Stumbling Toward God?

But Wait, There's More!

2009-12-31T10:31:00.000-08:00

I also get to pick my selection for the best song of the decade:

"Mr. Brightside" by the Killers. With no runners-up, it was a crap decade for music.

Wait, was 2001 in this decade? Let me rethink this.
"Kite" - U2
"Cut Here" - The Cure
"Idioteque" - Radiohead
"Lost Cause" - Beck
"Hurt" - Johnny Cash
"My December" - Linkin Park
"No One Knows" - Queens of the Stone Age
And what the heck, let's throw in:
"Fresh Feeling" - Eels
"Such Great Heights" - The Postal Service
"How Far We've Come" - Matchbox 20
"Vindicated" - Dashboard Confessional
"Something Beautiful" - The Newsboys
"Pork and Beans" - Weezer
"The Wrong Side" - Abney Park
"Viva la Vida" - Coldplay*
"Crazy" - Gnarls Barkley
"Apartment Story" - The National
"Feel Good Inc." - Gorillaz
"Hoppípolla" - Sigur Rós

So that's a list. I probably forgot some. Is it shallow of me to only mention songs that were massive hits? Seems shallow of me. Although, since I have repeatedly mentioned that I do not listen to music much anymore, a song would have to be awfully popular to come to my attention. Oh, and we still need a winner? Let's see... Hey, what was that song with the "Ode to Joy" guitar solo again? It kind of went: Jealousy, turning saints into the sea/turning through sick lullabies/choking on your alibis/but it's just the price I pay/destiny is calling me; open up my eager eyes...
Cause I'm Mr.
Bright
Side.

Ah, yes. First instinct is usually best.

*A couple of years ago I wanted to add this song to my regular year end list, except that I thought it was called, "Speed of Sound." I then discovered that that is a different song by Coldplay. It suddenly dawned on me that Coldplay songs are all slightly different shades of the same color. It is, however, a pleasant color. I guess you can stay.

Not Even Trying

2009-12-30T11:08:00.000-08:00

It's music time again. Back in July I heard a song that made me think I should call the winner early, because I was not likely to hear a better song this year. I should have done it, because now I do not remember anything about that song. Anyway, lately I have been listening to KBIG 104.3 a lot, which is now calling itself "My FM", but do not worry, it is still a total "chick" station.

I was thinking awhile ago that The Killers are definitely in the running for the best band of their generation... and if only there was another band that was any good at all we could actually have a competition. The Killers did not have a new album this year. (They did have a live album, but I'm not going to count that.)

You know who did have a new album this year? U2. And it might just be the greatest collection of notes and words that they or anyone else have ever put together. I mean, it might... I would not know, I have not heard it. Though what I have heard from it does not particularly support that hypothesis.

I heard a song this summer that featured the nastiest, dirtiest, fuzz pedal guitar tone that I have heard in a great long while. And it was a welcome breath of fresh air to the bland, over-produced drivel of recent years. It took me awhile to track down the song: "E-Pro" by Beck. From 2005. Oh well.

Another song I ran across is "Fresh Feeling" by Eels. I honestly can not explain what I like about it... it is so... peppy. That ain't like me. It also happens to be from 2000, although it was also on the soundtrack to the movie "Love Happens", which I did not see, and I doubt that you did either, but I imagine that that gave it the slight boost in popularity which brought it to my attention.

Didn't anyone write a good song this year? I heard a ditty on the radio: "Put me in a special school/Cause I am such a fool/And I don't need a single book to teach me how to read/Who needs stupid books?/They are for petty crooks/And I will learn by studying the lessons in my dreams." Normally I despise commercials, but this one had me thinking, "Interesting... where are you going with this?" Only it was not a commercial, it was "Troublemaker" by Weezer. A radio commercial that makes you stop and pay attention: triumphant success. A song that you mistake for an advertisement: total failure.

I saw Reba McEntire on Conan performing what was actually quite a good song. But no, I am not going to go that route. Can't do it. Although it is nice to know that she's still got it*.

So you know what? Screw it. If the music industry is not even going to try anymore, why should I? My pick for song of the year is "Livin' on a Prayer" by Bon Jovi. Which I have been hearing quite a lot recently for some reason.

*I actually could not name a single Reba McEntire song, including that one. Though I might take a stab with "Consider Me Gone."

Forgiveness/Apologies

2009-12-17T23:23:00.000-08:00

[I originally intended this as a loosely-related intro to this post, but sensing that it might take... oh... three months to get to the point, I chose to post it separately.]

I have gone back part time to a job that I used to have, and semi-coincidentally worked along side someone with whom I have some history. To call a spade a spade, we were friends in high school until he basically stole my girlfriend. So, back in April of this year, on one of my first days back with this company and things had been cordial thus far between this individual and myself, and we were working together in a scissor lift 20 feet in the air when it suddenly occurred to me, "Wait a minute, don't you hate this guy?"

I did of course, for many years. But that was all such a very long time ago... what does it matter now? So I began to wonder, is that all that forgiveness really is, when the consequences no longer matter? I have heard a few sermons on forgiveness and I feel like there is supposed to be more to it than that.

A few years ago there was some tension with another person, who would regularly cause a scene when I was around. Then I would get emails, so many emails, apologies, then perfectly innocent ones, and often ones that really did not make any sense to me. I felt at the time that the best policy was not to respond to these emails. I could forgive each incident; I certainly found it annoying, but also somewhat comical, and in some respects, I think it was more uncomfortable for others to witness than it really was for me. My concern was that in spite of the apologies, I had no expectation that things would be any different in the future, and I did not want to give this person a "pass" as it were to continue acting in the same manner. [I in no way claim that I handled that situation correctly, but do ask you to take my word for it that this person was not rational enough for us to work out our problem in private, like adults.]

In any event, I am pretty sure that "conditional forgiveness" is not Biblical either. In fact, I recall from at least one sermon, the speaker claimed that forgiveness is not dependent on apologies, moreover, forgiveness benefits YOU, not the person who wronged you.

There is someone else who has been on my mind a lot lately. I keep thinking back to the last time we did anything. It was not technically the last interaction that I had with this person, but it was the last time we had a meaningful one-on-one conversation. I regret that day. Not so much because I did anything wrong (although I did), but more because it was the last chance that I had to set things right. And I did not. It is perhaps the converse to the situation above. How do you apologize, not for a single act, but for a complete pattern of behavior? "I'm sorry. I have been selfish. I have been inconsiderate. I took our friendship for granted. I have been less than honest about my motivations and an overall bad friend, but if you give me another chance, I promise to do better?"

I do not even find that convincing myself.

At the Heart of it All

2009-11-28T23:34:00.000-08:00

I do not know if I have explicitly mentioned it here before, but I suffer from an internet addiction. I really do not like to mention this to people, because to me it merely sounds like a euphemism for "pornography addiction." Which is a serious problem of which it is not my intention to make light, it just so happens that I have a different serious problem.

I have talked for years about canceling my internet service, but still have not followed through. I have in the past taken the smaller steps of blocking particularly time-consuming sites such as youtube and hulu from my computer, and also had a come of periods where I disconnected my modem and forced myself to go to a local wifi hotspot in order to check email and so forth, but something always comes up that reinforces the necessity of a home internet connection. I rather feel that in this day and age, internet access has become more important than the telephone. (Oh, and also because I have no self-discipline. Let's not forget that.)

That was all a setup to mention that I recently went on a four week internet fast in an effort to force productivity in other areas. For full disclosure, it was not a 100% abstention, as I did log on occasionally for "business", i.e. to pay a bill, online banking, I checked my email exactly one time because of a work-related matter, and so forth. Also, I confess that I did have a couple of lapses where I spent a day (or two) researching everything there is to know about whatever random and ultimately pointless topic that happened to be on my mind at the time. I did however manage to avoid facebook, rss reader, webcomics, blogs, online flash games, TV shows, videos, comedy websites, and listening to music.

The first day was quite difficult. I literally went through withdrawals, wondering "What the !@#$ am I supposed to do now?" I think I spent a great deal of that first day literally staring at a wall. The second day I got into a cleaning mode which was a nice change. It was not until the third or fourth day that I finally made it back into the garage to continue with a certain woodworking project.

