Opting Out? Count Me In

Admirable – how do you recognize an action as such? Personally, something's admirable when I can nod my head and say to myself, "Yeah...that's the right thing to do!" and get the soft buzz of moral respect. Admiration isn't quantifiable. It's not something I want, or have desire to measure. Admiration is values-based – I've got to align with it morally – and, it needs to set a standard. It's gotta make me dream big, think critically, exist on a higher plane, or at least think, "Man, I should do that!" Most of all, admirable actions shouldn't be a ploy, a cry for attention, or done me-first – they should be selfless. Done for the other, or for the greater good.

After hashing that out in my mind, I wasn't expecting the actions of a company to stick in my mind. It's easier for me to ascribe honest values to people – they are creatures of action that thought that, transparent or not, are easier to pin values on. But, REI's announcement this year to stay closed on the biggest shopping day of the year (do I even need to tell you when?) – doing the very thing that would seem to hurt their bottom line. Well, that just wouldn't leave my brain.

(If I worked retail like 5 million other folks in the U.S. – I might have missed
 my nephew eating pie for the first time in his life!)

Sure, some folks thought that they did it to somehow line their wallet. By refusing shoppers one day, they'd win more other days. From working retail, I can tell you that that mentality may work with online shoppers ("Oh, I heard about REI's cool initiative – I'm going to support them by shopping their online store.") – physical shoppers are a different beast. They want convenience, good prices, good customer service, experience, oh...and convenience. To get people to go out of their way to patronize your store is more than a moral victory – it's winning a mental battle.

Whether or not the press from the event drove additional shoppers to REI – it's clear that the main benefits of the decision went to the employees. Staying closed the day after Thanksgiving (hopefully) means that Thanksgiving is easier, too. It's not like all those products stage and tidy themselves before the masses beat down your automatic door. Opening for Black Friday (or earlier – I'm looking at you, jerks) means work before Black Friday. That's a whole lot of time to give back to employees and their families and friends that they wouldn't otherwise have. Did I mention that all employees also received paid time off for that Friday, as well?

Because what's more important? Honoring tradition, community, and family with a day that all people are equally able to enjoy? Or staying open an extra few hours to shill some deals on material goods that might not even ever get used? I'm betting on the former – and want to give my business to companies that do the same.

Okay, I'll step off my capitalist soapbox for now – who or what did you admire this year?

[This post is part of Think Kit by SmallBox. Today's prompt: What achievement – from a person, a company, a nation – captures your attention? Who did something admirable this year?]

Warm That Sucker Up

Once a month, I gather in a plain room full of gentlemen in a circle of chairs. Hands in pockets or coats. Everyone with a bag, satchel, or case.

The rules are pretty simple – gather in someone's living room, basement, porch, or backyard, even. Hook up the stereo. [Note: this is the first thing I do when moving in. Even before unpacking boxes! Because how are you supposed to unpack boxes without jams?] Put a record on the platter – you gotta warm that sucker up. Yes, record.

This isn't CD club. It's record club.

(Jr. Bacon Record Club, October 2015, my humble abode.)

Next, put some bacon on the skillet. Probably a pound. Maybe three, depending on attendance. Write the attendees names on some scraps of paper, and put them in the hat of whoever has taken theirs off. Draw a name – that's who has to pick the first Perfect Side.

One record. One side. No pressure...just a perfect one is all.

There are different strategies for the side; some bring a single record, maybe something new scored at a thrift shop, a recent release, or an album recently listened to on repeat. Others prefer an improv approach; bring a few, feel out the flow of the evening, and pick a side that enhances the vibe ...or throws it for a loop. Give a quick introduction of your record: artist, title, year it was released, maybe a pressing detail or where you dug it out of a crate or who turned you on to it.

Put the record on. Cue it. Drop the needle.

Pass the album around – you gotta hold the art in your hands. Otherwise, you might as well be passing around an iPod. Cold metal is weaponry; ink and cardboard is art on canvas. The initial groove crackles and the music starts. Shoot the shit or put your head down and groove. Drink a beer or sit and stare.

Hear something you haven't heard before.

In the context of others it's fellowship; it's church with a cigarette break, communion with no priest. Someone's taking notes (maybe), but there's no boss. Everyone's on the level. Kanye to Kraftwerk, Penderecki to Purple Rain. Fifty sessions in without a repeat (...right?) – and then you've got another month to dig up your next gem.

[This post is part of Think Kit by SmallBox. Today's prompt: What new circles have you formed? Any unexpected ones? Did you start a book club or hang out in a tea yurt? Maybe you re-upped with existing friends. Explore your kumbaya moment from 2015.]

Keep It Modest

[Today's post is part of Think Kit by SmallBox. Today's prompt: We're all writing the story of our lives as we go. How can you make your story interesting in 2016? And if you can't see around the bend, it's okay to dream. Let's make 2016 one of the most riveting parts of our tale, shall we?]

I love planning trips, a meal (usually the day of...), and in the past...even a tour. But I also love living in the moment, wandering to wherever sees or smells good. I guess what I'm saying is – while I like to outline my own story, I prefer to fill in the details day-by-day. Here's a list of three modest things I'd like to accomplish in 2016:

1) Visit an island.

I've got Hawaiian in my genes (more on that later), friends and acquaintances extolling (heck, even living in) Iceland, and Amelia has family in the U.K. Did I mention sometimes I just want to get away? I'm not even going to pick an island right now – let's just say it's gonna happen, one way or another. Time to set up flight alerts.

(I mean, look at this. Photo via Jacinda! Hope it's okay I used this!)

2) Make another record.

Wooves has been sitting on a finished record (forthcoming PEEP – spoiler alert – which is totally my fault) for months. Not to mention, life has taken its toll on our writing & recording schedule. Three friends in different cities moving into their thirties...it's not worth making excuses, but shit gets busy and then you realize it's been 7 months since you played (a pretty dang good) show. But then the Universe hits you with reminders that ...well, creativity is important. And what better scene to embrace it than with two of your oldest friends?

(...the only known photo of Wooves performing?!)

3) See more live music.

While I'm on that wavelength...aside from achieving a life goal by seeing KRAFTWERK (not to mention a pretty sweet Madlib DJ set) – I didn't see a whole lot of music live this year. Indianapolis is still a flyover town for most artists that I seem to be actually excited about seeing perform live. Hoping to rectify that and start off the year strong by seeing two of my favorite current acts in Chicago in February: the previously written up Bitchin' Bajas opening up for the soon-to-be-written-up Holly Herndon. Needless to say, I'm pretty psyched – now to decide whether to roll the dice on Big Ears. Faust is calling...

