1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,190
There is a guy who lives around this area.

2
00:00:02,510 --> 00:00:02,710
Yeah.

3
00:00:02,990 --> 00:00:04,490
I mean, I always see him in the area.

4
00:00:04,590 --> 00:00:10,330
I don't know where he lives, but he dresses like a duck, like he has a big costume.

5
00:00:10,930 --> 00:00:11,790
He dresses up as a duck.

6
00:00:11,790 --> 00:00:12,890
Yeah, you don't see his face.

7
00:00:13,490 --> 00:00:14,750
Why would someone do that?

8
00:00:14,870 --> 00:00:16,290
Why would someone dress up as a duck?

9
00:00:17,550 --> 00:00:18,630
Just for fun, I guess.

10
00:00:30,760 --> 00:00:35,120
Man, I'm sitting here at the corner of Bathurst and College.

11
00:00:35,620 --> 00:00:39,480
He said there's a guy who walks around this neighborhood dressed up as a duck.

12
00:00:39,560 --> 00:00:43,200
And I know that's true because, I don't know, three months ago?

13
00:00:43,320 --> 00:00:43,960
Six months ago.

14
00:00:44,780 --> 00:00:45,740
It was probably somewhere between that.

15
00:00:45,740 --> 00:00:47,240
I made this coffee shop right behind me.

16
00:00:47,300 --> 00:00:48,540
I'm sitting on an orange bench.

17
00:00:48,620 --> 00:00:49,960
I'm leaning against a glass wall.

18
00:00:50,260 --> 00:00:52,560
Up to my right is a sign that says El Rancho Restaurant.

19
00:00:52,680 --> 00:00:53,300
That's not this place.

20
00:00:53,420 --> 00:01:04,260
Behind me is a black sans-serif, Ariel Nero-type font with an orange shadow that says MANIC with the word COFFEE in an all-caps Areil with wide kerning underneath COFFEE.

21
00:01:04,740 --> 00:01:05,700
And I was sitting here.

22
00:01:05,760 --> 00:01:06,540
I was up inside.

23
00:01:06,720 --> 00:01:08,160
Tony was serving me the barista.

24
00:01:08,480 --> 00:01:11,480
And he yells out all of a sudden, there's that duck.

25
00:01:12,180 --> 00:01:13,600
And I look out the window.

26
00:01:14,600 --> 00:01:23,380
And you are on the other side of the street in orange spandex, orange Chuck Taylors, a full, gigantic duck costume.

27
00:01:23,800 --> 00:01:25,140
I'm like, what is this?

28
00:01:25,400 --> 00:01:26,200
What's going on?

29
00:01:26,260 --> 00:01:27,300
You come across the street.

30
00:01:27,400 --> 00:01:28,480
I run out with my friend Ateqah.

31
00:01:29,480 --> 00:01:30,680
She knows you.

32
00:01:30,820 --> 00:01:32,160
She's seen you on social media.

33
00:01:32,580 --> 00:01:32,980
Lewis!

34
00:01:33,460 --> 00:01:34,640
She says, hey,  Lewis.

35
00:01:35,120 --> 00:01:35,880
Hi,  Lewis.

36
00:01:36,040 --> 00:01:37,440
And I run up to him like, oh, who are you?

37
00:01:37,460 --> 00:01:37,880
What are you doing?

38
00:01:37,940 --> 00:01:39,000
And you're just, what did you do?

39
00:01:39,820 --> 00:01:41,000
I quacked at you.

40
00:01:41,480 --> 00:01:43,020
You just refused to talk to me.

41
00:01:44,640 --> 00:01:49,560
No, I refused to use English words with you.

42
00:01:51,840 --> 00:01:52,240
Because?

43
00:01:52,980 --> 00:01:54,060
Because I was performing.

44
00:01:55,080 --> 00:02:02,820
And I stay in character while I'm performing, almost in every circumstance I come into.

45
00:02:03,060 --> 00:02:04,080
How long is the performance?

46
00:02:04,800 --> 00:02:05,760
How long was?

47
00:02:06,100 --> 00:02:06,720
How long is it?

48
00:02:06,740 --> 00:02:08,400
Are you walking around for like hours here?

49
00:02:08,639 --> 00:02:09,880
It depends on my bladder.

50
00:02:13,440 --> 00:02:15,420
As soon as you have to pee, the show's over.

51
00:02:15,620 --> 00:02:19,620
When I get the feeling, I start to head home.

52
00:02:20,740 --> 00:02:29,780
So like, there's a viral media sensation in Toronto right now, covered on CBC, BlogTO.

53
00:02:30,140 --> 00:02:37,260
I know the Toronto Star was just taking pictures of you here, where you've done this, you've made this installation of like, you've taken over a streetcar track.

54
00:02:37,460 --> 00:02:38,500
Streetcar's going by now.

55
00:02:38,580 --> 00:02:39,000
You can hear that.

56
00:02:39,160 --> 00:02:40,920
It says 506 Carlton on it.

57
00:02:41,200 --> 00:02:43,480
Red ribbons on the top and bottom, white ribbons in the middle.

58
00:02:43,740 --> 00:02:44,780
Toronto Transit Commission.

59
00:02:45,540 --> 00:02:46,840
And you took over this station.

60
00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:48,180
So everyone's following you.

61
00:02:48,560 --> 00:02:49,820
What's going, like, what is this?

62
00:02:49,920 --> 00:02:50,580
What are you doing?

63
00:02:50,900 --> 00:02:54,460
What is, what is  Lewis Mallard?

64
00:02:55,720 --> 00:02:57,940
Lewis is me.

65
00:02:58,600 --> 00:03:04,780
And it's something I created to get myself back into the art world full time.

66
00:03:05,560 --> 00:03:09,560
I always wanted to be an artist, ever since I could remember wanting to be anything.

67
00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:14,360
And I'm just trying to figure out how to do it.

68
00:03:17,420 --> 00:03:20,400
Ever since I wanted to be anything.

69
00:03:20,700 --> 00:03:22,060
So go back for me.

70
00:03:22,140 --> 00:03:23,120
I don't know your age.

71
00:03:23,200 --> 00:03:24,240
I don't know your real name.

72
00:03:24,240 --> 00:03:26,400
Your age and your real name will not be shared today.

73
00:03:26,900 --> 00:03:28,260
Secret identities are interesting.

74
00:03:28,380 --> 00:03:30,480
And I heard you say before I hit record, secrets are good.

75
00:03:31,180 --> 00:03:32,860
So now go back in time.

76
00:03:34,760 --> 00:03:37,600
When, where approximately did you come into being?

77
00:03:37,980 --> 00:03:39,560
Where did you start to exist?

78
00:03:40,260 --> 00:03:41,040
Like my hometown?

79
00:03:41,240 --> 00:03:41,440
Yeah.

80
00:03:42,080 --> 00:03:43,460
I could have just said that.

81
00:03:44,440 --> 00:03:45,340
St. Catharines.

82
00:03:45,620 --> 00:03:47,560
St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada.

83
00:03:47,720 --> 00:03:47,880
Correct.

84
00:03:48,000 --> 00:03:50,000
And I'm gonna guess sometime in the 70s.

85
00:03:50,320 --> 00:03:51,360
Late 70s.

86
00:03:51,360 --> 00:03:51,580
Okay.

87
00:03:53,540 --> 00:03:55,840
And what was St. Catharines in the 70s like?

88
00:03:55,940 --> 00:03:57,260
And what kind of family were you born into?

89
00:03:57,360 --> 00:04:01,140
Well, I don't have any memories from the 70s cause I was too young.

90
00:04:03,420 --> 00:04:07,800
And I would say I remember early 80s and onwards.

91
00:04:09,240 --> 00:04:10,640
And what was it like?

92
00:04:10,820 --> 00:04:23,740
It was, I think I didn't have any idea what it was really like, because I was so insulated from the real world until I could start wandering away from home probably about the age of eight.

93
00:04:24,680 --> 00:04:28,160
When I had a little bit of freedom to roam.

94
00:04:28,780 --> 00:04:28,940
Yeah.

95
00:04:29,140 --> 00:04:30,180
Freedom to roam.

96
00:04:30,560 --> 00:04:35,060
Something we seem to be losing, but which of course we seem aware that we're losing.

97
00:04:35,160 --> 00:04:36,420
So we're kind of trying to get it back.

98
00:04:36,780 --> 00:04:38,060
What was your home life like?

99
00:04:39,620 --> 00:04:40,620
Brothers, sisters?

100
00:04:40,880 --> 00:04:42,020
My sister, one sister.

101
00:04:43,660 --> 00:04:51,560
My parents were together until I think I was like about 12 years old is when they separated.

102
00:04:53,140 --> 00:05:04,680
But I spent a lot of time alone playing by myself and trying to get my parents' attention and not ever getting it.

103
00:05:05,400 --> 00:05:05,720
Why not?

104
00:05:05,740 --> 00:05:06,760
Cause they were, were they fighting?

105
00:05:07,140 --> 00:05:07,380
No.

106
00:05:07,440 --> 00:05:08,080
And they weren't fighting.

107
00:05:09,180 --> 00:05:14,360
They were just not super engaged, I guess.

108
00:05:14,360 --> 00:05:18,220
Not extremely interested in what I was doing.

109
00:05:18,560 --> 00:05:19,820
Hands-off approach to parenting.

110
00:05:20,220 --> 00:05:20,900
Very hands-off.

111
00:05:20,980 --> 00:05:21,660
Not uncommon.

112
00:05:22,160 --> 00:05:23,280
I spent a lot of time.

113
00:05:23,400 --> 00:05:26,760
The opposite of helicopter, we'll call it a flyby.

114
00:05:27,360 --> 00:05:27,640
Yeah.

115
00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:28,440
Yeah.

116
00:05:28,560 --> 00:05:39,200
From what I was told about when I was too young to remember, my nursery was a closet and I spent a lot of time alone in there.

117
00:05:39,300 --> 00:05:49,340
And when they would come and check in on me, I would throw shit from my diaper at them because I was probably angry of being left alone for so long.

118
00:05:49,780 --> 00:05:50,220
Wow.

119
00:05:52,120 --> 00:05:59,640
And yeah, I was, I find it, I mean, of course I don't remember doing that, but I think that it's in my personality to do that.

120
00:05:59,980 --> 00:06:00,420
Wow.

121
00:06:00,560 --> 00:06:02,660
A shit flinger at a young age.

122
00:06:03,620 --> 00:06:10,080
Not because of being interrupted in his artistic pursuits, but rather because it's just like, dude, what are you doing?

123
00:06:10,080 --> 00:06:11,880
And I get that from my youngest kid now.

124
00:06:12,160 --> 00:06:20,060
Like, you know, that whole like classic scenario of like the dog kind of facing the corner when you come home because you didn't take it for the walk with you or whatever.

125
00:06:20,260 --> 00:06:27,440
Like my youngest kid is like constantly perturbed about the lack of attention and it's a heartbreaking thing as a parent too.

126
00:06:28,120 --> 00:06:28,620
I can imagine.

127
00:06:28,980 --> 00:06:29,240
Yeah.

128
00:06:30,120 --> 00:06:30,520
Yeah.

129
00:06:31,340 --> 00:06:33,200
So the history, are they, are the Canadian?

130
00:06:33,540 --> 00:06:35,020
Are you from Canadian lineage?

131
00:06:35,400 --> 00:06:36,620
I don't want to guess much.

132
00:06:36,700 --> 00:06:39,440
And I won't, I don't know if I should describe your features for people or not.

133
00:06:39,440 --> 00:06:41,520
Cause I want to keep your identity secret, which it is.

134
00:06:41,760 --> 00:06:41,860
Yeah.

135
00:06:41,940 --> 00:06:54,520
Well, let's just say, I don't know how long my family's been in Canada and I've never looked into, you know, anybody older than my grandparents.

136
00:06:55,040 --> 00:07:01,920
And I know very little about them, but my family's been here for, I think probably three or four, maybe five generations.

137
00:07:02,220 --> 00:07:02,360
Wow.

138
00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:03,360
Five generations.

139
00:07:03,520 --> 00:07:04,200
That's a long time.

140
00:07:04,360 --> 00:07:09,140
I've never heard of, I didn't remember when I heard about anybody immigrating here.

141
00:07:10,360 --> 00:07:13,040
It would have been 1800s, I imagine.

142
00:07:13,260 --> 00:07:13,360
Wow.

143
00:07:13,980 --> 00:07:14,380
1800s.

144
00:07:15,960 --> 00:07:17,580
And, but my, my parents met.

145
00:07:17,620 --> 00:07:18,040
From where?

146
00:07:19,900 --> 00:07:21,080
England and Scotland.

147
00:07:21,220 --> 00:07:21,420
Yeah.

148
00:07:21,480 --> 00:07:21,940
I'm kind of.

149
00:07:21,980 --> 00:07:22,200
Yeah.

150
00:07:22,320 --> 00:07:22,600
You can do it.

151
00:07:22,600 --> 00:07:25,100
I've never done a blood test or anything, but this is what I've been told.

152
00:07:25,100 --> 00:07:25,980
Some Viking in there, maybe.

153
00:07:26,960 --> 00:07:28,320
I don't know about that, maybe.

154
00:07:31,880 --> 00:07:38,940
But yeah, they met in Hamilton and they were both raised in Hamilton and then moved to St. Catharines to start a family.

155
00:07:39,280 --> 00:07:40,240
Right, right, right.

156
00:07:41,060 --> 00:07:41,280
Okay.

157
00:07:41,380 --> 00:07:44,580
So we're, I want to describe the scene a little bit more for people so they can kind of picture us.

158
00:07:44,640 --> 00:07:54,100
A woman's walking by with green hair, green arms, a skull, headscarf wrapped around her waist and kind of paintball colored tights on.

159
00:07:56,080 --> 00:08:04,560
There's another woman by in a blue dress with about three purses walking by, very hairy legs and black flip flops.

160
00:08:05,100 --> 00:08:08,480
We're in a pretty urban part of the city here.

161
00:08:09,260 --> 00:08:14,340
There is a TTB trading company with Chinese characters on it across the street with bars in the windows.

162
00:08:15,240 --> 00:08:17,160
There's a pub and eatery.

163
00:08:17,500 --> 00:08:18,680
There's a, I don't know what that's like.

164
00:08:18,760 --> 00:08:20,360
That looks like a condemned building.

165
00:08:20,720 --> 00:08:23,880
I mean, there's just like spray painted signs all over the cover of it.

166
00:08:24,040 --> 00:08:24,220
I don't know.

167
00:08:24,280 --> 00:08:25,060
Maybe it's a nightclub.

168
00:08:25,240 --> 00:08:25,940
It is a nightclub.

169
00:08:26,140 --> 00:08:26,940
Oh, it's a nightclub.

170
00:08:27,480 --> 00:08:29,600
Nightclubs look like condemned buildings during the day.

171
00:08:29,760 --> 00:08:30,060
Yeah.

172
00:08:30,160 --> 00:08:31,620
A lot of them do, for sure.

173
00:08:32,460 --> 00:08:32,640
Yeah.

174
00:08:32,640 --> 00:08:35,280
I've never actually seen it open because I don't stay up that late.

175
00:08:35,840 --> 00:08:35,940
Right.

176
00:08:36,179 --> 00:08:36,500
Yeah.

177
00:08:36,580 --> 00:08:38,039
You're more of a daytime person.

178
00:08:38,220 --> 00:08:42,980
On your Instagram, you describe yourself as an interdimensional folk artist.

179
00:08:43,480 --> 00:08:45,060
Well, a psychedelic folk artist.

180
00:08:45,220 --> 00:08:46,420
Oh, it says psychedelic folk artist.

181
00:08:46,480 --> 00:08:46,820
It does.

182
00:08:47,220 --> 00:08:51,040
Did I make up the interdimensional part or is that an old iteration I saw?

183
00:08:51,060 --> 00:08:51,540
No, no, no.

184
00:08:52,500 --> 00:08:54,740
It is the active description.

185
00:08:55,720 --> 00:08:56,500
Psychedelic folk artist.

186
00:08:56,800 --> 00:08:57,160
Interdimensional.

187
00:08:57,580 --> 00:08:58,920
Oh, it just says interdimensional.

188
00:08:59,180 --> 00:08:59,460
Correct.

189
00:08:59,840 --> 00:09:01,460
So why did you say psychedelic folk artist?

190
00:09:01,480 --> 00:09:02,440
Because you left that part out.

191
00:09:02,820 --> 00:09:05,820
Oh, interdimensional psychedelic folk artist.

192
00:09:05,940 --> 00:09:06,400
We got there.

193
00:09:06,700 --> 00:09:07,560
We got...

194
00:09:10,040 --> 00:09:11,100
Oh my gosh.

195
00:09:11,160 --> 00:09:11,780
We're standing...

196
00:09:11,780 --> 00:09:13,460
So we're facing College Street.

197
00:09:16,100 --> 00:09:18,360
There's one lane in front of us.

198
00:09:18,440 --> 00:09:19,600
Then there's three lanes.

199
00:09:20,380 --> 00:09:40,460
And between the remaining three lanes, there's a giant, long, 100 foot, 100 foot concrete flat oval with giant erect glass rectangles, which I think in the old days used to call bus shelters, but they don't shelter you from much, a metal railing.

200
00:09:40,520 --> 00:09:42,380
And this is what's known as a streetcar stop.

201
00:09:42,820 --> 00:09:50,720
At the corner of the streetcar stop is an orange triangle, like a triangular prism, and like a polygon, a square polygon.

202
00:09:51,000 --> 00:10:03,860
You have, in broad daylight, repainted this to look like your Lewis Mallard face with a bright yellow bill, a bright green head as the male Mallard, the Drake Mallard has, and a blue eye with the black pupil.

203
00:10:04,440 --> 00:10:05,640
You did this in the middle of the day.

204
00:10:05,700 --> 00:10:07,040
The post of it went viral.

205
00:10:07,700 --> 00:10:11,380
It says, Toronto legend has his own streetcar stop now.

206
00:10:11,700 --> 00:10:15,040
You were just interviewed by the Toronto Star here, up on there in costume.

207
00:10:15,240 --> 00:10:17,100
What, what, what, where did this come from?

208
00:10:17,400 --> 00:10:19,660
You're painting, you're painting subway stations now?

209
00:10:19,720 --> 00:10:20,420
What's going on here?

210
00:10:20,820 --> 00:10:22,540
Well, I...

211
00:10:22,540 --> 00:10:24,140
Is this part of your interdimensionality?

212
00:10:24,140 --> 00:10:36,960
It's, yeah, part of my multidisciplinary, I've always liked street art, since I, you know, first realized it was a thing in my teenage years.

213
00:10:38,180 --> 00:10:47,340
But I never felt comfortable participating in it in the kind of stereotypical graffiti style that you see most of the time.

214
00:10:49,460 --> 00:10:49,740
And...

215
00:10:49,740 --> 00:10:50,940
Most street art is graffiti.

216
00:10:50,940 --> 00:10:56,520
Well, yes, I would say it is of that style.

217
00:10:57,420 --> 00:10:58,900
The vast majority that you see.

218
00:11:01,420 --> 00:11:02,780
Somebody's just yelling, give me my money.

219
00:11:02,920 --> 00:11:03,980
That's okay, we're not gonna give him his money.

220
00:11:03,980 --> 00:11:04,800
Just a local guy.

221
00:11:05,480 --> 00:11:06,540
Just a local guy.

222
00:11:07,000 --> 00:11:12,300
That guy actually, and I told you this before, but it wasn't on that particular man.

223
00:11:12,460 --> 00:11:14,120
I see him very often in the neighborhood.

224
00:11:14,480 --> 00:11:15,080
In the costume.

225
00:11:15,180 --> 00:11:16,020
While I'm in the costume.

226
00:11:16,560 --> 00:11:17,620
And what does he yell at you?

227
00:11:18,340 --> 00:11:21,140
He is convinced that I am a government psy-op.

228
00:11:22,200 --> 00:11:24,360
That I'm part of CSIS.

229
00:11:24,680 --> 00:11:26,120
I shouldn't laugh. He's probably got major schizophrenia.

230
00:11:26,540 --> 00:11:28,600
It's not just him, he's got a few buddies.

231
00:11:29,220 --> 00:11:31,400
I think they're all in the same group home in the neighborhood.

232
00:11:31,760 --> 00:11:35,520
And they're all convinced that I am a government psy-op.

233
00:11:36,060 --> 00:11:37,240
And they'll yell it at me.

234
00:11:37,340 --> 00:11:45,540
They don't chase me, or they're not aggressive with me, but they'll yell at me from across the street and single me out.

235
00:11:45,540 --> 00:11:47,640
And I think it's hilarious.

236
00:11:47,640 --> 00:11:49,660
Do they ever physically touch you?

237
00:11:49,840 --> 00:11:50,400
No, no.

238
00:11:50,420 --> 00:11:51,240
They don't punch you or anything?

239
00:11:51,240 --> 00:11:51,960
No, no, no.

240
00:11:52,380 --> 00:11:56,080
Yeah, because if I saw a government psy-op dressed as a duck in my neighborhood.

241
00:11:56,420 --> 00:11:57,720
If you really believed it was one?

242
00:11:57,900 --> 00:12:00,800
If I really believed it was one, I wouldn't just let him walk away.

243
00:12:00,900 --> 00:12:06,340
That's interesting about the schizophrenics, not to label, but in this neighborhood, they don't ever hurt you.

244
00:12:06,420 --> 00:12:15,440
Like I've walked around the streets a lot here and it can be quite scary for newcomers, but I've never had anyone ever come up to me or hit me or anything like that.

245
00:12:15,980 --> 00:12:23,940
No, I did hear a rumor like the other day here in the cafe though that there was one of the local guys was starting to take swings at people.

246
00:12:24,140 --> 00:12:24,880
Oh my gosh.

247
00:12:25,060 --> 00:12:27,620
And I really, that caught my attention.

248
00:12:27,820 --> 00:12:30,500
I was like, oh, that's an escalation.

249
00:12:30,740 --> 00:12:31,000
Yeah.

250
00:12:31,220 --> 00:12:33,460
And I mean, he was a big man too.

251
00:12:34,360 --> 00:12:37,560
I just about didn't, nobody would want him taking swings at anybody.

252
00:12:37,860 --> 00:12:38,840
No, nobody would want that.

253
00:12:39,100 --> 00:12:40,560
So we've got a few seeds planted here.

254
00:12:40,560 --> 00:12:50,040
We've got, we've got Lewis Mallard, age kind of five, six, seven, not ignored, but you know, flinging shit from his diaper when left alone for long periods of time in the closet.

255
00:12:50,240 --> 00:12:51,380
I think I was younger than five.

256
00:12:51,380 --> 00:13:07,620
We've got Lewis Mallard, based on my math, somewhere in his forties, interdimensional psychedelic folk artist sitting on an orange bench inside of Manic Coffee at College and Bathurst in downtown Toronto with planes and streetcars and delivery trucks and bikes and people.

257
00:13:07,840 --> 00:13:11,400
This is a busy, there's people with UHN tags going by right now.

258
00:13:11,500 --> 00:13:13,520
There are nurses probably at the Toronto Western Hospital.

259
00:13:13,660 --> 00:13:18,060
There's a guy walking in with this Narky Puppy t-shirt, tight black pants and black boots.

260
00:13:18,180 --> 00:13:19,380
Maybe he played a show last night.

261
00:13:19,800 --> 00:13:23,680
There's a couple of people walking by, look like high school students with their orange juices and their lattes.

262
00:13:24,180 --> 00:13:26,040
You know, there's a lot going on in this corner.

263
00:13:26,300 --> 00:13:33,640
You've decorated the corner, both with your performance art and you're now leaving marks on the city, physical marks.

264
00:13:34,080 --> 00:13:34,300
Yes.

265
00:13:34,380 --> 00:13:35,780
Which some people would call illegal.

266
00:13:36,620 --> 00:13:37,320
Yes, technically.

267
00:13:38,680 --> 00:13:40,780
Just do these two together for me, you know?

268
00:13:41,200 --> 00:13:51,420
Well, I see it as vandalism, of course, but I'm trying to do it, I wanted to clean the thing up.

269
00:13:52,040 --> 00:13:54,500
Oh, I wanted to clean the thing up.

270
00:13:54,580 --> 00:14:06,780
Well, it was, it seemed like there must've been an accident here a while ago because you could see two different kinds of concrete and repairs that have been done to the cement barrier.

271
00:14:07,380 --> 00:14:08,940
I thought you were going to say blood or something.

272
00:14:09,160 --> 00:14:09,820
No, no, no.

273
00:14:10,200 --> 00:14:11,740
I'm sure they washed the blood away.

274
00:14:13,800 --> 00:14:16,480
But accidents for sure, because it's like- Some kind of accident.

275
00:14:16,960 --> 00:14:18,260
It's a tough corner here.

276
00:14:18,440 --> 00:14:18,780
Yes.

277
00:14:18,940 --> 00:14:21,540
And I'm sure there'll be another accident, you know, at some point in the future.

278
00:14:21,800 --> 00:14:21,980
Yeah.

279
00:14:22,400 --> 00:14:24,780
There's always bikes and cars yelling at each other.

280
00:14:24,940 --> 00:14:26,160
The paint was falling off.

281
00:14:26,220 --> 00:14:28,200
It had been poorly graffitied.

282
00:14:28,600 --> 00:14:29,760
Oh, poorly graffitied?

283
00:14:29,880 --> 00:14:31,200
How do you judge that?

284
00:14:31,220 --> 00:14:32,460
Sloppily, carelessly.

285
00:14:33,060 --> 00:14:36,620
What if that person's calling themselves a four title name on Instagram too?

286
00:14:37,240 --> 00:14:38,320
I mean, it's fine.

287
00:14:38,620 --> 00:14:39,780
You can do whatever they want.

288
00:14:40,020 --> 00:14:41,520
But what makes you say sloppy?

289
00:14:42,000 --> 00:14:50,800
Well, in my mind, it looked like it was rushed and it was not, there was no thought, real thought put into it on placement.

290
00:14:51,600 --> 00:15:01,180
And it seemed like somebody who was afraid of being caught and trying to do it quickly and get away when my approach is a little bit different.

291
00:15:01,400 --> 00:15:09,840
I prefer to operate in broad daylight, turn it into a little bit of a performance and just act like I am supposed to be doing it.

292
00:15:10,020 --> 00:15:16,040
I like to get dressed up in coveralls and wear a high visibility reflective gear.

293
00:15:16,400 --> 00:15:16,920
Oh my gosh.

294
00:15:16,960 --> 00:15:19,580
So you look like you've been licensed to do this.

295
00:15:19,640 --> 00:15:20,340
You're wearing high.

296
00:15:20,560 --> 00:15:21,380
I bring pylons.

297
00:15:21,640 --> 00:15:22,400
Oh, you bring pylons.

298
00:15:22,460 --> 00:15:23,120
You keep pylons.

299
00:15:23,160 --> 00:15:23,900
Where do you get pylons?

300
00:15:24,000 --> 00:15:24,280
Amazon?

301
00:15:24,720 --> 00:15:25,320
Pylons, no.

302
00:15:25,540 --> 00:15:27,840
You just find them on the street sometimes.

303
00:15:29,040 --> 00:15:32,120
You know, there's a lot of pylons in construction sites.

304
00:15:32,380 --> 00:15:32,500
Yeah.

305
00:15:32,500 --> 00:15:32,740
Yeah.

306
00:15:32,980 --> 00:15:34,040
And sometimes they go missing.

307
00:15:34,720 --> 00:15:36,080
Right, right, right.

308
00:15:36,280 --> 00:15:36,520
Okay.

309
00:15:36,600 --> 00:15:50,200
Another form of vandalism, but it's all in contribution of improving the decorative quality of this corner, which I shall say, and we're going to link to the exact post, obviously, at Lewis Mallard, L-E-W-I-S-M-A-L-L-A-R-D is kind of your online home.

310
00:15:50,320 --> 00:15:53,280
That's an Instagram handle, Lewis Mallard.

311
00:15:55,220 --> 00:15:57,200
I get the mallard because you're a duck.

312
00:15:57,320 --> 00:15:58,340
Why Lewis?

313
00:15:59,840 --> 00:16:03,540
Although it seems totally appropriate for a duck to be called Lewis.

314
00:16:03,740 --> 00:16:04,700
I guess.

315
00:16:05,160 --> 00:16:15,260
I got the name from the biggest inspiration behind the whole project, which was one of my all-time favorite artists named Maude Lewis.

316
00:16:15,560 --> 00:16:16,780
Oh, Maude Lewis.

317
00:16:16,780 --> 00:16:19,280
A Canadian folk artist from Nova Scotia.

318
00:16:19,640 --> 00:16:20,660
How do you define folk?

319
00:16:21,420 --> 00:16:21,840
How do I?

320
00:16:22,180 --> 00:16:23,680
You've got folk in your name too.

321
00:16:23,740 --> 00:16:24,440
What is folk?

322
00:16:24,880 --> 00:16:26,520
F-O-L-K, what even is that?

323
00:16:26,520 --> 00:16:42,060
Well, to me, when I first discovered folk art, I didn't really appreciate it because I was really stuck in this mentality as a teenager that art had to be as like high skill as possible.

324
00:16:42,400 --> 00:16:50,740
I spent a lot of time as a teenager developing my drawing ability and trying to copy reality as close as I could.

325
00:16:50,900 --> 00:16:52,440
Right, it has to be realistic.

326
00:16:52,660 --> 00:16:54,360
Yeah, and this is how I valued things.

327
00:16:54,360 --> 00:17:02,180
And I didn't understand how something that was naively done was good. It wasn't until I got a little older and

328
00:17:02,780 --> 00:17:09,339
Is that a word that you would attach to the word folk, is naive?

329
00:17:09,839 --> 00:17:17,839
Well, to me, folk art is kind of done by people who just aren't real artists.

330
00:17:18,579 --> 00:17:20,420
I think everybody

331
00:17:20,640 --> 00:17:21,280
Is it music? Is it visual?

332
00:17:21,280 --> 00:17:21,980
Visual, is it?

333
00:17:22,680 --> 00:17:27,660
Yeah, well, there's folk music, there's folk art, there's

334
00:17:28,040 --> 00:17:30,380
What is folk art? Like, if I go to a folk art festival, what do I see on the tables?

335
00:17:31,120 --> 00:17:33,300
Oh, I've never been to one, so I wouldn't know.

336
00:17:34,680 --> 00:17:42,120
I think I'm specifically just talking about the art and folk art done by people who aren't necessarily trained.

337
00:17:42,300 --> 00:17:43,620
Oh, that's what it means.

338
00:17:44,220 --> 00:17:46,100
It's something akin to amateur.

339
00:17:46,880 --> 00:17:47,900
Yeah, in a way.

340
00:17:47,900 --> 00:17:57,280
And so I think there's a lot of lovely magic that happens when people don't completely understand what they're looking at.

341
00:17:58,800 --> 00:18:03,160
And then depict it in the way that they are able.

342
00:18:03,780 --> 00:18:11,680
I think there's a lot of magic when people don't fully understand what they're looking at.

343
00:18:13,650 --> 00:18:14,300
Is that what you said?

344
00:18:14,680 --> 00:18:15,660
Yeah, it was along that line.

345
00:18:16,020 --> 00:18:17,040
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

346
00:18:18,480 --> 00:18:19,460
Okay, okay.

347
00:18:19,460 --> 00:18:34,180
And so when I first discovered Maude Lewis's artwork, I was in Halifax visiting my sister when she was living out there, and I went into the museum there, and she had a very large retrospective show.

348
00:18:36,620 --> 00:18:40,340
And there was a little house in the middle of the gallery.

349
00:18:40,920 --> 00:18:43,960
It was a replica of a house that she lived in with her husband.

350
00:18:44,720 --> 00:18:52,760
And it was so small, and it blew my mind that, first of all, somebody lived in there.

351
00:18:52,840 --> 00:18:53,860
Two people lived in there.

352
00:18:54,120 --> 00:18:54,820
What city was this?

353
00:18:55,120 --> 00:18:56,040
This was Halifax.

354
00:18:56,400 --> 00:19:02,400
Halifax, Nova Scotia, a maritime region of Canada, kind of above Maine for U.S. geography people.

355
00:19:02,700 --> 00:19:06,060
Yeah, and I think that she lived outside of the main city.

356
00:19:06,360 --> 00:19:13,400
If I remember correctly, watching some of the footage from when she was alive, they were very poor.

357
00:19:16,120 --> 00:19:21,260
And she saw a reasonable amount of success in her lifetime.

358
00:19:22,300 --> 00:19:24,260
Refused to sell her paintings for a lot of money.

359
00:19:29,080 --> 00:19:33,800
And just, she lived her art right up until the end.

360
00:19:33,980 --> 00:19:35,920
She couldn't help it.

361
00:19:36,200 --> 00:19:39,620
It was like she surrounded herself with her art.

362
00:19:39,620 --> 00:19:43,720
I really admired her dedication to being an artist.

363
00:19:43,900 --> 00:19:44,940
It's like she didn't have a choice.

364
00:19:45,480 --> 00:19:51,920
She was a crippled and very small person.

365
00:19:52,740 --> 00:19:53,280
Small?

366
00:19:53,760 --> 00:19:55,580
Yeah, she was a very tiny person.

367
00:19:56,000 --> 00:19:57,080
Very tiny person?

368
00:19:57,200 --> 00:19:57,360
Yeah.

369
00:20:00,600 --> 00:20:03,600
Maybe five foot tall or shorter.

370
00:20:03,900 --> 00:20:12,820
I think I was just, I was in art college at the time, and I was just trying to broaden my horizons.

371
00:20:12,980 --> 00:20:14,200
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

372
00:20:14,260 --> 00:20:15,920
To expose myself to different things.

373
00:20:16,140 --> 00:20:16,580
Oh, okay.

374
00:20:17,060 --> 00:20:19,540
So, what's Lewis made out of?

375
00:20:19,580 --> 00:20:19,960
Paper mache?

376
00:20:20,400 --> 00:20:21,240
Largely paper mache.

377
00:20:21,260 --> 00:20:22,940
You've got like chicken wire in there?

378
00:20:23,100 --> 00:20:24,200
No, that was the original.

379
00:20:24,860 --> 00:20:33,240
When I didn't know how to make a costume, and I made my very first one, I used chicken wire and paper mache.

380
00:20:34,080 --> 00:20:37,700
And I didn't know how to do it, but I knew I could do it.

381
00:20:38,500 --> 00:20:42,060
And so I just threw it together in whatever way I thought it would work.

382
00:20:43,160 --> 00:20:59,700
And hoped that if it struck a chord with people, that I would have an opportunity to make a 2.0 and a 3.0. And improve upon the structure, the way it looked.

383
00:20:59,820 --> 00:21:01,660
And you began doing this in 2021?

384
00:21:02,220 --> 00:21:03,780
In 2019, September.

385
00:21:04,300 --> 00:21:05,580
2019, in Hamilton, Ontario.

386
00:21:05,580 --> 00:21:06,260
In Hamilton, yes.

387
00:21:06,260 --> 00:21:07,360
Where you were living at the time.

388
00:21:07,860 --> 00:21:08,220
Yes.

389
00:21:08,340 --> 00:21:08,580
Okay.

390
00:21:09,300 --> 00:21:12,740
So five years ago, you'd make a paper mache duck.

391
00:21:13,200 --> 00:21:14,920
You start walking around.

392
00:21:16,500 --> 00:21:17,300
How'd you know?

393
00:21:17,540 --> 00:21:23,500
You said, if it struck a nerve, if it was popular, I would do a 2.0, 3.0. Well, how'd you know it did?

394
00:21:23,820 --> 00:21:24,640
What happened then?

395
00:21:27,460 --> 00:21:30,340
Well, the pandemic happened.

396
00:21:31,660 --> 00:21:37,200
I launched the project at Supercrawl in September, 2019.

397
00:21:37,920 --> 00:21:40,180
I was living in my studio right downtown Hamilton.

398
00:21:40,600 --> 00:21:44,100
I'd been thinking about this project for about a year, year and a half.

399
00:21:46,540 --> 00:21:49,760
About re-entering the art world full-time.

400
00:21:50,620 --> 00:21:54,640
I was living in a city that I knew very well, but I did not know many people.

401
00:21:55,660 --> 00:21:57,700
I'd only ever visited family there.

402
00:21:57,820 --> 00:22:00,320
I had not taken up residence in Hamilton for a while.

403
00:22:00,320 --> 00:22:03,900
I had not been there for any length of time to build a friends or community.

404
00:22:05,860 --> 00:22:09,580
And I wanted to stay and start my career in Hamilton again.

405
00:22:09,720 --> 00:22:18,540
I thought it was a smarter choice than trying to come into Toronto and compete with the way more artists here, people who try harder.

406
00:22:19,160 --> 00:22:20,580
And this is more competition.

407
00:22:21,320 --> 00:22:31,640
And at Hamilton, I thought that, although it's a growing city and there's a lot of artists there that- It's historically known as like a steel town, like they made Stelco Steel.

408
00:22:31,920 --> 00:22:34,080
It was gentrifying for a long time.

409
00:22:34,240 --> 00:22:41,520
Now it's probably an up and coming artists, 500,000 person type of town, two hours or an hour and a half away from Toronto.

410
00:22:41,860 --> 00:22:43,180
Just a bit of, is that right?

411
00:22:43,620 --> 00:22:44,780
Yeah, more or less.

412
00:22:45,100 --> 00:22:45,520
Please correct it.

413
00:22:45,860 --> 00:22:48,680
I think that it, well, it's 60 kilometers roughly.

414
00:22:49,340 --> 00:22:51,520
Depending on traffic, it could be an hour or two.

415
00:22:52,200 --> 00:22:53,480
Yeah, yeah.

416
00:22:53,480 --> 00:22:58,940
And it's certainly a city that is lifting itself up.

417
00:22:59,180 --> 00:23:04,040
A lot of people are moving there from Toronto, from, well, other places as well.

418
00:23:04,160 --> 00:23:22,100
But it seems like the largest influx of people into Hamilton are Torontonians who can afford to buy a house there and have sold their house or their condo in Toronto for a lot of money and then move to Hamilton.

419
00:23:22,680 --> 00:23:29,800
And I thought, I knew people, many people who were doing this exact thing right as I was starting this project.

420
00:23:30,100 --> 00:23:31,300
Doing this exact thing?

421
00:23:32,860 --> 00:23:36,060
Moving to Hamilton from Toronto.

422
00:23:36,140 --> 00:23:37,500
Okay, okay, not the art project.

423
00:23:37,760 --> 00:23:38,020
No, no.

424
00:23:38,180 --> 00:23:38,300
Okay.

425
00:23:38,440 --> 00:23:45,000
No, and having made, being able to afford something in Hamilton that they could never afford in Toronto.

426
00:23:45,160 --> 00:23:45,940
Right, right, right.

427
00:23:46,000 --> 00:23:52,640
And so I thought, I understand the demographic of people that are moving here.

428
00:23:53,280 --> 00:24:09,360
And I wanted to try to talk to them first, to build, this was my target demographic for audience was people who were in their 30s to 40s and who I would relate to.

429
00:24:12,320 --> 00:24:19,120
And I also knew about Hamilton that people who move there, they buy in really quick.

430
00:24:19,240 --> 00:24:20,220
They fall in love with the city.

431
00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:23,180
There's a lot of charming things about the city.

432
00:24:23,380 --> 00:24:29,260
And before you know it, they've gone to the first Hamilton Tiger-Cats game and they're saying, Oskie-wee-wee.

433
00:24:29,780 --> 00:24:30,660
Oskie-wee-wee?

434
00:24:30,760 --> 00:24:32,760
It's like a Tiger-Cats thing.

435
00:24:32,860 --> 00:24:33,180
Oh, okay.

436
00:24:33,360 --> 00:24:34,540
Yeah, Oskie-wee-wee.

437
00:24:35,040 --> 00:24:38,420
That's a Canadian football league team.

438
00:24:38,540 --> 00:24:41,220
Yeah, I think it's some kind of chant they do at the game.

439
00:24:41,820 --> 00:24:45,140
I have been to a Tiger-Cats game, but only as a child.

440
00:24:45,440 --> 00:24:45,540
Hopefully not problematic.

441
00:24:46,100 --> 00:24:46,540
No.

442
00:24:46,740 --> 00:24:47,660
We have no idea what it means.

443
00:24:47,660 --> 00:24:48,300
I don't think so.

444
00:24:48,380 --> 00:24:49,120
Okay, okay.

445
00:24:49,120 --> 00:24:52,360
I think if it was problematic- It would've canceled in two years.

446
00:24:52,360 --> 00:24:53,460
Yes, it would've been gone by now.

447
00:24:54,340 --> 00:24:56,700
Yeah, no, it's synonymous.

448
00:24:56,700 --> 00:24:58,720
It changed a few sports teams' names up here.

449
00:24:58,980 --> 00:25:02,640
Yeah, no, right now there's, I think the Tiger-Cats are okay.

450
00:25:05,140 --> 00:25:08,320
And so I knew people fall in love with Hamilton quick.

451
00:25:08,460 --> 00:25:15,340
And so I thought, if I can be part of that, then that will give me a bit of a boost early on.

452
00:25:15,820 --> 00:25:24,160
I wanted to try to find the quickest way to developing an audience so that I could make a living off my art.

453
00:25:24,420 --> 00:25:24,820
Wow.

454
00:25:25,240 --> 00:25:30,120
I wanted to find the quickest way to develop an audience so that I can make a living off my art.

455
00:25:30,260 --> 00:25:30,600
Yeah.

456
00:25:30,840 --> 00:25:33,500
It wasn't like a pure artistic motive.

457
00:25:33,880 --> 00:25:34,980
Well, it was also that.

458
00:25:35,800 --> 00:25:37,540
I'm not saying, I'm not trying to take that away from you.

459
00:25:37,580 --> 00:25:40,840
I'm just saying, you're using words like target market.

460
00:25:41,680 --> 00:25:46,300
Well, unfortunately, I think the world we live in has forced me to think this way.

461
00:25:46,400 --> 00:25:48,100
I would rather not think this way.

462
00:25:48,100 --> 00:25:54,080
I would rather create purely for the sake of creating and not think too much about competing with other artists.

463
00:25:54,640 --> 00:26:02,280
I don't like to compete with other artists, but I feel like I'm forced to if I want to make a meaningful living at something I'm passionate about.

464
00:26:02,940 --> 00:26:06,860
And so for me, Lewis was

465
00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:10,780
It's a good point. If you don't make it sustainable financially, then it's therefore not sustainable.

466
00:26:11,800 --> 00:26:16,720
Yeah, well, it can be sustainable in that you do it just because you're passionate about it and you love to make things.

467
00:26:16,720 --> 00:26:19,380
The ghost in red beard has really given us the stare down here.

468
00:26:20,520 --> 00:26:23,560
Well, this isn't a common thing that people see walking down the street.

469
00:26:23,600 --> 00:26:24,660
No, but he's giving us the angry look.

470
00:26:24,700 --> 00:26:26,240
He's walking away now, so I think we're okay.

471
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:28,820
You're gonna have to protect me here.

472
00:26:29,620 --> 00:26:30,340
You'll be okay.

473
00:26:32,700 --> 00:26:35,060
If you don't make it sustainable financially, it's not sustainable.

474
00:26:35,220 --> 00:26:36,880
If it's not sustainable, you're not practicing your art.

475
00:26:37,000 --> 00:26:44,580
So you're just, part of what you're pulling in here, and I've heard you talk in other interviews saying that your life goal is to be able to not look at prices on the grocery store.

476
00:26:44,580 --> 00:26:46,520
I've heard you say that in multiple interviews.

477
00:26:47,040 --> 00:26:48,660
Yeah, I mean, I would love to.

478
00:26:48,920 --> 00:26:51,360
So we're not talking like you're trying to make a billion dollars here.

479
00:26:51,580 --> 00:26:54,620
Your life goal is to not look at prices at the grocery store.

480
00:26:54,800 --> 00:26:57,460
No, I want to make it, I don't want to be greedy.

481
00:26:57,780 --> 00:27:08,360
I want to be able to provide for a good life for myself and in conjunction with what my wife does and makes, and I want to be able

482
00:27:08,560 --> 00:27:09,460
An opera singer, I read.

483
00:27:10,220 --> 00:27:11,160
We're gonna get to that later.

484
00:27:11,160 --> 00:27:12,480
An incredibly talented woman.

485
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:12,880
Yeah.

486
00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:23,680
And I would love to be able to treat the people in my life that I love and admire really well.

487
00:27:24,080 --> 00:27:24,520
Yeah.

488
00:27:24,740 --> 00:27:32,560
And share anything I get in excess, I would love to share and contribute to making this world a better place.

489
00:27:32,760 --> 00:27:35,700
Wow, wow, I knew I liked you from the beginning.

490
00:27:35,920 --> 00:27:37,500
So now it's been five years.

491
00:27:37,600 --> 00:27:39,740
Are you looking at the prices on the groceries now?

492
00:27:40,040 --> 00:27:40,480
Absolutely.

493
00:27:40,480 --> 00:27:43,180
Okay, so we're not at that point yet.

494
00:27:43,320 --> 00:27:43,840
No, we're nearing.

495
00:27:44,060 --> 00:27:47,840
Five years as a full-time artist, as Lewis Mallard.

496
00:27:48,020 --> 00:27:48,200
Yes.

497
00:27:48,320 --> 00:27:52,640
You've got, I think as of this morning, 8,120 followers on Instagram.

498
00:27:53,640 --> 00:27:53,960
Okay.

499
00:27:54,260 --> 00:27:55,840
I mean, I think that's what I checked this morning.

500
00:27:55,880 --> 00:27:56,280
Am I right?

501
00:27:56,860 --> 00:27:58,540
I think it's somewhere around there.

502
00:27:58,640 --> 00:27:59,000
Maybe a bit higher.

503
00:27:59,020 --> 00:27:59,940
It's always give or take five.

504
00:28:00,300 --> 00:28:01,900
Oh, you go up about five a day?

505
00:28:02,900 --> 00:28:04,720
Well, I'd say it depends.

506
00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:08,720
Lately, it's been between five and 20 a day.

507
00:28:08,740 --> 00:28:09,340
Oh, wow.

508
00:28:09,340 --> 00:28:10,660
All the press is helping.

509
00:28:11,760 --> 00:28:14,280
The legwork I'm putting in is helping.

510
00:28:15,460 --> 00:28:17,660
I see the sly grin on your face with the legwork.

511
00:28:17,980 --> 00:28:22,540
You're literally walking around the city for hours a day dressed as a duck.

512
00:28:22,780 --> 00:28:25,040
You're indulging people that want to take selfies.

513
00:28:25,600 --> 00:28:25,840
Yes.

514
00:28:25,980 --> 00:28:26,960
People are asking you for autographs.

515
00:28:26,980 --> 00:28:27,740
You quack at people.

516
00:28:27,840 --> 00:28:28,280
You dance.

517
00:28:28,420 --> 00:28:31,020
When I saw you for the first time, you did a jump for me.

518
00:28:31,120 --> 00:28:32,500
Nobody's ever asked me for an autograph.

519
00:28:33,440 --> 00:28:34,320
Actually, not true.

520
00:28:34,460 --> 00:28:37,940
I did autograph a beer can once inside the costume for somebody.

521
00:28:38,220 --> 00:28:40,180
That was a very odd request, but I did it.

522
00:28:40,280 --> 00:28:41,640
Well, you had a beer named after you.

523
00:28:42,000 --> 00:28:42,260
I did.

524
00:28:42,580 --> 00:28:43,580
See, that's another thing.

525
00:28:43,680 --> 00:28:47,460
So in Hamilton, a craft brewery has what, like the Lewis Mallard Ale?

526
00:28:47,800 --> 00:28:49,640
Well, they did for a very short time, yes.

527
00:28:49,980 --> 00:28:50,400
Yeah, yeah.

528
00:28:50,400 --> 00:28:51,240
You're so humble, though.

529
00:28:51,300 --> 00:28:55,280
Every time, I keep trying to lodge you with compliments and you keep trying to say, well, not every day. I don't work that hard.

530
00:28:55,320 --> 00:28:56,300
Well, I mean-

531
00:28:56,540 --> 00:28:57,460
Yes, you do.

532
00:28:57,560 --> 00:28:58,520
I've seen you work it.

533
00:28:58,560 --> 00:29:00,240
You're painting a streetcar stop.

534
00:29:00,340 --> 00:29:02,020
How long does it take you to paint that?

535
00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:02,940
Roughly three hours.

536
00:29:03,200 --> 00:29:05,160
In the coveralls, you have to get the pylons.

537
00:29:05,200 --> 00:29:06,380
You have to pilfer the pylons.

538
00:29:06,380 --> 00:29:07,340
That's the first step.

539
00:29:07,520 --> 00:29:08,240
Pilfer the pylons.

540
00:29:09,020 --> 00:29:10,940
You gotta get an orange vest.

541
00:29:11,300 --> 00:29:12,600
Not many people have one of those handy.

542
00:29:12,800 --> 00:29:13,900
You can buy them at the dollar store.

543
00:29:14,020 --> 00:29:14,440
They're real cheap.

544
00:29:15,760 --> 00:29:16,560
I'm resourceful.

545
00:29:16,600 --> 00:29:17,120
You're making merchandise.

546
00:29:17,520 --> 00:29:18,960
You're working hard at this.

547
00:29:19,180 --> 00:29:19,720
Yeah, yes.

548
00:29:19,900 --> 00:29:21,080
You're working hard at this.

549
00:29:21,140 --> 00:29:23,320
I want to build a

550
00:29:23,400 --> 00:29:23,920
Acknowledge your work. It's good.

551
00:29:24,140 --> 00:29:32,540
No, I agree that I work hard, but I don't go out in the costume every day.

552
00:29:32,580 --> 00:29:36,700
I go out in the costume maybe twice a week at the most, weather permitting.

553
00:29:38,260 --> 00:29:40,120
Yeah, there's like kind of specific things.

554
00:29:40,120 --> 00:29:42,480
Okay, considering how rarely you're going out, you get a lot of press.

555
00:29:42,620 --> 00:29:42,900
You get a lot.

556
00:29:42,980 --> 00:29:45,220
Every time you go out, there's tons of pictures coming online.

557
00:29:45,400 --> 00:29:46,700
People are, you know.

558
00:29:46,800 --> 00:29:47,620
I'm trying here.

559
00:29:47,800 --> 00:29:48,660
Yeah, you're working hard.

560
00:29:48,820 --> 00:29:49,900
Advertising is expensive.

561
00:29:51,000 --> 00:29:51,100
Yeah.

562
00:29:51,280 --> 00:30:06,300
So we've got two, I think, starting to come into focus photos of you right now, which is a wonderful way to do it, which I think is, you know, we've got this kid, fifth generation, from English guys in kind of small town, Ontario.

563
00:30:06,640 --> 00:30:08,400
Parents are kind of not that there.

564
00:30:08,560 --> 00:30:11,140
You're throwing shit from the closet when they open the door.