This of course, was the whole point of the exercise. For I have a great number of ideas and projects that I would like to do "sometime", but when it comes to getting up and JUST. F$%^ING. DO IT! ... I seem to have trouble with that.

So for years, I have blamed the internet, because I would rather surf the internet than do, well, anything really. Within the first few days of my fast, I realized that the problem was actually deeper than that. I have no energy. Even though I have this project that I have been working on, that I want to work on, that I really have nothing better to do than work on... I found that I just did not want to work on it "right now." I explained it to one person as the feeling you get when you have come home from a long and stressful day at work and you just want to sit down and "veg" for awhile... I feel like that all the time, only I haven't just worked a long day. I feel that way when I wake up, after breakfast, even after working for just an hour or so I feel like I would like to go back inside and sit down for awhile.

Surfing the internet is something that requires very little energy. If I had a working TV, I might watch that instead. If I had any video games, I might play those. If I subscribed to any magazines, I might read those. Yet, as I mentioned before, the internet is all of those AND MORE. It is, however, a symptom, not the problem.

It is not a particularly new problem either. For as long as I can remember, I have always been a little "slow." I think slowly; I move slowly; I drive slowly, work slowly, write slowly; and in a more abstract sense, make decisions slowly and accomplish life goals very, VERY, slowly. I am continually frustrated in that just about every task I undertake seems to take far longer than it reasonably should. It would be nice to say that I am merely being "meticulous", yet that is rarely the case. Take, for example, woodworking, which I am at least pretending to be passionate about lately, yet ultimately I recognize that it takes me a ridiculously long time to do shoddy work.

Anyway, that was my revelation for this month. I have not yet determined if the problem is psychological, physical, or dietary. At this point, I suspect all three.

So Not Helping

2009-10-20T22:44:00.000-07:00

My last post was because I (for whatever reason) was in a mood on that particular day such that I wanted everyone else to despise me as much as I despise myself. That's a horrible goal, you say? I know - I'm a horrible person. Bang, done and DONE.

By the way, I did not even know it at the time, but October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, which makes that post even nastier than intended, I suppose. Anyway, if I know anything at all about God (and I am not so sure that I do) he is going to have me choke on those words SOON. Watch.

The Dirtiest Mirror

2009-10-04T22:39:00.000-07:00

So, my home town hosted a "Believe and Walk the Cure" thing this morning, sponsored in part by Inland Women Fighting Cancer. I intially made the (perhaps understandable) mistake that this was specifically about breast cancer, when in fact it was to benefit the cancer center at a rather famous local university, and thus presumably for all forms of cancer, male or female.

However, on the topic of breast cancer, I found my immediate reaction to be, "It's too late. What do I care if they find a cure NOW?"

This might not necessarily be the best attitude to have.

In Which the Author Returns to What He Does Best

2009-09-13T21:14:00.000-07:00

I do a thing with some people sometimes and after the first couple of times I began to get the distinct impression that one of them did not like me much. As I think is natural in such cases, I found myself asking, "What did I do?"
Seriously?
Well, yeah, obviously I meant *besides* that...
Well how about...
And I was hoping we were passed all that.
And then there's...
I don't really see how that would affect...
Ahem.
Hey now, hardly anyone even knows about that last one.
You don't say?
You know what, just forget I brought it up.

We Keep Trying, And We Do Not Forget

2009-08-11T15:18:00.000-07:00

Back in January, I posted an old song for someone special. That song was, how do you say, "kinda crappy." It was more of an unpolished sketch with some interesting ideas and more than a few noticable mistakes in rhythm. Perhaps it was not so terrible for what I had to work with back then, but I remember thinking when I posted it that these days pretty much anyone could throw together something better in Garageband.

Now I know what you are probably thinking. That was seven months ago, and we have all "moved on." Sometimes the world moves a little too quickly for me. So finally, I took my own challenge and threw together something in Garageband.

Remembering.

Timothy "Timmy" Elfstrand
August 11, 2007 - January 10, 2009

Does Anyone Else Ever Want to Punch Their Internal Monologue in the Face?

2009-07-13T10:54:00.000-07:00

Hey, remember when you took that Chinese class, so that you might be able to talk to your hypothetical Chinese orphan in her native tongue?
I don't think you can prove that...
...Only to decide that (for some reason) your little spat with God precluded you from getting married, and thus disqualifying you from the adoption process?
Excuse me...
Which probably is not true by the way, although the fact that you neither have nor want a real job would likely pose a problem.
Did you have point?
Not really. I guess just that you're an idiot and your dreams are stupid.

Year 6A: The Long Overdue Report

2009-06-29T10:56:00.000-07:00

Years One, Two, Three, Four, ~~Five~~

I once stated the goal of answering the question, "Why do otherwise rational and intelligent people believe this absurd story?" I realize that there may be others following this blog who have wondered the same, but who likely have not put quite the amount of time and energy into "studying" the Christian life that I have. As such, I felt that some sort of report on my findings was in order.

I grew up with the stereotype that women were the religious ones and husbands only grudgingly went to church when their wives forced them. I presume that I must have acquired this view from Hollywood, and as a matter of fact, just last week I saw an example of this stereotype being reinforced in the movie Gran Torino. You can perhaps imagine my confusion upon learning that Christian doctrine dictates that the man is commanded to be the spiritual head of household, and that couples within the church seem to conform to that model (at least in outward appearance.)

While the aforementioned stereotype is not totally accurate, neither is it entirely without merit. I have heard at least four grown men deliver their testimony (the story of how they came to Jesus) in front of the church, and all of them began going to church in order to please their wife. Furthermore, I can not remember a grown man providing any other reason for coming to Christ. This leads me to suspect that at least on some level, all men within the church are merely putting on an overly elaborate, and quite likely subconscious, charade for the benefit of their wives.

This obviously does not account for the numerous single men within the church. I have even known a few divorced men whose ex-wives were the ones not interested in following God. The best I can say here is to not underestimate the power of the status quo. It was difficult for me to initially admit to my family that I had begun going to church, and my family does not even care about such things. It was difficult for me to officially stop going to church because even after just a few years, I felt that I had too much invested to walk away empty handed. I can hardly blame someone who has a whole lifetime involvement, plus actual family pressure, for not wanting to even consider alternatives.

While I was initially shocked to find that intelligent, scientifically-minded people would actually be active church participants, it eventually became clear to me that, by and large, men do not casually discuss theology and the things of God unless they are arranged a meeting with the expressed purpose of doing so. I find that the most intelligent discuss other interests such as technology and cell phones, more than you can possibly imagine.

To be continued.

[As this has been quite obviously backdated, I am forced admit that I started it on time but have been reluctant to come back to it, and I felt it best to just post what I had so far.]

Selling Out II: Redemption?

2009-06-24T21:01:00.000-07:00

Part I
A popular thing on Facebook recently was to make a "How Well Do You Know Me?" quiz. After taking a couple of those that my friends had made, I facetiously began to wonder if I could create a quiz on which all my friends would get perfect 0's, thus proving that no one really knows me at all. To that end, I sat down and worked out a list that quickly reached around 40 questions. (I did soften my original stance and included a few things that certain people reasonably ought to know. Heck, if you do not even bother to read the questions, you are statistically likely to get between 20-25% anyway.) Of course, the quizzes that I had seen had all been around 10-12 questions long or so, so 40 seemed a little high.

I tried to throw out the weakest of the lot and then decided to just see how many the application would let me enter. At that point, I very quickly realized that several of my questions and answers themselves were too long for the allotted input space. Yeah, screw Facebook.

But what to do with my pile of questions? It turns out that around this time my two year web hosting contract auto-renewed, forcing me to acknowledge that so far, I have not really done much of anything with my site that could not be accomplished with other free sites. The choice seemed painfully obvious: I will just program my own bloody quiz! Take that Facebook!

Now, there really is no shortage of quiz-making tools and scripts available (...for free...), but I wanted to make use of some of these features in my hosting package that I have already been paying for, and have no idea what they do. Besides, it seemed like the ability to create interactive web content might be a useful skill.Maye I could even make a Facebook app! [timoth has no plans to make a facebook app.] I already knew basic HTML or there would not be a site at all, but I spent the last few weeks learning PHP, MySQL, XML, XHTML... I kept running across references to DOM, but I patently refused to find out what that was, because I felt that I had more than enough acronyms already.

It gradually dawned on me that... how do I put it? I do not know if you have poked around on the non-blog part of my website at all, but it is, in a word, "crappy." So crappy that I never bothered to put a link from this blog back to the "main" site and merely relied on the extra-curious to manually delete "blog" from the address in their browsers. But now with my new quiz on the way, that junky old site was simply not going to fly. So I broke out my favorite graphics program and set about designing a new look from the ground up. Could I not have just gotten a nice template for free somewhere? Of course... but where is the fun in that? I started out all "Web 2.0" with shiny things and gradients, but quickly realized, "What? ...That ain't me." So I pushed it in another direction. "Tattered Web 2.0" if you will. Of course, to make a common template for all my pages, I had to add CSS to my list of things to learn. Technically, this is about the third time I have learned it, but I go so long between uses that I always have to start over completely over. So, the rest of the website is still pretty lame, but at least it looks better now (I hope*). The "music" section needs a full re-imagining, and the blog is really a separate animal entirely, but it is a start. So who wants to pay me to build them a website now? Personne?

Oh yeah, who wants to take the quiz? I whittled it down to 32 questions, which is a nice round number (in binary). I hope they are the best of the best. There is one particularlly silly question on there that I had no intention of keeping, it was merely my "filler" question as I built and tested the code, but I spent so much time with it that when I was all done I could not bare to throw it out. So see if you can pick that one out. Even if you get everything wrong, you still get to see the right answers, so it sort of doubles as a "25 Random Things" list that was also popular awhile back... with 7 bonus facts!

*My server logs indicate that a significant percentage of people view my site with Internet Explorer 6. IE6 is a bad browser that does not conform to established web standards. However, due to its popularity, webmasters have been forced to use a number of tricks and hacks to try to get it to work properly. Webmasters hate you. Norway hates you. Me, I am not really one to tell people they need to upgrade. I tried for the better part of a day to get my layout to look the same in IE6 as it does in Firefox and Safari. Eventually I decided to just make the things that did not work invisible to you. There are a number of better browsers available. If you do not care then neither will I. Now if someone is using a real browser and things still look out of whack, I definitely want to know about it. I am still new at this after all.

Hypocrisy

2009-06-11T11:56:00.000-07:00

I was driving yesterday when a song came on the radio that my subconscious immediately recognized from back in the day and shouted, "Now we're talkin'!" (Can your subconscious shout? Maybe I meant id. I don't know.) Guitar, guitar, guitar aaaaand... BOOM!
Here you go way too fast
Don't slow you're gonna crash
You should watch - watch your step
Don't look out you're gonna break your neck

So shut - shut your mouth
'Cause I'm not listening anyhow
I've had enough - enough of you
You know to last a lifetime through

Wait... is this an 80's song? Nah, man, nah. Gotta be early 90's. Really? Because it has that poppy upbeat tempo, that smooth female vocal, that glorifying a fast, irresponsible lifestyle, those 'na nana na na na nana na na naa's ... what about this song isn't 80's? But it has that chugchugchugchug guitar thing that's so 90's going on!

Alright, who knows who this song is by? Anyone? The name I pulled out of thin air was "Jill Sobule." This is wrong. It turns out the band in question is "The Primitives", which I am pretty sure is a name that I never heard before, not one that I had merely forgotten. The song "Crash" was released in 1988. Damn it. BUT Another version of the song ("The '95 Mix") was featured on the soundtrack to Dumber and Dumber, released (counter-intuitively) in 1994. Which is likely the version that would be most familiar to anyone who happened to be in high school around that time.

Judges?

Apropos of Nothing

2009-05-28T22:08:00.000-07:00

I was lying awake last night when for some reason it dawned on me that in "well known" fairy tales in our culture, the protagonists are predominantly female.

Observe:
Snow White
Cinderella
Sleeping Beauty
Little Red Riding Hood
Goldilocks and the Three Bears
The Little Mermaid
Rapunzel
The Princess and the Pea
Rumpelstiltskin
Beauty and the Beast¹

Compare With:
Jack and the Beanstalk
Pinocchio
Aladdin²
The Frog Prince³
The Boy Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was⁴

Neutral:
Hansel and Gretel - Obviously, one of each.
Puss in Boots - While the cat's master was male, I think this and any other stories in which the main characters are animals fall into a seperate category and gender tends to be largely irrelevant.

¹ Depending on whether one considers the Beast to be a protagonist, in which case this would be like "Hansel and Gretel."

² This is technically from a different culture. In fact, the only other stories which I could name from 1001 Arabian Nights (even if I do not actually know the plot) are "Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves" and around seven or so "Voyages of Sinbad." Since all of these feature a male protagonist, I would hypothesize that that particular culture's folklore does not contain the female dominance that I am attempting to illustrate here.

³ This story also features a female main character, (not to mention an animal) so might not rightfully belong in the "male protagonist" category.

⁴ Is this story even "well known"? I was really reaching by this point. There were some other tales that I did not include because I remember nothing about them beside the name. Whereas on the other end of the spectrum, (realizing that I am presuming a lot about my audience) I suspect that most of us could probably recount the story of "Little Red Riding Hood" start to finish right off the top of our heads.

Even ignoring the above caveats in my quick list of tales, the females outnumber males two to one. If we were to throw out anything with a footnote.... well then that is simply no contest at all.

I welcome your comments and counter examples.

For Years

2009-05-22T00:01:00.000-07:00

In New Orleans a couple of years ago, the church at which we were staying had a time for people to share there experiences from the week. I do not remember any of what was said now, but I do recall the sudden realization that my mother did not know that I was currently in New Orleans helping hurricane victims. My mother did know that I had been there the previous year either. This is simply because my mother never knew about Hurricane Katrina.

It was stated at the recent dedication of CSUSB's new literacy center, "Kathy taught ESL at 10 locations on three continents... in five different languages." Through "Kathys' Corner" in said literacy center, mother has managed to continue teaching children to read four years after she died.

What have you done lately?

Where's the Fun?

2009-04-28T01:10:00.000-07:00

The creator of one of the webcomics that I enjoy, but has not updated in quite some time, had this excuse to offer: "Part of the reason we're so late is that 2008 didn't actually happen." So it wasn't just me then.

I was walking down the street recently when I happened to pass a ringing pay phone. Naturally, my first thought was, "They still have pay phones?" Quickly followed by the internal debate as to whether or not to answer. Perhaps I might win something. Maybe it would be the start of a grand adventure. Or maybe it was a psychotic sniper who would shoot me if I hung up. Ultimately, I determined that it was astronomically unlikely to be for me and just kept walking. Heck, I never even answer my home phone, and have to be in the right mood just to answer my cell. But you know that mother would have answered it. Oh well, she was not there. And let's be honest: if I actually believed that she A) has any sort of awareness of what I do or do not do and B) could find no greater cause than that to be disappointed in me, then I would be having a very could day indeed.

Later, in conversation, someone expressed a liking for my sister. When I questioned how this person knew anything about my sister, it eventually became clear that the opinion was based on a comment or two left on my blog, not by my sister, but in fact, by a cousin. I do not know if it was because of my never-volunteer-information policy, my don't-rock-the-boat tendency or something else, but I resisted the desire at that point to declare, "She's married... TO A WOMAN!" just to see the resulting facial expression. Which is too bad really, it might have been entertaining.

The two anecdotes above actually took place on the same day. The reason that I was somewhat uncharacteristically out and about the town that day is that I was feeling a little frustrated and more than a little glum. As I have alluded to before, I had come to a point a few months ago where I realized that I had basically spent an entire year just killing time while talking about the end of the world. I made the decision then to commit another year toward pursuing the projects and ideas of which I have long dreamt. For if the world should happen to end anyway then I am no worse off, and if it does not then whatever the outcome, I will at least have the satisfaction that I tried. However, on the particular day in question, after a month and a half with nothing to show for it, I was already considering declaring the mission a failure and perhaps using the 10+ remaining months to get a head start on something actually productive.

