Tag Archives: writer

Max finale

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Cycling across Canada '94

Max has been part of my decision.  I want to get back to the same drive and focus I had back when I first received the hybrid bike my parents got me in 1992 after I graduated from Stelly’s.  Just like Max I had the big dream, but it was the crazy idea that I would ride that bike across the country.  Two years later I reached the shores of Halifax with the help of my parents who would meet me half way to refill my bottles and supply me with a muffin from Tim’s.

Now the dream is about the work I create.  My parents Jim and Joan have been extremely supportive of that as well (they are still together as well, unlike Max’s situation).  But the influence of family in the story was something I wanted.  The image I had of Max’s home was based on a mix of where we lived in Chilliwack, Langley and finally in Saanichton where they have been since 1988.  I know I am extremely lucky in this respect.  It has also been part of my drive to treat my work with the same “Sail, don’t drift” attitude they taught me.

I have the day job that I work hard at to pay bills.  Nothing new there for the aspiring writer and musician.  But one thing I have found with the Max project is that I really enjoy working with this WordPress writing platform as a chance to put my determination into action with daily writing along with my work with Jacobs Pogson Productions as a writer and Cookeilidh as a bassist.  It’s one of my opportunities like studying bass or reading that gives me a chance to stretch.  It’s like scales in thirds and it’s fun.

Much as I’ve loved creating the Max world which is still there for people to check out its time to wrap that up.  I am definitely looking forward to sharing the final wrap up episode!  Hope you’ll check that out early next week!

Click here for the Journal by Max blog story

Cheers,
Tom

Created by TomPogson.com

Morning person

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taking time to review the possible

I am a morning person convert.  I have done years of late shifts and music related things that naturally swing the other way but these days I tend to start earlier without honestly getting that “you may not speak to me yet” thing which others seem to suffer from.  Something interesting happens.  I’m still productive but not in my usual ADHD way.  If I’m up and working first thing it’s as if that action alone actually has a soothing quality so I can put my plans in sequence.  It’s a bit like showing up a little extra early for work.  You can ease into full speed.  Giving yourself that little extra time before the day is the best thing possible for your stress level because it makes those necessary waits into something less frantic.
Early morning in Victoria is one of my favorite things as well.  On a day off, really treat yourself to it.  Go for a walk downtown in the early morning.  Stop by a cafe where you aren’t standing in a line up looking at the value deal options.  Wander about the cool of the streets strewn with shadow and sun down to the harbour where the sound of the water below the causeway is the loudest thing you hear.
Early mornings don’t have to be about work.  They can be meditative.  Maybe let’s use the word reflective.
Or just nice.
That’s it.
Mornings can be nice.

Tom

Created by TomPogson.com

Writing prompt : the walls

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They sprinkle around the place, changing with the years like my life is marked by sections.  It’s an apartment in the morning before a shift.  I’m hardly a wealthy man but I’m less and less tolerant of posters.  I had one in a bathroom with a part torn for the light switch.  Far less acceptance of white walls then.  I accept them now.  The change in the sky colors against the bare slate of the bedroom above our heads.  It rumples soft peach over the folds of the strewn sheet.  It’s a good place to have coffee.  I need to go.  My cups almost empty.  Later today is laundry day.  I’ll have lots more to say about them, hung up like soft soldiers in the failing light.

Created by TomPogson.com

“Quiet City” teaser

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     The carriage pulled up at exactly nine am.  The polished black buggy with its springs like dull silver swayed lightly as the horseman pulled back on the twin tan and white horses that looked more like they belonged at the Sandown races than at work.

The owner of the carriage descended from the unmarked door, down the steps that one could pass right by without noticing,  his young moustached face vanished behind the carriage door.  No signal was needed as the driver in the tuxedo sprung the strong horses to action, following just behind a Government street trolley car.

On board a man with a newspaper tried not to notice.  He looked at his pocketwatch and made a note, tucking the pad and pen back into the tweed coat he originally bought in the Vauxhall high street.  It had served him for over twenty years that summer.

Now he had the new boy to consider.  One man had stumbled upon far too much and he would have undoubtedly left traces and questions behind for Mr. Baels, the junior clerk from Ottawa not to notice.  The passenger knew he could not be get off the street car until he reached the new Legislature. 

