will be proof positive that I’ve found true romance.

Happy Valentine’s Day, Gentle Reader!

Tagged: Dream Date, Ideal Dates, Poetry Reading, Romance, Romantic Fantasies, The Mix, Valentines Day

Post the Fifteenth: Valentines! For You!

It’s a tradition here, Gentle Reader, that I make heartfelt Valentines for you to share with your loved one. Unfortunately, my love-life and my sense of humor tend to render them suitable only for select audiences. Be warned, Gentle Reader, that some of these Valentines might not be quite the thing.

Bearing that in mind, Gentle Reader, I love you! I’m so glad that you’re mine, this St. Valentine’s Day!

A little taxidermy? Well, that’s not so bad!

I don’t know the original source for this dead-eyed crocheted monstrosity, but I sure do enjoy it.

And our love is explosive.

Sexy!

 

Tagged: 'Til Death Do Us Part, Baby Louis, Bee Beard, Centaur of my Universe, Creepy Valentines, Crocheted Baby Valentine, Gay Where's Waldo, Hindenburg Valentine, Silly Valentines, Taxidermy Fox Valentine, To Wake Up Gay In The Morning, Valentines

Poetic Interlude XCV

Lydia Gisborne

By Patrick Branwell Bront��

On Ouse’s grassy banks – last Whitsuntide,

I sat, with fears and pleasures, in my soul

Commingled, as ‘it roamed without control,’

O’er present hours and through a future wide

Where love, me thought, should keep, my heart beside

Her, whose own prison home I looked upon:

But, as I looked, descended summer’s sun,

And did not its descent my hopes deride?

The sky though blue was soon to change to grey -

I, on that day, next year must own no smile -

And as those waves, to Humber far away,

Were gliding – so, though that hour might beguile

My Hopes, they too, to woe’s far deeper sea,

Rolled past the shores of Joy’s now dim and distant isle.

Tagged: Lydia Gisborne, Patrick Branwell Bronte, Poetic Interludes, Poetry

Post the Fourteenth: In Which I Am Pierced

Piercing is so edgy, isn’t it? Gentle Reader, I’ll have you know that the last time I got anything pierced I was freshly sixteen, and I got an emerald stud in each ear. When I put this item on The List��I had an idea of what I wanted to do with it – I’m not very punk, you know.

When Miss Heidi said she was going to Claire’s to get some extra holes put in her ears in preparation for her wedding, I was all in.

The Task:

Pierce Something Unnecessary.

The Execution:

We decided on Wednesday that we’d go get pierced on Friday – that is, payday for both of us. The day came; that day at work was utterly atrocious – everything that could go wrong��did��go wrong. Naturally. Still, we both held it together, periodically reminding one another that��WE’RE GETTING PIERCED AFTER WORK!��

We finally got to drive out to the Mall so that we could go to Claire’s! Yep – on the inside, we’re 16-year-old girls.

We went first to Icing, so that we could peruse all the jewelry that we wanted to eventually get for the soon-to-be holes in our faces. It was on the opposite end of the mall from Claire’s, which turned out to be dangerous. You see, we went the Friday before Martin Luther King Jr. Day, so there were lots of sales. Further, we were at the Silverdale Mall – which, Gentle Reader, sees a lot of turnover. Forever 21 had markdowns up to 70% – and A��ropostale was up to 90%, and selling the fixtures. We were both on a budget, and it took a lot of fortitude to pass up some of those deals – we both get flighty and bad with money when we’re in the grocery store, let alone when presented with��terribly cute things we’ll never wear.

It was a trial, but we walked past all the shops, telling ourselves we’d get pierced and then reassess our finances.

Now, if it wasn’t clear by the fact we were going to Claire’s, my vision was of my ears – I wanted my original piercing for dangly earrings, while the four planned new piercings going up the interior of my ear would be four pristine pearl studs. Eventually, eventually.

Like this, but classier.

Heidi went under the gun first – one of my piercings was to be in my cartilage, and the specialist was on her break. ��She was a little nervous –

- but a swift pair of pinches, and it was over. Just one more set to do, my dear!

Then it was my turn. It had been many, many years since I’d had anything done, but I was beaming.

And then it was done. Easy-peasy, right?

I instantly felt, like, 20% cooler.