That was two weeks ago now. Where does the time go?

Lost Cause II

2009-03-25T18:07:00.000-07:00

I panicked. I sent out a number of strange emails to various people which I rather regret now. For someone who usually says so little, I am often surprised at just how much trouble I can cause by simply not knowing when to shut up. I wondered briefly if I am actually manic-depressive, but just happen to go years between manic states. Yet lacking formal psychological definition, I have to imagine that the very nature of bipolar disorder is rapid and frequent mood shifts.

I also quit my job. This was not a spur-of-the-moment decision, because I had been uncomfortable there for some time. The definitive factor though was the thought of losing something else. A few months ago, I inherited some assets. Most of it is in stocks and mutual funds and shares of jointly owned properties, which I do not really understand and have probably only lost value since coming into my possession. (With me cheering for "The Collapse" all the while.) There was also a not insignificant amount of cash. My sister put a down payment on a house. I bought a bass for $300, used. It was the cheapest of the ones that I was considering, and I never even got around to buying a much-needed larger amplifier to plug it into before the band broke up. I did not buy glasses to replace the ones that I lost a few months ago, that were ten years old anyway and could probably use a prescription update. I did not buy shoes to replace the ones that I threw away on Memorial Day almost two years ago. I did not buy a computer despite enduring months, if not years, of "You need a new computer" every time I saw a certain friend. In fact, aside from monthly bills, I rarely spend money on anything other than food and gas.

Truth be told, I completely ignored this development. And it probably goes without saying, I told no one. Maybe it was because when I first found out, I did not want to believe it until I actually saw it, and then when it took over a year for all the paperwork to be finalized I just did not care anymore. Maybe it is because it is really all just numbers on pieces of paper that have no tangible meaning to me. Maybe I was afraid that people would have different expectations of me and I like it when people make me dinner. Also, it seems that I just get off on keeping secrets.

I did not ask for this, I did not expect it, and it is not like I get to keep it. Please. I do not know if it will be the collapsing economy, mismanagement, fraud, identity theft, or whatever. (Am I concerned that by announcing it online that I set myself up as a target for a potentially nefarious international reader? A little, but I hope that the fact that my last name appears nowhere on this blog will slow them down.) But as I am sure to lose it, why get excited?

I had to make rules though. When discussing financial matters and concerns it is perfectly reasonable to refer to my low income, because I did have very low income, and I have gotten by my whole life on the simple formula money in > money out. Regardless of my bank balance, I do not like to operate "in the red." However, I was never, ever allowed to say "I can't afford it." Bull crap I can't. Unfortunately, one day I found myself saying those very words, and I immediately thought to myself, "Oh no you di'n't!" I lied. Worse, having done so, I did not apologize, and I did not explain. I suppose in that moment I realized it was the beginning of the end. I would like to say that it was not personal, that really I was only lying to myself, in trying to pretend that nothing had changed. I do not know if that matters now.

Someone might ask, "Well why not just give it all away and then no one ever had to know?" But no, I can't do that. Certainly not that. So what exactly am I afraid of losing? Money? It would not exactly seem so. [I don't care too much for money, 'cause money can't...] Yet when I think about how many of my family members worked hard, and then died in order for me to have the opportunity to be able to do whatever I want with my life... if I am not out there doing whatever I can then I am just pissing on their legacy.

So I quit my job to focus on music and my other projects, because I can. As someone who honestly can not remember the last time that I made a major life decision that I did not regret later, do I really think that *this* of all things is a good idea? Of course not. I know it is not so much money that I never have to worry about financial matters again, just not for right now. But this is the real world. Someone my age is supposed to have a career, a real job with benefits and a retirement plan and all that. You can't just up and quit your job to chase your dreams like there is no tomorrow. Not in the real world. It just does not work like that.

Oh well... doing it anyway.

Lost Cause

2009-03-20T14:50:00.000-07:00

It occurred to me recently that I seem to only be motivated by loss. I never really appreciate the things I have, or the things that are given to me. On the day of my "graduation" from college (nine months after I actually completed my degree), my family informed me that they had not gotten me anything for a graduation present because, "We know that you don't like things." My reaction to this was probably the polar opposite to what most of my readers are probably thinking. Something along the lines of, "Aww, they DO understand me..." Unfortunately, there was a "yet" in there somewhere and some options presented, but I figure they'll forget eventually. "Gifts" is definitely not my love language.

I do not appreciate things; I do not even really appreciate people. I also tend not to take advantage of resources and opportunities available to me. I really do not care very much at all until it is too late... and then, boy, do I ever lament what I used to have.

I mentioned, last month, a sermon which caught my attention. It was on tithing. Now I have heard more than a few messages on "tithing" and "giving" and whether or not the mandatory 10% tithe as described in the Old Testament still applies under the New Covenant and so forth. These always come off as awkward, because on some level, when a pastor says to give to God, he is really saying give to the church, i.e. himself. It is not always so blatant as "God wants me to have a new private jet!" Yet I think that even the most honest and well intentioned of preachers have trouble objectively distancing themselves on this topic. This particular preacher was different, however, because the group did not come from a single church, but was comprised of people from all over the country. When he spoke of tithing, he was talking about going back and giving to their home churches, which would not directly benefit him. So he did have that going for him, but he was also an older gentleman, what I would best describe as "a preacher for a different generation," who took the hardline conservative stance on every topic across the board and I had already spent most of the weekend disagreeing with him.

That is a lot of perhaps unnecessary build up merely to say that the sermon emphasized the blessings that *will* be received by those who tithe. Another member of the group also happened to be the pastor of a church, and shared that in the average church something like only 30% (I forget the number, maybe it was even less) of members actually tithe. Yet he claimed that a significant majority do in his church, and further claimed that as a direct result of this, not one single member of his congregation had been laid off in the declining economy. The message was clear: tithing leads to abundance.

I, however, walked away with the implied corollary: a firm conviction that I was going to lose everything. I was also quite certain that I did not want to lose everything, and that something needed to be done. This was a dramatic realization, coming as it did after more than a year of inactivity.

Yet, it had already begun. I had already lost my band; I had not literally lost my job, but I had made up my mind that I was definitely leaving; before the weekend was out I had "lost" two friends as previously described. I had lost something else that is harder to define - hope, faith, something like that.

To be continued...

Of Rather Little Consequence

2009-03-15T22:25:00.000-07:00

Yesterday out of curiosity, I flipped my iTunes library to list in order of "play count" just to see what is at the top. I have to admit, it was a bit of an eyebrow-raiser.

The top five are: "My Country b3" by The Purple Robe with a play count of 46. Ah, the joke that started it all. Then comes "Vertigo" by U2 with 29. Now, you have to understand that for a fair amount of time after purchasing this computer, these were actually the only two songs in the library, so it is no surprise that they would be at the top. Even so, tied with 28 each are an instrumental version of "When She Walks in the Room" by The Purple Robe and "youreagirl" by Strong Bad. How quaint. In fifth place with 25 is... yet another Purple Robe song. What a freakin' narcisist.

Alright so, the highest ten songs in the list that I didn't do myself (which accounted for 9 of the top 20) were:

Vertigo (Single Version) - U2
youreagirl - Strong Bad
cinematic - Cool Hand Luke
Story of Our Lives - The Echoing Green
Gone - tobymac
Everybody To The Limit - Strong Bad
Everything Is Bad For You - Map
Such Great Heights - The Postal Service
Last Nite - The Strokes
Vindicated (acoustic) - Dashboard Confessional

About this point I realized that the whole exercise was rather meaningless, because a very large percent of the staggering 391 songs in my library (yes, that is the correct number of digits) is just stuff I downloaded for free (legally) from various places, and is not a particularlly accurate reflection of my actual music tastes. For example, there are 82 songs in my "Purchased from iTunes" list, two of which I literally purchased, the other 80 being free downloads. Of those, 11 actually have a play count of 0, and 14 more have a play count of only 1. Nice.

