Low Looks Back

So many moments, some little, some big, some laughable, and some even stung like a bugger.

Year Defining statements:

So many things read, heard, screamed, whispered, and of course discovered. Here are but a few:

"Salad on a stick"

"We're just friends."

"One day you'll just be walking along, and you're going to have this most amazing feeling, and you're gonna go like 'Oh my God!' and and it's going to be amazing"

"I think I might be your biggest fan."

You are what you love, not what loves you.
- adaptation

Night and day were no more than relative terms
- from Paul Auster's New York trilogy

"I'll get what I want."

"On Three, Jump!"

Trying to find Chinatown!
from Joe Jackson, Chinatown

"Gay Boys Smell Nice"

Now don't mind me, it's just that,
vipers define me and I never thought
it'd be this way.
from Certain things you ought to know by Destroyer

Sadly, sadly, the sun rose; it rose upon no sadder sight than the man of good abilities and good emotions, incapable of their directed exercise, incapable of his own help and his own happiness, sensible of the blight on him, and resigning himself to let it eat him away.
-- Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

I woke up from a nightmare this morning. Funny how dreams and reality seem indistinguishable lately. I know it will come true, soon.
- Low's - July 15th 2004

"Yeah, the Sandbar is good, lots of targets."

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...
-Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

Love, love will tear us apart again.
- Joy Division, Love Will Tear Us Apart

If we're lost, then we are lost together.
- Blue Rodeo, Lost Together

"Hope you're ok..."

Year Defining Moments

Just a few that stand out among the best, and well, a few of the worst too:

-Yah!-Smoking weed in the dressing room at a fashion show, nude models all around in a state of undress, but I was, ahem, too busy to notice.

-Uhh!- Seeing my little one cry in the kitchen.

-Yah!- Stumbling up Park Ave, very drunk, and seeing the Empire State Building at 430 in the morning on my first night in Manhattan.

-Yah!- Making out with the lovely Piper, from Boston, on a garden patio at a night club in the west village.

-Yah!- Having Drinks with Veronica, from Brooklyn, in an east village pub.

-Yah!- The Mad Hatter Party on May 23rd, was a rowdy evening that set the stage for the rest of the summer.

-Yah!- Seeing the Yankees in the Bronx.

-Uhh!- An infiltration of privacy, sanctity, and the most perverse sense of friendship played out over the year, and coming in part from an entity we used to make fun of on TV, and laugh about. Now that really is sad.

-Undecided!-Flying over the Gate Bridge on my way to a ferry with a borrowed black sports coupe, the sunroof open, SOSO playing on the stereo, blue skies above, fist in the air, and tears in the corners of my eyes.

-Uhh!- Celebrating a Birthday without the guest of honour one afternoon on the beach in July. We shared some McDonald's and tried not to miss her too much.

-Yah!- Reading Dickens in the heat of the summer sun, and taking most of the summer to finish it.

-Yah!- An Xmas morning that most married men would kill for. If I told you, you wouldn't believe me.

-Yah!- Taking part in a new media art show at a gallery downtown, curated by a nice chap 10yrs my junior.

-Uhh!- My attempts at a party on Canada day was an absolute disaster when an hour before guests were to arrive I decided to develop the flu. I hosted most of the evening with a fever, and said some very odd things.

-Uhh!- Lying on the floor of the city hospital in mind bending, reality removing pain. The lovely nurses decided to punish me with a late admission to a bed on their obvious assumption that I was a drug user.

-Yah!-Watching the Saddest Music in the World on a hot sunny afternoon with Leroy and McHardy, and then drinking Maudite for the next 6 hours at a small roadside cafe.

-Uhh!- The passing of K, the towing of the K car, and finally weeping in Winnipeg, alone.

-Uhh!- Missed a wedding in Alberta.

-Yah!- Seeing The Dears in Winnipeg, at a bar that held much history.

-Uhh!- Trying to be the good guy, renting a truck, smashing it up, and then losing it all in the end.

-Yah!- Swarm, a festival for artist run culture spawned four days of partying I won't soon forget.

-Yah!- Victory day, we sat outside and watched some of the best bands in the hometown rock out under a harvest sunset. Saying good bye to the summer never sounded so good.

-Yah!-Playing my first rehearsal in a band that I had been invited to be in, on my birthday in a Chinatown jamspace.

On January 3rd, Low's will be one year old. Whithin that short space of time Low's has gone from an experiment to see if anyone would read a blog by a guy, a patehtic tool of passive aggressive behaviour, and a sounding board for difficult periods in one man's life, however trivial they may seem. One thing has remained constant though, I think, and that is the investigation of ones sense of self through the culture of the masses. Pop Culture, often referred to as Low culture treated in a Big and Tall way. It's what you have come to expect, gentle reader, and it's what I will try and provide on a semi regular basis. Thanks, Happy New Year, and, Read on....