MAY, 2008 - Halifax to Vancouver

MAY, 2008

Halifax to Vancouver

Ok, where am I? right…I am flying from Halifax (my new home) to Vancouver to film almost the last bits of the coaches documentary. I will be picked up at the airport by Mark Busse from Full Spectrum Coaching and rushed over to the Vancouver Aquarium to film some interviews, then the next morning back on a plane up to the BC interior to a place called Trail BC…wow, is there such a place? IF so I think I want to live there! Something like Forest City, population 11, on the New Brunswick / Maine border, truly one of my favorite get away secret places I have, FOREST CITY, NB, TRAIL, BC…come on! Anyway love the names…lots of adventures with great friends in Forest City from Hot Toddy Jams on Skiff Lake, to all night 80’s dance parties at my dear friends Tracy and Carstan’s straw bail home to intriguing visits and hula hoops at one of my favorite people in the world Anne’s place on the St. Croix River…literally a stone throw from the great United States of America…these borders are not secure…trust me! Hopefully Trail will produce some fond memories as well, man I’ll have to do a doc about cool names for towns and the interesting people and bizarre going ons in the village limits! Love it.

The last couple weeks where crazy as usual, I got back from Italy to see my lovely Jess for a whopping 2 days, we went to St. Andrews and checked out this amazing Inn called the Rossmont, perfect meal, great stay, New Brunswick is an amazingly beautiful place with such rich experiences if you take the time to adventure out of your immediate locale. Jess them said goodbye and hopped on the bus to go around the province with the 21 inc leader’s tour for 10 days. Again a big honor for her, yes she will be a leader in the New Brunswick, in fact Canadian medical scene very soon, in fact she already is. Cool thing is Jess is super creative and is coming up with great TV shows all the time, she is stoked to work with us soon, a doctor in Hemmings House Pictures...wow, sounds good.

I used the time to pack up Acamac, kind of sad actually, I love that neighborhood and I love that house, the nature, the campfires, the hot tub, the wild parties, the live bands, the basement production office, the “hotel” and “hostel” nature…anyway an era has been closed. Time to move on, it’s a good thing. Life brings changes and I welcome it with open arms. Just need to find someone to rent the place. I had a few nights of gatherings at the house, hot tub was kickin' in fine form. It was a good transition week to help me physically and mentally move out of Acamac, that place is the phattest neighborhood I have ever lived in, yes I used the word phat…man, I need to hop on tour again, if I’m using words that start with PH and am listening to Phish and String Cheese, and the Dead more often than ever…wow, means I am either getting nostalgic or I need to get back on the road and catch some more music! In fact in a couple weekends I’m heading down to Portland to meet up with my old partner in crime / Southern rocker / Trucker / pencil poking bearded, NyQuil and rye whisky drinkin’ friend Chris Gorman (a.k.a “Red Deer”) to hop on our Harley’s and cruise into the mountains to check out Mountain Jam…the lineup is sick this year. Anyway Chris has a new Hog, I’ll be renting as my little GS 550 won’t cut it…I’ll write more about that when the time comes, yes Red Dear and Labrador are hitting the road again…lest time we where on bikes was in the Caribbean, we kind of got stuck in the middle of a parade in the Dutch side of the island of St. Maarten…um…we looked like we belonged. Ha-ha…maybe I should start adding pictures to this blog, too funny, picture 2 very long haired, long bearded dudes with Rasta hats on each driving a 3 wheel scooter in the middle of a Carnival parade…yeah, maybe you shouldn’t see the pictures…for my sake of course, oh ask me sometime about how we almost literally got killed that day by a bunch of thugs, and how it resulted in a chase to beaches and eventually up to the top of a rain forest mountain which resulted in a treasure score 2 years later…I will leave it at that.

Sorry for the tangent…Jessica and I moved all of our stuff to our new home in Halifax, what a cool and cozy little place we got! We are right in the midst of what other people consider the sketchy part of town, we absolutely love it. We are walking distance from anything we need, the Lebanese bakery, the laundry mat, the commons, the Hydro stone Market, everything you need is there, even if there is a guy faithfully asking for change outside our door every morning, and even though there are crack houses in our backyard, we love it! Haha…honestly! Man I love cool diverse communities; Halifax’s North End is a real hip spot with every type of wonderful human you can imagine!

I had an incredible week of meeting with other producers, setting up future gigs, possible co-productions, possible investments, 3 actual job offers! I love the idea of having a regular salary, and a good one at that, but I am too entrepreneurially stubborn at this point to accept, though I am honored that the needs in Halifax are deemed to be satisfied through me…wow, cool thought…that’s all it is though! Ha ha. Why do I write my laughs in my journal? Hope it doesn’t bug you the reader too much, it’s kind of how I speak anyway. Loving Halifax, see a big future here for Jess and I, for Hemmings House Pictures, and for the future of the universe. Jess and I checked out the Halifax Vineyard on Sunday as well, pretty cool spot. Will be going back again, maybe they are looking for a drummer or a bass player…we shall see!

Today is the anniversary (5 years I believe) of the death of my dear friend Robin Mathieson, one of the most beautiful and creative people I have known. As Jess and I where walking down one of the North End streets where she used to live we saw the spray painted stenciled birds that she painted weeks before her passing. Makes you think about the value of your life and how long are you really remembered for? A generation? Two generations? Little did my beautiful friend know that the birds that she decorated the sidewalk with would be a symbol and reminder of her life, so symbolic as her name is that of a bird and she is now free very much like one as well. I will not forget you Robin, we had a lot of fun adventures together from grade 7 up to your passing, thanks for your friendship!

While I am thinking of it when I was home my friend Leanne and I went to visit our other dear friend who is not with us any more, Leslie’s grave. We went with her parents and it was very sad, but also because her spirit is very present it was inspiring to remember her and hang with her for a few minutes at Fern Hill cemetery. We need to appreciate life and live it to the fullest and love each other and love each other to the fullest. I must remind myself of this every day.

Almost in Vancouver…I will write more on my flight home….

…Ok, I’m back, 4 days have lapsed since the last sentence. I am back on the plane heading east again. It was a pretty cool few days in BC. When I arrived I was picked up by my friend Mark Busse who is one of the owners of Full Spectrum Coaching along with her husband Dave and Carollyne Connlin, these are the fine folks who have hired me to come out and film for this segment of the coaches documentary. It is interesting because I want to base this documentary after this journal, I keep calling it the “Coached” but it is actually named the same as this journal “Airplane Journals” because I feel that this blog represents me and my company quite well In fact today on the flight I need to start mapping out the structure of the documentary, how I am going to edit it together etc, I will be using this blog as the guide.

Anyway Marj picked me up she had already picked up the rented camera gear for me to save time as we where to film at the Vancouver Aquarium 20 minutes after my arrival, wow, tight timeline. We drove through downtown Vancouver, past Hastings and Main, then down towards the beaches and then into the beautiful Stanley Park where we drove through the lush jungle that was so damaged a few back with the monsoon, then arrived to the Aquarium. Mark coached the employees here, and this includes everyone from senior management to Janitors. Everyone there has adopted the coaching culture. This is very cool to see within a large organization working so well…truly inspiring actually. I interviewed a couple of wonderful people there about how coaching has affected the workplace and how they feel differently has a valued employee now that the coaching culture has been implemented. My other inspiration was filming the beautiful dolphins, seal lions and Beluga! The Sea Lions where very cool, HUGE animals, the Beluga where graceful and beautiful, kind of took me back to when I was in the arctic recently when I ate some Beluga…wow there is a small vegetarian inside me somewhere, when I have these experiences the little veggie voice seems to be heard! Ha ha. Anyway they are a beautiful beautiful animal. The dolphins are so freakin sociable and smart and cute…we where in an under water glassed in executive board room where the dolphins swim right up to the window and have little conversations with you through the glass.

Dolphins really hold a magic place in my life. I remember spending hours on the cruise ships alone searching the horizon for them, and the days that I saw them, usually in huge groups playing in the wake of the boat, where inspired days. I remember 2 real cool dolphin stories, 1 was sailing out of New York City, there had just been a huge rain storm, but the big black clouds where starting to lift, and the bright red sun was setting over the cityscape making the whole sky and clouds and water blood red. Because of those conditions a massive rainbow arced over the horizon. In our wake played at least 50 dolphins jumping, swimming and playing in the force of the boat’s current. It was one of the most inspiring things I have ever seen! The other time is when I was on watch on the Avontuur somewhere off the coast of Brazil. Because there where only 3 of us crewing the ship we each had to spend 4 hours of the night shift awake alone manning the sails and keeping watch in the blackness of the sometimes moonless, starless, lightless night. These where the nights that where kind of creepy sailing by your self, sometimes there would be no wind so the only sound you heard was you ears ringing, or the slight luff of a sail, or maybe the creek of the mast. Anyway one of these nights I was sitting on the edge of the boat, probably writing in my journal, which I will transcribe sometime and add it into this one, if I can find it…anyhow I was startled when something similar to a missile sped by the boat, fully electric fluorescent green light surrounded its shape and trailed along behind it, then another one and then another one, where we under attack? Ha ha, It was so strange, they where dolphins racing past our boat and playing around it as if to tease it! The green light was that magical phosphorescence that lights up sometimes in the water when agitated…it was a very cool and intense experience. The wonderful part is that they “hung out” with me for a while helping me not to be too lonely! Ha ha, anyway it was cool, ever since then I have been fascinated and excited by dolphins.

After our shoot was finished, Marj and I went back to her townhouse and had a few glasses of wine and I met one of her neighbors Marilyn who is the executive director of the Surrey Food Bank. Very inspiring lady for sure, the responsibility that she has in her community is so huge, so much respect goes to those who give themselves for the needy. Anyhow she was a bit stressed about a fund raising breakfast that they where having on Tuesday because a filmmaker said that he was going to do a video for the breakfast about homelessness but in the end he was unreliable and it didn’t happen. We recently produced a video about homeless in Saint John, Lauchlan did a great job producing, directing, photographing and editing it. So I told her about our video and said that’s he could use it instead, I am keen to hear how it turned out. The video is pretty cool actually, Lauchlan took still images of the faces of many of the homeless people in the area, recorded their voices as they talked about being homeless, then edited the photos to music and the narrative matched the faces that show up on screen. It is very touching, and the message is very clear, homelessness can happen to anyone.

I need to rewind here for a minute…have I mentioned our staff growth lately? Well a few months ago we hired Jon Williams onto the team. He is full support for everything in the company from marketing to shooting to editing to admin. He is kicking ass so far, our team has really come together to share in the common vision. We just need to start pumping out more profitable gigs to support the growth. We have now besides myself, Andrew MacCormack, Steve Foster, Lauchlan Ough, Jon Williams, and a new intern names Steve Belyea. I just though I should add that in while I was thinking of it!

