I have just completed my forth gig touring the Marie Celestial at Shambala, a wonderfully fluffy, glitter-ridden utopian festival. There is so much glitter shedding from the twenty-thousand strong crowd that the trackway literally sparkles.
The Marie Celestial is my adventure into running my own circus with my best friend 3D artist Ruby Soho. It has been a continual whirlwind of effort for nearly a full year now. I can report that the dedication and sacrifice of sanity somewhat outweighs the end result, but what we have made is good. Very good. It's far from perfect yet, but it's attracting attention and it's making people smile. It's also draining the life force out of others, hurting, breaking and offending some. But having come this far, there is no turning back, we all want to make it count. Plus it's far more fully fledged than a dead loss. We just need to streamline... everything. I could spend a lifetime picking to pieces my life lessons. Hell I already do, which is why other areas of my life have fallen silent. I'm also pregnant for the first time which is as equally fascinating, daunting and irreversible.
Perhaps it's my sobriety or perhaps it's simply a rare moment of peace where I find myself, but I wanted to report a few simple things before the next leg of the tour. I'm tucked up in my Transit van named Biscuit while rain falls and the weekend-long party draws towards it's close.
Just to cover some facts, I'm six months along, expecting a little girl in December. I've come to accept that she is not a talking dolphin, unicorn or other such mythical or imaginary creature. Yes I am romantically partnered with her father. I love him very much. He shares many of my peculiar anxieties, but together we face the world and find comfort and familiarity in music and choice of pudding. He is working as a sound engineer in one of the venues at the festival. Our little girl is kicking me from the inside in a comforting fidget I recognise in both of us. The Marie Celestial is my full time occupation, it represents my biggest ever professional challenge, but also my proudest achievement career wise.
I've never been to Shambala before. It has a reputation for being the festival at the end of the summer where touring crews finally let their hair down. I will be on my way to another first thing tomorrow but that is another chapter.
The best thing I have seen all weekend is a cardboard-box robot absolutely loosing it on the dance floor in the Wandering Word. Space hats off to you my cardboard android friend. You shook your square bottom like I never knew was possible!
This is a different cardboard robot from Secret Garden Party 2012.
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