Balance

Oops I haven’t written anything in over a week. I’m going to make up for it by making at least two entries this weekend. I don’t really like writing when I’m not in the mood; the quality of my writing deteriorates. When I am in the mood to write, ideas come in a rush and it seems like I don’t have enough time to put it all down, so I save ideas for later. For some reason I’ve felt blasé all week and unmotivated to do much of anything. My excitement came back Friday morning and I’ve got a backlog of stuff to write about.

Alright entry number 1: Kung Fu and Fire (I working on shooting fireballs)

We had our annual Kung Fu tournament last Saturday. It was a lot of fun and I did fairly we’ll, I really like the team spirit that goes into running and judging a tournament. I managed to get earn a gold in weapons forms, point sparring, san shou and a silver in hand forms. I was really happy about the silver in hand forms, it’s usually my weakest area, and I performed Kempo, a less advanced form for black belts. So it must mean the 1000 reps of Kempo I’ve been working on paid off. I wasn’t very happy about my Kwan Dao performance, I ended up facing the wrong way again, which screwed up the ending of the form and I ended up missing five or six moves, some of the best ones too. I managed to make it look like I hadn’t totally blown it though and it was still good enough to get gold so I am happy about that. I have yet to do the whole form in public without screwing up though, so I’ll be looking for chances to do it in demos this summer. I want to do it perfect at least once!

I think it’s kind of funny that I got a silver in the category I thought I wasn’t going to place in and that I didn’t get a medal in what I thought was going to be my best category (continuous sparring). I tied Sifu Becket for black belt grand champion and it was decided we’d break the tie with a pool noodle fight. A pool noodle fight involves taking a short foam pool noodle and a shield and wailing on each other. It was hilarious and a good, light hearted way to end the tournament. I wonder how it looked to the spectators, seeing two black belts unload on each other with pool noodles (formerly only a kid’s competition). Alas my pool noodle duel skills weren’t up to snuff and I ended up dropping it once and losing the match. Congrats to the new champion Brandi Becket!

We went out for supper afterwards and had a good time; it was a fantastic day so far. After supper I got in my car, checked my phone and saw that I had five voicemails from my mom. I assumed it was about my sister moving, because I was supposed to help her after I was finished with the tournament, and I was running later than I said I would be. To my surprise the move was off, and the voicemails were my mom in hysterics because our idiot neighbor burned down half the trees on our acreage.

It turns out he was burning the grass on his lawn, lost control of the fire (I’m guessing it was just him and a garden hose) and the fire spread into the woods that separate our lots. This resulted in a wild fire and six fire engines coming out to fight the fire. They managed to stop the fire from spreading to the rest of our neighbors so almost all of the damage was done to our lot, and a bit on the lot of the guy who started the fire. In the end a strip of bush about 60x25 meters ended up burning down. This isn’t the first time we’ve had problems with this neighbor, he almost did the same thing a few years ago, while burning his grass again, the same woods caught fire but he managed to get it under control. Apparently he didn’t learn his lesson the first time.

So where there once was a thick, beautiful patch of trees in our back yard, there’s now a scorched disaster zone and a black lawn. My parents have looked into getting compensation for the damages and to my surprise they are completely screwed. The neighbor had a burn permit which I’ve now learned gives you the right to do whatever you want, almost as powerful as James Bond’s license to kill. For some reason the fire marshal didn’t give him a fine, she said the conditions of the permit were met. Apparently deciding to do the burning on a very windy day and not keeping it under control doesn’t matter so long as you have some paper work.

My parents called their insurance company to see if they had any options there, to see if their insurance company could go after the neighbor’s insurance company. They were told that home insurance doesn’t cover landscaping, they’d have to make a claim and pay a deductible, the neighbors insurance wouldn’t cover it, and then the insurance company thanked them for notifying them and told my parents that their insurance rates would now be going up. I’ve told my dad to look into getting a lawyer but he’s convinced it will just end up costing him more money and that we probably wouldn’t have a case since the neighbor wasn’t even fined. Sadly he’s probably right. My parents consulted an old friend who used to be the mayor of Parkland County and she recommended writing a letter to the local councilman. My parents got a couple people in the neighborhood to sign the letter and sent it in, no developments so far.

It looks like there’s not going to be any help for my parents. My dad could spend a couple hours every day for the next ten years trying to clean up the mess. He had to buy a new power saw to knock down some of the dangerous trees and try to clean up a bit. So it’s already cost my dad $300 for a chainsaw, higher insurance rates, a decrease in property value and countless hours of manual labor.