(Just before Kraftwerk started at Nashville's historic Ryman Theater.)

Tome Terroir

I don't own many books anymore – which is strange, for an English major (yes, I have a degree, but referring to my studies as if they're ongoing seems apropos for reading, writing, thinking, and generally trying to understand the world a little bit better) – most of my school-related material I sold off in one of my periodic fits of minimalism a half-decade ago, keeping only some poetry, a few essay collections, and Shakespeare (one nod to my humanities education).


(One that I kept.)

It's weird to me because I generally look at a bookcase as a badge of sorts – an adjunct to my records, a histogram of what I've been interested in, causes I support, and items that I wish I was smart enough to understand. When we stay at someone's house (usually via Airbnb); I can't help but look through their books, to get a picture of where they've come from academically, or at least what a relative bought them last Christmas when the aisles of Half Price Books are littered with boot snow and scrawled lists.

Our collection has been finely whittled to mostly cookbooks, art books, and monographs, with a sprinkling of essays, literature, and related magazines. And yet – I still love the smell of cracking open a fresh book, pages stiff and binding crackling, the bright, biting, near-chemical smell of ink wafting upwards while I noisily thumb through the pages to scan for pictures, or break in the pages, or just to flip through and absorb the je ne sais quoi that comes from opening up a book for the first
time. I won't lie; I've been known to stick my nose near the binding and breathe a deep, contented breath.


(A recent gift for Amelia. Hat-tip to Powell's and their flat-rate shipping.)

Even gently (or not so) used books, brittle, yellowed, with their own mustiness absorbed out of the air of whatever shop, crate, case, or hovel they inhabited – each imparting its own terroir into the now-splayed pages. Now, I usually mailorder used books, but those still transport me back to the dim aisles of Don's Books in a cold Kokomo warehouse, searching the unorganized shelves for more Asimov as a 16-year old; or stopping in from the cold at Bloomington's Caveat Emptor, checking my messenger bag next to the clunky cassette and CD rack on the counter; or getting lost in Powell's for three days running, sipping coffee while flipping through the weirdest and funkiest zines I could find...

[This post is part of Think Kit by SmallBox. Today's prompt: Scratch and sniff! Scents have the power to take us all kinds of places. What smell takes you somewhere else? Where'd you go?]

Churchyard Hopscotch

[This post is part of Think Kit by SmallBox. Today's prompt: In your eyes. Share a photo or paint us a picture with words. Show us something from your year through your eyes. Did you see something that took your breath away? Or maybe you just couldn't look away?]


Charleston – September. The mercury was a snake's tongue and hot breath sssss-ing the century mark, the humidity approaching the same. While staying with a friend in the historic part of the city, we'd wandered in the direction of the French Quarter, then the battery, hoping to chance upon a breeze.

The sun was everywhere – the wet heat a blanket we couldn't get out from beneath, even after spending the night huffing sweet, sweet air conditioning in a rehabbed, crooked house just shy of 200 years young.

Down King Street, where women in 4-inch heels and 5-inch sunglass lenses navigated the occasional cobbled curbs with cool ease, there were momentary frosty blasts, airy lures dangling out of smoothie shops, mahogany-floored boutiques, and haberdasheries (yes; still a thing).

Detouring through the city market, packed with folks as sweaty as us but way more interested in knick-knacks. There are only so many vanity license plates and tchotchkes one can look at before one feels abusive of free air conditioning, especially when most people around looked nearer to collapse than us.

We reached the waterfront and there was no breeze, just benches next to fountains that taunted with their feet of standing water in-between rail and spout. A woman sat still, looking forward, beneath a weighty tree. A UPS man hopped out of his box truck and bounded up the steps of the Port Authority, unbowed by the weather.

At Battery Park we stood over the bay and looked at the ferry routes, the path that cannon shot would've travelled, and watched as a few young couples took posed shots beneath a statue to the Confederate Defenders of Charleston. It seemed strange, the American Legion mall in Indianapolis usually being barren except for when they serve a free meal on Saturdays at lunch.

Working back northwards, the only shade we could come upon reliably were in the churches, bone-white, and their ancient graveyards, which offered cool concrete benches and water fountains, placards describing folk who'd been dead longer than the nation had earned its stripes.

From one churchyard to the next, like hopping stones across a river. At one, a woman on the sidewalk said, "You can go inside, you know." and continued on her way. We cracked the two-story-tall door and went inside, padded across deep red carpet and into the low-lit sanctuary, cooled down somewhat by a strained AC unit. Nobody was inside – everything was dark, respectful, laminated.

Down the steps to the yard, there was a cat, running like he hadn't been outside all day. Next to a shrub growing in the shade of the old building's facade, the cat turned back, then disappeared inside a hole in the building's foundation.

Nobody Really Knows How To Spell 'Fitzcaraldo'

[This post is part of Think Kit by SmallBox. Today's prompt: Get analog. No screens, no technology – let's think about real world experiences. What did you do with your hands this year?]

So, it's not like my obsession with bread-baking is very much a secret – and describing my current process in-depth would be a bit of a cop-out in lieu of previous entries. But I did do something half-artistic this year that wasn't release a cassette of garage-pop or...bake numerous loaves of bread. Though it does have to do with bread. ...like most things in my life.

Earlier this year, my buddy Alex and I put on a pop-up shop featuring my bread and his coffee under the name Fitzcaraldo (hat-tip, Werner Herzog). I'll write more on this later, I'm sure, but one of the most important elements of the affair, besides the name, was the brilliant logo design (inspired by banneton lines on loaves of bread, as well as vintage coffee machines) that my good friend and connoisseur-of-life, Andrew, whipped up for the event.



I had the idea that we could produce a rubber stamp of the logo, done by cutting two separate pads (one for each color) that we could then use to print...on bread bags, of course. So, I printed the logo out, painstakingly (given my poor hand-eye-coordination & fine motor skills) cut out the lines and letters with an X-acto knife, traced the outlines to either side of a rubber pad, and voila!






Though it takes a little time, and I should probably invest in an ink roller, I can do 25 bags pretty quickly at this point. Much more quickly than I can bake and fill them! Since I generally 'accept' a donation per loaf, I figure the least I can do is deliver them in a (paper – which is best for letting the loaf cure & breathe) bag that looks legit.

