Two years ago, I was in New Orleans under the same full moon in Taurus that will shine tonight. I was at the end of a long prolonged break from the reality I had spent two years creating with a very special past loved one. New Orleans offered a change of climate while I sought to sort things out. It was also the first travel on which I sold my then newly published, hand-bound collection of short stories. I thought in a little over a month’s time the Mayan world was going to end. I felt accomplished that I had met at least one of my main goals: “publish a book before the end of the world on December 21 2012”.
Now we’re all under that Taurus moon again. And I am for sure on the road again. This time it’s a little different, though. Similar in that I seek a change of climate and new horizons, but there is no concrete heartache this time chasing me further onto the highway. This time of year has always offered unparalleled struggles, from the phone call notifying me of my closest friend’s suicide to the time I got attacked in my own home at the last show of the first Dream Oven. But each year these struggles have served to teach me and out of the darkness comes the light.
Since that time in NOLA, the Mayan world has gone and ended and I’ve survived into the new world to tell its tale. I’ve felt the cycle of death and rebirth a thousand times. I’ve brought its power under my wing. Learning everyday from my own finite nature. Watching the sunrise and sunset and growing stronger. At 27, I stand before you a wanderer. A man much humbled by the height of the mountains. Challenged by the length of the ocean. Encouraged by the depth of space. And stupefied by the sublime flagrant colors found everywhere at anytime. But I am no one and I continue to be honored by the presence of everyone I meet. Poets and architects, dreamers and psychedelic zen lunatics. The high rollers and the absolute dregs.
I stand here now in San Francisco on the opposite shore of this country from where I was born and look back towards the rising sun towards the east towards all that I came from and I think of my return visit to that old New Orleans full of magic only a few weeks or a month away. I stand here now and I wonder what further prosperity awaits me on the other side.
The Life and Works of Marshall James Kavanaugh 