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I started a Tumblr for my "band." Check it.

Musicology/Spiritology

Since I haven't blogged in a while, I think it's worth mentioning that for the past eleven months, I have played on the Vineyard worship team just about every week, with a week off here or there (no joke--I think I've had a max of seven weekends off). The past three months, I have been serving as the worship intern, which as had me working in that realm throughout the week too. Sunday, I had my first non-acoustic show in a long time, and it went swimmingly.

It is things like this that really get me thinking sometimes about just how important music is in my life, and how many different things I thought that meant--like that I should move to Chicago to become a full time musician, for instance. Two years ago, I was absolutely sure that what God wanted for me to do with my talent was to invest in it full time as a profession. A year ago, I was completely sure that I had made a complete mistake. So I moved back, gratefully. A month later, I found myself playing for a worship band--somewhere I never thought I'd go back to--and, surprisingly, enjoying it. As much as I'd criticized worship songs for being shallowly written (both musically and lyrically), I had come to appreciate what I saw as shallowness as simplicity, and I came to appreciate the space offered by that simplicity as freedom. I learned how to praise God again, and I learned to do it from the stage. To tell the truth, playing an instrument is much more natural for me than sitting in a large group and singing along. A lot of times, notes and rhythm say more from me than words do. If you ever catch me praying in solitude, you'll hear me humming rather than whispering. It's a language I sometimes feel like I speak better than English--which has brought up problems of its own when I try to write songs.

There's so much music can say. And lately, my lyrics have been talking about robots and time machines while the music itself just talks about truth, and beauty, and trembling, and aching, and love, and thankfulness.

I hope everyone hears that louder than the words.

I am truly blessed with a wonderful life.

The American Workforce

And so, it came to pass that Nathaniel FitzGerald worked several morning shifts at Bashor Children's Home, waking up at five to make the thirty minute drive that would end at the start of my shift, at six a.m. After the eight hour shift, he then drives twenty of those minutes back to the Vineyard Church to fulfill his internship there, which takes up around two and a half hours a day. He returns home around five thirty to his wife, who he wishes he could see more of, and then tries to be in bed before ten, which never happens.

And, I am tired. So, so, so tired. And that doesn't really bode well when my overall health is significantly affected by my sleep. I called off today because said overall health is a bit less than optimal, and after spending the past two days with a sick resident, I didn't want to risk infecting anyone else. But I'm beginning to rethink my goal of four days a week. It's going to be too hard to keep myself healthy with my current schedule. And with this schedule, being married is the only thing that makes sure I see Michelle anymore. If we were still just dating, I'm pretty sure I'd see her two days a week tops.

She got a teaching job, by the way. So I don't really need to work four Bashor days a week anyway. Maybe I'll take that extra day and spend it on music, or at the Vineyard. Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.

A Retrospective

The other day, in an episode of feeling particularly stupid (I burned a pan while making popcorn), I started to read back through my blog, specifically looking for times where I felt especially bad about myself (which were in no shortage). But as I went backward, something else started to happen. I started to become increasingly interested in what I was feeling with every post, whether I felt good or bad about myself. When I got the the end of this blog, I went to my Xanga and read that to its beginning, back to the summer after my 12th grade year, which I have often looked back to as my strongest days of faith, where I wrote about all the huge works God was doing in my life and my expectations for college. But as I read through it all, I realized that that time in my life, which was undoubtedly the brightest and most fiery was not the best or most godly. I was praying and expecting revival at Bethel, which in my mind meant prayer meetings that went on until the early morning with shouted prayers and hours and hours and hours of singing.

Regardless, that's not what my time at college looked like--not normally. And I felt let down by it. For a while, I felt somehow like God had ripped me off. But looking back now, I can definitely tell that there was a form of revival that happened--not a one or three day Spirit-falling-down, everyone huddling at the altar kind, but a four year revival of real growth and real learning that brought some of my very best friends to me and taught me that I must understand love before power and that grace always, always, always triumphs over judgment. I look back on the things God was doing in my life before college, and at times, I felt like I just couldn't contain it at all. It's been a very long time since I felt I couldn't contain my zeal and passion, but I realized the other night that that's because I've gotten bigger. I'm not trying to fit a huge thing into a small container. I have more room for it.

