a memo to a higher office

Lacuna Coil

2009-11-11T15:42:00.005-07:00

I was able to photograph and meet Lacuna Coil - what a great experience. Check out someof their best songs here:
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewIMix?id=340050636

You can see the complete set of photos here:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=4045686&l=5445223eb2&id=685934809

In the business of killing

2009-10-24T10:15:00.001-07:00

10 years ago, this would have been science fiction. As if tax payer funded murdering was not perverse enough...
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Elusive love for those who have wandered

2009-10-04T11:08:00.002-07:00

It is general conference weekend; I'm in logan visiting my daughters. We are staying at my parent's house. My mother is watching conference in an adjacent room. I hear an apostle admonishing his sheep to pray for love for those who "have wandered". Condescension lies in the shadow of this pseudo spirituality. The irony is so bitter- a message that claims to be about uniting people has the unintended effect of creating the wedge.

"They shout about love but when push comes to shove- they live for things they're afraid of" - Neil Peart, "The Weapon"

I believe we all have love in us innately. Our primal source is love, we emanated from it. We ARE it.

Let go.

Let go of your illusions that others are different from you. Let go of your need to fix them. Let go of your need to be right. Let go of the notion that your path is better than theirs. Let go of any thought that causes you to see yourself as separate from others.

Be open to the idea that love is your core energy, love is your greatest natural trait. Consider that it is your upbringing and messages of separateness that have covered up your natural tendency to love, like many layers of poorly applied paint.

When you have stopped clinging to ego driven ideas.... When you have let go, you will find that your arms are open, and you will have returned to that natural state of love that has no conditions.

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IMG00007-20090923-1627.jpg

2009-09-25T07:53:00.000-07:00

Hmmm....
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33

2009-08-30T10:11:00.004-07:00

I'm now 33.
Below are two self portraits, taken 33 months apart.

August 2009

December 2006

My mind races to anticipate what the next 33 months will bring... it is hard to imagine; and yet - I know that imagining it is precisely the first step in creating it. Here's to an exceptional 33!

Life in two dimensions is a mass production scheme

2009-08-04T22:19:00.003-07:00

I had a small serendipitous moment today, which I shall share.
My iPod was shuffling various things, and seems to have a preference for the Gym Class Heroes lately. As "papercuts" was fading out, I approached a house on 10th east. A man emerged to get his mail from me, I noticed he was wearing

As I approached the house on 10th east, a man emerged to come get his mail from me. He had on a T shirt from the RUSH Counterparts tour. As I complimented him on his choice of shirts, my iPod shuffled to the following RUSH song... I've heard this song a million times, but for some reason, today, the lyrics sunk deeply into my mind and heart:

GRAND DESIGNS

So much style without substance
So much stuff without style
It's hard to recognize the real thing
It comes along once in a while
Like a rare and precious metal beneath a ton of rock
It takes some time and trouble to separate from the stock
You sometimes have to listen to a lot of useless talk

Shapes and forms against the norm
Against the run of the mill
Swimming against the stream
Life in two dimensions is a mass production scheme

So much poison in power, the principles get left out
So much mind on the matter, the spirit gets forgotten about
Like a righteous inspiration overlooked in haste
Like a teardrop in the ocean, a diamond in the waste
Some world-views are spacious
And some are merely spaced

Against the run of the mill
Static as it seems
We break the surface tension with our wild kinetic dreams
Curves and lines
Of grand designs...

- from the album "Power Windows"

Reality is not much stranger than fiction... but at least the fiction has a kick ass sound track

2009-07-26T09:24:00.004-07:00

Last winter, I saw this really crazy film:

...and then this morning, I read this story in the newspaper:

Jul 25, 4:32 AM EDT

Brooklyn man accused of buying, selling kidneys

By DAVID PORTER and CARLA K. JOHNSON
Associated Press Writers

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) -- Levy Izhak Rosenbaum of Brooklyn called himself a "matchmaker," but his business wasn't romance. Instead, authorities say,
he brokered the sale of black-market kidneys, buying organs from vulnerable people from Israel for $10,000 and selling them to desperate patients in the U.S. for as much as $160,000.
(read the rest of the story by clicking this link)
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BLACK_MARKET_KIDNEYS?SITE=VASTR&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Somalis in SLC

2009-07-19T10:27:00.003-07:00

I met a group of Somali refugee families while delivering on an obscure backstreet in downtown SLC. The families fled from Somalia to escape the war.