The Verdict:

For three days, I was so thrilled. It looked great, and would look better yet when I’d gotten the next set done, and best of all when I could swap them out for my imagined pearls – but after the third day, I went back to work. I don’t know if I tore something in my sleep, or if the ear protection that we have to wear was just aggravating them, or if I had a slow reaction to the cheap-ass studs I’d gotten – but my ear was sore all day. When I got home, it wasn’t swollen, or looking bad – but by eight or nine that night it had swollen up so much that the top piercing was pinched tight, embedded in my upper ear. I had to pull it – and the piercing stud flew out from the pressure when I took the back off. The pain stopped, so I left the lower one in and went to bed; the swelling hadn’t stopped by noon the next day, so while it wasn’t painful, I pulled the lower one as well.

Would I do this again? Fuck yes. I want those pearl studs all up my ear. I guess I’ll just have to wait for a bit until I can afford four gold studs, is all – assuming my ear returns to its original shape.

Or else this is my future.

 

Tagged: Battered Dreams, Failed Experiments, Pearl Studs All Up The Ear, Piercings, Punk Life, Trying New Things, Twenty Percent Cooler, Unutterably Butch

Post the Thirteenth: In Which I Trace My Family Tree

While I would love ��to claim that I’ve traced my ancestry to a microbe of Pre-Adamite descent, it’s just not true, Gentle Reader. I can merely��trace my family, father-to-son, to 1200 A. D. I would say for an American – or indeed, any non-nobleman whose genealogies are a matter of legislation – that’s pretty damned impressive.

The Ur-Yoder, ladies, gentlemen, and distinguished non-binaries.

But there’s a lot of time and distance between me and he, you know. How did I find him? Well, I set out to accomplish one of the tasks on The List.

The Task:��

Plot Out My Actual Family Tree

��The Execution:

I’d had great luck with Ancestry.com years before, so I wasted no time and went there straightaway. I signed up for a two-week free trial, fully intending to cancel the service within a few days. I knew the names up through my great-grandparents, but I didn’t know anyone’s dates of birth or death – I only had some vague guesses.

What I Knew

I shouldn’t have worried; the service quickly found census records, and birth and death certificates, and obituaries, and corrected the hell out of the dates. It also swiftly offered suggestions for records to dig through, listing parents, siblings, other spouses! We were off!

I learned a lot from searching the past. For instance, I’m thoroughly convinced that the Yoder line came to America in the belly of a pregnant teenager – the father of the baby died in 1699, and never came to America, where his son was born in 1700. Hmmm.

Also, Anglicized spellings!

After we arrived in America in 1700, the Yoders proceeded to have around twenty children each. We are *the* cornerstone of the Amish community, since there’s so damned many of us. But I’d already known that – what I��didn’t think about were the implications of small towns full of cousins. Intermarriage is a thing, and not that uncommon, I guess. One woman, My sixth-great grandmother (twice over) Barbara, appears twice with different husbands in my family tree, presumably so that her grandchildren could marry and have beautifully inbred babies.

One’s in all caps because I was getting frustrated and confused. She also married another Yoder cousin at a later point, but I’m not really related to them. Well, not at this point in the tree. IT’S SUPER COMPLICATED, YOU GUYS.

A word on the name Yost, or Jost – it’s a really common name in my direct family line. The last Yost – my grandfather’s grandfather’s grandfather (that is, my 4th-great-grandpa) was not quite crippled, and was known throughout town as “Lame Yost” – presumably to distinguish him from all the other Yosts in the vicinity. I should note that for several generations, Yost Yoder was considered a perfectly ordinary name to have, apparently.

Not that normal names were ever really our thing. As I mentioned over on Facebook, there’s a lot of Casper/Gaspar/Caspars going on in the far reaches of my family. Imagine my delight when I discovered a Melchior and a Balthazar – THOSE ARE THE THREE WISE MEN’S NAMES, YOU GUYS. You know, like in the Christmas song?

Actually, there are several other Melchiors, too. But only the one Balthasar.

The Verdict:

I’m so glad that I traced my direct line – but after the confusing cousin/remarriage nonsense, I was ready to throttle those long-dead so-and-so’s – so I didn’t follow up on the other branches of the family. Another time, perhaps – but my free trial’s over and I’m not about to do all that work from scratch again.

Tagged: Family History, Family Research, Family Stories That Are Completely True, Family Tree, Finding My Roots, Genealogy, Melchior, Switzerland!, Three Wise Men, Yoders

Poetic Interlude XCIV

Are You Drinking?