Back then, I was always telling myself it was time to be a man. Now, I am a man. At least, more of one.

Also, I got the job at Bashor. I go in Thursday for background checks and preliminary paperwork. Praise God.

Waiting,Patience, etc.

Last Monday, I had my second interview at Bashor Children's Home. After telling me that he was glad I applied, the fellow interviewing me submitted the approval of my hire, and told me that once HR signs off on it, I'll have to do a couple background check things, and then I'll be ready for training. I called later in the week and was basically told to just wait until they call me. I consider myself a pretty patient person, but it's easy to get frustrated in situations like this. As much as I enjoy not going to work and listening to my records or riding my bike or whatever else all day, its really only fun for about three weeks, then I'd much rather have a job. And now...well, I basically have one, kinda? I just have to wait for it.

Always waiting.

I made a new mixtape today.

For your listening pleasure,

Multitrack Sneakattack, vol. XI: Shooting Stars in Your Breakfast Cereal

Bash 'em, Bashor

Last week, I had an interview at Bashor Children's Home. I got a very good vibe from it, and was told to call back in a week if I hadn't received a call already. Well, today was a week, and I called back, and was told that the guy who interviewed me is on vacation, so I should try again next week. Come onnnnnnn.

Some background. In high school, my youth group went to Bashor a couple times to have Christmas with children in the HOPE unit--children between the ages of eight and thirteen who have been charged with sexual offenses. Within the first few minutes, I fell in love with them. A little while later, the pastor in residence visited our student leadership team, and at one point during the discussion said, 'call us when you're twenty-one and get a job.' And there was nothing then that I wanted more. Long story short, a lot happens in five years, and I got a little sidetracked, but here I am again, looking to Bashor, and I want it. And after a long, beautiful conversation with my darling sister Lyndsey last night about God's unexpected goodness, I have to ask myself, 'do I know that God is that good?'

I certainly want Him to be.

But in the meantime, I've been watching a lot a lot a lot of football*. Geez, I love the World Cup. There have been some incredible matches, and only in the first round! And strangely...I'm finding myself becoming a fan of the US team...this never happens in international sporting events...

*REAL football

I'm becoming more and more convinced that often, the most godly way to live life is to just enjoy the goodness in everything around you.

The Tension and the Blessings

There are eight days left in the school year. This leaves me in the position to find a job for the summer which I would need to negotiate with my involvement at the church (which may just increase...we'll see). On the drive to work today and while sitting in the classroom before the students came in, I was almost paralyzed by the perceived difficulty of this task. After school, Michelle called and we were talking about places I was going to apply (but forgot to because of the overwhelming amount of dishes in the sink), and I mentioned my worry of maneuvering my involvement in the worship band with one of the jobs in particular, and she said, 'Just apply and see what God has for you.'

What a wise wife I have. I love her so incredibly much. And, she just got a lot of her hair cut off. She looks very sophisticated. And hot. So hot. Oh, my wise, sophisticated, hot wife.

A kid I helped with had a seizure today. He had to be taken to the hospital, where they were 'going to take pictures of my brain' (his words...then he started crying). I wasn't in the room when it happened, but I was told that the nurse just ran down the hall to my classroom (I was in prep, helping the librarians figure out Windows Movie Maker), so I went down there and arrived to a group of program assistants surrounding him, one of them holding his stiff body in his lap. I stayed long enough to figure out what had happened and walked to the wall, feeling like I needed to cry.

I hate when children hurt.

Marriage

Marriage is awesome. Never let anyone tell you anything differently. I've been married for a week, and I'm so excited about everything yet to come. Michelle and I honeymooned in Pure Michigan--we drove up the coast of Lake Michigan and stopped in St. Joseph (a great little lake town), Grand Rapids (in a suuuuper swanky hotel), Muskegon (with their incredibly cool historical district), Manistee (we camped on a bluff overlooking the lake), and Traverse City (hitting up record stores and hair salons, then staying in a room with a door that opened up to the beach). On the way back, we stopped in Holland for their Tulip Festival. It was a great trip. Now, it's time to settle into everyday married life and watch Betty White and Jay-Z on Saturday Night Live. What a great ending to a honeymoon.

