In life, change and forgetfulness may give the impression that relationships
are temporary and conditional by the events of time, but to the soul,
remembrance and eternal connectedness are more important.
-t.moore
continuing from my last post...
I took a trip - third year of college l won a 1000.dollar grant and l was
going to travel across Canada. I bought a 30 day via rail pass, could
get on and off when and where l wanted. I bought fourty rolls of black
and white film 400asa. My instructors told me that l was very
fortunate, the landscapes across canada they said. Little did they know.
My first stop was Swift Current, Saskatchewan. I stayed at the Imperial $9.45,
a room, bath and washroom down the hall. Met Charlie Butcher- lived there all
his life, 74years old and had farmed grain for 36 yrs. Lives in town now,
his parents homesteaded in Swift Current.
I met the mayor who instead of the key to the city gave me a swift current pin
and keychain. I gave my cheese buns and five dollars to Luis and Mercy who
were from New York, lost in swift current. Bob, Bunk, Erwin, Mrs Peters
then l met Floyd. He told me that he had been in "mental wards" three times
and his brother was in the kingston pen, "he was framed", says Floyd.
Floyd talked to me about "jerking off" and god. "People don't believe that they
can get back in their mother's womb you know." "My father choked to death,
my mother had a miscarriage." "Animals believe in god you know, everday down
at the zoo people are talking about god and the animals hear, you know."
As l left to board the train, Floyd gave me a stubbly bearded kiss on the cheek.
There was a thunderstorm going on that night, maybe one in Floyd as well.
Arrived in Brandon, Manitoba early the next morning. Stayed at the Crystal
motel for $18.00. Wandered Brandon, weary from the train. Took pics of Vern
in room #9 of my hotel. He's been there six years, 17 years in Brandon.
Moved from Winnipeg where he had a dry cleaning business which folded
when his wife left with the kids - "she got everything." Vern gave me a
polaroid of himself which a friend had taken and he was going to tear up.
I lit a wooden match; I let it all burn down
I've broken every rule; I've wrecked it all down
There are no words in the wind, the trees are all bare
Life's mean as a needle; but why should I care?
-tom waits
Took pics of Jane who had on a "Smile - Pass it on" patch on her jacket.
Brandon was strange to me, hard, dry, but l recognized warmth there...
On my way to Toronto where the train stops for a night. The actual train ride
was okay, slept in my seat, wandered to the bar car every now and then chatting
to people in my still and quiet way. I bought bagels or buns whenever
l stopped, and munched on them, scrunched in my seat like a raccoon
with a secret. Stayed at the youth hostel in Toronto for $14.00 and like the
other cities, wandered, shuffling along unsure of what l was really doing, peeking
here and there, down alleys, in churches, cafe's where l could get toast and
coffee. I had to be careful as l didn't have much money. Took pics at a church, built
in 1849. There was a strawberry luncheon going on in the back and in the front
l met Joe, Mike, and Frank. None of them had whip cream on their faces so
l guess they hadn't been invited.
Frank was hungry and was checking out the donation box inside the church.
My journal from this trip is so embarrassing, l rant and rave about churches,
l whine and fight with myself over what l'm doing.
All your cryin don't do no good
Come on up to the house
Come down off the cross
We can use the wood
Come on up to the house
-tom waits
I met Private Smith, use to be in the army, seven years he told me
He'll be 60 in a week. He got to go to Copenhagen
"where the girls and the booze where for the taking". He was such a nice man to
meet. I hung around union station like a lost traveler, i sat on benches, switching
every now and then so it didn't look like l was thinking. I met a wonderful man
name Bill which l wrote about early on in this blog...Here
You know, one of the first things l learned, not long before this trip while l
ventured the alleys of Calgary, well it was that l could approach anyone. It
didn't matter if they looked hardcore, disturbingly cold, or disenchanted,
gruff or gross. There's this human inside of us all, no matter the ventures
we've taken, it's there and wants to be touched.
I traveled to Halifax after Toronto. Headed straight to Dartmouth when l
arrived. Met Douglas Mysers in a hallway of a rooming house, dark, a single
uncovered bulb hung over his head like a noose.
It was unsettling, he was unsettling.
I stayed at the ymca for $16.50. The next day, traveled up to Sydney, stayed
at the Cliefden house hotel for $24.00. Wandered, wandered, wandered,
and wondered. Went into the Irish club, not many people, very dark, very quiet,
met Jimmy. Jimmy use to be on skid row in Montreal. "The french are great people."
"I,m an alcoholic, use to fish out of Nanaimo, had my steam ticket, fuckin liquor,
lost it, but l knew my ships." Jimmy had a fantastic face, he should be in the mafia l thought.
Traveled to Digby, met Stacy Rogers on the train. 16 next week she tells me. Lives
with her mom who loves harley davidson's and Bob Dylan. Stacy ran away once to
Halifax for three days. She wants to be a lawyer or a singer, she's been smoking
since she was 10. Arrived in Digby at 10pm, not much money so l stayed in a
all night pizza joint until the ferry to Saint John was to leave at 5am
Saint John , like a dusty old chest of drawers, clothes flung in, some dirty, some
stained, some even clean.