The next day I hopped onto a real small Beachcraft and flew over the Rockies into the BC interior. It was an incredible flight flying closely over the snow covered mountain tops, the Rockies from a plane are very interesting to look at, very ragged and multi layered. I landed in a small town called Trail BC that I mentioned earlier. All I can say is AWESOME…in the truest sense of the word. Awe inspiring maybe? The town is in a valley, 33 degrees when I got in, like a summer day, everything was green and beautiful and there was 7 feet of powder in the mountains that surround the town, one of the sister towns is Rossland BC that sits at the base of a ski mountain which is also home to my friend the Krazy Canadian Dan who is the extreme snowmobiler that I met at the Xtremey Awards last year. I tried to get in touch with Dan but he wasn’t around. I am keen to look into producing a HD snowmobile show, he is the man to talk about it.

I immediately started filming at a conference room. This is where Dave, Carollyne, and another executive coach where coaching the senior management of Kootney Savings, a credit union that is so cutting edge that they have fully embraced coaching within there whole organization. They have bought into it so heavily that this day 6 employees where certified and are now internal coaches for the organization The intention is to build a fully integrated coaching culture through ever strata of the organization. The senior management where also being trained while I was there, it was very cool to film them and realize that they have adopted a management structure that is open to personal growth and also to personal fulfillment. And its working. The employees are all very healthy and loyal and certainly have a strong sense of ownership. This is how I try to manage my company as well. Its cool. Anyway there is nothing much more to write about for this segment of the trip other than it is amazing to see how coaching not only works on a person to person level, but also on a multi tiers corporate level as well. It is also cool to ask the question “Why now?”. Why is coaching being adopted so strongly today and not 10 years ago? The answer varies, but mostly we are realizing that in today’s technology centered world, the personal relationship is being de valued. When the personal relationships, growth and development are put on the back burner, our generation does not tolerate it anymore. We want a healthy environment to work in, we want to be happy, we want to love what we do, we demand respect and the market is so competitive that if an employer doesn’t hop on this bus then retention of employees will be a challenge. Everyone on the world wants respect, which is what coaching is about, respect and humanity.

The next day after some more interviews down by the raging Columbia river, and after my explorations up the mountains to Rossland, and up the very Italian-like zig zagged narrow roads that make their way up the sides of very steep mountains, I hopped back onto the plane and flew back across the Rockies into Vancouver where my good pal Davey Miller picked me up. Dave is a friend of a long time, we have shared a lot of great adventures together. Dave, Mackenzie, Tidby and I spend weeks on the road filming the Useless Facts Travel show together, driving all over the Maritimes documenting as many useless facts as possible, such as Sussex inventing the ice cream cone as we know it and the biggest manmade lobster in Shediac…stuff like that. We also did an episode just on New Brunswick, Mackenzie and Miller where the English host and my friends Roxy and Moe where the French hosts, we all hopped in my motor home and cruised around the province, it was the beginnings of a very fun summer ahead.

Miller also joined Tidby, Natalie and myself on a cruise to Bermuda…back then I was still able to get my friends on for 10 bucks a day, can you imagine? We had a blast, Celebrity Cruises has a reputation for incredible food and its true. We ate and drank and swam and scootered and jumped cliffs and snorkeled and caved…it is an adventure that I will probably have to write more about sometime, next time I’m on a plane I guess…Oh yeah, Miller and his girlfriend Erica also joined us in Grand Cayman for our wedding adventures. So now you know who Miller is. We went to his condo and hit the roof top patio 20 stories up, WHAT A VIEW! The snow covered mountains in one direction, the city in another, Stanley park in another and the Pacific Ocean beach front in an other. Magic hour into evening we spent with a few friends eating cheese and drinking wine. Vancouver I am convinced is the most beautiful city I have ever visited. Having a view like that with a city surrounded by massive snow covered mountains with beautiful beaches right in the city is amazing, Hong Kong was another city that I thought was very beautiful because of the lush green mountains and the very interesting sky scape, but Vancouver is truly where it is at.

The next day which was also yesterday was a jam packed day of urban outdoors experiences, we started with breakfast at an outdoor patio bistro, then rented some bicycles and biked around Stanley Park for 2 hours…what a park! All along the sea wall the three of us biked. There where so many people outside enjoying the weather and the day and physical activity. After our ride we hit the beach for a couple of hours and I stubbornly got pretty sun burnt, but it was so nice to have the first sense of summer, Miller and I even jumped into the ocean and surprisingly it wasn’t that cold! We then drove only 10 minutes out of downtown to a place called Deep Cove, you would think we where in a natural paradise hundreds of miles into the interior, but no we where still in the city. It was so serene and peaceful with huge green mountains surrounding the cove, no view or feeling of the city whatsoever. We rented sea kayaks and had a great paddle for a few hours tucking close along the huge cliff faces that where populated by these beautiful “mansions” stuck to the cliffs. These homes had to no roads to get to them only by boat but they where super high end homes, it was very cool, it was exactly what I want to do with my cliff face properties that I have in the Saint John River. When I bought the property in Acamac for some reason I also thought it would be beneficial to purchase 2 other pieces of seemingly useless lots of land that are essentially cliff faces…what can you build on a cliff face? Well now I know./ In fact I was initially inspired when Jessica and I first arrived to Calgary for her 2 year stint in Alberta. Right after we arrived we bought her Subaru Impreza and had a great road trip across the Rockies to the Sunshine Coast to check out this great music festival called the Bonfire Festival, very cool even, the stage was based around a massive old growth tree, great music and folks, an old friend from the Evolve Festival Jim Dorey was helping to promote this festival so it was good to catch up with him.

After spending a few inspiring days on the Sunshine Coast we went to Vancouver to visit our old friend and my old motor home room mate in film school. Sarah Hedar. Sarah is an excellent editor working in Vancouver and we have years of friendship behind us, we lived together in leaky trailer for a year on a vineyard 45 minutes away from school together. We decided to buy this motor home when we realized rent was so expensive, we got it for 500 bucks each and we parked in literally in an ice wine vineyard and peach orchard. We lived in the Garden of Eden it seemed. Getting to school via hitch hiking and bumming rides everyday was a bit of a pain in the ass at times, but ma what a spread! We plugged the motor home into this little farming shack that during the summer the Mexican vineyard workers stay in, now 3 of my friends lived in there, it was a one room house, 3 other duded, myself and Sarah…a bit too much, so we bough our home named Ethel and lived our own little bohemian life with a propane heater that hardly worked and a roof that dripped like and open Fawcett. Yes we roughed it but that’s what you do when you are a poor student with no student loans. Man do I ever go on tangents…while we where there Jess and I went to the Granville Island Brewing Company for a tour of the brewery and a taste of the fine micro…loved it. The island is very cool, in fact we came to the same place last night to have dinner, up on an outdoor patio looking over the water, directly under this huge bridge, very hip spot…anyway Jess and I walked around the area and saw a community of floating homes. I was immediately energized…I was thinking about how my dad’s pre-fab homes could manufacture these floating homes, I wanted to change my career! Ha ha. Anyway that is why I bought the land on the river because with it comes a little cove and I thought it would be so cool to build a floating home community so the rest is history, I have still not done anything with this land but I had a chat with my old friends Monica and Steve, they are eco-conscious architects. They are always looking for an interesting environment to design a house for. This could be it! Paddling along these homes and then later that night revisiting Granville island with Miller and Erica stoked me up to start planning on developing these properties and floating homes again.

This morning Erica and Miller drove me to the airport, I just walked through the first class pods…I miss them! Ha ha, I’m a sucker. Now I have to start to think about the Airplane Journals and how I am going to lay it out. Till next time! When is next time anyway? Oh yes, Jessica and I will be flying back to BC to go on our Alaskan Honeymoon cruise…Talk to you then!

APRIL 22, 2008 - Cannes, Torino

APRIL 22, 2008

Cannes, Torino

I am flying over Spain right now, a few minutes ago I was over the green Mediterranean. It is always so interesting to me to look at the land below, then compare it with the flight map that appears on the plane screens to pinpoint exactly where I am. I have had quite a time the last few weeks. Truly a contrast from the peaceful serenity of the North.

I left the arctic via Montreal 2 weeks ago. I flew into Paris. I was fortunate to have one of those new “pods” in business class on the way over, it was amazing, the airplane seat lowered into a bed, I have never had such a comfy flight! Ha ha. I spent the flight drinking red wine (mistake?), watching some fantastic Canadian films, and read the Monty Lewis Story. Monty of course was one of Gene MacLellan’s good friends back in the day when Gene was involved with the prison ministries. Oh by the way, the Gene episode will be on CBC tonight, and her I am flying over the Atlantic, anyway I hope it goes well. The Gene story has been very inspiring. I must say though we have never had such tight deadlines, like the Kerouac episode we where at the 11^th hour not knowing if we where to get our E&O insurance. There is always something blocking the clear path to making television easy. This insurance bit is a total scam as well, may I vent?

All broadcasters have Errors and Omissions insurance, this protects them from being sued as a result of a program that they air. This makes sense. However, some broadcasters like the CBC requires the producer to purchase the E&O. The ONLY way to get E&O insurance is to have the entertainment lawyer go through the whole show and pinpoint every single possible liability. If releases aren’t covered for every possible issue, then we get no insurance, which means we have no sure, and we break the contract with CBC which means we are in a position for a lawsuit all over again. What does this mean for a producer and a director? It means if you don’t get the proper paper work and legal stuff taken care of as you are shooting, then forget about having creative control. The Insurance business makes me sick. Why is it even legal to treat small business like this anyway? So I guess the irony of it all to me is that if the lawyer makes the show E&O ready, then that means theoretically we won’t be sued because every liability will be covered, BUT WE STILL NEED TO PAY THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS FOR INSURANCE. Someday there will be equilibrium I hope.

Anyway to wrap up the Grave Concerns story, the Kerouac episode aired on CBC totally out of sync, quite a disappointment after all the work and money we put into making it broadcast ready, but it was out of our hands and we delivered a great show, that is what I will have to hold onto. After this week’s Gene episode will be the Fighting Fishermen Yvon Durell. I can’t wait to see the final edit of this episode. My friend Colin Thornton directed this episode for me, this is exciting for me as it is the first time I have hired someone else outside of my company to direct one of my shows. I’m sure I will write more about how it went when I travel to BC in a few weeks, I have a few more days of shooting for the Coaches documentary to shoot in Victoria and in Trail BC. Should be interesting.

I am listening to Sound Tribe Sector 9 right now, I’ve been trying to stop listening to Sigur Ros but I can’t, so I am going to take a 30 second break and change my I tunes back to my Icelandic heroes…Ok I’m back now.

