Call me a convert to the church of the coven, as I have fallen completely under the musical spell of enchantment cast by Stevie Nicks and her storied legacy of song sorcery. My friend JoAnn took me to my first Stevie Nicks show at Mohegan Sun this past Sunday, and it was a soul-enriching reminder of the healing power of music – and testament to the enduring performance wizardry of a woman who, despite her repeated reminders of her 76-years of age and wisdom, stood center stage and kept command of an entirely-rapt sold-out audience for two straight hours. The history of her triumphs and tribulations over the past few decades is as tortured and twisted as it is wondrous and miraculous. She’s worked her magic while countless others have burned brightly and faded quickly around her.
A little more than halfway through the how, I marveled at how she had preserved her voice over all those years of gold dust living, when she paused to share the background on how she has religiously maintained a 40-minute vocal warm-up regime before every single show she has done over the past twenty years or so. It’s that sort of dedication to her craft – and her passion for the music that has sustained her during the darkest days – which has established her presence in the firmament of musical legends. This Dazzler of the Day crowning is hardly enough to convey how many lives she has changed and inspired, and it’s only the start of my own discovery of her genius.
Our coquette summer is off to an early start with a little reunion of the kids who attended my office’s ‘Take Your Children To Work Day’ extravaganza this year. Their group got along so well that I proposed a follow-up hang-out with a coquette theme, since the kids seemed to know more about coquette than I did, and the only way to stay young is to keep up on such themes. With that, this song from the Coquette Summer Playlist the 1st, perfect for a moon-filled night:
Moon, a hole of light Through the big top tent up high Here before and after me Shinin’ down on me
Moon, tell me if I could Send up my heart to you? So, when I die, which I must do Could it shine down here with you?
Emi selected this song, as she did most of the songs on the first summer playlist, and it has a lovely, laid-back vibe to it – the perfect backdrop to today’s gathering. If there is rain, that will only add to the underlying shadows of the coquette theme. it is worth remembering that behind the clouds, the moon is still there.
‘Cause my love is mine, all mine I love mine, mine, mine Nothing in the world belongs to me But my love mine, all mine, all mine My baby, here on earth Showed me what my heart was worth So, when it comes to be my turn Could you shine it down here for her?
‘Cause my love is mine, all mine I love mine, mine, mine Nothing in the world belongs to me But my love mine, all mine Nothing in the world is mine for free But my love mine, all mine, all mine
A nostalgic throwback is best heard deeper into the evening. When dusk falls, so gloriously later in the daily run of the clock, it brings tales back to mind that may or may not have happened. In my childhood, the search for adventure or drama of any kind was a product of too many soap operas and an overactive imagination. Both were enough to sustain me through the summer, the former accompanied by fans, raspberry hard candies and Crystal Light iced tea – the latter inspired by songs that hinted at the love I was on the cusp of wanting.
Hold me, kiss me, Whisper sweetly That you love me Forever.
I didn’t know then how lucky I was to be wanting for drama, to have to conjure and create mystery and intrigue and difficulty because nothing new seemed to be happening in my life. Such carefree days and nights are the province of youth, and largely wasted upon it.
And so I indulged in listening to songs that spoke of love and heartache and all the feelings I thought I wanted to experience first-hand. The romanticism and folly of being young… the almost-innocence of being a teenager somewhere between spring and summer…
Hold me, kiss me, Whisper sweetly That you love me Forever.
We are scheduled to hold our first coquette-themed gathering of friends this weekend, and while sun would be ideal, the forecast calls for a cool rain. Maybe that’s more fitting for the coquette theme anyway – the underlying moodiness of it, as personified in a song like ‘Saturn’ by SZA. I have it on good authority that this song is true to the coquette aesthetic, which seems to go just slightly deeper than its beautiful outside trappings. That’s a theme that can become dear to one’s heart.
Life’s better on Saturn Got to break this pattern Of floating away Ooh (ooh, ooh) Find something worth saving It’s all for the taking I always say
I’ll be better on Saturn None of this matters Dreaming of Saturn, oh.
There’s a freshness at this time of the year, just as spring prepares to retire and let summer finally take her place. It’s a freshness that masks the mixed emotions that sometimes accompany a switch of seasons, so I don’t often feel the conflicted nature of the crux. Summer sun hides more than it reveals.
