wlwlcreated by welikewelove.com { a magazine about sharing the things you like }

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Seconds, please!

Switching up the Routine

Kyle Holloway

contents

24SpecialPlace

Kendra Fode

Moustache MusingsLiz Field &

Nicole Irene Dyck

FavoriteThings

Alyssa Chomick

ZimaSerezha Komarov

clockwise from top left:

DestinationEgo

Kevin Chapman

30 19 4 15 22

Welcome { 3 }

they like & love: { 5 }Kyle Holloway

good life: Toms Shoes { 6 }

thoughts: { 8 }Love Boarding

music: Transition { 10 }

art: Elise Trickey { 12 }

thoughts: { 18 }Desert Wandering

thoughts: { 18 }Art Addiction

short story: { 26 }Ben: Chapter 2

short story: { 28 }Prodigy

featured artist: { 32 }Darby Magill

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love what you likeWhile it’s not uncommon for the average iPod to have days and some-times weeks and months worth of music on it, I think most would admit to having one or two bands they keep tucked away, exempt from competing with new releases and chart topping hits and immune from fickle listen-ing pleasure and short attention spans – bands that remain timeless and continue to reach into the lives of listeners and connect in a relevant and meaningful way.

A few years ago, I had an experience with one of these bands I keep tucked away that felt larger than life at the time. I was writing for my college campus newspaper, and buy some stroke of unimaginable luck I managed to obtain media access to a concert of a band whose albums had significantly shaped my early twenties, and whose recent releases still manage to grab and maintain airtime on my playlists.

I was told by a label rep that I had a twenty minute interview slot with two of the band members before the show. Biographical information on band members already ingrained in the frontal cortex of my brain, I did the best I could to remain calm and as journalistically professional as I walked down a seemingly never ending hallway to start my interview.

About ten minutes in, I was able to control the nervous bounce of my right knee and actually listen to the responses to my questions. One response in particular seemed to hang in the air and settle down on me after the interview was over and I was walking into the venue.

“Find out what you like and then really love that thing. You have to love what you like.”

It’s a concept that has floated and danced through my mind for the last three years as I’ve attempted to avoid keeping up with status quo expec-tations. It’s a concept that challenges mediocrity and complacency, and if embraced, forces one to have an opinion and to take a side.

To make a commitment to love something requires one to say yes to that something, and no to many other things, something that seems to terrify our generation as we continuously face a crisis of unending choice and opportunity. It requires one to be selective and informed and intentional about their choices and time and resources. It requires one not to worry what they’re missing out on because they are enthralled and captivated by what they’re doing.

Alyssa and I hope that WLWL inspires you wherever you find yourself, whether it’s discovering what you like for the first time or learning to love what you’ve always liked.

* Cover photo: Shane Yuhas

welikewelovea magazine about sharing the things you likeissue 2 * Seconds, please!

Alyssa ChomickCreative Director* * * * * * * *alyssa@welikewelove.com

Liz FieldManaging Editor * * * * * * * *liz@welikewelove.com

Shane YuhasStaff Photographer * * * * * * * *shane@shaneyuhas.com

Kyle Holloway, Photographer & WriterKyla Butchko, Photographer & WriterKevin Chapman, Writer & PhotographerDalyce Chomick, Writer & Mischief MakerSerezha Komarov, PhotographerNicole Irene Dyck, PhotographerDarby Magill, PhotographerJon Mark Wiltshire, PhotographerErin Williams, Fashion & Jewelry DesignerJen & Jamie, ban.doChris Chomick, ArtistBrett Fillmore, WriterElise Trickey, ArtistJenn Demke, Ceramic ArtistJessie Jones, WriterKendra Fode, MusicianTransit, MC

thank you...to our amazing contributors

This is our second helping!wlwl is published 4 times a year it is available to purchase via www.welikewelove.magcloud.comSupport us by visiting www.welikewelove.com >Read the blog, send us an email and submit to the magazine. Thank you for your ongoing support of welikewelove! xoxo

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my favorite things

1} Rosi Golan, musicianwww.rosigolan.com(photo by lauracrosta.com)

2} 500 Days of Summerhttp://www.foxsearchlight.com/500daysofsummer/In theatres July 17th. Starring Zooey Deschanel & Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

3} Jen & Jamie, ban.dowww.shopbando.com

Location(s): Los Angeles and the world wide webHow did the two of you start ban.do? We both had special occasions last spring (Jamie was celebrat-ing her birthday and Jen was renewing her vows in vegas – cheesy, but fun), and each, without telling the other, made these elaborate head pieces. When we saw each others photos, we were amazed and immediately realized that this must be something that is out there in the minds of lots of girls. ban.do was born! Your favorite ban.do piece? We hate to pick favor-ites, but at the moment we are really loving no. 89 – our first cover girl (InStyle Weddings).What is on repeat on your iTunes? We have quite a mix. Rilo Kiley, Sam Cooke, Kanye West, the Smiths, Edith Piaf, She and Him... the list goes on.Favorite movie? We both love movies, but where ban.do is concerned it is definitely Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette.

* When they aren’t creating beauitful hair acces-sories, Jamie works as a wardrobe stylist and Jen is a photographer.

4} Blankets by Craig Thompsonwww.dootdootgarden.com

5} Jenn Demke, Mikindwww.epicwelding.com/jenn_demke

Location: Calgary, AlbertaHow did you start Mikind? After graduating from ACAD, I participated in The Medalta International Artist’s in Residence Program in Medicine Hat, AB. This residency program was the catalyst for me to continue making work independently. Providing me with studio space, mentors and inspiration, the Residency gave me exactly what I needed as a new emerging artist.Where can we find you now? After living in Medicine Hat for two years, I came back to Calgary where I have set up a studio and have been able to contin-ue working in part-time. I am currently selling my work both independently and through the Alberta Craft Council Gallery in Edmonton.

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Kyle HollowayPhotographer & Traveller

visit page { 24 } for more on Kyle

Likes* Getting a sunburn in winter

* Odd days of the week off

* Language barriers

* Mexican hot sauce

* Bartering

* Off the Wagon bar

* Smoked meat from Schwartz

* Working out

* Surprises

* Dirty house music

Loves* French toast bagels

* Sleeping in

* Rockefeller shrimp

* Watching the sun go down

in different time zones

* Don Julio Reposado Tequila

* Variety

* Efes Dark beer

* Spearmint Rhino

* Calgary Flames

* New socks

Every issue someone from a feature article will open up about the different things that are catching their eye right now.

they like & love

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Imagine travelling to Argentina and finding a shoe that could change the course of your life. While it wasn’t the goal of his journey, three years ago Blake Mycoskie came across that very piece of footwear – a traditional rope soled shoe called the alpargata that local farmers in Argentina have been wearing for hundreds of years.

“The shoes are lightweight and super comfortable, and soon I was wearing them all of the time,” said Mycoskie.

But it wasn’t the comfort of an ancient shoe that left

a lasting Argentinean impression on Mycoskie. It was the country’s children. And their lack of footwear.

