Loss and Liberation: Feminine Healing with filmmaker lori lozinski

Filmmaker lori lozinski on Motorcycling, Nature, and Self-Discovery

Award-winning producer and filmmaker lori lozinski, renowned for her poignant short films 'The Pilgrimage' and 'A Motorcycle Saved My Life,' opens up about navigating personal loss, challenging societal norms, and achieving balance between masculine and feminine energies through the liberating experience of motorcycling. Touching on transformative events like Babes Ride Out and discovering the deep connections between humans and nature, Andrea and lori explore themes of belonging, reconciliation, and self-acceptance. A powerful dialogue on freedom, identity, and the importance of embracing one's true self. PHOTO@Eline Mets

lori's website and films
The Pilgrimage
A Motorcycle Saved My Life
The episode of This Motorcycle Life

00:00 Finding Purpose in Everyday Life
00:26 The Motorcycle Connection
00:54 Living in the Present Moment
01:34 Embracing Identity and Safety
02:41 Balancing Masculine and Feminine Energies
04:41 Introduction to lori lozinski
08:54 lori's Childhood and Family Dynamics
11:31 Journey to Filmmaking
15:36 Mother's Influence and Family Challenges
20:49 Sports and Personal Struggles
33:48 Facing the Fear of Failure
33:57 Supportive Parents and Childhood Memories
36:25 The Impact of Sports and Parental Support
37:14 The Pilgrimage Ride Experience
38:35 Coping with Parental Loss
40:46 Embracing Motorcycles and Personal Freedom
43:20 Navigating Family Dynamics and Personal Growth
01:01:34 Balancing Masculine and Feminine Energies
01:06:55 Creating the Pilgrimage Documentary
01:10:09 Returning to Vancouver: A Filmmaker's Journey
01:10:29 The Ride: A Unique Motorcycle Experience
01:12:01 The Mystery and Trust of the Ride
01:12:59 The Bonding Experience
01:15:23 Capturing the Journey: Filming the Ride
01:15:57 Reflections on Motorcycling and Masculinity
01:19:30 Nature, Belonging, and Safety
01:20:49 A Motorcycle Saved My Life: Exploring Family and Land
01:31:35 Healing the Mother Wound
01:45:13 Reconciliation and Future Projects
01:48:54 Closing Thoughts and Gratitude

Transcript

Life's movements with Lori

Lori Lozinski: [00:00:00] so I read a lot about the death process to understand, why I wanted to live and what living every day could mean for me.

Like I'm not, I don't think of myself anymore as like dying every day. That's the big shift for me is I'm actually like, or waiting for a specific time to die. I actually it's really, you know, what can I do every day? And that could also just be like reading a book, laying on the couch, laying out in the grass, and being okay with that.

But I think where the motorcycle ties into that. And I talk about it a bit in Motorcycle Saved My Life. It's just like, because if you're not present on a motorcycle, you are going to die. Like every day I get on my motorcycle, I'm very close to death. And that's good for me. It reminds me why I want to be alive and everything that I want to do it could be my last day and I'm okay with that. And I don't think I would have been okay with that at 39. I I wouldn't have been okay with that. 

 Were you in the present moment at all, much during that time before 38, 39?

Andrea Hiott: Were [00:01:00] you No. 

Lori Lozinski: No. Being, living in present, I think for women is extremely difficult anyway. Because we're always, Worried about the past, worried about the future. What do I look like? How do I sound? Am I safe? Am I saying the right things? Am I doing the right things? Am I upsetting somebody? It's almost impossible for women to live in a present state. And when we're on a motorcycle, you are in a present state. And so when I think a lot of women talk about freedom of motorcycles, for women, for me, it's like, because we get to exist in a present state for that small amount of time, we're on a motorcycle. And that is amazing. Also to feel safe, like I do dress a particular way so that I don't attract what I would consider negative attention. On me. No, zero judgment on how other people are living their lives, but for me, it is not a safe, comfortable space. So, you know, I, most people assume I'm queer or I'm a lesbian by the way I dress and the way I look, and I'm frankly fine with [00:02:00] it. I was called that a lot growing up as well, even when I did, like, seemingly dress more feminine because of my sports and my, you know, and what I was doing with my life and career focused and not really looking to like, get married or any of those things. I got called lesbian like my whole life. It was like. That's not an insult. That's not like a bad thing. Some of my closest friends are lesbians.

Andrea Hiott: also when we are in these situations like sports, we almost, I don't know if you did, but you almost feel like you have to be a boy because

or the things you need to be like strong and fast and all these things are associated with boys, which is totally messed up, but it becomes confusing, right? Like the male, female characterization, I don't know if that even makes sense. And 

Lori Lozinski: it's, and this is the thing is like, this is the thing about growing up when it felt like it was either or, like, I definitely prefaced masculine qualities because I thought that would show the world that I was stronger, not someone to fuck with,, like all these things, right? So like, I definitely wanted to exude [00:03:00] way more masculine qualities as a young person. And I did for most of my life to, you know, up until like my parents died, I was living that prefacing those qualities, no doubt about it, because I felt like that's How to set myself apart, how to not be less than, it wasn't until after they died and you know, and doing all of this you know, deep work , just in terms of who we are as really humans, where I see it's we're just a balance of those energies. Like, right? I feel really balanced in my feminine and masculine energy..

We're 

Andrea Hiott: all All of it in different ways. We're not all of it! Men need to be feminine too. I mean, it's wonderful to be able to be all of it, you know, in different ways at different times, but why it's so hard, 

 but what I found so beautiful and confusing in the most, in the best way, almost like untangling all that stuff, the other confusion is that you embraced the motorcycle and learned how to ride, and it embraced your feminine, being feminine in a way, or being a woman and Opened up this space of acceptance for just being who you are 

Lori Lozinski: to me that [00:04:00] riding a motorcycle is that perfect balance of masculine and feminine because the bike does have all that masculine.

energy to it, right? And so when women ride, it is a balance, like it feels like really incredible. And I think that is another aspect of the presence in the overarching theme of freedom. I think all of these things come in, play into that, that I think a lot of us just don't know how to articulate, but for me, like riding that riding the motorcycle really definitely helped me embrace more of my feminine.

 like that film really came about healing that mother wound for sure. And I wouldn't have even been able to express that when I was making it, to be honest, it's just like in reflection years down the road.

 Hello, everyone. This is a podcast with Lori Lozinsky who created two films. that I hope you'll watch. One is called The Pilgrimage. And other is called A Motorcycle Saved my Life. And they are both about women on motorcycles, but they are also about family [00:05:00] and the ecological connection of. Humans and machines and the open. Nature that we are and that we move through all the time. And that when you're on a motorcycle, moving through. That world becomes, especially potent. 

Andrea Hiott: If you're in a particular state of mind, So I found Lori because of the film she made. And I wanted to talk to her as part of the ecological monitoring initiative, because I wanted to talk to her. because she's a woman riding a motorcycle. And also because I love the films that she made. About the experience of being a woman or group of women. Connecting to and through. Uh, the world and one another in oneself. Uh, while on a motorcycle. 

But we ended up talking about all kinds of things, love and philosophy life. What it means to be a woman, all the images and things that are put upon us [00:06:00] as both women and men. And how kind of weird and strange it is that we have these ideas of what a woman is supposed to be and what a man is supposed to be. 

And. That we all live in such pressure, trying to live up to these things. Like where did that come from? And. Why do we do this? Can't we have both sides of what we've traditionally thought of as masculine and feminine to different degrees. I think we come into the world that has an inertia of judgment and we take on that judgment without actually questioning it. 

But we're on different parts of that spectrum or we're nested at different levels of all those scales at different times in her life. 

And that's the richness and beauty of life. And in our most intimate relationships, we feel. Okay to explore all those areas. It's something as someone who grew up playing sports and also being involved in them in the motoring world. Also, in other areas of life like academia and so on. There you do confront what it means to be a [00:07:00] woman, what it means to be a man in different ways. 

And it's something we all think about. And Lori is just wonderful because she talks about it. So honestly, here. And I really appreciate that. I, I'm not even going to cut this much. It's going to be long because I just, it's just one of those episodes. I feel like she's gonna say something that someone needs to hear. And even if it's only one person it's worth just leaving it all in there so that whoever that one person is can listen to it and hear it all. 

So it's, it's a conversation between. Lori, who is a award-winning filmmaker in Canada. She lives in Vancouver. And me. Um, about different parts of life, love and motoring. So this one's posting on a lot of different channels and, uh, hope that's okay with you all hope you're doing well out there wherever you're making your way. And okay, let's go.

Hi, Lori. It's so nice to see you. Thank you for being here today. 

Lori Lozinski: I'm, super happy to be here. Thank you. 

Andrea Hiott: All the way from [00:08:00] Vancouver. Vancouver to the Netherlands is the connection today. Thanks for getting up early. You said you're an early bird. I'm a night owl. So getting up early, I have great respect for those who can get up early and look as like, you look like you've been awake for hours or something. 

Lori Lozinski: Wait for a couple hours. Yeah, for sure. No, I am the older I get, I appreciate the morning, the quiet morning hours to myself.

Andrea Hiott: You know, I love the morning hours. I have to say, and I love the late night hours. It's just you can't really have both of those at the same time, unless you stay up all night and then sleep all day, which, you know, doesn't really work for normal life, I guess. 

Lori Lozinski: No, that worked for my teenage years, that's for sure. 

Andrea Hiott: So you, we're going to talk about a couple of movies that you've made, a couple of films, but you've got your own company and there's a lot of films. And one of the through lines, at least that I've noticed is of journey exploration, be that in physical space, emotional space.

Et cetera. So to get into all that, I'm wondering about your childhood. Did you take a lot of road trips [00:09:00] or what was like kind of the relationship to movement in your early life?

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, we did take a lot of road trips when I was young. The holidays were always in like, this van my dad bought. He just bought like a shell of a van and then You know, made a bed and put a bed inside it and we would go camping and he had relatives in Vancouver.

This is, I lived in Edmonton, Alberta, and we had relatives in Vancouver. So, you know, a lot of those younger kind of holidays were camping in the van on the way to Vancouver to see relatives. And I think too, also, because we had farmland that was north of Edmonton, like about two hours northeast of Edmonton, or around a town called Blacklebush.

You We went there every weekend, so, because my dad was a part time farmer, that's where he grew up he was an engineer, but he still farmed on the weekend, we had cattle, and a little over 2, 000 acres, and so we were doing that every weekend, so we would drive two hours every Friday. To go there and then every Sunday back.

So there was a lot 

Andrea Hiott: [00:10:00] of literally a lot, 

Lori Lozinski: lots of times in the car. So me and my sister learned how to entertain ourselves, you know, because that was the days, when there was, you're lucky if I was lucky if like my parents played the radio, it was pretty cool. So, or it was just news, you know, so, yeah, me and my sister learned to entertain ourselves.

So yeah, road tripping was Very prevalent there my child. It's funny. 

Andrea Hiott: You said your dad was part time engineer and part time farmer because these are kind of themes I see A lot to the land connection and also the motoring or the movement through some sort of vehicle connection. Was he really into cars and stuff, too, or?

Lori Lozinski: No, he wasn't, surprisingly. He and I will say he was probably a full time engineer and a full time farmer. Wow, yeah, 

Andrea Hiott: that's a lot of 

Lori Lozinski: work. Yeah, you know, he He really he really worked hard. I got an extremely great work ethic from him in many ways. And I think I got the take it easy [00:11:00] gene from my mother.

So I have a balance of it all now. You know, I just turned 50, so I feel like I'm finally balanced with my, my work and you know, how I choose to live my life and that kind of stuff. But happy birthday. That's a beautiful, very much. It was in May. I'm a very grateful aging person. And I'm, yeah, I'm excited about the next, I'm going to say 50 to 75 years.

I'm about longevity. So if I can, yeah, 25, I'll be great. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. There's still a lot of years. That's for sure. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of movement left. So how did you get from farming or this world interested in films? Do you, were you watching a lot of films? Did that, yeah. What about the film part? When did that come in?

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, the film part came in quite late into my 20s. Growing up, I definitely watched movies and stuff, you know, going to the theater. I can remember going and seeing Star Wars and like kind of the bigger movies and but you know, in terms of television, like we didn't really have cable growing up. cause we [00:12:00] were at that time of, you know, life, we were made to go outside.

