James - ProfilesArchive

About Me

I grew up in Michigan, went to a community college for graphic design, got a job in Austin doing web work just before the end of the dot-com boom, survived several rounds of layoffs only to quit to hitchhike around the country for seven months or so, returned to Michigan briefly to get reacquainted with my family and decompress, moved to Washington DC where I worked for several months at Whole Foods (lording over all the cashiers from behind the customer service counter), returned to Michigan to spend all the money I saved up and spend a lot of time exercising and going to parks, left Michigan again to thruhike the Appalachian Trail, then moved across the country to be with my girlfriend (now my wife) in Portland, Oregon, where I now live. I am returning to college in the fall to pursue an English degree, with the goal of eventually teaching high school English (to spare a new generation the suffering I experienced with several terrible teachers during my truncated high school career; also, to warp fragile little minds). Currently, I dress mannequins for a living. I also am a fair hand with a bike wrench and play a mean game of Scrabble.

My Interests

My wife, bicycling, making old things work like new, veganism, cooking, writing, drawing, digital photography, walks in the woods, long walks to just about anywhere, fresh produce, reading, writing, Scrabble, backpacking, salvage, nutrition, Buddhist philosophy, good movies, vinyasa yoga, sustainable living practices, poetry, storytelling, hitchhiking, design, the Appalachian Trail, good conversation, long-distance hiking, art, fashion, beauty, ambigrams, libraries, Wendell Berry, Tao Te Ching, craftiness.

I'd like to meet:

I'd like to meet creative, interesting people with a sense of purpose -- even if they're still trying to figure out exactly what that purpose is :) Couples would be cool; I spend most of my social time with my wife, and it would be nice to hang out with other people in committed, happy relationships. I'd like to meet *anyone* intelligent and multidimensional, though, particularly if they're into hiking, urban photographic expeditions, or playing a (beginner) game of Go. Local people are definitely preferred, since I don't spend much time networking on the internet anymore (the existence of this page notwithstanding).

Music:

Bright Eyes, Deerhoof, Antony & the Johnsons, Electrelane, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Nick Cave, A Silver Mt. Zion, Persephone's Bees, France Gall, The White Stripes, Tool, Tori Amos, Beethoven, Ani DiFranco, John Coltrane, The Flaming Lips, Squarepusher, Johnny Cash, Massive Attack, Allegri, Ry Cooder, Aphex Twin, Miles Davis, Tricky, Janis Joplin, Eminem, Mozart, Cowboy Junkies, John Lee Hooker. And anyone else good :)

Movies:

The Piano
Badlands
Dancer in the Dark
Oldboy
Five Easy Pieces
Lawrence of Arabia
Paris, Texas
The Bridge on the River Kwai
When We Were Kings
Amelie
All About Eve
Days of Heaven
Casablanca
Crumb
In the Bedroom
Requiem for a Dream
Hero (2002)
Easy Rider
Monty Python & the Holy Grail
The Princess Bride
Gaza Strip

Television:

I don't watch TV.

Books:

Cormac McCarthy, Annie Dillard, Wendell Berry, Milan Kundera, J.D. Salinger, Kurt Vonnegut, Earnest Hemingway, Jorge Luis Borges, Ray Bradbury, The Last American Man, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (by the above-mentioned Dillard), Being Nobody Going Nowhere, The Art of Happiness, Dylan Thomas, Dr. Seuss, T.S. Eliot, Galway Kinnell, Marilyn Hacker, Rumi, Thom Gunn, Dante, Shel Silverstein, Tao Te Ching. And Harry Potter.

Heroes:

The Dalai Lama, Ani DiFranco, Wendell Berry, Richard P. Feynman, Joseph DeRisi, all the anonymous people working for the common good.