I'm always curious about how foreigners experience my home country, my home town. I'm curious how my neighbors treat them. Out of the large multi-family group. only a few of them spoke english - albeit broken. I asked about their experience here.. they remarked that Utah is much more hot than Somalia (and colder), but that they really like SLC.

"America good!
Americans good!
Thank you!!"

I'm not one for nationalism. I eschew identifying too strongly with anything larger than myself. And yet, for that moment, I felt proud to be an American.

Click on the image to see more from this series

hhmm.... this was fun

2009-07-18T17:37:00.002-07:00

Random snippet of dialogue from my past #47

2009-06-25T20:41:00.003-07:00

Bishop: "Have you ever wondered if you are bi-polar?"

Paul: "Well, yes... in fact..."

Bishop: "My son is an artistic type - he paints. His doctor diagnosed him as bipolar, and he went on medication for a while. He didn't like it..."

I went to a movie

2009-06-21T21:50:00.004-07:00

I took my little girls out to a movie tonight. The storyline was familiar:

Boy meets girl
Boy grows up with girl
Boy daydreams with girl
Boy and girl daydream of a life of adventure
Boy marries girl
Boy grows old with girl
Boy loses girl to old age...
...boy continues on alone.

I cried.

Those damn tears, in needing to be wiped away, brought my physical self and my inner self's attention to a focused point - made me consider my losses. I've been that boy in a wide eyed state of wonderment... meeting a girl whose sense of adventure, whose life and love, seem perfectly tailored to my own. I know the ecstasy of letting my guard down completely, and finding that step into the unknown rewarded with the awe and wonderment of discovering a soul mate. The word 'home' took on new meaning, and new place - at her side.

Boy lost girl.

Boy is pretty philosophical about it now-a-days.

Boy wonders if he'll ever be able to trust enough to just free fall into love again.

Boy hopes so.

Though I don't pine away for her to return, my tears revealed a still open wound. We are all different now.

Boy wonders if being philosophical about it is just a bunch of bullshit.

sidewalk scripture

2009-06-01T20:21:00.003-07:00

Jesus is easy to trust. It's his followers that you must be wary of.

grandeur of the sky

2009-05-31T09:49:00.013-07:00

The grandeur of the sky demands nothing in return.

ghosts at home

2009-05-31T09:49:00.012-07:00

This is the place:
My home town is a peculiar place. Mount Logan to the east, the Wellsvilles to the west... you always know where you are. Winston Churchill once said, "We shape our buildings; thereafter, our buildings shape us". Though our forbearers hardly shaped these majestic peaks, they did choose to become boxed in by them. One has to wonder how the mountains mold the malleable minds of men who live here. The businesses here are Run by people who grew up here, whose parents grew up here whose parents grew up here whose parents grew up here whose parents grew up here whose parents grew up here whose parents...

Heathens, visitors, and boxes:

On a sunday morning, only 2 cafes will serve me breakfast. One is full of lapsed mormons who seem to revel in the fact that they are not at church. This group is so concerned with "the box"... that one with the steeple that they are absent from... they seem to go to a certain effort to make sure people know that they are outside of "the box". The cafe is frequented by another class of non-believers: university professors. They have been imported, and sometimes seem befuddled at the presence of this box and all the fuss it receives.

Gravity of memory:
This town is full of ghosts. As I write this, I remember something about the table I'm sitting at. I once sat in this very space, and sipped iced tea with the love of my life - the girl I gave my whole heart to, only to have it broken. In this same spot, on several occasions, I sat with my laptop working on college papers - at times, painfully unaware of the futility of that pursuit.

Roads of ruin:
There are only so many roads in this town, and they are all veneered with memories. I can't go anywhere without traveling the path I took on my way to propose to my future ex wife. I remember driving to the drive-through with my mom, dad, brother and sister... the unique excitement of a hamburger, french fries, orange soda and a toy, all housed in a cardboard box of joy. I drive on the street I worked on when my grandmother died. I traverse the road I took home the night I lost my job. I drive past the office I entered to have my have our divorce papers notarized.

100 south... I could write volumes about this simple street. This is the street I grew up on. The church of my upbringing is on this street. My highschool is on this street. The studio I was photographically born in - is on this street. The highschool auditorium that hosted so many of my performances, is on this street. I walked this street hand in hand with love... and spent many nights running it when love had left me. This is where I came when my family was torn from me. This street houses the altar at which I sacrificed all I had in the name of God... and here, my cross was crudely constructed...even after paying "the uttermost farthing", I was beaten, broken, and left bleeding my most humble state of desperation. This street also is the place where the stone was put in place - the stone that would one day be moved from the cavernous tomb of my consciousness, letting the light of day in, and my consciousness, out, to live again... I wonder if, IF die... I will haunt this street as a forlorn ghost.

It's no wonder that people die. This tiny town is compacted with memories... which become tales, sad stories of what might have been. It's hard to not feel my age when I'm here. In a place that constantly reminds you of how old you are, it's no surprise that one grows old.

My new home is far from my family. It is also far from the sedimentary layers of sadness that are my home town. It is a place of change, a million people and a million-and-one opportunities. A longing heart, I suppose, is the price I pay to walk streets that are paved with possibility.

grave yard of dreams

2009-05-31T09:33:00.007-07:00

Some office buildings are filled with ghosts.
3/4 empty, with tenents who seem to have all but given up on coming to work.
The forest green carpet once was so stately.
You can still feel reverberations of pride that once radiated from the brilliant new start up in suite #311. Echoes of ambition still haunt this space.
The once crystalline light fixtures have developed coffee stains too- the flickering fluorescent tube can barely stay awake.
These empty pastel plaid halls are the grave yards of dreams.

congregations of the wicked

2009-05-17T07:37:00.002-07:00

Good morning! This morning at my parent's home, they are, as ususal, playing BYU TV. A program is on, featuring a couple of "professors of church history and doctrine". (I'm certain that these obviously bright people eat prozac like candy just to keep the depression / cognitive dissonance at bay).

They are discussing a passage where the missionaries are told to 'cast the dust from their feet' as a testimony against those who they have taught.

For the uninitiated, this gesture is an outward sign that the missionaries are no longer accountable for the sins of the people they have taught. Apparently the Lord told them that they didn't need to do it RIGHT IN FRONT of the people (turns out, it was highly offensive, and they were getting beat up a lot). God told them they could do it in a more private setting... because omnipotent God, Alpha and Omega, needs them to brush their shoes off, to help him remember that these folks are now on the eternal naughty list...

I digress. let us revisit the 2nd Article of Faith:

2. We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam's transgression.

Right.

Jesus just loves hyperbole.

filling your body with light

2009-05-14T23:30:00.005-07:00

Is it any wonder that our bodies are thrive when we feed them robust proportions of fruits and vegetables?

During my monthly scramble to get ready for gallery stroll, I searched my kitchen for a midnight snack. I stumbled upon a few opportune oranges. As I started peeling the orange, I thought about where it came from. This fruit is the sum of 3 things: Sunlight, water, and soil. Have you ever really thought about how amazing fruits and vegetables are? In a few short months, a plant is able to convert minerals from the soil, water, and energy from the sun, into huge quantities of food. Have you ever thought about how amazing it is that something like an orange tree, produces something from, seemingly, nothing? A tree may have hundreds of pounds of fruit hanging from it at the end of the growing season, and yet- there are not hundreds of pounds worth of soil missing from underneath it. It's really quite astounding. Magical, it seems.

Physicists argue a lot about whether light is a wave or a particle.

