2020-07-21 Life, Death, and Chantry: The Betty Sessions
Life, Death, and Chantry: The Betty Sessions
Location: Wayak'il Ts'onot náak'Chi'ha
Date and Time: July 21, 2020
Summary: Chantry Montage
Mood Music: Taylor Swift - "Betty"
“Hey, this is your RPVJ Madison for All the World’s a Stage Music Television right here with tonight’s World Premiere Video from … we’ll I guess this one /is/ a blonde, Taylor Swift with the new single from her top selling album ‘Folklore.’ Here’s ‘Betty’ ...“
Betty, I won't make assumptions
About why you switched your homeroom, but
I think it's 'cause of me
Betty, one time I was riding on my skateboard
When I passed your house
It's like I couldn't breathe
The front doors of the house have been flung open in a welcoming display, with bright fall flowers in garlands draping over the ornate decorations on either side. A U-Haul, large enough for the contents of a three bedroom house, sits idle, the engine ticking rhythmically as it cools from the difficult journey up the winding, hilly roads. Tucked in the very front of the cargo area, nearly lost in the cavernous space are boxes, easels, and bits of collected furniture. Apparently this U-haul was the only one available.
Dressed in work overalls, two young women work together to bring the contents of the truck into their new home. One slides a box to the edge of the U-haul, while the other hefts another that has already been pushed forward to the edge, staggering overdramatically at the slight weight of the load. Giving a smirk, the other hops down and takes another box, following the other into the welcoming embrace of the house and, as time passes, the contents of the truck are slowly transferred from one to the other.
You heard the rumors from Inez
You can't believe a word she says
Most times, but this time it was true
The worst thing that I ever did
Was what I did to you
Through the door, the house is much like any other built in the 20’s and updated in the 40’s, with meticulous, ornate decorations and dark wood floors contrasted by bright patterned wallpaper, time causing the glue to lose its strength, causing the wallpaper to peel in places. One large wall in the hallway leading to the ballroom has been covered in ornate murals of multicolored spray paint.
Bare footsteps can be heard throughout the house, thudding rhythmically as they trundle over recently swept floors, hurrying towards the hearth where green sticks have been arranged in a pyramid, a small twist of cloth and paper placed there to act as tinder, shreds of art and cloth and broken pencils. Parts of an old life being consumed to start one anew. Footsteps, childlike in their enthusiasm, can be heard on bare floors, thudding rhythmically as they run towards the beginning of the new Chantry.
Together.
Work begins on the ritual space. The floor is swept, mopped, and mopped again, then polished until it gleamed. And once it’s dry and ready, only then does the multicolored chalk dust start to be trickled into circles, into triangles nested inside of circles, with words of power written by the one that knows how, each taking turn. One writes in the language of dreams while the other writes in the language of the angels. Straight lines intersect and splay to the borders of the wall, and when observed from above on the balcony, the leylines of the city can be seen, replicated in exacting miniature on the floor below with the new chantry centered. Looking at each other, they touch hands briefly before parting, the two following wordless guidance from the city itself. Candles are carefully placed at junctions of the lines, in specially prepared dishes that keep them a part of the design but in a way to prevent wax from dripping into the design itself. On one side, a mirror is carefully placed, the moon reflecting in from the ocean, casting a pure, white light over their work. On the other side sits a table with a compass, an ancient map with unknown areas left blank, and a cup of tea, steaming.
An offering to their Avatars, inviting them here to watch the creation of something new.
But if I just showed up at your party
Would you have me? Would you want me?
Would you tell me to go fuck myself
Or lead me to the garden?
In the garden, would you trust me
If I told you it was just a summer thing?
I'm only seventeen, I don't know anything
But I know I miss you
Filling the air and obscuring all, is the white smoke of purification. The smoke begins to shift and flow, dancing about in a way both playful and serious. As it moves, it’s clear there is a force beyond shaping it; invisible hands drifting through, leaving trails in the hazy light. It moves from the natural to the unnatural and back again in the wake of an oscillation. Slowly, the smoke begins to dissipate, leaving hazy tendrils wrapped around the space.
In the middle of the smoke are obscured figures in ceremonial garments, their ritual movements creating the breeze that swirls the smoke through the space. Their feet are bare as they move around a circle chalked with sigils on the floor. At each of the four corners are physical symbols of power, derived from a collaboration between two Traditions that are often seen to have little in common with each other. They have found otherwise, and so together they form this circle of protection and work to purify the Chantry.