565
00:30:11,260 --> 00:30:13,640
I mean, I'm really fixed on that image, as you can tell.

566
00:30:14,240 --> 00:30:25,360
Now we've got this early forties, married to an opera singer, Lewis Mallard today, who is doing graffiti and performance art, inter-dimensional psychedelic folk artist.

567
00:30:25,380 --> 00:30:26,820
We haven't got to the psychedelic part.

568
00:30:27,240 --> 00:30:33,180
And somewhere in between the two is like this 30 to 35 years of growing up from then to now.

569
00:30:33,580 --> 00:30:35,280
And I have a pile of three books here.

570
00:30:35,400 --> 00:30:38,960
You were really kind enough to give us three formative books.

571
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:44,340
Is this one that I'm tapping the first one that came into the picture here?

572
00:30:44,600 --> 00:30:47,140
Yeah, it's the first book I ever remember owning.

573
00:30:47,360 --> 00:30:48,700
Wow, the first book I remember owning.

574
00:30:48,840 --> 00:30:59,000
So if you don't mind, what I'll do for the audience here now is I will spend a minute giving them a background of the book, and then I'll ask you to tell us about your relationship with us.

575
00:30:59,020 --> 00:31:10,920
And I don't know if you don't mind, but if you could take us from the shit-flicking child up into this book, I wanna understand what your life looked like, the good, the bad, the ugly, the highs, the lows, like what was happening here?

576
00:31:11,020 --> 00:31:12,820
This book is wonderful.

577
00:31:13,140 --> 00:31:15,740
I was really, really, I really loved reading it.

578
00:31:16,140 --> 00:31:17,340
So interesting and different.

579
00:31:17,460 --> 00:31:29,520
The book is called Lu Pan, L-U space P-A-N, in brackets, The Carpenter's Apprentice by Demi Hitz, H-I-T-Z or Z, originally published in 1978 by Prentice Hall.

580
00:31:29,520 --> 00:31:31,080
The cover is pure red.

581
00:31:31,360 --> 00:31:33,900
I mean, mine that I found online is literally pure red.

582
00:31:34,040 --> 00:31:34,600
It's just red.

583
00:31:34,880 --> 00:31:36,500
It's just like the copy I had

584
00:31:36,620 --> 00:31:40,040
Oh, really? So it's just like a red linen thin hardcover.

585
00:31:40,140 --> 00:31:42,620
There it is hitting the microphone so you know what the book sounds like.

586
00:31:42,800 --> 00:31:53,320
But the cover online is fifth century BC, China, a woman holding an ax in one hand, a piece of lumber in the other with a big red and gold pagoda behind her.

587
00:31:53,440 --> 00:31:55,740
I say woman, but that's actually probably not a woman.

588
00:31:55,800 --> 00:31:56,500
That's probably Lu Pan.

589
00:31:57,160 --> 00:31:57,860
I think that is.

590
00:31:57,940 --> 00:31:58,800
I think that is Lu Pan.

591
00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:00,200
That would probably not be a woman then.

592
00:32:01,000 --> 00:32:01,900
Lu Pan not being a woman.

593
00:32:02,100 --> 00:32:04,940
I believe that the gender is not revealed, but I believe that's the case.

594
00:32:05,440 --> 00:32:07,900
Demi Hitz is currently 82 years old.

595
00:32:07,980 --> 00:32:08,620
Did you know that?

596
00:32:08,860 --> 00:32:10,300
I didn't know that.

597
00:32:10,620 --> 00:32:24,340
But I actually, I learned, I didn't even realize that Demi Hitz was the author until I was searching for this book to send you a link to it because I no longer have the copy I did when I was a child.

598
00:32:24,500 --> 00:32:25,520
I gave it to my nephew.

599
00:32:26,100 --> 00:32:26,700
Oh, that's nice.

600
00:32:26,700 --> 00:32:30,660
And hoped that he would find something in it that I found in it.

601
00:32:32,800 --> 00:32:37,460
So I didn't realize what I loved about this book until I was older.

602
00:32:37,800 --> 00:32:39,140
Yeah, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

603
00:32:39,380 --> 00:32:41,340
You didn't realize what you loved about the book until, oh, that's interesting.

604
00:32:41,560 --> 00:32:44,640
So Demi Hitz, quickly, she's created over a hundred books for children.

605
00:32:45,120 --> 00:32:49,320
Most of them are adaptations of Chinese folk tales, fables and nursery rhymes, interestingly.

606
00:32:50,020 --> 00:32:54,140
Lu Pan, the carpenter's apprentice, sets the tone for most of her later work.

607
00:32:54,140 --> 00:32:56,320
It's part biography, part adapted folk tale.

608
00:32:56,680 --> 00:33:07,500
The book tells the story of a young apprentice growing up in China in the fifth century BC and how he ultimately becomes a master carpenter and one of China's greatest architects and inventors.

609
00:33:07,620 --> 00:33:09,700
So now we've got a real story weaved in.

610
00:33:10,400 --> 00:33:18,700
File this one Dewey Decimal under 694.092 for technology slash building slash carpentry semi-colon stair building.

611
00:33:18,980 --> 00:33:21,240
That is the exact Dewey Decimal category.

612
00:33:21,560 --> 00:33:22,600
That is a strange category.

613
00:33:22,980 --> 00:33:23,700
Carpenting and stair building.

614
00:33:23,700 --> 00:33:26,040
You got to squish those together if you're Melville Dewey.

615
00:33:26,800 --> 00:33:33,860
Lewis, tell us about your relationship with Lu Pan, the carpenter's apprentice by Demi Hitz.

616
00:33:35,320 --> 00:33:42,060
Well, this book was given to me by my grandmother and I only remember that because it's written in the book.

617
00:33:43,660 --> 00:33:44,520
I love inscriptions.

618
00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:45,100
Yeah.

619
00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:50,020
And I was obsessed with this book as a kid.

620
00:33:50,160 --> 00:33:54,340
From before I could read to, I would just look at the photo, the drawings.

621
00:33:54,940 --> 00:33:55,780
I love the drawings.

622
00:33:56,080 --> 00:33:58,040
They're very delicate and detailed.

623
00:33:59,740 --> 00:34:01,580
Black and white line drawings. And then once I could read

624
00:34:03,380 --> 00:34:06,360
Demi does those as well, by the way.

625
00:34:06,480 --> 00:34:07,260
I believe so, yes.

626
00:34:07,440 --> 00:34:07,719
Yeah, yeah.

627
00:34:08,040 --> 00:34:11,780
And- Delicate line drawings is a great way to put it.

628
00:34:12,040 --> 00:34:12,800
Yeah, I think.

629
00:34:13,139 --> 00:34:16,020
Kind of like the Giving Tree a little bit type sort of style.

630
00:34:16,199 --> 00:34:18,400
I mean, some of- I'm not sure what that is.

631
00:34:18,480 --> 00:34:19,840
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein.

632
00:34:20,940 --> 00:34:29,480
I'm just noticing on some of the drawings, but also the pagodas, the lumber, the horses, the pastoral fields, the people in long flowing robes.

633
00:34:29,580 --> 00:34:29,760
Yeah.

634
00:34:30,360 --> 00:34:31,460
Delicate line drawings.

635
00:34:32,280 --> 00:34:55,239
But once I could read well enough to understand what the story was about, I just loved the idea that this little kid had, was an apprentice to this master and was being- This knowledge was being passed down and I always wanted this in my life.

636
00:34:56,100 --> 00:35:02,960
And I didn't really realize how much I wanted this until I think I was on my way through high school.

637
00:35:03,480 --> 00:35:15,620
And I was searching for this kind of person in my life that would take me under their wing and teach me everything they know.

638
00:35:17,740 --> 00:35:26,760
Because I, and I'm sure it has something to do with my relationship with my father, who never answered any real questions I had.

639
00:35:28,020 --> 00:35:30,280
I would ask him why.

640
00:35:30,460 --> 00:35:35,300
I was a very curious kid and the answer was always like, because I told you so.

641
00:35:36,560 --> 00:35:38,120
Or something along those lines.

642
00:35:38,620 --> 00:35:43,720
So if I ever wanted to know anything, I had to go find out for myself what it was.

643
00:35:43,720 --> 00:35:50,200
And my parents were not necessarily very artistic.

644
00:35:50,800 --> 00:36:01,420
They didn't, my father had a minor passion for carpentry when I was a child and, but he stopped doing that.

645
00:36:01,440 --> 00:36:01,780
What did your parents do?

646
00:36:02,580 --> 00:36:04,140
My father was a salesman.

647
00:36:04,780 --> 00:36:11,980
He sold mechanical, industrial tools, that kind of stuff.

648
00:36:12,880 --> 00:36:14,820
My mother always worked for the government.

649
00:36:15,220 --> 00:36:21,200
She was a, she worked at the post office when I was really young and then worked for the land registry office.

650
00:36:21,300 --> 00:36:22,420
She answered your questions?

651
00:36:24,340 --> 00:36:25,620
A little bit. I think I

652
00:36:26,520 --> 00:36:29,700
Seems like you were kind of like ignored almost.

653
00:36:29,820 --> 00:36:30,920
I don't want to put words in your mouth.

654
00:36:30,940 --> 00:36:33,460
Yeah, no, no, I feel like very much.

655
00:36:34,700 --> 00:36:39,540
Yeah, I was told to go, you know, go away, go play somewhere else.

656
00:36:39,580 --> 00:36:40,940
Did they not want to have kids?

657
00:36:42,960 --> 00:36:44,080
I honestly don't know.

658
00:36:44,500 --> 00:36:50,380
I think that there was a short time in their lives that they were in love and happy and I never saw that.

659
00:36:52,420 --> 00:36:55,480
And so when your grandmother gave you this book, was this before your parents got divorced?

660
00:36:55,900 --> 00:36:56,160
Oh yeah.

661
00:36:56,200 --> 00:36:57,320
They got divorced at 12.

662
00:36:57,460 --> 00:37:00,600
The memories, the earliest memories in the closet were probably like three, four, five.

663
00:37:00,940 --> 00:37:02,700
Take us through the seven years.

664
00:37:02,700 --> 00:37:05,080
I don't remember, I don't even remember being in the closet.

665
00:37:05,260 --> 00:37:08,560
I do remember having my own bedroom in the same house.

666
00:37:10,020 --> 00:37:26,620
I think the reason that my sister and I were put in the closet when we were kids is because it was close to my parents' room, but it was, and it was small enough and contained that, you know, I think they let us cry ourselves to sleep.

667
00:37:27,220 --> 00:37:29,040
That kind of thing.

668
00:37:29,660 --> 00:37:30,700
Yeah, of course, yeah.

669
00:37:30,780 --> 00:37:31,380
Cry it out.

670
00:37:31,580 --> 00:37:33,580
That was the popular thing at the time.

671
00:37:33,720 --> 00:37:34,340
Very, yeah.

672
00:37:34,540 --> 00:37:44,220
And did you not once tell me like maybe months ago when I was first getting to know you that your dad also did a lot of drugs?

673
00:37:45,040 --> 00:37:45,940
Yeah, he certainly did.

674
00:37:46,300 --> 00:37:47,360
He liked drugs a lot.

675
00:37:47,760 --> 00:37:50,540
I didn't see it.

676
00:37:50,580 --> 00:37:53,000
It wasn't like he was just getting high all the time at home.

677
00:37:53,160 --> 00:37:55,140
He kept it away from home.

678
00:37:55,740 --> 00:37:58,560
And I didn't really learn about this until later in life.

679
00:37:59,160 --> 00:38:01,220
You know, I knew my dad liked to drink.

680
00:38:01,620 --> 00:38:02,680
He liked to party.

681
00:38:04,780 --> 00:38:15,540
Once I was old enough and I learned what marijuana smoke smells like, it kind of, I had a flashback to being like, oh, I always remember that smell coming out of the basement.

682
00:38:15,780 --> 00:38:16,680
Oh my God, yeah, of course.

683
00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:17,280
You know, when I was a kid.

684
00:38:19,400 --> 00:38:21,860
Did you not tell me that they were also getting high at work?

685
00:38:22,520 --> 00:38:22,880
Yeah.

686
00:38:23,140 --> 00:38:24,940
Like what kind of stuff was happening?

687
00:38:25,860 --> 00:38:28,340
So we're in Hamilton, we're in the 70s and 80s.

688
00:38:28,420 --> 00:38:30,020
Tell me what this workplace scene is like.

689
00:38:30,140 --> 00:38:45,260
You know, a rare story my father told me about himself was it started with the time that he accidentally did heroin and he didn't intend to snort heroin.

690
00:38:45,400 --> 00:38:46,460
He intended to snort cocaine.

691
00:38:49,360 --> 00:38:53,500
And he would tell me that when he would go into the office, he worked in Mississauga.

692
00:38:53,780 --> 00:39:00,380
He drove from St. Catharines to Mississauga most mornings and most of the time he would come home.

693
00:39:00,520 --> 00:39:02,580
Sometimes he would stay in Mississauga overnight.

694
00:39:05,080 --> 00:39:10,340
But he said when he would show up to work most mornings, there would be a line or two of coke on his desk.

695
00:39:11,700 --> 00:39:15,220
And he would just snort it to get the day started.

696
00:39:17,280 --> 00:39:21,320
And then one time it wasn't coke and it hit a little different.

697
00:39:24,740 --> 00:39:31,060
And he's lucky that he didn't overdose because they're very different things.

698
00:39:31,660 --> 00:39:34,420
Yeah, who was putting cocaine on his desk?

699
00:39:34,700 --> 00:39:38,560
I think it was a salesman or somebody that worked in his office.

700
00:39:38,640 --> 00:39:40,120
Just like, this is how we do it.

701
00:39:40,300 --> 00:39:41,540
Yeah, I don't remember.

702
00:39:43,260 --> 00:39:54,800
The only employee or the other co-worker of his that I knew was his secretary, which I later found out he was having an affair with the whole time he was with my mother.

703
00:39:56,860 --> 00:39:58,220
You found out a lot later.

704
00:39:59,200 --> 00:39:59,520
Sorry?

705
00:39:59,520 --> 00:40:02,020
You found out, you got a lot of scoop later.

706
00:40:02,160 --> 00:40:04,920
Like you didn't obviously know this stuff.

707
00:40:04,920 --> 00:40:05,960
Yeah, we had to pry.

708
00:40:06,360 --> 00:40:12,080
My sister and I had to like combine information, you know, that we were getting from different resources.

709
00:40:12,100 --> 00:40:13,560
That's a common sibling tactic.

710
00:40:13,920 --> 00:40:14,240
Yeah.

711
00:40:15,160 --> 00:40:18,660
I hope, I hope my sister and I can continue to do that as my parents get very old.

712
00:40:18,660 --> 00:40:20,880
Yeah, I hope your kids do it behind your back.

713
00:40:20,900 --> 00:40:23,660
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

714
00:40:24,020 --> 00:40:24,420
Because?

715
00:40:24,940 --> 00:40:28,240
I think it's necessary and it's good relationship building stuff.

716
00:40:28,240 --> 00:40:29,560
Yes, exactly.

717
00:40:30,180 --> 00:40:39,060
So you find out your dad is having an affair with his secretary, snorting coke every morning at a sales job, accidentally did heroin once.

718
00:40:41,560 --> 00:40:47,000
You were not ignored, capital I, but you know, there's the tilt that way.

719
00:40:47,720 --> 00:40:49,400
You got a grandmother in the picture.

720
00:40:50,680 --> 00:40:50,920
Yeah.

721
00:40:51,060 --> 00:40:51,880
Who's buying you books.

722
00:40:52,500 --> 00:41:01,720
Yeah, my family, my father was a big reader and my, I was never very close with my grandmother, either of them.

723
00:41:04,300 --> 00:41:06,300
She lived in Stoney Creek.

724
00:41:07,240 --> 00:41:13,040
We would see her, you know, once a month, you know, a few times a year kind of thing.

725
00:41:13,360 --> 00:41:21,420
And, and it, it was for a birthday before I was old enough to remember or Christmas that I got this book.

726
00:41:22,090 --> 00:41:31,280
And so it probably just sat in my room with like other books I was, you know, picture books.

727
00:41:32,220 --> 00:41:39,260
And so I wish I knew why she chose this book.

728
00:41:40,140 --> 00:41:47,680
And, you know, it, it didn't strike me as an odd book to have as a kid when I was a kid, but as I got older, I thought this is a little bit of a.

729
00:41:47,760 --> 00:41:49,840
I never heard, it certainly is, yeah.

730
00:41:49,840 --> 00:41:51,360
A strange book to give a kid.

731
00:41:51,540 --> 00:41:52,680
Very unique book.

732
00:41:52,900 --> 00:42:07,980
This boy, you know, he's challenged by the carpenter to do all kinds of incredible feats, like spend a year, you know, lifting all these stones and, you know, building this crazy pagodas and he does it.

733
00:42:08,080 --> 00:42:11,060
And then the guy's reward is like, do it again for another year.

734
00:42:11,220 --> 00:42:17,720
Like it was, you know, he's put through all these essentially Sisyphean type of feats, like, you know, like these endless challenges.

735
00:42:18,440 --> 00:42:20,760
You probably related to that though.

736
00:42:20,840 --> 00:42:36,420
It sounds like because you had this desire to have a connection and a learner, learnee role with your own parents and your father, which was kind of replicated in this book, but you cultivated, it sounds like an astounding sense of independence from a very young age.

737
00:42:36,780 --> 00:42:39,740
I always wanted, I hated being restricted.

738
00:42:40,080 --> 00:42:43,060
I never wanted to do anything necessarily bad.

739
00:42:43,340 --> 00:42:45,040
I just didn't want to be restricted.

740
00:42:45,960 --> 00:42:59,420
I, you know, as soon as I could wander away from home, I started wandering away and pushing the boundaries and, but also trying to be respectful at the same time, you know, like not, didn't want to worry my parents too much.

741
00:42:59,920 --> 00:43:00,400
You know?

742
00:43:00,460 --> 00:43:01,320
What do you mean wander away?

743
00:43:01,380 --> 00:43:02,600
So you're eight, nine, 10 years old.

744
00:43:02,620 --> 00:43:03,020
What are you doing?

745
00:43:03,140 --> 00:43:03,600
Where are you going?

746
00:43:03,600 --> 00:43:08,040
If I could walk around the block, if I could, you know, there was major streets.

747
00:43:08,120 --> 00:43:16,200
I lived on a major street in St. Catharines, which would have been, you know, dangerous for a young kid to be crossing willy-nilly.

748
00:43:17,500 --> 00:43:28,160
But once I was old enough and my parents trusted me to use crosswalk properly and, you know, then I could walk to a convenience store that was four or five blocks away and not one that was just on the same block.

749
00:43:28,160 --> 00:43:28,920
And this was all by yourself?

750
00:43:29,640 --> 00:43:30,420
Yeah, it would be by myself.

751
00:43:30,420 --> 00:43:31,500
What was happening in your head?

752
00:43:32,920 --> 00:43:36,860
So an eight and nine and 10 year old today does not have A, time by themselves.

753
00:43:37,440 --> 00:43:40,340
I mean, just B, but time in their own head.

754
00:43:40,480 --> 00:43:48,100
Like they've got screens and they've got video game systems and they've got, you know, there's, I don't see kids doing what it sounds like you did.

755
00:43:48,240 --> 00:43:53,780
And as you get older here, I'm picturing you as a kid, any artistic gleanings early?

756
00:43:54,100 --> 00:43:58,320
What were the first demonstrations of your art history?

757
00:44:00,580 --> 00:44:05,200
I distinctly remember a moment in daycare.

758
00:44:05,200 --> 00:44:10,180
It was either in a before school or an after school program at the YMCA.

759
00:44:11,780 --> 00:44:17,520
I spent a lot of my childhood also at the YMCA in St. Catharines.

760
00:44:17,880 --> 00:44:27,120
And I would spend time alone in the daycare drawing on paper with, you know, pastels and crayons.

761
00:44:28,140 --> 00:44:36,200
I was probably five or six years old and I taped a piece of paper on the wall and I was just drawing on it.

762
00:44:36,640 --> 00:44:39,280
And I thought, this is what I want to do forever.

763
00:44:40,400 --> 00:44:41,860
Like, I want to be an artist.

764
00:44:42,260 --> 00:44:42,540
Wow.

765
00:44:43,200 --> 00:44:44,860
This is what I want to do forever.

766
00:44:45,300 --> 00:44:46,260
Where'd that come from?

767
00:44:46,880 --> 00:44:50,900
I just, I really enjoyed any time I had when I was drawing.

768
00:44:52,020 --> 00:44:56,360
I don't think that I showed any exceptional ability from a young child.

769
00:44:57,200 --> 00:44:59,260
Most kids must feel some of that when they're drawing.

770
00:44:59,400 --> 00:45:00,820
I mean, drawing is such a...

771
00:45:00,820 --> 00:45:01,400
Yeah, it's a...

772
00:45:01,400 --> 00:45:04,460
I'm a big fan of Austin Kleon, who was a past guest on 3 Books.

773
00:45:04,600 --> 00:45:08,400
And he just really espouses like drawing as an adult.

774
00:45:08,580 --> 00:45:14,080
And, you know, adults are like, oh yeah, I guess I should, you know, we forget that kids love drawing.

775
00:45:14,380 --> 00:45:15,300
Kids love drawing.

776
00:45:15,520 --> 00:45:16,700
We all love drawing.

777
00:45:16,900 --> 00:45:17,060
Yeah.

778
00:45:17,220 --> 00:45:18,320
You just never stopped.

779
00:45:19,180 --> 00:45:20,120
No, I never did.

780
00:45:21,180 --> 00:45:26,580
I didn't, I mean, there was periods in my life where I went without drawing for quite a while.

781
00:45:29,680 --> 00:45:32,680
And if I could go back in time and give myself a shake, I think I would.

782
00:45:34,140 --> 00:45:36,040
So what kind of student were you?

783
00:45:36,160 --> 00:45:36,640
A kid were you?

784
00:45:36,760 --> 00:45:38,480
What group did you fit into?

785
00:45:38,800 --> 00:45:43,800
What, you know, how would you define yourself in regards to like student groups?

786
00:45:46,360 --> 00:45:47,160
Socially, I mean.

787
00:45:47,380 --> 00:45:52,740
Early on, I didn't feel like I had a lot of say in who my friends were.

788
00:45:53,100 --> 00:45:58,420
It was kind of like, I was friends with whoever were the kids of my friends, my parents' friends.

789
00:45:59,660 --> 00:46:01,340
And you're just kind of stuck with those kids.

790
00:46:02,340 --> 00:46:11,740
And then as you get into high school, you know, in high school, there's like, I don't want to put labels on it, but most schools have like the jocks, the goths, the nerds, the, you know, how does this work for you?

791
00:46:12,040 --> 00:46:20,580
Well, by high school, I was really starting to sort out, you know, who I wanted to be around or who I related to and who I didn't relate to.

792
00:46:20,940 --> 00:46:29,480
And I dealt with a lot of bullies as a young kid, as I think probably most boys do, unless you're the bully.

793
00:46:30,460 --> 00:46:35,120
That dynamic probably still plays itself out the same way.

794
00:46:38,220 --> 00:47:06,160
And so once I was in high school and I started to really feel like I was developing my own personal style and slowly starting to realize like who I am and where I am, my place in the world, I fell in with a bunch of other students who were weird and didn't fit into that jock narrative.

795
00:47:06,600 --> 00:47:07,060
Whoa, whoa, whoa.

796
00:47:07,120 --> 00:47:08,780
So you fell into students that were weird.

797
00:47:09,000 --> 00:47:10,920
That's how you define your group.

798
00:47:10,940 --> 00:47:20,440
Well, weird in that they were not like the stereotypical, popular in style dressing.

799
00:47:20,740 --> 00:47:25,340
Did I hear you once say in another interview, they were the only group that would have me?

800
00:47:25,500 --> 00:47:26,380
Am I putting words in your mouth?

801
00:47:26,400 --> 00:47:27,500
That's how I felt, yes.

802
00:47:27,720 --> 00:47:28,920
It was something like that.

803
00:47:29,180 --> 00:47:31,840
You know, we all kind of fell in together.

804
00:47:32,840 --> 00:47:38,320
We just got called the freaks basically by the popular kids.

805
00:47:41,480 --> 00:47:46,600
We would all move our lockers to be in the same hallway together.

806
00:47:46,720 --> 00:47:47,260
Oh, interesting.

807
00:47:48,060 --> 00:47:49,380
Probably weren't allowed to do that.

808
00:47:49,440 --> 00:47:49,680
No.

809
00:47:50,140 --> 00:47:50,660
Early vandalism.

810
00:47:50,840 --> 00:47:52,200
We had assigned lockers, yeah.

811
00:47:53,080 --> 00:47:56,440
But we found a secluded area of the school.

812
00:47:56,740 --> 00:47:57,380
Oh, wow.

813
00:47:57,740 --> 00:48:01,560
And took the bolts off of the bolted up lockers and just put our locks on them.

814
00:48:01,740 --> 00:48:02,000
Wow.

815
00:48:02,360 --> 00:48:04,680
And then we would

816
00:48:04,740 --> 00:48:05,600
Took the bolts off? That's ballsy.

817
00:48:05,840 --> 00:48:11,000
Well, I mean, I guess it felt like just the right amount of bad.

818
00:48:12,320 --> 00:48:14,460
It didn't feel like it was too bad.

819
00:48:14,660 --> 00:48:15,340
The right amount of bad.

820
00:48:15,340 --> 00:48:17,000
We weren't doing anything irreversible.

821
00:48:17,160 --> 00:48:18,240
We weren't really vandalizing. We were just

822
00:48:18,440 --> 00:48:21,380
You felt like you were on okay moral grounds.

823
00:48:21,380 --> 00:48:23,800
This is for a community you're trying to develop here.

824
00:48:24,100 --> 00:48:27,740
Well, we just wanted a place that we could go and be left alone.

825
00:48:28,480 --> 00:48:29,140
Oh, interesting.

826
00:48:29,360 --> 00:48:31,540
We wanted a place we could go, be left alone.

827
00:48:31,660 --> 00:48:34,440
And what we did to do that felt like the right amount of bad.

828
00:48:35,080 --> 00:48:35,620
Yeah, I guess.

829
00:48:36,200 --> 00:48:39,780
And I think that plays itself out as we get further along here.

830
00:48:40,040 --> 00:48:47,920
But there was a fair amount of drug and alcohol abuse.

831
00:48:48,420 --> 00:48:49,680
More than a fair, like a lot.

832
00:48:51,880 --> 00:48:53,080
What kind of drugs?

833
00:48:53,780 --> 00:48:54,260
Everything.

834
00:48:54,880 --> 00:48:55,360
Everything?

835
00:48:55,560 --> 00:48:56,440
Grade nine and 10?

836
00:48:57,340 --> 00:48:59,760
Grade nine and 10 was- Or 10 and 11?

837
00:48:59,800 --> 00:49:01,160
Alcohol, marijuana.

838
00:49:03,120 --> 00:49:07,860
Grade 10, 11, we're getting mushrooms, LSD, cocaine, heroin.

839
00:49:09,740 --> 00:49:20,020
And I think that I saw, I mean, by the time I was in grade 11 and grade 12, I knew multiple people that were shooting up at school, before school, after school.

840
00:49:21,800 --> 00:49:23,500
When you say shooting up, you mean heroin?

841
00:49:24,440 --> 00:49:26,260
Heroin, cocaine, a mixture of both.

842
00:49:26,500 --> 00:49:26,900
I saw it all.

843
00:49:27,800 --> 00:49:29,360
Shooting up before and after school.

844
00:49:29,500 --> 00:49:38,900
So I'm sorry to say this in a, I don't mean this in a derogatory way, but like, if you're shooting heroin twice a day in high school.

845
00:49:39,240 --> 00:49:39,600
More.

846
00:49:40,840 --> 00:49:42,660
But you're also going to school?

847
00:49:43,180 --> 00:49:43,460
Yeah.

848
00:49:44,260 --> 00:49:46,100
Sometimes, sometimes they wouldn't show up.

849
00:49:46,700 --> 00:49:50,620
I just, I just, I just would equate, sorry, like, am I way off on this?

850
00:49:50,620 --> 00:49:58,720
How does the combination of shooting heroin multiple times a day at age 15 or 16 tie together with being a studious person?

851
00:49:59,280 --> 00:50:00,800
They weren't necessarily studious.

852
00:50:01,040 --> 00:50:02,080
They had to be out of the house.

853
00:50:02,520 --> 00:50:02,760
Okay.

854
00:50:03,740 --> 00:50:05,040
They just needed a place to go.

855
00:50:05,340 --> 00:50:08,380
Okay, so we've got a couple parameters of the freak class here.

856
00:50:08,440 --> 00:50:10,020
We've got the lockers moving together.

857
00:50:10,140 --> 00:50:13,820
We've got the 10 or 20 students throughout the grades, or maybe over two grade splits.

858
00:50:14,280 --> 00:50:17,020
There's the drug and alcohol growth, but not for you.

859
00:50:17,680 --> 00:50:19,080
You're doing no drugs, no alcohol, right?

860
00:50:19,240 --> 00:50:19,600
Exactly.

861
00:50:19,600 --> 00:50:20,220
Okay.

862
00:50:20,660 --> 00:50:22,880
What else defines that community?

863
00:50:23,020 --> 00:50:25,060
I find this community really interesting.

864
00:50:25,600 --> 00:50:28,940
Like, it's a really nice window into the world here.

865
00:50:29,820 --> 00:50:33,280
Grunge, like grunge music was starting to become very popular at the time.

866
00:50:33,380 --> 00:50:33,680
Oh, okay.

867
00:50:33,780 --> 00:50:34,420
So the, you know.

868
00:50:34,680 --> 00:50:35,180
Pearl Jam Nirvana?

869
00:50:35,460 --> 00:50:35,760
Yeah.

870
00:50:36,320 --> 00:50:37,380
Sound Garden, that kind of stuff?

871
00:50:37,400 --> 00:50:38,260
All of that kind of stuff.

872
00:50:39,040 --> 00:50:41,940
So there was, there was the grungy, there was the grungy kids.

873
00:50:42,100 --> 00:50:42,780
There was the.

874
00:50:42,860 --> 00:50:43,740
That's how you dressed too?

875
00:50:43,840 --> 00:50:46,480
Like the, like ripped pants and plaids?

876
00:50:46,820 --> 00:50:47,460
Exactly, yeah.

877
00:50:47,500 --> 00:50:48,120
Ripped jeans.

878
00:50:48,120 --> 00:50:52,220
A lot of Salvation Army chic.

879
00:50:54,840 --> 00:50:56,620
And there was the goth kids.

880
00:50:56,840 --> 00:50:57,720
There was always goth kids.

881
00:50:58,120 --> 00:50:59,000
But they were part of your group?

882
00:50:59,160 --> 00:50:59,380
Yep.

883
00:50:59,600 --> 00:51:01,440
Oh, the goths were part of the freaks, a subset.

884
00:51:01,700 --> 00:51:02,500
The punks.

885
00:51:03,180 --> 00:51:04,220
Oh, the punks.

886
00:51:04,260 --> 00:51:04,840
And the ravers.

887
00:51:05,120 --> 00:51:05,720
The ravers.

888
00:51:06,600 --> 00:51:07,080
Yeah.

889
00:51:07,560 --> 00:51:08,740
Goths, punks, ravers.

890
00:51:08,980 --> 00:51:09,780
Yeah, there was.

891
00:51:10,680 --> 00:51:11,940
Were you one of those three?

892
00:51:13,060 --> 00:51:17,460
I probably fell in closer to the grunge.

893
00:51:18,120 --> 00:51:21,840
So there's grunge, goth, punk, and raver.

894
00:51:22,420 --> 00:51:23,660
He certainly, there was.

895
00:51:24,800 --> 00:51:26,760
What's a raver and a punk?

896
00:51:26,840 --> 00:51:29,460
How do they differ in appearance and behavior?

897
00:51:30,240 --> 00:51:33,460
How do I identify the difference between a raver and a punk?

898
00:51:34,440 --> 00:51:37,640
We're talking like, like lanolin mohawks here?

899
00:51:37,800 --> 00:51:39,780
This is like 90s, 90s raver culture.

900
00:51:39,900 --> 00:51:41,640
So we're talking like humongous pants.

901
00:51:41,900 --> 00:51:42,140
Yeah.

902
00:51:42,680 --> 00:51:45,800
A lot of fluorescent colors.

903
00:51:52,150 --> 00:51:54,390
And like big plastic jewelry.

904
00:51:54,810 --> 00:51:55,490
Yeah, yeah.

905
00:51:55,570 --> 00:51:56,430
Okay, I can picture that.

906
00:51:56,530 --> 00:51:57,390
And then what about the punks?

907
00:51:57,510 --> 00:51:58,170
90s punks?

908
00:51:58,410 --> 00:51:59,110
The punks, I.

909
00:51:59,250 --> 00:52:05,030
I heard Andrew Hieberman once in an interview with Rich Roll, by the way, that his childhood, he describes it as like the movie Kids.

910
00:52:05,650 --> 00:52:08,770
Oh, I related to that movie so hard.

911
00:52:09,610 --> 00:52:14,170
When I felt like I was watching my teenage years go by.

912
00:52:14,270 --> 00:52:15,130
That's exactly what he said.

913
00:52:15,150 --> 00:52:15,950
Just in a bigger city.

914
00:52:16,230 --> 00:52:16,630
Wow.

915
00:52:16,630 --> 00:52:18,050
Except in New York.

916
00:52:18,290 --> 00:52:18,590
Yeah.

917
00:52:20,250 --> 00:52:24,630
I saw that same kind of violence, that skateboard beating.

918
00:52:25,130 --> 00:52:26,210
I saw that happen.

919
00:52:26,610 --> 00:52:27,570
Skateboard beatings?

920
00:52:27,590 --> 00:52:27,890
Yes.

921
00:52:27,910 --> 00:52:29,510
But the skaters are not part of your group.

922
00:52:29,610 --> 00:52:30,150
No, they were.

923
00:52:30,550 --> 00:52:32,070
Oh, skaters were also part of Freaks.

924
00:52:32,710 --> 00:52:36,450
We were just about every subculture that didn't.

925
00:52:36,970 --> 00:52:38,630
Identify with the mainstream big ones.

926
00:52:38,910 --> 00:52:39,410
Yeah, yes.

927
00:52:40,930 --> 00:52:44,930
We were kind of a catch-all for everybody who was left behind.

928
00:52:45,930 --> 00:52:46,370
And.

929
00:52:46,850 --> 00:52:47,810
You saw the skateboard beatings?

930
00:52:48,690 --> 00:52:49,110
Sure.

931
00:52:49,450 --> 00:52:50,190
I mean, I.

932
00:52:50,330 --> 00:52:51,370
Who would you guys beat up?

933
00:52:51,950 --> 00:52:52,170
Who?

934
00:52:52,330 --> 00:52:53,570
We didn't beat anybody up.

935
00:52:54,390 --> 00:52:56,050
But you saw skateboard beatings.

936
00:52:56,050 --> 00:52:56,750
Oh, yes.

937
00:52:57,390 --> 00:53:02,330
I, well, that was, I was in Hamilton at a skate park when I saw that happen.

938
00:53:02,370 --> 00:53:03,370
Oh, it wasn't your friends?

939
00:53:03,370 --> 00:53:04,310
It wasn't in high school, no.

940
00:53:04,350 --> 00:53:04,750
Okay, okay.

941
00:53:04,750 --> 00:53:06,330
There was a lot of fights and fighting.

942
00:53:06,450 --> 00:53:07,910
Stealing stuff from variety stores.

943
00:53:09,090 --> 00:53:10,330
That's what happens in the movie.

944
00:53:10,730 --> 00:53:12,250
The drugs though, heavy, heavy drugs.

945
00:53:12,970 --> 00:53:13,350
Yes.

946
00:53:13,350 --> 00:53:15,790
Most of that happened after school.

947
00:53:16,310 --> 00:53:22,290
It wasn't until later in high school when the real addicts were doing their thing.

948
00:53:22,910 --> 00:53:24,210
In the school lot.

949
00:53:24,970 --> 00:53:25,270
Sorry?

950
00:53:25,390 --> 00:53:26,290
Where were they shooting up?

951
00:53:27,650 --> 00:53:28,690
Oh, bathrooms.

952
00:53:28,950 --> 00:53:30,430
And where were they getting heroin from?

953
00:53:32,230 --> 00:53:33,550
They're drug dealers.

954
00:53:33,870 --> 00:53:34,890
We all knew who they were.

955
00:53:35,110 --> 00:53:35,290
Yeah.

956
00:53:36,010 --> 00:53:42,390
There were kids slightly older than us that either dropped out of school or had graduated school and not done anything.

957
00:53:42,390 --> 00:53:53,490
So if, I'm sorry, you know, so there's this, I think, well-held belief that we are most influenced by our culture than anything, you know?

958
00:53:53,710 --> 00:54:07,870
And Maria Popova, past guest on 3 Books, says that her number one piece of advice to her younger self or any younger person is to try to see the culture you are a part of and ignore its norms for your own benefit.

959
00:54:07,950 --> 00:54:11,630
You don't have to do X, Y, and Z as it may be propaned to.

960
00:54:11,630 --> 00:54:17,110
She grew up in Bulgaria behind the Iron Curtain, so it's a little different, but that was her perspective.

961
00:54:17,730 --> 00:54:25,970
And yet you were surrounded by these kids who had a deep artistic sensibility like you did, but you didn't start drinking, you didn't do any drugs.

962
00:54:26,110 --> 00:54:35,490
And in fact, not to foreshadow here, I believe you have a large tattoo on your stomach that says the word straight edge.

963
00:54:35,990 --> 00:54:41,030
I would classify it as a medium tattoo across my stomach that says straight edge.

964
00:54:41,510 --> 00:54:42,750
So it was my first tattoo.

965
00:54:42,950 --> 00:54:43,990
How did you resist this?

966
00:54:44,190 --> 00:54:45,870
How did you resist the drinking drug culture?

967
00:54:47,430 --> 00:54:50,870
Your parents weren't around, they weren't cared, they didn't look, they weren't checking on you.

968
00:54:51,490 --> 00:54:52,310
No, they would have been.

969
00:54:52,310 --> 00:54:53,950
They weren't looking through your knapsack.

970
00:54:54,070 --> 00:54:56,210
My father would have encouraged it to a degree.

971
00:54:56,230 --> 00:54:56,710
Oh my gosh.

972
00:54:56,710 --> 00:55:07,170
Not to a toxic, he wouldn't have encouraged me to do hard drugs, but I was free to try a sip of this and that and the other thing anytime I wanted as a kid.

973
00:55:07,390 --> 00:55:12,530
And I tried beer a couple times and it was always disgusting.

974
00:55:13,030 --> 00:55:26,390
And as I was in high school and I started to go to parties where people were drinking, grade nine, grade 10, I tried a beer, I just didn't, I thought it was disgusting.

975
00:55:27,150 --> 00:55:28,030
Yeah, it is.

976
00:55:28,150 --> 00:55:32,570
And once I saw how people were acting, I was like, I don't want to act like that.

977
00:55:32,650 --> 00:55:36,410
I didn't, I just didn't have the, I didn't want to do it.

978
00:55:36,470 --> 00:55:42,050
I'm a parent of four boys who I desperately don't want them to try alcohol and cannabis and these drugs in high school.

979
00:55:42,210 --> 00:55:46,950
And you have managed to do this, even though you were immersed in a culture that did the opposite.

980
00:55:47,050 --> 00:55:53,090
So I'm curious for what lessons or ideas or principles or what actually created this behavior inside you.

981
00:55:53,490 --> 00:55:54,590
I just didn't have.

982
00:55:54,790 --> 00:55:56,350
To the point where you identify with it.

983
00:55:56,370 --> 00:56:01,090
I mean, you just have a medium sized stomach that labels yourself as straight edge, that you got at what age?

984
00:56:01,230 --> 00:56:01,890
At 18.

985
00:56:02,090 --> 00:56:02,730
You got at 18.

986
00:56:02,790 --> 00:56:07,630
So you already were labeling yourself sort of antithetical to the culture.

987
00:56:08,970 --> 00:56:17,210
Yeah, I, you know, it was, it was a movement that the straight edge, I didn't know anybody else who was straight edge.

988
00:56:17,370 --> 00:56:24,530
I was just told by some of the punk rock and the hardcore guys that got to know me.

989
00:56:24,590 --> 00:56:25,890
And they're like, oh, you're straight edge.

990
00:56:26,130 --> 00:56:27,170
And I was like, what is that?

991
00:56:27,470 --> 00:56:31,730
And then they would, they would tell me, it's like, oh, you know, somebody who doesn't drink or smoke or use drugs.

992
00:56:33,130 --> 00:56:35,070
And I was like, oh, I have an identity.

993
00:56:35,430 --> 00:56:35,870
You know?

994
00:56:36,190 --> 00:56:37,690
Oh, interesting.

995
00:56:38,370 --> 00:56:41,490
It was partly that you connected with that label.

996
00:56:41,930 --> 00:56:46,950
Yeah, in a way, you know, I thought, I listened to some of the music for a while.

997
00:56:47,650 --> 00:56:48,190
What music?

998
00:56:48,790 --> 00:56:50,590
Like hardcore, straight edge.

999
00:56:50,850 --> 00:56:51,910
Hardcore, straight edge?

1000
00:56:51,990 --> 00:56:57,790
Well, it was like in the genre of hardcore, which is like a subset of metal, I guess.

1001
00:56:57,950 --> 00:57:01,810
Okay, so within metal, there's hardcore, within metal, hardcore, there's straight edge.

1002
00:57:02,150 --> 00:57:04,750
Not to be confused with Christian rock.

1003
00:57:05,250 --> 00:57:11,650
So it would be, yes, more like straight edge rock, where they are talking about their values.

1004
00:57:12,730 --> 00:57:14,770
And for me, it was all a little bit too preaching.

1005
00:57:15,070 --> 00:57:17,530
Do you remember any of the lyrics or the bands or the songs?

1006
00:57:19,710 --> 00:57:21,010
I do not know.

1007
00:57:21,170 --> 00:57:22,250
Straight edge music.

1008
00:57:22,370 --> 00:57:23,370
I would know it if I heard it.

1009
00:57:23,430 --> 00:57:25,230
Even though you had no other straight edge friends.

1010
00:57:26,470 --> 00:57:30,950
Yeah, so I was- They never forced you to, people weren't pushing alcohol and weed on you?

1011
00:57:31,090 --> 00:57:32,770
The odd person would offer.

1012
00:57:33,370 --> 00:57:36,930
I would get teased a little bit, but I never felt real peer pressure.

1013
00:57:39,250 --> 00:57:44,790
Yeah, there was never, nobody ever like put their arm around me and was like, you better take a hit of this.

1014
00:57:45,030 --> 00:57:48,610
Yeah, it sounds like one of the defining- We were pretty respectful of each other.

1015
00:57:48,610 --> 00:57:52,170
Pieces of your culture was that we took anybody who wasn't welcome anywhere else.

1016
00:57:52,230 --> 00:57:54,930
So by definition, that is a culture of acceptance.

1017
00:57:55,250 --> 00:58:01,770
Yeah, we were- Maybe we all should envy hanging out with the freaks in high school, because they're the open-hearted, open-minded kindness group.

1018
00:58:01,770 --> 00:58:04,150
We were very, we tried to be.

1019
00:58:04,490 --> 00:58:10,230
Of course, it wasn't all good, but-

1020
00:58:10,630 --> 00:58:11,810
The odd skateboard beating. That wasn't your group though.

1021
00:58:12,010 --> 00:58:14,250
No, but we did get in fights from time to time.

1022
00:58:14,870 --> 00:58:15,690
Really, over what?

1023
00:58:16,430 --> 00:58:17,450
Over being bullied.

1024
00:58:18,110 --> 00:58:20,130
Oh, you'd fight with the other groups.

1025
00:58:20,670 --> 00:58:30,850
Well, if somebody was picking on you, if somebody had, I can't tell you how many times I got pushed into a locker, threatened to get beat up.

1026
00:58:30,850 --> 00:58:34,430
I mean, I was also antagonizing in my own way.

1027
00:58:34,630 --> 00:58:37,310
I would make my own t-shirts that said, jocks suck.

1028
00:58:37,990 --> 00:58:38,630
Oh, wow.

1029
00:58:39,110 --> 00:58:42,290
And I would wear it in high school.

1030
00:58:42,570 --> 00:58:45,490
Wow, so the merchandise streak started young.

1031
00:58:45,790 --> 00:58:46,710
I did make my own t-shirts.

1032
00:58:47,170 --> 00:58:49,810
You're wearing a Lewis Mallard red baseball cap now, I should mention.

1033
00:58:49,970 --> 00:58:50,270
Correct.

1034
00:58:50,310 --> 00:58:53,130
For those that want to support your work and your art, you sell merchandise.

1035
00:58:53,710 --> 00:58:54,310
I do, yes.

1036
00:58:54,530 --> 00:58:59,990
And so at Lewis Mallard, there's presumably a buy button, because I'm sure Instagram's got the mallification happening.

1037
00:59:00,450 --> 00:59:02,650
Yes, I don't have that set up, but I have a website.

1038
00:59:03,030 --> 00:59:05,770
Okay, well, you got to get the buy button now that I just talked about it.

1039
00:59:06,370 --> 00:59:07,870
Now there's some pressure on you.

1040
00:59:08,090 --> 00:59:08,490
Oh, no.

1041
00:59:08,650 --> 00:59:11,450
Before this is released, the TikTok store is taking over Amazon.

1042
00:59:11,630 --> 00:59:12,670
Haven't you heard, Lewis?

1043
00:59:12,730 --> 00:59:13,370
Come on.

1044
00:59:14,110 --> 00:59:16,730
Okay, so you were in a kindness-based group.

1045
00:59:16,870 --> 00:59:17,890
You accepted everybody else.

1046
00:59:18,070 --> 00:59:18,930
You accepted everybody.

1047
00:59:19,070 --> 00:59:19,810
You were in group.

1048
00:59:20,050 --> 00:59:22,450
You were in the artistic nerve we can fear.

1049
00:59:22,610 --> 00:59:25,350
Was it also like, did you have an art teacher anywhere in high school?

1050
00:59:25,430 --> 00:59:28,530
Was there some sort of art, you know?

1051
00:59:28,920 --> 00:59:34,190
I had one art teacher who tried very hard to keep me in school.

1052
00:59:36,030 --> 00:59:37,930
I got suspended a lot.

1053
00:59:38,730 --> 00:59:40,650
I neared expulsion a few times.

1054
00:59:41,630 --> 00:59:42,050
What for?

1055
00:59:43,530 --> 00:59:45,450
For having a smart mouth, mostly. I did a lot of

1056
00:59:46,070 --> 00:59:48,590
Any examples?

1057
00:59:48,730 --> 00:59:49,230
Any memories?

1058
00:59:50,830 --> 00:59:55,010
And anything you said to a teacher once that you can still recall, or others?

1059
00:59:55,170 --> 01:00:00,390
Well, one thing that got me, one of my suspensions was from wearing my hat in school.

1060
01:00:00,850 --> 01:00:02,410
We weren't allowed to wear hats in school.

1061
01:00:02,410 --> 01:00:03,010
Neither were we.

1062
01:00:04,610 --> 01:00:05,870
That's it, just wore your hat?

1063
01:00:05,950 --> 01:00:07,790
No, it was after school.

1064
01:00:08,150 --> 01:00:14,970
I was walking through the hallways after the bell had gone and was on my way out, and I just had my hat on my head.

1065
01:00:15,190 --> 01:00:16,570
Figured it was after school hours.

1066
01:00:16,950 --> 01:00:18,770
I knew I was riding a line.

1067
01:00:19,110 --> 01:00:20,050
I liked to ride the line.

1068
01:00:20,670 --> 01:00:27,930
And a particular teacher who I didn't get along with very well walked past me and snatched it off my head and said, you can have this on Monday.

1069
01:00:29,130 --> 01:00:30,850
And I didn't like that.

1070
01:00:31,050 --> 01:00:33,810
And so I snuck up behind him and I ripped it out of his hand.

1071
01:00:34,030 --> 01:00:35,050
And I said, fuck you.

1072
01:00:35,230 --> 01:00:36,310
Oh my gosh.

1073
01:00:36,570 --> 01:00:38,990
And I said, I'll see you on Monday.

1074
01:00:39,210 --> 01:00:43,790
And then I went home and I knew I was gonna get suspended.

1075
01:00:44,390 --> 01:00:46,990
To me, it was worth it because I really didn't like this guy.

1076
01:00:48,130 --> 01:00:49,290
And it was a moral thing here.

1077
01:00:50,170 --> 01:00:53,490
I mean, even if you were violating the rules, you shouldn't grab it off your head.

1078
01:00:53,610 --> 01:00:56,170
There's like, you know, that's a- It's a bit over the top.

1079
01:00:56,330 --> 01:01:00,610
Had he approached me in a respectful manner, I would have been in a completely different scenario.

1080
01:01:00,870 --> 01:01:01,150
Wow.

1081
01:01:01,310 --> 01:01:05,350
Yeah, as Omar Little says in The Wire, man's gotta have a code.

1082
01:01:06,030 --> 01:01:07,250
Anything else that you recall?

1083
01:01:07,370 --> 01:01:12,990
Anything else your smart brain can remember that your smart mouth said to get you in trouble back then?

1084
01:01:13,290 --> 01:01:16,950
And any other teachers like, you know, kind of light you up back then?

1085
01:01:17,090 --> 01:01:19,650
Like keep taking us through that time period of your life.

1086
01:01:19,690 --> 01:01:21,010
It sounds pretty formative.

1087
01:01:22,110 --> 01:01:31,190
Well, the same teacher that I took the hat from, Mr. Meisner, if you're out there, I'm sorry I gave you such a hard time.

1088
01:01:31,930 --> 01:01:32,590
That's nice.

1089
01:01:33,310 --> 01:01:34,850
You know, you gotta forgive and forget.

1090
01:01:35,870 --> 01:01:36,950
I hope he hears that.

1091
01:01:37,190 --> 01:01:38,190
I doubt he will.

1092
01:01:38,450 --> 01:01:39,970
Well, you doubt it, but you don't know.

1093
01:01:40,250 --> 01:01:40,930
I don't even know if he's alive.

1094
01:01:40,930 --> 01:01:42,030
You're going Banksy, brother.

1095
01:01:42,790 --> 01:01:48,190
This is like a secret identity performance artist in the city that's moving around and dropping stuff all over the place.

1096
01:01:48,350 --> 01:01:50,390
Like, this is exact Banksy.

1097
01:01:50,390 --> 01:01:52,070
I mean, it was two years before.

1098
01:01:52,790 --> 01:01:53,290
Well, let's hope.

1099
01:01:55,490 --> 01:01:58,770
He was substituting in an art class I was in.

1100
01:02:00,730 --> 01:02:03,110
And I was doing an independent study at the time.

