A Cactus Blooms as I Exit the Prairies -- Barely Escaping With My Life

It was a close call. But now I'm finally in a safe place. Swimming in REAL turquoise waves.

Sometimes you must escape from an "island of prisons". And I must thank all of my friends who have helped me out whether they know it or not. You just might have saved my life...

I realize now that I must take my own advice. It is indeed a fine balance. But sometimes "something BIG needs to happen. Because 'fundamental changes' means everything shifts." But this means be smart. It doesn't mean it's over... You kill off that prickling negativity -- the seeping black oil that corrupts the mind and soul, but stand up strong like the carefree blossoming flower. Yeh -- don't ever let them tell you it's over.

Saskatchewan is just being overrun by oil interests and they don't really even know it yet. And the good hardworking farm town of Saskatoon isn't quite ready to be a star on the map. At its corer it is still a hard-working farming community. The whole northern portion of the city caters to it. Remember, 80 per cent of the men don't own a proper pair of dress pants, as one club owner wanted me to keep in mind. The locals just hate the foreign yuppies that are buying up all the million-dollar housing, putting average homes out of reach of average people. And it's very hard to get an event up and running if you don't have your country music in place.

And yet potash mines are planned. A lady with connections tipped me off to another one yet that's going to go forward. Cameco has big billboards set up, to convince the labour market that their uranium mines are the answer. Don't forget, they've assembled worldwide talent to tap what's there beneath the ground. And OIL... well, it's only the beginning. There's more oil to be had in Saskatchewan than in Alberta -- and they haven't even discovered most of it yet. As one of my rides said, as we headed south -- looking out over the rise and fall of the valley: "Wow, last time I was here there weren't any oil wells." And now across the misty green hillside stood stark black donkeys, consistently pumping like the diligent machines they are. Working as efficiently as possible -- because this is their nature, so the guy at the top can increase his stability. There were probably about 30 now. And the tar sands are still on the way...

Oh ya, this is a very dry place. A place creative minds can get sucked up in all too easily.

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Currently the future of this blog is in jeopardy... I'm not sure where I will go from here (and yes I mean that literally) -- though I have some really cool ideas...

But what I do now know is this: despite the incredible sadness my experiences have left me with... THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING!

I only had one way out. A business card with a map on it in my wallet: I swim naked in the stream, run up and down the hills, and burn away all the creeping insidiousness. Caught in the arms of the strongest defenses. Family farmer. The guy knows how to fix things.

It is here I see the most amazing sight: a small little cactus with a bright yellow flower poking its head out of the needles in the evening's dying rays. It is small and insignificant. Really it is nothing. But then again, it is the most stunning singular image that I see for acres and acres in all directions. Given the climate and terrain I think, I've never seen anything quite like this.

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But let's not get too ahead of ourselves here...

Colouring on the table... whoever thought of this is a genius.

It would seem that country music is the happy medium out here. But to catch all the undercurrents I think you'd have to dig around a bit.

You might wonder, for example, why a Toronto band as faraway and distant as Metric, has the ability to resonate through the airspace out here, though kids in farmland suburbs south of the border aren't given the chance to hear the same music.

Or you might also wonder as well, how come, with the simple twangy ballads and tender Christian radio hits, in Canada's own Heartland, why punk and hardcore tunes done up with super fast guitar licks and an easy enough style -- just make so much sense to so many kids out here.

And from Regina I'm picked up by a dark-haired girl with rings in her face and tattoos on her arms, the wife of a dude in a non-stop touring hardcore band. She fell in love with the urban kids who need so much help, but are still so rad, over there in Nairobi. Over the kilometers we chill to tracks from Cursive's Domestica album, Coheed and Cambria, and various melodic hardcore bands. Then we put in the latest album her husband's hardcore group has put out, and vibe out to the breakdowns.

As we cruise along (half the time on the wrong side of the road I swear) we'll pass some guy on a bike raising money for Darfur. And later I'll watch Andy Shauf play some great acoustic, check out some chill art photos, and salvaged Douglas Fir woodwork, and I'll hear about a girl going to help out in South Africa.

But for now, alongside a soundtrack of guttural growls, I watch the sun stream through the clouds, fanning out for miles.