Betty, I know where it all went wrong
Your favorite song was playing
From the far side of the gym
I was nowhere to be found
I hate the crowds, you know that
Plus, I saw you dance with him
The spiritual hangers-on that exist around the chantry begin to stir. The growing flickers of power, the awakening ritual going on, tying the home’s spiritual power to a source far in the desert, sends sparks through the spirit world, bringing light to otherwise immobile and darkened corners of the house. The ones that are usually awake recognize the one form that usually passes through, the one spiritual spark that glows brighter than a normal human, but there is another. The new is similar in brightness, but is different. While one has sharp edges and facets and tastes of magick and sour altoids that threaten to burn the tongue, the other has curved shapes and tastes smooth and cool and circular, like a peppermint candy soaked in a drop of cinnamon oil. A hint of spice beneath the mellow, cooling sensation. One is more familiar than the other, but both could be familiar with time. A good pair that, as they awaken the smoke, the flame, and the house itself through their words and exertion, their dancing and art, more spirits awaken and move towards the center where they are. The spirits notice the new Dreamspeaker with the Hermetic. The once closed and tangled paths rearrange themselves to accept this new light.
You heard the rumors from Inez
You can't believe a word she says
Most times, but this time it was true
The worst thing that I ever did
Was what I did to you
There have been changes around the house and the grounds of the Foreboding Jacobean that aren’t initially seen, but can definitely be felt. The garage in the back, normally used for storage, has had a great deal of the clutter moved to one side, the wooden doors swung wide and welcoming. Inside, a blue Datsun has been backed into the space made, with various boxes of stuff - almost certainly car related - stacked against the back wall on a disused workbench with a stack of four tires kept off the floor on a little rolling stand. There’s also space for a Vespa to be parked nearby but, for now, that space is empty.
Inside the house, the room just down the hall from Luu’s has been mostly cleared and cleaned, the crates and bags and hanging things moved elsewhere in the house, leaving clean, bare walls and a freshly mopped floor. Jokingly, a sign has been hung on a nail stuck in the door. According to the sign this room used to be Shoe Antechamber 4-B, but the block letters have been crossed out with a spritz of green spray paint, and ‘Jinny’s Room - Keep out (except Luu!)’ written over it in black sharpie. The window has been left half-open to help the floors dry, the gentle breeze rustling the gauzy curtains with each light gust, clearing the room of any lingering odor of mothballs or dust that may have been clinging onto the walls. The furniture in here is sparse - almost an afterthought - with only a repurposed dresser and a rectangular work table sitting here while two chairs are placed haphazardly near the middle of the room, ready to be used but not actually set up in their final location. A twin mattress leans against the opposite wall, blankets, sheets, and a pillow perched on top. A temporary thing, this bed. It seems it’s just waiting for a frame.
In the corner, nearest to the door, sit several cardboard boxes, each labeled with a few words in quickly scrawled black marker to indicate their contents. ‘Bedroom.’ ‘Dreams.’ ‘Art Supplies.’ ‘Spray Paint,’ Time.’ Jinny’s roller skates have been placed carefully on this pile, too, the destroyed Rocket Bunny looking pitiful compared to the other one. A well-made staff is there, too, balanced carefully, the black surface gleaming, the contrasting white runes seeming to change on their own while one isn’t looking. A few larger items have been brought in and hung on nails already driven into the studs. A small set of drawers - a printer’s chest full of movable type rests next to a round fish tank full of hundreds of coins from around the world. Were Jinny to take time and sort it all out, perhaps there would be a few hundred dollars in there, but that’s not the value to her. Inside, something seems to stir, glowing eyes briefly peering from beneath the surface before vanishing, easily missed as a glint of a polished coin settling.
Two well-used easels rest against the wall opposite the mattress with a few half-finished canvases facing out of sight behind them, all covered with a white drop cloth. A stack of books, hard covers in English, Spanish, Latin, and Chinese, all about dreams, desires, and a pair of philosophical texts on reality are stacked carefully nearby. Another, partially done work can be seen - an outline of an angel in bullet casings with the wings slowly being built up, as well as the five gallon bucket of spent shell casings being used for the project, each polished and gleaming in the natural light cast by the window.
But if I just showed up at your party
Would you have me? Would you want me?