I actually like the handmade, mussed, slightly inaccurate nature of the stamps – it gives the logo more character than if I were mass-printing. And, it acts as a nice analogy for baking with 100% sourdough levain. Every loaf is a little different, every time, depending on timing, temperature, ingredients; and I think this individualism comes across in the lines and variations that happen with each stamp.

Meanwhile, at Fitzcaraldo HQ... #vscocam #fitzcaraldo #realbread #sourdough (logo hat-tip @maxsophone)

A photo posted by Drew D. (@dronestreet) on Dec 27, 2015 at 5:24pm PST

2015 Albums of the Year: Bitchin' Bajas - Transporteur

I'm going through my albums of the year (listed in their entirety at LUNA's site) – relistening and revisiting – and giving them a much-deserved if belatedly abbreviated write-up. One-by-one. Because they deserve more than a number on a list, even if my own list is unranked (he said, haughtily). So, with no further adieu, here's the first record...alphabetically.

Bitchin' Bajas - Transporteur

Chicago's Bitchin' Bajas are a crew I've been following for a couple years now. Though I can't remember how I initially became aware of their existence, their fantastic (if extremely short) set at the last-for-now Indianapolis psych/garage-explosion/fest CATARACTS sealed the deal. What was once a side excursion from neo-kraut rockists CAVE now almost seems to be their main project, at least in sheer terms of productivity, for Cooper Crain, Rob Frye, and Dan Quinlivan.

Following quickly on the heels of last year's immersive, highly organic, sprawling self-titled double-LP on inimitable Drag City, Transporteur (released in limited fashion by French label Hands In the Dark) is a much different, refined animal. The touchstones are still here – the Bajas are well-versed in the 20th century masters of avant-garde minimalist/new-age composition – the obvious forefathers here are Steve Reich, Brian Eno, Terry Riley, Cluster, and the like. Whether the recording is improvised or highly edited, they waste no time accessing a mood or flow and riding it into the ether with sublime abandon.

(Bitchin' Bajas at CATARACTS...2013?)

While there were some outre synth workouts found amidst the warmer tones of self-titled, Transporteur begins in a starkly different territory with career highlight "Raias Baixas": a Hutter/Schneider-ish beat, whose phased stutter/polyrhythm is too stilted to be completely Kraftwerk-ian.  A cold, fragile high-hat accents the polyrhythm and is slowly joined by oscillations and fat bass tones. Gradually, the ice melts – warm synths seep in, at first unnoticed, but soon coloring and coating the entire structure, while the cymbals bloom like a frozen flower. The masterful way that "Raias Baixas" consistently shifts and moves into new territory, all while retaining the crucial flow established in the early moments – it's most amazing to accomplish all that without jarring the listener out of a trance-like state. As the cymbals whisper out of existence, the negative space that is left swoops and whirls with synth splashes, the lower deck pulsing with interwoven bass tones. When the end is tied up neatly in warbly, pitch-shifted organ, you've arrived somewhere completely different than where you departed, without noticing you've moved at all. It's a monumental achievement in a completely digestible 10-minute trip.

(Great performance of "Raias Baixas" – take that, Pfork crowd.)

Elsewhere, "Planète T" softly filters lush tones with slow-motion, reverse-loop feedback. After the jarring coldness of the opener, it's a perfectly drawn bath. Rob Frye's flute dances around the edges, before coming through in clusters, while the cymbals here are coloration, not drivers. They rise and fall, blurry mountains in the distance. I could live here. "Marimba" pairs a percolating synth-loop with a balance of burbling marimba in the left channel and Frye's dulcet flute, this time in a lower register, panned mostly to the right. The result is both hypnotic and enchanting – additional heft clambers in via organs, and the resulting propulsive track moves forward at a good clip, though softly, hovering above the ground or sea on the utterly transfixing flute solos. Closer "No Tabac" is a bit of an outlier, beginning with rounded, bubbly rhythms that are reminiscent of smoothed over thumb piano or other percussive-yet-melodic engines. The proto-world-beat that emerges, in clicks and claps (a shaker, even!) is as close to dance-party as the Bajas get on this set. The bass is downright Kuti-esque, and Frye's sax (or altered flute?), slightly overdriven, riffs hard and loops back on itself noisily. It's some funky shit, not sanded down, and a palate cleanser for you to flip the platter and dive right back into the opener.

[This post is Day 2 of the Think Kit project. I took a lifeline and wrote about music that moved me!]

A Man of Letters

[Part of Think Kit by SmallBox. Today's prompt: First line. Pretend you're writing your autobiography. Give us your first line, a first chapter, or even just an image. What's the story of you? Based on a previous discussion with a friend, I twisted this prompt and imagined a future in which I was a known entity, and my letters would be collected, published, and dissected. A real 'man of letters' – an anomaly in 2015.]


I tried many times to become a man of letters, before it took. There were the various journals, construction-paper-and-staple bound in bold colors around the gray, lined, re-used pulp paper that tore easily under my pencil's eraser as a seven-year-old. Those entries were mostly rote; who did what at lunch, my after school concerns – the neighborhood crew I was running around with, or what was new at the small creek that ran through our 1960s-era subdivision.

In high school there were composition books, the black-and-white speckled covers, the inside flap penned with a thousand iterations of signing my first time. This must've seemed more pertinent in study hall than reading or writing – although there were poems of a sort interspersed with math and history notes, mostly paired couplets with seven or eight words per line, hard end rhymes, and choruses that were about as pathetic as you'd expect.

Other beginnings included the magnetic-clasped, faux-leather-bound half-size volume from Carmichael's in Louisville. This went with me on my first few full-band tours, tucked into a backpack full of unwashed clothes, peanut butter jars, and squished loaves of Aunt Millie's Honey Wheat. In fits and starts this filled up with paragraphs of floors I'd slept on, weird things that people said in the back of the van, to-do lists, directions to bars or clubs or the last homely house – pre-smartphone-era, most things I owned were fair game for jotted down, turn-by-turn instructions that ended in bold-faced, underlined addresses.

Even postcards from sojourns would often go unsent – even, embarrassingly, after they were addressed. They'd get stuck in a book purchased on the road, or like a weed poking out of a clump of receipts. And once I came home, it seemed an affront to the addressee to send the postcard stamped instead with INDIANAPOLIS IN. They'd notice, judge me (correctly) for my sloth and inability to write three sentences that basically summed up the weather, my location, and what I'd done in the past 24 hours.

