Ashlandsblog

I have never seen him shy.
When I was young, he would swift away The curtains deftly, without a word — Urging.


Just before we would leave the hotel,
He would pat down my coat,
Summon a tissue to wipe an invisible stain.
Always preoccupied, him and me.
We spoke different languages,
And I could barely stand to look him in the eyes,
Though he demanded.
I learned to draw out the details in the silence we shared.


I’m at the Blue Hotel in San Francisco, Gently drawing the curtains open—
Though it makes no difference; the room is grey.
I’m hoping she takes the hint that the sun
Hides behind its own curtains on this side of the world.
Elevator music escapes the revolving doors,
Rain-slicked roads are wearing the night lights.
My sister and I are ready to head out, And I’m fighting the urge to wipe
The stain off her coat.

Soft sunrays breached the curtains of Mrs. Aritzia. Specks of light on her powdery comforter, and when she opened her blue e-

Woah, wait. No. She wakes up way too late for that. The sun was already out, and she woke up.

She had her dog fetch her coffee. Dressed like a butler, the dog sets the breakfast tray down on her bed and resumes being a dog after he’s left the room. After she’s done with coffee number one, she goes into her phone and deletes the alarms she missed. All 14 of them. Headed to work, exactly late. Few moments setting things down, and now it’s time for coffee. Her first one of the day before the one at home. Pavement and floor amassing as she takes a step—she could walk on clouds.

And she’s here. She’s going to try something different today.

She doesn’t. She never does. Which is to say, how poetic and philosophical—she’ll try something different today, she’ll engage a part of herself that she usually doesn’t. But she actually doesn’t. The latte makes itself. The barista’s head is a coffee pitcher, and he’s pouring himself down. When she leaves, the coffee shop fades out. Her desire for change fades out. Till it rises again when she’s back.

And my god, she’s back. Two hours later for her FIRST coffee. But this time she took the alleyways to another coffee shop, so it’s the first one of the day.

And when she gets home to the front door that’s a decoupage of coffee cups made to look like a door, she walks into her butler-dog holding her first cup of coffee for the day.

My dad used to take me to his office. He’d have his meetings, and I was in the room next door, drawing. There was a stack of printer paper ready for me, and I’m sure I’d use up 500 of them a day. You could say we were both working at the same time.

Interestingly, you’d think someone so crass and heavy handed, and business minded would encourage someone to be more practical and less creative, but he never intervened. Even today, he never questions it. I remember him telling me one day that, before there was any language, there was art. On the walls of caves and trees and so on.

Eventually we’d go onto hire a resident artist from Iran. She was the quintessential foreign artist. Painting portraits of everyone in the family. She’d take me shopping with her, I never took shopping for oil paints seriously. The whole process of oil and paint seemed to industrial to me, then and now.

In High-school, where that picture is from, I never attended any of my other classes. I only went to the art class, 8am to 2. Never-mind getting in trouble for it, I was too sharp with my tongue and too intentional for someone to put me in time out. When the principal, questioned it? I said I’ll attend all my exams, but I need to only go to the art room and focus on that. And that is what I did. Ofcourse I passed, and ofcourse I had the best art teacher. She helped me not just with technical skills but with style. She would say, if you’re going to draw, or paint, don’t make it look like it’s a drawing or a painting. Exaggerate. Lean in. And so I did. Though I had trouble.

You know, you almost never have to teach a child the definition of art. They understand what it is. They might not be able to explain it to you, no better than any adult but they can feel it. Art is like that exact moment the universe is reflected back to itself with style it couldn’t have imagined.

I met my Al at my best,
Lines raking the edge of his eyes,
Burnt at the neck,
An old cat.
I wish I could say beautiful,
But he was invasive, warmth creeping in.
If I looked away, his voice unbuttoned
My being.
It’s always cold in this city,
The moment I step away for
My beloved cigarette.
She reminds me I have to buy her,
Pay in tar under my teeth,
And at the tip of my fingers.
But my Al is the relief
That doesn’t come in a box,
Someone I can’t
Throw a twenty at.

My friend, Jordan. One of those moments you don’t remember the first time you met. But you guys know I remember.

He’s my reference point. When I think about him, I think about Florida and ordering take out, and walking to Dunkin’ Donuts in the evening and no matter how hard I tried to blow the smoke away from his face, it would just follow him. He gave up swatting it away and instead just tolerating it for my sake.

Jordan is Jewish and he would teach me all about it. I was, as I always am, actually a reference point for most people, the exception, the outlier in most relational and social dynamics. And that was the fatal flaw, the Achilles heel. Back then? I wasn’t worried about softening myself for anyone, I was forming. Jordan wanted a friend, I was trying to be a spectacle. No matter how many times he adjusted, I introduced a new side of myself. I was a complicated card game, and he had just figured out how it all worked. We both lived on campus in Florida, our ritual was ordering Denny’s breakfast in the evening. He sent me a lot of his writing, and I read it and I held my tongue.

He didn’t hold his. Eventually he wrote me a poem and I have to say I loved him more for it. Because he’s not wrong at all. And we’ve stayed friends after too.

“Dear Ash

How can I say goodbye without thanking you? 
Have to know I’ll never go a day every mistaking you 
As a curse
Because yes, we got what we deserved 
But no, you’re a blessing 
A well-learned lesson 
In how not to treat others
We put up with each other for too long 
Always knowing where the other was going wrong 
But you’ll live forever in me 
Focus on the guy to really remember
Focus on the guy to really see
You’ve helped shape who I am till now 
Influenced me in the moments where you weren’t around 
Crossed the line between vanity and self love
Made me question my sanity more times than enough
Facing down your demons
While knowing every meaning 
Curiosity killed the cat
I guess that is that
Too great to change 
So you’ll just stay the same
Making people adjust to you
Smiling when they come up to you 
But let me just say I’m done with and through
In your mind you are always right
But here’s something you never knew 
Your presence always leads to unsettling despair
So in essence I have begun not to care
Thinking the world will bend at your will
That nobody is as close to as skilled
Everyone else is two degrees lesser than
Happy to explain so they can understand 
Some people stick some people fade
The person I like is there but in spades 
Not a frequent visitor to the civility club
So I’ll hold on to my nobility and say enough is enough

– Jordan Davis

Here’s a drawing I made when I was in Vancouver Island. I am measuring places by what art I made there.

Market Research

Or dating? How often do we find that people- whether they want to or not – are subtly influenced by the people they date or want to date. Exposure, proximity, access. There’s even research suggesting that middle-class people spend more money on luxury goods than wealthy people overall. It’s all about osmosis these days. You think if you stand next to Megan Fox long enough, you’ll start to look like her. And in many cases, that’s true – in some fractional way. You’ll learn the tricks of the trade, learn to dress like her, wear what she wears, take on her habits.

But then why do we love finding out that someone’s beauty wasn’t paid for – that it was inborn, natural, a gift from God? You know why? It makes people believe you’re special or gifted and, in the most compelling way, lucky to be around. Because if God’s favorite likes you, then you must be close to that -or will be, eventually.

How frequently do we find that the salesmen at our door aren’t selling us a product but an idea? The cleanest, shiniest mirror with your best self in view at all times. Perhaps the salesman at our door is actually our most desperate self.

Banks sell you time. I’m not being skeptical at all, and let me say in my defense that I’m not opposed to consumerism. I love buying things. I love an idea. In fact, when I was very depressed and disappointed in people in general—and myself—I looked to materials and thought: If Yves Saint Laurent had such an amazing vision and he brought it to life and I can purchase it? Perfection and beauty and details can exist – and can be bought.

But you know what else you can purchase these days? Everything. And if you can’t buy it? Date it.

What we’re seeing more and more is how people are able to subconsciously take on the qualities of their partners—but also literally steal their ideas. That’s only if you’re smart enough. I remember dating someone and thinking, My god, I haven’t seen someone be this sincere and selfish at the same time. Now I look at myself and think: Why did I become the exact thing I admired?

Your Instagram becomes your résumé and your stop shop. Your bank on display for people to steal ideas from. It’s no one’s fault, but there’s no agency. If everyone becomes a derivative version of another, then you’re just recycling.

Instead, I think everyone should be just like me.

We’ll skip definitions. It seems to me, at times, integration is the key modality all people should aspire to. Sometimes the heart is weak, and sometimes the mind. Balance is key? Okay, whoever said that – can you make spares and pass them out next time? I might be projecting, because I lean too far one way or the other. Actually, I lean too far just one way. The mind just takes over, and these days, they make it so easy. This is a commentary. I have no solution for you or myself.

So – the sunk-cost fallacy. When you’ve invested too much and for too long in something that’s better to cut losses with. But we might be facing quite the opposite problem: people don’t spend time investing in much at all. I, too, have been a victim of socialization far beyond my grasp. I have to physically stop myself from cutting the cord to anything too quickly.

As soon as you tell your friends your job isn’t satisfying yet? Oh, they’ll hound you to quit. Relationship problems? Fifty thousand reasons to break up. You don’t like your therapist? There’s a billion more, and some in school right now already versed in why you have a problem letting go. We have so many measures -weighing your food, checking your balance, tire pressure, heart rate, step count – but have they come up with how people measure emotional investment?

Every heart has its own limits and language. And if you see someone able to hold more ground for someone than you would? Don’t be so quick to deter them. The world works on equilibrium, but it needs asymmetry just as much. And some people that weren’t so fortunate might be relying on the good fortunes of others – even emotional fortunes. It simply means they were unfortunate. So next time you have wine night and you’re pressing your thumbs into the bridge of your nose wondering why someone’s testing your limits? Don’t ask why they’re doing it – they know they can. Those types of people are hardwired to pick out people like you. In layman’s terms? Soul mates.

You see how if I word everything just right, you start to question things? I almost made you believe it’s okay for people to use other people as pedestals or extract things for gain because they were either unfortunate or you’re their savior? Don’t ponder too long – the vultures are already circling the skies.

I have this one customer who keeps me sharp. I have the second one to test it out on. These two, black and white foxes, orbit me. And though my posture is steel, it softens around the two. People don’t like jokes – they either like the person who makes the joke, or maybe we’re naturally inclined to give in to our sentiments and senses and find someone funny simply because they think they are. So when the guy with the bad joke once again throws his hook into water, all the fish in the world scatter away. You don’t laugh at his joke? Oh, he’s ice fishing for it.

However, after a thousand bad jokes, a couple have landed. The best one being the time he reluctantly explained how, over the weekend at a different store, he spilled his drink as soon as he got to his driveway. Now I’m not a nice guy – I’m spectacular.

No, no, you’re not paying for this, you dropped it, mistakes happen. Don’t worry about it!

Upon getting his freebie, he snatches it and says, “That works every time!”

Any time he’s hanging out longer than he would, any time he’s waiting for a reaction to his joke? I know it won’t be funny. The couple of times he has been, he walks away. True winners don’t care for the applause – the reward is intrinsic. And some part of him knows this. On days he doesn’t have a joke, he acts busy – files dropping out of his briefcase, calculators falling, the numbers at his desk threatening to board flights unless he accounts for them right away!

His partner in crime is a bit more savvy. He’s dry. More attentive. A lesser man might miss it, but he’s familiar with disruption. And so am I. This one’s caught me off guard more than once. One time I joked about getting surgical work done – I was getting my teeth whitened – and he simply saw me, a slight pause and straight face: “So you’re finally getting some work done.”

And after I’m done laughing, he adjusts his comically large collar and grunts like he got a lion to jump across a ring of fire.

Now I have to wonder how one is funny and the other tries to be funny. But if you look close enough? Mister Bad Joke is exactly why the other one is funny. He takes the initiative and makes the joke. Mister Dry Wit and I are simply editors. Our humour relies on his. Otherwise, we come across as too jagged and sharp. The people with the bad jokes, or the ones that try to be funny, are foundational. They’ve got broad shoulders and no gym membership. 

People with a dry sense of humor rely on timing, place, person, precision – and although that’s not easy and a whole thing of its own, the guy with the bad joke simply has that one joke in his back pocket. No relation to time or audience.

Interestingly, the bad jokers are also never going to laugh at your joke. Their directive is simply to be the funniest. Someone else’s joke might as well pull the wake down on itself. The attendees won’t even look up from their phones.

My brother was like this too. You could never get him to laugh at anything I’d say. Perpetually unimpressed. He was also just like Mister Bad Jokes – chronically on his phone, probably stealing jokes. I guess where there’s lions, there’s hyenas too.

Meanwhile, Mister Dry Humour and I roll dynamite under each other’s doors. Our noses are red from the cold — it’s not paint.

I have this one customer who keeps me sharp. I have the second one to test it out on. These two, black and white foxes, orbit me. And though my posture is steel, it softens around the two.