Day 277

there's a mug of tea sitting between the shiny buckles of the black accordion case. the box acts as a nightstand when i'm not hauling it to this or that or creating and learning with what it holds inside. a vintage, silver photojournalism book is on the lower part of this mattress/futon conversion bed and a little desk lamp hangs from above. in the corner is an amp and keyboard. and in the top closet shelf is the growing collection of over a dozen new (used and borrowed, but new in the never-read sense) books. i love my room here and outside of all this are mountains.

we're back in canada. the appearance of the red engine light on the dashboard of benji's jimmy was a situation always easily rectified. if, on the way home, it popped on, he'd simply leave the car in gear and restart the vehicle as we rolled. there. no engine light. every time. and speeding wasn't a problem because, unless we cruised downhill, the highest we could reach would be the mid sixties of miles per hour.

i realized a bit today that these are a group of friends within the bigger group of friends who are very much like minded in these manners. simplicity. adventure. they're the people who don't have the most epic snowboard pictures of themselves posted everywhere- although that is all well and good for many a folk and their first snow experiences.

as we left montana today, it was us who joked- and how seriously i'm left to wonder- about chipping in for a volkswagon van at the beginning of spring to travel down a coast or to the midwest. in some ways the words and stories of beat poets and new journalists are being paralleled in this live and are appearing in traces of breath and philosophy and in the people i meet and know. and community. this is exciting.

this is one of the books i bought at the used bookstore in kalispell. for only a couple dollars, i've been even more inspired and educated by those who proved, in the ivy league and intellectual world, that creativity and perspective are going to get you further than accepting and answering every bland question and situation of the life ahead.