In the end, it was the omnipresent, real-time connectivity imposed on me by the all-too-consuming digital world that made sitting at the table, curtains open, coffee steaming, in front of a pen and stationery – where else could one carefully compose thoughts that were meant for a single reader? Away from the screen strain, I gradually shed the filter of my online self one scribble at a time.

Light Station No. 496

When I travel, I have a strange habit. Inside my desk drawer, along with a few years’ worth of accumulated Sharpies, spare earplugs, now-arcane thumb drives, and last year’s birthday cards, there are several folders. Each folder contains the paper detritus of a trip or two, loosely bound by a pocket divider or binder clip: bleached receipts, transit cards, tickets, programs, random stickers, maps – any paper good that I could fold up and put in my pocket, until my pocket was too full, when they’d get wedged into my small notebook like an overstuffed pita.

 

Early this fall, Amelia and I took a pretty epic trip to Northern California (referenced in my previous post) – which provided the two paper scraps above. The first was a receipt (old-school dot-matrix printer, if you couldn’t tell) from a hostel in Monterey. At the end of our trip, we made a quick jaunt down the coast to explore parks around Big Sur for a day. Not having the coin to stay in a swanky, cliffside, masseuse-included resort (or a yurt fancier than our own house), we bunked (literally in bunk-beds, albeit with stellar memory-foam mattresses) at a hostel in Monterey.

A year previous, during my first coastal excursion with a group of dude-friends, we’d stayed at the same place. I felt a pull to return, and everything was unchanged, down to the slightly-salty elder sea-hippie at the counter, whose sockhat and sweater were as rumpled as 12 months ago.

Also unchanged? His check-in manner. Only one guest could check in at a time, which initiated an unstoppable-but-friendly 10+ minute sequence that involved an archaic computer system, a thorough facility introduction including safety & door lock warnings, bathroom token explanations, and brief tour of rooms. He also jotted notes down on your receipts indicating rooms and codes and (last year), even drew a brief map indicating a suggested restaurant. In short, the man is a champ...if inefficient.

Because as sure as the wind blows, when one backpacker arrives, they all do. And holding fifty-pound rigs while sitting four parties back in line, watching the check-in sequence over and over must’ve seemed like some sort of torturous performance art. I could only look back sympathetically before we went off in search of unadorned shrimp with some drawn butter and strong cocktail sauce.

---

Further up the coast, well north of the Bay Area, we’d stopped at the only climbable lighthouse on California’s coast. It stands neatly west of the coastal highway, across a couple miles of scorched coastal plain, small shrub stands and cattle woven into the foggy fabric and occasional sun-shower.

(The view from atop Point Arena.)

I have a strange, not unromantic attachment to lighthouses, as do many in landlocked areas, as evidenced by Indiana’s plethora of lighthouse-themed apartment complexes, storage facilities, restaurant/bars, and more. Not that I’m drawn to those simulacrums, or that I have a room full of lighthouse tchotchkes displayed on a prim shelf.

No, my predilection is if I see one that can be ascended – I need to climb that lighthouse. Growing up, my mom’s side of the family would rent a large house or two in North Carolina’s Outer Banks, big enough to stuff 25 or more of us into for a week each summer for the better part of a decade. In-between endless pancake breakfasts, jellyfish counting, and nightly euchre tournaments full of war whoops and dancing, there was always a trip to the famous Hatteras lighthouse.

Driving up through the lot, at an acute angle to the beach, this massive lighthouse almost seemed to rise from the waves, thrust out of the ocean by some giant hand that was unperceivable. In fact, at one point it was delicately moved back from the eroding shore, something that must’ve taken a couple years considering the tons of brick that made up the structure.

There’s a photograph of my younger brother and I atop the lighthouse, out against the railing that now seems very open, beneath 2014’s near-paranoia safety standards. We’re wearing soccer jerseys, wind in hair, sun in eyes, staring into the camera, maybe slightly past down the coast full of battered beach and a bunch of houses that were subsumed by a hurricane in the last decade-and-a-half.

No fog floats around, just sun and youth. I remember looking down at the parking lot and watching the ant-like people scurry back and forth, before looking down the tide as it ran toward the horizon. Time seems to pause when you’re inside a view that used to be the solitary blessing of the keeper. When I’m in a lighthouse, taking the stairs two-by-two to get to the top, I’m momentarily transported back in time to my younger self, looking at the beach, smelling the sea – a temporary fountain of youth.

---

Day #17 of Think Kit.

Down On The Corner

Yeah, I know – my third place was supposed to be neither work, nor home. But – part-time work wasn't specified, so I'm gonna roll with it. If you know me, you probably know that I moonlight on weekends as a Record Store Clerk at LUNA Music. A year-plus ago, I walked in on a Saturday morning (my usual weekly visiting time...due to Amelia often being at work), and they asked me, "Hey dude, would you want to work here?"

 

(Sunday mornings with the Rev. Al Green – a Tracks tradition I keep alive at LUNA.)

"Uh, yeah. For sure!" was the only response I could think of, despite any other commitments I had. Turns out that I am physically unable to turn down working at a record store. In Muncie, while I was attending Ball State (and playing music), my friend and bandmate started Village Green Records. I took my work-study salary and bought a record a week, hanging out there with friends and bandmates who either lived in the back of the shop, or were always on the porch or coffee-stained living room couches.

 

(Growing's drone masterwork The Sky's Run Into The Sea, one of the vinyls
I picked up from VGR when building my collection a piece at a time.)

In Bloomington, I had wandered into Tracks, an old shop (the last of a regional chain destroyed by big box stores) with a (killer at the time) jazz selection to randomly ask for a job on the day that someone else left – that turned into nearly year-long job where I learned some of the ins-and-outs of buying and vinyl-sorting and cartridge-replacement and margins and how-to-open-a-CD-really-quickly-and-get-the-damn-sticker-off. In my spare time, I was also volunteering at the Secretly Canadian distribution warehouse, moving around crates of records (thanks for bombing and making me re-stack 100k albums, The Avalanche) & filling orders while listening to entire label discographies...a flood of music that approximates the ease of today's streaming society, except that this was my life, and I had to work for it!

Though the vinyl resurgance hadn't yet really begun, I loved all of it. Not just listening to new releases and getting wrapped up in 2-hour conversations about Neil Young guitar solos – it was the fact that, for most people coming in a record shop, this is a highlight of their day, week, or month. They aren't generally on some mission – they love music, whether it's Neil Diamond, Neil Young, or bands who don't even have a Neil. That energy and passion is infectious, alluring...it makes work not seem like work. (Until you have to vacuum 20-year-old-carpet, or buy-back twice-used porn DVDs from a dude who had just bought 'em a month ago...)