Happenings

I took off work today to apply for a summer job through WorkOne (a sort of unemployment office). About half an hour into the three hour orientation, I realized that the hour they were going to have me drive every day wasn't worth the $8.50 an hour they were going to pay me to do it. C'est la vie ("La vie")* But, I was sick today anyway, so it's okay that I wasn't hanging out with any kids that could also get sick. I'm also taking tomorrow off to get some rest so I can be fully back on my feet on Wednesday.

On a major sidenote, if anyone is interested, I'll once more restate that I have a new music review blog, www.turnoffthatnoise.blogspot.com. I've been covering all sorts of music, both old and new, but since my rate of keeping up with music with any regularity is pretty slow these days, some of the reviews may seem completely irrelevant. But hey. Whatevz.

The wedding is in eleven and a half days. Wow. It's crazy that, after such a long time of waiting for marriage (since fifteen, even if it was just for sex then**), it's finally going to be here. Yesterday, I gave Michelle the letters that I had written for my wife over the past four years (with no sort of regularity at all). It was funny, because the very first letter mentioned that I was 'currently very attracted to my friend Michelle...but I don't think that would happen. But if that is you, that'd be really funny.' And guess what? It was funny. It was strange to look over those letters again. As much as I've changed since I started writing those letters, the core of Nathaniel was the same then as it is now. I'm just taller now. A tiny, tiny bit taller, but taller nonetheless.

Eleven and a half days. Shoot.

*My dad just told me about a friend he has that makes this joke. But, the proper French meaning and spelling was so ingrained in my mind that I completely missed the say/c'est pun.

**don't get me wrong: I'm still looking forward to that too, just not only that.

Once more, On Music

I'm starting a music blog. That's right.

Check it out here.

On marriage

My parents' divorce is finally starting to move. Mediation begins in a few weeks. It's bittersweet, because on one hand, the tension of their daily interactions will finally be resolved, but on the other...you know. It's a divorce. They're rarely happy affairs. (Although sometimes they're caused by happy affairs)

A couple close friends of mine are surprisingly not being divorced. After dropping off of the face of the planet for a few months, husband came back, realizing what each of them had done wrong and newly determined to make it work. "Realizing the problem is there doesn't fix the problem," he told me. I did not expect this at all. Maybe I should have held hope for longer, but I didn't want to be disappointed.

I'm getting married in two weeks plus four days. Yesterday, I was sitting next to Michelle in church and I realized: I will be sitting next to this woman in church for the rest of my life. I will be sitting across the table from her, on the couch with her, sleeping in bed with her, in the car with her, my entire life. Starting May 1, 2010, the days I spend apart from her will be few and far between. All of my life, I have been surrounded by marriages with varying levels of toxicity, whether it be my own family, people in my church, close friends. I have seen couples happier than we grow to resent and despise one another. I have seen how more time together can embitter a man to his wife or a woman to her husband.

Far more rarely but much more notably, I have also seen marriages drowning with grace--grace for who the other person is, their weaknesses, their struggles, their irritating habits, their differing sleep patterns, their differences in decorating opinions. It reminds me that, like a commitment to Christ and His ministry of reconciliation, a marriage commitment is something that needs to be constantly overflowing with grace, and grace, and grace, and grace. Not only that, but I can't just see some girl in the food court and be all, '@wife we had a good run. see you later #speedydivorce.'

So I, sitting next to Michelle in church, realizing the weight of the decision I've made, looked at her and thought, 'if I'm going to make a commitment to anyone, it might as well be superawesomehotgirl Michelle.'

Because when it comes to marriage, I don't think it's as much about finding the right person as it is making right decisions for that person. And I'm positive that even when I don't, Michelle will take my wrong decisions and cover them with grace, and grace, and grace, and grace.

Top Ten

Alright, this started as a Facebook comment, and I needed a different forum.

These are the ten most impacting records on my life, in chronological order.

1. Project 86 - Drawing Black Lines
Before I heard this album, I really only listened to Weird Al and the Star Wars soundtracks. This record began to show me what kind of power music had.

2. The Ataris - Blue Skies, Broken Hearts...Next 12 Exits/End is Forever
I listened to these two records back to back to back in eighth and ninth grade--during which time I saw my first relationship, my first break up, my first kiss with a stranger, and my first real rebellion. The Ataris both enforced that rebellion and, in more introspective moments, helped me realize that I wasn't happy there.

