Leave it to the Quakers to pen the greatest and most thoughtful letter of all-time on the process and considerations that lay behind their inclusive washroom policies. Read it and especially read the heartfelt ending, that holds so much the higher purpose of the work. It’s beautiful.
The Alberta government has made some decisions about the books to be banned in schools because they contain “sexually explicit” material. A list from the Edmonton School Board was leaked on social media. It’s interesting to me that the vast majority of authors on the list are women. In fact it is one of the few lists of significant books I have ever seen that is dominated by women writers. These works should be read by young people and especially young men. Of note, The Bible is not on the list — in fact it is explicitly ALLOWED to remain on shelves — because the list is not really about sexually explicit material, is it? The promoters of this exercise in authoritarianism, as usual, don’t have the moral courage or honesty to state truthfully what they are bothered by. Cowards who love cruelty, every one of them.
From annals of humanizing things, kudos to Jon van Tetzchner, the CEO of Vivaldi, a browser that refuses to integrate generative AI in its software because it ruins the pleasure of browsing that connects you to human beings who post beautiful things. In a blog post he writes “Browsing should push you to explore, chase ideas, and make your own decisions. It should light up your brain. Vivaldi is taking a stand. We choose humans over hype, and we will not turn the joy of exploring into inactive spectatorship.”
At our annual Bowfest parade last weekend the prize for the best float went to a new group of island puppeteers who debuted with a silent beautiful massive heron puppet. The puppet was very powerful. Many people were just astonished as it passed them and it was the talk of the day. The folks behind it include some well known Bowen Islanders (including puppeteer Liz Nankin and renowned clown Paul Hoosen who studied mime with Marcel Marceau) and others. The Undercurrent ran a story this week about the group.
As humans we love form, even if we don’t know it. In this fascinating essay Samuel Jay Keyser discusses the neurology of the appreciation of form in art and how similarities and difference (or same/except, in Keyser’s words) delight us and draw us in.
The delight in these works — from Warhol to Friedlander, Horn to Gigli — comes from the same source. Our eyes trace patterns, spot subtle variations, and construct visual rhymes, taking satisfaction in order amid difference. The satisfaction of solving this visual puzzle is a key part of the pleasure it provides.
I read this essay with my mind also on music and how there are well known techniques in jazz for constructing satisfying improvised solos using principles of form that include repetition and variation.
The 49th annual Bowfest festival happened today in our village. This annual rite traditionally signifies the ending of summer and the beginning of fall. It’s the last of our summer festivals, which includes a May Day celebration, National Indigenous People’s Day, Canada Day, the Dock Dance, Logger Sports and the fastpitch tournament. These are traditions around here, some newer than others, but each of which marks a moment in our shared summer, and provides a little window into the Bowen Island community.
Bowfest is one long day of musical acts, a lip synch contest, jam and jelly competitions, a community parade and a slug race. It has waned over the years (COVID really smashed it) but it is starting to come back, like much of Bowen’s community life, spearheaded by a new generation of volunteers. In the last ten years, we have sustained a MASSIVE generational shift as Elders and long term residents moved away and new families joined our community. The COVID years from 2020-2022 meant that many of these new folks became a part of the community without being hosted in to the community rhythms, events and ways we do things. There was no one to guide them and they were struggling to fit in, focused on working hard to pay for their very expensive houses (or hustle to live within their very precarious housing situations) and the time for community giving was limited.
This year though I’m starting to feel the shift. I hardly knew anyone there. The citizen of the year was someone who has only lived here for 7 years, which is awesome. People were making comments about how cool it was but how much better it could be, and I heard all kinds of folks talking about what they might do next year, for Bowfest’s 50th anniversary. I hope they volunteer!
It’s hard getting older in a place when so many of your compatriots have moved away or died. The older we get the more people there are that are younger, of course. At one point we found ourselves with a small group of our community Elders dancing together to The ’60s Band. These folks hold a particular thread of this island culture and have been here forever. And they aren’t planning to leave soon either. These are the folks that welcomed me here when I arrived in 2001 and they are the people that we built stuff with that many people take for granted, like the Island Discovery Learning Community.
These community festivals and events are important touch points and I’m realizing that it takes some practice to find oneself drifting more and more to the sidelines of community here. I’m good with it. It’s natural. But it’s a journey.
