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Description
In this oral history, filmmaker and visual storyteller Gary Yost recounts a life of openness to the opportunities that arise, devotion to Mount Tamalpais as his spiritual home and creative muse, and commitment to a place-based though temporally-extended sense of community. Born in 1959 in Bergen County, New Jersey, Gary left the East Coast at the age of 19, driven westward by an especially intense winter spent in Boston. He settled in San Francisco, where in 1978 he met his wife, Sondra. In this oral history he recalls the first time they came over together to Marin to go hiking on Mt. Tam and the paradise he felt that he had found. Gary describes how he got interested in microcomputing in the early 1980s and became a successful graphics software designer. After selling his company in 1997, he and Sondra moved over to Mill Valley, and Gary began a three-year period of heavy hiking on Mt. Tam that led to his volunteering as a fire lookout on the East Peak. Gary recounts how he got back into photography --- the passion of his youth --- when daughter Ruby started kindergarten at Greenwood School, and how by the late 2000s he was yearning to make a film expressing his love for Mt. Tam. He discusses in-depth the making of his first film A Day in the Life of a Fire Lookout as well as Invisible Peak and Song of the Last Place from his West Peak trilogy. Throughout this oral history Gary shares his wisdom on being present to life, the experiences of individual finitude and deep-time, the mystery and joy of creativity, and the value of family and community.
Identifier
B9835536-0BD9-4D3D-B849-227989878125 2016.042.001
Subject
A Day in the Life of a Fire Lookout Animation Computer-aided designs Computers Coyote, Peter Dillon, Jimmy Filmmakers - Marin County Films Greenwood School Hiking Hirshfield, Jane Miwoks Mt. Tamalpais MV history - Digital era (1990s) One Tam Oral history - Nature and conservation Oral history - Spirituality, philosophy, religion Oral history - Visual, performing, literary arts Oral history - Volunteerism, activism Photographers Photography Swezy, Mike Tamalpais Lands Collaborative The Invisible Peak Webb, Sky Road Yost, Sondra
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