What really bugs me about the whole situation is that the neighbor doesn’t have to account for his irresponsibility. The systems we have in place to protect people from other peoples actions have failed. I see traffic marshals and photo radar everywhere, it seems there’s no shortage of people ready to hand out fines for damages you “could” cause but when somebody actually does destroy something, and victimize someone, it’s ok. I’m slowly becoming more and more disgruntled with our justice system. From personal experience, whenever myself or friends needed help from authorities it never came, but they never hesitate to hand out fines for minor issues.

I went to court for the first time to fight a traffic ticket I got. It was an altogether negative experience. I got a ticket for running a stop sign when I didn’t run a stop sign. It wasn’t even debatable as a rolling stop. The intersection is a scary intersection, it’s a stop sign to cross three lanes of busy traffic and there’s limited visibility due to cars parked by a bus lane. You would have to be suicidal to run this stop sign. I stopped for twice as long as I usually would because I was nervous about going through the intersection. I got through safely; well clear of any incoming cars, the only incoming car was a police cruiser just turning onto the street. I was completely surprised when he followed me for awhile and pulled me over. I wasn’t worried, I was confident I hadn’t done anything wrong but to my amazement I still got a ticket.

I took pictures of the intersection; I thought the officer had simply mistaken the position of the stop sign because you can’t physically see the stop sign from where he was. I represented myself in court and had great pictures to show that the stop sign isn’t even visible from where the officer was and therefore there’s no way he could have seen me at the stop sign, he only would have been able to see me once I’d already entered the intersection. I lost the case anyway and now it’s going to cost me a fortune in insurance. I left the courtroom, after having to wait 2.5 hours for my turn, to find the meter I parked at expired 10 minutes earlier and I now had a parking ticket. Damn you irony! Sometimes it’s therapeutic to rant.

Relationships

I’ve been thinking about the “mend 3 relationships” goal of the UBBT (not romantic relationships). When I was choosing which requirements I wanted to do for UBBT 6 I decided to leave this one out. I still back my decision because, speaking earnestly, I don’t have many relationships gone bad and those that have, happened for a reason. I think all the ones gone bad ended when I decided I didn’t want to be around somebody that only impacts my life negatively. The ones gone bad were unhealthy for me and getting out was good for me. There’s no benefit in mending them, I would be taking steps backward. I have my share of relationships that slowly faded into the mist, not really ending, just not continuing. Life happens, things get in the way, practicality rears its ugly head and people grow distant, the world keeps spinning.

Instead of mending relationships gone wrong I would like to strengthen some of my weaker relationships. I have a list in my mind made up of what I call high quality people. These are people I have met that, for some reason or another, made a strong impression on me as being fantastic people. The specifics of what makes someone, in my opinion, a “high quality” person is variable person to person and somewhat indescribable. They are strong people you want to surround yourself with. These are people we want in our lives because we feel that their presence could help us become better people.

It’s a social goal of mine to try and surround myself with as many high quality people as I can. There are a few people on this list that I regret not knowing better. So instead of mending past relationships I’m going to try and rekindle/create new ones with people I have always wanted to know better. I can think of at least a few names in my phone that I should be calling more frequently. I’m going to make a point of trying to integrate our social circles.

Captains Log

I was late with my last journal entry so I’m writing this one, two back to back, to make up for it, huzzah! This is a status update; it’s been awhile since I’ve done one. Things are going fairly well overall. I’m still ahead in some and behind in others. I’m on track with forms, pushups/sit-ups, journaling and reading but behind in acts of kindness, sparring and jujitsu. I’ve been grappling a lot more lately with another black belt during the week (Sifu Prince) but it’s still pretty hard to get 2 hours a week in. Sparring can be tough to get, especially since I’m running the advanced class now and can’t jump in myself to spar as much.

I think I’m a bit behind in the running/biking goal but the snow has finally melted and I got my bike tuned up yesterday so I’m ready to start putting on the km’s. I’ve been entertaining the idea of riding my bike to work. I probably will start doing it most of the week; it’s not that far, about 10 minutes in a car, I’m worried about riding in traffic though. This weekend I’m going to do a trial run to see how long it takes and plan a route. I’ll see if I can stay of the major roads. This will help with my 1000 mile goal and the buy/ride bike a lot goal.

