Twenty Ten

Post-holiday stress levels seem so low in comparison with the holidays themselves. Michelle and I did an awful lot of traveling--to west Michigan the week before Christmas to visit her extended family, and to east Michigan a couple days after to visit mine. They all like her more than they like me. I don't mind. I like her more than I like me too.

Barnes and Noble has been nice enough to give me two weeks off. That is to say, I am at the bottom of the totem poll and everyone before are getting all the hours before I am. Not that I mind too much. It's giving me time to look for a new job. I had breakfast with one of the associate pastors at Vineyard about an internship there. It wouldn't pay much more than gas, but it would give a lot of opportunity to serve, which is what everyone I know who's worked in ministry told me to do. I still have the substitute application that I've been holding onto, and now that Christmas break is over, school's back in. There are also a few children's homes that I'll be sending applications to. And I'll probably send Woodwind and Brasswind my resume.

I picked up the new Flaming Lips record today (Embryonic). It's so bleeding fantastic. It's one of those records that make me want to grab a bass guitar and a drum machine and throw something onto tape.
Other records I've been enjoying a lot lately:
Portishead - Third
Grizzly Bear - Vecktimest
Deerhunter - Cryptograms
The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds (allegedly the greatest pop album ever recorded. I started listening to it while driving, and instead of going home, I sat in the McDonald's parking lot and let it play through. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant)

I recorded a little instrumental track for the next album (this one isn't done yet though) and put it on my myspace. It's called 'o be still be still be still.' It's a little more experimental than some other things I've done. The rest of the album will be similar in that way.

Michelle made me a paper chain to count down to the wedding. On the inside of each ring, she wrote a memory, something she loves about me, or a prayer for us. I greatly appreciate and enjoy that woman.

Thank You, Lord, for Your blessings.

All I Want For Christmas

is a slightly better job.

I've talked with some children's homes and the media pastor at the Vineyard, and there are a few options that look better than Barnes and Noble's cafe (any of those options, substitute teaching, etc).

Today, Michelle and I drove to Muskegon, MI to visit her parents' families. They are absolutely crazy. In the best way.
Mostly.

Also. Why is this coat so expensive on every site I find it on, and in every brand that makes it?

No updates in a while. I've been busy, what, with having an alright job, the hours of which I wish were a little more regular, and planning a wedding, for which we found a church.

I'm also playing with the worship band at the Vineyard now. It's helping me get over myself and put personal preferences aside.

Life is good.

On insomnia, planning, and anxiety.

It's becoming obvious that being financially stable is not the be-all end-all of nervousness. And, being engaged has had some interesting effects--notably a more pointed feeling of insufficiency and a lack of self control. I have a hard enough time getting my mind to slow down to sleep as it is, and neither of these really help.
Last night as I struggled against wakefulness, the old promise came into my head -- Be still, and know that I am God. Except that meant a much, much, much different thing to me than it ever did. The statement 'I am God' rattled my whole being and grew and grew and grew, and I was terrified. A great and dreadful hand grabbed my bed in its palm and lifted it. I am God, it said. And as I began to understand the Bigness that held me and my sleepless mattress in its terrifying palm, it grew larger and pulled me out of my house and held me one hundred feet above the ground. I am God. I looked down and then into the Great Face that looked on me with its huge and terrible eyes. I looked back down to the ground and was as high as if I'd been in an airplane. I looked back to the Great Face, and to the hand that held me, and it continued to grow.
The Hand continued to lift me and I watched the ground grow further away--out of its orbit, out of the solar system, out of the galaxy, until all the universe was too small to notice. My bed now sat on a ridge of the Great Hand's fingerprint. From a thousand thousands of miles away, the Great Face still looked as if it were right before me.
You don't understand, it said.
I am God.

Oh, be still, be still, be still.

Fiance Knowles

If you like it, put a ring on it.

Employmentville, USA

I have my orientation for the Barnes & Noble Cafe tomorrow evening.
Hurrah!
Now after I get some paychecks under my belt, I can start doing things with my life.
But until then, I've got some things to do.
Like finish an album.
Or finish the Brothers Karamazov
Or tease my girlfriend.

I am very thankful for new beginnings.

And, for mixtapes.
Multitrack Sneakattack, vol VIII: Otto Octavius' Top Picks