So. Back to LUNA. I visit record stores almost anywhere I go, from Dusty Groove & Reckless in Chicago, Amoeba & Groove Merchant in San Fran, Grimey's in Nashville, Vintage Vinyl in St. Louis, Little Axe & Mississippi in Portland, Sonic Boom in Seattle...and LUNA is something special. I can't be biased, because I'm just the "weekend dude", but we have the friendliest staff, the cleanest, brightest, and most welcoming shop, and an amazingly curated sense of place, from fantastic art contributors to Todd's collection of ephemera and general great taste. I feel fortunate every day to be a part of sharing and spreading a love of music-as-art, of supporting career musicians, hobbyist labels, archival/curator/record-digging folks, independent & local garage bands, and everything in-between.

On December 20th, LUNA celebrates its 20th anniversary – if you haven't been in in awhile, or ever – what are you waiting for?!

---

Day #6 of Think Kit!

Stage Fright? Yeah, Right.

The domestic creature I have morphed into (sorry for clogging your feeds with pictures of a loaf of bread...) may not pass muster with the reality of my early twenties: more weekends than not, you would've found me on the stage (or in the corner of a room) with my brothers-in-sound, plying our woolly version of garage-psych-pop across the South...the Midwest...the East...the Plains...pretty much anywhere that would have us (and a few places that wouldn't). By my amateur count, not including practices, the number of shows I was physically present to play at exceeds 400.

For whomever is keeping stats: that's 3.7% of the nights in my entire life.

The halcyon days of thoughtfully rocking.

Fast-forward ten years or so: I took the stage twice this year. Twice. My percentage must've taken a hit. Those two performances though, would've been highlights in many past years, and included a magical aforementioned set with Athens, GA-based Circulatory System, and our seventh or so set at the annual Second Helpings Tonic Ball, which was ten feverish, sweaty minutes of Velvet Underground chord-bashing.

"Oh yeah," my body said, while gripping an ice-cold Hamm's in the overfull backstage room, "that's a helluva lot of fun." Which brings me to my realization for 2015: I like to play shows, and I should play more of them. And go to a few more, along the way...

But, like any artist knows, reality is an illusion unless you plan to go do something. So, I'm hoping a couple key things transpire that will be the impetus to sling some gear around in my hatchback and hassle my friends with a minimal amount of shameless promotion (just enough to let a hint of guilt into their conscience should they choose not to attend).

• a new Wooves record. Yes, I've talked about this before – the band formed from close friends who needed an excuse to hang out in a decrepit Eastside basement. Then, it turned out that we weren't that terrible (though, fair warning, it's still basement-produced-slacker-rock). Despite having but a single show under our belt (a year ago in October), we finally finished a second ten-song album, which should be out late this Winter in early 2015. And! We had a successful rehearsal, to quote a witness who was upstairs whilst we fogged the cellar with incense, Old Overholt fumes, and practice amp fuzz, "It sounded like there was a real band down there." That's basically a Christgau A+ for us. Springtime should see our new set unleashed upon the Illinois-Indiana highway corridor.
• some weirdo-skronk-experimentalism-turned-exercise-in-excess-and-restraint that gathers in a garage in-town to record noises to tape. It's a secret but it's not a secret. Rumor has it that a set will be carved out of the cut-n-paste spliced sound memories so that we may inhabit the corner of a stranger's party, or other such non-stage-space. I'm even contemplating a gear purchase for the first time since I had to buy a double-keyboard stand some five years ago.

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Day #9 of Think Kit!

Goodbye, Shelf System

If you know me, you probably know I don't have a TV anymore. It seems to come up in conversation here-and-there. It used to be a point of pride, but now it's just a fact. We were moving – we owned a TV that wasn't that big, but was three decades old, and weighed as much as three of me – so I herniated myself getting it out to the curb, slapped a "FREE" sign on it, and washed my hands of having another screen...at least for awhile.

What is the focus of my living room, then? Well, I'm not as much an ascetic as I make it seem – this year I said goodbye to my old stereo set-up, and hello to a new era in sound. I'd been rolling with a $20 discontinued Nu-Mark turntable, Sony shelf system (with built-in phono input, as well as a dual tape deck and broken 5-CD changer) inherited from both of my brothers, and the Sony's particleboard speakers.

Here's what I ended up with:

First spin on the new deck was the new remaster of CAN's Ege Bamyasi. 

Because nothing else would do.

• Pro-Ject Debut Carbon – this machine is pretty much a minimalist work of art, so much so that often when I enter the living room, I wonder, "Did I just walk into a museum? Why are there dirty dishes on a coffee table next to that gallery display?" With minimal, heavy-duty, high-quality parts, a glossy black coat, hidden power switch, and slightly beveled clear lid, the real thing of beauty is the only bit of color: the Ortofon 2M Red cartridge, which produces the most detailed, spacious vinyl sound I've yet had the wherewithal to own. I cannot recommend this turntable enough if you are thinking about upgrading – it's worth the extra initial spend from the moment you drop the needle.
• NAD 7125 receiver – just a lil' minimalist 25 WPC receiver I snagged for $20, and is more than plenty loud for our room. I'm not a big classical or electronic/hip-hop listener, so this suits my frequencies pretty well without super detailed EQ'ing (though I may spring for one of those components next).
• Cerwin Vega D3 – these speakers are nearly as tall as my record shelf...almost too big for the room. But ran into a pair for $50 and rolled the dice. I still need to refoam them, but they were otherwise mint, and sound so much better than my old Sony shelf speakers that it's not funny. On either side of the shelf, they create a magic zone exactly where our couch sits. I've already given more than one Masters-level lecture on the audio aesthetics of Ege Bamyasi...is that a course I could charge for?

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Day #5 of Think Kit!

We're All Cavemen Here

Every weekday, in blustery, rainy, ocean-brined Brighton, a man leaves his house with everyday purpose. He gets into a black sedan, and, wipers on, drives a few kilometers to an anonymous office park, in a strip of anonymous businesses crawling with the detritus of laypeople. He gets out of his car, and goes inside for 8 hours.

At 5pm or so, he emerges, looking worked, a little fatigued, furrowed brow set over sunglasses, and gets back into the sedan. He drives home in time for dinner with his twin sons and wife.

