Memory of a Memory

2009-11-06T10:13:00.000-08:00

More.... late night ideas

2007-05-11T18:41:00.000-07:00

2007-05-02T01:52:00.000-07:00

Hanami at Queen E

2007-04-30T19:29:00.000-07:00

its blossom heaven here in Vancouver. A few days ago I spent 10 minutes just leaning out my window and watching some kind of bulldog, obviously crazed with spring fever, leaping straight up into the air towards a stick which was hanging down from a cherry tree loaded with flowers in the park across the street. It was just out of his reach, but that did not deter him from repeated acrobatic leaps straight upwards, trying over and over again to catch it. He did manage to snatch it in his jaws twice , for a split second before gravity proved much stronger than his teeth. In the second he caught it though, a glorious shower of blossoms shook all over everything.

The 1st Annual Absurdist Spring Teaparty

2007-04-05T22:13:00.000-07:00

So I think the tea party was basically a success. It really went exactly as I'd hoped, apart from the fact that there were obvious missing faces I would have been happy to have there - including Myles, Zoe, Rachel, Skye and Stephen, and the list goes on... We had 7 kinds of tea, chocolate covered radishes, a cake with salamanders and money baked into it, parachute men from the ceiling in the living room, jujubes from the ceiling in the solarium, a photo booth room, games like - find the most buttons, pickup the most feathers using giant utensils, bunny bunny ( with absurd punishments for screwing up) and the highlight of the afternoon - the boat race game. Not to mention classic surrealist movies playing constantly, a screening of "What's for Dinner" and " Melon Murder Madness" ( courtesy of Fermented Films) and the creation of a Borat imitation video which was submitted to Much Music that very night hours before the deadline. Looking forward to next year!

Always the Photographer Never the Bride or the Bridesmaid...

2007-03-15T19:48:00.000-07:00

Well, I have taken photographs at 3 different weddings, in 3 different provinces within the past year, and they have been enjoyably different from each other. I thought I would post some photos that I like from these special events. Skye and Stephen's wedding was first - in September along the St. Lawrence in Morrisville Ontario near the Quebec border - a very gorgeous Canadian Wedding. Next was Jen and Mark's in Winnipeg Manitoba in December - also very Canadian in a totally different way! Probably the most traditional as well. Finally Becky and Norm's just this past January here in Vancouver BC - the most unusual as they run a Burlesque Troupe - she's the creative director / performer and he's the producer. Most of the guests were punks or dancers or performers of some kind. And it was just down the street from my old place on Main St. at the Heritage Hall. Shooting weddings is kind of stressful - I think its better to do it with a second shooter - its just really hard because you often feel like you should be in two places at once. Still, I enjoyed doing them even if they were challenging.

30 years on earth

2006-11-20T09:09:00.000-08:00

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

2006-10-16T16:55:00.000-07:00

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

2006-10-16T16:25:00.000-07:00

August 4th

2006-08-04T22:07:00.000-07:00

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

2006-07-21T22:29:00.000-07:00

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

2006-04-15T16:38:00.000-07:00

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

2006-04-14T17:31:00.000-07:00

Settling in

2006-04-12T18:10:00.000-07:00

So I've had the last 6 days off - it has been a sort of luxury in the sense that I have felt here and now puffing up all around me - becoming tangible one might say. A relief to be honest. I was wondering if it would ever happen. I continue to be surprised at how resistant I am to being home. It hasn't been difficult, but then again, not easy either. I have been escaping from here, from my history, from any sort of continuing future for such a long time now. Yet, it was really for those reasons that I came back here too. A sense of having arrived at a point where I would be able to come back to my history and see it with new eyes - confront certain things I'm afraid of, understand parts of myself I had left behind. And I guess this is the process - somehow I thought I would blithely skip through everything - never falter, bask in some golden era of self understanding...and maybe thats finally approaching - though its taken nearly a year of being back in Canada for me to reach the edges of that phase.
I went to Victoria on the weekend - visited grandma, Murray and Blair's aunt Anthea. It was good being back there because ( well apart from the obvious enjoyment of seeing people) it did bring back a lot of feelings - mostly a love for the natural surroundings and a dislike of the community. I find Victoria oppressively comfortable. I always felt like second class citizen there. We rented scooters one day and drove all around the town. The best part was going through Oak Bay - over the dry scrubby hills, the ocean a muted pastel blue against the yellow gorse bushes. We passed the old house on King George terrace - the one we lived in when I was 12 - where the Vassilis stayed with us for a while, the neighbourhood that offered the best halloween take of any place any time. I used to walk She-ra on the little peninsula just off the bay - with our faces square into the wind we would stare out at the pacific ocean - stretching out to everywhere... the landscape filled in little patches of me that had peeled away with time and weather.

But back in Vancouver the last few days - Blair has been working and I've had time to just be around here. I feel like I always need to face into the wind - I mean move in the direction of what I need to tackle next. and then find a way to unravel the complexities of why I'm afraid or uncertain about it. But I also have to make sure its the right thing to tackle. That its something worth my energy - not a diversion I have created for myself. I find it crazy how difficult it is to understand ourselves. I mean, people even hire other people to help them figure out themselves. I guess thats only when they can't talk about it with anyone else - I know thats how I figure myself out - by talking to other people. But isn't that ridiculous. I wish I could get to the point of understanding myself without requiring constant interpretation. Then again, sometimes I think we all know ourselves, we just choose to confuse ourselves because we don't like the conclusions we arrive at.

But surely forward motion will happen soon. The flailing has to stop eventually right? Summer is coming and I hope I will let it arrive...

more new photos

2006-03-21T17:32:00.000-08:00

New Photos

2006-03-21T17:01:00.000-08:00

untitled

2006-03-10T16:45:00.000-08:00

This morning it was snowing wet snow, snowing down on the twin trees outside my bedroom window. I woke up early since the Skytrain closes when it snows too much and Blair needed a ride to his first day as a boom operator on a cbc show called 49th and main. When I got back I went straight to sleep again, and by 9 the sun was glinting off the snowy melting roofs across the street.
I took a photo of snowy rivers running through the lane.

approaching somewhere

the birds fly over the east side in the late afternoon. I see them from the skytrain windows, I watch them and think of how nice they will look through the windows in the solarium at home.

approaching nowhere

approaching outerspace........