The fact is, iTunes is simply not my prefered way to listen to music. I do not really need to download music, because I discovered a long time ago that I can almost always find what I want online, whether it be on a bands official website or myspace page, or a YouTube video (even if YouTube happens to be blocked... there are other sites). Now there is Pandora, which of course only allows you to select certain qualities, not to pick specfic songs, but I just recently discovered imeem, which does. Really the only reason to fire up iTunes at all anymore is just to listen to... my own songs. That explains that, I reckon.

I suppose if there was a point to all this (aside from the obvious amusment of "Seriously? 'Last Nite' by The Strokes...?"), it would be that, having recently [ahem] quit my job (in part) in order to focus on music, I have to wonder if anyone actually even buys music anymore. Oh, I don't know... Maybe people who don't surf the internet all day, and actually need something to put on the iPod for when they LEAVE THE HOUSE?

That, and also to point out that "youreagirl" is a fine song. If you actually know the song I'm talking about, you are going to go looking for it right now aren't you? You know who you are. (The rest of you, it's a bit of an inside joke. You are probably better off.)

On U2

2009-03-13T09:07:00.000-07:00

I want to play the guitar very badly and I do play the guitar very badly.
--Bono

When I was a young man, I fell in love with a rock and roll band. It was the sort of everything-they-do-is-perfect infatuation that is usually reserved for the opposite sex... though I highly doubt I'm the only one to ever make that mistake. Kids, don't fall in love with a rock and roll band; they are only going to break your heart.

I used to think that U2 was Bono and the Edge and those other two guys. I remember one day in high school, I was listening to the radio as I drove when the (possibly stoned) DJ announced, "Here's the theme from Gilligan's Island." What followed instead was a new version of the theme from Mission: Impossible, and I thought to myself, "This sounds like U2." If you can imagine in the days before the internet was common, when information traveled a lot more slowly, I had no idea that - not U2 - but rather Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. were redoing the theme for the forthcoming movie. And here were these two guys whom I had always overlooked, whose contribution to the band was so fundamental that without any prior knowledge, I could immediately recognize their touch even while covering a very well know piece of music.

What can I say, I was a man obsessed back then. When did the love die? Was it when Zooropa was pretty good, but certainly no Achtung Baby? Was Passengers: Original Soundtracks 1 just a little too abstract? Was it the continual delays that finally resulted in Pop, which was still so unfinished that almost every song released as a single from that album was a whole new recording? Was it their ever rising ticket prices, for ever crappier seats? Was it a little of everything?

I suppose I have been insulting U2 like a scorned lover for some time now. Particularly their (until last week) two most recent albums. I know that I am in the minority, but I really like Pop. I'm listening to it right now in fact. I admit that some of the electronic stuff is a bit over-the-top, but I think that lyrically, it is their strongest album to date. Then a few years down the road comes All That You Can't Leave Behind, which had a few songs with lyrics that I honestly wondered if Bono let his kids write. I do not really hate that album as much as I let on. About half of it is really quite good. It is merely the fact that only half of it is good, when I had come to expect so much more, that makes it so disappointing.

Then we had the rise of the iTunes Music store, which I believe I was one of the first to get on board with (and definitely one of the first to jump off board.) But I did take the opportunity to download "Vertigo." This song was peculiar in the sense that it reminded me most of "11 O'Clock Tick Tock", a single from before they even had their first album... as if the twenty five or so intervening years had never happened. Yet, it was not really that good, and for the first time, I decided to pass on the new album. Someone eventually gave it to me anyway, and on my first listen, I could not help but think, "Man, there is not a good song on this album!" Maybe "Crumbs From Your Table"... MAYBE... I listen to it several more times before I finally decided that I was just trying to hard, and that I would never give an album that much of a chance if it did not happen to say "U2" on the cover. The problem with this album is that it is just bland. The online community seemed reluctant to criticize it, but I did read one person's opinion somewhere that it suffered from "rank amateur mixing" and "too many producers, not enough of whom were named 'Eno' or 'Lanois'." Fair enough. Some time back I found a clip on YouTube from one of they're previous tours, and one commentor mentioned about how this was when they used to be good, but now they "just play songs for your mom." Well said.

Then they got in bed with Apple and had the U2 iPod, and The [semi-]Complete U2; and then there was the Best Of-According-To-Who-Exactly? And now we have all sorts of 'Remastered' this and 'Limited Edition' that. One might overlook the selling out if they were still putting out butt-kicking music, but to sell out while releasing boring music? Inexcusable.

FREEEEEEDOM has a scent
Like the top of a new born baby's head!
The songs are in your eyes,
I see them when you smile.
I've had enough, I'm not giving up
On a miracle... A miracle drug!
--U2, "Miracle Drug"
Uhhhhhhhhhh... what?

Even so, on a good day, in a generous mood, I might be willing to admit that there are as many as four decent songs on How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb Yet after trying to convince myself for so long that it maybe was not so bad after all, I popped Achtung Baby in my car CD player for awhile... and yeah, they have fallen an awful long way. Even the weakest song off of that album [which after much difficult deliberation, I am going to go with "So Cruel"] will still kick the stuffing out of anything off of ATYCLB, HTDAAB, and really probably most albums by a lot of other artists one might care to mention.

U2 3D was pretty amazing though. Maybe "they've still got it" when it comes to live performance. You know, if you can actually see them.

It also bares mentioning that I still consider it to be my "useless superpower" to be able to recognize a U2 song in any environment. I have even been so bold as to claim that I can name any U2 song "in one note." Which is probably not true, but I have made some modestly impressive identifications in crowded restaurants. (The sort of thing where the response is often, "I don't even hear a song," then after a pause to listen intently, "Oh yeah, you're right!")

So the new album came out last week. I was in denial for awhile. I resisted listening to the new single, "Get on Your Boots" for quite some time. When I finally did, my impression was that it was not exactly 'bad', but that it did seem to have "one hit wonder" written all over it, which is sad for a band with a thirty year career. "Sexy boots"? What are you talking about? I read somewhere that the song is about how men have ruined everything and it's time to let the women take over. I happen to come from a family where I think that idea would go over quite well, but I do not buy it myself.

Anyway, I have not yet bought the new CD. Last week they were unprecedentedly the music guest on Letterman for the entire week. I missed Monday night, but Tuesday and Wednesday they played new songs, one of which was "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" and the other I have completely forgotten. But it seems like they went from being too "Adult Contemporary" to trying to appeal to preteens. Then on Thursday they played "Beautiful Day" from two albums back. What, so after three songs they have already run out of new material? Nice.

I was thinking about all of this when it occurred to me that U2's latest albums are not even my least favorite. You know what album I really do not like? The Unforgettable Fire. Sure, you have "Pride" and "Bad" which are classics, but can you even name another song? [A Sort of Homecoming-Pride-Wire-The Unforgettable Fire-Promenade- 4th of July-Indian Summer Sky-Bad-MLK-Elvis Presley and America.] Wow, okay... I guess I do. (Wrong order though.) Do you know any of the words then? And you hunger for the time/Time to heal/Desire time/Hmm hmm hmmmm/Hmm hmm hmmmmmm...yeah, I'm out. Well, amusing diversion aside, my point was that this album is (ironically) quite forgettable. But they followed that with The Joshua Tree which was pretty okay I guess. So maybe they just have an off album now and then, or an off year... decade, whatever.

I guess this concludes my review of the new album, without touching the new album. I leave you with an observation I made a number of years ago, but since then the pattern has continued to the point that I can only assume that they are doing it on purpose, though I can not imagine why:

Boy
October *song title*
War
The Unforgettable Fire *song title*
The Joshua Tree
Rattle and Hum *song lyric (Bullet the Blue Sky)*
Achtung Baby
Zooropa *song title*
Pop
All That You Can't Leave Behind *song lyric (Walk On)*
How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb
No Line on the Horizon *song title*

In the Meantime, There is Music

2009-03-06T15:17:00.000-08:00

Some months back I decided that I absolutely despise 80's music, and was so bold as to further assert that if I had my way, I would erase all of 80's pop culture from history, saving only Calvin and Hobbes.

"What about U2?" I was asked.
"Eh, screw 'em."
"But wait, if you get to save Calvin and Hobbes..."
If you are rushing into a burning building, I reasoned, and you can only save one thing... that's my one thing I am saving from the 80's.