3. The Juliana Theory - Emotion is Dead
The first emo record I ever heard, and I immediately started growing out my hair and playing acoustic guitar. No joke.

4. Weezer - Pinkerton
I don't think this needs an explanation. Just a metal fist. lml =w=

5. Sunny Day Real Estate - How It Feels To Be Something On
During a time in my life when I was playing mostly Thursday and Thrice influenced heavy emocore, SDRE grabbed a hold of me and showed me just how pretty emo could be.

6. mewithoutYou - [A-->B] Life/Brother, Sister
Because I can't choose. These albums represent such different periods in my life. I first bought A-->B for six dollars at the church camp bookstore. I hated it at first, but I forced myself to listen to it. A few weeks later, my girlfriend of two years broke up with me. Needless to say, that record got a lot of play. Brother, Sister came out during my sophomore year of college, and it opened up so much about God that had been clouded previously. Lyrically, musically, and spiritually, it crushed me and built me back up the first time I heard it the whole way through. And the Jeremy Enigk cameo didn't hurt.

7. Mae - The Everglow
At the time of this album's release, I had finally done most of my wandering and found my way back to God (in one way or the other), and I identified myself so much with the journey taken by the main character in the record. It was also during a time where I had thrown out all of my secular music, and this album was one of the first 'Christian CDs I bought after the great Purge, and I was pleased with it.

8. The Mars Volta - De-Loused in the Comatorium/Sigur Ros - ( )
These were the first secular albums I let myself listen to after months of listening to only 'Christian' music. And God let me know that He'll dwell wherever creation is, no matter what the people who create it think of Him. They're just so dynamic and crushing. I would often put on ( ) and just lose the next hour and a half, and I would awake from the trance feeling like I was just born.

9. Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning
The first folk record I ever bought. It set me off on three years of writing primarily folk songs.

10. Brand New - The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me
Ear and heart shatteringly vulnerable. Very few records have ever had the emotional impact on me that this record does. It had way more to do with the almost disturbingly personal portrayal of spiritual struggle that my music has taken on than any other record. I sometimes feel like Jesse Lacey is a very close friend of mine, and we're just exchanging these narratives.

Spring Broke

I love being a substitute teacher. Seriously, the best job in the whole world. Maybe. Maybe third or fourth best. The kids are great, and if they aren't great, they're at least funny.

However. This week, kids around the nation are celebrating spring break. One of the students I work with a lot is going to Arizona. He's very excited.

And me? I'm staying right here in Mishawaka, not working and not getting paid.

It's not that bad. It's good to be in a position where I can miss being paid for a week and not starve or get evicted or get my power shut off. And it's going to give me some time to get some things done around the apartment, like painting the entertainment center or getting internet set up or bike downtown or just play guitar with my old amp that I just bought back from the friend I sold it to and some new pedals.

And, the wedding is in four weeks minus two days. Hot dang.

God is good.

March Thirty-first, Twenty-ten.

Today is my soon-to-be nephew's fourth birthday. Four was my favorite age. We had a kind of party for him last night, but he wasn't feeling too well, so we just had some cake and presents. His maternal grandparents are here from Sweden until Tuesday, so this was a good time for his birthday.

I bought my old guitar amp back from the friend I sold it to a few years ago back from him today. It's good to have it back. It's like suddenly rediscovering an old friend.

Michelle and I are having a picnic this evening. As much as I dislike people complaining about bad weather, I'm so glad for the sun's return.

Today, the class I was in had a visiting teacher that spoke about recycling and then taught them about haiku, and had them write some haiku about the earth. Naturally, I wrote a few.

Do your part to care

For Earth: always keep closed the

refrigerator.

The earth surrounds me

I look around, and I see

trees, bees, peas, and knees

You down with hippies?

They are down with Mother Earth

Mess with her; with them.

"Oh, my recyclers,"

Captain Planet bids you, "Be

also bicyclers!"

(these next two are from the perspective of Captain Planet)

Ugh. Oh, pollution

My band and abhoréd foe

I'm comin' for ya.

Um. Did you just throw

that toxic waste in the woods?

