Alanis

I grew up with Alanis 

Jagged Little Pill was one of the first albums I ever owned

And seeing her live

For the first time 

Was exhilirating and touching and strange 

It wasn’t just Present Me

Standing in the middle of the crowd

In this vast venue in London

It was thirteen year old me

Standing in the large school hall

Singing “Hand in my Pocket” 

And my classmates laughing because I couldn’t swear

And because it was so incredibly, painfully, obvious that I would never, ever, flick a cigarette 

I think it was one of the first times I had ever sung solo

And the lady who had asked me to sing was so encouraging

I went home and re-listened to Jagged Little Pill to see what else I could learn 

It was twenty-something year old me

Standing in the practise rooms above the Student Union

And channelling my anger at my ex

So I could sing “You Oughta Know” 

I knew the song well by then

But the lyrics meant more

It was twenty-something year old me 

Walking the Camino

And re-calling that Alanis had done some sort of pilgrimage to India 

And had then released Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie 

And listening to it again 

And as I walked 

“Thank u” resonated

And it changed the entire outlook on my life 

It was teenage me 

Watching Dogma and seeing Alanis play God

(Controversial because in Christianity, God is always a He) 

And realizing for the first time

God could be female 

And then present day me

With all these memories

From time and space almost forgotten 

Standing there surrounded by strangers

And Alanis

As gorgeous and talented as I’d hoped she’d be 

But with a twist

This feminine rock chick with biting lyrics and a fierce sound 

Had stage fright.

She barely looked at the audience for the first two songs

She roamed around the stage

Her amazing hair swishing behind her 

She settled in though

And from the beginning her voice 

Was even more powerful than I thought

Her belt is phenomenal

She didn’t talk between songs

But she would bow to the band members

And call out thank you to the audience

She started out with Woman Down 

A call for an end to misogyny 

And throughout the night played 

guardian, receive, all I really want, you oughta know, hand in my pocket, you learn, head over feet, mary jane, ironic, and uninvited. 

The crowd knew every word

We laughed when she updated the lyrics - 

"It's like meeting the man of your dreams

And meeting his husband". 

But the highlight

Was the acapella hidden track from Jagged Little Pill

It was almost divine it was so moving

Still as raw and gut wrenching as it was eighteen years ago

I’ve never been brave/stupid enough to walk into an ex’s house

And lie in his bed and cry all afternoon

But I have dreamt it 

In the dream I walked through his house 

Smelt his cologne 

And both in sleep and awake 

I have sobbed

And through it all 

Alanis. 

With her own highs and lows and journies and quests

For forgiveness 

For peace 

For love

For life.

The end. 

This Is

This is me breathing

This is me standing in space

This is me embracing all twenty-seven years of me 

This is me rejecting everything I know and starting again

But embracing everything I know and incorporating it into the starting again

Everything is important

Nothing is important 

Everything matters

Nothing matters

In the words of Alanis

I’m high but I’m grounded

I’m sane but I’m overwhelmed 

I’m delirious

I’m stable

I’m happy 

I’m emotional 

I’m floating on the energy of you

This is me kissing your face

Your hands your lips your ribs your thigh

This is me holding you

This is me crawling into bed to be tangled in you 

This is us lying in bed together

This is the sound of rain on leaves on trees on the world

This is us snuggled under the doona

This is us sharing who we have become today in this moment

There is no time no space

Only what we have constructed determined to be so

There is only this moment

How can we make promises beyond the moment when this moment this breathing this now this second this “this” is all we have all we can be

The power of memory

The power of now

Eckhart speaks to us and we smile and quote movies

Heath and Julia and Joseph and Alison Janney 

And it makes us smile 

It makes us laugh

Makes our energy sparkle radiate pulsate on the same frequency

You said that

We were on the same frequency

And it made me tingle with delight 

This is me falling in love with you

This is me feeling light and wonderful

This is me wanting to rush to rooftops 

And tell everyone about you

This is me smiling

This is me writing 

This is me not being able to find the words to express what I’m feeling

This is me laughing at myself for being like this 

This is me being incredulous that it is at all possible

This is me giving thanks to the universe

To the powers that be

To spirit

To the unnamable thing 

To you

To all the stuff of the last year and a half that has had to be lived 

To experience

To life, to life, lachaim! To Tevye saying why is it so? I don’t know. Because. It is. 

Because it must be so. Because the world is completely unknowable. And yet I know it. I can fathom it. Even if just a little bit. But that’s ok. It’s my little bit that I fathom. 

And here I am fathoming and living and breathing and being frustrated and being delighted and being here on this earth. And my god, it has taken me so long to be okay with the fact that I’m even here! But HERE I AM AND I’M OKAY WITH THAT. 

And then let go of that because that’s not important either. 

Soothsaying for the ego.

All of it is great. All of it is nothing. 

Love. Life. Joy. Bliss. Sadness. The world. 

Here we are.

Here you are.

This is me.

This is us. This is the world. This is everything and nothing. 

These are signifiers for the unnamable unquantifiable unimaginable energy of life of shifting of currents of time of space of the world of everything ever happening to be existence.

Once upon a time there was a big bang

And the world began

And the light was started

And a little while later you and I were lying on the grass (that had grown in the meantime)

And the lights from that beginning were shining down

The very glow of them

And in the moment I offered my thanks to the universe the spark the divine unnamable thing that is the energy of the world

I saw my first shooting star of the summer

And in a ring around the field where we were lying

Were dark clouds, even darker than the dark of the night

And they were flashing bright with lightning

Somehow that night

We were simultaneously star gazing and storm watching

And the air smelt sweet

And you tasted like peppermint 

And there was a fizzle a spark of chemistry an exchange of energy a thrill of joy rush delight 

And then we agreed to say goodbye

This is me breathing

This is me standing in space

This. Is. 

The end.