please pooder, don't hurt 'em...

finally feeling the special tingle of the season. family and friends all coming together like bears to a trough of honey. who cares, really, about the rampant commercialization? is that still happening? i thought we all learned our lesson in the past couple of years....

my memories of childhood christmases do include the ecstatic joy of ripping open wrapping paper to get at the treasures beneath...but my best one is sitting alone by the tree in the dark, staring at the lights for what seemed like hours.

it is too bad that we've managed to turn what should be a relaxed, fun, and reflective time of year (regardless of one's creed or colour) into something that inspires stress and worry. and obviously, the coming together of family without any friction at all is a blessing indeed...but so what. this is one of the few times of the year our current culture gives up to celebration.

c'mon pooder, let's do this.

what price, gatekeepah?

a new year coming, new sensations...impossible to refuse?

an ending and a beginning: a death and a birth.

micheal hutchence dead all those years ago from autoerotic asphyxiation, and recently the unfortunate young MI5 employee found dead locked in a duffel bag, supposedly a victim of a sex act gone wrong. convergence of sex and death.

the yearly ritual of waving goodbye to the old, hello to the new. at midnight, la petite mort--and then we begin again...

up and in, in the u.k. and saskatchewan

Finally, finally! My two homes have met, and in my lifetime! Who could have guessed that this would happen?

On this side of the pond, she's young and large and gregarious, though a little bit chilly eight months of the year...she makes up for that in prepar-ed-ness. Heavy equipment stored and waiting to clear the snowy byways and highways, granular salt galore to nibble at the toes of crusty ice. Her happy inhabitants traversing her noble expanse in a dizzying array of four by fours and half-ton trucks, speedy snowmobiles and cross-country skis, snow shoes and intricately treaded boots.

Over there, he has been known as the green and pleasant land, small yet varied, blessed albion. On all sides surrounded by rocking waters, populated by shopkeepers and their customers, chippy and defiant, proud rulers once of an empire that even the sun could not ignore. But what's this? O yuletide of 2010, what have ye wrought? What blistering blizzards roar through ancient roads of village, of town, of bustling city? The wheezy slumbering breath of Merlin barely heard now--his magick cannot save you! You need graders and three ton trucks! Tankers full of grit, snow tires and supplies, thermal underwear! The price of arctic peace is paid in knitted caps and colourful fleece!

And how! And now...

...United by the white crystalline magnificence which falls slow and relentless, and yes, covering the living and the dead in insulating layers; the sky itself has deigned to tuck these two under seasonal blankets of snow.

We must retire discreetly, and let these two become intimate friends. They have so much to teach each other!

but i digress...

A swift shift into the small hours. Eyes bare to the moonlight. Feel free to find your strength here. Pay no heed to the mockers. Their lifelines are short.

What's that you say? It's 23:23? It's TIME.

Fall apart, already. We're all doing it.

Come on in, the water's

stormin'.

VITAMIN D

i can remember every misstep, every regrettable word, every pigheaded manoeuvre, with an astonishing clarity, as if my cells were programmed to record shame in all its wonderful iterations.

and yet it happens again and again; my brain-mouth-body composes its own organism, separate from my better inclinations...before i've even finished disgorging the words, somewhere inside me a little spirit grimaces.

i've long known i cover up insecurity with an ineffectual bravado. not very original, i know...and also--this insecurity, or better put, lack of self-knowledge becomes an omnipresent taint in all of my relationships...in moments of clarity, i question the nature and value of my relations with people, past and present.

but but and BUT--there's a viscous circularity built into this type of thinking--once entrapped, its a big old beyotch to get out of. genetically disposed to see only the shadow and not the light that casts it?

to the manor-

we walk. are you blessed, or do you work your blessings?

younger and hearing my grandmother speak the word 'london' like an incantation; world centre, a hub of the universe.

a concrete maze of graft.

is it the end of the world? no. just the end of the night...and you're waiting for the bus.

believe in the ways of magick?

are you beginning to wonder why?

is this it?

yes it is.

to your heath!

