social distortions / halloween parade

​I went to the first punk / hardcore / whatever people want to argue about on forums and call it or whatever show tonight that I had been to in at least a decade. Going made me realize some things about not only the show and the groups of people there, but also about myself.

I will start out by saying that I have been listening to punk music, like many others, since I was a teenager. One day in my algebra class in my freshman year of high school, I borrowed a friend’s iPod nano and she had Black Flag’s Nervous Breakdown EP uploaded. I had been into Nirvana and Kurt Cobain, and had read about how much he liked that band so I listened to the whole thing (it’s only four short songs long), and I was instantly changed. Or at least I thought I was. I was already reading Salinger and Kerouac by this point, rebelling against the tame and seemingly suffocating world that I lived in, made up of endless suburbs, standardized testing, and a Southern Baptist community that I had been in since birth.

When I was a little older I was finding out that there were punk and hardcore shows that were happening in the city nearby. All of the bands for the most part in the town I lived in (that I knew of) were indie rock or some sort of Animal Collective inspired thing, which were pretty cool looking back, but I just wasn’t interested in it after a while. I wanted to see bands like Black Flag, the Dead Kennedys, or even more, Bad Brains. I wanted the insanity and intensity that went along with it. I wanted the style too, but I didn’t know that to do besides shave my head like I’d seen people do in that documentary American Hardcore, so I did that. Looking back, I really just wanted to be a part of something that didn’t feel like it was going to tell me what to do or suffocate me with rules. Punk music seemed like the right direction.

Unfortunately, throughout most of my young life it was very hard for me to make friends or feel like I was part of a group. I was always paying attention to what other people around me were doing and trying to figure out what exactly I had to do to be accepted and be a constant member of that group (this plays out much later in a very interesting way). Was it the shoes they wore, the music they liked, the movies, the places they went? I just couldn’t figure that out and it always did a real number on my self-esteem as a young person.

Throughout all of this, I loved the music, seeing the bands, hearing the banter of what was punk and what wasn’t. Who is a sell out? Who is a true punk? What is actually punk? It started as a fashion statement, for God’s sake. What does the word even fucking mean?? Bullet belts? Spiky hair? Do it yourself-ism? Nihilism? Positive outlook? Again, I just couldn’t figure it out on a smaller or larger social level. I just wanted to be a part of something.

Recently I have been listening to a podcast called End on End which talks about the DC area punk/hardcore/music label Dischord Records. Turns out that I like learning about the music and the people that experience the shows just as much or even more than I liked being a part of the crowd. Being a part of the crowd was so hard. Observing from the outside is fascinating. Why do people wear the clothes that they do? What influences the way they play their instruments? Why the fuck do people dress like it’s 1982 in England?? Why do they play the bass exactly like someone played bass in 1986 in New York City?

Of course some of this has to do with globalization. Images of culture are highly accessible in most cases. You can watch videos on YouTube 24/7 about any subculture that you like and just emulate it. Want to look like Robert Smith from the goth band The Cure in 1994? You got it. How about the lead singer of a crust punk band from 1984? You can also do that.

There was a point when I was going to shows when I was younger and someone got me into Lou Reed. I always liked listening to him because for one he was just kind of an asshole, but he also just stood completely apart from the genres that he played (The Velvet Underground & Nico freaked me out and wooed me way more and any punk record ever did). There is a Lou Reed song called Halloween Parade where he talks about all of the characters that he sees in New York City. I was instantly impressed by that and related immensely. Everything felt like Halloween to me. People dressing up to be these characters and sometimes doing it to play parts in some bigger scene (maybe a music scene). I never liked playing the part myself. I didn’t know who I was but I certainly knew who I wasn’t. I wasn’t a (insert rock and roll stereotype here) because I was blatantly incapable of doing so. I just couldn’t fake it. To be crystal clear, this is not to say that I think that people are “faking it”. I believe that most people are genuine in who they are and act the way they do around others to be a part of the group - it’s a tale as old as time and there is nothing wrong with doing what you’re doing as long as you aren’t hurting yourself or others in the process. 

