Mad World

Well, would you look at that. It's November. You wouldn't think so much could have changed since the last time I posted, but here we are.

AbraCadaver was a smashing success this year - I count it among one of our best shows. I honestly couldn't be more proud of both all the performers and also of us producers and writers - Melody Mangler and my sister Voodoo Pixie were fucking brilliant. I'm even happy with myself.

Although my wig made me look like my mom.

by FubarFoto

With AbraCadaver over, my sister and I settled into October. "We have a whole month to do Halloween things!" we said. My sister is always booked solid with Halloween shows because she's one of Vancouver's spookiest dancers, but we figured we'd still have loads of time to check out haunted trolleys and ghost trains.

Then we found out that our apartment building had been sold, and consequently the rent was going up.

And so, we found ourselves moving in the middle of the month. My sister and I moved back in together into the main floor of an old heritage house with stained glass windows, just a block from the ocean. We were blessed to have family and friends to help us, and although we moved in the middle of a storm warning it was truly not traumatic. We've acclimated to being in one another's space very quickly - the fact that the house is larger than we're used to no doubt helps. Surprisingly, I was gifted with the bigger bedroom, which clearly used to be a dining room. The size means that not only is it my bedroom, but also a perfect magical workroom. It even fits all of my books,

Speaking of books... You really ought to put your pre-order in for Glamour Magic: The Witchcraft Revolution to Get What You Want. I just did.

So. October went by in a blur. On the interpersonal level, I came to the decision to distance myself from people with the emotional intelligence of potatoes. This was a harder decision to make than perhaps it should have been, simply because one of the people in question was a part of the witch meetups I had been hosting. Consequently, I was trying stubbornly to make it work in spite of feeling disrespected more often than not. But ultimately I realised that I cannot work magic with someone who does not trust me, as it in turn destroys my own trust. It's a rotten cycle that leads solely to doubt and anger. That realisation made me reexamine other aspects of that relationship, and ultimately I found the negative outweighed the positive. So it was time to pull back. Thankfully I don't feel any genuine malice towards this person - mostly I just feel stupid.

More positively, this week I discovered that a lot more of my girlfriends at work are into fortune telling than I had suspected. I fully intend to organise a wine-and-tarot evening sometime this month, and perhaps try another magic night with the ladies who I know are a bit more open and honest.

My sister, as always, reminds me that I should settle for nothing less than love and respect.

Voodoo Pixie (and Sweet Pea McGee) as photographed by Bob Ayers.

to control my mind

Every year I forget that the month leading up to AbraCadaver will be chaos, and every year I forget that said chaos will inevitably lead to stress manifesting itself physically. I woke up at 5 AM with a splitting headache, and I couldn't decide if it was caused by me clenching my jaw as I slept, the shit food I've been eating, not enough water, PMS or just general mental catastrophe.

So tonight I rolled on the floor.

Music for release.

Music for equilibrium.

October.

IT'S OVER.

FubarFoto documenting yours truly right before the bloodshed.

Well, AbraCadaver is, anyway. October is still just beginning, and thank all that is dark and spooky for that. The show was a huge success (I heard we had three walk-outs this year, which may be a new record) and the feedback I've gotten so far indicates people thought it was our most sophisticated production yet. I am truly blessed to work with so many talented and passionate people - it means we can keep scaring the living bejeezus out of people year after year.

The last act this year involved my darling little sister murdering me horribly on stage. My cousin was in attendance and she said that while the people around her reacted to our fighting with winces, she could only snort and think "sisters." Indeed, I think it would be hard to fight more convincingly with anyone BUT Voodoo - we've been play fighting for years, after all, and if we slip and actually hurt one another we won't be all that angry. And hurt ourselves we did - I cannot begin to tell you how many bruises I have, and my left knee is missing most of its skin. Worth it. However, these bumps combined with the physical exhaustion of both setting up and taking down the stage dec this year has left me pretty fucking sore.

This is not entirely a bad thing - it is a reminder that we live in the body. And some of us have not been looking after those bodies as well as we should.

October marks one of the traditional Witches Sabbats that I hold dear - Samhain. Halloween has always been my favourite holiday (and my favourite costume as a child was a bat, so we can see that goth is apparently a disease one contracts early on) and the spiritual side of this day is one that I have not been able to ignore with any great success even in my most secular phases.

Many people consider Samhain to be the Witches New Year. It's the final harvest, and as such acts as the death knell for the year.

Also a character on the old Ghostbusters cartoon.

I've come to approach the holiday as time to clear old old junk in order to set new patterns over the winter, and this year feels like a good one to really stop fucking around in. A lot of my plans over the past year started strong and fell flat, and that's a problem. I think I've learned ways to avoid the usual obstacles I create for myself, and now is a time when I truly have no excuses left to keep me from doing my shit.

And man, do I have shit to do.

AbraCadaver 2014: Deal With the Devil

So that was LAST year.

This year, the theme of the show is 'Deal With the Devil' and oh boy oh boy, am I ever excited about it. Obviously I won't divulge too much - the show is this Saturday, and for anybody who happens to be reading this you can get your tickets online at Brown Paper Tickets dot com.

This year my involvement has been primarily offstage, much as it was last year - I'm a co-producer of course, but I'm also a writer and it's there that I have the most fun. I wound up doing a lot of research into the history of witch trials for a piece, and I have to say... what the fuck, why are dudes so scared of people stealing their dicks? Like, come on guys. Grow up.

One of the things about writing for shows is that you get to hear some pretty unbiased stuff - you're not on stage, so people don't necessarily know your involvement. I think it was the second year of AbraCadaver that had what some people called 'the rape monologue' and what I referred to as "the demon possession monologue."

Now, certain topics are triggering for some people, and I'm not about to slam anybody for that. But what I have considered about that particular show is that in my piece rape was alluded to, while in another piece about a guy chaining up a zombie and fucking it it was considerably more explicit. The latter piece was preformed by a man, and mine by a woman. I feel this may have been a factor in one being more upsetting than the other. I don't apologise for my writing in general, and while I'm sad to have upset people I also feel that that's good. You SHOULD be upset by that shit.

At any rate, the horror continues this year. Because it is a horror show, not a Halloween show - a distinction Voodoo and I have been careful to make in the past few years. Halloween shows may have spooky skeletons, pumpkins, black cats. A horror show will try its hardest to disturb you. There will be blood... and maybe the Devil himself.