You just made my list.

I had a good day today.

Discovery

This week, I had the pleasure of substitute teaching at my old middle school. I was expecting to see a few teachers that I had, and I did. But I wasn't expecting to be revisited with how much those teachers meant to me.

Some background: I was a really insecure kid in elementary school, and didn't really come into my own until around seventh and eighth grade. But, being between the walls I walked as I found out who I was, I remembered just how much each of my teachers fostered that. Especially Mrs. Stutzman.

In fifth grade, there was an activity we did where we had a picture of a brain, and we had to divide it up into sections that represented each subject in school. The size of each section depended on how interested we were in the subject. I distinctly remember asking my teacher if I needed to have every subject in our diagram, because I wasn't interested in music at all. She said I had to, so I made it as small as could muster, and made it the ugliest color I could find.

Going into middle school, I was disappointed to find that I HAD to pick a music class. Wanting to do as little as possible, I signed up for Piano Lab with Mrs. Stutzman. Now...if I wanted to keep my indifference to music intact, this was absolutely the wrong choice. The first week of class, she taught us the grand scale, and played the entire class through a simple version of Ode To Joy. And I discovered that I could create music. My world was flipped. I didn't care much about science anymore (in elementary school if anyone asked what I wanted to be, it was a scientist). My mom bought me a keyboard from RadioShack, and I would come home from school and just sit down at the keyboard for hours--BEFORE I played Mario, even. Keyboard became the new most important thing, and I quickly excelled in Mrs. Stutzman's class. Then, in seventh grade, there was a three week guitar unit, right after my mom gave me a bass guitar. It whet my appetite a little, but I was still focused on the piano. The next year, after I had started working on bass at home, Mrs. Stutzman let me bring it in during the guitar unit. Then, after the guitar unit wrapped up, she let a handful of us continue the guitar unit in the hallway. For about half of that year, my Piano Lab class consisted of sitting out in the hallway with a few friends playing Blink-182 songs.

And there, in the hallway playing punk rock, I found myself.

Goodness, Faithfulness, Holiness, etc.

Today and yesterday, I substituted in two different preschool classes. Children are so incredible. I think my favorite thing about them is how they are completely free from prejudice. In each class, there were several students with mild to severe disabilities, but the other kids didn't look down on them. They were their friend, and that was that. One of my favorites was a little girl with a birth defect that made her arms very shot. When we went outside, she and one of the other teachers jumped rope, and she could jump about ten times before the rope hit her legs. And she was the happiest child I've ever seen. Then today when we went outside, I was chased for about ten minutes by at least eleven four year olds.

Michelle's dad's last day at his job is tomorrow. He's been preparing for them to lay him off, but it still is hard when it finally comes. It's alright, though. He hated that job, and he rarely sits still. If the past few weeks of my life is any testament, the Lord will provide generously.

The other night, I was reading Romans and I came to the verse were the Lord says, 'I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy,' and for the first time didn't read that as, 'I'm the Lord, and I get to send whoever I want to Hell, no matter how good of a person they are' and instead read it as, 'I will forgive whoever I want to forgive, whether you think they're good enough or not.' I think that's more in line with His character. He forgives a lot of people we hate.

My parents are getting a divorce, and it's not going as well as maybe we've hoped. My mom's been staying somewhere else until things are finalized. I haven't seen her in two weeks. But hopefully in a week, I'll be living elsewhere. My apartment application is being processed and the super said she'd try to get me something by Monday. Incredible.

I had coffee with the youth pastor of the Vineyard today, which about half functioned as an interview for some level of involvement. At one point he asked me, 'Why do you love God?' My answer was something like:

Shoot, because I can't help it. He's too good. I'd love to just ignore it and be a selfish bastard, but He's just too good. In the past, I've tried to respond to that with as little as I could get away with, but He's just too good for me to just sit there and be a complete ass. I have to do something about it.

He really is just too good to just sit there and not see it, no matter what's going on.

Submarine, pt II.

While subbing at Hums Elementary the past few days, part of my daily duties were to assist a boy named Tyler as he ate lunch. Tyler is eight years old, knows what Paul Revere yelled while riding through the countryside, loves Veggie Tales, and is rapidly going blind. While I sat with him at lunch, I watched him as his eyes stared up to the tops of the curtains in the cafeteria, desperately trying to see his surroundings. But, he couldn't, and the frustration was written all over his face, which was riddled with the pain of being defeated. Even the way he spoke communicated his hopelessness, speaking quietly and stammering through his words. And I will be completely honest. The first time I met Tyler, I found it a little more difficult to believe that there was an all powerful, all knowing God who loves us. Why would this eight year old be going blind if there was? I sat and talked with Tyler, thinking, 'God, what do You think You're doing?'

But there was something else about Tyler. Or rather, about the way everyone else reacted to him. Just about every student who passed Tyler said hello and offered to help him. Kid after kid walked by him and said hello so that they were sure he heard them. In the lunch line, two or three kids asked him what kind of milk he wanted. A little girl helped him find his chair. Someone else offered to take his trash up. And as I saw all of these seven and eight and nine year olds interacting with this boy, I thought, 'Oh, there You are.'

Friday was my last consecutive day working with Tyler. After he finished watching his video in the resource room I was working in (he did so from two inches from the screen), he stood up and turned to where he thought I was. Staring into his darkness looking for me, he raised his hand up. 'Goodbye, goodbye,' he said timidly. He left the room, and a few seconds later, he walked back in. He looked back toward me and stammered, 'Th-thank you, Mister FiiizGera.'

Thank you, Tyler.

Submarine

About a month ago, I attended the inservice for Mishawaka Schools, thus putting me into the substitute teaching service. A few days later, my Aunt Sue, who is a program assistant for two special needs second graders, called me to substitute for her some morning. I did, gladly, and enjoyed myself greatly. In the days that followed, I checked the automated system regularly, but was entirely unable to find any assignments. And so, I took my job search elsewhere--Starbucks, Best Buy, etc. There was a job fair at a Starbucks where they would be performing open interviews for full time positions. I arrived, confident in my chance and in my cafe experience, and was shortly told that the positions they were hiring required Sunday morning positions, which I can't give because of my involvement with the worship team. I left, almost dumbfounded, started my car and stared into my unemployment. "Lord, what do you have for me?"

The day after, I attended the inservice at Penn Schools, and hoped to find some jobs through that corporation, even though the pay is five dollars less per day. The next day, I was on the automated system's website, trying to figure out the multi-district options. While doing that, I went to the view of my preferred schools for Mishawaka. I was baffled; I had marked every school, every day, yet I was entirely unable to find any jobs. But lo! What is this? Above the list of schools--two previously unnoticed check marks. The first: "I would like to receive assignments from the schools marked below." My gaff: I had marked the second.

So I fixed THAT, and I've worked everyday since. First, subbing for the least organized social studies teacher at Mishawaka's social studies classes. Today and yesterday, I was subbing for a first grade class, which was much more of a handful. I love five and six year olds, but in small groups. Sixteen is not a small group, especially when all of them want to be your best friend and tell you everything about their lives all of the time. But, nevermind. I love them in large groups, too. Then, tomorrow, I'm subbing for another program assistant who was in my class in second grade.

It's good to have a job. Especially when Michelle and I just filled out an application for an apartment.

The Lord provides.

Jazz

If you've been following my status updates on Facebook, you've probably already figured out that I've been getting really into jazz lately. That's not even the half of it, really. I'm drowning in it. What started as a growing interest in cool jazz has turned into an all out submersion in bebop, hard bop, post bop, fusion, free-jazz, and the like. I've read more Wikipedia albums, downloaded more music, and read more online guitar lessons in the past three days than I have in the past month. Charles Mingus, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Count Basie, Herbie Hancock, Sun Ra, Charlie Parker, Duke Ellington--they're all over my mind. And as for learning how to play jazz, my scales have suddenly grown from seven notes to eleven, and my fingers are fumbling and jumping and stuttering all over my strings. And can I just say how much modal jazz has opened up the way I write music? I can already see the influence it's going to have on future projects.

And the space--good Lord, the space! There's so much space in jazz to just let things happen. Like in Miles Davis' Kind of Blue, in the segments where the rhythm section just holds a groove and waits--sometimes for several measures--for Miles or Cannonball or Coltrane to make something happen. And in free-jazz, they take that space and they use up every bit of it they can. Free-jazz especially has changed the way I hear the world around me. I recognize different creaks in a door hinge as the door lazily swings open. I hear syncopation and borrowed rhythms in my footsteps and in dishes falling into the sink. I hear the chords created by water running through the pipes or cars driving by. And above all, I hear the wide open space of life, just holding its groove and waiting for something to happen.

Jazz has taken everything I know about music and broken it wide open. Ever since taking music theory in high school, I've understood music pretty well. I recognized the forms and the progressions and the melodies and the scales as things I understood in a sort of formula--well, not exactly a formula, but something pliable that I could still manage with my own hands. And the thing is, even in that seven note, four scale world, music was still so much more to me than the sum of its parts. But jazz--it's easy to get bored listening to anything else after listening to John Coltrane's Ascension. Not much sounds exciting compared to eight guys cutting improvising their own parts at the same time. This isn't to say that I dislike all other music now--the upper level of my spectrum is just broken wide open.

But the biggest thing...jazz has taught me more about life and God than any other type of music. Mostly, the space. There's so much space in life, and God's holding down His groove just waiting for us to do something. And a lot of times, He'll give us a lead in. But since jazz and life are both improvised, there's room for mistakes. So much more room than we with our western scale, top 40, over produced ears allow for.

Album release

The Sparrow & The Whale is finally finished and released. I was writing the liner notes in a text document, and I realized that this album has been a huge part of my life for the past three years. Each song was a huge part of me when I wrote it. I remember the dark, dark days where I sang Sister's Winter Coat, Brother's Tennis Shoes back to back with The Sparrow & The Whale. I remember an amazing (albeit complicated) beginning to a wonderful friendship that spawned The Trollopw & The Troubadour, and then the year after where I found myself living in the wrong direction and writing Trees & Towers, Floods & Fires as an admission of that. Then, a few weeks later, writing Wings on a church camp bunk before the campers arrived with the other counselors standing in the doorway listening. And as time went on, those songs started to trap me. Sister's Winter Coat became a two and a half minute filler. The Trollop & The Troubadour grew too long to sing. Trees & Towers, even moreso. Song For Everyone was the annoying pop song I had to play or people would get angry instead of the anthem to friendship it was when it was written. Sparrow was the only song I felt I had any freedom to move around in--I added drum machines, trumpets, electric guitars...it was the only song on the album I really enjoyed, even when recording became a chore.

I remember getting my MacBook and messing around on Garage Band, and the record suddenly became fun again. I would scream in octaves out of my range to create a background part that wouldn't be heard above the rest of the sounds anyway. My roommate Justin laughed and told me I was crazy. Then after I moved to Chicago is where things really started to move. One day, I was fiddling around with the new version of Sister's Winter Coat, and I was playing trumpet along with it. Mind you, I don't play trumpet that well. But Kriss was disappointed when he found out I wasn't recording, so in went a trumpet track. And then a cello track. And then an electric piano. Suddenly, the experimental spirit I had when I first started the album in the dining room of our farm house returned full force. And for the past few months, that is all I've done with the songs. I've experimented. I added bass parts for the first time (which all rock). And it made it fun again.

And now, on the night of the release, years after the writing, months after the tinkering, and a day after all of the mixing is complete...the songs are finally songs. They're no longer projects to tweak and add to and edit.

And it's all pouring out of me.

Thank God for completion.

Now onto the next album.

Haiti

I always feel terribly uncomfortable when catastrophe strikes parts of the world that I have no connection to. I've always feared that this is because I didn't want to interrupt my usual schedule to grieve for those affected. But after letting that initial resistance wear off, I just read a couple articles about the earthquake in Port-au-Prince--one was the Associated Press overview on the Yahoo! website, and the other was a blog post by someone who knows an American couple who run an orphanage in the capital. The orphanage has collapsed and the couple and the children are now living in the yard next to the ruins. She made pleas for people to contact the Senate to get the children to the United States, where they can be adopted and have clean water, which no one in Port-au-Prince has now.

And I think I realize, I don't feel uncomfortable because I don't want to be bothered. I feel uncomfortable because I feel so damned powerless to do anything about it. And I really don't like that feeling.

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.