My reading is on track. I was way ahead, I probably still am, but my lead has lessened because of a single book. I was reading D.H. Lawrence’s “The Rainbow”. It took me forever to read it; I didn’t have a lot of enthusiasm for it. The best way to describe it, in my opinion, is “filling”. A single page in that book felt like a chapter in others, not because I thought it was boring but because of the writing style and how much importance was put on every sentence. It was exhausting to read. I didn’t enjoy it very much. It was one of those things that, looking at it in its entirety, I admire it for the accomplishment it is, and find moments of brilliance here and there, but overall I got very little enjoyment in the reading itself. It was a very ambitious book and had some fantastic ideas but it was very heavy. I just started “Howard’s End” and I’m already moving faster and I’m enjoying it.

I got my first public performance in on Saturday (albeit a lousy performance on my part ARGH!), only four more to go, it should be easy to get since I want to be active on the demo team. I have a new goal to add to my UBBT requirements! The goal is actually one of my friend’s ideas, something he wants to do. It involves my participation and I was taking it fairly casually but I’ve decided to take it seriously and commit to doing it. This way both my friend and I can help each other work towards the same goal and keep each other accountable.

The goal is! … Drum roll please…

***Do something adventurous every month***

The main focus of these adventures will be backpacking/hiking/canoeing/climbing/snowboarding and other outdoor, wilderness orientated activities. I am leaving the interpretation of “adventurous” open to include pretty much anything though, so long as it’s bold, a step out of routine or a new experience.

I’ve been having trouble for the past couple weeks keeping a regular daily routine. I’ve just now started to pick myself out of the slump. I think it had something to do with my last few injuries. After I’m healed I try to get back in the swing of things and go hard right away. About three days in I usually feel exhausted and end up taking it easy for the next couple. It’s easy to get behind and it takes a bit of time for me to have enough energy to work hard every single day (except Sunday). I should really start getting more sleep, it would probably help. I feel like I need more sleep whenever I’m really active.

I’ve watched the new Star Trek movie trailer too many times and now I’m a bit excited, hence the title of this entry.

The Void

I’ve realized I always have more energy in the evening and at night. As I’ve said before, I’m not a mourning person, I’m a night person. On Saturdays when I go to open training around noon, I feel like I have half the strength and energy than I’d have on a weekday around 8pm. I like doing things at night, it seems to revitalize me. I’ve always felt some mysterious, primal connection to night and darkness. Something about it makes me feel vibrantly alive.

Some of my fondest memories involved doing things in the dark. In my JFW days we used to play a bunch of games in the woods at night like kick the can, grim reaper or hide and go seek tag. I loved those games! Breathing the crisp night air, hiding in the shadows, stealthily roaming through the woods alone with only starlight to guide you is a lot of fun. I remember wandering around in a field with some friends until we found a nice spot on a hill, in long grass, then we lied on our backs for a long time and watched the stars slowly creep across the sky. Moments of contemplation like those somehow seem intense, even though no great realizations have occurred it feels like something important has taken place.

When I was young we would drive into Edmonton to visit my grandmother. We would spend the whole day there and drive back once it got dark. My favorite part of the trip was the ride home. I’d lean my seat back, gaze out the window and watch the city lights go by until I fell asleep. When we got back home the city lights would be gone, replaced by the moon and the stars, I’d peer up and try to spot the few constellations I knew. I used to love driving by the windows of houses or businesses that had their lights on. You get that brief, clear glimpse of the people or objects inside that no one notices during the day. I used to wish I could teleport into those rooms behind the windows and exist, for a brief instant, in someone else’s life, as an invisible, quiet, omniscient observer. Just to see the different lives being lived around me and feel what other people are feeling in the times of rest when the great forces in our lives are temporarily forgotten. I still get this urge when I’m driving around the city at night.

Now that I’m older I still feel the same way about night but I enjoy it different ways. I love driving at night. It’s peaceful driving around the city when there’s no other cars on the road, I love putting on a good CD and cruising around. I’ve done this a few times for fun when I was feeling restless, I’ll get in my car with no place to be and just drive around aimlessly until I feel like going home. I think most of the enjoyment I get from this comes from my loner side, I like being alone and away from everything now and then. A good fire and a warm sleeping bag, on a mountain side, is infinitely more pleasurable to me than 100 hours of cold television glow. Night + nature + cards + lamplight= awesomeness. I’ve also developed an interest in caving. I’m hoping to go out exploring caves more often; I’ve only ever been to Cadomin a few times, it’s a lot of fun.

I’m guessing that the wonder I get from night is pretty common. Maybe it’s human nature to be fascinated with darkness. Or maybe I’m just a little bit crazy. I should look into my family tree, maybe I’m related to some Romanian royalty… could I be descended from a long lost count?