We were not allowed to stay inside. So I didn't grow up with a lot of television. But I had, I was a project manager in the telecommunication industry, 

Andrea Hiott: oh, okay. So that's how that's how it started because you're often talking about how hard working you were and I can tell you've had like a really intense career, but I don't exactly know how to put it all together to where you got to making the films.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, I had I had moved to I started in the telecommunication industry in Edmonton, and it's also because that's the industry my father was in so I worked with my dad for many years. And And then I took a job in Calgary. So I lived in Calgary for a little while. And then that company claimed bankruptcy.

And so, my dad was actually the chief technical officer of a company in Vancouver and he was looking for a project manager and he asked if I was, you know, interested and available. So I came out to Vancouver and then that company also claimed bankruptcy about a month after I moved. Oh gosh. My dad had to fire me or had [00:13:00] to leave, which was very, it was all very funny.

It was fine. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. 

Lori Lozinski: But I was now in Vancouver and, you know, I had thought. Like kind of early in my 20s and all through my 20s, I really thought I was going to get an MBA and be running a company by the time I was 30 and like all these things. And by when I came to Vancouver and I was in, you know, still in what I corporate life, I realized I didn't really like it.

To be honest, it wasn't really suitable for my personality and what I like doing. And even back in the day when I had gone to college, I was thinking of taking accounting because I like the black and white of numbers and my dad talked me out of it. He's like, Oh, I'm gonna like enjoy being an accountant.

He's like, it's great. You have the skills, but there's so many other things you can do. Interesting. Like laugh about, cause that would have been a very nice stable job. 

Andrea Hiott: Do you wish you had done that a bit or? Not at all. But I'm very happy. He was right over. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, he was totally right. I'm very happy. I have all like that [00:14:00] background.

It helps me so much being a producer and film and television. But so I came to I was like in Vancouver, I didn't have a job and I was just like, and then there was just like film trucks everywhere. And I was like, Oh, what is that? Cause I had never really seen that before. And in Edmonton, you know, it didn't have like a film industry.

It doesn't now, but nothing like Vancouver. So Vancouver 

Andrea Hiott: is like the center, I guess, for those who don't know, there's always a film being made there or something. Or 

Lori Lozinski: there's the film and television industry employs like 60, 000 people here. So there's like, there's a ton of work being done here. So much service work from Americans.

So lots of series, lots of films. Toronto and Vancouver. Toronto is a little bit bigger, but we're the main centers here in Canada. Calgary is getting quite big too. But yeah. So you saw all 

Andrea Hiott: those trucks and you're like, hey. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And so I just kind of did some research into the film industry. And I realized that a lot of the skills I had as a project manager would translate [00:15:00] to producing.

So I decided to go to the Vancouver film school, which was a film production program. It was a year long program. And I really just wanted to learn how films were made. And that program was really great. And it taught me that. And then immediately I came out to And was working on set a little bit as an assistant director.

And then I started working with a production company called Screen Siren Pictures for a number of years. And then I went to the Canadian Film Center and yeah. And then, so I've been pretty much producing now for over 20 years. 

Andrea Hiott: It's interesting. It's also interesting that sort of started.

Connected with your father and his work a bit. We haven't talked about your mom yet But except you said that she was more relaxed and laid back and in the film. There's one film We'll talk about a motorcycle saved my life where One of the, I'm not sure exactly which family member it is, but says that she was always very happy and easygoing and so on.

Maybe like, what was the connection with your mom early on? I know she rode horses [00:16:00] too, but she had given that up or were you riding horses on the farm? What was like, maybe we can open that part up a little bit too before we get in. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, I think that's where my mom was like, kind of, a chronic reader of things.

So I think a lot of my love of stories comes from my mother. Because like, that's what we, you know, just a good afternoon, just me and mom laying in bed and reading books somewhere. Oh, wonderful. And yeah, and even in the short, A Motorcycle Saved My Life, there is like that small moment where they're in a room and they're reading together.

And to me, that you know, 

Andrea Hiott: and in the pilgrimage, you would take a shot of someone reading a book. I really liked that part. Yeah. Or somebody takes a shot of that. Yeah. Yeah. That was me. Okay. Yeah. I figured it was you, but, and then also there was this great thing I wanted to ask you about where you said you're kind of joking with your family members and you say that you were reading your mom's dirty books when you were already in elementary.

Can we unpack that just a little bit? 

Lori Lozinski: Well, like, a lot of women that read books, they like their erotica, so. Yeah, cool. Okay. I was, 

Andrea Hiott: yeah, I 

Lori Lozinski: was, you [00:17:00] know. You found 

Andrea Hiott: them, you discovered them, like, what, under the sink or something. My mom used to keep her stuff, like, under the sink, thinking I couldn't find it, but that's the easiest place to find it.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, no, my mother was very sex positive, so they were out in the open. Oh, 

Andrea Hiott: cool. I'm also very fortunate. 

Lori Lozinski: I had a very sex positive mother. 

Andrea Hiott: That's really good. Yeah. 

Lori Lozinski: I mean, I was pretty young reading those things, but I don't see it like as, I really don't see it as a bad thing because there's so much story and character and, you know, and relationships that are going around, you know, when you read those books, you realize like, kind of like those, the intimacy is, you know, It comes through in many ways, not just through, you know, the act of sex.

So I was reading like, you know, her Harold Robbins and her Danielle Steele and her Jackie Collins. Okay. Yeah. Like all that when I was young and I am very entertaining as a young person to read all that stuff. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, it's kind of exciting. You have really not much of a clue of what they're talking about, but it's still sort of exciting and later it makes more [00:18:00] sense.

Did your mom have a lot of friends? Did she have like a group of women? I mean, the reason I kind of wonder about it because I want to talk about The Pilgrimage, which is just so beautiful and it's a film about women taking motorcycle tour together, mindful motorcycle tour. We'll get into it.

It's great. But I'm thinking about like what your experience of women was like when you were young, you and your sister, you had a lot of women in the family. Your mom sounds rather empowered. But I don't know what did it, can you, what comes to mind when I ask about that? 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, no, my mom was extremely popular.

She had a lot of friends and I honestly never met a person that didn't like her. All of my friends loved her. She was, you know, she was definitely the support for a lot of my friends. Her best friend was, you know, lived across the street. She was the Avon lady. So we had a lot of Avon in the house.

The 

Andrea Hiott: Avon lady. Oh yes. I remember Avon ladies. I guess there still are Avon ladies, are there? 

Lori Lozinski: I think so. I haven't seen one in a really long time, but I had a lot of Avon growing up. So it was [00:19:00] always, that was always fun. These are the Avon catalog as well. And so, you know, I mean, my, there were some challenging times like early on with my mother cause she was diagnosed as bipolar and was put into an institution for a little while when I was young and had shock therapy and but that's something she said helped her.

So. I feel like I got, you know, and I, you know, I had a good experience with, you know, living with someone with bipolar. I know a lot of people don't. But I felt like that really made her just appreciate life, to be honest. And like, just, you know, she liked to have a good time. She didn't think, take things too seriously.

You know, as a child, I had a lot of freedom. I didn't have curfews. I was trusted. I, you know, and so I kind of felt like I was treated Like a responsible person from a very young age and also when my parents divorced. I was quite young I was only nine and my mom had to start working So it was really, you know, me and my mom and my sister really on our own taking care of each other.

So 

Andrea Hiott: I Didn't know you were so [00:20:00] young. Yeah. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, so But you know, there was so many things like I, I identified a lot more with my dad when I was growing up. So when he left, it was harder for me. And I've always felt like, more close to him in so many ways. My sister felt closer to my mother in, in many respects.

And, you know, I, you know, at the end of the day, my mom was, you know, you know, really happy if I was in a relationship and that kind of stuff. And I, like, I never wanted to get married. I never wanted children. I never wanted those things. And I think she would have been really happy if I had just, that would, she would have understood more, I think, if I would have just kind of worked into that, like, frankly, I think a stereotype of what a woman's life is supposed to be.

So I really tried, you know, to, to defy all those stereotypes for a lot of my life. And You know, I was a competitive athlete in softball and volleyball. And that was another thing that, you know, my parents met playing sports. So I come from a very sporty family. My mom wrote Equestrian. They wrote [00:21:00] playing volleyball.

My dad played softball. He played hockey. He, like, both my parents could kind of play whatever they wanted to do. And so me and my sister were really into competitive sports as well. And and my mom was my coach for a number of years when I was growing up in ball. And so, yeah, she was very, well loved.

Was she 

Andrea Hiott: very traditionally sort of feminine? Because, I mean, I ask, and I even hate the question, but there's a lot of, tensions in there that I think play out in your work a lot in terms of breaking conventions and and even these spaces that open for women where they feel like they don't have to be what everyone's been telling them a woman is supposed to be.

 Like, I didn't know your mom had this, the bipolar two, that adds a whole, it's a lot to handle if I'm thinking of your mom. And then also that the marriage didn't work and then that she had the two daughters.

And I guess, there's two, two threads I want to see how to bring together because in, in the work you talk about how you were really close to your dad from early on. And it sounds like there was a alignment between [00:22:00] you and your father in terms of, just, hanging out together and stuff, daily kind of stuff. And then as you just expressed, maybe with your mom, it was a little different, but so there, that's one thread. And then there's also this thread of where was the pressure coming from to conform? Because I kind of felt it from your dad in a way towards, but not towards being a woman in the traditional way. And then now it sounds like it's from your mom a little bit towards, I don't know, it just feels a little confusing. What is that, those threads, Priyam? 

Lori Lozinski: I think it is confusing, you know, and that's the, like I do feel, you know, I saw a lot of my mother and a lot of the women in my family being, living like those kind of, you know, Traditional lives, and I didn't feel a lot of happiness in my family, to be honest, about it.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, and traditional, we mean like the mom stays home and cooks and is looking pretty and this kind of stuff? 

Lori Lozinski: That's definitely not the way I know my family is. 

Andrea Hiott: Okay. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, like, I wrote I wrote an essay a number of years ago called, My Mother Doesn't Wear Makeup. My mom never wore makeup.

She was always, like, you know, kind of outdoorsy. She wasn't 

Andrea Hiott: [00:23:00] the Avon lady. 

Lori Lozinski: She was not the Avon lady but her best friend. She was not buying 

Andrea Hiott: the Avon, yeah, that's cool. 

Lori Lozinski: She had short hair, no other mothers had short hair and You know, she was really, she was very quick and witty and a smartass and like, had a, like, a very quick humor about her and loved her British television and, 

Andrea Hiott: Sounds, she sounds like Someone would write a book about yeah, you know, 

Lori Lozinski: I you know, I definitely I think making a motorcycle saved My life is really that film is really and you know, it's a it's kind of a love letter to my mother for sure 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, it definitely feels like that which I think was a surprise to you, which we'll get into I guess but Or you can get into it now Sure, well, well 

Lori Lozinski: that was the thing is like, you know, even With The Pilgrimage and A Motorcycle Saved My Life, I had written one proposal and it was really The Pilgrimage, and I had sent that to the CBC and I'd sent one to the National Film Board just trying to get, money to make these shorts, and the [00:24:00] CBC like the pilgrimage.

They really, you know, and so I went forward with them. And then the NFB is just like, they liked the writing in my proposal. They liked when I talked about myself and why I ride. Cause I had a whole section on, you know, why I started riding. And then they, I went into, and they're like, we'd like to go to development phase with you, but we don't want to make the pilgrimage.

We want to make a film about Um, so, and that, and that turned into, you know, the film that it is now, but through that development. So they 

Andrea Hiott: funded the Motorcycle Saved My Life, but you still did The Pilgrimage, or both got Yeah, I 

Lori Lozinski: did both. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was trying to figure out which came first, or if they came together, or kind of how that 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, they originated from the same proposal, but I did make The Pilgrimage first.

Andrea Hiott: Okay, that's what I thought. 2019 or so, it was released. Yeah, because 

Lori Lozinski: I shot the ride, I shot the ride myself in 2019, and that was before something came on. So they liked it. I love 

Andrea Hiott: the way you shot [00:25:00] it with the nature and that bird at the end. Oh my gosh, like. That was just luck or what? 

Lori Lozinski: Total luck. It was like, that was her last shot of the day.

And then three eagles just rose up from the road. I couldn't 

Andrea Hiott: believe it, I mean. Yeah. And I was like, is that really, like I thought, is that a bird of prey? Is that really, or am I, is it like a crow or something? No, it's definitely, it was, so it was an eagle, okay. 