Anyways, it’s really interesting to me how this has all played out through my life because as of now I am re-enrolled in school and looking to get a degree in sociology- the study of groups of people and how they interact with each other and the world. There are so many example of this, but my experiences with music and the trying to fit in with the groups of people that also enjoy it inadvertently led me to what I am so interested in now.

I’m hoping to get some time to upload some postcard scans soon. I’ve got a good selection of Tennessee themed postcards and some other interesting stuff from the stash box that I can’t wait to share. Until then…

music: baby teeth thieves

     Today I was waking up...slowly...trying to guzzle down some coffee, getting my thoughts together- for some reason my brain went to an old dusty space...where I sat at my computer as a teenager, socially alienated, looking for connection elsewhere besides school or church where I did not feel like I fit in one bit...mid 2000's, maybe 2007 or 2008.

    My first job was at a Kroger, bagging groceries for the neighborhood folks. There was a guy that worked on one of the registers there that had a band that played alt-country (think Uncle Tupelo, etc). I started going to these shows in this house kind of across town and then from there found out about other houses and bands. One time I was at one of these shows and saw a sticker or something that said "lation.org". 

    When I got back home to my computer and myspace account, I started searching around and found the myspace and actual website, and after a while I discovered that "lation" was some sort of mindset or collective or maybe both. There was music and art on there that was being made around me and I had no physical connection to it but I did like the music, so I searched the bands out.

    One of the bands that I eventually was able to see more than a few times was Baby Teeth Thieves. They were such a joy to see perform. It was mostly acoustic and spacey and sort of sad...and there was a celloist. I have always loved the way a cello sounded for some reason. Here is one of their records:

we'll replace the factories with the factories that grows trees that trees grow in front of...

books being read // music appreciated

​    I’m going to ask a question here. How many books have you read so far this year? What are you reading? If you are reading, where do you get your books? As a student, I am constantly reading my textbooks, and I’m also pretty constantly (sometimes to my own detriment) “monitoring the situation”. So I read quite a bit of non-fiction. I also try to throw fiction or historical fiction in there just to keep my brain active and my imagination running. This is what I’ve been reading lately:

• For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway - about an American who volunteers to fight for the Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. This book was declared "non-mailable" (censored...) by the US Post Office in 1940 and is considered one of the best war novels of all time. Hemingway does not disappoint...
• The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism by Max Weber - A pretty hefty read of sociological theory that people haven't stopped talking about since it was published. It theorizes on the links between Protestantism (mostly Calvinism) and industrial capitalism in society during the Industrial Revolution and the early Gilded Age. I will just leave the link for the SparkNotes here if you are at all interested.

EDIT:

    Alright...

    So I started working on this post on 3/25/26. Since then, I have been taking online classes at a community college, majoring in Sociology. I have since finished the semester, taking a Sociology 1010 for my major and a Music Appreciation course to satisfy a Humanities credit. I admittedly enrolled in the music course because I thought it would just be "an easy A". (Narrator: It was not.) I figured, how hard can it be? I love music. I grew up singing hymns in church, have played guitar or some other instrument since I was a teenager, and have owned so many records and CDs that I have scoured the booklets and covers of. I knew this stuff already, or so I thought.

    Although it was difficult, and I am now indisputable hater of the tyranny of McGraw Hill's textbooks, I do have a new appreciation for music as a whole, and understand why symphonies are split up into parts. I know why people hated and still hate Wagner and Stravinsky, and also have a new appreciation for fugues, Impressionism, and Expressionism, as well as Minimalism and the avant-garde.

I wanted to share a few pieces of music here that really stuck out to me this semester.

J.S. Bach - "Little" Fugue in G minor:

Pachelbel - Canon in D major:

José Pablo Moncayo - Huapango:

Milton Babbit - Three Compositions:

Igor Stravinsky - The Rite of Spring (1913):

    I hope you listen to these and find something crazy and interesting that you like. I never in a million years thought that I would find myself looking for symphony orchestra LPs or reading about Stravinsky ballets. But hey, life is long, and every day is new, right?

incoming: postcard pickups

Every year, I go to a military antiques show called Show of Shows. It's a show focused on military collectibles ranging anywhere from antique weapons to US Army patches or Tiger Stripe pants from Vietnam. I used to go looking for old food, MREs (meals ready-to-eat), or just general personal items like forks or prayer books. 

