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Formative Fires
Raining ash, a now common occurrence, settles on the hood of my vehicle. July 2023.
July 2023
Another summer and another long drive ahead. From BC’s Northern capital to its swarming metropolis via its paved blood vessels. It is a cool Saturday morning and I have the heater going and a light jacket on, despite knowing it will soon be above 30 C. Another hot day in a drought-stricken summer, driving around in a carbon belching sedan that burns prehistoric life. Luckily, I have some tunes to underscore the journey.
My iPod Touch, bought back in mid-2009 and still going strong, is plugged into the vehicle’s sound system. It carries 800 or so songs and has not been updated in a couple of years. An extended time capsule covering my high school days to my late twenties.
I have my coffee and everything is packed in the back. Time to head off. Initially, in silence. The daylight is barely present and the roads are quiet. Not too many giant metal prowlers – comically big pick-ups and SUVs, to the rest of you – out and about. It feels nice just starting off without any noise in a city that is usually bathed in it. I navigate past the bridge construction and make my way onto the main highway. The signs change from 70 to 100 and I am off. Cruise control set; time to hit play.
It is Paul Simon’s reworked “Can’t Run But”. I turn it up and settle in.
I can’t run but I can walk much faster than this,
Can’t run but.
A cooling system burns out in the Ukraine,
Trees and umbrellas protect us from the new rain,
Armies of engineers to analyze the soil,
The food we contemplate, the water that we boil.
July 2017
Over an hour on transit in with a suit and tie on, during a fairly busy morning, to make my way to downtown Vancouver. I am not a morning person, nor a suit person. Some people say suits are comfortable and/or that the formality they impress upon onlookers is worth the rigmarole of putting one on. Comfort is a moot point – my objections go beyond soft fabric on skin. Identity can be expressive or hidden and clothing only its most visible articulation. What one chooses to wear is then just a social dance, a jig of conformity or non-conformity with various in and out-groups. Suits, thus, associated with many things I choose to avoid. As for the onlookers, I wish I could care less.
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Vangelis and the Past Future of LA
The person runs, futility in motion. The water cascades down, each window and mortar wall a riverbed. The drains overflow with a mixture of muck, covering the cracked ground with black filth. It is the middle of night, but the darkness lies above and below. Here, at street level, the effulgence of neon signs blinds anyone who look anywhere but down.
They splash their way down the high street, screaming for help. People look up, notice the blaring red and blue illuminations, and look down again. There is an order to things, and this is no aberrance. The runner looks back and sees the flying lights nearing. They pivot into an alley and rush past dumpsters, lightly floating but tightly chained. The darkness has crept in here, but not enough to hide in; nothing can shroud those chased by the hunters of the sky.
The person slips and falls into a thick splatter. Tar! The ever-seeping liquid asphalt abundant below the crevasses. This city eats people. Those living in alcoves a little easier to pick clean from its stained edifices.
“Halt!” The car blares as it rounds the corner. “Replicant, halt!” It is almost over their broken body, breathing heavy as the fumes of the city begin to overwhelm them.
“I am no replicant!” The plea goes unheard. “I am a threat to no one!” They unstick themselves and stand up, a stark silhouette against a malicious glare.
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Journey
When this post is published, I will be in Los Angeles, having driven 800km South from Prince George and having caught a flight from Vancouver. One of many stops that I will be making over the course of this month. From the moderate chill of middle BC to the balmy sunshine of Southern California, before heading back to work up North to travel across frigid Yukon, to reach some of the most remote communities in Canada.
Boy, what a large carbon footprint I carry. I suspect no one, from the gaudiest campaigner to the most ardent activist, will quit travel entirely until we are forced by the climate itself to confine ourselves to little squares on the global grid. For now, no carbon emissions more egregious than any other, from the ones we produce directly to the ones we wear or consume. All the more important to recognize since we are having quite the ‘winter’. Though Prince George has had a couple of weeks at or below the -30 range, it has also been much warmer than usual. Not to localize large climate patterns, of course, only to point out the observable results of their compounding impacts. It is no longer strange seeing headlines about wildfires and drought as early as February.
And I am a contributor.
I share that as a grim caveat to a fond feeling I am reminded of on a sporadic basis. As a young adult attending post-secondary, I used to dream of living a life where I get to travel regularly. Not engage in tourism. Rather go from place to place as a learner and appreciator of the differences that define us and the similarities they disguise. I did not care where – you can find plenty that is foreign in familiar surroundings left unexplored – but I did not want to remain unmoved.
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folkshilfe, LEMO & Kosik
Salzburg as seen from Hohensalzburg Fortress
I visited central Europe last year, my first trip abroad since before the Covid interlude. I travelled with a few friends and we galivanted from Budapest to Geneva, spending the bulk of our time in the lovely country of Austria.
A couple of months later, I decided to revisit the photos and videos we had all taken to compile them into a video for the group. I needed background music and went digging through the Austrian charts from the last few years to find the appropriate track.
The winner was folkshilfe’s “Hau di her”, a song about finding meaningful connection:
Other good ones I came across: “Schwarze Wolken” from LEMO and “Legenden” from Christina Kosik.
In case you are looking to add some Austrian pop to your playlist.
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In Dread and Promise
The crowd was mostly young. Bookworms, sweatered paramours, and fans of underground rock slowly filled the Edinburgh Festival Theatre in anticipation of a performance that would end the 2016 Edinburgh International Festival. We sat on the upper tier, far from the stage and yet able to see every nook and cranny. The theatre’s curvature made it appear as though we were on the edge of a concave lens, just a short lean away from tipping ourselves into the hundreds of seats below.
The program read: “Mogwai & Mark Cousins”. We were there to witness a non-narrative film of archived footage assembled by Mark Cousins called Atomic, Living in Dread and Promise. The feature was scored by the Scottish band Mogwai, with many in attendance solely to see them play.
And that is what they did. With no bombast or introduction of any kind, they strolled out into the orchestra pit, equipped themselves, and began the show. Their strides out were greeted with mild cheers silenced quickly by the dimming lights and deafening volume of their instruments. The vibrations reached into our bones as a large projection illuminated the space above the stage. A man’s face appeared. He began, “The government has decided, that in the present state of international tension, you should be told how best to protect yourselves…”
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Solitude, Interrupted
Walk with me for a moment.
This path leads onwards. It does not circle back. It may branch, like the trees adorning its tranquility. Whether its branches converge again is unknown. What we cannot do is turn back. We may want to, but forward is the only motion in this space. After all, we dare not cheat time.
Occasionally, we may happen across a mirrored surface. One that allows us to look around a corner, or offer a reflection on what has passed. Unfortunately, the surface will never be free of impurities. The grime will make it difficult to say with certainty what we are contemplating. Echoes, harmonious and discordant alike, may pierce the air. Visions from beyond this locale may briefly glide into view between the tangled network of green and brown; our perspective marred by the spore-driven haze.
But we shall stick to the earth marked out for us. A simple line through an overgrown reality. The path is soft and still, and we are its only inhabitants. At least for the time being.