Would you tell me to go fuck myself
Or lead me to the garden?
In the garden, would you trust me
If I told you it was just a summer thing?
I'm only seventeen, I don't know anything
But I know I miss you
A gray bobblehead slowly wobbles its head in time with the music. Along the shelf, a large collection is slowly revealed: Bigfoot, Chupacabra, The Jersey Devil, Mothman, Ogopogo, it keeps going, and there dozens, perhaps more than a hundred such bobbleheads. The shelf below is revealed to be these same creatures, but now in Pez Dispenser form, and below that once more as Snow Globes.
Sweeping back from the shelf, the whole room is revealed. A dizzying array of kitschy paranormal tchotchkes, and other ephemera. Some items are clearly cheap examples of the craft - knock offs from 60’s television, made in plastic and steel, lurid colors of lead bearing paint splashed over them - while others are more reverently displayed, seeming to be of high quality and manufactured with care, begging a viewer to come closer and look. The room seems to go on forever, stretching out like something out of Alice in Wonderland, and may be one of many, if the barely visible doors at the end lead to such things.
There’s so many different collections of objects based on themes of mundane strangeness and fortean phenomenon. The collection is clearly still growing. All the way at the back are piled high cardboard boxes, each carefully marked with some obscure cipher that indicates which estate sale or convention they came from. They are tidily arranged, and yet some of them seem to have scratches or gouges in the cardboard, some ripping nearly through to the contents. Most disturbing of all, one of the boxes has burst from the inside, as if something had struggled mightily and then, through great effort, managed to escape. The boxes begin to shift and rumble, almost as if something is moving inside of them.
I was walking home on broken cobblestones
Just thinking of you when she pulled up like
A figment of my worst intentions
She said "James, get in, let's drive"
Those days turned into nights
Slept next to her, but
I dreamt of you all summer long
As the pair move through the house in their merry ways, the vantage point changes, slowly pulling back, the room they are in growing smaller, the walls revealed to be one-sided, the floor they tread upon well worn, painted black to focus attention. Plush velvet curtains flank the walls and, as they pull back further, cameras. Microphones held on booms. A studio audience watching the show. Further back, still, the view moves, revealing an actor with a pizza box waiting in the wings for his cue, adjusting his uniform so the name tag is displayed prominently, in case there is the potential for a recurring role, or an agent in the audience that might be looking for the next person take their place on stage.
A stage. That’s what this is. The whole city. Everything they do, or say, or experience is acted out on the stage of the City.
Drawing back further, the city of Los Angeles glitters in miniature below, model cars being directed along freeways, controlled by invisible controllers behind the glass windows above. Up there, in the control room, decisions are made, lights are adjusted for the best possible coverage, soundtracks and songs are played for mood, and scenes are changed with military-like precision. If a change goes badly, the magick might be broken, so they are careful. So careful with their actors and their scenes that prove the adage; ‘When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all.’
It’s the most popular show, after all.
Those directors, their faces hidden in the glare of the lights, move expertly through a script that writes itself, the pages before fully written, the pages beyond completely and utterly blank. Movement can be seen barely, the heat and glare of the lights below wash out anything that could be seen behind, the stars glimmering faintly in the glass as they direct the show. What can be seen, though? A heart and triangle, combined, set on the wall just below the window, the logo of the Philia Trigono Company painted there with the tag ‘Est. 1781.’ and the motto ‘facere magicae realem’
One looks to the other and gestures towards the actors, and the scene changes again.
Betty, I'm here on your doorstep
And I planned it out for weeks now
But it's finally sinkin' in
Betty, right now is the last time
I can dream about what happens when
You see my face again
Zooming through a fractal of Triangles and the The City Heart, the difference between microcosm and macrocosm ceases to have meaning. Infinities and eternities pass by until the shapes give way to other representations of themselves. The Discordian and Baruti sit cross-legged, bumping shoulders as they laugh, enjoying slices of pizza. The momentary relaxation in their busy schedule, itself mired in the esoteric symbolism found throughout the Chantry. They don’t just do this, they live this. This is their new world, a world that they have just taken the first steps into. A larger, more brilliant world. A more dangerous world. A world filled with promise. A world that can be anything that they want it to be.