As a result of my red wine consumption in my pod, when I arrived in Paris I had a bit of an ill feeling in my brain…when will I learn? Ha ha. But all was well because when I got onto the TVG bullet train, I had a full row of seats to shut my eyes and wonder off into anti-jet leg, anti-hangover la la land! I had a 5 hour train ride from Paris to Cannes, and was it ever beautiful. Europe is such a special area, so beautiful with the rolling hills and vineyards, to the snow covered Alps, to the white sands and cliffs of the Mediterranean…I saw it all on the train. What a great way to travel, longer than flying, but way more comfy and scenic! My grandfather Thomas was the ultimate “train guy”. Grampy had a train set in his basement that was the size of the whole basement, man it was HUGE! Great memories of playing with the electronic remotes watching the trains go through the tunnels and hills that Grampy built. I have one major regret in my life, when Grampy was dying of Alzheimer’s he wanted one of the 4 grandkids to take the train set. I was living at my parents home at the time and I had no room for it. None of the grandkids wanted it. When Grampy passed away the whole train set went a fellow from the church, I am guessing it is either all packed in boxes or has been sold off. So sad. But I do have great memories of Grampy taking me on the train from Saint John to Fredericton Junction, or him and Nanny taking my cousin Craig and I to Hillsborough train museum to check out the steam operated trains. What a cool hobby looking back on it that he had, trains, steam engines, rails, travel…I owe a lot of who I am today to my grandfather.

Funny enough many years later one of my first CBC drama’s I worked on was shot in Hillsborough. The production company didn’t have enough money to put me up in a hotel as a camera trainee, so I brought my motorbike and my tent. Can you imagine? I was always pretty hard core for getting work! Anyway they put my friend Swanny and I in the old steam train for a week, it was our hotel! It was perfect! That was so long ago, the show was called Paradise Siding, part of a series of CBC short dramas I worked on. I learned a lot on those shoots. After the motorbike I ended up buying my motorhomes and not only would I go to work on films in other cities living in the motorhome, I would rent it out to production as well as the camera vehicle! Always an entrepreneur I guess. I remember Starhunter very well, the Sci-Fi series that I worked on for months in Minto, it was always a treat to retire to my motorhome after work instead of driving 45 minutes to Fredericton like everyone else had to do. More on that experience in another blog entry I’m sure.

I finally made it to Cannes, thankfully I felt great after a long sleep on the train, and I found my apartment. I was sharing with my friend John Wesley Chisholm from Arcadia Entertainment in Halifax. I think after this MIPTV I will be doing a fair bit of work with those guys. John Wesley and I seem to come up with a lot of the same ideas for TV shows, we I think both agree that it might be better to do some of these projects together instead of competing with each other! I won’t go into too much detail about MIP, except that it was wonderful, certainly the most productive markets I have been to yet. Being with the NSI crew again (from Winnipeg) was amazing, it was just real nice to have a team and a home base to work from. Experiences are always more wonderful when shared with others. Sadly one of my NSI colleagues Don got sick the first day and was in the hospital for the whole time, how awful. Heather, Raja, Tyler and I had a great time together, along with NSI leadership Mickey and Suzanne…and also John Wesley! We went out for fantastic French and Italian meals, met up with other old friends, walked the cobblestones, experienced Southern France. We will see what the real results where from this year’s MIP when I get home. I haven’t even had a chance to do my MIP follow-ups, this is only because I have been in mad editing mode in Torino with no time for anything but being in the intense groove of editing a 52 minutes documentary to fine cut in 7 days…read on…

After a fun night on top of Raj’s penthouse rooftop condo, we all said goodbye and I left Cannes and hopped onto a Trenitalia regional train, heading South down the coast into Italy, broke down halfway between the border and Genova, finally got to Torino 9 hours later. I very frustrating travel day with no communication, my Aliant cell phone didn’t work here, my calling card had no time left, credit card calls where 11 Euro per minute (yeah right) and I didn’t have Federica’s number on me, oh and to top it off I needed to get to the internet because at that point Grave Concerns (Kerouac) was about to air in 3 days and we where having MAJOR clearance issues that I needed to deal with. I can’t believe that we pulled everything together with Steve at Hemmings House, Angelika and Cindy taking care of the legal and admin and management of Grave Concerns, MacCormack overseeing the Post Production of Graves, and me trying to make us all a future at MIP and editing together an epic documentary in Torino that we shot in the arctic a week previous. I am, I mean WE are becoming great multitaskers. I am learning a lot though about taking on to much, it is my addiction to experience and challenge I suppose. Things always seem to work out in the end though and I owe that to faith.

TORINO

After my hellish journey, I was finally settled back into my Italian home away from home, with Federica and Mauro. We spent a week of amazing food every night, and intense editing sessions every day. Matteo and I rocked through the documentary which is now called MELTING LANDS- A CULTURAL CLIMATE CHANGE. It was the most inspiring edit of my life. I wish I could bottle that feeling that I get when I edit music and images and create emotions on screen…I would be a wealthy man! Ha ha. As you know I am pushing to become a successful producer, not an editor, but I must say it is the editing process that really ignites me.

Matteo took me to 2 football games, ma they where nuts, the first one was Juventos vs. Milano (4-3), there where 800 police officers in full riot gear separating the fan entry points at the stadium! The second one was Juventos and Parma, another great match…3 to 0. I am now a committed fan and I know that it is because of me that they won, remember back in 2006 world cup when each country Al and I visited the county won the match? Well there you go, I think the Juventus football club should hire me and fly me down every time there is a match. Haha.

I left Torino this morning after a great night with Federica, Mauro and Matteo and this incredible restaurant with huge columns and ceilings, I’m sure it was a few hundred years ago. I had a week of heavy emotion in the fact that I had some real struggles with somebody who is involved in our project. But I kept a thick skin and edited what I think is the most beautiful documentary I have ever had anything to do with. The footage is beautiful, the sound is great, and the subjects where so humble and wonderful to let us film their lives. My composers Mat and Jon hooked me up with a great soundtrack that we edited too. There is no sense really in talking about this until you see it for yourself. I brought it up to a 52 minute fine cut in record time, audio mix included in 7 days, Federica’s company SGI will be doing the final online and color correct in the next few days, I can’t wait to see it! But most importantly I can’t wait to get home and see Jess, see my family, and my friends. This Saturday night Grand Theft Bus is playing in St Andrews at the annual Paddle Fest that Jamie Steele organizes every year…this is probably the best place for me to resurface!

March 24th, 2008 - The Arctic, Part 2

Yesterday I was snowboarding with Jessica and 2 our good friends Jan and Laurina at Sunday River, now I am storm stayed in a small airport in the arctic region of Quebec, in a town called Kuujjuak. As it turns out flights up to our destination Kangirsuujuak have been cancelled for the past 4 days. I feel for those who are stuck as it costs $250 per night to stay in the hotel…what luxury! I am here for round two of “Melting Lands”…nothing is melting here I can assure you that! It is absolutely freezing here, the wind is blowing like mad and it looks pretty grim. I miss being in the Caribbean! I have been reunited with Genti and Matteo. We are getting ready to shoot the rest of the project, to be honest with you I have no idea about the direction we are going to take with this. It is going to be interesting to se how it shapes up.

I am writing this flying over a sea of melting ice. It is a beautiful sight of ever changing openings in the ice that turn ocean waters into temporary rivers, slowly cracking and forming into new works of art every minute. I am flying in a small Air Inuit plane from Kangiqsujuaq back to Kuujjuak (via a couple other small Inuit village stops). I have on my I-pod an inspiring mix of Bjork, Sigor Ros, Delerium and Catherine MacLeallan. Aside from being the only time I can ever write in this journal, flights are also a great time for me to nothing but listen to beautiful inspiring music. Watching the melting lands below to this sound track really inspires me. Inspires me to do what? I’m not sure…just live and appreciate I guess.

This has been a very valuable trip for me internally, I have had a lot of time to think, and really evaluate where I am spiritually, emotionally and existentially. That’s what the arctic does for me…it is a void, a vast landscape of white and nothingness…in the most beautiful form. This is the environment that my brain needs to clear my head of financial stress, business issues, real life. This trip was such a great experience for me it will be hard for me to put it into words. Last time I was here in July it was such a different landscape and experience. I wrote in this journal each night last time and was very specific about my day to day experiences. This time was different as we filmed late into the evening every day and hen we got home all I had the energy to do was put on my headphones and put myself to sleep listening to music, something I have denied myself of for so long.

Our first night we where welcomed by our friend Robert who drove us to one of the teacher’s house where we would be staying for 8 nights. The teacher and his family was away on vacation so it was nice to have an apartment to ourselves. We set up base camp here for the bulk of our production. A well deserved and deep sleep brought us to a new day, full of blowing winds and snow, a full white out. We bumped into our old fiend Johnny the hunter, he agreed to take us up into the tundra to go ice fishing. We rented our skidoo from Noah, followed Johnny across Wakum Bay, over massive ice chunks, up the tundra to one of the many lakes that we had flown over filming caribou last time we where here. It is so interesting being here the second time having a better grasp of the landscape.

 

The next day we found our friend Lukasi and his grandson. He took us to this amazing place in the ice where he dug a hole and we slid ourselves fully under the ice as it was low tide. Wakum Bay actually has higher tides than the Bay of Fundy, so when the tide goes way down there are millions of mussels…this is an old Inuit tradition when food was scarce to get under the ice and pick these rich sources of energy. I have always been intrigued by caves and tight places, this was the pinnacle experience for me. The blue light that creeps into the cracks under the ice is fantastic. Lukasi and his grandson picked a few bags of mussels for dinner, then the tide started to rise. The ice actually slowly lowers at the same pace that the tide comes up, so there is only a window of about 30 minutes that you can be down there before the tide will sweep you away, and it has happened in this town on more than one occasion. Lukasi assured us that he is the only one in town who can safely take people down under the ice…he is an incredible man.

 

Thursday and Friday we went out on a 2 day hunt with 3 Inuit hunters, Charlie, Tiivi, and Willie. We took the snowmobiles over land and ice for about 2 and half hours looking for polar bear, seal, fox, wolf, tarmegon etc…anything that moves they where ready to shoot! Such a different experience for me, I am the furthest thing from a hunter, I love animals, and seeing something die because of me is hard on my soul, but this is how the Inuit live and I fully respect their culture and their ways. I as a documentary filmmaker has a duty to document as I see, not get personally involved.

The coolest part of the day for me was getting out to the ice edge to find seal. The ice edge was probably 10 kms from shore, it was a long and bumpy ride over the ice to get there, but when we got there it was breathtaking. It was sunny, not a cloud in the sky and not even a whisper of wind. It was so quiet at the edge that I could hear the ringing in my ears. I have never been somewhere so peaceful in my life. There where seal, and walrus…unfortunately for our hunter guides they where too far out to shoot. Once they shoot they have a small kayak that they paddle out into the frigid water to retrieve the catch, but if its too far out it is too risky to go, so they decided not to hunt. We where literally inches from the ice edge, it is kind of creepy knowing that I am 10 kilometers into the Hudson straight on ice, only 3 inches from deathly cold water. But I know we where guided by the most experienced people around to keep an eye on our safety. We decided to try to find other water where the animals where closer, but we had no luck. At high tide the ice chunks block access to the water making it impossible to get to the edge. We missed our chance. We decided to move on for another hour and set up at the camp.