Perhaps the orange is proof of the particle.

the drive to create is divine

2009-05-01T16:28:00.004-07:00

A friend of mine shared this with me the other day. I love it. Acts of creation, whether they be in an accounting office, a painter's studio, or a 3rd grade art class, are the seeds of godhood.

what of the muse?

2009-03-08T21:04:00.001-07:00

What of love
and what of the muse?
Might the muse be a woman
demure
and dangerous
whose soul is the uncharted depths
and heights
of sea and sky - beckoning
with the siren song - irresistible to the adventurer of life and love?
Might the sage
love the Ten Thousand Things
and speak the Language Of The World
communing with The Way
and need
no one?
Might the sun and stars and soil and strangers
be the seduction...
the stuff
of a poet's dreams?

we were once salesmen

2009-02-16T10:49:00.002-07:00

I know the things we used to say
about people "like that"
deceived!
proud!
awash in sin
self loathing
unto damnation
And now I am he of who we would speak.
Tell me we are still brothers
I need to know you've changed too.
I cannot bear your pity
of 13 years prior
We used to speak of love
and sing of the cross
the man made famous.
We were once salesmen
of a shrink-wrapped eternity
Bound by the saving of souls
our two year labor of love.
May we now be bound by a truth
even higher?
I'll take no righteous pity
for love IS god.

racial profiling - Jesus style

2009-02-08T09:31:00.003-07:00

It's sunday morning, 9:32am. I've dropped the girls off to Mireesa so she can take them to church. My dad turns on the TV to watch "Music and the Spoken Word", the weekly broadcast of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. A TV spot for the church comes on... (they like to do these quick little tv spots promoting different wholesome values...)

The narrator is speaking with a distinct mexican accent:
"when I was young, I once stole something from a store..."

Just curious why the narrator didn't have a thick... oh, dutch accent, perhaps?

This message about racial profiling brought to you by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

:-P

Godspeed, Elder Webb

2009-02-05T01:11:00.003-07:00

As I approached 1296 Magnolia St, I assembled the letters and larger envelopes to go into thier mail box. They only had one large envelope... from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Missionary Department. It was addressed to an Elder James Webb. I felt the small spiral bound booklet inside, containing such instructions as what suits to buy, what kind of haircut to get... this envelope is unmistakable.

I was instantly taken back to that June morning in 2005 when I found a similar large white envelope in my mail box. I was called to serve in the Philadelphia Pennsylvania Mission.

Much has transpired in my life since I opened that fateful envelope... things I would never have dared to imagine...

...and even now, at this moment, I am instant messaging with a missionary I served around during my mission.

There is something incredible about dedicating your life to a cause that is bigger than you. I was so happy when I recieved my mission call. I was SO happy when I landed in Philadelphia and met President Wagstaff... it was a wonderful time of my life.

If you've read much of my blog, you probably understand the complicated subtext in which I say this... I loved my mission. I am glad I went. I only have a few regrets about my missionary service. Elder Webb, if you are reading this... (and I'm sure you aren't, but maybe some other preparing missionary will read it some day)...

1. I spent WAY too much time obsessing over my 'worthiness', and thus left little room in my heart to let the love of God in.

2. I spent WAY too much time trying to convince everyone that our church was 'the true church'.

3. If I could re-write one aspect of my mission... I would have relaxed about 1 & 2 and just LOVED the people more. That's what the people in the world need - they need to feel love. They need to believe that they are lovable. And when they feel lovable, ONLY THEN will they be able to love thier own neighbor.

I just wish I would have loved people more.

Elder Webb, I want you to know, even this AP-gone-agnostic, could not stop smiling for the rest of the afternoon, as your mission call sat in your mailbox.

Godspeed, Elder.

hope

2009-01-29T19:09:00.003-07:00

Inauguration Day

George Clooney wishes Israel would cut it out with the rocket attacks, allready

2009-01-27T08:17:00.005-07:00

Wow, who knew that Khaled Meshall, militant Hamas leader, is actually George Clooney?

the alchemy of light

2009-01-25T10:10:00.003-07:00

a tiny silver halide crystal
shown the light of day
for 1/100th of a second
was forever changed
and I was made immortal