Back in the U.K. Serge Gainsbourg and wine from M&S. Hospitality provided by an old school Saskatchewan treeplanting buddy, the best kind. Trying to work my way through an intro to literary theory by Terry Eagleton while I wait for some family papers to wind their way through the bureaucracy. Hunkered down hobbit-like in a flat in Belsize Park, London. Hampsted Heath less than a minute away...walking Maddox, a beautiful big black lab, every afternoon.

My gran used to live in Barking, in the east of the city. Years ago I spent a summer with her--a hot summer in the city, mid nineties...sticky doc martens, drum and bass (goldie!), trainspotting, big black t-shirt with RAF symbol...etc--riding the District line to Tower Hill, then walk into the city.... Quite a few years of coming to the UK, the past three working up north in the Kielder forest...

This time here for a funeral. The first one I've organized, with much help from my father. I went to the graveyard last week, took flowers to the grave. Stood in front of the stone, finally realized there's no need to summon token emotions. My love for her is natural and ever present.

Saskatchewan, Fuck Yeah!

home is where the heart is?

home is where your good friends is.

fo'shizz.

Reference Point

well...yep, long time no post...i've been chasing a ghost, a chap i haven't seen for a long, long time...related to a close friend of mine--he's been hiding out. won't tell me what he's been up to, no matter how many questions i throw at him.

there's been a lot of commiseration, a lot of talking around the campfire.

we set our timetables by the next big mosquito outbreak.

just finished reading The Drought by J.G. Ballard. what did he see?-back in the sixties?

a water-free future for you and me?

getting it togetha

i used to be a huge fan of synesthetic nostalgia trips...certain songs, smells, visuals (for example, yellow leaves billowing behind you on the highway) would send me on melancholy imaginative journeys, usually ending up with visions of me walking alone somewhere--whilst 'here i go again' by whitesnake played in the background, no doubt--yes, that is some extra olde forte cheese.

now that i'm a cynical old drunkard...i jest i jest, i think--i do find myself revisiting those daydreams, but without that same tug on the heartstrings...instead i've reached a point where i can see certain behavioural cycles repeating themselves...which is annoying and reassuring at the same time.

annoying in the sense that just when i think i've evolved out of a certain way of being, i discover that i'm still doing the same old shit, just in a different octave. reassuring--why? well sometimes it's nice to be reminded of what you bring to the world; sort of like coming down, perhaps--one goes out on a limb, then returns to the trunk?

and that was...

summer? holee shit. a few months gone down the memory hole...i was listening to a podcast today, called 'entitled opinions'--this particular episode focused on shakespeare. the host opened with some quotes from wittgenstein, who apparently couldn't deal with shakespeare--long story short, paraphrased, etc.; old ludwig was obsessed with a neat, categorical understanding of reality, whereas shakespeare presented a horizontal explosion of possibility--reality unfettered, so to speak.

what does this have to do with anything? well, and i may be stretching the analogy a bit, but i began the summer with the hope of having a very compartmentalized, constructive summer...and--it became debauchalypse 2010!!! hahaha...only partly true. the tenuous connection is this; what you plan to happen doesn't always happen...especially when you're like me--equipped with a sail that's ready to catch ANY prevailing wind.

moving

moving again, (over and over again)--farther north and closer to work.

simple

how heavenly is this groove?

any and all abrasive neurotic edges are smoothed out by this vista, so says i.

SPRUNG!

hot air, video game clouds plodding across the sky, animals stirring in every nook and cranny...every time i'm out in the bush now it's like the earth's creatures have spent the preceding hours making more of themselves...rabbits, squirrels, elk, deer, and bugs...god the bugs. i respect you, i know you occupy a very important position in the food chain etc...but i'm still not reconciled to your hot sticky buzzing dominance that's just around the corner. i'm looking at you, mosquito. let's hope this fine specimen above eats a million of you this spring.

back to work...

...well there goes the holiday, lovely while it lasted, wish you were there, etc.