Tottenham has had a good record at Manchester City over the years and has been the Premier League team against which Pep Guardiola has had the least success as City manager. Last year we won this fixture 0-4. This was a chance to really see Thomas Frank’s principles at play: out work your opponents, defensive solidity and focus on set pieces.
In the first half Spurs pushed City and pressed on defense, resulting in a 0-2 lead at the half. Coming out in the second half, we went right into a low block with Bentancur and Palhinha sliding back to cover defenders who stepped out to frustrate City’s quick passing.
Those two are key to the strategy because as the second half unfolded we saw them bolting forward into the attack as well which helped to play around City’s press and force them back into a more defensive shape.
It paid off. We walked away from Lancashire with a 0-2 victory and the distinction of being the only team to ever beat Pep at home twice in a row. Clean sheets both times to boot.
Changing tactics like this was not a feature of the Postacoglu era and that security looks like just the thing to take us up the table this season. Not that there is anywhere else to go from 17th.
Today I learned about “kelping.” That’s when orcas or humpbacks tangle themselves up in kelp beds because it feels nice.
Orcas are more than just a charismatic mega fauna on our coast line. They are a population, and for First Nations, they are kin. For the people that live close to them, including researchers, the whales are chosen family. This week, I76 died. Here is the account of his death from OrcaLab. It contains these beautiful words:
At this moment the day shifted. Jared Towers had come out specifically in response to the previous day’s concerns about I76, the oldest son of I4. He was extremely thin and having difficulties. Jared found him on the Vancouver Island side of the Strait opposite to the entrance to Blackney Pass. The rest of his small family were further away. The day was grey, the ocean only slightly agitated. As several dolphins surrounded and overwhelmed I76, his mother came flying across to him. Jared said he had never seen a Northern Resident move so fast and that she was clearly upset. From that time on his family remained close to his side with the dolphins surrounding the entire family who were more or less stationary. This continued until just before 3pm when I76 took his last breath and sank out of sight into the depths. His family lingered near his last position, then began to call..
Ernest Alfred happened to be here and he and a few of us went out into Johnstone Strait. There next to the mountains of Vancouver Island, near to a few dolphins who still seemingly hovered over where I76’s had his last moments and not far from his family now slowly weaving their way east, Ernest sang in Kwakwala reminding us to shed our tears before nightfall, morning would bring another ceremony fitting with the time of day and a chance to say good-bye.
Read the subsequent posts to see how the humans and whales who knew I76 mourned his passing.
Clouds continue to hang around here in the wake of our first Pineapple Express storm of the season. The Music By The Sea Festival wrapped up late last night (I was home again after midnight) after three full days of community music-making, with a few professional ringers thrown into our midst. It was a multi-generational event which sprang out of a group of local Bowen Island families who were long time regulars at the Nimblefingers Festival in Sorrento, BC. As a result there was a strong core of bluegrass and Americana music-making at MBTS, which suits me fine. Bluegrass is like folk jazz. Simple chord progressions and beautiful melodies and harmony singing, but incredible virtuosity on the instrumental side, including a strong value on improvised breaks and solos. It is massively accessible music, but for the performer the sky is the limit in terms of technique and creative possibilities.
Importantly, the gathering brought together many Bowen Islander, including several who left the island years ago. The music scene when I moved here was rich and vibrant and diverse and it withered a little as we made the transition between the 1970s-1990s nearly intentional community of interesting characters to a place where property became a financial investment. Since COVID, our demographics have radically shifted and there is more of a feeling of intentional community again. People are moving here for something other than what might be a decent return on a real estate investment. Make no mistake, this is still a massively unaffordable place to live, and our best efforts to address it are swallowed in a context of general inaction and apathy about structural policy solutions. But. There is a revival of community going on here, and I met many people this weekend who are my neighbours and with whom I know I will be making music this year and into the future.
I love short forms of writing. Poetry, short stories, short novels. And aphorisms. There is something about the pithy wisdom contained in a single sentence that can make it powerful. A well crafted aphorism has a rhythm to it as well. It swings, like a jazz lick. And like a lick, it evokes something timeless and connected to an ecosystem of meaning. Peter Limberger lives aphorisms too and here he writes about two medieval aphorists, Baltasar Gracián (1601–1658), a Jesuit priest who wrote The Art of Worldly Wisdom and Duc de La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680), a French nobleman who wrote a collection of Maxims, while also pointing to his favourite, Nicolás Gómez Dávila.
