maerd krad

I knelt in the middle of the road. Head up. Staring into the blinding light of oncoming traffic, thinking about the future. A car approached, fast. Horn blaring, tires screeching. Its full weight slammed into me. I felt my bones break in the brief second before darkness fell.

I awoke on the couch, on the otherside of the mirror. Staring at nothing.

...transmission...

"...strong winds from the east...heavy organ rain...the deep rumble of horses running somewhere in the distance...babies crying...on the other side of the forest...darkness falls...the tall stranger smiles..."

The joy of discovering.

You ever stumble on something, a book, or a newspaper column or a website, or a magazine or something, read it and just think shit. Whoever wrote this is way smarter and way cleverer than me. You know, when you read someones opinions on stuff and they just seem more informed, and grammatically gifted than you? And witty on a level you can barely grasp? This happened to me when I first read A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers. It happened the first time I discovered Charlie Brooker and Marina Hyde in the Guardian newspaper. It happens a lot when I read The Onion. And most recently it happened while I was reading the monthly email from McSweeneys Quarterly magazine. They put up a link for a website called The Rumpus. I clicked on it, and to tell you the truth I'm still trying to get my head around it. The link on McSweeneys was advertising a new book club The Rumpus have set up, but once I got on the website I just started reading snippets of all the different stuff on the site, and I signed up for the newsletter.
     I just received the latest newsletter about five minutes ago, and its why I'm writing this right now. The newsletter, and I assume most of the website is written by this guy called Stephen Elliott and the stuff he writes makes me interested, makes me laugh, makes me think and makes me despair for this world all at once. I guess like all the writers I love reading. Writers like that always give me the feeling that at anytime something they're writing might go right over my head, or simply make me pause with admiration at any moment, and it is exhilarating. But then again, I might be alone in this line of thought. I often am.
     Either way, you should check it out and judge for yourself. The Rumpus. He writes about politics and popular culture and all sorts of other random stuff. Currently he's talking quite a bit about a bill some politicians are trying to put through in San Francisco that would make it illegal for homeless people to lie down. To stop them sleeping on the streets.
    Anyway, you should check it out and if your interested or haven't already done so you should also look out for Marina Hyde and Charlie Brooker in the Guardian. Their respective columns(and books) make for hilarious and very satisfying reading. Writers like them give me hope in this increasingly hopeless world. Sorry if that sounds grim. I didn't mean to put you in a downer, friend. If it helps my neighbours have three giant gorgeous black Newfoundland dogs named Oscar, Angus and Yogi. They are the gentlest dogs you'll ever meet. I try to stop by and see them at least once a day. Oscar is my favourite. He has a grumpy old man face and tries in vain to make people think he's intimidating but he can't hide his gentle nature. His eyes give it away. Hope that brightened you up a little bit. Now go read The Rumpus.

