á↗︎ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ also, @island → o ° scroll down for chat.bubbles ° o ░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░ ░░ ░░ ░░ ░░ ░░ in the small nest box ░░ ░░ nuthatches rest quietly ░░ ▒▒ after a long day ▒▒ ▒▒ ▒▒ ▒▒ ▒▒ ▒▒ /~> <~\ ▒▒ ▒▒ (((((()))))) ▒▒ ▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓ 4.5.26 last Sunday afteroon, i had an opportunity to visit Ken Josephson and Maleea Acker at the UVic mapping collaboratory headquarters while they cleared the space out (end of an era). Maleea had invited me after our 'Nature-Based Design' event chat, and very generously offered to gift me one of Erin Robinsong & Merlin Sheldrake's beautiful 'Return Address' zines. i had met Ken years ago (pre-pandemic) when i was hosting Community Socials downtown for the Social Autonomy Project, and was looking for large maps of Victoria that people could gather around to discuss community spaces. i remembered his office being full of maps, art, plants, and other cool ephemera, and him being so welcoming, fashionable, and kind. such a character, who i've since learned has been at UVic for 45 years! after doing a bit of clearing and deliberating, we sat and chatted about some of the memories attached to things now moving out the door, and the challenge of letting objects go that have so much personal history and unique beauty. i could really feel the community energy embedded there, and was grateful to have an opportunity to visit during this time. we also talked about the community mapping project that i've been wanting to bring to life for several months. Ken gave me some great suggestions and i feel like i'm getting close to at least a first draft in the not-too-distant future! ~ then on Monday, @wingy and i joined our friend Alfred for a meditative writing exercise. the goal is basically to set aside structure and intention to see what might flow out. not quite stream of consciousness - more related to automatic writing. we wrote in several segments, and afterwards discussed how the experience changed each time - but didn't read our writing out loud. that evening, we hosted Defence Against The Digital Dark Arts and met a cool new softer town member named Samantha who shared some really resonant experiences and insights. honestly, it was a bit of a shock and delight to meet someone who i don't already know who's interested in this stuff. ~ Tuesday, we met with Karla Kerr over tea to chat about the Doing Death Different market that'll be happening at the end of May, and about potentially collaborating on an Hourglass session in June. it was so nice to have a chance to sit down with Karla for a proper chat, especially since she has so much experience in the 'death trade'. later that night, i stopped by a 'Tea & Mortality' event that she was hosting at a nearby restaurant. i couldn't stay too long, but sipped tea and munched on baklava while chatting with an older woman about various deathy things. it was a sweet conversation, but unfortunately the space was quite noisy, so one person left overwhelmed. always hard to gauge with certain spaces until you try them out. anyway, still a nice little event, and i look forward to collaborating with Karla in the future. ~ Wednesday morning, i traded in some more books at Russell, catching up with Lesley, who's probably gone though about 100 books from me now & knows a bit of the history. always a pleasure. after that, i chatted with the person in charge of consignment about potentially stocking some copies of @wingy & i's microseasons book there. she was really into it, and it sounds like we'll be on the shelf there soon! later that afternoon, i had been invited to my friend Keira's mystery play readthrough at Intrepid Theatre, and it was so sweet! a small group of us gathered around a table in the lobby at the beginning to highlight different characters' scripts, and did an initial readthrough. i won't get into the details, since it's still hush hush, but there are many creatures involved, and i ended up being Eagle and Beaver. it was fun! as time went on, more friends from her network trickled in. so many lovely people, and a few familiar faces. we all shared a feast of food catered by Bold Butcher, and got to know each other better. wholesome chats all around. after dinner, we headed into the theatre space proper, formed a big circle, and did a larger readthrough with maybe 30 people. this time, people really got into their roles, and we had such a lovely time. most of the performers had no prior experience, but i think we did very well! it helps that the story and script are really solid and intriguing. looking forward to seeing how the finished version eventually manifests! after that, i dashed off to Little Fernwood to see Jeffrey perform as Pesewa, opening for Elisa Thorn. the space was comfortably filled, and our friend (& fellow spider-lover) Taylor was at the door, and many other friends were gathered inside. Jeffrey's set was enchanting as always, and you could feel the concentration in the room. Softer Drink were also there with the best bevs as always, and i had a chance to catch up with my dear friend Phoebe who i hadn't seen in some months. i enjoyed Elisa Thorn's set, but to be honest, it wasn't really my cup of tea - which is odd, since i have a history of people obsessed with harpists, and had coincidentally been revisiting Joanna Newsom's