all that remains is milk...

and when you are used to juices and beers and flavors beyond compare, milk will only do the trick in the right context. like MOST things in life. any cliche metaphor you want to throw in you may. can't fit a square into a circle. unless you break the circle. shit like that. and i mean SHIT.

i've been searching for years for a valid justification for me to paint on walls. make art on the canvas of cityscape. no in your face statement, no tag or name or ownership attached to it, just a little observation to make people think about beauty and what belongs where. i'm sure it's been done before and the idea isn't new by any means, but it's exciting to me and has given me the massive urge to get on my ninja gear and go 'destroy' property. liberation has never sounded so just... (i think what set me over the edge was seeing a temporary wood paneled fence up around a construction site, one day clean, the next day averagely (yet wondrously) tagged, and then the next day the lovely natural wood panels all painted grey to cover up the graffiti. i cannot comprehend why a temporary fence would have money put into it to cover up something that will be gone in a few weeks anyways. somebody in power needs less power and more cultural perspective. ... at least the shiny new bridge got hit super quick in a mighty dangerous place to cover up. well done daredevils of shoddy tagging.. i approve.)

today has been one of those gems of a day where you don't realize how good it's actually been because of all the dirt on it. there was no satisfaction to anything i did. and it pissed me off. but because of that angst it set ideas in motion that will kick-start my thought process into achieving relevancy within my practice and life. if it has happened to be about intention, i need to dissociate myself from that and step into something i've not done before. people and teacher pleasing must cease. i need to care less, limit less, paint-draw-read-interact more, and continue growing. the great funk of early to mid-september has ended and it's time to kill the residue. october truly is my favorite month and i'm gonna make it justified.

and this whole time i'm hoping that the square is actually a cylinder and it's just been turned the wrong way. milk will always have a home in cereal. reckless passion will always have a home in my heart and thoughts and hopefully actions.

yeah i painted that once.

mildly (pfft if that) critical essay on why halloween is amazing.

justification? spock. ninjas. an unnamed jedi of your choosing. whatever. sure it can be said that halloween has had a dark history, ritualistic and 'demonic' in some descriptions... i believe that yeah, you can take the points in history that highlight the darkness of halloween and not have any fun at all with it, OR you can choose to dismiss the less spiritually affirming attributes of this holiday and focus on the ending of the summer season and embracing the most intentional form of escapism and disguise yourself as something random and awesome!

sometimes a break from your own identity can give you a wonderful joyous perspective on how awesome you actually are on the inside and outside by stepping away from it and involving yourself in an image you only are allowed to indulge in once a year. any other day you'd be called crazy, but on halloween you can be whatever you want, free of judgement (unless you are of the less creative person and choose a career and make it slutty. that's not a costume, that's a projection of your inner slut!).

i think if you DID want to take it to the spiritual level, Jesus tell us to be IN the world, but not OF the world. if you try to subvert the nasty associations of what halloween can be and turn it into something completely different, i feel you are being a 'little Jesus', taking something the world sees a certain way and creating an opportunity to change some perspectives. be the sheep in wolves clothing (or an insomniac monk, zombie tennis player, the word plentiful, beaver) and choose to represent something bigger than tradition and ritual, make something new of something old. surely it isn't about what people think, it's about what people DO with what they think. halloween is an attitude. a celebration of creativity. and time to longboard ridiculously, dance into the streets, and be what you happen to end up being..


2009

2008

2007

rising... riiiisinnngg... RIIISSSSIIIIINNNNGGGG

i have never been so homesick in my life. oh my goodness.



watch it if you have half of an hour. seriously the coolest most hopeful video i've watched in a very long time.

http://www.palladiumboots.com/exploration/detroit

he was sure the world was ending

when all that is meant to be has gone all wrong, i'll want to know so please allow me to be the first to hear this song. the bass beats echo off your head and into mine and i'll take it but i'd rather sit here and pay close attention to ignoring the time. the lyrics mean nothing because it's all been said before, everyone in their final hours trying to count up and tally their own score. fuck your passive i want your aggressive, i won't handle the idle and inability to initiate a real way to live. what we leave unfinished will roll away like credits, to an audience that was never paying attention until we threw one of our erratic disenchanted fits.

we can't repeat all of those dramas we took as self entitled fights..
i meant to flush the toilet but all i did was turn out the lights.

hefeuckingweizen.

my mind is ablaze. so much anger and passionate recoil in the last 24 hours i can't stand it. yet amongst it all poured out blessings of subtle love letters from my Jesus reminding me which things really matter.

music littered with profanity so i don't have to say it but allowing me to feel and release it, upset snatch and grab understanding thrown upon deaf ears, failure to retaliate with newly instated rules of silence, battered emotions thrown upon battered canvases ready to be painted white.

i still know that i know, and i know when i'm close to You.

trash ending.

it is done. not 'officially' like the societal standard of calendar observing goes, but OFFICIALLY as education continues, summer's boundless freedom and suppressed academia comes to a close. i can't say it was the greatest summer of my life, but it by far was not the worst. i learned quite a lot. sometimes too much. but in the end (of this season, i cannot condone a period at the end of the sentence that is my stage of life) what i have done and seen and experienced will definitely exist as a stage for many memories and stories for future tyler to twiddle his mind-thumbs around. here are a few things i have learned:

less is more; whether it be words, sleep, hours spent consecutively driving, safeway glazed donut croissants, or arm wrestling challenges, it's the little things that make me tick and appreciate the bigger things. just like God uses the foolish things to confound the proud and the strong... double chyess.

family guy can still make me laugh.

i really like clouds. to paint, to appreciate, to shield me from the heat-panic inducing sun. (i'm white for a reason... tans have been added to my 'overrated' list. whereas tan-lines have been added to my 'under-appreciated' list...) along with this is the confirmation that there is NO way to accurately predict the weather in calgary.. even if you see it brewing all day. out of all the forecasts given to me via radio this summer, only one was correct enough to be predictable.

female supervision is recommended with any hair cutting activity. tyler + alone with thinning shears = an interesting perspective on the 'no paying for haircuts' life-law.

i have never been in better shape in my life. full time construction job, 2-3 nights of frisbee a week, and random moments of losing the 'mine' game has set me up for heightened expectations for this continuing year. the downside is i now have the knees of a 57 year old man. if anyone needs a cement grinding soundtrack, i am your man.

i love calgary. i really do. i love other places as well, but they exist better for me as escapist meadows of responsibility-less bliss. i could choose to forsake my calgary future in favor of areas that have heightened cultural opportunities, but if i leave who will invite those opportunities into this city? this is the attitude i must bring on. for however long it takes or until i know i'm supposed to go somewhere else.



things i am sad to see leave vs. things i am excited for coming back

- summer dresses >< winter wear. on girls. cold frosty red noses cannot be beaten though.
- planned roadtrips >< canoodling off into the distance at random.
- the appreciation for shade >< the appreciation for blankets.
- frisbee >< hockey.
- rain >< snow.
- the fear of entering my car because of it's heat >< the fear of leaving my house because of it's heat.
- feeling busy as shit with nothing to show for it >< feeling busy as balls but having everything to show for it.
- the night walk >< the blanket swindle.

and with 3 new favorite bands entering the scene this summer, i salute

mumford and sons
the rescues
as cities burn...

for making me dance when i'm alone, sing when i'm driving, and brag about when i'm socializing.

.... seeing SP twice isn't enough yet...