Over the past several months I've spent immeasurable hours discovering, uncovering, editing, publishing and showcasing the unique stories of some truly incredible small businesses here in Greater Victoria. Never before have I been surrounded by so much youthful, hopeful and contagious positivity. I can safely say that's certainly rubbed off on me. My radar has become focused like a laser beam; a red-hot laser beam of local-loving intensity. I've entered a new hyper-reality where my neighbourhood is my backyard and my city is my universe. Sure I love certain things about other countries and other towns but nothing holds a candle to this town - my town. At least not as far as I'm concerned.      

Call Me Crazy

     You could call me crazy but I'd prefer it if you'd just call me "Loco". According to Wikipedia, "Loco is Crazy or Madman in Spanish". I'm certainly not Spanish but the word suits me to me a tee because I'm certifiably bat-shit crazy for this town. Like so many other local-loving Victorians, it gives me a great sense of both pride and achievement to be able to get to know a little bit more about my neighbours and what passions and talents they bring to the community. When I find out more, I care more. When I care more I will go out of my way to buy more. When I buy and support them more more money stays within our communities. when more money stays within our community...well, you get the picture.

     The more I move about the Capital Regional District the more my opinions and preconceptions about it change. I'm coming to realize that while indeed sometimes Victoria feels a lot like it's reputation as a small-town-kind-of-city-where-everybody-knows the-same-person-you know-and-gosh-golly-gee-doesn't-word-travel-fast-around-these-parts it's only now that I'm beginning to appreciate the distinct and unique nature of each of the nearly 100 recognized neighbourhoods that make up Greater Victoria.

     Perhaps I'm late to the local-loving party and that's fine - after all, I lived in Vancouver for 10 years between 1998-2008 after my brother was murdered on the streets of this town. You can see it took me a decade to heal from those wounds and forgive my city for something that plagues every city and town in the world - upset and unloved individuals reacting without thought of consequence. But I'm not here to write at lengths about that side of my philosophy. Instead, I'd much rather introduce you to a much more positive outcome that my time away from Victoria inspired within me.

      After many years away I return home to embrace Victoria in my long gangly arms and stand back to look at her from a distance. Here I see a vibrant landscape full of opportunity, passion and innovation. I see farmland, fresh lakes, rivers and streams all surrounding by fresh moving tidal waters. I move in a little closer and her face reminds me of dear old friend; a familiar array of places been and stories told from a childhood experienced nearly thirty years ago. I look into her eyes and can feel her intent; I recognize kinship within them, an understanding bound with the same string but cut from many a different swath. She opens her hands before me and I can see the long lines of her travels; intersections of lives crossing and uncrossing, each one winding along the path of its own unique journey. Finally she guides my head towards her chest where I can hear her heart beating. Soft and steady like the seasonal rains I can feel the rhythms and hear the sounds of my home shifting at night beneath its own weight as windswept ocean breezes rush between the streets of James Bay where I live with my wife Amy and our young daughter Bella Hope.

     I love her again, old Victoria. I love her again wholly (local) but I cherish her heart in a new way. This time I love the essence of her spirit; the soul of the local neighbourhood where I live and work (hyperlocal) that fills the faces of my neighbours with smiles as they walk by me and swirls throughout the park near my home with the divinity of children's laughter. It's exciting and exhilarating to feel so connected after being untethered for so long but this is not a joke. This is not just fluffy-goo or sappy-dribble. This is where I live. This is my home. These are my roots. This is my loco.

     I represent a whole new breed of local lovers that are eagerly devouring the cool joints, hot spots, trendy digs and worthy causes of their direct neighbourhoods. In this city we are united by a common cause, a shared set of goals to build a stronger community that will flourish for generations of Victorians to come and so now that you know a little more about me I'm dying to ask, "Where's your loco?"