By Charles Bukowski

washed-up, on shore, the old yellow notebook

����out again

����I write from the bed

����as I did last

����year.

����will see the doctor,

����Monday.

����“yes, doctor, weak legs, vertigo, head-

����aches and my back

����hurts.”

����“are you drinking?” he will ask.

����“are you getting your

exercise, your

����vitamins?”

����I think that I am just ill

����with life, the same stale yet

����fluctuating

����factors.

����even at the track

����I watch the horses run by

����and it seems

����meaningless.

����I leave early after buying tickets on the

����remaining races.

����“taking off?” asks the motel

����clerk.

����“yes, it’s boring,”

����I tell him.

����“If you think it’s boring

����out there,” he tells me, “you oughta be

����back here.”

����so here I am

����propped up against my pillows

����again

����just an old guy

����just an old writer

����with a yellow

����notebook.

����something is

����walking across the

����floor

����toward

����me.

����oh, it’s just

����my cat

����this

����time.

Tagged: Are You Drinking?, Charles Bukowski, Poetic Interludes, Poetry

Post the Twelfth: In Which We Find Borscht and Opulence

If one starts bandying the words “Opulent” and “Queer” and “Empire” – Gentle Reader, it’s a forgone conclusion that I’m going to start salivating. Those are not terms that I take lightly. There may or may not be a monthly event that I believed to be firmly centered on just those ideas, and it was with deep regret that I had to decline my first invitation. When Ms. Capere invited me to the next, I began scouring the photographs of prior events, searching for inspiration. After all – what was I to wear?

We had hoped to attend with our dear Mr. Darling, and stay at his fabulous new apartment after the fact. At the eleventh hour, he was called to Canada, and we sought other accommodation. Enter my Auntie and Uncle Stone – an amazing couple who I dearly love. Despite everything happening at the last minute, they welcomed us with open arms.

I arrived long before Capere, and caught up with the relations. As you’ll recall, their home is ridiculously beautifully decorated; since I’d last visited, the Tiki bar had been moved to dominate the front room, along with all the accoutrements. Nobody makes cocktails like my Uncle Gwydion – he’s a distiller, after all. Actually, his new gin – Foxtrot – should be on shelves this week! It’s very exciting.

Stone and Szilard Distilling

Ms. Capere showed up, and joined us in a cocktail – and also, serendipitously, a List Item. The Stones had made borscht!

The Task: Try Borscht

The Execution: Uncle Gwyd had made Ukranian-style borscht, modified from a recipe from a restaurant he used to work at. Rather than just a broth, it contained chunks of beet, beef, carrot, and dumplings. Auntie Trin told us about various other styles of borscht; it’s a very local kind of thing, with each region having its own style. It was utterly delicious, and not at all what I’d expected – I anticipated something much more sour, more vinegary – and it was a wonderful coincidence that they’d happened to make it. Full marks, all around.

Thank you for dinner, and for letting us stay, Uncle Gwydion and Auntie Trinity! You’re sublime.

The Verdict: Absolutement. I plan on asking Uncle for the recipe. It was delish!

After supper, Ms. Capere and I chatted some more with the Stones, and it turns out they have mutual acquaintances, which was a delightful surprise. It grew late, and if we were to make it to the event, we needed to get ready. Auntie Trin lent Capere a beautiful beaded gown, a headband, vintage ostrich plumes, and a fabulous leopard coat. As for me? I was rocking a sequined pillbox hat, my shaved head, and my grandmother’s silver fox-fur. We looked pretty damned good.

Photo credit to Rachel Robinson, and to Nark Magazine. It’s not often I’m able to source my photos, but when I can, I’m happy to do so.

However, in the event itself, it seemed most people were rocking flannel, t-shirts, and jeans. Hardly what I’d call opulent – but I don’t own the word. It seemed like a decent enough event, but it was hardly what I’d pictured. Ms. Capere and I – after pausing for a photo-op, naturally –

Thanks again, Rachel Robinson, and Nark Magazine!

-slipped a few doors down to a quieter venue, talked intensely, as only old friends and teenagers can do – and then made an early night of it.

