here's hoping your new year's eve is at least somewhat, almost, a little bit, maybe, kind of, slightly exciting.

i realize that's a lot to ask.

I went to Waffle House this morning, making my Christmas break complete. But I totally forgot how large the double waffle was...tooootally unnecessary on top of my egg and bacon sandwich. I feel sick.

i always heard i was loved, but i didn't always know i was loved. later, i finally knew i was loved, but only because i knew i needed love, only because i was deperate.

lately, i've forgotten i am loved, or perhaps i've heard it too much, or what i really think it is, is that i've just forgotten that i still need love. needing love, i think, is essential to feeling loved.

...because it's easy to love someone who is loveable. is it really love, then? it's more convenience, comfort, pleasure, interest, or the act of liking. it's a fuzzy feeling. whatever loving the loveable is, it's easy, and one thing i've learned all over the place is that love isn't easy and, usually, easy isn't love. so, if you're asking me, the answer is no, it's not love, not in the truest sense of the word, anyway.

so of course, when i see myself as loveable, forgetting i'm still so far from being so, which is happening all too frequently, i'm not going to feel truly loved. i'm going to feel conveniently and expectedly befriended.

and when i'm loveable and conventiently befriended, the lover becomes an equal, a peer, a pal, a buddy. i'm loving him, and so, of course, he's loving me, and we're all getting along. and we approve of each other and maybe we could go out and chat and relax and joke and enjoy each other's company, at least seemingly so, knowing somewhere up there that i am loved, flippantly and expectantly so, but not really feeling loved, not truthfully or deeply or genuinely so.

and how do i reach this point?! how do i think with my brain and speak with my lips of vast things like holiness or goodness or omniptence or justice or, of all things, glory, and yet, in my mind and soul and actions, and in my desperate ugly heart of all places, arrive at this place of familiarity, flippant convenience, two pals going out for a drink? my brain talks about all of things i am not, and my heart goes its own way bragging of all the things i am.

if anyone could have felt comfortable and familiar around christ, it would have been john the baptist, the chosen forerunner--and even cousin if i'm not mistaken--the man who baptized the messiah himself. and yet, what did he tell everyone? he told them that even he was far too unworthy to bend down in front of christ, reach towards his smelly, calloused, dirty feet, and untie his shoe. the man wearing those shoes was far too holy, far too good, far too powerful, far too just, and of all things, far too glorious for him to take part in even these lowliest acts of service.

if anyone could have felt comfortable and familiar around christ, it would have been paul, the chosen missionary and forefather of the church. and what did he tell everyone? in light of christ's glory, paul was the lowest of the apostles, the worst of all sinners, the least deserving of the entire human race.

so if the baptizing forerunner and the evangelizing forefather are unloveable, what do i have that is loveable? if they, of all people, are unworthy, how am i, of all people, worthy? (those are rhetorical questions whose answers, i assume, are evident.)

glory! this man is GOD, the central character in this supernatural cosmic drama, the creator of the universe, and on and on we could go! what makes me think i can call him up and take him out for a drink?!

and so how did i get here, and how do i arrive here time and time again? most days, i take my gifts and talents--the mind, the thoughts, the words god himself has given me--and i use them in the worst sense, i use them to gain some sort of self-serving ground, i pervert them, i spin them upside-down using them to promote myself rather than putting them to their true use of promoting the only one worthy of promotion.

oh! how do i find myself here?! it's a mere--what?!--8 inches?! 12 inches?! between the brain, mouth, and heart! so where do these things escape and lose themselves?! where along the awy do they become so twisted and tainted?!

and how can we (oh yes, we've all done it) be so audacious to sit in sunday school, laughing and poking fun at those poor disciples who mess up over and over again?

"i need more grace than i thought...oh brother, i'm far, i'm far away away from everything good! you, my hidden pearl of pure and perfect love...and i'm the living example of 100 percent the opposite of this!"

and so, how humbling, then, to be reminded this advent season that i--even me, as loveable as i think i am--am starving for truth and starving for grace and it is for this very reason a tiny, messy, screaming infant was born full of grace and truth, ready to be given freely. how humbling to be reminded that i am unloveable and for that reason, this baby, coming to a world corrupt, deprived, ugly, perverted, underserving, worthless, and unloveable, is LOVE in the truest sense of the word.

how thrilling, then, to sing, "to show god's love aright, she bore to us a savior when half spent was the night...true man, yet very God, from sin and death he saves us and lightens every load."

