Do you send postcards to yourself? I lovely way to document your own trip and in this case especially, acquire cancellations from a significant location / historic Gion, Kyoto (noting the last opportunity for having a classic “pillar“ postbox in front rather than a more contemporary box unit)
wrote a poem (in reply to the great singer songwriter Hawksley Workman who’s playing in #Saskatoon tonight)
Saskatoon
I was born here
but
never lived there (left quickly on a 707)
but
obliged to print on application forms
since–
quite literally hundreds or possibly thousands
there’s never enough room
(especially in Japan)
to write:
b. Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Aug, 16 1970
As I’m stumbling along on my “healing ramble” series (please watch the intro video for overview and disclaimers, not unusually, finding myself a little bit overwhelmed with all the artifacts, memories, items, even data, to share. So, rather than obsess over it just putting it all out there, even if it’s a bit redundant.
The next “real” dispatches from the series include my “tips for travelling with a chronic illness” (which is rather practical and logistical stuff), plus another entry from Sri Lanka, another from Nepal, a tough one from Pacifica California, more from other places i forgot and maybe I’ll even fill in the missing gaps from Adelaide Australia, Austin Texas, and crossing Canada looking for a home.
In the meanwhile here are the fronts of some notebooks and a postcard which allude to some of the above.
From a kura barn in provincial Japan, DaveO kicks off “Beat Sushi” by sending greetings to Beat / Deadhead / Prankster / Political fixer(?) Brian Hassett with a meandering answer to a simple question about a Jack Kerouac vinyl box set.
Along with spinning Velvet Underground and Jack’s “Western Movies” with Al Cohn and Zoot Sims from “The Last Word” disc, your rambling host talks about:
Dig Jack Kerouac festivities in Lowell roundup riff at Brian Land: https://brianhassett.com/2022/03/kerouacs-100th-birthday-celebration-in-lowell/
DaveO’s Creative Life Archive at https://daveostory.com {you are here}
including “Six Poets at Six Gallery” video: https://daveostory.com/film-vids-docs/social-culture/meet-the-beats/
Much more Beat & counter-culture literary goodness, fill yer boots!
A rollicking rapid-fire, mixed-media introduction to The Beat Generation – made especially for youth (specifically, a 11th grade lit class at a DoD base school) – with topics including:
Presented from a historic barn in provincial Japan with vinyl records, artifacts, ephemera, loads of books, postcards etc – by storymaker Dave Olson who invites you to ask questions via postcard (address included within).
(fuzzy photos of) notebooks of poetry, notes, musings etc – set to transcribe, eventually…
this batch includes a Yukon-made silk screened book – a gift from Bollwitts – plus an assortment of remixed The Royal Tenenbaums books, a handmade Japanese washi book and re-purposed passport.
sometimes i feel like because i am not one of those “writer every day” writers, i don’t get *enough done*, then i tidy up desk adn realized i have a stack of notebooks filled with scribbles, lists, notes, observations, full grown poems, lyrics, letters and so on, waiting for a transcription into another more shareable form. so i stack em up to do so and realize i still havent done the typity-type-type with a stack of others, yet somehow its all ok – art makes the future and all that and all that.
In bed sick a lot these last weeks/months #MECFS, which means I scribbled a lot in my bedside notebooks while in the fog.
Mostly will be filed in my “old man punk” dossier meeting semi-lyrical, probably angsty, likely too revealing bits & scraps of shiny foolish gold… which may eventually become songs or otherwise.
So anyhow, came out to the barn studio today just to bring/move some stuff around and try and get my brain and body moving a wee and set-up a device ideal for transcribing.
(thanks to Neal Cropper for keys & Rebecca & John Bollwitt for Yukon notebook)
And, listened to Television “Marquee Moon” = vinyl perfection
Also got the soundtrack to Wes Anderson’s “the French Dispatch“ along with another record by “top top” a.k.a. Jarvis Cocker which goes along with the movies vibes (i guess), also a poster in the pack (signed).
annnd a non/fictional magazine, seen here with a copy of the inspiration source The New Yorker and another French culture magazine (in English).
Somehow it makes me think of the Borges quote “the original is unfaithful to the translation“.