1101
01:02:03,250 --> 01:02:07,910
So I was going into the dark room in the photo lab in my high school.

1102
01:02:08,070 --> 01:02:14,490
We were fortunate enough to have an old school photography studio in the school.

1103
01:02:14,770 --> 01:02:18,430
And I spent a lot of time developing my own photos.

1104
01:02:19,010 --> 01:02:19,110
Yeah.

1105
01:02:19,190 --> 01:02:19,810
Dark room, that's great.

1106
01:02:19,810 --> 01:02:20,630
Yeah, we had one too.

1107
01:02:20,710 --> 01:02:21,110
That's cool.

1108
01:02:21,250 --> 01:02:27,830
Yeah, so we got to take out cameras, take photos, develop the film, enlarge it myself.

1109
01:02:28,530 --> 01:02:34,190
And so I was working on an independent study that was not in the actual classroom I had to leave.

1110
01:02:34,330 --> 01:02:36,450
And so when he said, all right guys, just go about your work.

1111
01:02:36,610 --> 01:02:38,870
I got up to walk to the dark room.

1112
01:02:38,910 --> 01:02:39,630
He said, where are you going?

1113
01:02:39,710 --> 01:02:41,550
And I said, you could do my work.

1114
01:02:41,910 --> 01:02:43,530
And he said, no, you have to do it in the room.

1115
01:02:43,870 --> 01:02:45,830
And I said, well, it's not in the room.

1116
01:02:46,510 --> 01:02:48,030
He's like, well, do something in the room.

1117
01:02:48,030 --> 01:02:50,270
And I was like, but my work is not in the room.

1118
01:02:50,530 --> 01:02:51,750
And it went on like that.

1119
01:02:52,590 --> 01:02:57,350
And then I told him a couple of choice words.

1120
01:02:57,790 --> 01:02:58,650
Motherfuck you.

1121
01:02:59,190 --> 01:03:02,710
Basically, and I just started to walk to the principal's office.

1122
01:03:02,930 --> 01:03:03,750
And then he told me to go. And I said, I'm already going there because I know you're gonna send me

1123
01:03:03,830 --> 01:03:11,390
You rendered his future advice moot by heading there already.

1124
01:03:11,590 --> 01:03:12,650
Yes, I knew where I was heading.

1125
01:03:12,790 --> 01:03:16,290
I knew that as soon as I

1126
01:03:16,290 --> 01:03:18,070
How many suspensions is an expulsion? For us, our high school was three.

1127
01:03:18,210 --> 01:03:19,990
And we knew the kids that had one or two.

1128
01:03:20,470 --> 01:03:21,470
I don't remember.

1129
01:03:21,590 --> 01:03:24,650
It was three strikes, you know, three suspensions, you're out of school.

1130
01:03:25,150 --> 01:03:30,130
Yeah, so Perry Vakulich, great dude.

1131
01:03:31,430 --> 01:03:32,250
I admired him.

1132
01:03:34,550 --> 01:03:36,470
I was getting in a lot of trouble at the time.

1133
01:03:36,810 --> 01:03:48,570
And the principal of the school had asked him to have a sit down meeting with me and try to convince me to rein in my behavior and finish school.

1134
01:03:50,350 --> 01:03:52,290
And so he talked some sense into me.

1135
01:03:53,090 --> 01:03:57,390
And he allowed me to do independent studies.

1136
01:03:58,290 --> 01:04:01,330
And I thought, well, what a nice challenging idea.

1137
01:04:01,430 --> 01:04:03,350
I get to choose what I wanna study.

1138
01:04:03,650 --> 01:04:09,730
I have to write my own curriculum and then study it and report back basically.

1139
01:04:09,970 --> 01:04:12,070
And just be present in school through the day.

1140
01:04:12,070 --> 01:04:13,930
I don't have to be in any particular room.

1141
01:04:14,170 --> 01:04:16,090
I just have to be in the building working.

1142
01:04:17,590 --> 01:04:18,470
That's amazing.

1143
01:04:18,690 --> 01:04:38,930
What an incredible Yoda-like teacher move to recognize a kid's potential for graduating, separate the suspension-laden behaviors of telling the same teacher to fuck off multiple times, and then just cultivating a curriculum for you that could allow you to do both, be independent, be learning, and finish.

1144
01:04:39,250 --> 01:04:39,690
Yes.

1145
01:04:39,830 --> 01:04:41,790
Because you were in danger of not finishing, I'm assuming.

1146
01:04:42,790 --> 01:04:45,590
Constantly getting suspended is not a good sign towards finishing.

1147
01:04:46,310 --> 01:04:46,910
Yeah, absolutely.

1148
01:04:47,350 --> 01:04:49,510
I was very angry at the world then.

1149
01:04:49,870 --> 01:04:50,570
I didn't know why.

1150
01:04:51,830 --> 01:04:52,510
You didn't know why?

1151
01:04:52,930 --> 01:04:54,110
No, not at the time.

1152
01:04:54,290 --> 01:04:58,250
I didn't even realize I was angry necessarily.

1153
01:04:59,290 --> 01:05:03,630
But when I look back and reflect on my behavior, I was an angry young man.

1154
01:05:04,810 --> 01:05:05,610
And you don't know why?

1155
01:05:06,150 --> 01:05:06,850
Do you know why now?

1156
01:05:06,850 --> 01:05:12,530
I think that I was not reaching my potential.

1157
01:05:12,870 --> 01:05:14,250
I was nowhere near reaching my potential.

1158
01:05:15,150 --> 01:05:18,970
Oh, you were angry at how you were showing up in the world.

1159
01:05:19,690 --> 01:05:20,050
I guess.

1160
01:05:20,630 --> 01:05:31,050
I mean, at the time, I knew I had a lot of anger in me and I didn't have many healthy avenues to express it.

1161
01:05:31,250 --> 01:05:39,430
I had a lot of anger in me because I wasn't hitting my potential and nowhere to put it, so then it comes out in sharp, kind of dysfunctional ways.

1162
01:05:40,090 --> 01:05:40,370
Yes.

1163
01:05:40,630 --> 01:05:40,850
Yeah.

1164
01:05:42,650 --> 01:05:47,930
And once I started doing these independent studies, my marks increased dramatically.

1165
01:05:47,930 --> 01:05:51,870
I went from a strong C to honor roll.

1166
01:05:52,170 --> 01:05:52,630
No way.

1167
01:05:52,710 --> 01:05:53,910
And near valedictorian.

1168
01:05:54,350 --> 01:05:54,730
No way!

1169
01:05:55,730 --> 01:05:58,670
I think a high 90 average.

1170
01:06:00,090 --> 01:06:04,630
I was highly engaged and interested because I was choosing what I could study.

1171
01:06:04,630 --> 01:06:15,530
Oh my gosh, from a C student, that means your marks were in the 60s, to a high 90 average, almost valedictorian, meaning it sounds like your school anointed valedictorian based on the highest mark in the school?

1172
01:06:15,610 --> 01:06:16,490
It was something like that, yes.

1173
01:06:16,490 --> 01:06:18,130
Right, not the peer elected thing.

1174
01:06:18,250 --> 01:06:18,450
No.

1175
01:06:18,510 --> 01:06:18,910
Right, right.

1176
01:06:19,270 --> 01:06:23,710
But you were, yeah, okay, so you, wow.

1177
01:06:24,090 --> 01:06:27,550
Because, so how many years did you do the independent study stuff?

1178
01:06:27,610 --> 01:06:28,730
Well, by the end.

1179
01:06:28,730 --> 01:06:29,630
Just one in the last year?

1180
01:06:30,150 --> 01:06:37,590
By the end of high school for me, I had gotten all of the mandatory stuff out of the way.

1181
01:06:38,390 --> 01:06:44,650
All of the English and science and math requirements I had gone through, and I'd just done the minimum.

1182
01:06:44,870 --> 01:06:46,170
How many credits do I need?

1183
01:06:46,310 --> 01:06:47,230
I did the minimum.

1184
01:06:47,310 --> 01:06:47,950
Yes, yes.

1185
01:06:48,030 --> 01:06:48,970
And I was.

1186
01:06:48,970 --> 01:06:55,410
Yeah, you need four credits and four electives, and then this teacher figured out that the whole last phase of your high school career could be all electives, basically.

1187
01:06:55,730 --> 01:06:57,950
Basically, it was all electives or other art programs.

1188
01:06:57,950 --> 01:06:59,950
And you did photography, pretty much, and all this stuff?

1189
01:07:00,070 --> 01:07:03,910
I had gone through all of the photography programs the school offered, like a year ahead.

1190
01:07:04,890 --> 01:07:04,990
Yeah.

1191
01:07:05,590 --> 01:07:10,150
I was doing grade 12 photography and grade 11, and.

1192
01:07:10,590 --> 01:07:11,930
So it was all art stuff, though.

1193
01:07:12,130 --> 01:07:12,750
Pretty much all art credits.

1194
01:07:12,750 --> 01:07:14,990
Any and all art programs, shop.

1195
01:07:16,590 --> 01:07:18,290
There was a drafting class I took.

1196
01:07:18,870 --> 01:07:21,510
I took anything that was like making things.

1197
01:07:21,830 --> 01:07:24,810
Home economics, I learned how to sew, I learned how to cook.

1198
01:07:24,810 --> 01:07:26,370
Oh, home economics, that's a phrase I have not heard in a while.

1199
01:07:26,910 --> 01:07:30,710
When I first had home economics, it was like, yeah, learning how to cook, learning how to sew, learning how to.

1200
01:07:30,850 --> 01:07:31,970
Yeah, I found it very valuable.

1201
01:07:31,970 --> 01:07:33,670
What a terribly insulting name.

1202
01:07:34,190 --> 01:07:34,490
Yes.

1203
01:07:34,690 --> 01:07:35,670
Home economics.

1204
01:07:35,670 --> 01:07:37,890
Yeah, they didn't really teach you any economics.

1205
01:07:37,890 --> 01:07:43,970
Trying to merge the capitalistic economic value with home, but that home is, of course, sewing.

1206
01:07:44,590 --> 01:07:45,250
You know, it's not.

1207
01:07:45,290 --> 01:07:47,150
Yeah, well, I mean, viable skill.

1208
01:07:47,430 --> 01:07:48,170
I mean, it worked, though.

1209
01:07:48,250 --> 01:07:51,390
I mean, Lu Pan, the carpenter's apprentice, is about building and making.

1210
01:07:51,670 --> 01:07:52,650
You're learning about sewing.

1211
01:07:52,990 --> 01:07:55,950
You went from a C student to a high school valedictorian from.

1212
01:07:56,030 --> 01:07:56,630
Well, not high.

1213
01:07:56,790 --> 01:07:59,130
Near, I put the place of nears back in there.

1214
01:07:59,130 --> 01:08:04,370
Thank you for constantly taking my hyperbolic phrases and bringing me back down to earth.

1215
01:08:04,570 --> 01:08:05,590
Yeah, we're going to keep you here on earth.

1216
01:08:05,750 --> 01:08:06,690
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

1217
01:08:07,230 --> 01:08:11,230
And, but it all comes and it's home economics, sewing.

1218
01:08:11,390 --> 01:08:14,410
And like here you are, you know, you're making the duck costume.

1219
01:08:14,550 --> 01:08:20,590
I saw your post on Instagram from the eclipse and like you clearly made like giant duck glasses.

1220
01:08:20,850 --> 01:08:23,790
Like you're doing a lot of home economics today.

1221
01:08:24,290 --> 01:08:25,950
I like to make things, absolutely.

1222
01:08:26,149 --> 01:08:27,029
I always did.

1223
01:08:27,970 --> 01:08:31,930
What other words do you use to apply to your identity?

1224
01:08:32,130 --> 01:08:33,270
We've got interdisciplinary.

1225
01:08:33,630 --> 01:08:34,710
We understand that one.

1226
01:08:34,990 --> 01:08:35,729
We've got psychedelic.

1227
01:08:35,790 --> 01:08:37,410
We do not yet understand that.

1228
01:08:37,490 --> 01:08:41,830
We're going to pause that, but I know you're straight edge on your stomach, but I don't think you're straight edge now.

1229
01:08:42,330 --> 01:08:43,090
No, things have changed.

1230
01:08:43,229 --> 01:08:43,630
Okay, okay.

1231
01:08:43,770 --> 01:08:44,430
So there's psychedelic.

1232
01:08:44,529 --> 01:08:53,649
Then there's folk, which you kind of got a taste of in the vein of sort of a non-professional heart forward type of art.

1233
01:08:54,170 --> 01:08:54,550
Artist.

1234
01:08:55,310 --> 01:08:56,550
We're understanding artists.

1235
01:08:56,550 --> 01:08:59,090
Now we're going to take a break.

1236
01:08:59,930 --> 01:09:03,810
You and I, this is, for those that are listening, you might detect this.

1237
01:09:04,050 --> 01:09:07,270
This is a very challenging environment to do a podcast.

1238
01:09:07,810 --> 01:09:09,149
There are house bears here.

1239
01:09:09,229 --> 01:09:10,170
There are chimneys just above us.

1240
01:09:10,210 --> 01:09:12,149
There's people walking by with boom boxes playing.

1241
01:09:12,370 --> 01:09:13,810
There's bikes flying by.

1242
01:09:13,870 --> 01:09:14,729
There's people looking at us.

1243
01:09:14,790 --> 01:09:16,870
There's people's like, one person was waving at you.

1244
01:09:16,890 --> 01:09:18,330
I think I saw another person waving at you.

1245
01:09:18,390 --> 01:09:21,310
Like, I think that, you know, inside they're kind of saying there's a podcast.

1246
01:09:21,770 --> 01:09:23,229
So this is a very distracting.

1247
01:09:23,310 --> 01:09:24,790
I need like a sensory reset.

1248
01:09:24,970 --> 01:09:26,210
I need to get a glass of water.

1249
01:09:26,210 --> 01:09:27,850
I see the cops coming now down here.

1250
01:09:28,170 --> 01:09:29,510
I need to get a glass of water.

1251
01:09:29,729 --> 01:09:30,790
I need to have a sensory reset.

1252
01:09:30,930 --> 01:09:33,290
And then we're going to keep going with Lewis Mallard.

1253
01:09:33,450 --> 01:09:35,069
Two more formative books.

1254
01:09:35,170 --> 01:09:36,950
I'm having a wonderful time with this conversation.

1255
01:09:37,250 --> 01:09:41,050
I'm really, really deeply grateful for your heart and for your love, for the artistry you're doing.

1256
01:09:41,270 --> 01:09:43,130
And thanks so much for doing this show with us.

1257
01:09:43,490 --> 01:09:44,350
Thanks, handsome.

1258
01:09:46,170 --> 01:09:47,290
Okay, be back in a bit.

1259
01:09:49,729 --> 01:09:50,790
It's called 3 Books.

1260
01:09:51,290 --> 01:09:52,229
Yeah, 3 Books.

1261
01:09:52,290 --> 01:09:53,490
The number three in the word books.

1262
01:09:53,590 --> 01:09:54,270
And your name is Noah?

1263
01:09:54,270 --> 01:09:54,710
Yeah.

1264
01:09:55,030 --> 01:09:59,290
And you're in like a jean shirt and a white t-shirt and a black jeans.

1265
01:09:59,350 --> 01:10:01,030
And you're a reader because you got a book beside you.

1266
01:10:01,070 --> 01:10:01,790
What book is that?

1267
01:10:03,090 --> 01:10:04,250
The Hidden Life of Trees.

1268
01:10:04,570 --> 01:10:05,150
Oh, nice.

1269
01:10:05,270 --> 01:10:06,190
How'd you hear about that?

1270
01:10:06,690 --> 01:10:08,130
I borrowed it from a friend this morning.

1271
01:10:08,610 --> 01:10:09,790
Oh, you borrowed it from a friend this morning.

1272
01:10:09,930 --> 01:10:11,270
And that's what we were just talking about.

1273
01:10:11,330 --> 01:10:13,430
That when you borrow books, you fucking can't calculate.

1274
01:10:14,070 --> 01:10:18,590
Because I asked both of you in the break, how many people do you think are readers?

1275
01:10:18,710 --> 01:10:20,470
And I was thinking in my head, five or 10%.

1276
01:10:20,470 --> 01:10:22,850
And you guys were saying more like 50, 60, 70%.

1277
01:10:23,790 --> 01:10:29,790
Because it's more of a community that doesn't fully participate in the capitalist system with libraries and borrowing.

1278
01:10:30,110 --> 01:10:31,170
Is that what you were saying, Noah?

1279
01:10:31,350 --> 01:10:32,350
Am I putting words in your mouth?

1280
01:10:33,290 --> 01:10:33,790
No, that's right.

1281
01:10:34,730 --> 01:10:35,030
Okay.

1282
01:10:35,210 --> 01:10:36,270
Yeah, that's how it went.

1283
01:10:36,570 --> 01:10:37,190
That's how it went.

1284
01:10:37,290 --> 01:10:37,850
Okay, okay.

1285
01:10:38,330 --> 01:10:39,290
All right, we're gonna come back.

1286
01:10:39,570 --> 01:10:40,730
What's the scene look like now?

1287
01:10:40,770 --> 01:10:42,390
It's getting a lot hotter, I'll tell you that.

1288
01:10:42,470 --> 01:10:43,150
The sun is brighter.

1289
01:10:43,150 --> 01:10:44,610
I feel like I wanna put sunblock on my face.

1290
01:10:45,550 --> 01:10:49,150
I'm sweating in my shirt, but you can't take a shirt off and just sit on a bench with a microphone.

1291
01:10:49,470 --> 01:10:50,090
No, you can.

1292
01:10:50,190 --> 01:10:51,710
You would just get looked at a little funnier.

1293
01:10:53,430 --> 01:10:54,410
It's hot though.

1294
01:10:54,650 --> 01:10:55,290
It's getting warm.

1295
01:10:55,410 --> 01:10:58,490
And what's your observation of the College and Bathurst intersection now?

1296
01:10:58,670 --> 01:11:01,370
I say, we're now in like a hot mid morning.

1297
01:11:01,710 --> 01:11:02,590
We're recording in June.

1298
01:11:02,710 --> 01:11:05,010
It'll probably come out in the summer.

1299
01:11:05,530 --> 01:11:06,750
In July or August sometime.

1300
01:11:07,530 --> 01:11:09,550
The scene, it's not that much different.

1301
01:11:09,750 --> 01:11:12,210
Just a little, it turned up a little bit in the heat.

1302
01:11:12,290 --> 01:11:13,230
What's going past us?

1303
01:11:13,990 --> 01:11:16,510
Random cars, white vans, white trucks.

1304
01:11:16,810 --> 01:11:18,090
A lot of white vehicles right now.

1305
01:11:18,550 --> 01:11:19,550
Toronto called 311.

1306
01:11:19,970 --> 01:11:21,690
A lot of four by fours.

1307
01:11:21,690 --> 01:11:28,930
Four by four trucks with like people on their phone and guys sitting in the back, like cleaning park bathrooms and like shoveling.

1308
01:11:28,970 --> 01:11:31,790
I saw them shoveling leaves off the corner of the sewers.

1309
01:11:32,390 --> 01:11:35,310
And I talked to the guys and they said, we're the snowplow group.

1310
01:11:35,850 --> 01:11:38,110
We've just been doing this all winter because there was no snow.

1311
01:11:38,830 --> 01:11:41,490
Cleaning, getting drainage.

1312
01:11:41,990 --> 01:11:43,530
We need better drainage on these streets.

1313
01:11:44,310 --> 01:11:45,870
Well, how would you describe the city of Toronto?

1314
01:11:45,990 --> 01:11:54,750
It doesn't seem like you grew up here and the city of Toronto in 2024 is a pulsing, vibrating, like, you know, it's a city on the world stage.

1315
01:11:54,830 --> 01:11:57,130
How would you describe this city?

1316
01:12:01,990 --> 01:12:03,370
A little bit of everything.

1317
01:12:07,440 --> 01:12:09,540
He needs a little more than a little bit of everything.

1318
01:12:11,660 --> 01:12:12,580
It's a...

1319
01:12:13,180 --> 01:12:14,280
What's working, what's not.

1320
01:12:14,840 --> 01:12:16,100
What's good, what's bad.

1321
01:12:17,000 --> 01:12:18,200
You're leaving, I heard.

1322
01:12:18,200 --> 01:12:19,040
I'm moving.

1323
01:12:19,400 --> 01:12:22,920
You're posting on your Lewis Mallard Instagram feed that you're moving to Montreal.

1324
01:12:23,500 --> 01:12:23,600
Oui.

1325
01:12:26,580 --> 01:12:30,880
We as in you and your opera singer partner or oui as in O-U-I?

1326
01:12:31,140 --> 01:12:31,780
Yeah, both forms.

1327
01:12:32,260 --> 01:12:34,660
Yeah, that was a double entendre.

1328
01:12:34,800 --> 01:12:35,380
Oh, nice.

1329
01:12:35,420 --> 01:12:36,580
That could be the word of the chapter.

1330
01:12:36,780 --> 01:12:41,120
At the end of every chapter, we have a word that was said that we go into the etymology of.

1331
01:12:41,160 --> 01:12:41,780
That could be it.

1332
01:12:41,800 --> 01:12:42,840
Double entendre.

1333
01:12:45,040 --> 01:12:49,680
Toronto, I moved back here after being away for about five and a half years.

1334
01:12:50,580 --> 01:12:52,940
And it's not the city I left.

1335
01:12:53,000 --> 01:12:53,920
It's not the same city.

1336
01:12:54,180 --> 01:12:55,760
It's changing rapidly.

1337
01:12:57,480 --> 01:13:01,120
I don't recognize it the same way.

1338
01:13:02,300 --> 01:13:04,160
Many landmarks are being torn down.

1339
01:13:04,480 --> 01:13:07,220
Many new buildings are being put up in place of them.

1340
01:13:10,880 --> 01:13:12,080
I'm a cyclist.

1341
01:13:12,580 --> 01:13:24,000
The cycling infrastructure is growing, I guess, reasonably quickly, but it's kind of slapdash, bandaid, not really well thought out.

1342
01:13:24,600 --> 01:13:28,620
And the amount of people riding bikes in the city is exploding.

1343
01:13:29,660 --> 01:13:37,440
And it is absolute chaos on these streets as a cyclist now, where before the chaos was other cars.

1344
01:13:38,120 --> 01:13:41,720
And now I find the chaos is an inexperienced cyclist.

1345
01:13:42,520 --> 01:13:43,660
Mm-hmm, that would be me.

1346
01:13:44,180 --> 01:13:45,580
I'm on these bike lanes.

1347
01:13:45,700 --> 01:13:46,540
I'm inexperienced.

1348
01:13:46,860 --> 01:13:48,400
I get dinged at all the time.

1349
01:13:48,720 --> 01:13:50,700
Not honked at, dinged at.

1350
01:13:50,740 --> 01:13:55,520
It's a much less abrasive form of vehicular communication.

1351
01:13:57,000 --> 01:13:58,420
The bicycle bell.

1352
01:13:58,820 --> 01:14:01,740
No one's figured out how to put these big honking horns on bikes yet.

1353
01:14:01,980 --> 01:14:02,480
Eh, eh.

1354
01:14:02,780 --> 01:14:03,380
There are, yeah.

1355
01:14:03,520 --> 01:14:09,080
There's the few people who will do the air powered horn, the obnoxiously loud.

1356
01:14:09,720 --> 01:14:14,100
They also bang, it should be said that Toronto cyclists bang on cars a lot.

1357
01:14:14,280 --> 01:14:15,680
I've witnessed it a lot.

1358
01:14:15,760 --> 01:14:16,880
Like they yell at drivers.

1359
01:14:17,040 --> 01:14:19,600
They pound their fists on hoods and things.

1360
01:14:19,740 --> 01:14:20,940
And they're usually right.

1361
01:14:21,020 --> 01:14:22,640
It's because someone's parking in the bike lane.

1362
01:14:22,760 --> 01:14:24,460
It's because someone's turning without seeing the bikes coming.

1363
01:14:24,820 --> 01:14:27,600
They're usually right, but they do so very aggressively.

1364
01:14:27,820 --> 01:14:29,060
Am I right about this?

1365
01:14:29,500 --> 01:14:31,080
I've seen it, unfortunately.

1366
01:14:31,080 --> 01:14:32,880
I have also participated in it.

1367
01:14:32,880 --> 01:14:36,960
I really try not to do that as hard as I can now.

1368
01:14:37,560 --> 01:14:41,820
I've tried to change that behavior and just move on with my day.

1369
01:14:41,840 --> 01:14:46,760
There's a bit of 18 year old Lewis, fuck you teacher still left in there in his early 40s.

1370
01:14:48,660 --> 01:14:55,700
I think drivers who are not necessarily cyclists don't realize how threatening a car can be.

1371
01:14:56,540 --> 01:14:57,700
Completely dangerous.

1372
01:14:58,080 --> 01:15:04,620
And when they do things to purposefully put you in danger, it's extremely frustrating.

1373
01:15:04,960 --> 01:15:05,400
Purposefully?

1374
01:15:05,920 --> 01:15:06,120
Yeah.

1375
01:15:06,140 --> 01:15:10,460
How are you going to evaluate intent when someone parking in the bike lane or turning in the corner by accident?

1376
01:15:10,640 --> 01:15:11,880
Well, that's not what I'm talking about.

1377
01:15:11,880 --> 01:15:12,560
That's what you're talking about.

1378
01:15:12,580 --> 01:15:13,280
What are you talking about?

1379
01:15:13,680 --> 01:15:18,000
When people will swerve to threaten you with their car.

1380
01:15:18,340 --> 01:15:18,660
Oh.

1381
01:15:18,820 --> 01:15:20,960
Will purposefully cut you off.

1382
01:15:21,220 --> 01:15:21,680
Oh, really?

1383
01:15:21,820 --> 01:15:23,540
To brake check you.

1384
01:15:24,320 --> 01:15:25,340
Brake check you?

1385
01:15:25,520 --> 01:15:25,920
Absolutely.

1386
01:15:26,240 --> 01:15:27,340
What does brake check you mean?

1387
01:15:27,520 --> 01:15:33,100
Like when you're following behind them and they will...

1388
01:15:33,100 --> 01:15:34,240
In a lane, not a bike lane.

1389
01:15:34,320 --> 01:15:34,420
Yes.

1390
01:15:34,420 --> 01:15:35,140
In a car lane.

1391
01:15:35,160 --> 01:15:35,420
Yes.

1392
01:15:35,540 --> 01:15:36,560
But it's not a car lane.

1393
01:15:36,680 --> 01:15:37,460
It's a shared lane.

1394
01:15:37,700 --> 01:15:37,920
Yeah.

1395
01:15:38,280 --> 01:15:39,620
But people think it's a car lane.

1396
01:15:39,940 --> 01:15:41,120
One subtle one.

1397
01:15:41,560 --> 01:15:44,840
They'll brake you because they think that you aren't going to brake and then you'll pound the back of their car.

1398
01:15:46,260 --> 01:15:46,620
Well...

1399
01:15:46,620 --> 01:15:48,880
That's what they want to have happen is what you're saying.

1400
01:15:48,940 --> 01:15:50,080
I don't think they're thinking clearly.

1401
01:15:50,280 --> 01:15:51,100
So I don't know.

1402
01:15:51,220 --> 01:15:51,400
Right.

1403
01:15:51,420 --> 01:15:52,120
I don't really know what they want.

1404
01:15:52,240 --> 01:15:52,420
Right.

1405
01:15:52,500 --> 01:15:53,480
They brake check you though.

1406
01:15:53,580 --> 01:15:55,300
And now I understand what brake check you means.

1407
01:15:56,240 --> 01:16:02,700
And another one that I've had many times is people spray you with their windshield washer fluid.

1408
01:16:02,920 --> 01:16:03,720
No way.

1409
01:16:04,160 --> 01:16:04,420
Yeah.

1410
01:16:04,680 --> 01:16:06,340
They spray you with their...

1411
01:16:06,340 --> 01:16:10,460
Because they know that the windshield washer fluid on any car splashes the everywhere.

1412
01:16:11,640 --> 01:16:13,480
And so they do it as you're passing.

1413
01:16:13,920 --> 01:16:14,320
Really?

1414
01:16:14,480 --> 01:16:15,300
Just when you're passing?

1415
01:16:15,480 --> 01:16:15,700
Yeah.

1416
01:16:16,020 --> 01:16:17,180
I've had that many times.

1417
01:16:17,360 --> 01:16:17,800
So what is...

1418
01:16:17,800 --> 01:16:18,460
I'm sorry to ask.

1419
01:16:18,540 --> 01:16:20,840
What is it about you that's drawing all this ire?

1420
01:16:21,080 --> 01:16:21,720
I don't think it's me.

1421
01:16:21,800 --> 01:16:22,640
I think a lot of cyclists deal with these things.

1422
01:16:22,640 --> 01:16:24,140
It's just the frequency on the roads.

1423
01:16:24,240 --> 01:16:24,760
You're like...

1424
01:16:24,760 --> 01:16:26,060
I'm like an everyday...

1425
01:16:26,060 --> 01:16:28,120
I'm like a drop my kids off at school kind of cyclist.

1426
01:16:28,120 --> 01:16:30,000
You're like a bike around town.

1427
01:16:30,100 --> 01:16:30,820
You don't have a car.

1428
01:16:31,080 --> 01:16:31,620
I don't have a car.

1429
01:16:31,680 --> 01:16:33,940
So you're using your bike in the winter.

1430
01:16:34,080 --> 01:16:35,060
All seasons.

1431
01:16:35,400 --> 01:16:35,800
Right, all seasons.

1432
01:16:35,800 --> 01:16:39,040
And I also use it for commuting, for recreation.

1433
01:16:39,060 --> 01:16:42,280
It should be said that the winter in Toronto, the streets can be quite snowy, slushy.

1434
01:16:42,340 --> 01:16:43,000
You're on your bike.

1435
01:16:43,280 --> 01:16:43,560
Yes.

1436
01:16:43,820 --> 01:16:45,360
You're biking through, you're on the lanes.

1437
01:16:45,880 --> 01:16:46,820
You're getting brake checked.

1438
01:16:46,940 --> 01:16:48,700
You're getting washer fluid in your eyes.

1439
01:16:49,100 --> 01:16:50,140
You pound on cars.

1440
01:16:50,200 --> 01:16:51,360
You try not to do that.

1441
01:16:51,760 --> 01:16:52,640
I try not to...

1442
01:16:52,640 --> 01:16:53,480
But you'll engage...

1443
01:16:53,480 --> 01:16:53,960
Carry the...

1444
01:16:53,960 --> 01:16:55,460
I used to when I was younger.

1445
01:16:55,560 --> 01:16:59,360
What's the highest amount of road rage you've been involved in?

1446
01:17:02,440 --> 01:17:06,180
I should also say I've pounded on a few cars myself.

1447
01:17:06,920 --> 01:17:09,040
I have done that because sometimes you're right.

1448
01:17:09,100 --> 01:17:11,220
When you're on a bike, it's like, what is this guy doing?

1449
01:17:11,240 --> 01:17:12,160
He's trying to kill me.

1450
01:17:12,960 --> 01:17:13,060
Yeah.

1451
01:17:13,140 --> 01:17:13,500
I do.

1452
01:17:13,600 --> 01:17:14,300
I have felt that.

1453
01:17:14,440 --> 01:17:17,420
But as soon as I've pounded on a car, I've only done a couple of times, I run away.

1454
01:17:17,500 --> 01:17:17,980
I bolt away.

1455
01:17:18,060 --> 01:17:21,400
I'm like, I'm immediately regretful and fearful of what I've just done.

1456
01:17:22,080 --> 01:17:24,500
I won't stand there and get into an actual fight.

1457
01:17:24,560 --> 01:17:25,640
I'll take off.

1458
01:17:26,120 --> 01:17:27,980
Because I'm like a real...

1459
01:17:27,980 --> 01:17:29,420
I can't believe I just did that.

1460
01:17:29,700 --> 01:17:30,540
It's out of character.

1461
01:17:30,800 --> 01:17:31,000
Yeah.

1462
01:17:31,280 --> 01:17:32,380
I think, but I guess not.

1463
01:17:33,460 --> 01:17:49,840
Well, people get so irrationally angry in these road rage scenarios that I almost find it interesting to see somebody go from zero to a hundred in the anger scale over something so small.

1464
01:17:50,740 --> 01:17:57,280
And we know this because George Carlin said, everyone driving faster than you is a maniac and everyone driving slower than you is an idiot.

1465
01:17:57,840 --> 01:17:59,340
Everyone relates to this.

1466
01:18:01,920 --> 01:18:12,060
And how willing somebody who's in this state of mind is to seemingly throw away their whole life because they're angry.

1467
01:18:12,200 --> 01:18:13,500
They're so angry about this one thing.

1468
01:18:13,700 --> 01:18:25,440
And I recognize this behavior in people now where before I would try to, I would almost match their anger and things would come to, not come to blows, but come close to blows.

1469
01:18:26,200 --> 01:18:35,000
And in the most recent time that I was involved in a road range scenario, there was a driver who was threatening me with his vehicle.

1470
01:18:35,220 --> 01:18:38,360
He was charging me and then stopping before he would hit me.

1471
01:18:38,460 --> 01:18:43,460
He was swerving, cutting me off, not letting me pass.

1472
01:18:43,660 --> 01:18:49,580
I went away that he couldn't go up a one-way street with heavy traffic and I knew he couldn't follow me in his car.

1473
01:18:49,820 --> 01:18:49,940
Why?

1474
01:18:50,020 --> 01:18:51,840
So you ended up walking away from the fight?

1475
01:18:51,840 --> 01:18:52,920
I walked away from it.

1476
01:18:52,920 --> 01:18:54,420
You could have been in a physical fight with him.

1477
01:18:54,420 --> 01:18:55,080
Oh, absolutely.

1478
01:18:55,740 --> 01:19:00,400
It would have turned to blows without a doubt if I had gotten off my bike. And I was interested-

1479
01:19:01,080 --> 01:19:03,900
And nobody else was around.

1480
01:19:04,160 --> 01:19:05,160
No, I-I landed into an alleyway.

1481
01:19:05,160 --> 01:19:06,040
How long ago was this?

1482
01:19:06,380 --> 01:19:07,160
This was last summer.

1483
01:19:07,540 --> 01:19:08,600
Okay, this is pretty recent.

1484
01:19:09,100 --> 01:19:14,320
What have you learned over time that can help the novice rider navigate road rage better?

1485
01:19:14,840 --> 01:19:15,120
Oh.

1486
01:19:16,260 --> 01:19:17,080
Just drive it away?

1487
01:19:17,380 --> 01:19:20,100
Just get to the finish of whatever that story ended faster?

1488
01:19:20,220 --> 01:19:20,880
I think it's better

1489
01:19:20,880 --> 01:19:22,700
Don't engage.

1490
01:19:22,960 --> 01:19:23,900
It's better to walk away?

1491
01:19:24,060 --> 01:19:24,460
It's better to walk away.

1492
01:19:24,460 --> 01:19:27,120
If you did something wrong, apologize and move on.

1493
01:19:27,320 --> 01:19:28,000
Oh, apologize?

1494
01:19:28,320 --> 01:19:31,520
I think if you actually are

1495
01:19:31,600 --> 01:19:32,000
I always put my palm up. You know what I mean?

1496
01:19:32,040 --> 01:19:33,940
When I do something wrong on the road, I put my palm up.

1497
01:19:34,000 --> 01:19:35,300
I'm like, that was me.

1498
01:19:35,520 --> 01:19:36,540
Like, am I bad?

1499
01:19:36,960 --> 01:19:37,120
Yeah.

1500
01:19:37,200 --> 01:19:37,920
I do that a lot.

1501
01:19:38,200 --> 01:19:40,100
My palm is often up while I'm driving.

1502
01:19:40,600 --> 01:19:42,200
I think apologies go a long way.

1503
01:19:42,540 --> 01:19:43,260
Apologies, yeah.

1504
01:19:44,580 --> 01:19:47,080
But for me, I really try to let it go.

1505
01:19:47,080 --> 01:19:58,860
I feel like I have the power to absorb that anger that somebody else is giving out and let it go and so that it doesn't have to carry on through that branch that was just kind of created.

1506
01:19:59,320 --> 01:19:59,720
Wow.

1507
01:20:00,440 --> 01:20:01,980
Tributary or whatever you want to call it.

1508
01:20:02,080 --> 01:20:02,880
Oh, tributary.

1509
01:20:03,280 --> 01:20:03,580
Of anger.

1510
01:20:03,780 --> 01:20:05,060
Oh, we got to mark that one.

1511
01:20:05,160 --> 01:20:06,980
That's a potential word of the podcast too.

1512
01:20:08,420 --> 01:20:14,320
Tributary and double entendre popping out so far early in the conversation.

1513
01:20:14,440 --> 01:20:15,100
Now, here's the thing.

1514
01:20:15,520 --> 01:20:17,420
You were in your early 40s.

1515
01:20:17,740 --> 01:20:17,840
Mid.

1516
01:20:18,680 --> 01:20:19,300
Mid, okay.

1517
01:20:19,360 --> 01:20:19,860
Okay, good, yeah.

1518
01:20:19,900 --> 01:20:22,520
Because we never quite got the clarity on the blurry 70s.

1519
01:20:23,660 --> 01:20:25,940
But I'm September 17th, 1979.

1520
01:20:26,420 --> 01:20:28,780
So I would agree with the 70s being blurry.

1521
01:20:30,100 --> 01:20:33,320
You probably played that game I did of like, I've been around for six decades.

1522
01:20:33,620 --> 01:20:34,240
I'm 41.

1523
01:20:34,660 --> 01:20:35,420
Anyway, maybe not.

1524
01:20:37,700 --> 01:20:41,480
So we got kind of a book of your childhood, Lupin and the Carpenter's Apprentice.

1525
01:20:41,500 --> 01:20:42,360
I talked to you in advance.

1526
01:20:42,420 --> 01:20:47,220
So I know that we also have a book kind of of your 20s and I know we have a book kind of of your 30s.

1527
01:20:47,300 --> 01:20:57,580
I think what I'll do now is I'll introduce the book kind of of your 20s and we'll steer the conversation kind of towards that kind of post high school, pre-Lewis part of your life.

1528
01:20:57,980 --> 01:21:02,920
And then we'll talk about the book of your 30s after that.

1529
01:21:03,000 --> 01:21:04,560
Does that sound like a good structure?

1530
01:21:05,600 --> 01:21:06,080
That is.

1531
01:21:06,080 --> 01:21:07,380
You can feel free to, you know.

1532
01:21:07,500 --> 01:21:08,340
That is the structure.

1533
01:21:08,340 --> 01:21:09,660
Chiropractically adjust the structure.

1534
01:21:10,160 --> 01:21:13,620
Okay, the book of your 20s is, oh yeah, here it comes people.

1535
01:21:13,620 --> 01:21:19,740
I'm excited for this because, you know, we're in the, we're getting into the 500s now.

1536
01:21:19,840 --> 01:21:23,000
Like we've counted down over 400 books on the show.

1537
01:21:23,400 --> 01:21:30,960
So it's exciting to me that we're getting into the one and the only Moby Dick.

1538
01:21:31,260 --> 01:21:31,980
Oh yes.

1539
01:21:32,260 --> 01:21:35,740
By Herman Melville, M-E-L-V-I-L-L-E.

1540
01:21:35,840 --> 01:21:43,260
Originally published in October 18th, 1851 by Richard Bentley in the UK and a U.S., Harper and Brothers.

1541
01:21:44,160 --> 01:21:46,320
And I love the old publisher names.

1542
01:21:46,420 --> 01:21:51,780
Harper and Brothers, not Harper Collins, in the U.S. This is, everyone's got different covers for this.

1543
01:21:51,860 --> 01:21:52,980
The paperback I have.

1544
01:21:53,400 --> 01:21:54,040
It's a nice cover.

1545
01:21:54,180 --> 01:21:54,860
You like that one?

1546
01:21:54,960 --> 01:21:59,280
It's got like this gigantic white, almost like lino block kind of whale.

1547
01:21:59,400 --> 01:22:01,160
Yeah, it looks like an etching maybe.

1548
01:22:02,000 --> 01:22:02,680
It's tough to say.

1549
01:22:02,880 --> 01:22:04,400
Yeah, that's yours.

1550
01:22:04,680 --> 01:22:05,480
By the way, you want that?

1551
01:22:05,540 --> 01:22:05,920
That's yours.

1552
01:22:06,760 --> 01:22:07,120
Okay.

1553
01:22:07,340 --> 01:22:08,180
Okay, that's yours.

1554
01:22:08,180 --> 01:22:12,220
That's your signifying commemorative copy of the conversation.

1555
01:22:12,440 --> 01:22:13,300
You got it right in it though.

1556
01:22:13,460 --> 01:22:14,420
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

1557
01:22:14,460 --> 01:22:16,100
I'll sign Herman Melville's name in there.

1558
01:22:16,340 --> 01:22:16,460
Yeah.

1559
01:22:17,680 --> 01:22:24,840
So mine is like a kind of a white, gigantic, it's almost like a scary looking whale, but it's only like from the tip of its nose.

1560
01:22:25,060 --> 01:22:27,280
I'm sure it's not called a nose, to like just past its eye.

1561
01:22:27,420 --> 01:22:29,620
That's the most recognizable part of a sperm whale.

1562
01:22:29,840 --> 01:22:30,180
Yes.

1563
01:22:30,260 --> 01:22:30,780
Oh, sperm whale.

1564
01:22:30,860 --> 01:22:31,860
Thank you for specific.

1565
01:22:32,180 --> 01:22:40,920
And then it's an all caps kind of impact font, wide kerning Moby Dick with Herman Melville in an embossed all caps serif font.

1566
01:22:40,980 --> 01:22:41,760
That's debossed.

1567
01:22:41,820 --> 01:22:42,540
Oh, debossed.

1568
01:22:42,540 --> 01:22:43,200
Or wait, which one?

1569
01:22:43,360 --> 01:22:44,520
This is in, not out.

1570
01:22:44,640 --> 01:22:46,120
Oh yeah, I think that is debossed.

1571
01:22:46,400 --> 01:22:48,200
Embossed means pop, popping out.

1572
01:22:48,360 --> 01:22:49,360
And then you're debossed.

1573
01:22:49,460 --> 01:22:50,080
Oh, that is interesting.

1574
01:22:50,240 --> 01:22:51,420
So it's a debossed cover.

1575
01:22:52,000 --> 01:22:54,660
Well, that seems like a competitor for the word of the chapter.

1576
01:22:55,380 --> 01:22:57,140
Herman Melville was a New Yorker.

1577
01:22:57,220 --> 01:22:57,900
I didn't realize this.

1578
01:22:57,940 --> 01:23:01,740
He's a New Yorker who lived from, listen to the years, 1819 to 1891.

1579
01:23:02,580 --> 01:23:05,160
Imagine that, 1819 to 1891.

1580
01:23:05,300 --> 01:23:07,280
Flip the numbers around and that's how long I'll be here.

1581
01:23:07,280 --> 01:23:11,920
He's an American novelist, short story writer, and poet of the American Renaissance.

1582
01:23:12,440 --> 01:23:17,400
Came from a distinguished family, but after his father's death in 1832, his family was in poverty.

1583
01:23:17,880 --> 01:23:20,320
From the age of 12, Melville worked just a number of jobs.

1584
01:23:20,640 --> 01:23:22,420
It's gonna think I sound like a bit like your 20s.

1585
01:23:22,780 --> 01:23:24,500
Bank clerk, farmer, teacher.

1586
01:23:24,660 --> 01:23:29,740
In the summer of 1839, he joined the crew of a merchant ship that sailed to England.

1587
01:23:29,960 --> 01:23:30,560
Think about this.

1588
01:23:30,640 --> 01:23:34,700
Less than 200 years ago, Lewis, joining a merchant ship to sail to England.

1589
01:23:35,000 --> 01:23:37,940
When he returned, he tried several jobs, but none lasted for long.

1590
01:23:38,280 --> 01:23:42,020
He then signed on to a whaling ship that set sail.

1591
01:23:42,480 --> 01:23:44,840
There goes a mad vac beside us, sucking garbage off the trail.

1592
01:23:45,660 --> 01:23:46,240
Melville, oh yeah.

1593
01:23:46,500 --> 01:23:49,020
A whaling ship that set sail on January 3rd, 1841.

1594
01:23:49,200 --> 01:23:52,700
He then spent the next two years having adventures in the South Pacific.

1595
01:23:53,480 --> 01:23:55,840
Nowhere close to New York or England.

1596
01:23:56,620 --> 01:24:00,040
And by the way, Moby Dick, this book, which we're gonna get into, was a flop.

1597
01:24:00,160 --> 01:24:05,960
Only 3,715 copies precisely were sold during Melville's lifetime.

1598
01:24:05,960 --> 01:24:12,780
Critics and readers didn't know what to take of the popular adventure novelist's turn towards dark, complex, psychological explorations.

1599
01:24:13,220 --> 01:24:16,760
The total amount he earned from Moby Dick was $556.

1600
01:24:17,300 --> 01:24:19,540
Jesus, adjusted for inflation it's still bullshit.

1601
01:24:19,640 --> 01:24:29,620
Essentially, the book more or less torpedoed his existing popularity, and the writer returned to New York and became a customs inspector in 1863.

1602
01:24:30,120 --> 01:24:30,880
That's unfortunate, Herman.

1603
01:24:30,900 --> 01:24:32,720
Moby Dick torpedoed his career.

1604
01:24:32,860 --> 01:24:35,000
What is this torpedoing book about?

1605
01:24:35,000 --> 01:24:47,580
The sailor Ishmael's narrative of the maniacal quest of Ahab, captain of the whaling ship Pequod, P-Q-O-D, for vengeance against Moby Dick, the giant white sperm whale that bit off his leg on the ship's previous voyage.

1606
01:24:48,120 --> 01:24:58,040
Moby Dick is the story of an eerily compelling madman pursuing an unholy war against a creature as vast and dangerous and unknowable as the sea itself.

1607
01:24:58,500 --> 01:25:11,860
But more than just a novel of adventure, more than an encyclopedia of whaling lore and legend, the book can be seen as part of its author's lifelong meditation on America, written with wonderful, redemptive humor.

1608
01:25:12,340 --> 01:25:17,700
It's also a profound inquiry into character, faith, and the nature of perception.

1609
01:25:18,160 --> 01:25:18,440
Wow!

1610
01:25:19,440 --> 01:25:23,840
File this one to 813.3 for literature slash middle 19th century literature.

1611
01:25:24,040 --> 01:25:26,180
Not much goes in that slot that I know of.

1612
01:25:26,560 --> 01:25:34,160
Lewis, please tell us about your relationship with Moby Dick by Herman Melville.

1613
01:25:36,880 --> 01:25:43,140
You know, this is a book that I'd heard of growing up through school.

1614
01:25:43,300 --> 01:25:44,420
We didn't read it in high school.

1615
01:25:45,040 --> 01:25:49,600
I think it was a little, probably a little too heavy for that time in my life.

1616
01:25:49,680 --> 01:25:52,520
And it was, I kind of thought of it as like a challenge.

1617
01:25:52,640 --> 01:25:59,040
Like, oh, one day I would like to read that book, consume that book.

1618
01:25:59,680 --> 01:26:05,860
And I never, I was never much of a reader.

1619
01:26:06,020 --> 01:26:12,680
I had a difficult relationship with reading through school.

1620
01:26:13,080 --> 01:26:19,720
You know, I was in, what do you call it nowadays?

1621
01:26:19,980 --> 01:26:21,760
I was in like the remedial class.

1622
01:26:22,380 --> 01:26:24,820
You were in like a, well, special education.

1623
01:26:24,820 --> 01:26:31,640
Yeah, I got put into the slow kid class for some of this stuff.

1624
01:26:32,360 --> 01:26:38,860
And I had tutors to help me with reading and writing as a kid.

1625
01:26:38,960 --> 01:26:50,080
So it was always kind of a sore spot, especially since my father was such a voracious reader and my sister was the scholastically smart one.

1626
01:26:52,920 --> 01:26:56,040
And so I kind of felt bashful about...

1627
01:26:56,940 --> 01:27:00,960
Sorry to ask, but how does somebody with that background then wanna read Moby Dick?

1628
01:27:01,520 --> 01:27:03,640
The most challenging novel of all time.

1629
01:27:03,660 --> 01:27:04,460
I like a challenge.

1630
01:27:05,060 --> 01:27:05,460
Wow.

1631
01:27:05,640 --> 01:27:08,420
So with that background, it made you attracted to it.

1632
01:27:08,540 --> 01:27:09,800
How did you come across Moby Dick?

1633
01:27:09,880 --> 01:27:12,100
How did it enter your brain view?

1634
01:27:12,220 --> 01:27:13,320
How did you even know it was a book?

1635
01:27:14,140 --> 01:27:15,760
Well, I don't remember.

1636
01:27:15,960 --> 01:27:17,580
Noah's standing up, Noah's taking off.

1637
01:27:17,620 --> 01:27:18,760
He's got the secret life of trees.

1638
01:27:18,880 --> 01:27:19,440
Enjoy the book.

1639
01:27:19,440 --> 01:27:20,120
Goodbye, Noah.

1640
01:27:20,200 --> 01:27:20,940
Great chatting with you.

1641
01:27:23,440 --> 01:27:26,180
I don't remember how exactly it came on my radar.

1642
01:27:26,660 --> 01:27:27,180
After high school?

1643
01:27:27,680 --> 01:27:28,620
Sometime after high school.

1644
01:27:28,700 --> 01:27:30,040
I'm sure I heard of it in high school. And I knew it was-

1645
01:27:32,080 --> 01:27:34,080
Can I ask what you did after high school?

1646
01:27:34,720 --> 01:27:35,640
I went to college.

1647
01:27:36,100 --> 01:27:36,760
You took art?

1648
01:27:37,040 --> 01:27:37,300
Yeah.

1649
01:27:37,440 --> 01:27:38,240
You took illustration?

1650
01:27:38,460 --> 01:27:38,760
I did.

1651
01:27:38,920 --> 01:27:42,280
You were trying to find the program that-

1652
01:27:42,720 --> 01:27:43,100
I went to Sheridan College.

1653
01:27:43,340 --> 01:27:47,500
Okay. So someone that wanted to figure out your identity could start tracing these trails.

1654
01:27:47,820 --> 01:27:49,080
You know, Banksy's been really careful.

1655
01:27:49,080 --> 01:27:50,540
He doesn't let a peep out about them.

1656
01:27:51,320 --> 01:27:51,780
Oh, well.

1657
01:27:51,860 --> 01:27:53,380
You want us to bleep out the name of the college?

1658
01:27:53,860 --> 01:27:54,640
No, that's fine.

1659
01:27:54,900 --> 01:27:55,840
It's Sheridan College.

1660
01:27:55,980 --> 01:27:56,680
It's in Oakville.

1661
01:27:57,000 --> 01:27:58,140
Boring fucking city.