" I never really imagined life past that point you know..."
" if I had 20 million dollars in my pocket... well.. but I don't" " a whole world of nations is right here in our city" " why all this talking, when it doesn't matter, when you open your mouth you miss the point" " why all this thinking, when thinking self tells knowing self, what knowing self already knows" " the coast the coast the coast is clear today"

2006-02-14T17:59:00.000-08:00

ps - the post below was done on Valentines day - I just started it on the 12th. Sometimes Blogger is annoying! I want a blog that can do more... like let me post an audio clip of the awesome music Billy Beatty made for the 2 minute movie....

Tagged! Happy Valentines!

2006-02-12T21:31:00.000-08:00

So Rhya tagged me, and I guess that means I am supposed to say a few specific things about things?

Its been nearly a month since I wrote on this! Have been so busy. well... maybe my answers will reveal a bit of whats been happening.

4 jobs I've had....

1. Lifeguard - I guess I lifeguarded on and off for about 6 years at quite a few different pools including Victoria Commonwealth Games Pool, Toronto Hart House, and London England, Peckham Rye Pool. Ah, so many hours of staring at water and keeping my mind in a state of roving focus.

2. English Teacher - 3 years in Japan - this job was not busy enough - especially in the first year. I did get into it though, especially by the end, the best was reinacting english movies on video with my students. Imagine 15 year old girls performing the "Huggies Robbery Scene" From Raising Arizona ( If you haven't seen that movie, go rent it right now )

3.Sales Girl at the PNE - for lipstick that changes to the best color for your skin tone - this was only for a few weeks right after University - but over the years I have done quite a lot of pitch work - it's lame in a lot of ways, but fantastic in others because its such an interesting perspective. Its like the building block our whole society is built on. Convincing people to buy things from you - only this is the old fashioned direct way. Advertising is no different - even your Dentist is trying to upsell you. Plus you see a lot of fucking weird people.

4. Admin Assistant at the Specialty Gourmet! This is my new job with Marina and so far its really great. Not that our work is super interesting in and of itself ( check it out )
but our office has such a great energy and I really don't mind going to work at all in the morning - ( well apart from having to wake up ) Today was a bit ridiculous though - I was working alone for what was supposed to be the 3-4 hr shift and locked myself out..... it sucked. I was wearing a t shirt and had no money, no key no phone. Luckily for me i didn't get stuck in the building ( which is loaded with key card access points ) and the nice girls at starbucks let me use the phone to wake up Marina.... ( a big sorry M!) Then they even gave me a free coffee while I waited for an hour. So stupid. I got pretty stressed out there for a bit... Well, i will never do it again!

4 Movies I watch over and over....

Hmmm I don't tend to do that very much - so here are some I plan to start watching over and over

1. Cry Baby ( actually I used to watch this over and over when I was about 13 )

2. Before Sunset / Before Sunrise

3. Together ( Hilarious Swedish movie you should see )

4. Spirited Away

4 Places I've lived

1. Zeballos - a tiny logging / fishing / mining town on Vancouver Island's Northwest coast - I was born here actually

2. The Greek Island of Paros - very nice place. I lived here when I was 4 and haven't been back since I was 6. Why? I don't know. I've been longing for it ever since.

3. Chino city - Japan - I lived here for the last 3 years - I miss it.

4. Vancouver - I lived here in my own house for about 6 months with Zoe and Skye before I went to Japan - ah those Main St. days... But now I'm going to be living here again ( in my own house ) starting on wednesday! Well, its 95% sure anyway - Blair and I are moving to 1st and Commercial. I wanted to be back on Main St. again - but this is a pretty nice place... two bedrooms, the top floor ( 4th ) back corner suite facing south west - skylight and gas fireplace, washer drier dishwasher, and my favorite - a solarium at the back. Can you tell I'm excited? And the distance from Main st. just makes me more determined to get a scooter again and then it will be just a five minute jaunt. We even have underground parking!

4 TV shows... well I almost never watch TV but... when i do....

1. The Simpsons always makes me happy

2. I have been watching 24 - although I don't really like it to be honest - but my parents watch it and I get sucked in

3. Seinfeld also always pleases me ( they don't have to be current TV do they? )

4. I want to watch " The Prisoner" and "The Office" which are both british TV shows - oh yeah and what was the name of that crazy show Rhya brought at New Years.... I forgot. It was bizarre.

4 Vacations.....hmm... lets see -

1. Australia - up the east coast ostensibly on a surfing trip with Zoe

2. New York - with Marina in my last year of Uni - I saw " Sensation" at the Brooklyn Art Gallery

3. Dublin - with Angus at the end of my time living in London - we visited David - an old friend of mine, went out drinking all night and ended up with the worst hangover I've ever had which we assauged with watching EastEnders all afternoon ( not particularly soothing in my opinion ) Those Irish have a reputation for a reason!

4. France - for 3 months with my parents when I was 6 - we stayed in all these big rental chateaux - I have good memories of searching for " petit fours" - although Zoe almost drowned when we were staying in Champagne.

4 Dishes I love

1. really good lentil soup

2. I have to agree with Rhya - Marina's or her mom's enchiladas

3. Skye's bamboo shoots

4. My dad's bacon wrapped date appetizer. Oh and Pancakes made by Blair. I guess thats 5...

4 Sites I visit

1. Rhya, Skye, Malani and Kimiko's blogs

2. Craigs list ( yes I'm a bit addicted I admit )

3. Google Maps

4. um... I don't even think there is another site I regularly visit! How boring!

I think a new category should be added to this list - actually two - books I love - and things I've made recently.
So...