Lori Lozinski: Three eagles, yeah, there were three eagles.

It was really great because the ride, I, like, basically all the footage of the ride and the riders, I shot myself off the back of my bike, I just bought a camera and rented some lenses and some stuff because I didn't secure any financing and I wanted to shoot it and my really good friend Chris was the one that organized it and so, you know, We, you know, did all that together.

And then after I shot it, I showed CBC some footage and then they came in. And so what I did is I went back six months later in January of 2020 and shot of the footage of like the road and the eagles and some of the trees and some [00:26:00] of like the water. And I had another director of photography and a team out there doing that.

So all the footage that we see on the road was actually a camera mounted to the front of a truck that had motion control. So I had a guy inside the truck working the camera to simulate what it felt like for a motorcycle to be on the road and do that kind of stuff. And really that, the literally.

Those eagles, it was the last shot of our day, there was the lead truck in front of us, I was in the van behind us with the director of photography, and I had a monitor, and then, buddy Chris was in another car behind us, and they also had a monitor, and as soon as those eagles flew, like, we all just flew.

Lipped like every like because we were all on walkies and stuff like that too. It was just like incredible and the way just the camera guy like just caught it all. It was just it's a gift. 

Andrea Hiott: It's a real gift. You feel like on the bike. You are flying with the eagle in a way and just like where with the story.

It fits so perfectly with this kind of freedom and release and oh, I love it so much. But [00:27:00] okay, so you're I'm confused a bit because It sounds like your mom was really freeing in a way, but then I feel a block, you know, there's some kind of a block between you guys and then maybe it also with your, you just watching the films, listening to another interview you did with The purple motorcycle, which I'm going to recommend to everyone.

Feel like where you were holding yourself back a little bit with your parents or maybe in your life or something, and this could be wrong. Just correct me. But I don't know, like, We're going to talk about the pilgrimage and this is a, like, there's so much in there about acceptance of self and being who you are and so on.

Did you struggle with that as a kid? Was it related to your parents or were you really at peace and you already kind of had this zen flying with the eagles dance? 

Lori Lozinski: You know, I always, I think there, I always had a struggle when I was younger. I really felt like I was a pretty staunch feminist from birth and I [00:28:00] was always trying to

push back against the stereotype of being less than as a woman. You know, I excelled in sports. You know, I was frankly playing, like when I was younger, playing at a higher level than boys my own age, but I was still relegated to certain things. And, you know, as a young person. Ballplayer.

I was playing, you know, with women quite older than me. And you know, that and my mom allowing me to do that and pushing me to do that was like rare too. And she got a lot of flack from other parents of other girls because I wasn't playing with girls my own age and that kind of stuff. And so, but where I think I really, you know, seeing my mother wasn't very ambitious and I kind of, that didn't.

Speak well to me like and it could be like her bipolar it could have been the medication She like there's so many factors there But you know I think at some point like she gave up writing when she got married like there was [00:29:00] things I felt like she just She gave up who she could have been 

Andrea Hiott: You know what I mean?

She was a really good rider, a horse rider we should say, riding a horse. Yeah, she 

Lori Lozinski: was, yeah. Seems like it 

Andrea Hiott: just disappeared when she was married and even in the film your family's talking about, oh well then she started, she needed to learn how to cook and all of this. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, cause that was for me I wanted to try and understand because she's no longer here for me to ask and I don't even know what kind of answer she'd give me anyway.

Yeah. Trying to talk to some of, you know, my family members that knew her and I think it's wild that, you know, from, cause I have. All of these pictures of her riding from like basically 10 years old, because her father rode. He was in the mounted military. So, and she was very close to her father. So, so she rode competitively for like, you know, 12 years and then suddenly gets married and just stops.

And I was like, You know, and is it, was that her choice? Was that something like her and my dad talked about? Like, I don't know. Like, I don't know any of that [00:30:00] stuff, but I just, that makes me sad. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, 

Lori Lozinski: because I used to probably 

Andrea Hiott: picked up on something in her too, because I mean, I don't know any, what I'm talking about at all.

So you can disregard all this, but it sounds like there was probably some tension even in her, right? Like she's, you sound like you're more like her than anyone in a way, but that's often hard, I think, for parents. Because then you'd, you know, the pressures that you've had to deal with or the things that people have said to you.

And so there, there's this inner struggle of maybe pushing that person that's so much like you. to be something different. I don't know. It can be very confusing, right? This isn't a linear thing. There's all kinds of things going on in all of us when we try to deal with these, especially masculine, feminine, and especially at that time.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And I think too, like, and as well with her, you know, we used to go to like every summer or every fall for a number of years, we used to go to an event in outside Calgary called Spruce Meadows, which is like a world class [00:31:00] international show jumping competition. I went to that every year and then my mom would literally say she knows the people jumping like she jumped against them and I was like been still 

Andrea Hiott: doing 

Lori Lozinski: well yeah so to me I was just like oh my god like you could have been this world class athlete and maybe you were but You know, and then I had a similar trajectory, right?

I played very high level softball, and at a certain point, I played with Olympic players, I played against Olympic players, and at a certain point, I didn't push myself to do that either. Like, it's one of the major regrets of my life is that I didn't try to play in the 

Andrea Hiott: Olympics. Because I played that level.

Why didn't you? Why didn't you? I understand you, by the way. I just want you to know I also played sports and I was also, like, people called me a tomboy and all of this stuff when I was a kid and stuff, so I just want you to know I'm understanding you. But why didn't you, why didn't you go for it? 

Lori Lozinski: You know, I had I'd had kind of a, an incident in grade 11 when I was like 16 years old where I was playing.[00:32:00] 

You know, volleyball at a very, I went to a very good high school for volleyball. I didn't go to a high school that was in my neighborhood or where my sister went. I went to a school that had a really good volleyball program. For that reason? 

Andrea Hiott: Okay, well. 

Lori Lozinski: And, but the thing was I'm very tiny for volleyball.

I'm only 5'3 I can't tell. Yeah, I'm only 5'3 and a half. So back in those days, the game was a little bit different. It's a lot bigger now and I could have played now at my size in a different role. 

Andrea Hiott: Setter or something. Yeah. 

Lori Lozinski: Well, I probably would have been a libero. I probably would have been a defense specialist and that didn't exist in the volleyball I grew up with.

I see. And all the women, you know, and I played high school and I also played club volleyball and all the women I played club volleyball with were quite big. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, I was small, and I'm 5'8 by the way, and I was small, so. I would have 

Lori Lozinski: died to be 5'8 would have died to be 5'8 

Andrea Hiott: It worked great. I was taller, you know, I mean, I kind of stayed the same, but I was taller in like 9th and 10th grade, but then I didn't keep [00:33:00] getting taller.

But yeah, most people were even taller than me playing volleyball. 

Lori Lozinski: Oh, yeah. And all these, you know, a bunch of the women that I did. play with in high school and play club. They went on to be like, they all went on to the University of Alberta and won multiple national championships. Those women. Sounds 

Andrea Hiott: like there's a little bit of theme here.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And so, but what had happened was I was trying out for the provincial team with all of them and I got cut and I had never been cut before. And I was really pissed off about it because I definitely wasn't cut because I wasn't a good player. I was cut because I was short. Yep. Yep. And so I, you know, and then I kind of spiraled a bit after that.

I dropped out of high school. I didn't want to go anymore. And then the softball kind of like tailed off for me a little bit. I came back to it. And, but I think I just came afraid of failure. Yeah. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. I wonder if anything like that ever happened to your mom 

Lori Lozinski: with her 

Andrea Hiott: stuff. 

Lori Lozinski: You know, I, maybe, and [00:34:00] that's the thing is we never really talked.

I mean, she was always very supportive and understanding. She did not. push me into things necessarily. And sometimes I'm a little bit mad maybe at my parents for not actually Not take, like, not allowing me to quit things and not do things. . But I was a pretty stubborn young person. I'm still very stubborn.

Like , not many people. I, nobody can get me to do something I don't wanna do. , . So, you know, so I can see looking back that was, you know, they just tried to support in every, everything we did and like my mother came to like every game I had. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. Wow. And volleyball, even when I went. That's wonderful.

Lori Lozinski: The first time I went to Nationals, it was in Burlington, Ontario, and she didn't come, and she was so upset. So the next year, you know, she came to the Nationals when we were in Saskatchewan, like, and everybody knew my mother, and everybody loved my mother, and like, I mean, just how fortunate and grateful I am that I had a parent that was so supportive, like every ball game, every volleyball game, like, she was there.

And 

Andrea Hiott: that's, I know those kind of parents, too. My mom came, too, but there were [00:35:00] some parents who were sort of, I don't know. They made the room better, you know, like, cause they were, everyone looked to them and it, they would set the pace. I'm imagining your mom was kind of like that. One of those, cause you said she was there for a lot of your friends and this kind of thing.

And those were the moms, right? Where if you needed something, you went to them or they always had this kind of spirit. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, they do. And like, and then the irritating thing to my mother was when my dad would occasionally show up. Yeah. He becomes the life of the party. 

Andrea Hiott: Okay, gosh. 

Lori Lozinski: You know, so he got all this, like, all the, you know, everyone would be like, oh my god, Dave's here, right?

And so, and he's very loud and boisterous and very supportive too, like, like, when I was young, he used to, like, pay me to hit home runs. 

Andrea Hiott: What? That worked? He used to 

Lori Lozinski: pay me, like, ten bucks a home run when I was, like, super young, so I would just, yeah, I'd make money every game. 

Andrea Hiott: Oh my gosh. Yeah, 

Lori Lozinski: like very, he was, my mom was like the super supportive, like always, like, you know, was there when I won or lost, really, my dad wasn't but my dad was there to [00:36:00] like, you know, really provide that ambition for me, and it's just like, it may be good and not good, but you know, if you're not winning, you're losing kind of mentality, and I do still Take that like I do still hear that all the time.

So I, that kind of is all in all facets of my life in so many ways. You know, I've really pushed hard at the career I have because of those kind of mantras from a young age. 

Andrea Hiott: Sports really gives you something like that. I think of it a lot. I mean, the Olympics are on right now. And it's almost hard for me to watch because I want to play so much, you know.

It's, and I remember that spirit and that time and that, I don't know, it sets you up, right? It almost gives you a weird scaffolding that you kind of can apply to a lot of other things. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, definitely like all the team sports I was in and playing at a high level and understanding loss, you know, and what that actually is and knowing how to win and what the feeling of winning is.

I, the only time I've ever achieved that similar feeling is being on a film [00:37:00] set when it's, when everything works. It's magic. And, 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, the same kind of team flow. Weirdly, I thought of it a little bit with The Pilgrimage reminded me a little bit of some feelings you get when you're, Yeah. In the national championship, for example.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. The pilgrimage really was a beautiful experience. It's really funny timing, too, because, you know, when Chris organized that ride she said, I just, something spoke to me and I needed to organize it, and this may be the only time it happens. And Was Chris 

Andrea Hiott: the one who was, had the smudge stick and wrote the letters and stuff?

Yeah. Or was that someone else? Okay. 

Lori Lozinski: No, that was her. Okay. 

Andrea Hiott: Amazing person there. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. She's like one of my closest dearest friends and and yeah and it's really funny cause some of the women that were on that ride were just recently on Facebook reaching out to her saying like, we're all still thinking about this ride and we'd love to do it again.

And stuff. It's funny cause one of the crew says they organized another one. I don't know, but she never promised to organize another one. So we'll see how that goes. [00:38:00] But the women, like so many of the women had yeah, it was. a spiritual experience for most of us, I'd say. 

Andrea Hiott: So I want to get to that, but also like you talked about how this moment when you got cut kind of jarred you.

I think I know it from myself too, that when you're just in an inertia where you're used to winning and you're competitive and it matters so much, when the obstacle comes, and they always come for all of us at some point, right? It jars you more, right, than if you've had a lot of little kind of, it's not that we don't all have obstacles, but it kind of can throw you off. It reminds me a little bit of, in a much bigger way, what ends up kind of motivating some of the films, which is when you had another loss, but of course this one was a emotional deep loss of your parents within a very short time, both of them passed. Is that right? Or 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. Yeah. Within like two years of each other.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, and that and they were both kind of unexpected or 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, [00:39:00] my dad had a fatal heart attack and died in a chair. And I just a few days beforehand and he, you know, of course people seem fine. And then and he had just turned 70. So, you know, like it was kind of incredible. Cause, you know, You know, generally we would have a family reunion every year around the time of my dad's birthday because his cousin had the exact same birthday and so a bunch of us had just all been together as well, like two weeks before.

