Falling Forward

Sometimes pushing through boredom means performing your “funny cowboy dance” for your friends while wearing men’s size 14 wooden clogs and a borrowed sweatshirt with an embroidered graphic of a crab and the slogan “Don’t Be Crabby”. Other times it means unexpectedly running into a drunken Santa Clause and his equally drunk chicken sidekick on a random street corner in a city far from home. In any case, pure unbridled silliness beats the heck out of boredom 100% of the time.

Laughter, good friends, live music, and random absurdity have been the staples of this summer. From Iron Maiden to Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, to Harvey Milk to the Melvins to Red Red Meat to the Fluid to Flight of the Conchords to Radiohead, I’ve rocked and rolled and sweated and sang along with the ‘kids these days’ until the summer began to take her leave and the rain has slowly and incrementally started to return to Seattle.

From Washington to Hawaii to Texas to Oregon, I've surfed and skated and partied and, um, danced (if you can call it that) until the sun came up. I've met new friends and tried new things and stuffed myself with the ice cream of the Gods. Now, even as I hold tight to the last tiny bits of warm weather and golden sunshine before the gray skies begin to rain down on us again, I secretly find myself excitedly looking forward to the fall when the smell of wood stoves will permeate the neighborhood as I walk with my best friend through the crisp evening air.