It can be defined as ability, force or potential. Some call it influence or pressure, others relate it to mechanics, something calculable; for still more it’s something unseen or mystical yet everywhere, silently affecting outcomes. We all have it in some measure whether we like it or not, quiet as mist or booming as a roll of thunder. We use it everyday for better or for worse. Power.
The ambitious channel it, the timid hide it—or run in the opposite direction. We are each of us a victor from it, or a victim of it. To understand that you have a capacity for it should diffuse the fear of it. You are powerful. The real question is, now that you know, or you’ve been reminded—what are you going to do with what you have?
Energy is a constant global conversation. Oil is always on the table, LNG, atomic and alternative… but there’s power in the blood. The creative, considered, social and ecological, athletic, artistically energized and inspired kind. As the days lengthen and the solar powered souls of the Comox Valley muster their bikes, boats and ignite their barbeques, we offer you our energy. Consider the ignition of the human spirit as we set about the summer season. We offer up an abundance of stoke as we tell these stories to pour it on.
Wavering economics, prevailing politics and what’s trending irrelevantly on social media seems to dominate the scales, but in our corner of the edge of the world the sheer force of human connection is real and to be reckoned with. Open up the pages of the valley and get caught up in the force of summer driving the power behind its people.
Let’s face it. When summer comes rolling around the often-soggy corner of spring business tends to take a back seat. Citizens’ of the stoke capital of Vancouver Island are out doing what they moved here for—creating, playing and exploring. In this issue we explore the energy of the arts, media, film and fashion. Animal forms of propulsion, wind energy of a variety sans-propeller and not to be found in the plains provinces, the philosophies of a fisher-woman and some of the more subtle powers the people of the valley have come to value.
As you soak up the sun, read on and saturate your soul. Charge up your batteries with the energy of human inspiration. We each have it in one way or another, a brand of it that can’t be packaged, exported or exploited without our will. Your power is unique to you, yours to do with what you will, so to quote Voltaire and the great Ben Parker, “With great power comes great responsibility.” What are you going to do with yours?