music: Phish- 9/12/2000, Mansfield, MA
This one came from duncan, by way of TiMO. It’s very much worth a look.
It is, of course, a shame that Brian’s home would be so forcefully torn down. I’d expect the Law to not give the man much wiggle room, especially after living on the fringes of society for so long, but to raze such a magnificient structure? At the very least they should preserve it, charge admission, and use the money to fund homeless shelters. As TiMO pointed out, there is very little that is different between Brian Joyce’s endeavours and that of Henry David Thoreau. Thoreau’s homestead at Walden Pond, some 15 miles to the West, is now a historical and recreational park. Brian Joyce’s homestead, perhaps more impressive in that he built it with supplies and materials scavenged and found for over 5 years, and did so literally under the noses of a couple million people, is now a patch of dirt.
What is striking to me here is that someone is able to live like this for five years, virtually unbothered and virtually undetected, in one of the largest metropolitan areas in the country. When I was in Boston I had absolutely no idea that Brian Joyce existed, but his tenure in his house was almost exactly the same as my own in JP, Allston, Cambridge, and Somerville. Think of all the rent money I could have saved…
This is not a normal picture of homelessness. Many homeless people are homeless not by choice, but by one circumstance or another. Homelessness is a terrible byproduct of a social system where the distribution of incredible amounts of wealth is so uneven, as well as an indicator of certain types of institutionalized prejudices. But in the case of Brian Joyce, a very sharp and strong and willful and lucid figure, I can’t help but romantacize homelessness a little bit. Brian has found a way to work his way between the big teathers of society and subsist on what everyone else has cast aside. This is, no doubt, not an easy way to do things, and is probably uncomfortable at times, perhaps somewhat dangerous at other times, but I support Brian’s efforts. He is a walking practice of what so many have just read about the so-called “Great American Novels.” How many of us have cast down the river like Huck and Jim? How many of us have jumped trains like Jack and Dean? How many of us have dropped everything, built a one-room cabin by a pond, and lived in it for two years like Henry? Damn near none of us. But Brian Joyce has. His homelessness can be construed as unfortunate, but I think in this particular case Brian’s homelessness is the reason for his extraordinary life.
music: The Curtis Twelve- 5/13/2006, Somerville, MA
(Long TIme No Blog. I think February of 2007 was the first month I missed since I started this thing in June of 2003. Things have been busy and I’ve been pushing myself away from this contraption as much as possible.)
Of all the material possessions that I still have, only a few have been with me since I lived in Milwaukee. I moved out to Providence in the fall of 1997, so most of my belongings are newer than that. Between 4 moves in Providence, 6 moves in Boston, and one big cross-country drive this summer there are only a few things that have survived the changes of the last 10 years. I take inventory as I look around my room: what has made cut after cut for the past 10 years? There is my acoustic guitar, a very important object. There are a few ratty t-shirts, each with sentimental value for one reason or another. There are certain CDs and books, for obvious reasons. There is my clock radio. There is my big green Osprey Silhouette, a very important item indeed. And there is my little stereo, which has been around longer than any of the above items.
I bought my little Panasonic shelf unit in December of 1991, when I was in seventh grade. It was a pretty expensive piece of equipment at the time, but put out a lot of good sound for the size and had some top-of-the-line features. That little stereo made its way to college, every apartment I’ve lived in, my cabin when I was a summer camp counselor (where I dubbed a good 100 tapes from AJM in the summer of 1997).. Every night I gazed at the flickering LCD EQ as I drifted off to bed, every morning I rubbed my eyes and squinted at the time on it. Today, though, that all came to a close as I picked up a used receiver off Craigslist for $35. It was time; I’m running three sets of speakers, multiple inputs (the least of which is this computer). Moreover, after 15 years the CD player on the shelf unit no longer works for most CDs and one of the tape players is broken. The new receiver puts out incredible power, is able to fill the entire upstairs of my house with sound, exhibits great stereo separation, can handle multiple inputs with ease, but something is still off. After living with something and interacting with it on a daily basis for 15 years I’d imagine this will take some getting used to.
It is said that every cell in your body regenerates after about seven years, meaning that you are made of completely different molecules every seven years or so. The little panasonic shelf unit, as an extension of my cellular makeup for the past 15 years, has survived two complete biological overhauls. Now it sits under my bed, unused, gathering dust. Its time has definitely come, but it’s still awkward to not have the thing around.