Arnold Zwicky's Blog

🇲🇽 It’s Cinco de Mayo today, but this posting has precious little Mexican content; don’t let that keep you from your celebrations, whatever they are.

I had intentions to cook up a homey Mexican pozole  (any occasion is a good one for pozole, in my book, and I always have a can of white hominy in the cupboard, just in case I want to assemble the materials for one), but the main fresh ingredient I had on hand was an big order of Chinese (mung) bean sprouts, so I chopped them up; added a can of lentils (another household staple), with their liquid; splashed in a dose of sriracha sauce; thickened the broth with a container of hummus (ground up chickpeas); and produced a rich, spicy, and crunchy  Chinese / Middle Eastern / Southeast Asian three-legume soup, heated in the microwave. It was fabulous. I might do it again, on purpose this time.

But this posting is a reaction to a card I got from Kathryn Burlingham in Portland OR roughly a month ago — I move sloth-like through my social responsibilities —  about (among other things) the toll of the closet for queer people. Trying to write out and then mail a physical card is, however, gravely difficult for me, while typing at my computer’s keyboard is merely somewhat painful, so this is my response to KB, which turns not so much on the closet — coming out, accepting myself, was heart-breakingly difficult for me, but I spent almost no time in the closet — but on the actual card that KB sent me, the Jahna Vashti greeting card (“vibrantly printed in [yes!] Portland OR on a sturdy, uncoated card stock”) “Brother Sun”:

(#1) Sol Resplendens, looking decidedly fey, at least from his neck all the way down his starry body

Let’s face it: hot stars are frequently, secretly fond of each other (apologies to Ned Sublette and all who have covered his delightful song “Cowboys Are Frequently, Secretly fond of Each Other”).

Jahna Vashti cards. #1 isn’t especially cute, but most JV cards are, in one way or another. I have a high tolerance for cuteness, especially if it’s good-hearted and playful, and the JV cards are well within my tolerance. Animals and music are two recurrent themes, as here:

(#2) “Shroom Tunes”, with musical mushrooms

(#3) “Forest Festivities”: bear on a banjo, rabbit on the drums, everybody dance (there’s also a card with an adorable hedgehog playing the violin)

About JV. From the About page from her website:

Hi, I’m Jahna, my middle name is Vashti. I was born on Vancouver Island Canada, but grew up in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles. I always longed for lush green forests and rain, but love the twinkly lights and culture of a city. So, when I found myself in Portland OR many moons ago, I fell in love. In the summer of 2021, I relocated to Vancouver WA., now I’m all snuggled up here with my two sons and their handsome Dad.

Creating art has forever been what I needed to do, and always will be. My ideas come to me like lightning bolts and trying to explain that is hard for me. I can only say that it feels ancient, and spiritually sound. Having no formal training, I have had to learn to trust myself and embrace my flaws as an artist — and believe me, coming to this place of acceptance was no easy feat.

We all have our ways of being and our own ways of understanding our places in the world. Words like twinkly and, especially, spiritually, tend to make me edgy, but, really, what she chooses to think in the privacy of her own mind is none of my business.  Her animals are delightful, and that’s good enough for me.

[It has only just now occurred to me that she might think that the personified sun in #1 is female, not fey (note that the mushrooms in #2 seem to be all female, despite their phallic forms). The sun deity of Greco-Roman mythology is male, so I’ve been going with that. Maybe I’m offering an alternative interpretation of her work; well, that happens (and it brings me to Ned Sublette).]

[Third thought on 5/6: but JV’s title for this work is “Brother Sun”]

This entry was posted on May 5, 2025 at 4:50 pm and is filed under Art, Gender and sexuality, Holidays, Language and animals, Language and food, Music, My life, Phallicity, Signs and symbols. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.