I am a Music Lover

Hi my name is Jesse and I’ve been a music lover for about two, maybe three years now. It’s a pretty recent development in my life. I might have claimed to be a music lover before this time but I would have been lying, denying the truth. Before I became a music lover I was very passive, a bit indifferent, to music in general. I listened to whatever happened to come my way, whatever was handy and tolerable. I had favorites here and there but I never really got into them heavily. I never felt motivated to go out and find music, I discovered new music through recommendations or I osmotically absorbed it through mediums like radio and television.

My musical life was passionless, a confused, aimless, wandering through different genres. I’d often follow trends. I’d get into whatever was popular at the time. I always felt like I wasn’t getting enough out of music, something about my musical shambling seemed hollow, like I was missing the real point, like opening a Kinder Surprise to find nothing inside. I happened to know some true music lovers and I envied them. I was jealous of their ability to get a purer experience from music then I was.

I’ve always listened to the radio a lot. There was always a radio playing in the background at my parent’s house and I spent a lot of time in or around trucks at work. I listened to the standard commercial radio stations and heard the same things over and over. Eventually something snapped inside of me, I couldn’t handle the standard music like I used to, I was having a tough time stomaching it and the advertising that came with it. In a moment of desperation I turned to something else, the dial spun, I was looking for anything new, something I hadn’t heard before, anything without loud aggressive advertising or phony DJ’s! Something! Anything! By chance I landed on public radio, CKUA to be exact. I breathed relief, it was new, it was calm, it was diverse and accepting.

I didn’t think much of it at first, I’d tune in to it now and then but still followed my usual habits. Gradually I started to tune in more and more. It opened my ears! Here was something built around, designed for the sole purpose of enjoying music! It wasn’t trying to sell me anything! It stood alone, aloof, basking in its truthful glory. It seemed to say,

“Here I am in all my glory, I exist only for you. I exist solely for the benefit of those searching for higher quality. You may come to me and I will embrace you and love you but only if you come of your own free will. I will not be saddened if you do not, I will hold no grudge against you, for I believe, and am confident in my purpose. I will remain here, happy, waiting for those searchers to find me, forever in the air around you striving to uphold a higher purpose.”

I’ve been listening to CKUA for three years now and I am cured. I care about music. I have passion for music. I’ve started to think about music in terms of artists and albums instead of just individual songs. I discover artists I like and try to follow their works. I like to learn about them, where they came from, what their influences are, what they were trying to achieve or what they were feeling when they wrote their album. I can often be found spending hours reading the CKUA playlists and watching videos of the artists on YouTube, looking for something I like. I now take initiative in discovering music; I look for it instead of always waiting for it to come to me.

The DJ’s at CKUA actually care about and have passion for the music they play. You can hear joy in their voices when they talk about music and it in turn awakens joy in yourself. Instead of just playing the song, they talk about the artist, they let you know a bit about them and make you want to learn more. Why, one of their announcers even broadcasts from a cabin in the woods and reads poetry. While you listen to the music and poetry you can hear the crackling of a fire or the chirping of birds in the background and feel at peace.

I crave variety in music. I’ve come to find myself listening mostly to Folk, Indie Rock, Blues, Down Tempo, Lo-Fi, Electronic, Soul, World and Alternative. But I like almost anything that is high quality and sincere. I crave singers with passion in their voice and emotional attachment to their music. It could be the simplest or the most complex music but if it’s passionate I will like it. I love how I get chills every time I hear Bon Iver sing “Skinny Love” or Martha Wainwright sing, “Bloody Mother F***ing A**hole”.

I tend to avoid most main stream music now. It’s not that there isn’t anything good out there, it just seems tainted to me now. Maybe a lot of these famous, popular bands lose some of that passion when the money starts rolling in. Instead of creating music as an artistic, emotional, expression of something you feel strongly about, it becomes a means of sustenance. Instead of creating music to express themselves, they make up stuff they aren’t passionate about and slap it onto a CD because they know their former glory has earned them a reputation that will allow them to sell it, even if it has lost that certain something that made it stand out above the others. . Since I’ve come appreciate music more I like to share it with people. I’ll recommend artists or talk the ear off of anyone willing to listen to me babble about awesome songs.

I am overjoyed and surprised that I can call myself a music lover. I always wished I could and now I can. Still, I can always improve. My lyrics appreciation could use a bit more work. CKUA was my medium to find a love for music. There are many other ways out there to discover music; you just have to find them.

This was a lot of fun to write.