---

That man is Nick Cave.

 

Cave is an Australian ex-pat songwriter best known for his explosively dramatic turns fronting, first, the post-punk outfit The Birthday Party (who made everyday nihilists look like patsies), and afterwards, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds (brooding, literate rockists) and Grinderman (the penultimate sideshow id act). Yeah, a rock star. Who goes to the office.

It's not that I didn't know that artistic output takes work. I understand. I've watched close friends labor of musical works of love for years. I've watched Amelia painstakingly sew hand-cut banners for a staged photo series. Art equals work. 

Cave had a "documentary" (the beautifully shot 20,000 Days On Earth) that came out this year, that he scripted himself. Regardless of how much of the movie was "real" (the script dealt constantly with the push-pull relationship between self and self-creation) – there were some bits that really hit home.

After footage of the Bad Seeds at work in the studio, playing the repetitive, building, cut-off future-blues of "Higgs Boson Blues" – Cave opined about his songwriting process, saying, "You take two things, two ideas, and smash them together. When you see sparks, you follow them."

[That's what I got out of the quote, at least.]

Wow – though it may be a reductionist view of the artistic process, I prefer to hear it as empowering. Inside our double-helixes, we're all cavemen, smashing anything at hand together to produce work, art, life. We have our caves, and we chase everything except an alive dinner (well, some of us chase that, too). We dig through air, land, and water for glittery stuff (or its paper representative). 

We all have the same chance to create. Don't take it for granted – pick something up. Now pick something else up. Start smashing. Make art.

 

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Day #4 of Think Kit!

Masters of Mass & Velocity

Although I laughed myself to tears last week learning "Why We Yawn" – I felt like I should provide a story with personal context, and a lesson, to illustrate the humor in the lack of common sense I display on a near-daily basis. Whether it's losing a screwdriver while putting together a turntable (nevermind that I did not move while doing so), or leaving my keys in the door at work and not realizing I've done so until biking all the way home (twice in the last month)...I've become quite adept at glossing over the simple things in life. I blame it on constant esoteric thinking, mentally solving the problems of the universe, and adapting recipe amounts in my brain.

This summer, we moved out of a house we'd been living in for over 2.5 years. When my parents escaped the icy grip of the Midwest for Florida, they'd left behind their (20-year-old but still fine) Maytag washer-and-dryer, just as I was moving into a place with an empty basement. I took them everywhere I went in Indianapolis, but fate had other plans for these scuffed, white aluminum hunks of machinery: the washer went kaputt two weeks before the moving date.

Not wanting to fix a W/D set that was nearly as old as myself (though I have better hair), the east-side in me decided that I should drag them out of the basement and stick them on the curb with a big "FREE" sign taped to the street-side. Maybe my property-value-concerned neighbors would throw shade at such incomprehensible behavior...but hopefully they wouldn't sit there for three weeks like the beige couch I tried to rid myself of a couple years back.

With my younger (stronger) brother and buddy Andy assisting, we manhandled the dryer out of the basement and to the curb. Good to start with the lighter item, I said, as the temperature passed 95. Of course, moving day happened to be the hottest day of 2014. Andy mopped the sweat off his brow, replying, "Sure. Whatever you say." In the 80s they must have used a heavier gauge of aluminum – or maybe there were 30 years worth of pennies in its belly. Either way...it wasn't light.

The washer posed multiple challenges, beyond being heavy as shit. The water intake had rusted onto the spout. After much wrenching (made harder with sweat-covered hands), I retrieved a hacksaw and cut the hose off. I'm sure the new residents will enjoy their hose portion, I thought. We inched it over to the ancient stairwell, tipped it on its side, and with Wes and I pushing from beneath and Andy guiding the top (and ruining his back), made it to the landing a foot down and 90-degree turn from the door.

Perfect time for the sides of the washer to slam against the molding. It was a half-inch too wide on either side...and because we couldn't rotate it while it was leaning at a 45-degree angle on the stairs, we had to back down to the basement floor and try not to squash ourselves. Wes retrieved some boards to use as ramps, and we rotated the washer so the slightly smaller backside faced the stairs.

At the penultimate moment, the sides of the washer this time scraped the wall with a shearing sound, like some fat tugboat dragging ass through the Panama Canal. But hey! – we made it up to the landing, and were a 90-degree turn from being out the back door. Unfortunately, the instrument panel made such a turn impossible. Wes's solution? Smash it forward with a hammer till the turn was possible. That instrument panel was pretty analog anyhow, with less dials than a 21st-century beard trimmer. No big loss.

So, now it's 100 degrees. Everyone is completely sweat-soaked, and the washer is in the backyard. I figure I have to be the one to shuffle it through the grass, around the house, and to the curb. My possession – my job. After wobbling forward a foot-or-two, Wes sees my lack of progress and gets up to help. We both grab two corners, and push as hard as we can to rotate and move the beast forward.

One problem – it doesn't budge. I figure it must be stuck on some funky grass knoll that I didn't see (not because I only mowed once a month...). We try again and the washer doesn't move. Sweat is in my eyes and I'm muttering, "...the fuck?" A third push gains a couple inches.

Andy is visibly upset in the shade of the back stoop. He has an engineering background, and is uniquely qualified to solve this matter of mass and velocity...right? "Here, let me see..." he grabs my end of the washer. Wes grabs his, and they move it five feet like it was riding on greased wheels.

Andy shakes his head, "Yeah, you guys were pushing at each other. C'mon!"

Shamed, I back off for the next 25 feet, only helping again when the gate is cleared, when I can drag the washer, panel hanging off like a loose appendage, across the cement. By the time we return in the evening to clean, it is gone. My oldest friend!

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Day #3 of Think Kit!

No Need. Ever.

Call it idealism, call it willpower, call it being contrarian – hell, call it trendy. I don't care. I turned tail and retreated from a single consumerist outpost...not exactly a moral victory. All that to say – I don't buy anything from Amazon anymore.

Last year, for the Holidays, I bought most gifts (that weren't food, drink, or records) from Amazon. It was easy – there were multiple options, low-ish prices, home delivery of goods (valuable when you share a car)...and clicking through endless iterations of material goods seemed to be less soul-sucking than wandering the glittery corpse of a mall.

Then this year's media blitz happened, and I started paying attention to their labor practices. I learned their original name was Relentless (and still redirects to Amazon!). I learned they'd been historically stingy despite astronomical revenue. Most of all their (incredibly tone-deaf) dust-up with Hachette.