 

We arrived at this small little shack made from plywood with a little stove in it.; Just 3 Inuit hunters, 2 Italian men, and me…ha ha, in very tight quarters, it was like camping out in my tree house as a kid, we where all cuddled together all night in sleeping bags keeping each other warm! Ha, what a great image! Anyway at night we headed into the mountains and found a lake, they drilled a hole in the 5 foot deep ice, inserted a long piece of wood with a little claw attached to it that had a piece of rope tied to the end. They call this a jigger, once it goes down the hole, they pull the rope and the claw moves the stick in a straight line for many meters under the ice. They do this at night because to drill the hole 50 meters away and successfully find the jigger they attach a flashlight (waterproof!) to the end of it and you can literally see this glow under the snow from under the 5 foot ice creeping in a straight line, man it was so cool to see this. When it reached the destination, Charlie and Tiivi drilled another hole, grabbed the jigger and pulled it out. On the first hole they attached their fish net to the end of the rope and pulled the net through from the 2^nd hole….in a matter of minutes they had a net set under the ice. Necessity is the mother of invention! The next morning we went back and we pulled the net back out of the hole and 21 very large arctic char where in the nets. The char are very similar to salmon in size and in taste even. We immediately cooked one up and had the freshest fish in the world! I can’t forget to mention the Northern Lights the night before…standing outside the small cabin in complete darkness, save for the small glow through the cracks in the cabin from the Coleman lamp on the inside, I was knocked over in awe and inspiration seeing these incredible lights. Tiivi told me about some of the mythology that explained the lights. I felt like I was the luckiest guy on earth to be witnessing this…and I was.

 

After catching the fish, and shooting 3 tarmagon (arctic bird) we headed back to the ice edge looking for more seal or bear. My snowmobile ran out of gas. We where stranded in the middle of the iced desert! Haha, our guides where about 5 kms ahead of us but finally realized we weren’t with them, they came back and drove us the next hour in the sled behind their skidoos back to town, what a painful ride that was! Noah went out the next day to retrieve our snowmobile.

 

The next few days where filled with amazing time lapse shots of sun sets, sun rises, more awe inspiring Northern Lights, I didn’t realize that they where so bright! They had the intensity of a very powerful spotlight beaming into the sky, only it was dancing all over the place with colorful trails, you couldn’t ask for a trippier psychedelic experience with a perfectly sober mind! God’s art.

 

We had the chance to go dog sledding. The dogs are amazing, all working together to pull so much weight, so effortlessly and so contently…huskies are amazing creatures. Sadly we met with some hunters who came back with a wolf in their sled. I shouldn’t say sadly, like I said before it is what they have been doing for ever, but to see such a beautiful animal up close with a bullet hole in its head is sad, especially knowing how few of them we have on the earth. What a great animal though, ferocious teeth, and paws the size of my head. This is why everyone travels with a gun up North, I can’t believe how many times the 3 of us went into the tundra, or the ice for miles alone without a guide or a gun, we would be helpless if we met a hungry polar bear or wolf…ha, stupid white boys we are!

Another fantastic experience was when Ussipee (Joe) built us an igloo on the side of a mountain, it took him 90 minutes with only a saw and a knife and he built a beautiful house! Ha, it was amazing! We time lapsed the sun going down as the igloo went up, then when it was completely dark the igloo was illuminated by Joe’s Coleman lamp inside, it was so cozy in there and I was amazed how quick he put this thing up! He was actually born in an igloo and lived in one for the first 8 years of his life, he had some good insights for us about life in igloo. That night as well was complimented by the most glorious northern lights yet. I can’t and won’t even try to explain. You will have to witness it for yourself.

After 8 days staying at our “base camp” we moved to our friend Cathie’s house for the remaining 2 days. Cathie is an amazing woman who has devoted so much of her life to bringing inspiration and culture to the kids of Kangiqsujuaq. She is a teacher at the elementary school, but on the side she has a project that brings “animators” from the South up to teach and entertain the kids…for example when we where there in July she had this great girl named Elody who was a cirque entertainer, hula hoops, stilts, masks, parades, art, culture…everything. The purpose is to get the kids ready for a trip to the Gaspe once a year to participate in a world festival. It is here where the Inuit kids can experience the cultures of the world in a real fun and exciting environment…anyway Cathie has passionately spearheaded this initiative purely out of the love for the kids and the culture…truly commendable. This semester she brought up a real inspiring guy named Remi who is a fantastic musician and percussionist. He brought with him a whole bunch of percussion and drums to teach the community Brazilian drumming…yes it is true, global warming has happened when you hear the rhythms of Brazil in the land of the Inuit! Haha. Anyway it was so cool because on one of the real nice sunny afternoons they had a parade through town, the echo of the drums resonated through the whole community, made me want to dance! Last night was Remi’s last night as well as ours. They had a the last workshop with him until he comes back in June. We joined the workshop and I played snare and cowbell..MORE COWBELL! Truly a great example of the positive sides of intercultural meshing! Music is the unifying language of the world and it is music that can be use to bring peace, I really believe that.

 

I am now almost in Montreal, tomorrow I will be in Paris, then down to Cannes, then Turnio, then Rome, then back home to my beautiful woman…well kind of, it will be me sitting at home for a week alone as she will be on the road with 21 leaders at that point, but this is who we are, we love opportunity, we love life, and we love each other and support each other to live our lives according to our dreams. I always digress don’t I? I guess my writing is a mirror of how my mind works..all over the place! I think this is why it was good fro me to be up here, it has been a very stressful few months, and even though Grave Concerns is being edited as we speak, and the business is running…all without me being there…it has been real good perspective for me to wipe my mind clear of some things to re focus.

 

What have I learned this trip? Well without going into detail, I have had some very uncomfortable experiences the last 10 days when it comes to how people respect each other. I feel that I am so honored to be able to bring a camera into the lives and culture of another people…like the Inuit. The aboriginal communities have been so dishonored and taken advantage of throughout history that sometimes I am embarrassed to ask anything of them…I tread with much respect and honor. I lay down my rights and realize that is a privilege, not a right to be able to document and film people in their most intimate settings. I love the Inuit, I have a heart for them and pray many blessings on them. Like I said before they have been abused so much in history that they are now in a state of stripped culture. Substance abuse is huge, reliance on the system and unemployment is everywhere, young kids smoking cigarettes, and people not respecting each other the way they should is all a result of a mismanaged aid program / evangelism (conversion) of the past. Yaaka put it right when he said that they have suffered a cultural genocide…I believe it. Thanks to people like Cathie and Remi and many others I believe that there is hope for this community of beautiful people. Their heritage and traditional ways of living are disappearing, or evolving maybe? One way or the other I have learned so much from this experience being in their community and becoming friends with so many of them, buying their art, going hunting, eating country food at their table, I am truly honored and truly blessed. Thank you.

March 12th, 2008 - Grave Concerns and JSB DVD

It has certainly been a busy, busy month so far! There is so much to write about for the production of Grave Concerns, we are on the road shooting Gene MacLellan and Yvonne Durell (The Fighting Fisherman). Gene and Yvonne are heroes with rich and intense stories. Brent has been doing a great job driving the Hearse around the Maritimes. We stated the whole show at a real speakeasy (bootleggers) in North Rustico PEI. The jam session was incredible. People shared stories about Gene, told about how much an influence Gene had on the world folk scene, some played some of Gene’s songs…I didn’t here Snowbird played once though…it was a beautiful and spirit filled night. A truly REAL experience. This episode took us to the penitentiary where Gene and his friend Monty Lewis used to play and preach the gospel to. Gene lived a real powerful and some may say tortured life. It was a real honor to hear is story and give honor to him via his friends and family. His daughter Catherine is a friend of mine and one of the most beautiful female folk singers I have ever met, her voice melts me…her mom Judy told me that Gene was the same way, quiet yet powerful with the ability to grab the attention of anyone and everyone who would be close.

The same goes for the Yvonne Durell story, because we have been so freakin busy these days I was very happy to have Colin Thornton, my writer, to direct this episode. Yvonne was a fisherman from Baie St Ann who almost took the World Champ boxer, Archie Moore for the belt. He instantly became a worldwide household name. Yvonne also had a profound affect on people close to him, he was a gentle family man, a giving community member, and a great boxer. In 2 days we will be shooting Frank McKenna’s interview about how when Yvonne was once charged with murder, young lawyer McKenna proved his innocence. The story is rich with many layers. Another reason why doing this job is so fulfilling for me.

To add to the madness, Saturday night we filmed the Jimmy Swift Band concert…7 cameras, jib crane, stedicam, everything, its going to be the best concert film I have ever shot for sure. I am using the footage for a pilot episode for a show I am trying to produce called FANS. It is a dream of mine to produce a series that focuses on live music…the time has come!

Jess and I moved into our new house in Halifax the same day. To add to the excitement the other crew was filming the Durell story, and also another one of my crew was filming the New Brunswick Youth Orchestra…keep up? I don’t know how I do.

March 3, 2008 - From NSI in Winnipeg to ECMAs in Fredericton to JSB in Halifax and more

I am currently on the flight from Toronto to Fredericton catching up on my journal. All I can say is wow...I said wow is lower case letters because I am overwhelmed, exhausted and excited all at the same time. Wow. I was supposed to be home last night to see my beautiful wife but like a couple of months ago, Air Canada and SJ airport didn't have their shit together and they canceled my flight and I was storm stayed in Toronto for the night. Thankfully I am in the air, CN tower far below out the port side window. I just thought about how when I was younger the take off and landing where so exciting for me, it still is. I always love seeing the world as a microcosm, us as ants. It really gives perspective to look out the window of an airplane, we really are all so insignificant and small to the universe, but so large and important in our selves, our family, friends and communities. I guess maybe this is why being a documentary filmmaker is so interesting?

I am flying home from Winnipeg. I was there for 5 days on the most intense and amazing training session of my life, I can sincerely say that I have NEVER in my life learned more in such a short period of time the I did the last few days in Winnipeg. I was excepted into phase 2 of the NSI global marketing program. I was 1 of 5 up and coming producers to be chosen, I certainly was the least experience of all the participants, this excites me!

There was Heather who works for one of Canada's largest production companies OMNI Pictures, she is in charge of all of the lifestyle and factual entertainment at Omni....WOW in capital letters. Tyler is VP of development at Pyramid, a huge company of over 80 employees in Calgary, in fact a year ago when I was living with Jess in Calgary I was in touch with this company about possibly getting a job with them, wow have things changed since then! Raj is one of the majors at Georgian Entertainment who produce one of Canada's favorite cult show Rent-a-Goalie. And then there is Don, a traditional documentary filmmaker from Alta Nova pictures. Don has produced and directed many very interesting documentaries. He, like me, has trouble promoting himself as AWARD WINNING, I always had a hard time saying that, but now I realize the importance of self marketing, but Dons projects have won Gemini's ! Something to be very proud of!

Anyhow, we where being trained to go to the market and properly market ourselves in Cannes in April, man we went over everything!!! The workshop presenters where ALL world class from distributors in Australia and Canada, to multi-platform gurus from England, to the VP of the new mega power CANWEST GLOBAL (who incidentally bought out Alliance Atlantis the day I was there visiting Michael Kott last time with Colin and Tidby. Such a momentous pinnacle in Canadian corporate / broadcasting history! Basically there are 3 major players in Canada now after the historic consolidation.

<!--[if !supportLists]-->1) <!--[endif]-->Can-West Global (Alliance/Atlantis / Global / E!)

<!--[if !supportLists]-->2) <!--[endif]-->Bell Canada (CTV, CHUM)

<!--[if !supportLists]-->3) <!--[endif]-->Rogers (CITY TV)

Suffice it to say I learned more in 4 days than I did in 3 years of film school. The National Screen Institute is truly an incredible program and I absorbed ALL OF IT. I am really inspired at the opportunities that where presented over the workshops about how I can take my projects to the world. Man I can't say enough.

The training went along side NSI's Drama Prize that mentors a large amount of producer / director teams that produce a short film. We have the chance to join a few hundred people at the theater to watch last years films, and also on the last night we went down to the Forks in Winnipeg (that’s where people skate and have fun) and over an open campfire 1500 hundred people watched NFB short animations on a huge screen made of snow!!! It was amazing and the animations of course where incredible! Minus 30 never felt so warm!

To wrap it up I learned so much, met incredible people, I can't express in words how inspired I am right now so I won't even try. I am now heading to Fredericton as mentioned earlier....tomorrow morning we start filming Grave Concerns for CBC. I was hoping to do a script breakdown on the flight but I feel it more important right now to update my journal. So much has gone on recently I hope I can nail it all in this blog entry.

I will try to be quick, After the wedding things went into HIGH GEAR. I haven't taken a day off in months, I guess this is the serial entrepreneur syndrome. Now that I am married all I want to do is be with Jess. It is so hard to be away from her now. Funny that I say that considering how important travel has been to me all my life. I live on the road, the fact that I have written so many entries all from airplanes kind of gives you a hint about how much I travel. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE adventures, meeting new people and seeing new places, right now though its all nothing compared to spending quality time with Jess at home. Home??? what is that? I haven't seen at my house in a month. Good news though as of Friday jess and I just closed the deal on our new house in Halifax! Yay! I had to swing some major favors on Friday to make that happen, as it turns out, even though Jess is buying the house, now that we are married I need to sign as her spouse! Who would have thought? Haha. Anyway it was really stressful because I was in Winnipeg, SOOOOO I asked Steve to find me a lawyer in Winnipeg to help me sign the papers under oath. As it turns out as a result of Steve’s trip to Prime time last week, he met a producer friend who lives in Winnipeg, he called her, and she got us hooked up with her entertainment lawyer and God bless her she came down to the Fort Garry hotel for me to sign the mortgage papers! WOW. What a favor! Anyway as it turns out she was the entertainment lawyer that was scheduled to do a session with us the next day!!! It is SUCH A SMALL WORLD the broadcast circles in Canada. WOW. Anyway she hooked me up and I was so grateful, she really helped Jess and I get out of a jam. REMEMBER GREG TO PAY IT FORWARD!!!.

Sorry I got side tracked again, oh yeah, back from wedding, I went straight to Fredericton to film the ECMA's (East Coast Music Awards) Literally this was 5 days of “H-E Double Hockey stick. ”I didn't sleep for 5 nights, we filmed, captured and compressed 60 concerts or something like that, it was nuts. All I can say is we got through it. In fact we where asked to film the actual ECMA award show as well. That was very interesting considering I was up for an ECMA award myself and Jess and I where having dinner on the floor during the awards ceremony and my boys where filming at the same time with huge pre-show technical glitches. We got through it. I did not win my category of Music Industry Professional, but I tell you, what an honor to be nominated. That nomination really meant a lot to me. I feel like my passion for music and all of the time I have spent promoting the East Coast scene through video has been recognized and I really appreciate the honor of a nomination.

Speaking of music, last night I went to TACF again for a Sunday night service. It was quite beautiful actually despite the fact that there where only maybe 15 people in the congregation...it was a real time of reflection, relaxation, and worship. I ended up getting Ruth Fazal's newest CD and that is what I am listening to right now as I write on the plane. Ruth is a violin player who releases improv CDs with violin, synth and voice, it is very beautiful and relaxing. I bought my first CD of hers years ago at TACF and it is the ultimate “put you in that place” collection of beautiful music. Funny, as I wrote that last line I spilled by glass of white wine all over me! Ha ha, I'll blame it on the pilot (can I do that?). Music is such an inspirational part of my life, especially Holy Spirit music. I truly believe God shows up in music through His spirit whether its through Bob Marley, a Phish concert, a Polyphonic Spree experience or a Ruth Fazal CD on an airplane ride home from an intense week of inspirational learning.

Please stop me from going on tangents! Ha ha. Who am I talking to anyway? Really this is a blog for myself...so in essence I'm talking to myself! Yeah I'm weird. OK, what else happened the last few weeks in February? Hmm, non stop action for sure. We edited and delivered the rough cut to the Sabian documentary that was interesting to say the least. I am looking forward to hearing comments from the broadcasters (Bravo! / CBC) about our direction. I really like where we have taken this story, it looks and sounds great. Semra the producer / Director spent a few days with us at our new office last week packaging up the rough cut.

I shot a cool corporate video at the Halifax shipyard for the Irving Pot Safety video. With this I got to go inside a brand new cruise ship that they are building as well as a NAVY ship they are repairing! That is always cool! This was with my old bro Marc Roy who is the safety officer there, and who is also one of my high school best buddies! Man we got into a lot of interesting adventures together when we where younger! Haha... always nice to reminisce! Am I that old that I am looking back into the “good ole days?” ha, maybe, weird. I love every moment of the present though, I am so blessed to realize that the present is the most important time of my life.

We are getting ready for a DVD shooting of the Jimmy Swift Band on March 15th! I cant wait for this! It will also act as a pilot for a series I want to produce called “FANS” Let me write about that later after we shoot it, basically it is the answer to our companies desire to mix our passions of music and film, THIS IS IT!!!! We are going to film the most incredible concert experience the East Coast has ever seen. I can't wait, and on top of that we are going to shoot the pilot to the show I have always wanted to produce. More to come later!!!

Our cash flow is looking great, we have so many corporate gigs on the go, man so many! I am so blessed to have a team to rock these in my style when I am away! The commercial side of the business is finally really starting to take off, certainly many challenges and headaches are still with us, but we are doing it, we are finally creating a culture of self employment and quality production. The time has come to expand, evolve and produce world class production that mixes our passions with clients needs, and in the end mixes that corporate vision, with my creative vision to lead this company down a road that will be open to the global experience. Mark my words, it is happening...GREG IT IS HAPPENING. I have only God, the universal law, friends, family, and a solid team to thank for this! The river is flowing fast and I don't intend to portage...lets hit the rapids.

Captain is telling us that we are close to destination. Sorry about the lack of detail in this entry, man all I can say is the last month has been SUPER intense, I have been married for exactly on month today, I can count on 2 hands how many days I’ve seen Jess, she is so incredibly supportive about my passions that I am able to do this, I am so lucky, After the next few weeks I will have shot all of Grave Concerns episodes 2 and 3 . I will be on a plane to the Arctic for round 2 of Weather Bomb. I will update you next at that time! Until then! I'm really speechless, can I add again the analogy of a river? I really feel that I have jumped in and I cant see around the corner, but I have a life jacket keeping me afloat which is sustained by my faith, my passion, my woman and my team...thanks you all for letting me do this, creative living, and creative teamwork, and creative faith is true life, I can't tell you enough how blessed and excited I am, despite my exhaustion.

Feb, 20 08-02-07. Wedding in the Cayman Islands

Jessica is now my wife!!! Those exclamation marks represent me screaming it in a real happy voice!!! Haha. I’m totally honored and stoked that we are about to start this new life of opportunities together. We were married on a picture perfect day in Grand Cayman on the ocean. We have similar dreams, goals, passions, drive, determination, ethics, motivations, spirit and love! I feel that our partnership will prove to be a force to be reckoned with. Anyway, we are now flying in a shitty Delta flight from Atlanta to Bangor. I just bought these incredible Panasonic noise canceling headphones, they are incredible! Of course I’m listening to Beatport Burners (www.beatport.com) , there’s nothing like hearing electronica in sonically perfect headphones!!! Jess and I stayed at the Hyatt Atlanta last night, very cool hotel, 52 inch plasma in the room, funky interior design, and all serve yourself concept in the lounge and registration desk. The future of the executive hotel experience! We watched the movie JUNO, it was a fun show.

Let me rewind...Jan 29^th we flew into Grand Cayman and pretty much began a week of paradise living! The Reef resort was right on the sandy beach. It was Jess, myself and 48 of our closest friends and family...a perfect combination, all here to celebrate our marriage, we feel really honored and blessed to have everyone with us. Jess and I treated everyone to a pirate ship sunset sail, all you can drink open bar, pirates, and reggae music in the Caribbean sea...c’mon...does it get better? I won’t go into too much detail about the wedding but I have to tell you Jessica and I had the wedding we had dreamed for, everything was perfect and stress free, I can’t tell you how smoothly it went! We ended up getting married at the end of this beautiful pier, my old bro’s from child hood Mike Long and Michael LeBlanc played some beautiful tunes on the acoustic guitars during the ceremony, Jessica looked stunning, BREATHTAKING even, the wedding was beautiful and I am truly the luckiest guy alive to have such an incredible partner in life. Its going to be a great adventure together.

The night of the wedding we hired an incredible Reggae / Soca band called the Coco Red band, they played everything you could imagine, from Bob Marley, to Gregory Isaacs! In fact they even invited me to come join them on drums for “Night Nurse” one of my favorite Reggae tunes ever, the dance party was kickin! Jay MacLean was the best MC you could ask for, my brother and Tidby stood up with me, Ruchi and Van stood up with Jess. Jessica’s bro Chris got up and said a great speech welcoming me into the family...he recalled a road trip he and I took back in 1996 when I admitted I wanted to marry Jess...he ended his speech with “what took you so long?” ha ha! So true! Anyway to be honest Jess and I have lived the lives we needed to live in our 20s to get us to where we are today, the timing is perfect for us to join together and rock it!!! My dad welcomed Jess to the family with a real special speech. Jay was able to keep the party going smoothly however by feeding everyone Jager and Baha shots...I could go on for ever, but lets just end it with me just saying it was the best wedding I have ever been too!

The next few days we spent relaxing, playing beach volleyball, snorkeling, swimming with the Stingrays, checking out the skate park and riding the manmade surf wave.

