yyt

a day that shakes up all. the usual chats in the morning, prepared everything to head into st. john's to do a culture walk. a.g.n.l., eastern edge, st. michael's print workshop, christina parker, emma bulter and what ever i find.

heading down allendale toward the centre the news is talking about a rash of break-ins around the city - not break-ins people climbing in through open windows to pick up laptops and money. there has also been some vandalism. crime comes to the rock i think.

head into wordplay to download the blog, and read my e-mails. they are listed most recent to older.

open aimée's something about feeling ill, panic phone calls and josh. close it and look further down to find one from tim with josh helson as a heading.

read it and am shocked by the death but thought it was a road accident.

re-read aimée's. think about emma berger and another death too soon. head out.

had just wondered about josh, it could have been wondering about diana cameras or the gameboy camera or some other piece of equipment barely suited for it use. thought he was in tennesee. he had given me a record of truly horrible newfoundland folk songs.

was in auntie crae's where i ran into jessie who was there with her family staying for a week in st. john's - how odd someone who worked downstairs from me in auntie crae's.

when i get back tim writes copying the story of what happened.

numbness becomes powerlessness and anger and who knows.

trying not to rant about the differences in the cultures - but when i told people i know up here, there was a an how horrible but with the implication of what do you expect from the states.

i'm pissed that josh is dead and would be if it were the car accident that i was thinking happened. that would be tragic but a twist of a sick fate.

this seems to have been preventable - gang crime, guns swerving car hits, kills josh. no preventable if there was intervention 10 minutes before the shootings but preventable if the lifestyle hadn't become ingrained in the culture. so ingrained that we don't even try to solve it anymore.

now it may truly be too late obviously for josh but also for future joshes. subcultures alienated, not feeling part of the whole, fending for themselves,

won't address the gun culture mentality as that is way down the list of factors that caused this. it is the dominant culture saying i got mine - good luck to the rest.

feel angry, upset, powerless confused. i also know that while josh was someone we knew, he is to most now just a statistic that daley, blagojovich and bush will use for or against some agenda and another incident bolstering the stereotype of the states.

when the day was finished, gave a lift back to pouch who were staying at the pipe house - erin and josh.

bye josh.