And I haven’t quite yet decided if I’m ready for summer – which won’t slow its arrival in the slightest, merely color how I navigate the early days. I’ll come around eventually, I usually do… In the meantime, when there are rainy days and dismal weather, I’ll turn on the coquette coziness, spray a little ‘Carnal Flower’, and bloom, bloom, bloom… while revisiting the sort of sunny day captured in these pictures.
The last few weeks of school before summer vacation often played confusing games with my mind. As much as I wanted out, as much as I wanted the drudgery and worry and strain of school to be done, June also made me want to slow things down. Faced with the prospect of freedom, suddenly I wasn’t sure I wanted to go. There were spells of enchantment in every school year, and friends who made their mark in my life. All of us had gone through the same trauma and drama in ways that bound us to each other like no one would again. That tender part of one’s life, those formative and impressionable years – I sensed then that they might not ever be repeated, and every June I felt them slip further away.
I’m a high school lover And you’re my favorite flavor Love is all, all my soul You’re my playground love
Our playgrounds shifted and changed, from the other-worldly, gaudily-painted steel flowers and caterpillars and mushrooms of kindergarten, to the wooden climbing houses and shadowy covered slides, to the almost-adult tracks and courts of high school, just as our play moved from the outside world to the inside of our heads.
Through those high school corridors, my mind travels back into the past. The hallways feel dimmer in my head than they looked the last time I was in the building. Hazier and more dangerous too, filled with the people who tormented my mind more than they ever troubled me in person, the way most demons wreak their havoc – lazily relying on you to fill in the frightening blanks. And I would always give them more ferocity and power than they ever really held.
Yet my hands are shaking I feel my body remains Time’s no matter, I’m on fire On the playground, love
Though I could not see it or fully feel it at the time – there was only a vague sense of it – I held my own power too. It was there in the way most teachers appreciated my rapt attention to their every word, there in the compliments garnered from my outfits, there in the gaze of a guy who watched me change in the locker room for gym class, his eyes glued to me no matter how long I waited for him to leave before hastily pulling off my khakis and slipping into sweat pants. Power operated on all planes and playgrounds – we each had some, and we each used it in different ways. We were just starting to see, to learn, to play…
You’re the piece of gold That flashes on my soul Extra time, on the ground You’re my playground love
Fresh from the bonus track of this coquette playlist, ‘A Night to Remember’ plays slinkily on this almost-summer Saturday night. In the attic loft window, and air conditioner hums and sputters, trying to keep the building heat at bay. Below, the Japanese garden gently waves its fronds of fountain bamboo in the slightest breeze, a host of hostas and their beautiful blue-grey leaves blend into the evening shadows, while a Japanese spikenard glows chartreuse behind a row of Japanese painted ferns. The night calls for music to remember…
Swore I’d seen you before Watched you walk through the door Something in your eye Reminded me of somebody I used to know…
The pink associated with the coquette aesthetic is a light and soft powdery pink – nothing too hot, nothing too electric, nothing too reddish, nothing too purplish, nothing too anythingish but the purest and simplest pink. It’s a whisper, it’s a brush, it’s an evocation. It doesn’t shout or demand or do much of anything other than exist in its own realm and plane, ephemeral and fleeting as the breeze. It’s a shrug and a sigh, and a collapse onto a rose-quilted antique bed.
It will be a bouquet of old-fashioned spray roses as soon as I get around to the market to find some. In the meantime, it’s a song – this song – played as the lights go dim, and the air cools down, and we whisper invitational incantations to summer…
The coquette vibe, according to those in-the-know, is a dreamy state of ultra-romantic yearning, innocently filled with unfulfilled desires and hints of romantic entanglements that may or may not work out. Emi and Cameron lended their ears and recommendations for most of these cuts, and I sequenced them in a way that sounded right to my virgin coquette ears. This is only the beginning – there are two more to come…
Bonus Track: A Night to Remember – Laufey and beabadoobee
Give a few of these a spin, ideally in this sequence to give you the closest approximation to what our home will sound like over the next few weeks. Rather than a single big coquette party, we shall be hosting several smaller coquette events. IYKYK, and if you don’t you probably won’t get the invite. Turns out a coquette isn’t all softness and bend…
Wrapped me in your arms Leaned in and whispered “Keep me in your heart” I’m so bewildered What’s this new desire called? I didn’t know that much at all ’bout love before But now, I think I’m learning…
The modern-day use of coquette indicates an aesthetic based on a “2020’s fashion trend that combines sweet, romantic, and playful elements to create a prim, hyper-feminine look. It features lace, pearls, bows, pastel colors, ballet flats, corsets, puff sleeves, and gold jewelry.” Once I read that, I knew this was speaking to me on one of those planes of kismet and destiny, where something that has been inside of me all along suddenly finds expression and fruition in some parallel movement of pop culture and fashion trends. It feels good to belong to something again. And it feels good to welcome a new summer.