January, 2008-01-30 - A New Year!

Christmas was the furthest thing from relaxing, although it was a wonderful time to share with family and friends. I guess the older I get the more I realize and value the time spent with people close to you is so much more valuable than gifts and Christmas commercialism (quite the oxymoron!) . I knew immediately that after the week of the holidays people would finally get back to work and that I would be flooded, it?s so funny that Christmastime shuts down business for 2 weeks. I guess this 2 week downtime was a blessing as it really gave me a chance to finish off backburner projects...but then the rest of the world woke up, and the craziest January of my life just began!

Jessica and I are currently in the Delta Airplanes executive lounge waiting our flight to Grand Cayman. I'm such a lounge snob as all my friends and Jessica's family are in the airport, ahhh well! Ha-ha...Jess is reading and article in the New York Times about tomorrow nights premier of season 4 of LOST...I know it will be our first full day on our wedding vacation, but we need to watch it! I can't wait, I will admit that for a non TV watcher, I am HOOKED!!!

January began with a few real big wins, one was that Jessica was selected to join the 21 Inc. Group. This is a real honor as it involved New Brunswick's most progressive young leaders to tour around the province doing workshops, discussions and brainstorms to help shape the future of New Brunswick. This is a very cool experience, and not only that my man Jay MacLean was chosen as well! Leaders everywhere!

The next win was the NSI Global Marketing Program. Every year the National Screen Institute mentors only a small group of up and coming producers to go to MIP in Cannes, and properly guide them through the process of global export in the television content markets. So as you can imagine I was stoked to find out that I was accepted for phase one of the program! If I get through phase 1 then the next phase will be a trip to Winnipeg for some intensive training. I'm ready for it!

The other VERY cool recognition was that I was nominated for an East Coast Music Award! The ECMA is a music industry awards festival and industry market. Truly bizarre and incredible that I was nominated for "Industry Professional" considering that I don't even work in the music industry! BUT as we all know, music is my passion and I have been filming bands, musicians, concerts, festivals, and in fact the ECMA's themselves for many years...so I feel really blessed to even get a nomination. My good friend Darren Gallop from Cape Breton has a nomination for this as well, truly it is he that deserved this award as far as music industry professional, man that guy kicks it hard bringing bands from the island to the world, bands like Slowcoaster, Carman Townsend, Tom Fun etc are all bands that Darren has propelled into the market. Anyway suffice it to say I?m excited for my nomination. The day I get back from the wedding I drive to Fredericton to film them for Aliant.net again. It will be interesting to be on both sides of the festival this year!

Another very interesting thing about this month is the growing project list on the commercial side of the business, there are so many projects that I am forced to expand. Not only have we just moved our office and studios downtown into the Atlantica Center for the Arts building, I also need to hire...re-enter lauchlan Ough! It's great to have Lauchlan back. He was a high school co-op student that we took under our wing a few years ago with HIT! Media. He learned quickly and Tidby and I are proud to say that we have shaped him in many ways into the cool dude he is today. Anyway he was one of our editors for Planet Luxury, and one of the camera guys for Wrestling Reality. Anyway I have hired him back on, so now I have Steve, MacCormack and Lauchlan. We are looking into hiring one other guy named John as well to help with Audio Post and Admin. The company I feel in really starting to take shape, we just need to respectfully and responsibly make the right choices and work as hard as we possibly can to continue growing and to continue providing income for all involved.

The other cool thing that is going down is that the CFTPA (Canadian Film and Television Producers Association) that helped fund Steve's wages through the mentor program has chosen him to go to the CFTPA awards this year, all expenses paid! This is another incredible win for our company, I'm proud of what Steve has accomplished in our company and where he is going to go through these experiences. Way to learn!

January has also been a busy month for project development. I met with CBC before Christmas to discuss Grave Concerns, great news, they want to acquire the Jack Kerouac pilot episode! That was certainly not expected, we put the pilot together strictly to pitch, but bravo! We produced a CBC worthy show! Anyhow along with the acquisition, they also wanted us to think about pitching an Atlantic Canadian version. Along with Grave Concerns, the 2 projects that Colin Thornton and Cindy D?Orsay have asked me to co-produce (Aztec Enigma and Eureka!) have come to the point in the developmental stage that we can start pitching as well. We went back to meet with CBC Halifax for all three of these projects, they are VERY interested in Eureka! (a series about imagination) and they want to go forward with producing 2 episodes of Grave Concerns to start with. Here?s the pressure drop, they need it produce by April! The only time I think we will have time to produce the show will be the week before I hit the road to England for Wrestling Reality season 2. This is going to be a crazy winter / spring. As it stands right now here is my upcoming calendar.

March 15-21 - Hit the road for Grave Concerns

March 22-28 - England for Wrestling Reality

March 29-April 5 - Nunavik for Melting Lands

April 6 - Rome

April 7-11 - Cannes France for MIPCOM

April 12 - Turino Italy for post production of Melting Lands

April 1-30 - Post Production for Grave Concerns and Wrestling Reality

It kind of freaks me out but I've done it before, this is where the team REALLY has to come together and I will have to trust that they are able to take ownership of their tasks and roll with it. I feel like we are floating at the top of a white water rapid in a canoe preparing to hit the rapids with no clue of what the outcome will be, we will roll? Will we crash? Will we sink? Or will we catch a huge buzz and paddle as hard as we can and celebrate a victory at the bottom? Let's find out! One thing on my personal side I'm a bit upset about is the lack of time I will have to spend during this time with my wife...WOW that?s the first time I have written the word wife!

Colin Thornton and I went to Toronto a couple of weeks ago to pitch Eureka! and Aztec Enigma. Tidby joined us for the trip. Angelika my entertainment lawyer and her husband Cam (who is an old Evolve Tribe friend of mine) invited me to stay with them for the 2 nights. We had a full day of great meetings at CTV, Discovery, and History. I had a chance to catch up with the Canadian Urban Music Association founder Will Stricklen. Will has such deep roots in the Hip Hop scene, his stories are nuts. Will has worked with Wu Tang, Run DMC, amongst many others, he's a real inspiring cat. Will wants to produce a boxing TV series. He has a few other cool projects on the go as well that we could find ourselves working together n in the future. I always enjoy the possibilities of working with other like minded and passionate people...Will is one of those. I met Will in the green room at TSN when Peter was on ?Off The Record?. Every opportunity that is presented to you opens doors to other opportunities, what a maze! Love to see where this one leads!

The next day Pete and Rick flew in and we had a full and very intense day with The Fight Network. Negotiating WR 2 is interesting as the facts remain there is hardly any money to be afforded to us from the Network. It is complex and its part of the business I don?t enjoy. I really like the guys at the network on a personal level. Talking hard business is tough some times when you are working with people you consider friends, its all part of the package though.

December 2008-01-30

It is actually Jan 30, 2008 as I write this, I am cramped on a small Delta Airlines commuter from Bangor to Atlanta with 12 of some of my best friends. Jess is beside me, and we are en-route to Grand Cayman to get married! What a wild ride it’s been, anyway fortunately I have had the opportunity to stay put since the end of November for the most part. This means I haven’t been on an airplane in a while and it also means that I haven’t updated my journal. So I have my headphones on, Wintersleep is inspiring me to write, all is good!

Looking back December and January have been absolutely ridiculously busy, I have never in my life experienced such mad hours, Jessica has been pulling 32 hour shifts at the hospital, I have been plugging 14 hour days every day with no weekends for 2 months. The idea is to get everything cooking along so when we do go on this wedding trio and sneak away for a week, I will be able to rest at ease knowing that everything is taken care of. Andrew MacCormack has been in China for the last 8 weeks and man can we ever feel it, Steve and I have been holding it together as well as we can, but the demand has been large. I have been editing a lot, which is exactly what I hired employees to do so I could concentrate more on producing, but now I have been juggling both roles, its a high though...I do love editing...I like the idea of sleep as well though.

I can’t remember if I mentioned that Jess and I where given a hot tub in October as a wedding present, what an addition to the Acamac experience, literally we have been having our Monday morning meetings in the tub, great way to start the week off. It has also attracted more friends...hmmm, strange coincidence! Anyway I guess this is symbolic of the culture that we have created at Hemmings House Pictures, in my mind it’s all about working as hard as we can to produce the most creative and cost effective programming possible, and have a lot of fun while doing it. Our jam room set up outside the office has been great, when we get stressed, MacCormack hops on drums, me on electric guitar and Steve on bass, we rock out for 20 minutes then get back at er! It’s a great stress reliever and creativity fueler! Our Hemmings House band is called “The Industry Standards” ha-ha...inside joke! Anyway it’s a lot of fun having Steve and MacCormack on board...and super necessary. I am training Steve to become a great producer so that when I move to Halifax he can still manage all of the corporate projects, Andrew is developing into a great director, shooter, editor...head of production baby.

December along with its business was a lot of fun as well, Jess and I got to go to Sunday River for some snowboarding and skiing, Christmas came so we got to see lots of great friends, I had my bachelor party!!! We went to Poley for a great day of snowboarding and a night at a cabin jamming. I managed to finish editing the |Belize documentary that has been on my computer now for almost 2 years, wow what a relief that is. It turned out pretty cool actually, Ill be screening sometime in February most likely. We rang in the new year at Sebastian’s, oh and Jess and I moved out of Acamac, it was getting to crazy and we needed some alone time before the wedding and stuff, it has been really nice, I treated her to a kick ass super hip condo on Prince William street, man it was beautiful, exposed bricks, open concept, 2 floors, big windows, and a lot of dough...hence only being there for a month! Ha ha. We have moved now into our friends Terrie and Jackie pad to sub lease it for the 3 months that they are away, then we head to Halifax for 2 years....which reminds me we just bought a crazy cool house on North Street in Hali! I can't wait because it will truly be a new start, I really feel that the promise of 2008 will come true, there is a reward for all the effort and passion that we have all put into this company. It will be cool to live downtown Halifax, walk everywhere, sell as car, have less of an imprint. That leaves Acamac, I have asked my dear roomies to clear house by end of February then I am putting the house on the rental market. When we come back to SJ in 2 years we will have a beautiful house to walk back into in Acamac. It all makes sense!!!

Revelations

TORONTO - Healing and Revelations

I don't really need to go into too much more about California. I look forward to coming back, hopefully next time with Jessica. So hear I am, 18 hour later after being stuck at the Toronto airport. I checked in to the hotel, and a relaxing night watching Kubrick's last film "Eyes Wide Shut" all I can say is that film is fantastically messed up. I am a huge Stanley Kubrick fan, strangely I was introduced to him via a skinhead (friend?) at high school. yes I seem to befriend even the most philosophically vile people. anyway it was high school, and the dude was mis-led, besides his brain washed and simpleton views he was actually a decent guy. He would always be listening to classical music on his Walkman, I never understood, I figured he would be into some white supremest punk rock or something, no he loved classical music. So he actually turned me on to Beethoven via Kubrick's soundtrack for "A Clockwork Orange" another fabulously fucked up movie, and one of my favs to boot. How did I get onto this topic anyway??? Oh yeah, my movie watching last night, anyway because Eyes Wide Shut is such a long movie I does off around 2:00 am and woke up at 8:30.