After a few moments of conscious thought, it became pretty clear that this wasn't an organization I thought should be the gatekeeper to many of the world's cultural products. This wasn't someone I'd want to work for.

No, this was an organization dedicated to accumulating possessions, with little care to quality. Dedicated to pure, uncut commercialism & attempted domination of any sector it touches. Not to mention, "Is there anything on Amazon that I actually need?" The answer, of course, was a resounding "NO."

I'd rather wait a day and give money to a local business who feeds my economy, pays & treats workers like people, rather than avoids paying taxes and uses seasonal workers as automaton stand-ins until the drones are ready to do the mouse-clicks bidding.

Most of all – I don't need any of the things that an algorithm tells me to shop for. I don't need to immediately resolve almost any of my "wants". What I do need are experiences, connection, warmth, and people that value others over any material good. And if you need those things, too, then you don't need a gift from me.

See ya, Amazon. I won't miss you.

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Day #2 of Think Kit!

Thirty Ain't Too Shabby

In January, I turned 30. In what has become an annual tradition, my buddy Andy & I took a bus up to Chicago to stay with our old roommate and man-of-fine-taste, Tyler. We feasted with the most solid dudes around upon hams and other hooved delicacies at Publican, which is where this stein set recessed and noble. Oh, and then we were accosted by a unstable fool, and nearly stranded by a polar-vortex-induced ice/shitstorm.

But that's another story.



Bread. I kept making it. And, I was able to eat some of the country's finest loaves. Tartine. The Mill. And stumbling upon Cellar Door Provisions. To be continued...

 

After Amelia got back from England and her grandmother's funeral, we took some day trips around the area, including her first visit to Turkey Run State Park, on one of the most astoundingly beautiful days of the year. Indiana, you clean up well...when you're surrounded by microclimates and funky, ancient moss-encased canyons.

In June, we moved. For the second time in three years, just a few blocks away to a two-story pad with a *ahem* baller *ahem* kitchen. I used the opportunity to set-up a new listening station (Pro-Ject deck, NAD amplifier, used Cerwin Vegas) in the living room. And yes, the speakers reside on the floor. Just outside the frame was our bedframe, waiting to be taken apart, carried upstairs, and put back together again.

 

Everything, Now! only played two shows this year (and one was a ten-minute set at the 13th annual Tonic Ball). The other? A mind-opening set before our psychedelic-pop heroes in Circulatory System. The night flew by in a dream-state, though their set (and new long-player) was phenomenal.

I got wrapped up in World Cup fever, again rooting for the squad while nervously watching the early rounds. Despite a terrible draw, we made it through to the knockout round, which necessitated the donning of my American flag shorts (courtesy Tyler) and a bike-ride down to Mass Ave., which had been closed off to watch the game on projection screens. We lost, but after a late goal and an impossibly near miss, hope was thick in the air.

Last year, I journeyed West for a thirtieth birthday gathering of dudes. Such an epic time was had driving south down the Pacific Coast Highway from San Fran to LA...that I had to go back. Had to. Plus, Amelia had to hear all the tales and see none of the sights. This time, we ventured north up the PCH to the Lost Coast and redwood country. 

It is simply the most stunning landscape, and raw, sun-showered coastline imaginable. I have to go back. Have to.

(Somewhere near Mendocino.)

(Punta Gorda, Lost Coast.)

(Amelia atop San Fran's Twin Peaks.)

 A few weeks later, my elbow randomly swelled up. Then it got hot. Then I got a fever. Then I went to urgent care. Then I went to the ER. Then I went home. Then I went back to the ER. Then I was in the hospital for three nights. I think this was the day I got out, before collapsing into a pile of exhaustion.

To celebrate being alive (and, I had already bought the tickets) – Amelia and I drove to Chicago to see the reunion tour for Slowdive, one of my absolute favorites (peep Souvlaki for hazy pop gems). The show was stellar, as much so as staying and eating breakfast (and drinking whiskey) at Longman & Eagle. To whomever planted that seed in my brain...good work.

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Day #1 of Think Kit!

Think Kit #28: Eating The Peel

Part of Think Kit.
Warning: this post contains shirtless photos of the narrator.

I haven't spoken to my maternal grandfather in over 23 years. In the fall of 1990, when I was six, he passed away. I can recall seeing him for the last time, in what seemed to be a nursing home. I remember the smell – it didn't smell like home. The air seemed clotted with strange things, and I didn't want to touch anything in the room. It all seemed temporal.

Time has glossed over enough of my neurons that I can't remember saying anything to my Grandfather, although I assume I shared the wisdom of a five-year old. I was really interested in baseball at the time; maybe I spouted a random Mark Grace statistic, or talked about my best friends in Kindergarten, Asher and Dan and Steve. These are all probabilities, though considering any of them feels foreign.

I remember going to a house that he lived in – there was a lofted room and a hammock indoors. In my memory, the room seems as big as a factory floor, the walls a burnished white, the trim a dark-stained brown. There aren't items in the house other than people, the loft, a hammock, and stairs. It is Summer, and the yard is hot and dry, the trees short and far apart.

I wonder what we would talk about, on the eve of turning 30. He liked driving, and cars – I wonder what he'd say to my ten years of bad luck with used vehicles. (Blown transmissions, selling for scrap metal.) Would I have medical questions? (He was a doctor back in the day that house calls were still made.) Would I mail him my latest band's cassette tape? (His father was a musician, and played a ukulele.) Would we disagree politically? (Or has my not-knowing turned him into a sympathetic character?) Would he have any other light to shed on family history? (In college, I was fascinated by his, and our, Hawaiian heritage.) What would he think of my writing? (He considered himself a writer, and left material unpublished.)

Even creating a fiction around him is hard. Decades pass and things become rigid – maybe he is too far away to get roped easily into a new story. A favorite story about him was his ability to eat the peel. He and my mom loved oranges – and after eating the orange, he'd eat the peel, piece by piece. My mom can even recall him eating a banana peel or two, although, "Those weren't his favorite."

There's a bag of tangerines on my counter. I think I'll eat one today. And try a piece of the peel.

Think Kit #21: Repetition, Repetition

(Part of Think Kit!)