4 books

1. The Brothers Karamazov ( Dostoevsky )

2. If on a winters night a traveller... ( Italo Calvino )

3. Borges' fictions

4. Midnight's Children ( Salman Rushdie )

5. Oh well, 5, - Iris Murdoch - The Sandcastle ( Its good to have a woman author in the list )

4 things I've made lately

1. Some drawings for my new blog with Rhya!

2. A two minute movie for the Portable film festival preview ( link to come later )

3. A japanese feast ( along with Malani )

4. Backstage video part of a documentary on a burlesque festival here in Van

Well, I think that might give an idea of things I've been up to.

Many things to do still! Happy Valentines Everyone!

Its cold outside

2006-01-16T18:39:00.000-08:00

Well into january now, I find myself looking back on the past month and noticing details I had no time for when they happened. Thus a few selected photos - which by no means show everything that happened, but perhaps give some idea. To me anyway.
It really is cold tonight - rainy and windy and nasty - but the daffodils are sprouting up in the pots on the balcony, and one little snowdrop is already blooming. The days are getting longer, and a modern me is showing signs of waltzing onto the scene. tra la la la la.

2006-01-12T15:57:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!

2006-01-09T23:31:00.000-08:00

Topsy and Tallulah in Mr. Peabody's Rescue

Well, its been a while since I posted anything, and so much has happened... where to start... we made a silent movie ( which I have long promised to post photos of) then there was Christmas, New Years, and all the intervening shenanigans. Here are some from the movie first since those are the most overdue. Unfortunately I realized there are no photos of Mr. Peabody himself... also no photos of our illustrious hairdo creator - Malani de Leon - mostly because she was also the stills photographer who took most of these fantastic shots - the only exceptions being the mexican scene ones which are courtesy of Myles, and the dancing shots which Zoe and I took of each other.

Topsy and Tallulah head to Mexico

2005-12-09T08:07:00.000-08:00

the last scene of topsy and tallulah

Top Model Results

2005-12-08T00:55:00.000-08:00

Tonight was the last top model. My girl Nik didn't win! The big winner was Nicole - and I have to say, she did have a lot of spunk. The funny thing is, only one person voted for her, and no-one knows who she is! well, even if she had I wouldn't have won any money since my 2nd choice Jayla got kicked out last week. It was an exciting evening, Malani and I even dressed up like ' models' ( whatever that really means....) and got harangued by a crazy on the bus for it.. he said ' you look like anorexics! you look like a fat cow - I'll call you a cow - why don't you give some food to the hungry.. why don't you shop at value village? Nice coat - I love blue, it goes with my eyes - if I had my way I'd send all asians back to their countries...' very crazy. It was kind of funny though, because I guess we were so dressed up he thought we were actually part of the ' affluent masses' who were abstractly destroying his life. Um, crazy dude, have you noticed we're riding the bus? I don't think we'd be on the loser cruiser if we had money to burn...
So after the amazing dinner prepared by Mark and Ester, and after the final episode concluded, we took some modelling photos of our own... the top photo is me sulking that I lost the money - then after that comes photos from our fabulous stable of top model watchers Ester, Scooby, Becca, Claudia, Karen, Marina, Peggie-Ann, Malani, and me, Ariel Kirk-Gushowaty. A few notes on the photos - this week's winner? I say - Ester - for originality and flair. As for the rest, I'd say Claudia was the most fierce, and Becca, you need to work on trying to minimize the enormous size of your hands. Thats all for tonight no idea why I stayed up this late writing this...

2005-12-05T18:47:00.000-08:00

December the First

2005-12-01T22:19:00.000-08:00

Well, things have been here and there, things have been in several places at once even, but maybe, possibly, I'm getting accustomed to the rhythm of life in the city at the edge of the great Pacific Ocean - the last outpost before you reach Hawaii... Vancouver.

November seemed to be a month of playing at being a grown-up. I am in the process of developing several companies - or shall I say - proprietorships - and its gotten to the point where I feel that taking yourself seriously in a professional sense - that is, believing that you can legitimately offer things to other people - and then following through no matter what it takes to make it happen - opens up a whole new dimension. In the sense that it suddenly seems possible that my working life actually could happen on my own terms. At least to a much greater degree than I thought before.

It seems like a game in a certain way though - not because I don't take the work itself seriously - but because I think identity is so tied up in your ' title' so to speak. The whole ' what do you do? ' scenario. And I think I have always had difficulties choosing what to do because I hated the idea of locking my identity into something. But now I feel like its all just costumes, acting, and if you look the part, and tell someone 'I'm a blah blah blah' they pretty much believe you. Not that I'm saying I want to do things I'm not capable of doing well, or that I'm trying to cheat anyone. Its just that I think that people's perception of you based on what you do - and the accompanying shifts in identity and self-esteem - are nothing at all really - just smoke and mirrors. Virtually everyone on earth stays alive by convincing other people to give them money for something. Thats how the world works. At least this world does. Everyone is marketing something, everyone is trying to get into your pockets. But I don't find this depressing really - its just the way it is. A big game.
Suddenly I'm not taking myself so seriously anymore - I don't really care about status, because it means a lot less than I thought it did - its so easy to be legitimate, you just have to act like you're legitimate. I'm not saying I'm going to try to be a rocket-scientist, but there are plenty of things I'm capable of doing well and its just that easy.
So now I have two companies in the works, and thinking on some others

Image consulting
Fine-art magnet production/ Framing and matting
and maybe
Photographer
Manga translation ( in partnership with Skye and one of our Japanese friends)

Its like toy companies a bit- if I like doing it, and it proves profitable, I'll keep doing it. If not, I will turf them into that big intangible dump out there of companies that didn't make the grade. Why shouldn't I have an experimentation period? I might as well experiment now when I can afford to. Then maybe by the time I have to get rent money each month, I will have a way of doing it that suits me.

As for my artistic ambitions, well, they haven't gone away... but I'm not totally sure where they are heading. Recently I had an idea that I wanted to start taking totally abstract photos of patterns I find all over the place. That perhaps that is the style I should focus on for a while. Its a sort of purifying thing to take photos of. Totally devoid of connotation except in the most vague way. Its like a glass of clear water for your overstressed eyes and brain. And all this business stuff can be tiring. We'll see though. There are plenty of things to explore.

