30 years on earth

Photos include: trip to hotsprings cove, Halloween ( we were a mad scientist and sidekick igor monster ) some randoms, and shots for school.




Well it was my 30th birthday nearly two weeks ago already. Its weird where you end up after 30 years. Its really not that long then its practically infinite. I guess the thing for me is that in a certain way every minute is independent of all the others so I'm always just becoming right now. When you think of it that way the whole sociologically constructed concept of age doesn't seem to mean much. The only thing about it thats real is that you are such and such a percentage through your lifespan. I mean a natural and un-interrupted lifespan that is. I think 25 was the last year of my adolescence anyway -the year I realized I would keep getting older and older till I disappear. I don't really have a problem with that now that my imagination of myself has extended past the glamorous years.

This autumn has been busy and rewarding. I have been loving my photography classes and I think I want to finish the whole diploma program at Langara. I didn't really love the product photography part, I really prefer to work with people. But since started working with people in my lighting class, I find its really holding my attention. Which is a difficult thing for me - I like practically everything so its easy to get distracted. I feel like I'm still unsure about the exact path I want to pursue within photography, but my technical skills have really improved which is a good feeling because it gives you the control to execute ideas.

Its been unusual weather this year.

Its snowing outside right now, freezing cold, and its been holding for days. Before that was intense rainstorms which led to our drinking water getting mud in it, and before that a long stretch of warm clear weather. I can't say what it means, but I admit i love the drama.

Back to my birthday - the highlight was definitely the trip Blair and I took to hotsprings cove ( my birthday present from him ). We went to Tofino and visited Neal for a few days, then took a float plane there ( amazing!) and stayed on a bed and breakfast boat eating gourmet meals and being entertained by Shawn, our gracious host. And the springs! yes there was that. They were gorgeous, right on the coast, you had to walk 25 minutes through the rainforest along a board walk, then there they were open to the ocean, a flowing waterfall carrying the hot water into little tide pools which were empty of sea water when the tide was low. As the tide started to turn you could be in a pool with hot water coming from behind and freezing ocean water coming from the front. Glorious. I couldn't think of anything I would rather do for my birthday. There was almost no one else there, just a lone camper the first night, and 3 swiss people who joined us on the boat the second night. Mmmm wish it was still then instead of now.... We went twice a day every day and once again the morning we flew out.

Then on my actual birthday we had a foot rally and small party at mom and dad's house - a good throwback to the old school birthday... and Myles and Rachel made me a great cake with the 3 decades portrayed in classic contorted jellies and marzipan. Jenny and Nan came up from Seattle which was great - the only thing I was sorry about was the people I wished could have been there- but you can't have it all can you...

So hard to get around to writing on this - I think because so much is happening I don't have time to update properly and regularly ... ah well. The truth is I really only write this for the benefit of a few people. And it would be nicer anyway if I made them packages and sent personal letters. Maybe one of these days. Not in good touch with anyone right now... I really miss you all!

Names from the bottom up

rockfoam, kevin miller wrestles with death, suitcase blues, tub drunks, the elephant appears, puddle brick dummy, the blonde and the bowtied, log feature -all names temporary and likely to change at later dates in accordance with my whims.

and next

August 4th

Photos that seemed like good choices






This is an auspicious day for me. The reason is that 4 years ago I left for Japan on this date, and last year I arrived back in Canada on the same date. A day to look at where I'm at, where I'm going, where I've been.

I want to stop settling in as of tomorrow, stop re-assessing myself constantly, stop overthinking everything. Even today, I want to stop doing that. I would like to attribute my recent tendency to that kind of self-nagging as an automatic throwback response to old habits, bred of my experience of life in Canada.

I would like to accept where I'm at, go in the direction I'm going, see what goes on around me clearly, face things squarely and savour all experiences. Sometimes I have a few hours of feeling like that, then find I slide back into a sort of anxiety about all the things I should be doing, which immediately makes me feel no interest at all in doing any of them.

I started looking at the 'Learning to love you more' website yesterday and got obsessed with it again. I am essentially an ' anti-establishment' type of person I have recently realized. I love LTLYM because its so free from the rules of learning, art, etc. and is so essentially about exploring the world and finding delight in its endless details. Its a bit of a problem for me actually ( the anti-establishment thing) because no matter what the area of life I consider, I start to find it constrictive and stuffy as soon as it gets commandeered by ' the experts'. Its not that I don't see the use of that kind of thing, but that as soon as some committee establishes some kind of guidelines to their chosen field, it immediately loses its luster and imaginative possibilities. Plus, I feel its a real shortcoming in our society that there are so many experts within specific fields, and noone looking at the big picture. I know I just need to shut out those frustrations and focus on what inspires me, and thats what I intend to do - starting tomorrow.

I think the key to feeling right about what you are doing is a kind of partitioning. You must section off the irritating details of life when you are trying to find inspiration, and you must section off the frustration at not having time to follow your inspiration when you have to worry about the irritating details.

Regardless of all that, its time for me to take a walk in the warm night. To think of plane trips and time cycles and peeling off the last year, jumping into the next.

HISASHIBURI

WowEE

I can't believe how long its been since I wrote on this. Its all because the weather started to get nice, and stayed nice, so nice I'm wearing nothing at 10;30 and still boiling hot. Seems unusual, but I' m definitely not complaining. Well, the weather as well as the fact that I am only on the computer when I have to be these days. What can I say, I just haven't been in the mood.

So why write now? I don't know I thought I'd grab the impulse while it lasts.

I saw 'Through a Scanner Darkly" this afternoon - it was great and awful - awful because it could have been so much better I thought - not enough payoff at the end.

The city looks hazy through the window of my newly cleaned out studio / computer / spare room - hazy lights on a hot night. I can hear the seagulls who have made a nest on the roof of our building squawking their nightwatch. We went up there a few days ago in a semi-successful attempt to clean seagull shit off our solarium window using a rag fashioned around a swiffer type broom thingy - I thought the parents were going to dive bomb us. I was seriously scared. But they just swooped around cawing and batting their wings - and we saw the baby! it was so cute. I thought it might fall off its little turret as it was walking around all grey and downy - luckily it didn't or the parents would probably have started attacking the skylight. I can see them up there all the time standing on guard.
Ah - easier to talk about now and very recently than trying to wrap up the last few silent months in some kind of neat package.
To all the people I owe letters/ emails to - I will write eventually and don't think I've singled you out - I've been neglecting those far away people i hold dear pretty much across the board. and even some of the close ones. I think about you all often if thats any consolation.
Have not come to any major revelation point about anything - but sort of chugging away at doing things I like, thinking I should work harder at some kind of plan, yet finding myself inclined to spend a lot of time enjoying my house, getting books about photographers from the library and drinking vermouth and ginger ale. its really too bad everyone else is so busy with their own little universes too, as my house is really a fantastic place to engage in this kind of activity, and I do miss having guests.
Still, one day soon I will shake myself off and think about the outside world again. I guess this is what happens when you get too contented! They say happiness is not necessarily good for productivity.
I have still been taking and making and finding photos - gradually pulling them into some kind of bouquet - or maybe I mean multiple different varieties of bouquets. But its a slow process, figuring out your mind made visible reflecting off times and places, deciding what parts are interesting and what parts sentimental, maudlin, or derivative, and you know I don't really feel inclined to rush it.

Lets hope time spent will result in a keenness of selection, intention, execution - and that the same will hold true of the various letters that have been taking shape slowly and organically the mughug langour of these hot days and nights.

Untitled

photos from victoria ( and one from the alley behind the house )