work earlier that day. but yeah... i liked it, but there were certain aspects that didn't really capture me. ~ on Saturday, @wingy and i started officially setting things up for the Library of Death pop-up at The Ministry of Casual Living. we've been feeling so grateful to Ash for inviting us into the space and being so accommodating. it has always been a dream to have a more consistent space where people can visit us, and this seems like the natural path to a more permanent future location (in the works!). (we'll also have a similar one-off pop-up during the Doing Death Different market at the end of May) ~ okay, tapping out now! ~_~ { written while listening to Jonathan & Andrea's Softer Drink set on Public Assembly (CFUV), followed by Colleen's "Libres antes del final" on a handheld recorder piped into a speaker } ((~* bliss & chills *~)) 3.29.2026 last Thursday, i felt a bit like Mario or some other outfit-transforming character, as I swapped back and forth between my Habitat Acquisition Trust hat and my Library of Death hat. i made my way from a presentation about 'Nature-Based Design' at RBCM (HAT hat), to a rehearsal at Little Fernwood for a play directed by Misty Cozac where Death is personified (LoD hat), to Sarah Jim's Native Plant Study Group talk (HAT hat, again). all three events resonated with the creative practice that i've been cultivating around interrelationality, and i left each feeling nourished and inspired in different ways. ~ Friday was full-on web work day. that season is definitely coming to an end for me. many lessons learned, and good growth, but it's time to move on... ~ Saturday morning, I took @wingy up to Canoe Cove and was delighted to learn that our friend Cedric was driving the water taxi for the first time in many months. on our way into the marina, i had been wistfully reminiscing about bygone days and our time with Guy. we met Cedric after Guy had to step away from Sea Star, and became fast friends. anyway, it was delightful to chat with Cedric for a bit before i had to head out. i later learned/realized that Jason Brown of holyscapes had come aboard before i departed. he and i had discussed the personhood of oaks at a Swan Lake Nature Sanctuary workshop some years ago. hopefully we'll have another chance to reconnect. instead of continuing on to the shrine with everyone else, i headed to volunteer at Sarah Jim's W̱S͸ḴEM Ivy Project. it was fun to navigate there by intuition, my favourite method of travel. (i also had my HAT hat on again.) i arrived early to a soundscape of birdsong at the end of a dusty, rural road. shortly after, a car parked nearby and two figures emerged - one who i'd met at Sarah Jim's NPSG talk, and the other who seemed familiar in the 'is that? no, couldn't be' kind of way. but once we gathered at the meeting point, i found that it was indeed my old friend Kikila! he used to work at HAT, and we always ended up having sweet, long chats together. a warm reunion ensued. as more and more people trickled in, the warm energy increased between old faces and new. Jameson and Trenton also made an appearance, which was great because i've only previously had very short opportunities to chat with them. we formed a large circle (30?) and introduced ourselves, with an optional ancestry prompt. i usually skim past that because 1) i prefer to talk about my relationships with other species/forms and 2) it's a loooong, complicated story. but this time felt called to share in more detail and tried to walk a balance between these two aspects. later, i had some nice chats with people whose curiosity was piqued. (on a side note, it has been feeling right to reflect more on my desert roots lately... maybe especially so since that is when my pre-Internet memories are from.) out in the forest, we spread out and worked on all fours to extract the ivy. the whole experience brought a lot of mixed feelings for me, due to my past stewardship work, and the grief, learnings, & transformations that come with it. i also made a sad mistake, which is inevitable. that being said, i enjoyed connecting with the land and community there. i'd been feeling called to make the trip up for years, and now was the right time. chickadees wondered what we were up to, spiders ran and hid, tiny mushrooms persisted, and the native landscape seemed to breathe a bit more easily in the end. a few people expressed gratitude towards the ivy for bringing us together, which is the right way to orient towards this kind of work in my opinion. at the very least, we need to open up more spaces for discussing the interactions, beliefs, and feelings that present themselves through this kind of work... 3.22.2026 on Friday, i attended Ballet Victoria's 'Rite of Spring' showcase to see Gwagwadaxla's new dance work, 'Movement 74'. i've not really been to many contemporary dance performances before, and have previously not felt particularly connected to the genre, but was genuinely excited to see this one. before 'Movement 74', the curtains rose for a performance based around Max Richter's recomposition of Vivaldi's Four Seasons. this actually brought tears to my eyes, because i have deep memories associated with that work. it was also just a beautiful performance, and especially surreal since i'm recovering from being ill. after that, Gwagwadaxla came out to introduce Movement 74 and really held the space as a good host (meaning of his Kwakʼwala name). the curtains rose again to an undulating group of dancers on the stage floor, wearing black outfits with splashes of white to embody the orcas. the backdrop became an underwater scene and the stage became milky with a bit of fog. the performance was beautiful, powerful, intense. the dancers really evoked the grace, form, and sound(!) of an orca pod encountering the world in 2026. ~ i also had the opportunity to attend CREAN's 'Culture, Identity, & AI' conference, which i had originally been a bit wary of, thinking it would end up being another AI™️ hype train. but no no, true to the theme, it was a thoughtful, creative, intercultural exploration of the rise of AI, and how communities might respond to and rethink our relationship with LLMs etc. lots of thoughtful insights from a very diverse group of people, including someone who is blind and now uses AI tech to navigate the world & someone from Ireland who is using LLMs to practice Gaeilge. overall, people are intrigued by potential benefits, but very concerned, overwhelmed, and in want of a more thoughtful approach to these technologies. this coincides neatly with the work that i've been doing both with @softercomputing and a little event series that i started recently called "Defense Against the Digital Dark Arts". much more in this vein to come, but suffice it to say that we are clearly at a major junction right now with this stuff... also, one of the other storytellers from 'What The Wild Taught Me', who happens to work at a cemetery (we discussed needing to connect re: The Library of Death), also works for CREAN! the synchronicities continue to align... 3.15.2026 my brother's been in town for the past couple of days, and although i've been trying to be a good host, i was also determined to do something special for pi(e) day this year - @softercomputing style. normally, @wingy and i try to bake an edible pie for 3.14, but this time around, she made some slices of paper pie (baked in the printer, sculpted by hand) while i prepared the filling: ~π~ usb sticks with my old pi(e) day montage (the 31.4m version) ~π~ an audio recording from 2014, where i taught my friends Dan & Evan how to make a good pie dough, and talk about how i got into piemaking ~π~ a "sounds of pi" mp3 clip ~π~ a txt file with one million digits of pi ~π~ a txt file with ingredients notes i also tinkered with a couple of cute little pimoroni raspberry pi projects - making an eink pi(e) day 'card' via the og rpi and a pi quiz with python, a pi pico, + lcd display. i'd never done this sorta stuff before and it was really fun/satisfying to dip my toes in we brought all of this to Softer Drink at 3pm in my old pie basket, and at 3:14pm we tried out the quiz. a lovely group of people gradually trickled in to join us (unwittingly) and it ended up being a really sweet little celebration we gave away four slices, and saved some for a few others who couldn't make it before bed, we also rewatched the montage on the rpi - - - - - - - - - - - - - archive: https://www.leaflitter.ca/special.fish - - - - - - - - - - - - - ░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░ _______________________________________________________________ |[+]o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o° [ chat.bubbles] °o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o°o[v1.2]| |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| | | | o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o° | | ° [3.5 '26 ] °° | | o o | | ° ~leaf message delivered! jonathan was intrigued °o° | | o to hear about this special.fish connection :^) o | | ° o° ° | | o also, ~wingy is pretty sure that she stayed at o | | o your house in oaxaca in like 2017? her brother o| | ° ° is kevin romain o° | | ° °° | | o & cool! let's try out special.fish.mail! o | | ° i actually printed an ascii postcard to send to °o°| | o ~elliott some years back, & have been wanting to o | | ° o° do something else like that ° | | o o | | o maybe just write a message to ~softercomputing o | | ° ° and add some sort of ascii art if you'd like. o° | | ° we'll be setting up a little mailbox at softer °° | | o drink soon, where people can send/receive small o | | ° printed messages °o° | | o o | | °o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° | | | | o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o° | | o [3.8 '26] o | | ° o° ° | | o ~leaf sweet! i've never been to oaxaca, but o | | o would love to visit someday. so kind of you o | | ° ° to invite us :^) o° | | o o | | ° we'll be in touch for sure if we're able to make °° | | o a trip your way. meanwhile, yes, let's have o | | ° some fun here in the special.fish.sea ~~~☆~~~ °o° | | o o | | °o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° o ° | | ___________________________________________________ | | | [3.22 '26] | | | | | | | | ~morningdove | | | | | | | | wishing you all the best in navigating this | | | | difficult time. you reminded me of a similar | | | | chapter of my own past when heartbreak and | | | | bereavement converged, sending me down into | | | | dark depths... | | | | | | | | keep listening to that sweet, tender birdsong, | | | | be kind to yourself, & one day new growth will | | | | indeed emerge from the soil of all this | | | ! | | | | }<,☉> < #7cc351 | | | |___________________________________________________| | |_______________________________________________________________|