Sometimes questions are like aphorisms. One has to be careful asking questions that are beautiful in their own right. Questions occasionally try too hard to impress. They aim too much for a response that is in awe of the question itself. Mary Oliver’s “What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” is one of those. But asking “What time is it?” Is a question that dances ever so lightly on the fence between genuine curiosity and profound insight in its own right. Tenneson writes “I used to see people more often resist these kind of questions. It was resistance that saw some fluff and said, “let’s get to the real work.” These days, oh gosh, so many more people recognize these questions are the real work. Or are the real contexting that helps us get to the real work.” Amen.
Life is just a long conversation that we drop into for a bit. Patti Digh:
Life, then, is less about owning the discussion and more about showing up to it. Listening well. Speaking honestly. Departing graciously. And trusting that the conversation—like life itself—will carry on.
Perhaps the real measure is not how loudly or how often we speak, but how we change in the process. We arrive thinking we understand the argument; we leave having been shaped by the voices around us. We are participants, yes, but also apprentices to the human story—learning from those who came before, influencing those who come after, even in ways we’ll never know.
Some day, someone else will walk into the same parlor after we’ve gone. They’ll hear the echoes of our words, softened by time, folded into the larger chorus. They may not know our name, but they will inherit a conversation made—if we’ve done our part—slightly kinder, richer, and more open than when we found it.
A decent start to the Premier League season for Tottenham. After an early goal from Richarlison, Spurs were a bit disjointed for the rest of the first half. They came out ganagbusters in the second though and Richarlison scored his second from a beautiful scissor kick off a Kudus delivery. Kudus impressed with his flair and quickness. Brennan Johnson scored the third for an emphatic win in the end.
The latest TSS Rover to turn pro is Aislin Streicek, who played for us in 2022 and 2023 and who was signed by Celtic FC to a two year contract. She made her first appearance yesterday coming off the bench in a 2-1 win over Hearts. Watching and helping young players turn professional is why we do what we do at our little second division Canadian club.
A little grey this morning as the Island recovers formats busiest weekend of the year. Saturday night was the infamous Bowen Island dock dance, staged by the fire fighters every year to raise money for the volunteer fire department. It’s a huge party with bands and dancing and lots of beer. The subsequent day, the island seems hungover (and truly a fair percentage of its residents are actually that way). I had a light day, cooking breakfast for my own visiting family members who were slow to get going. I walked to the Cove in the afternoon and on the way back picked blackberries and Oregon grapes to make jelly today. Today is a holiday in British Columbia, and the clouds have rolled in, lowering the sky a little. Rain is possible, and will be welcomed. There is a chill on the air. The seasons continue to turn over.
Elsewhere…
Matt Webb marks the seasons too. Today he reflected on the very special moment of the summer in which the Test cricket season comes to an end in England. I do think you have to love cricket to appreciate it, especially the metronome of summer hours ticking away that is the fall of wickets.
And more from Matt: the dream of crowd sourced information and citizen science is still one of the best things the internet has enabled. Matt has a mammoth post documenting six crowd-based efforts which reveal patterns of life in our atmosphere, biosphere and noosphere.
And something else to think about. Space hurricanes!
Cameron Norman has been blogging about his approach to Strategic Design all summer and he’s finally tied together all the posts into one big guide to doing it. It’s so good that I’m going to add it to my facilitation resources page.
On our recent sailing trip, we noticed that the return of the ochre sea stars has been knocked back. I have seen very few of our iconic purple starfish this year. It looked as if they were recovering from a bacterial wasting disease, but now it seems they are still suffering. The Tyee reports on what’s happening.
Two of our TSS Rovers made their professional debuts on August 2. Kirstin Tynan, who played for us from 2022-2024 and was signed in February to the Vancouver Rise of the Northern Super League got her first start in goal, stopping ten shots in a 3-3 draw against Ottawa Rapid. Callum Weir, our men’s team keeper this year got a short term call up to Valour FC of the Canadian Premier League but suffered a 5-0 defeat behind a team that offered very little defence in front of him. Callum will return to university at the University of Victoria for the winter. Watching these players leaning hard into their dreams and challenging themselves at the professional level of their games is way I continue to help build this little club of ours. It’s all about building better players and ultimately better human beings.