A few weeks ago, before the snow started, there was a fog that lasted nearly a week. I went out one day and wandered around the city taking photos. Here are some of those, and some of the abstracts I've been doing.
Oh yeah, and a cat I met in Seattle when we were there last week for American Thanksgiving ( and for Jenny's amazing dinner, and Billy singing in the Children of the Revolution show, and Julie's return from India )

birthday weekend

2005-11-21T23:24:00.000-08:00

test shots

2005-11-15T22:41:00.000-08:00

I am toying with the idea of plant portraits for the show at the Ayden Gallery in January. The theme is personal space, but the show is more about decorative / functional art than conceptual art. I don't really know where that line is, or what it means. Im not even sure I will end up being in this show because I don't know if the theme appeals enough to me. I guess I could just put any ' pretty pictures' in it, but that feels so random. But most of the photo series I do end up being the kind of thing people don't want to ' put on their walls' . I don't know about these plant shots either though- I was thinking a kind of ' plants for people with no good light and/or inclination towards caring for them' I think photos of plants would certainly brighten up a room better than no plants at all. But its also sort of tongue in cheek. Maybe I shouldn't be ironic at all, but I just don't know how to approach it otherwise. As for the cat, Joey loved the lights so much he was the perfect subject....
animal life 1

2005-11-15T22:40:00.000-08:00

plantlife 2

2005-11-15T22:39:00.000-08:00

plantlife 1

things i've been doing or thinking about doing

2005-11-15T21:44:00.000-08:00

So I'm a working image consultant these days- It came about when I replied to an ad, and now I'm thinking about making a website and was also Vanessa's consultant yesterday. ( see one of the new outfits below, sideways-except for the belt which is mine...) its its not a bad way to make money... also have been considering what photos to submit to 'ripe magazine's winter issue' ( no - not rind .... ) the theme is ' AND...' readers of this blog please tell me which photos you think represent the theme best... ( from the ones below Vanessa)

November Rain

2005-11-02T22:24:00.000-08:00

So on Halloween the other night John Woods was talking about making a mix tape of songs which all begin with the sound of rain falling...... so cool... I was kind of impressed by how many he came up with off the top of his head. The only one I came up with was ' rain drops keep fallin on my head' which was vetoed because apparently it doesn't start with the sound of raindrops.

Yes the rainy season is upon us. I don't mind too much because I get to wear my black rubber boots and sleep with a hot water bottle. Usually the sun does break through at some point in the day too, so it isn't totally depressing. When I went running today though I felt sick when I got back because the temperature has reached the - burning lungs temperature. I hate that burning lung sensation.

I am not working so much this month, and instead am trying to study about 4 or 5 hours a day for the Japanese test ( 2 級　）　 which is in less than a month already. I have a very slim chance of passing, but it would at least be good to surpass the failing score I got last year... not necessarily an easy feat either because there is just so much grammar and kanji that I crammed for last year that I didn't use almost at all this year.
I have been thinking about what Japanese might be useful for in the last few days. I think translating movies would be a great gig. I wonder how you get into it. Maybe I will look it up. Of course I am not good enough for that, but its nice to have a goal however unrealistic.
Today I felt like getting out of the house while I was studying so I actually went to Starbucks which I normally avoid pretty intensely - but they definitely have the best armchairs in the area... while i was waiting for my drink I noticed an old lady sitting at the back of the room with her forehead flat on the table and not moving. I thought maybe she was sick, or even dead so I went over and patted her gently on the shoulder ' are you ok?' as I was so carefully trained to do in my lifeguarding days... ha ha - she woke up and sat bolt upright ' oh! oh
dear I must have fallen asleep! Its because my life is so boring you know! ' then almost immediately taking it back ' oh, oh no, its not boring at all, I have a great life, everything I need, how could life be boring when I have everything I need?' She was a little frightening. I felt sort of guilty that i didn't talk with her longer, but I really was trying to study...
Can life be boring if you have everything you need? anyone out there feel like responding to that? I think it certainly can be, because boring is a state of mind, not really a situation. Its all about how you choose to interact with your situation whatever that might be. and in a city like this there a plenty of things to get involved with if you don't like your situation. Still, I did feel sad for her, I think so many old people get cut off from the young generation and just get pickled in their own mothballs of memory. I like the project ' my grandmothers' by miwa yanagi. ALthough I think it could have been executed better actually - but the idea is really interestingto me. This Japanese artist got about 30 women to write a story of themselves as old women, and then they made it into a kind of fashion shoot - make up artists etc. turned them into their own visions of themselves as grandmothers. its online somewhere, but tonight I'm too lazy to find the link.
In fact I'm too lazy to write any more on this either. This is the after Halloween week, a little bland really. A little lacking in inspiration - some things sort of simmering, but nothing's quite come to the boiling point.
As for Halloween there are some photos of Blair and I up above - unfortunately I don't have the ones of other people on my camera, but I will get them from Blair and put them on soon. It was a great night - many thanks to Claudia for her great party ( where Blair and i won 2nd prize for the costumes! Marina won 1st as the best mr. T ever! ) and to the owners of the mansion at 49th and Granville with the fantastic 70's basement and the run down tennis courts etc. etc. Some closing thoughts: Maybe I should study Punjabi next...and do a master's in east asian studies...but how does doing that connect to any kind of paid employment?

