Spring?

Good news everyone. Light is still out until around 10PM. Epic I know. Sadly, it snowed again recently. All signs pointed to a continuous warming, but then BAM! Mother Nature put us back in our place with 6" of snow. WILD. This is a crazy land I live in.

I went to Folk Festival last weekend in Juneau. It is one of the largest festivals in Alaska and it did not disappoint. I got down there on a Thursday night and stayed until Monday. Almost all of the Alaskan JVs crammed into one house and set out on adventures together.

The music and other activities were all free. People buy "memberships" to Folk Festival that help fund bringing a guest artist and pay for a convention center. In fact, anyone can register to play a 15 minute set, out of the hours of music I saw, only a couple of these 15 minute sections were not worth seeing. And the music ranged from rock-folk to folk-folk to alternative-folk. I'm not sure if these are accurate descriptions but they work in my head and I think are a working explanation.

When we boarded the plane we saw tons of interesting characters. People with outlandish mutton chops, long hair, loads of instruments, crazy beards, wild hats, and a few hippies who were a moment in time from the 60s. It was one of the loudest plane rides I've been on. One of the other great things was that all of these musicians would just play their instruments wherever they could set up and so music was everywhere.

Another thing I learned: folk music speaks to the human condition much better than many other forms of music. There is true emotion coupled with unguarded lyrics.

There was one man who pushed the boundaries of society with his hippy ways. He sang about how to pronounce a place in Alaska, about thinking he was a butterfly but emerging from his cocoon as a moth, and about nuclear bombs. He also suggested that Alaskans take their PFDs and use them to change our social ills for the most oppressed. I had mixed reactions to this man. I think the spectre of Richard Nixon fell upon me and tried to convince me that this man had good intentions but was making America weak, while the spectre of Jesus cascaded on my heart and found his ideas to be true, but not very palatable in the cornyness of his approach. Either way, the hippy man walked off the stage, his long grey ponytail bouncing as peace guided his steps.

In the end, Juneau is a beautiful place that people should visit. Yet it has some oddities to it. They have a whole street that has diamond jewelers on it. The city has 30,000 some people in it. How can you have a STREET of (blood) diamonds for that many people? Wouldn't you only need one or two? Hmmmm. I wonder what they could all be for... Oh yeah, another thing. People in Juneau all wear these boots called Xtratuffs. They are brown rain boots with a yellow rim at the bottom. Girls, boys, young and old. They are the fashion. It's like Henry Ford's black model T: they come in every color, as long as it's brown.

I also watched Fargo. I'm now starting to recognize a Midwest accent in myself.

Lastly, I'm bringing the Midwest up here for our diversity dinner on Thursday. Sloppy Joes and Cornbread. Watch out coastal fools! Freshwater is best!