When I shared the link for linerider with you the other day, I had no idea it was already an underground craze sweeping college campuses, office cubicles, and (of course) YouTube by storm, but then Wes came over and showed me THIS.

See also: linerider.org, official-linerider.com

Boy, am I ever behind the times.

hope your christmas was merry!

Yesterday in detention, a poor student was upset with me because I was making him copy the Student Code of Conduct. This student, still in the process of learning English, finally expressed his frustration with his thick Spanish accent:

"Mister, you like a snowman, wit no feeling."

I responded frankly, "That doesn't make any sense."

He came back, "Yes. A snowman is cold...inside, outside. That jus like you."

I smiled big, very impressed, and promptly emailed his Language Arts teacher, commending her on her instruction of similes and metaphors.

O come, thou Dayspring, come and cheer
our spirits by thine advent here;
and drive away the shades of night,
and pierce the clouds and bring us light!
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel!

Hail the heaven-born Prince of Peace! Hail the Sun of Righeousness!
Light and life to all he brings, risen with healing in his wings.
Mild he lays his glory by, born that man no more may die,
born to raise us from the earth, born to give us second birth.

Truly He taught us to love one another;
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother
And in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
Let all within us praise His holy name!
Christ is the Lord, Oh praise His name forever,
His pow'r and glory evermore proclaim.

And our eyes at last shall see him, through his own redeeming love;
for that child, so dear and gentle, is our Lord in heaven above,
and he leads his children on to the place where he has gone.

Newfound pet peeve:

When the old married couple gets to the Edy's Ice Cream before you do and spends 5 minutes arguing over what flavor to buy with the freezer door open, so that, once they finally finish, the glass is completely fogged up and you can't see what's available, forcing you to browse with the door open as well, which is not only a little chilly, but also causes the same thing to happen again for the person wanting some ice cream after you.

Man. Yet another reason why adulthood is so rough.

Links to keep you busy until the next time I post something:

I didn't discover the new Danielson video until recently. It's pretty great.

Here are some free special Page France songs to download, and I would suggest at least definitely downloading (or just streaming) the song Dogs. They'll again be the topic of an upcoming post if I get around to it. While you're there, stick around and check out Daytrotter.com, because it seems like a pretty great website.

While you're at it, download some of Six Parts Seven's new and old stuff.

And here's some less than ideal footage of the mewithoutYou show I was telling you about.

Here are some things my kids have shown me in class, things they've found on their laptops instead of doing the work they've been given...

Here you can make your own beautiful cyber snowflake.

Here you can draw a line, then make a cute little penguin sled down it.

My wife will try to tell you not to get the new Sufjan Steven's Christmas Box Set, but I would encourage you to at least listen to his version of Holy, Holy, Holy, which does an amazing amount of justice to the song, and Jamin would encourage you to listen to Sister Winter, and I would too, so you should probably get on that.

You can stream it here, click on the Peace album, 15:23 for Sister Winter, 28:37 for Holy Holy Holy.

Yes, Jamin, I give you full credit here.

And to my family members: this is the only thing I can think of for my Christmas list. There's five discs, so you can split the cost and I give you permission to open it up and each give me one individually.

My brother (a man who is much further into adulthood than I am...he might even have an earlier bedtime than me due to his insanely-early-morning job) was a little disappointed to find that I covered my adventure in Hoboken but not our adventure in Allentown. So here we go...

We traveled 15 minutes to the city of Allentown the other week to see mewithoutYou playing with Forgive Durden and Piebald and Say Anything.

We couldn't find parking in Allentown, either, and when we finally found a spot, I had to cut across two lanes of traffic as the light turned green to get to it, and as I pulled in, two guys in a really large boat of a lowrider slowed down and scowled at me. It was scarier than missing an exit to Hoboken.

We didn't have to stand outside in the cold with the teenyboppers because we were over 21. See? There are perks to adulthood!

When we were waiting in the line, we were standing next to Aaron Weiss--the singer of mewithoutYou--who was sitting at the bar eating a meal. I told Andy who it was, and he admitted he thought it was a homeless guy on his way to the nearby rescue mission. Let's be honest, it was a reasonable assumption.