I am very interested in work recently and how our working world is structured. I like the idea of making new structures rather than fitting into old ones - that is to say working for myself rather than someone else. Of course that has its own problems too, but I'd rather be a contractor than an employee by a long shot. I was looking at 'flight centre' today thinking that it wouldn't be so bad to be a travel agent for a while - but I just couldn't handle the idea of going to their mandatory ' buzz nights' and engaging in all that corporate socializing balony. JET was bad enough... what is the adjective for that kind of thing anyway? its all just so contrived and sort of self-satisfied and fake. Even if the people are individually fine its the structure of the whole ' company as family' which I sort of recoil from when its clearly so constructed and unnatural. I would rather do a bunch of different things, projects, contracts, etc. and wrap them all up in the title of ' self-employed'...

after 82 days in the country

2005-10-24T20:53:00.000-07:00

list of photos: the summer dreamers(2), orgy of the dead (2), van laughs, the real season, sonya tries to finish the peanut butter, andrew from two directions, the working wild thing

Some things that happened this month

1. Met with Fiona about the show at the Ayden Gallery in January. I think I will do some very big photos of house plants - portraits you might say. The show theme is sort of vague still, but is focused around objects for beautifying one's personal space. I thought it might be something that all those brown thumbs/ basement apartment dwellers might find pleasing. then again I might do something entirely different.

2. Started a Japanese class on saturday mornings. There are three other students in the class: Tomson, Desmond and Jeremy. They are all pleasant Chinese fellows. They can write kanji much better than me, but much worse at speaking seeing as they have never been to Japan.

3. Bought tickets to Deerhoof this thursday.

4. Saw Sue at Jitters cafe on 4th ave. She has started lining her eyes with black and I think it suits her very well. I bought a light blue scarf which I needed at the time ( because it was cold and I wasn't feeling well ) but which overall was an unnecessary addition to my wardrobe.

5. Accepted an honorarium postion as my mother's personal stylist. ( the honorarium is clothing perks for me ) I discovered I like helping people develop a good style for them. Maybe I should become a consultant. We went to the salvation army for 1 hour and came out with 6 sweaters, a jacket, and a dress for 65 dollars. Then I went through her wardrobe and threw out a whole bunch of crappy old things. I guess we are both pleased about it.

6. Found out that my photos got into a juried photography show in Tsawwassen.
I wonder if I will win anything. The opening is Friday November 4 5:30- 8. You never know.

7. Talked to Kayla who is going to buy me a mat cutter with her employee discount ( thanks Kayla!) so I can start doing my incredibly minor business of making magnets for Rae Mate. Nevertheless I am excited about it because I think it will be very useful to have a mat cutter, and besides I have already got another commission from our neighbour Adele who wants me to frame her watercolour of her cat, as well as a native print she got for doing an opera performance at a potlatch or something.

8. Started making mine and Blair's Halloween costumes. ( see my mom above wearing my headdress) I am really more excited about this than anything else that happened this month. We are going to be 'Wild Things' from the book... I am also making a mini Max doll which Blair will carry around on his back just to make sure people get it. We are going to Claudia's house for a party this saturday, and after her party apparently going to some strange mansion party. And I am hoping to make a stop at the graveyard where some weird post -religious day of the dead style thing is taking place, led by some community artist lady. It might be terrible or hilarious or amazing.

9. Saw Andrew Apostola, a character from my past who hails from Australia and whom I hadn't seen for nearly 5 years. We hung out for many hours. While walking through gastown, we came across a buttons only store where I bought a button with a deer on it. We also visited Hastings and Main since he had never been there. I finally went to the Ovaltine Cafe which was really atmospheric and perfect. As long as you don't need to use the bathroom which is slightly scary. We went to Bosman's hotel bar towards the end of our visit, and met an Asian Vancouverite named Kevin ( I think ) who just wrote a book about Neil Young. It was a good visit.

10. Started working on a dollhouse version of my bedroom project. I think it will be weird and satisfying to make the big version.

11. Went to a burlesque version of ' Ed Wood's Orgy of the Dead' at the Wise Hall, and put on by Blair's crazy theatre punk friends. Bizarre and very entertaining. Burlesque is pretty fucking awesome.

12. Met with Sonya and talked about maybe moving into her house when she leaves sometime this winter - then walked down to the Foundation where she couldn't finish the peanut butter sandwich she ordered. We found a flyer for a show that looks cool. ' Diorama-rama' : Seamrippers present a collective art show of fabulous dioramas' November 4 8pm opening. Oh wait, but thats the same day as the photo show. I guess I will have to go after the opening. Damn. I thought it was on thursday for some reason. Oh then I tried to look for a website about it, and found this Rhya I think you should check it out.

13. Heard from Richard who is not sick with the African flu anymore. That is a relief.

14. Got about 4 more chapters into the fabulous ' The #1 Ladies Detective Agency' . The quote which has been going round my head this week is ' what's the point of being rich if you don't have time to watch your cattle eat grass?' or something like that. An excellent point I think.

15. I would just like to point out that I am already up to 15, and still I think there were many more important things which happened this month. Life is much more complicated in the big ( ish) city.

16. Bought a book at Oscar's Art Books called ' Great Americans' ' Which is photographs of normal Americans who have famous names. Its really just a normal book of portraits, but with that goofy gimmick which somehow I find appealing. Also the book was only 2 dollars and 99 cents.

17. Went for lunch with Van at Havana on Commercial Drive. I hadn't seen her in 2 years actually. But she didn't look much different, apart from seeming happier. She is engaged and is in the middle of doing a master's in Film at Simon Fraser. We pretty much gossiped the whole time, which is what lunch dates are basically for.

18. Went to a tea ceremony class in North Vancouver. It was a long way by public transit, but I loved being in that little corner of experience and action that tea ceremony is. I had to practice letting the bare essentials expand into a scene. Its a new part of the ceremony in a way, yet at the same time its merely an intensified version of itself.

19. Thought about post -post- secondary matters. Aesthetics, East Asian Studies, Photography, Language, Practical Training, Opening a Store, Becoming an Accountant, Not Doing Anything In Particular And Waiting to See What Comes Along... etc. etc. etc. Ah the Future - how Exciting and Terrible!

20. Almost lost my 20 dollars in the Top Model betting pool when Nik was nearly voted out!

21. Found out we ( some version of people I know and don't know ) are spending New Years' ( plus 2 days) in a sweet cottage on Saltspring! And found out that two of the people I know are going to be Rhya and Kyle who are coming for 10 days! yippee!