Black Rock

    He climbed down the steep bank to the rocky beach below. Sea gulls squawked over head. The tide rolled in gently almost up to his feet. He breathed in deeply, and sighed. Looking out across the water to the distant horizon. He glanced down the beach at the rocks and sand, large bare trees hanging over, clinging desperately to the grassy embankment above. He turned right and began running down this beach. Leaping from stone to stone as fast as he could. The stones rolling and jerking beneath his tattered sneakers. He kept his eyes ahead, singling out one stone after another. His feet moving faster and faster as his confidence grew. He hurtled across the stony beach, no, glided across the stony beach, his feet merely brushing over each rock.
    The wind pushed the long mess of hair back off his forehead. Tears began running down his cheeks but the wind quickly grabbed these too, pushing them back towards his ears, into his hair. His vision blurred, and the quickness and unexpectedness of this caught him off guard. In full flight and in mid stride he lost track of the stones in front of him. His right foot already descending upon a large rounded stone, glanced off the side of the stone and he stumbled, his arms flailed as he tried to regain his balance, his left foot caught on another stone and he tumbled through the air. He landed hard on the rocks and stones in front of him, the impact punching the air from his lungs.
     He hit the side of his head hard. He lay still for a few seconds, trying to find his breath. His ankle throbbed, his elbow throbbed and his head pounded. He rolled over and sat up awkwardly. The side of his face was warm and wet. Blood ran down into the neck of his shirt. Trying to clear his head, he glanced around and his eyes stopped on a large grey mass fifteen feet up the beach.
     Squinting, he stood up carefully, wary of his ankle. The large grey mass didn't look like any rock he'd ever seen. He took a step forward and his ankle buckled. He redistributed his weight to his other ankle and regained his balance, slowly hobbling forward. Four or five steps later he stopped. His tears forgotten. He starred at the huge grey mass in front of him, and his heart grew heavy.
     Just in front of him, on this rocky beach lay the grey/black mass of a whale. He didn't know what kind of whale it was, but the stench rising from its body made him wince. He hobbled around the side of it. Its big sad eye watching him unseeing. He sat down on a rock,wrapped his arms around himself and starred at the whale. Time faded into nothing. Days and nights seemed to pass. The wind grew strong, and dropped down. And grew strong again. After a time he felt no cold and no hunger. He forgot what cities were. And couldn't remember the faces of anybody from his past. He was alone with the whale.
     Centuries seemed to pass. After a time he looked up from the sad eye of the whale and out at the vast ocean before him. The tide rolling slowly in and out. He could no longer remember his own name, he couldn't remember language or words.
     As he watched the ocean, his eyes suddenly fell upon a tiny brown spot that had broken the horizon. He starred without wonder or concern as the brown dot grew. The only sounds, the tide, the wind and his breathing. As he watched the brown spot grew into a wooden boat. The boat approached slowly.
     As it grew steadily closer he could make out the shape of a man. The man had his back to him and was rowing slowly but steadily. He watched the boat and the rowing man, and another century passed. Night rose and the stars appeared. The stars faded and night fell. And as the dawn of the last day grew brighter, the clouds parted and the sun broke the horizon and rose into the sky. It had been so long since he had seen the sun, that he no longer knew what it was. But he knew it was glorious. He stood up and lifted his face to its warm light.
      Finally the man and the boat reached the shore. The edge of the boat coming to rest softly on the sand between the rocky beach and the waters edge. The man lay his oars gently in the boat, stood up and turned to face the man on the beach.
     The man on the beach, after a time, looked away from the sun high up in the blue sky. He looked briefly again, at the whale, and turned to the boatman.

modern guy

    Gonna get a tattoo of a moth on my face. Gonna start wearing suspenders and ride a bike with one good tire, everywhere. Gonna listen to jangly british indie pop circa 1994 and a smidge of psych folk circa 1971. I'm only gonna talk to Asian girls with green eyes. Gonna drink Labatt 50 and get an undercut. Gonna look down on people with pets, only quote Allen Ginsberg and live in a tree.

Gonna buy a fake leather jacket and stop eating bread. Gonna walk around with an empty guitar case. I'm only gonna wear discontinued Reebok hightops from 1983. Gonna keep all my John Grisham novels wrapped up in sleeves from old socio economic text books. Gonna hum Japanese pop songs and only eat Captain Crunch cereal. Gonna throw old batteries at people and preach about the new world order.

Gonna key car doors, grow my hair out and shave my head. Gonna buy an umbrella and set it on fire, then laugh at the self image you project because it's boring. Gonna wear old beat up cowboy boots and sigh at you in a condescending manner for not getting my obscure references to psych folk circa 1971. I'm gonna buy a couch and sit on the floor. I'm gonna stand by a pond and cry into my own hands.

...static...transmission...

...blood......blood.....blood.......blood....blood......blood.....blood.......blood...

A little clarity.

