I want to be good to myself (continued)

A second slate of Trouble teasers, inspired by the Matthew Dickman poem.

Good to myself: Manu De La Torre from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Good to myself: Sully Alataar from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Good to myself: Barbara Kinzle from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

I want to be good to myself.

We're working on a few-years delay here, but Ryan Kost and I are releasing a short film inspired by a Matthew Dickman poem. As a preview, here are three character sketches based on the poem's final stanzas.

"In the morning I get out of bed, I brush
my teeth, I wash my face, I get dressed in the clothes I like best.
I want to be good to myself." - Matthew Dickman

Good to myself: Nancy Wong from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Good to myself: Bonden Lyons from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Good to myself: Luc Smith from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

The Black Boy Speech

My coworker Beth Nakamura and I made a series of videos recently featuring mothers whose sons are Black, Latino or biracial. The mothers talked about their family's experiences with police and explained "The Black Boy Speech," a talk they've given their sons about how to interact with police. We made six individual videos, which you can watch on The Oregonian's website. But here's the main video, which includes several of the mothers.

The Black Boy Speech: Mothers of color give advice to their sons about interacting with police from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

if I stay here, trouble will find me

I spent a few months with Dracey as part of my recent project documenting rappers from North Portland. The package is a multimedia piece that includes sound clips, photographs by Beth Nakamura and these short documentaries I made of each rapper. For the video on Dracey, we went back to the three-bedroom apartment he once shared with 13 other people. We also visited his old high school, where he recorded his first album in a utility closet.

Glenn Waco revisits the places that inform his music from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

To see the stories, check out Straight Outta St. Johns.

back down, down to the downtown, down to the lockdown

Aubree and I are headed back to Louisiana in a few weeks, so I'm putting together a few vignettes to hype up the trip. Here's one from last April. Chris, Erin and I met Archie Lee Harrell at his church on a rainy afternoon. Chris was still brainstorming score ideas, and he sat down and played one of his ideas.

Diary of a Misfit teaser: Chris Johnson works on developing the score from Cabin 7 on Vimeo.

If I mentioned all of my skeletons, would you jump in the seat?

My big multimedia project about Portland rappers came out last week. It's a package of four stories and three videos I made, along with black and white photographs from Beth Nakamura. I feel really grateful to have had the time to work with these musicians on telling their stories. NPR Music and Longreads both linked to the project, and it looks like the boys have sold some records in its wake. I went on Oregon Public Broadcasting this week, too, to talk about the stories.

Check out the whole project, called "Straight Outta St. Johns," for the full effect, but in the meantime, here's one of the videos.

Egbe Vado: A loss threatens the rapper's dreams from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Egbevado Ananouko’s family left West Africa banking on the American dream and found minimum wage jobs instead. Like other St. Johns teenagers, Ananouko saw hip-hop as a path out of the neighborhood. Rap music’s tales of gold chains and suped-up cars gripped Ananouko. But unlike his peers, the wiry, thickly accented Ananouko built his music studio hoping to secure something more pedestrian: acceptance.

everything above my brain is sovereign airspace

Another sneak peek from my upcoming rap project: Spent a few hours watching guys freestyle under the St. Johns bridge. This one went on for three minutes and really blew my mind. What a talent.

{fragments} illmaculate cyphers under the St. Johns Bridge from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

the white caps of memory, confusing and violent

Here's a preview of a short documentary I made, coming soon to The Oregonian.

{fragments} Egbevado's lost days from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Out classed, out hustled: Well, we all struggle.

Glenn Waco - Intro (NorthBound) from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

But resistance builds muscle.

decipher prophecies through a mic and say peace

Mic Capes - Innercity Tantrum from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

I've been working on a series of videos about St. Johns rappers this month. I had two of the guys do a Capella versions of their songs for me. Mic Capes was raised in foster homes, instant ramen and the music of Tupac and Nas. He works at recreation centers now, using rap to connect with kids.

Givin ends to my friends and it feels stupendous

What's better than one story about a barber? Two! Here's a different kind of barber, just half a mile away from yesterday's barber.