22. Hung out with my cousin Megan from Ontario who is applying for Grad school on this coast. She is a science star and did research on the Herpes virus last summer in Seattle. I think thats pretty cool - I'm sure she will get into the program.

23. Went for thanksgiving dinner with Blair's uncle Craig and aunt Karen. They live in Richmond and have a crazy cat named Angus. Blair and I hung around on the couch at my house for too long watching ' Tokyo Drifter' and chilling out - so we were late and didn't bring anything ( like wine or something) I felt bad, but we just didn't realize the time.....

24. Saw Fellini's 8 1/2 - the photography is startling. Have got to watch it again.

25. Ordered a magazine I'd been wanting to get for a while - shots magazine. I think I will submit something for next month. Its sort of cooler than most photography magazines - but there are a lot of photos which i sort of secretly think ' what's so good about this? am I missing something?' My dad doesn't think those things so secretly and instead says things like ' I just don't understand why there are still so many bad photos being printed all the time'. I guess that doesn't make it sound like such a great magazine. Well, I guess I haven't decided. but I'll probably still submit something.

26. Thought about my birthday next month (november 18th ) and how I'm going to be 29 -whats the best thing about 29? it seems sort of neutral to me - like tofu - I guess it will be one of those years that soaks up the atmosphere of what happens, rather than a year that has its own character already. Well I guess it does have a character - but I think its a bullshit one of ' the last year of youth and the good life' which is just the character that our manic youth shopping world puts on it. I don't really feel that way at all.

27. sent Zoe a ' no more Dave's' pin which I made at the fabulous new main st. store ' The Regional Assembly of Text' . 'No More Dave's' are an experimental elevator music band consisting of herbie and smarty ( my brother's imaginary friends) 11 year old girls from early 20th century novels, and old women who really don't have anyone to impress. They all exist in my mind and appear at opportune times to frighten away people who really don't know their own hearts and/or minds and screw other people over along the way without really meaning to, but nevertheless manage to do it anyway. 'No More Dave's' progressive sound and lyrics are really quite intolerable to the wishy washy. Or at least I am trying to urge them in that direction.

28. Had a dream that the world was ending - there were riots everywhere and I was with Blair. We ran upstairs into a room at the top of this huge building and locked the door - but we could see that everyone was killing each other outside the window and down many floors below. Then the room began to get hotter and hotter and I knew the world was ending. So we just held hands and kept our eyes open - I was so determined to experience dying and try to understand it. Then it was like time fast-forwarded and I never closed my eyes - suddenly it was normal temperature again and everything in the room around us was melted and had then hardened into something like igneous rock. Blair was still alive too. We went downstairs and everyone who had been fighting and killing had just become these sort of human shaped rocks. It was pretty amazing to have remained conscious while I died and came to life again all within some kind of strange eternal second. When I woke up for real I had the feeling that no-one ever really dies. I think I am too serious.

29. Ate perfect pears and remembered the persimmon trees in Japan. I hope those people lucky enough to be there are appreciating them.

30. Finally wrote something on this. and even added links which I usually never do because I'm lazy. I wonder if anyone will actually click on any of them. I thought I was quite comprehensive about finding them all.

31. wondered if it was lame to end this list with a reference to the list itself, but then decided I didn't care and was too tired to care about whether I was ending it in a non-clever, clever, too-clever or ... now the meaning of 'clever' is starting to unravel and for god's sake this is just a stupid blog and the ending be damned.

into the autumn

2005-10-11T18:37:00.000-07:00

thanksgiving day at the pool

walking in the rose city

2005-10-02T15:29:00.000-07:00

2005-10-02T15:23:00.000-07:00

rosecity

2005-09-29T00:04:00.000-07:00

redboy

Rewind... Toronto, Airtime, RedDeer...

2005-09-21T00:14:00.000-07:00

deja vu
the emblem of the city
take out breakfast

waiting for the taxi

Otis takes a plane
Blair and Lynda
the Golfers

elastics on my wrists

2005-09-20T00:11:00.000-07:00

life on the tenth floor

2005-09-11T10:41:00.000-07:00

I just lost this whole big post I wrote. How terribly depressing. I was finally satisfied with it and was adding the last photo. I still want to go for a swim in the pool since its the last day. I watched ' eternal sunshine of the spotless mind last night' then dreamt of travelling in a van across maps, guided along our route by zoe's boyfriends and sinkholes into alternate dimensions of the same reality. Woke up to sunlight on the green monster couch and a plan for the park. Thinking of finding the perfect couch and chair. I have decided not to think about ' my life in Vancouver' for 3 or 4 days since I tried that and it set off infinite bombs of possibilities in my already exhausted equilibrium. Therefore not going to see anyone, or do anything I don't feel like doing. The last month travelling was both fantastic and awful - full of excitement for this new time, and melancholy for the passing of the old. and so intense there was only time for reflection in the murky nights of borrowed rooms. I am going to post a few photos going backwards. First the drive home through the rocky mountains. Beautiful flying across landscapes, carried on the soundscapes of bob dylan, the beta band, neil young, parliment, modest mouse, bjork, UA, big brother and the holding company, more more - the names lost in blurred grasses and distances disappearing. green chalky water next to us when we stopped to eat our tuna sandwiches and red licorice. that color Im keeping in my mouth in a small pocket - its a good place to keep memories that haven't developed fully yet. Scenes that were too light, that floated through reality like seeds in my whirlwind. they're falling slowly and delicately now, let it happen, let it happen..

The Hosokawas

2005-08-02T06:17:00.000-07:00

Wednesday the 27th - the last day of work ......

2005-07-28T19:53:00.002-07:00

wednesday night - chino high school teachers!

2005-07-28T19:53:00.001-07:00

chiba sensei and okuhara sensei

2005-07-28T19:53:00.000-07:00

a bit better

2005-07-28T19:52:00.002-07:00

bad timing ....

2005-07-28T19:52:00.001-07:00

wednesday after the speech - jumping with the ni-nensei's

2005-07-28T19:52:00.000-07:00

Wedenesday morning - the last class ever ( boo hoo! )

the past 7 days

2005-07-26T06:10:00.000-07:00

sadly no photos from my last tea ceremony class on thursday night - I got a million gifts from Eiko and Hiroto sensei too.... so beautiful!
another sad thing is that for some reason blogger is weirdly formatting - when I try to title some photos ' tuesday' or ' saturday night' it doesn't put it where i want it to go, but somewhere else several photos down. Therefore its a bit hard to tell when what was. But that is more realistic anyway since thats how it feels for me too.....

Tuesday night

2005-07-26T06:09:00.000-07:00

yoshie and momose sensei

2005-07-26T06:08:00.002-07:00

Fujimi's goodbye party - the principal, the vice principal, and iguchi sensei

2005-07-26T06:08:00.001-07:00

the principal, the vice principal and iguchi sensei ( still the jump master)

2005-07-26T06:08:00.000-07:00

2005-07-26T06:07:00.001-07:00

fujimi farewell party

2005-07-26T06:07:00.000-07:00

iguchi sensei - jump master

2005-07-26T06:06:00.002-07:00

Tuesday afternoon

2005-07-26T06:06:00.001-07:00

kimiko akane and kachan

2005-07-26T06:06:00.000-07:00

kachan and I take a leap

2005-07-26T06:05:00.002-07:00

me and akane's baby

2005-07-26T06:05:00.001-07:00

akane's baby! adorable!

Tuesday morning

2005-07-26T06:05:00.000-07:00

serious students make pancakes

2005-07-26T06:04:00.004-07:00

malani showed up just in time

2005-07-26T06:04:00.003-07:00

monday night

2005-07-26T06:04:00.002-07:00

2005-07-26T06:04:00.001-07:00

shirokiya hurrah

2005-07-26T06:04:00.000-07:00

white bear

2005-07-26T06:03:00.003-07:00

monday night - the business men's party - so many presents!

sunday morning

2005-07-26T06:03:00.002-07:00

me asuka tomomi and malani

2005-07-26T06:03:00.001-07:00

sunday morning

saturday night

2005-07-26T06:03:00.000-07:00

birthday girl ( and a luck hunter )

2005-07-26T06:02:00.000-07:00

good levels

2005-07-26T06:01:00.002-07:00

my favorite saturday jump

2005-07-26T06:01:00.001-07:00

saturday afternoon 2

2005-07-26T06:01:00.000-07:00

saturday afternoon jumps

friday night

2005-07-26T06:00:00.001-07:00

pucker

2005-07-26T06:00:00.000-07:00

friday - chino teachers party

wednesday afternoon

2005-07-26T05:59:00.002-07:00

the boys head back

2005-07-26T05:59:00.001-07:00

timing off

2005-07-26T05:59:00.000-07:00

the hara boys

2005-07-26T05:58:00.002-07:00

cheeeeeeese! ( wallace style )

2005-07-26T05:58:00.001-07:00

ayano

2005-07-26T05:58:00.000-07:00

aki

jump pictures

2005-07-26T05:48:00.000-07:00

Well, I have a million things to write about, instead of writing I'd like to make a brief photo essay of the last 7 days and all my goodbye parties. I have gotten obsessed with jump photos so most of them will fall into that category! Their were some great ones which Dane took too, - I had run out of batteries - I don't have them yet but Skye does so perhaps she will post them. Ok here they are....

sunday at 10:39 am

2005-07-16T18:37:00.000-07:00

well here are a bunch of photos from the school festival ( and a few from Tokai - Malani's school) yesterday. Its weird looking at them, because I feel like I know the students pretty well now - I can see it in the photos. But on the other hand, I also don't know them in the least. All I really know about them, is the kind of faces they make, or whether they seem to be enthusiastic or not, and how they walk and relate to other people. But I don't know much at all about how they use language - I don't know what kind of expressions they use, or what that would indicate about the kind of people they are, I don't really know what their families or home lives are like, I don't know what they want to do after school, or in many cases what sort of things they like to do when they are not busy with school or work. I can guess that many of them don't have a very good home life, and don't think they are very smart, and will probably not continue their education after high school. But really, I know such a small small part of them. But now I have one moment of their lives on 'film' on something - I took all those tiny little parts of their face and body and the way the light reflected off them at that place and time ( yesterday somewhere on the school grounds) and broke them down into molecular like pixels turned them into some kind of 1's and 0's ( actually I have very little idea how digital technology works) and then put them all together again in exactly the same configuration as before, only shrunk to about what, 1/50th the original size? I can't even estimate that accurately. But now I have that tiny replica of them forever and ever. Well, relatively speaking. And I don't even really know them. I was just reading Susan Sontag's ' On Photography' this morning. I have had it around meaning to read it for ages, but somehow I always put it off, thinking ' oh I'll get around to it later' or ' Well, actually its sort of boring to read it, the same stuff we talked about in film theory classes at U of T - all these references to ' Blow Up' and ' Peeping Tom' and the camera as an instrument of appropriation, intimidation, voyeurism' But thinking about it, in a way I never feel like reading it because at least at the beginning ( don't know about the end yet) everything it says about photography is so negative. That it's the symptom of a disconnected world, an uneasy people, a time of isolation and violence and everyone trying to dominate each other, a symptom of a time when people cannot experience reality on its own, they have to seperate it from themselves to experience a kind of constructed version of what's happening to them. It makes me feel guilty to like taking photos so much.
On the other hand, I agree with pretty much everything I've read so far. That is what photography is in so many ways. But I can't help but feel that that analysis is only one part of the whole. Its hard to say how much photography is fictionalizing reality to make it bearable and consumable to people, distancing us from our lives and selves, and how much it acts as a mirror which helps us to explore reality and ourselves from so many different perspectives. In general, when we look at how photography affects the general population in regards to how advertising, news, state, etc. - I think i can agree that in general its a negative thing. I really think so. The sheer volume of information via the image is so overwhelming and distracting to people that it addles the brain, and in the best case scenario makes us tune it out, in the worst takes a hold of our minds in a strange way which raises our anxiety levels to a high pitched buzzing. But I'm not sure that the effect of ' photography in the media and daily life' can be equated with all photography and the actual act of photographing. I mean, in a way I feel that Sontag's perspective ( and keep in mind I have only a very slim aspect of it to go on so am wildly drawing uniformed conclusions based on the tone of her writing!) is a very 1960's way of seeing things. I'm not saying its wrong at all, but its very political and seems to see the situation as bad / good in a way that I don't necessarily think is a useful way to think of it now. I'm not quite sure what I mean. Well, I guess its just that I don't know how useful it ever really is to compare the ' world consciousness' now, to the ' world consciousness' one hundred years ago or whatever - if the comparison is trying to make some kind of claim about whats gotten better or whats gotten worse. It just seems so impossible to do that. A whole bunch of things have gotten worse, and a whole bunch of things have gotten better. And more to the point, there's no going back. There's no use in saying ' it was better when people talked more and watched tv less and so that's what we should all try to do' Its a dead relationship - the relationship between the past and the present. Sure, we can try to change things, but its got to be leading out of a point we are at NOW. There's no going back. We can only try to feel out the most positive direction available to us at this time and juncture. And to bring this back to photography, I guess its just that I think that negative assessment of photography is only one side of the old ying yang. Photography and film are tools which we can choose to make use of in so many many different ways. To me they are instruments for exploring reality, which enrich my experience of unfiltered reality every day. I think that thinking about the negative aspects of photography/ film is absolutely essential though. Essential if we want to keep in mind the pitfalls, the ways in which it can act as a tool of separation, detachment, fantasy. One of the worst things about people nowadays ( Of course i don't know what they were like before 'nowadays' but I have a hunch things were different ) is that no-one seems to appreciate reality itself. Noone seems to even notice it. As though the miracle of 3 dimensional space was just so mundane. Who hasn't daydreamed about entering some movie world - but if you were there, it would quickly become just as boring as this reality because people these days live on fantasy - the unobtainable - if they got what they wanted they wouldn't be happy with it, because it would change as soon as they got it. And images feed that constantly by showing fantasy worlds - every image is a fantasy world really. But if those images can be looped into our lives in a meaningful way, a way that doesn't just show a time or place as an appealing abstraction, but as a reflection of what we really have, of our real lives, of the real substance of this mind blowing thing which is ' existing' then it can enrich our experiences and help us to find meaning, engagement, connection, depth. Or am I just trying to justify all the negative things I engage in when I take a photo? Its difficult to be honest with oneself, because taking photos is such an average occupation these days, that noone would really fault you for it - noone would suggest that the act is a violent one. I don't know, I guess just like everything its a complex mix of motives. I certainly know that when in an uncomfortable situation, taking photos makes me feel like I have a place. Its like smoking a cigarette. ha ha.... I think its been easy to develop my skills as a photographer in Japan, because I often feel awkward here - unsure how I should act or engage with people - taking photos gives me a role. Also, I think I have genuinely come to enjoy observing people - in a rather gentle way I think - I love to see how their personality shows itself in small gestures, movements, posture. I cannot understand people well through language, so I have learned to be observant of the visible aspects of people's individual worlds. But at the same time, the world I enter when I get really engaged with the camera, is the world that I think of as the foundation of reality. There are times when I feel I am sort of extra-present in the world. Aware to an almost excruitiating degree of my own existence, of being on the edge of the cliff of the future ( no one knows what will happen tomorrow!) of the strangeness of 3 dimentional space, of the incredible complexity of everything around us - from the composition of a leaf, to the mad and fantastic workings of chance, coincidence, fate, accidents, love, death etc. etc. etc. Those times happen when I am quite unconcerned with my own affairs - and for that reason able to ' open the valve' as wide as possible. It happens sometimes when I meet someone and we really connect, it happens when I'm alone and watching the sunlight, it happens totally unexpectedly when something strange occurs, and it happens when I take photos sometimes. I guess its because - even if I am not able to open the valve all the way all the time, I can often open it all the way in regards to the tiny slice of reality I see through the lens. It allows me to get totally involved in that small square of reality, and to see in it so many aspects of the whole ( of reality ) . So the question I ask then is - is that negative? I guess it is in certain ways, but isn't it also wonderful in other ways? And if we are aware of the problems inherent in photography, and explore them too, can't they become positive in a way? Because they help us understand life more deeply?

Ok well, this has been probably the longest diatribe on this whole blog. I guess its a topic that hits very close to things I feel are most important to me. I will probably reread it and think its crap, but I suppose its good to get these things out - perhaps it will spark some new project, or make me want to do my M.A. Ok back to cleaning my house. God there is a lot of dust where things used to be.

2005-07-16T18:36:00.000-07:00

looking for friends

2005-07-16T18:35:00.001-07:00

hip girls in striped socks

2005-07-16T18:35:00.000-07:00

making churros yo

2005-07-16T18:34:00.000-07:00

a disturbing photo of the principal and a student

2005-07-16T18:33:00.001-07:00

bass in green

2005-07-16T18:33:00.000-07:00

pause between songs

2005-07-16T18:32:00.000-07:00

try the cabo waco tequila

2005-07-16T18:31:00.001-07:00

ayumu, rie and yoshimi ( not battling the pink robots here )

2005-07-16T18:31:00.000-07:00

yellow boys

2005-07-16T18:30:00.001-07:00

horizontal certitude

2005-07-16T18:30:00.000-07:00

the rich school

2005-07-16T18:29:00.001-07:00

the archway

2005-07-16T18:29:00.000-07:00

staring stairs

2005-07-16T18:28:00.001-07:00

my exhibit of the teacher's photos

2005-07-16T18:28:00.000-07:00

yes, they really are like this

2005-07-16T18:27:00.001-07:00

saborutachi

2005-07-16T18:27:00.000-07:00

double peace