1662
01:27:59,880 --> 01:28:00,700
Horrible place.

1663
01:28:01,000 --> 01:28:01,700
I hated Oakville.

1664
01:28:01,760 --> 01:28:02,420
Oh my gosh.

1665
01:28:02,500 --> 01:28:04,540
Wow, you're going hard on Oakville here.

1666
01:28:04,860 --> 01:28:05,440
Didn't like it.

1667
01:28:05,540 --> 01:28:06,000
Oh, wow.

1668
01:28:06,480 --> 01:28:07,240
Culture-less.

1669
01:28:07,560 --> 01:28:07,880
Wow.

1670
01:28:08,380 --> 01:28:08,720
Boring.

1671
01:28:09,000 --> 01:28:14,100
We interviewed Dave Cheesewright, former CEO of Walmart in Oakville on an earlier chapter of three books.

1672
01:28:14,840 --> 01:28:20,500
We won't pass this chapter along to him for his response to you on Oakville, but maybe he wouldn't protect it.

1673
01:28:20,540 --> 01:28:20,780
Who knows?

1674
01:28:21,300 --> 01:28:23,740
Now, listen, you go after to Sheridan College.

1675
01:28:23,840 --> 01:28:24,700
You take an illustration.

1676
01:28:24,960 --> 01:28:25,660
You're doing art.

1677
01:28:26,280 --> 01:28:28,020
I know Moby Dick's coming into here.

1678
01:28:28,300 --> 01:28:30,000
Take me through this period of your life though.

1679
01:28:30,060 --> 01:28:31,120
What's happened in your life?

1680
01:28:33,360 --> 01:28:34,680
Well, I was in college. I was doing a lot of trying to figure out-

1681
01:28:35,480 --> 01:28:39,340
Still straight edge.

1682
01:28:39,440 --> 01:28:40,040
Who I am, yes.

1683
01:28:40,120 --> 01:28:41,380
Pre-tattoo or post-tattoo?

1684
01:28:41,400 --> 01:28:41,900
Post-tattoo.

1685
01:28:42,000 --> 01:28:42,500
Post-tattoo.

1686
01:28:42,640 --> 01:28:43,940
I got the tattoo in high school.

1687
01:28:43,940 --> 01:28:47,380
When anyone asks you to drink or smoke weed, you lift up your shirt and show them the tattoo?

1688
01:28:47,680 --> 01:28:47,900
No.

1689
01:28:48,280 --> 01:28:50,340
No, you just were- But you were proud of it.

1690
01:28:50,340 --> 01:28:51,360
I just said, no, thank you.

1691
01:28:51,560 --> 01:28:51,780
Yeah.

1692
01:28:53,740 --> 01:28:55,080
Yes, I-

1693
01:28:55,280 --> 01:28:57,000
By the way, I was too. I was straight edge until my 20s, by the way.

1694
01:28:57,180 --> 01:28:58,840
But did you identify that way? Or you just happened to be-

1695
01:28:58,920 --> 01:29:01,260
No, I was actually scared to identify that way.

1696
01:29:01,300 --> 01:29:01,760
I hid it.

1697
01:29:02,080 --> 01:29:02,300
Oh.

1698
01:29:02,420 --> 01:29:02,940
I hid it, yeah.

1699
01:29:02,980 --> 01:29:07,340
Because at my college, if you didn't drink, it was kind of like you were a major outlier.

1700
01:29:07,720 --> 01:29:08,020
Oh.

1701
01:29:08,080 --> 01:29:11,580
I never felt that at all.

1702
01:29:11,840 --> 01:29:13,740
I think my closest friends all knew I didn't drink.

1703
01:29:13,900 --> 01:29:16,060
And I started drinking in my fourth year, my last year.

1704
01:29:16,480 --> 01:29:19,200
After I got my job offer from Procter & Gamble, we had a rager.

1705
01:29:19,820 --> 01:29:20,160
Oh, yes.

1706
01:29:20,200 --> 01:29:21,660
And you drank a bunch of Smirnoff Ices.

1707
01:29:21,660 --> 01:29:22,760
How'd you remember that?

1708
01:29:22,840 --> 01:29:26,420
Because I just listened to your podcast episode yesterday where you talked about that.

1709
01:29:26,420 --> 01:29:26,900
Oh my God.

1710
01:29:26,920 --> 01:29:28,100
I don't even remember talking about that.

1711
01:29:28,160 --> 01:29:29,240
But yeah, Smirnoff Ice.

1712
01:29:29,340 --> 01:29:30,620
I still, to this day, cannot drink.

1713
01:29:30,740 --> 01:29:32,640
Smirnoff Ices are, for the most part, vodka.

1714
01:29:33,060 --> 01:29:33,960
You did research.

1715
01:29:34,100 --> 01:29:34,800
I did research.

1716
01:29:36,180 --> 01:29:37,320
You're coming in hot.

1717
01:29:37,900 --> 01:29:39,980
Yeah, I'm quoting past interviews you've done.

1718
01:29:40,040 --> 01:29:41,360
You're quoting past interviews I've done.

1719
01:29:41,620 --> 01:29:41,940
Yes.

1720
01:29:42,380 --> 01:29:42,640
Okay.

1721
01:29:42,980 --> 01:29:44,540
Okay, so you're straight edge.

1722
01:29:44,540 --> 01:29:45,160
You're in college.

1723
01:29:45,280 --> 01:29:45,720
You're taking illustration.

1724
01:29:45,880 --> 01:29:51,200
I know the city was boring, but did you learn a lot from the perspective of craft or artistry?

1725
01:29:51,480 --> 01:29:57,180
It gave me a lot of time to solely focus on those things.

1726
01:29:58,460 --> 01:30:00,120
So yeah, I learned a lot.

1727
01:30:00,300 --> 01:30:03,680
You seemed to, you deepened your connection with it.

1728
01:30:03,780 --> 01:30:04,980
Like, I mean, you became more of an artist.

1729
01:30:05,280 --> 01:30:13,660
Certainly, I was starting to decide on what an art career might look like for myself or how I fit into that world.

1730
01:30:15,140 --> 01:30:19,180
I flip-flopped on whether I was gonna go into animation or illustration.

1731
01:30:20,640 --> 01:30:21,860
The school offered both.

1732
01:30:21,940 --> 01:30:24,520
They were both excellent programs that were very hard to get into.

1733
01:30:26,600 --> 01:30:32,260
I knew that the chances of getting in were slim, but I was extremely confident I would get in.

1734
01:30:32,780 --> 01:30:41,760
It was just a matter of doing the work, and so I decided on- That should be underlined for people, and I know this because I have one other friend that tried to go.

1735
01:30:41,860 --> 01:30:45,000
So at this time in the 90s- Early 2000s.

1736
01:30:45,000 --> 01:30:45,980
Early 2000s.

1737
01:30:45,980 --> 01:30:46,580
No, late 99.

1738
01:30:46,780 --> 01:30:57,460
So Sheridan College's animation and illustration program had the global reputation for being strong theater schools into places like Industrial Light and Magic, Lucasfilm.

1739
01:30:58,220 --> 01:31:01,760
They were getting scooped and going to California to make movies. It was a real strong-

1740
01:31:01,940 --> 01:31:03,720
Big time.

1741
01:31:03,780 --> 01:31:04,520
Well-known.

1742
01:31:04,720 --> 01:31:05,340
Very, very competitive.

1743
01:31:05,380 --> 01:31:09,340
If you wanna go work in, not Silicon Valley, I don't know what, Hollywood, I guess, really.

1744
01:31:09,820 --> 01:31:20,780
You go to Sheridan, you take illustration, you take animation, and they want you because you come out knowing all these hard-to-know skills, like how to use all the 3D animation software and all the-

1745
01:31:21,020 --> 01:31:26,540
They were incredible. It was unbelievable what the animation students were capable of after three years.

1746
01:31:27,040 --> 01:31:28,140
Three years, and that's it?

1747
01:31:28,240 --> 01:31:28,460
Yeah.

1748
01:31:28,740 --> 01:31:30,000
Wow, wow.

1749
01:31:30,060 --> 01:31:31,260
It was such an intense program.

1750
01:31:31,300 --> 01:31:31,780
So I can see why you wanted to go there.

1751
01:31:32,220 --> 01:31:41,760
The illustration program didn't have that reputation necessarily because it's not as glamorous, I think, as animating Disney movies, Pixar movies.

1752
01:31:41,760 --> 01:31:43,780
Although all those movies start off as illustrations.

1753
01:31:44,300 --> 01:31:45,280
Yeah, in a sense.

1754
01:31:45,720 --> 01:31:54,260
And at that time, I was very good at realism and not much else.

1755
01:31:54,400 --> 01:31:55,420
Drafting, I was good at.

1756
01:31:55,860 --> 01:31:56,560
Mechanical drawing.

1757
01:31:57,120 --> 01:31:58,880
These are things that came very natural to me.

1758
01:31:59,200 --> 01:32:08,860
The creative, making up stuff out of my head and putting that down on paper, to me, that was amazing and I didn't understand how people did it.

1759
01:32:09,600 --> 01:32:12,220
I had never really tried to do it.

1760
01:32:12,560 --> 01:32:25,020
And so I went into a specific program in illustration called technical illustration, which was mainly scientific, medical, and technical mechanical drawing.

1761
01:32:25,460 --> 01:32:25,580
Yeah.

1762
01:32:27,100 --> 01:32:30,160
It was exactly where I excelled and where I naturally fit.

1763
01:32:30,760 --> 01:32:31,800
And I was so bored.

1764
01:32:32,240 --> 01:32:32,680
Oh, really?

1765
01:32:33,460 --> 01:32:35,940
I was doing very well, getting extremely high marks.

1766
01:32:35,940 --> 01:32:41,620
And I could see exactly where I would fit into the art world there.

1767
01:32:42,340 --> 01:32:43,460
And I didn't want it.

1768
01:32:44,340 --> 01:32:48,160
I was starting to realize it's not what I wanted out of art.

1769
01:32:48,780 --> 01:32:49,940
I wanted to be an artist.

1770
01:32:50,620 --> 01:32:53,260
I wanted to lean more into the fine art world.

1771
01:32:55,040 --> 01:32:59,500
And that was more of the vision I had of myself, I think, from a child.

1772
01:32:59,580 --> 01:33:01,060
Well, how do you define fine art?

1773
01:33:01,060 --> 01:33:07,540
Well, making artwork to sell in a gallery was how I viewed it then.

1774
01:33:07,560 --> 01:33:08,060
Oh, interesting.

1775
01:33:08,200 --> 01:33:09,760
Making artwork to sell in a gallery.

1776
01:33:09,820 --> 01:33:12,380
Not doing a different kind of commercial art, you know?

1777
01:33:12,820 --> 01:33:15,280
No street art was really coming out of you at this age either.

1778
01:33:15,340 --> 01:33:16,100
It doesn't sound like it.

1779
01:33:16,120 --> 01:33:17,740
You weren't spray painting in the alleys at night?

1780
01:33:17,860 --> 01:33:19,700
No, I was absolutely doing that.

1781
01:33:20,020 --> 01:33:20,400
Oh, okay.

1782
01:33:21,000 --> 01:33:21,500
Oh, really?

1783
01:33:21,640 --> 01:33:22,460
Okay, I didn't hear that yet.

1784
01:33:22,760 --> 01:33:26,000
Well, in high school, I was very active as a graffiti artist.

1785
01:33:26,520 --> 01:33:26,760
Really?

1786
01:33:27,360 --> 01:33:36,960
I did what I think, if you saw it now, you would refer to it as just nonsense, vandalism, graffiti.

1787
01:33:37,980 --> 01:33:41,640
I was experimenting, I was practicing, trying to figure out.

1788
01:33:42,120 --> 01:33:46,040
And even while I was doing it, I was like, I like the act.

1789
01:33:46,100 --> 01:33:50,100
I don't like how I'm doing it, but I just continued doing it.

1790
01:33:50,260 --> 01:33:51,520
What about the act did you like?

1791
01:33:51,520 --> 01:33:56,300
Well, I liked the altering my surroundings.

1792
01:33:56,540 --> 01:34:02,040
I liked the danger of it.

1793
01:34:02,420 --> 01:34:02,940
Transgressiveness.

1794
01:34:03,460 --> 01:34:04,540
You know, I like doing it.

1795
01:34:04,560 --> 01:34:06,240
Doing something just the right amount of bad.

1796
01:34:06,340 --> 01:34:08,920
Something that was bad, but not like catastrophic.

1797
01:34:09,640 --> 01:34:13,160
Can I ask about the moral compass you use to guide yourself?

1798
01:34:13,320 --> 01:34:21,220
From a lot of people's perspective, you're engaging heavily and frequently in acts of mischief and vandalism and stuff, but you obviously have a code.

1799
01:34:21,920 --> 01:34:22,760
Man's gotta have it.

1800
01:34:22,840 --> 01:34:23,740
I'm sensing it in you.

1801
01:34:23,860 --> 01:34:26,340
So how do you articulate what you do and not do?

1802
01:34:26,500 --> 01:34:27,760
What are your yeses and noes?

1803
01:34:27,880 --> 01:34:28,900
Developing a code then.

1804
01:34:31,020 --> 01:34:36,800
After high school, I didn't participate for a little while in graffiti.

1805
01:34:37,460 --> 01:34:45,340
And then later on in college, I think in my second or third year, I started to do some stencil graffiti.

1806
01:34:45,840 --> 01:34:53,240
So I would make my own stencils and then I would go out with spray paint and do this kind of stencil art.

1807
01:34:53,260 --> 01:34:55,320
Any notable or memorable stencils?

1808
01:34:55,820 --> 01:34:59,200
You're not the guy that does Post No Bills and posts pictures of Bill Clinton and Bill Cosby.

1809
01:34:59,220 --> 01:35:03,360
No, but I remember when that started in Toronto and it was very funny, very clever.

1810
01:35:03,740 --> 01:35:04,240
I loved it.

1811
01:35:04,460 --> 01:35:07,080
I think I like the sense of humor of that very much.

1812
01:35:07,840 --> 01:35:12,120
This was before Bill Cosby had been discovered.

1813
01:35:12,180 --> 01:35:17,980
Yeah, for those that don't know, on all kinds of Toronto downtown construction sites, they would say Post No Bills, meaning Post No Posters.

1814
01:35:18,480 --> 01:35:25,160
And somebody came up with the idea of posting stenciled, perfect, realistic versions of Bill Cosby, Bill Clinton, and other famous bills.

1815
01:35:25,200 --> 01:35:27,320
Other famous bills, it was very funny.

1816
01:35:27,500 --> 01:35:32,740
Yeah, funny, and nobody got, I think I'm also sensing like, there's nobody gets hurt with your stuff.

1817
01:35:33,460 --> 01:35:40,560
Well, I mean, how many people get hurt by graffiti other than property owners who have to pay?

1818
01:35:41,040 --> 01:35:46,520
Yeah, that's a type of injury, but I'm talking no one's actually like, aggrieved really.

1819
01:35:46,880 --> 01:35:49,740
Unless it's bad graffiti and they have to clean it up, I guess is what you're saying.

1820
01:35:49,880 --> 01:35:56,520
I would say what I was doing back then was kind of, it was not refined.

1821
01:35:56,700 --> 01:35:59,060
It was not really with the purpose I was experimenting. Ultimately-

1822
01:36:00,780 --> 01:36:02,300
You defined your code, really.

1823
01:36:02,460 --> 01:36:07,900
I didn't like, I didn't-

1824
01:36:08,880 --> 01:36:10,700
Do people do stuff in graffiti that you don't agree with and that you wouldn't do? Is there places that you wouldn't graffiti?

1825
01:36:10,800 --> 01:36:12,340
You don't graffiti a storefront window.

1826
01:36:12,760 --> 01:36:13,620
Absolutely not.

1827
01:36:13,620 --> 01:36:19,680
So this is what I'm trying to ask you, like, what are your things that you would do and what are the things that you would don't do?

1828
01:36:19,720 --> 01:36:27,940
For someone interested in becoming a street artist and well aware that it's illegal to become one, how do you navigate the morals of it?

1829
01:36:28,260 --> 01:36:29,880
The rights and the wrongs?

1830
01:36:30,180 --> 01:36:51,220
For myself, right now, I look for places, I look for places, objects that are not typical vessels for graffiti.

1831
01:36:51,400 --> 01:36:55,440
They're not a typical target of a stereotypical-

1832
01:36:57,400 --> 01:36:58,460
Atypical vessels. Atypical vessels.

1833
01:36:58,480 --> 01:37:01,200
So we're talking about this one in front of us here.

1834
01:37:01,500 --> 01:37:01,800
Yes.

1835
01:37:02,260 --> 01:37:03,960
I saw it as- The concrete.

1836
01:37:04,200 --> 01:37:11,740
I saw it as a forgotten piece of street furniture that the city doesn't have the time or energy to repaint.

1837
01:37:11,920 --> 01:37:12,440
They don't.

1838
01:37:12,580 --> 01:37:13,660
That's why it's covered in graffiti.

1839
01:37:14,100 --> 01:37:15,500
And peeling paint.

1840
01:37:15,880 --> 01:37:20,320
It had an old coat of paint that it was crumbling off and I scraped that off as best I could.

1841
01:37:20,460 --> 01:37:22,360
Forgotten piece of street furniture.

1842
01:37:23,740 --> 01:37:25,100
Hmm, street furniture.

1843
01:37:25,200 --> 01:37:27,120
That's a phrase I don't think I've heard much before.

1844
01:37:27,700 --> 01:37:32,900
I think it's the graffiti landscape of this city and in most cities is very cluttered.

1845
01:37:33,320 --> 01:37:34,480
It's hard to stand out.

1846
01:37:36,960 --> 01:37:40,240
Most of the best spots are already taken.

1847
01:37:40,760 --> 01:37:42,160
Yeah, yeah.

1848
01:37:44,200 --> 01:37:50,980
And so I look for the spots that nobody wants and that I see potential in.

1849
01:37:53,760 --> 01:37:56,320
And I try to make them look nicer.

1850
01:37:56,640 --> 01:37:56,800
Right.

1851
01:37:57,020 --> 01:37:59,160
Oh, so there's a beautification here too.

1852
01:37:59,360 --> 01:37:59,680
Absolutely.

1853
01:38:00,180 --> 01:38:01,720
I try to clean up and add.

1854
01:38:01,980 --> 01:38:03,320
Clean up and add.

1855
01:38:03,520 --> 01:38:05,300
But also serve a purpose for myself.

1856
01:38:05,300 --> 01:38:06,960
Clean up and add.

1857
01:38:07,200 --> 01:38:08,940
And what's the purpose you're serving for yourself?

1858
01:38:09,040 --> 01:38:12,160
Is this the competing with other artists, standing out from the crowd?

1859
01:38:12,200 --> 01:38:13,480
Because you did mention that earlier too.

1860
01:38:13,920 --> 01:38:18,340
I don't want to, I don't like to compete in like a, I'd rather compete in a fun way.

1861
01:38:18,700 --> 01:38:18,980
Yeah.

1862
01:38:19,300 --> 01:38:20,940
The way football players compete.

1863
01:38:21,400 --> 01:38:24,020
The way Jonathan Franzen told us he competes with David Foster Wallace.

1864
01:38:24,480 --> 01:38:25,800
I have no idea who those people are.

1865
01:38:25,820 --> 01:38:30,280
Sorry, I just mean like a writer competing with another writer on like writing something great.

1866
01:38:30,800 --> 01:38:31,060
Yeah.

1867
01:38:31,460 --> 01:38:32,540
Making something great.

1868
01:38:32,540 --> 01:38:44,660
I want to push people to, I would love to see more creative, more interesting and well thought out public street art, graffiti.

1869
01:38:45,140 --> 01:38:45,240
Yeah.

1870
01:38:45,240 --> 01:38:46,120
Whatever you want to call it.

1871
01:38:46,120 --> 01:38:52,180
I would like to see people really think about what they're doing and try to do it the best way they can.

1872
01:38:52,680 --> 01:38:52,780
Wow.

1873
01:38:53,280 --> 01:38:53,900
I understand.

1874
01:38:53,960 --> 01:39:04,480
Like Nick Sweetman, who's a mural artist in Toronto we both like, who draws these hyper realistic looking birds, but giant pink walls with like bumblebees and hooded mergansers, beautiful stuff.

1875
01:39:04,980 --> 01:39:05,080
Yeah.

1876
01:39:06,620 --> 01:39:11,580
A lot of low rising, low rise military planes flying over us today for some reason.

1877
01:39:12,480 --> 01:39:14,580
Would you classify that as a military plane?

1878
01:39:14,700 --> 01:39:15,860
Like what kind of plane is that?

1879
01:39:16,440 --> 01:39:20,100
It looks like it, it might even be like the Lancaster from Hamilton.

1880
01:39:20,540 --> 01:39:22,420
The old World War II bomber.

1881
01:39:22,420 --> 01:39:25,340
Something about that plane looks like straight out of World War II.

1882
01:39:25,740 --> 01:39:26,540
I hate that shit.

1883
01:39:26,980 --> 01:39:29,980
Meanwhile, yeah, it is fear inducing.

1884
01:39:29,980 --> 01:39:30,180
Yeah.

1885
01:39:30,320 --> 01:39:36,420
Can you only imagine being from a country that, how many immigrants do we have here that come from war torn fucking countries?

1886
01:39:36,640 --> 01:39:37,360
It's scary for them.

1887
01:39:37,480 --> 01:39:43,980
And then they hear these war planes flying overhead and it's like, objectively, I'm sure they know that they're not being bombed, but it triggers something.

1888
01:39:44,060 --> 01:39:44,860
It's got to trigger something.

1889
01:39:44,980 --> 01:39:48,460
I mean, we have a lot of Palestinian protests happening right downtown right now.

1890
01:39:48,560 --> 01:39:50,300
Streets are gleaming closed left, right and center.

1891
01:39:50,660 --> 01:39:51,840
We've got encampments here.

1892
01:39:52,160 --> 01:39:57,320
We've had a big story in the news here in the Toronto Star last year saying this military flyovers have got to stop.

1893
01:39:57,400 --> 01:39:58,420
Like, what the fuck are they doing?

1894
01:39:58,480 --> 01:39:59,220
Like, why is it?

1895
01:39:59,220 --> 01:40:02,340
Why are we traumatizing people?

1896
01:40:02,460 --> 01:40:03,740
That actually came out.

1897
01:40:03,840 --> 01:40:09,740
And some people reacted to that article and said, oh my gosh, what a soft culture we live in.

1898
01:40:09,780 --> 01:40:11,520
You can't even fly a plane anymore.

1899
01:40:11,840 --> 01:40:14,460
Like, I'm just saying, like there's two sides of that argument.

1900
01:40:14,620 --> 01:40:15,480
You're on the first side.

1901
01:40:15,620 --> 01:40:18,060
Well, I think, what a waste of resources.

1902
01:40:21,700 --> 01:40:23,680
And who gives a shit?

1903
01:40:24,340 --> 01:40:26,540
So you're going to, you go to Oakville, you're taking the illustration.

1904
01:40:26,820 --> 01:40:28,400
You're in your illustration all the way through?

1905
01:40:28,400 --> 01:40:29,020
Yes.

1906
01:40:29,200 --> 01:40:30,060
No, you change.

1907
01:40:30,320 --> 01:40:37,540
I was in technical illustration and I switched to interpretive illustration, which meant I had to go back a year.

1908
01:40:37,960 --> 01:40:39,800
I couldn't continue into my third year.

1909
01:40:39,900 --> 01:40:41,920
I had to go back and redo my second year.

1910
01:40:42,440 --> 01:40:52,660
And I felt like if I ever wanted to be good at drawing from my imagination, I had 10,000 hours to put in because I hadn't put really any hours into it.

1911
01:40:52,860 --> 01:41:03,200
And so the start of that journey for me was dropping back a year in college, redoing my second year, in a way saying goodbye to the friends I had made.

1912
01:41:03,460 --> 01:41:03,720
Oh, no.

1913
01:41:03,880 --> 01:41:07,720
Because they had moved on to their third year, which is a very intense year.

1914
01:41:07,740 --> 01:41:08,500
That's the last year.

1915
01:41:08,980 --> 01:41:15,980
And I ended up in a class full of people I had kind of seen around school, but didn't really know.

1916
01:41:16,080 --> 01:41:16,580
Oh, wow.

1917
01:41:16,840 --> 01:41:29,080
And once I was dropped into this class, I met three guys who I became quick friends with and we started our art careers together just a couple of years later.

1918
01:41:29,220 --> 01:41:29,580
Oh, really?

1919
01:41:29,680 --> 01:41:30,540
How did you do that?

1920
01:41:30,940 --> 01:41:32,060
What do you mean start your art career?

1921
01:41:32,240 --> 01:41:35,940
Well, we met in our second year of illustration.

1922
01:41:36,860 --> 01:41:38,800
We formed a tight bond over that year.

1923
01:41:38,900 --> 01:41:39,620
Because of what?

1924
01:41:39,700 --> 01:41:41,760
Is it your work that you were attracted to each other about?

1925
01:41:41,880 --> 01:41:46,120
I think it was a sense of humor.

1926
01:41:46,600 --> 01:41:50,460
It was a way of creative problem solving.

1927
01:41:52,400 --> 01:42:04,140
I was trying to find a style to draw in, a creative imaginary style, which was really pushed on us by the teachers that you have to market yourself with a style.

1928
01:42:04,760 --> 01:42:06,340
And so I was really-

1929
01:42:06,540 --> 01:42:09,620
Oh, interesting. It's like what they tell writers to find your voice, find your voice, find your voice.

1930
01:42:09,800 --> 01:42:11,280
Yeah, and I was really anxious about this.

1931
01:42:11,300 --> 01:42:12,480
They say to find your style, find your style, find your style.

1932
01:42:12,560 --> 01:42:15,360
I always felt like, one, I have to pick one?

1933
01:42:16,200 --> 01:42:16,480
Yeah.

1934
01:42:16,540 --> 01:42:17,580
Wow, there's so many I like.

1935
01:42:17,680 --> 01:42:18,040
Yeah.

1936
01:42:18,240 --> 01:42:20,060
And I was capable of multiple.

1937
01:42:21,680 --> 01:42:24,860
And I just, I wasn't capable of the imaginary stuff yet.

1938
01:42:25,420 --> 01:42:37,960
And so I figured it's just a matter of, I was starting to figure out like, oh, this is just a skill I can learn if I seek it out, if I practice every day.

1939
01:42:39,480 --> 01:42:47,180
So in the summer between switching programs, I tried to unlearn, in a way, all of the drawing I did.

1940
01:42:47,240 --> 01:42:50,040
And I tried to teach myself how to draw in a different way.

1941
01:42:50,040 --> 01:42:50,900
How do you unlearn?

1942
01:42:52,060 --> 01:42:56,260
Well, I just tried to break all the rules that I had learned.

1943
01:42:56,980 --> 01:42:58,600
How do you, how does someone do that?

1944
01:42:59,320 --> 01:43:03,560
I probably have all kinds of rules about podcasting and about writing, and I can't even see them.

1945
01:43:04,580 --> 01:43:10,380
I don't know, I picked up a new sketchbook that I hadn't drawn in, and I just started drawing in it in a different way.

1946
01:43:10,500 --> 01:43:14,060
Wow, so you just used your power of mind to redirect yourself.

1947
01:43:14,220 --> 01:43:16,320
I wouldn't let myself draw the things I wanted to draw.

1948
01:43:16,700 --> 01:43:16,960
Yep.

1949
01:43:20,060 --> 01:43:27,580
And I'd spent a lot of time just thinking about, I knew I was going into what was gonna be a difficult new year, full of challenges.

1950
01:43:27,980 --> 01:43:32,620
And so I was trying to set myself up for it and get ahead a little bit.

1951
01:43:33,960 --> 01:43:34,840
Still straight edge.

1952
01:43:35,340 --> 01:43:35,620
Yes.

1953
01:43:35,940 --> 01:43:36,420
Graduated.

1954
01:43:36,680 --> 01:43:37,000
Yes.

1955
01:43:37,200 --> 01:43:39,060
Form an art collective with a few friends.

1956
01:43:39,500 --> 01:43:42,960
This is, yeah, this is about a year and a half after meeting them.

1957
01:43:43,260 --> 01:43:44,120
Move to Toronto.

1958
01:43:44,580 --> 01:43:46,560
In our last year of college.

1959
01:43:46,560 --> 01:43:47,700
And lived together.

1960
01:43:48,320 --> 01:43:52,000
We moved to 888 DuPont Street, the corner of Ossington and DuPont.

1961
01:43:52,120 --> 01:43:52,920
We got a studio.

1962
01:43:54,080 --> 01:43:56,620
That's not that derelict broken glass building.

1963
01:43:56,960 --> 01:43:58,240
That doesn't exist anymore.

1964
01:43:58,480 --> 01:43:58,740
It was.

1965
01:43:58,740 --> 01:43:59,440
But that's what it was, right?

1966
01:43:59,560 --> 01:44:00,100
It was.

1967
01:44:00,260 --> 01:44:01,820
You lived in a derelict broken glass building?

1968
01:44:02,420 --> 01:44:03,460
Absolutely illegally.

1969
01:44:04,180 --> 01:44:04,600
Illegally?

1970
01:44:05,000 --> 01:44:07,500
Yeah, it was a commercial building.

1971
01:44:07,620 --> 01:44:08,720
Oh, you weren't allowed to live there?

1972
01:44:08,920 --> 01:44:09,600
Technically, no.

1973
01:44:11,640 --> 01:44:21,840
The landlord, Carl, at the time, he was what I consider a pretty decent slumlord.

1974
01:44:23,040 --> 01:44:24,620
Oh my God.

1975
01:44:26,260 --> 01:44:31,520
He was, I don't think he realized how much he was supporting the arts in the city.

1976
01:44:32,800 --> 01:44:33,180
Tell me more.

1977
01:44:33,500 --> 01:44:43,500
Well, he was allowing artists, such as ourselves and many other people to live and work in a building that they weren't technically allowed to live in.

1978
01:44:44,520 --> 01:44:46,760
The building was safe for living and it was fine.

1979
01:44:47,060 --> 01:44:47,980
It had its problems.

1980
01:44:48,220 --> 01:44:48,900
It was noisy.

1981
01:44:50,140 --> 01:44:51,540
It was too hot in the winter.

1982
01:44:51,960 --> 01:44:53,180
It was too hot in the summer.

1983
01:44:55,460 --> 01:45:00,100
There was other people there that were living there that were also not allowed to be there.

1984
01:45:00,300 --> 01:45:00,400
Everybody.

1985
01:45:00,860 --> 01:45:03,940
I'm assuming that kind of felt like a street community in some ways.

1986
01:45:04,340 --> 01:45:08,860
Well, we didn't, there was only a few of us that hung out together.

1987
01:45:09,100 --> 01:45:10,420
Everybody was kind of pretty separate.

1988
01:45:11,440 --> 01:45:17,520
There was a lot of people from different art scenes in the city that lived and worked out of that building.

1989
01:45:18,860 --> 01:45:19,560
Like what?

1990
01:45:19,980 --> 01:45:20,780
Oh, there was musicians.

1991
01:45:21,140 --> 01:45:23,820
There was performance artists. There were-

1992
01:45:24,200 --> 01:45:25,960
Any big names come out of there?

1993
01:45:28,920 --> 01:45:32,900
Well, Will Monroe was, to us, the biggest name at the time.

1994
01:45:33,120 --> 01:45:43,120
He was a very prominent artist and DJ in Toronto in the gay queer scene at the time.

1995
01:45:44,200 --> 01:45:47,400
He threw the biggest parties.

1996
01:45:50,500 --> 01:45:52,140
Vaseline, Vaseline.

1997
01:45:52,740 --> 01:45:54,120
What's Vaseline, Vaseline?

1998
01:45:55,360 --> 01:45:59,820
Vaseline was his dance night, his party night.

1999
01:45:59,840 --> 01:46:00,860
Is that the one that was on the subway?

2000
01:46:01,440 --> 01:46:17,260
No, but for Will's birthday, I think it was Will's birthday when his birthday would come up, he would throw, him and his friends would organize a subway party where we would plan to meet on a specific train traveling in a specific direction.

2001
01:46:18,060 --> 01:46:27,720
And we would all pile into one car and eventually the people who were just riding the TTC would switch cars because it all became very noisy.

2002
01:46:28,020 --> 01:46:33,480
Yeah, you take over a subway car and you're taking it over with like

2003
01:46:33,500 --> 01:46:33,980
30, 40, 50 people, sometimes more.

2004
01:46:35,400 --> 01:46:36,240
Doing what?

2005
01:46:36,900 --> 01:46:40,920
Dancing, decorating. People would bring decorations, hang them over the railings.

2006
01:46:41,440 --> 01:46:49,340
There'd be boom boxes, a lot of, not a lot of clothing, but the clothing that was on was tight and colorful.

2007
01:46:49,840 --> 01:46:50,880
Not a lot of clothing.

2008
01:46:51,140 --> 01:46:53,600
Well, you know, people were out to party.

2009
01:46:54,360 --> 01:46:55,720
Flamboyant, queer community.

2010
01:46:56,020 --> 01:46:56,500
Yeah, yeah.

2011
01:46:57,320 --> 01:46:58,240
Not a lot of clothing.

2012
01:46:58,400 --> 01:47:10,420
A lot of fun, you know, beautiful, amazing people having a, you're doing something that is illegal, but I mean, it's, we weren't, nobody was harmed.

2013
01:47:10,600 --> 01:47:11,280
Yeah, exactly.

2014
01:47:11,660 --> 01:47:13,120
People were disrupted.

2015
01:47:13,720 --> 01:47:16,140
Some people joined in.

2016
01:47:16,460 --> 01:47:17,500
Random strangers joined in.

2017
01:47:17,960 --> 01:47:21,240
I think when you have a party on a subway car, you're taking that risk right up front.

2018
01:47:21,360 --> 01:47:21,520
Yeah.

2019
01:47:21,620 --> 01:47:22,740
Like it is the subway.

2020
01:47:22,880 --> 01:47:23,700
We welcomed it.

2021
01:47:24,060 --> 01:47:24,360
Yeah.

2022
01:47:24,460 --> 01:47:26,000
You know, and eventually it would get shut down.

2023
01:47:26,980 --> 01:47:28,300
That's how it has to end.

2024
01:47:28,400 --> 01:47:28,580
Yeah.

2025
01:47:28,660 --> 01:47:33,840
There's no other way a subway party could end rather than-

2026
01:47:34,020 --> 01:47:34,880
I hope, you know, I hope that they still exist. I hope people are still doing it.

2027
01:47:34,900 --> 01:47:35,780
Nobody got arrested.

2028
01:47:36,120 --> 01:47:36,360
No.

2029
01:47:36,940 --> 01:47:37,780
Just get out of here.

2030
01:47:37,880 --> 01:47:38,280
Get out of here.

2031
01:47:38,540 --> 01:47:40,300
Well, also it gets to the end of the line.

2032
01:47:41,400 --> 01:47:43,200
Yeah, we would go- How long would this party last?

2033
01:47:43,900 --> 01:47:46,080
You know, back and forth a couple of times.

2034
01:47:46,380 --> 01:47:46,880
Oh, really?

2035
01:47:47,200 --> 01:47:47,880
It would switch.

2036
01:47:48,080 --> 01:47:49,020
You know, we would move trains.

2037
01:47:49,240 --> 01:47:51,200
So this is, we would get broke up for hours then.

2038
01:47:51,300 --> 01:47:54,100
We'd get off at Bloor and Spadina and then get out.

2039
01:47:54,100 --> 01:47:54,900
Oh, you had a plan.

2040
01:47:55,000 --> 01:47:56,200
And then go, yeah, of course.

2041
01:47:56,380 --> 01:47:57,720
Oh, and that's how you keep it going.

2042
01:47:57,820 --> 01:47:58,060
Yeah.

2043
01:47:58,340 --> 01:48:02,340
Oh, you switch at Bloor and Spadina, you want to go North, South and then you have to catch the- Oh, wow.

2044
01:48:02,460 --> 01:48:03,500
That's how you keep it going.

2045
01:48:03,600 --> 01:48:04,620
You're jumping the line.

2046
01:48:04,760 --> 01:48:04,880
Yeah.

2047
01:48:04,900 --> 01:48:10,180
And then you go, you do the loop down to Union, back up and- And jump the line again.

2048
01:48:10,480 --> 01:48:10,720
Yeah, yeah.

2049
01:48:10,880 --> 01:48:11,900
Oh, wow.

2050
01:48:12,020 --> 01:48:14,860
You say this like we know what you're talking about, Lewis.

2051
01:48:15,000 --> 01:48:27,500
Like just in general, with your life and your scene and your, because, you know, part of what I'm attracted to with you in your conversation is that you're just being so wonderfully outlandish about everything.

2052
01:48:27,980 --> 01:48:33,000
Like you're not living within this, the skirted rules of any sort of system.

2053
01:48:33,000 --> 01:48:38,300
Like you just well acknowledge that almost everything you're doing is outside, certainly the lines of legality.

2054
01:48:38,740 --> 01:48:42,900
I'd say a lot of my life has been lived in that realm.

2055
01:48:43,860 --> 01:48:44,340
Yeah.

2056
01:48:44,400 --> 01:48:49,120
I'm noticing that with your art, with where you're living, with how you're partying, it's all illegal.

2057
01:48:49,820 --> 01:48:53,460
Not to, I'm not saying that we need to live within those lines.

2058
01:48:53,560 --> 01:49:00,420
But those are the most fun things, you know, and we barely scratch the surface of, we don't have time to go into all of the various things.

2059
01:49:00,480 --> 01:49:05,060
Give me two or three other things you guys would do, this crazy arts collective, what the scene was like.

2060
01:49:05,380 --> 01:49:12,920
Oh, I was thinking more like going back in time to high school, the places that we would hang out.

2061
01:49:13,340 --> 01:49:18,400
We would hang out anywhere that was away from other people's view.

2062
01:49:19,160 --> 01:49:22,720
And one of our favorite places to hang out was inside of a bridge.

2063
01:49:23,540 --> 01:49:25,100
Inside of a bridge?

2064
01:49:25,100 --> 01:49:29,660
There was, I think it was the 406, runs through St. Catharines.

2065
01:49:32,180 --> 01:49:37,720
And from downtown, we found, it goes over, I think it's a 12-mile creek.

2066
01:49:38,300 --> 01:49:40,160
This bridge spans over this creek.

2067
01:49:41,640 --> 01:49:50,900
And just through urban exploration, we found an area where we could physically get inside of this big cement bridge.

2068
01:49:51,100 --> 01:49:51,260
Oh my gosh.

2069
01:49:51,260 --> 01:49:53,700
There was a cavernous area.

2070
01:49:53,700 --> 01:49:54,500
I can picture it.

2071
01:49:54,500 --> 01:49:56,080
Like a highway tunnel.

2072
01:49:56,460 --> 01:50:01,320
Essentially, it was all just this empty space.

2073
01:50:02,360 --> 01:50:08,980
I think the bridge was probably prefabbed and then dropped in place.

2074
01:50:09,620 --> 01:50:10,780
Like some military aircraft.

2075
01:50:11,300 --> 01:50:20,420
And there was a hole in a wall that led into a dark, open room, and we went and explored this space.

2076
01:50:21,120 --> 01:50:24,300
And eventually, you know, we weren't the first people in there.

2077
01:50:26,200 --> 01:50:32,100
I distinctly remember going in there the first time, jumping in and turning on a flashlight, because it was pitch black.

2078
01:50:33,320 --> 01:50:35,320
A low ceiling, smelled bad.

2079
01:50:35,880 --> 01:50:36,700
You could smell urine.

2080
01:50:36,900 --> 01:50:37,780
You could smell feces.

2081
01:50:37,980 --> 01:50:40,360
You could smell booze, cigarettes.

2082
01:50:40,800 --> 01:50:43,060
So it's like people had partied down here.

2083
01:50:44,260 --> 01:50:50,620
And the first thing we all saw when we turned the light on in there was a deflated sex doll that had been abused.

2084
01:50:51,120 --> 01:50:51,600
Oh no.

2085
01:50:52,420 --> 01:50:54,320
And it was just like laying there on the ground.

2086
01:50:54,460 --> 01:50:55,160
Oh my gosh.

2087
01:50:55,200 --> 01:50:58,700
And I took photos of it and I handed it in for a photography project and got a good mark.

2088
01:50:59,060 --> 01:51:00,180
Oh my gosh.

2089
01:51:00,280 --> 01:51:00,540
Wow.

2090
01:51:00,640 --> 01:51:04,800
The connection of observation with kind of living in your own lines.

2091
01:51:06,080 --> 01:51:08,420
So we would go in here and people would party.

2092
01:51:08,580 --> 01:51:09,360
We would have fires.

2093
01:51:09,880 --> 01:51:16,540
In the center, we would walk into the center of the structure, probably about 400 or 500 meters, ducking under beams.

2094
01:51:16,540 --> 01:51:17,440
The bridge was that big?

2095
01:51:17,560 --> 01:51:18,120
Long bridge.

2096
01:51:18,560 --> 01:51:19,980
400 to 500 meters?

2097
01:51:20,820 --> 01:51:21,560
It felt about...

2098
01:51:21,560 --> 01:51:22,660
That's a very long bridge.

2099
01:51:22,860 --> 01:51:22,960
Okay.

2100
01:51:25,020 --> 01:51:26,120
Less than a hundred.

2101
01:51:27,140 --> 01:51:27,760
Okay, okay.

2102
01:51:28,380 --> 01:51:28,800
Tenth of a mile.

2103
01:51:28,820 --> 01:51:31,920
It felt long because it was a bit of an arduous journey.

2104
01:51:31,940 --> 01:51:32,180
Okay.

2105
01:51:32,700 --> 01:51:33,520
Ducking under these things.

2106
01:51:33,520 --> 01:51:34,640
You would have fires in there.

2107
01:51:35,080 --> 01:51:36,740
Yeah, and we would...

2108
01:51:36,740 --> 01:51:39,780
That's skirting the definition of no one's getting hurt here.

2109
01:51:40,320 --> 01:51:41,660
There was lung pollution.

2110
01:51:43,060 --> 01:51:43,540
Surely.

2111
01:51:44,100 --> 01:51:45,060
Lung pollution.

2112
01:51:47,400 --> 01:51:50,540
When these kinds of things are happening, I would be present.

2113
01:51:50,720 --> 01:51:52,800
I wouldn't sit very close to the fire.

2114
01:51:53,080 --> 01:51:53,180
Yeah.

2115
01:51:53,540 --> 01:51:54,520
I found it unpleasant.

2116
01:51:55,060 --> 01:51:58,820
But I also liked the wild atmosphere.

2117
01:51:59,060 --> 01:52:00,740
Okay, now take us back into your 20s.

2118
01:52:00,800 --> 01:52:01,660
You're at this arts collective.

2119
01:52:01,840 --> 01:52:02,820
You're at DuPont in Ossington.

2120
01:52:02,980 --> 01:52:06,460
You had an outside the lines kind of upbringing and childhood.

2121
01:52:06,620 --> 01:52:09,320
You certainly are defining the rules for yourself as you go.

2122
01:52:09,420 --> 01:52:15,920
You're really trying to maintain kind of a wide canvas of kind of within which you live and function.

2123
01:52:16,540 --> 01:52:18,000
Now you're in this art collective.

2124
01:52:18,320 --> 01:52:19,060
You're in your 20s.

2125
01:52:19,160 --> 01:52:19,740
I haven't got...

2126
01:52:19,740 --> 01:52:21,080
We haven't got to Moby Dick yet.

2127
01:52:21,180 --> 01:52:25,420
We haven't got to marriage yet, by the way, like, you know, cause I know you're married now.

2128
01:52:26,040 --> 01:52:27,760
We haven't got to Lewis yet.

2129
01:52:29,180 --> 01:52:31,060
There's a few things missing here from the story.

2130
01:52:31,260 --> 01:52:31,920
So is it...

2131
01:52:31,920 --> 01:52:33,540
Give me what happened in the 20s.

2132
01:52:33,580 --> 01:52:34,620
Give me your 20s.

2133
01:52:35,020 --> 01:52:36,400
Well, we...

2134
01:52:36,400 --> 01:52:38,540
I also haven't got to all the tattoos you're covered in yet.

2135
01:52:39,060 --> 01:52:39,680
But I know...

2136
01:52:39,680 --> 01:52:41,820
And also the straight edge tattoo, you're not straight edge now.

2137
01:52:41,900 --> 01:52:44,080
So that's another switch that I'm waiting for at some point.

2138
01:52:44,080 --> 01:52:44,360
Yeah.

2139
01:52:45,780 --> 01:52:54,660
Well, after meeting Nick, Steven and Lockie, the three gentlemen that really like changed...

2140
01:52:54,660 --> 01:52:55,840
Nick, Steven and Lockie.

2141
01:52:55,860 --> 01:52:57,060
Changed the direction of my life.

2142
01:52:57,160 --> 01:52:57,960
I love the name Lockie.

2143
01:52:58,160 --> 01:52:58,540
Yeah, keep going.

2144
01:52:58,580 --> 01:52:59,200
Interesting name.

2145
01:52:59,660 --> 01:53:00,840
Very boring guy though.

2146
01:53:01,580 --> 01:53:02,020
No, I'm kidding.

2147
01:53:02,440 --> 01:53:03,280
He's a great guy.

2148
01:53:03,300 --> 01:53:07,380
Old man walking by in a purple striped shirt holding a case of Coca-Cola over his shoulder.

2149
01:53:07,600 --> 01:53:08,560
Yeah, like it's a boom box.

2150
01:53:08,680 --> 01:53:09,500
Yeah, I love that.

2151
01:53:09,580 --> 01:53:10,640
That's a great look for that man.

2152
01:53:10,700 --> 01:53:10,920
Yeah.

2153
01:53:10,920 --> 01:53:11,200
Yeah.

2154
01:53:12,600 --> 01:53:23,080
And so we became fast friends and spend a lot of time together, making art together, critiquing each other's artwork, growing as artists, being honest with each other.

2155
01:53:24,240 --> 01:53:27,200
And we were really trying to be the best in the school.

2156
01:53:27,360 --> 01:53:29,060
We were trying to be...

2157
01:53:29,060 --> 01:53:31,080
We wanted to be competitive with each other.

2158
01:53:32,620 --> 01:53:35,320
We wanted to do well.

2159
01:53:35,460 --> 01:53:36,540
We wanted to show off.

2160
01:53:41,020 --> 01:53:47,840
And once we started to develop a plan for our future, we knew we wanted to work together.

2161
01:53:48,600 --> 01:53:52,240
We would come up to Toronto as often as possible, the four of us.

2162
01:53:52,340 --> 01:53:54,960
We'd take the GO train into the city to get some culture.

2163
01:53:55,260 --> 01:53:57,180
We were so thirsty for culture.

2164
01:53:59,120 --> 01:53:59,400
And...

2165
01:53:59,400 --> 01:54:02,080
How'd you define culture when you came in on the GO train to the big city?

2166
01:54:02,260 --> 01:54:02,640
What were you looking for?

2167
01:54:02,640 --> 01:54:03,220
From Oakville.

2168
01:54:03,820 --> 01:54:05,280
Were you looking to set fires on bridges?

2169
01:54:05,460 --> 01:54:05,960
No, no.

2170
01:54:06,140 --> 01:54:06,520
We were just looking for culture.

2171
01:54:06,520 --> 01:54:11,400
We were just looking to be around people from somewhere other than Oakville.

2172
01:54:11,860 --> 01:54:12,380
Right, right.

2173
01:54:12,720 --> 01:54:17,800
You'd walk up and down Yonge Street, street preachers, sex theaters, that kind of world.

2174
01:54:17,860 --> 01:54:20,440
No, we would go to cafes.

2175
01:54:21,160 --> 01:54:23,280
And we would sit down and draw in cafes.

2176
01:54:23,380 --> 01:54:24,380
Oh, okay, okay, okay.

2177
01:54:24,540 --> 01:54:30,500
And so there was one particular day at a store called Tequila Bookworm.

2178
01:54:30,640 --> 01:54:31,720
Oh, I know that store.

2179
01:54:31,720 --> 01:54:32,580
The old location.

2180
01:54:32,860 --> 01:54:35,440
It's in a new, where it's been there for a long time.

2181
01:54:35,440 --> 01:54:37,080
Bar slash bookstore.

2182
01:54:37,320 --> 01:54:37,600
Yeah.

2183
01:54:37,900 --> 01:54:44,660
And we were sitting at a table for four and we started passing around a drawing.

2184
01:54:45,040 --> 01:54:45,300
Oh.

2185
01:54:45,700 --> 01:54:50,160
And then Lockie wrote on the drawing, he wrote Team Macho.

2186
01:54:50,580 --> 01:54:51,280
Team Macho.

2187
01:54:51,860 --> 01:54:54,180
And this became the name of our collective.

2188
01:54:54,960 --> 01:55:06,160
We basically formed our collective that day in Tequila Bookworm, sitting at this beautiful table, which I tried to buy from them when they were moving and getting rid of their furniture.

2189
01:55:06,320 --> 01:55:09,840
I went in and offered way more money for that table than it was worth.

2190
01:55:10,080 --> 01:55:11,360
And they refused to sell it to me.

2191
01:55:11,940 --> 01:55:12,580
On what grounds?

2192
01:55:14,240 --> 01:55:15,180
They just refused.

2193
01:55:15,360 --> 01:55:16,540
I didn't ask for a reason.

2194
01:55:17,300 --> 01:55:19,200
I just took, I was like, all right, I'm not, you know.

2195
01:55:19,480 --> 01:55:22,960
I offered like $400 for a shitty old table.

2196
01:55:25,100 --> 01:55:28,120
And I had no business spending that much money on a table at that time.

2197
01:55:28,180 --> 01:55:28,600
I was poor.

2198
01:55:28,760 --> 01:55:31,340
But it had to do something with what happened after from that table.

2199
01:55:31,360 --> 01:55:33,480
The sentimental value of the table to us.

2200
01:55:33,480 --> 01:55:35,660
So that means the collective had some value too.

2201
01:55:35,760 --> 01:55:38,160
So take us into what happened with this collective, Team Macho.

2202
01:55:38,280 --> 01:55:41,160
Oh, well, we got our studio together.

2203
01:55:41,880 --> 01:55:43,640
So you lived together, you're working together.

2204
01:55:44,140 --> 01:55:44,880
More or less, yes.

2205
01:55:45,820 --> 01:55:46,920
No bedrooms though.

2206
01:55:47,200 --> 01:55:48,220
Just what, sleeping on the floor?

2207
01:55:48,360 --> 01:55:49,120
Not at the time.

2208
01:55:49,300 --> 01:55:53,960
When we moved into the place, it had not been lived in in recent memory.

2209
01:55:55,160 --> 01:55:55,640
Is there a bathroom?

2210
01:55:55,940 --> 01:55:56,820
Not in any formal way.

