"I am a poem heeding hyper-distillation..."

I want to share a poem by Ani Difranco entitled "Self Evident." You can read and/or listen to it here. At first I thought I could wait until 11 September 2007 to post this poem, but the more time I spend away from the United States and the more time I listen to distilled Canadian news broadcasts and the more time I find myself missing the Pacific Northwest, the more I am convinced that I myself must work and speak and share to effect the change I wish to see in my adopted nation of America. Because before my greencard expires in 2014, I must make a choice - a choice of homelands, of identities, of communities. I pray every day that in seven years there will even remain a choice to be had. I by no means intend to use my Canadian citizenship as a "Get Out of Hell Free" card; however, I will return to the passive-aggressive, beautiful, semi-socialist, intermittently open-minded winter wonderland in which I was born should our neighbours south of the border pass the point of no return (and many would argue that they already have). So I am posting this poem out of anger, out of fear, out of anticipation, and as a call to every reader, regardless of nationality or political affiliation, to enact real and positive change in the United States of America.

Or, to quote Ms. Difranco again, "I’m gonna take all my friends/and I’m gonna move to Canada/and we’re gonna die of old age."

Favourite Summer Photos

Kovitz

So, I think they just do it better in Seattle. Or rather, those in Seattle know how to do it better wherever they go. Summer 2007 will go down in infamy as one of most hysterical, joyful, and rejuvenating breaks I have ever had. "I'll prob your case..."

"Pop the cork, a champagne glass
Raise to the future, drink to the past
Thank the Lord for the friends he cast
In the play he wrote for you..."
Ellis Paul

Words for the 24th year:

As I begin, to use Diane's phrase, another loop around the sun, I want to share a quotation from Elizabeth Gilbert's phenomenal book, Eat, Pray, Love:

In the end, though, maybe we must all give up trying to pay back the people in this world who sustain our lives. In the end, maybe it's wiser to surrender before the miraculous scope of human generosity and to just keep saying thank you, forever and sincerely, for as long as we have voices.

All in the family

So I love my brother. Today I picked him up from the airport and we spent two and a half hours listening to all sorts of music (Infected Mushroom to Feist, Rod Stewart to Phil Collins, Lynard Skynard to Postal Service), laughing about our parents, and genuinely having a great time. At one point, I turned to him and smiled, saying "I'm so glad that we get along so well." And I am!

Dave decided that as we drove into the marina, we should have a grand entrance in honor of my Dad's 52nd birthday. So we rolled down all of the windows and blasted "Smoke on the Water" by Deep Purple as we parked in the middle of the marina grounds. My parents came out, my mom bawled her eyes out as she laughed, and we showered my dad with balloons and hugs. Best birthday present ever: having my entire family in one house.

Happy Independence Day!