In high school I worked at the local public library as a page. Endless hours placing recently returned books in their proper place...once that task was completed, it was time to go through entire sections of the library making sure every book was in the correct order according to the dewey decimal system. Insanely boring job, especially in the quiet dead of winter. Minus forty degrees celsius outside, dry and empty inside. However--I discovered many a good book in the process. Hidden away in a fiction corner, a copy of 'Opus Pistorum' by Henry Miller. I believe it has most recently been published under the title 'Under the Roof Tops of Paris'. A collection of the pornography he wrote to keep himself fed while living the bohemian life in Paris. An eye opener for an inexperienced kid to say the least. How it got into that library--who knows. I remember a quote from the introduction which passed the following pages off as a rollicking search for the 'good life'--chief amongst the requirements for said life was the perfect job. The perfect job seemed to be working in some sort of journalistic capacity (if I remember it correctly) where one could bunk off after a couple of desultory hours in front of the typewriter to drink, eat, and indulge in every combination of fornication possible. Not bad work if you can get it, I guess.

At the moment my perfect job is the standard Monday-Friday eight hours a day slog. Half hour for lunch, two fifteen minute coffee breaks...ah, the coffee break. Just long enough to want a smoke. I swear, coffee breaks are killing my desire to fully quit smoking.

I feel blessed to have the job I do, honest to goddess. I work in a beautiful place with good people. We are the first generation (in the west, anyway) to be raised with the idea that the world is our oyster, and there is nothing we cannot achieve if we put our mind to it. How true that is depends upon individual circumstance. I personally don't think I'm where I should be, but it's my own choices that have led me to where I am today.

BUDS

Had a great afternoon the other week with a couple of old friends...people who I hadn't seen in forever, and it was great to see them--parts of our conversation peppered with memories of people I haven't thought of for, well I can actually say--a decade or so. That whole milieu of people that you grow up with if you stayed in the same school area for years. The character that these little characters take on.

All the friends I've had over the years, all those peeps--so close to some then the connection fades and possibly comes back again. The friends I've had the longest are now mirrors that I can trust.

I remember a kid I used to play with when I was six or seven--I was in grade two, that I know for sure. Anyway, I remember the day he moved. We were hanging out, and he said he wanted to give me a hug before he left...and I refused! He chased me around his yard--I don't know what my problem was. He just wanted a hug before he left. Oh well--guy whose name I can't recall, I now hug you back.

forklover

Listening to 'Take It Easy' by Surfer Blood. No, pappa don't surf (but I like to watch). The sweetness of the skill--richer than a vein of silver, a surfer riding a massive surge of turquoise. Neptune must know how hard it is...but when it's done right, nothing looks simpler.

A sixteenth century Italian diplomat named Baldassare Castiglione either epitomized or coined the term 'sprezzatura'. Sprezzatura(fucking fantastic word); 1. a certain nonchalance, so as to conceal all art and make whatever one does or says appear to be without effort and almost without thought...2. a form of defensive irony: the ability to disguise what one really desires, thinks, feels, and means or intends behind a mask of apparent reticence and nonchalance. I came into contact with this word reading a Guardian review of the films of Eric Rohmer. None of which I've seen, but perhaps I should...anyway, the word itself reminded me of Burroughs' rant on 'do easy'...the practice of practicing smooth moves. The ability to make the most prosaic human chores a ballet of simplicity.

I like to think I achieve this state after a bottle of wine. Ha Ha, Ho Ho, and Hee Hee.

So...real nonchalance requires tremendous effort? Shit. Foiled again. But that sounds about right...the truly relaxed are already living several moves ahead of the game. In 'A Study in Scarlet' Sherlock Holmes says to the Doctor, "What you do in this world is a matter of no consequence.... The question is, what can you make people believe that you have done?". Quite an odd statement from an obsessive detective.

A question of ego? Doin' it easy implies not giving damn what others think...indeed, 'others' can't even enter the equation. Think of the best show you've ever seen, the best game, etc.... The performers, athletes, whatever, are lost in what they're doing and thus so are you.

When do we as individuals achieve this state? Well perhaps there are zen buddhists amongst us. Sex will do it. Runner's high. Transcendence--that's the ticket.

crack in the armour?

The old arena again, this time the back corner of the building, passed by today while walking with pooder. Beautiful AND sexy, the can reclines whilst awaiting its owner to heat it up once again...I mean, that's what I'm assuming anyway. Kids aren't shotgunning cola now, surely....

