Adventures: David has criss-crossed large parts of the planet by bus, car, boat, rail and thumb. He's lived in 4 provinces, and made his home in a tents, huts, cabins and even an old blue tarp for a summer. He's swum with elephants, slept in a volcano crater, and been tattooed by candlelight. He was robbed in Mexico, arrested in Sault-Ste-Marie, strip-searched in Brussels, and delivered to the Salvation Army in Belfast by helpful police officers.
At 18 he had ridden from Victoria to Zijuatenejo, Mexico and back by train and bus; he flew to India on a one-way ticket at the age of 19; by 21 he had visited 30 countries in Europe, Asia and Central America. David hitch-hiked through the Rockies three times and rode the Greyhound across the continent six times. He's driven fork lifts, school buses, rescue boats, ATVs, swamp buggies, and once, an eighteen-wheel semi rolling east out of the foothills into Calgary.
For six summers he tramped the north as a tree planter, living in bush camps and putting more than 300,000 seedlings in the ground while largely avoiding both towns and showers. In more civilized times he photographed more than 30,000 Toronto buildings, 10,000 college graduates and innumerable kids with Santa Claus. David also worked as a waiter, busker, factory worker, painter, pizza cook, delivery man, mason's helper, tutor, camera salesman, telemarketing supervisor, ad manager, and the proprietor of a used record store.
David's university years were spent in Montreal; he graduated with distinction from Concordia's Fine Arts program in 1995, winning two awards for his visual and theoretical work. David spent a year in Halifax as a performer and radio host before moving to East Margaretsville, Nova Scotia, where he built a cabin in the woods and lived "off the grid" for more than a year while running a used record shop and occasionally singing for his supper.
In 1997 David heard the call of the city, and moved into an east-end Toronto row house built by his grandfather's grandfather where he lives today. He quickly involved himself in the burgeoning internet industry, first as researcher and writer of educational CD ROMS and later as a web producer. He made a random appearance as the Toronto Sun's Sunshine Boy in the spring of 1998 and still can't figure out how it happened.
David spent five years at Discovery Channel Canada, where he wrote and produced numerous large-scale web projects, covered the Eco-Challenge race from the Fiji Islands, launched a weekly TV segment with Jay Ingram and travelled across the Canada by train with Valerie Pringle. He recorded a version of his theme song, "Roll Away," in the bar car eastbound out of Edmonton and will never forget the glow of the sun on the rails.
David went on to work as photographer and web producer at CBC. In addition to photographing a spate of stars, including Tom Cochrane, Bare Naked Ladies, and Pink, David managed to shoot what may be the best-ever picture of Ralph Nader. In the spring of 2007 David travelled to eight cities in ten with Phil Keoghan of the Amazing Race as web producer for "No Opportunity Wasted."
Since July of 2007 David has worked at Canoe.ca, where he has settled down very nicely and is relishing his role as Editor-in-Chief.
Photo by Jayke Raven