Tagged: Auntie and Uncle Stone, Borscht, Cocktail Culture, Foxtrot Gin, Opulent Queer Empire, Seattle, The List, Trying New Things

Post the Eleventh: In Which I Undertake The Banjo

Gentle Reader, it should be quite clear by this juncture that I’m suffering from a bad case of Banjo Fever, and the only known cure is 40 cc’s of pure medical-grade bluegrass applied to the auditory canal.

My banjo lust began, as such things often do, in the back corner of a run-down pawn shop. I had listened to several songs by My Gay Banjo that morning, and when I saw the beautiful piece of wood and steel behind the counter, I was overcome with desire. My hand brushed the drum – the strings fluttered in anticipation; I strummed, and a proud, brash chord vibrated throughout the store, making the other patrons glance up from the gun counter. I had to make it mine.

When one is poor, as I am, one seldom has a spare two hundred dollars lying around – and if one does, there are far better uses to put it to than buying an instrument one doesn’t even play. Nonetheless, my dear online friend Ekgo saw how excited I’d gotten from the mere existence of such a thing, and sent me some cash to start my Banjo Fund. Maman, for a Christmas present, kicked in the rest, and since then, I’ve been learning to play.

The sound’s much more robust, more fulfilling than my ukulele, and the length of the neck means that I can actually feel the tension in my muscles as I play. The strings are stout and steel, and the chords are completely alien and new. It’s very strange, having a competancy in strum patterns but being completely baffled by the chords; I’ll be strolling along with confidence and become entirely derailed by having to contort my fingers into an entirely unfamiliar form of origami.

This is how you make a Unicorn. And a F Sharp.

Now, I’ve only had Lear for about a month, now, but I’ve made demonstrable progress. I say demonstrable because, well – see for yourself.

Amber Goss came to visit, and there were buckets of home-made wine, and we attempted to sing Dolly Parton’s��Jolene.

On my own, dedicated to Sad Lady Country, I undertook Crystal Gayle. Here you can find��Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue.

And then, I guess, I tried the Statler Brother’s��Whatever Happened to Randolph Scott?

It’s a start, Gentle Reader. Please don’t be too harsh; I’m still learning. I’ll admit that these vids are shit, though.��I will try to post at least one banjo video per month, Gentle Reader, but I won’t promise anything – I’m rubbish at promises. Happy … whatever.

 

Tagged: Banjo, Music Monday, Sad Lady Country, Strictly an Amateur, The List, Trying New Things

Poetic Interlude XCIII

Women, Wine, and Snuff

By John Keats

Give me women, wine and snuff

Until I cry out ��hold, enough!��

You may do so sans objection

Till the day of resurrection;

For bless my beard they aye shall be

My beloved Trinity.

 

Tagged: John Keats, Poetic Interludes, Poetry, Women Wine And Snuff

Post the Tenth: Arvingdale, Part II

When my father fell ill, we had to scale things back, let some things go. I’d get so frustrated – there were things he wouldn’t let me fix, that I actually could have – “You’re just a boy, what do you know?” At the same time, there were a million things that were beyond me, but Dad wouldn’t hear of letting anyone else near the house to take care of it – his pride got in the way. He’d hobble out, painfully and laboriously, and shake his head. And so the greenhouse got boarded up. The pool was drained. The gardens were left to their own devices, and the fountains ran dry.

When my father died, the electricity went haywire. He’d wired it all himself – he was an electrician by trade – but my parents had never meant to stay there more than a few years. So the lights would flicker, would brown out, would black out – and then the next day, they’d be fine. My mother was convinced that it was my father’s ghost. When the breakers started shooting sparks one morning, my mother cursed – it was five in the morning; I had just gotten out of the shower, getting ready for work, and she was hoping that I wouldn’t see it. Apparently it had been happening for a while. I put my foot down, called in sick to work, and called an electrician – ghost or no ghost.

My dad would have been furious, but he wouldn’t have wanted the house to burn up around us, either. The electrician we called in couldn’t make head nor tail of what Dad had done – and none of it was to the current code – but he called Dad a genius and rerouted everything.

That was when we lost electricity to the workshop, the hot tub, and the gazebo.

Time marched on, as it inevitably does; I moved away, and Maman was forced to shut off the part of the house I lived in – my bedroom, the office and bathroom on that end of the house. She moved out; I moved back home to put things in order. And now, at last, it’s time to pack up and leave Arvingdale for the last time.

Tagged: Arvingdale, Decline and Decay, Hard Times, My Childhood Home, Packing Up and Selling, Saying Goodbye