The car clicked onto the new road beside the grand hotel with the warmth of the harbor sun pouring through the windows.  The shadow-like carriage driving behind turned towards the Empress Hotel, driving up the immaculate lawns to the stone steps of the front door.  Outside a sturdy woman in white with bags waited by the door, two giants of men flanking her sides.

“Miss Penny has arrived,” he whispered to himself with his eyes just over the unkempt edge of the Colonist “God help us.”

–

Quiet City is one of the projects I’ve been working on set in Victoria, British Columbia in both modern times and in 1910.

Created by TomPogson.com

My problem with cultural appropriation.

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One of our rules in the Ollie and Emma project is that we leave the issue aside and just have fun with the opportunity to bring people together.  That aside I think their should be some ground rules.  Being the white half of a comedy team writing a multicultural project knowing where the line between funny and too far is only too apparent.  It all comes down to simply respecting someone else and looking past the stereotypes which need to be finally dropped.
The problem I have with Halloween headdresses, sport teams names and so on is that it treats Native culture like it’s something of the past.  We call the University of Victoria sports teams the Vikes (Vikings).  We don’t call them the UVic Norwegians.  There is another team I’m sure is called the Pilgrims (I will admit…I’m not especially a sports person.  Apologies to those who are.).  The folks who are referred to as Braves are still very much alive and active as well as the use of real ceremonial garments (and unless your entire sports team is First Nations, which would have the name make more sense).  The best way to think of this is consider something that is important or sacred to yourself and ask yourself if you would want it used like a gimmick.  Yeah, First Nations people don’t love that either.

This is one of the things about working with my cowriter Cheri Jacobs that I think has it’s own influence on the Ollie and Emma project.  Our two cultures can work together with common respect and have lots of fun doing it.  All the people who I have met have been very welcoming and free of judgement. 

Community is possible.

Cheers,
Tom

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The world of waiting

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I like the quote that Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode used to talk about the years he had already worked in the music business.   He got the quote from Keith Richards originally but I don’t think it’s only true for rock stars…

“It’s five years of work and the rest is waiting.”

We wait so much of our lives and you just know for a fact that there is…oh lots more to go.  As I write this (originally) I’m early for work and so I’m simply waiting as well.  Some folks naturally don’t like to wait.  I probably don’t much of the time as well as there is lots of things to do with creative work where it’s not one event after another.  So much of what I do is scheduling (as my many employers can understandably talk about) and that naturally leads to those in between times when you are simply waiting on the green light to get going.  But since we know that the waiting is going to happen I think that it’s almost empowering.
I mean, we now have these sometimes leash like mobile devices and if you “do social media” that is certainly one way to use up that time when we line up for a ticket, a coffee, purchasing a new shirt but there also just that opportunity to be more present in the moment.

This is one thing that is great about kids.  They are utterly self aware and in the moment.  They notice everything, and as we know, they are only too ready to tell you about it.  Ok, this shouldn’t be confused with patience as spending any time at a religious (or otherwise) service can tell you but that’s just because they have been told to quell their natural exuberance.  But as a busker, kids are awesome because they will often halt their parents who are cannoning from one very important thing to the next very important thing to pull at mom’s coat and exclaim…

“Mommy!  Look!  Guitar!”

I owe their union a lot of money for this.  It’s about being relaxed that things will work out and just setting off early so you’re not late.  Don’t line up if you can’t.   Don’t take on more than you can.  You don’t need to be perfect.  You’ll have plenty of time to wait tomorrow too.

But then I’m probably just an early bird.  Victoria is wonderful first thing in the early morning.  Give yourself the time to enjoy those little details of her city because there is lots of them.  That’s actually one thing I’ve really enjoyed about working on my own twitter and my project accounts…when reaching out to the city to tell everybody that we are here I’ve learned how much is really going on that you can get involved in.  This city was founded on a Gold Rush and a sudden influx of people from all over the globe.  With a background like that set on the Pacific Coast there is always another thing to see.  So step out of your own blinders when you have no option but to wait.  You could be surprised to find out where your really standing.

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St Patrick’s week and more!

