The Blondie painting came out today after a long time.
I went a little wild with her back then. Every layer was an experiment. With grid drawing, pastels, metallics, neons, shapes and layering. I knew nothing and I wanted to learn everything.
This is where she started.
She felt like Jem and she was truly outrageous.
Every part of her was covered except eyes and mouth, but somehow I can still see it’s her.
She's too busy.
She needs to give us a place to rest.
I start tracing some of the lines I see under the layers. Blue and black letters and numbers that are a jumbled code I don’t understand. I flip the canvas and try to see more.
I see the word “tag” and I hope that doesn’t mean tag, you’re it. I don’t want to chase. I’m tired.
It says 1995 right side up and upside down so that’s probably significant. I haven’t written a 90s storyline yet. Which is weird because that should be an obvious one. Maybe the reason I keep seeing 777, lucky 7s, is because the 90s version of Jackson was that kid I had a mad crush on in high school whose birthday was July 7th. Just a thought for later.
It says 45 and I think again of J. There is a picture of him and me in my phone from a few years back when he was doing ok. There is a sign on the wall of the pub behind us that says “together again” —the almost twins. I wonder if one version of Jackson and Mae is cousins.
I used to imagine Gaslight music as a Broadway musical. And it should be. The song 45 would be a conversation between an addict and a loved one begging them to turn the record over.
Have you seen my hands? Just look at them shake.
And the song just keeps on repeating…
I can't move on and I can't stay the same.
I put on a random Gaslight mix and I’m taken back in time. Pretending to be a jogger, jogging through the yellow Harlow leaves, newly in love, listening to Sink or Swim on my silver iPod nano.
I start scribbling over her when Bring it On came on. The lengths and patterns of the lines and loops are all in sync with the music.
When I first painted over this one, there appeared a mouth--lips and a weird tooth coming through from under the surface behind the picture of Debbie. Now that I have drawn Mae, the lips look kinda like hers. And now that Jackson has puffy lips, they could be his, too.
A still shot from the Shayla video is the source for the original layer. Although she had pink hair and looked like Jem from Jem and the Holigrams.
As I type this, I wonder if that image coming through behind her is one of the Misfits. Did one of them have a blue and grey to silver balayage? I don't remember.
*I did a quick search and the blue haired one is Stormer--the kind one.
Blondie seems even busier now yet somehow she seems more rested.
I went to watch the Shayla video for clues and I imagine I'm Tom Hanks trying to decode the secrets of the universe that I trace from the layers of Debbie Harry’s 80s hair and make up.
Earlier I noticed that the rectangular structure that has all the numbers in it, similar to the VR door in a few other places. It looked like it was being sucked in by the object above it.
In the Shayla video there was someone being similarly sucked into something—some cosmic energy.
I notice the word joy in the scribbles above her right eye on the top left corner of the canvas and I think I might let this one sit for a bit.
She’s still so busy but now there's joy.
She might not stay this way for long but she has to stay this way for now.