THAT train - Kodachrome - Goodbye (to a house)

Outside on this dreary night the sounds of drunken college students, humming streetlamps, and the patter of rain is once again submitting to the deep faint rumble and crack. How many times have I heard the same sound, my feet up on the railing, cup of coffee in hand as I listened to the whistle disappear in the darkness? Yet tonight it has a somewhat different feel, for I realize that this is one of the last times I'll hear that train powering up from my loft, over and through the black, drenched grade, through the Salinas valley and on to God knows where. THAT train. That train, as if it was the same one each and every time. I suppose it might as well have been. In a way it became the sound of home (well that and Jack's standard kitchen counter perched "meow" as I walked through the door). How excited I was when I found the place I'm in right now. How disappointed I am to be leaving it now. I suppose that even now it's not so bad though. Tim Martin used to say a quote that went something like “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” What a good perspective and as good of a lead in as any to my headline..

Back in the mid 30's the good scientists at Kodak developed Kodachrome. Over the years the film has become synonymous with longevity and color accuracy. Yet when I think of Kodachrome, for some reason, I think of old 8mm movies of family vacations. Now old super 8 home movies are known for anything but color accuracy, but it is wonderful to think that they get the point across in, perhaps, a better way then anything digitized now days.

Two days ago I was sitting in the backyard of the house I most equate with my childhood pondering the brilliance of Poe's "House of Usher" when I suddenly was hit out of the blue with a spell of nostalgia. It came on rather suddenly, and in my defense there was no time to duck out of the way. Perhaps I should avoid the firing line for as it were I was sitting at the now rusted out outdoor metal patio set that looked out at the most defining 20 yards of my pre-teens.

I’m sure I’m not the only one, but normally when I think back on old times I'm able to muster up a still frame, a feeling, and, if I'm lucky, a short clip. This time, however, things seemed to come like an old kodachrome super 8 movie complete with theme song and the ever-present projector flicker. No, I wasn't on anything. It just happened that way. But... and here's the theme song... "Lend me your ear and I'll sing you a song, and I'll try not to sing out of key.... ". Ok so I had a wonder years moment, can you blame me? I was sitting at the table I used to bring the butterfly's that I'd catch in the front yard, the table where my grandpa gave me my first beer (Odules mind you..), the same spot I have photo's with my mother in at my first birthday, right next to the patch of yard where my grandpa would throw the ball to my first dog, which is next to the pool where my grandma taught me to swim, being surrounded by the tropical trees that produced the best cousin (and little brother) stabbing sword leafs in the world, which follow the pool around to the forest where the monsters lived and my dad taught me to fire a BB gun. I don’t mean to throw down any zang attitude, but I believe my wonder years moment is justified. Is it not?

Out in front of the old pool with the acclaimed cousin stabbers in the background...


In the same way I feel that much of the last 5 years has been carelessly edited into one big jumble. Of course, by this point we've moved onto digital and the theme music has changed dramatically. There's, of course, the Metallica (mmm.. shall we say infested?) first year of trucks, dunes, and endangered species hating, which ushered in a stevie ray vaughn/bob dylan inspired second year of fatties pizza, bunk beds, and bill cosby records. Of course, few things stand out better then the blissful tranquility of heavy metal, Johnny cash, pipes, and dirt bikes that characterized year number 3. Year 4 came about with the wonderfulness of all night design projects, M. Ward, good movies, big rooms, Radiohead, and walking around downtown taking night shots (the photographic kind). Fifth year, being the most recent and henceforth taking up the predominant portion of this flick found me taking night shots of a different kind, in a relationship, doing lots of school stuff, planning trips abroad, listening to ray lamontagne and spending many nights here in this same loft listening to THAT train.

Summing it up, condensing such defining times of my life it seems a rather empty assertion. It may be true that over time our memories tend to jumble up into one short clip, but when you break it down they are just that, defining. I suppose that in the end memories and experiences are what they are. Some have a sting that we wish we could forget, but in the end they serve to make who we are in life. It’s true that in time the rumble of the train will be a distant memory, but in the end, it’s come to symbolize one of the greatest rollercoaster periods I can remember.

I’ll be the last to be so masochistic as to say that hard times hold a special place in my heart, but it is also true that I have learned the most through them. Many of my friends have been there through so many of them, always with a word of encouragement or maybe more so a heart of understanding. Thank you very much. So many of you have changed dramatically over the years. It’s nice to look back on it now. All of you that have come and gone over this period have my sincerest respect and admiration and I hope that year 10 finds us in touch. While I doubt that I’ll ever have a wonder years moment thinking back on these times, I wouldn’t rule out “the boys are back in town”

So… goodbye house. Goodbye Jack’s window. Goodbye cramped loft. Thanks for the good times and the bad. It's been a great ride.

-Keith

Transitions - Salton Sea - Marriage

As you might of guessed from the title I have been feeling the winds of change lately, so I went to the salton sea and got married. My appologies for not telling any of you, hopefully you understand. 

