the paradigm of josh dion...

This is Josh Dion... He is one of my three best friends. We live in Portland an he always partakes in the winter "beard off". You wouldn't know it by his hard look here, but he is really a baby-faced lover with soft arms to hold you with. We met snowboarding in Lake Tahoe. In fact during the time that we hung out we met up with another friend, Kyle "Schwartzkopf". Kyle mistook "Mr. Niceguy" Josh Dion for a 35 year-old hardcore ass kicker ( he was 21 at the time). Perhaps it was due to the Fu-manchu that Josh adorned at the time, or perhaps it was the hand sewn homemade patches that he wore on the sleeves and back of his denim jacket. I'm pretty sure Josh invented denim on the snowboard hill.
Josh wanted to be a filmer and I thought that I was a hardcore snowboarder, so we hit it off. He filmed me as I fell down, a lot. I don't think that I could have been a snowboarder worthy of film, but I think that he is a filmer worthy of recognition. Had he stuck it out in the cold he would be getting paid to stick it out in the cold.
Josh is one of my three best friends and one of my two human best friends and he is not my girlfriend... so he could be considered my best friend, by default. We have an interesting passive relationship but always look for fun. I like that.

if portland's sunset is bhutan's sunrise...

...then a new day I send to you.

city of roses...

In winter's wake, roses awake; a blossoming flower flutters... In spring's rainy prelude, petals soak the nude; a warm wind mutters...
the roses,
the roses,
the roses are here...
always a beauty, never the same, and the want to be near.

Tyrannosaurus...

Its roar is mighty...

Its speed is unparalleled...

It fears nothing...

...only in a child's imagination.

Expecting...

I was extremely excited when I knew that I would get to take Megan's maternity photos. I have never had children and I have never had a younger sibling. Sometimes I would babysit my cousins when I was younger, but was not mentally inept to understand the process and nostalgia that coincides with watching a person develop through their adolescence. Though I am not consistent in my friendship with Todd and Megan, I still get little "sneak peeks" as to what Flora (who is pictured here) and her older brother Haylen are becoming.

Though larger picture problems infect my mind and newscasts, the core of human nature is shown more eloquently on an intimate level between sole individuals. The idea of rocking on a chair and watching children overcome the new day's struggles that we have all gone through is a beautiful thing. I have now been a viewer of what someone achieves by merging their love to create another. Assembling molecules from the cosmos in the body's kettle only to share that body with another. Truly a timeless cycle that is beautifully shared throughout all living beings.

I am jealous of this power, for I will always only be an observant sailor, as barren as the sea's horizon, knowing fully of the ocean's potential of life and never become the ocean itself.

Into the land of goat pepper...

This last fall I had an opportunity to witness and share the love between two individuals. There were five of us in all to partake in the ceremony and festivities. We all whisked away to the far off island of Ireland. Drove to the western most coast to the Cliffs of Moher. Everyone jumped a fence, trudged through cow pasture mud, and arrived at where the island falls slowly into the sea. The sun peeked in-and-out of the clouds that the wind pushed by. Yet, within all the chaos that is nature was a vortex of shared excitement and sincerity. Two beautiful people, with the help of a cherished friend, gave themselves to each other.

kid project...

Three of the last five books that I have read have started out giving thanks to a child who asked the author a question that they couldn't answer. Once simple question lead those individuals to write whole works of literature because a child asked of it. There is much muse and self-discovery to be found in a young being. Perhaps, because we all sprout from the same make-up of the cosmos and structure ourselves through the same patterns, we can always relate with what we were. If we're lucky some of us never have to completely change. This is the hopes that I can be inspired by never forgetting my roots of adolescents.