I remember very distinctly the first time I heard the motorik backing beat of NEU! From a young age, I had been a finger-tapper, pencil-drummer, leg-shaker – I was generally vibrating, due to some internally-combusted mix of anxiety, energy, and nervous compulsion. Though I never really listened to much music growing up (or played anything beyond the dried-saliva smelling beige recorder), somehow the 4/4 beat was in my blood. "Hallogallo" resonated with my insides, and I can still listen to it over and over without being sated.

Repetition soothes my inner beat. Repetition is my musical mantra, apparently. I can get down with the overlords of day-long chords, Oneida, the extreme-drum-circle of Boredoms, the modern two-chord slow-boogie of Wooden Shjips...it just makes sense.

When it comes to personal mantras, I also tend towards repetition. My friends and I, a couple years back, began to write songs, and in a fit of 5:00am-inspiration, decided that a few years back would be the Year of Doing "Stuff" (stuff, while replacing something less couth, meant actually creating), and the following year became the Year of Doing Better "Stuff".

And now life's 4/4 beat has turned the corner again – 2014 has snuck up like the gray hairs poking out of my temples. I've decided that the mantra I'll repeat this year is less wordy, but more complex:

(Photo taken at DFW.)

I am at heart a conservatively-behaving person (not politically – there'll you'll find me...quite left); whether a Lutheran upbringing in an auto-town is to blame, or my 20th-century genetic mish-mash, or some inner alarm that urges caution, whatever it is, I'm not prone to risk.

In 2014, I'm still going to use judgment, still will assess the scenario and take stock and size things up...but I will make a conscious effort toward chance, toward the road less travelled, toward the difficult, the labor-intensive, the creative epicenter of self, and other parts unknown.

...I am a writer, after all, or at least I call myself one. And each writer needs fertile material. Time to put the plow down and see what I can dig up.

Think Kit #12: Nu-Dill

I like to say that I'm a restless wanderer, but aside from new brews (thanks, Twenty Tap) – I don't do a whole lot of "new" week-to-week. I have set habits that may or may not make me some kinda OCD-freak:

• alternating breakfasts (toast one day, egg the next)
• when weather cooperates, running Sun. - Thurs.
• read New Yorker in the AM and before bed
• read NY Times over lunch
• consistently cook-and-refine favorite recipes fairly often
• spin records from 7p - 8p while cooking or cleaning

...I mean, you get the point. Being an adult is some boring shit.

I did try something new this week. It's really cold, and I had some fresh dill to use before it went off, so I decided to make some soup. Or more specifically, dal, an Indian-subcontinental specialty that is always amazing at an Indian joint – the earthy thickness of lentils, fragrant aroma of spice, and bite of fresh herbs create a powerful spell to eyes, ears, and mouth ... but mine are usually lacking. 

What am I missing? Is it ghee? Is it fresh spices? Some kind of hidden secret like tamarind paste or other exotic, unpronounceable powder? Maybe I'm cooking it wrong?

I've also only used fresh dill in one recipe so far a dry Indian curry that's so good...I haven't branched out. The dill cooks down till it's tender like a green – unfortunately, I only see dill in bulk at Asian markets like Saraga. Come on, Kroger, step up your produce game! I don't want those tiny, plastic containers of past-date herb snippets. Weak.

This time I cooked the lentils separate, in liquid (2 to 1 ratio); afterwards you can easily whisk them into sort of a paste. I sauteed onions, garlic, and spices in a separate pot, then added the dill, cooked down a bit – after which I added the lentils and some water, and brought to a boil as a light, spicy soup.

In hindsight, I wish I had added a cup or so less water, in order to thicken things, but this method was closer to what I was hoping for. ...still might need that ghee, though!

Think Kit #10: Touching Two Oceans

This year, I touched two oceans. In August I flew to California, and touched the Pacific several times. When we hit the PCH just past Half Moon Bay, we slid down a rope to an abandoned, rocky beach. I ran into the cold waves until my feet were frozen, pulsing with hurt. I sprinted up the warm sand past rusty piles of beer cans and month-old bonfire remains.

I waded past my knees in the much warmer surf off the boardwalk in Santa Barbara, pulling my shorts up in an Urkel-like maneuver until they were scrunched against my pale thighs. The water was more green and yellow than blue, though I spent more time gazing back at the palm trees and distant mountains.

In Venice Beach, we arrived at sunset and low-tide, the sky reflecting off the inch-high waves that felt like quiet velvet barely brushing the tops of your feet. The next day was windy, and the waves were knock-you-down violent. We got in past our waist, saw a small shark nosing about, and moved further down the beach. Occasionally, two waves would catch up to each other like just-full-grown dogs – the force swept my feet out and ground me against the sand, ripping my swimtrunks down to my knees while I surfaced slowly in order to stay clothed.

(Venice Beach, low-tide, looking North. August 2013.)

In November, Amelia & I flew down to Florida to see my parents. In Indian Rocks, after a sandwich and a Yuengling, we walked towards the ominously-colored sky to the beach, the wind whipping a few spare drops like tiny comets. The water was warm, and the low, strong tide was eating a two-foot tall shelf along the lower half of the beach. We walked a few hundred yards in the water until the storm rolled closer in and we broke from the car.

A few days later, we visited some other traveling Hoosiers in Redington Beach. We walked several miles down the beach, wading in and out of the water and passing under a pier where a family was taking family pictures in front of some grizzled pelicans. On Honeymoon Island, the rocks and crushed shells became too sharp to walk barefoot on, so despite the warm water, we put our shoes back on, driving down the causeway and setting up camp chairs to watch the sunset with a fat cigar and a full stomach.

The final night of the trip, Clearwater Beach was abandoned, in full post-Thanksgiving hangover mode. We walked down the beach in the late afternoon and watched a pod of dolphins swim around a couple hundred yards out. One went against the flow of his friends and jumped a full six feet out of the water. After dinner, it was too dark to walk on the beach filled with forgotten sand pits, paunchy jellyfish, and the chill of the ocean at night.

On the boardwalk, past a few lonely vendors selling jewelry and cell phone accessories and face painting, there was a completely empty bandstand blasting music from a lone speaker jauntily propped up on a metal cart.

(Prancing the rocky beach in Florida, December 2013.)

In 2006, I touched the Pacific and Atlantic on two separate tours with Everything, Now!
In 2012, I touched the North Sea while on a European sojourn in Newcastle, and the Pacific in Seattle's Golden Gardens Park, while visiting for my brother's wedding.
Each time has felt distinctly different and ripe with importance, like a clear bell of blessing. A tone that resonates for days inside my body.

I want to make a habit of touching two oceans in a year.