Wandering some of my childhood streets and remembering the old ley-lines of freedom, and the power points where the pathways met up; schoolyards, dirt hills on the edge (what used to be the edge) of town, that hidden grave-yard behind a strip mall, any place where foliage was allowed to grow unchecked--therein hidden caches of cigarette butts, empty booze bottles, moldy porn mags, rusty bicycle frames entangled in the overgrowth.

One of my best memories of my hometown--racing home late on my bike, fall, streets empty and cold, hypnotized by the thrum of my tires on the asphalt. Beady stars overhead blinking through bare gothic branches.

The grid of this town a frame that I've thrown successive canvases over, painting them with the obsessions of the moment. The mystery and magick I once attempted to infuse it with now replaced with questions--could I live here? What are the house prices like? Who the fuck lives here anymore? Well it has been a long time since I attempted to make friends with this place. Maybe it's best we remain...acquaintances, for now at least.

restore daiiad!

Apparently the actor Stephen Baldwin is asking to be 'restored'. It has something to do with the story of Job and the fact that Mr. Baldwin is broke. Google Stephen Baldwin Restored or something like that--you should be able to find the site where you can donate(!). I can't decide if this is a joke or not. Anyway, wish I'd thought of that when I was swimming in student loan debt. I could be living in this place now!

Played out

Walking the dog this morning past the old arena. Like every other building I frequented as a kid, it looks ten times smaller than it does in memory. I gave up hockey when I reached my teens, moving on to basketball, soccer, and artsy pretensions. From the ages of five to thirteen, however--well like thousands of others I assumed one day I'd be kissing the Cup. It's closed for the summer, but I can still smell this place. The musty aroma of the dressing rooms and unwashed equipment. Hard wood benches and concrete walls. The sharp cold numbing your throat when you hit the ice. Greasy cheeseburgers and ketchup chips, better than anything at McDicks. Numbness in the ankles from too-tight skates. The sound of sharp blades when you begin to glide.

I've spent the past two winters working in the United Kingdom, and my love for (european) football has asserted itself. I've got a team and I watch whatever games I can. I get passionate about it in a way I can't with hockey. The hockey playoffs are on and my dad is into it. I haven't watched a full game in years. At first I brushed off his invitations to watch, but, slowly, I find myself drawn to the box...it's the sounds that get me. The reliable tones of the CBC commentators, the rattle of the boards after a good hit, the thunk of a slapshot.

Of course I was an Oilers fan back in the day, but my longest love has been for the Leafs. The only game I can remember watching as a kid, and I did watch a lot, was a regular season match-up between the Leafs and the Oilers, which the Leafs won--the score was 13-7 or 13-6. Anyway, I was fucking stoked--I couldn't believe what was happening...this was in the day of Messier, Gretzky, etc. Eventually I gave up on the Leafs in my head; never in my heart, ha ha ha. As an aside--Torontonians--you have one of, if not the, richest team in the league--please, just one game, vote with your bloody feet and don't show up! You deserve better! The past is the past!

So--am I going to follow this play-off season religiously? Hells no. But I know I'll be there for some games...dad informs me the Kings are a team of young unknowns with an outside chance. Alright then. Go Los Angeles!

Driving Home

Beautiful three days at the lake. Dawn drive home. Companion; Pooder, aka Poots McGee, aka 'the boy', aka P-dot, aka Poo-snippety, etc.... Attitude, courtesy of the Smiths; "everyone has to live their life, and god knows I have to live mine..." and the Sundays; "desire, desire's a terrible thing, but I rely on mine...". Wan early sunlight hitting the tops of the trees, pale blue sky, wide wide road.

Waiting for the thaw...

Losing something that's really important to you becomes, over time, a gift. Not like being a kid losing sleep on Christmas Eve--in fact, at the time, it's like you're starving and your worst enemy hands you his last shit sandwich. So far, so obvious. But over time you realize that what you've been given is one of the best presents ever--opportunity.

