A life lived more thoughtful, contemplative and productive and that's good

Yes it was not a fun year .. well not all of it some of it was did a lotta kayaking, movie-makihng, book-making, biking, hiking and then was hit with incredible stomach pain so severe had to call the ambulance to take me to hospital ( i live with cancer so hat's always a concern when such pain occurs since i'm hoping it's not some outbreak again and more chest splitting surgery required ) - my new life style excludes a lotta the night life fun i used to have until the cancer hit me. Unlike many of my comrades, amigos, colleagues and friends who died, i managed to survive to become an elder. An elder a everyone knows, has a life of moan&groan and 'freedom55' isn't any freedom for most. But that all said i enjoy life and have no interest to not enjoy it so i turned my energy, talent and moola into making creative work thus along came bookshandmade.com and movieshandmade.com and GOOP gallery. With my partner HELENE we have fun making art and making all sorts of creative things .. and thus a happy new beginning to a life lived hard and rough and now lived more thoughful, contemplative and productive... and that's good...

the Sir Charles GD ROBERTS project continues slowly but surely

HELENE LACELLE's illustration of the crying oxen creates a totally modern 'look' to the hundred year old animal stories of GD ROBERTS, a NB born and raised writer who 'created' the animal story wherein he treates so called 'wild beasts' as humans i.e. they think and feel and react as we human animals do - along with E.T. SETON he was the first in the world to do so and as a result became world famous for these stories - his first collection of anmal stories sold 80,000 copies in N.A. which considering it was about 100 years ago this was fantastic.

ahhh the life of an elder filled with aches and payne's and delays and Hernias, cancer, kidney stones and torn rotator cuff

yes the elder world full of aches, pains and illness whether we wer too lazy, too careless or too rough and tough on life, there comes a time ... yes and that time for me started in 2006 when my chest was split open, ribs split and a huge cancer tumour removed - and forever more .. i live with cancer go in for annual tests/scans and as long as it doesn't grow no more heart splitting surgery ... well, that's the tip of my 'berg' 'cause this past summer i passed some stones the kidney kind and just died of poop and pain on my way to shoot the ROBERTS' project in the Maritimes from editing B.B. in Montreal ( MC SARDA is editor did THE FASTRUNNER won numerous awards ) - projectile diahrea stopping on the roadside frequently - the #40 has some nice fertilizer. Anyway, enough of that and on with the story many but not all have a beginning, a middle and an end, but not this one at least not yet - yesterday was in hospital to have me HERNIA made back into a HIMnia i.e. flat tummy time - so all night and all day and for a few more days i'm trying to rest/sleep/avoid lifting more than a cup of tea - thus my projects once again are on backburner for a few more days ... ahh life in the slow lane isn't for me...

Rob Payne is now 'roomed' no longer homeless and wants me to catch up to his life in Toronto for B.B. as a man of means - his alleyway home is now kaput - boarded and fenced off and so that part of his life is over as he re-aquaints himself finally after 8 years living 'living rough' outside with living 'on the inside' in his room with a very limited view - basement apartment room. 

the sir Charles GD ROBERTS book and documentary .. update

last year i started documenting all of ROBERTS associations with NB: his birthplace in Douglas, his upbringing in Westcock around the Tantramar Marsh, his home on George Street in Fredericton, his burial spot near his university the UofNB, his schools and places of education/etc. This was for a book the front cover is exhibited above and for a documentary in progress ... the book will be published in Jan.2014.