Forgive Durden was awful! Forgive Durden? More like Forgive Us For Making You Listen to This!

Piebald was fun, and it reminded me of college and Kyle, my roommate, when we would sing together, "HEY! You're part of it!"

mewithoutYou was really really good. Their set was too short, but what can you do?

We left before Say Anything played.

When we left the club, Andy saw the pickup truck of his friend--who was with us at the show and stayed after we left--in the parking lot, and he decided we needed to pull a prank on him. We found that he left the back sliding windows unlocked, so we slid them open, and shoved everything that was in the bed of the truck through the windows, including several large pieces of lumber, some fishing rods, a pair of gloves, a large hose, pieces of straw, and a few other things I'm forgetting. We decided to finish it off by hanging the big rusty chain on his rearview mirror. Andy went for it, and when he did, the entire mirror fell off the windshield. Whoops. We giggled like teenagers.

We got back home well before 11:00PM.

Man was it crazy! The whole evening kind of felt like we were Bo and Luke Duke!

I forgot to say that the drummer of Page France looks like Ryan Gosling, and the new drummer of Anathallo looks like Zach Braff.

Here is a video clip of Anathallo in Hoboken. Here is a video of Page France in San Francisco, but I wasn't at that show.

Here is the story of two adults and three youngsters partaking in adventure focused around a heck of a indierockshow lineup: Denison Witmer, Page France, and Anathallo.

Remember when I said Erica and I were no longer cut out for late-night road trips and whathaveyou? Well something made me think we could make a trip to Hoboken to see this show, despite the fact that it didn't start until 9:30 in the evening. So we did it, and Stan and Leah and Travis came along at the last minute, too. Since we had youngsters along, Erica and I had to act real tough and young and play it off like we could handle it no problem.

I drank six cups of coffee throughout the day in preparation for it, and that helped. Erica, on the other hand, struggled in her exhaustion to stay awake throughout the evening.

We were right on schedule, approaching Hoboken (which is a quaint little city right across the river from New York, New York [a city so nice they named it twice {-Michael Scott}] and also the birthplace of ol' blue eyes himself) at 8:50PM, when I went left towards the Holland Tunnel instead of right towards our exit. I immediately pulled over, and decided I had no choice but to put 'er in reverse and get the exit, rather than driving into the Big Apple and getting lost or mugged or whatever else happens in that place.

Erica told me it was illegal and started making siren noises, and I insisted we had no choice. I was very safe and cautious. The shoulder was nice and large, I defrosted the back window, I even put my four ways on as I backed up, and we pulled it off perfectly and everyone cheered and we were on our way to Hoboken.

But as we accelerated, we saw a New Jersey State Trooper waiting for us in stealth mode, and before we knew it, we were back in the shoulder, this time with a bright spotlight shining on the car and an officer approaching the car with a riot stick or whatever they're called. I blamed it on Erica's jinxing siren noises.

Now, you know how socially awkward I am? Multiply that by ten, nay, twelve, and you'll get a picture for how completely awkward I am with cops. It never goes well. (Like the time we were pulled over after the prom, and I was wearing my neon orange tux, and the officer asked, "Is there a prom tonight?" and I said frantically, "Nosir,there'snoproblem,Imean,didyousayprom?Uh,yessir,therewasapromtonight,butthere'snoproblem...")

"I need to see your license and registration. Where you headed tonight?"
"HoBOken."
"HOboken?" (That's when I found out I was putting the accent on the wrong syllable of Hoboken.)
"Yes, sir."
"Do you know why I pulled you over?"
"I assume because I missed the exit."
"Well, yes, because you were going in reverse on the shoulder."
"Right."
"Where you going in Hoboken?"
"Maxwells." (I guess I should have said we were going to a concert.)
"Is that a bar?"
"Um, yes, I think so." (I really honestly didn't know.)
"Is everyone in the car 21?"
"Um, no, sir."
"Well, some of you are going to stay and keep the car warm, then, right?"
"Um, yeah, of course, sir." (What does that mean, anyway?!) "But, I mean, I don't know if it's a bar or not." (Sure, kid. I wanted to clarify but I guess it wasn't worth it at this point.)
"You have any problems with your license?"
"What?" (Seriously, what kind of question is that?)
"Problems with your license?"
"Um, no." (It seems to work just fine for me, thank you.)
He came back and only gave us a warning, for careless driving. I wanted to let him know that I really was quite careful in the whole matter, but didn't think it was necessary. He asked if we were lost, helped us with directions, then added...
"I pulled you over because you were going in reverse on the shoulder. How old are you?!"
"23."
"Well, use your head, alright?"
"Of course, sir."

