January 2007

well, i finally read The Alchemist. i know, i know… it’s about damn time.

hype is a funny thing, claiming fragments that don’t belong to it, buiding undue and unrealistic expectations. so it is a rare occasion when something actually supersedes its hype. well, i will be the first to tell you: the alchemist does. anything positive you’ve heard about this book, it is better. please go read it.

i also just finished a book called A Matrix Of Meanings: Finding God In Pop Culture and must highly, highly recommend it as well. it is written by two professors in the los angeles area and illuminates facets of spirituality within pop culture that i had never considered before. if you are fascinated by cultural studies, sociology, art, pop culture, and theology you will love this book.

and that’s all the sunshine i’ve got for ya.

i flew back to denver for a gig last thursday and got back to california saturday night. while there i was able to hang out with “my boys” (my two best friends in the world) all day on friday before my show, and it was… beautiful. i love those guys like my brothers, even though we don’t have much of anything in common.well, except for the fact that we all want to change the world.most of the time, that seems to be enough to occupy our conversations for hours, days, months on end. as i said, i had a simply fabulous time; unfortunately upon my return to the desert, those phantom feelings have made me revisit the depth of my relational vacuum here in palmdale. i know friendships don’t happen overnight — thankfully i’m not that naive — but to forge connections, one must have something in common, right? ah… i think we’ve found the problem.i don’t know anyone here who really wants to change the world.back in colorado i also got to hang out with two of my other bestest friends in the world and their 3-year-old daughter, my “niece,” Seraphim. i’ll be honest: i often have trouble with kids. somewhere, deep down, i know i want to have some (later) of my own, but most of the time, children just kind of annoy me. all the piercing screaming, littered toys, cake-covered-face, and incessant attention… eeek.i’m not sure if i’m getting old or if some kind of biological clock of mine is beginning to get its revenge on my attitude towards kids, but this trip, for whatever reason, i absolutely fell in love. i had a blast with my niece and i think she had a good time with me, even though we really didn’t get to hang out too much. strange? yes. for me, at least.daddy josh? eh, don’t hold your breath, not anytime too soon anyway. but it’s almost like i can feel myself changing… and that’s about all the weirdness i can take… for now.

i just finished a book called “i am charlotte simmons” by tom wolfe, a fascinating expose/discussion/analysis on/about college life. the phrase “not for the faint of heart” comes to mind if you’re thinking about picking it up, but it is supremely well written, and quite thought-provoking.

without tranforming my blog into a book-review, if you’re interested in knowing, wolfe explores a couple facets of college life that are surpremely interesting and mostly frightening: the unjustified elitism of collegiate athletes, the insulting caste system of “cool” (and the harsh American reality that one can never really be ’smart’ and ‘cool’ at the same time), the billowing superiority of the rich, the complete (but not quite as ubiquitous as he portrays — in my post-college experience, anyhow) moral ineptitude of the student, the profanity-laden patois of the common campus, and the universal human desire for acceptance.

overall, quite a good read — and would probably be incendiary material for starting some meaningful discussions… if you had the right group.

it was maybe a little long, though.

eh, my two cents.

It helps, now and then, to step back
and take the long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,
it is beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of
the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
Nothing we do is complete,
which is another way of saying
that the kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection . . .
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.

This is what we are about:
We plant seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted,
knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces effects beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything
and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.
This enables us to do something,
and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way,
an opportunity for God’s grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results . . .
We are prophets of a future not our own.

“A Future Not Our Own”
Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador

i wanted to write a profound, intense, meaningful blog about my visit to the museum of tolerance on monday, but i just can’t find the adequate words.

i will say this:

you should go.

museumoftolerance.com

where:

…love of art, fame, and money have become the same thing. i almost wonder if i can even separate them anymore.

…love of self has become paramount.

…love of networking has replaced love for people. “what have you done for me?” “what could you do for me?” and, most importantly, “what have you done for me lately?” as i cannot remember past the insecurities of my own last 24 hours.

…alone is the new together. every individual must own a car and drive it everywhere. alone. across the street? drive. it is state law. you may own a cell phone and talk on it incessantly, but you may not have meaningful conversations. (that is also state law.)

…california is god. we will sacrifice every spare cent we make to live in a city that is just like every other city on the world, but with more traffic, and an unusually high concentration of businessartists. we will pay outlandish costs for taxes, milk, gas, rent, heat, water, and everyothergodforsakenthing you can buy, simply because our zip codes start with “9.”

…everything can be bought. everything.

i think we best pray to God that, unlike fashions, mentalities do not spread from the left coast.

there is some fabulous truth in this article:

www.commondreams.org/views07/0112-26.htm

“This is how it works
You’re young until you’re not
You love until you don’t
You try until you can’t
You laugh until you cry
You cry until you laugh
And everyone must breathe
Until their dying breath

No, this is how it works
You peer inside yourself
You take the things you like
And try to love the things you took
And then you take that love you made
And stick it into some
Someone else’s heart
Pumping someone else’s blood
And walking arm in arm
You hope it don’t get harmed
But even if it does
You’ll just do it all again”

On The Radio, Regina Spektor

over the past couple days i’ve been corresponding with an e-friend of mine across the world about various things on alex’s blog.

i love conversations. i like people to agree with me — perhaps that’s not so rare. i like to be the one with good ideas. i like to be a leader.

i also know i’m young. i know i’m naive, probably in many ways, but i also feel like there’s a passion, a heart that is somehow unexplicably connected to that bright-eyed wonder that i never want to lose.

as usual, my conversations have led me to wonder…

i wonder if one must lose some of that ardor to gain the perspective of wisdom, or if it would be possible to keep it.

i wonder if my wonder is somehow tied to my greenness, like if the opposite of “child” isn’t “adult,” but “cynic.”

even as i write this, it’s almost like i can feel some of my naivete leaving me, and the road-weary doubt and cynicsm, its inevitable, if not rightful, heir, creeping in.

to be honest, my conversations have been very upbeat, positive, helpful, interesting. just wanted to write this thought down before i forgot it.