When Jennifer and I started the Happy Monk Baking Company, the world seemed larger — too big, it seemed, for a small fish like me. I set my sights on selling bread to anyone who wanted it up or down Gowlland Point Road, South Pender. There was a neighbourhood email list, and that was my market.… Continue reading
It’s time to put away the baker’s peel again. But just for a while.
A short restorative for Jennifer and me to catch up on our sleep, reconnect with old friends and family and rejuvenate our creative juices.… Continue reading
In 1978, after finishing university, I moved into an old apartment with my friend Gary. We were barely into our 20s, and life was opening up. A West End pad one block off “Robsonstrasse” was about as good as it got!
Along with a bunch of shoddy furniture, we merged our vast record collections, which were definitely not shabby.… Continue reading
Listen to this song by the gravel-voiced crooner and barfly poet Tom Waits. It’s “Emotional Weather Report” from one of his earlier discs, “Nighthawks at the Diner”. If you like, you can follow along with the lyrics as you listen.
The droll way Waits delivers the song, which equates a television weather report to his emotional state, is perfect.… Continue reading
This Friday, October 27, would have been Dylan Thomas’ 109th birthday, and although the Welsh poet lived barely 39 of those years, his words and spirit changed my life. I was not even born when he died in New York in November 1953 under mysterious circumstances. He’s still with me, such as in the Spring when the trees and flowers come to life, and these words emerge:
… Continue readingThe force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer.