12 (P1)

This month marks my first year here at HubPages, and although I have been increasingly quiet I can't stress enough that the time spent has brought me nothing short of a whole new world view and life. And no, I'm not being overly dramatic.

I only regret not taking my own personal digital camera in some of the more active chapters.

In two thousand & nine

I found myself re-established and comfortably back netside after a leave of absence due to moving out of the family nest. This followed from some of the darkest periods of my life.

 Batting down my hatches and swinging into an accelerated growth cycle I began resurrecting my penchant for writing and laying the ground work for a few novels.

When the re-connection of the net happened I lurked around Writing.com but found that it's need to have a subscription to fully enjoy the benefits ruffled by penny pinching motif. Undaunted I began to roam the world wide writer's web wasteland in search of a clear alternative that may offer the benefits of support, growth, revenue, and community.

Whether from a Wired article or a random search via Google, there came HubPages in February of last year. This is where it started, but I could not hazard a guess as to what it would bring.

When I sat down to write my first hub, I pondered what it was that I could bring to the site that other Hubbers may not be quite familiar with. Having a love for music (conventional or otherwise) and tinkering with home recording technologies for the better part of ten years I decided to do an easy piece to introduce people to some toys and tools of the trade.

The hub would have to be as easy and clear as I could make it while offering a fun pay off. It was then I remembered a "secret" track from one of my favorite albums as a teen and wrote up a guide to discover backmasking.

Plodding along doing hubs about my favorite b-movies, super heroes, and internet memes I was encapsulated by capsules, their use and how I may mangle them. I wasn't sure what it was I wanted, but I wasn't about to reach out to the community without content to read.

One night would come where the anxiousness of my life kept me awake, and I filled several pages with what I termed the GLM Roadmap. Ideas were in a fetal stage at best, determination benzened great desire for exploration of an autowritten business manifesto.

Ralph Deeds was the first hubber ever to comment in response to this post. Even if it was as I suspect a snarky one. And so far, he was the only one.

artfuldodger and a few others would begin to provide input to my other hubs as my forum posting picked up. Making friends and fans, one of my bigger breaks would come from Volume Two of Darwin's Laureate, a pet project that sought to combine a story line with video that most often tended to be that of a musical variety. I was nominated for a HubNugget and I met Teresa McGurk and Shirley Anderson in the process.

(Darwin's Laureate, as adamant as I have been in the past to continue it was recently removed to one day possibly be resurrected in a new form that isn't quite as limiting as a web page.)

My hub output began to rise, and as the infamous 30 Day Hubber's Challenge raced to a start I diverged myself into a completely separate alter ego to start from ground zero and study HubMetrics among other things. I won't quite cover that complete time frame, because I already have. While many older hubbers have mixed feelings about the challenge's outcome, I had fun creating a conspiracy of sorts.

In it's wake, however, the HubPages community began to fracture, alter, mutate. I, however, wouldn't have much time to explore this because soon I would meet a hubber that led to some extraordinary experiences.

"Marry when June roses grow,
Over land and sea you’ll go."

This adventure instigated around a hub. More specifically, "Profitable job to bid." My alien alter ego lxxy showed up and offered some possible assistance to translating Zeitgeist the Movie. It was one of those snap judgments I often make, not because I was seeing dollar signs from the work but rather it was a project I felt I could assist through the use of technology and communication. Extorting and exploring these two is a fond hobby, and a cornerstone of GLM.

What followed was a series of e-mails from that hub's writer, Indigenous. I responded with simple encouragement and orientation of HubPages at first although for a time I believed that he was a ghostwriter. It racked my brain to be speaking so actively to another hubber and not have had a prior meeting. Not because I was afraid of doing such a thing myself, mainly for the point that I frequently e-mailed hubbers and rarely received eager responses.

His command of english at times could be confusing, but more often than not he wrote adequately enough for my mind to click it together. On my home front I was beginning to struggle personally with my room mate and working as a liquor store clerk. My desire to forge onwards into a new path and leave the menial idiosyncrasies of both behind had been expanding rapidly.

I wasn't able to keep to all of my commitments, however, mostly due to that work schedule and the aforementioned lonely alcoholic room mate.

One day Indigenous wrote to me to tell me he was having trouble with a hub that capitalized on those titular titles that seemed destined and pre-planned to generate traffic. That particular hub was entitled The Best Hub of All. The problem was it's lack of content--it was flagged as substandard by HP and so I was tasked to help get it back online. I was unsure how to accomplish such a feat, and I wasn't quite understanding that the account Indigenous wrote from was open for anyone and everyone to play with.