While still in Argentina, he had an idea that would give birth to his newest company. He would make and sell the traditional Argentine shoe that was unheard out of outside the country. He determined for every pair sold, he would give a pair to a child in Argentina until they all had shoes. And he would continue doing it so they always had shoes.

Three years later, Mycoskie’s company, TOMS Shoes, has given over 130,000 pairs of shoes to children in

Argentina, South Africa, Ethiopia, and the U.S. and has grown to a company of over 40 employees.

Originally titled ‘Shoes for Tomorrow Project,’ the name evolved into shorter moniker that better suited the company, albeit one that is sometimes confuses those looking for someone named Tom.

“We like to say that everyone is TOM, because what TOMS stands for. It’s a derivative of the word ‘tomorrow’ and the idea that we have a better tomorrow,” said Mycoskie. “You buy a pair today, we give a pair away tomorrow.”

Try Walking in Their Shoes{ Liz Field } loves Toms Shoes

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With an early encounter with the direct impact TOMS Shoes had on the lives of children receiving footwear, Mycoskie had proof that his One-for-One business model was effective and life changing.

“On our first ‘Shoe Drop’ in 2006, there were three boys who had just received their TOMS, and they led me to a field where they loved to play soccer. It was full of rocks and glass, yet they had been playing barefooted. Their first thought when they had received their shoes, was that playing soccer would be easier and even give them speed! Experiencing that with them was one of my most fulfilling moments,” he said.

But some of the rewards of children no longer having to go barefoot are not as obvious as that.

“Having shoes helps someone with their personal security and understanding. It gives them self-worth. It shows that they’re valued. It’s almost a sense of wealth in these communities. It almost becomes a passport into other things that are very important. School, for instance, is probably the easiest example. A lot of kids cannot go to school unless they have a proper uniform, and a proper uniform includes shoes,” said Mycoskie. “So giving them a pair of shoes allows education.”

One of the daily chores that many children in developing countries are responsible for is re-trieving fresh water for the family. Fresh water sources, often miles away from villages, require children to journey over rocky terrain usually resulting in cuts and wounds in their feet which lead to infection.

Mycoskie’s biggest focus is on particular debil-itating foot disease called podoconiosis, which is completely preventable with shoes. Podoconiosis

has a destructive result on the human lymphatic system and causes feet to inflame nearly to the size of an elephant’s. Children and teenagers are isolated from participating in their communities and cut off from most human interaction as the disease is often interpreted by villagers as a curse.

With global environmental and economic consciousness on the rise, success for a socially responsible based footwear company has become completely viable. Not only does TOMS Shoes offer an innovative product, but is also provides an opportunity to empower consumers to change the life of an individual and connects them to that individual, breathing whole new meaning to the phrase “walk a mile in his shoes.”

TOMS Shoes One-for-One brand continues to expand as a recent partnership has developed with Element Skateboards’ founder Johnny Schillereff.

“We realized that our passions paralleled and our combined effort could only strengthen the power of our messages,” said Mycoskie.

The two companies teamed up to produce a collection that included three limited edition women’s shoes, two men’s shoes and two skateboards. For every pair of shoes purchased, TOMS will give a pair of shoes to a child in need. As part of the One-for-One collaboration, for every skateboard purchased, Element will give a skateboard to a child in need.

“It is truly amazing to see another company adopt the One-for-One model. It is a true testament that the One-for-One model can work.”

To find out more information, or how to get involved: { Visit } www.tomsshoes.com

TOMS shoes facts: The upper of the shoe is made

of cotton canvas with a rubber sole. TOMS classic shoes are very low environmental impact by nature of the design. All TOMS Shoes use a “loose-lining” con-struction to avoid any glues in the uppers. The same for the one-piece bottom unit- there is no glue. The shoes are also made with AZO-free and lead-free dyes.

The original TOMS Shoe has aunique slip-on design comprised of clean lines and lightweight fabrics in vibrant colors and prints. Materials of the shoe vary from season to season; bright vibrant canvases, suede, codu-roy, and a variety of wovens.

From the time a pair of shoes are sold, it takes a couple of months* to produce and match the pair of shoes given to a child in need. *This time period ac-counts for the time a pair of shoes is shipped to a customer and if the shoes are returned, ex-changed, replaced, etc.

TOMS has a 501 ( c) (3) non-profit organization, called Fri-ends of TOMS, dedicated to mobilizing, connecting, and em-powering individuals who want to give further aid to communi-ties served by the TOMS One for One mission. Friends of TOMS offers the Shoe Drop volunteer program and helps the treat-ment of those affected with Podoconiosis, a debilitating foot and leg disease, in Ethiopia that is 100% preventable by wearing shoes from an early age.

good life

{ � }breaks. It brings endless joy into my life. Having crisp air run against your face can recharge you, making you leave all the anguish of the days previ-ous at home.

I’m normally the type of person to shy away from confrontation, difficulties and any kind of obstruc-tion that prevents me from sailing through my days virtually scar free. There is a little something inside all of us that responds to an obstacle. That something is different with everyone. Mine can only be explained as this determined, positive person - someone who will stare a challenge in the face and give it a shot anyways.

I was this awkward, pre- adolescent with braces and glasses. Thin as a rail and pale as a ghost. I was the ideal candidate for any type of junior high criticism, with only a few friends, so it was hard to join sports teams with school. Dexterity was some-thing I dreamt about and esteem was a figment of my imagination. I needed something to hold onto. Something to bring me up a notch.

Grade 7. Ski trip for Phys-Ed. Option to ski or snow-board, and I chose to snowboard. I never tried it at that point, but decided to give it a shot. I fell, I cried, I whined, and at the end of the day all I wanted to do was crawl into a hole, and play my computer games, and have my parents standing motionless

If you ever looked through my moleskin day timer, you’ll see that I have instinctively written “snow-board” on every weekend from November until May.

With the exception of a few prior engagements, it seems to be the only thing that fills my weekends. When I’m faced with the question “why do you love snowboarding,” it’s difficult to convey an answer that everyone can relate to. There’s the obvious answers. I love to hang out with my friends. It’s fun. I enjoy it. And why not? There’s much more to it than that, though.

Someone might sit there and wonder, what use is it to go out there? Waking up at 7 a.m., piling into a car, standing in lines and braving the sometimes

harsh elements that Mother Nature hands to us. There isn’t the slightest element of fiscal gain or acknowledgment from this experience. I learn how cold I can get, how far I can hike, how fast I can go but I don’t gain much when it comes to money or recognition. It’s a hard bargain convincing someone to try snowboarding. It breaks the bank, can break some bones, and really frustrate you at times

But what I can say is this.

It makes me feel like I exist. It’s one thing that I don’t believe in quitting. It’s breathing in fresh air rather than exhaust fumes, and listening to the wind blow the snow around and whistle through trees, rather than honking horns, or screeching

boardingLove

{ Kyla Butchko } likes to snowboard all season long

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thoughts

Have you ever been so strained and starved of any inspirational, positive thoughts? Where every-where you turn, you’re just looking down another void? Your life feels as if you’re walking on egg-shells, and you start to feel empty, and drained. Something in the makeup of your life shifts when you are going up that chairlift.

You take that deep breath. You know the one you take after a highly stressful problem is resolved.

Or when you are looking in your rear view mirror and think that the guy behind you is going to rear end you… your heart stops. He hits the brakes. You take a deep sigh of relief once you realize there is still an inkling of space between fender and bum-per. Take that relief, multiply it by 10. Throw in some minty fresh air, and good friends.

There’s no doors, no walls, nothing to make you feel trapped. It makes you appreciate how free you are, and how truly fragile it really is. All that matters is those present moments, while being surrounded by this serene, flawless landscape. All you can do is smile.

There is something about being surrounded by fresh snow, tall mountainous peaks and deep, snow covered valley’s. There’s a calmness. You become humbled by your surroundings. These gigantic pieces of rock that have been molded by nature over thousands of years. Enormous trees slanted against the rock, windblown and weathered, star-ing down and seeing everyone scramble about like ants on a hill.

You’ll start watching others try something new. Pushing their personal limits. Even if it’s just learn-ing to turn, or stand up. It feels good to be a part of something. I’m a lucky person to have the life I do, and even luckier to have people in my life, and a family that understands how important it is for me to get out of town.

Every weekend it’s the same routine. Wake up, meet up, drive up, with many “car dance parties” along the way. An old Weakerthans album, and John Samson crooning “fallow” into my one ear bud, and finally understanding what he is saying…

This is why I love snowboarding.

in the doorway telling me I should spend less time on the computer.

I finally decided to try it again.

Convincing your parents or a friend’s parent to drive you to Wintergreen at 7 a.m. on the weekends was always a hard task, but we did our best. I kept dropping like a rock, and criticizing the sport, but eventually something in me kicked into high gear and my clumsiness went out the window. I stopped caring about what everyone thought. I kept stand-ing up, and pushing myself, over and over.

This was it. This is what made me truly happy. Not just snowboarding, but being outside, in the moun-tains, in the snow. I swore to myself at a young age that I would never let anyone take me away from this. I had confidence. For the first time in my life, there it was, and it felt great. I didn’t want to let go of it. Confidence started to stick to me like glue.

Some seasons would go by and I wouldn’t have a chance or money to make it out to the hills. Rela-tionships came and went and sometimes the person I was with didn’t really understand why I had to get out there “every single weekend”. I guess some people can’t help but compare snowboarding with some airhead surfer dude from Fast Times at Ridge-mont high who was always “searching for some

tasty waves and a cool buzz.” Gnarly.

There were points in my life that I would grow envi-ous of anyone who could go while I sat at home. It started to weigh in that I actually had a hard time being with someone who couldn’t relate, or at least feel the same about something. I started to discover that it’s not just a sport. There is an entire culture associated with snowboarding, and I loved it. It became a passion, and passion is hard enough to come by in life, in relationships, in friendships. So when it is passing by, you have to grab it. I finally began meeting other people who felt the same way.

Some might say I’m silly for feeling so deeply about this thing I do. Two feet, strapped on a board, going down a mountain. What’s the big deal, right?

I call it a diversion from life. It’s in those moments that I’m up there, I can finally see everything for what it is. Decisions become clear and I truly listen to people, and my mind opens up. When I start to feel this, I just want to take it and be a part of it forever, but I think that’s what makes this experi-ence so profound. I cherish every second I can feel that way. The city does not burden me, but I tend to stress quite easily. Nothing can get to me when I’m out there. It’s like putting everything on hold for a few hours.

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Transition: Victoria Diaspora Bring the Sound from the Underground{ Brett Fillmore } likes to write about music{ Jon Mark Wiltshire } likes to take photos

{ Visit } www.transithiphop.com

MC Transit feels a little out of place.

“My scene is definitely the black sheep. I’m confused like a man in a woman’s body. Or maybe I’m more like the gay kid in your Swift Current high school.”

Not your average analogy; not your average rapper. Although already an anomaly in Calgary’s underex-posed hip hop subculture, Transit — one half of the indie-rap outfit Transition — spits a brand of hip hop that would stand unique in any of Canada’s hip hophotbeds, if not the Canadian music industry broadly.

Transit & Dave Wallace

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Space, shaggy haired indie kids can listen to hip hop and actually relate to it.

“There is a want for real hip hop and all we have is T-Pain and stupid club music. We want something non-commercial,” explains Transit.

“With Transition we want to do something differ-ent, not radio hip hop. When we made Nomadic we really tried to be more abstract and more edgy and really look for concepts .We felt like making “Fall”, a ten minute song with a long ambient intro like that. That’s the feel we’re going for.”

Transit may be right. With Scribble Jam indie-rap darlings like Atmosphere and Sage Francis on the cusp of breakthrough, below the radar outfits like Transition may be gaining traction.

“In Indie, fans find a sound and they dig into the blogs and the indie mags and they tell all their American Apparel friends, and I think people are starting to do that with hip hop now,” says Transit. Regardless of success, the chief challenge for Wal-lace and Transit is lasting to see their music bloom. The future for Transition is tenuous. Rigors of the DIY approach are further complicated by the geo-graphical separation of Transition’s members, and the partnership is strained by the difficulties of recording and performing.

“One of us is always waiting around,” says Transit. “But I can’t just drop everything, and neither can Dave.”

The going will be tough, especially for a group whose musical movement is only germinating. Time will tell, but regardless of Transition’s future, their vein of music will have a lot to say concerning the shape of hip hop as it continues to evolve beyond the club anthems and ghetto realities (or fantasies) of thug life to speak to an ever diversifying audi-ence worldwide.

sour apple flavouringhats reese puffspepto bismalthe oceanpeeing outsidesunglasseskitesegg nogstreet lights

music

Transit (aka Dan Bennett) began rapping alongside musician Dave Wallace in the summer of 2007 as a side project to Transit’s award nominate duo, Curb-side Philosophy. The personal relationship dete-riorated between Transit and Curbside`s DJ Home-school Jon, and Curbside Philosophy held their final concert August ‘07. The end of one project gave birth to another, as Wallace and Transit be-came a full time partnership, dubbing themselves Transition. Wallace plays ying to Transit’s yang, his churning soundscapes creating a backdrop for Transit’s unconventional MC prowess.

Natives of Victoria, British Columbia, Transit has since moved to Calgary to pursue post-secondary, while Wallace stayed back on the Island to pursue a dream of full-time studio work. Wallace and Tran-sit send compositions back and forth through email and record when Transit flies back to the coast on school breaks.

“Yeah, at Christmastime I went back to Victoria and we would put in eleven hour days in the studio” re-calls Transit. The fruit of their labours is their bril-liant debut album Nomadic, thus named for Transit’s newfound roving ways.

If rappers like Talib Kweli and Lupe Fiasco are alter-native and hip hop acts like The Cool Kids and The Knux are underground, then Transition is subterra-nean —flowing along music’s mantle unhindered by the fault lines of genres and categories.

“I guess we’re hip hop because we’re rap under a beat,” reasons Transit. “Hip hop is usually just a piano loop with a couple snares but Dave brings a lot of different elements together.”

Wallace, Transition’s mixing board wizard, and in-strumentalist extraordinaire spills timbres and textures decidedly foreign in most realms of rap. Samples and bass lines take a back seat to chiming synths, throbbing keyboards, and ambient guitar washes. Likewise, Transit’s lyrical and stylistic tone ventures far from the shopworn clichés of traditional hardcore rap. In place of boastful inner city slang delivered with a snarl, Transit broods and yearns, showing a vulnerable and introspective quality that emerges all too rarely in the hip hop scene. As such, much of Transition’s appeal lies in their unpretentious earnestness. Nomadic courses through themes of young love, spirituality, fading memories, and self doubt: the aching uncertainties that loom when tip-toeing through the minefield of young adult hood. Granted, such lyrical matter sounds like the familiar trappings of emo fanfare, but in rap—often the land of explicit and narcissis-tic gangsta hyperbole—Transit’s honest personal truths are a cool breeze amid the firefight. But

Transit doesn’t see his lyrics as anything new; it’s just a difference in style.

“It’s like, in the studio, you can’t talk about break-ups or God. It’s about ‘keeping it real’ or something. But original hip hop is not flexing, it’s not about how cool you are. Real hip hop is about saying what you feel,” says Transit.

For him, today’s burley and bullet-ridden image of rap skews the original spirit of the movement, and he’s not worried about fitting that image.

“Rap started as ‘Rhythm And Poetry’. It was about sharing what you feel, so, the most hip hop thing you can do is not caring what other people say. Public Enemy didn’t care what people think.”

This is hip hop with indie rock sensibility; or, per-haps, it’s electronic indie with rap aesthetics. Either way, it’s the sound all the post-punk hipsters have been waiting for. Finally, we gasp, a rapper whose headphones blare Bright Eyes and Stars alongside Jay-Z and Lil’ Wayne. Indeed, Transition’s verses name-drop such alt-icons as Damien Rice and Post-al Service, not to mention an epic track-long tribute to Death Cab for Cutie (entitled “Brothers”).

“I listen to bands like Death Cab more than I listen to hip hop. It’s more lyrical, more passionate, more emotional. A guy like Conor Oberst, he sounds like he’s about to cry every song. I admire the feeling he puts into his music,” Transit confesses.

Transition tether these tendencies to their own music, exhibiting a heartache and candour that make Nomadic accessible, affecting, and uniquely appealing. Regardless, Transit just sees two guys being themselves.

“I’m from Victoria I’m not going to act like I’m Snoop Dogg or talk about drive bys.”

Hailing from the plush surroundings of Strawberry Vale and Lambrick Park in picturesque corners of Victoria, Transition are middle-class everymen and see no reason to present any facades.

“No matter what, people respect you if you can flow and rhyme. If you live in Victoria you don’t live in the ghetto. You can’t rap like you’re from the ghet-to. No one will listen to it.” Transition remain unsigned, and admit they re-main a tad unpolished. Slowly but steadily, though, Transition’s feel is connecting. Gigs for Transit and Dave are rare, but when they happen the crowd is laden with black rimmed glasses and skinny jeans. Instead of feeling like Michael Bolton a la Office

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Come dancing with me in your golden slippers, past houses and buildings that are made of Jacks, see the queen whose crown was stolen from right off her head. Read love letters and confessions spilt out onto walls. Gaze at the moon while he watches sleeplessly over the night. Be carried to a far away world where mountains are made out of ice-cream and to carnivals where magic tricks are performed for the puppets. Listen to the music that is being played and follow it to a place where romance is bound to be found, discovered and unlocked.

{ Elise Trickey } likes to laugh, create and dream

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art

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This body of work is a collection of found materials and differ-ent mediums: watercolourlacefabrictuelbeadsgold leafacrylic paintinkpapersplaying cards

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For the past two years, Elise has been for-mally studying visual arts in her hometown of Sydney, Australia and has embarked on a journey of discovering what she wants her art to communicate to people. She believes art is meant to teach, challenge, cause minds to think and change. Her inspiration for this body of work include The Beatles, Alice in Wonder-land, love, romance, fairy tales, Amelie, Paris, Florence Broadhurst, carnivals and beauty.

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d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e

d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e

d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e

d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d ed e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e d e

photo essay

{ Serezha Komarov } likes to capture the beauty of her country{ Visit } www.prelost.livejournal.com

“and the world around me shone with gold and silver so beautiful...”

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Winter is really special and beautiful time in Rus-sia. Most people living in big cities find it very dull and ugly. If you want to find the real Russian winter you should escape the town.

Winter is cold, snow, vodka, medved (bear), Ded Moroz (santa claus), New Year, snow flakes. Winter is fairy-tales, winter is grandpa and grandma in the country house. It is strawberry jams. Wool socks.

Winter is childhood.

These photos were made in a very special morning. The sun was so bright, no clouds, the cold was so

strong. And everything, grass, houses, trees, were covered with special snow.

It wasn’t real snow that falls from the sky. It was snow that due to the cold weather grew on every-thing around. The world around me shone with gold and silver so beautiful, I tried to capture it with my camera. These pictures can’t show the full atmo-sphere, it was absolutely unreal.

So hello, dear everybody, my name is Serezha Komarov. I’m and artist from Moscow.

I’m a cinema producer with education, but my

real work is photography.

I’m interested in modern, conceptual photog-raphy, no matter the genre - portrait, archi-tecture, travel, psychological, documental.

My main principle - is to do my work and be honest with you and with myself.

I love beauty and fashion, not in a trendy way, but in more philosophical and fundamental, the beauty of human and nature - this is my point of view.

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photo essay

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thoughts

Anytime I make a record, it’s followed by a painting period. It’s good crop rotation. I keep the creative juices going by switching from one to the other, so that when the music or the writing dries up, I paint. You rest the ear awhile, and you rest the inner mind, because poetry takes a lot of plumbing the inner depths. I mean, the way I write anyway, it takes a lot of meditation. Without the painting to clear the head, I don’t think I could do it. - Joni Mitchell

ad•dic•tion – nounthe state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma.

I am an addict. I love – no NEED – to make things, always have, always will, as it is the essence of my chemical makeup. I blame my Mother. She was al-ways doing artsy things: drawing, painting, sculpt-ing and involving us pre-school kids in one project or another: sketching of a bowl of fruit, paint-by-numbers or sculpting an object d’art in clay – any-thing to keep us quiet and occupied. Those were happy times, peaceful times, wrapped an atmo-sphere of quiet meditation as we created our art, mainly to please Mother – too young to understand

Not too long ago, I began to find my golden heart becoming concentrated. It was molded tighter and tighter by the subtle realization that curiously venturing down other creative avenues without feeling repentant was just what I had always been searching for.