So as of late I've taken to writing down plans and things to do on my mirror with a permanent marker. No, I probably shouldn't say lately; it's actually been happening for awhile now. Last year I remember Pam and I would write down inspiring quotes or something like that. Over the summer it migrated into the inspirational/blow off the world type (with empasis of the blow of the world), and upon my return it's been a chaotic jumble of things to do (which end up staying on there for awhile). To be honest, I've been tempted to further the migration into art. Now I'm not exaclty talking about the design oriented art or a favorite lithograph. I'm talknig about a much more deranged variety such as drawing an old man curlie que mustach on my reflection or something of that variety.  What on earth does this have to do with anything? The answer is not much, but it provides a decent illustration of how things have changed over the past 1.5 years. Encouragement- blow off the world - slight insanity, same mirror. It's a really predictable pattern if you ask me and one that is more then evident in conversatoins that I've had over that period of time. 

I've been loosing track of some intersting people lately. That is really a bummer. I'm so predictable. Times get confusing and I go wandering. The truly unfortunate part is that a few of my friends have been going through some hard times lately, and I find myself not being as understanding as I normally would be. I'm not so sure this blog is going to be a turning point either. That is rather unfortunate and a blog is no place for consoulment, but I will go on to say that these times happen for a reason. One never grows durring the easiest of times, but more so through struggle. I'm not so sure how much help I can be, but there is a glass of wine with anyones name on it at my place. Stop on by...

What's on the docket? For starters, I've been putting together some of the stuff that Chris and I have taken at the Salton Sea over the last few years in addition to trying to compile stuff from my time in SLO. 



The Salton Sea trips are so bittersweet. On the one hand, it's hard to see such an aweseome place shunned by much of the environmentalist comunity. It's really odd, but it's one of the biggest lakes in California. Yeah that's right. A reeeally big freekin lake, that nobody knows about exept for the colloquial description "that thing that smells" by people on their way to glamis. Go ahead, ask someone to try to locate it and you'd think you'd asked them where Iraq was. On the other hand, hanging out, getting buzzed off 2 dollar hefenwizen's with grandmothers, dudes with eye patches, and the token bar fixture (in this case his name was Bob) is really neat. Really really neat.

Oh yeah, marriage. I did a wirlwind visit to orange country this weekend for Jon Shuler's wedding. What a great experience. The pastor's talk about balancing was right on, and I really came to appreciate that view of relationships. Being able to complement one another is by far more importaint then finding someone that is similar to you. As a disclaimer this is my view of relationships circa November 13, 2006. It is bound to change (most likely by November 14th). Anyways I had the pleasure of doing some "blue tape" with Jon and Erica a week or so before the wedding. Again, a really good experience.






So anyways if your reading this and thinking "wow this sounds a bit different then some of his other ramblings".. good. You got the point. Hope all is well with everyone, and if I haven't talked to you lately, bear with me. I'll come around.

-Keith

So, it's been awhile..

So it has been awhile since i've posted anything. Rest assured, there is no particular reason for this... well not really.

I've suprisingly enough been marginally busy with school, yet this doesn't really compare to other quarters. So what else have I been doing? That's really a great question, and one in which i'll dodge for now. We'll just call it the dark ages. Alright then...

I have, however, also been getting the future tense of this question as well: "what are you going to do (after you graduate)"? Now, I don't mean to sound too forward about this, but If we could all just come to a consensus on a few points we'd all be able to put our minds at ease (i know you all are loosing sleep over the course of my life and all)...

Keith:
1) ... does not, nor ever will, have a definate plan.
2) ... does not have any such plan, including a tenative one, at the moment.
3) ... is mildly worried about the fact that he doesn't have any such a plan at the moment.
4) ... knows he would eventually like to get a graduate degree.
5) ... needs a source of income come January.
6. ... likes having a general framework for what he will be doing (see: #1, #3)
7) ... has developed an odd sort of friendship with his cat which some find disturbing.
8) ... thinks that he would like to try to travel for a few months after January (see: #5).
9) ... wants to persue photography for a little while after graduation (see: # 1,2,3,4,5,6,8... and... oh, why not... #7 as well).


So yeah, a consensus, that would be greeeeaaat... thaaaanks.

Anyways, in the true spirit of procrastination, I decided that I would spend the morning hiking around the dunes south of guadelupe. It's always really nice out there, and it provides a good fourm for some life pondering.

So, picked up one of these for 30 bucks last night:


and spent the morning doing this...


The dunes really made me think about some good times hiking around out there and about how much things have changed since then. Like I said, it's a really good place for some pondering.


Anyways, I'll try to be a little more up to date on this thing...

-Keith

(ps.. in reading over this post I realized I'm starring to develop the real... oh maybe.. "self improtaint" attitude. This is unintentional, but that in itself is a little worrisome... hmm.. maybe we should come to a consensus on this...

Keith: ...
1.....Just kidding.. kind of )