Through our communication he began to sprinkle in pictures, clues..visual cues.

My interest was certainly piqued.

Little did I realize The Best Hub of All would soon turn into a central idea that would culminate into one strange trip.

^{Full Lyrics Here}

As May faded into June my correspondence with Indigenous continued at a steady pace. We revealed to each other our beliefs about life and Open Source. While my Piece de Resistance described something of this model in operating a brand corporation, we both felt that old world paradigms were moving into obsolescence.

Between terrorism, emerging medical and agricultural technologies, economic stress, and the continued advancement of cyberspace the world and the people that lived on it could be on the verge of a radical transformation.

Soon enough, he hatched a plan to create an Academy. This academy would teach GNU/Linux to anyone and everyone, and I would be one of it's professors. The goal was to help broaden the adoption of GNU/Linux and computer competence.

Right up my alley.

From writing, to video editing, to audio trickery and musical mayhem the computer had long been my ultimate tool of creation. And rather than find a revolution of gun fire and cannon fodder, I wanted to be at the forefront of the digital renaissance.

LinuxColors Academy, where any gender and skin tone can enter a community and grow together endeavoring to learn and teach each other how to create and profit via circuits and networks.

We would find said community through the internet and create a portal through a website or Hub it's self.

Continuing our discourse, he would begin to ask me about other hubbers-- first came chaixkee, then goldentoad. I didn't quite understand why, until much later. Though, looking back, I'd already had a visual clue.

"This is who I am today," Indigenous said as he produced his wallet and handed it to me. He did so in an effort to show me there was nothing he was hiding. I flipped through it, more out of curiosity than fear.

It was June 22nd, 2009, and he had just arrived in a rented white Toyota after deplaning at LAX. We were at a Starbucks, one of two that shared the same geographic location--only divided by which side of the street they were erected on.

He stood nearly six foot, had short brown hair that had begun to receede. At just forty four he was on the verge of flipping some real estate he owned in Seattle and make a leap in an effort to change the world.

And I, with my ever present air of confidence was to be his partner.

He wanted to know everything about me, so I tried to oblige. It was hard to pick out the most important parts about yourself in such a situation.

I detailed about falling in love with computers at a young age, having screwed up a few along the way but ultimately learned how to fix them and avoid any hazards of utilizing them. I briefly described some of my less than legal activities for a time, but assured him that was a past I had long walked away from.

After several minutes of pleasantries we decided to head towards my apartment as to afford us easy access to electrons. This was not without a pit stop, however, for I needed to appease my room mate with some scratchers.

It would turn out that Indigenous' good will and giving nature would rear it's head. I allowed him after some convincing on my part to purchase a load of tickets for said room mate, knowing that with any luck it would quiet him for some bit.

When we arrived the roomie was quiet and rather suspect of Indigenous. Indigenous himself was a fire of thought, blazing through his sentences as he revved up higher and higher. His attitude was completely infectious for some but very susceptible to much scrutiny.

Producing an expensive watch from his luggage he handed it to Gary with instructions to sell it if he was in a bind.. He also showed Gary his passport, stamped with the dozens of countries he had visited just that year alone.

Gary characteristically began his nervous routine and revealed his usual negativity with utter distrust. I think most would have the doubts he did about Indigenous, but on the whole I've never met anyone so bitter and cynical.

He ended up opting to retire for the night, and soon we decided that accomplishing anything in the atmosphere provided was not going to be easy. We opted to move towards greener pastures.

With a goodbye, I explained to Gary that I was stepping out for awhile. He asked if I'd be home by morning, and I told him I probably would.

At the behest of Indigenous I departed with very little, mostly the clothes on my back.

Traveling well into the night

towards a more positive work arena Indigenous continually spoke. I would answer, add in my two cents, but I am a silent person in most situations.

What he did learn however was that I had yet to see the very movie I originally offered to help translate. This was quite the revelation for him I suppose because the work and writing he had seen of mine on HubPages echoed it's overall statements. Somehow, somewhere, I had evolved parallel to Peter Joseph's [Director of Zeitgeist] world view.

As the night wore thin we abruptly found ourselves at the boarder between the US and Mexico. Even living in California for the better part of a decade, and in the southern half at that, I had never bothered to see it.

It wasn't our goal, but we had reached a point of no return. Veering off into a small lane most Indigenous asked for directions back onto the highway proper. We were directed to continue down the road we were no on and circle back through.

This created quite the stir with the guards, though, and Indigenous busily tried to explain the situation. Armed with his passport and my nearly snapped California drivers license we sat at a picnic table and watched the patrol search our vehicle.

You would not have wanted to be with us if you suffer from a faint of heart. In his home state of Washington Indigenous was a patient who had access to a certain medication not yet federally recognized as a safe substance.

With passion he explained that he had medication that was very important to him because he was rather sick. They didn't bother to take it any further, but we were forewarned that another transgression in using the unauthorized lane could mean Indigenous would succumb to a hefty fine. We simply weren't supposed to navigate through the way we were directed.

Back to the USA.

We eventually found ourselves

in Santa Monica, at the home of a couple near the age of Indigenous. It was surrounded by a fence and looked to be a cosy little cottage, even if it was sectioned off and shared by a couple of other families.

I was fed and had authentic Mediterranean cuisine enjoying the first meal I had since we left. Indigenous was racing a million miles a second and quickly began to speak more about our fledgling non-profit corporation. His tact was to basically take this document and donate a large sum of cash to The Linux Foundation. We would become a Silver member at the tune of 5000USD (or perhaps more) and cooperate within the community to help build LinuxColorsAcademy, and our operating title would be The Open Minded Foundation.This was based off of the name of another member at HP, who in turn was Indigenous' wife.

I was tasked with contacting Mike Woster, the man who handled corporate accounts at the Linux Foundation. After speaking with him and trying to explain our mission and goal, he wasn't too sure we were heading down the right path as far as joining up with them.

Indigenous wondered if he himself should set up a personal meeting with Mike, but a few calls and conversations later Mr. Woster wasn't feeling particularly up to the task. Our contact with him was then hampered by hit and misses, messages and no follow-ups.

That night Indigenous and I began talking about our plans to this family--the man in particular had been a long time friend of his, even if the last visit to Indigenous' place had not gone as smoothly as he would have liked.

I showed them a couple of my writings, and launched into a highly philosophical display. It was a live, on the air presentation that may have been quite spontaneous but it would be a test of the waters in relation to how those who heard about it reacted.

The husband was quite skeptical, although the wife sat contemplatively. The advantage of being young, vibrant, and head strong kept me from displaying too much nervousness. I was determined to save the experience for later and decide how better to present this new venture of ours.

As the hours faded and the family went to sleep Indigenous and I conversed late into the night. One image I'll never shake occurred as I was standing in the door way of the condo: The light above the stoop would cast a yellow glow upon Indigenous' face as he worked up into a super charger heaven; his eyes wide, his thoughts coming so fast he could barely keep his words coming at a quick enough pace...I suddenly saw an impression of a Ray Stantz, who had inadvertently been possessed by one Vigo the Carpathian.

Mind blowing, and perhaps a tell-tale sign, I did what I could to foist the scene into the back of my mind.

As sleep beckoned, we energetically rested couch side (I slept because I knew I had to, not because I was tired.). It wasn't anything new to me, because this was my land of nod transportation even back home and had been since I was fifteen.

The next day

we awoke to some breakfast and the family gearing up to visit some friends in Chicago. I took the time to show the husband how to take video off of his Sony hard disk camcorder. He swore up and down that he had fiddled with it on numerous occasions and had yet to successfully import or burn anything from it.

Since I had sold camcorders (and this particular model, at that) for a few years I was quite savvy and readily showed him the trick. From there I cleaned off an iPod of it's music for the older boy and showed him how to find more audioware on the internet, walking him through downloading and importing it into the iPod.

By around noon Indigenous had borrowed the wife's SUV and we were heading back towards my home location to meet up with my parents and check in on Gary. Upon meeting my father he said that he "just wanted to thank you for allowing your son to help me with this project." We then headed towards Gary's so I could pick up a couple of things. We also stocked him up on some tv dinners and beer, then headed down towards my mother who was currently home.

Along the way we stopped in on a Trader Joe's so he could find her a gift, and we also pit stopped into a Pet Smart to pick up a leash for one of my rats with the intention of electing to bring him with us. Ultimately, I decided it would not be fair to seperate him from his cage mate.

In a twist of fate though there was a rat up for adoption. We decided to take him, leaving the free cage behind for someone else. This rat would be Indigenous--never knowing a leash or a cage.

So there we were, two guys and a rat. Parking at the liquor store that was the current vocation of my income we said good bye to my boss, and I picked up an A&W cream soda. Indigenous would pay with a twenty dollar bill, not accepting change. "They'll remember you forever, and you will own them," he would say about his reasoning.

We then met up with my mother and I exchanged hugs and told her I'd keep in touch. I was leaving Rancho Santa Margarita, perhaps for good, and forging a path towards a digital renaissance.

