Tunnel Falls
Hiked 12 miles roundtrip to walk behind a waterfall last week. What's a long hike to you? Twelve miles is very long to me. The longest! But it seemed worth it considering that walking is good for you and meditative and also there was that sweet sap smell of the trees in the sun and how, once at the falls, you could slip into the darkness of a cold tunnel and then emerge again in a wild prism of overspray, which dropped over you like a veil and cooled your skin, giving you energy for the (long) walk back to the car.
Favorites 6.2.15
The close proximity of river season: Almost, almost, almost.
Marc Maron interviews Fresh Air's Terry Gross: Hey it's just two of my favorite interviewers, like, interviewing each other. Marc gets at a cooler, younger Terry. Terry gets at a more empathetic Marc. It's great.
Fried cauliflower po' boy at The Old Gold: Spicy, crunchy, soft. An incendiary sandwich for people of the vegetarian persuasion—and crucial acknowledgement that we can do better than reconstituted soy product.
Silicon Valley: Because Mike Judge, because Martin Starr, because everyone of us knows someone who's just fucking like one of the characters on this show.
Deep Cuts
Life update: the auxiliary component on my car stereo broke, and I'm stuck listening to CDs like in the olden days.
Usually, I let my iPod rip on shuffle—never pledging myself to a full album. The digital age has us all afraid of commitment. Also, I'm always in search of the deep cut—the tune you forgot about, the B side that hasn't once seen a radio wave, the diamond in the bag of quartz.
Like you, I stopped buying CDs a while ago. Listening to my old CDs has been a tour de force of deep cuts. Who knew?
Also, listening to a full album start to finish. An album as a full package! I used to know/understand/appreciate what this was all about, and I'm relearning it these days.
Off The Grid
As a kind of antidote to my urban wanderings in NYC, I went off the grid this weekend for one long day on the Olympic peninsula. This involved a walk in the rainforest, which involved a field exploding with forsythia, sneaking through a paper-thin slot canyon, and a pale green pool that was the very definition of stillness.
The walk had a point—we were looking for a "big rock," a sacred spot to the local tribe. Maybe you can only see it if you really believe, though, because that rock turned out to be pretty hard to find. Only half of us actually beheld it, and me, being a believer—in life, in mystery, in things we cannot see—was one of them.
Here's to sacred rocks, and repelling down them with a beer in yer pocket.
NYC Mega Post
Flew 3,000 miles east to New York City this past weekend. I needed it in a bad way, getting out of town. Hung out with old friends—land pirates, most of them. Had a shitload of fun meeting new people and seeing new things. Dollar pizza slices. Rooftop rock shows. Heat and crazy humidity. My fill of skate missions; never wanting for laughter. Always, always looking for a good place to pee, hopefully indoors, hopefully not just having to crouch on the far side of a car and street pee but willing and able and hey that's how they do it in New York City.
First day, we skated through Brooklyn, bombed the Williamsburg bridge into Manhattan, pushed into oncoming traffic, pushed through side street gridlock, Nassau, Broadway, Wall, et cetera, et cetera, moved faster than the cars, snuck past bumpers, constantly pushing, miles and miles and miles. The perfect way to see the city—the grime, grit, and beauty. Ended it all on the East River ferry headed back to Williamsburg, standing there tired as dogs watching the city sink into the sunset and drinking tall boys in the wind.
Williamsburg, I liked it alright. I know Portland has its own high-grade infestation of cookie-cutter hipsters, but the Brooklyn hipsters—mom jeans for the girls and beards for the boys—they were out in numbers and kicking down a kind of "I live in New York" coolness that Portlanders just can't pretend at cuz I mean fuck, we live in a little ol hippy town in the woods.
As mentioned elsewhere, I have new buds from New Jersey and had to go see their towns and the rad spots that they've built. We drove west Newark-bound through the Holland tunnel to Shorty's—a renegade tranny-land inside a decaying warehouse, and then on to Junk Spot in Jersey City—a slab of cement sprawl turned magical DIY skatepark. The guys behind these zones, they're a cool crew of builders and rippers who just did shit themselves. Found a little patch of land, built a little beauty in the wasteland. In general, that's the kind of kinetic self-made creative energy that I'm most inspired by.
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Aaanyway, New York City—walked a hundred miles, drank 18 cups of coffee a day, spent a crap ton of money and didn't regret a single cent. Love all of those people and love that town—see you again soon, I hope!