My "standby" flight isn't until 2:00 pm, I really hope I can make it, I woke up early so I could go down to Atwell Street and visit the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship to got to Church (yes, even when I'm on the road I need to get a gas station fill up at church sometimes). I have made mention to this place before. Truly this building holds a big piece of who I am as a person, and where my spiritual walk sort of started. TACF is where spiritual renewal happened in the Christian church in the early 90s. It was here where thousands of people have been healed both physically and spiritually, it is here where a whole new style of free form worship was created, very similar to how the church that I go to is (Saint John Vineyard), it was here as well where much of the new sound of worship music originated from. I have played in bands for years and I always get a buzz out of playing live, but when I play bass guitar Sunday mornings at my church, there is no feeling like it. The difference is we are collectively offering our worship and energy's to our Creator when I play at church, so the "I" disappears and I become part of the collective. This is different when playing elsewhere where it is far more about the "I" then the "We". Also there is a lot of room and space for improve and groove playing bass with this sort of so called "worship music".

I have great memories of some VERY intense spiritual experiences that I had at this church back in the late 90s when I was going to film school at Niagara. I would come up to this church whenever I could, for a regular Sunday service, a mid week service, a youth conference, whatever, just to get filled up with the Spirit. Although my religious position in life has changed a lot since then the reality of the Spirit is still ever present in my life, and I feel empty when I get disconnected. I remember working on a Disney movie called "The Color of Friendship" in Toronto. To be honest I had a real hard time working as a camera trainee on that show. I grew a lot then, professionally and spiritually. It seemed that the 2 things that gave me comfort were "The New Riders of the Purple Sage" (the band that Jerry Garcia plays Pedal Steel in, fantastic albums) and the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship , radical!

TIMELAPSE

So hear I am again 2 hours after I wrote that great timeless word "Radical!" And yes I'm still at the Air Canada lounge. They wouldn't fit me on the last flight, so I will wait until tonight at 9:00, 7 hours later. I will have been delayed for 26 hours by then, all the more time to update my journal I guess! ( I have a Johnny walker, a Southern Ontario red wine, and a Baileys & coffee at my side ready to hang out with me for the rest of the night.

It has been an emotionally packed day to say the least. Where do I start, I guess because I was introducing my spiritual life earlier I will continue with it. Years ago I was really "into" the new wave of Christianity, radical left wing Christianity if you can imagine such a thing, BUT IT'S TRUE, IT EXISTS, I FEEL THAT I AM A LIVING EXAMPLE! I won't get too into it, but basically without contradicting myself too much (earlier in the blog I said I don't like to establish my religious beliefs in writing in fears of being dogmatic) anyway, I feel that living a life in the Spirit, in my case I am a follower of the teachings of Yeshua (Hebrew for Jesus)?I feel that my positive experience 2 nights ago with the Polyphonic Spree in LA can be slightly connected with my spiritual Christianity; Joy, Freedom Love and openness? "Hey! It?s the sun! And it makes me shine!" If people actually followed the fundamentals of their religion there would be no war?LOVE LOVE LOVE"most of the world's religions are based upon love as their foundation, why do we always fuck it up? Selfishness and greed are at the root of dogmatism, which I think is the most powerful tool of the devil?LOVE and UNDERSTANDING,I need to keep reminding myself of that.

Anyhow, when I was a bit younger, like I mentioned a second ago, I was really into this Christian revival thing, it was very experiential, I had many times laying on the floor feeling the electric power of the Spirit flow through my body as I gave thanks and praise for life, love and all the blessing that are continually bestowed upon me. As time moved on I feel like I have become far more secularized, even surfacely ashamed of my beliefs, not having the energy or desire to defend my beliefs. I don?t like arguing politics or spirituality. Spirituality is its? own thing for everyone, mine is mine and mine is what makes me, well me! Blah blah blah, back to today.

It's been a while since I have really sensed the Spirit within me, I have been connecting to the Creator ONLY through music for so long (not that there is anything wrong with that on its own, that is my medium, but), its like religion was wiped out of me, and I have proudly tried to make it through my recent life (full of distractions, success, disappointments, love, broken relationships, debt etc) by myself. I have really adopted a protected "I'll do it myself" attitude. This is no way to grow as I have found out in so many aspects of my life. This morning I was urged to wake up, get out of my comfy hotel bed and hop in a cab and make it to the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship to go to church. I arrived, it was nice, great memories of a seemingly "much more spiritual" time of my life. The worship band came on, I went through the motions, it was nice, nothing mind blowing, but comforting in a safe environment (that is one thing that this new revival is a master at, making people feel comfortable and wanted and loved, not persecuted, judged and hated like many other dead factions of Christianity).

Then something profound!!!

A couple got up and told of their recent trip to Alabama for a week at a youth detention facility. They had a chance to minister to these kids, many with physical illness, drug addiction, emotional and physical pain, and how they witnessed with their own eyes healing that was a direct result of faithful prayer. I am always filled with joy when I hear these stories, but equally filled with skepticism. I feel awful saying that, but I feel that even though my faith is still foundational in my life, I have developed much doubt in many things as of late, especially healing, why, I don't know. I hope that I can soon get over that.

Recently my brother Mark found that he had a tumor in his inner ear, as a musician for so many years, scar tissue had developed and formed into a tumor. Why him and not me? I play way more music then he does and go to way more concerts, man its me that deserves that, not him, anyway suffice it to say it has been a scare to him and his family, and to our whole family. If Mark had to get this tumor operated on, there is a small risk that he would loose his motor skills in one side of his faced, leaving him slightly deformed, and a slight risk that he would have to re-learn how to walk.

A few months ago he came to my church with me, and after we got a few people together and prayed with Mark that he would be healed. Last week he went to a specialist in Toronto and as it turns out he doesn't need it to be operated on now and it isn?t at a stage where it will spread. We are all very thankful for this, I DON'T WANT CANCER to be in anyone close to me, I have already lost my good friend Randy Cable to this killer, and some other people close to me are battling it as we speak, I hate cancer. Was this a miracle that Mark doesn't have to get operated on? Maybe? Or is it just the way it is? I'm not sure, my faith is based very much in realism and logic, so I?m convinced that it is a miracle of natural design, or at least I think it is? my spiritual faith is up and down so much these days.

Then this morning happened. Wow, I haven't cried in so long, I have cried twice in 7 years. The first time was with my friend at Evolve this year as we both came to term with our friend Leslie's death. It was profound in the fact that we both realized that Leslie had to go at that time and at that place and that she was in a good place. It was 7 years previous that I cried before that on New Years Eve at a Phish Concert in the Florida Everglades with a head full of mushrooms and a spirit full of emotion.

As a side bar, I would like to remind the reader (family, friend, business acquaintance, etc) that my primary life desire is to me real and honest and truthful with everyone. Despite popular belief (haha) I am not a pot smoker, I have smoked a few joints in my day but I just have never enjoyed the buzz, always made me paranoid and antisocial, mushrooms however I have experienced a few times which I will write about someday, are a whole different experience. I have ALWAYS had deep spiritual / emotion experiences when I had a mushroom. Don't get me wrong, I experiment with these only 2 or 3 times a year, but it, like my spiritual Christianity, and like music, and like, family, friends and love, is what has made me who I am today, and I wouldn't trade my life experiences thus far for anything. So instead of me hiding the fact that I have from time to time experimented with mind altering drugs, let's just realize that every time in this blog I mention "chocolate", really I'm talking about tasty chocolate covered psilocybin mushrooms. Not to go on a tangent, but I do want to write about this sometime, I have had some very profound Holy Spirit experiences with mushrooms, I know it sounds crazy, but I will try to remember to write about Phish in Toronto 99 and NYE 2000, my weird zoomy experience with Grand Theft Bus, and again with my Evolve zoomy experience with my friend while dealing with Leslie's death while listening to drum and bass DJs in a field. Oh man, I am totally going off on a tangent here. The basic philosophy here that I am so pathetically trying to get across is reminded to me by a dead head I met, actually right here in Toronto at the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship during the Fresh wind Youth Conference many years ago.he said;

"Greg, when I die, I want everyone from every part of my life to know the real me"

I have quoted that for years since?what that means to me is that if we are all honest with ourselves and our friends and family, the no matter how painful it may be, we will create a better world, and a better understanding of ourselves. For example, at my funeral, I want my brothers and sisters from my church community to talk to my family, my friends, my business acquaintances, my party friends, my drinking buddies, people I have had profound "trips" with, etc to all know every aspect of my life. I don?t want my friends I smoked a joint with to say:

"I didn't know Greg was a spiritual Christian"

And also I don't want my church family to say.

I didn't think Greg ever experienced drugs, other spiritual avenues, and great Scotch Whiskey!?

It means a lot to me that I am honest, so from this point forward in my blog, no more bullshit, I respect you the reader enough to give you all of me in this. Why? Well maybe it's more interesting to you, but also maybe in a selfish way when I am gone these will be my words. And if I want people to remember me as the WHOLE GREG, then it is my responsibility to write it.

Back to my brother, and church in Toronto this morning?it?s been a very tearful day and I don't know why, not out of sadness, but out of love for my family and out of hope?it?s weird. I just got off the phone with Jessica telling the story I am about to tell you and I started to cry (it felt good by the way), I couldn't even talk to her, I tried to tell her I'd call her back because I was talking on the phone crying, trying to get my words out on the phone at the Air Canada executive lounge with all of these first class passengers sitting beside me eating cucumbers and drinking Scotch (mmmmmmmm, yummmmy!)

Back at church, as the couple where telling amazing stories of healing with these young offenders in Alabama, people started getting up and giving testimonials about their personal healing experiences, then they started calling people to stand up who had illnesses that needed to be healed, and people where being healed in the room, it was crazy, I've seen this many times before, and still my faith is week, weird eh? But peoples arms, legs, lungs, whatever, where being healed in front of all of our eyes. Then they said;

"If any one has cancer, or has someone in their family with cancer or a tumor please stand up!"

So I got up for my brother, I wanted prayer for his healing, my lack of faith didn't hold me back from standing up. When I stood up a bunch of people came over to me and started to pray over me, I immediately said "This is for my brother" and then I had to start trying to hold my tears back, honestly I'm not the least bit afraid for Mark, I know he is going to be ok, I just think it was this immediate and unexpected lowering of my emotional wall that brought me to tears. Anyway the Spirit was very present and our Creators' love was warm.

