new years..........

teopdances
Originally uploaded by al-zahra

this is teop, or calanthe, who is manifesting so strongly as a uncontrollable force of nature right now. he is probably the most beautiful person i know. this new years eve he was set to perform at a masquerade with the hipnautica collective at teh club copa downtown.

he wore a version of what he normally wears at carnaval. namely, body paint and the skimpiest of loincloths, with little legwarmers since he dislikes to show his lower legs.

although i missed the firedancing and performance part, i hung out with him for a bit outside where he obligingly let me capture his dancing and take a few blurry pics with my crackberry.

this whole outfit was made by a friend of his who is a seamstress, from a skirt obtained from a second-hand shop. he was wearing his dancebelt underneath it, and a mask that he'd decorated himself to match.

he is such a hummingbird and such a presence that i spied him immediately on the dance floor in the dimly lit club, and he was standing outside smoking and chatting with me in about 40 F degree weather, and seemingly insensible to the cold.

he also has the power to attract stares and downright adulation, and it amused me very much this evening to see him in his finest form, soaking up all the attention, and converting it into a kind of focused energy which he then threw back into the crowd.

i myself decided to go goth this evening. generally i glam it up on my birthday and wear ballgowns. but i thought given the masquerade, that it might be more interesting to go in pure goth style. normally i like to wear a mixture of things, not really favoring one particular style. i do tend to like punkish gothish stuff though, though most often i am found in jeans and a funny t-shirt.

i will make a terrible admission. i do go to secret october, and workclothes and more, and legs diamond, and any number of indie store, but often i cheat and go to hot topic, the mall goth store. it's a dreadful thing, but i am so lazy and barely have time to make my SCA dresses.

i am sort of picky though because generally the gothy things they have i don't like. i think it's interference from the costuming that i do, that makes me abhor some of the clothes that are out there, with their mishmash of corsetry nightmares, and badly made too. but i found a nice little dress i liked, and a fishnet shrug for sleeves, some silly wristlets, rhinestone and skull earrings, and banded fishnet stockings. the dress reminds me some of dickie's actually.

i wore a little plastic ring, my new lion's head torc, and my beloved doc boots. and dressed my hair in pigtails.

i was wildy amused because when i arrived at the second party, all my friends crowded around me and scrutinized my attire very closely. they were the ones who discovered that the little hanging tabs on the skirt were actually garter belt attachments (though only in the front, so what gives with that?) and that the zippers on the armlets actually were functional. so theoretically i could secret items in them.

the only thing i would have wished was to have legwarmers, but i will have to figure that one on my own. alas.