As it goes, while I’ve collected artifacts about the movie, I still haven’t had a chance to see it here in Japan (Yes I can get it from dodgy sources but waiting for proper Japanese subtitles so I can enjoy with my family).
Pausing in the Kura barn from arranging dongles, cables, tripods – trying to upgrade tech aspect of telling stories – Dave starts with Kiana Brassest singing in the background while adding notes about decades of story making & thoughts about continuing with vigor.
Then into a recent Osera magazine cameo from a fermented foods tour (including saké, beer, cheese, wine, miso, shoyu…) in Maniwa, Okayama (which is also sorta son Ichiro’s first publication).
Next onto recent books by post including:
“Waiting for Now” world-traveling “Scarborough dude” Ken Bole *often very* candid letters from Japan, Nigeria, Thailand, Canada etc to friends and family (with numerous coincidences and intersections with my own life).
“Waiting for Now” available via Blurb (part 2 available for preorder) & Check Scarborough Dudes DicknJanes pod diary etc.
“High White Notes” – David S Wills’ brand-new literary biography of Gonzo writer/journalist renegade Hunter S Thompson – available from his Beatdom publishing imprint + riffs include namechecks for Dr. HST’s book of letters “Proud Highway” and references to Joseph Conrad (re: Importance of dedication to art), Henry Miller (re: Big Sur etc), and Jack Kerouac (re: enemy of my enemy is my friend – if he could get write about drugs and get published…)
“First Third” – beat, prankster, railroader, hero “Adonis of Denver” 50th anniversary of Neal Cassady’s partial autobiography, inscribed by his daughter Jami Cassady on behalf of Neal Cassady Estate –including postcards with noted photos of, and by, the elegant poet, photographer, lover and muse Carolyn Cassady – with the aim of “Keeping the legacy alive” ++ a bit about Ken Kesey & the Merry Pranksters Further bus.
Oh yeah a reference to Brian Hassett’s cool “Hitchhiking to Kerouac” book in there too with stories about Carolyn Cassady…
Finally, a whole rundown of poets Gary Snyder and Wang Ping spending time together at Kitkitddizze in Sierra Nevada –working on translation, amplification and edification including coffee, Han Shan poems, Hanko stamps, sons Gen and Kei, Lagunitas IPA and gyoza dumplings and cowboy steaks, the history of Axe Handles poem (and translation thereof), Snyder’s new book “This Present Moment” and me at “home” (finally) in a red velvet robe with coffee cup by potter Marty Thurston Kendall of Utah knowing while our journey is our own, there is precedent for path before (like I can be 91 hanging out with my son Ichiro, living well and making poems in a barn).
See more at @Ping Wang’s Youtube – especially this video about Axe Handles: and website: http://www.wangping.com/ and see also translated “Flander’s Field” (Canadian) John McCrae to Chinese.
More Kiana Brasset at (I guess, sorta need better link or…? anyhow) met her on the Tracks on Tracks trip.
Also, a postcard from a friend wandering in London, a new batch of Moo “friendship” cards [get yer own]
Always more more more projects coming along…
Fondly, dvo/uw
Thinking about “going home in October” or even more, going far away with this video version of the audio-first podcast.
Take some spoken word poetry and add some shaky tuktuks and random trains with assorted filters and voila, ya got a podcast you can watch AND listen to if that’s your thing.
+ Lost the Plot (Finding Home) – Postcard #85 podcast, but video(!) +
Blurb: Thinking about “going home in October” or going far away via freeverse poetry backed by trains from Moncton to Sri Lanka and tuk tuks from Kerala and Thailand, read by a weary fella in barn in Japan.
Note: Postcards from Gravelly Beach, literature podcast, est 2006, now with 85 dispatches, each handcrafted with affection.
fondly, dvo
Audio-only version of “Lost the Plot (Finding Home) – Postcard #85
Continue reading Lost the Plot (Finding Home), Video – Postcard #85
Thinking about “going home in October” or even more, going far away from home via freeverse poetry, read directly from scribbled travel scrapbooks and backed by trains from Moncton to Sri Lanka and tuk tuks from Kerala and Thailand, by a weary fella in an olden barn in provincial Japan. Fondly home.
Be Lost at Home: Lost the Plot (Finding Home) #85
(17MB, 10:26, 192 kbps, mp3, stereo)