2211
01:55:57,620 --> 01:55:59,680
The landlord built us a bathroom.

2212
01:55:59,880 --> 01:56:00,860
But no shower probably.

2213
01:56:01,020 --> 01:56:01,540
With a shower.

2214
01:56:01,640 --> 01:56:02,020
Oh wow.

2215
01:56:02,020 --> 01:56:02,680
Yeah.

2216
01:56:04,120 --> 01:56:05,320
There was no kitchen.

2217
01:56:05,480 --> 01:56:06,100
No kitchen.

2218
01:56:06,480 --> 01:56:07,200
That's a bit of a...

2219
01:56:07,200 --> 01:56:16,880
So our bathroom had a pink toilet, a standup shower, and a laundry tub for a sink.

2220
01:56:17,440 --> 01:56:18,480
But no ceiling.

2221
01:56:18,960 --> 01:56:20,520
The walls went...

2222
01:56:20,520 --> 01:56:23,140
If the ceilings were nine foot, they're about nine foot in there.

2223
01:56:23,540 --> 01:56:25,960
The bathroom ceiling or the bathroom wall was eight foot.

2224
01:56:26,920 --> 01:56:29,060
And there was a lot of pipes running along the ceiling.

2225
01:56:29,180 --> 01:56:33,820
So it would have been extremely difficult for him to build the wall up to the ceiling around all the pipes.

2226
01:56:34,060 --> 01:56:34,780
He didn't want to do it.

2227
01:56:34,840 --> 01:56:36,220
He built it eight foot.

2228
01:56:36,700 --> 01:56:42,820
So any noise in the bathroom, any smell from the bathroom came out of the bathroom very easily.

2229
01:56:43,120 --> 01:56:44,000
Into the artist's studio.

2230
01:56:44,320 --> 01:56:44,980
And yes.

2231
01:56:45,220 --> 01:56:48,140
So we had rules about being in the bathroom.

2232
01:56:48,400 --> 01:56:48,900
What were they?

2233
01:56:51,480 --> 01:56:52,840
Flush, the goddamn toilet.

2234
01:56:53,460 --> 01:56:54,640
Yeah, that's a good one.

2235
01:56:55,840 --> 01:56:55,940
Courtesy flush.

2236
01:56:55,940 --> 01:56:56,620
Oh, courtesy flush.

2237
01:56:56,740 --> 01:56:58,300
Immediately after the defecation.

2238
01:56:58,400 --> 01:56:58,780
Yeah.

2239
01:56:58,780 --> 01:57:05,480
But also, since any noise could be heard easily, anybody who was shy about going to the bathroom, we had a CD player in the bathroom.

2240
01:57:05,880 --> 01:57:07,920
And we always kept the same CD in it.

2241
01:57:09,100 --> 01:57:11,900
And it was a kind of like big band music.

2242
01:57:12,140 --> 01:57:12,920
Oh, wow.

2243
01:57:14,040 --> 01:57:15,480
A lot of tubas in there.

2244
01:57:16,260 --> 01:57:17,100
Yeah, exactly.

2245
01:57:18,580 --> 01:57:24,540
And there was a particular song that if you got to that song, we basically started harassing.

2246
01:57:24,580 --> 01:57:26,120
Everybody would be like, get out of there.

2247
01:57:26,180 --> 01:57:27,320
You're in there for too long.

2248
01:57:27,800 --> 01:57:29,400
When the saints come marching in.

2249
01:57:29,560 --> 01:57:29,920
Oh, yeah.

2250
01:57:30,020 --> 01:57:30,440
Came on.

2251
01:57:31,300 --> 01:57:35,260
Everybody would lift their head up from the desk and be like, who has been in the bathroom forever?

2252
01:57:35,460 --> 01:57:35,800
Wow.

2253
01:57:36,060 --> 01:57:37,680
You know, get out of there kind of thing.

2254
01:57:37,780 --> 01:57:37,880
Wow.

2255
01:57:38,500 --> 01:57:39,620
You're shitting a month.

2256
01:57:39,700 --> 01:57:41,720
Yeah, they always say don't sleep where you shit.

2257
01:57:41,820 --> 01:57:42,560
You've heard that phrase.

2258
01:57:43,140 --> 01:57:44,160
We didn't have a choice.

2259
01:57:44,240 --> 01:57:44,760
No beds though.

2260
01:57:45,180 --> 01:57:46,660
Well, at this point we had beds.

2261
01:57:46,740 --> 01:57:47,540
We didn't have bedrooms.

2262
01:57:48,000 --> 01:57:56,800
We were all sleeping in the living room with our beds kind of like tucked in together to save space and slowly building the space.

2263
01:57:56,800 --> 01:57:57,800
What happened?

2264
01:57:57,920 --> 01:57:58,620
What about no kitchen?

2265
01:57:58,660 --> 01:57:59,280
How do you eat?

2266
01:57:59,520 --> 01:57:59,800
What do you eat?

2267
01:57:59,800 --> 01:58:00,800
Well, we built ourselves a kitchen.

2268
01:58:01,100 --> 01:58:02,000
You built a kitchen?

2269
01:58:02,260 --> 01:58:10,120
Yeah, well, we went and bought sinks and I built countertops and cupboards. We stole-

2270
01:58:12,480 --> 01:58:13,980
What kind of food were you eating though?

2271
01:58:14,000 --> 01:58:15,480
You didn't have any income it sounds like.

2272
01:58:16,340 --> 01:58:17,460
Not much anyway.

2273
01:58:18,440 --> 01:58:21,860
No, I was eating a lot of...

2274
01:58:21,860 --> 01:58:36,100
So Nick, his father has chickens he's from the country up near Muskoka and his father would come down every weekend to teach at a Japanese school.

2275
01:58:36,220 --> 01:58:45,060
He worked at a Japanese school, a Saturday school nearby and he would bring us two, three, four dozen eggs.

2276
01:58:47,120 --> 01:58:53,220
And so Nick and I, who at the time were the only ones living there full-time, we were sharing a bed.

2277
01:58:53,780 --> 01:59:01,840
We were washing our dishes in the bathroom and we were eating rice, miso soup and eggs like three times a day.

2278
01:59:01,900 --> 01:59:02,320
Wow.

2279
01:59:02,780 --> 01:59:03,860
It's all we could afford. Luckily-

2280
01:59:04,500 --> 01:59:06,520
Nice hookup on the eggs though.

2281
01:59:06,620 --> 01:59:08,340
High quality, excellent eggs.

2282
01:59:08,820 --> 01:59:11,980
I learned how to make a really good miso soup.

2283
01:59:12,420 --> 01:59:13,560
Oh, you were making the miso soup?

2284
01:59:13,560 --> 01:59:14,940
Yeah, we had the paste.

2285
01:59:15,680 --> 01:59:16,080
Oh, okay.

2286
01:59:16,400 --> 01:59:17,940
Sounds like your friend, Nick is Japanese.

2287
01:59:18,120 --> 01:59:18,520
It sounds like.

2288
01:59:18,640 --> 01:59:18,860
Half, yeah.

2289
01:59:19,360 --> 01:59:21,540
So miso, you're making miso soup.

2290
01:59:21,540 --> 01:59:24,080
Yeah, I mean, it's just paste and soup stock.

2291
01:59:24,740 --> 01:59:26,100
It was pretty simple.

2292
01:59:26,320 --> 01:59:26,600
And rice.

2293
01:59:27,140 --> 01:59:28,640
And rice and eggs, yeah.

2294
01:59:28,780 --> 01:59:32,660
Wow, and the other two guys were involved but they're not always living there.

2295
01:59:32,860 --> 01:59:33,660
They weren't always living there.

2296
01:59:33,660 --> 01:59:35,280
And what was Team Macho producing?

2297
01:59:35,920 --> 01:59:40,740
At the time, we were trying to figure things out.

2298
01:59:41,160 --> 01:59:52,120
We had just finished school, I'm 24 at the time and we were making zines.

2299
01:59:52,300 --> 01:59:53,360
Oh, yeah.

2300
01:59:55,220 --> 01:59:56,260
Zine culture.

2301
01:59:56,460 --> 01:59:58,960
We got the attention of a store called Magic Pony.

2302
01:59:59,320 --> 01:59:59,840
Okay.

2303
02:00:00,160 --> 02:00:11,480
Magic Pony, at this time, they were on the second floor of Queen Street in a small shop that you wouldn't notice if you didn't know it was there.

2304
02:00:12,040 --> 02:00:13,360
We'll start with the second floor.

2305
02:00:13,480 --> 02:00:15,840
Not many shops people know are there on the second floor of anything.

2306
02:00:15,840 --> 02:00:18,240
Yeah, you had to know the door to go in and there was a small sign.

2307
02:00:18,380 --> 02:00:19,180
And they just sold zines?

2308
02:00:19,340 --> 02:00:28,200
They were very, no, they sold, at the time, the owners would fly to Japan with empty suitcases, buy a bunch of toys and bring them home.

2309
02:00:28,260 --> 02:00:29,060
Oh my gosh.

2310
02:00:29,080 --> 02:00:30,660
And sell them and just mark them up.

2311
02:00:30,720 --> 02:00:31,520
They weren't available here.

2312
02:00:31,600 --> 02:00:32,480
Oh, wow.

2313
02:00:33,060 --> 02:00:36,080
But they knew that there was a market for them.

2314
02:00:36,120 --> 02:00:38,920
Yeah, probably a Nervous Customs check at the border on that one.

2315
02:00:38,920 --> 02:00:40,280
I don't know, but they did well.

2316
02:00:40,520 --> 02:00:42,200
And they had a small space in the back.

2317
02:00:43,880 --> 02:00:44,880
We're doing a podcast.

2318
02:00:46,220 --> 02:00:47,600
It's called 3 Books.

2319
02:00:47,940 --> 02:00:48,600
Is it called what?

2320
02:00:48,800 --> 02:00:49,760
3 Books.

2321
02:00:49,980 --> 02:00:50,400
3 Books.

2322
02:00:50,840 --> 02:00:52,280
Do you have three favorite books?

2323
02:00:52,660 --> 02:00:53,140
Formative.

2324
02:00:53,880 --> 02:00:54,620
Formative,  Lewis.

2325
02:00:54,900 --> 02:00:55,580
Nice to meet you.

2326
02:00:55,760 --> 02:00:56,140
You too.

2327
02:00:57,880 --> 02:01:01,720
So we, Podcasting.

2328
02:01:02,900 --> 02:01:04,100
What was the first thing you said?

2329
02:01:05,100 --> 02:01:06,820
Is something happening or are you just podcasting?

2330
02:01:06,880 --> 02:01:07,580
They, yeah.

2331
02:01:09,020 --> 02:01:12,120
They had a small gallery space in the back that they would have shows in.

2332
02:01:12,860 --> 02:01:17,760
They were a fan of zines that Lockie, Steven, and Nick were making.

2333
02:01:17,840 --> 02:01:18,980
I wasn't making zines at the time.

2334
02:01:19,040 --> 02:01:19,640
The three of them were.

2335
02:01:19,740 --> 02:01:20,840
They were really into this scene.

2336
02:01:22,020 --> 02:01:22,640
Zine scene.

2337
02:01:22,740 --> 02:01:23,460
Yeah, the zine scene.

2338
02:01:24,180 --> 02:01:25,440
Say that five times fast.

2339
02:01:25,940 --> 02:01:33,160
And they liked the zines and we just asked like, hey, could we do a show?

2340
02:01:33,280 --> 02:01:34,620
How were they doing different things?

2341
02:01:34,640 --> 02:01:35,920
I thought this was a collective.

2342
02:01:37,300 --> 02:01:39,720
But we were figuring out how it looked.

2343
02:01:39,860 --> 02:01:41,060
This was very early on.

2344
02:01:41,140 --> 02:01:42,640
It doesn't mean you just made art together.

2345
02:01:42,640 --> 02:01:44,520
We knew we wanted to make art together.

2346
02:01:44,520 --> 02:01:45,640
We just didn't know how.

2347
02:01:45,740 --> 02:01:46,900
We needed an opportunity.

2348
02:01:47,420 --> 02:01:55,820
So we got an opportunity to have a show and we were like, collectively, we were like, oh shit, what do we do now?

2349
02:01:56,160 --> 02:01:58,400
I mean, we wanted a show.

2350
02:01:58,540 --> 02:02:00,240
We didn't think about what we were gonna do for a show.

2351
02:02:00,540 --> 02:02:01,500
The Magic Pony gave you a show?

2352
02:02:01,780 --> 02:02:04,040
Magic Pony took a chance and gave us a show.

2353
02:02:04,640 --> 02:02:08,740
We had, I don't know, let's say for the sake of this, six to eight months to prepare.

2354
02:02:09,100 --> 02:02:10,780
Wow, six to eight months.

2355
02:02:11,020 --> 02:02:11,280
Which.

2356
02:02:11,860 --> 02:02:17,120
That's a long time to prepare for a show for an indiscreet, second floor, not, you know.

2357
02:02:17,220 --> 02:02:18,620
Well, you gotta plan these things ahead of time.

2358
02:02:18,920 --> 02:02:19,920
Illegal Japanese sales store.

2359
02:02:21,460 --> 02:02:25,480
And so the four of us just put our heads together and we started to make work.

2360
02:02:25,720 --> 02:02:26,320
What'd you make?

2361
02:02:26,940 --> 02:02:28,840
I love, this is Seth Godin, by the way, chapter three.

2362
02:02:28,960 --> 02:02:30,700
You know, the deadline creates the shipment.

2363
02:02:31,140 --> 02:02:31,800
You know what I'm saying?

2364
02:02:32,080 --> 02:02:32,560
Oh yes, I.

2365
02:02:32,560 --> 02:02:34,180
The deadline creates the product.

2366
02:02:34,320 --> 02:02:34,600
I agree with this.

2367
02:02:34,600 --> 02:02:35,180
Start with the deadline.

2368
02:02:36,160 --> 02:02:38,800
There was a fifth member, I think, around this time.

2369
02:02:38,960 --> 02:02:42,300
We brought in a friend of ours named Jacob, who we met.

2370
02:02:44,540 --> 02:02:45,760
He went to OCAD.

2371
02:02:46,460 --> 02:02:48,820
He was a bit of an outsider from the group, but we brought him in.

2372
02:02:49,300 --> 02:02:50,280
He fit in well.

2373
02:02:51,100 --> 02:02:53,020
And for the first few years of the collective.

2374
02:02:53,020 --> 02:02:53,620
He didn't shit too long.

2375
02:02:54,160 --> 02:02:58,820
For the first few years of the collective, he was a part of it.

2376
02:02:59,160 --> 02:03:03,280
And eventually he wanted to take his career in a different direction.

2377
02:03:03,440 --> 02:03:04,660
And so he stepped away.

2378
02:03:05,600 --> 02:03:12,880
He knows that, we all signed a contract early on in our collective, that we would be friends for life.

2379
02:03:12,980 --> 02:03:14,600
And we are still all very good friends.

2380
02:03:14,840 --> 02:03:16,800
Because the contract decrees that.

2381
02:03:17,120 --> 02:03:18,240
That we are friends for life.

2382
02:03:19,220 --> 02:03:20,240
Did you sign it in blood?

2383
02:03:21,000 --> 02:03:25,320
No, we didn't sign it in blood, but we did sign it.

2384
02:03:25,480 --> 02:03:26,440
And I think it's what we called.

2385
02:03:27,560 --> 02:03:28,140
Thank you.

2386
02:03:28,240 --> 02:03:31,340
It's what we called our very first show, I believe, friends for life.

2387
02:03:31,560 --> 02:03:32,240
Friends for life.

2388
02:03:32,560 --> 02:03:34,640
So in the six to eight months, what'd you guys make?

2389
02:03:35,160 --> 02:03:39,540
We made probably 50 to 60 paintings, drawings.

2390
02:03:42,340 --> 02:03:45,920
The idea of the collective was that we were gonna work on each other's work.

2391
02:03:46,280 --> 02:03:50,240
That we were gonna try to remove the ego out of the art.

2392
02:03:50,400 --> 02:03:50,560
Wow.

2393
02:03:50,560 --> 02:03:51,560
Take our egos out of it.

2394
02:03:51,680 --> 02:03:53,380
Remove the ego from the art.

2395
02:03:53,900 --> 02:03:57,860
And collaborate on things in a way that only we knew.

2396
02:03:58,120 --> 02:04:01,320
And that we wouldn't necessarily tell the audience who did what.

2397
02:04:01,500 --> 02:04:03,160
Oh, kind of like Lennon and McCartney.

2398
02:04:03,740 --> 02:04:08,180
And so we would mimic each other's styles.

2399
02:04:09,620 --> 02:04:10,740
I saw it very much.

2400
02:04:10,800 --> 02:04:12,420
I liked it because it was problem solving.

2401
02:04:12,620 --> 02:04:14,700
I would be given a half finished piece.

2402
02:04:16,080 --> 02:04:18,560
And I could take it in any direction I wanted to.

2403
02:04:19,260 --> 02:04:20,860
And no drug use here still.

2404
02:04:21,040 --> 02:04:23,780
I don't mean to keep asking, but at some point you flip over.

2405
02:04:25,080 --> 02:04:38,160
The guys, although they did consume intoxicants, none of them did it in a way that was as abusive as my friends in high school did.

2406
02:04:38,280 --> 02:04:38,640
Oh, okay.

2407
02:04:38,900 --> 02:04:40,540
Yeah, they weren't letting the.

2408
02:04:40,760 --> 02:04:42,140
A slightly more mature approach.

2409
02:04:42,760 --> 02:04:45,140
Maybe a little too much alcohol sometimes.

2410
02:04:45,360 --> 02:04:46,520
Art came first though, would you say?

2411
02:04:46,620 --> 02:04:47,120
Art came first.

2412
02:04:47,120 --> 02:04:49,800
We were all very dedicated to, yes, absolutely.

2413
02:04:50,020 --> 02:04:51,620
Can I ask where this dedication to art came from?

2414
02:04:51,760 --> 02:04:53,400
Clearly it wasn't financially based.

2415
02:04:54,380 --> 02:04:54,820
No, I'm not.

2416
02:04:54,980 --> 02:04:56,980
Six to eight months to make the art for the.

2417
02:04:57,360 --> 02:04:59,360
No, well we all had part time jobs.

2418
02:04:59,360 --> 02:05:01,080
Oh, you're all working on the side.

2419
02:05:01,180 --> 02:05:01,860
Oh yeah, yeah.

2420
02:05:02,200 --> 02:05:04,600
The whole time through, even through college and high school.

2421
02:05:05,020 --> 02:05:05,200
Okay, I guess I missed.

2422
02:05:05,400 --> 02:05:06,020
What are you doing?

2423
02:05:06,600 --> 02:05:09,480
I was getting random kitchen jobs.

2424
02:05:10,000 --> 02:05:10,900
Oh, you're working in kitchens.

2425
02:05:10,940 --> 02:05:11,900
I've worked in a lot of kitchens.

2426
02:05:12,240 --> 02:05:12,640
Okay.

2427
02:05:13,740 --> 02:05:14,140
Restaurants.

2428
02:05:14,460 --> 02:05:14,700
Yeah.

2429
02:05:15,720 --> 02:05:16,120
Okay.

2430
02:05:16,280 --> 02:05:19,140
Did we skip over the part where you slept on Center Island?

2431
02:05:19,920 --> 02:05:20,400
Did we miss that?

2432
02:05:20,560 --> 02:05:21,640
No, we're nowhere near that.

2433
02:05:21,740 --> 02:05:22,520
Oh, that's coming later.

2434
02:05:22,700 --> 02:05:22,980
Yes.

2435
02:05:23,060 --> 02:05:23,580
Okay, okay.

2436
02:05:23,960 --> 02:05:24,840
I heard about this.

2437
02:05:24,900 --> 02:05:25,780
We're gonna get to that later.

2438
02:05:26,760 --> 02:05:27,560
So we.

2439
02:05:27,780 --> 02:05:28,520
How did the show go?

2440
02:05:29,200 --> 02:05:31,340
It went better than our wildest dreams.

2441
02:05:31,780 --> 02:05:33,400
You know, we sold almost everything.

2442
02:05:34,200 --> 02:05:36,420
It was, we couldn't believe it.

2443
02:05:36,500 --> 02:05:41,020
We couldn't believe that so many people showed up for a group that nobody had ever heard of.

2444
02:05:41,180 --> 02:05:41,860
Why did they?

2445
02:05:42,780 --> 02:05:44,200
Magic Pony was doing something cool.

2446
02:05:44,440 --> 02:05:47,520
They had a, they had a.

2447
02:05:47,600 --> 02:05:49,360
This is 90s, 2000s?

2448
02:05:49,440 --> 02:05:50,180
Early 2000s.

2449
02:05:50,180 --> 02:05:51,220
Early 2000s.

2450
02:05:51,340 --> 02:05:52,220
Four, five, six.

2451
02:05:52,320 --> 02:05:53,480
Pre-social media though.

2452
02:05:54,440 --> 02:05:54,920
Yes.

2453
02:05:54,980 --> 02:05:56,240
It wasn't like you were using social media.

2454
02:05:56,240 --> 02:05:57,480
But there's like MySpace or some shit.

2455
02:05:57,480 --> 02:06:04,180
It wasn't like you were, I went to a concert recently in Toronto and I was like, me and my friend, my friend Flip from New York for it, Brian.

2456
02:06:04,460 --> 02:06:07,380
He's like, I want to come see this, you know, concert.

2457
02:06:07,780 --> 02:06:10,120
And it was like, he got popular off TikTok.

2458
02:06:10,660 --> 02:06:11,780
I didn't know that.

2459
02:06:12,160 --> 02:06:17,900
And, but you could tell when you got there because it was all 23 year old women wearing the same denim cutoffs.

2460
02:06:18,300 --> 02:06:19,140
And white tank tops.

2461
02:06:19,320 --> 02:06:20,020
Sounds like a Taylor Swift concert.

2462
02:06:20,180 --> 02:06:21,980
We were like totally out of character.

2463
02:06:22,120 --> 02:06:23,940
I was like, oh my God, it was Noah Kahan.

2464
02:06:24,620 --> 02:06:25,640
K-A-H-A-N.

2465
02:06:25,740 --> 02:06:26,280
Never heard of him.

2466
02:06:26,280 --> 02:06:31,220
Okay, well, I guess you don't go on TikTok because he's got like billions of followers and stuff.

2467
02:06:31,520 --> 02:06:31,900
Don't, don't.

2468
02:06:32,700 --> 02:06:37,140
I downloaded it once when it was Musical.ly and I was like, this isn't for me.

2469
02:06:37,260 --> 02:06:38,020
And I deleted it.

2470
02:06:39,300 --> 02:06:39,940
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

2471
02:06:40,000 --> 02:06:40,220
Okay.

2472
02:06:40,780 --> 02:06:42,300
So the show, so.

2473
02:06:43,140 --> 02:06:44,400
So we prepared a show.

2474
02:06:45,200 --> 02:06:46,340
We made a lot of work.

2475
02:06:47,220 --> 02:06:48,220
You prepare for the show.

2476
02:06:48,300 --> 02:06:48,800
You do the show.

2477
02:06:48,860 --> 02:06:50,080
You make a lot, you make a lot of work.

2478
02:06:50,220 --> 02:06:51,060
You sell a lot of work.

2479
02:06:51,160 --> 02:06:51,860
Sold a lot of work.

2480
02:06:52,040 --> 02:06:53,260
Nobody quits their job yet though.

2481
02:06:53,440 --> 02:06:53,980
Their side job.

2482
02:06:54,100 --> 02:06:54,420
No way.

2483
02:06:54,500 --> 02:06:55,660
There's no way that was possible.

2484
02:06:55,660 --> 02:06:58,520
So the gallery takes 50%.

2485
02:06:59,080 --> 02:07:01,040
You're making like thousand bucks or something.

2486
02:07:01,220 --> 02:07:01,740
Not much, yeah.

2487
02:07:02,140 --> 02:07:08,020
By the time our 50% gets divided by four, there's not a lot of money left over.

2488
02:07:08,140 --> 02:07:08,720
Yeah, exactly.

2489
02:07:08,900 --> 02:07:09,980
But we were riding high.

2490
02:07:10,220 --> 02:07:11,140
We sold a lot of work.

2491
02:07:11,300 --> 02:07:11,500
We couldn't believe it.

2492
02:07:11,500 --> 02:07:14,520
And it's a sign of investment in what you're doing.

2493
02:07:15,060 --> 02:07:16,360
We were very much doing that.

2494
02:07:18,220 --> 02:07:23,840
No, I'm saying like the world told you, you're doing, like, it's a belief check mark on being an artist.

2495
02:07:24,540 --> 02:07:33,000
It certainly gave us the confidence to do another one.

2496
02:07:33,100 --> 02:07:33,660
That's what I'm saying.

2497
02:07:33,760 --> 02:07:33,900
Yeah.

2498
02:07:34,140 --> 02:07:34,440
Okay.

2499
02:07:34,680 --> 02:07:35,160
Absolutely.

2500
02:07:35,360 --> 02:07:36,960
So keep taking me through the 20s then.

2501
02:07:37,260 --> 02:07:40,220
And then also, I'm still looking, I'm searching for Moby Dick in here.

2502
02:07:40,840 --> 02:07:41,060
Okay.

2503
02:07:43,540 --> 02:07:48,200
Well, I'm starting to read more for myself at this point.

2504
02:07:48,400 --> 02:07:52,480
And I'm finding books that I'm interested in reading and I'm reading through them.

2505
02:07:52,900 --> 02:07:56,080
I'm not necessarily enjoying them, but I'm learning.

2506
02:07:57,300 --> 02:08:00,760
And it wasn't until I started reading Harry Potter.

2507
02:08:01,200 --> 02:08:01,980
Oh, Harry Potter.

2508
02:08:02,240 --> 02:08:06,740
And we had talked about this as, I mentioned this as- Might've been a formative book.

2509
02:08:07,180 --> 02:08:08,080
Yeah, absolutely.

2510
02:08:08,220 --> 02:08:23,380
In a way that it was the first series of books that I ever actually enjoyed reading, where I was looking forward to the next one and would read it and take time out of my day to read it and not just do it because I thought it was something I should be doing.

2511
02:08:23,500 --> 02:08:28,000
What a gift Harry Potter gave to the world, turning so many, at the time, non-readers to readers.

2512
02:08:28,500 --> 02:08:28,740
Yeah.

2513
02:08:29,780 --> 02:08:34,600
I kind of wished I had that innocent childhood, I think.

2514
02:08:35,020 --> 02:08:42,340
That was something for me where I was like, I envied that school experience, that high school experience.

2515
02:08:42,340 --> 02:08:42,440
Oh, interesting.

2516
02:08:42,440 --> 02:08:43,540
Because it was so different than mine.

2517
02:08:43,640 --> 02:08:44,040
Yes.

2518
02:08:44,600 --> 02:08:46,760
Yeah, nobody was shooting heroin at Hogwarts.

2519
02:08:47,480 --> 02:08:49,100
Yeah, it was a lot more innocent.

2520
02:08:53,300 --> 02:08:56,480
And, but I thought it was great, great storytelling, great adventure.

2521
02:08:56,840 --> 02:09:04,600
And I will point out to the listener, I hope this doesn't break your identity, but on the palm of the hand that you're holding the microphone with, is that not the Deathly Hallows?

2522
02:09:04,740 --> 02:09:05,120
Correct.

2523
02:09:05,340 --> 02:09:07,560
So you've got the Harry Potter tattoo right on your palm.

2524
02:09:07,820 --> 02:09:08,120
Yes.

2525
02:09:08,560 --> 02:09:11,980
I would imagine that's a place you don't see, I don't see many palm tattoos.

2526
02:09:13,720 --> 02:09:14,040
No.

2527
02:09:15,580 --> 02:09:15,800
Yeah.

2528
02:09:16,060 --> 02:09:20,040
So what made you decide to get the Deathly Hallows tattooed on your palm?

2529
02:09:20,520 --> 02:09:28,020
Deathly Hallows, for people that don't know, is a giant triangle with a big circle in the middle and a line through the circle, like kind of like a cat eye sort of thing.

2530
02:09:28,020 --> 02:09:30,320
An equilateral triangle with a line dividing.

2531
02:09:30,320 --> 02:09:34,400
It's probably like the Elder Wand and the Invisibility Cloak and the whatever the third thing was.

2532
02:09:34,420 --> 02:09:34,860
And the stone.

2533
02:09:35,500 --> 02:09:36,400
Oh, the Philosopher's Stone.

2534
02:09:36,860 --> 02:09:39,740
The, is that the name of it?

2535
02:09:39,820 --> 02:09:40,900
I don't know, maybe that, maybe not.

2536
02:09:40,900 --> 02:09:43,300
It was the stone that can bring back dead people temporarily.

2537
02:09:43,600 --> 02:09:44,680
Oh, okay, that's a different stone.

2538
02:09:44,680 --> 02:09:45,400
I forget the name of it.

2539
02:09:45,600 --> 02:09:45,700
Okay.

2540
02:09:46,040 --> 02:09:48,760
So what made you get that tattooed on your palm?

2541
02:09:48,760 --> 02:09:53,380
It was the only tattoo I have that was a spur of the moment decision.

2542
02:09:53,580 --> 02:09:55,840
I didn't think too much about it ahead of time.

2543
02:09:58,300 --> 02:10:00,520
I just got it done.

2544
02:10:01,140 --> 02:10:12,860
And I figured that since I use my hands a lot, that it would eventually, not completely disappear, but disintegrate to a point where it wouldn't necessarily be recognizable.

2545
02:10:13,920 --> 02:10:15,060
And boy, was I wrong.

2546
02:10:15,200 --> 02:10:16,280
It is very permanent.

2547
02:10:16,760 --> 02:10:22,600
I mean, of course I knew tattoos were gonna be permanent, but I thought that it would get beat up more than it has.

2548
02:10:22,780 --> 02:10:23,000
Wow.

2549
02:10:24,420 --> 02:10:24,780
And.

2550
02:10:25,660 --> 02:10:27,160
Would you recommend a palm tattoo?

2551
02:10:28,260 --> 02:10:29,880
I mean, if you're in.

2552
02:10:29,960 --> 02:10:31,540
You got tattoos, you got sleeves, you got arms.

2553
02:10:31,620 --> 02:10:32,320
What else we got here?

2554
02:10:32,400 --> 02:10:32,780
Oh, stomach.

2555
02:10:33,060 --> 02:10:33,740
I have a sleeve.

2556
02:10:34,160 --> 02:10:35,880
One sleeve, a stomach, a palm.

2557
02:10:36,320 --> 02:10:39,220
I've got some on my ribs, a bit on my leg.

2558
02:10:42,760 --> 02:10:44,280
Yeah, it's a painful process.

2559
02:10:44,660 --> 02:10:44,900
Yeah.

2560
02:10:45,280 --> 02:10:49,900
I think that you, I tried to get into tattooing.

2561
02:10:50,000 --> 02:10:53,560
I wanted to learn how to do it at a point in my life.

2562
02:10:53,960 --> 02:11:03,860
And I'm glad that I never got accepted by anybody because I think I would probably have a lot more tattoos if it becomes an easier access thing.

2563
02:11:04,400 --> 02:11:06,840
I'm sure I would have be heavily coated.

2564
02:11:07,060 --> 02:11:08,300
Not that I'm opposed to getting more.

2565
02:11:09,000 --> 02:11:15,940
I just, I think that I, from going forward, I'm gonna put more thought into it if I do it.

2566
02:11:16,240 --> 02:11:16,980
Ah, interesting.

2567
02:11:17,160 --> 02:11:17,860
I'll put more thought.

2568
02:11:18,040 --> 02:11:18,380
Which I normally have.

2569
02:11:18,380 --> 02:11:20,600
And by the way, they say over half tattoos are now removed.

2570
02:11:20,980 --> 02:11:22,680
More than 50% of tattoos.

2571
02:11:22,800 --> 02:11:23,580
I've considered trying.

2572
02:11:24,140 --> 02:11:26,660
I've considered getting the straight edge tattoo removed from my stomach.

2573
02:11:28,880 --> 02:11:33,980
Maybe just do strikethrough, you know, like a line and then underneath it, you now say psychedelic.

2574
02:11:33,980 --> 02:11:35,040
No, I don't think I would do that.

2575
02:11:35,260 --> 02:11:35,360
Psychonaut.

2576
02:11:35,620 --> 02:11:37,540
It was a very painful place to get a tattoo.

2577
02:11:37,760 --> 02:11:38,300
Your stomach?

2578
02:11:38,480 --> 02:11:39,120
Oh my gosh.

2579
02:11:39,120 --> 02:11:40,040
I can't even imagine.

2580
02:11:40,200 --> 02:11:43,740
The tattoo artist, you know, thought I was crazy for it being my first tattoo.

2581
02:11:45,980 --> 02:11:47,080
But I don't know.

2582
02:11:47,500 --> 02:11:49,220
It's like, it's gonna hurt one way or the other.

2583
02:11:49,400 --> 02:11:50,860
Might as well just get it.

2584
02:11:51,020 --> 02:11:51,980
You know, get it where you want it.

2585
02:11:52,260 --> 02:11:54,120
You get, so you get into Harry Potter and your toys.

2586
02:11:54,260 --> 02:11:55,240
It gets you back into reading.

2587
02:11:55,340 --> 02:11:56,220
It got me back into reading.

2588
02:11:56,400 --> 02:11:57,680
Your dad was a big reader growing up.

2589
02:11:57,800 --> 02:12:00,900
It got me into, Harry Potter got me into audio books too.

2590
02:12:01,140 --> 02:12:01,500
Ah.

2591
02:12:01,760 --> 02:12:03,520
It, it was a bridge.

2592
02:12:03,760 --> 02:12:05,200
I was listening to a lot of audio.

2593
02:12:05,260 --> 02:12:07,120
Audio books was not big at the time.

2594
02:12:07,500 --> 02:12:08,340
At the time, no.

2595
02:12:08,880 --> 02:12:10,100
You like doing CDs or something?

2596
02:12:10,100 --> 02:12:13,040
I listened to, well, yes.

2597
02:12:13,560 --> 02:12:20,160
I, a lot of my life, I listened to a lot of audio, a lot of talk radio.

2598
02:12:20,780 --> 02:12:23,800
I loved late night AM radio, Art Bell.

2599
02:12:24,360 --> 02:12:26,680
Ooh, late night AM radio.

2600
02:12:26,860 --> 02:12:28,300
What a cool subculture.

2601
02:12:28,460 --> 02:12:30,840
As a kid, I listened to a lot of this.

2602
02:12:31,500 --> 02:12:37,600
And as I got older, I listened to a lot of AM, just talk radio in general.

2603
02:12:37,800 --> 02:12:39,380
I listened to Howard Stern.

2604
02:12:39,960 --> 02:12:42,640
You were always a big AM late night radio guy.

2605
02:12:42,640 --> 02:12:43,760
You were a big Stern person.

2606
02:12:43,900 --> 02:12:44,960
You were a big listener.

2607
02:12:45,100 --> 02:12:47,500
You consumed the world through audio.

2608
02:12:47,660 --> 02:12:53,160
So the audio book entry point for you to become an adult reader was natural for you.

2609
02:12:53,400 --> 02:12:53,700
Yeah.

2610
02:12:53,980 --> 02:13:00,880
Well, I found that in the beginning, it was difficult to listen to audio books and do something else, to follow along with a story.

2611
02:13:01,680 --> 02:13:09,820
But since I had physically read all of the Harry Potter books, when I listened to them for the first time, I already knew the story.

2612
02:13:09,820 --> 02:13:24,480
So I could just kind of, from then on, it was more like watching a movie, where I had already built a visual world in my head of what this looked like outside of the movies, also influenced by the movies, surely.

2613
02:13:25,520 --> 02:13:29,420
And so just listening to the story, I didn't have to be present the whole time.

2614
02:13:30,320 --> 02:13:32,940
And the more I listened, the better I got at listening.

2615
02:13:33,320 --> 02:13:36,680
And I was able to start listening to other books.

2616
02:13:36,800 --> 02:13:41,040
And I thought, oh, this is a much better way for me to consume books, because I can do it while I'm drawing.

2617
02:13:42,660 --> 02:13:54,180
Not in all kinds of drawing, or if I'm being creative, if I was actively doing creative work, coming up with ideas, problem solving, I could not listen to audio books.

2618
02:13:54,660 --> 02:13:55,920
It was too much of a distraction.

2619
02:13:56,120 --> 02:13:57,320
I needed silence or music. But once I was doing the-

2620
02:13:58,540 --> 02:14:05,640
This is part of the thing that prevents audio books from fully taking off, is it's hard to do it and do something else.

2621
02:14:05,780 --> 02:14:14,660
But once I was doing the grunt work, once all the problem solving was done, and it was just applying, finishing, rendering, whatever, then I could tune out and listen.

2622
02:14:15,340 --> 02:14:16,880
And so that's when I would listen to books.

2623
02:14:17,040 --> 02:14:18,880
Plus it's good for rereading, as you're pointing out.

2624
02:14:19,160 --> 02:14:19,480
Yes.

2625
02:14:19,800 --> 02:14:20,200
Uh-huh.

2626
02:14:20,860 --> 02:14:22,860
But Moby Dick is not rereading.

2627
02:14:23,100 --> 02:14:25,700
Moby Dick is a sizable challenge.

2628
02:14:26,280 --> 02:14:31,400
So I took on Moby Dick while I was painting a friend's house.

2629
02:14:32,820 --> 02:14:36,760
I did a lot of house painting, indoor, outdoor.

2630
02:14:37,640 --> 02:14:48,160
I started painting in school, and in my college, in the summer, I would do painting around the school in the summer, just refurbishing.

2631
02:14:48,240 --> 02:14:51,560
So it wasn't a task that took all of your mental faculties?

2632
02:14:51,640 --> 02:14:52,040
Zero.

2633
02:14:52,480 --> 02:14:54,760
So you could listen to Moby Dick while painting a house.

2634
02:14:54,840 --> 02:14:56,260
And so eventually, yeah.

2635
02:14:56,800 --> 02:14:59,360
It's probably like a 25-hour audio book or something, I bet.

2636
02:14:59,560 --> 02:15:01,100
I think it was like 30 to 40.

2637
02:15:01,100 --> 02:15:01,700
It was long.

2638
02:15:02,140 --> 02:15:02,740
Yeah, yeah.

2639
02:15:03,140 --> 02:15:05,440
How many hours does it take to paint a house?

2640
02:15:06,700 --> 02:15:07,560
30 to 40?

2641
02:15:07,820 --> 02:15:11,160
No, I think that the book was just part of that time.

2642
02:15:11,280 --> 02:15:11,520
Okay.

2643
02:15:12,180 --> 02:15:16,580
But I distinctly remember listening to it in that phase of my life.

2644
02:15:16,780 --> 02:15:23,540
And I was somewhere in my late 20s, I think, maybe 30 at the oldest.

2645
02:15:25,080 --> 02:15:28,320
And I really enjoyed the adventure of the book.

2646
02:15:28,790 --> 02:15:45,960
I love the idea of this guy just changing his life, like being, I'm gonna join a crew of sailors and do something I've never done before for the sake of adventure, that kind of thing.

2647
02:15:46,500 --> 02:15:56,920
And I thought, wow, what a wild experience that must've been like, especially back in the day when they're using whale oil to light their lamps.

2648
02:15:57,360 --> 02:15:59,820
That's why they're on a whale searching boat.

2649
02:15:59,820 --> 02:16:00,660
They were going after sperm whales, yeah.

2650
02:16:00,660 --> 02:16:01,680
They're looking for the oil.

2651
02:16:01,960 --> 02:16:02,200
Yes.

2652
02:16:02,240 --> 02:16:05,240
That was the original- Spermaceti, I think.

2653
02:16:05,480 --> 02:16:10,560
Was that not the original kind of start of like the oil industry?

2654
02:16:11,160 --> 02:16:17,180
I think it- Like, is that not the first energy- It was certainly an early, it was, I think it was easier to get.

2655
02:16:18,020 --> 02:16:19,860
That was before oil was a thing.

2656
02:16:21,900 --> 02:16:25,380
Oil was a thing, I think it was just hard to refine and to deal with.

2657
02:16:25,380 --> 02:16:25,920
Ah, okay, yeah.

2658
02:16:25,920 --> 02:16:31,299
And that the-

2659
02:16:31,540 --> 02:16:34,639
There was no oil, there was no, nothing was running on oil though. I mean, whale oil, but not what we call gas today.

2660
02:16:35,120 --> 02:16:39,520
No, if it was, I think to refine it was very difficult.

2661
02:16:39,860 --> 02:16:42,700
We've really screwed up the world fast is what I'm noticing here.

2662
02:16:42,840 --> 02:16:44,680
It's what we do really well.

2663
02:16:44,680 --> 02:16:46,200
Like fast, like really fast.

2664
02:16:46,420 --> 02:16:49,200
Like we're gonna put out more carbon emissions this year than we ever have in history.

2665
02:16:49,260 --> 02:16:50,580
And that's the same for every fucking year.

2666
02:16:50,719 --> 02:16:53,260
It just seems- Since the last 50 years, we've been talking about it being a problem.

2667
02:16:53,340 --> 02:16:55,420
Yeah, it seems absolutely crazy.

2668
02:16:55,420 --> 02:16:57,080
I'm very glad that we both walked here today.

2669
02:16:57,959 --> 02:16:59,639
Like such a beautiful animal, right?

2670
02:17:00,059 --> 02:17:02,440
Like what a unique looking creature here.

2671
02:17:02,680 --> 02:17:05,400
He's pointing at the cover of the book, the sperm whale.

2672
02:17:05,900 --> 02:17:15,440
You know, I was just like, although it was a book about hunting these animals, I just thought like, what a waste too.

2673
02:17:15,760 --> 02:17:25,280
You know, like you're such a cool creature and all we can think to do with it is exploit it.

2674
02:17:25,860 --> 02:17:29,959
Largest animal, amongst the largest animals ever on the planet historically.

2675
02:17:30,160 --> 02:17:31,840
I think it dives deeper than any other whale.

2676
02:17:32,120 --> 02:17:33,780
Dives deeper than any other whale.

2677
02:17:33,920 --> 02:17:35,500
Probably bigger than almost any dinosaur.

2678
02:17:36,680 --> 02:17:37,559
Yeah, likely.

2679
02:17:38,100 --> 02:17:39,820
It's been around since the dinosaurs too.

2680
02:17:39,879 --> 02:17:41,620
I mean, arguably it is a dinosaur, is it not?

2681
02:17:41,920 --> 02:17:44,459
Battles mythical creatures at the bottom of the ocean.

2682
02:17:44,920 --> 02:17:46,280
Giant squids and shit.

2683
02:17:47,100 --> 02:17:48,059
Giant squids are real.

2684
02:17:48,440 --> 02:17:50,840
Yeah, well, you know, back then they were mythical.

2685
02:17:51,660 --> 02:17:52,980
That's kind of cool that we proved one.

2686
02:17:53,420 --> 02:17:54,820
Loch Ness never came through.

2687
02:17:55,000 --> 02:17:55,520
Not yet.

2688
02:17:55,520 --> 02:17:56,459
Maybe it just went extinct.

2689
02:17:56,680 --> 02:17:57,340
Not yet.

2690
02:17:58,139 --> 02:17:59,180
Yeah, exactly.

2691
02:17:59,379 --> 02:18:06,180
So you identified earlier in this conversation that the size and the challenge of Moby Dick was appealing to you.

2692
02:18:06,260 --> 02:18:06,559
Absolutely.

2693
02:18:07,660 --> 02:18:13,520
To the point where at the end of these interviews, I sometimes ask people, what is your white whale book?

2694
02:18:14,020 --> 02:18:15,639
That's a closing question I have.

2695
02:18:15,660 --> 02:18:21,100
A book you've been chasing the longest and many people answer that question by saying Moby Dick.

2696
02:18:22,260 --> 02:18:23,139
Yeah, I mean.

2697
02:18:23,420 --> 02:18:24,520
And you fucking tackled it out of the gate.

2698
02:18:24,660 --> 02:18:25,920
Like you become an adult reader.

2699
02:18:26,040 --> 02:18:31,959
You go boom into, I know you had Harry Potter as your amuse-bouche, but pretty quick after you're going hard.

2700
02:18:32,520 --> 02:18:36,459
This is a huge, gigantic, overwhelming.

2701
02:18:36,680 --> 02:18:37,680
It was a difficult lesson.

2702
02:18:37,780 --> 02:18:38,900
Big piece of literature.

2703
02:18:39,160 --> 02:18:42,100
There was certainly pausing, rewinding and re-listening happening.

2704
02:18:44,639 --> 02:18:46,520
Yeah, even just the language it's written in.

2705
02:18:46,639 --> 02:18:49,120
It's of course English, but it's an old English.

2706
02:18:49,420 --> 02:18:50,080
200 year old, yeah.

2707
02:18:52,360 --> 02:19:03,219
And yeah, I just thought that it's a book that was valued by people who were smart and that I looked up to.

2708
02:19:03,559 --> 02:19:11,299
And I thought, if I'm gonna have a well-rounded education, at this point I was teaching myself things.

2709
02:19:11,799 --> 02:19:18,020
I was very unsatisfied with the education I received going through grade school, middle school, high school.

2710
02:19:19,540 --> 02:19:29,700
And I decided to start seeking out the things I was interested in as soon as I had the wherewithal to do so and realized that I needed to because I wasn't being provided it.

2711
02:19:29,959 --> 02:19:31,200
Yeah, yeah.

2712
02:19:31,360 --> 02:19:39,660
And I love that you did so in a way that was both daunting, but also accessible because you went into Moby Dick from an audio book perspective while painting a house.

2713
02:19:39,740 --> 02:19:43,980
I think that's good guidance for listeners like me who have not read this book like me.

2714
02:19:44,280 --> 02:19:47,940
I'm not gonna be ashamed of it because one of the values of the show is no book guilt, no book shame.

2715
02:19:48,380 --> 02:19:51,640
But I've read the first 20, 30 pages and they're good.

2716
02:19:51,780 --> 02:19:52,780
I really liked it.

2717
02:19:52,840 --> 02:19:55,480
I could tell it's challenging, but I really enjoyed the experience.

2718
02:19:55,860 --> 02:19:57,120
So, but audio book would be great.

2719
02:19:57,440 --> 02:19:57,540
Yeah.

2720
02:19:57,660 --> 02:19:58,860
I just need to find a house to paint now.

2721
02:19:59,120 --> 02:20:01,140
Yeah, or a banal task to tackle.

2722
02:20:01,220 --> 02:20:02,280
Yeah, a banal task.

2723
02:20:02,380 --> 02:20:04,880
You're throwing the words of the chapter out left, right and center.

2724
02:20:05,440 --> 02:20:08,540
Now, Moby Dick is often described as being about one man's obsession.

2725
02:20:09,140 --> 02:20:14,400
And as such, it can be read as a cautionary tale about hyper-focus on an individual pursuit.

2726
02:20:15,040 --> 02:20:18,080
Is there a tension for you between that and being an artist?

2727
02:20:18,960 --> 02:20:24,400
What is the risk for you about too much hyper-focus on your individual pursuit?

2728
02:20:24,880 --> 02:20:26,780
How do you avoid being like Ahab?

2729
02:20:28,280 --> 02:20:29,560
Or Ishmael, I guess it is.

2730
02:20:29,720 --> 02:20:29,920
Yeah.

2731
02:20:33,510 --> 02:20:34,650
Check in with my wife.

2732
02:20:35,490 --> 02:20:36,110
Oh, that's good.

2733
02:20:36,390 --> 02:20:37,610
Check in with my wife.

2734
02:20:37,790 --> 02:20:38,770
I think she lets me know.

2735
02:20:40,350 --> 02:20:42,270
Like go to bed, it's 5 a.m. kind of thing?

2736
02:20:42,310 --> 02:20:51,510
No, more like, you know, get out of your fantasy world and do some real life tasks.

2737
02:20:53,230 --> 02:20:55,350
And you no longer have a part-time job, right?

2738
02:20:56,090 --> 02:20:56,530
No.

2739
02:20:56,890 --> 02:21:02,230
So Lewis Mallard has achieved the goal of being self-sufficient financially.

2740
02:21:02,550 --> 02:21:04,950
He has not achieved the goal of being-

2741
02:21:06,230 --> 02:21:11,070
I wouldn't say that. I am surviving off of savings.

2742
02:21:12,530 --> 02:21:21,110
And when I make money, it's like, a lot comes in and then a lot doesn't come in for a long time.

2743
02:21:21,870 --> 02:21:27,430
It comes in bursts, with shows, with I have to make a lot of my own opportunities. Right now I am-

2744
02:21:27,930 --> 02:21:30,610
You're open for commissions.

2745
02:21:30,950 --> 02:21:33,810
People can hire you to paint something, do something.

2746
02:21:34,090 --> 02:21:42,490
I open myself for commissions rarely because I'm heavily focused on other creative ventures.

2747
02:21:43,170 --> 02:21:45,870
I do take on commissions from time to time.

2748
02:21:46,750 --> 02:21:57,530
Most often from people who have already been supporters of me, clients, customers, good customers, that kind of thing.

2749
02:21:58,230 --> 02:22:03,790
So it's not self-sufficient financially yet, but- I'm trying to build- You want that, that's the goal you have.

2750
02:22:03,790 --> 02:22:04,170
Absolutely.

2751
02:22:04,230 --> 02:22:14,470
So it's the question about obsession is you're kind of like, I'm not there yet towards my goals, but your wife will steer you away from falling too far into it.

2752
02:22:14,830 --> 02:22:17,570
Well, she tolerates it up into a point.

2753
02:22:18,730 --> 02:22:20,690
Does her level of toleration work for you?

2754
02:22:21,130 --> 02:22:21,510
Yes.

2755
02:22:21,610 --> 02:22:22,990
Not like you spite her for it?

2756
02:22:23,110 --> 02:22:24,010
No, absolutely not.

2757
02:22:24,070 --> 02:22:26,730
You're grateful to have her pull you out of the abyss?

2758
02:22:27,330 --> 02:22:36,690
Yeah, she drives me to work away harder than I would for myself because it's not just me anymore, it's we.

2759
02:22:39,510 --> 02:22:44,810
She's also in a career path that isn't known for being extremely lucrative.

2760
02:22:45,330 --> 02:22:45,630
Opera singing.

2761
02:22:45,930 --> 02:22:48,730
Yes, and she's in the beginning of her career. And we're building-

2762
02:22:51,590 --> 02:22:53,950
There's not many operas.

2763
02:22:54,590 --> 02:22:54,850
No.

2764
02:22:55,030 --> 02:22:56,910
Like in Canada, how many operas are there?

2765
02:22:57,030 --> 02:22:58,490
Toronto, Vancouver, that's it?

2766
02:22:58,810 --> 02:22:59,130
Montreal.

2767
02:22:59,650 --> 02:23:03,570
Well, we're moving to Montreal so that she has a contract with the Opera of Montreal.