Now in truth, I was not talking about U2, Queen, Tom Petty... or really any band with a multi-decade career that happened to include the 1980's. What I can not stand is the 80's pop one-hit-wonder types; the kind of thing that they play on "flashback" specials, "awesome 80's" collections, "80's night" or what have you. The kind of thing that people enjoy for nostalgia value, or like specifically because it is so cheesy... really for any reason other than because it is actually any GOOD.

I put quite a lot of thought into this because it was irritating me so. I realized that 80's songs weren't really ABOUT anything, or more specifically, they were about something silly and/or some bizarre analogy for sex. (With quite a few songs specifically about partying/dancing/playing music/having a song on the radio/etc.)

The 00's has not been such a great decade either when you get down to it. It seems like everything is "over-produced" this or "a cheap imitation of" that. Even my favorite bands from the past are disappointing. Radiohead has transcended the need to make music to which people can relate; I hear that Robert Smith, Simon Gallup, Porl Thompson and some drummer are now in a mediocre "The Cure" cover band. And U2... [sigh].

Last year, despite (or perhaps due to) my profound lack of productivity in other areas, I actually had quite a number of ideas on the music front. At one point I thought of an album title that was so good, it really made me wish that I actually had some songs to put on it. Well, how many songs do you have? I dunno, four or five I guess, if I finish everything that I have been working on. Really, everything? The question was, "How many songs do you have?" Oh... like 30-40... but I was talking about recent stuff.

I came up with a new song in the middle of my "Scarecrow" sessions a few years back. It served as a nice bridge between my older guitar work and my more recent computer based stuff. It even had lyrics based upon a few of my then-recent blog posts, but I never quite managed to "bring it home."

I put a lot of effort into adapting a certain other song, which I felt that if I ever performed was sure to get me sued, fired or excommunicated depending on the context. It is that good.

I wrote another song with some challenging [for me at least] strumming patterns, and unusual [...for me] chord progressions - including one chord that I just plain made up. I can not even play each piece of the song consistently, let alone string them together. I had a concept in mind for the lyrics but had trouble coming up with specifics. In one verse I merely stated, "Je ne sais rien/Je ne comprends pas" while jamming one time, and decided to keep that for lack of anything better. I have the sinking fear that this song really sucks, even if I could put it all together. That is particularly distressing, because the subject of the song is such that it is very important for this NOT to suck.

I started another song and only got one verse and a chorus before hitting a wall. This one seemed to want to be in a Dean Martin/Frank Sinatra sort of style... a genre about which I know almost nothing. I do not know the structure of such songs, and more importantly, even if I did finish writing it, I would likely need to find someone else to sing it, because there is no way I am capable of "crooning" this baby. It was a good start, but I do not know if it will ever get finished. The particular state of mind I was in at the time has passed and I do not know if I could recapture that mood.

It was while working on that last one that I finally had to ask myself, "Man, what are you doing? Why don't you stop this nonsense and try to remember how to play 'Last Night I Slept in the Garden'?" So I returned for a time to my older songs. It was a strange sensation; in trying to remember songs that I had not played in years, which now seemed so foreign to me, I found myself asking, "Did I really write this? I don't remember writing this." Then it came to me: You didn't write those songs... *I* did. Oh. Well that is not exactly good news is it?

I had another new song as well. It started off well enough: I was trying something different by fretting with my RIGHT hand while hammering/plucking with the left. Although that part was rather innovative, in trying to flesh out the rest of the song I kept thinking that I have done something like this before musically, or that I had used that same lyrical pattern in the past - I had to change one line specifically because I had definitely done that kind of wordplay before. It just did not seem that there was anything "new" about this song. Then it hit me: 80's music had no substance, the 00's have no teeth... but kids, this is how we did things in the 90's. (You know... more or less.)

On The Nature of Friendship (Part II)

2009-02-27T13:24:00.000-08:00

Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will provide brothers suitable to fellowship with him."
-- Gen 2.18*

I was asked once (well probably more than once, really) what someone could do "as a friend" to help me. I do not remember what I said. (I think you said, "Buy my CD.") No I didn't. I probably said that I would let them know, and then never did. [Although in thinking about it, I realize that there is actually a surprising amount of depth in that seemingly flippant answer. I do not want to get into it just now, other than ask you to imagine that I had phrased the same idea slightly differently, "Show me that you appreciate my music."]

As to the topic at hand, I keep coming back to the person I consider to be the best friend I ever had. Back in high school I had a friend who, if she percieved that I had something on my mind, (something that, knowing me, I was most likely trying to conceal) then she would not rest until she had extracted it. I can not say that I appreciated it at the time; I once got so angry that I threw her out of the house. (Or so I was told, as I was actually so angry that I could not remember the details afterward. Impressive, really.) It was some years after we had gone are separate ways in life before I realized that someone like me really needs someone like that.

Certainly I meet people from time to time that ask a lot of questions. But I usually interpret such people as just being nosy, like they only want an answer so that they can check off that box, not because they actually care what the answer might be. No, what I am looking for is someone who is not necessarily naturally inclined to ask the tough questions, but who cares enough to step out of the comfort zone.

My, aren't we picky?...And why the hell should anyone do that for you? I do not want to say that I do not care about anyone, because I think that, on rare occasions, I will do something that shows I care. But regardless, I am really not involved in anyone else's life.

Sometimes I get to a point where I am absolutely going out of my mind struggling with some issue, and I will finally break down and call someone up and we will meet so that I might unburden myself. Although I feel much better afterward, those relationships never actually seem to be any deeper after that. I have actually done this several times and I do not think it has ever been the same person twice. More importantly, I have never been that person to anyone else. No one has ever called me up to say, "I'm going out of my mind and you're the only one who I think would understand." Maybe it is just because most people do not let things get that bad before doing something about it. Yet even when people do share serious things, I rarely (if ever) feel as though I am the first to know.

I write this blog and I generally expect people to read it. Yet I do not read anyone else's blog, and, well I do not even know what this "twitter" thing is exactly. When I started blogging years ago, there were a few other blogs that I followed, but I gradually gave up on each of those as they began posting even less frequently than I did. I still check in every once in a while if I happen to think of it, but that is rare. Some other people have blogs that I have looked at when I first found out about it but never went back. Sometimes someone will mention that they have a blog but do not mention the address, in which case I assume that they do not actually want me to read it. Though now that I think about it, maybe they just want to see if I care enough to ask. Does anyone out there have a blog that they want me to read?

I blog to be honest, to show a side of myself that I can not show in person. I blog to connect with people. After all this time, it was not until last week that I realized that that really does not work at all. It might make sense as a starting point, and I think part of my motivations in the beginning was to start conversations and discussions. Yet when people leave comments, I either do not respond at all, or else respond in a way that does not encourage further discussion. I tried last week to be more intentional about responding to comments, but I still think it probably came off as condescending. As for private conversations, it is rare that I even admit to having a blog, and I am extremely reluctant to discuss any particular topic in depth. Why is that? I guess it is because the "right" people just never ask the "right" questions.

I simply do not try very hard at maintaining friendships. On some level, I do not think that I should have to. You either like someone or you do not, you enjoy their company or you do not, you find them easy to talk to or you do not - you really should not have to "work at" anything. But that is not really true, is it now?

"But you don't understand!" I protest. "I have realized all of this before... I did have a friendship that was important to me... I was trying to be specific and intentional and I still got it all horribly wrong!" But that is *my* problem, and I really have been much too hard on my friend who at least had the decency to say, "I can't do this anymore," when most people just fade away. Oh well, "next time I have friends", right?

So, to answer the original question, a real friend would not take all of this BS from me.

Where exactly do I expect this magic friend to come from? Or these "right" people with their "right" questions? Deep down I suppose I have always believed that there would only be one person to whom I could really talk, one person who would really understand me, and if you aren't my soul mate then I'm just not interested. I have not looking for a friend, I have been looking for a "savior." That really is not going to happen, is it?

I was at a bar last week, watching those (quite frankly, unattractive) people drinking and smoking. I was doing neither, I was only there to play music. A couple of thoughts occurred to me. One was that I never seem to "belong" anywhere, it seems like no matter where I am - church, school, job, this bar, whatever - I am always there for a different reason than everyone else. That is a whole topic in itself. The other thought that I had was that I really need to get over myself and try to be friends with some "real" people.