The first year I was there, I happened upon a booth that had binders full of old money, old photographs, and paper goods that were mostly from World War 2. Since them I've made a point to stop and see what the guy has. I've bought coins from the beginning and the end of Nazi Germany (the metals are lighter as the years progressed), and stamps with Saddam Hussein's face on them which I will try to dig up and post at a later date.

This year, I was looking through what he had and I found these postcards. They were in a small photo album with about 20 or 30 pictures that looked like they had been made on an island in the Pacific during World War 2. From the look of them they were made either during or right after a battle. There were photos of Japanese that had been captured and taken as prisoners as well as dead Japanese. There were also photos of what I would have to assume were natives on the island.

I couldn't bring myself to buy the photos. I equally enjoyed and disliked being able to look through them. A few were too gruesome to mention here; I didn't even really feel comfortable holding a few of them. It felt odd and in some way disrespectful. But I did see these postcards. I flipped them over and looked at them; I noticed that they looked like serene places in contrast to the other photos that were in the album. I haven't been able to translate the text on them yet, but if and when I do I will make sure to update this post with it.

The postcards are dirty. They have been handled. Not just bought and put in a box. They look like they were carried, maybe overseas by a soldier to remind him of home, or a place that he wanted to visit after the war was over. They also seem to have some sort of residue on them, like mud or possibly blood. I hope it is only mud. I also hope that whoever wanted to see these places got to see them, but it is quite unlikely. In that case, I hope he is just at peace if nothing else.

sonic adventures: Dead Ex

 At one point in my life about a decade ago (yikes) I was living in Seattle. It had some of the best record stores that I've ever been to. One of the stores I used to frequent was Wall of Sound. It was a super small place in the University District that was highly curated with all kinds of music that I had never heard of, or at least explored at the time: dub techno, acid jazz, free jazz, ambient, industrial, noise, etc. It was one of the few record stores that I could still go into and just buy things to listen to because the album covers looked interesting.

At some point, after frequenting Wall of Sound and perusing their wares like a lost traveler in Skyrim, I ended up getting into noise music somehow. I also picked up a few (free!) copies of a print magazine called Tape Op. I was pretty immediately engulfed in the idea of tape machines (cassette tape recorders) as a means to create music. I already had a guitar and some pedals. I also had a loop pedal, which allowed me to loop sounds over and over again.

I decided to give it a whirl and make some loops with a tape machine that I had lying around. My friend Kyle, who also had interest in making loops and noise music, worked together with me on these two pieces which he posted on his bandcamp account a few years ago. And now, here they are for you to listen to. Maybe I should drag out the Tascam and all of my old tapes and see what I can conjure up...

prayer cards

 These were some of the first items I picked up that got me interested in the idea of ephemera. There was a big stack of them, all one-sided, one color of ink each. I found them at an antique mall and couldn't help but wonder 1) where they originated from 2) what they were given to people for and 3) where they sat for years before they somehow ended up in a booth in an antique store in Nashville.

I wonder if they were given out at funerals? Not too sure. But still on the lookout for more.

incoming: photo pickups

 

    First of all, it was someone's grandma's birthday...

    And then of course, as any grandma would, she wanted a family photo. 

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Then, in some other person's world, they went to a train museum of some sort. The grey engine on the left is what's called a "tank engine" because of the tank of water that surrounds the cylindrical boiler in the center of it. The one on the right...I'm not so sure of what it is. There are two sets of rails. Not sure if its some sort of incline railway or what. No date on the photo, no engine numbers, no way to tell.

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    Moving on...to Central America I believe? Maybe Spain here. I'm not sure. Not sure who these people are. I can't tell if this a party or a riot of some kind. Maybe a procession to a party that turned into a riot?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

This is most definitely a god that we quit listening to somewhere along the way. I wonder what he thinks of where we're at now.

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And finally, here we are, at a New York Mets game in 2004 (it was written on the back of the photo). Somebody is warming up for something. He doesn't quite look like a pitcher. More like an outfielder. Ya think the Mets won that day? I hope they did, but probably didn't.

all good things...