My niece Emi and my friend Missy’s son Cameron helped me finalize the concept for our summer theme, and here, as best as my old eyes and brain can figure, is how we are defining ‘coquette’ for the moment, and for the whole of this summer:
Coquette is pink gingham, not red and white plaid or purple damask.
Coquette is a pair of freshly-plucked cherries, perhaps with a withered leaf still attached, not those obnoxious day-glo maraschino monstrosities you find on sundaes.
Coquette is blush or bashful pink, not hot pink or magenta.
Coquette is refined ease and elegance, not forced formality or fortitude.
Coquette is effortless, not plodding.
Coquette is late spring and early summer, not fall or winter.
Finally, coquette is now, not later.
For our musical inspiration, the coquette theme is all Lana Del Rey and Laufey, with a few others sprinkled in to lend whimsy and a dreamlike quality to the rest of the sunny season. (Playlist to come in the next post.) Here, then, is Laufey with the lovely ‘Bewitched’ – a song which perfectly encapsulates the innocent longing that personifies the heart of today’s coquette.
You bewitched me From the first time that you kissed me Waited all night Then we ran down the street in the late London light The world froze around us, you kissed me good night
You bewitch me Every damn second you’re with me I try to think straight But I’m falling so badly, I’m coming apart You wrote me a note, cast a spell on my heart And bewitched me Bewitched me
You’re not even gone I already miss you What’s going on? I’ve never been through This all-consuming fire fuming Cursing at the moon and losing all control and crying ‘Cause I think I’m falling
Perhaps above all else, coquette is escapism and fantasy and a whimsical refusal of the rotten things this life can throw at us. That may be why it’s speaking to me so profoundly at this particular time, for this particular summer. After last year, I feel a little emotionally shell-shocked with the advance of the summer season, and I’ve noticed a little apprehension, which is to be expected. As such, I’m wading slowly and gently into the warmer waters, testing things out and allowing myself to continue grieving as the sadness comes. An underlying sentiment of melancholy informs much of our coquette music as well – proof that romance doesn’t heal all wounds, that love can be as eternal as it is painful – and what heartbreaking beauty comes from the pain of love. This summer, let us have our coquette moments, and let them transport us to a place of stilled prettiness, suspended softness, and delicate wistfulness.
You bewitch me Every damn second you’re with me I try to think straight But I’m falling so badly, I’m coming apart You wrote me a note, cast a spell on my heart And bewitched me Bewitched
This piece of music from the AMC television series ‘Interview with the Vampire‘ (of which I am thrillingly enthralled at a time when not much on television enthralls me) struck me as incredibly moving, as it formed the backdrop to when two vampires met for the first time and didn’t realize they were at the beginning of a centuries-long love affair. No one knows at the beginning – we all think we do, but if we’re honest with ourselves, we never really know. Even if it turns out to last a lifetime, we didn’t know it at the time it began. All we knew was love.
The first summer I met Andy wasn’t what we initially knew as our first summer – it was simply summer. Who could foresee the twenty-four years – and counting – that would follow? As much as I felt like it might be for more than a single summer, I didn’t truly know, and as much as I wanted it to be, I was only one-half of the equation.
Looking back at our story, to the very genesis of how it began in the summer of 2000, I’m more and more touched by our innocence then, by the tenderness of how we learned to accept and love each other. Watching Andy clean the pool – something that seems like such a simple act – is a part of the daily mundane that I’ve come to appreciate as magical over the past few years, when the world has revealed itself to be so much less than kind.
Back when we were the young men, maybe we just didn’t notice it.
This was a defining song of the summer of 1989 – and while that summer comes and goes from my memory all these years later, I remember this song playing on the radio waves, along with the waves of the ocean, and the waves of heat that beat off the sand, off the pavement, off the stone and tar of our garage roof. Such heat coming amid such a sick beat.
Only summer could handle a banger like ‘Express Yourself’.