2768
02:23:03,730 --> 02:23:04,190
Oh, interesting.

2769
02:23:04,370 --> 02:23:06,730
So Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, three operas in the country?

2770
02:23:07,010 --> 02:23:12,330
There's small- A country of 40 million people that has three viable places an opera singer can work.

2771
02:23:13,210 --> 02:23:15,710
And maybe make enough to call it a living, yes.

2772
02:23:15,850 --> 02:23:16,710
Right, yeah.

2773
02:23:16,830 --> 02:23:20,110
I'm not counting the stuff you're doing on the street or on the side or the birthday parties.

2774
02:23:20,130 --> 02:23:22,270
In the small venues, yes.

2775
02:23:22,310 --> 02:23:23,090
Wow, wow.

2776
02:23:23,110 --> 02:23:27,630
I love how both of you are so, so deep down, very narrow niches.

2777
02:23:28,710 --> 02:23:37,030
It was one of the things that brought us together and that we related to each other about is how driven we are to succeed in our fields.

2778
02:23:37,470 --> 02:23:37,830
Yes.

2779
02:23:39,290 --> 02:23:40,010
Wow, okay.

2780
02:23:40,870 --> 02:23:43,930
So I feel like I've got a nice little portrait of your 20s here.

2781
02:23:44,010 --> 02:23:46,990
You're in this art collective, you're at 888 DuPont, what a cool number.

2782
02:23:47,410 --> 02:23:47,690
Yes.

2783
02:23:47,850 --> 02:23:50,090
You're eating eggs, you're eating rice.

2784
02:23:50,230 --> 02:23:56,850
I think- You're yelling at people when they go to when the Saints go marching in, sitting in the middle of the studio, you're building kitchens, you're pulling people.

2785
02:23:57,010 --> 02:24:05,750
You told me in a past conversation that wasn't recorded that you were pulling people out of like, you'd wake up in the morning and there'd be like people sleeping in your place kind of thing.

2786
02:24:06,430 --> 02:24:13,470
Very often, we would have visitors, people from out of town that were coming by.

2787
02:24:14,010 --> 02:24:21,070
I mean, with four or five people with keys and not all of them live there and it's kind of a 24 hour environment.

2788
02:24:21,770 --> 02:24:23,430
You know, we did build bedrooms eventually.

2789
02:24:23,690 --> 02:24:24,810
Was that not unsettling though?

2790
02:24:25,090 --> 02:24:29,230
Was that not like somewhat trauma inducing to have like people showing up all the time?

2791
02:24:29,670 --> 02:24:32,070
I don't know, we were all pretty comfortable with it.

2792
02:24:32,130 --> 02:24:32,810
We knew who they were.

2793
02:24:33,250 --> 02:24:34,530
Yeah, and you're not on the street.

2794
02:24:34,530 --> 02:24:38,090
Like this is one notch above living on the street.

2795
02:24:38,310 --> 02:24:40,550
Oh yeah, I'd say more than one notch, a couple notches.

2796
02:24:41,070 --> 02:24:46,590
You know, it was not a place I think most people would want to live.

2797
02:24:46,590 --> 02:24:48,890
Would your parents come downtown and visit you there?

2798
02:24:49,630 --> 02:24:55,890
I feel like my mother might've seen it once and was probably horrified by the whole thing.

2799
02:24:56,770 --> 02:24:57,650
Dad never came by?

2800
02:24:58,270 --> 02:25:00,050
He might have come by.

2801
02:25:00,370 --> 02:25:03,290
So the relationship with dad is still kind of, sounds like pretty distant here.

2802
02:25:03,290 --> 02:25:06,330
It was difficult to get them to come.

2803
02:25:06,870 --> 02:25:14,210
If I had an art show, I really had to like voice my opinion that I wanted them there.

2804
02:25:14,350 --> 02:25:14,690
Wow.

2805
02:25:14,890 --> 02:25:17,030
For them to come and show interest.

2806
02:25:17,550 --> 02:25:17,670
Yeah.

2807
02:25:17,810 --> 02:25:21,170
And that was a pretty common thing.

2808
02:25:21,310 --> 02:25:21,510
Yeah.

2809
02:25:21,630 --> 02:25:21,790
Yeah.

2810
02:25:22,530 --> 02:25:24,210
I don't think they really related.

2811
02:25:24,350 --> 02:25:26,470
I was very different than they were.

2812
02:25:26,710 --> 02:25:27,010
Wow.

2813
02:25:27,310 --> 02:25:30,510
So I don't know if we really related to each other very much.

2814
02:25:31,630 --> 02:25:31,770
Yeah.

2815
02:25:31,770 --> 02:25:37,510
Even the straight edge thing was quite a different thing for your dad doing lines of Coke and when he gets to his job in the mornings.

2816
02:25:37,850 --> 02:25:37,950
Yeah.

2817
02:25:37,990 --> 02:25:41,750
For me, I think it was a way of rebelling against my father.

2818
02:25:41,890 --> 02:25:42,290
Yeah.

2819
02:25:42,430 --> 02:25:44,910
To be like just different than he was.

2820
02:25:45,070 --> 02:25:45,370
Yeah.

2821
02:25:45,590 --> 02:25:45,810
Yeah.

2822
02:25:45,890 --> 02:25:47,510
How interesting that is, isn't it?

2823
02:25:47,810 --> 02:25:58,290
You know, you often see the kid that falls into abusing drugs as a form of rebellion, but here you have a drug abusing parent and your form of rebellion is sobriety.

2824
02:25:59,610 --> 02:26:00,810
In a way, I think.

2825
02:26:00,810 --> 02:26:02,550
It certainly had something to do with it.

2826
02:26:02,770 --> 02:26:03,210
Wow.

2827
02:26:03,450 --> 02:26:04,230
That's amazing.

2828
02:26:05,490 --> 02:26:05,610
Yeah.

2829
02:26:05,750 --> 02:26:17,730
So parental advice for everyone listening, if you want, do be a functional alcoholic and casually consume just about any drug put in front of you.

2830
02:26:17,730 --> 02:26:20,390
Ignore your kids so when you open the closet, they flip their diaper shit at you.

2831
02:26:20,930 --> 02:26:21,370
Okay.

2832
02:26:21,570 --> 02:26:21,870
Okay.

2833
02:26:21,990 --> 02:26:22,290
Okay.

2834
02:26:22,330 --> 02:26:23,970
We have a nice portrait of your 20s.

2835
02:26:24,070 --> 02:26:39,610
I know there was another big decade before we get into your 40s and I know there's a book that orients the decade around us a little bit and I know we're going to touch on it tangentially and we've done this way, but that book I just want to introduce to people is called Alaska by James A.

2836
02:26:39,970 --> 02:26:40,190
Michener.

2837
02:26:40,290 --> 02:26:43,450
M-I-C-H-E-N-E-R.

2838
02:26:44,110 --> 02:26:44,310
Yeah.

2839
02:26:44,530 --> 02:26:46,330
My father's favorite author.

2840
02:26:46,590 --> 02:26:46,850
Really?

2841
02:26:48,090 --> 02:26:52,010
I grew up seeing his books, James Michener's books.

2842
02:26:52,710 --> 02:26:53,290
On your bookshelf.

2843
02:26:53,550 --> 02:26:55,030
Yeah, on my father's bookshelves.

2844
02:26:55,810 --> 02:26:56,630
Many of them.

2845
02:26:56,750 --> 02:26:57,890
He was a prolific author.

2846
02:26:58,110 --> 02:26:58,270
Yeah.

2847
02:26:58,270 --> 02:27:00,750
He had a team that helped him write and research.

2848
02:27:00,950 --> 02:27:07,550
He lived, here's another thing, he lived 1907 to 1997, another sort of numerical thing.

2849
02:27:07,670 --> 02:27:16,810
He wrote 40 books, most of which were long fictional family sagas covering many generations set in particular geographic locales where he incorporated detailed history.

2850
02:27:16,930 --> 02:27:17,210
Yes.

2851
02:27:17,690 --> 02:27:25,510
In the sweeping epic of the northernmost frontier, Michener guides us through Alaska's fierce terrain and history from the long forgotten past to the bustling present.

2852
02:27:25,890 --> 02:27:41,770
As his characters struggle for survival, he weaves together exciting high points of Alaska's story, its brutal origins, the American acquisition, the gold rush, the growth and exploitation of salmon, the arduous construction of the Alcan Highway undertaken to defend the territory during World War II.

2853
02:27:42,090 --> 02:27:54,950
As spellbinding portrait of a human community fighting to establish its place and voice in the world, Alaska traces a bold majestic saga of the enduring spirit of the land and its people.

2854
02:27:54,950 --> 02:27:58,970
Files 10813.54 for literature slash 20th century fiction.

2855
02:27:59,470 --> 02:28:04,610
Take us into this book and to your 30s in the life of Lewis Mallard today.

2856
02:28:04,890 --> 02:28:13,890
Well, I mean, I'd always seen these books on my dad's shelves, never read one.

2857
02:28:14,930 --> 02:28:17,290
I still haven't literally read one.

2858
02:28:17,850 --> 02:28:19,770
Only listened to many of them.

2859
02:28:19,930 --> 02:28:20,290
That counts.

2860
02:28:20,570 --> 02:28:20,850
Yes.

2861
02:28:21,410 --> 02:28:22,710
You have read Alaska.

2862
02:28:23,370 --> 02:28:24,710
I've listened to it a couple times.

2863
02:28:24,710 --> 02:28:25,890
That counts.

2864
02:28:26,350 --> 02:28:28,190
And I chose this particular book.

2865
02:28:28,470 --> 02:28:40,350
I mean, I would have just chosen the author had you given me the opportunity because although I didn't love every single one of his books, Alaska was one that I quite enjoyed.

2866
02:28:41,610 --> 02:28:42,790
Hawaii was another.

2867
02:28:43,230 --> 02:28:43,330
Hawaii.

2868
02:28:44,010 --> 02:28:46,170
Chesapeake, the source.

2869
02:28:47,750 --> 02:28:48,870
There's been...

2870
02:28:48,870 --> 02:28:50,810
Turkey vultures or red-tailed hawks are circling us.

2871
02:28:50,890 --> 02:28:51,570
I'm just noticing that.

2872
02:28:51,910 --> 02:28:52,130
Yeah.

2873
02:28:52,270 --> 02:28:53,410
No dead pigeons around us.

2874
02:28:53,410 --> 02:28:55,990
No, or mallards, thankfully.

2875
02:28:56,530 --> 02:29:07,070
And so I didn't start consuming Michener until I was in my, well, very late 30s, just about to turn 40.

2876
02:29:07,830 --> 02:29:09,810
When I was living, I had moved back.

2877
02:29:09,930 --> 02:29:15,550
I'd moved to Hamilton to move in with my father and become a caregiver as he was approaching the end of his life.

2878
02:29:16,890 --> 02:29:18,570
How did you know it was the end of his life?

2879
02:29:19,350 --> 02:29:20,170
What happened?

2880
02:29:20,290 --> 02:29:20,890
Was there an incident?

2881
02:29:20,890 --> 02:29:26,130
He was getting, he had dementia and it was getting progressively worse.

2882
02:29:26,470 --> 02:29:30,810
My sister lived in Hamilton, lived in the same house as my father.

2883
02:29:31,190 --> 02:29:33,450
She had moved my father into the house that she bought.

2884
02:29:34,230 --> 02:29:35,810
It was a two-unit house.

2885
02:29:35,930 --> 02:29:40,010
So she was living upstairs with her partner and a newborn baby.

2886
02:29:40,490 --> 02:29:43,490
My father was living downstairs on the ground floor.

2887
02:29:45,030 --> 02:29:52,970
Can I ask what compelled you to be a chief full-time caregiver for a parent that doesn't sound like he was that for you ever?

2888
02:29:55,450 --> 02:30:01,330
I didn't see that I had any other choices that I could live with myself with.

2889
02:30:03,870 --> 02:30:09,350
I was living in Toronto with a, well, now ex-girlfriend.

2890
02:30:11,090 --> 02:30:15,570
I was in a very confusing point in my life.

2891
02:30:15,570 --> 02:30:27,210
I had quit my full-time job working for the YMCA, moving up through that organization, managing a group fitness department.

2892
02:30:27,390 --> 02:30:29,650
I was very unsatisfied with my life.

2893
02:30:29,990 --> 02:30:32,330
I was making half-decent money.

2894
02:30:32,950 --> 02:30:38,230
I had a salary, had benefits, had job security, and had a clear path forward.

2895
02:30:38,310 --> 02:30:39,170
What were you doing for the Y?

2896
02:30:39,530 --> 02:30:43,570
I was managing fitness instructors, training staff.

2897
02:30:45,230 --> 02:30:46,690
Outside the artistic world.

2898
02:30:47,390 --> 02:30:51,530
Yeah, this is a period of my life where I was not really creating much.

2899
02:30:52,790 --> 02:30:53,690
The collective fell apart?

2900
02:30:54,010 --> 02:31:03,610
The collective didn't fall apart, but in our 30s, we had moved on to other things that we could actually make money in.

2901
02:31:07,650 --> 02:31:18,770
I, you know, in my 30s, I was like, well, art, I was working part-time jobs that were go-nowhere things, and I needed to make adult money.

2902
02:31:19,810 --> 02:31:21,990
And I always enjoyed the YMCA.

2903
02:31:22,490 --> 02:31:24,170
I grew up in a YMCA, essentially.

2904
02:31:25,090 --> 02:31:27,790
And I had great memories of being in a YMCA.

2905
02:31:28,130 --> 02:31:35,670
And so I became a member of this particular Y, and enjoyed the environment.

2906
02:31:36,350 --> 02:31:42,210
And I was on a, I didn't realize at the time, but I was on a journey kind of discovering myself as an athlete.

2907
02:31:45,230 --> 02:31:47,710
And I tried running, I didn't like it.

2908
02:31:48,270 --> 02:31:54,790
I got into spin class and thought, I like it, I just don't like the way it's taught.

2909
02:31:55,990 --> 02:31:58,370
You disagreed with the pedagogy.

2910
02:31:58,630 --> 02:32:00,730
And I thought, I could teach this better.

2911
02:32:02,490 --> 02:32:11,050
And so eventually I was enough of a regular in the class that I got recruited by a staff member to be a volunteer, which is something the YMCA does.

2912
02:32:11,690 --> 02:32:15,330
They love volunteers, and they recruit them.

2913
02:32:15,710 --> 02:32:17,630
Not many people, not many organizations do that.

2914
02:32:18,450 --> 02:32:19,190
Not that I know of.

2915
02:32:19,370 --> 02:32:19,490
Yeah.

2916
02:32:21,110 --> 02:32:23,670
So you were a volunteer spin instructor.

2917
02:32:23,690 --> 02:32:26,050
I really liked the Y, and I became a volunteer spin instructor.

2918
02:32:27,530 --> 02:32:32,570
And it was a challenge to myself to get over a fear of public speaking.

2919
02:32:32,890 --> 02:32:33,490
Oh, wow.

2920
02:32:33,550 --> 02:32:35,490
Because you had a little lav mic on probably.

2921
02:32:36,730 --> 02:32:39,050
Yeah, that or I just used my voice.

2922
02:32:39,190 --> 02:32:39,450
I projected my voice.

2923
02:32:39,450 --> 02:32:41,090
What didn't you like about how spinning was taught?

2924
02:32:41,130 --> 02:32:42,310
I've only been to one spin class.

2925
02:32:42,390 --> 02:32:43,810
I didn't like that it was hard and I quit.

2926
02:32:44,130 --> 02:32:44,890
What did you didn't like?

2927
02:32:44,970 --> 02:32:46,210
Well, you didn't like the way it was taught.

2928
02:32:46,450 --> 02:32:49,950
I didn't like the music and the way the program was delivered.

2929
02:32:50,250 --> 02:32:51,490
Oh, what was wrong?

2930
02:32:51,630 --> 02:32:51,890
Why?

2931
02:32:52,390 --> 02:32:53,810
I didn't know what I didn't like about it.

2932
02:32:53,870 --> 02:32:54,570
I just knew I didn't like it.

2933
02:32:54,570 --> 02:32:55,630
You knew you didn't like it, okay.

2934
02:32:55,630 --> 02:32:58,270
I mean, the surface level was I didn't like the type of music.

2935
02:32:58,860 --> 02:33:07,990
But I also knew that the type of music I wanted to ride my bike hard to would not be the type of music that the general public would enjoy riding their bike to.

2936
02:33:09,090 --> 02:33:12,650
But it wasn't straight edge metal.

2937
02:33:12,930 --> 02:33:13,750
No, no, no.

2938
02:33:14,030 --> 02:33:17,270
At this point, I wasn't listening to hardcore straight edge.

2939
02:33:17,270 --> 02:33:18,630
I know, I'm just joking, I'm just joking.

2940
02:33:19,370 --> 02:33:21,770
Trying to do a callback to the one genre we've talked about.

2941
02:33:24,790 --> 02:33:29,230
So when I did get my own class, I just copied in the beginning.

2942
02:33:29,370 --> 02:33:31,650
I just mimicked what other instructors did so I could learn.

2943
02:33:31,950 --> 02:33:35,130
For me, getting over the fear of talking was the biggest hurdle.

2944
02:33:36,010 --> 02:33:42,310
And once I was comfortable delivering a program and confident, I could start to be myself.

2945
02:33:43,510 --> 02:33:55,370
And then once I learned how to be myself and deliver a class the way that I wanted one, I was also at the same time, I was becoming an avid outdoor cyclist.

2946
02:33:55,430 --> 02:33:59,130
I was learning about road cycling, off-road cycling, racing.

2947
02:33:59,830 --> 02:34:02,030
I was making friends in the cycling community. I was becoming a very-

2948
02:34:02,330 --> 02:34:04,830
So you're in Hamilton or Toronto?

2949
02:34:04,910 --> 02:34:05,130
Toronto.

2950
02:34:05,510 --> 02:34:07,090
College in Davenport.

2951
02:34:08,170 --> 02:34:08,910
Dover Court.

2952
02:34:09,270 --> 02:34:09,410
Okay.

2953
02:34:09,770 --> 02:34:14,730
So you're cycling, you're volunteering at the Y.

2954
02:34:15,070 --> 02:34:15,230
Yeah.

2955
02:34:15,230 --> 02:34:16,410
Dad gets sick.

2956
02:34:16,530 --> 02:34:21,570
I started working at, well, and I started working at the Y in the aquatics department.

2957
02:34:21,770 --> 02:34:27,650
I wanted to work in the group fitness department, but I didn't have a degree in physical education, which they required.

2958
02:34:27,970 --> 02:34:28,450
Oh my gosh.

2959
02:34:28,490 --> 02:34:34,230
So here they go from being a volunteer organization, A, and B, now you need a kinesiology degree to work.

2960
02:34:34,230 --> 02:34:35,810
To work full-time in the fitness department.

2961
02:34:35,910 --> 02:34:36,750
That's what they asked for.

2962
02:34:36,850 --> 02:34:37,350
Wow, okay.

2963
02:34:38,250 --> 02:34:39,130
Leveling up here.

2964
02:34:39,290 --> 02:34:43,650
And so I decided I wanted to work here.

2965
02:34:43,950 --> 02:34:44,950
I liked the building.

2966
02:34:45,330 --> 02:34:47,030
I wanted to be there more.

2967
02:34:47,210 --> 02:34:49,030
So I got in in the aquatics department.

2968
02:34:49,310 --> 02:34:52,350
I learned how to swim well enough to become a lifeguard.

2969
02:34:53,290 --> 02:34:56,550
I basically had a chat with There was one woman there-

2970
02:34:57,350 --> 02:34:59,670
Self-taught swimming. That's hard.

2971
02:34:59,790 --> 02:35:01,270
Who I admired.

2972
02:35:01,950 --> 02:35:03,710
She was in upper management.

2973
02:35:03,890 --> 02:35:08,050
We became friends, and she wanted me to work there.

2974
02:35:08,150 --> 02:35:14,730
She saw something in me, and she said, look, I can't hire you like this, but if you get your lifeguarding, I can hire you as a lifeguard.

2975
02:35:14,770 --> 02:35:15,790
How'd you get a lifeguarding then?

2976
02:35:16,130 --> 02:35:17,350
Like, I- I took the courses.

2977
02:35:17,790 --> 02:35:18,670
You just kept going until you got it.

2978
02:35:18,670 --> 02:35:23,910
Well, I was starting to get into swimming, because I thought it would be good cross-training for my cycling.

2979
02:35:24,150 --> 02:35:26,110
I felt like I was plateauing in cycling.

2980
02:35:27,490 --> 02:35:31,170
And I knew how to swim, but I didn't know how to be an efficient swimmer.

2981
02:35:31,250 --> 02:35:33,550
I hadn't learned, like, really proper technique.

2982
02:35:35,750 --> 02:35:44,310
And there was a guy at the Y who was a lifeguard, an older gentleman, who was an ex-swim instructor, a high-level swim instructor.

2983
02:35:45,330 --> 02:35:47,290
And so he offered to show me.

2984
02:35:47,570 --> 02:35:52,250
So I would come in and swim when he was lifeguarding, and he would just teach me how to be a better swimmer.

2985
02:35:52,770 --> 02:35:58,330
And as I learned how to swim properly, with good form and efficient, I really enjoyed it. I thought it was-

2986
02:35:58,510 --> 02:36:01,750
Man, you're inspiring me.

2987
02:36:01,850 --> 02:36:05,990
I was swimming at a level that I couldn't, I wouldn't have believed I could have swim at.

2988
02:36:09,430 --> 02:36:15,790
And, and so this woman, Ika, she noticed my, me swimming, and thought that, you know, this guy's a good swimmer.

2989
02:36:15,830 --> 02:36:16,990
He could easily become a lifeguard.

2990
02:36:17,110 --> 02:36:17,330
Yeah.

2991
02:36:18,170 --> 02:36:21,190
And so she encouraged me to go get my lifeguarding. In my early thirties, it was uncomfortable to get it because I was only around-

2992
02:36:22,250 --> 02:36:29,790
The oldest kid, probably.

2993
02:36:30,030 --> 02:36:30,590
By far.

2994
02:36:30,850 --> 02:36:31,070
Yeah.

2995
02:36:31,430 --> 02:36:32,990
It's all like teenagers, right?

2996
02:36:33,090 --> 02:36:33,410
Yes.

2997
02:36:33,690 --> 02:36:39,670
There's one other guy who was as old as me, who had to get his lifeguarding for work.

2998
02:36:40,150 --> 02:36:43,050
And so we kind of just bonded, and we became each other's partners.

2999
02:36:43,770 --> 02:36:46,050
He was a hulking, like, 230-pound dude.

3000
02:36:47,010 --> 02:36:52,230
And for reference, I'm like 160 pounds, soaking wet.

3001
02:36:54,010 --> 02:36:55,470
I'm 170.

3002
02:36:55,970 --> 02:36:57,570
You're a lot taller than me.

3003
02:36:57,810 --> 02:36:59,310
I got a lot of chub compared to you.

3004
02:36:59,850 --> 02:37:01,070
I'm built like a bird.

3005
02:37:01,330 --> 02:37:02,810
I'm built like a bird.

3006
02:37:03,170 --> 02:37:04,030
You are a bird.

3007
02:37:04,070 --> 02:37:05,010
I've got thin bones.

3008
02:37:05,290 --> 02:37:06,330
I got thin bones.

3009
02:37:06,330 --> 02:37:09,330
I'm like, I've got my mother's frame.

3010
02:37:09,530 --> 02:37:10,930
I got thin bones.

3011
02:37:10,970 --> 02:37:11,350
I do.

3012
02:37:11,810 --> 02:37:13,370
I've never heard anyone say that before.

3013
02:37:13,790 --> 02:37:15,050
I'm built like a bird.

3014
02:37:15,370 --> 02:37:15,590
Yeah.

3015
02:37:15,810 --> 02:37:16,810
I noticed your legs.

3016
02:37:17,470 --> 02:37:20,450
That was one of the first things I noticed about you, the orange spandex.

3017
02:37:20,590 --> 02:37:20,730
Thanks.

3018
02:37:20,730 --> 02:37:24,490
Yeah, and it's also like, you know, you're pretty close to, like, testicular level there.

3019
02:37:24,730 --> 02:37:28,850
I mean, a duck paper mache costume doesn't go as low as you might think.

3020
02:37:28,970 --> 02:37:30,850
You got, you're revealing a lot about yourself.

3021
02:37:31,290 --> 02:37:35,930
2.0 and 3.0, I built to be lower than 1.0.

3022
02:37:36,070 --> 02:37:37,210
Because what was happening?

3023
02:37:37,590 --> 02:37:48,310
People were noticing stuff. I saw photos of myself in the costume where there was just a little too much junk showing.

3024
02:37:49,570 --> 02:37:56,690
On a hot summer day, you know, the onesie, the orange onesie gets real hot.

3025
02:37:58,450 --> 02:38:02,130
And I could see that I was uncircumcised.

3026
02:38:03,330 --> 02:38:04,410
Or sorry, circumcised.

3027
02:38:04,410 --> 02:38:07,070
I could see that I was circumcised in a photo.

3028
02:38:07,790 --> 02:38:09,710
And I was like, oh, dear.

3029
02:38:09,710 --> 02:38:12,050
I like that the error was that you were uncircumcised.

3030
02:38:12,310 --> 02:38:14,150
I could see that I was uncircumcised.

3031
02:38:14,610 --> 02:38:16,450
I could see that I was, I would see that I was circumcised.

3032
02:38:16,590 --> 02:38:17,690
Oh, we're getting a lot of looks right now.

3033
02:38:18,070 --> 02:38:22,390
And I thought like, okay, that's not what I didn't mean.

3034
02:38:22,390 --> 02:38:24,310
That's not how you maintain a secret identity.

3035
02:38:24,670 --> 02:38:25,690
Yeah, and so.

3036
02:38:26,130 --> 02:38:29,450
Okay, he's Jewish, he's Muslim, he's born in the seventies.

3037
02:38:30,790 --> 02:38:36,450
And so I was like, all right, well, when I remake this costume, I need to make it a little bit lower.

3038
02:38:36,470 --> 02:38:38,070
Oh my gosh, you are so funny.

3039
02:38:38,530 --> 02:38:41,950
Although, you know, it's like, I'm not necessarily shy about it.

3040
02:38:42,050 --> 02:38:42,790
It's not a big deal.

3041
02:38:42,790 --> 02:38:48,850
But I also, you know, I didn't make it for kids, but kids really like it.

3042
02:38:49,190 --> 02:38:51,610
And it's not a bad thing to be kid friendly.

3043
02:38:52,010 --> 02:38:54,290
I talk about you with my kids all the time.

3044
02:38:54,330 --> 02:38:55,490
They are obsessed with you.

3045
02:38:55,810 --> 02:38:56,950
I hope it's not annoying.

3046
02:38:57,310 --> 02:38:58,250
No, they love you.

3047
02:38:58,630 --> 02:39:00,730
I'm gonna buy a bunch of these hats for them.

3048
02:39:01,230 --> 02:39:02,450
Where if they're for sale.

3049
02:39:02,590 --> 02:39:02,830
Yes.

3050
02:39:03,070 --> 02:39:04,090
How much was it as a hat?

3051
02:39:05,130 --> 02:39:06,750
It's a good quality ball cap, by the way.

3052
02:39:07,710 --> 02:39:08,110
$35.

3053
02:39:08,550 --> 02:39:10,330
Oh, that's a deal for that hat.

3054
02:39:10,330 --> 02:39:12,070
That's a really nice.

3055
02:39:12,690 --> 02:39:13,630
Who are you waving at here?

3056
02:39:14,270 --> 02:39:15,350
You know everybody going by.

3057
02:39:15,350 --> 02:39:16,750
It was a friend of mine.

3058
02:39:17,350 --> 02:39:18,570
Does he know your secret identity?

3059
02:39:18,970 --> 02:39:19,350
Yes.

3060
02:39:19,490 --> 02:39:21,710
Oh, so how do you decide who you tell your secret identity to?

3061
02:39:21,890 --> 02:39:23,110
I've known him for a lot of years.

3062
02:39:23,210 --> 02:39:24,090
I used to ride bikes with him.

3063
02:39:24,130 --> 02:39:25,190
Gotta know you for a lot of years.

3064
02:39:25,510 --> 02:39:25,910
Start with that.

3065
02:39:25,950 --> 02:39:26,570
Not necessarily.

3066
02:39:26,790 --> 02:39:27,010
Okay.

3067
02:39:28,290 --> 02:39:38,070
But he's just somebody I know and like, and you know, he knew me before Lewis, and he saw Lewis come to life on social media.

3068
02:39:38,310 --> 02:39:39,710
Okay, okay, nice.

3069
02:39:40,670 --> 02:39:41,650
Your dad's sick.

3070
02:39:41,790 --> 02:39:42,730
He's got dementia.

3071
02:39:42,930 --> 02:39:43,870
You move back home.

3072
02:39:44,070 --> 02:39:45,410
You leave the life in Toronto.

3073
02:39:45,630 --> 02:39:50,350
I'm at a point where I wanted to, I desperately wanted to change something about my life.

3074
02:39:50,510 --> 02:39:52,450
I wanted to be making art again.

3075
02:39:52,550 --> 02:39:53,710
I wanted to be an artist again.

3076
02:39:54,430 --> 02:39:56,210
I felt like I.

3077
02:39:56,330 --> 02:39:59,990
But I'm stuck here, because you said, it's the only way I could live with myself.

3078
02:40:00,090 --> 02:40:05,970
I said, why are you becoming chief caregiver for a person who, no offense, doesn't seem like he was ever chief caregiver for you.

3079
02:40:06,110 --> 02:40:06,290
Well.

3080
02:40:06,350 --> 02:40:08,270
And you said, it's the only way I could live with myself.

3081
02:40:08,530 --> 02:40:09,470
Like, so why is that?

3082
02:40:09,470 --> 02:40:15,470
A lot of people in your situation would say, you know, I didn't have a strong relationship, or, you know, that person was not in my life.

3083
02:40:15,530 --> 02:40:22,810
But you were like, moving back home, abandoning the cycling kind of, the YMCA job that you had making money, as your full-time gig.

3084
02:40:22,970 --> 02:40:25,770
You're moving back home to be chief caregiver for your dying father.

3085
02:40:25,910 --> 02:40:27,350
Like, I'm not, I'm not challenging you.

3086
02:40:27,410 --> 02:40:29,130
I'm just curious about your decision making here.

3087
02:40:29,390 --> 02:40:39,650
So also, at the time, the woman I was with, I think she realized that I was about to go into a very difficult time in my life.

3088
02:40:40,070 --> 02:40:43,430
And she broke up with me.

3089
02:40:43,830 --> 02:40:45,350
I was living in her condo.

3090
02:40:45,890 --> 02:40:47,810
I was unemployed.

3091
02:40:48,650 --> 02:40:49,570
No, sorry.

3092
02:40:50,910 --> 02:40:52,130
You're not working at the Y?

3093
02:40:52,250 --> 02:40:53,270
I was not working at the Y.

3094
02:40:53,310 --> 02:40:56,490
I was working in my friend's bike painting shop.

3095
02:40:56,610 --> 02:40:56,870
Okay.

3096
02:40:56,930 --> 02:40:57,730
I was painting bikes.

3097
02:40:58,090 --> 02:41:02,470
Very niche job.

3098
02:41:04,870 --> 02:41:06,810
And I wasn't happy there either.

3099
02:41:06,810 --> 02:41:08,990
I wasn't making art.

3100
02:41:09,170 --> 02:41:11,730
I was making beautiful objects.

3101
02:41:12,810 --> 02:41:13,830
And I thought that would be enough.

3102
02:41:13,890 --> 02:41:22,550
If I could make a living using my hands, making an extremely high-end product, I thought it would be enough.

3103
02:41:22,650 --> 02:41:23,570
And it really wasn't.

3104
02:41:24,030 --> 02:41:38,610
And so, when my father got to a point where my sister couldn't manage by herself anymore, and this relationship was clearly ending, and I was already spending a lot of my time in Hamilton.

3105
02:41:38,810 --> 02:41:43,430
I would go to Hamilton every weekend, and I would cook a week's worth of food for my father.

3106
02:41:44,330 --> 02:41:49,150
And I would package it up, and my sister would give it to him.

3107
02:41:49,630 --> 02:41:54,790
So he was no longer able to take his medication or cook for himself.

3108
02:41:57,450 --> 02:42:05,030
And so I thought, I've got to move out of this condo I'm living in in the Roncesvalles area.

3109
02:42:06,090 --> 02:42:11,810
And I don't want to pay Toronto rent to spend all my free time in Hamilton working a job I hate.

3110
02:42:12,990 --> 02:42:22,150
And also, my sister and I could not afford to put my dad in any type of home or anything like that.

3111
02:42:22,590 --> 02:42:26,590
So my father did not save for retirement.

3112
02:42:26,630 --> 02:42:27,110
Where's your mom?

3113
02:42:27,510 --> 02:42:29,010
Oh, she's not around.

3114
02:42:29,190 --> 02:42:30,830
No, my mom's gone at this point.

3115
02:42:31,350 --> 02:42:31,630
Gone?

3116
02:42:31,970 --> 02:42:32,250
Cancer.

3117
02:42:32,810 --> 02:42:33,690
Oh, I'm sorry.

3118
02:42:33,850 --> 02:42:34,170
That's okay.

3119
02:42:34,290 --> 02:42:34,970
You mean she's dead?

3120
02:42:35,450 --> 02:42:37,830
Yeah, happened in my 30s, early 30s.

3121
02:42:37,930 --> 02:42:39,890
You weren't caring for her at the end of her life, though.

3122
02:42:39,930 --> 02:42:41,530
We did a little bit.

3123
02:42:41,650 --> 02:42:46,290
She was married to a guy.

3124
02:42:46,410 --> 02:42:47,310
She lived in Port Dover.

3125
02:42:48,830 --> 02:42:53,110
And she hid her cancer from my sister and I up until near the end.

3126
02:42:54,350 --> 02:42:58,550
I got a call from her one day basically saying, sit down, I gotta tell you something.

3127
02:42:59,270 --> 02:43:00,910
I just had a double mastectomy.

3128
02:43:01,350 --> 02:43:02,390
I've had breast cancer.

3129
02:43:03,010 --> 02:43:03,850
It's gone.

3130
02:43:04,190 --> 02:43:12,110
I've healed from the double mastectomy and the doctors have just found chronic lymphatic leukemia and say I've got five years to live.

3131
02:43:13,670 --> 02:43:18,350
And so all this information was dropped on my sister and I in a casual conversation with her mother.

3132
02:43:19,510 --> 02:43:27,390
And we were both pretty upset about it because she didn't even give us an opportunity to be there for her.

3133
02:43:28,890 --> 02:43:30,210
I was closer with my mom.

3134
02:43:32,930 --> 02:43:38,010
But after that, I took every opportunity I could to be with her, to spend more time.

3135
02:43:43,490 --> 02:43:49,110
I tried to build like a bit more of a meaningful relationship with her.

3136
02:43:51,210 --> 02:43:51,830
It's okay.

3137
02:43:53,450 --> 02:43:54,350
It's pretty serious.

3138
02:43:58,440 --> 02:43:58,960
It's okay.

3139
02:43:59,300 --> 02:43:59,780
Go get them.

3140
02:44:02,600 --> 02:44:08,960
And although she lived a little bit away it wasn't always easy to go and see her but I went as much as I could.

3141
02:44:09,140 --> 02:44:13,620
And the closer she got to the end the more time I spent with her.

3142
02:44:16,040 --> 02:44:18,660
I kind of like this philosophy you have.

3143
02:44:18,780 --> 02:44:19,600
I agree with it.

3144
02:44:19,680 --> 02:44:27,280
I'm from Eastern cultures where parent-child relationships often in India historically, it's like they're living together.

3145
02:44:27,700 --> 02:44:31,420
I don't expect to live with my parents at this stage and age of my life.

3146
02:44:31,500 --> 02:44:32,360
I don't know what will happen.

3147
02:44:32,460 --> 02:44:35,080
They're both alive but in their seventies, not but, but are.

3148
02:44:35,840 --> 02:44:40,880
But I like this philosophy you have which is as much time as I can spend before they die.

3149
02:44:40,960 --> 02:44:42,120
This is a thing you have.

3150
02:44:42,460 --> 02:44:42,820
I tried.

3151
02:44:43,920 --> 02:44:45,320
Where's that coming from though?

3152
02:44:45,380 --> 02:44:47,860
Like you have this sense of, it's not obligation.

3153
02:44:48,120 --> 02:44:49,060
It seems like desire.

3154
02:44:49,600 --> 02:44:53,840
You are trying to soak up the relationship as much as you can.

3155
02:44:54,440 --> 02:44:54,840
Yeah.

3156
02:44:54,940 --> 02:45:01,020
To make sure that for the rest of your life you can look back on those years and say, I did as much as I could.

3157
02:45:01,060 --> 02:45:03,120
I was connected to my family as deeply as I could.

3158
02:45:03,120 --> 02:45:06,040
Is that the thought or the feeling?

3159
02:45:08,100 --> 02:45:13,440
I wish that I would have, it would have mattered to me more when I was younger or that I thought about it.

3160
02:45:13,560 --> 02:45:14,100
Oh, I see.

3161
02:45:15,700 --> 02:45:20,140
Because I didn't have a very strong relationship with either parent.

3162
02:45:22,500 --> 02:45:26,260
It was almost like we were roommates more than anything.

3163
02:45:26,580 --> 02:45:29,860
That's how I felt with my wife before my divorce, my first wife.

3164
02:45:29,940 --> 02:45:30,280
Yeah.

3165
02:45:30,800 --> 02:45:32,160
That was the exact word I used.

3166
02:45:32,260 --> 02:45:32,880
We were like roommates.

3167
02:45:33,740 --> 02:45:33,940
Yeah.

3168
02:45:35,820 --> 02:45:41,340
But also, I think that that was kind of natural for them too.

3169
02:45:41,860 --> 02:45:44,440
It was just the way their family life was too.

3170
02:45:45,160 --> 02:45:52,940
There was a lot of stuff going on in my family that my sister and I never understood, never had an opportunity to understand.

3171
02:45:54,320 --> 02:45:59,360
My mother was estranged from her mother and we never knew why.

3172
02:46:00,040 --> 02:46:06,780
And many of her siblings were, and relatives on my mom's side, there was a lot of estrangement going on there.

3173
02:46:07,380 --> 02:46:08,120
A lot of trauma.

3174
02:46:08,360 --> 02:46:11,340
Nobody ever talked about how, when, where or why it came from.

3175
02:46:13,020 --> 02:46:14,400
And I still don't know.

3176
02:46:15,060 --> 02:46:19,580
My sister and I just kind of left to guess about this kind of thing.

3177
02:46:20,000 --> 02:46:20,820
Thank God for siblings.

3178
02:46:21,980 --> 02:46:22,240
Yeah.

3179
02:46:23,780 --> 02:46:31,480
And so, I feel like I was fortunate to get to be with my mother when she died.

3180
02:46:33,500 --> 02:46:34,460
And your father.

3181
02:46:34,780 --> 02:46:36,960
Yeah, and I was touching both of them.

3182
02:46:37,400 --> 02:46:39,180
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

3183
02:46:39,940 --> 02:46:44,420
And your mama sounds like in your earlier 30s, your dad in your late 30s.

3184
02:46:44,700 --> 02:46:44,920
Yeah.

3185
02:46:45,040 --> 02:46:48,640
What age did you switch from straight edge and why?

3186
02:46:50,340 --> 02:46:52,140
It was when I was 36.

3187
02:46:53,000 --> 02:46:54,900
What changed your mind about that?

3188
02:46:54,940 --> 02:46:56,900
Your mama died, your dad was still around.

3189
02:46:56,900 --> 02:46:57,460
Yeah.

3190
02:47:00,000 --> 02:47:13,200
I had started dating somebody that, I think it was a bigger part of her life, the consumption of drugs and alcohol, but not in a toxic way.

3191
02:47:13,420 --> 02:47:15,440
It just was something that she did responsibly.

3192
02:47:16,220 --> 02:47:22,220
And I hadn't met many people who responsibly consumed substances.

3193
02:47:22,840 --> 02:47:28,080
I was very much of the mindset that if you're drinking, you're getting wasted.

3194
02:47:28,380 --> 02:47:31,120
If you're doing drugs, you're getting fucked up.

3195
02:47:32,600 --> 02:47:36,660
And I was kind of, I wasn't interested in getting wasted or getting fucked up.

3196
02:47:39,560 --> 02:47:45,920
And so, with this partner, I felt comfortable enough to experiment.

3197
02:47:46,700 --> 02:47:50,700
I had been thinking about trying things.

3198
02:47:50,840 --> 02:47:54,400
I had started to be curious about altered states of consciousness.

3199
02:47:57,060 --> 02:48:01,560
And so, I felt comfortable just trying.

3200
02:48:01,980 --> 02:48:09,320
For the longest time, it was such a part of my identity that I was identified as straight edge or just somebody who didn't consume intoxicants.

3201
02:48:10,240 --> 02:48:17,520
I didn't even really consume caffeine that much, aside from a little bit in soda pop or something like that.

3202
02:48:20,300 --> 02:48:26,620
And so, I started very slowly and tried a little bit of this, a little bit of that.

3203
02:48:27,780 --> 02:48:30,780
And some things I liked.

3204
02:48:31,560 --> 02:48:33,220
Some things I thought were okay.

3205
02:48:33,960 --> 02:48:36,320
At this time, marijuana was still illegal.

3206
02:48:36,820 --> 02:48:46,640
And I couldn't believe, when I got high for my first time and I got drunk for my first time, afterwards, I thought, I can't believe that alcohol is the legal one.

3207
02:48:48,340 --> 02:48:50,680
Because that one feels so much more destructive.

3208
02:48:51,260 --> 02:48:52,840
To me, it felt extremely destructive.

3209
02:48:53,100 --> 02:48:55,000
Oh, I know exactly what you're talking about.

3210
02:48:55,660 --> 02:48:58,160
I can't believe alcohol is the legal one.

3211
02:48:58,440 --> 02:48:58,660
Yeah.

3212
02:48:58,800 --> 02:48:59,520
That's a great line.

3213
02:49:01,340 --> 02:49:03,920
Or as cannabis probably felt, not that.

3214
02:49:04,600 --> 02:49:07,620
Yeah, that one- Sensory amplifying, perhaps.

3215
02:49:07,880 --> 02:49:14,160
I thought, I am glad I didn't find this when I was a teenager because I would have over-consumed it.

3216
02:49:14,460 --> 02:49:15,700
Because I really liked it.

3217
02:49:15,860 --> 02:49:16,880
Ah, interesting.

3218
02:49:17,840 --> 02:49:22,880
So, I thought it was better that I let my mind form and mature.

3219
02:49:23,800 --> 02:49:29,620
The research says, they say don't use cannabis or alcohol really before age 25, 27 now.

3220
02:49:29,640 --> 02:49:31,200
Yeah, so I'd never been high.

3221
02:49:31,460 --> 02:49:34,920
I had a hard time even inhaling enough to get high.

3222
02:49:36,220 --> 02:49:37,020
But I knew that.

3223
02:49:37,060 --> 02:49:39,520
I'd seen enough people try their first cigarette, try their first joint.

3224
02:49:40,140 --> 02:49:42,080
I knew that there was gonna be a hack attack.

3225
02:49:44,300 --> 02:49:45,960
But I was on board for trying it.

3226
02:49:47,640 --> 02:49:50,140
And- Did this person become your wife or no?

3227
02:49:50,180 --> 02:49:50,380
No.

3228
02:49:50,580 --> 02:49:50,880
Okay.

3229
02:49:51,120 --> 02:49:55,800
No, we eventually, she broke up with me before I moved to Hamilton.

3230
02:49:55,940 --> 02:49:57,280
A lot of women are breaking up with  Lewis.

3231
02:49:57,660 --> 02:49:58,720
No, just that one.

3232
02:49:59,040 --> 02:49:59,420
Oh, okay.

3233
02:49:59,520 --> 02:50:03,740
And the one before, the one that saw that the, you're going into serious- No, same person.

3234
02:50:04,020 --> 02:50:04,840
Oh, that's the same person?

3235
02:50:05,620 --> 02:50:07,740
Okay, okay, okay.

3236
02:50:08,040 --> 02:50:08,960
Smart enough to get away.

3237
02:50:09,180 --> 02:50:16,520
Yeah, so you're not, how much time did you have as your father's chief caregiver from the time you started chief caregiving to the time he died?

3238
02:50:16,960 --> 02:50:19,080
It was like almost a year and a half, exactly.

3239
02:50:19,380 --> 02:50:19,760
Wow.

3240
02:50:19,880 --> 02:50:26,440
And what does chief caregiving for a dying father with dementia look like?

3241
02:50:26,600 --> 02:50:27,260
It started off slow.

3242
02:50:27,800 --> 02:50:30,400
I was still working more or less full-time in Toronto.

3243
02:50:31,220 --> 02:50:32,000
I would commute.

3244
02:50:34,520 --> 02:50:37,680
I'd get up in the morning, I'd get my dad breakfast.

3245
02:50:38,380 --> 02:50:41,560
I would leave him a note about lunch, where it was, you know.

3246
02:50:41,640 --> 02:50:42,580
What it was, where it was.

3247
02:50:42,580 --> 02:50:42,920
How to do it, yeah.

3248
02:50:45,180 --> 02:50:48,480
And my sister would help him out with like one of the meals, you know.

3249
02:50:48,580 --> 02:50:50,620
And I'd get back from Toronto.

3250
02:50:51,020 --> 02:50:52,000
Is it the YMCA job?

3251
02:50:52,940 --> 02:50:54,500
No, this is when I was painting bikes.

3252
02:50:54,680 --> 02:50:56,120
Okay, you're painting, you're in the painting job.

3253
02:50:56,180 --> 02:50:56,620
You come to Toronto.

3254
02:50:56,640 --> 02:50:57,900
You don't have a place to live in Toronto, though.

3255
02:50:57,940 --> 02:51:04,360
No, no, I was, I'd get up at 5 a.m. I'd be on the 6 a.m. bus to Toronto with my bike on the front of the bus.

3256
02:51:04,480 --> 02:51:05,180
Oh my gosh.

3257
02:51:05,580 --> 02:51:06,640
I'd show up at Union.

3258
02:51:07,300 --> 02:51:10,440
I would arrive really early for work.

3259
02:51:10,480 --> 02:51:11,200
I didn't start till 10.

3260
02:51:11,200 --> 02:51:13,500
But traffic was horrible.

3261
02:51:13,640 --> 02:51:16,080
I didn't want to sit in traffic, so I opted to leave early.

3262
02:51:16,780 --> 02:51:17,820
Get up with the ducks.

3263
02:51:18,020 --> 02:51:20,460
I was reading books at the time.

3264
02:51:20,920 --> 02:51:24,280
I decided to read on the commute.

3265
02:51:24,940 --> 02:51:26,340
With books or audio books?

3266
02:51:26,820 --> 02:51:27,740
Real, real.

3267
02:51:28,220 --> 02:51:28,580
Yeah.

3268
02:51:28,820 --> 02:51:29,860
Yeah, real books.

3269
02:51:29,940 --> 02:51:33,380
Seems like audio book is good for a bus, but okay, you go the other way now.

3270
02:51:33,520 --> 02:51:35,360
You're left right on me the whole conversation.

3271
02:51:35,560 --> 02:51:35,980
You're surprising.

3272
02:51:36,060 --> 02:51:48,040
And so I had a routine where I would, you know, get up, set my dad up, get on the bus, read, and I would then ride to a cafe that opened at like 7 in the morning.

3273
02:51:48,780 --> 02:51:49,420
Oh my gosh.

3274
02:51:49,800 --> 02:51:51,120
I'd show up at the cafe.

3275
02:51:51,400 --> 02:51:52,520
Three hours early for work.

3276
02:51:52,580 --> 02:51:53,400
Three hours early for work.

3277
02:51:53,460 --> 02:51:54,780
I'd sit at the cafe, have a coffee.

3278
02:51:55,760 --> 02:52:00,080
I would read for another 30, 40 minutes, and then I would draw.

3279
02:52:00,340 --> 02:52:04,600
I had a sketchbook with me, and I started.

3280
02:52:04,780 --> 02:52:05,440
I've seen your sketchbook.

3281
02:52:05,500 --> 02:52:05,900
It's unbelievable.

3282
02:52:06,140 --> 02:52:27,840
I started, this was the start of a project that's still going on, something I still do every day, where I draw patterns as an exercise to do something just solely for myself, and to develop a skill, and to see where it goes, and to see how good I can get at something.

3283
02:52:29,220 --> 02:52:33,660
I'm now six, seven years into this practice.

3284
02:52:34,620 --> 02:52:37,360
I've got a lot of sketchbooks full.

3285
02:52:37,360 --> 02:52:40,520
I've got a lot of skill that I built up.

3286
02:52:40,520 --> 02:52:45,640
Who would you recommend a daily drawing practice for, and what could that look like for someone who's interested in developing one?

3287
02:52:46,240 --> 02:52:47,900
What's the first step for that?

3288
02:52:48,560 --> 02:52:51,560
I'd say it doesn't have to be drawing.

3289
02:52:52,000 --> 02:53:10,980
I think it's a valuable thing for people to develop more skills, to give yourself the time to go on this journey, because it's such an interesting journey from the beginning to wherever the end is.

3290
02:53:11,060 --> 02:53:25,140
I don't know where that is for this, but I've gone past what I thought was possible in this realm of geometric pattern drawing without the use of any aids, like just freehand drawing.

3291
02:53:25,400 --> 02:53:27,300
Even though it looks like you're using 10 rulers.

3292
02:53:27,300 --> 02:53:28,620
It does now, yes.

3293
02:53:28,780 --> 02:53:29,620
It didn't in the beginning.

3294
02:53:30,640 --> 02:53:35,360
So you're coming to Toronto, I'm sorry to say, you're getting to coffee shops at 7 a.m. You don't work till 10.

3295
02:53:35,580 --> 02:53:38,240
You spend the day here, then you go back and take care of him at night.

3296
02:53:38,340 --> 02:53:39,520
I would catch the first train.

3297
02:53:39,620 --> 02:53:41,400
I could get on with my bike back to Hamilton.

3298
02:53:43,100 --> 02:53:48,600
I would arrive at like 8, 8.30. I'd get him dinner.

3299
02:53:50,200 --> 02:53:55,220
I'd put him to bed and just repeat the next day.

3300
02:53:55,320 --> 02:53:57,640
Okay, so that was the first iteration of it.

3301
02:53:57,760 --> 02:54:10,120
Yeah, and slowly, as he progressively got worse, I would, I'd do three days a week, and then I did two days a week, and I was down to one day a week, and then no days a week.

3302
02:54:10,400 --> 02:54:10,700
Working.

3303
02:54:11,180 --> 02:54:11,520
Yeah.