^{Full Lyrics Here}

"I made my own machine, yes we're building steam. I hate the same routine.

I made my own machine, yes we're building steam, I hate the same routine."

We ended our day on the road in the backwoods of a town called Fallbrook. It had all the makings of a Mayberry, if they had police helicopters circling around the outlining areas looking for marijuana and those who were busy harvesting it. Growing season, so I was told.

After picking up a long time acquaintance of his, I would come to meet another interesting character. His name by Open Minded Foundation vernacular was Al Capone.

An older man in his late seventies (or early eighties, I forget) he had much to say and much to teach. Indigenous decided to find a hotel close by, and that we did. We checked in and unloaded then ordered Dominoes. That night was spent with the two catching up, and the introduction of myself.

The next day found Indigenous running on an errand and I sat alone with Al as he related a story wherein he found some particular art from a bygone era, and had almost pounced on it. Interpol strongly discouraged it, and he found out later the ones who had decided to make the move were arrested.

This guy was to the point in his life where Fallbrook was his home and he had wormed his way into the hearts of many. He also had some steel in his legs just so he could continue skiing on occasion. He drove a red beater (not quite sure of the make and model, anymore) and always knew where the keys were to it. It was pretty simple: he dropped them on the driver's seat floorboard whenever he reached his destination.

We would spend several days in Fallbrook, but we would end up moving to a Hillside Inn managed by a Manny on the second night.

While the town was quite unremarkable, I remember it fondly for a few reasons. Besides Al Capone I managed to help out the hotel manager (Manny) by processing a booking request via their website, which many customers were having trouble with. Upon scrutiny I discovered that for me the website for reservations seemed to be user friendly for anyone with a good degree of english (read: first grade at least) and mildly competent user skills.

I would also go on to fill out a Yelp review for him...the first time I had heard of the site. And while I was at it, I thought maybe Shirley Anderson could help Manny with some SEO work.

Al had also taken me to a spot called The Grand Tradition, which helped the local economy by attracting many weddings. It was a victorian house with a magnificent pond that stretched acres. Al himself tended to sit down at the gazebo and just pass away the time watching the wild life and eating from various wild grown fruit trees.

While the trip sounds super peachy keen, there was a nitty gritty grind stone routine. In fact, one of the first things we did upon entering any given hotel room was to take the alarm clock out of it's wall socket. Time was not an enemy for us, and nor was it to be our master.

If I could describe what I did within Fallbrook it would be this: setup Ubuntu on a laptop, watch both Zeitgeist movies, re-install Ubuntu when Indigenous decided to slow it down with a lavish explanation with why it was still imperfect, look for a FireWire thumb drive on the market (FireWire beats out USB in terms of speed, power provided by socket, and overhead for the computer to use it) and generally evolve our presentation.

It's best to describe it as I usually do: work, work, work, eat, sleep, work, work, work. I endured steadily, trying to advance our agenda as much as possible.

This period too saw me chewing my roomie's ass up over his mother's alleged death. Don't get me wrong, for sure she's quite the elderly lady in her nineties but her passing on didn't happen. Merely lonely and at his wits end, his desperation hit a low point. I had learned not to trust him over the time I had lived with him, and this was just a cherry on top. Indigenous, too, was rightfully chafed by him when he learned he had blatantly lied to us. Of course Gary had reasoning for doing so, in his own mind anyway, and never acknowledged how deceitful it was.

Betwixt false starts

of meetings that eventually would not come to fruition, I would begin to open a dialogue between us and Richard Stallman. Leader of the GNU Foundation, his corporation relied on much the same principles as that of the Linux Foundation. In fact, open source would not exist without Richard.

On the night before we eventually left Fallbrook I would embark on a food run. Upon returning to the small hotel parking lot I had found every single space had been taken, save for one. I cursed the art community under my breath, and wondered why they had to have some sort of gathering right there and now over the weekend.

Tired and feeling the beginnings of exhaustion (among other things) I tried my best to park the SUV under a stall. In the process I scrapped along it's side and left an obvious reminder.

Freaking out I re-entered the room and explained the situation to Indigenous, calling it a minor scratch. It was to me, but my standards were low.

When he finally saw it he was furious, but calmed down after a couple of minutes. It was time for us to forget about Richard Stallman for now. We were going to meet a large influence on Zeitgeist and to do that we would need to travel to Florida.

Forsaking my relatively new and favorite steel toed boots I donned sandals furnished by Al Capone and systematically gathered our belongings from the room.

LAX, here we come.