Pictures Of You

I haven't read that one best-selling book about decluttering your life, but I don't think I have to. The urge to cleanse comes on like a fever now and then. For me, life feels lighter when you open a drawer and dump its entire contents in the trash. Byeeeee.

But what about photos. Do they count as clutter? I'm gonna argue somewhat controversially that yes, yes they do—and I just dumped a whole bunch.

I don't like going back to things. Moments. Haircuts. Old apartments. Forward is my natural motion. And from this 30-something vantage, I do quite honestly believe I'm living the best moment that has ever happened RIGHT FREAKING NOW. Self-helpy, I know. Ugh. But seriously, the more I get to thinking about it, the more the fact that I even have a now seems so fortunate, so impossibly lucky, well it may as well be gold dipped.

So I threw away so many old photos.

It felt glorious! All the trips to Europe with all the old buildings. If I want to see the Eiffel Tower, I'll just look it up. Yes, and all the party pictures. I lived ’em—but I don't need to hang on to ’em. Oh, and hey, all the times I fell in love and then so completely out. Later. Ciao. Au revoir.

I did save a few select pics, though—most of them heartbreakingly cute pictures of old friends and pets. There is a method to my madness.

Holiday Observances

Like ghosts—there to be observed or ignored—several important holidays passed through our world in the last few days.

The first was the summer solstice, which marks the longest day of the year and the warm season emerging. A lovely passage. On this day there was, cosmically, a ripe full moon, just as ripe as the many ears of corn that showed up to my house on summer-solstice eve, brought for the grill by all my friends—along with other good fare like bean salad and French onion dip—to celebrate the day and the season.

The second was Go Skateboarding Day. I'm not exactly sure what the origin of this holiday is—maybe just a marketing ploy cooked up by some companies? Still, the intention is nice, and meaning is all I try take away from any holiday, anyway. Last year, Go Skate Day was action packed, but this year, what I did was work all day and then skate one of my favorite ramps in the late sunshine. A few buds. Some beers. It was, as they say, mellow.

Of course, we don't need holidays to eat, drink and do special stuff—life is reason enough. But then again, there's something to be said for ritual and how it grounds you and keeps you present. That's just my opinion, mind you.

*This was not a make, but life ain't all makes, now is it?

Fearless Nothing

Here I sit, on the verge of a couple months' good, hard work. I'll be busy! Busy is good. Harness all that kinetic energy ... But. Right now, while things are normal, I like right now, too.

Basically, I'm trying to get profoundly good at resting, so that when the whirlwind hits, I can be profoundly good at that, too. Make sense? I don't know. It's harder than it should be to find the balance between the doing and the not doing. This weekend I dialed it in, though.

There was skateboarding, there was wandering in the woods, there was hang time in the hammock, there was the stacking of many rocks and the creation of a giant inferno, there was camp wine and camp coffee, there was, in fact, tent camping.

Rest-wise, though, I'm most proud of Sunday afternoon, during which we came home and did nothing. We napped! Also, we basked like cats on the sunny deck, staring up into the void of blue—which, after a few minutes, revealed itself not to be a void at all, but instead a lively expanse of bugs and cottonwood fluff and one lost lone balloon flashing the sunlight back down at us from impossibly high.

I can't get the hang of meditating, but this felt a whole lot like that. I hope to stick this moment in my cap of fine, pure moments and maybe pull it out next month when I'm stressed and really freaking need it.

In Real Life

I encountered a friend out last night whom I rarely see/talk to. He asked me if I'd been skating lately or "just hiking." It was an odd question. It left me wondering. Of course I've been skating! But then I realized that those moments on 4 wheels haven't been making it onto Instagram. Who cares? Reality check: My Insta feed is the only way some people know me.

That's fine—but it's weird. Everyone uses Instagram (and all social medias) for different reasons. Me? I'm on there to see cool pictures and laugh. I don't ever post selfies, can't get behind them, will unfollow friends who post too many of ’em. I want to see your world, what you're doing, what you think! I don't follow certain friends that I adore in real life simply cuz they clog the feed with crap I'm not interested in. Likewise I follow total strangers who post dynamic pics that make me feel something. Long story short, Instagram isn't real life.

Obvious: we're crafting stories about our identities and lives with every picture we put up—and the ones we choose not to. Not so obvious: those stories probably aren't very true. Sure, hopefully everyone's living extraordinary lives full of natural beauty and wonder, full of humor, full of friends and happy things going down. Full of hiking! But you can sense just by looking that that's not totally the case. We're all just normal. Buncha normal people living normal lives!

And hey, normal is cool.

Work-Life Balance

Check it out. Mostly what I write about on here is life. I mean it's life, man! Work takes up half of life, tho—maybe even more on some weeks. So without any more ado, here are a few fun things I've been typing up lately.

The cool thing is, at least one of these projects came out of meeting rad strangers at the skatepark (this has happened to me more than once! which is why all my skate expenses are a legit write-offs ;).

My buds at Teva have me writing their Insta posts. I'm paid in dollar bills not double taps tho.

I love food. I love writing. By the transitive properties, I love writing about food. Been doing the summer Portland Mercury ads for Pine State Biscuits. Yay for biscuits!

I grew up a hopeless nerd, and ball sports bewilder me. Despite my obvious failings in this matter, my pal Scott let me help him and CDS with this bad-ass brand book for the Texas Tech University athletic department. It was hard and fun ultimately one of the coolest projects I've worked on in a while. Maybe there's a lesson here? I guess probably.