Living in the Oasis!

My 'Bro' Andrew and me before performing at Speak Your Heart Out! (Thanks Chols:)

Last week was an extremely busy week. It's the middle of March and everything that could be happening is happening at the same time. I have final projects, film reviews, video editing, major research essays, mini weekly journals due and thats just school stuff. Yet in the middle of it all I found time to live outside of the mundane "sleep, eat, repeat."

Last Wed. night Copeland played at the Opera House in Toronto and after a friend of mine hunted down a ticket for me on craigslist I spontaneously decided to go. (Thanks Jobin:) GOOD CHOICE! The show was amazing. After all it's their last tour together as a band:( Not only are these guys incredibly talented musicians, with lyrics so honest they're disarming but they are extremely personable. Well there's a plug for the band if you don't know them.

They have this song from their oldest album called "Love is a Fast Song" and some of the Lyrics go like this:

You don't have to be ashamed
'Cause you're a miracle through and through
Oh, and you don't have to be ashamed
Of the miracle inside of you

What has love become?
(What has love become?)
It's not like we used to hear in those old songs
And it's not like yours
(And it's not like yours)
What has love become?

...your love is in motion
And it's spinning me around, yeah
...my heart is in motion
For the movement that's in you

You should not be angry
If all she wants is your money
Oh, you should not be angry
'Cause all you want is her body

What has love become?
(What has love become?)
It's not like we used to hear in those old songs
And it's not like yours
(And it's not like yours)
What has love become?

Right in the middle of all this stuff that just seems so fast I can relate to the emotion behind this. My heart has been begging the question "What has love become?" I know I blog about love a lot. I guess it's because it's a BIG deal. Love is meant to be our source, how can we love each other if we ourselves don't understand true love? One that's larger than just romance, although that's a part of it. Loved people, LOVE! Hurt people, HURT!

I ended up playing some of my original music at a fundraiser for Nellie's Women Shelter in Toronto on Friday night and it was incredible once I mustered up the bravery to walk on stage and sing my heart out. Before I went on stage though I was scared, intimidated and wasn't sure if I could sing sappy love songs that were a clothing line holding stories of identity, worth, dreams, and poetic responses to the source of all that is good. I began to devalue my femininity as I stood amongst pronounced feminists, all of whom were extremely talented. Yet I didn't have a bibliography to my lyrics, I didn't have a list of people to validate my experiences with God and music, I didn't have a correct language or proper structure for academia, but I did have a love story to tell. One that didn't talk of what that word has become. It's a transaction now with underlying messages that whisper "Here's my body for your company" or "Here's my all for your money," in our minds love rings 'TAKE.' This is not what it's meant to be.

This year my research has consisted of the interconnection of the global political economy of sex and the value of a human being. What are we teaching this generation? I realize that there are contradictions to almost everything today; there are two sides; other perspectives. A feminist lens looks at everything so intricately, yet very contradictory and still embraces it. I say that there is a consistency in this inconsistency, there is a constant still! I understand that in research aimed at the acceptance by the world of academia I need a Works Cited, proper language, that my argument must be formed around a specific lens with assumptions thought out. Yet in my music you wont find that, you'll find stories of my relationship with my Source of creativity and the people in my life. Love, this word that dares not to be mentioned in school, you wont find it's epistemology in the textbooks, you have to live it!

Music has been this constant for me in life. Before living in High Park I moved over 8 times in 2 years after leaving home at 17. Then since being in one spot for 3 years I've had over 15 roommates. That's A LOT of transition! Sure melodies change, rhythm forms, and lyrics tell a story but the source that speaks this language is constant, good and true even when the circumstances say otherwise. I've found an oasis in music, in writing and communing with God.

I'm not too sure why I'm writing this today. I guess because I've experienced the counterfeit love. I don't have the same story as all the women that gathered in that room on Friday night but I am a woman with a story. My femininity has a voice as well. Why should I become masculinized to compete to be heard?

What I do understand is that our responses to what's been done to us can be one of forgiveness-- saying what's been done is by NO MEANS right, but I choose to forgive and release you so that I am not held in prison of rage-- spinning in circles of judgment and resentment. I'd consider myself a feminist, all about the equality of men and women but not at the expense of masculinity so torn to shreds that the masculine strength is rejected when it comes to helping. The dualistic qualities with the two sexes must stop-- Men strong, fierce, brute: women, fragile, nurturing, gentle-- it doesn't work that way. Most of my guy friends are the ones cooking in the kitchen while the ladies are out 'bringing home the bacon'...hmm. Does this make these men less masculine and these women less feminine by our polarized definitions? We must get to a place of working together not against each other, embracing the differences; love. Men aren't the enemy, it's the deceit that is! This is a journey, one that will take time but I hope that we can all find the oasis while traveling together.

"I won't be ashamed of this miracle inside me...my heart is in motion for it's movement.."