3304
02:54:11,700 --> 02:54:12,560
Coming to Toronto.

3305
02:54:12,800 --> 02:54:14,720
Yeah, and so this is when I.

3306
02:54:15,080 --> 02:54:17,080
You're telling them, my dad's dying, I gotta be at home.

3307
02:54:17,100 --> 02:54:17,980
Well, they knew, they understood.

3308
02:54:18,240 --> 02:54:22,940
These were good friends of mine, and they were very empathetic and patient with me.

3309
02:54:23,000 --> 02:54:25,700
Yeah, but your life is rebalancing towards your father at this point.

3310
02:54:25,760 --> 02:54:30,100
I was going through one of the most significant relationships ending in my life.

3311
02:54:30,100 --> 02:54:31,600
I was absolutely heartbroken.

3312
02:54:33,560 --> 02:54:34,520
And my dad was.

3313
02:54:35,000 --> 02:54:35,400
Sorry?

3314
02:54:35,560 --> 02:54:36,220
How old was your dad?

3315
02:54:36,760 --> 02:54:39,340
At the time, he was 76.

3316
02:54:39,500 --> 02:54:40,480
Oh, he's pretty up there.

3317
02:54:41,060 --> 02:54:43,100
Yeah, he lived longer than he thought he was gonna live.

3318
02:54:43,260 --> 02:54:43,640
Wow.

3319
02:54:44,500 --> 02:54:53,180
He wanted to ride the bus until the wheels fell off, and he thought the wheels were gonna fall off in his late 60s, early 70s.

3320
02:54:53,180 --> 02:54:53,980
Mm-hmm.

3321
02:54:57,240 --> 02:55:00,840
And so, I kind of forget where we were there.

3322
02:55:00,860 --> 02:55:13,880
Well, I'm just trying to point out here is that, because I know that the genesis for Lewis Mallard, you have said in other interviews, came to you on a mushroom trip while you were doing chief caregiving for your father.

3323
02:55:14,140 --> 02:55:14,500
So.

3324
02:55:14,680 --> 02:55:15,500
That's what I've read.

3325
02:55:15,680 --> 02:55:15,980
Yes.

3326
02:55:16,080 --> 02:55:18,020
So I feel like I'm near this point in your story.

3327
02:55:18,020 --> 02:55:19,980
Absolutely, it's all kind of coming there.

3328
02:55:21,940 --> 02:55:31,700
So, as my father got progressively worse, and I was still working in Toronto, the commute for me was very difficult, the back and forth every day.

3329
02:55:33,440 --> 02:55:43,400
And so, to combat that, on the days when it wasn't too cold or it wasn't raining, I would bring my camping gear to work with me.

3330
02:55:44,040 --> 02:56:01,420
I just left all my camping gear at work, and I would leave work up in the junction in Toronto, Keele and St. Clair area, and I would ride down to the ferry terminal to go to Toronto Island.

3331
02:56:01,940 --> 02:56:15,560
I'd grab some kind of dinner on the way to go, and I'd jump on the ferry, go over to the island, and I'd just set up on the beach right near where the airport is.

3332
02:56:16,020 --> 02:56:17,560
It's the clothing optional beach out there.

3333
02:56:17,720 --> 02:56:21,780
Wow, you'd camp out on the nude beach rather than any park near the junction.

3334
02:56:22,040 --> 02:56:28,900
Like, that's still a pretty hefty commute to get from the junction down to a ferry terminal, down to crossing a body of water.

3335
02:56:28,980 --> 02:56:51,440
For those that don't know, there's about a 500 meter, maybe a kilometer wide channel right in front of the CN Tower in Skydome, where then there's a series of little islands with a tiny airport on it, there's a nude beach, there is like a amusement park, there's a life-size maze, there's a few hundred people that live there, there's all kinds of non-optional, like there's other beaches.

3336
02:56:52,000 --> 02:56:54,340
It's like a bird watcher's paradise as well.

3337
02:56:54,560 --> 02:57:06,560
There certainly was a lot of bird watchers out there, and I would move down the beach to be away from the people who were actually using the beach for the intended purposes of relaxing and suntanning and swimming.

3338
02:57:06,760 --> 02:57:09,920
So this is also, I will say, like a not allowed to do, right?

3339
02:57:09,920 --> 02:57:11,400
Not allowed to do, definitely not.

3340
02:57:12,280 --> 02:57:16,040
Yeah, you never got in trouble, though, for just camping out on Center Island.

3341
02:57:17,460 --> 02:57:29,300
Yeah, I would move away from people, I would set up my tent only after the sun went down, and I would disassemble and be gone by 6.30 in the morning.

3342
02:57:29,380 --> 02:57:30,140
Oh my gosh.

3343
02:57:30,240 --> 02:57:32,140
Because I would catch the first ferry.

3344
02:57:32,380 --> 02:57:33,100
Weren't you scared?

3345
02:57:34,100 --> 02:57:38,560
A little, like, it was exciting, I would say.

3346
02:57:38,900 --> 02:57:42,420
But also, I figured like- Exhilarating.

3347
02:57:42,420 --> 02:57:52,480
Who's, not many people are gonna approach a solo male doing something weird like camping on a beach.

3348
02:57:53,040 --> 02:57:54,620
On a clothing optional beach.

3349
02:57:54,700 --> 02:57:56,020
Yeah, you know.

3350
02:57:56,200 --> 02:57:57,760
You seemed like the crazy one.

3351
02:57:58,000 --> 02:57:58,640
They're not gonna approach you.

3352
02:57:58,640 --> 02:58:00,000
That's kind of how I was like.

3353
02:58:00,080 --> 02:58:00,300
Yeah.

3354
02:58:01,860 --> 02:58:03,880
Although I didn't feel crazy, of course, you know.

3355
02:58:04,140 --> 02:58:10,840
But I just thought like, realistically, like if I was, would I ever go approach a random stranger doing something?

3356
02:58:10,860 --> 02:58:11,080
No.

3357
02:58:11,080 --> 02:58:11,700
Yeah.

3358
02:58:12,500 --> 02:58:13,400
And I was like, no.

3359
02:58:13,420 --> 02:58:14,500
That's a good life rule.

3360
02:58:14,680 --> 02:58:18,440
If you look crazier than the norm, you're not gonna be harassed in general.

3361
02:58:18,660 --> 02:58:19,120
I think.

3362
02:58:20,520 --> 02:58:29,720
Maybe by only somebody who matches or exceeds your, so camping on the island, it wasn't great sleeping, but it was an amazing adventure.

3363
02:58:29,980 --> 02:58:31,980
I saw some of the best sunsets of my life.

3364
02:58:32,000 --> 02:58:32,720
Oh yeah.

3365
02:58:32,920 --> 02:58:33,840
Sitting out there.

3366
02:58:33,880 --> 02:58:35,800
Right over the huge Great Lakes, yeah.

3367
02:58:36,740 --> 02:58:43,440
And I'd wake up in the morning to sunrise, although the sun was rising on the opposite side of the island.

3368
02:58:44,020 --> 02:58:48,180
But I'd wake up to like these kind of pink and orange mornings.

3369
02:58:48,720 --> 02:58:50,360
I'd stumble out of my tent naked.

3370
02:58:51,200 --> 02:58:52,500
Wow, you're nude here.

3371
02:58:52,800 --> 02:58:53,660
Well, I guess it's summer.

3372
02:58:53,920 --> 02:58:55,360
It's only fitting, you're on the nude beach.

3373
02:58:55,960 --> 02:59:00,720
Yeah, and I would relieve myself in the water, take a piss.

3374
02:59:02,560 --> 02:59:04,400
And also get your bath in that way.

3375
02:59:04,700 --> 02:59:06,580
No, I would stop off at the Y.

3376
02:59:06,640 --> 02:59:10,360
Once I got to the mainland, I would come to the YMCA and have a shower.

3377
02:59:11,140 --> 02:59:12,760
You're not just taking a lake dip.

3378
02:59:13,220 --> 02:59:13,800
No, no.

3379
02:59:14,060 --> 02:59:14,360
Okay.

3380
02:59:15,620 --> 02:59:16,780
Why pee in the lake then?

3381
02:59:17,020 --> 02:59:17,900
Why not pee in the bushes?

3382
02:59:18,620 --> 02:59:22,160
For some reason to me, peeing in the bushes is cleaner than peeing in the lake.

3383
02:59:22,620 --> 02:59:25,000
Even though I have no justification for that.

3384
02:59:25,280 --> 02:59:27,200
I think it's six of one, half a dozen or the other.

3385
02:59:27,240 --> 02:59:27,840
Yeah, I'm sure you're right.

3386
02:59:28,180 --> 02:59:28,720
It's a lake.

3387
02:59:29,000 --> 02:59:29,980
It's a huge lake.

3388
02:59:30,140 --> 02:59:30,300
Yeah.

3389
02:59:31,240 --> 02:59:31,820
But anyway.

3390
02:59:31,920 --> 02:59:33,500
I'm anti-peeing in pools now, by the way.

3391
02:59:33,640 --> 02:59:34,420
Yeah, I don't like to.

3392
02:59:34,900 --> 02:59:36,100
Yeah, I've switched on that.

3393
02:59:36,140 --> 02:59:37,260
I've definitely peed in a pool.

3394
02:59:37,260 --> 02:59:43,800
Now you recognize the smallness of the body of water and the PPM of the urine.

3395
02:59:44,180 --> 02:59:44,280
Yeah.

3396
02:59:44,460 --> 02:59:46,180
Yeah, it's different than a pee in an ocean.

3397
02:59:46,360 --> 02:59:46,860
That's for sure.

3398
02:59:47,860 --> 02:59:48,960
So where's the mushroom trip?

3399
02:59:49,320 --> 02:59:50,960
So I did not.

3400
02:59:51,960 --> 02:59:54,620
So I guess this can tie into Alaska a little bit.

3401
02:59:54,820 --> 03:00:09,400
So I went to, early on when my dad was still kind of manageable by part-time caregiving and my sister was around and could help, I had an opportunity to take a vacation.

3402
03:00:10,140 --> 03:00:14,340
I knew I was gonna be doing this for, I assumed about two years.

3403
03:00:14,660 --> 03:00:22,180
Having seen my mother go through cancer and slowly deteriorate and knowing where my father was and how he was looking and how he was acting.

3404
03:00:22,540 --> 03:00:26,060
And I guessed it was gonna be no more than two years.

3405
03:00:29,760 --> 03:00:36,220
And so I was like, if I'm gonna take some time off I'm gonna do it now.

3406
03:00:37,900 --> 03:00:46,320
And so while I was still working at the bike painting shop, I decided to go to my cousin's wedding in Vancouver.

3407
03:00:46,620 --> 03:00:46,980
Oh wow.

3408
03:00:47,160 --> 03:00:48,440
She was getting married.

3409
03:00:48,900 --> 03:00:51,640
I had a lot of family and some very good friends out there.

3410
03:00:51,740 --> 03:00:55,620
Most of my family on my father's side had moved to Vancouver.

3411
03:00:56,320 --> 03:01:03,340
While I was at this wedding, I met relatives of mine that I'd only ever heard of and I never had met or talked to before. And they were two first cousins of mine that were raised in Haida Gwaii, which is-

3412
03:01:03,840 --> 03:01:10,780
How do you spell that?

3413
03:01:12,140 --> 03:01:14,520
H-A-I-D-A.

3414
03:01:14,620 --> 03:01:15,480
That's the first word.

3415
03:01:15,540 --> 03:01:19,060
Haida Gwaii, D-G-W-A-I-I.

3416
03:01:19,240 --> 03:01:23,700
G-W-A-I-I, Haida Gwaii, which is a first nations indigenous community in Canada.

3417
03:01:23,720 --> 03:01:28,160
Like vast majority of the people that live out there are first nations.

3418
03:01:28,360 --> 03:01:31,600
And they're known from a distance for their totem poles, I believe.

3419
03:01:31,600 --> 03:01:37,400
Yeah, the Haida people, I believe are the originators of the totem pole.

3420
03:01:37,540 --> 03:01:37,860
Wow.

3421
03:01:38,340 --> 03:01:39,960
That's what I came to understand.

3422
03:01:40,140 --> 03:01:40,560
Bye, Rob.

3423
03:01:41,200 --> 03:01:41,840
Bye, guys.

3424
03:01:43,760 --> 03:01:53,520
And so my uncle donated sperm to a lesbian couple, friends of his, and they each had a child of his.

3425
03:01:53,700 --> 03:01:54,140
Wow.

3426
03:01:54,220 --> 03:02:00,160
And so I have two first cousins that were raised outside of my family on this amazing island.

3427
03:02:00,740 --> 03:02:05,080
And so I met my cousins and their mothers at this wedding.

3428
03:02:05,900 --> 03:02:07,800
And I was so interested in them.

3429
03:02:07,880 --> 03:02:10,120
I didn't really participate in much of the wedding.

3430
03:02:10,240 --> 03:02:11,080
I didn't dance.

3431
03:02:12,900 --> 03:02:15,740
I was just, I sat at the table talking to these people.

3432
03:02:16,060 --> 03:02:18,380
Their life was so different than mine and I was extremely interested.

3433
03:02:18,880 --> 03:02:22,680
And they said, and they said, well, why don't you come and visit?

3434
03:02:23,940 --> 03:02:24,860
And I thought.

3435
03:02:26,120 --> 03:02:26,800
Why don't I?

3436
03:02:26,880 --> 03:02:27,440
Why don't I?

3437
03:02:28,940 --> 03:02:29,880
It's a big trip.

3438
03:02:30,060 --> 03:02:33,040
So I planned, I was like, okay, I'll come back at the end of the summer.

3439
03:02:33,140 --> 03:02:35,520
This was spring that I was out there.

3440
03:02:35,940 --> 03:02:48,940
And so while I was out there in Vancouver for a couple of weeks for my cousin's wedding, I was staying with a very good friend of mine for most of my life who's living out there in East Van.

3441
03:02:49,080 --> 03:02:53,560
He had his own apartment and I was just crashing on his couch for two weeks.

3442
03:02:56,320 --> 03:03:00,840
He had also, he had never done mushrooms before and I had not done mushrooms yet.

3443
03:03:01,560 --> 03:03:02,360
Tried mushrooms.

3444
03:03:02,640 --> 03:03:03,740
I had wanted to.

3445
03:03:03,860 --> 03:03:04,640
I was very curious.

3446
03:03:05,520 --> 03:03:11,500
And I thought, what better place to try mushrooms for your first time than with one of your best buddies who has also never done it out in BC.

3447
03:03:12,000 --> 03:03:16,120
So we got on our bikes and I brought my bike out there with me.

3448
03:03:17,080 --> 03:03:17,780
And I, we.

3449
03:03:17,900 --> 03:03:18,400
On an airplane.

3450
03:03:18,940 --> 03:03:19,160
Yeah.

3451
03:03:19,180 --> 03:03:19,720
Wow, okay.

3452
03:03:20,300 --> 03:03:21,120
Really into biking.

3453
03:03:21,700 --> 03:03:22,580
Very into biking.

3454
03:03:22,580 --> 03:03:25,700
In front of the bus, on the GO train, on an airplane.

3455
03:03:26,060 --> 03:03:28,280
I've been riding a bike my whole life.

3456
03:03:28,280 --> 03:03:28,640
Wow, okay.

3457
03:03:28,640 --> 03:03:29,900
Of one form or another.

3458
03:03:30,880 --> 03:03:34,180
But I didn't find my passion in cycling until I was in my 30s.

3459
03:03:34,240 --> 03:03:34,460
Okay.

3460
03:03:35,000 --> 03:03:37,040
You take your bike out there, you go with your buddy.

3461
03:03:37,400 --> 03:03:42,600
Yeah, and we grab our camping gear and we ride kind of to interior.

3462
03:03:45,980 --> 03:03:47,100
Somewhere in the interior.

3463
03:03:47,440 --> 03:03:48,940
It was a lake called Devil's Lake.

3464
03:03:49,200 --> 03:03:50,080
Really small lake.

3465
03:03:50,830 --> 03:03:53,300
You could almost throw a rock across it.

3466
03:03:53,500 --> 03:03:56,400
You could easily swim across any direction.

3467
03:03:57,560 --> 03:03:58,540
It's spring.

3468
03:03:58,760 --> 03:04:00,360
It's still kind of cold there.

3469
03:04:01,550 --> 03:04:04,680
We buy some mushroom chocolate bar off a random stranger.

3470
03:04:06,960 --> 03:04:11,500
And we set up and we eat the mushrooms.

3471
03:04:12,220 --> 03:04:15,500
And you know, it was quite a journey.

3472
03:04:17,320 --> 03:04:18,840
We had a great time.

3473
03:04:19,620 --> 03:04:23,200
It was one of the most interesting experiences of my life at the time.

3474
03:04:23,480 --> 03:04:28,140
I'd never, you know, mushrooms.

3475
03:04:29,120 --> 03:04:31,520
I think I maybe ate two grams at the most.

3476
03:04:33,220 --> 03:04:43,160
I started thinking thoughts that I'd never thought before that didn't seem like typical thoughts that I had ever had.

3477
03:04:45,340 --> 03:04:47,400
And they weren't scary thoughts or anything like that.

3478
03:04:47,400 --> 03:05:01,960
I had a difficult moment during the trip where all of the sadness from my relationship ending kind of came up unexpectedly.

3479
03:05:03,440 --> 03:05:06,900
And I think I cried for maybe like 15 minutes.

3480
03:05:07,460 --> 03:05:08,320
Extremely hard.

3481
03:05:08,480 --> 03:05:11,940
Like some of the hardest crying I'd ever done for about 15 minutes.

3482
03:05:12,060 --> 03:05:13,580
And then it just was over.

3483
03:05:13,580 --> 03:05:15,640
Wow, you got it out of you.

3484
03:05:15,780 --> 03:05:19,180
And I got something out of me that I didn't even know was in me.

3485
03:05:19,320 --> 03:05:19,760
Wow.

3486
03:05:20,460 --> 03:05:22,780
And it felt like in a very healthy way.

3487
03:05:23,260 --> 03:05:33,340
And I just accepted that it was like over and that I was moving in a different direction.

3488
03:05:34,140 --> 03:05:36,840
And I just went back to having a fun time with my buddy.

3489
03:05:38,340 --> 03:05:46,100
Even though, you know, we sat around our fire, we talked a lot, we cried a bunch, but it was a good time.

3490
03:05:47,900 --> 03:05:58,020
And eventually we, you know, came down and went to bed and we could hear wolves or coyotes howling around us.

3491
03:05:58,740 --> 03:06:02,920
It was hard to fall asleep, you know, but we did, you know.

3492
03:06:03,120 --> 03:06:05,040
We were completely alone out there.

3493
03:06:05,280 --> 03:06:07,000
Nobody else, we weren't allowed to camp.

3494
03:06:07,160 --> 03:06:08,220
We were just wild camping.

3495
03:06:09,520 --> 03:06:11,440
But we're, you know, we're respectful.

3496
03:06:11,620 --> 03:06:12,500
We left no trace.

3497
03:06:12,780 --> 03:06:17,380
We, and we left the place the next morning and rode back.

3498
03:06:17,640 --> 03:06:31,800
And when I came back to BC later that summer to go to Haida Gwaii, Haida Gwaii is up near Alaska, up near the banana belt of Alaska.

3499
03:06:31,980 --> 03:06:36,720
And you can even see on a clear day, you can see Alaska from the north side of the islands there.

3500
03:06:38,220 --> 03:06:40,000
And I'd never been anywhere so remote.

3501
03:06:40,540 --> 03:06:47,280
In order to get there, I took the ferry, multiple ferries, from Vancouver to Nanaimo.

3502
03:06:47,740 --> 03:06:54,780
And I took a bus from Nanaimo all the way to Port Hardy, other side of Vancouver Island, northwestern most town.

3503
03:06:58,280 --> 03:07:07,120
Camped out there, was warned by the locals not to ride my bike down the trails at night because there's mountain lions everywhere.

3504
03:07:08,400 --> 03:07:14,900
And so I took, I had to get up early in the morning to catch a ferry, a 16 hour ferry to Prince Rupert.

3505
03:07:15,800 --> 03:07:25,840
So I got up at like four in the morning in the pouring rain, packed up my gear, rode out to this ferry to get on at like 7 a.m. And it was a 16 hour journey.

3506
03:07:27,020 --> 03:07:28,740
No mountain lions.

3507
03:07:29,060 --> 03:07:31,120
No mountain lions on the ferry, confirmed.

3508
03:07:31,420 --> 03:07:32,280
No, I mean on the way.

3509
03:07:32,500 --> 03:07:34,440
No, I took the long way on the road.

3510
03:07:34,540 --> 03:07:35,600
I took their advice.

3511
03:07:35,600 --> 03:07:40,400
And you got on the 16 hour ferry from already a super remote location.

3512
03:07:40,560 --> 03:07:43,920
There's no other way to get there?

3513
03:07:44,000 --> 03:07:44,500
You can fly.

3514
03:07:44,920 --> 03:07:45,660
Oh, fly, okay.

3515
03:07:45,700 --> 03:07:46,780
I was interested in the journey.

3516
03:07:46,940 --> 03:07:47,120
Yeah.

3517
03:07:47,880 --> 03:07:53,480
Beautiful scenery, slow moving, gigantic ferry, thousands of people on it.

3518
03:07:55,420 --> 03:07:56,520
Thousands, okay.

3519
03:07:56,700 --> 03:07:57,420
Yeah, a lot of people.

3520
03:07:57,780 --> 03:07:58,000
Okay.

3521
03:08:00,540 --> 03:08:02,380
Then you land in Prince Rupert.

3522
03:08:02,660 --> 03:08:04,060
Is that a town in Canada?

3523
03:08:04,060 --> 03:08:05,560
Yeah, it's on the mainland.

3524
03:08:06,380 --> 03:08:10,720
It is a very gray, rainy place.

3525
03:08:10,760 --> 03:08:15,620
I think amongst the rainiest in the North America.

3526
03:08:16,140 --> 03:08:18,560
Kind of a surprising settlement there, maybe.

3527
03:08:18,660 --> 03:08:21,080
Maybe some sort of natural resources.

3528
03:08:21,080 --> 03:08:22,220
It seems like it's a port.

3529
03:08:23,900 --> 03:08:28,480
Like, you know, a lot of goods come in on boat.

3530
03:08:29,140 --> 03:08:34,160
And since it's on the mainland, there's a lot of trains picking up containers and that kind of shit.

3531
03:08:37,020 --> 03:08:42,180
Have a horrible night's sleep in Prince Rupert and then jump on a seven hour ferry to Haida Gwaii.

3532
03:08:42,180 --> 03:08:43,540
Oh my gosh, you're not done yet?

3533
03:08:43,760 --> 03:08:45,820
Okay, so then another seven hour ferry?

3534
03:08:45,980 --> 03:08:49,660
Kind of open water ferry, seven hours to Haida Gwaii.

3535
03:08:50,520 --> 03:08:53,840
And then Haida Gwaii appears out of the mist like Jurassic Park.

3536
03:08:54,640 --> 03:09:01,020
You know, it was one of the last, this is what I was told, it was one of the last settled places in North America.

3537
03:09:01,120 --> 03:09:01,560
I believe it.

3538
03:09:01,580 --> 03:09:02,600
Because it was hard to find.

3539
03:09:02,600 --> 03:09:05,060
Well, oh, hard to find.

3540
03:09:05,280 --> 03:09:08,180
Because it was- Like it's shrouded in mist.

3541
03:09:08,520 --> 03:09:12,940
Yes, it's very gray and misty out there.

3542
03:09:12,980 --> 03:09:13,340
Can't find it.

3543
03:09:14,220 --> 03:09:15,340
They found it, all right.

3544
03:09:15,340 --> 03:09:15,940
Well, of course.

3545
03:09:18,280 --> 03:09:32,320
And yeah, got off the ferry, had the address of my cousin, you know, rode to, I was with my bike, again, and went to my cousin's place, you know, met him and settled in.

3546
03:09:32,820 --> 03:09:36,860
Is your cousin your uncle's sperm donor's kid?

3547
03:09:37,080 --> 03:09:37,440
Yes.

3548
03:09:37,840 --> 03:09:40,440
I think they all met in the school system.

3549
03:09:40,880 --> 03:09:42,260
My uncle was a teacher.

3550
03:09:42,740 --> 03:09:43,920
I think that one of them would have been a principal.

3551
03:09:43,920 --> 03:09:45,440
What was that like meeting these people?

3552
03:09:46,100 --> 03:09:47,100
Oh, just interesting.

3553
03:09:47,420 --> 03:09:49,540
You know, their lifestyle was so different.

3554
03:09:49,900 --> 03:09:50,280
How so?

3555
03:09:50,840 --> 03:09:55,300
Well, these two women were some of the most badass people I'd ever met in my life.

3556
03:09:56,420 --> 03:10:00,980
They hunted all their own meat, or fished.

3557
03:10:00,980 --> 03:10:02,020
They drove around.

3558
03:10:02,160 --> 03:10:06,040
They always had a loaded 22 rifle on the dashboard of the truck.

3559
03:10:06,480 --> 03:10:08,720
If they saw a deer, they got it.

3560
03:10:09,760 --> 03:10:13,240
Donna would post up on the hood of her truck.

3561
03:10:13,680 --> 03:10:17,880
She'd shoot the deer, walk over to it, gut it, throw it in the back of the truck.

3562
03:10:18,020 --> 03:10:20,180
It would be sausage 24 hours later.

3563
03:10:20,980 --> 03:10:25,480
And then it would be canned or stored frozen, whatever.

3564
03:10:25,900 --> 03:10:26,920
They didn't waste anything.

3565
03:10:28,360 --> 03:10:30,160
I went deep sea fishing with them.

3566
03:10:30,300 --> 03:10:31,180
They ran a charter boat.

3567
03:10:31,600 --> 03:10:32,780
Deep sea fishing?

3568
03:10:33,080 --> 03:10:33,260
Yeah.

3569
03:10:33,640 --> 03:10:40,400
So I got a permit to catch a salmon and a halibut.

3570
03:10:41,660 --> 03:10:43,540
I had a permit to get one of each.

3571
03:10:43,620 --> 03:10:44,660
You caught a halibut?

3572
03:10:45,100 --> 03:10:46,720
Those are gigantic fish.

3573
03:10:46,880 --> 03:10:47,800
Yeah, it was about 50 pounds.

3574
03:10:48,280 --> 03:10:48,680
Wow.

3575
03:10:49,180 --> 03:10:51,980
And then, so these two were married.

3576
03:10:52,180 --> 03:10:52,280
A spear?

3577
03:10:52,420 --> 03:10:56,000
They'd been, no, it was a hook.

3578
03:10:56,380 --> 03:10:56,860
Oh, a hook.

3579
03:10:56,860 --> 03:11:00,060
Heavily weighted, industrial gauge.

3580
03:11:00,340 --> 03:11:00,860
Oh my God.

3581
03:11:00,880 --> 03:11:01,740
They had serious equipment.

3582
03:11:01,840 --> 03:11:03,740
We were in a small boat, but they had radar.

3583
03:11:03,920 --> 03:11:05,420
They survived there for thousands of years.

3584
03:11:05,580 --> 03:11:07,120
These women are very smart.

3585
03:11:07,240 --> 03:11:08,660
They knew exactly where the fish were.

3586
03:11:10,320 --> 03:11:11,680
And they're very capable.

3587
03:11:12,100 --> 03:11:13,860
They had more of a homestead.

3588
03:11:14,600 --> 03:11:20,240
Their home was half conventional home, half log cabin.

3589
03:11:21,840 --> 03:11:24,460
They raised chickens and turkeys and bunnies.

3590
03:11:25,040 --> 03:11:26,280
They grew vegetables.

3591
03:11:27,100 --> 03:11:33,780
Everybody in the family had killed a black bear to save their own ass.

3592
03:11:34,340 --> 03:11:35,040
Oh my gosh.

3593
03:11:35,800 --> 03:11:40,220
Not as a right of passage, but as a thing that you just threw there.

3594
03:11:40,400 --> 03:11:42,760
There was a bear coming at them and they had no other choice.

3595
03:11:42,760 --> 03:11:46,740
The same way we would swat a fly or kill a spider.

3596
03:11:46,900 --> 03:11:47,340
I was warned.

3597
03:11:47,440 --> 03:11:48,640
They've all killed a bear.

3598
03:11:48,720 --> 03:11:54,500
I was warned many times to be careful about your surroundings, that the black bears are big and aggressive.

3599
03:11:54,780 --> 03:11:55,560
They don't hibernate.

3600
03:11:55,840 --> 03:11:57,220
They have food all year round.

3601
03:11:57,420 --> 03:11:58,720
It's essentially a rainforest.

3602
03:11:59,100 --> 03:12:00,180
They don't hibernate.

3603
03:12:00,280 --> 03:12:01,040
This is what I was told.

3604
03:12:01,340 --> 03:12:02,320
Wow, well, they would know.

3605
03:12:02,620 --> 03:12:02,740
Yeah.

3606
03:12:03,000 --> 03:12:04,520
So big and aggressive.

3607
03:12:04,700 --> 03:12:05,320
They can eat all year round.

3608
03:12:05,640 --> 03:12:07,960
Black bears in Ontario are known to be not big or aggressive.

3609
03:12:08,280 --> 03:12:13,240
Yeah, these are very well-fed bears with no other natural predators around.

3610
03:12:13,660 --> 03:12:14,320
So they got it.

3611
03:12:14,920 --> 03:12:16,020
They're not competing with people.

3612
03:12:16,760 --> 03:12:16,940
Yes.

3613
03:12:17,600 --> 03:12:20,180
So you gotta be ready to shoot them, to kill them.

3614
03:12:20,260 --> 03:12:21,140
And they all did.

3615
03:12:21,640 --> 03:12:22,060
At least one.

3616
03:12:22,220 --> 03:12:22,560
Oh my gosh.

3617
03:12:22,560 --> 03:12:24,620
And you're not allowed to do anything with it.

3618
03:12:24,700 --> 03:12:25,720
You have to leave it.

3619
03:12:26,040 --> 03:12:26,140
Why?

3620
03:12:26,440 --> 03:12:30,580
It's just, they don't want people commercial or, you know.

3621
03:12:30,580 --> 03:12:31,940
Yeah, but you can't eat it.

3622
03:12:32,000 --> 03:12:34,920
Like, isn't that more respectful to the animal to consume it?

3623
03:12:34,920 --> 03:12:35,100
You would think.

3624
03:12:35,420 --> 03:12:38,000
But I think they just don't want any...

3625
03:12:38,400 --> 03:12:39,560
Sport to develop.

3626
03:12:39,740 --> 03:12:40,020
Yeah, yeah.

3627
03:12:40,460 --> 03:12:43,760
Because you got an island full of giant, big, aggressive black bears.

3628
03:12:43,880 --> 03:12:44,000
Yes.

3629
03:12:44,000 --> 03:12:44,400
Some people might.

3630
03:12:44,780 --> 03:12:45,140
Apparently.

3631
03:12:45,320 --> 03:12:45,940
Yeah, yeah.

3632
03:12:46,240 --> 03:12:46,720
It's a natural resource.

3633
03:12:46,720 --> 03:12:47,420
I never saw one.

3634
03:12:47,640 --> 03:12:47,820
Yeah.

3635
03:12:47,860 --> 03:12:51,060
But we did go on hikes and my one cousin carried a rifle the whole time.

3636
03:12:51,200 --> 03:12:51,520
Wow.

3637
03:12:52,020 --> 03:12:55,020
We went to visit, you know, various hunting camps that they've used.

3638
03:12:55,460 --> 03:12:56,240
And they were just kind of...

3639
03:12:56,240 --> 03:12:58,080
So proximity to Alaska though.

3640
03:12:58,540 --> 03:12:58,680
Very close.

3641
03:12:58,680 --> 03:12:59,920
Is this the James Michener book?

3642
03:13:00,200 --> 03:13:00,480
Yes.

3643
03:13:00,620 --> 03:13:02,400
And so I started listening.

3644
03:13:03,560 --> 03:13:07,300
As I was caring for my father, I wanted to get to know him better.

3645
03:13:07,660 --> 03:13:13,560
I really tried to engage him more in conversation and talk about things that I wish we would have talked about.

3646
03:13:14,260 --> 03:13:18,320
I wanted to get in touch with his emotional side more.

3647
03:13:18,820 --> 03:13:19,620
His sensitive side.

3648
03:13:19,620 --> 03:13:22,660
I saw that he shared a different...

3649
03:13:22,660 --> 03:13:26,420
His relationship with my sister was very different than his relationship with me.

3650
03:13:27,280 --> 03:13:31,000
My sister got the sensitive, emotional side of my father.

3651
03:13:31,140 --> 03:13:31,900
I got...

3652
03:13:32,900 --> 03:13:34,220
Let's talk about sports.

3653
03:13:35,940 --> 03:13:38,420
And say derogatory things about women.

3654
03:13:38,460 --> 03:13:38,900
Oh no.

3655
03:13:39,180 --> 03:13:40,100
Side of my father.

3656
03:13:40,240 --> 03:13:40,700
Oh really?

3657
03:13:42,180 --> 03:13:44,200
Every woman driver was a cunt.

3658
03:13:44,360 --> 03:13:45,180
Oh my God.

3659
03:13:45,660 --> 03:13:46,760
Or a fucking cunt.

3660
03:13:46,880 --> 03:13:47,640
Oh my God.

3661
03:13:47,660 --> 03:13:48,440
That's kind of like...

3662
03:13:48,440 --> 03:13:48,980
I'm so sorry.

3663
03:13:49,740 --> 03:13:50,540
Oh wow.

3664
03:13:51,040 --> 03:13:51,680
That is...

3665
03:13:51,680 --> 03:13:52,660
Wow, that is...

3666
03:13:52,660 --> 03:14:03,060
And if I wanted to talk to my father, I had to behave this way or pay attention to sports I didn't give a shit about just to hang around him.

3667
03:14:03,160 --> 03:14:03,840
If I wanted to...

3668
03:14:03,840 --> 03:14:07,260
But it's still inspiring you the desire to care for him at the end of his life.

3669
03:14:07,340 --> 03:14:07,780
He's my father.

3670
03:14:07,880 --> 03:14:08,220
I love him.

3671
03:14:08,880 --> 03:14:09,820
What am I gonna do?

3672
03:14:09,860 --> 03:14:10,580
I can't help that.

3673
03:14:10,980 --> 03:14:12,020
It's like born into me.

3674
03:14:14,020 --> 03:14:18,940
And so like I was saying, I didn't see any other option that I would comfortably live with myself.

3675
03:14:20,100 --> 03:14:21,120
I was actively...

3676
03:14:21,120 --> 03:14:22,680
Was he a misogynist to the end?

3677
03:14:23,080 --> 03:14:23,520
Oh yeah.

3678
03:14:23,800 --> 03:14:28,540
He would say things to the nurses, the personal caregivers that would come in and help.

3679
03:14:30,560 --> 03:14:32,240
They must have refused to work with him.

3680
03:14:32,360 --> 03:14:32,740
No, no.

3681
03:14:32,860 --> 03:14:37,380
They said he was not nearly as bad as most people.

3682
03:14:38,940 --> 03:14:43,700
But they would come in and say, all right, Jim, are we gonna get you a shower today?

3683
03:14:43,780 --> 03:14:45,360
He'd say, nope, but I'll shower you.

3684
03:14:45,760 --> 03:14:46,480
Oh my God.

3685
03:14:46,480 --> 03:14:49,980
And then I'd have to like chastise him and apologize for him.

3686
03:14:50,320 --> 03:14:51,560
And they would laugh it off.

3687
03:14:51,700 --> 03:14:53,040
And then I would...

3688
03:14:53,040 --> 03:14:55,180
As they were leaving, I'd be like, I'm really sorry.

3689
03:14:55,360 --> 03:14:57,240
If you don't wanna come back, I totally understand.

3690
03:14:58,380 --> 03:15:00,160
And they more often than not came back.

3691
03:15:00,320 --> 03:15:04,680
But funnily enough, he would only accept a shower from a male nurse.

3692
03:15:05,420 --> 03:15:07,240
He would not accept one from a female nurse.

3693
03:15:07,800 --> 03:15:11,720
I think it was his pride there.

3694
03:15:13,580 --> 03:15:15,680
But eventually that all got to be too much.

3695
03:15:15,680 --> 03:15:19,720
And he eventually let me do that for him.

3696
03:15:20,460 --> 03:15:20,860
Shower him?

3697
03:15:21,040 --> 03:15:22,780
Yeah, help him out, that kind of thing.

3698
03:15:22,900 --> 03:15:23,900
How did that feel for you?

3699
03:15:27,240 --> 03:15:33,700
I was happy that he was finally letting me do something I knew I was capable of doing.

3700
03:15:34,020 --> 03:15:35,420
And it was just easier.

3701
03:15:35,740 --> 03:15:36,140
Wow.

3702
03:15:36,440 --> 03:15:37,860
Almost therapeutic for you.

3703
03:15:38,360 --> 03:15:44,640
In a way, I mean, it was difficult, especially when it got to the diaper phase.

3704
03:15:44,640 --> 03:15:46,860
Yeah, you're wiping now.

3705
03:15:47,160 --> 03:15:52,400
Funnily enough, his podiatrist pointed out to me that he had diaper rash.

3706
03:15:53,460 --> 03:15:57,580
Because he wouldn't let me do anything hygienic.

3707
03:15:58,160 --> 03:15:58,820
He was very stubborn.

3708
03:16:00,060 --> 03:16:02,580
I took him to the podiatrist appointment.

3709
03:16:03,280 --> 03:16:04,340
He was sitting uncomfortably.

3710
03:16:04,460 --> 03:16:05,660
And the doctor was like, what's wrong?

3711
03:16:05,700 --> 03:16:06,680
Why can't you get comfortable, Jim?

3712
03:16:09,140 --> 03:16:11,040
And he said, ah, my butt hurts.

3713
03:16:11,640 --> 03:16:13,320
And he's like, let me have a look back there.

3714
03:16:13,320 --> 03:16:22,080
And so he took him into his office, and my dad dropped his pants, and the doctor took a look, spread the cheeks, and he recoiled right away.

3715
03:16:22,800 --> 03:16:24,880
And he's like, have a look.

3716
03:16:25,100 --> 03:16:28,920
And he showed me, he's like, this is essentially extremely bad diaper rash.

3717
03:16:32,340 --> 03:16:35,300
And he's like, you gotta help him.

3718
03:16:36,000 --> 03:16:38,060
And I had no idea that things were so bad.

3719
03:16:38,180 --> 03:16:46,940
And so this was kind of the moment where he provided me with free medical advice outside of his thing.

3720
03:16:47,400 --> 03:16:48,740
He said, go get a zinc paste.

3721
03:16:49,300 --> 03:16:53,500
It's an off-the-shelf thing.

3722
03:16:55,600 --> 03:16:56,500
It's an old school treatment.

3723
03:16:56,740 --> 03:16:57,820
He's like, I promise it'll work.

3724
03:16:58,100 --> 03:17:00,680
It's just like a thick, white zinc paste.

3725
03:17:01,260 --> 03:17:03,040
He's like, you gotta wipe them, you gotta clean them.

3726
03:17:03,760 --> 03:17:05,600
And then put this on like it's spackle.

3727
03:17:06,380 --> 03:17:06,820
Spackle?

3728
03:17:07,400 --> 03:17:10,220
Like just the more the better.

3729
03:17:11,340 --> 03:17:17,120
And so I got the stuff, I did the thing, and I couldn't believe how quickly he healed back there.

3730
03:17:17,760 --> 03:17:20,040
And it changed, like he could sit comfortably.

3731
03:17:20,600 --> 03:17:21,780
It was a big improvement.

3732
03:17:22,300 --> 03:17:24,180
I was very grateful to this doctor for doing that.

3733
03:17:24,940 --> 03:17:26,120
He totally didn't have to do it.

3734
03:17:28,440 --> 03:17:35,540
It's hard later in life, I'm imagining, that you lose your, not just privacy, but in some cases, your dignity, right?

3735
03:17:35,540 --> 03:17:37,080
Oh yeah, he had to go with it.

3736
03:17:37,280 --> 03:17:38,740
It was difficult for him.

3737
03:17:38,900 --> 03:17:41,160
He wouldn't let my sister do it for the longest time.

3738
03:17:43,100 --> 03:17:46,400
But we had a routine, and I tried to make it fun.

3739
03:17:46,520 --> 03:17:47,780
I would play music he liked.

3740
03:17:48,380 --> 03:17:50,040
I tried to keep it as light as possible.

3741
03:17:52,900 --> 03:17:54,880
And really just like have fun.

3742
03:17:55,060 --> 03:17:57,140
Try to find the humor in it.

3743
03:17:58,200 --> 03:18:01,740
It was like the only way I was gonna get through it.

3744
03:18:02,520 --> 03:18:06,260
And then you had a mushroom trip while you were taking care of your dad, too.

3745
03:18:06,540 --> 03:18:15,400
Yeah, and so later on through the thing, after I had a couple mushroom experiences, and I wasn't able to take time off anymore the same way.

3746
03:18:15,500 --> 03:18:19,020
I needed to be more hands-on, and more or less 24 hours a day.

3747
03:18:19,560 --> 03:18:32,040
So in order to get some time away that felt like a vacation, I would take a handful of mushrooms and go to Gage Park and take four or five hours off.

3748
03:18:32,040 --> 03:18:41,160
And that four or five hours high on mushrooms felt like 20, 30 hours away because it was a real mental vacation.

3749
03:18:41,480 --> 03:18:45,820
It's when I really started to be like, oh, I am on a trip.

3750
03:18:47,500 --> 03:18:52,700
You know, where I never really related to, the I'm tripping out, you know, it's like, oh no.

3751
03:18:53,060 --> 03:18:54,760
The metaphor became real.

3752
03:18:54,840 --> 03:18:57,100
Yeah, it was like, oh, I never thought of it this way.

3753
03:18:57,300 --> 03:18:59,400
It really does feel like a mini vacation.

3754
03:19:00,040 --> 03:19:18,620
And so on one particular trip in the park, I would set boundaries for myself because I knew that I had, I would get ideas when I was high on mushrooms and I would have desires to do things that were not what I would typically wanna do.

3755
03:19:20,160 --> 03:19:23,180
I really wanted to be naked when I was high on mushrooms.

3756
03:19:23,400 --> 03:19:26,360
And I knew in my mind, if I'm in public, I can't be.

3757
03:19:26,760 --> 03:19:29,720
So I would just be in jean shorts and nothing else.

3758
03:19:29,840 --> 03:19:32,480
No socks, no shoes, no shirt, just shorts.

3759
03:19:32,900 --> 03:19:34,820
I'd lay in the grass, it felt amazing.

3760
03:19:36,280 --> 03:19:38,780
Do you think you wanna be naked because of the sensory experience of it?

3761
03:19:38,920 --> 03:19:39,440
I don't know.

3762
03:19:39,600 --> 03:19:41,680
It was just like instinctually what I wanted.

3763
03:19:41,700 --> 03:19:42,680
You said it felt amazing, yeah.

3764
03:19:42,800 --> 03:19:43,580
Oh, instinctually, okay.

3765
03:19:43,580 --> 03:19:46,920
Yeah, I felt no, I wasn't worried about judgment.

3766
03:19:47,260 --> 03:19:47,520
I didn't.

3767
03:19:47,800 --> 03:19:48,700
Oh, that's interesting.

3768
03:19:48,780 --> 03:19:50,580
You know, it was something about that state of mind.

3769
03:19:50,680 --> 03:19:52,020
Social mores fall away.

3770
03:19:52,260 --> 03:19:56,120
Yeah, but I also realized that they existed and I couldn't.

3771
03:19:56,120 --> 03:19:59,280
That I had to behave a certain way.

3772
03:19:59,400 --> 03:20:04,220
Yeah, so next time I see someone in the park near my house in the middle of the night, totally naked.

3773
03:20:04,420 --> 03:20:04,820
No, middle of the day.

3774
03:20:04,980 --> 03:20:08,920
Middle of the day, lying there naked, which I have seen multiple times, that they might just be high on mushrooms.

3775
03:20:09,440 --> 03:20:10,640
I mean, maybe.

3776
03:20:12,120 --> 03:20:19,620
And so on this particular trip, I took a pretty healthy amount of mushrooms and went to the park, set boundaries for myself.

3777
03:20:21,120 --> 03:20:38,780
And when I got to the park, there was a religious group that had gotten a permit to use a PA system and to use the main stage, the bandshell, a defining feature in this park, this blue semi-circle.

3778
03:20:39,120 --> 03:20:40,820
I remember the old bandshells.

3779
03:20:40,880 --> 03:20:42,120
There was one in Oshawa.

3780
03:20:42,540 --> 03:20:42,840
Probably.

3781
03:20:43,060 --> 03:20:45,560
Yeah, just one, but in Whippy, where I moved to, there was none.

3782
03:20:45,700 --> 03:20:48,020
So it's like a kind of a hundred year old thing.

3783
03:20:48,080 --> 03:20:49,240
It's an old thing, for sure.

3784
03:20:49,240 --> 03:20:53,440
It had a bit of seating around it, but mostly open field there.

3785
03:20:53,720 --> 03:20:59,300
And so, although the park is big, it's very flat and sound travels across it.

3786
03:20:59,580 --> 03:21:02,500
And there was no getting away from the noise of it.

3787
03:21:02,580 --> 03:21:04,220
So I was just like, well, whatever.

3788
03:21:04,840 --> 03:21:05,900
I'll just deal with it.

3789
03:21:06,880 --> 03:21:13,140
And as I started to get higher and higher, as I was going up, I was listening to people talk.

3790
03:21:13,260 --> 03:21:16,600
And it seemed to me like it was kind of a born again Christian vibe.

3791
03:21:17,060 --> 03:21:28,620
People were going up on stage and just talking about how they were going in a bad direction, and then they found Jesus, and it changed their life, and that they're on a better path now.

3792
03:21:28,760 --> 03:21:30,360
And it was all overwhelmingly positive.

3793
03:21:30,880 --> 03:21:37,820
It was people that sincerely believed that they found this higher power, and it changed their life for the better.

3794
03:21:38,300 --> 03:21:40,060
I was like, well, there's nothing wrong with this message.

3795
03:21:40,920 --> 03:21:41,140
You know?

3796
03:21:42,200 --> 03:21:45,680
And so I just was like, that's pretty nice and innocent.

3797
03:21:46,720 --> 03:21:52,020
And I didn't, I found my place, I laid down in the grass, and I was just looking at the band shell.

3798
03:21:52,680 --> 03:22:04,680
And as I got higher, I started to hallucinate, auditory hallucinate, which I learned, for me, is like a pretty common thing when I'm high on these substances.

3799
03:22:05,660 --> 03:22:12,560
And I, all of a sudden, all of the talking on stage became Charlie Brown's parents-esque.

3800
03:22:13,720 --> 03:22:17,500
So I was just hearing like, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah.

3801
03:22:17,580 --> 03:22:21,940
But it was like, but I was feeling like the positive vibes wash over me.

3802
03:22:22,200 --> 03:22:31,460
And I was looking at the band shell, and I thought, doesn't that look like the eye of a creature that's like stuck underground in this park?

3803
03:22:32,900 --> 03:22:34,000
I bet it is.

3804
03:22:35,480 --> 03:22:39,140
And in fact, I'm gonna dig this creature up and figure out who it is.

3805
03:22:39,900 --> 03:22:42,920
And I really liked this idea of that.

3806
03:22:43,760 --> 03:22:47,720
And I carried that idea with me for a little while, and I thought about it a lot.

3807
03:22:47,780 --> 03:23:03,760
And I talked about it with some friends, about how I think that I might have figured out how to tie together all of these projects I'd been thinking of for a long time into one cohesive idea that I could do.

3808
03:23:03,940 --> 03:23:06,200
And it was starting to make sense to me how I could do it.

3809
03:23:06,360 --> 03:23:13,420
I wanted to tie in folk art, I wanted to tie in psychedelic art, things I was interested in but I didn't participate in.

3810
03:23:13,780 --> 03:23:14,580
Interdimensional art.

3811
03:23:14,920 --> 03:23:18,060
I wanted to do performance art, I wanted to do street art.

3812
03:23:18,780 --> 03:23:19,700
Street art, yeah, right.

3813
03:23:19,980 --> 03:23:23,760
And although I had done street art in the past, I wanted to do it in a different way.

3814
03:23:24,300 --> 03:23:27,860
And performance art, I didn't understand it.

3815
03:23:28,280 --> 03:23:36,680
I wanted to get in that world a little bit, but I didn't think I was able to because I wasn't a performance artist.

3816
03:23:38,540 --> 03:23:43,840
And so I just kind of was like, well, I'm the only one telling me that I can't do it.

3817
03:23:44,880 --> 03:23:45,220
Right?

3818
03:23:46,160 --> 03:23:47,520
So what the fuck do I know?

3819
03:23:47,680 --> 03:23:48,640
I'm just gonna do it.

3820
03:23:48,960 --> 03:23:51,680
Wow, I'm the only one telling me I can't do it, so what the fuck do I know?

3821
03:23:51,780 --> 03:23:51,920
I was, right?

3822
03:23:52,240 --> 03:23:56,080
Wow, what a barrier-eviscerating thought.

3823
03:23:56,700 --> 03:24:07,120
And I'd had that thought before about other things, and so I stopped telling myself that I couldn't be a performance artist, and I just was like, fuck it, I'm gonna do it.

3824
03:24:07,120 --> 03:24:08,780
I'm gonna tie it into this whole thing.

3825
03:24:10,340 --> 03:24:12,420
And- I'm the only one telling me I can't do it.

3826
03:24:13,240 --> 03:24:14,380
And what the fuck do I know?

3827
03:24:15,580 --> 03:24:17,340
I didn't know what  Lewis was gonna look like.

3828
03:24:17,440 --> 03:24:18,960
At the time,  Lewis didn't even have a name.

3829
03:24:19,700 --> 03:24:21,620
It was like, I had to discover.

3830
03:24:21,980 --> 03:24:25,960
I didn't literally go dig him up, but metaphorically I did.

3831
03:24:26,520 --> 03:24:36,380
I spent time thinking about it and what this creature would look like, and what I needed it to be in order to make a costume.

3832
03:24:38,400 --> 03:24:44,600
And so over the course of the time I was with my father, I spent a lot of time thinking about this.

3833
03:24:44,840 --> 03:24:48,940
A lot of the time I was drawing patterns in my sketchbooks, I was really thinking about this.

3834
03:24:49,400 --> 03:24:51,780
I don't listen to anything when I do it.

3835
03:24:51,900 --> 03:25:02,980
I just, I'm usually in a cafe, and I just like to be around people and kind of pull ideas out of the air.

3836
03:25:04,720 --> 03:25:09,140
And so I would plan and think about my future once my dad was gone.

3837
03:25:09,400 --> 03:25:10,600
But what was I gonna do?

3838
03:25:11,520 --> 03:25:13,880
I knew I was gonna feel like alone.