I passed through Toronto again, it's unavoidable. I decided l wanted to go to
Niagra Falls. I met the most wonderful couple having lunch there. They were
from a small town of 800 people just outside of London, ont. They came to the falls
39 years ago on their honeymoon and have come back every year since.
Back in Toronto, "Have l begged from you before," he asked me. Pics of Lynda,
i was attracted by the gold glitter on her chest. She wore alot of crosses,
goes to three churches. "Have to pleae everyone," she tells me. When she
got out of the hospital as she had a bio chem breakdown, she started writing.
She has certain powers and when they got too great
she had a breakdown but now can control them.
Back on the train heading to Edmonton. Bits of conversation float down
the aisle, breaking like bubbles over my head. "Stop it or l'll pull your dink,"
says a little girl to her brother. "Maybe l'm not fit to be a security
guard." says George to Marg.
I drift, sleep, waking myself shouting my own dreamlike words "That's Nice"
Edmonton, Jasper, Prince Rupert where l sleep in the front seat of Chet's van.
My trip peters out in Princeton.
How do l end this- l guess l don't, it goes on, a walk through this fog,
grasping at what is human, trying to be human.
Because of all these tears,
these eyes can't hope to see,
the beauty that surround them,
isn't it a pity.
-nina simon
any time left...check out this generous and beautiful blog
Every photo tells a story
I have come home and l'm looking through the window...
I am looking back into a world gone forever. Thinking of a time that
will never return. A book of photographs is looking at me. 25 years
of looking for the right road. Postcards from everywhere. If there
are any answers. I have lost them.
-Robert Frank
I am scrapbooking, a hundred or more paintings, finding
their images and stories. Bear with me...
It started so many years ago now. I was a punk, my head and
body almost transcluscent. It was my first year at college and
l was listening to Joe Cocker. English 101 and we were told to do
a presentation - on anything. I decided l would do a piece on the
homeless, men on the streets. So one morning l borrowed a cheap
plastic camera and headed downtown (calgary) on my "excalibur".
Yes my ten speed was called excalibur, a canadian tire special,
gold in color, and l felt like a knight.
It was was wintery cold, minus something, l bought a styrofoam coffee
and just stood on the street and waited.
Eye contact, cigarettes, l offered him a sip of my coffee. He was short, spoke
with an accent and his name was Meitro. I spent the day with Meitro, we had
bus station sandwiches and we walked and walked. He showed me the bins behind
safeway, lots of broccoli, not so green. He constantly checked telephone and
newspaper slots for spare coin. He showed me where to go and what to do.
Our day together was slow, meandering, and gentle. When l left Meitro that day,
l was filled with such joy, l had survived the round table.
And so it went...My second year of college and l spent it taking pictures of people
on the street. I can't describe the feeliing, l was scared, l had butterflys in my
stomach, l was excited. Those feelings when you know you are truly alive.
I photographed everyone, l was on a binge, l bathed in it. I pimped my smokes
for hints of conversation. I was champagne in a bucket.
I was still a punk, l was still transcluscent, but...
I started to question myself.
Afraid to die alone, afraid to die unloved.
Maybe l needed to care and to be cared.
cont...
When we are no longer children, we are already dead.
-Brancusi
I have to go climb scaffold for two weeks, till then...
Check A Painter's Room, a sacred celebration.
and passion of earth; The Waxing Moon
Amid a place of stone,
Be secret and exult,
Because of all things known
That is most difficult
-w.b.yeats
The lamb that ate itself to death...
Years ago l spent a winter on a cattle farm in Rolla, bc. I lived in a cabin and
worked on a painting. The farmer and his wife were so gracious and so lovely.
I would help bring in calves when they were born. Frozen white
ground and wind that would rush through you tearing at your flesh as it left.
I remember having to pull a calf out of it's mother. I pulled so hard,
the farmer and l pulled and pulled, l thought l would turn the cow inside out.,
I helped skin a dead calf, used a utility knife. We wrapped the hide around
another motherless calf in hopes the cow would smell her's and let it feed.
I drank beer in the rolla pub and listened to the farmer's sons sing,
sing, their music was like passion - ferocious.
Huge round bales of hay stretched out on the farm, stacked two high.
One day l noticed a lamb eating at the bales, all alone, biting, chewing,
tearing, all day she ate. The next morning l found her, dead. She had eaten
way too much in one spot, in one sitting, and the top bale had fallen on her.
There was beauty on the farm.
You don't die when you live on a farm
you just become part of the earth's mystery and secrets.
when the road's washed out
they pass the bottle around
and wait in the arms
of the cold cold ground
cold cold ground
tom waits
I"ve been ready to ka boom for a week
Put on your stockings and your powder and blush
Keep it all on the hush, hush, hush
-tomwaits
I have a love/hate relationship with "The old school house art gallery.
...but if your looking for cheap art, it's the place to be feb 1st to the 6th.
They are having a become a art collector deal, only 250. for any of the work.
