Found in the archive: a letter written, apparently to a friend from teenage days, travelling on Pacific Blue Drum Corps tour, reacquainting with a life catch up (note to self: can’t find in any original channel)
considering the contents of the letter, we‘s seen each other turn those late-80 times when back-and-forth between parents in British Columbia and Utah – each trip with some kind of catastrophe including a VW van fire, driving the whole way without brakes (using parking brake), a smash into a dumpster, and worst, a catastrophic car crash with me at the wheel, totalling a four-wheel-drive Blazer
{we’d driven through the night, not stopping at a motel for *various reasons* and started the trip with an extra long route through the North Cascades for “scenic purposes” stuck behind snowplows, not putting a lot of miles behind us, then, in the early dawn of slick windswept Idaho freeways – me, not at my best, but trying my best as I do – bleary-eyed and faded, veered the vehicle into a right hand ditch which flipped, spun, bounced, like a jumping bean over and over across the freeway, into the depressed median, which knocked it back the other way // 3 brothers were sleeping (1 wasn’t with us) and all awoke to me in complete shock and panic / It’s a terrible experience (nightwares still), and I never talk about it (the cops treated me so brusquely though i was barely 18, and kind folks of a local church put us up next to a real life nativity scene) but while sharing “way too much” in this dispatch, even found a snapshot and when you see this picture, you might wonder how all of us survived aside from my chronic bad back/neck (the seatbelt prob saved my life, but also effed me up), brother Dan was asleep in the front passenger nestled in the foot area (otherwise he’d…) and brother Bob got a cut on his elbow and was admitted to the hospital, still has a scar which he reminds me about every time we see each other :-) #Allgood}
chronological context: at time time of the letter,i’d finished a ridiculous string of adventure in the late 80s early 90s, (Europe, Mexico, USA, over and over again, Japan, Micronesia…), spent nine years of reinvention and devolution in Olympia and returned to Vancouver, my “sorta kinda I guess, hometown” and run gauntlet on a string of “.com” (some noteworthy, others soul-destroying) biz and evidently into the illness chapter of life
this preamble is entirely unnecessary and if continued, i won’t share, so gonna skip adding photos, except for the one of the broken vehicle (which i never have #yikes)
Feb. 3, 2015
When my family had split up and my mom moved to super white, super conservative Utah,… Well, you know all this but it was really tough having my family split up and being away from my brothers because we are all really tight (or something).
As you likely remember, we did many back and forth drives in treacherous conditions. So scary driving my VW bus over snowy passes frozen cold just with enough money for gas. We caught on fire, got in crashes, drove without brakes, did dangerous things to keep warm, spent Christmas in a hospital in Idaho. It was tough being pulled and confused.
So I did high school in Utah for just over a year and it was surreal – all kinds of dances, pep rallies, football games, elections. I thought it was also stupid and bailed out by enrolling in an “Adult high school” program at the community college (now university). Turned out great as I met lots of older dudes who knew many life secrets and taught a eager young renegade about the forgotten corners and canyons of Utah as well as how to work the “system” – i got multiple sets of IDs (fakes) and I bought my Volkswagen bus when I was 15 and drove to my driving test, failed and drove away.
In between of breaking down for use of the time, I started to go down farther and farther adventures all the way back to the East Coast and back to Kansas City for a DCI championship to Colorado to see the who many times to California or Mexico just to go. Hitchhiked up and down the east coast, stayed for most of a winter in Providence RI where i wrote term papers for pay for ivy league students.
Travelling with the dome on the VW bus it’s sort of felt like going on or tour again. I love that so much just getting away and learned about life. We learned to be fearless and streetwise too (also growing up in Surrey) … Gave me the confidence to go all these crazy adventures to are the Grateful Dead shows that you probably heard about but just going anywhere for any reason nothing phases me and I love to go. That’s one of the things it drives me nuts about my sickness is it’s hard to travel but… Because lots of people who have it worse.
From time to time I would end up at my moms while I was regrouping from a trip or need to make a little bit of money but I was always good at building community and rallying people around for a good time even in Utah. During that time I did tons of exploration of all the four corners area rock climbing and and mountain bike and all that.
Then, during this time I was on and off going to various colleges and I decided to go to Evergreen College in Olympia Washington. I worked at sunrise cycler in Logan building bikes and tried to save up money to get scholarships but it didn’t happen so instead I flew to Amsterdam with a one-way ticket and $220 US and $100 CDN bill in my shoe
I hitchhiked all around and I have benefited ventures being totally broke for party in strangers and friends seeing music and that I met up with Trevor Erikson we traveled little bit to get in tand worked i the grape fields. I painted, wrote poems and made friends. Broke. We explored old castles on LSD and snuck into anywhere.
On that trip we ended up back to Amsterdam been to London in on the cheap flight to Miami which is just after the hurricane and after a couple weeks there which was horrible got a delivery car to drop off a Dallas Texas which almost got us killed and then we had to get from Dallas to Salt Lake it into Vancouver.