As people where praying for Mark through me, (I know that sounds weird, but whatever, I don't care anymore) other people where still getting up on stage giving testimonials about healing and faithfulness, I heard with my eyes shut as people still surrounded me, a woman say that she has $80,000 of credit card debt and it had been really breaking her spirit. I as well have been plagued with exactly $80,000 of credit card debt, yes its true, man I?m ballsy to admit it, but I am dying with debt, and this is the price of past business mistakes and of putting 150% into a small business, I am in debt and sadly I feel like I have lost a bit of myself as a result of the stress resulting from this stress. I feel that my family, friends and employees have all seen a different Greg with a slightly less "joy of life" in recent times SOLEY DUE TO DEBT. Trust me, I am crazy passionate and exited about where my life is right now, man I travel the world doing a job that I absolutely love, its nuts how blessed I am. This coaching experience has really helped me preserve my hopes and dreams, it has been truly invaluable. However there is still a stress that is bringing me down in a major way, it is this debt. I am a risk taker and I have such great dreams of what is possible for my business and my life that I dive straight in hoping for the best, in most cases it works out, I am still trying to manage this "illness" of debt though.

Anyway as people where still praying for my bro by laying hands on me, I heard the pastor say "anyone with debt issues, please stand up and lets pray for you?" typically I would take advantage of this opportunity, man I'll try anything at this point. I'm getting married, the last thing I want to worry about are my credit cards, I just want to live a happy and humble and successful life, I don't need much, but I know if there is one thing I don?t want are stressed due to something as stupid as credit card debt, responsible debt at that which came because of my entrepreneurial dreams. I am a VERY responsible person with my money, if I didn't have the plans to change my world through following my dreams I would probably have little or no debt, and a cushy, less than passionate job that pays the bills, but also makes me miserable, I guess it's the initial price to pay.

The temptation was there to take my mental focus on asking for healing for my bro and focus on my own problems, but it only took a split second to realize that it was far more important to keep focusing on my brother. I prayed to God that I would give up any debt relief for any amount of debt that I am ever in if it would heal Mark of his tumor. I didn't even think about it, its was my natural response, and truthfully I'm happy that my nature proved to be a somewhat selfless one, I have been worried about that in recent times.

Here's the messed up part , right after I made that prayer asking God to heal my brother and that I would rather that happen then for my finances to be cleared, a woman came up to me and opened my hand and gave my a $20.00 bill. I asked what this was for, very confused?she said it is a symbol of what God has in store for me, she was a random lady knowing nothing about my life and my financial struggle. She said ?I had a prophetic feeling that you need to know that IT IS COMING, THE REST IS COMING.

I said thank you, and she went on, I sat in my chair as the rest of the room where dancing in celebration?I didn?t get it at first, but then it clicked in, she gave me $20.00 as a SYMBOL OF WHAT IS TO COME. Maybe that is an answer to my prayer for help with my debt relief that I just voided by asking to exchange it for my brother?s healing.

I am for some reason of little faith in recent years, it is very easy for me to think that none of this could be true, it?s not logical or scientific, but you know what? It is what it is,this experience was real and brought be to cry for the first time in years,crying without the aid of a mushrooms! Ha ha, Anyway, I don't feel comfortable crying, although it is very liberating, and in fact I cry quite often in my dreams and as I sleep I realize how feeing crying really is. Sadly I have been trapped into the groove that society has carved out saying that men don't cry. I still have a long way to go on that one, but today I feel a part of that wall has been broken down.

Sometimes I feel like I am a selfish person. I have experienced deaths and sickness where I didn't feel any emotion. These are people who I loved, I just didn't feel sad. I felt like it was their time. I think I confused those feelings with being selfish. But I think between my experiences of dealing with Leslie's death, and asking for healing for my brother I am starting to realize that maybe I am not selfish, maybe I am just growing up and become closer to the ways of the spirit and of the "peaceful warrior" (The Peaceful Warrior is a pretty cheesy new age story about a man who finds complete peace in his spirit recognizing the true value of life and timeless existence, if you get a chance to read the book you will groan at some of the cheese ball parts, but fundamentally I took a lot away from that book and it can all be related to this entry into my blog.)

Over and out..let's hope I can catch the 9:oo flight tonight, otherwise I fear I will be drunk with all of the free flowing Guinness and Johnny Walker on tap in the lounge till the next flight opportunity, tomorrow at 10:00 am.

Wait a minute I can't close this off just yet. One of the most important reasons why I am so disappointed that I am not home is that my old captain Paul Whalen is in Saint Andrews this weekend and I was supposed to be there with him and Charlene and other friends to be with Paul. Paul was my captain on the Avontuur, the tall ship I lived on for many months back in 1999. Sadly Paul has recently developed cancer, it has spread all throughout, this man is the strongest (in physique and in mind and spirit) that I have ever met. Always hanging off the top of the mast untangling sails in hurricane winds, and deathly waves.

I learned a lot about life, work ethic, and philosophy working on this ship with Paul. Even though this was years ago, I will type out my journal from my experiences on the Avontuur with Paul very soon. Maybe when I get home if I ever do! Haha. Anyway sadly Charlene (the woman who got me on the ship in the first place) invited me and other close friends to hang and party with Paul this weekend, and this damned storm is keeping me stuck at the Toronto Airport. I am saddened by Paul?s cancer, but I talked to him tonight and damn is he ever positive, he lives with himself knowing that he lived a good life and is in check with his own karma. I feel at peace with Paul, he is the man in control of all things around him, and I respect him beyond words. As I said earlier, cancer is taking over, I feel like we are at war, it can happen to any of us, we NEEED TO REALIZE THE VALUE OF OUR LIVES and the lives of our loved ones, this fucking disease is taking too much. This is why I am so proud of my future wife Jessica who is taking on the fight for cancer as her full time career.

One last note about my brother Mark?I honestly have faith (blind or legit? who knows) that he is healed. I just have this feeling that his tumor will be gone next time he goes to get checked out. I know Mark has a huge task on this planet and he isn?t even close to realizing his responsibilities, Mark will be a healer of some sort as a result of this experience, I know it.

Speaking of Jessica, her younger brother Adam, who I have mounds of respect for (as well for her older bro Chris who I recorded one of my first band,s albums with) wrote a letter to Paul that I was supposed to read to him this weekend if I was able to be there?and not here writing this long drawn out journal. I don't think Adam would mind if I shared it here. After I get a chance, like I said earlier I will type out my journals of my experiences aboard the Avontuur. As a side, the very first thing that I ever filmed on my own outside of film school was my adventures with Paul, as well as Charlene, one of my best bros Jamie (Wolfman) Fougiere, amongst others as we delivered cargo between the Caribbean islands, to South America all the way up to Martha's Vineyard on a 90 year old 130 ft double masted schooner, the last self sustained, working sailing cargo ship left in the world. And I was one it. I still haven't edited that first experience, but now I'm thinking I might have to find some time to put it together. My experience on the Avontuur, like many other things mentioned in this blog, was a defining experience that has shaped me for better or for worse, into what I am today, and I thank everyone involved for making this experience available to me.

Here is Adam's letter that I wanted to read to Paul last night, if I wasn't in this wretched airport?

Second night on the Avontuur, first night sailing. The wind direction was starboard which allowed me to see out the door from my vantage point in bed, on the bottom starboard bunk. From there the night looked dark and forbidding, nay a star nor moon in sight. Darkness and unknown invited and beckoned me to get out of bed and onto the deck. With much protest I pulled my body out of bed, stood up and kind of doggy walked up the stairs that lead out of the bunk area and up to the deck. The day previous I had chosen the VERY early morning watch for the reason of wanting to witness the sun rise - to see every inch of the glorious sun peak it's way over the horizion and then progressively fill the sky. A beautiful sight with an uninterrupted horizon.

I made my way up the stairs and onto the deck which in itself was quite the task because I was not feeling so hot. O man, SEA SICK. I had never felt anything like that before. As soon as the Avontuur left the break water in the Charleston harbor I was feeling rather tired in my knees. That feeling spread rapidly and took over my body. All I can say is that I was pretty much useless that day (and the next for that matter). So that early morning as I pulled my body up onto the deck I felt sick, but I felt ready. This was going to be great. Always up for a challenge. I stepped out of the door and was immediately hit by wind. I was then hit by the most awe inspiring sight I have ever been witness too. A vast, black, rolling sea. Water to the ends of sight. No land. Water. Shadowed hills that moved like shells of giant turtles. A visual plane that altered itself every second so nothing was constant except for the darkness, the immensity and the terror that was bestowed upon me. The Avontuur being hurled this way and that. Rocking back and forth threatening to flip over into the sea and forever be lost. I grabbed the rail and looked around. To my right was the bow where the previous day I learned the technique of laying rope on the deck when raising sail so it wouldn't get caught up in itself and get tangled. Chinese style I believe the captain called it. To my immediate left was the rigging beyond which, a faint red glow that I would later come to admire as a source of warmth and reflection.

On the other side there was Charlene, her beauty radiating through the night, holding a rope and looking up. Still gripping the rail and I'm sure a washed with sickness and terror she noticed me, smiled and waved then returned her attention upwards. Smiled and waved?! Who could smile and wave in this choas? I followed her gaze up. At first I didn't see anything. I didn't understand what she was looking at. Then I saw the Captain. He was at the top of the mast, at the very top. He couldn't have gone any higher. With his back to the mast, holding himself steady with his hands he seemed to be using his feet to untangle the sail that was up there. It was completely insane. I knew the Avontuur was rocking around but when looking at the mast it became more apparent just how much it was moving. I stared for a few minutes in disbelief. Have you ever seen a cartoon where someone is flung off a catapult and is sent soaring into the horizion never to be seen again? Well, that is what I was expecting. Like a sling shot - the Captain..... gone. Seriously. I know is sounds ridiculous but that's what I envisioned. I then started to think of ways in which I could save or catch him should he fall. As if I could actually catch the man falling from that height! I just kind of stayed where I was, watching him work, with my mouth gaping in awe. It was terrifying but thrilling. Amazing. The man had complete control. I began to relax. That happened a lot on that trip. The Captain doing some acrobatic work up in the rigging and never missing a beat. Another form of control he often displayed was more personal. For instance, patience while I grabbed the wrong line, or calmly repeating himself when I asked the same question over again.

I was 20 when I boarded the Avontuur. 2 1/2 months was the duration of the trip. I've since thought about that time over and over again. Sometimes I tell friends about it, but mostly I keep it for myself. I find it hard to relate exactly what I felt, saw and did to make telling the story justifiable. In the end the whole experience had a profound influence on my life. After working for Paul I believe that anything is possible. I know that is a very cliché statement but it's true. Paul taught me what it was like to have a passion in life. What it was like to live a non-materialistic life style. He taught me patience; inner reflection; determination; the will and drive to seek more and do more in life; to be a complete individual and be happy with choices made. These are all qualities that were developed and fortified on the Avontuur.

Paul, I thank you for the opportunity and experience you gave me. I wish I was there to shake your hand and talk with you.

Adam Guimond