Listen to Laufey and see if you’re obsessed about this as a lovely summer soundtrack for a summer that will be dreamy and blue and sadly whimsical. Fittingly entitled ‘From the Start’, this is actually an echo of a previous post, so it’s more of a continuation of things pink, and a little pointer of where things are headed. Our official summer theme is about to be revealed – and if you know (and a few of you already do) then snap your fan and keep it secret, keep it safe.
Don’t you notice how I get quiet when there’s no one else around? Me and you and awkward silence Don’t you dare look at me that way I don’t need reminders of how you don’t feel the same
These lilies have been getting in on the act, splashing their flashy selves across the garden centers, and completely out of place at this early stage of the gardening season. Still, they are pretty, and prettiness is its own mystery and solution.
After what seems like a lifetime of delicious teasing, Jim Verraros releases his new single ‘Pyramid’ today, making this a day worthy of celebration, continuing the splash he made with recent hit ‘Take My Bow’. From cuts like ‘ Go Deep’ on his debut album ‘Rollercoaster’ to much of the ‘Do Not Disturb’ era, Verraros has often offered cheekily unabashed musical takes on gay love and life. Sprinkling in enough skin and spiciness to the proceedings to visually entice viewers, Verraros is also making music that moves the masses. ‘Take My Bow‘ charged across dance floors around the world, and ‘Pyramid’ aims to erect a similar trajectory.
The tantalizing possibilities of a song named ‘Pyramid’ have had all fans of Jim Verraros salivating and waiting with properly-baited breath for the arrival of his new single, set to debut May 10. The promotional artwork and video clips are scintillating, and only hint at the follow-up to his worldwide smash ‘Take My Bow’. Like many, I’m hoping this is the beginning of an entire album of new work, as the world seems poised and ready for someone who once trail-blazed his way onto the music scene and never quite got the credit he deserved for it. Get ready to be dazzled all over again as ‘Pyramid’ gets its long-awaited release this week.
With all this talk of flowers, let’s add a little music into the mix for a relaxing Saturday night. Windflowers are aptly named and full of all expected charm. They dance in the slightest breeze, and positively go bonkers when the wind is strong. (Makes for a fun bit of macro-focusing, and part of the reason you don’t see any close-ups here – sorry Norma Desmond.) Anyway, here’s a mellow piece perfect for a Saturday night in spring, when blossoms are on the breeze and hope is in the air.
While Mercury in retrograde wreaked its customary havoc, mostly it was about dealing with bothersome people not knowing how to drive or dropping things like the pictured vase here. During all of this, Taylor Swift released her latest – ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ – a surprise double-album that I’m still digesting. Overall, I dig it, as it feels like a combo of the ‘folklore‘, ‘evermore‘ and ‘Midnights‘ albums, which are the ones that brought me into the Swifties club. This song stood out from the rest, and is delightfully indicative of the mess that Mercury and full moons can bring into existence.
I can read your mind She’s having the time of her life There in her glittering prime The lights refract sequined stars off her silhouette every night I can show you lies (one, two, three)
‘Cause I’m a real tough kid, I can handle my shit They said, baby, gotta fake it ’til you make it and I did Lights, camera, bitch smile, even when you wanna die
I was grinning like I’m winning, I was hitting my marks ‘Cause I can do it with a broken heart (one, two, three)
I’m so depressed, I act like it’s my birthday every day I’m so obsessed with him but he avoids me like the plague I cry a lot but I am so productive, it’s an art You know you’re good when you can even do it With a broken heart
This one goes to anyone who’s ever gone into the world and put on a brave face when everything else is crumbling to the ground. It’s never good to keep things like that inside for long, but sometimes you have to do it – for work, for school, for family, for survival. Some people can’t do it – they can’t soldier on, they have to pause and break down – and my heart breaks for them a little. It breaks more for those of us who carry the weight and move forward with a brave, unbothered face.
He said he’d love me for all time But that time was quite short Breaking down, I hit the floor All the pieces of me shattered as the crowd was chanting, “More” I was grinning like I’m winning, I was hitting my marks ‘Cause I can do it with a broken heart (one, two, three)
I’m so depressed, I act like it’s my birthday every day
I’m so obsessed with him but he avoids me like the plague (he avoids me) I cry a lot but I am so productive, it’s an art
You know you’re good when you can even do it
With a broken heart
You know you’re good when you can even do it
With a broken heart
You know you’re good, I’m good
‘Cause I’m miserable
And no one even knows
Try to come for my job