So yeah, that one was hard. And then my mom got diagnosed with cancer and it happened quite quickly. So, 

Andrea Hiott: okay. Yeah. And where were you in your life at this time? Were you, had you, you know, Made any films on your own then had you started violator films, which is your company or what was where were you around this time?

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. No, I was already fully in my career. I had You know, I had won like a major An award by then too. I won something called one 

Andrea Hiott: of quite a few awards But I can't I couldn't figure out if you were it was with these other companies that you're working with or with your own or Both or I [00:40:00] don't know.

I just got I don't know the landscape so well. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, no, they were my own. And the thing too is like, you know, my parents, you know, saw me come out of film school. And I mean, yeah, I think for them just being able to see my things on television, see my names and credits and yeah, like I had won like, you know, a major award as well called a genie at that time.

They're now called the Canadian screen awards, but genie was for, It was for film and it's like the Canadian Oscar, so I'd won that for, yeah, it's huge film. 

Andrea Hiott: So they saw you reach the top in a sense. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, they, well, yeah, they definitely saw me achieve, like, the highest level award you can in Canada. So, so still ambitious. Of course there are always 

Andrea Hiott: levels, there's the next one, oh of course, I know. Still, but they had seen that and you, so, I guess when, You, we haven't talked about the motorcycle in your life yet, which I guess needs to come in now, but you weren't riding though at that time and [00:41:00] you'd wanted to as a kid or the motorcycle?

Yeah. Let's talk about the motorcycle a little. Like, well, you wanted to do that as a kid, but nobody, your dad said no, right? 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. My dad said no. My dad was weirdly against two wheeled things. I mean, I could drive, like, honestly, he taught me how to drive massive equipment at a young age. So I could. And I had a trike.

It was like these Honda trikes, which were like, frankly, the most dangerous things in the world. 

Andrea Hiott: Really? Yeah, so unstable, I guess, even with that. So unstable. And like, 

Lori Lozinski: we didn't wear helmets then. Like, we didn't do anything. And I was like such a little jerk on that thing. So it surprised me, but I also didn't, you know, just talking about a lot of women in my family, there were no boys.

You know, so it was all women. And so it was, yeah, my dad, I don't know what my dad's issue was with motorbikes, but he wasn't going to get us something like that. So, you know, and over the years, you know, I would make jokes about getting my motorcycle license and he's like, I don't know over my dead body or whatever.

Like, you know, he would just like [00:42:00] crack funny jokes at me. Cause I mean, I can do whatever I want. I'm an adult, but 

Andrea Hiott: yeah, 

Lori Lozinski: but honestly it was like, and then he died. And my boyfriend at the time. Had his license and ridden motorcycles. He didn't have one at the time, but I was like, you know what? I'm going to get my, I'm going to get my license.

And so, yeah, I just started taking lessons like a year after he died. And then, you know, I did my lessons and then me and my boyfriend went out for like one ride when we were, when I was in Vancouver, I bought a bike and he had rented a bike for us to just rip around on, And then my mom got sick, and I was, I went back to Edmonton to be with her and be with my family during that time, and then after she died that spring, I got my license, and I, and then I bought my purple motorcycle, which was for my 40th birthday.

Andrea Hiott: I love it that you have a purple motorcycle. You still have it, I guess. 

Lori Lozinski: I do still have it. I don't think I'll ever sell it. 

Andrea Hiott: Okay, good. Yeah, it's a very special thing. And then 

Lori Lozinski: my boyfriend broke up with me. And [00:43:00] so, and then, yeah, so like, I just had like these three kind of big losses and honestly, and also my father died without a will.

So it got really rocky in my family for many years. So, yeah, so it was it was not a fun number of years. So the motorcycle was really stabilizing for me at that time. 

Andrea Hiott: Was your, I don't know why I want to ask this and you don't have, if it's too personal, you don't have to answer it, but was your dad competitive with your mom or like what happened when they were.

Like, why did they break up and you went with your mom, but you were really close to your dad. I just wonder what was that? Was that also a shock? Or did you see it coming? Did it feel like a loss? Is it comparable at all to this loss that we're talking about now? I don't know. 

Lori Lozinski: It was for me. It was pretty catastrophic for me at a young age.

Age 

Andrea Hiott: nine, you have full on consciousness. I mean, you remember everything by that age. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. You really do. I do. And. And the thing too is, like, I don't remember [00:44:00] them fighting or not getting along. My sister does. My sister is three and a half years older than me, so she remembers that stuff, but I don't.

I think, honestly, I think my mom's mental illness freaked him out. I think he, he left quite soon after that. 

Andrea Hiott: Why did it freak him out? Because of what others thought or like the actual everyday ness of it or what? I think 

Lori Lozinski: both. Both. Yeah, he was he was someone that, like, he had to exist in a space where everybody loved him. It really mattered to him and he didn't do well if he felt someone didn't like him. So, you know, the thought of having to take care of her perhaps for the rest of her life and being uncertain about Like, yeah, uncertain and unsure about how she was going to behave and, but also like looking back at that, like how awful that he just left two kids with her.

Andrea Hiott: I mean he just couldn't handle it, like he, he just couldn't handle it but still it is awful. 

Lori Lozinski: It is awful and he couldn't handle it and you know, he was, you know, And he, you know, was somebody else and [00:45:00] he eventually married that person and like stayed with them until he died. And then, you know, eventually my mom, you know, several years later also found a, you know, her partner and they were together.

She died. So, but it was, yeah, I think You know, so seeing him, you know, and I didn't think of him, you know, chickening out at the time, but like looking back, I was like, Oh my God, like he ran because he was afraid and, you know, and I think he probably was wondering what others would think of him having a wife like this and all that kind of stuff.

So, I mean, my mom was always great with him at like, for like, I was again, very fortunate. I never heard them speak. badly about one another. Like that was never, 

Andrea Hiott: you know, this whole, like, try to get you on their side thing. 

Lori Lozinski: No, none of that. No. My dad for, you know, some of his like, you know, faults and stuff was like very responsible.

Like, you know, took care of us, , paid for the house that we were like, you know, like we were taken care of, you know, and my mother just didn't 

Andrea Hiott: know how to handle the, [00:46:00] I think I have some of this in my own family, by the way. So I, and I've seen Not bipolar, but something, you know, these kind of illnesses that at some point were a little bit stigmatized or that people just don't understand and they don't know how to handle.

And I've seen it too, where. They don't want, like, they don't want people to know it's associated with the family, so they don't talk about it or tell anyone or, , all kinds of weird stuff. I mean, these days we know that like every family has something and yeah, but it just, it kind of goes deep to me.

I guess I'm trying to get into a little bit, like what was going on with you unconsciously, because yeah. And maybe I wonder if the loss of both of them. at that time? Did you have any kind of stuff that you hadn't dealt with that you needed to deal with? It sounds like it hit you really hard. And of course, that's just also because you've lost these two incredibly important people in your life. But I just wonder what all the complexity was. In there. [00:47:00] Not that you might even not know yourself, but I 

Lori Lozinski: thought a lot. I've had some therapy. I've done a number of things for sure.

Absolutely. After they died, I, you know, I had a really wonderful counselor that helped me through. Many years. And I, they're credited in a motorcycle saved my life because they were a part of that. You know, I think what, like looking back and you know what I knew or didn't know in my little body, what I saw was women get left.

And so I, and I learned that. Men can't be trusted. And so like that has definitely permeated most of my life. And you know, I've had a number of like, you know, relationships and that kind of stuff. But for the most part, I've been on my own. And, you know, I'm totally okay with that. And like, the thing too is like, I, you know, nurture versus nature.

Did I never want children? Did I never want to get married just naturally? Or was it like a reaction to what I saw around me? I think it's probably a reaction to what I saw around me. [00:48:00] But like, I've never felt like maternal in that way. I've, and so I really was like opposite of what I thought was, okay.

the life that women were supposed to be leading as per what society said they should be living. And my sister did, you know, kind of that as well, got married young like had a career, had children and that kind of stuff. And I was like, no, I'm not doing any of that. Like I'm, and like, you know, and I moved very far away from my family when I was in my twenties.

Like I live in a, like, I don't have any family where I live and you know, and I travel alone and I do stuff, a lot of things alone. And that. My, a lot of my family doesn't, they love it, but they don't get it. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, no, I understand. I did the same, so, I 

Lori Lozinski: understand. Yeah, so it's just like, so I think for like, basically, you know, basically up till my parents died, I lived my life a certain way.

You know, to be against the system, to be very ambitious, to not, to do exactly the opposite of what society thinks a woman should behave, I really tried [00:49:00] to be the opposite of that. And then And then as soon as they died, and I had some good, really good counseling and some years to like, and years to sit in that grief and not numb it and not try to hide from it like I really sat in that grief for a couple years, again, didn't know if I wanted to keep producing, like I really I was really in a dark place for a couple years 

Andrea Hiott: Like you didn't feel motivated to do anything?

I mean, where are you? 

Lori Lozinski: Well, I didn't know what I was living for anymore, you know, like I really felt like I was living for the pride of my parents and the two people that loved me unconditionally were gone. So it's like, oh, like, so I can't get away with doing anything anymore because, like, who's gonna love me.

So I actually had to learn how to love myself. And I. And I thought I did, but like now I actually do. 

Andrea Hiott: That's a message in your, a lot of your work too that comes through, I think. So, yeah. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, it is about that, like, acceptance of who you are regardless of [00:50:00] society's ideas on who you're supposed to be.

Andrea Hiott: I'm sorry to interrupt you, but when we say this, like, just accepting who you are, it can sound so, like, I need to take a minute, because this is really deep stuff, you know, like what you were going through and I think a lot of us go through it with whoever in our lives, our parents often, our caretakers, or, you know, we have these kind of, we need to prove something to someone, or we're, I don't know, it's we haven't come to terms with, like, being just, Okay, with who we are we feel like we need to be okay.

And it does get with our parents a lot, whether it's our dad or our mom or both. Somehow we don't feel that they've said you did a good job, even if they've said it or, and then when they're gone, or when you just kind of leave them, or you have to start being the adult and the relationship shifts or whatever happens, it can feel like the foundation is kind of gone, you know, like what was all that?

And I guess, yeah, I just, this acceptance of self, how do you [00:51:00] see that? I mean, it's not just so easy cause you don't even, it's hard to know who you are too, isn't it? 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And I do, I don't think we know who we are until we actually go through some, a lot of suffering to be honest. Um, Because some people, Get delusional in their suffering or they numb their suffering or they avoid their suffering.

And to me, that's where that's where you find yourself is at the bottom. And I think to like, you know, losing them both by 30, like I was 39 years old when they were both gone. And I had kind of had this like weird. I thoughts that I wasn't gonna live till 40. And I would voice that every once in a while to my parents and I'd be like, oh my God.

Like, stop being so like, dark about it. All right. 

Andrea Hiott: When did you have that, when you were young? Really young. 

Lori Lozinski: Young? Yeah. I was young. I was in my late teens and I kind of always thought it. And so I think I, you know, I was extremely ambitious for a lot of my life because of that. 'cause I was like, I have, at the time 

Andrea Hiott: you knew the time would be running out at that time it felt [00:52:00] like or 

Lori Lozinski: something.

Yeah. And what happened is they both died before I was 40. 

I did experience death. Yeah, you 

Andrea Hiott: did. Not what you expected, I guess. 

Lori Lozinski: Not what I expected. And probably exactly what it was supposed to be, because I think what I feared most was their death, actually not my own.

And then that happened by, before I was 40. So I was like, oh, Okay, so what do I do with that? I can either choose to end my own life. I can do that. Cause I thought about it a lot. Cause I didn't really know where I was going to go anymore or who I was, what I was doing, who was I, what is the purpose of life?

Why am I making films and television? Like, why am I a storyteller? What does it matter? Like, what does anything matter? So it was a couple years. It really was a couple years of doing that. I'm going to a counselor as well through that period. But I was really like, I lost friendships during that time, you know, cause there's people that are like, Oh, well stop [00:53:00] feeling sad, go on medication.

I'm like, no, I am just going to feel real shitty. For as long as it needs to happen, and that's, and so I'm really grateful I did that, but it was extremely difficult. And I also, you know, had the time to do that, and the resources to do that, so. Again, that's a privilege, to be honest, to be able to, like, suffer comfortably, if that's a, if that's a thing.

But I read a lot, you know, I read a lot of books about dying, like, Tibetan book of living and dying, like, the, you know, living and dying, and, you know, Die Wise, Stephen Jenkinson is someone I read a lot, like, so I read a lot about, like, the death process to understand, like, why I wanted to live and what living every day could mean for me.

Like I'm not, I don't think of myself anymore as like, like dying every day. That's the big shift for me is like, I'm actually like, or waiting for a specific time to die. I actually it's really, you know, what can I do [00:54:00] every day? And not in a creepy productive way. Cause like, that could also just be like reading a book, laying on the couch, laying out in the grass, you know, late going to the beach and being okay with that.

But I think where the motorcycle ties into that. Is that, and I kind of talk about it a bit in Motorcycle Saved My Life. It's just like, because if you're not present on a motorcycle, you are going to die. Like every day I get on my motorcycle, like I'm very close to death. And that's good for me. It reminds me why I want to be alive and everything that I want to do and not be afraid of death either.

Also knowing that every day I got on my bike, it could be my last day and I'm okay with that. And I don't think I would have been okay with that. at 39. I definitely would have been, I wouldn't have been okay with that. 

Andrea Hiott: So it's Were you in the present moment at all, much during that time before 38, 39?

Were you No. 

Lori Lozinski: No. Being, living in present, I think for women is extremely difficult anyway. You know, because we're always, Worried about the past, worried about the [00:55:00] future. What do I look like? How do I sound? Am I safe? Am I saying the right things? Am I doing the right things? Am I upsetting somebody?

Like, you know, it's really hard for women and like, and all the people that you're responsible to and, you know, people that rely on you. I just think it's like, almost impossible for women to live in a present state. And when we're on a motorcycle, you are in a present state. And so when I think a lot of women talk about freedom of motorcycles, which is different than what men, it's different for men.

I'm not going to speak to their experience because I'm not one, but for women, for me, it's like, because we get to exist in a present state for that small amount of time, we're on a motorcycle. And that is like, amazing. Like you were just, there is no noise other than that bike. So yeah, it's pretty incredible.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, and the, there's all these themes in there. There's the power and the control and the freedom and the weird balance of [00:56:00] that you find that kind of what you just described where you have to be in control and present. But at the same time, you, and not worried too. So there's, it is a bit like surfing, I guess, for people Who don't ride or, but for people who ride, everyone knows it, right.

And we're always constantly trying to figure out a way to describe it. And there's really no way to describe it, but I do think connecting it to life and to that moment that you release control, but at the same time, you've never been more present. There's something about that, you know, which is a hard place to get into.

As a woman, as you said, but even just in, in life, I mean, as you were talking, I was wondering, what was your relationship to like the gays? You know, being seen, being looked at because sometimes, I mean, a lot of that was you're trying to perform for your parents and do well. I don't only mean like people looking at you, but I do mean that too.

And maybe I'm just speaking, projecting from my own sense, because I think it can be hard to be in the present moment. As a woman, because you feel like you have to watch [00:57:00] how everyone else is watching you, if that makes sense. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, I mean, that was like, just the physical gaze was really prevalent in my life.

And mostly because, again, tomboy, similar to yourself, and sporty, and I wasn't really, I didn't really dress like a girl was supposed to. I mean, I did for a little while. I experimented a little while in my late teens and early twenties and stuff like that. But it wasn't 

Andrea Hiott: comfortable for you? 

Lori Lozinski: No, it's not comfortable.

I don't like being viewed sexually. It scares me. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah, I understand that. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And so, you know, and you know, I'm a curvy lady. I have big breasts and that kind of stuff. And so it's So the gaze comes no matter what. It came no matter what. I find now in my 40s and when I cut off all my hair and I let it go silver, I like, I appreciate the gaze now like a little bit, because it's like, it feels different if it comes but being a young person um, like all through my, I was not comfortable dressing that [00:58:00] way.

So, you know, 

Andrea Hiott: Maybe it feels different because you're, I guess you're being you're presenting yourself externally the way that feels comfortable for you instead of the way that you think other people think a woman should look or something. Is that fair? Thanks 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, and also to feel safe, like I do dress a particular way so that I don't attract what I would consider negative attention.

You know, on me. No, zero judgment on how other people are living their lives, but for me, it is not a safe, comfortable space. So, you know, I, most people assume I'm queer or I'm a lesbian by the way I dress and the way I look, and I'm frankly fine with it. 

Andrea Hiott: You know, because it's like, because I do like to hear that's powerful to hear.

I'm glad you said that because I think people probably need to hear that. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, and it's, also, I was called that a lot growing up as well, even when I did, like, seemingly dress more feminine because of my sports and my, you know, and what I was doing with my life and career focused and not really looking [00:59:00] to like, get married or any of those things.

Like, I got called dyke and, you know, lesbian like my whole life. It was like. That's not an insult. That's not like a bad thing. Some of my closest friends are lesbians. So, now 

Andrea Hiott: it's cool. Now it's trendy and cool, I guess, in a lot of places, although I won't. Yeah, there's a lot of places. It's still very hard and painful.

But I think back then, which wasn't so long ago, I mean, just it's changed so much just in 10 years or five years. But yeah, it was another one of those things that reminds me of maybe your dad's discomfort with the illness or this thing where people feel uncomfortable about it because it's so true in a way.

It's always been. True, but we can't look at it. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And I think too, like also, and again, this was like over 30 years ago that people are saying to me, but like, because of playing sports, I was around like queer folks and like one of my cousins is like, is gay. Like it was. And the thing was, that was very accepted in my family, which also very grateful for you know, and so it wasn't, you know, it wasn't.

 It wasn't it was never a negative [01:00:00] thing and even through periods of time when I wasn't in a relationship for a long time, you know, my mother would call me and she'd be like, Oh, so are you dating? Are you seeing anybody? That's just like, No, she's like, no guys. I'm like, no guys, mom, no women.

I'm like, no, no women moms don't have it. 

Andrea Hiott: It's so wonderful you brought this up because I was thinking of this and I think this leads into now we can really talk about like the pilgrimage and the other movie because I was really thinking about this a lot of because I also, as I said, grew up playing sports and being a bit tomboy, just my natural state.

Was I didn't want to wear makeup, like the most natural I can be if I can wake up and just be who I am and comfortable clothes and like, I don't mind wearing dresses or skirts if they're comfortable, like, but in general, yeah. And when you play sports too, you, I think this is hard to talk about and even like with your dad treating you a bit like a boy in a way you say in the film, there's a weird confusion about it all in my head.

And I think in the world where maybe [01:01:00] your dad felt more comfortable. With a boy. So he treated you that way. Well, like it was probably too in the same, like too much to love you as a girl or just to love you and not know how, because he's a boy, how to deal with being a girl, but also when we are in these situations like sports, we almost, I don't know if you did, but you almost feel like you have to be a boy because.

Or the things you need to be like strong and fast and all these things are associated with boys, which is totally messed up, but it becomes confusing, right? Like the male, female characterization, I don't know if that even makes sense. And 

Lori Lozinski: it's, and this is the thing is like, this is the thing about growing up when it felt like it was either or, like I, I wanted to, like, I definitely prefaced masculine qualities because I thought that would.

show the world that I was stronger, not someone to fuck with, like I was not rapable, like all these things, right? So like, I definitely wanted to exude way more masculine qualities [01:02:00] as a young person. And I did for most of my life to, you know, you know, up until like my parents died, I was living that like, prefacing those qualities, no doubt about it, because I felt like that's How to set myself apart, how to not be less than, how to not be all of these things.

And it wasn't until after they died and like the thing, you know, and doing all of this like, you know, deep work you know, just in terms of like, who we are as really humans, where I see it's we're just a balance of those energies. Like, right? I feel really balanced in my feminine and masculine energy.

We're 

Andrea Hiott: All of it in different ways. We're not all of it! Men need to be feminine too. I mean, it's wonderful to be able to be all of it, you know, in different ways at different times, but why it's so hard, you know, it's so, but like, just to to, it's hard not to talk in either ors and it's not an either or, but with you, when you learned how to ride the motorcycle, which most people would say, oh, that's like a male thing, right?

I have my motorcycle license by the way, but I don't, I don't ride. Yeah, I do. And it's not something that people think a woman should [01:03:00] get or something. It seems like a boy thing. And there's a lot of reasons for that we don't need to go into, but what I found so beautiful and confusing in the most, in the best way, almost like untangling all that stuff, the other confusion I just note, noted, is that you embraced the motorcycle and learned how to ride, and it embraced your feminine, being feminine in a way, or being a woman and Opened up this space of acceptance for just being who you are and stuff.

It's interesting, it's almost like the male portal, so called, became a portal into just being okay with all, or helping others be okay with it? I don't know, what do you, what does that bring up in you, am I talking crazy? Yes! No, I, 

Lori Lozinski: It's my kind of crazy if it's crazy. Okay. It's just, I do like, and that's the thing, another aspect with women and motorcycles.

And again, it's like, you know, I speak most, I speak from a heterosexual point of view for sure. I [01:04:00] very, you know, I have a lot of queer friends and lesbian friends and gay friends, but you know, I speak all just from my heterosexual point of view, but to me that riding a motorcycle is that perfect balance of masculine and feminine because the bike does have all that masculine.

energy to it, right? And 

Andrea Hiott: which is wonderful. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And so when women ride, it is a balance, like it feels like really incredible. And I think that is another aspect of the presence in like, you know, the overarching theme of freedom. I think all of these things come in, play into that, that I think a lot of us just don't know how to articulate, you know, but for me, you know, like riding that, like riding the motorcycle really definitely helped me embrace more of my feminine.

And a lot of women riders. You know, even our instructors would say women are much more technical, like we're like, you know, a lot of women that rider like have less accidents have less things and it's not because we're necessarily less risky, but sometimes we're a little bit more technical on how we ride, you know, there's a 

Andrea Hiott: kind of embodiment to that's another theme in [01:05:00] a lot of your work of coming into the body feeling the body and on the bike and in the land.

Lori Lozinski: Well, you know, the body knows. We, our little consciousness is in these like, like the most amazing, like, bodies. Like, we have no idea. Yeah, the body is amazing. The body is amazing. It's like. 

Andrea Hiott: But we don't, that's another thing connected to all this, right? I guess like the women fill their bodies in a different way.

And when you combine that with a motorcycle, the masculinity of the, I mean, it's a different experience for a woman, I'm sure, riding a motorcycle, just physically, but also. And what you were saying about the trainers where I think once a woman embraces the motorcycle, there is already an embodiment, a sensitivity or something that's a little bit different in terms of just the writing.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, it totally is. Yeah, it's It's interesting because this summer was the first time I'm, I mostly ride, you know, a lot of the time with women and I go to these huge like women only like camp outs and stuff like that with like a thousand plus women, which is like one of the most [01:06:00] incredible feelings in the world.

It's such a safe space, isn't it? Yeah. It's, yeah, it was just something I had never experienced before when I went to an event in California called Babes Ride Out with another friend of mine. I went multiple years until COVID happened. But just, yeah, being in like a space and a campground with only women, I had just never experienced that kind of safety.

Before and like I was in my early 40s and I was like, and I've played, you know, I've done a lot of things and I'm a confident woman and but yeah, that feeling really that experience really sparked something for me and even for my friend Chris who came to one of those events. I think it sparked her to do the pilgrimage ride as well.

So that was 

Andrea Hiott: before the pilgrimage. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, because I thought of that space of, I mean, a lot of the themes we've talked about, it's almost like a relaxing of all that stuff in those spaces where you don't have to worry about the gaze. You don't have to worry about how everyone else is looking at you or if you're looking a certain way or [01:07:00] what you're wearing or like all that is just relaxed and wow, What if what a feeling like and I think let's talk about the pilgrimage now because I think the movie itself the way you do It you get that feeling even when we were talking about the bird at the beginning There is this feeling of soaring or something right where you're just free and I don't mean free in a The way people usually mean it with motorcycles, more like, oh, it's okay to be who I am.

And so many people say that in the film that, so before we talk about that, like maybe we can set it up just a little bit. So Chris decided to do this, and it's like a mindfulness kind of ride, or maybe just like sketch it a little bit for people who haven't seen it yet. They can go watch it. Yeah, but 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah.