So I have been trying to be better about initiating contact with people, actually asking the questions I wonder about, following up on things they have mentioned previously... which probably does not seem that impressive to you, but none of which comes naturally for me. It is really too soon to tell what is to come of it.

*Someone seriously might want to double check this.

On the Nature of Friendship (Part I)

2009-02-19T17:52:00.000-08:00

It's no secret that a friend is someone who lets you help
It's no secret that a liar won't believe anyone else
--U2

I lost two friends last week. I mean, not "lost" lost, but they have moved away. One moved physically, the other, for lack of a better word, emotionally. I know that I just recently admitted to more or less lying to everyone I know, but these were two of the people who, among my current acquaintances, had known me the longest, that I saw with the greatest regularity, and were on the very short list of people whom I consider to know the *real* me, if anyone could make such a claim.

I wanted to clarify: I do not lie on my blog. When writing my last post (which I think unintentionally ended up as a sort of summary for the entire blog) I found myself having to reread a lot of old posts in order to refresh myself about sequences of events and so forth. Clearly a lot of the posts are vague. [No, really?] I like to think that was more so in the earlier ones and that I have gotten better over time, but your opinion may vary. I also go through long periods of not posting anything, but then sometimes come out with a rash of posts that are about as brutally honest as I have ever been about anything in my life. A lot of times I will work in a subtle joke that I might only expect one other person to get. There have also been a few cases where I have attempted to conceal a private message for one specific person. (Not always for the same person, and I actually do not know if any one of those attempts has ever been successful.) I guess I have to admit that the last example does seem to border on deceitful. But I stand by the statement that I do not lie on my blog. I do not write something intending for you to believe one thing when I know another to be true. Or at least, I do not remember ever doing it on purpose, and I hope that I never have, because the whole point of the blog was to be honest.

In one older post, I mention that it is actually the person who writes this blog that is the "real" me, and the one that you see walking around that is the made-up personality. That may be a bit extreme, and it certainly is the opposite of what you would probably expect, but it is reasonably accurate. I have a lot of "friends" on Facebook who (as far as I know) have no knowledge of this blog. [Edit: well I guess they do now.] There are people who read this blog that I know are not on Facebook. And of course, there are people I interact with in the real world who do not do either. I would say that anyone who does not read my blog is probably missing the larger piece of my personality. I'm wishing that was not the case now. It would be much better for me if I could talk openly in person about the things on my blog.

There are a lot of things that have lead me to question the nature of friendship lately. A little while ago I watched the entire series of a show called "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip." I'd never heard of it until it was recommended to me. The show is about the cast and crew of a "Saturday Night Live" type show (not unlike "30 Rock", except that it's a drama instead of a comedy.) Anyway the first episode is about these two guys who are coming back to the show as Head Writer and Producer. Basically, a few years prior to the current story, one of them had been fired/encouraged to quit over some controversy, and the other guy had quit in support and they ended up making a couple of successful movies together, but now the second guy was being coerced into coming back to the show and the first guy came back as well, rather than continuing to make movies and his reason was basically that they were a team. Of course it's only a TV show, but I was inspired by that friendship and loyalty and just that overall sense of "what are 'we' going to do now". The series actually had a second example of such a partnership, but I won't go into that.

Back to my two friends. The first was a simple case of new-job-new-city-ok-bye. It all happened quite suddenly, but that is the way life goes. My regret there is that we were never really as close of friends as I always thought we could be and I am sorry to have let that opportunity pass. The other case is challenging because it is a lot more my "fault"... at least in the sense that if I had said and done things differently in the past then this particular trouble might have been avoided, and I fear that my efforts to correct mistakes of the past have only made it worse. Is it too late to heal? I honestly don't know.

A long time ago there was someone whom I cared about very much. This person was on what I saw to be a very destructive path, and nothing I said or did seemed to make any difference. This was so painful to me that eventually one day I made up my mind that if they insisted upon self-destructing, then at least they were not going to take me down with them, and I walked away. I still tend to think of that as the hardest thing I have ever done, to turn my back on a friend. Was it the right thing to do? I have questioned that many times over the years. But I was so young. Is it possible that I have never been truly able to care about anyone since? I never thought about that before, but I suppose it might be.

I bring that up because I realized that I (quite unintentionally) wrote two posts in a row in which I mentioned my own funeral. That is probably not a good sign. Along with everything else, I could see how someone might read that and finally say, "That's it, I've done all that I can for you... I'm done." Not that anyone has, but I recognize the possibility... because it is exactly what I once did.

Ode to Joy

2009-02-15T08:31:00.000-08:00

Let's take a break and focus on something else for a change, shall we?

"Window in the Skies" was one of two new songs on U2's career-spanning (and curiously-chosen) singles collection a couple of years back. From things I have read here and there online, I gather that a lot of U2 fans do not particularly care for it, but at the time it came out, I felt that it was very appropriate for what I was going through. (I meant to blog about it at the time, but no one ever reminded me!) Especially after a couple of sub-par albums, I was finally content to say, "Okay U2, this one is actually good... so if you just STOP NOW then all will be forgiven." [Hold on, I'm just getting word...] Oh. Nevermind. Anyway, there are two different videos for this song, both of which seem like they must have been mind-blowingly difficult to create, but I happen to favor this one. I was able to download it from the official website when it first came out, and have never been able to watch it just one time through. How did it not take years to put this together?

I used to read an awful lot of webcomics, and though I have tapered that off, there are still a handful that I keep up with. They all have there unique charms and are entertaining in various ways, but none of them make me exclaim, "I love Kate Beaton!" quite like katebeaton.com. (Although that site seems to have a lot of technical difficulties and I find it easier to go here.) The art work appears simple, yet the characters convey emotion quite well. I must warn that the comics occasionally contain language and "adult situations" so are probably not for everyone, but her unique perspective on historical figures (most of whom I have either never heard of or know almost nothing about... so it's educational!) is definately worth the price of admission. Especially this one.

Speaking of webcomics, this one panel happens to be from a side project of another comic I enjoy. Some of you know that I take my humor very seriously, so it is no small endorsement that I say, without exageration, that this is the single funniest thing that I have ever seen.

Back on the music side of things, Sigur Rós is an experimental band from Iceland that sings songs in a made-up language. Okay. They also happen to make cinematic masterpieces for music videos.

This dude actually quit his job to dance around the world. With the popularity of his first video, he got corporate sponsorship to make more.

And what's this? A new Purple Robe song? Okay, it's not that new... It was just sitting in a pile of stuff on my computer that all needs a little something-something to be finished. But hey, it's new to you. I put together this song after watching the above Sigur Rós video as an experiment to try to capture an entirely different sentiment than my music usually conveys.

So Far

2009-02-11T23:28:00.001-08:00

You say
You want
Diamonds on a ring of gold
Your story to remain untold
Your love not to grow cold
All the promises we break
From the cradle to the grave
When all
I want
Is you
--U2

It began with five words.

So, courtship. You may wonder, like I did, what the heck that means. A few months ago I was party to a conversation about courtship where it was described as "dating with purpose." That purpose, of course, being marriage. (Isn't that always the purpose of dating, you ask? Tragically... it most certainly is not.) Six years ago, all I knew was that "courtship" meant that I was not allowed to ask out a certain delightful young lady without first consulting her father. That conversation went about as well as you might expect.
"Do you know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior?"
"Uh... no..."
That was sure over quick. But this courtship thing had me intrigued. Maybe it was because when I met this girl I had recently come out of a breakup. I did not need any convincing that the practice of dating has an enormous capacity for confusion, for deceit, and for pain. A number of my married friends have mentioned how horrible they think dating is and how relieved they are that it is over. Single people seem to just except it as a necessary means to an end. But what if you could skip all that? What if it could be over before it begins? Sign me up for THAT. How hard could this "Christian" thing be?

