Guest Blogger! Sitari -- "Mad Hatter's Attack Metaphor"

I often use rabbit holes and wardrobes as metaphors for my underground nights. I once described the legendary MorYork Gallery as Narnia so often that my companion thought it was actually titled so. Last night, the rabbit hole metaphor hopped off the page to pummel our brains with flamingos, whacking reality through croquet arches poised on a well-manicured mental lawn.

Our twin top hats tipped to the night, we drudged through the stale tediousness of Hollywood to the Mad Hatter's Art Party. Storybook characters, fully animated, intently strutted down concrete corridors; a mouse scrambled by with a huge tray of sandwiches. A rabbit clad in a red jacket, pocket watch and hot pants disappeared around a corner, the white puff of a tail perched on perky booty luring us obviously into metaphor manifest.

I spend my Saturdays submerged in costumed parties, yet was still surprised by the sense that everyone there had a full Wonderland wardrobe.
"Honey, what should I wear? I simply cannot decide between Queen of Hearts and Mad Hatter tonight."
"Why don't you wear the Cheshire cat lingerie, it will nicely compliment my hookah caterpillar."
"Splendid idea, dear!"
And if these ornate Wonderland wardrobes had a purpose, the red-lit lounge suggested it was to entice and be removed. The space seethed with the seedy vibe of kink, perhaps a very specific Alice in Wonderland fetish. The uncomfortable overabundance of whips and lip-locked pairs suggested a secret we missed. Was it not on the evite?

Moving from the warm odor of nag champa and other people's sex, we wandered deeper into the Wonderland warehouse. Freaks scattered across the pink dance floor, taking advantage of the ample space to dance like you do alone in your underwear. Transvestite Alice graced the decks, a dark beard poking out from under a crooked blonde wig. A goddess in pink playing card bikini tangoed across the floor with a plastic flamingo. The he-she-dee-jay spun tracks and minds, twisting breaks with salsa, rap with 80's love songs, NiN mashups with the Backstreet Boys. While not particularly conducive to establishing groove, the musical mess was the perfect auditory accompaniment to the visual freakfest before us. A Spartan warrior glided by, his armor made from decks upon decks of cards.

Bjork played; interpretive dance broke out like an Icelandic tarantella. Contemplating Tweedle-dee in headstand next to me, I poured the last of my Drink Me vial into my mouth. The potion's potency was not enough to keep me afloat, thus we retreated giggling back into the night, awed and awkward. Was it the environmental mindfuck that left me confused? Perhaps it was the fun and weird mixed with striking feelings of inadequacy and otherness. Typically, my descent to the underground is filled with a sense of magic, culture, knowing and debauchery; rabbit holes and wardrobes allude to the hidden wonder, as if I needed to explain that. Yet just as that last sentence insulted the metaphor with its obviousness, the literalness of Wonderland manifest suffocated its mystique.