3839
03:25:16,100 --> 03:25:20,820
You know, it was similar to the feeling of leaving home for the first time.

3840
03:25:22,380 --> 03:25:26,660
But like this time I'm really on my own, like no one-

3841
03:25:27,060 --> 03:25:27,280
Untethered.

3842
03:25:27,280 --> 03:25:28,780
Yeah. And I was single.

3843
03:25:31,400 --> 03:25:37,640
And so I didn't have to, for the first time in my life, I didn't have to think about somebody else being in my life.

3844
03:25:39,500 --> 03:25:49,980
And so when my dad eventually passed, I knew I was gonna have to move out of that house, and I wanted to restart my career in Hamilton.

3845
03:25:51,280 --> 03:25:54,160
And so I got a studio downtown.

3846
03:25:54,740 --> 03:25:59,760
I found an affordable place that I could live and work out of, again, not legally.

3847
03:26:00,540 --> 03:26:05,080
The landlord was very nice and let me sleep there.

3848
03:26:07,140 --> 03:26:10,260
And his only rule was no candles.

3849
03:26:10,840 --> 03:26:11,300
No candles?

3850
03:26:11,780 --> 03:26:12,040
Yeah.

3851
03:26:12,200 --> 03:26:12,920
Not the one rule.

3852
03:26:12,960 --> 03:26:14,180
No open fire.

3853
03:26:14,280 --> 03:26:14,860
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

3854
03:26:14,880 --> 03:26:15,680
I mean, it's a good rule.

3855
03:26:15,780 --> 03:26:16,340
No smoking joints.

3856
03:26:16,560 --> 03:26:17,980
It's just funny that that's the one rule.

3857
03:26:18,080 --> 03:26:18,440
Yeah, yeah. He seemed to really be-

3858
03:26:18,540 --> 03:26:20,640
You can sleep in the place illegally.

3859
03:26:20,880 --> 03:26:21,080
Yeah, yeah.

3860
03:26:21,080 --> 03:26:21,780
Just no candles. Practical guy

3861
03:26:22,520 --> 03:26:25,460
So I rented a room-

3862
03:26:25,580 --> 03:26:31,300
A room above a bike store, 15 by 16 feet, with a decently high ceiling, couple windows.

3863
03:26:31,720 --> 03:26:32,740
I had no running water.

3864
03:26:33,220 --> 03:26:33,700
Oh my gosh.

3865
03:26:33,700 --> 03:26:35,780
I shared a bathroom with the bike store.

3866
03:26:36,120 --> 03:26:36,940
Oh my gosh.

3867
03:26:37,120 --> 03:26:38,360
That had no shower.

3868
03:26:39,260 --> 03:26:40,740
So- Ah, what'd you bathe?

3869
03:26:41,120 --> 03:26:43,660
I did sponge bath, sink bath.

3870
03:26:44,380 --> 03:26:47,100
Used a washcloth and I washed my hair in the sink.

3871
03:26:47,380 --> 03:26:47,760
Wow.

3872
03:26:47,960 --> 03:26:49,700
I washed my dishes in that sink.

3873
03:26:49,800 --> 03:26:50,780
Get the armpits there.

3874
03:26:50,780 --> 03:26:51,780
Yeah, everything.

3875
03:26:52,060 --> 03:26:52,460
Soap up.

3876
03:26:52,560 --> 03:26:53,280
You could soap up your armpits in the sink.

3877
03:26:53,280 --> 03:26:56,840
I'm pretty like, you know, I had a whole routine.

3878
03:26:58,280 --> 03:27:01,680
I experimented with different routines and I found one that worked really well.

3879
03:27:01,780 --> 03:27:02,360
Which is what?

3880
03:27:02,880 --> 03:27:08,400
It was just required a washcloth, a bar of soap, and well, shampoo for my hair.

3881
03:27:08,600 --> 03:27:08,740
Yeah.

3882
03:27:09,080 --> 03:27:15,840
And you know, just not- Hard to wash your lower half of your body in a sink.

3883
03:27:16,080 --> 03:27:22,620
I was tall enough that I could straddle the sink in a way and wash, you know?

3884
03:27:23,080 --> 03:27:23,540
Sink straddling.

3885
03:27:23,780 --> 03:27:24,120
Yeah.

3886
03:27:24,540 --> 03:27:28,320
If you don't have a shower around, look into sink straddling.

3887
03:27:28,420 --> 03:27:29,000
Sink straddling.

3888
03:27:29,180 --> 03:27:31,340
Yeah, I'm starting to picture that.

3889
03:27:31,380 --> 03:27:32,480
I was definitely a sink straddler.

3890
03:27:32,700 --> 03:27:32,880
Yeah.

3891
03:27:33,180 --> 03:27:35,920
You know, you're living more and more like a duck here, man.

3892
03:27:36,080 --> 03:27:37,020
Like you just are.

3893
03:27:37,120 --> 03:27:37,940
Like you're like a bird.

3894
03:27:38,040 --> 03:27:39,280
You say you're bird-like.

3895
03:27:39,480 --> 03:27:40,560
You're living like a bird.

3896
03:27:40,640 --> 03:27:42,180
You're flying all over the place.

3897
03:27:42,380 --> 03:27:44,380
You're landing wherever you want.

3898
03:27:44,880 --> 03:27:51,640
Like, I don't mean that in a negative way, but you're like, you are like, you're like, behavior is more and more merging with this character.

3899
03:27:52,400 --> 03:27:52,880
Yeah. I mean, I think that-

3900
03:27:53,160 --> 03:27:55,560
You are Lewis, man.

3901
03:27:55,560 --> 03:28:02,160
I wanted, I didn't want any distinction between like my art and my life.

3902
03:28:02,360 --> 03:28:04,460
I wanted it to be- But you don't call yourself an anima thing.

3903
03:28:04,600 --> 03:28:06,260
You don't, you know, the people that identify as animals?

3904
03:28:06,620 --> 03:28:06,920
No.

3905
03:28:07,020 --> 03:28:08,060
You don't call yourself that.

3906
03:28:08,300 --> 03:28:08,680
No.

3907
03:28:09,200 --> 03:28:13,400
In fact, I- You don't look down on those people, but you don't- You wouldn't get your eyes done differently and stuff like that.

3908
03:28:13,520 --> 03:28:13,800
No.

3909
03:28:14,180 --> 03:28:17,240
You wouldn't shave your mustache into a beak.

3910
03:28:17,440 --> 03:28:17,760
No.

3911
03:28:17,760 --> 03:28:22,300
No, absolutely not.

3912
03:28:22,680 --> 03:28:25,860
It's really- No, I'm a furless non-furry.

3913
03:28:26,240 --> 03:28:28,240
I'm a furless non-furry.

3914
03:28:28,440 --> 03:28:30,540
Well, I had that thought one day when I was in the costume.

3915
03:28:32,960 --> 03:28:34,100
You call it a costume.

3916
03:28:34,420 --> 03:28:35,340
You don't call it a skin.

3917
03:28:35,640 --> 03:28:36,120
No, yeah.

3918
03:28:36,140 --> 03:28:36,600
It's a costume.

3919
03:28:36,740 --> 03:28:37,240
It's a costume.

3920
03:28:37,340 --> 03:28:38,220
But you're a furless non-furry.

3921
03:28:38,220 --> 03:28:40,120
We're wearing costumes now, you know.

3922
03:28:40,140 --> 03:28:40,540
Oh, okay.

3923
03:28:40,540 --> 03:28:41,300
Our clothes, yeah.

3924
03:28:41,320 --> 03:28:42,620
We're presenting ourselves in a certain way.

3925
03:28:42,800 --> 03:28:43,800
Oh yeah, sure, yeah.

3926
03:28:46,160 --> 03:28:47,060
Furless non-furry.

3927
03:28:47,060 --> 03:28:50,240
And so I was in the costume one day, and I was pretty high.

3928
03:28:50,420 --> 03:28:51,620
I like to hotbox a costume.

3929
03:28:54,500 --> 03:28:55,140
Who wouldn't?

3930
03:28:56,000 --> 03:29:02,780
I mean, I'm sure a lot of people wouldn't, but if you smoke pot and you like to do wild shit, it's a pretty fun thing to do.

3931
03:29:03,320 --> 03:29:06,880
And it's a great place to think, because again, I don't talk when I'm in there.

3932
03:29:07,620 --> 03:29:08,260
I'm silent.

3933
03:29:08,700 --> 03:29:09,260
I'm alone.

3934
03:29:09,440 --> 03:29:12,000
You will not talk to people who talk to you as I found out the first time I met you.

3935
03:29:12,040 --> 03:29:13,140
You only quack at them.

3936
03:29:13,460 --> 03:29:13,740
Correct.

3937
03:29:13,880 --> 03:29:19,460
Unless I- If I ran into you on the street now in a costume, I would probably say, hey, Neil, what's up?

3938
03:29:19,480 --> 03:29:20,380
No, I think you shouldn't.

3939
03:29:20,460 --> 03:29:21,800
Hold onto that integrity, Lewis.

3940
03:29:21,980 --> 03:29:24,020
Well, you know, sometimes I do.

3941
03:29:24,080 --> 03:29:24,400
I'm sorry.

3942
03:29:24,680 --> 03:29:25,020
Okay, okay.

3943
03:29:25,140 --> 03:29:27,760
But I usually make sure there's nobody around that's gonna hear me.

3944
03:29:27,800 --> 03:29:28,500
Oh, there you go.

3945
03:29:28,640 --> 03:29:28,780
Yeah.

3946
03:29:29,620 --> 03:29:33,880
No one's gonna see Lewis on film, like, talking behind an alley, smoking a cigarette.

3947
03:29:34,040 --> 03:29:36,360
It seems, well, you'd never see me smoking a cigarette, but.

3948
03:29:36,540 --> 03:29:37,020
Yeah, okay.

3949
03:29:39,460 --> 03:29:43,780
And so I was in the costume, and I thought, I hope people don't think I'm a furry.

3950
03:29:44,060 --> 03:29:48,980
Not that there's anything wrong with being a furry, but I just don't want to put out furry vibes.

3951
03:29:50,440 --> 03:29:53,060
And I was like, well, of course they wouldn't think I'm a furry because I don't have any fur.

3952
03:29:54,640 --> 03:29:55,300
I'm a furless.

3953
03:29:55,340 --> 03:29:57,440
Yeah, I was like, I'm a furless non-furry.

3954
03:29:57,780 --> 03:29:59,300
I'm a furless non-furry.

3955
03:29:59,300 --> 03:30:03,540
And I put a pin in that idea because I was in the costume, and I like that.

3956
03:30:04,220 --> 03:30:05,900
And I- How do you take notes in there?

3957
03:30:06,000 --> 03:30:06,640
Are you getting all these high ideas?

3958
03:30:06,640 --> 03:30:07,900
Just a mental note.

3959
03:30:07,940 --> 03:30:08,240
Okay.

3960
03:30:09,020 --> 03:30:21,400
And so when I came back to the drawing board, I did a little drawing of what a badge, a little crest would look like, you know, for the National Federation of Furless Non-Furries.

3961
03:30:21,580 --> 03:30:24,360
The National Federation of Furless Non-Furries.

3962
03:30:24,480 --> 03:30:25,500
And so that's what I called it.

3963
03:30:25,780 --> 03:30:29,360
And it was one of the first merch items I ever made.

3964
03:30:29,500 --> 03:30:30,480
Oh, how did it sell?

3965
03:30:30,640 --> 03:30:33,380
I did a painting of it, and the painting didn't sell right away.

3966
03:30:33,580 --> 03:30:35,260
I didn't really try hard to sell the painting.

3967
03:30:35,400 --> 03:30:36,640
I was more interested in the idea.

3968
03:30:36,640 --> 03:30:37,340
Do you sell through Instagram?

3969
03:30:38,120 --> 03:30:40,040
I did, and I do, yes.

3970
03:30:40,900 --> 03:30:43,500
Like, @lewismallard on Instagram is where your home is online.

3971
03:30:43,500 --> 03:30:45,560
At lewis underscore mallard.

3972
03:30:45,700 --> 03:30:46,040
Oh.

3973
03:30:46,280 --> 03:30:49,460
L-E-W-I-S underscore M-A-L-L-A-R-D.

3974
03:30:49,600 --> 03:30:49,820
Correct.

3975
03:30:50,020 --> 03:30:51,780
The other Lewis Mallard will not let go.

3976
03:30:51,920 --> 03:30:54,600
I have tried- Numerous times.

3977
03:30:54,780 --> 03:31:02,340
To buy the real Lewis Mallard's account, but he refused to even reply to me.

3978
03:31:03,380 --> 03:31:05,060
They, I don't, I shouldn't, you know.

3979
03:31:05,160 --> 03:31:05,500
But anyway.

3980
03:31:11,390 --> 03:31:29,890
Well, I think what we've just done in this epic conversation is we have finally come to the part in the road where Wild High on Mushroom, taking care of your dad, the James Michener reading, Alaska-inspired, final tethering you had to not living alone.

3981
03:31:30,110 --> 03:31:31,370
I love the adventure of that book.

3982
03:31:32,880 --> 03:31:35,430
I learned about my father from these books.

3983
03:31:36,250 --> 03:31:41,210
I learned that he liked the idea of going on wild adventures.

3984
03:31:42,250 --> 03:31:54,130
And there was a lot of like father-son bonding in these books that I was so jealous of that these fictional characters, these fictional fathers did amazing things with their fictional sons.

3985
03:31:54,890 --> 03:31:58,410
And I thought, I wonder if my dad wanted to do this with his son.

3986
03:31:58,450 --> 03:31:59,450
He would have read about it.

3987
03:31:59,590 --> 03:32:00,550
Yeah, he would have read about it.

3988
03:32:00,630 --> 03:32:05,090
It's a cool thing to connect with somebody through reading the same thing that they've read.

3989
03:32:05,270 --> 03:32:05,610
Yes.

3990
03:32:05,730 --> 03:32:06,130
You know what I'm saying?

3991
03:32:07,350 --> 03:32:08,690
You're in this interview now.

3992
03:32:09,750 --> 03:32:11,310
Yeah, we're doing a podcast.

3993
03:32:13,250 --> 03:32:13,970
That's right.

3994
03:32:16,090 --> 03:32:16,510
Okay.

3995
03:32:22,670 --> 03:32:24,270
It's a lot of action here on the street.

3996
03:32:24,730 --> 03:32:27,810
So the adventure of the book, the father-son bonding on the book.

3997
03:32:28,010 --> 03:32:29,370
Why is there a fight happening?

3998
03:32:29,550 --> 03:32:30,750
Is it real or fake?

3999
03:32:30,750 --> 03:32:31,350
That's a real.

4000
03:32:31,790 --> 03:32:32,710
That's a real fight?

4001
03:32:33,850 --> 03:32:35,250
He's being taught a lesson.

4002
03:32:38,030 --> 03:32:38,950
That's a child.

4003
03:32:38,950 --> 03:32:40,150
Looks like his mother, maybe?

4004
03:32:41,450 --> 03:32:41,870
Yeah.

4005
03:32:41,990 --> 03:32:42,610
You don't know?

4006
03:32:43,290 --> 03:32:44,190
You don't fucking know?

4007
03:32:45,870 --> 03:32:46,730
To let it go.

4008
03:32:47,070 --> 03:32:48,190
That's something you let go.

4009
03:32:48,350 --> 03:32:49,310
That is family business.

4010
03:32:50,030 --> 03:32:51,450
Yeah, that looks like his mom, right?

4011
03:32:51,870 --> 03:32:55,150
I think we just saw a mother punching her son.

4012
03:32:55,730 --> 03:32:57,850
Punching her son and pulling him into the car.

4013
03:32:58,290 --> 03:33:00,050
It does seem like his mother, am I right?

4014
03:33:00,110 --> 03:33:01,510
Like age-wise, race-wise.

4015
03:33:01,610 --> 03:33:03,750
He turtled and went with her.

4016
03:33:03,850 --> 03:33:05,030
Went with her in the car.

4017
03:33:05,030 --> 03:33:06,310
Head down, the friends kept walking.

4018
03:33:06,910 --> 03:33:09,850
That was the guy that just yelled, I'm on this, I'm recording this.

4019
03:33:09,970 --> 03:33:10,850
That was fucking crazy.

4020
03:33:10,850 --> 03:33:12,630
She screamed, you don't know?

4021
03:33:12,770 --> 03:33:13,750
You don't fucking know?

4022
03:33:14,950 --> 03:33:16,810
I guess he did know, potentially.

4023
03:33:17,110 --> 03:33:18,170
It turned out he knew.

4024
03:33:18,990 --> 03:33:20,090
It seemed like it.

4025
03:33:20,230 --> 03:33:20,970
This is the reaction.

4026
03:33:21,930 --> 03:33:22,870
Yeah, oh my gosh.

4027
03:33:22,890 --> 03:33:24,430
That was a wild punch-up, though.

4028
03:33:24,610 --> 03:33:28,570
You don't really see mothers jump out of their cars beating their sons often, I would say.

4029
03:33:28,990 --> 03:33:30,430
What do you think just happened there?

4030
03:33:31,470 --> 03:33:32,410
What do you think?

4031
03:33:32,870 --> 03:33:34,750
Okay, a woman in a hijab with a twin.

4032
03:33:35,210 --> 03:33:35,930
Pardon me, what'd you say?

4033
03:33:36,090 --> 03:33:36,750
Good job.

4034
03:33:37,230 --> 03:33:37,830
I don't know.

4035
03:33:38,250 --> 03:33:38,650
Yeah.

4036
03:33:38,730 --> 03:33:39,370
Okay, okay.

4037
03:33:39,370 --> 03:33:41,170
It didn't seem alarming at the end.

4038
03:33:41,250 --> 03:33:42,970
We don't need to call the authorities, right?

4039
03:33:43,150 --> 03:33:44,670
I think that they would be pointless.

4040
03:33:45,270 --> 03:33:47,090
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

4041
03:33:47,850 --> 03:33:52,490
So, Lewis, we're more than three hours into this conversation here, man.

4042
03:33:53,010 --> 03:34:08,270
We've gone all the way from the beginning to not the end, but to the end of the genesis of the project that you're now currently doing in and around cities in Canada where you're creating this performance art, this folk art, this psychedelic art.

4043
03:34:08,270 --> 03:34:09,530
You're taking over stations.

4044
03:34:09,530 --> 03:34:10,590
You're dressing up as a duck.

4045
03:34:10,670 --> 03:34:11,570
You're walking across town.

4046
03:34:11,770 --> 03:34:16,050
You've got a viral following online, eight, one, two, zero followers, or maybe it's getting more.

4047
03:34:16,190 --> 03:34:18,690
After this comes out, get ready for a few more.

4048
03:34:18,710 --> 03:34:19,570
Whoa, the Neil bump.

4049
03:34:19,930 --> 03:34:22,030
The Neil bump, the Tim Ferriss effect.

4050
03:34:22,110 --> 03:34:23,290
We'll call it the Neil Pasricha effect.

4051
03:34:23,610 --> 03:34:24,830
You got merch for sale.

4052
03:34:24,890 --> 03:34:26,150
You're gonna add the Instagram button.

4053
03:34:26,270 --> 03:34:27,870
Okay, I wanna buy it only through Instagram.

4054
03:34:27,990 --> 03:34:29,550
I wanna give Mark Zuckerberg a piece.

4055
03:34:30,290 --> 03:34:30,790
No, I'm just kidding.

4056
03:34:30,890 --> 03:34:32,450
I wanna give you cash.

4057
03:34:32,890 --> 03:34:33,890
I wanna give you cash.

4058
03:34:34,450 --> 03:34:38,570
So, I hope that this conversation has been inspiring to artists.

4059
03:34:39,290 --> 03:34:40,830
We sometimes have fast money questions.

4060
03:34:40,910 --> 03:34:42,370
I don't know if you're up for it, energy-wise.

4061
03:34:42,690 --> 03:34:43,670
You wanna do some fast money?

4062
03:34:44,110 --> 03:34:45,070
What's a fast money question?

4063
03:34:45,410 --> 03:34:47,290
Hardcover, paperback, audio, or E?

4064
03:34:48,570 --> 03:34:48,990
Sorry?

4065
03:34:50,050 --> 03:34:52,330
Hardcover, paperback, audio, or E?

4066
03:34:53,030 --> 03:34:54,290
Audio, we're talking books?

4067
03:34:54,450 --> 03:34:54,650
Yeah.

4068
03:34:54,890 --> 03:34:55,890
I prefer audio.

4069
03:34:55,950 --> 03:34:57,750
How do you organize the books on your bookshelf?

4070
03:35:01,070 --> 03:35:02,390
I don't really.

4071
03:35:03,490 --> 03:35:05,850
They just kind of fit in where they fit in by size.

4072
03:35:05,850 --> 03:35:10,170
I don't organize them alphabetically or by topic.

4073
03:35:10,390 --> 03:35:13,790
Do you have a white whale book or a book you've been chasing the longest?

4074
03:35:19,250 --> 03:35:22,190
What is a book I really wanna read, but haven't tackled yet?

4075
03:35:22,190 --> 03:35:23,230
That's exactly it.

4076
03:35:24,130 --> 03:35:30,690
I'll put Moby Dick for mine, because I wanna read it, and it was good, and it's just really overwhelmingly, dauntingly long.

4077
03:35:31,510 --> 03:35:33,250
But length shouldn't, you know.

4078
03:35:33,450 --> 03:35:34,870
The audio thing's a great idea.

4079
03:35:35,570 --> 03:35:35,930
Yeah.

4080
03:35:36,770 --> 03:35:39,310
There's a few James Minchner books I haven't tackled yet.

4081
03:35:39,350 --> 03:35:41,850
Are all his books 987 pages like this one?

4082
03:35:41,850 --> 03:35:43,310
The vast majority of them are very long.

4083
03:35:43,370 --> 03:35:45,850
Wow, can you believe this guy produced these that long?

4084
03:35:45,930 --> 03:35:48,090
I mean, it would take me a whole lifetime to research Alaska.

4085
03:35:48,270 --> 03:35:48,750
He had a team.

4086
03:35:49,250 --> 03:35:49,970
Oh, he had a team.

4087
03:35:49,970 --> 03:35:51,030
He had to have had a team.

4088
03:35:51,210 --> 03:35:52,190
He had to have had a team.

4089
03:35:52,190 --> 03:35:52,630
I think, yes.

4090
03:35:52,650 --> 03:35:53,330
Okay, okay.

4091
03:35:53,390 --> 03:35:57,610
To help research and stuff, because he goes into, it's historical fiction.

4092
03:35:58,470 --> 03:35:59,490
Yeah, yeah, you gotta.

4093
03:35:59,490 --> 03:36:01,750
So it was an interesting way to learn about places.

4094
03:36:02,030 --> 03:36:06,050
It's a great, I would recommend this book for anyone who's going to Alaska or wants to go to Alaska.

4095
03:36:06,250 --> 03:36:07,670
You get, you absorb the whole.

4096
03:36:07,790 --> 03:36:09,050
You certainly get some of the history.

4097
03:36:09,050 --> 03:36:12,990
Cultural history of the place through a story that is not like reading the history in a history book.

4098
03:36:13,070 --> 03:36:14,390
We're getting rained on now, by the way.

4099
03:36:14,570 --> 03:36:16,470
I got microphones out here getting wet.

4100
03:36:16,690 --> 03:36:17,330
Little baby drops.

4101
03:36:17,390 --> 03:36:17,770
What's this?

4102
03:36:17,790 --> 03:36:18,530
Here's how we're gonna wrap.

4103
03:36:18,790 --> 03:36:19,710
Do you have a bookstore?

4104
03:36:20,370 --> 03:36:22,110
What's your favorite bookstore, living or dead?

4105
03:36:23,550 --> 03:36:25,870
Favorite bookstore, living or dead?

4106
03:36:30,650 --> 03:36:32,850
I don't really have a favorite bookstore.

4107
03:36:33,050 --> 03:36:34,170
That's okay, that's okay.

4108
03:36:34,310 --> 03:36:34,510
Yeah?

4109
03:36:34,510 --> 03:36:38,170
Yeah, the audio books you're getting on CD are from the library, presumably, back in the day.

4110
03:36:38,510 --> 03:36:40,030
They were from the library sometimes.

4111
03:36:40,470 --> 03:36:41,190
Sometimes they were downloaded.

4112
03:36:42,070 --> 03:36:42,910
Do you have a favorite library?

4113
03:36:43,470 --> 03:36:46,250
Oh, yeah, the Hamilton Central Library.

4114
03:36:46,470 --> 03:36:49,770
Hamilton Central, that sounds like one of those old school, big.

4115
03:36:50,010 --> 03:36:54,190
It's a brutalist building, right downtown Hamilton.

4116
03:36:55,110 --> 03:36:55,910
I always liked, I mean.

4117
03:36:56,050 --> 03:36:57,410
I love old libraries like that.

4118
03:36:58,310 --> 03:37:01,590
Robert McLaughlin Library in Oshawa, shout out to you.

4119
03:37:01,710 --> 03:37:03,170
Never been there, but I would love to see it.

4120
03:37:03,170 --> 03:37:04,230
Oh yeah, you gotta go there.

4121
03:37:04,230 --> 03:37:08,330
I spent a lot of time in the library in St. Catharines, just doing my homework.

4122
03:37:10,430 --> 03:37:12,670
And when I met you, you were on your way to the library.

4123
03:37:12,790 --> 03:37:16,210
When I met you in person, you were telling me, I just booked an hour at the library.

4124
03:37:16,530 --> 03:37:16,710
Yeah?

4125
03:37:16,790 --> 03:37:17,850
You're a library guy.

4126
03:37:18,010 --> 03:37:19,990
I like the reference library in Toronto very much.

4127
03:37:20,230 --> 03:37:22,390
Yeah, I like your like of the library.

4128
03:37:22,710 --> 03:37:29,890
Yeah, I think it's an extremely valuable, underutilized resource in the city, especially the one in Hamilton.

4129
03:37:30,330 --> 03:37:35,670
The maker space there was extremely valuable to me in starting my business.

4130
03:37:37,170 --> 03:37:46,810
It provided a very easy use and cheap use of their printers and computers.

4131
03:37:48,230 --> 03:37:51,650
And so I could start making my merch myself.

4132
03:37:52,090 --> 03:37:53,630
Start making my merch myself.

4133
03:37:53,770 --> 03:38:10,250
Yeah, so with my ability to draw, plus the knowledge of various computer programs, and then the library having a vinyl printer and vinyl cutter, I could make and print my own stickers and make the packaging and sell them.

4134
03:38:10,530 --> 03:38:10,890
Wow.

4135
03:38:11,310 --> 03:38:15,290
And so it gave me the ability to make something for cheap.

4136
03:38:15,550 --> 03:38:18,390
I did the labor myself and then I could keep all the money myself.

4137
03:38:18,610 --> 03:38:19,390
Oh my gosh.

4138
03:38:19,690 --> 03:38:24,030
You're well on your way to not looking at the prices at the grocery store, Lewis.

4139
03:38:24,310 --> 03:38:24,670
I hope so.

4140
03:38:25,170 --> 03:38:48,430
Your jarringly left, right, you know, life story, slaloming the boundaries of societal norms, you know, basically living life from first principles, using the codes that you're developing to guide not just your art, but how you live, how you think about relationships.

4141
03:38:49,210 --> 03:38:56,130
I mean, I'm really in awe of so much of your thinking and your articulation about how you do things.

4142
03:38:56,130 --> 03:39:13,490
I wonder if you might close us off today with any hard-fought piece of wisdom, bit of advice, or any general reflection you wanna leave us with to be the final thoughts as we close off this deep and long conversation.

4143
03:39:15,370 --> 03:39:24,030
I think that you, not just you, anybody listening, is capable of a lot more than they think they are.

4144
03:39:24,590 --> 03:39:28,710
And that if you give yourself a chance to amaze yourself, that you probably will.

4145
03:39:29,530 --> 03:39:33,650
Give yourself a chance to amaze yourself, you probably will.

4146
03:39:33,730 --> 03:39:37,230
Lewis Mallard, thank you so much for coming on Freebox.

4147
03:39:37,370 --> 03:39:37,830
Thank you, man.

4148
03:39:37,930 --> 03:39:41,990
It's been a pleasure knowing you in this short time, and I look forward to keeping on knowing you in the future.

4149
03:39:42,150 --> 03:39:42,750
I hope so.

4150
03:39:56,450 --> 03:40:08,670
Hey everybody, it's just me, just Neil again, hanging out in my basement, my laptop flipped open in front of me, listening back to that wide and wonderful conversation with the one and only Lewis Mallard.

4151
03:40:09,790 --> 03:40:14,690
I hope that you enjoyed that conversation like I did.

4152
03:40:14,810 --> 03:40:27,090
So many quotes jumped out to me, like, when I first discovered folk art, I didn't really appreciate it because I was really stuck in this mentality as a teenager that art had to be as high skill as possible.

4153
03:40:27,890 --> 03:40:41,570
That really reminds me of chapter eight, way back in 2018, the conversation we had with Sarah Anderson, author of Sarah's Scribbles, where she called Hyperbole and a Half by Ali Broch, one of her three most formative books.

4154
03:40:41,650 --> 03:40:44,770
And for those that know Hyperbole and a Half, that was number 980 in her top 1000.

4155
03:40:45,270 --> 03:40:47,390
You know, it's like totally scribble drawings, right?

4156
03:40:47,430 --> 03:40:49,210
Like it's just totally messy scribble drawings.

4157
03:40:49,630 --> 03:41:01,350
And for Sarah Anderson, that book did, I think, what the folk art did for Lewis, which is kind of just crack you out of this like, has to be perfect kind of idea of art, which is beautiful.

4158
03:41:02,030 --> 03:41:02,890
Kind of related.

4159
03:41:02,890 --> 03:41:03,570
How about this quote?

4160
03:41:03,650 --> 03:41:09,690
I think there's a lot of lovely magic that happens when people don't completely understand what they're looking at.

4161
03:41:10,430 --> 03:41:11,410
I love that.

4162
03:41:12,470 --> 03:41:18,510
And then the third quote, I got lots of quotes here, you know, it's got some quotes about the poverty he was living in, altering his surroundings, but how about this one?

4163
03:41:19,430 --> 03:41:21,730
I'm the only one telling me I can't do it.

4164
03:41:21,930 --> 03:41:23,090
So what the fuck do I know?

4165
03:41:24,730 --> 03:41:25,710
I just love that.

4166
03:41:25,770 --> 03:41:27,250
I'm the only one telling me I can't do it.

4167
03:41:27,270 --> 03:41:28,070
So what the fuck do I know?

4168
03:41:28,070 --> 03:41:42,350
But like having an awareness that like you, we, I am the one limiting myself from trying anything new, doing anything new, and then having a healthy degree of skepticism about your own confidence, like that is a really beautiful mix.

4169
03:41:42,910 --> 03:41:44,850
I love those three quotes.

4170
03:41:44,970 --> 03:41:46,030
I love Lewis Mallard.

4171
03:41:46,190 --> 03:41:46,790
You can tell.

4172
03:41:46,910 --> 03:41:57,610
I mean, I'm a big fan of this guy, the work, and just the grassroots nature of it, you know, it's a person on their own just choosing to do something and putting it out into the world.

4173
03:41:57,610 --> 03:41:59,330
So I love really everything about this.

4174
03:41:59,430 --> 03:42:11,950
I'm really grateful to Lewis Mallard for coming on the show and giving us three more books to add to our top 1000, including number 595, Lu Pan by Demi Hitz, H-I-T-Z or Z.

4175
03:42:12,290 --> 03:42:18,790
Number 594, Moby Dick by Herman Melville, also known as The Whale, but really everyone knows that as Moby Dick.

4176
03:42:19,170 --> 03:42:21,990
And number 593, Alaska by James A.

4177
03:42:22,370 --> 03:42:24,790
Michener, M-I-C-H-E-N-E-R.

4178
03:42:25,250 --> 03:42:28,090
Thank you so much to Lewis for coming on the show.

4179
03:42:31,850 --> 03:42:35,210
Did you make it past the three second pause?

4180
03:42:35,310 --> 03:42:36,850
Are you still here?

4181
03:42:36,950 --> 03:42:37,890
It's a long one.

4182
03:42:38,050 --> 03:42:42,270
One of our longest, maybe the long, is this the longest chapter we've had ever?

4183
03:42:42,510 --> 03:42:43,370
It might've been.

4184
03:42:43,430 --> 03:42:44,550
It was more of a hangout.

4185
03:42:44,610 --> 03:42:49,910
I always wanted to do like a hangout, you know, just like a chill and sit and hang out type of show.

4186
03:42:50,250 --> 03:42:51,050
This is one of them.

4187
03:42:51,130 --> 03:42:56,570
Doug Miller, I think chapter 99, you know, and Doug Miller's, Doug Miller books is also one like this.

4188
03:42:56,570 --> 03:42:58,750
Maybe chapter 44 too with Kevin, the bookseller.

4189
03:42:58,850 --> 03:43:06,510
That one was all over the place, but hangouts are fun and I'm hanging out with you and you're hanging out with me and that's why we're back in the end of the podcast club.

4190
03:43:06,610 --> 03:43:11,830
This is one of three clubs we have for three bookers, including the cover to cover club.

4191
03:43:11,930 --> 03:43:17,410
That's people listen to or to attempt to listen to every single chapter of the show, the 333, the end in 2040, where you be then?

4192
03:43:18,330 --> 03:43:19,970
Maybe we should do a party for the last chapter.

4193
03:43:20,010 --> 03:43:20,510
What do you think?

4194
03:43:21,190 --> 03:43:25,810
And of course the secret club, which I cannot tell you more about other than you can call our phone number for clues.

4195
03:43:25,810 --> 03:43:28,190
Speaking of our phone number, please do call it.

4196
03:43:28,250 --> 03:43:29,910
If you're listening to this, call the phone number.

4197
03:43:30,370 --> 03:43:31,190
Tell me who you are.

4198
03:43:31,270 --> 03:43:32,050
Let's hear your voice.

4199
03:43:32,150 --> 03:43:36,350
Tell me a formative book, a reflection, a poem, anything you want.

4200
03:43:36,470 --> 03:43:36,810
Don't don't.

4201
03:43:36,950 --> 03:43:38,230
It doesn't have to be perfect.

4202
03:43:38,370 --> 03:43:39,110
Just like the art.

4203
03:43:39,510 --> 03:43:43,390
Just, just make a phone call 1-833-READ-A-LOT.

4204
03:43:44,110 --> 03:43:49,150
And as we always do, let's kick off the end of the podcast club by going to the phones now.

4205
03:43:51,530 --> 03:43:52,570
Hi, good evening.

4206
03:43:52,570 --> 03:44:07,690
My name is Shamina Hildreth, and I actually just, someone shared one of a, I think it's Harvard Business Review article that briefly touched on your untouchable day every week.

4207
03:44:08,030 --> 03:44:10,810
And I just totally love that whole concept.

4208
03:44:11,190 --> 03:44:17,390
And I look to adopt it in some type of way, even if it's just in a small way.

4209
03:44:17,390 --> 03:44:22,210
I work for a Fortune 500 company as an analyst.

4210
03:44:22,750 --> 03:44:28,050
And so it's really hard to balance meetings and also the deliverables.

4211
03:44:28,270 --> 03:44:40,790
So and I know you kind of spoke to that in the article that I read about how you were to accomplish having an untouchable day and not compromising that day.

4212
03:44:40,910 --> 03:44:42,570
So really inspired by that.

4213
03:44:43,230 --> 03:44:45,230
I want to implement that into my life.

4214
03:44:45,230 --> 03:44:52,790
I don't work in a creative space, but I think that I would be a lot more productive if I wasn't just all over the place all the time.

4215
03:44:52,950 --> 03:44:55,330
So again, I just want to leave a quick voicemail.

4216
03:44:55,370 --> 03:44:56,650
I haven't done this in a long time.

4217
03:44:56,730 --> 03:45:01,250
So thank you for drawing me outside of my comfort zone and leaving this voicemail.

4218
03:45:01,390 --> 03:45:02,330
Again, my name is Shamina.

4219
03:45:02,850 --> 03:45:06,930
I'm here in the Minneapolis, Minnesota Twin Cities area.

4220
03:45:07,810 --> 03:45:11,470
And yeah, just leaving a voicemail as you asked.

4221
03:45:11,470 --> 03:45:15,150
And thank you so much for all that you do and the books that you've written.

4222
03:45:15,910 --> 03:45:17,890
Have a great day and enjoy your summer.

4223
03:45:19,790 --> 03:45:23,470
Shamina from Minneapolis, what a beautiful voicemail.

4224
03:45:23,610 --> 03:45:25,710
So nice to hear from you, Shamina.

4225
03:45:25,970 --> 03:45:38,510
Yeah, I wrote that article, I want to say 2019 for Harvard Business Review, hbr.org has or you can just type in untouchable days and my name into Google or you can just go to the show notes on threebooks.co because we'll link to that at the bottom.

4226
03:45:38,510 --> 03:45:47,530
But basically what I advocate is just taking one day a week where you're completely untethered, unplugged, not on email all day.

4227
03:45:48,030 --> 03:45:51,710
As Shamina says, I think I'd be a lot more productive if I wasn't all over the place all the time.

4228
03:45:51,790 --> 03:45:53,210
Yeah, you would be.

4229
03:45:53,430 --> 03:45:56,050
And so that's why it's so important to do this.

4230
03:45:56,150 --> 03:45:57,690
But in the corporate setting, it's more difficult.

4231
03:45:57,890 --> 03:46:07,070
The first thing I recommend, I don't think I put in the article because I think it came through lots of people asking me about this later, I mentioned the Rich Roll podcast though, is take an untouchable lunch.

4232
03:46:07,930 --> 03:46:17,030
It sounds so like obvious, but when I was at Walmart, you know, everybody is like piling into someone's Toyota Tercel like head over for sushi.

4233
03:46:17,210 --> 03:46:24,810
And of course, we're all at the time with our work phones, you know, checking our emails like the whole time we're on lunch.

4234
03:46:24,970 --> 03:46:32,610
So it is and what I do is when I started doing this at Walmart, I did so like brazenly I like leave the phone on your desk.

4235
03:46:32,650 --> 03:46:39,690
So if anyone comes by your desk to look for you, there's just a phone there knowing that they cannot reach you because the phone is left behind, you know what I mean?

4236
03:46:40,210 --> 03:46:42,070
And I know it's different with remote work and so on.

4237
03:46:42,110 --> 03:46:43,550
But let's just say you're in an office setting.

4238
03:46:44,470 --> 03:46:46,970
So leave the phone on the desk, try to go for an untouchable lunch.

4239
03:46:47,150 --> 03:46:52,510
Now if you can pull up the untouchable lunch, then that means you can go from like, let's just say 12 to one with no contact.

4240
03:46:52,650 --> 03:46:56,310
You come back, there's eight emails now instead of like, you know, one every six minutes.

4241
03:46:58,110 --> 03:46:59,770
And then you start stretching it a bit.

4242
03:46:59,870 --> 03:47:04,410
Okay, if I can be untouchable from 12 to one, maybe I can be untouchable from 11 to one or 11 to two.

4243
03:47:04,410 --> 03:47:16,870
And then what you do, here's the way to sell it into your boss is prepare some like half day piece of work that you really know you could crush, or maybe you crush in advance for the three hours.

4244
03:47:17,090 --> 03:47:27,150
And then say to your boss, after you just give yourself permission to take it, Hey, Jordan, I went I read this great article in Harvard Business Review.

4245
03:47:28,010 --> 03:47:33,830
And I decided to take the person's advice I know we can't do untouchable days here at this office because everyone's working so hard.

4246
03:47:34,250 --> 03:47:45,430
But I decided to try it and I took an untouchable half day I just shut off my Outlook and my email and left my phone at my desk and I went and worked in the boardroom for half a day or whatever it is.

4247
03:47:45,490 --> 03:47:46,570
I went and worked at home for half a day.

4248
03:47:46,910 --> 03:47:47,390
And guess what?

4249
03:47:47,570 --> 03:47:57,250
I finally got that like proposal that I said I was going to get to you three months ago where I finally like got back to I wrote that email to that CEO that required like deep time to like thoughtfully craft whatever it is.

4250
03:47:57,330 --> 03:47:59,470
And the person's like, Oh, great, great, good job.

4251
03:47:59,970 --> 03:48:01,490
Then you keep doing that.

4252
03:48:01,490 --> 03:48:15,310
You keep like selling in the results because the results will be there 100% like once you take a half day or a day off from like the the the overwhelming amount of ping ponging that happens in a corporate office like the busy work, you know, Cal Newport would call that pseudo productivity.

4253
03:48:15,770 --> 03:48:18,550
Well, it's amazing what you get done tons of stuff, right?

4254
03:48:18,670 --> 03:48:27,090
So you keep using the results to sell in the permission, you know, and then you kind of tip off your boss, Hey, Jordan, why don't you take one too?

4255
03:48:27,590 --> 03:48:30,690
You know, and this is how it kind of goes up grassroots through a company.

4256
03:48:31,110 --> 03:48:32,390
Use the HBR article.

4257
03:48:32,470 --> 03:48:37,370
You know what, I think we should link in the show notes to the actual fancy like PDF version of it.

4258
03:48:37,590 --> 03:48:46,550
If you don't have it, I can like send it to you like somehow when those things are sent around with the HBR logo on top with like the big square orange thing, it just looks more professional.

4259
03:48:46,990 --> 03:48:48,470
HBR is telling me to do it.

4260
03:48:48,590 --> 03:48:50,350
Not this crazy podcast host.

4261
03:48:51,830 --> 03:48:53,090
Anyway, you know what I'm saying?

4262
03:48:53,270 --> 03:48:53,650
All right.

4263
03:48:53,870 --> 03:49:01,770
I use this website called chartable, which tracks reviews for every podcast around the whole world, no matter where people leave them.

4264
03:49:02,230 --> 03:49:16,550
So just a nice new one here from P S three, five stars, interesting, heartening, love the podcast, love the concept and love books with a big smiley emoji P S three.

4265
03:49:16,810 --> 03:49:23,450
If you're listening, I owe you a book as you know, so you can drop me a line with your address and now it's time for the word of the chapter.

4266
03:49:23,590 --> 03:49:24,270
Oh my gosh.

4267
03:49:24,270 --> 03:49:27,830
How many cool and interesting words that Lewis Mallard use.

4268
03:49:28,950 --> 03:49:29,430
Hmm.

4269
03:49:29,770 --> 03:49:30,190
Hmm.

4270
03:49:30,290 --> 03:49:31,030
There was a lot.

4271
03:49:31,110 --> 03:49:33,630
Let's go back to Lewis now and then see if one jumps out for us.

4272
03:49:33,670 --> 03:49:34,810
Here we go.

4273
03:49:35,570 --> 03:49:38,550
Psychedelic folk artist, my government PSYOP, vandalism.

4274
03:49:38,730 --> 03:49:42,690
Of course I bring pylons, double entendre, tributary or whatever.

4275
03:49:42,750 --> 03:49:43,510
It's debossed.

4276
03:49:43,550 --> 03:49:46,290
The forgotten piece of street furniture or banal task.

4277
03:49:46,470 --> 03:49:49,210
It's a brutalist, uh, building, furless non-furry.

4278
03:49:50,230 --> 03:49:51,190
Oh yeah.

4279
03:49:51,190 --> 03:49:53,530
There's a lot of goodies to choose from there.

4280
03:49:53,530 --> 03:49:54,570
That's for sure.

4281
03:49:54,750 --> 03:50:02,010
Why don't we go with double entendre, double entendre, Miriam Webster.

4282
03:50:02,210 --> 03:50:03,950
Could you play it for us please?

4283
03:50:05,070 --> 03:50:21,950
Double entendre, double entendre, number one in linguistics, a word or expression capable of two interpretations with one usually risque such as flirty talk full of double entendres or two ambiguity of meaning arising from language that tends that lends itself to more than one interpretation.

4284
03:50:22,070 --> 03:50:22,290
Okay.

4285
03:50:22,790 --> 03:50:25,710
So first off, this obviously comes from the French entendre.

4286
03:50:26,470 --> 03:50:34,390
That means, you know, uh, the verb is, what's the verb on Tante E N T E N T T here to understand to me.

4287
03:50:34,450 --> 03:50:37,530
It's a double entendre means two meetings, two hearings, two understandings.

4288
03:50:37,610 --> 03:50:54,890
But what's interesting is that there's a huge entry on this on Wikipedia, um, and basically it says that, you know, one of the ways a figure speech is obvious, one of them is not obvious and it goes all the way back to like the odyssey.

4289
03:50:55,470 --> 03:51:03,450
You know, when Odysseus is captured by the Cyclops, he tells the Cyclops his name is Odoesis, which I probably got wrong, which means no one, right?

4290
03:51:03,530 --> 03:51:11,030
When Odysseus attacks the Cyclops later that night and stabs him in the eye, the Cyclops runs out of his cave yelling to the other Cyclops, no one has hurt me.

4291
03:51:11,510 --> 03:51:11,910
Right?

4292
03:51:12,350 --> 03:51:12,710
Okay.

4293
03:51:12,870 --> 03:51:13,790
That's an old book.

4294
03:51:14,150 --> 03:51:14,870
How old is it?

4295
03:51:15,090 --> 03:51:15,790
Really old.

4296
03:51:16,230 --> 03:51:16,930
How old is it?

4297
03:51:16,930 --> 03:51:21,670
Ancient Greek epic, uh, in the year eighth, in the eighth century BC.

4298
03:51:21,990 --> 03:51:26,050
So yeah, we want to say that's about almost 3000 years old.

4299
03:51:26,110 --> 03:51:26,530
Okay.

4300
03:51:26,730 --> 03:51:28,950
So that's one of the first double entendres.

4301
03:51:29,110 --> 03:51:36,910
There's other ones from Canterbury tales, stage performances in, in Shakespeare, um, some of which I can't read on the air.

4302
03:51:37,010 --> 03:51:42,390
Well, you know, just C words and M just bad, bad words kind of hidden in there.

4303
03:51:42,390 --> 03:51:51,870
Uh, there's a picture of Steve Carell who plays, you know, Michael Scott in the office and it says he often points out unintentional double entendres with the phrase, that's what she said.

4304
03:51:52,490 --> 03:51:55,670
Also it's in the entry, which is pretty epic.

4305
03:51:55,910 --> 03:52:03,030
Howard Stern, the Howard Stern show in the 1980s began to use double entendres as a way to get around FCC regulations.

4306
03:52:03,810 --> 03:52:04,230
Right?

4307
03:52:04,430 --> 03:52:05,210
That's interesting.

4308
03:52:05,370 --> 03:52:08,670
So double entendres were kind of a way to like kind of secretly slip in things.

4309
03:52:08,670 --> 03:52:16,590
Um, double entendres are also, uh, one notch below triple entendres.

4310
03:52:17,110 --> 03:52:19,370
Triple entendres exist.

4311
03:52:19,990 --> 03:52:36,470
For example, Joe Harris, a professor of modern French at Royal Holloway University in London, uh, says in Shakespeare's Timon of Athens, Timon, who has realized all his fawning guests are only in it for the food and generosity, invites them to one last dinner at his house just before revealing the dinner plates are empty.

4312
03:52:36,470 --> 03:52:38,970
He refers to them all as his present friends.

4313
03:52:39,330 --> 03:52:41,270
To them, it just means friends who are present.

4314
03:52:41,470 --> 03:52:49,690
But we know it's alluding to the fact that they are only his friends for the time being at present and because they want to enjoy his generosity, his presence.

4315
03:52:50,070 --> 03:52:51,230
A triple entendre!

4316
03:52:51,890 --> 03:52:52,310
Yes.

4317
03:52:52,830 --> 03:52:54,570
Are other triple entendres possible?

4318
03:52:55,190 --> 03:52:56,030
Yes, they are.

4319
03:52:56,250 --> 03:53:02,090
In fact, we go to rap music, the kids and the rap music, right?

4320
03:53:02,510 --> 03:53:08,350
For example, Pusha T in the song Suicide says, I build mine off fed time and dope lines.

4321
03:53:08,630 --> 03:53:14,430
You caught steam off headlines and cosigns, meaning number one, his lines are good or dope.

4322
03:53:14,590 --> 03:53:17,530
Two, the lines he raps about are about dope.

4323
03:53:17,690 --> 03:53:20,030
And three, he has actually sold lines of dope himself.

4324
03:53:21,190 --> 03:53:25,490
Three subtle things and other people are saying, what about Frank Ocean's line, I'm high and I'm bi.

4325
03:53:25,570 --> 03:53:26,490
Wait, I mean, I'm straight.

4326
03:53:26,490 --> 03:53:31,490
In the song Oldie, because it's a lyric, so you can't see how it's spelt.

4327
03:53:31,810 --> 03:53:36,270
Is it B-Y-E or is it B-I as in a sexuality, right?

4328
03:53:36,510 --> 03:53:37,610
Lots of stuff like that.

4329
03:53:37,910 --> 03:53:44,870
Triple, if you type in like best triple entendres or favorite double entendres, there are entire threads online and we could go down a rabbit hole.

4330
03:53:44,950 --> 03:53:54,710
I love that there is, I love that the internet is so big that you could literally just come up with the word of the chapter for a podcast that's strangely about formative books, right?

4331
03:53:55,350 --> 03:54:02,270
Find your word of the chapter and then find people in chat rooms from 11 years ago on Reddit talking about their favorite double and triple entendres.

4332
03:54:02,450 --> 03:54:06,550
I mean, we live in a great time, don't we?

4333
03:54:06,690 --> 03:54:12,770
I mean, you get to, you get to meet walking and talking ducks just walking around the street.

4334
03:54:12,950 --> 03:54:20,630
You get to sit with them for an entire morning, hang out with them in the sun, talk to them about art, so much stuff there.

4335
03:54:20,630 --> 03:54:25,270
I just love the way we got, I love the time of life we're alive.

4336
03:54:25,450 --> 03:54:26,570
I think that's what I'm trying to say.

4337
03:54:26,850 --> 03:54:28,470
I love when we're alive.

4338
03:54:28,690 --> 03:54:29,670
I love when we're alive.

4339
03:54:29,870 --> 03:54:32,930
I love that we're alive when I can talk in my basement.

4340
03:54:33,170 --> 03:54:37,910
You can hear me in that basement gym of Mongolia on a long drive, on a long dog walk, wherever you are.

4341
03:54:38,130 --> 03:54:42,450
We can hang out on the full moons for a lot more years to come.

4342
03:54:44,750 --> 03:54:46,970
Sixteen more years till the ways to go, everybody.

4343
03:54:46,970 --> 03:54:52,750
Until next time, remember that you are what you eat and you are what you read.

4344
03:54:52,870 --> 03:54:54,110
Keep turning the page, everybody.

4345
03:54:54,330 --> 03:54:55,950
Thanks so much for listening and I'll talk to you soon.

4346
03:54:56,110 --> 03:54:56,310
Take care.