North Chautauqua's barber from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Because I'm still in love with you

For years, I made video wrap-ups of each season. I stopped doing them a while ago because I felt I couldn't do anything new with them. This one doesn't break any ground, either, but it had been a while I since did one, and I wanted something to put on the blog. So here you go, my 2012 fall at a glance:

Fall 2012 from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

For old time's sake, here's a video collage of what I did this fall.

Hell Street

Hell Street from Amorphous Films on Vimeo.

The street Roy Hudgins grew up on is called Chatham Street. But Delhi residents know it by another name. Check out this short video vignette featuring Delhi characters for a glimpse at Hell Street.

"A lot of unpleasant things went on up there," the late town historian Dorothy Bradley told us in 2010. "Rowdy. I don't mean they killed anybody. Well, maybe they did."

Diary of a Misfit

Who was Roy Hudgins? from Amorphous Films on Vimeo.

Nearly 10 years ago, I sat across a tiny wooden table from my grandmother. My grandmother fumbled with a pack of Virginia Slims. I touched my hand to my hair, which I had had cut into a close crop the week before. I had just graduated high school. We were not close.

"When I was a little girl, I lived across the street from a woman who dressed like a man," she said suddenly. "Her name was Roy."

Any TV show or book or history lesson would tell you Louisiana in the mid-1900s was not the kind of place where you would have wanted to be a woman living your life as a man. Even now, people there have a word for people like that: Hesheit. If you slur it just right, the phrase sounds like heshit, which is what people called the local cross-dresser in Monroe, Louisiana, where I went to junior high school. There, gender roles are specific: Women wear make-up and dresses, do womanly things. Men are masculine, given to hunting and sports-watching. If you are something in-between, people make fun of you. A heshit, they say, is not something God intended.

Delhi, just thirty miles east of Monroe, isn't much different. That's where my grandmother Louise grew up. But my grandma never felt that way. In 1952, Louise already knew something was different about Roy. He wasn't shaped like other males. His voice was a little higher.

But Louise was only 12 then. She knew nothing of the world. And when she first met Roy, what struck her was not his shape or his voice, but the banjo he held in his hand.

That day at the table, my grandma told me the first details in a story that I've spent a decade trying to unravel. At times, I've thought I'd never learn any real truths about Roy's life. But I'm closer.

Aubree Bernier-Clarke and I launched a Kickstarter today. We're hoping to raise $10,000 so we can go to Louisiana and Arkansas several times in the next year to finish the movie.

The video above is the first trailer we have released. Filmmaker Aaron Wong and musician Christopher Johnson also contributed.

If you feel like donating to the Kickstarter, here's the link: Diary of a Misfit: The Roy Hudgins Documentary Project.

This is not a song; it's an outburst

Most of what I've been writing or making has been forgettable lately. I don't have the foundations laid down for anything spectacular soon, either. I hate this time after a story, when the next one feels so far away. Here's a tiny something I made this week. It's not any good, but I do think Asha has the cutest smile. I love injera but had no idea how it was made.

Otherwise, I've been toiling away on my documentary (we're launching a Kickstarter next week), obsessing over the new Kendrick Lamar album and re-reading "Random Family," wishing I could one day day write something even 1/100 as good. Alas, not any time soon.

Asha Gebibo Makes Injera from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

Don't stop til you get enough

Thursday night, as I shot this video in the last big light of the day, I kept thinking to myself, "If there is a better job in this world, I don't know of it."

New Columbia dance battle small from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

If I had a hammer

I'm totally jealous of this summer camp for middle school girls I videoed earlier this week. They learned to build, weld and mix cement this week. Which officially makes them more tools-competent than I am. They are also adorable.

Building Girls Camp from Casey Parks on Vimeo.

we keep on churning and the lights inside the house turn on

Here's a video I made for a story I have in the Oregonian next weekend. I had a hard time chasing after them to get footage of them biking, so the b-roll isn't great. But Vivianna was a great interview.

we are drifting back and forth between each other

Ryan and I wanted to practice making music videos, so over Thanksgiving we enlisted a few friends to create one for Youth Lagoon's song "17."

Our life is not a movie or maybe

Moving pictures from last weekend's Thanksgiving getaway: