I'd forgotten how good it felt to write a song. Welll, it's only 75% done. It needs one more verse, but MAN, to get the chorus just right, the guitar hook, a clever verse with a nifty rhyme scheme - MAN! :) It doesn't get much better than that. I was sitting around after work Friday night and wrote two verses and a chorus about the moment you realize whatever it is you realize. I use a 7th chord to express irony. HA! Music is so cooll.
There've been songs that took me years to finish. Some came out complete in minutes - a pure gift. The best is when you've been struggling to make sense of something, you can't even explain it to yourself, and then it happens. You get it all right in a verse or two and tie it alll together. aaahhhhhhhh.
God is good to me. I like this talent. It's when I get out of His way and get out of my own way and let things happen that He really works through me, and that's a neat feeling.
Sunday 28 October 2007
Tuesday 23 October 2007
The Devil and Daniel Johnston
If you haven't seen it, go rent it yesterday.
My dad has been telling me about this movie he saw about an artist who came up in the late 70's, grew up in rural West Virginia attending the Church of Christ with his family and just couldn't help himself, he was such an artist. Drawing, songwriting, film-making, he was brilliant. He's a genius due not in part to his bipolar disorder. The movie documented his inability to finish college and how one night he joined the circus! and in 1985 ended up in Austin, Texas and got a job at McDonald's but became a legend on the scene by giving out tapes (CASSETTES) that he produced on his own little old-skool recorder. He got on MTV (back when it was actually cool and not a skin-a-thon network) A few years later Kurt Cobain started wearing a T-shirt he received as a gift that Johnston had drawn for someone else years prior, he wore it EVERYWHERE, and that created buzz about the guy all over again. From there the story just gets nuts and you can't believe it's all really someone's life. He'd go off his meds and just do crazy, damaging, self-defeating, stuff. Poor tortured soul, ranting about Satan and the number 9.
Anyway, bless his heart, I really wanna go see him live now. He still plays, though he's always been raw. Lots of neat indie bands have covered his stuff. Man, I wanna be some nutjob whose songs get covered by neat indie bands! :)
My dad has been telling me about this movie he saw about an artist who came up in the late 70's, grew up in rural West Virginia attending the Church of Christ with his family and just couldn't help himself, he was such an artist. Drawing, songwriting, film-making, he was brilliant. He's a genius due not in part to his bipolar disorder. The movie documented his inability to finish college and how one night he joined the circus! and in 1985 ended up in Austin, Texas and got a job at McDonald's but became a legend on the scene by giving out tapes (CASSETTES) that he produced on his own little old-skool recorder. He got on MTV (back when it was actually cool and not a skin-a-thon network) A few years later Kurt Cobain started wearing a T-shirt he received as a gift that Johnston had drawn for someone else years prior, he wore it EVERYWHERE, and that created buzz about the guy all over again. From there the story just gets nuts and you can't believe it's all really someone's life. He'd go off his meds and just do crazy, damaging, self-defeating, stuff. Poor tortured soul, ranting about Satan and the number 9.
Anyway, bless his heart, I really wanna go see him live now. He still plays, though he's always been raw. Lots of neat indie bands have covered his stuff. Man, I wanna be some nutjob whose songs get covered by neat indie bands! :)
Sunday 30 September 2007
To Be Content...
Is that what it's all about? To be content, no matter your circumstances, is what it means to really be okay with yourself, inside and out. To not mind or have to matter or take it personally or complain but just be thankful for the hand the good Lord dealt ya. We are commanded to be content but it sure slips right by me most of the time. Something I must work on, day to day, hour to hour, second to second. One day at a time. "To be content...". There it is.
An old friend I worked with at Saks couldn't help but mantra-ize on the phrase, "To Be Obedient". This was during one of our reflecting sessions in the food court at the mall as we couldn't help but distinguish ourselves from the co-workers and customers whose lives resolved around acquiring that next piece of Gucci. Our faith in God pulled us through those feelings of poverty and oppression while we were surrounded by frivolous consumption and luxury obsession. We wanted to prove our faith to God through our obedience to Him by not worshiping at the golden alter of the new fall line. "To be obedient..." There it is.
Am now realizing a new found contentment with my current state of mind vs the last one, one that seemed so preferable, but viewing it now as the prism breaks the light, I can see its folly and delusion. Everyone (even the liars, haha) considers themselves an honest person. I wouldn't lie or cheat or steal from anyone, so I must be honest. But boy can I betray my own self. Empty prayers and broken promises are sent up for me and made by me evvvvery day. It needs to stop. The only person it's hurting more than myself is God, because He's the only one who truly understands how badly I'm mistreating myself. Maybe it's ironic that I've always been competitive, because now it seems like I'm out to secure defeat of myself. If it's not one thing, it's another - this is how it goes. Shall I dare call it by its true name? There it is.
An old friend I worked with at Saks couldn't help but mantra-ize on the phrase, "To Be Obedient". This was during one of our reflecting sessions in the food court at the mall as we couldn't help but distinguish ourselves from the co-workers and customers whose lives resolved around acquiring that next piece of Gucci. Our faith in God pulled us through those feelings of poverty and oppression while we were surrounded by frivolous consumption and luxury obsession. We wanted to prove our faith to God through our obedience to Him by not worshiping at the golden alter of the new fall line. "To be obedient..." There it is.
Am now realizing a new found contentment with my current state of mind vs the last one, one that seemed so preferable, but viewing it now as the prism breaks the light, I can see its folly and delusion. Everyone (even the liars, haha) considers themselves an honest person. I wouldn't lie or cheat or steal from anyone, so I must be honest. But boy can I betray my own self. Empty prayers and broken promises are sent up for me and made by me evvvvery day. It needs to stop. The only person it's hurting more than myself is God, because He's the only one who truly understands how badly I'm mistreating myself. Maybe it's ironic that I've always been competitive, because now it seems like I'm out to secure defeat of myself. If it's not one thing, it's another - this is how it goes. Shall I dare call it by its true name? There it is.
Saturday 8 September 2007
Feelings
Feelings are powerful things. Completely irrational and overwhelming. The thing about feelings is that you can't just read about what it's like, you can't listen to a friend's description and get a good idea - you have to FEEL it yourself and only then will you understand. I remember the first time I kissed a boy I actually really liked - it felt completely different from the regular perfunctory kiss with someone I was lukewarm about. When I experience any sort of emotion, it's STRONG, all or nothing. When I'd finally let myself fall in love, and then of course got my heart ripped out, it was the best thing that had ever happened to me because it made me a more complete human being. It allowed me to identify much more with all those songs on the radio that seemed so pathetic before. Having a broken heart isn't pathetic at all - it just deepens the human experience. To me, if you've never been hurt, you haven't really lived. It's something everyone should experience. I lived too long trying to shelter myself from it, and it didn't get me anywhere.
Artists specialize in attempting to express these crazy emotion things through their various mediums, which sucks for them, cause the general population doesn't feel as deeply as they do so their work goes unappreciated. Music is probably the most accessible of all artistic mediums, because most folks need words to tell them what a feeling is about. Most (and I'm really not trying to sound condescending) don't wander in to a museum and look at sculptures or paintings and seek to identify with shapes and colors or whatevah. Songwriters, if they want to make money at it, have to generalize their lyrics so as many people as possible can relate. This felt like prostitution at first to me, but then it occurred to me that I'm just summing up in a verse what people are feeling but don't know how to express. My friend Allison said there's some song I've written (it's sad I can't even remember which one!) that expresses emotion that oozes out of her bones but would never be able to put into words. That made me feel good. I guess it depends for me, whether I'm writing the song for my own out-letting of emotional junk or if I'm just telling a story. When I wrote "Tear After Tear", I imagined a young, naive girl who'd had her heart broken by a dashing dirtbag and made it as melodramatic and sad as possible, because that's what a good country song is. I also imagined Dolly Parton's voice the whole time cause she's beyond fabulous.
Did any of this make sense? It was kind of all over the place. Art is pretty stinking cool. I was intimidated by other mediums before (like photography, painting, sculpture, ballet, etc), because like many people, I was sure I didn't get it, that my reaction would be wrong. But any artist will tell you that all they want is a reaction, no matter what kind. It may not be what they intended, but every piece of art is meant to be thought-provoking or emotionally charged. It means what you want it to. When the artist finishes a piece and puts it out there, it belongs to everyone. Some are more protective of their work than others, but all are just funneling an idea or situation into something that makes sense for them, and if they're lucky, it might help someone else understand themselves a little bit better. All too often, we walk around frustrated and don't know why - then we hear a song or see an image that calms us a little bit because out there somewhere, someone else has felt the same way. God put us all here, billions of unique individuals, for each other, and finding common ground can be thing that makes our own battles a little easier to fight each day.
Artists specialize in attempting to express these crazy emotion things through their various mediums, which sucks for them, cause the general population doesn't feel as deeply as they do so their work goes unappreciated. Music is probably the most accessible of all artistic mediums, because most folks need words to tell them what a feeling is about. Most (and I'm really not trying to sound condescending) don't wander in to a museum and look at sculptures or paintings and seek to identify with shapes and colors or whatevah. Songwriters, if they want to make money at it, have to generalize their lyrics so as many people as possible can relate. This felt like prostitution at first to me, but then it occurred to me that I'm just summing up in a verse what people are feeling but don't know how to express. My friend Allison said there's some song I've written (it's sad I can't even remember which one!) that expresses emotion that oozes out of her bones but would never be able to put into words. That made me feel good. I guess it depends for me, whether I'm writing the song for my own out-letting of emotional junk or if I'm just telling a story. When I wrote "Tear After Tear", I imagined a young, naive girl who'd had her heart broken by a dashing dirtbag and made it as melodramatic and sad as possible, because that's what a good country song is. I also imagined Dolly Parton's voice the whole time cause she's beyond fabulous.
Did any of this make sense? It was kind of all over the place. Art is pretty stinking cool. I was intimidated by other mediums before (like photography, painting, sculpture, ballet, etc), because like many people, I was sure I didn't get it, that my reaction would be wrong. But any artist will tell you that all they want is a reaction, no matter what kind. It may not be what they intended, but every piece of art is meant to be thought-provoking or emotionally charged. It means what you want it to. When the artist finishes a piece and puts it out there, it belongs to everyone. Some are more protective of their work than others, but all are just funneling an idea or situation into something that makes sense for them, and if they're lucky, it might help someone else understand themselves a little bit better. All too often, we walk around frustrated and don't know why - then we hear a song or see an image that calms us a little bit because out there somewhere, someone else has felt the same way. God put us all here, billions of unique individuals, for each other, and finding common ground can be thing that makes our own battles a little easier to fight each day.
Friday 20 July 2007
There's Nothing Like...
- going home
- a hug from a teammate when the whistle blows and you know you all won because of each other
- a look across a crowded room
- missing a tackle and hearing the crowd go "awwww!"
- or, making an impossible catch and hearing the crowd go "whooaaaaa!"
- finishing a song, especially one that'd been floating around your heard for a couple years
- taking your shoes and socks off after a loooonnnng day working outside
- the first plunge into a cold swimming pool without dipping your toe in first
- the moment someone gets baptized and comes up out of the water
- running the Bleep Test (against someone better than you so you just can't let yourself stop)
- the Florida Gator football team charging into the Swamp from the tunnel (AAAHHHHH!)
- a tearful talk with Momma
- holding hands with the boy you like (it's my thing)
- executing a run perfectly in a piano piece - you could be alone, it doesn't matter
- hearing my Daddy and Aunt Ann talk about food, the excitement in their voices
- multiple-hour roadtrips alone (again, my thing)
- the crack of a baseball bat
- Louis Armstrong's voice
- clean sheets, a big dump and a rock-hard alibi (Kids In the Hall reference...)
- the shudder that comes from thinking back on something he did
- opening the mailbox to find a REAL letter from someone who cared enough to WRITE it, STAMP it, and SEND it
- smelling rain before it comes, watching it fall, and hearing it on your roof and windows
- being chased through pine trees in pitch-black darkness by a herd of angry cows
- the smell of dew on cowcrap in the morning (yes, the very same cows, and yes, I mean I like it)
- when someone calls and says they put your CD in and it put them in a good mood
- getting wrapped in a warm blanket in a cold hospital room
- realizing how alive you are when you reflect on the fact that you're playing rugby while you are in fact playing it
- blocking a kick with your FACE and scoring a try :)
- the happy squeals of children's laughter
- when your dad says he's proud of you
- riding a bike down a steep hill and not braking at all (weeeeee)
- when the boy I'm hitting on laughs at my stupid jokes
- crossing stuff off the list
- the tug of a fish's bite on your line
- spontaneously sitting down at a piano and entertaining a group of unsuspecting bystanders for the sport of it
- feeling satiated
- a hug from a teammate when the whistle blows and you know you all won because of each other
- a look across a crowded room
- missing a tackle and hearing the crowd go "awwww!"
- or, making an impossible catch and hearing the crowd go "whooaaaaa!"
- finishing a song, especially one that'd been floating around your heard for a couple years
- taking your shoes and socks off after a loooonnnng day working outside
- the first plunge into a cold swimming pool without dipping your toe in first
- the moment someone gets baptized and comes up out of the water
- running the Bleep Test (against someone better than you so you just can't let yourself stop)
- the Florida Gator football team charging into the Swamp from the tunnel (AAAHHHHH!)
- a tearful talk with Momma
- holding hands with the boy you like (it's my thing)
- executing a run perfectly in a piano piece - you could be alone, it doesn't matter
- hearing my Daddy and Aunt Ann talk about food, the excitement in their voices
- multiple-hour roadtrips alone (again, my thing)
- the crack of a baseball bat
- Louis Armstrong's voice
- clean sheets, a big dump and a rock-hard alibi (Kids In the Hall reference...)
- the shudder that comes from thinking back on something he did
- opening the mailbox to find a REAL letter from someone who cared enough to WRITE it, STAMP it, and SEND it
- smelling rain before it comes, watching it fall, and hearing it on your roof and windows
- being chased through pine trees in pitch-black darkness by a herd of angry cows
- the smell of dew on cowcrap in the morning (yes, the very same cows, and yes, I mean I like it)
- when someone calls and says they put your CD in and it put them in a good mood
- getting wrapped in a warm blanket in a cold hospital room
- realizing how alive you are when you reflect on the fact that you're playing rugby while you are in fact playing it
- blocking a kick with your FACE and scoring a try :)
- the happy squeals of children's laughter
- when your dad says he's proud of you
- riding a bike down a steep hill and not braking at all (weeeeee)
- when the boy I'm hitting on laughs at my stupid jokes
- crossing stuff off the list
- the tug of a fish's bite on your line
- spontaneously sitting down at a piano and entertaining a group of unsuspecting bystanders for the sport of it
- feeling satiated
Saturday 14 July 2007
Bayou La Batre, Alabama
Am living in a little camper Dustin (our intern preacher for the summer who is from West Monroe, La.) named "Lil' Mimi" that has a "3" sticker with angel wings on the front window. If you don't know what that means go back to Redneck School. I am quite proud of it. :) Since I'm the only female permanent worker (apart from Miss Daphne, the matriarch of Bayou Recovery Project), I get one all to myself! My first day saw me riding around from jobsite to jobsite delivering various tools or supplies with another volunteer here who lives at "Bayou Estates" (our fancy name for the group of trailors set up by the Community Center), John. He's from Dublin, Ga. but knows how to properly pronounce "Na'orrlins". He's Baptist (i.e. alcoholic) - he says where there's four Baptists there's a fifth. So he got excited when I said I wanted to get some gigs around the area, so we drove down to Dauphin Island and over to Rodney's here on the Bayou, which is mainly a seafood house (STINKY) but has a lil honky-tonk. Mr. Rodney was all about it, wants to have a big boil and me the featured entertainment. I went and got my guitar and played for the guys in there - made $3!!! :P Miss Daphne got there and was a little miffed at us for being at a jook, knowing John was upstairs drinking with the locals and here I am this nice Christian girl playing music for heathens. Such is life for a musician. She said if I got mixed up with any of the boys who hang out there she'd send me home to my momma, haha. AS IF. Frankly if I meet another nice (or otherwise) boy (with long legs, plays rugby and/or wears glasses) it'll be waaaaay too soon, UGH. After that we went back down to the beach at Dauphin Island and played and kicked the rugby ball (Ugh, Jr.!) and swam and all that. It was good for my soul cause I got some bad news this afternoon, which is just one of those things where God knows better than you but you want what you want so you have to pout a little bit but then just put it in perspective and understand that God wouldn't take something away from you if He didn't plan on giving you something way better. I truly believe that.
The next six weeks will be interesting. It's definitely time for me to re-focus on my faith. I've allowed myself to become distracted during the first part of the summer. It's scary how quickly and easily that can happen. I once heard in a Sunday School class (taught by Don Keefer in Raleigh, N.C. actually) that your faith is like a big rock you have to continually push up the hill and as soon as you stop pushing, it'll roll back on you and you'll regress. It's my prayer that I can do something constructive with my time down here and grow spiritually. There's definitely A LOT of work to be done, so it's time to focus and finish.
The next six weeks will be interesting. It's definitely time for me to re-focus on my faith. I've allowed myself to become distracted during the first part of the summer. It's scary how quickly and easily that can happen. I once heard in a Sunday School class (taught by Don Keefer in Raleigh, N.C. actually) that your faith is like a big rock you have to continually push up the hill and as soon as you stop pushing, it'll roll back on you and you'll regress. It's my prayer that I can do something constructive with my time down here and grow spiritually. There's definitely A LOT of work to be done, so it's time to focus and finish.
Wednesday 11 July 2007
In a Word, What Happened?
Uh, was it "romance"?
Would I recognize it if it fell out of the sky and brushed my hair away from my face? Is it when the water rushes over your feet as you balance against each other while sinking in wet sand? Is it "romantic" when he unexpectedly takes your hand at precisely the correct moment? Would I know if it pushed me over when I wasn't looking? What do you call it when you lock eyes across the room and smile? When it's no big deal? Not some earth-shattering, cosmic event, but what was it exactly? Is it "romantic" to try to live one day as a complete life together (i.e. For Whom the Bell Tolls) with a clean-cut end and beginning? I don't know what it was. It was neat, I know that much. What's the word when you both have the same thing in mind? (SportsCenter!) Is it "romantic" to recognize that you like someone when he's kissing you? And maybe genuine when you haven't decided to try not to care in the face of uncertainty? Uh...do I care? Uh huh. What is "romance" anyway? How does it happen between two innocent people? Does recognition of it spawn the feeling of fondness, or does the fondness spawn romance's recognition? Is it the big picture or all the little things? Is the "romance" magnified by the fleeting nature of each passing moment? What makes it possible? Do you recognize it when you're in it, or does that break the spell? Is "romance" a concept that cannot be processed until after the moment has passed? Is it simply being overwhelmed by an experience with another like-minded individual? Can it only occur between two people who feel exactly the same amount for each other? What the heck is it anyway? Can it be intellectualized the way I'm trying to do right now, or is "romance" only an intangible, irrational feeling - only maybe tangible in the way one tugs at a shirt or hair or pulls you toward him or touches your face? I don't know. What happened? Can it only happen in the absence of fear? Maybe I'm past thinking I'm immune, past the fear, so it could be entirely possible it happened to me. If Webster defines it as derivatives of a dead language or my favorite period of piano music, I understand those, can wrap my mind around them. But what is this essence of feeling/experience - was it one moment or a series of moments? Is it romantic to say exactly what you think or feel at that precise moment to the object of your focus? Is "romantic" what you call it?
romance
c.1300, "story of a hero's adventures," also (c.1330), "vernacular language of France" (as opposed to Latin), from O.Fr. romanz "verse narrative," originally an adverb, "in the vernacular language," from V.L. *romanice scribere "to write in a Romance language" (one developed from Latin instead of Frankish), from L. Romanicus "of or in the Roman style," from Romanus "Roman" (see Roman). The connecting notion is that medieval vernacular tales were usually about chivalric adventure. Literary sense extended by 1667 to "a love story." Extended 1612 to other modern languages derived from Latin (Spanish, Italian, etc.). Meaning "adventurous quality" first recorded 1801; that of "love affair, idealistic quality" is from 1916. The verb meaning "court as a lover" is from 1942.
ro·mance1 /n., adj. roʊˈmæns, ˈroʊmæns; v. roʊˈmæns/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[n., adj. roh-mans, roh-mans; v. roh-mans] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation noun, verb, -manced, -manc·ing, adjective
–noun 1. a novel or other prose narrative depicting heroic or marvelous deeds, pageantry, romantic exploits, etc., usually in a historical or imaginary setting.
2. the colorful world, life, or conditions depicted in such tales.
3. a medieval narrative, originally one in verse and in some Romance dialect, treating of heroic, fantastic, or supernatural events, often in the form of allegory.
4. a baseless, made-up story, usually full of exaggeration or fanciful invention.
5. a romantic spirit, sentiment, emotion, or desire.
6. romantic character or quality.
7. a romantic affair or experience; a love affair.
8. (initial capital letter) Also, Romanic. Also called Romance languages. the group of Italic Indo-European languages descended since a.d. 800 from Latin, as French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Provençal, Catalan, Rhaeto-Romanic, Sardinian, and Ladino. Abbreviation: Rom.
–verb (used without object) 9. to invent or relate romances; indulge in fanciful or extravagant stories or daydreams.
10. to think or talk romantically.
–verb (used with object) 11. Informal. a. to court or woo romantically; treat with ardor or chivalrousness: He's currently romancing a very attractive widow.
b. to court the favor of or make overtures to; play up to: They need to romance the local business community if they expect to do business here.
romance2 [rəˈmans] noun
a story about such a relationship etc, especially one in which the people, events etc are more exciting etc than in normal life; Music A lyrical, tender, usually sentimental song or short instrumental piece; A love affair. 1. Music. a short, simple melody, vocal or instrumental, of tender character.
2. Spanish Literature. a short epic poem, esp. a historical ballad.
Ardent emotional attachment or involvement between people;
A strong, sometimes short-lived attachment, fascination, or enthusiasm for something: a childhood romance with the sea.
an exciting and mysterious quality (noun); talk or behave amorously, without serious intentions (verb)
The term romance has also been used for stories of mysterious adventures, not necessarily of heroes. Like the heroic kind of romance, however, these adventure romances usually are set in distant places. William Shakespeare's play The Tempest is this kind of romance.
Thesaurus
Definition: love affair
Synonyms: affair, amour, attachment, carrying on, courtship, enchantment, fairy tale, fascination, fling, flirtation, goings-on, hanky-panky, intrigue, liaison, love, love story, passion, playing around, relationship, thing together
Definition: love book
Synonyms: ballad, fairy tale, fantasy, fiction, idealization, idyll, legend, love story, lyric, melodrama, novel, story, tale, tear-jerker*
Definition: adventure
Synonyms: charm, color, excitement, exoticness, fairy tale, fancy, fantasy, fascination, glamour, hazard, idealization, idyll, mystery, nostalgia, risk, sentiment, venture
Definition: relationship
Synonyms: affaire, amour, carrying on*, extracurricular activity*, fling, goings-on*, hanky-panky*, intimacy, intrigue, liaison, love, matinee, nooner, playing around*, relationship, rendezvous, romance, thing together*, two-timing*
Definition: teasing
Synonyms: amour, coquetry, courting, cruising, dalliance, flirting, intrique, love, love affair, philandering, pickup*, romance, romancing, tease, teasing, toying*, trifling*
Synonyms: allure, allurement, animal magnetism, appeal, attraction, bewitchment, charisma, charm, color, enchantment, fascination, interest, magnetism, prestige, ravishment, razzle-dazzle*, romance, star quality, style, witchery
Definition: monkey business
Synonyms: amour, dalliance, dirty pool, fling, flirtation, fooling around, funny business*, hankie-pankie, hokey-pokey, liaison, love affair, mischief, romance, sexual activity, trickery
Definition: affair
Synonyms: amour, attachment, case, flirtation, infatuation, interlude, intimacy, liaison, romance
I still don't get it.
I'm starting to understand that the further I get away from it, the more removed I am from it, the more I attempt to cling to threads of shreds of memories of it, the more it sucks. I wish I could see him again.
From For Whom The Bell Tolls:
"But in the meantime all the life you have or ever will have is today, tonight, tomorrow, today, tonight, tomorrow over and over again (I hope), he thought and so you had better take what time there is and be very thankful for it..."
"...wanted to make the point that you must make your whole life in two nights that are given to you; that living as we do now you must concentrate all of that which you should always have into the short time that you have it."
"Dying was nothing and he had no picture of it nor fear of it in his mind. But living was a field of grain blowing in the wind on the side of a hill. Living was a hawk in the sky. Living was an earthen jar of water in the dust of the threshing with the grain flailed out and the chaff blowing. Living was a horse between your legs and a carbine under one leg and a hill and a valley and a stream with trees along it and the far side of the valley and the hills beyond."
"If this was how it was then this was how it was. But there was no law that made him say he liked it. I did not know that I could ever feel what I have felt, he thought. Nor that this could happen to me. I would like to have it my whole life. You will, the other part of him said. You will. You have it now and that is all your life is; now. There is nothing else than now. There is neither yesterday, certainly, nor is there any tomorrow. How old must you be before you know that? There is only now, and if now is only two days, then two days is your life and everything in it will be in proportion. This is how you live a life in two days. And if you stop complaining and asking for what you will never get, you will have a good life. A good life is not measured by any Biblical span."
Would I recognize it if it fell out of the sky and brushed my hair away from my face? Is it when the water rushes over your feet as you balance against each other while sinking in wet sand? Is it "romantic" when he unexpectedly takes your hand at precisely the correct moment? Would I know if it pushed me over when I wasn't looking? What do you call it when you lock eyes across the room and smile? When it's no big deal? Not some earth-shattering, cosmic event, but what was it exactly? Is it "romantic" to try to live one day as a complete life together (i.e. For Whom the Bell Tolls) with a clean-cut end and beginning? I don't know what it was. It was neat, I know that much. What's the word when you both have the same thing in mind? (SportsCenter!) Is it "romantic" to recognize that you like someone when he's kissing you? And maybe genuine when you haven't decided to try not to care in the face of uncertainty? Uh...do I care? Uh huh. What is "romance" anyway? How does it happen between two innocent people? Does recognition of it spawn the feeling of fondness, or does the fondness spawn romance's recognition? Is it the big picture or all the little things? Is the "romance" magnified by the fleeting nature of each passing moment? What makes it possible? Do you recognize it when you're in it, or does that break the spell? Is "romance" a concept that cannot be processed until after the moment has passed? Is it simply being overwhelmed by an experience with another like-minded individual? Can it only occur between two people who feel exactly the same amount for each other? What the heck is it anyway? Can it be intellectualized the way I'm trying to do right now, or is "romance" only an intangible, irrational feeling - only maybe tangible in the way one tugs at a shirt or hair or pulls you toward him or touches your face? I don't know. What happened? Can it only happen in the absence of fear? Maybe I'm past thinking I'm immune, past the fear, so it could be entirely possible it happened to me. If Webster defines it as derivatives of a dead language or my favorite period of piano music, I understand those, can wrap my mind around them. But what is this essence of feeling/experience - was it one moment or a series of moments? Is it romantic to say exactly what you think or feel at that precise moment to the object of your focus? Is "romantic" what you call it?
romance
c.1300, "story of a hero's adventures," also (c.1330), "vernacular language of France" (as opposed to Latin), from O.Fr. romanz "verse narrative," originally an adverb, "in the vernacular language," from V.L. *romanice scribere "to write in a Romance language" (one developed from Latin instead of Frankish), from L. Romanicus "of or in the Roman style," from Romanus "Roman" (see Roman). The connecting notion is that medieval vernacular tales were usually about chivalric adventure. Literary sense extended by 1667 to "a love story." Extended 1612 to other modern languages derived from Latin (Spanish, Italian, etc.). Meaning "adventurous quality" first recorded 1801; that of "love affair, idealistic quality" is from 1916. The verb meaning "court as a lover" is from 1942.
ro·mance1 /n., adj. roʊˈmæns, ˈroʊmæns; v. roʊˈmæns/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[n., adj. roh-mans, roh-mans; v. roh-mans] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation noun, verb, -manced, -manc·ing, adjective
–noun 1. a novel or other prose narrative depicting heroic or marvelous deeds, pageantry, romantic exploits, etc., usually in a historical or imaginary setting.
2. the colorful world, life, or conditions depicted in such tales.
3. a medieval narrative, originally one in verse and in some Romance dialect, treating of heroic, fantastic, or supernatural events, often in the form of allegory.
4. a baseless, made-up story, usually full of exaggeration or fanciful invention.
5. a romantic spirit, sentiment, emotion, or desire.
6. romantic character or quality.
7. a romantic affair or experience; a love affair.
8. (initial capital letter) Also, Romanic. Also called Romance languages. the group of Italic Indo-European languages descended since a.d. 800 from Latin, as French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Provençal, Catalan, Rhaeto-Romanic, Sardinian, and Ladino. Abbreviation: Rom.
–verb (used without object) 9. to invent or relate romances; indulge in fanciful or extravagant stories or daydreams.
10. to think or talk romantically.
–verb (used with object) 11. Informal. a. to court or woo romantically; treat with ardor or chivalrousness: He's currently romancing a very attractive widow.
b. to court the favor of or make overtures to; play up to: They need to romance the local business community if they expect to do business here.
romance2 [rəˈmans] noun
a story about such a relationship etc, especially one in which the people, events etc are more exciting etc than in normal life; Music A lyrical, tender, usually sentimental song or short instrumental piece; A love affair. 1. Music. a short, simple melody, vocal or instrumental, of tender character.
2. Spanish Literature. a short epic poem, esp. a historical ballad.
Ardent emotional attachment or involvement between people;
A strong, sometimes short-lived attachment, fascination, or enthusiasm for something: a childhood romance with the sea.
an exciting and mysterious quality (noun); talk or behave amorously, without serious intentions (verb)
The term romance has also been used for stories of mysterious adventures, not necessarily of heroes. Like the heroic kind of romance, however, these adventure romances usually are set in distant places. William Shakespeare's play The Tempest is this kind of romance.
Thesaurus
Definition: love affair
Synonyms: affair, amour, attachment, carrying on, courtship, enchantment, fairy tale, fascination, fling, flirtation, goings-on, hanky-panky, intrigue, liaison, love, love story, passion, playing around, relationship, thing together
Definition: love book
Synonyms: ballad, fairy tale, fantasy, fiction, idealization, idyll, legend, love story, lyric, melodrama, novel, story, tale, tear-jerker*
Definition: adventure
Synonyms: charm, color, excitement, exoticness, fairy tale, fancy, fantasy, fascination, glamour, hazard, idealization, idyll, mystery, nostalgia, risk, sentiment, venture
Definition: relationship
Synonyms: affaire, amour, carrying on*, extracurricular activity*, fling, goings-on*, hanky-panky*, intimacy, intrigue, liaison, love, matinee, nooner, playing around*, relationship, rendezvous, romance, thing together*, two-timing*
Definition: teasing
Synonyms: amour, coquetry, courting, cruising, dalliance, flirting, intrique, love, love affair, philandering, pickup*, romance, romancing, tease, teasing, toying*, trifling*
Synonyms: allure, allurement, animal magnetism, appeal, attraction, bewitchment, charisma, charm, color, enchantment, fascination, interest, magnetism, prestige, ravishment, razzle-dazzle*, romance, star quality, style, witchery
Definition: monkey business
Synonyms: amour, dalliance, dirty pool, fling, flirtation, fooling around, funny business*, hankie-pankie, hokey-pokey, liaison, love affair, mischief, romance, sexual activity, trickery
Definition: affair
Synonyms: amour, attachment, case, flirtation, infatuation, interlude, intimacy, liaison, romance
I still don't get it.
I'm starting to understand that the further I get away from it, the more removed I am from it, the more I attempt to cling to threads of shreds of memories of it, the more it sucks. I wish I could see him again.
From For Whom The Bell Tolls:
"But in the meantime all the life you have or ever will have is today, tonight, tomorrow, today, tonight, tomorrow over and over again (I hope), he thought and so you had better take what time there is and be very thankful for it..."
"...wanted to make the point that you must make your whole life in two nights that are given to you; that living as we do now you must concentrate all of that which you should always have into the short time that you have it."
"Dying was nothing and he had no picture of it nor fear of it in his mind. But living was a field of grain blowing in the wind on the side of a hill. Living was a hawk in the sky. Living was an earthen jar of water in the dust of the threshing with the grain flailed out and the chaff blowing. Living was a horse between your legs and a carbine under one leg and a hill and a valley and a stream with trees along it and the far side of the valley and the hills beyond."
"If this was how it was then this was how it was. But there was no law that made him say he liked it. I did not know that I could ever feel what I have felt, he thought. Nor that this could happen to me. I would like to have it my whole life. You will, the other part of him said. You will. You have it now and that is all your life is; now. There is nothing else than now. There is neither yesterday, certainly, nor is there any tomorrow. How old must you be before you know that? There is only now, and if now is only two days, then two days is your life and everything in it will be in proportion. This is how you live a life in two days. And if you stop complaining and asking for what you will never get, you will have a good life. A good life is not measured by any Biblical span."
Wednesday 20 June 2007
HONDURAS
6/20/07
Will get on a bus from Gainesvile tonight and ride to Miami. Plane will depart early morning and supposedly arrive mid-afternoon in Tegucigalpa. But now, I ride to Gators Dockside to watch Carolina get revenge on Rice.
6/21/07
Almost lost my rugby ball (Ugh, Jr.) in the stream running through the church yard last night. Got wet and dirty but found her, smelled worse but it was worth it. Couldn't leave the country without my best girl! Rode all night on the bus. Tried to sleep on the floorboard, didn't really work out. Spilled my agua caliente all over Catherine Howell's blanket (a quadrant of it anyway). Got to Miami (after briefly getting lost then receiving directions from a drunk fellow who apparentlah smelled really bad) around 4:30. Hung out in the airport. MET THE COOLEST KID IN THE WORLD, Ben B. We played as hard as we could for as long as we could - I had to get on the plane at 9:15. He taught me how and why to eat boogers (HAHA, he said his mom tells him not to do it at school but he does it anyway). I asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up, he told me I could "be EVERYTHING - Do you wanna be COP!?!?!??? I'm gonna be the BADDEST cop and arrest EVERYBODY!!" He went on to say that I look like an alien cause my face was green (I think it was at that point I told him he had bats in the cave, haha). We played with his two stuffed cats at first, then he told me I was better with my ball cause he'd seen me kicking it around, so we kicked Ugh, Jr. for like an HOUR. He was SO NEAT. So when we had to leave I hugged him. Then I cried cause I'm like that, but I wouldn't let him see me. I got one more hug when I ran to the bathroom at the last minute. Gave him a CD and had him sign my ball - his momma and NaNa were all about me entertaining him, but the fun was had all by me. And him. We're teammates.
So we landed in Tegucigalpa smoothly (stud pilot I guess). Went to the Baxter, showered, walked around. FOUND THE CHORUS ROOM AND PLAYED THEIR LITTLE CASIO KEYBOARD. Not long enough, but the ACOUSTICS WERE INCREDIBLE. As a singer I had to linger and listen to the resonances, you don't get that everyday. Walked to the ampitheatre and Donny and I found a cat with AN EAR CHEWED OFF - I MEAN IT WAS A FESTERING MESS. El gato was all, "Don't hate cause half my brain is hanging out." Sadness. So I walked up to the top of the thingie and fell asleep on a picnic table before Brittany woke me up, sorta. It's all good. Read some crazy story Jefe gave me to read, felt all enlightened, sorta. Sat with Wess chillin, got on the bus, rode to the mall, had dinner with ocho other like-minded souls feelin' like some Argentinian food - YEEAAAHHHH. I'll probably get sick but I don't care. K gotta go.
6/22/07
First work day is always slow. Got up and ran around the Baxter Institute, hiked up the side of a steep mountain thing, ended up on the same platform where I napped yesterday. Did yoga with a view of the city. Pretty sweet. Had corn flakes (with the best leche in the WORLD), CAFE (mmmm, life-giving caffffe), and one tortilla with huevos y frijoles negros, and of course LOTS of chile sauce, heh heh heh. Got to the church building (they've poured a concrete slab since we left! they have windows with hinges!) and waited to get organized - the construction team went to build houses and the medical team got stuff together and went on with them. We set up the Carnaval, the climaz of tomorrow's VBS. The grass needed mowing (um, 10-inches at least) so Brittany grabbed a machete and I got a hoe and we hacked it down. It looks soooooo much better. Some of us went down to the waterfall, I LOVE that place. It'd be a great place for a first kiss (heehee). Wrote a song, took a nap, I was spent by 3pm. I gave Dupree a hard time for misspelling my name in an email on the way home, loserpants. :) We went back to the Baxter, got showered up and ate dinner at Pizza Hut. Apparently they tricked Mr. Holway and sung happy birthday to him (instead of his wife, last year we sung Happy Birthday to her every night cause she turned 50 that week, so cruel!) and one of the waitresses danced with him. Well aight, we gotta go hit up the grocery store so I can get some Honduran coffee, oatmeal, honey (with the comb in of course), and a mango.
6-23-07
Woke up tired, didn´t kick much, only pilates. The mountains were covered with fog. Had a memorable breakfast...they tell us every year that no breakfast is prepared for us on Saturdays, but then Maria la Saint de Cafeteria always makes pancakes. VBS ROCKED. The skits were hilarious... Rich Howell our preacher read from the Bible in Spanish to the niños, who were remarkably still and attentive, as our theatrical brethren acted it out. Guess you had to be there, your loss, sorry. For our classes I got to play with the 0-5 year olds... woo hoo! Rich Hanks played my mandolin (or attempted I should say) while we made bead necklaces with the youngens. I sat down to paint and a chica pequeña named Rizi came over to see what was up, so I let her take over. It was pretty amazing...she liked bold colors and broad strokes. Then we had the Carnaval which was a huge success!! My booth was the "pin the rock on the Philistine´s forehead" HAHA. I got Lindsay Scaggs (big firefighting dude from Colorado) to wear the armor and helmet and stuff, bless his heart. I blindfolded the kids and spun them around. Then of course they threw "the rock" (my hacky-sack) as hard as they could. He´d say "uh, back this one up", cause the kids really were trying to nail him, but he was a great sport. Sergio eventually came to relieve him. We got done early cause we ran out of prizes. Catherine and I were handing out kazoos, which some of them couldn´t make work, so of course I had to be careless and show them how after they´d put their little third-world mouths on them. Hope I don´t get sick, ugh! Had a nice relaxing shower (cleanliness, although I shun it in the States for the most part, haha, jk, is not to be taken for granted) and we came to the old mall so we ate in the good ole food court. Found THE BEST DRESS EVER! SOULMATE DRESS OF THE MONTH! AAAHHHH! GOT TO HAVE IT AAHHH! okay sorry. But have to borrow some dolares to get it. What a deadbeat am I, but the dress is SO FRICKIN GREAT! Kirsten and Giovanni were my heroes and gave me some just now, WOO HOO! K gotta go. Oh yeah, mañana we have church in Las Casitas and then go down to Los Valles de Angeles for ghetto flea market shopping, but I´m probably gonna skip it and do the zip-line-down-the-mountain thing like last year. Anything that requires headgear is cooler than shopping in 100 degree heat, but shopping for THE PERFECT DRESS AAAHHH (YOU SHOULD SEE THE SLEEEEEVES AND SAAAASSSSSHHHHHH!!!) in the air conditioning is alright. K gotta go make her mine.
6/26/07
Got the dress, wore it to church Sunday morning. Was a big hit, yay :) Man, there's something about worshipping God in a third-world country in a very humble building we constructed for them last year, which they were so grateful to receive. Yesterday I worked in the medical clinic, and between three stations (and one dentist from the Honduran Army) we saw 100 patients (mostly children) in 4.5 hours. Brian did an amazing devo this morning on I Corinthians 13 - "if I build the best houses for these people but have not love, I just sound like a chainsaw...if I can speak Spanish fluently but don't love the people I'm speaking to, I'm just another Gringo". It all comes down to love, such a nice thought. :) Today I worked construction and we completed two more houses. The site was pretty gross, basically a landfill covered with chickens and children running around barefoot. They were so grateful for the houses we built for them, which are smaller than my parents' bedroom, with one window and a tin roof. I'll never not be amazed at how wealthy we are in the States compared with here. Makes crashing on couches in Chapel Hill for a whole summer seem pretty dadgum cool (not that I was complaining at the time, heehee). Tomorrow I'm back in the clinic in the morning then get to go over to the school to play with the kids when they get out at 1pm. Hurrah! Their faces can't be described, so content, so happy to see us. Brittany taught them a handshake that ends with the dap explosion - they're all so good at it! Can't believe this is all over Friday morning. :(
7/2/07
Back now, and am grateful to flush TP down the toilet rather that throw it in a stinky trashcan, take showers without fear of getting water in my eyes or mouth, brush my teeth in the faucet rather than with bottled water, etc. Hurrah USA! I wish I could go back and take dog food to all the skinny perros we saw running around all pitiful.
Wednesday night we ate dinner at the Baxter and I put away waaay too much pollo, beets, SALAD (stuuupid), and arroz. But it was so GOOD! Somehow I got a wild hair and went back in the kitchen and asked Fernando (a boy who works back there and plays the recorder) to dance with me! (Giovanni instructed me on how to ask for un baile in Spanish) It was so cute! He had no idea what he was doing but I made him dip me and everything! Then he sat with me during the devotional and we held hands for the prayer. :) We exchanged emails and got pictures and stuff, such a sweet boy.
Thursday morning I woke up with a belly ache. Went to the bathroom and let's just say about a 1/2 gallon of beet-colored fluid came out. Not cool. Then I puked four times. Mrs. Holway brought me Gatorade and Cipro and I passed out for the rest of the day. It SUCKED, but could've been much worse from other Montezuma's Revenge horror stories I've heard. I might've eaten a bad tomato, mango, or just had too much water build up in me from showers and such. Whatever. I felt better by the afternoon, and we all went to El Patio for dinner, an authentic local Honduran restaurant. I didn't eat much of anything but enjoyed everyone (I missed them badly through the day while they were building bathrooms and painting the church out at Las Casitas). There was a mariachi band and everything! We had so much fun and sang some spirituals on the way home.
Friday we headed back to the States and arrived in Gainesville around 2:30am Saturday morning. We said a little prayer thanking God for giving us so much success and watching over us while we were gone. It really was a great success. All in all, I made some great new friends and enjoyed myself while I did some good work for the Lord and the people down there, bless their hearts. Everyone should do a mission trip at least once, it's the most worth-while thing I've ever done with myself and can't wait to go again next year! :)
Will get on a bus from Gainesvile tonight and ride to Miami. Plane will depart early morning and supposedly arrive mid-afternoon in Tegucigalpa. But now, I ride to Gators Dockside to watch Carolina get revenge on Rice.
6/21/07
Almost lost my rugby ball (Ugh, Jr.) in the stream running through the church yard last night. Got wet and dirty but found her, smelled worse but it was worth it. Couldn't leave the country without my best girl! Rode all night on the bus. Tried to sleep on the floorboard, didn't really work out. Spilled my agua caliente all over Catherine Howell's blanket (a quadrant of it anyway). Got to Miami (after briefly getting lost then receiving directions from a drunk fellow who apparentlah smelled really bad) around 4:30. Hung out in the airport. MET THE COOLEST KID IN THE WORLD, Ben B. We played as hard as we could for as long as we could - I had to get on the plane at 9:15. He taught me how and why to eat boogers (HAHA, he said his mom tells him not to do it at school but he does it anyway). I asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up, he told me I could "be EVERYTHING - Do you wanna be COP!?!?!??? I'm gonna be the BADDEST cop and arrest EVERYBODY!!" He went on to say that I look like an alien cause my face was green (I think it was at that point I told him he had bats in the cave, haha). We played with his two stuffed cats at first, then he told me I was better with my ball cause he'd seen me kicking it around, so we kicked Ugh, Jr. for like an HOUR. He was SO NEAT. So when we had to leave I hugged him. Then I cried cause I'm like that, but I wouldn't let him see me. I got one more hug when I ran to the bathroom at the last minute. Gave him a CD and had him sign my ball - his momma and NaNa were all about me entertaining him, but the fun was had all by me. And him. We're teammates.
So we landed in Tegucigalpa smoothly (stud pilot I guess). Went to the Baxter, showered, walked around. FOUND THE CHORUS ROOM AND PLAYED THEIR LITTLE CASIO KEYBOARD. Not long enough, but the ACOUSTICS WERE INCREDIBLE. As a singer I had to linger and listen to the resonances, you don't get that everyday. Walked to the ampitheatre and Donny and I found a cat with AN EAR CHEWED OFF - I MEAN IT WAS A FESTERING MESS. El gato was all, "Don't hate cause half my brain is hanging out." Sadness. So I walked up to the top of the thingie and fell asleep on a picnic table before Brittany woke me up, sorta. It's all good. Read some crazy story Jefe gave me to read, felt all enlightened, sorta. Sat with Wess chillin, got on the bus, rode to the mall, had dinner with ocho other like-minded souls feelin' like some Argentinian food - YEEAAAHHHH. I'll probably get sick but I don't care. K gotta go.
6/22/07
First work day is always slow. Got up and ran around the Baxter Institute, hiked up the side of a steep mountain thing, ended up on the same platform where I napped yesterday. Did yoga with a view of the city. Pretty sweet. Had corn flakes (with the best leche in the WORLD), CAFE (mmmm, life-giving caffffe), and one tortilla with huevos y frijoles negros, and of course LOTS of chile sauce, heh heh heh. Got to the church building (they've poured a concrete slab since we left! they have windows with hinges!) and waited to get organized - the construction team went to build houses and the medical team got stuff together and went on with them. We set up the Carnaval, the climaz of tomorrow's VBS. The grass needed mowing (um, 10-inches at least) so Brittany grabbed a machete and I got a hoe and we hacked it down. It looks soooooo much better. Some of us went down to the waterfall, I LOVE that place. It'd be a great place for a first kiss (heehee). Wrote a song, took a nap, I was spent by 3pm. I gave Dupree a hard time for misspelling my name in an email on the way home, loserpants. :) We went back to the Baxter, got showered up and ate dinner at Pizza Hut. Apparently they tricked Mr. Holway and sung happy birthday to him (instead of his wife, last year we sung Happy Birthday to her every night cause she turned 50 that week, so cruel!) and one of the waitresses danced with him. Well aight, we gotta go hit up the grocery store so I can get some Honduran coffee, oatmeal, honey (with the comb in of course), and a mango.
6-23-07
Woke up tired, didn´t kick much, only pilates. The mountains were covered with fog. Had a memorable breakfast...they tell us every year that no breakfast is prepared for us on Saturdays, but then Maria la Saint de Cafeteria always makes pancakes. VBS ROCKED. The skits were hilarious... Rich Howell our preacher read from the Bible in Spanish to the niños, who were remarkably still and attentive, as our theatrical brethren acted it out. Guess you had to be there, your loss, sorry. For our classes I got to play with the 0-5 year olds... woo hoo! Rich Hanks played my mandolin (or attempted I should say) while we made bead necklaces with the youngens. I sat down to paint and a chica pequeña named Rizi came over to see what was up, so I let her take over. It was pretty amazing...she liked bold colors and broad strokes. Then we had the Carnaval which was a huge success!! My booth was the "pin the rock on the Philistine´s forehead" HAHA. I got Lindsay Scaggs (big firefighting dude from Colorado) to wear the armor and helmet and stuff, bless his heart. I blindfolded the kids and spun them around. Then of course they threw "the rock" (my hacky-sack) as hard as they could. He´d say "uh, back this one up", cause the kids really were trying to nail him, but he was a great sport. Sergio eventually came to relieve him. We got done early cause we ran out of prizes. Catherine and I were handing out kazoos, which some of them couldn´t make work, so of course I had to be careless and show them how after they´d put their little third-world mouths on them. Hope I don´t get sick, ugh! Had a nice relaxing shower (cleanliness, although I shun it in the States for the most part, haha, jk, is not to be taken for granted) and we came to the old mall so we ate in the good ole food court. Found THE BEST DRESS EVER! SOULMATE DRESS OF THE MONTH! AAAHHHH! GOT TO HAVE IT AAHHH! okay sorry. But have to borrow some dolares to get it. What a deadbeat am I, but the dress is SO FRICKIN GREAT! Kirsten and Giovanni were my heroes and gave me some just now, WOO HOO! K gotta go. Oh yeah, mañana we have church in Las Casitas and then go down to Los Valles de Angeles for ghetto flea market shopping, but I´m probably gonna skip it and do the zip-line-down-the-mountain thing like last year. Anything that requires headgear is cooler than shopping in 100 degree heat, but shopping for THE PERFECT DRESS AAAHHH (YOU SHOULD SEE THE SLEEEEEVES AND SAAAASSSSSHHHHHH!!!) in the air conditioning is alright. K gotta go make her mine.
6/26/07
Got the dress, wore it to church Sunday morning. Was a big hit, yay :) Man, there's something about worshipping God in a third-world country in a very humble building we constructed for them last year, which they were so grateful to receive. Yesterday I worked in the medical clinic, and between three stations (and one dentist from the Honduran Army) we saw 100 patients (mostly children) in 4.5 hours. Brian did an amazing devo this morning on I Corinthians 13 - "if I build the best houses for these people but have not love, I just sound like a chainsaw...if I can speak Spanish fluently but don't love the people I'm speaking to, I'm just another Gringo". It all comes down to love, such a nice thought. :) Today I worked construction and we completed two more houses. The site was pretty gross, basically a landfill covered with chickens and children running around barefoot. They were so grateful for the houses we built for them, which are smaller than my parents' bedroom, with one window and a tin roof. I'll never not be amazed at how wealthy we are in the States compared with here. Makes crashing on couches in Chapel Hill for a whole summer seem pretty dadgum cool (not that I was complaining at the time, heehee). Tomorrow I'm back in the clinic in the morning then get to go over to the school to play with the kids when they get out at 1pm. Hurrah! Their faces can't be described, so content, so happy to see us. Brittany taught them a handshake that ends with the dap explosion - they're all so good at it! Can't believe this is all over Friday morning. :(
7/2/07
Back now, and am grateful to flush TP down the toilet rather that throw it in a stinky trashcan, take showers without fear of getting water in my eyes or mouth, brush my teeth in the faucet rather than with bottled water, etc. Hurrah USA! I wish I could go back and take dog food to all the skinny perros we saw running around all pitiful.
Wednesday night we ate dinner at the Baxter and I put away waaay too much pollo, beets, SALAD (stuuupid), and arroz. But it was so GOOD! Somehow I got a wild hair and went back in the kitchen and asked Fernando (a boy who works back there and plays the recorder) to dance with me! (Giovanni instructed me on how to ask for un baile in Spanish) It was so cute! He had no idea what he was doing but I made him dip me and everything! Then he sat with me during the devotional and we held hands for the prayer. :) We exchanged emails and got pictures and stuff, such a sweet boy.
Thursday morning I woke up with a belly ache. Went to the bathroom and let's just say about a 1/2 gallon of beet-colored fluid came out. Not cool. Then I puked four times. Mrs. Holway brought me Gatorade and Cipro and I passed out for the rest of the day. It SUCKED, but could've been much worse from other Montezuma's Revenge horror stories I've heard. I might've eaten a bad tomato, mango, or just had too much water build up in me from showers and such. Whatever. I felt better by the afternoon, and we all went to El Patio for dinner, an authentic local Honduran restaurant. I didn't eat much of anything but enjoyed everyone (I missed them badly through the day while they were building bathrooms and painting the church out at Las Casitas). There was a mariachi band and everything! We had so much fun and sang some spirituals on the way home.
Friday we headed back to the States and arrived in Gainesville around 2:30am Saturday morning. We said a little prayer thanking God for giving us so much success and watching over us while we were gone. It really was a great success. All in all, I made some great new friends and enjoyed myself while I did some good work for the Lord and the people down there, bless their hearts. Everyone should do a mission trip at least once, it's the most worth-while thing I've ever done with myself and can't wait to go again next year! :)
Tuesday 19 June 2007
Mere Christianity
Some favorite quotes from C.S. Lewis' masterpiece:
"When you are feeling fit and the sun is shining and you do not want to believe that the whole universe is a mere mechanical dance of atoms, it is nice to be able to think of this great mysterious Force rolling on through the centuries and carrying you on its crest."
"If the universe is not governed by an absolute goodness, then all our efforts are in the long run hopeless. But if it is, then we are making ourselves enemies to that goodness every day, and are not in the least likely to do any better tomorrow, and so our case is hopeless again."
"If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning."
"Besides being complicated, reality, in my experience, is usually odd. It is not neat, not obvious, not what you expect...Reality, in fact, is usually something you could not have guessed."
"But there is difficulty about disagreeing with God. He is the source from which all your reasoning comes...when you are arguing against Him you are arguing against the very power that makes you able to argue at all."
"God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food out spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other."
*many of us waste many years trying to fill this God-shaped hole in our soul with alcohol, sex, money, book-learning, etc. The reason 12-step programs like AA work is because the 1st step is humbly admitting your brokenness, 2nd step is acknowledging there's something bigger than you that can handle it, and the 3rd step is letting Him. Just my two cents. That was free. :)
"Now repentance is no fun at all. It is something much harder than merely eating humble pie. It means unlearning all the self-conceit and self will that we have been training ourselves into for thousands of years. It means killing a part of yourself..."
"To what will you look for help if you will not look to that which is stronger than yourself?"
"...the Christian thinks any good he does comes from the Christ-life inside him. HE DOES NOT THINK GOD WILL LOVE US BECAUSE WE ARE GOOD, BUT THAT GOD WILL MAKE US GOOD BECAUSE HE LOVES US..."
"If somebody else made me, for His own purposes, then I shall have a lot of duties which I should not have if I simply belonged to myself."
"Morality, then, seems to be concerned with three things. Firstly, with fair play and harmony between individuals. Secondly, with what might be called tidying up or harmonizing the things inside each individual. Thirdly, with the general purpose of human life as a whole: what man was made for: what course the whole fleet ought to be on: what tune the conductor of the band wants it to play."
The Cardinal Virtues: Prudence, Temperance, Justice, and Fortitude.
Prudence means practical common sense, taking the trouble to think out what you are doing and what is likely to come of it... Christianity is an education itself.
Temperance referred not specially to drink, but to all pleasures, and it meant not abstaining, but going the right length and no further.
Justice...the old name for everything we should now called fairness; it includes honesty, give and take, truthfulness, keeping promises, and all that side of life.
Fortitude includes both kinds of courage - the kind that faces danger and the kind that "sticks it" under pain. "Guts"...
"(A Christian society) is to be cheerful: full of singing and rejoicing, and regarding worry or anxiety as wrong. Courtesy is one of the Christian virtues...
On charity: "the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare."
"...That is why Christian are told not to judge. We see only the results which a man's choices make out of his raw material. But God does not judge him on the raw material at all, but on what he has done with it."
"...every time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what it was before. And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowing turning this central thing into either a heavenly creature or into a hellish creature: either...in harmony with God, and with its fellow creatures, and with itself. To be the one kind of creature is heaven: that is, it is joy and peace and knowledge and power. To be the other means madness, horror, idiocy, rage, impotence, and eternal loneliness. Each of us at each moment is progressing to the one state or the other."
"When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him."
"A real desire to believe all the good you can of others and to make others as comfortable as you can will solve most of the problems."
"We may, indeed, be sure that perfect chastity - like perfect charity - will not be attained by merely human efforts. You must ask for God's help... After each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up, and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again... It cures our illusions about ourselves and teaches us to depend on God."
"...THOSE WHO ARE SERIOUSLY ATTEMPTING CHASTITY ARE MORE CONSCIOUS, AND SOON KNOW A GREAT DEAL MORE ABOUT THEIR OWN SEXUALITY THAN ANYONE ELSE."
"Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing... It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling. Now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all... But, of course, ceasing to be 'in love' need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense - love as distinct from 'being in love' is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriage) the grace with both parents ask, and receive, from God."
"THE THRILL YOU FEEL ON FIRST SEEING SOME DELIGHTFUL PLACE DIES AWAY WHEN YOU REALLY GO LIVE THERE. Does this mean it would better... not to live in the beautiful place? By no means... IF YOU GO THROUGH WITH IT, THE DYING AWAY OF THE FIRST THRILL WILL BE COMPENSATED FOR BY A QUIETER AND MORE LASTING KIND OF INTEREST. WHAT IS MORE, IT IS JUST THE PEOPLE WHO ARE READY TO SUBMIT TO THE LOSS OF THE THRILL AND SETTLE DOWN TO THE SOBER INTEREST, WHO ARE LIKELY TO MEET NEW THRILLS IN SOME QUITE DIFFERENT DIRECTION... But if you decide to make thrills your regular diet and try to prolong them artificially, they will all get weaker and fewer... and you will be a bored, disillusioned old man for the rest of your life."
"A proud man is always looking down on things and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you."
"The real test of being in the presense of God is that you either forget about yourself altogether or see yourself as a small, dirty object. It is better to forget about yourself altogether."
"The real black, diabolical Pride comes when you look down on others so much that you do not care what they think of you."
"...if you really get into any kind of touch with Him you will, in fact, be humble - delightly humble, feeling the infinite relief of having for once got rid of all the silly nonsense about your own dignity which has made you restless and unhappy all your life."
"THE SMALLEST GOOD ACT TODAY IS THE CAPTURE OF A STRATEGIC POINT FROM WHICH, A FEW MONTHS LATER, YOU MAY BE ABLE TO GO ON TO VICTORIES YOU NEVER DREAMED OF."
"Aim at heaven and you'll get earth 'thrown in': aim at earth and you'll get neither."
"When you are feeling fit and the sun is shining and you do not want to believe that the whole universe is a mere mechanical dance of atoms, it is nice to be able to think of this great mysterious Force rolling on through the centuries and carrying you on its crest."
"If the universe is not governed by an absolute goodness, then all our efforts are in the long run hopeless. But if it is, then we are making ourselves enemies to that goodness every day, and are not in the least likely to do any better tomorrow, and so our case is hopeless again."
"If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning."
"Besides being complicated, reality, in my experience, is usually odd. It is not neat, not obvious, not what you expect...Reality, in fact, is usually something you could not have guessed."
"But there is difficulty about disagreeing with God. He is the source from which all your reasoning comes...when you are arguing against Him you are arguing against the very power that makes you able to argue at all."
"God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food out spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other."
*many of us waste many years trying to fill this God-shaped hole in our soul with alcohol, sex, money, book-learning, etc. The reason 12-step programs like AA work is because the 1st step is humbly admitting your brokenness, 2nd step is acknowledging there's something bigger than you that can handle it, and the 3rd step is letting Him. Just my two cents. That was free. :)
"Now repentance is no fun at all. It is something much harder than merely eating humble pie. It means unlearning all the self-conceit and self will that we have been training ourselves into for thousands of years. It means killing a part of yourself..."
"To what will you look for help if you will not look to that which is stronger than yourself?"
"...the Christian thinks any good he does comes from the Christ-life inside him. HE DOES NOT THINK GOD WILL LOVE US BECAUSE WE ARE GOOD, BUT THAT GOD WILL MAKE US GOOD BECAUSE HE LOVES US..."
"If somebody else made me, for His own purposes, then I shall have a lot of duties which I should not have if I simply belonged to myself."
"Morality, then, seems to be concerned with three things. Firstly, with fair play and harmony between individuals. Secondly, with what might be called tidying up or harmonizing the things inside each individual. Thirdly, with the general purpose of human life as a whole: what man was made for: what course the whole fleet ought to be on: what tune the conductor of the band wants it to play."
The Cardinal Virtues: Prudence, Temperance, Justice, and Fortitude.
Prudence means practical common sense, taking the trouble to think out what you are doing and what is likely to come of it... Christianity is an education itself.
Temperance referred not specially to drink, but to all pleasures, and it meant not abstaining, but going the right length and no further.
Justice...the old name for everything we should now called fairness; it includes honesty, give and take, truthfulness, keeping promises, and all that side of life.
Fortitude includes both kinds of courage - the kind that faces danger and the kind that "sticks it" under pain. "Guts"...
"(A Christian society) is to be cheerful: full of singing and rejoicing, and regarding worry or anxiety as wrong. Courtesy is one of the Christian virtues...
On charity: "the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare."
"...That is why Christian are told not to judge. We see only the results which a man's choices make out of his raw material. But God does not judge him on the raw material at all, but on what he has done with it."
"...every time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what it was before. And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowing turning this central thing into either a heavenly creature or into a hellish creature: either...in harmony with God, and with its fellow creatures, and with itself. To be the one kind of creature is heaven: that is, it is joy and peace and knowledge and power. To be the other means madness, horror, idiocy, rage, impotence, and eternal loneliness. Each of us at each moment is progressing to the one state or the other."
"When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him."
"A real desire to believe all the good you can of others and to make others as comfortable as you can will solve most of the problems."
"We may, indeed, be sure that perfect chastity - like perfect charity - will not be attained by merely human efforts. You must ask for God's help... After each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up, and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again... It cures our illusions about ourselves and teaches us to depend on God."
"...THOSE WHO ARE SERIOUSLY ATTEMPTING CHASTITY ARE MORE CONSCIOUS, AND SOON KNOW A GREAT DEAL MORE ABOUT THEIR OWN SEXUALITY THAN ANYONE ELSE."
"Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing... It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling. Now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all... But, of course, ceasing to be 'in love' need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense - love as distinct from 'being in love' is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriage) the grace with both parents ask, and receive, from God."
"THE THRILL YOU FEEL ON FIRST SEEING SOME DELIGHTFUL PLACE DIES AWAY WHEN YOU REALLY GO LIVE THERE. Does this mean it would better... not to live in the beautiful place? By no means... IF YOU GO THROUGH WITH IT, THE DYING AWAY OF THE FIRST THRILL WILL BE COMPENSATED FOR BY A QUIETER AND MORE LASTING KIND OF INTEREST. WHAT IS MORE, IT IS JUST THE PEOPLE WHO ARE READY TO SUBMIT TO THE LOSS OF THE THRILL AND SETTLE DOWN TO THE SOBER INTEREST, WHO ARE LIKELY TO MEET NEW THRILLS IN SOME QUITE DIFFERENT DIRECTION... But if you decide to make thrills your regular diet and try to prolong them artificially, they will all get weaker and fewer... and you will be a bored, disillusioned old man for the rest of your life."
"A proud man is always looking down on things and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you."
"The real test of being in the presense of God is that you either forget about yourself altogether or see yourself as a small, dirty object. It is better to forget about yourself altogether."
"The real black, diabolical Pride comes when you look down on others so much that you do not care what they think of you."
"...if you really get into any kind of touch with Him you will, in fact, be humble - delightly humble, feeling the infinite relief of having for once got rid of all the silly nonsense about your own dignity which has made you restless and unhappy all your life."
"THE SMALLEST GOOD ACT TODAY IS THE CAPTURE OF A STRATEGIC POINT FROM WHICH, A FEW MONTHS LATER, YOU MAY BE ABLE TO GO ON TO VICTORIES YOU NEVER DREAMED OF."
"Aim at heaven and you'll get earth 'thrown in': aim at earth and you'll get neither."
Sunday 17 June 2007
Dad Quotes
Me: That's an awfully big carcass. (Daddy was cleaning a redfish)
Dad: Yessss, yes it is. (he threw it to the pelicans)
Me (watching it sink): They're too chicken to go get it.
Dad: Yessss (as he picks up the hose to rinse off the table). Look out, Love Affair.
Mom: I just saw (boy who broke my heart), gosh he got skinny!
Dad: Must be the crack.
Me: Daddy, I kinda have a big crush on (current flame that won't go out).
Dad: You're probably not by yourself on that, ya know.
Dad (on the top rung of the ladder last Thanksgiving, attempting to rescue the cat who'd been up in a neighborhood pine tree for two days): Kitty Sue, please come to Daddy! Kitty Sue I know you can do it!
Mom: Missy's dragging her butt on the carpet. I need to take her to the vet to have her anal gland expressed.
Dad: I refuse to believe that God would design an animal that couldn't take care of its own anal gland.
Dad (to Xena our Hemingway cat): How bout me and you and some love? Please don't push me away, I just wanna love ya. Haylee you see me and dis girl right here? Oh my word, her lil motor is runnin' about 5700 rpms, yes sir. Okay, dats it! Dat's all you're gettin'!
Dad: I need to give y'all a lesson on leavin' these doors open. You only have to have the width of a cat.
Dad: Yessss, yes it is. (he threw it to the pelicans)
Me (watching it sink): They're too chicken to go get it.
Dad: Yessss (as he picks up the hose to rinse off the table). Look out, Love Affair.
Mom: I just saw (boy who broke my heart), gosh he got skinny!
Dad: Must be the crack.
Me: Daddy, I kinda have a big crush on (current flame that won't go out).
Dad: You're probably not by yourself on that, ya know.
Dad (on the top rung of the ladder last Thanksgiving, attempting to rescue the cat who'd been up in a neighborhood pine tree for two days): Kitty Sue, please come to Daddy! Kitty Sue I know you can do it!
Mom: Missy's dragging her butt on the carpet. I need to take her to the vet to have her anal gland expressed.
Dad: I refuse to believe that God would design an animal that couldn't take care of its own anal gland.
Dad (to Xena our Hemingway cat): How bout me and you and some love? Please don't push me away, I just wanna love ya. Haylee you see me and dis girl right here? Oh my word, her lil motor is runnin' about 5700 rpms, yes sir. Okay, dats it! Dat's all you're gettin'!
Dad: I need to give y'all a lesson on leavin' these doors open. You only have to have the width of a cat.
Mom Quotes
Mom: Oh you're making a salad? Will you make me one?
Me: Ugh, fine. Get me down a bowl.
Mom: Taylor, will you get a bowl so she can make me a salad?
Me: Jeez Mom, don't you ever do anything for yourself?
Mom: Not if I can help it.
Mom: That is so disgusting! How can someone have sex with a total stranger?! The thought of sleeping with anyone but your father is just nauseating!
Me: Maybe they're just painfully lonely, Mom.
Mom: Ugh, but why do they have to have sex? Why can't they just drink coffee or something?
Mom: I wish I could remember the excitement of new love. The older you get, the longer you're married, the more it just becomes like, tolerance.
Me: He doesn't drink coffee! Didn't even have it in the house!
Mom: Are you serious? Ugh, and I thought he was cool...
Mom: You are NOT going to Atlanta. You have no business playing rugby.
Me (passed out on the bathroom floor from the flu): Michael Jordan scored 68 points in a play-off game once with the full-blown flu and a 103 fever.
Mom: Uh, but you're not Michael Jordan.
Me: How dare you say such a thing!
Later.....
Mom: You're burning up. I really think you ought to stay home and get well.
Me: Michael Jordan once scored...
Mom: Uh, you've already told me this.
Me: I'm freaking going.
Mom (first thing this morning, still in bed): Did you Daddy go fishing?
Me: No, he's downstairs passed out in front of a Western.
Mom: He is? Bless his heart, bless his heart.
Me: Along some desert highway blooms a flawless flower that is content to simply be, To go unnoticed with no concern.
Mom: How can a flower be content or discontent? That is such B.S.
Me: You a-hole! :)
Me: I heard you got drunk and danced to Baby Got Back at the Roadside Inn.
Mom: Who told you that? They're lying! I wasn't there!
Me: Where'd these come from? (referring to some irregular Mason jars in the cupboard)
Mom: I think they came with the house.
Me: Oh this house, where someone was MURDERED!? (yes, someone was actually gunned down on stairs of the porch downstairs)
Mom: (BLEEP), what's wrong with this thing!?! (frustrated because the remote control wasn't cooperating...apparently the whole murder thing doesn't phase her)
Me: Thanks for the Blizzard.
Mom: And what about lunch?
Me: Oh yeah, thanks for lunch, too.
Mom: Next one's on you.
Me: Oh yeah, let me dip into my savings account to buy you lunch.
Mom: That's the funniest thing I've ever said.
Me: What?
Mom: Next one's on you!
Mom (after reading this blog): I sound like Archie Bunker.
Me: Ugh, fine. Get me down a bowl.
Mom: Taylor, will you get a bowl so she can make me a salad?
Me: Jeez Mom, don't you ever do anything for yourself?
Mom: Not if I can help it.
Mom: That is so disgusting! How can someone have sex with a total stranger?! The thought of sleeping with anyone but your father is just nauseating!
Me: Maybe they're just painfully lonely, Mom.
Mom: Ugh, but why do they have to have sex? Why can't they just drink coffee or something?
Mom: I wish I could remember the excitement of new love. The older you get, the longer you're married, the more it just becomes like, tolerance.
Me: He doesn't drink coffee! Didn't even have it in the house!
Mom: Are you serious? Ugh, and I thought he was cool...
Mom: You are NOT going to Atlanta. You have no business playing rugby.
Me (passed out on the bathroom floor from the flu): Michael Jordan scored 68 points in a play-off game once with the full-blown flu and a 103 fever.
Mom: Uh, but you're not Michael Jordan.
Me: How dare you say such a thing!
Later.....
Mom: You're burning up. I really think you ought to stay home and get well.
Me: Michael Jordan once scored...
Mom: Uh, you've already told me this.
Me: I'm freaking going.
Mom (first thing this morning, still in bed): Did you Daddy go fishing?
Me: No, he's downstairs passed out in front of a Western.
Mom: He is? Bless his heart, bless his heart.
Me: Along some desert highway blooms a flawless flower that is content to simply be, To go unnoticed with no concern.
Mom: How can a flower be content or discontent? That is such B.S.
Me: You a-hole! :)
Me: I heard you got drunk and danced to Baby Got Back at the Roadside Inn.
Mom: Who told you that? They're lying! I wasn't there!
Me: Where'd these come from? (referring to some irregular Mason jars in the cupboard)
Mom: I think they came with the house.
Me: Oh this house, where someone was MURDERED!? (yes, someone was actually gunned down on stairs of the porch downstairs)
Mom: (BLEEP), what's wrong with this thing!?! (frustrated because the remote control wasn't cooperating...apparently the whole murder thing doesn't phase her)
Me: Thanks for the Blizzard.
Mom: And what about lunch?
Me: Oh yeah, thanks for lunch, too.
Mom: Next one's on you.
Me: Oh yeah, let me dip into my savings account to buy you lunch.
Mom: That's the funniest thing I've ever said.
Me: What?
Mom: Next one's on you!
Mom (after reading this blog): I sound like Archie Bunker.
Saturday 16 June 2007
Dreams
4/16/04
I had a dream that I was at the cages picking out a bat and they were all as big, long and heavy as I prefer. Big bats help you cover more of the plate and feeling its weight over your shoulder gives you more confidence that you could Rob Hobbs the crap out of whatever comes your way.
5/27/04
Dreampt I was playing the trumpet in a big brass band (not well.)
08/08/04
Dreampt of a big harvest moon on the horizon.
06/07/06
An angel came to me in the night to let me know I'd never be anybody's wife.
"Just so you know, you're never going to get married."
The rain kept falling and I could hear a baby cry.
3/18/07
I had a dream that Marcia Lou and I were driving down a dirt road in search of a grapefruit tree. We came around a bend and this field opened up to us, all grassy green, with a farm house off to the left. This huge grapefruit tree dominated the landscape. I jumped out of the truck and proceeded to pick the biggest, ripest, prettiest grapefruits ever, so many I couldn't hold them all. The most vivid part of the dream I remember is the giant grin on my face.
This reminds me of one of the most famous passages from The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath:
"I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet."
This makes me really grateful that I don't take thoughts like these to dark places. People who do that end up gassing themselves with the kitchen stove as their children play in the next room. Choices are good, but I think maybe in this country we have too many. I choose simplicity, humility, and to rejoice for whatever crumb the Rich Man tosses to the dogs. Luke 16:19-31.
I had a dream that I was at the cages picking out a bat and they were all as big, long and heavy as I prefer. Big bats help you cover more of the plate and feeling its weight over your shoulder gives you more confidence that you could Rob Hobbs the crap out of whatever comes your way.
5/27/04
Dreampt I was playing the trumpet in a big brass band (not well.)
08/08/04
Dreampt of a big harvest moon on the horizon.
06/07/06
An angel came to me in the night to let me know I'd never be anybody's wife.
"Just so you know, you're never going to get married."
The rain kept falling and I could hear a baby cry.
3/18/07
I had a dream that Marcia Lou and I were driving down a dirt road in search of a grapefruit tree. We came around a bend and this field opened up to us, all grassy green, with a farm house off to the left. This huge grapefruit tree dominated the landscape. I jumped out of the truck and proceeded to pick the biggest, ripest, prettiest grapefruits ever, so many I couldn't hold them all. The most vivid part of the dream I remember is the giant grin on my face.
This reminds me of one of the most famous passages from The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath:
"I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet."
This makes me really grateful that I don't take thoughts like these to dark places. People who do that end up gassing themselves with the kitchen stove as their children play in the next room. Choices are good, but I think maybe in this country we have too many. I choose simplicity, humility, and to rejoice for whatever crumb the Rich Man tosses to the dogs. Luke 16:19-31.
For Love of the Nutty Woman
I wrote this for all my guy friends (namely Trae and Tom) who're perpetually attracted to insane women who make them miserable.
FOR LOVE OF THE NUTTY WOMAN
For love of the nutty woman,
I have laid down my weapons in battle
And let her crazy ass win.
Thought I was putting the horse before the saddle
For love of the nutty woman.
I looked away, forgave and forgot,
Probably sacrificed a lot
While she was trying to drive me away.
Went back for more and more was what I got
For love of the nutty woman.
FOR LOVE OF THE NUTTY WOMAN
For love of the nutty woman,
I have laid down my weapons in battle
And let her crazy ass win.
Thought I was putting the horse before the saddle
For love of the nutty woman.
I looked away, forgave and forgot,
Probably sacrificed a lot
While she was trying to drive me away.
Went back for more and more was what I got
For love of the nutty woman.
Maybe
Maybe my True Love, El Uno, my Soulmate isn't human at all, but an abstract combination of frequencies in time, consonant or dissonant, major and minor, treble and bass. See I've never been a one-man kind of woman. Music has, on occasion, touched me in ways and places a hand could never reach. It is more pure and loyal than any fallible human being would ever be. Music has been strong for me my whole life and I love it whole-heartedly. I know I'd never cheat, never stray, never try to run away. Me and Music Forever. He's never jealous or possessive, only proud to have me by his side.
Carson Cat Attempts to Commit Calculated Acts of Kindness
A stop on my roadtrip a couple weeks ago was a visit to Cousin Matt Elliott's in Buford, Georgia, which is just up from Atlanta. The family includes his amazing wife Lela (a super hero mom), kids Isaac, Seth, Annie, and cat Carson. Carson is the most affectionate cat I've ever met, and we all know cats are usually independent lil' cusses. So I asked Lela for the how-come, and she said Carson had been hit by a car about ten years ago and lived with her sister. When the family dog died, the Elliotts were obviously devastated. They needed a comforter in the house but weren't quite ready for a dog, so Carson came to live with them.
It all made perfect sense to me. I'm not sure if anyone else is aware of it, but our pets are solely concerned with loving and taking care of us. I slept on the futon downstairs one night, and woke up to find Carson curled up purring in the crook of my belly. What a big sweetie! So it hit me right then to write a story bout him/her (since the accident they can't tell what gender Carson is - since Carson is the name of a pretty girl in the movie "Shag", I will henceforth say "she"). The gist of it (pardon me while I end lots of sentences with prepositions):
One Sunday morning, Carson was bored to tears because his family was away at church and she had no one to take care of. After watching a cartoon about sharing on Sesame Street, Carson decided to go find someone to be nice to. Surely there was someone out there in need of some love!
So she headed down into the city of Atlanta, but everyone was either in church or still asleep! Carson was feeling discouraged - who could she be nice to? While strolling through a nice neighborhood, a beautiful black puppygirl came out barking. Carson was frightened! "What on Earth are you barking for?" she asked. The puppygirl replied, "oh I'm sorry, I'm just so worried about my best friend, my soulmate, the Love of my Life. He's gone to a basketball game and couldn't take me with him, he usually does! I'm just afraid he'll take his glasses off and not be able to find them again, he's somewhat blind you see." Carson graciously accepted her apology and they made introductions: Hannah Banana was her name. "Well, since you're all alone, why don't you come with me? I'm going to find someone to be nice to. Surely we'll be home in time for supper." So away they went, and headed down to Florida.
Their first stop in the Sunshine State was in a little coastal fishing village called Suwannee. As they walked along by the old canal, they spotted two sleek and confident young cat ladies. "Hello!" hollered Carson. "Hello yourself!" cried the black & white feline. Carson and Hannah Banana entered the yard and approached the two cats on the big covered porch. "This is Xena, and I'm Kitty Sue," said the black & white cat, indifferently. Daddy Sam, our benefactor, has gone fishing, so we're even more bored than usual. Not that he doesn't fish all the stinking time, but it's all right because he gives us sushi when he gets back." Hannah told her, "When will he return? Perhaps we can be nice to him!". "Fat chance," Xena said smartly, "he's a big ole grouch with a heart of gold. He may get stuck on a mudflat and not come in til tomorrow evening. We never know, we're just sick with worry everytime he leaves. But we like the sushi he brings when he finally returns." "Well come on with us! Surely we can do something nice for someone on our travels, and we'll be home by suppertime," suggested Carson, and away they went.
They pressed on to a little town called Oxford. A quiet country road led them to a mysterious driveway through some pines to a brick house surrounded by ancient oak trees. Suddenly they heard yapping from some little dogs who seemed more frightened than anything else. "Gracious, will you put a sock in it!?!?" said Kitty Sue, as she bopped the dominant one on the nose. "Ouch! What'd you do that for?" protested the rebel-rouser. Hannah said, "There's no sense in senseless barking!" Carson added, "Um yes, you're one to talk, lady," and they all laughed. "I am Evelyn, and this is Melissa Manchester, but everyone calls her Missy. Our lady Miss Lisa has gone to see her grandbabies across the pasture so we have no one to entertain! Gosh, we miss her!" "There, there", Carson comforted, "you can come along with us and we'll find someone to be nice to. We'll be sure to have you home in time for supper!" so they pressed on, rejoicing in the possibilities of good intentions.
Their travels across water and land led them to Bayou La Batre, Alabama. The first folks who greeted them were a gregarious pair of mutts named Dixie and Blue. "Well howdy! Where y'all from?", said Blue. "We're from all over," said Carson. "This is Hannah Banana, Kitty Sue, Xena, Evelyn, Missy, and my name is Carson Cat. We're looking to commit calculated acts of kindness for whomever we can find." "Well Lawd son, you sure come to the right place," cried Dixie. "We still need help. This town been hit by the Hurricane Katrina almost two years ago and it still ain't the same." Missy shuddered and replied, "what kind of help do you need? We excel in general loving kisses and hugs and lap-sitting." "Golly we need more than that," said Blue, "how bout we all get to the church and say a prayer about it?" "Well that sounds like a fine idea," said Hannah, "I sure need to pray that my Best Friend doesn't misplace his glasses!" So they headed down Henley Street toward the Bayou and arrived at the Church of Christ right in time for singing. They all lined up in the 2nd pew from the front and got to praising the Lord with "Amazing Grace". When the song was done and they sat down, Carson whispered loudly, "I reckon this is almost as good as getting out there and helping folks." "Now we pray." stated Dixie, "Tomorrow we work." So they all counted their blessings that they were on the giving and not the receiving end. This might've been the best thing they learned all day long.
THE END.
"
It all made perfect sense to me. I'm not sure if anyone else is aware of it, but our pets are solely concerned with loving and taking care of us. I slept on the futon downstairs one night, and woke up to find Carson curled up purring in the crook of my belly. What a big sweetie! So it hit me right then to write a story bout him/her (since the accident they can't tell what gender Carson is - since Carson is the name of a pretty girl in the movie "Shag", I will henceforth say "she"). The gist of it (pardon me while I end lots of sentences with prepositions):
One Sunday morning, Carson was bored to tears because his family was away at church and she had no one to take care of. After watching a cartoon about sharing on Sesame Street, Carson decided to go find someone to be nice to. Surely there was someone out there in need of some love!
So she headed down into the city of Atlanta, but everyone was either in church or still asleep! Carson was feeling discouraged - who could she be nice to? While strolling through a nice neighborhood, a beautiful black puppygirl came out barking. Carson was frightened! "What on Earth are you barking for?" she asked. The puppygirl replied, "oh I'm sorry, I'm just so worried about my best friend, my soulmate, the Love of my Life. He's gone to a basketball game and couldn't take me with him, he usually does! I'm just afraid he'll take his glasses off and not be able to find them again, he's somewhat blind you see." Carson graciously accepted her apology and they made introductions: Hannah Banana was her name. "Well, since you're all alone, why don't you come with me? I'm going to find someone to be nice to. Surely we'll be home in time for supper." So away they went, and headed down to Florida.
Their first stop in the Sunshine State was in a little coastal fishing village called Suwannee. As they walked along by the old canal, they spotted two sleek and confident young cat ladies. "Hello!" hollered Carson. "Hello yourself!" cried the black & white feline. Carson and Hannah Banana entered the yard and approached the two cats on the big covered porch. "This is Xena, and I'm Kitty Sue," said the black & white cat, indifferently. Daddy Sam, our benefactor, has gone fishing, so we're even more bored than usual. Not that he doesn't fish all the stinking time, but it's all right because he gives us sushi when he gets back." Hannah told her, "When will he return? Perhaps we can be nice to him!". "Fat chance," Xena said smartly, "he's a big ole grouch with a heart of gold. He may get stuck on a mudflat and not come in til tomorrow evening. We never know, we're just sick with worry everytime he leaves. But we like the sushi he brings when he finally returns." "Well come on with us! Surely we can do something nice for someone on our travels, and we'll be home by suppertime," suggested Carson, and away they went.
They pressed on to a little town called Oxford. A quiet country road led them to a mysterious driveway through some pines to a brick house surrounded by ancient oak trees. Suddenly they heard yapping from some little dogs who seemed more frightened than anything else. "Gracious, will you put a sock in it!?!?" said Kitty Sue, as she bopped the dominant one on the nose. "Ouch! What'd you do that for?" protested the rebel-rouser. Hannah said, "There's no sense in senseless barking!" Carson added, "Um yes, you're one to talk, lady," and they all laughed. "I am Evelyn, and this is Melissa Manchester, but everyone calls her Missy. Our lady Miss Lisa has gone to see her grandbabies across the pasture so we have no one to entertain! Gosh, we miss her!" "There, there", Carson comforted, "you can come along with us and we'll find someone to be nice to. We'll be sure to have you home in time for supper!" so they pressed on, rejoicing in the possibilities of good intentions.
Their travels across water and land led them to Bayou La Batre, Alabama. The first folks who greeted them were a gregarious pair of mutts named Dixie and Blue. "Well howdy! Where y'all from?", said Blue. "We're from all over," said Carson. "This is Hannah Banana, Kitty Sue, Xena, Evelyn, Missy, and my name is Carson Cat. We're looking to commit calculated acts of kindness for whomever we can find." "Well Lawd son, you sure come to the right place," cried Dixie. "We still need help. This town been hit by the Hurricane Katrina almost two years ago and it still ain't the same." Missy shuddered and replied, "what kind of help do you need? We excel in general loving kisses and hugs and lap-sitting." "Golly we need more than that," said Blue, "how bout we all get to the church and say a prayer about it?" "Well that sounds like a fine idea," said Hannah, "I sure need to pray that my Best Friend doesn't misplace his glasses!" So they headed down Henley Street toward the Bayou and arrived at the Church of Christ right in time for singing. They all lined up in the 2nd pew from the front and got to praising the Lord with "Amazing Grace". When the song was done and they sat down, Carson whispered loudly, "I reckon this is almost as good as getting out there and helping folks." "Now we pray." stated Dixie, "Tomorrow we work." So they all counted their blessings that they were on the giving and not the receiving end. This might've been the best thing they learned all day long.
THE END.
"
Thursday 14 June 2007
Athens to Pembroke on Hwy 78, 4/24/07
I like to take a song
And hear every note,
Feel it rise and fall.
The drums become my heart,
Cymbals crash like waves,
Carrying me home
The way that Jesus saves.
To know every bend, lyric, melody, harmony, the bassist's two cents, every tear that comes from a logically-coming thought or memory. This self-doubt and loathing. The peace and serenity of a herd of cows silently grazing in a sunset pasture, sitting in shadow. Beholding a radiant and sun-lit, freshly-plowed field of Southern-American clay. Open the spigot and let it run wide open, a full inhale-of-air to take in the right-then-and-there moment to its fullest, eyes drink in blue sky like the purest water.
Seeing the world mostly from inside my car. Always leaving, always on the way, not quite yet arrived. Prepare to meet thy God. I build the strongest wall and say, oh, but there's a pretty nice garden back here. There's a million roads we all pass that lead to who knows where? Everyone is turning out so well, hope to join them soon. I still haven't met him. Rolling with the piedmont - how about making the best of it? Lines blur as light goes low. When that yellow moon appeared a'glow over the river, she reminded me that you never can tell when the resolution will arrive - so I still am riding off into the moonset, a lanturn just over the tree line.
*Appears in the liner notes for "He's Got My Heart"
And hear every note,
Feel it rise and fall.
The drums become my heart,
Cymbals crash like waves,
Carrying me home
The way that Jesus saves.
To know every bend, lyric, melody, harmony, the bassist's two cents, every tear that comes from a logically-coming thought or memory. This self-doubt and loathing. The peace and serenity of a herd of cows silently grazing in a sunset pasture, sitting in shadow. Beholding a radiant and sun-lit, freshly-plowed field of Southern-American clay. Open the spigot and let it run wide open, a full inhale-of-air to take in the right-then-and-there moment to its fullest, eyes drink in blue sky like the purest water.
Seeing the world mostly from inside my car. Always leaving, always on the way, not quite yet arrived. Prepare to meet thy God. I build the strongest wall and say, oh, but there's a pretty nice garden back here. There's a million roads we all pass that lead to who knows where? Everyone is turning out so well, hope to join them soon. I still haven't met him. Rolling with the piedmont - how about making the best of it? Lines blur as light goes low. When that yellow moon appeared a'glow over the river, she reminded me that you never can tell when the resolution will arrive - so I still am riding off into the moonset, a lanturn just over the tree line.
*Appears in the liner notes for "He's Got My Heart"
Wednesday 13 June 2007
5/26/07
North Pier, Skyway Bridge, Tampa Bay
Blue sky, blue water, cloud shadows darken the bay. Friendly white puffs of shade. Lines out, baits ready. Silence between brothers - no words needed. Birds flutter and beg. Love bugs mate around my head and legs. Distant sandy shores, boats slowly streaking. Kind smiles from strangers. The sound of passing cars. Gleeful squeals of children - fish on! The bowing, bending, never breaking of a favorite rod. The breeze relieves the neck from the sun's unrelenting gaze. Will we ever pull one in? New buddy napping in the truck. The lady reels as her cigarette dangles. Convenient proximity to el ban~o. Another glance at the watch reveals another hour is gone. Peace on Earth, good will towards men.
Blue sky, blue water, cloud shadows darken the bay. Friendly white puffs of shade. Lines out, baits ready. Silence between brothers - no words needed. Birds flutter and beg. Love bugs mate around my head and legs. Distant sandy shores, boats slowly streaking. Kind smiles from strangers. The sound of passing cars. Gleeful squeals of children - fish on! The bowing, bending, never breaking of a favorite rod. The breeze relieves the neck from the sun's unrelenting gaze. Will we ever pull one in? New buddy napping in the truck. The lady reels as her cigarette dangles. Convenient proximity to el ban~o. Another glance at the watch reveals another hour is gone. Peace on Earth, good will towards men.
Monday 11 June 2007
Trip to Wal-Mart I Didn't Want to Make
Met the cutest boy in Wal-Mart on the pillow aisle. His momma was pulling his cart backward and a Sponge Bob Square Pants pillow caught his eye. I couldn't resist his outstretched, chubby little arms, so I handed it to him. His bright brown eyes never left it. "Spun Bah Spun Bah". He worked the shrunken feet back and forth, patted its shoulders and became so content! I followed the family at a distance to keep an eye on my new friend, as he was so amusing! Suddenly, his momma turned around - this was after at least five minutes, mind you - and she asked him, "Did that lady give you that Sponge Bob Square Pants?" He just looked up, mouth open. I laughed and told her I couldn't help myself. She said, "No wonder he's been so quiet!" I looked down at him, clutching his new friend, sitting in the grocery cart seat designated for cutie pies just like him, and raised my eye brows. He raised his right back! So I shrugged my shoulders - and he shrugged his right back! That was all I needed to know. :)
Alabama Psalms
Preface:
We've landed in a field cut out of young pine. Some sort of public park right on Mobile Bay. We're staying in Air Force tents, sleeping on cots. The giant, protective clouds hang low and the wind blows mercifully hard to relieve the oppressive humidity. No one really seems to know what to do, what the plan is or what time supper is, but all are good-natured, excited to be here and willing to help. The Carolina blue sky peeks out from behind the cotton here and there as the fluff moves north. The bahaya grass and clover quiver with each gust of gulf breeze. Praise God.
Night. The stars are incredible. We had a brief rain. They don't seem nearly as distracted as I do. The random pulse of the generator. The mosquitoes loves me. This shooting star seems to be falling forever. It reminds me of the one I saw in a dream that landed in the outstretched water that looks uncannily like the Mobile Bay across the street. DISTRACTIONS....
ALABAMA PSALM 1
God, your ways are perfect. What looks like tragedy is a miracle of your doing. You humble and purify me in sickness to exalt me with your power. You deliver me safely home to call me back out into service. I sit in awe of your unsurassing greatness and ability to see around the corner of Life. I will go wherever you call, for you are the LORD Almighty, whom I serve for ever and ever. AMEN.
ALABAMA PSALM 2
My Lord and God, forgive me as I am limited, distracted and trapped. Limited by my humanness and lack of understanding of your might and power and willingness to rescue me. Distracted by my sinful nature that easily entangles a lowly human soul that needs only to remember thy love for me. Trapped in this crude, fleshly matter in which I must roam your Earth until I am called home to be with Thee. Have mercy on thy servant, God, who wants only to be with Thee and to gaze upon Thy face. AMEN.
ALABAMA PSALM 3
O feel the wind that races across thy land, reminding the trees and grass of their liveliness! O count the stars that give light and wonder to the sky. O watch the clouds pass and reform and bring rain with which to bless God's Earth. O gaze upon night's lanturn, a moon that causes the ocean tides to rise and fall. All of these were spoken into being by the great I AM, and it is He whom I will worship and serve all the days of my life. AMEN.
ALABAMA PSALM 4
The good Lord blessed me with big, quick feet and strong, able hands, so how shall I use them to His glory? I will be swift to help a child or widow in need and attempt to lead them to your throne of righteousness. I will lift up my brother when he falls. I will help build foundations of shelter for those in need to live. I will tenderly tend to the wounds of the ill and troubled. I will bow down to the God of the Heaves and Earth, who created me for His own purposes, according to His own plan, which is my destiny. I will forever praise Him. AMEN.
We've landed in a field cut out of young pine. Some sort of public park right on Mobile Bay. We're staying in Air Force tents, sleeping on cots. The giant, protective clouds hang low and the wind blows mercifully hard to relieve the oppressive humidity. No one really seems to know what to do, what the plan is or what time supper is, but all are good-natured, excited to be here and willing to help. The Carolina blue sky peeks out from behind the cotton here and there as the fluff moves north. The bahaya grass and clover quiver with each gust of gulf breeze. Praise God.
Night. The stars are incredible. We had a brief rain. They don't seem nearly as distracted as I do. The random pulse of the generator. The mosquitoes loves me. This shooting star seems to be falling forever. It reminds me of the one I saw in a dream that landed in the outstretched water that looks uncannily like the Mobile Bay across the street. DISTRACTIONS....
ALABAMA PSALM 1
God, your ways are perfect. What looks like tragedy is a miracle of your doing. You humble and purify me in sickness to exalt me with your power. You deliver me safely home to call me back out into service. I sit in awe of your unsurassing greatness and ability to see around the corner of Life. I will go wherever you call, for you are the LORD Almighty, whom I serve for ever and ever. AMEN.
ALABAMA PSALM 2
My Lord and God, forgive me as I am limited, distracted and trapped. Limited by my humanness and lack of understanding of your might and power and willingness to rescue me. Distracted by my sinful nature that easily entangles a lowly human soul that needs only to remember thy love for me. Trapped in this crude, fleshly matter in which I must roam your Earth until I am called home to be with Thee. Have mercy on thy servant, God, who wants only to be with Thee and to gaze upon Thy face. AMEN.
ALABAMA PSALM 3
O feel the wind that races across thy land, reminding the trees and grass of their liveliness! O count the stars that give light and wonder to the sky. O watch the clouds pass and reform and bring rain with which to bless God's Earth. O gaze upon night's lanturn, a moon that causes the ocean tides to rise and fall. All of these were spoken into being by the great I AM, and it is He whom I will worship and serve all the days of my life. AMEN.
ALABAMA PSALM 4
The good Lord blessed me with big, quick feet and strong, able hands, so how shall I use them to His glory? I will be swift to help a child or widow in need and attempt to lead them to your throne of righteousness. I will lift up my brother when he falls. I will help build foundations of shelter for those in need to live. I will tenderly tend to the wounds of the ill and troubled. I will bow down to the God of the Heaves and Earth, who created me for His own purposes, according to His own plan, which is my destiny. I will forever praise Him. AMEN.
But I'm Not Dead Yet
I still haven't been to Fenway Park
I've never punched my daddy
Or head-butted my mom.
Ain't ever been to New York City.
New York City?!?
New York City.
But I'm not dead yet.
I never have made love,
Or looked into a man's eyes.
I've never driven cross-country,
But I have had one birthday surprise.
Anyway, I haven't played Austin City Limits
Or shook Bob Dylan's hand .
They say I've got lead singer syndrome
and I don't even have a band.
I've never met a Greek diplomat,
But I made out with his son.
Ain't been to Vegas and placed a bet,
Don't ever really wanna go neither,
But I'm not dead yet.
I've never been denied by a Florida football player.
I've never enclosed myself in a Tupperware container.
Ain't sat in the boxes at an Atlanta Braves game.
Lost my luggage en route to Honduras but I didn't complain.
Haven't ever lost a battle without getting upset
But I'm not dead yet.
Still haven't harmonized with Alison Krauss
Or co-wrote one with John Mayer,
But I have crossed stuff off the list lately
That I once thought didn't have a prayer.
I think it's going about as well as it can get
But I'm still not dead yet.
I've never punched my daddy
Or head-butted my mom.
Ain't ever been to New York City.
New York City?!?
New York City.
But I'm not dead yet.
I never have made love,
Or looked into a man's eyes.
I've never driven cross-country,
But I have had one birthday surprise.
Anyway, I haven't played Austin City Limits
Or shook Bob Dylan's hand .
They say I've got lead singer syndrome
and I don't even have a band.
I've never met a Greek diplomat,
But I made out with his son.
Ain't been to Vegas and placed a bet,
Don't ever really wanna go neither,
But I'm not dead yet.
I've never been denied by a Florida football player.
I've never enclosed myself in a Tupperware container.
Ain't sat in the boxes at an Atlanta Braves game.
Lost my luggage en route to Honduras but I didn't complain.
Haven't ever lost a battle without getting upset
But I'm not dead yet.
Still haven't harmonized with Alison Krauss
Or co-wrote one with John Mayer,
But I have crossed stuff off the list lately
That I once thought didn't have a prayer.
I think it's going about as well as it can get
But I'm still not dead yet.
Monday 4 June 2007
Ugh's Redfish Gumbo
UGH'S REDFISH GUMBO
9:27pm Friday, Apr 27
Ugh's Redfish Gumbo
Ingredients:
1 TBPS olive oil
1 small yellow onion, medium dice
2 small garlic cloves, minced
2 inch-thick redfish filets, large dice (uniformly cut ~ ¾" to 1" cubes)
¼ cup water
½ tsp oregano
1 cup frozen Cajun gumbo vegetable medley (can be found in frozen vegetable section of Winn Dixie, contains okra, corn, bell peppers and onions)
1 can Progresso Hearty Tomato soup
1 bay leaf
5-8 shakes of Louisiana Hot Sauce (to taste)
Salt and freshly-ground black pepper
1/4 - ½ cup cooked white rice
Directions:
Put olive oil in a medium soup pot and turn on heat to low. Add onion and sweat on low heat for three minutes. Add garlic, sweat until translucent (about 5 minutes) on low heat. Lightly salt and pepper. Stir in fish, water and oregano and mix well. Cover and simmer for 5 minutes on low to medium-low heat, stirring occasionally. Add vegetables, and again add a light sprinkling of salt and pepper. Stir to combine well. Add tomato soup and bay leaf, stir well. Cover and simmer or medium low heat for 10-20 minutes (however long you can stand it!) Stir again, remove bay leaf, and add hot sauce and salt and pepper to taste. Top with white rice.
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Serves two.
9:27pm Friday, Apr 27
Ugh's Redfish Gumbo
Ingredients:
1 TBPS olive oil
1 small yellow onion, medium dice
2 small garlic cloves, minced
2 inch-thick redfish filets, large dice (uniformly cut ~ ¾" to 1" cubes)
¼ cup water
½ tsp oregano
1 cup frozen Cajun gumbo vegetable medley (can be found in frozen vegetable section of Winn Dixie, contains okra, corn, bell peppers and onions)
1 can Progresso Hearty Tomato soup
1 bay leaf
5-8 shakes of Louisiana Hot Sauce (to taste)
Salt and freshly-ground black pepper
1/4 - ½ cup cooked white rice
Directions:
Put olive oil in a medium soup pot and turn on heat to low. Add onion and sweat on low heat for three minutes. Add garlic, sweat until translucent (about 5 minutes) on low heat. Lightly salt and pepper. Stir in fish, water and oregano and mix well. Cover and simmer for 5 minutes on low to medium-low heat, stirring occasionally. Add vegetables, and again add a light sprinkling of salt and pepper. Stir to combine well. Add tomato soup and bay leaf, stir well. Cover and simmer or medium low heat for 10-20 minutes (however long you can stand it!) Stir again, remove bay leaf, and add hot sauce and salt and pepper to taste. Top with white rice.
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Serves two.
Aunt Ann's Cornbread
Aunt Ann's Cornbread
1:23pm Saturday, May 5
Ingredients:
(You don't really measure out this recipe exactlah, just kinda eye it)
- Self-rising corn meal (NOT "MIX" - Martha White makes a good one,
if you can find a locally-ground self-rising corn meal that's even better)
- Buttermilk (whole if you can find it, but low fat is okay)
- Canola oil (or whatev, not olive oil, obviouslah, but it'll work in a pinch)
Directions:
Take your cast iron skillet and put a dollop of oil in the bottom and kinda swirl it around. Stick it in the oven and preheat it up to 350 degrees. This is so when you pour your batter in it'll make a nice sizzle and be a pretty golden-brown on the bottom of your pone. Take a bowl comparable to the size of the cast iron skillet you'll be cooking the pone in (cast iron is the ONLY way to go). Sprinkle out the corn meal into the bowl, about as much as you want for the size of the pone. (I like mine thin and crispy). Pour some buttermilk on top (not too much!). Stir with a fork to combine, get the lumps out. Add more if you want. The batter should be kinda runny if you want a crispy pone, dryer if you want a fluffier one. Put a small quarter-sized dollop of oil on top and stir that in. Let the batter sit a spell to make sure your oven is nice and hot. So take your hot (and I mean it's HOT) skillet out and pour the batter in the bottom. Take a moment to listen to that nice sizzle sound. Then use your fork to spread it around on the bottom and kinda make it higher on the edges. Stick it back in the oven, set the timer for 40 minutes. When it beeps, check and see if it's golden brown on the top. If it is as crispy-lookin as you desire, take it out and let it rest for a minute or two. Slice like a pie and serve with buttah. Goes well with some pintos or black eyed peas, floating on top so it can absorb the flavah. Is also a nice accompaniment to a heart soup or stew like Ugh's Redfish Gumbo. ;)
1:23pm Saturday, May 5
Ingredients:
(You don't really measure out this recipe exactlah, just kinda eye it)
- Self-rising corn meal (NOT "MIX" - Martha White makes a good one,
if you can find a locally-ground self-rising corn meal that's even better)
- Buttermilk (whole if you can find it, but low fat is okay)
- Canola oil (or whatev, not olive oil, obviouslah, but it'll work in a pinch)
Directions:
Take your cast iron skillet and put a dollop of oil in the bottom and kinda swirl it around. Stick it in the oven and preheat it up to 350 degrees. This is so when you pour your batter in it'll make a nice sizzle and be a pretty golden-brown on the bottom of your pone. Take a bowl comparable to the size of the cast iron skillet you'll be cooking the pone in (cast iron is the ONLY way to go). Sprinkle out the corn meal into the bowl, about as much as you want for the size of the pone. (I like mine thin and crispy). Pour some buttermilk on top (not too much!). Stir with a fork to combine, get the lumps out. Add more if you want. The batter should be kinda runny if you want a crispy pone, dryer if you want a fluffier one. Put a small quarter-sized dollop of oil on top and stir that in. Let the batter sit a spell to make sure your oven is nice and hot. So take your hot (and I mean it's HOT) skillet out and pour the batter in the bottom. Take a moment to listen to that nice sizzle sound. Then use your fork to spread it around on the bottom and kinda make it higher on the edges. Stick it back in the oven, set the timer for 40 minutes. When it beeps, check and see if it's golden brown on the top. If it is as crispy-lookin as you desire, take it out and let it rest for a minute or two. Slice like a pie and serve with buttah. Goes well with some pintos or black eyed peas, floating on top so it can absorb the flavah. Is also a nice accompaniment to a heart soup or stew like Ugh's Redfish Gumbo. ;)
Things I Learned In the Kitchen Tonight/Fried Green Tomatoes
Things I Learned in the Kitchen Tonight/Fried Green Tomatoes
8:21pm Thursday, May 17
Now all you Southern cookin' purists don't hate. I kinda created a new twist on our favorite snack, Fried Green Tomatoes
Ingredients:
1 large green tomato
cornmeal
buttermilk
olive oil
salt
pepper
dried basil
Directions:
Heat oil in medium skillet (cast iron if you got it). Slice tomato about 1/2 inch thick. Lay slices on some paper towels to absorb the moisture for a couple minutes, then salt and pepper real good. Have a bowl with some buttermilk in the bottom and another with some cornmeal. For yummy crusty goodness, lay the slices of tomato in the cornmeal, then the buttermilk, then back into the cornmeal (you definitely need the cornmeal on the outer layer...one thing I learned tonight). Be sure your oil is nice and hot, but not so hot it's smoking, and gently place the slice in the oil (make sure you're wearing a shirt...another thing I learned tonight: just a sports bra don't cut it). Seriouslah, be careful. Cook a couple minutes then flip. I like em brown on both sides but you do what you want. Take them off and transfer to a cool plate and salt and pepper both sides. Just before serving, sprinkle with some basil to go ahead and complete the Italian thing you weren't planning on doing at all but just seemed logical and ended up tasting YUUUMMMMMMYYYY!!!
So I guess the main thing I learned tonight is that spontaneity in the kitchen can be cool and just because tradition holds one thing doesn't mean my spin on it is a sin. Or something. :)
8:21pm Thursday, May 17
Now all you Southern cookin' purists don't hate. I kinda created a new twist on our favorite snack, Fried Green Tomatoes
Ingredients:
1 large green tomato
cornmeal
buttermilk
olive oil
salt
pepper
dried basil
Directions:
Heat oil in medium skillet (cast iron if you got it). Slice tomato about 1/2 inch thick. Lay slices on some paper towels to absorb the moisture for a couple minutes, then salt and pepper real good. Have a bowl with some buttermilk in the bottom and another with some cornmeal. For yummy crusty goodness, lay the slices of tomato in the cornmeal, then the buttermilk, then back into the cornmeal (you definitely need the cornmeal on the outer layer...one thing I learned tonight). Be sure your oil is nice and hot, but not so hot it's smoking, and gently place the slice in the oil (make sure you're wearing a shirt...another thing I learned tonight: just a sports bra don't cut it). Seriouslah, be careful. Cook a couple minutes then flip. I like em brown on both sides but you do what you want. Take them off and transfer to a cool plate and salt and pepper both sides. Just before serving, sprinkle with some basil to go ahead and complete the Italian thing you weren't planning on doing at all but just seemed logical and ended up tasting YUUUMMMMMMYYYY!!!
So I guess the main thing I learned tonight is that spontaneity in the kitchen can be cool and just because tradition holds one thing doesn't mean my spin on it is a sin. Or something. :)
Why I Love Sister Mackie
Why I Love Miss Margaret/Official Lyric Change
6:26am Friday, May 25
We sat down in the parlor and I took up my guitar (Grace Martin). I was so excited to play my latest song for my favorite sister in Christ!
When I finished singing, “He’s Got My Heart”, she said, “I like that, it’s really cute, but I want you to change the part where you say ‘darn’. It was the first thing I heard and darn’s a bad word and I know you want to be pure and what not.”
I said, “Gosh, alright, how ‘bout ‘dern’?”
“No way, ‘dern’’s worse than ‘darn’! How bout “really good”? Play that.”
So I tried singing, “and that could be a really good start”, but it didn’t work.
“Well, let’s think about it and come up with something later.”
She said okay.
The next morning at breakfast I told her, “Miss Margaret, I came up with a line I think that fits: “and that could be a ‘mighty fine’ start”.
She said, “oh yeah, that’s much better, and it goes along with the language you use in the whole song, ya know, real local”.
☺
So the chorus of “He’s Got My Heart” now official goes:
He’s got my heart (my whole heart) and nothing but my heart so help me God
He’s got my heart (my whole heart) and nothing but my heart so help me God
I love him from afar/But that could be a MIGHTY FINE start
He’s got my heart (my whole heart) and nothing but my heart so help me God.
-HBS
6:26am Friday, May 25
We sat down in the parlor and I took up my guitar (Grace Martin). I was so excited to play my latest song for my favorite sister in Christ!
When I finished singing, “He’s Got My Heart”, she said, “I like that, it’s really cute, but I want you to change the part where you say ‘darn’. It was the first thing I heard and darn’s a bad word and I know you want to be pure and what not.”
I said, “Gosh, alright, how ‘bout ‘dern’?”
“No way, ‘dern’’s worse than ‘darn’! How bout “really good”? Play that.”
So I tried singing, “and that could be a really good start”, but it didn’t work.
“Well, let’s think about it and come up with something later.”
She said okay.
The next morning at breakfast I told her, “Miss Margaret, I came up with a line I think that fits: “and that could be a ‘mighty fine’ start”.
She said, “oh yeah, that’s much better, and it goes along with the language you use in the whole song, ya know, real local”.
☺
So the chorus of “He’s Got My Heart” now official goes:
He’s got my heart (my whole heart) and nothing but my heart so help me God
He’s got my heart (my whole heart) and nothing but my heart so help me God
I love him from afar/But that could be a MIGHTY FINE start
He’s got my heart (my whole heart) and nothing but my heart so help me God.
-HBS
My New Obsession
My New Obsession
8:48pm Friday, May 25
Flamm Lakay!!!
It used to be all about Brazas Chicken, this Peruvian place tucked in a little strip mall on the corner of Davis and Orange, but not no mo'. That place has been discovered and you actually have to wait for a table now.
Today I went to a Haitian/Caribbean place on South Orange I'd been dying to try for a month or so now, called Flamm Lakay.
I walk in and the place has lots of natural sunlight coming in through the windows, tile floors and native folk art decorating the walls. A beautiful middle-aged Creole woman greeted me at the door and told me to sit anywhere. I had the whole place to myself!
After looking at the menu, I wanted the chicken (some fancy Creole name, can't recall) but she said it wasn't ready yet. So I ordered the snapper instead, with fried plantains and mixed rice. She served me cold water with lime, no ice - just the way I like it on a hot summer day!
The salad was beautiful - the dressing came in a tiny ceramic pitcher and was excellent. She served it with fresh-baked bread, still warm - mmmm, so doughy and soft! AAAHHHH.
Then the snapper came - it was a whole fish, head and all! Well, the guts were cut out, but I'd never had it this way before. Still, I set to work. The eye stared at me. I told myself to not be a wuss and just eat it. So I did - it was EXCELLENT! :) Not at all what I expected...I thought it would pop in my mouth like caviar, but instead it had a soft, crunchy texture, kind of like a ligament on a chicken wing. Mmmm, myyyy faaaavorrriiiiiiiite.
When I presented my plate of bones to the lady (nothing was left but bones, scales, and the tail, mmmm), she said, "You did so well! You plucked the eyes and everything!", beaming. :)
I noticed on the table that they served Haitian coffee there, and I asked if they sold it to take home. Woo hoo! - I got a pound of fresh ground Cafe Rebo 100% Arabica ("Rebo, le bon cafe', C'est la Qualite'!". I can't wait until tomorrow morning!!!!!!!).
So I went off rejoicing and promised the lady I'd soon be back with friends.
8:48pm Friday, May 25
Flamm Lakay!!!
It used to be all about Brazas Chicken, this Peruvian place tucked in a little strip mall on the corner of Davis and Orange, but not no mo'. That place has been discovered and you actually have to wait for a table now.
Today I went to a Haitian/Caribbean place on South Orange I'd been dying to try for a month or so now, called Flamm Lakay.
I walk in and the place has lots of natural sunlight coming in through the windows, tile floors and native folk art decorating the walls. A beautiful middle-aged Creole woman greeted me at the door and told me to sit anywhere. I had the whole place to myself!
After looking at the menu, I wanted the chicken (some fancy Creole name, can't recall) but she said it wasn't ready yet. So I ordered the snapper instead, with fried plantains and mixed rice. She served me cold water with lime, no ice - just the way I like it on a hot summer day!
The salad was beautiful - the dressing came in a tiny ceramic pitcher and was excellent. She served it with fresh-baked bread, still warm - mmmm, so doughy and soft! AAAHHHH.
Then the snapper came - it was a whole fish, head and all! Well, the guts were cut out, but I'd never had it this way before. Still, I set to work. The eye stared at me. I told myself to not be a wuss and just eat it. So I did - it was EXCELLENT! :) Not at all what I expected...I thought it would pop in my mouth like caviar, but instead it had a soft, crunchy texture, kind of like a ligament on a chicken wing. Mmmm, myyyy faaaavorrriiiiiiiite.
When I presented my plate of bones to the lady (nothing was left but bones, scales, and the tail, mmmm), she said, "You did so well! You plucked the eyes and everything!", beaming. :)
I noticed on the table that they served Haitian coffee there, and I asked if they sold it to take home. Woo hoo! - I got a pound of fresh ground Cafe Rebo 100% Arabica ("Rebo, le bon cafe', C'est la Qualite'!". I can't wait until tomorrow morning!!!!!!!).
So I went off rejoicing and promised the lady I'd soon be back with friends.
Friday 25 May 2007
Discography
I thought it would be neat to post a "Storyteller's"-type description of my songs to give folks a better idea of where I was coming from when I wrote them:
He's Got My Heart (2007)
1. He's Got My Heart
2. Split My Time
3. Just Leave Me Be
4. Banned From Baton Rouge
5. Self Defense
6. Thank The Lord It Wasn't You
7. You Won't Give Me The Time
8. Optimism
9. Right As Rain
10. The Lows
11. Huckleberry Finn
12. Tear After Tear
13. Heartaches
14. You Don't Have to Shave Your Legs For Me*
15. Traveling Soldier*
He's Got My Heart:
Well, I'd written the chorus a couple weeks before I came around to finishing it. It was originally written about Lee Humphrey (!) and this funny-haha school-girl crush I had on him. No big whoop, it was just amusing. Well, 'round about April-ish I fell for this other kid I've known for years and on April 20, went fishing up out of Gulf Breeze and caught this big cobia (okay not so big by cobia standards, but was still a keeper and definitely the biggest fish I've ever caught, 20lbs and 40"!). So after catching the fish I was out on the bow of this huge boat all by myself, and the verses just came to me. Thus, He's Got My Heart is the title track of the record, and the photo of me with the cobia (who had the bait eel still hanging out of his mouth!) is the album cover. :)
Split My Time:
I had a bluegrass crush on this banjo player who lived in Greensboro and was in my ex-producer (scumbag)'s band. His name was Jeff, and he was AMAZING. He played it like jazz. So it just kinda went from there. Don't get me wrong, he's married with kids (and waaaaaaayyyyy too old for me), but it was a cool idea for a song. My hope is that if it gets recorded by a real performer, they'll have a fiddle vs. banjo duel for my heart, HAHA.
Just Leave Me Be:
Wrote this New Year's Day evening of 2006. During December 2005 I'd had roughly 12 boyfriends (gross, I know, not that I went past 2nd base with any of them, and only 1 got that far, and that's bad enough, but I was lying to myself that it was okay). I had this idea that all of them brought something to the table and at the end of the day I was full. WRONG-O REINDEER! So after walking onto the Quad at UGA, on my way to climb this big magnolia that Audrey and I had carved our names into the New Year's Day before and some random guy came up and tied my shoelaces and followed me up the tree, I'd had my fill. So they can all just leave me the heck alone.
Banned From Baton Rouge:
Awwww, I love this song. I wrote it about the stories Bradley'd told me about his life. Bradley is the last boy I kissed (January 2, 2006) - I have this thing for juvenile delinquents. All of it is true, except for the part in the chorus about how "I hope the Lord forgives me for the awful things I've done", because he's an atheist, even though his favorite book is "A Prayer for Owen Meany" by John Irving. I'd say there's hope for him, after all. God bless Bradley, wherever he may be.
Self Defense:
I have NO IDEA where this song came from. I guess I thought it'd be cool to write a song about a girl killing her high school sweetheart she was so flattered to have gotten to marry and not feeling bad about it until she knew she was busted. Just found it in a journal. I really like singing it though.
Thank The Lord It Wasn't You:
Haha, wrote this one about my old beau from college. It tickled me so much to see him with his now-wife - as soon as I saw them together I knew they'd get hitched. And I really couldn't be happier for him, cause we never could've made each other happy. We just brought out the worst in each other!
You Won't Give Me The Time:
Just a fun little bluegrass song. I wrote it for Jeff's band, EIGHTwenty3.
Optimism:
The third recorded version of the purest love song I've ever written. No lyrics, it's just what my heart sounds like when it's in love. Originally written for the "C-word" (haha, yeah, how pure can love be when you refer to the object of your affection with a nickname like that?!?!), so in some ways I consider it his, but when I play it now it just makes me happy in the best way and makes me think of the new boy (who's got my heart, my whole heart, and nothing but my heart, so help me God). :)
Right As Rain:
I really like the verses in this and the imagery. Honestly don't know where it came from, wasn't really intended to be about anyone, just a general feel-good song, another gift from God.
The Lows:
Wrote this back in 2004. This arrangement was suggested by my ex-producer (scumbag), and I hate to admit he was right about some things (maybe 5% of the diahrrea that came out of his mouth cause he just looooved the sound of his own voice).
Huckleberry Finn:
Another one of the C-word's nicknames, given by one of my college rugby teammates, haha. Wrote it in grad school - was reading Bob Dylan's book Chronicles, Vol 1 - at the part where he was in New Orleans about to record the Oh Mercy album and mentioned "the Southern-most magnolia" and the melody just came to me. Also, Huck Finn was my Papa Frank's favorite book. I LOVE this song, it makes me so happy to sing it, because I truly, truly feel every word.
Tear After Tear:
Wrote this for Dolly Parton but so far have been too lazy to send it off to her! Supposedly was going to be my hit (according to E.P.S.B.) - he suggested a couple relative-minor chord changes that made the song better, and then wanted to throw in some random instrumental break that didn't make any sense to me. To be nice, I offered him song-writing credit for the music (the lyrics are allll mine except for a couple of suggestions my little sister Emmy Lou made when I was writing it at home one summer working watermelons and training for a rugby national championship tournament, which my team won, thank you, thank you, haha) - just to be nice, it was an excessive credit. So when I told him to get lost, I put the chords the way I wanted and dropped the crazy instrumental break and gave my sister half credit for the lyrics. That way he'll have to sue me if he wants part of the royalties, which would only amount to 25% anyway - HA HA HA. It's even creepier that he latched on to this song about a naive young girl who gets cheated on and hurt by a man, GROSS. I still like the song though, it's mine, dangit! :)
Heartaches:
One of the first songs I ever wrote. Worked on it for years before it was finished. Just set out to write a country song in drop D and here you go. It's fun to sing too - I like to sound all hurt and what not to make it more dramatical, haha.
You Don't Have to Shave Your Legs For Me:
A cover of a great Keb'Mo' song. This song is why I got to discover him in the first place. My parents were listening to XM Radio on the way back from Suwannee and this came on. As soon as they heard the hook, they gave each other that look (I know exactly the look, too), and Momma was all, "Oh I hope Haylee can find love like this some day!" and ran out and bought me the CD the next week. Getting that album was the best thing that happened to me in 2004 - don't underestimate the power of music, people.
Traveling Soldier:
A cover of a Bruce Robison song, as recorded by the Dixie Chicks. I love this song. I recorded it to dedicate to my daddy's best fishing buddy, Big John. He served in Vietnam. The first time I heard this song was in college, in my car, and I boo-hoo-ed like a child.
There you have it! No secrets! Hope you dig the songs. :)
He's Got My Heart (2007)
1. He's Got My Heart
2. Split My Time
3. Just Leave Me Be
4. Banned From Baton Rouge
5. Self Defense
6. Thank The Lord It Wasn't You
7. You Won't Give Me The Time
8. Optimism
9. Right As Rain
10. The Lows
11. Huckleberry Finn
12. Tear After Tear
13. Heartaches
14. You Don't Have to Shave Your Legs For Me*
15. Traveling Soldier*
He's Got My Heart:
Well, I'd written the chorus a couple weeks before I came around to finishing it. It was originally written about Lee Humphrey (!) and this funny-haha school-girl crush I had on him. No big whoop, it was just amusing. Well, 'round about April-ish I fell for this other kid I've known for years and on April 20, went fishing up out of Gulf Breeze and caught this big cobia (okay not so big by cobia standards, but was still a keeper and definitely the biggest fish I've ever caught, 20lbs and 40"!). So after catching the fish I was out on the bow of this huge boat all by myself, and the verses just came to me. Thus, He's Got My Heart is the title track of the record, and the photo of me with the cobia (who had the bait eel still hanging out of his mouth!) is the album cover. :)
Split My Time:
I had a bluegrass crush on this banjo player who lived in Greensboro and was in my ex-producer (scumbag)'s band. His name was Jeff, and he was AMAZING. He played it like jazz. So it just kinda went from there. Don't get me wrong, he's married with kids (and waaaaaaayyyyy too old for me), but it was a cool idea for a song. My hope is that if it gets recorded by a real performer, they'll have a fiddle vs. banjo duel for my heart, HAHA.
Just Leave Me Be:
Wrote this New Year's Day evening of 2006. During December 2005 I'd had roughly 12 boyfriends (gross, I know, not that I went past 2nd base with any of them, and only 1 got that far, and that's bad enough, but I was lying to myself that it was okay). I had this idea that all of them brought something to the table and at the end of the day I was full. WRONG-O REINDEER! So after walking onto the Quad at UGA, on my way to climb this big magnolia that Audrey and I had carved our names into the New Year's Day before and some random guy came up and tied my shoelaces and followed me up the tree, I'd had my fill. So they can all just leave me the heck alone.
Banned From Baton Rouge:
Awwww, I love this song. I wrote it about the stories Bradley'd told me about his life. Bradley is the last boy I kissed (January 2, 2006) - I have this thing for juvenile delinquents. All of it is true, except for the part in the chorus about how "I hope the Lord forgives me for the awful things I've done", because he's an atheist, even though his favorite book is "A Prayer for Owen Meany" by John Irving. I'd say there's hope for him, after all. God bless Bradley, wherever he may be.
Self Defense:
I have NO IDEA where this song came from. I guess I thought it'd be cool to write a song about a girl killing her high school sweetheart she was so flattered to have gotten to marry and not feeling bad about it until she knew she was busted. Just found it in a journal. I really like singing it though.
Thank The Lord It Wasn't You:
Haha, wrote this one about my old beau from college. It tickled me so much to see him with his now-wife - as soon as I saw them together I knew they'd get hitched. And I really couldn't be happier for him, cause we never could've made each other happy. We just brought out the worst in each other!
You Won't Give Me The Time:
Just a fun little bluegrass song. I wrote it for Jeff's band, EIGHTwenty3.
Optimism:
The third recorded version of the purest love song I've ever written. No lyrics, it's just what my heart sounds like when it's in love. Originally written for the "C-word" (haha, yeah, how pure can love be when you refer to the object of your affection with a nickname like that?!?!), so in some ways I consider it his, but when I play it now it just makes me happy in the best way and makes me think of the new boy (who's got my heart, my whole heart, and nothing but my heart, so help me God). :)
Right As Rain:
I really like the verses in this and the imagery. Honestly don't know where it came from, wasn't really intended to be about anyone, just a general feel-good song, another gift from God.
The Lows:
Wrote this back in 2004. This arrangement was suggested by my ex-producer (scumbag), and I hate to admit he was right about some things (maybe 5% of the diahrrea that came out of his mouth cause he just looooved the sound of his own voice).
Huckleberry Finn:
Another one of the C-word's nicknames, given by one of my college rugby teammates, haha. Wrote it in grad school - was reading Bob Dylan's book Chronicles, Vol 1 - at the part where he was in New Orleans about to record the Oh Mercy album and mentioned "the Southern-most magnolia" and the melody just came to me. Also, Huck Finn was my Papa Frank's favorite book. I LOVE this song, it makes me so happy to sing it, because I truly, truly feel every word.
Tear After Tear:
Wrote this for Dolly Parton but so far have been too lazy to send it off to her! Supposedly was going to be my hit (according to E.P.S.B.) - he suggested a couple relative-minor chord changes that made the song better, and then wanted to throw in some random instrumental break that didn't make any sense to me. To be nice, I offered him song-writing credit for the music (the lyrics are allll mine except for a couple of suggestions my little sister Emmy Lou made when I was writing it at home one summer working watermelons and training for a rugby national championship tournament, which my team won, thank you, thank you, haha) - just to be nice, it was an excessive credit. So when I told him to get lost, I put the chords the way I wanted and dropped the crazy instrumental break and gave my sister half credit for the lyrics. That way he'll have to sue me if he wants part of the royalties, which would only amount to 25% anyway - HA HA HA. It's even creepier that he latched on to this song about a naive young girl who gets cheated on and hurt by a man, GROSS. I still like the song though, it's mine, dangit! :)
Heartaches:
One of the first songs I ever wrote. Worked on it for years before it was finished. Just set out to write a country song in drop D and here you go. It's fun to sing too - I like to sound all hurt and what not to make it more dramatical, haha.
You Don't Have to Shave Your Legs For Me:
A cover of a great Keb'Mo' song. This song is why I got to discover him in the first place. My parents were listening to XM Radio on the way back from Suwannee and this came on. As soon as they heard the hook, they gave each other that look (I know exactly the look, too), and Momma was all, "Oh I hope Haylee can find love like this some day!" and ran out and bought me the CD the next week. Getting that album was the best thing that happened to me in 2004 - don't underestimate the power of music, people.
Traveling Soldier:
A cover of a Bruce Robison song, as recorded by the Dixie Chicks. I love this song. I recorded it to dedicate to my daddy's best fishing buddy, Big John. He served in Vietnam. The first time I heard this song was in college, in my car, and I boo-hoo-ed like a child.
There you have it! No secrets! Hope you dig the songs. :)
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