The opportunity to view yourself from a different angle and think o yeah, that's what I look like. The empty space created by loss seeks to be filled by something new--and power comes from the realization that you can choose what flows in to replace it.

a place called pre-destine

One horoscope informs me that some desire of mine will snowball over the coming weeks, steamrolling down the birth canal, arriving fresh and fully formed...another horoscope tells me that though it certainly is the case that I'm trying to make changes for the better in my life, it's best to not do too much at once, and let things happen gradually.

If I were to take this advice and use it actively, I suppose I'd take the second point to heart first. I've often tried to change my life in a scatterbrained fashion; e.g., I am going to become a ninja, write a novel, travel the world, act in several movies, and read every important book ever written--and have something original to say about them too. I think I learned that approach doesn't work. Sure things get done, but those few secret desires haven't happened, yet. The older I get, the more secret they become--because the more foolish you look yapping about shit that remains in the realm of possibility. So secret they remain, but; those goals shed their light on you from their space of future probability--the street of desire runs both ways--the trick may be in knowing the end goal wants you as much as you want it. And a strong relationship like that usually pushes aside all other desires.

So, thing in the distance I want so badly, do you want me too?

birfday!

In The Cult of the Fact, Liam Hudson writes something to the effect of, "When a man turns thirty-five, he begins to be aware of his mortality"--that's a loose paraphrase--I'm too lazy to look up the exact quote at the moment. All I can say is, 'Amen, brother--testify!' I would add my own caveat--"Especially when said man is not where he planned to be at this tender age"...of course, things could be much worse. I've got great friends, family, a work life which, though not lucrative, is satisfying, (a little) money in the bank, etc...but!

There was a post on StreetbonersandTVCarnage yesterday by Robert Foster where he talked about choosing an 'alternative' life as opposed to a 'normal' one of early mornings, suburban effluvia and 'working for the man'...he was, for the most part, savaged in the comments. Kudos to those who write personal missives on highly trafficked websites, I say. I was dismissive in my comment to his article--not abusive, but dismissive. The fact is, parts of his essay hit a little close to home.

Without going into too much detail, it's safe to say that I had some of the same thoughts when I was younger. I suppose I was in my mid teens when I started devouring Henry Miller, the beats, Burroughs, et al...and decided a 'normal' life wasn't for me. Of course, I had no concern (yet) for the basics of life--i.e.--normal or not, we're all similar in the sense that we need to eat and put a roof over our heads. The process of navigating through one's dream life and the real one--that's been my concern for years--and I haven't done the greatest job of it. I've been naive, outright stupid, a master of procrastination (no discipline), and completely oblivious to simple facts of life that were not only staring me in the face, but actually getting up and slapping me, once-twice-thrice!

Anyway, I'm nothing if not a late bloomer. This birthday finds me awake and having a coffee at 7a.m. It's windy and wet outside, a light frosting of snow on the ground. The plan is to go hiking in Waskesiu national park with a couple of friends. A couple of beers and a chilly barbecue later on. The first birthday in a while where the plan isn't to get buck wild...but I guess you never know, right?

Whose nightmare am I waking from? Am I Dracul, waiting for the setting sun?

Fire and Forget

What wants to be free cannot be suppressed. But that power, that energy, will it be harnessed?

Alone?

What lurks beneath? Lovecraftian nightmare cities, with monstrous deities entombed? Or just all those things I've ignored and suppressed...minor little things that with time have grown, slowly synthesizing what light reaches them in the depths, adrift in subterranean currents, waiting, knowing their time will come.

What's for dinner?

Instead of the naked lunch, where the morsel lies exposed on your fork, the opaque banquet; let's eat, drink, and let all sorts mingle in our guts. Pay no attention to what you imbibe.

Burroughs launched a very smart missile; programmed to strike at the hypocrisy at the centre of entrenched power structures. What could shock in the same way today? Perhaps a cluster bomb of paintings, novels, poems, videos...but where is the enemy? Who is the enemy? There is no enemy? The enemy is you, me, all we three...there are as many realities as there are brains on this planet.

Introducing...

Image: a representation, an idea, the root of imagination. A projection--my 'image'. Or switch the I and the M and add an R.