I roamed the desert sand of creativity day after day, even weeks at time, searching for who and what I thought I lacked. My beaten suede boots were worn in with incontinence and laced with worry of what I was to come up with... and more and more as I stomped along the sand in the chill of the moonlight, the solutions to my epic search became further from reach.

The desert sand was bottomless for me, though

shallow and superficial for others. I reached the edge of the desert, nearly able to touch the white Celestial body surrounded by stars, when all of a sudden I began to fall from imagination, but then woke inside reality.

I was searching for a fragment of hope in the shell-abandoned sand that the truth I was seeking was only a revolution of methods in dealing with the concealed feats of my never ending hunt.

I began to develop thoughts of dejection when staring at the canvas blank, looking for something that just didn’t loom.

After encountering my realizations that everything was okay even when it was all falling out of place, I inverted myself to wander the seashores once again, frequently loosing myself in time.

I gazed past the fact I was sinking away in time, but really my thoughts of needing to ‘be’ became completely irrelevant. I felt the chains around my captive mind loosen and slip away, and then all of a sudden cultivated something wonderful: compas-sion towards my own skill became visible and by dawn, I was flourishing in something new.

The energies I had been wasting on thoughts to harvest the most wonderful plans that were not flowing, now were focused on new travels of a va-grant mind.

While Erin is most notably known as a street-wear designer in Calgary, taking notes from Joni Mitchell she rotates her creative crops with photography, painting, drawing and jewelry design.

Art Addiction{ Chris Chomick } likes to create dolls and other magnificent things

the warm feeling of contentment that comes from creating something out of nothing. I only knew it felt good and wanted more. Unaware of my growing ob-session, Mother innocently introduced a book of children’s crafts to the cabal; soon the tactile feeling of sock puppets and the new skill of sewing replaced the waxy odor of crayoned paper dolls.

Fifty-years later I am hooked, but since my addiction involves items found in your local “socially acceptable” craft store (and such lovely, shiny treasures they are) there is no escape from the artsy-craftsy monkey on my back. There have been periods of time the impulse to make things ceased leading to withdrawal symptoms, mainly depression, anxiety and an “itchy” sensation in my fingers, needing to be doing something and feeling lost without a creative outlet. What a pleasure when the dry spell ends! However, the insatiable need to cre-ate begins driven by fear that this creative spell too shall end. Panic ensues, the madness extending into the early hours, day-after-day, until pure exhaus-tion forces the body to rest, to replenish and start again. This compulsively occupied condition continues until this frenzied obsession takes on a gentle flow, fully immersed in creating, feeling energized, focused – you have now entered “the zone” – and memories of childhood contentment.

Desert Wandering{ Erin Williams } likes to play her thoughts like a mixtape

{ Visit } www.chomickmeder.com

{ Visit } www.buildaboy.org

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photo essay

To grow or not to grow, that is the question.

At least for the majority of post-pubescent men capable of sprouting hair on their upper lip. Never personally faced with such a decision (as I’ve been told that shaving my legs is one of the those non-negotiable things in life), I can only imagine the variables considered in the verdict reaching process of whether or not to shave the most recognisably distinguishable part of the human body.

The question I might ask someone to help them decide whether or not to grow a moustache first and foremost is, are you in a band? If so, do you play the guitar? If you play in a band, and especially if you play the guitar, you should grow a moustache. Your band will most likely be more successful if you have a moustache for at least a short period of time. Another question I might ask someone is, do you like girls? If so, do you want to date a girl? If you like girls and you want to date one, you should grow a moustache. I’m not saying it will automatically make up for character flaws like poor communication skills or commitment phobia and get you a guaranteed girlfriend. I’m just saying it would help.

To me, the moustache is a thing of mystery. The effect it has on me is subcon-

MoustacheMusings{ Liz Field } likes to write love notes

{ Nicole Irene Dyck } likes to take photos of facial hair

scious, but somehow the grower of the moustache immediately gains some sort of enigmatic quality. Thoughts flurry through the hidden parts of my mind: what are you hiding under there? If you can grow a moustache, what else can you do? And why is it that a man that can grow a thick, full moustache is thought of as more of a man? I know that it’s not the hair on a man’s upper lip that makes him a man, but I still find myself secretly impressed with it. Even if the man didn’t currently have a moustache but I still knew he could grow one if he wanted to, that he had that weapon in his arsenal of abilities, I would still be impressed.

Back hair on the other hand has the complete op-posite effect. But that is another story.

Did you know?While the exact origin of the word ‘moustache’ is unknown, it can most likely be traced back to the Hellenistic Greek word ‘mullon’ – ‘lip’ in English.

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create your very own moustache!

All you have to do it cut it out! Apply it to your nose.

Moustachein other languages

Czech: knír Danish: overskæg Dutch: snor Estonian: vuntsid Finnish: viikset French: moustache German: der Schnurrbart Hungarian: bajusz Icelandic: yfirskegg

Indonesian: kumis Italian: baffiPortuguese: bigode Romanian: musta†ä Russian: ycblSlovak: fúzy Slovenian: brki Spanish: bigote Swedish: mustasch

{ Visit } www.nicoleirenephoto.com

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thoughts

Destination Ego * Pack Lightly{ Kevin Chapman } likes to write and explore the world

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* To move forward, to travel, requires we let go of whatever we might be holding onto.It’s the third flight in and you can’t help but notice that with each layover you have become more of a visible minority. The previous urge to get off the plane you reluctantly familiarized yourself with now becomes questionable. You’re arriving at a place you know nothing about and the only attachment to home you have left is the uncomfortable plane seat. Besides your carry-on luggage, the only thing you’re holding is a set of preconceived ideas. And the journey begins…

Walking off that plane into a country you’ve never experienced awakens the human sensory experi-ence we so often let go of in daily routine. Smell always being the most genuine yet subtle. Ears are subject to hearsay and eyes are easily distracted but smell keeps the experience honest; you’ve never experienced a place until you’ve smelt it. Smell alone can formulate thousands of thoughts, at-tributions, and criticisms within moments. It’s the most obvious prelude to any trip, realizing the potential of an experience without any comprehen-sion of the environment.

To some degree we try controlling the variables: an mp3 player in the ears blasting tunes, a set of pre-

determined internal guiding principles and a loose itinerary. Whatever they may be, they’re in place to create a reassurance that things will go according to plan; even if the plan is chaos. But these are con-cepts brought from home. They are ideas and influ-encing thoughts that, in some way, are supposed to act as vehicles for change; assuming change occurs within our anticipated terms.

To an extent, we get the desired outcome: spicy goat meat, muggy jungle air, bizarre hospital-ity and gifts from endless markets rife with that special cultural representation in the form of in-cense holders and textile woven journals. The ex-pectation is met. But is this the reason to travel, to merely fulfill an expectation? The realization of such fulfillment is contradictory; it robs the trav-eler’s sense of discovery. The deliverance of such a hollow mandate does not take long to find and some backpackers contrive to stay within their comfort-able parameters. The race to security and comfort is won. But is it truly rewarding? Or can something else exist?