The only thing I wanna do
Is make it up to you
So I showed up at your party
Yeah, I showed up at your party
The hour has grown late, with the last rays of the sun vanishing into the darkness of night. The city in the valley below, stretches out like a sparkling sea of lights, inviting, the glittering welcoming, sharing information and comfort for those who know what to look for. There are lights upstairs in the hallways and bedrooms, but moving past Jinny’s room, with the door wide open, the lights off and the windows closed, one notices something quite obvious compared to the rest of the house. Here, the bed has not been made and the mattress still rests against the wall, the sheets still folded, the bed unmade. All of the things brought over remain in their boxes, still packed away from the move.
She’s not moving in?
Down below, in the garage, the sound of an engine rumbling to life can be heard, and from the upstairs window, something peers around the trim of a window, a small hand curling around the window casing, watching from behind the curtain as Jinny’s dark blue Datsun pulls around from the back of the house. She stops in front of the front door where Luu stands. With a plaintive wave the driver, Jinny, twists the stem that turns on the headlights and puts the car into gear. Another hesitant wave follows and for a second, and it looks like she might say something, she might get out and run to Luu but, with a small nod of resignation, she turns her gaze forward and puts the car into gear. With a growl of the engine and a quiet crunch of gravel beneath the wheels, Jinny starts driving, the car trundling down the driveway, whisking her away from the Chantry.
Jinny’s on her way back to the place in the city she calls home, leaving the Chantry, leaving Luu, all alone in the big, old mansion.
When the Baruti leaves, the spirits, once awake, start drifting back to their slumber. The spark the Dreamspeaker brought to the house slowly fading, the forgotten corners falling into shadow again. One spirit, though, a spirit of the breeze, lingers near Luu, dancing in her hair, even though she may not notice it, resting on her shoulder when it’s tired, and then dancing again. She’ll be back. Somehow the spirit knows this and celebrates the fact, even though Luu may not even realize it.
Yeah, I showed up at your party
Will you have me? Will you love me?
Will you kiss me on the porch
In front of all your stupid friends?
If you kiss me, will it be just like I dreamed it?
Will it patch your broken wings?
I'm only seventeen, I don't know anything
But I know I miss you
The sun has set long ago, the candles that remain are little more than puddles of melted wax, with a sputtering final flame here and there. On an unmade bed is Lloyd, a stuffed alien of the Gray variety, obviously well loved. The mattress is a strictly solo affair, though big enough for two or perhaps even more, there is but one lonely outline pressed into the contours of the sheets. It’s like this many nights, it’s like this most nights, and if pressed, Luu would likely be unable to say the last time it was any other way. People that collect strange things tend to die alone. It doesn’t haunt her as much, but she still remembers, and she still sees the truth in it.
Preoccupied and conflicted, Luu paces back and forth, trying to make up her mind about something. She never had illusions that any of this would be easy. They don’t call it ‘The Path of Thorns’ or ‘The Bitter Road’ for nothing. There’s a few other choice names she can think to scream, but she holds her composure. Coming to a rest, she lets out a slow breath, and looks down at the cellular phone in her hand. The lit up screen displays the word ‘Jinny’ and Luu’s finger hovers by the send button. Press it, don’t press it, and in the indecision she feels other frequencies coming through to her, a distant resonance beaming an image to her mind like a malfunctioning TV antenna, or maybe one that’s looking just right.
The screen splits, Luu on one side and on the other ...
Standing in your cardigan
Kissin' in my car again
Stopped at a streetlight
You know I miss you
Jinny’s apartment is mostly empty. Quiet. Barely a sound to be heard.
The radio is on, playing a soft song. The television is unplugged, the air conditioner idle, and an oscillating fan is moving back and forth, blowing cool air. She sits on the couch, forlorn, quiet, a loose mens shirt draped over her naked form, feet covered in colorful green socks with little gray aliens stitched around the foot, gazing out the window at the city, towards Hollywood. Towards the hills where the Chantry rests. Where she is, alone. Just as alone as she feels right now. The phone, made of ancient black bakelite and monolithic in its size, the declaration ‘Property of Pacific Bell’ still emblazoned in the steel backplate with a rusty bell in its innards, starts to ring.
Once.
She looks up and over, surprised.
Twice.
She stands and walks over, reaching for the handset.
Three times.
The handset is lifted and Jinny holds it to her ear.
“Hello?”
Silence on the other end. Only the sound of breathing barely heard over the static on the line. and then….
She speaks.