So my friend Chris Ventura, who I've known for a number of years we initially met in the film industry and then discovered that we both ride motorcycles. And, you know, we had gone to one of these women only events in California together as well. She came and she just woke up one day, I think, and she kind of [01:08:00] describes it, it best herself, but just like, had a feeling like she had to put together this ride.

And so she did. And this was, yeah, in 2019. So I remember her telling me, I was in Toronto at the time producing a feature film and she'd called me and she was talking to me about it. And she's like, I think I'm going to organize this ride. And I'm like, yeah, that sounds amazing. Like, let me know, like, I'll do anything to help organize or do anything.

And she's like, and she knew that I was like wanting to do more writing and directing. Cause I really hadn't at that point, I had directed some. Theater and stuff, but it's like, I want you to make a documentary about it. 

Andrea Hiott: Oh, it was her idea. Oh, how wonderful. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, and so I was like, oh, yeah. And this was like, I think, on a Saturday afternoon.

Andrea Hiott: Gosh, 

Lori Lozinski: that's so funny, Lori, 

Andrea Hiott: because the other film was also not really your idea, to do the one that became Motorcycle Saved My Life. Life is so weird. 

Lori Lozinski: I have, like, these beautiful humans in my life that can see things in me that I don't see. Yeah, and you 

Andrea Hiott: listen, too. 

Lori Lozinski: You listen. And I [01:09:00] listen. 

Andrea Hiott: Anyway, sorry, okay.

Lori Lozinski: I didn't resist these ones. Yeah. But I was like, oh my god, yeah. And so I was like, well, I'll write a proposal. And I'll send it to you tomorrow. And I wrote a proposal and sent it to her and she called me back and she was just like, wow, did you just write that? And I was like, yeah. I was like, what? In one day?

Yeah. And I was like, yeah, I just wrote it this morning. And she was like, like, dude, this is really good. And so I was like, well, cool. I'm going to try and get some money. And then I think like a week later, I was really sending it out to like, you know, folks that like CBC and the National Film Board, like to just get, you know, You know, and that was the first time I had really done that, and that was the first time I had written so personally, because I had put applications into Direct before and in other programs, and I wasn't successful.

I'd done that for a few years. But you hadn't 

Andrea Hiott: really written personally for those? 

Lori Lozinski: Just from the heart, right? Like, this one was, like, just so, again, it was, you know, About this ride and why this [01:10:00] ride mattered, but like why I ride and why these type of rides matter for women and how I came to riding and what it means to my life.

Powerful. Yeah. And so, and then and then, yeah, I finished making that film and I came back to Vancouver in the spring and you know, Chris, you know, I just continue to try and find money, but, you know, the funders weren't, you know, gonna give me money at that time. So I was like, and Chris was like, what are you going to do?

I'm like, well, I'm just going to go buy a camera and do it myself. She's like, all right. Awesome. And so, you know, and so like, you know, a couple of days before the ride as well, I went out, you know, to Victoria and did the route, like she showed me the route and we were, I was helping her put up signage and that kind of stuff.

But, and we just kind of talked and like, I've made documentaries, like, that's the beautiful thing is like, I'm an emerging I'm not a director, but I've made a lot of things, so I have my shot list, like I had all my plans and the real intention was just to like to shoot the ride and to talk to, and not interview people cause I didn't want [01:11:00] to take anybody out of their experience.

Andrea Hiott: I was wondering about that where all the, if you ask people questions or first we should probably say like how many women were there? Was it? I think there was over, there was about 55. Yeah. 55, wow. Okay, so 55 women sort of meet all with their bikes. They didn't really all know each other, right? But was it Chris that connected them?

Because there's, you know, they, there's this beautiful thing of like sending handwritten notes to everyone to invite them with like little flower petals in it. It's already very physical and kind of sensual from the start and then there's the smudge stick and there's like, it's very, but then you have these beautiful huge machines and It's all this masculine feminine stuff in a new context.

How did all she did all that, Chris, or? 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. Well that was like, you know, there, back at that time there was like a, and it still exists. There was a Facebook group in Vancouver called the Moto Girls of Van City, and that was like, like from where it started and where it is now, it's pretty like, I mean, motorcycle industry is just boomed for women in these last 10 years, but, she [01:12:00] had so she put out. You know, saying like, I'm having this ride and this is the cost and this is what it's going to be and it's a mindful motorcycle ride, but she didn't tell anybody the route and she didn't tell anybody what they were going to be doing. She didn't tell people where they were going to be camping.

So it was all a mystery, right? It was about, like, yeah. Surrendering to the mystery of it all, which again is very difficult for women is to know where they're going to sleep, where they're going to go, like, all plays into our safety. So she kind of wrapped it in this, like, everyone, you're going to be great, but I need you to trust me.

You gotta 

Andrea Hiott: trust. Trust is big. We should say a lot of these women have families and lives and careers and they were all, you can tell, you know, they, they're all coming from the hustle bustle of daily being a woman life. Into the space. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And so, you know, and that attracted those people, and there was definitely people that are like, hell no, I'm not doing that, you know, but the people that came, it was like, it was for them.

It was meant for them. [01:13:00] And so, Kind of the structure of it was we all met in Victoria, we all stayed in like hotels like the Friday night, and there was an opening kind of party at a motorcycle bar in Victoria, and everybody got to meet each other and sign up and like, and then, you know, you were basically told where to, we were told where to go the next morning to meet, and we were going to have like, It's very exciting.

Yeah, everybody gets their motorcycles. We all meet it. We all met at like a motorcycle shop on the Saturday morning and had breakfast and Chris spoke and you know, from her, tradition of like sanding smudgy and she, you know, everybody that was wanted it was welcome to like, you know, be cleansed before the ride.

You know, Chris is definitely very spiritual and very witchy. She's, and so she, you know, she, 

Andrea Hiott: you know, 

Lori Lozinski: created a space. She has a 

Andrea Hiott: twinkle in her eye about it. She 

Lori Lozinski: definitely has a twinkle that one. And she created a safe space for us to all be in energetically, you know, between the veils and and then the ride started and then everyone was given the map.

You were given a map and then you [01:14:00] were told, you know, And then, and you had stops along the way, so everyone had to stop along the way. I think we had, I think she called, I think there were three refugios where you had to stop and contemplate something, you didn't know what. So you had to, yeah, so everyone got the map and everyone headed out.

And the first stop was like at the lighthouse where, and there was a certain, and everyone had a handwritten note with their name on it. So every stop they had, they just had to give their name, they were handed their card, and they opened it. Oh, at 

Andrea Hiott: every stop you had a handwritten note? Oh my goodness.

Lori Lozinski: You were handed a note, and it told you to contemplate something. And so there was, it was at the water and then it was like, you know, at the lighthouse and then it was on the beach and then it was like in the trees and then, and then the final destination. So people on that map knew where they were going to be camping that night.

And it was like an old girl guides campsite. So it was really cute. And there was a river. It was really beautiful. Yeah, everyone went swimming. Yeah, a bunch of people went swimming and were totally fine [01:15:00] for me to film them swimming naked. Naked, 

Andrea Hiott: yeah, so sweet. Everyone's like 

Lori Lozinski: splashing around like little kids.

Yeah, a really beautiful experience. And so that was the container of it. And then,, and then, you know, Everything that happened. And then the Sunday morning was, , Chris had another, you know, kind of small ceremony to, you know, close the circle and let everyone safely release.

But for me, it was really important. And this is Chris and I talked about it as like, I, everyone. So in all of Chris's things, it's like, it's going to be filmed. So just, you know, but like, non invasive 

Andrea Hiott: filming. Yeah, 

Lori Lozinski: non invasive filming. So everyone, I met everybody on the Friday night. They saw me with my camera and everyone was like, cool.

And I knew like a bunch of the ladies too, and a bunch they didn't. But it was just like, I'm not gonna talk to anybody. I'm not gonna interview. Just please, just exist. And, you know, I'm just capturing a moment. So that was what was really essential for me. So what I did after was I [01:16:00] had, I think I invited nine or 10 women into a space very, actually the studio next door to me, I had nine or 10 women come in and I just, the, They were all miked, and I had a professional guy recording us all and Chris was there as well, and I just asked them questions about their lives and their ride, and it was like, an emotional couple hours talking about the ride, and crying, and laughing, and doing all these things, and and then let everybody go, and then the guy that was recording us, his name was Jeff, he was like, he also rides, and he was like, Wow, me and my friends don't feel that way about writing and I feel like I'm missing out.

I was like, maybe talk to your guy friends a little like maybe do some different thing, have a different experience you can have those experiences with people like, you know, this masculine thing is bullshit Like it is 

Andrea Hiott: I mean, that's what the men need to hear right that they because they want it too I believe me every man I've ever really gotten into a deep conversation with will say something like that, right?

They miss [01:17:00] there's a longing for it 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, and it was something that, like, Bruce and I talked about on his podcast, The Motorcycle Life. He said something similar. He's like, yeah, I feel like I'm not getting the full experience that you guys are 

Andrea Hiott: getting. I think I remember, yeah. 

Lori Lozinski: So it was, and so, and that's, and that kind of, like, you know, became, why, you the film just has like a cacophony of voices.

It's just the voices of all those different women. 

Andrea Hiott: What do you think it was like for them? Because all the stuff we've been talking about this space, we haven't really described it yet, but maybe we don't, can't describe it. People just watch the film, but I think like the, those moments where you do feel okay with who you are and life is going and there's that, the metaphor that we described of writing, which isn't really just a metaphor where you're really present, but you've also surrendered.

Like, did you feel that space opening gradually? Was it there from the beginning? Yeah. How did it feel in the process of actually happening? 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, it was, it's even one of the writers says it in the [01:18:00] film too. It's just like when they came to the final campground, like it just, They all felt as one, right?

Like it didn't and I think that was the thing is like, you know, the Friday night people are just kind of getting to know each other, having a drink, having something to eat and some music and stuff like that. And that, but once you get in the rides and you're all having the same experience, but different individually, but the same collectively, like they already felt bonded by the time they all landed at that campground.

And so like that evening was really beautiful. And women came from like, Interior BC and, you know, and like from Vancouver and Victoria and like from Seattle and the States, a friend of ours, like, flew up from San Diego, like, so it was like, you know, women were kind of coming from like, and not many folks knew each other.

So it was just so hearing those type of things and just knowing like how bonded they were. And like other women, it's like, there's no drama. There's no, it was all just love. Right. It was just love and acceptance. Like, we're all here. We're riding [01:19:00] motorcycles and we're all here at this moment in time.

And it honestly, it's just like 

Andrea Hiott: like supportive too. There was a feeling of being supported and we can, I guess we should say we did talk about the birds, but everything feels so in touch with the, like the trees, the everything. There's this feeling that's also about being on a bike, right? Where you're just, you're kind of becoming one with the people you're riding with, but also with this.

Space you're riding through. Yeah, 

Lori Lozinski: It's the it is like the themes that I am have explored in past work and a lot of themes that I explore in the things I'm writing and directing it's that sense of like belonging, obviously, you know, like we belong to one another. And also we belong to nature and that's something else about motorcycling and Women are safe in nature.

A lot of the world says we are not. I mean, it's classic bear versus man, right? That's just like the heightened version of it all. But women are safe in [01:20:00] nature. And I think we need to talk about that more. And I think we need to like live in that a lot more. And I think like having these type of environments is especially like the pilgrimage and where we, you know, had the ride.

I mean, you're just surrounded by like, natural beauty. And everyone's 

Andrea Hiott: something to you too, right? Your senses, your physicality, what's possible. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. And being safe with one another naked and like being safe with one another, like in singing and dancing and, you know, in joy. 

Andrea Hiott: That space you show very well too with your filming the way that because it can be very hard not to feel judged if you want to just stand in the corner and read a book or if you want to do some karaoke like in social situations we can all feel so pressured and when that's lifted and you just can be whatever what a special thing you show it somehow with the filming.

But, okay, so we were talking about the nature and stuff and I noticed this too in A Motorcycle Saved My Life because you know, it's a motorcycle saved my life but Like, even the pictures of your family, [01:21:00] most of them are in nature.

You're, of course you're on the motorcycle, so you're traveling, but there's the trees, in the picture and then the lake. And I just wonder how conscious you were maybe in both films, but we can sort of move into a motorcycle saved my life a bit too, because there's so much there that's rich richness to talk about.

 I know it's a theme in even your current work in the land and the relationship. It's almost like a nestedness with what we've been talking about with masculine, feminine and feeling supported in the way you just described it with belonging. But when did you start thinking of that in that way? Not that you can remember exactly a moment, but was it part of your filming at that time period and your thinking?

Lori Lozinski: I think it's just been in my body since I was a little thing. And even, you know, even growing up on the farm, like being on the farm on the weekends and being, , in the city for school and stuff is great. But I was like, . A number of years younger than my sister, three and a half. So it was enough to, like, you don't at a certain age, like you just don't play together so much anymore.

Maybe , my sister didn't [01:22:00] want to, I don't know. And I was the youngest of all my cousins too. Like all my sister was closer to my cousins and Okay. So I was. on my own a lot. And I was just like, you know, and motorcycle kind of shows that as like a, the little girl going into the woods with her ax and that, like, that's what I did.

Like every day I was just like, you know, woke up and I was like I was just out. I was in the forest all the time by myself and didn't have like, my parents weren't afraid, like, like nobody was worried about me, you know? And like, I think it's really kind of fascinating because as at a certain age. I can't remember, maybe in my 20s, I became afraid of that.

And I'm still a little afraid of that. Like, I go camping on my own and stuff like that now, but I'm still not super comfortable. And so I just want to return to that. I just want to return to like feeling safe there again and for all women, to be honest. And 

Andrea Hiott: it's very powerful what you said. I almost want you to say it again. [01:23:00] Women are safe in nature. Is that what you said or nature? Yeah because it's hard that makes me feel a little emotional in a weird way because and I especially thinking of you as a little kid Because me too.

I mean, there's a lot of parallels here and probably for a lot of people listening as a kid That was my safe space or where I felt what we've been talking about in the terms of nobody's looking at you But you're present and you're with others, but you're you're not So called alone, you know, it's yeah, just to hear that that still is okay.

Yeah. 

Lori Lozinski: And even you know, one of my fondest memories too, growing up is just like, my dad handed me like a bucket of nails, horseshoe nails to like, go walk the fence line and then just like fix any fencing that was down. And so like. I would just take that bucket of nails and I would my hammer and I would go out all day and I had like a pony named Misty and she would just follow me and like she would just come to every post with me and and it was just like [01:24:00] yeah to me that was just like combining like a great day of like you know doing good working on the farm and and then just being in nature and being with the things I loved and yeah so I definitely wanted to represent that in a motorcycle save my life and the land is that it's just it was another character, you know, there's my parents, and to see how integrated we are with the land.

Right. And even like with those old pictures, like being a little bit translucent to like show like the land is still there. Those people are not anymore, but the land still is. And yeah it's really powerful to me and we belong to the land. And this is like, You know, we'll lead into another project that I'm just trying to develop right now to like, I don't believe we can own land because I think we belong to the land.

So we belong to one another. So it's yeah, it's just a different mindset in terms of, and it's, and it feels Cause the earth energy is feminine to me. That just feels [01:25:00] completely correct. 

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. I hadn't thought of it until you just said it, but that might be part of healing a lot of the or not even healing, but also transforming a lot of the economics and things is connecting with that belonging on that level, then things that different systems would already start to shift a bit.

But I love that story you told about going out with the bucket of nails and the horse and just being with Nate, being out there alone, which. It reminds me of you on your motorcycle because I still have the feeling that you're a bit of a loner in a way, not a loner, I mean you obviously have a lot of friendships and deep stuff, but you know, you're behind the camera or you're on your bike and some would say that's like not a good thing, but in a way it's the most connective, it can be for some of us, maybe I'm speaking again, projecting, but it can be the most, the place you're most connected or the place you're connected to.

Charging, you know, the place you're, I don't know, surrendering into that [01:26:00] belonging. Does that make any sense at all? 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, no you're, I think we share a lot of similar views and thoughts and feelings about it all. No, I am most comfortable when I'm in nature on my own, when I can stop all the noise.

And the thing, and that is on my motorcycle, like I do, I ride a lot by myself and I really like it. And I've been on a lot of long trips by myself. weeks at a time. I definitely dream of doing month long trips. And hopefully I will do that, you know, in the next several years. Yeah, it's solitude works for me.

I really like it, you know, and I love meeting people along the way. I love having conversations with strangers and, you know, I love like, you know, being by myself and all my gear in a restaurant and people, like, it's such an invitation for people to talk to you, which I love. I mean, it doesn't take much for me to talk to anybody anyway, but it's like, I love when people feel compelled to ask me a question about what I'm doing and why I'm doing it and, you know, the odd question, the crazy questions always are like, oh, So brave of you.

 So I'm like, [01:27:00] what's brave, you know, but just to be a woman out on her own like that and like that kind of stuff, like how people seeing me like kind of, I think, hopefully breaks those, you know, ideas about what women can do and what we should be doing. And 

Andrea Hiott: definitely, and I hope people see you, maybe young people and they think, Oh, they could do it too.

You know, it's, it becomes a possibility. 

Lori Lozinski: Exactly. And like, again, I had like another really great memory that I wrote about in my proposals and it was, you know, when I first started riding and because when I was growing up and see motorcycle riders, like I was always like, Oh my God, that looks amazing.

You would see all these tour bikes going around and even like the Harleys and all that stuff. I just, I didn't care. It just looked. I was riding in Vancouver and I pulled up to a light and I looked to the car beside me and there was a little girl in the back seat and I flipped up my visor because I have like a dark visor and she saw that I was a girl and the way her face lit up and then like, you know, I just kind of smiled and I waved and like off I went but I was just like, You know, I wish I would have seen that when I [01:28:00] was young.

You know, I wish I would have seen, because I only saw women on the back of bikes, and I don't like being on the back of a bike, ever. Like, I really, I've been on the back of a bike, like, twice, and I hate it. Yeah, it's, you know, it's scary. Weird. Yeah, it's scary, and it's not trusting, and I like to be in control and all those things.

I mean, I do have other things to work through but just that moment. For that little, for me and that little girl, like I really hope she saw something that day that she didn't know was possible for her. 

Andrea Hiott: It sounds like she did. I remember once I went to a restaurant to eat by myself and, I mean, actually it's happened more than once when I was a young woman because I liked it, not because I couldn't find someone to eat with me.

I just wanted to read my book, you know, and people would come up to me and say, you know, it's amazing that what you're doing. Yeah. Like, I'm eating food and reading a book as a woman alone, but people literally would say that, you know. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. 

Andrea Hiott: And you're like, thank you. I am amazing. But I guess what I'm saying is it opens up possibility.[01:29:00] 

Once people see that it's okay to do and other people are doing it, it changes like all those patterns in a way over time and so on and so forth. For some reason, it makes me wonder when you got your motorcycle, your mom was really happy, right? Why do you think she was so supportive and happy that you got a motorcycle?

Lori Lozinski: Honestly, it's like the, it's it's just those funny contradictions, right? Where my dad was like, no. And then, you know, my mom was just like, cause I think I must have talked about it a lot, and she, and I definitely, when I traveled, I would always be buying, like, my brother in law and my stepdad Harley shirts from, like, all around the world.

Like, I would always go into a Harley. Oh, so that's why she asked if you got a Harley. Yeah. And so it was always, you know, because the family is always kind of like bikes and stuff, but nobody rode, really. But my stepdad's, like, best friend was a biker and stuff like that. So, and I would always be, you know, buying these things all over the world for them.

And so, yeah, and I just, actually, I assumed I would have a Harley, to be honest. I thought that would be my first bike and I did test ride some, but they just, they didn't feel right [01:30:00] when I did it. And so when, yeah, when she was dying, she was, I told her I, you know, I'd taken my lessons and got my learners and stuff like that.

And she was just like, Oh, did you buy a Harley? And I was like, no, I bought a little Honda right now. I don't, yeah, I think. Because in her wanting me to, you know, feel loved and safe and be in a relationship and do those things, she also was really, I think she was really proud that I just, I walked, I wrote my own book, right?

Like, I was my own person, you know? Like, I think she was really proud of that. Again very fortunate. My parents were both very proud of me. I was, you know, so like when they died, I don't have regrets in terms of my relationships with them. I'm sad and I miss them and I wish I could talk to them, but I was loved and they were proud of me and that kind of stuff.

So I think, yeah, for her it would have been, to see me ride, I think she would have been thoroughly, like, scared and [01:31:00] delighted. 

I do every once in a while picture myself pulling up, To her house on my bike and what that moment would have been like, but yeah. 

Andrea Hiott: Can you share it a little bit? 

Lori Lozinski: Oh, I think she would have just, like, howled.

Yeah, she would have howled at a good time, and I would have tried to, like, get her on my bike, and it probably would have been a fight to get her to sit on it, but yeah. I mean, I wouldn't have taken her for a ride or anything like that, but just to, like, get a picture of her, like, her joy and her sitting on my bike, I think would have been really amazing.

Andrea Hiott: Well, I, I asked because, you know, the film, A Motorcycle Saved My Life, we can talk about a little bit here. She, you kind of started out thinking it would be with your dad, right? And you talk, cause you, it seems like, that's why I brought up at the beginning about road trips and stuff, because it seemed like you kind of associated that with your dad.

I think in the movie, you say he was always on the road or he was such a road tripper or something like that. So it seemed like you maybe thought that would be a mostly. Dad oriented or something, [01:32:00] but then it becomes a, in a way, I feel like you're healing. Your relationship with your mom, but not, and I don't mean, almost healing your mom, 

Lori Lozinski: in 

Andrea Hiott: a way.

Well, it's definitely, I've talked to other folks, 

Lori Lozinski: like, 

Andrea Hiott: definitely 

Lori Lozinski: healing the mother wound, 

Andrea Hiott: you know? Yeah, and that's with the land too, and this, when you said you're still trying to figure out how to be in nature, that feels connected to me, all that. 

Lori Lozinski: That's mother wound as well, all of that. You know, that's the patriarchal system that we're in that tries to sever our connections, right?

So it's yeah, like that film really came about healing that mother wound for sure. And I wouldn't have even been able to express that when I was making it, to be honest, it's just like in reflection years down the road. But I know when I was developing it. And just with the National Film Board, and I was working with Terry Snellgrove, who was my producer and Shirley Veracruz both producers at the National Film Board in Vancouver you know, I think just because I went through a phase, what they call an investigate, which is just like looking at, you know, yourself and who you are and why you want to [01:33:00] tell this story and stuff.

And then, you know, you know, further going into another phase of development. But after that investigate, I was like, Terry just said, we were sitting down at her office and she was just like, I think this film's about your mother. And I was like, Oh, and so that it was really just that moment. I was just like, Oh, you're right.

It is. And then that's where the development really shifted. Like we went into another phase of development and that was when I decided to Actually go and interview all of my relatives, all my female relatives. So all those voices that you hear in the film were actually recorded two years before I filmed it.

Andrea Hiott: So you just went and talked to them. What about the campfire thing and all that? That was later, I guess. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, that was during the filming. But like, I went, you know, we went to northern Alberta. We went on a trip hilariously. You know, we flew back on March 13th, 2020, which was the last day of flying 

Andrea Hiott: for 

Lori Lozinski: Coke.

Yeah, it was like right at that time. [01:34:00] You just barely got in. Just barely got in, but we went and recorded the 

Andrea Hiott: change. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, we recorded my sister and two of my aunts and a cousin. And it is those women around the fire that I've talked to. Those are all there. 

Andrea Hiott: That is their voices. That is their voices.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, so I did that and then came back and then basically wrote a script. I went through all the transcripts and I wrote a script. So it's very hybrid that way and so I wrote a script so I knew exactly what I wanted to film. So it's not like a verite documentary. It's very planned and intentional and hybrid y that way.

But the, 

Andrea Hiott: what you're saying is real because like at the beginning your voice is kind of, you know, you're almost like sort of crying or something. It feels like you're, that was. That was just when you were talking in the two years before? 

Lori Lozinski: That was me and my sister talking.

Yeah, like there's a couple, there's a couple moments in the narration or the voiceover where I supplemented some things. It's normally just my voice. I, you know, I've clarified something or it didn't record or we needed just something, another sentence [01:35:00] to set it up correctly or whatever.

But for like 95 percent of that or probably 98 percent of it was all pre recorded. Like two years before I filmed it, or a year and a half. That's 

Andrea Hiott: even more powerful then, because it was just, you were just recording these conversations and then I don't know. I have to just tell you, I mean, a lot of this is, feels like it's still, I don't know about for you, but still being processed, right?

There's these nested things that I feel like are, the motorcycle for me feels almost like the vehicle that helps it stay together. But there's a lot of nested stuff going on with all these themes and even with your other films. I mean, there's even a road trip film in there, I think. Shelter or something.

I don't know. There's this movement and for me when I was watching it still it's still I'm still Not sure how it had such a strong effect on me. I have to tell you I'll just be very honest with you because I was when I when it first starts and you're kind of your voice is like that It's almost too much it for me because I'm like, oh it's already emotional from the first word, you know But it feels [01:36:00] real, because it is.

Now I know it was just you having a conversation. And then, of course, it's beautifully filmed and all of this, and then by the end, I was feeling very emotional, you know? And I still don't exactly know why, but I'm absolutely sure it's connected to just feeling love for my mom and my bigger family. Mom all you know that are in these ways that we can't really articulate or something So it sounds like that was how you made the film too is almost like I'm surprised to you in a way almost like the way You're describing the pilgrimage where you didn't know you knew you were gonna go on a journey But you didn't know where you're gonna stop or something.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, the pilgrimage was very like that and like And I tried to have a little bit more control over a motorcycle, saved my life. You know, like I did when I interviewed my family. I had specific questions, but of course you go on tangents with family. And then I wrote a script, and I had, and I thought I knew exactly what I wanted to get.

And I did for the most part, but the ending is what [01:37:00] changed from my script. And because when I go for, you know, a ride with my mother at the end, like that was never supposed to be. We were never supposed to be in the frame together. It was always supposed to be the horse riding, and then me, and then me riding, and then we meld, and then I just leave.

Like, she fades away, and then I leave. But we for, you know, a variety of filming reasons, and you're working with live animals you know, the horse was getting scared running through the field with the drone, because we had a drone. 

Andrea Hiott: And you were on a motorcycle. I was on my motorcycle 

Lori Lozinski: and all that kind of 

Andrea Hiott: horse beside you, for those who haven't seen it.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, but we were never supposed to ride together. I was really, like, we did multiple passes of the horse just running and just trying to get the drone. But the horse would always, like, kind of scare at it. So I was like, you know what, why don't I just go? come up beside and let's try this. And so, you know, we came and then the horse was totally fine with me on its side because I was on the side that [01:38:00] something was like on the other side of the drone.

So the drone was on the other side of me. And then it turned into this like field of dreams moment, which is one of my favorite movies that I'm going for a final ride with my mother. Like, and like, I was in my helmet and I have Bluetooth in my helmet. And my friend Chris was also there. My friend Chris was like on.

She was, she had to be with me during the filming, so she was also part of that film. She was on, like, on her phone talking to me, and she was bawling, and I was bawling in my helmet, and, like, it was so, like, that kind of moment wasn't planned. 

Andrea Hiott: Okay, well, maybe that's what comes through, because that's the moment I teared up, and it was before I listened to Motorcycle Life.

Ah, yeah. Too, because then I was like, oh, so she also feels emotional there, because 

Lori Lozinski: I'm a mess in my helmet in that shot. 

Andrea Hiott: Are you? Total mess. I mean, yeah, even when I'm very, it's very, I don't know why it's, there's, I think it's all the combinations too. Like with masculine and feminine, you have the horse, you have [01:39:00] this creature that's really the beginning of all motoring, you know?

I mean, we talk horsepower and all this, it comes, there's this mobility. And so you're, there's this reaching into the past already with Horse and then the machine and then they're together and there's something so graceful and I'm, I was kind of thinking, wow, the horse is so calm. It almost feels like your mom would like, weirdly the horse and your mom feel like the leader, not the machine, you know?

Lori Lozinski: Oh, absolutely. And the thing is, the horse's name was Glory, and she is like a senior mare, she's in her 20s, and that's like, you know, the woman that played my mother Brandy, that is like, you know, that's her, and like, but still a lot of zip and fire, like, tossed her off the day before. Oh, wow. Okay, that was your mom 

Andrea Hiott: then.

Going 

Lori Lozinski: for a test ride, because Brandy generally rides Western, and I had asked if she could ride English, like, because my mother rode English saddle. And, yeah, she went [01:40:00] for a ride the day before, and like, yeah, she got tossed off. She was all bruised up. Oh, 

Andrea Hiott: gosh, wow. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, so Glory had a lot of fire in her still.

And so, and like, yeah, just, and the thing is too, is just like, senior mayors lead herds, and they lead from behind. And just, like, there's, so there's, I mean, there's just so many things at play in those kind of shots. Like, there's land, there's emotion, there's mother wound, there's like, horse and machine and then, like, just, yeah, you know, the leadership of it all.

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. And that it just kind of happened makes it somehow 

Lori Lozinski: crazy. I know. And they were like, did it just happen or was it meant to be exactly the same? Well, nothing just 

Andrea Hiott: happens in, but at the same time there's a kind of, there, you know, there are things that are more likely and less likely and yeah. But it's beautiful.

It like, it starts with the horse and then it's both and then it's. It's you right? Yeah, 

Lori Lozinski: it's just yeah, we go for a ride together and then I'm back on my own 

Andrea Hiott: here [01:41:00] and Do you feel like your relationship with your mom changed after making this because I feel like we're all still in relationship with the people That are gone that aren't we it's harder because we can't physically Speak to them anymore But I feel like we're still having a conversation at least Like with my grandmother or someone, I still feel this conversation.

I don't know if you do. Maybe that's part of that visualizing of going to her house and stuff, too, but 

Lori Lozinski: did it change your 

Andrea Hiott: relationship with her? 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, absolutely. It just, it made me realize how close we were, even though I didn't recognize it, you know? And even like at the times I tried to push her away, and I tried a lot.

And, you know, and that kind of stuff. And also, like, not only with my mother, but it really healed a lot of pain with me and my family, with my sister and my aunts and my cousin. Like, I'm so much closer to them now because of that experience. And, like, and I know you, like, we're having conversations around that fire.

We filmed that fire for, you know, like an hour and a half. [01:42:00] And we had a lot of conversations. And obviously, they did not know I was going to pull out my mother's ashes. 

Andrea Hiott: Oh, they didn't? Because you sort of put them in the fire. Oh my gosh. 

Lori Lozinski: I didn't tell them anything that was going to happen. They all knew that they had to show up wearing something appropriate for to film in, like no patterns, no, none of this.

And I was like, and then we're going to have a conversation in front of the fire and there's going to be a camera there. And they're all like, okay. And all of their partners and boyfriends and husbands were like behind us. Oh my God. I love the thumbs up. We're behind us. Like with coolers, drinking beer and just hanging out.

And what? Yeah. Yeah. Because after we finished filming and then we all just hung out, right. Yeah. That's 

Andrea Hiott: wonderful. 

Lori Lozinski: We had some hot dogs and marshmallows and drank some drinks and like, you know, just went into the evening together. But yeah, but that time with all of us together around the fire and the conversations we had and the spreading of the You know, the ashes and stuff really bonded us all in a way that I don't think I'd ever allowed before in my life.[01:43:00] 

So I'm a lot 

Andrea Hiott: closer to all of them now. That's beautiful. Your mom gave you something. I mean, I don't have any right to say this, but it has come into my head a few times that You were very close to your mom or your mom was even very close to you. Maybe too close in a way, you know, like in the sense, and it feels like that something expressed through you, through her, through you, through all of this, right.

And I don't know what all that is, but when it comes to belonging, when it comes to the things you're working on now, like, I guess more, I think you use the word reconciliation maybe when I asked you in the email, what you were working on. It feels it opened reconciliation and it's, that feels like it's furthering your work maybe too.

Maybe we can even use that to go into what you're doing now. But does that make sense? Cause. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, I did. She did feel too close to me. Yeah. Do you, like, I look at it so differently now, right. And sometimes we can only experience that in death. So I don't wish for a time, I don't wish for [01:44:00] her still to be alive that so, because it We would still be the same.

It's like something, you know, something had to die for us to have this relationship now. And yeah, I belong to her and she belongs to me. Yeah. And you're

Andrea Hiott: furthering the best of her she's helping you be you, helping you be a better, come to terms with yourself in that way that we were talking about, be, sit with yourself accept and love yourself as they say in the pilgrimage.

Lori Lozinski: Well, and to accept and love yourself the way that my parents loved me. You know, because that was pretty great. But yeah, in terms of, yeah, it does feel, it is reconciliation for sure. And I do think like having these experiences, it is, that is permeating, like my I, Work going forward.

It's like more about belonging, but also reconciling things of like humans and land. You know, through the death of my dad, I inherited some of that land that is in the motorcycle saved my life. Beautiful. [01:45:00] Yeah, where we filmed is actually my aunt's property, but that's where I grew up a lot of mine.

I'm just like around the corner from her me and my sister. Me and my sister share 80 acres of land. Due to the passing of my father. And my next project, which is a feature length documentary, well I'm hoping it'll be, I'm developing it, is called Ten Steps to Land Back for White People. And it's about the possibility of looking at what it would what's the process of ceding ownership of that land and back to the Indigenous nations.

Andrea Hiott: Which is part of a very powerful theme. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, which is part of reconciliation of this territory that I'm on called Canada and Turtle Island in general, like, you know, stolen lands and also, of me of European descent, like there's a reason why my ancestors came to these lands. It's because their lands were stolen from them, , so this, you know, colonization didn't just start.

Like, in the last couple hundred years, it's been going on for thousands of years. And [01:46:00] so, like, my documentary is really looking at, like, my reconciling the land that I own now, and not really believing that humans can own land and what that could potentially, what kind of relationship could I have with community and with land if I no longer own something.

Andrea Hiott: And just thinking about ownership in a different way and belonging and so you're looking back into your ancestral, I don't, I just like, what do you mean your, so your family moved to Canada because they were persecuted or something or what? What do you mean? Or what? I don't know. Exactly. Okay. So you're looking at all that.

Lori Lozinski: Yeah. So I think that's part of the film was, we'll be looking at my own ancestry as to like, why my ancestors came here in the first place. And like, my mother was Scottish. So, and then my father was a little bit of a mix of Ukrainian, Austrian, German, Prussian, and all that kind of stuff. So Eastern Europe.

And I will be, yeah, I don't think they left where they were because they were having a good time. I just don't, I just don't think that really, you know, I don't think people leave places that [01:47:00] they love. And, You know, are safe there. So yeah, we'll look into that. And and people bring that trauma with them, right?

Andrea Hiott: Yeah. It's almost like you've gone a step back from it and being able to heal your relationship with yourself, which meant healing your relationship, even if it was just the way you thought of your mom and your dad and their loss. And your place when they're not there and all, like all of that reconciliation and healing kind of opens you up to now look at it.

Like you can almost look at maybe where they were and what they were trying to heal before you even came and generations back. And then that's also kind of nested within. the First Nations and all the Native issues, which we didn't get into, but a lot of the movies you've done or worked on deal with a lot of those issues too.

So it's very interesting now that the space, the landscape, so to speak, has kind of deepened [01:48:00] and gotten multi dimensional around these themes. 

Lori Lozinski: Yeah, because even I have a couple feature films that I'm writing in Plantage Direct too, and one is like, About reconciling a past romantic relationship, like seven years after it's over, supposedly, right.

And then, you know, another film I'm doing is like kind of more of the female easy rider where it's two women on the road and that it is about reconciling their lives and finding their belonging and finding a new community and like, again, realizing that they're safer in nature, and that kind of stuff.

So I am kind of like it is, it's kind of in everything I'm doing right now. Yeah. 

Andrea Hiott: That's powerful. And did the notion of the pilgrimage and a motorcycle saved my life, even those very words, right? Take on new resonances with these new kinds of reconciliation. Yeah. So it's powerful. That's cool. That's powerful.

And I just, we've been talking a couple hours, so let's go. But my dog's gotta go out, but I love talking to you and I love your films and I'm really [01:49:00] very honestly that's why I found you on the Purple Motorcycle, The Motorcycle Life, because somehow I came across that and it moved me and I wasn't sure why, how.

So yeah, I just want to say thanks for the work you're doing and I look forward to what's to come. 

Lori Lozinski: Oh my god, thank you so much. I was like so thrilled when you reached out and and I do think we have so much in common and I've really loved our talk and I so appreciate it.

Thank you so much. 

Andrea Hiott: Thank you, Lori. Awesome. Alright, have a great day there. Thank you. It's just beginning. 

Lori Lozinski: I know, you're just going into your night owl. The sun is 

Andrea Hiott: setting here and the sun is rising there, or it's already risen, but. Awesome. Okay. Bye.