The true reward of travel is humility; the more people and places you come across the more appar-

ent it becomes how little you know about the world. It’s humility that a backpacker travels toward. It’s harder to confront than the tout eyeballing your wallet or the pushy tourist seething hate at the free-map kiosk. It means surrendering what you thought you knew to know nothing at all, but keep-ing the confidence to push ahead and keep learning, loving, and living.

To move forward, to travel, requires we let go of whatever we might be holding onto. In this way, travelling offers a unique opportunity to realize how firmly we grip the constructed self and how it inhibits the ability to adapt. It demonstrates the possibility to arrive and exist in a place while never really leaving where we came from. 19th cen-tury transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the Stern Fact, the Sad Self, unrelent-ing, identical, that I fled from.”

We count on interactions with people and places to shape an experience, yet the surrendering of self is what ultimately produces the desired change. This theme flows constant through life and is a deter-mining reason to travel; whether we realize it or not. Just as a river is to a dam, cultural experience is to the backpacker. The dam determines how long it will hold back the river. At what point do you let the culture move through and empower you?

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travel

Switching Up the routine{ Kyle Holloway } loves jet-setting and taking photos

{ Visit } www.pausedphotography.com

What are you up to this weekend?

If you would have asked me this question seven months ago, I would have given you the exact same response week after week. Same bars. Same pubs. Same people.

My life was routine and predictable: Monday to Friday I would wake up, drive to work before the sun came up and drive home from work after the sun had gone down. The pay was more than enough, but it was monotonous and unfulfilling. I’ve had the same address my entire life. At twenty-three I had never been out of the country or further east than Manitoba. I felt I was going nowhere and that my life experience was starting to plateau. One morn-ing while I was lacing up my steel toed work boots and getting ready for another 12 hour day in a dusty warehouse, I realized something had to change.

I quit my full time job, got a “less responsible” and more flexible part-time job. Soon after, I started planning a trip to the Big Apple. New York, New York. Something clicked and I felt like I was start-ing to make up for lost time.

The smallest details about new places made me re-alize I was missing out by playing it safe and living in the familiar.

For once in my life, I wasn’t sure where I had to go and nothing looked household. It forced me to look up, look around, look at signs and as a result, really absorb my surroundings rather than just walk though them. In a five hour plane ride, I went from watching movies and listening to songs about drinking in Soho or life in Manhattan to actually experiencing it. I saw a New York Yankees game in the last year of the original Yankee stadium. In four days I experienced more than I would have in four months at home. Before I got back, I was already planning my next trip.

The next week I left work and hopped on a plane to Vancouver to check out a cool bar I heard about. I can tell people first hand that 6 Acres is worth checking out for some great beer, different music, cool people and even different language tutorials playing in the washrooms. I walked down East Hastings to see what everybody warned me about and told me to stay away from. I swam in the ocean and got a sunburn.

I was hooked. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to control myself and that any excuse would do for me to travel somewhere, anywhere. Lucky for me, I was never short for a reason or an excuse to get away. If I wasn’t working, I wasn’t home.

Soon after my Vancouver trip, my good friend was looking for some material for her brides-maid dresses and wasn’t having any luck. This was as good a reason as any to take a trip. I told her if she couldn’t find it in a week, we would go to NYC to pick it up and have a good time while we were there. A week later, we were both on a plane on a mission for the perfect fabric. We ended up at a fabric store called Mood. You might remember it from Project Runway. It’s also a place Diddy likes to pick up material for his latest designs. Needless to say, those brides-maids dresses have a little bit more of a background story than most.

My addiction was full blown now. Multiple trips to Hawaii had me lounging on the beach and meeting locals who were more than willing to show me Ha-waiian life beyond the tourist attractions. I know the thrill of surfing and the pain of my crashes and

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bails. Shooting honeymoon photos for a friend on the beaches of Waikiki cap-tured memories for them and remarkable material for my portfolio. While I was there my life was anything but mundane and generic.

A trip to Montreal had me eating real poutine and smoked meat sandwiches for four days straight. I was able to watch a Montreal Canadians hockey game at the Bell Centre during their historic 100th season - the kind of thing I’ll be able to tell my grandchildren about. Though another quick stint, it provided me with a cultural experience foreign to my own and gave me perspective on how I was living my life. I realized that the repetition of my previous routine didn’t determine who I was, and the fear of living a boring life void of adventure began to subside.

When I got back from Montreal, somebody asked me where I was going to be watching the UFC 94 fight between the Montreal native George St. Pierre and the Hawaiian native BJ Penn. They were asking what bar I’d be watching it in, but without hesitation I responded “maybe I will go to Vegas and watch it live in person.” Having visited both fighters’ hometowns, what better way to show appreciation for their way of life than joining them in person in Las Vegas, right? My family surprised me with two tickets to the most anticipated sold out fight in UFC history. Instead of watching the fight with my friends at the same old pub, I was in the audience and they were trying to spot me on TV.

My most recent trip took me to Mazatlan, Mexico showed me how fortunate I am. I went with a tight budget and expected a lifestyle of extreme mini-malism while I was there. But my limited funds did anything but limit my near celebrity experience. Even the over-priced tourist retailers were more than affordable. Perspective hit me one night swim-ming in the ocean after being out on the town that made me step back and look at a bigger picture of my life. If you’ve ever questioned the path you’re on and wondered if it was supposed to be different, I recommend doing the opposite of thinking about it. Experience it first hand instead of watching an-other opportunity pass you by.

And if you’re thinking I’m some spoiled rich kid who can just fly wherever he wants, whenever he wants, I’m anything but. I just got a job in the right indus-try. Working for an airline might not line my pock-ets like some jobs, but I get extreme discounts any-where they fly. No steel toed boots required.

When Kyle isn’t working or hopping flights, he’s taking photos. Visit page { 5 } to see more of what he likes & loves.

Previous page:

Airplane. This

page (clockwise

from top): Boat,

New York & Taxi.

“While I was there my life was anything but mundane and generic.”

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* Last time we left awkward, dungeons and drag ons loving Ben, he was in the back of Tim Hor tons with Geisy, the potty-mouth cook...

ben: Chapter 2{ Dalyce Chomick } likes to write, sing & play with feathers

{ Shane Yuhas } loves to take photos of juicy tomatoes

{ 2� }

“Smoke Pot?”“What?”“Marijuana, hash, Acapulco gold, maryjane, whacky weed, boo-boo bama, fuma D’Angola, northern lights, ganjah, cheeba, Rasta weed, pocket rocket, Dona Juana, Sweet Lucy, boom berries, 420…”

I knew long before Geisey finished the word Mari-juana that he was talking about weed – “grass” if you will. I was just curious to see how long he could go. Like I said, I don’t like awkward small talk. And I really hate this job, so all the time I can waste here in the back means less time with Gary in the front.

“Aaa, not really.”“How about your meet me after work and I’ll give you a taste of some of the sweetest f*** zigzag man you’ll ever have. My bro got me some straight s*** from the Isle of Tokin-A. F*** yea.”

Then he grabbed his junk and stuck his tongue out. It was weird.

I doubted very much that it was his actual brother. I watch a lot of prison break, I know his type - they call every person they have something in common with “Bro.” And I’ve never heard of the Isle of Tokin-A, unless he’s talking about J.R.R. Tolkien, then I’m lost. My mother always warned me about drugs and how if you are even around people who do drugs you could become addicted.

I remember in fifth grade my best friend started smoking cigarettes and I told him I couldn’t be friends with him anymore because I didn’t want to become a junkie and have to live on the streets. He got mad at me and pushed me over. I fell to the ground and decided to fire back with a swift punch to the groin. He to fell to the ground, but not be-fore his cigarette flew out from between his index and middle finger, landing on the top of my right eyebrow. I now have a scar, and some of my eye-brow never grew back. My mom said she was proud of me for standing up for myself and that the scar on my face is a daily reminder to me of the difficult choices I’ll have to make in life.

If I could, I would have punched her in the crotch, but it wouldn’t have had the same affect on her as it did on Danny. Oh, and just so you aren’t think-ing about Danny for the rest of our time together, he kept smoking through grade 5 and 6 and then stopped once he reached grade 7 because he start-ed playing basketball. Now he’s the star forward of the senior varsity team at school. He dated Claire

last year, it’s rumored that he popped her cherry. I sometimes go to his games and stand in the back by the trashcan and janitor. I secretly cheer for him in my head. He was my best friend once - this is how I rationalize my depressing actions.

I guess mothers aren’t right about everything…he never became addicted to anything, unless you call a daily dose of high school girls throwing their pannies at him and praises from his adoring fans and general public an addiction. Like, he wasn’t about to call up Betty Ford and make a coffee date or anything (unless she was like a 5’8-big boob’d- blond -legs for days-cheer leader or pin-up girl (with non-specific traits)). So, no more questions about Danny, ok?

“I can’t today.” I grabbed one-multigrain bagel and spun around on my heels out the flip doors.

“Did you just grab that bagel with your bare hands?” Gary was back.“Um.”“Its been contaminated. Just throw it out and get back to the bagel counter. The tomatoes need to be cut ½ an inch thick, ok. Half – an – inch – thick - here let me show you.”

He spoke to me as if I were an ESL student from Ko-rea or something. It’s demeaning for someone with his general knowledge of life and god awful adult acne to speak to me like that. And then for him to take 3 minutes out of my day to correctly show me how to cut tomatoes into ½ inch slices - I felt like an 8 year old, I felt like a child (get me my ruler… I’ll measure something on you Gary that’s only ½ inch long…).

“Oh and we’ll dock you for that bagel too.”Geisey is right, Gary is a F*** tool.

I looked around the shop. Claire was gone, even her smell had left the shop and was now only a dis-tant memory to me. I’d eat her hair if it wouldn’t make me choke and die like my childhood cat, Gimli. I found him dead one morning on my way out the door to a scouts meeting - fatal hairball. He was an obsessive groomer; parts of his back had gone completely bald. The vet said it was because of stress. I don’t know what Gimli had to be stressed about, he’s a cat after all.

I think the stress started after his lover died due to a car related incident, when my dad was leav-ing late for work and didn’t see her sleeping on

the drive way. It was messy, and I vomited into my mom’s Nierembergia bushes. Gimli came run-ning out the door with me. He took one look at the carnage on the driveway and ran off into our back yard. We didn’t see him for two weeks. But he came back with half his tail missing and a limp. He use to sit on my dad’s lap after dinner while he would watch the news and ‘2 & ½ men.’ He’d purr and my dad would pet him. But after the incident and his two week disappearance, he won’t even look my dad in the eye. Instead, he’ll just groom and stare out the window.

In the end, I don’t think it’s the hair that got him. I think he died of a broken heart. Much like Johnny Cash over what’s her name, Reese Whiterspoon. But I would never say that out loud, it sounds like something Jewel would sing about. Not that ever I listened to Jewel either.

Once finished cutting probably 15 tomatoes into ½ inch thick slices Gary told me, after glaring me down for cutting too many ½ inch thick slices, that I could go on my break. It’s my first day, what does a 17 year-old bageler do on his coffee break? I’ve never even tried coffee, so the term ‘coffee break’ felt a little foreign to me.

So that’s what I did…I mean the break is labeled ‘coffee break’ after all. So I should probably keep up the appearance that I am indeed on a coffee break. If asked by fellow employees or the tool known as Gary, I will simply say, whilst pointing at my mug of hot coffee – “I’m on my Coffee break.” I might even say it in a British accent. I might even wink. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.

So I went up to Candace at the till. I threw down my toonie and said in the deepest voice I could muster, “One Extra L---AR-----ge cup of coffee.” I threw in a wink at the end there for effect. I saw it in an old James Dean film, but he got a better reaction then I did.

She rolled her eyes, and then walked away to make up my first cup of coffee. She returned with what I think might have been a liter of coffee, but only after she bumped into Geisey (who had just been standing there staring her up and down for the last 7 minutes), she probably scolded her hands on the over flow of coffee that poured over the sides post-collision. She was annoyed slamming the cof-fee down on the counter (pouring more over the sides) and shaking her hands to cool the blistering wounds that were sure to ensue.

short story

“He fell to the ground, but not before his cigarette flew out from between his index finger, landing on the top of my right eyebrow.”

{ 2� }

Before you knew him, you knew his hands. Child-sized, they moved across the grin of the piano, a tiny dentist choosing which tooth to pull. His feet un-able to touch the ground, the toes of his slick, black shoes pumped the sustain pedal anyway. From your mother’s lap, your televi-sion showed you how fast a child’s body could move. You thought of the slow loops of your own left hand as it spelled your name, house, cat, red.

“Really? I think he’s kind of cute. Shy, maybe.”“Nah. He just uses the cuteness to get away with the prickness.”“I don’t think that’s a word.” “Does that matter?”“Hmm…”

Your girlfriend leaves the party without you on the thick arm of a linebacker with mustard stains on his tight, white t-shirt and, somehow, his elbow. You wish he could lick it off and, like the myth, be turned into a woman, his thighs lonely and empty as your own.

Across the room, the prodigy sits on a bookshelf next to two fanged Venus flytraps and the girl from your Psychology 1000 class, who wears tight tank tops with words like Cutie, Princess, and Trouble stretched across her breasts. He’s bored by her and when he sees you watching, he lays the back of his right hand on his leg and lifts it into a discreet, four-fingered wave. You interrupt Princess Tank Top with a clear of your throat and turn to him.

“Sorry, I’ve been informed that there’s a dip emer-gency. We need your help.”

He blinks at you and then the girl and scoots to the door. When he looks back, you follow him. Without a second thought, you leave your jacket and shoes behind.

“Do you still play?”“Piano?”“Yeah.”“Yeah. I try.”

You laugh out loud. You think, Oh, you modest stud. You musical genius. Even as you walk beside him, the cool pavement under your nylon covered feet, you imagine him as he lays you over a tar-black piano bench, clean and unmarked by fingerprints or smudges. He kneels beside you, your body raised off the floor like a ritual. His hands hover above the sweet opaline buttons of your floral dress. And

The talk show host yelled, “Ah-maze-zinnnngggg” through her toilet-seat-white teeth. The g’s rung out in the back of your mouth like undescended molars and those small hands and their neat mother-cut nails drummed their fingertips along your ribcage.

“Amazing,” you whispered to your mother, her soft fleshy arms tight around your chest.“Mmm,” she replied.

But you catch up, your left hand loops around four syllable words, around cursive like a tongue around rolled r’s. You talk and motion with your hands which have grown into women’s hands, long-boned and peach. They write exams in high school, admission forms to colleges, and wind up tangled in some boy’s hair, in some dorm room in the dark. And at some party, you meet him, the child prodigy, with those hands jammed deep in his pockets. Of course you don’t recognize him at first; his legs have stretched underneath his faded jeans, his face half-masked by a dip of blonde hair across his eyes. It’s been 12 years since you watched his hands grapevine across the keys far from your wood paneled living room, your mother’s warm, familiar lap. But when you are finally introduced and he reaches from his pocket with those perfect hands, you remember.

“I know you.”“Oh.”“I watched you on TV when I was younger. You’re the child prodigy. The pianist.”“Oh, yeah. Sort of.”“Sort of?”“Well, I’m not a child anymore.”

It doesn’t go much further than this; he’s shy, sticks to one corner of the room and people migrate to and from him. But you watch him from across the room with a girlfriend. You hear her become bored with this game: the stare, the look away, the quick glance, repeat.

“He’s a prick. Seems pretentious.”

Prodigy{ Jessie Jones } loves to write while living on an island

{ 29 }

short story

with movements only a prodigy can master, he rolls those perfect fingers on those perfect hands down your body, undoes buttons with a quick gentleness, a preciseness that leaves them loose but intact. He moves into the lower regis-ter of your body, peels off the nylons, moves from middle C to the lowest notes of your toes, the notes no one has ever sung. He slides back across your body, into the higher, oh, the higher notes. He trills his fingers along in the top keys, untangles your hair from a messy bun, and spills it over the end of the bench in the swift sweep of a triplet. His fingers tiptoe from freckles to moles, touch scars like darker minor keys. And then the ritardando: he lingers on the mouth, the eyelids, the shoulders, the neck, and down and down and down.

“I could play for you sometime.” He brings you out of the daydream with his low voice, shuffled footsteps.“I’d like that.”“We could do it now.”“Now? Where?”

You don’t care. If it was in Mozambique, you’d follow him.

He takes you to a small performance hall on campus. Outside the door, he nods at a janitor with bright yellow headphones, who does not see him or pretends not to and continues to mop. The walls, ceiling, floor, and stage have all been painted black and before he turns the lights on, you stand in the dark and try to call back the achy goodness you felt when his imaginary hands were a restless pulse over your body.

He flicks on one set of lights that illuminate a baby grand in the middle of the stage. You stay where you are in the black theatre as he moves towards the glossy piano as if it were a beautiful woman. There are no chairs to sit on, so you stand and wait for the sound, ski your feet back and forth across the slick, pitch floor.

He sits down at the bench and you almost expect him to flip invisible coat tails behind him. He doesn’t, but when he overturns the cover, he waits with his hands suspended over the glitter of the keys. You can’t see his face, tucked be-hind the blonde fan of hair so you watch his hands instead. The fingers stretch from bulbed knuckles and the first sound you hear in the still room is the low hum of the piano as he rests his fingers on six keys. You twist the hem of your dress, nervous and afraid to make a sound. The prodigy slumps over the keys close enough for them to hear him whisper.

It starts slow; those great hands wander through the middle and lower reg-ister as if on a search for something they‘ve lost. You close your eyes and listen and though you know very little about music, you hear the hesitation in those hands, those beautiful hands. Each struck note is a question; they pile

up on one another with no answer. You recall what his hands looked like as a child, easy and comfort-able under a spotlight, how each ear listened for an error, how simple he made flawless seem.

And then the hands stumble, tighten, stop, try again. But they are stuck in the movement of mis-take. Suddenly, they are normal; they are not the hands of the prodigy. He replays the three bars over and over until finally, he moves past them. As he finishes, his hands wait on the keys; the notes fade and fade until they are only a buzz.

You walk toward him onstage, leave damp stocking footprints behind you. He doesn’t move except for the inflating and deflating of his chest under that navy sweater. His spine curves into the hunched shoulders, the hung head. Once onstage, you stand behind him and watch him bow before this great grinned instrument. Your hands hover over the rounds of his shoulders and as he inhales they brush your fingertips. You pull his shoulders back gently and the spine straightens, then you slip your hand under his chin and raise it. He takes his hands from the piano and lays them in his lap, palm up and limp. You reach over his shoulders and lace your own fingers through his. They feel like other boys’ hands you’ve held, maybe softer and larger than you expected them to be. He doesn’t speak, continues to breathe and wait.

You lift those hands to your face; his arms pulled up over his head and bowed into a diamond. All along the back of his hands, you move your face, rub a cheek into one, brush your lips against the other. You kiss each pinched knuckle, rough cuticle and smooth-boned fingernail. You imagine those small hands wearing this man’s like ill-fitting gloves; you’d swear to feel them in there somewhere, hum-ming like the heart of a mouse. You kiss each bone, love each blue vein as if it were his, that boy’s. And as the man on the bench cries, you mouth into the hands, Come back.

{ 30 }

my place

{ red room }a room to wonder * a room to hide * floor boards that pound one creak into another * walls absorbing half-written songs * it is a place * a place to calm the quiet * a place to stir the loud * it’s a 17th century promenade * a ballroom of gowns * a hall of mirrors * it’s a place in love * its a place in time * it is a room that slightly whispers... “get in here” *

{ Kendra Fode } loves to find vintage lightswitch plates

Where is your favorite place?

Do you have a spot you go to think?

Where you can sing at the top of

your lungs? A room you feel safe

to dream and create inside? A loc-

ation you’ve made your very own?

A secret hideout? Is it indoors or

outdoors? Send us a photo and

short description of what your

place means to you.

Email: info@welikewelove.com,

Subject: My Place

{ 31 }

wlwlcall for submissions

email: liz@welikewelove.com

Deadline for summer issue:June 12th, 2009

photo by { Darby Magill }

{ 32 }

{ Darby Magill } likes to shoot with her toy cameras{ Visit } www.darbymagill.com

Our mantra this issue is: { love what you like }It is simple. Write it on your hand. Put it on your fridge.Don’t forget it.