It was so lovely read all of your kind birthday wishes. Thank you! Driving back from this show at midnight, the temperature hovered just above 0, and wind sent gusts of snow whirling across the road. The region of Canada around Montreal is remarkably flat—all geographic features rubbed smooth by the glaciers of the last Ice Age. Now, fields stretch out as far as the eye can see in either direction from the road. Every mile or so, there is another dairy farm with golden light spilling out onto the snow in puddles underneath the smudged glass of the barn's windows.
Things felt rushed up to the point of our departure. The company we bought flooring from delivered it to the new house yesterday, and the big truck couldn’t make it up our long snowy driveway—even after we plowed it. So we spent the better part of two hours transferring sap maple flooring into the bed of the pickup truck, and then driving it up the hill and unloading it, before leaving.
We also found ourselves caught off guard by the sudden foreignness of Montreal with it’s maze of one way streets, fast drivers, and French language. The show was intense and amazing. Thousands of lights, and multiple screens allowed the dancers on stage to interact with a computer-generated graphic environment. Once I let go of my expectations of seeing a typical Cirque performance with acrobats and clowns, I became engrossed in the intense visual and musical performance of Delirium, that narrated human being's quest for self-knowledge in a world that is at once isolated and mechnaized, and yet intensly passionate, dynamic and fleeting.
I left inspired and overwhelmed. The sheer volume and brightness almost felt invasive--- the thrumming of the drums making my heart alter its rhythm---but the seeing art in such intensity was also invigorating, and the bright technicolored images of lithe dancers in a forest of sky high dandelions spun through my dreams all night.
Today the air is cold. Hoary fingers of ice travel up windows like the fronds of tiny ferns. In the kitchen my mother-in-law is making cheese cake. Upstairs the neighbors feet make knock-knocking patterns across the floor. The house is wrapped in warmth and early evening comfort—the cats purring in the lamplight, and Bean investigating a pile of blocks. This year was a fitting way to launch the year—with intense creativity, with family, and with a handful of quiet moments.
sunset yesterday
snowy woods at dusk
Canadian farmland
silo silhouette
snow gusting across the road at midnight
Montreal tunnel