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Cookeilidh are : Woody, me, Kim David

     Been a really busy week since last Tuesday when St Patrick’s started.  That’s the thing about being in a celtic band.  St. Patrick’s for us is, and sorry if this sounds ego driven but it’s a whole lot more than one night of green beer (even though that’s fun too!)  We’ve been pretty much doing one gig a night for well over a week and there is still more to go.  One thrill was having tracks from our new cd played on All Points West CBC with Jo-Ann Roberts just before our show at The Copper Owl (pictured above)

It’s funny…just jamming along to Depeche Mode’s Personal Jesus with my bass (ok that’s wierd) and how even though lots of things change…lots more are always the same.  I love playing acoustic music and playing a lot to the band’s I’ve loved over the years (some celtic, some acoustic and some really neither) and I love writing and creating things.  I’ve probably said that before and it’s easy to go with the things you know but the main thing is not to leave any place unexplored because you’ve got a prejudged notion.  That was the wierd story behind me as an acoustic / celtic musician liking Depeche and others (weirdest cd I ever had was definitely “Coyot” which was aeolian strings stretched across a Swedish abandoned military base)  I was very much focused on my style of music back then and I heard of Depeche but lumped them in with those “wierd stuff over there” bands.  When a friend gave me a tape I never even listened until one day making a tape (yeah, tape) as a joke.  From that I brought the whole tape to work and it seriously turned my head around.  Learned my lesson.  I think that applies to way beyond music.  You simply never know.  You never know what the young man with the skateboard on the bus next to you or the lady in front of you in line at Tim’s is really all about.  The idea that other people have it easier is also illusion.  Rich or poor live provides its struggles and it’s joy.

Went philosophical there.  Anyways, check out my other new thing I’ve been working on this week if you get a chance.  It’s a story that is based on my own background when I use to aspire to bike mechanics and was seriously into cycling and going to bike shops…and listening to loads of classic rock!
Journal by Max

You can also follow the band at…
Cookeilidh’s main website!

Cheers
Tom 🙂

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Work in the arts.

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“There’s a job…there’s a gig here” Billy Joel

It’s probably one of the hardest things about a career path that’s already not the easiest choice.  If you do any other kind of work and let’s say you’ve just started and you’re not making that much coin people still respect it because it’s still considered “real work”.  In the arts though it’s seen strangely as not being given the same accolade unless you are one of us fortunate enough to have a creative field as their primary source of income.  But the trap here I think is that we run the risk of treating it like a pipe dream or a hobby.  Having a hobby is fine but for those of us who think of ourselves as artists we have to give our craft that same attention as any other tradesman who puts in forty hours a week.  Will this immediately pay off?  This I can’t say but there is certainly a pride in putting serious determination behind what you do and one thing I have found is that you never know where your creative road will take you, but the more work you do on your craft, the better armed to fight you will be when you get there. 
Our role is different from some trades as just hammering the same thing again and again can work against us so being creative you have to find ways of still focusing on your craft without making yourself bored (creative death here!)  As a writer I like to play with different forms or ideas like this or my other blogs, narrative experiments, prose, non-fiction, or a thing I sometimes do called morning stories.  In this one I do a thousand words (usually ends up being more) of something.  In the same way as a Artist Way morning page you just go with what pops in your head and roll or riff on that.  Writers probably have it the worst for practicing because there’s the natural assumption that everyone can write so it’s easy to get complacent.  The great thing about it is the portability though and I have so many of those little Hilroy 300 page books just full of material and even a little mini one that fits in my coat.  And just like a musician who listens and transcribes what they hear the more well read you are, naturally, the better.  Check out some of the books on writers and writing as well.  Try a new form like creative non fiction or poetry.  Poetry is not to be sniffed at as people think of folks in berets musing on the moon.  Taken to its highest level poems are the writing equivalent of making every shot count.  This fine art, and the origin of all writing in western civilization, is all about specific details and sense and particularity.  Trying to write in a non ambiguous way and connect with people at gut level is genius.  That’s one thing I found with well crafted (and you’ll laugh) country music.  You can’t be ambiguous in that form.  It’s from the hip and for a musician it’s usually written in a bright major key which makes it just that much harder to emote in a way that connects with listeners.  And that’s why some of that style can hurt.
Don’t shoot the country pianist.  He’s doing his best.
A good idea is to set up your work at a time when you know you are at your most alert and won’t be too distracted.  Set that as a daily habit that you don’t intend to break even if the building is burning down around you.  Ignore the fireman.  You’re working. 

So pour yourself a coffee, punch the clock and rock. 

Cheers,
Tom

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