    Posted below are some pretty cool first day covers (FDCs) from St. Vincent and the Grenadines featuring stamps from one of the best TV shows of all time, Star Trek: The Next Generation. I don't generally advocate for television shows, but this is one of the few times I'll say it: go watch it. Go watch all of it. Watch some of the original series as well and see where that gets you.

    I bought these at a local record store for next to nothing. The guy behind the counter didn't know what they were or why someone would be interested in them besides the fact that they had to do with Star Trek, which he had to know at least a little about.

    

    What's so cool about these FDCs? Well, I think they're pretty sweet because they've been preserved, kept from the mail room, kept from someone's mailbox where they would sit until they were eventually ripped open and thrown away. They're kinda frozen in time (and space).

telephone pole genesis

​I’ve been using a camera (called myself a photographer?) for roughly 6 or 7 years now. An ex partner of mine had cameras and I was given access to a 35mm Minolta. I really had no idea what I was doing. I remember really liking the mechanical, physical aspects of the hobby immediately. I was close to train tracks, and have always been slightly infatuated with freight trains in general…so I was off to the races 

Most of the rest of the rolls developed at that time were my first foray into “benching”, which is a term used in graffiti and railroad culture that means to sit and take photos of shit you see in trains, whether it’s tags, throw ups, monikers, Simpsons characters, an array of expletives, or anything else. Some benchers you can find on Instagram have massive collections of tags from each artist that they’ve seen and captured with a camera of some kind. 

Anyways, that was my original aim, to take photos of trains, which I did. But I also took some photos of other things out of curiosity. And out of one of the first batches of film that I had developed at Dury’s Photo (rip), I got this one back.

I was obsessed with this photo. I think I took it because that day felt like a scene from Twin Peaks. The clouds were a swirling mix of grays and whites. I think it was about to storm too - it might have been the last shot I was able to get before I went inside for the night. I couldn't get over how the power lines looked against those clouds, either. I still pull over sometimes just to get shots of power lines or telephone poles like this. There's usually not much vegetation in them these days. Its just not as satisfying for me to look at and click a button over, I guess.

ephemera: a definition

Hello to everyone who is reading this. I'd like to welcome you to this space, hiding in some server, probably sitting at the bottom of the ocean (it keeps the computers nice and cold). In this great new year of 2026, I'm trying my best to find a new place to post things that matter to me. I got sick of dealing with Meta's algorithm and feeling limited on how I interacted with people that I "share" with. There is also just too much digital yelling on those platforms for my liking. People upset about 15-second-long nothings. No conversations, just comments. I am completely over it. Anyways, this is a new place that I'm going to use to share photos I've found, photos I've taken myself, poetry that I've written, or as the title says, my STASH of EPHEMERA.

What is "ephemera" you ask?

As of 2026, Mirriam Webster's Online Dictionary defines ephemera as "items (such as posters, broadsides, and tickets) originally meant to be discarded after use but that later become collectibles". So like when you get dragged to the antique store with your Aunt Sylvia when you go to visit her, and there are all those old pieces of paper like old found photos for $5 apiece (outrageous) and old trading cards and postcards and pages of stamps and all that dusty old paper junk? Yeah. That's it. That's the good stuff. That's what "ephemera" means.

I've got my own stash, and this is where it's going to live digitally. Maybe I'll write about it when I post something, or maybe I'll just let you figure it out. Nice.

Here is my first photo that I'm going to share here. I took it myself on my parents' old film camera, and Olympus Infinity Zoom 105. It was at Edwin Warner Park and Nature Center. It was the beginning of Spring in Tennessee and the clouds were magnificent that day. Take your kid or your partner (or both) there and just walk the hell around until you feel way better. It seems to usually work that way for me.

I had prints made of this entire roll of film. It was a little overexposed (I might have hit the latch trying to figure out how to use it for the first time and exposed the film just a tad) but the majority of the roll turned out pretty well. There were a few shots of clouds from that day as well as telephone poles/wires, street lights, the usual stuff that I like to shoot. But I kept going back to this one...I remember looking up at the sky and feeling so glad to be alive that day. Do you ever feel like that for no particular reason? Like a kid on summer break? I hope you do.

Until next time...