During this time I have an opportunity to go to Japan to work as a farmhand as a mushroom farm – at this point I was in someone Louisiana trying to get back to somewhere where I could rest up and get fed but I was just very open to adventure and so i said yes.
10 days later I was in Vancouver to get my documents, packed up and on my way to Japan where I lived a very rigorous farming hand living up to the mountains growing mushrooms you know I’m not psychedelic once but just like edible mushrooms… it was a really tough job because the boss was an asshole so after about six months, I was committed to two years but was no way that I do that, I literally ran away – brought a bicycle up and told him to fck off and I ran away and he yelled after “you don’t speak the language you don’t have a return ticket you’ll never make it” and I ended up hitchhiking around Japan learning the culture, yes even falling in love – causing a family drama which turned into a three or four years tug-of-war between me and the family about where precious daughter should live. Much of this time we are living very high remote in the mountains in Japan when is only dirt roads and it’s like going back in time. I really love this.
Then my visa was running out so we went to Guam because I had a US passport so I could work there – and by this time I spoke pretty good Japanese with found me suddenly very employable – first as a submarine tour guide and then later as a high schoolteacher teaching Japanese. Finally at host at a private beach for Japanese tourists – yup, helping folks have fun on an idyllic beach. It was a pretty wild and fun time but the company and family were pretty corrupt and instigated evil on many islands – plus I could kind of feel my brain atrophy.
Somewhere in all of these times I’d started to import hemp bags and surfboard covers and shorts and stuff, I would also sell these devil/hippie/juggling sticks called Flowersticks and supported life on the road by making and selling those at various fair, markets, festivals, and wrangled some media appearances including TV coverage in Japan and Guam.
I went to explore other islands of Micronesia because so hard to get there, so after Guam where I walked off job and planed to Palau which blew my muthfcking mind. History, colonialism, wars, scuba, reefs, and the best ganja in the islands. Then i went to Yap where the women are bare-breasted (which is no where near as cool as it sounds) and everyone chews betel nut and spits the red, juice down their shirts and bellies. Both are very remote places (and i hope they remain this way).
In 2005, whirlwind trip through Europe a few years ago backpaker style and often would run up the Eiffel Tower, Sagrada Familia, Arc De Triumph and go to Van Gogh, Picasso and The Louvre museums. Train rides, painting along the way. I am most always painting, scrapbooking, writing, photo essaying, static montaging, essaying, inspecting – capturing the stories behind topics and artifacts i find compelling.
I have drafts of short stories about them if you’re curious. I’ve also done other trips to Belize when I was supposed to take a drug test at a company … this is a long digression, will just stay ended up on Caye Caulker, rented an $8/night cabin on the beach and starting reading War and Peace. By day 3, i was localized, had a posse and best ganja on island. There’s a podcast about this. {I make lots of little audio documentaries oh the places i go. Sometimes for business, but I’m a lousy sleeper so i wander streets late into the morning… London, NYC, etc.}
I’ve done all these Internet businesses since I left Guam, and sold some, mergered some, but I cut it by being a “rosetta stone” between the suits, the geeks and the market. I did this first in Olympia with notable success and painful doldrums, Then moved back up to BC, i always wanted to live in Lynn Valley. Sold house in Olympia and rolled north. I re-tooled myself for 6 months and created a load of art content published on emerging tech channels (podcasts, vidcasts, photostreams, mixed media dossiers).
I then reentered the “workforce” and quickly moved through a series of successful companies in which i planned, launched, mangled wrangled etc. social marketing campaigns. Brand makeover, build story, build community, show love. I’d learned these skills in Olympia but honed at an ecommerce company, web community design studio, green business community site, a movie production and promotion site. HootSuite came out of kick ass success from some of these projects, as well (i think) the grace and tenacity i showed when times were tough. At Hootsuite. I did many jobs in the early days which shaped culture, community and attitude & esprit de corps, plus found myself in the midst of various world event including the Egypt revolution, Japanese earthquake and other freedom censorship issues. As a vice president it’s really strange for me being away from my tribe as I was employee number seven and there are now more than 700 – so, i keep in mind that i had a lot of great times with dear people, but at the same time I worked so hard, that I think it’s part of the reason my body just collapsed.
If you’re curious you could see kind of what I do if you go to CBC.ca and search for a film called “generation social” – I’m one of three storylines in this documentary and it follows me kind of doing my job and doing my thing you might get a kick out of it – it’s hard to explain what i do.
I’ve also done TED talk and 2 SxSW talks (tech industry “Olympics”) and all sorts of other public speaking. I truly enjoy this – whether its a sold out Vogue Theatre or a group of students, love it. Fcking Love it.
I have literally dozens of nieces, nephews, cousins, 2nd cousins, randoms and interns. I am happy to inspire and educate and hug them.
I publish here and there. I have a files (physical and digital) laden with more: freeverse poetry, short fiction, epistlatory lit, and scattered prose as it were. I make this for me, and the people living 100 years from now. The rest of anyone can look over the shoulder though.
Post script: more on many of these riffs can possibly be found elsewhere in this archive (look below), pardon the self-indulgence // questions accepted within reason