Man, rereading some of the posts I've put on here makes me feel decidedly self-conscious. I think some times a lot of what I'm saying here comes out sounding contrived and cliched. Which is exactly the opposite of what I want.
      I need to clarify a couple of things. While I do believe our civilisation is in decline, I believe the world we live in is an amazing and beautiful place. I don't want to come off here as being too cynical, it doesn't do anyone any good and it's something I'm really trying to improve on.I hate cynicism. And even more,I hate preaching.The world has enough preaching cynics as it is. So if I do it, slap me.
     Also I don't want to compare this blog to art at all, in any shape or form. Not great art or bad art or anything. Let's face it. This is a blog. Nothing more glamorous than that. One of a million on the world wide web. This is simply a place for me to talk. To put ideas and other silly things like that.
     So hopefully, with a little more care and practice I can improve the language and make this sound a little less heavy handed.
     On the plus side, Canada performed wonderfully at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, culminating in a truly great moment last night when the Canadian Mens Hockey Team beat Team USA 3-2 in overtime to win Canada's fourteenth gold medal. The winning goal, assisted by Jerome Iginla and scored by Sydney Crosby will be remembered with the all-time great Canadian hockey moments.
     I would also like to congratulate the Canadian Women's Hockey Team on their gold medal, and for embodying everything that makes ice hockey great. Their skill on the ice and especially, their sportsmanship, are unparalleled.
     Oh, and St Kev, you are a champion.
 

The Story of Tiny Norman.

Beneath the carpet, there is a tiny house. The tiny walls are yellow, and the tiny roof is green and in the middle of the tiny roof there is a tiny chimney painted red.
In this house lives a tiny man named Norman. He has a tiny white beard, and always always always wears his tiny purple hat with the tiny brim cocked just to the left side of his tiny head.
Norman is a peaceful man. A solitary man, never more contented than when sat at his tiny brown desk, in front of his tiny blue typewriter, lost deep in his giant imagination, typing away.
Norman has lived here longer than he can remember, writing his giant stories on his tiny typewriter. Stories of the smallness and vastness of things. Stories of lost worlds, and lost tribes. Stories of unfathomable colour and limitless compassion. Stories of the beauty of things.
But now Norman sits at his tiny desk, his tiny head in his tiny hands, weeping. For not two minutes ago, a swirling black grey funnel of dirt and dust reached out of the beige sky and down upon the tiny roof of his tiny house, and all the stories he had written on his tiny typewriter over the uncountable solitary years, all his stories of the beauty of things, were lifted up from their many tiny piles beside his tiny desk, up into the air, where they swirled madly for three tiny seconds, before being sucked up into his tiny red chimney and pulled out the other side high up into the swirling grey black mass.
The grey black funnel of dust and dirt swirled for a further eight tiny seconds before rising high up into the vast beige sky above and disappearing almost as fast as it had appeared.
Leaving Norman, the solitary writer with the tiny white beard, and the tiny purple hat with the tiny brim cocked just to the left side of his tiny head, sat at his tiny brown desk, in front of his tiny blue typewriter, confused and sad.
With his head still in his hands, he wept tiny sparkling tears, and a tiny sob fell from his tiny mouth.
But one solitary sob from this solitary man, was all the grey black funnel would get.
For as soon as the tiny sob was out and gone, Norman the tiny solitary writer, looked over at his tiny red chimney, looked out his tiny window at the vast beige sky above and finally looked down at his tiny blue typewriter that was his favourite thing that he owned, and placed his tiny fingers on the tiny keys.

And Norman smiled.

Home sweet home.

Thirteen years later and here I am. Its been far far too long but what can you do? All I can say is it feels good to be here. Everything looks the same, just a little worn down in places. The road has a lot more holes in it, and the woods I used to play in are overgrown but everythings still here. I can still see where the paths in the trees used to be. And the air is still clean and crisp. The wind still takes your breath away. All the memories are still here even if a lot of the people in them are gone.
The best part though is the people that are here; and all the new editions to my family. All the new babies. I've heard so many stories and now I get to see them for myself. And they're gorgeous. They're all precious and beautiful.
It's calming being here. Far away from the city. I feel guilty for having been gone for so long, and good to be back.