Thursday, February 12, 2009

What makes up our experience?




video and picture of me and Logan just before he died

You know when you are in a new place with new friends and new feelings and a new culture, and you almost can't remember what the last place you lived felt like? You can remember a few things about it, like what the air smelled like, but you forget other aspects, like what the slang and dialect were and more importantly how that slang made you feel or what it enabled or made impossible. Well, a few years back when I lived in Cocoa Beach a close friend of mine overdosed, and I made a webpage where people could post their memories. Today, someone posted on that webpage, and just reading it brought back so many aspects of what it felt like to be living and breathing and intertwined with Cocoa Beach and the mangroves and the people and the drugs and the ocean and the music. It's a slice of that life, and not one I always appreciate. It brought back a web of memories of living in a small beach town on 13th street, next door to Sean O'Hare, playing with Logan.

Sean Volland says:
i had a dejavoodoo the other day when i pulled up to 13th street to check the waves. so much has changed.its ohares street and we used to be best friends, and now arch enemies, but so goes cocoa beach, but the flashback was of say 93-94'ish, and bowman and logan were dangling there on the old boardwalk, b4 all of the storms and rebeaching, and they were punk teens on the verge of degbauchery, yet still golden hearted and harmless, just wound like balin wire, and we all know that im the advocate surfer for smoking cigs, and as usual, i was puffing a dirt, and they both approached me cautiosly as kids like them did in those days, and bowman said nothing, but logan winked at me and said, " hey col. can i get a cig off ya", and just as quick said, " dont tell my dad", so i gave him one, and bonehead was just carousing, spacing, no balls to ask for one himself, so i said, "hey kid, u want a dirt too or what", and he acknowledged, i obliged, and it was all cool. a step had been taken by groms, just as a decade before, i had asked billy atkinson and mcmillen for a bong hit as a teen, and although this is no grandoise story of mentorship, nor tuteledge of our youth, its the truth, and its the way it was, and still should be, and maybe we wouldnt be burying so many of our young hero's if we just treated them more like equals and men. i miss u lotion, i loved u dearly, and im so blessed that ive seen bowman grow up to be the best surfer intown on any board,(while slatz isnt around), and to be a good man and a gr8 father, and i know 99% of this town hates me and rightfully so, but im so real, im so here, and i so love cocoa beach, as did logan, bob, d. codgen, bruce, and all the others we have lost. GOD BLESS this shitty lil town. sean "da col." volland

Thinking about all of this makes me reflect on all the aspects of my current life that make up the flesh of my experience. What words are used daily? What activities? What is the attitude of the people who surround me? What tools do we use? What world are we creating for ourselves? This last one being the most important point: that we can create the experience we want by choosing and also realizing and reifying the landscape of a sweet great joyful awesome loving experience in every moment. And so I will. I will. I will.


Photo of me last week


Update!
Sean Volland posted a response to this post (above) on Logan's website. Here is his response reposted
-------------------
im not sure i know jay silver, but he posted my comments on logan on his blog page, which being computer wetawded, i know lil' about, but he posted a video of logan jamming, playing air guitar, driving down s. a1a, and it was sooooooo real, and soooooo logan, and now im balling, snivelling, and really comprehending what loss really is. GOD BLESS U ALL!!!!! ill truly miss this place, as i miss logan, codgen, dr. al, sterling, foster, devon, valuzzi, my grandma, and anyothers i cant quite put my shrivelled mind on currently! reflection is a bitch, especially if u r sean volland, but 2 u all, tell someone how much u love them today; send an enemy a nice email or a card; hug someone u care about, apologize if if u didnt think u were wrong, becuz time is so short and we r all one another has. sorry 2 ramble, just way emotional right now, and thank u mr. jay silver, cuz that video made and ruined my day, and quite possibly changed my life. yall be good, 2 yourselves, and those u love, and those u dont even know, cuz one never knows where u will find, need, or lose a true friend. sean volland