So I started reading the Bible. By this point, I had already accepted the existence God, because the whole situation was so ridiculous that I was convinced that there just had to be a higher power that was screwing with me. I started going to churches and was invited to join a Bible study group. I had grown up believing that Christians were simply not very bright people who just believed the nonsense that their parents had taught them. It had never once occurred to me that an intelligent person who had not been raised in a Christian environment would actually convert to Christianity. But I found that there was far more depth to it all than I ever could have imagined. And I met actual intelligent, thinking people who still believed in all this. I started a website to record my thoughts and experiences, which later became a blog. The Pastor at one of the churches that I visited gave a convincing argument about the necessity of publicly accepting Christ, and I was one of the ones who went forward. I started seeing and hearing references to baptism all around, so I did that too. I stopped playing my music, because it was ever so depressing, and I was caught up in the idea that life does not have to be so bad.

That girl was long gone now, but that was okay. I was still learning, and I figured that if this was really meant to happen, then God would bring us back together when I was ready. Wouldn't that make for an amazing story? Besides, I knew where she had gone: Cal Poly Pomona.

If you go to church long enough, you get involved in the lifestyle, you learn all the lingo, and no one even thinks to ask if you are really a believer. Of course I did not want to advertise that I was still a "seeker", and I certainly did not want anyone to know that I was really doing all this because of a girl. I figured that one day, I would get it all sorted out, and once I had arrived at a happy ending, I could finally tell the whole story. Then I met another girl. I was not looking to meet anyone, and certainly had no interest in dating, because I already had my plan all set. But I had to admit that she was ever so intriguing.

I transfered to Cal Poly Pomona myself. In the very first week, I saw that girl who had started it all. She was holding hands with another guy. At least, I thought that it was her. I did not get a real clear look... and I had kind of forgotten what she looked like? Even so, I died a little that day. But I also thought of it as a warning to not let that other girl get away. So we dated. It was more good than bad. I was able to be more honest with her than I had been with anyone since I started going to church. I finally was not afraid to share my struggles about God with someone. But what about courtship? What about that happy ending to my amazing story? I had set that aside, but I had not let it go. I remember one day, I fasted and prayed like they tell you to do, I went for a long walk and asked God if it was really right for me to be with this girl or if that other one, who I may or may not have seen, who had reached almost legendary status in my mind, was really still out there somewhere. Two days later my girlfriend ended the relationship.

Then my life proceeded to burn to the ground. My mother died, then my grandfather. My grandmother would later follow. I hated my school and had completely lost interest in my major. In spite of all my talk and all my time in various ministries, I still did not actually believe in the Bible. I was putting on a charade to everyone I met. All I cared about anymore was that girl, not that first one, I mean the real girl, the one that I had never appreciated and never fully committed to when I had the chance. Our relationship had unofficially rekindled for awhile, but she had long since she made it clear that that could not continue. I started to get violent and destructive around my house. I spent a lot of time just lying on the floor.

Eventually, I reached a point where I absolutely could not go on any longer. Yet, somehow, it occurred to me that for all the time and effort I had spent studying Christianity and learning about Jesus, I had never tried to actually trust Jesus. When I finally reached the bitter end, I cried out to Jesus... and I kept walking. Things did change. Life did not exactly get better, in fact, for a while it became significantly more dramatic. But I had a strange peace about it. I started going to two more Bible studies. (Making it three a week.) I blogged up a storm in those days (at least compared to my usual output), finally clearing out a lot of the baggage that I had been carrying for years. For the first time, I fully confronted my feelings about that original girl, who started this whole journey. I was somewhat surprised to discover that there was not anything there. There had NEVER been anything real there. I described at the time that I felt like I had been carrying around a piece of baggage for years, only to look inside and find it completely empty. Moving on from my real love was not so easy, but I finally was able to do so. I finally was able to admit that there were other women in my life that I could see myself in a relationship with. There was one in particular that I honestly felt as though God was DARING me to ask out. So ask her out I did. She was not interested.

What the Hell, God? What the bloody Hell? Alright, so I had made the wrong choice there. But at least I was back in the game right? But no, I was not. I realized that I was still selling my dreams short. Five words: "We don't date we court." I have no interest in casual dating. I want an honest, permanent relationship.

It became clear to me that it was my desire to get married that interfered with my honest search for God. My father once asked me what made me "want to believe" in Christianity. I do not recall now what answer I gave him. However, "wanting" to believe was never really the issue. I simply needed it to be true in order to accomplish my goal, and therefore, the fact that deep down I did not actually believe it could never be acknowledged. I also began to feel very strongly that several passages in the New Testament actually discourage Christians from marriage, indicating that marriage and family interfere with one's obligations to spread the Gospel.

So, in order to achieve (my understanding of) a "Godly" marriage that I had sought for so long, I first had to pursue God. In order to pursue God, I first had to give up my desire for marriage. I turned this over and around for some time before finally, in a sudden fit of maturity, I declared, "Well fine! How about if I just don't do either then!"

And to this day, I haven't.

The final straw came when my grandmother died. I was still in a Bible study at the time, and as with my mother and grandfather, there was always someone who asked if they knew the Lord. I always tried to dodge that question as best I could, partly because I simply did not know the answer, but mainly because deep in my heart, I honestly do not believe that it makes any difference. That being the case, and that point being the fundamental basis of Christianity, then nothing else about my church involvement means anything at all.

There has always been a great emptiness in my life. Christians sometimes refer to it as a "God-shaped hole." At various stages in my life, I tried to fill it with alcohol, with love relationships, with music, with MORE alcohol, with education, and finally, with God. And I have to say (and I think that any long time reader of my blog would have to agree) that my search for God has left me every bit as empty and despairing as any of the others.

I'm not saying that I do not believe in God, and I am not going to go on record saying that the Bible definitely is not true, because I can not be sure of that. There certainly is a lot of truth to be found in it, but one would expect that in such an extensive body of work. I would imagine that there is also a great deal of truth to be found in the collected works of Shakespeare, but that does not mean that the stories themselves are true, even if many are based on actual historic figures. Still, there are many things that I can not explain. A great many things really. In the past, it was easy to say that bizarre circumstances were the work of God, because that is what all of the people around me would say. Maybe they really were, I do not know. All I know is that I have long since grown tired of hearing the name "Jesus," when I have never experienced that relationship of which others speak. These Christians, they tell such wonderful stories... but ultimately, I do not believe that there are real answers to be found here. I just pretended that I did in order to get to what to I really wanted.

I began formulating this post because I was asking myself, "Why are you still here?" I do not really go to church anymore, but I still work in ministry. I still occasionally have conversations about God and I probably too readily give my interpretation of Bible passages while conveniently leaving out that I do not actually consider the Bible to be authoritative. Why am I here? Going back now I realize that from those five words to the "God-shaped hole", all of this, all of it, has been simply because I did not want to be alone.

And how has that worked out for you?

Not. So. Well.

Waking Up

2009-02-11T05:52:00.000-08:00

Six Fingered Man: I have just sucked one year of your life away. [...] How do you feel?
Westley: [Whimpering moan].
Six Fingered Man: Interesting.
--The Princess Bride

Did I honestly spend an entire year doing absolutely nothing productive? That just can not be. "What about [this]?" I ask. But that was at the end of 2007. "Well how about [that], that was like, last summer, right?" Checking my records... January 2008.
No... just NO.

And the worse part is, it's not even the first time.
Some days you wake up with your head in a cloud
And when you look up, a whole year's gone by.
Some days you wake up from living underground
And when you go out, the sun spits in your eye

...But it's alright
It's alright.
Some days are like that.
--Less is More

I was out and about on Monday (which is highly unusual, because normally after working all weekend, I do not feel like leaving the house for a day or two... or five), and I was thinking about how, in the beginning, I felt compelled to start visiting churches; felt that I was led by God to be baptized, to pick a permanent "home" church, and other things like go to New Orleans. I have not felt anything like that for a very long time. I idly wondered when exactly I stopped feeling "led by God." I sort of thought it was a rhetorical question, it was one of those things that just slowly fades away. Then later in the day, it suddenly occurred to me, Gee, ya think maybe it was when you felt "led" to abstain from marriage, and you basically told God to "eff off"? Are you ever going to finish that story?

Oh right, THAT. I started to write something a few months back but never finished the thought. I have now posted what I had written so far, with my best guess at a back-date.