Chapter Four.

So I've been living in Winnipeg for awhile. I feel like I've been in some kind of rehab to immerse myself back into normal life. I've been all about this "work hard play hard" lifestyle for so long that I got stuck into this fast paced routine, and I didn't know how to slow down and enjoy simple things anymore. All in all, it was worth it. I pulled off about an 80 average in my first year of university and I have a direction I can go towards but now I'm ready to relax and learn how to be self sufficient again. I'm not a fan of university life in Saskatoon because I become so dependent on my parents. Eventually living with them wore me down until I was clinging onto the boney fingers of depression. I was living an amazing life of shooting photos, partying, schooling, and a good job that I enjoyed at West 49, but in the end it was becoming repetitive and I just had to leave. I was so busy I felt like I was losing the close bonds with all my friends. It's hard to become close to someone when you want to be friends and spend time with everyone. I've been in Winnipeg for almost a month now and I'm ashamed to say that I don't miss home much. I love home to death but I just wore myself down until I was sick of it. I lived and partied the shit out of that city. It's nice to be somewhere where I don't know anybody. Yesterday I went to the forks market and bought some local food, visited my friend Eden at the smoothie bar, and today I watched Jersey Shore. I used to not care for the show but it cleared out my head. I have a habit of thinking too much, so watching it helped me learn to wind down and stop thinking fast paced for a bit. It helped me to forget my high tension past at home and help me realize "okay I'm here. I can live differently now, and how I choose to live here is my choice." I'm constantly changing my lifestyle but that's just part of developing who you are. Now I'm just trying to sort out my next steps and directions.

Chapter Three

Oh hello friends! It's been awhile. I guess I could just skip to today because there's just way too much to talk about in between. I went to my first art show today that you could tell was filled with mainly art students. It was a collage of outfits I have never seen all grouped together at such multitude, the crowd itself was like a painting that I could stand and stare at in awe for hours. But I was so scared! People always put me under the impression that the artistic crowd is pretentious and one that looks you up and down if they don't know who you are. But I found that it was actually the complete opposite. People would approach me and extend a hand and we'd proceed to engage in rather long conversations. It could be that I have grown a lot mentally since the beginning of school and have much more to discuss now. English class has forced me to take my own stance on politics, when before I could care less about them. I still could give two shits but I am beginning to define my beliefs of what they should be. It was such an eye-opening experience and I need to go to them more. That atmosphere is so addicting! It made me yearn for a larger city, but also opened my eyes to what I didn't know this city had and how great it is. All I could think was "Where did all these amazing people come from?" Where the hell have they been hiding? In a way similar to my views of Winnipeg of which I'm now dying to explore and experience from different eyes. I shot a series of Holga photographs, black and white, of Winnipeg's downtown and when they first appeared before my eyes they were nothing that I expected them to be. They were better! I was in awe and it almost felt like I didn't even take them. It was like looking at somebody else's work. But lo and behold it was my work, and I was proud. In fact I think it was the first time that I've been genuinely proud of my work before receiving external feedback. I coupled the series with The Weakerthan's "One Great City!" which fit the series so well because they describe how a "darker grey breaks through a lighter one" which embodied the theme of my photos. I had an image of the Golden Boy against a grey sky, double exposed over a faded and drab looking parkade, but the amalgamation of the two created an effect that captured exactly how I currently view Winnipeg through my eyes; My new perception of its beauty, overlaying my past memories of it's grey ,dirty, concrete ugliness. All of the photos were black, white, and grey...depressing, but beautiful, so much that you feel some kind of warmth inside. Anyways I think this is all I have to say for now. I could ramble about anything and everything for days so it is best to end it here. Bon voyages friends.