I am giving them this piece above "the dragonslayers return"
So take a trip to Qualicum, buy some cheap art,
it's really not a bad way to spend money.
"This beauty is within us at the bottom of memory.
It is the beauty of a flight which revives us,
which puts the dynamism of one of life's beauties within us.
In our childhood, reverie gave us freedom.
It is striking that the most favorable field for receiving
the consciousness of freedom is none other than reverie...
it is in reverie that we are free beings.
A potential childhood is within us."
-Gaston Bachelard
...like a carrot still in the ground over winter, check fucoid
Memory open; memory close;
memory taught me to be a man.
It remembers everything.
It helps the little birds to sing.
It finds the honey for the bee.
It opens and closes,
opens and closes.
-harold monro
Lyle and l go way back, back to the beatles, back to styx and queen, back to
nazereth. We met on pym street, guess we were 15 or 16. The first thing he showed
me were the row of green mail boxes at the end of the street. We practiced picking
locks with bobby pins but no need to worry, we weren't really any good at it.
Cars were important, we bombed around in the bush. I had a 56 ford, my brother
had a 54 dodge and Lyle, well Lyle just navigated. But later,
Lyle got a 64 dodge polara, primer gray with bits of real red. He rebuilt the engine
but could never get it going after that. We even tried towing it down the bypass.
Tied to my mustang with a thick rope Lyle told me l needed to get up to 70 or 80 mph
because the polara was an automatic.
We had a race once - Vancouver to Princeton. Me in my fiat (cereal box) and
Lyle in his chrysler (tank). Ya okay Lyle technically won, but it was so close.
It felt like the "Cannonball Run" and l really wanted to be like Dean Martin.
We both lived in Princeton that summer. I worked in the mill and Lyle wanted
to work in the mill, he just ended up getting kicked out of Princeton by the RCMP.
We both talked of joining the army that summer, even filled out the papers.
Lyle moved to Edmonton, "lots of work out there", he said, "come on".
So l loaded the camero and moved to Edmonton, it was winter.
We lived outside of Edmonton, stayed with his Argentina friend Rod.
Rod was kindof funny. Lyle told me that he could only make out if he was drunk,
real drunk. Years later Rod disappeared, they found his wallet and truck in the
bush, searched for months but never did find him.
Lyle moved back to the island after a couple of months and l stayed.
I moved into a little basement suite downtown Edmonton and got a job with
a security company. I had to wear a uniform, it was pale and worn
like they had found it in someone's attic. and it came with this stupid hat
that felt like you were wearing a table on your head. I drove around at night,
the deep dear night, with a mopey german shepherd and the only good memory l have
is the memory of listening to Bruce Springsteen on the radio.
...singing "santa claus is coming to town".
Caress the Sleep of Mortals
Bound to the Mast of Longing
Friend, tie me to the ship's mast
To ride to the rim of life.
Wounded at the ear's edge
Branded in burnt blood.
Friend, do not let me leap
From love's fierce sensual fire.
On dark horses of rising tide.
Brave breakers in beauty's risks.
Friend, if I am empty, embered.
Fill me with your wild cleansing.
Let your siren song of exile
Heal these stripes of wounded will.
-ron atkinson
There are really three gifts, simultaneous in their effect:
blind hope, fire, and craft (techne').They open up wonders-
and terrors-to human creatures, the wonders and terrors
of being fully cognizant and sensitive creatures of earth.
-eileen gregory (summoning the familiar)
I like the idea of knights, of cowboys, l like stories from
the great depression, l like the history of the gold rush.
Rob has lived in the gully on and off since he was seven, he use to run away
from home and hide there, sleeping under the tree branches.
He knows how to keep dry...
They change their camp every now and then, sometimes because of the city,
sometimes because of the cops, sometimes for a change of scenery.
Rob, Cindy, and Bobby, this was the core - everynow and then
someone else joins, another body curled up on the ground, the
disheveled head of hair sticking out like a scarecrow.
Rob's a good person, like's my dog, tells me stories that l haven't heard before.
I am welcomed when l visit their camp. On cold mornings and when there is
a smoldering fire we huddle around it, feels like a Louis L'Amour novel.
A sense of belonging, a sense of longing.
We need communities based on this...
and the road was like a ribbon and the moon was like a bone
he didn't seem to be like any guy she'd ever known
-tw
What are little girls made of?
Sugar and spice,
And everything nice,
That's what little girls are made of.
What are little boys made of?
Snips and snails,
And puppy dog tails,
That's what little boys are made of.
If I was a puppy dog in the early dawn
I'd make it to your house and sleep on your lawn
but I ain'ty no puppydog, you know my name
And the wind blows fortune, the wind blows pain
-tw
l found the perfect mummified rat...dried skin, full skeleton, even had it's tail.
It is really the tail that is the rat's downfall, otherwise we'd be petting them.
Well Cedar ate him, l had washed the rat and left it out in the sun to dry.
Reminds me of the time l found the perfect bat skeleton, l buried it in
a secret place, so secret l didn't even know where...
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