So we arrived in Hoboken just in time, which is quite a nice little place. As we apporached and saw the New York City Skyline, we yelled things like "These colors don't run!" and "It takes guts! It takes an American!" and Stan kept yelling in a funny voice "The Biiig Apple!" and we sang things like "Start spreadin' the news.....!"

Let me make one thing clear about Hoboken, empty parking spaces are just about completely non-existent. After about 25 minutes of looking, we asked two girls who were walking for any suggestions they might have and they said, "We were just looking for an hour." We were about to follow their advice, but dropped the youngsters off at Maxwells first. On a fluke, we turned in one direction, and saw big construction site straight ahead with some completely empty road-side parking, well-lit, a block away from the club, and so that problem was solved.

Denison played first, and it was nice to see him. He's good, but he's kind of losing his touch. He's still got a sense of humor though. There were a whole lot of talkative people in the back, so he said, "This is my first time in Hoboken, and the nice thing about Maxwell's is that they have two bars, one for talking, and one for listening, so if you want to talk, you should probably realize this is the bar for listening." They kept talking, so he added, "Did somebody order a shutup sandwich?" We all laughed, but the oblivious talkers just kept going. Well a little later in his set, he said, "Has that shutup sandwich been delivered yet?" And just by chance, everyone got quiet at the same time, except for some loudmouth lady at the bar who kept going, saying really really loudly, "THERE AINT NO LOVE FOR YOUR SISTER WHEN YOU'RE CALLIN' HER A SLUT!" The entire place heard it including Denison, and everyone just went, "OOOOOOOOOoooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" and it was really really funny. Guess you had to be there. The talking stopped after that.

Page France played second. I've been listening to their album "Hello, Dear Wind" for a little while now, and I was excited to see them live. Page France is incredibly simple and repetitive, and if you consider that a downfall, it's their only one; put another way, they've indeed mastered the art of a 2-chord song. At any rate, Michael Nau picks up his pen and rich metaphors and colorful imagery naturally flow; he opens his mouth and lively, vibrant melody naturally sounds. Maybe I'm reading into them and their lyrics far too much, but there is something deep and rich, unique and almost magical going on here...It's a hopeful longing and eagerness to move on from this world....It's in their presence and stature, it's in their music...It's not something you point to and dissect, but something that is only felt. I can't explain it.

"I heard it's getting windy, so I'll sit and watch you blow, I will chain you to my boat, I will you carry you back home. And I won't say I love you because it's all been said before, let's not say it anymore, cause love nothing here's for sure...When we blow away, get out of this place, go down like a shout, go up like praise...I'm not sure what happens when everything here ends, but I hope it's like they say, and I hope it never ends...
...They're turning out the lights, the first day of my second life, take my name off the lease, and you can keep the name, it never suited me anyway..."

Anathallo closed the evening, astounding and charming as always. It is incredibly refreshing to see a group of artists doing things the way they should be done, or at least trying their hardest, rather than doing it for the money, the image, the popularity, whatever it is. They are proving things can be done successfully without compromising ideals, when it is done with passion, excellence, and authenticity. Everybody--and I do mean everybody--has a lot to learn from these guys.

Anyway, the show ended at about 1:15AM, which is at least three hours way past my bedtime. Erica was falling asleep standing up (she woke up at 7:00AM and had a busy, long day), and we were ready to get out of there.

We saw Lady Liberty on our way out, and even though I insisted no one would be sleeping on the way home, it only took about 20 minutes until everyone was out cold. Those cups of coffee kept me going.

When we crossed the Delaware and stopped at the tollbooth, Erica woke up and counted out the change: 2 quarters, 1 dime, 2 nickels, and 5 pennies. The tollbooth man was mad at the world because he was stuck counting change at 2:15 in the morning, and I pleasantly gave him my toll, wished him a good evening, but he refused to lift the gate. He opened his window back up and said grumpily, "There's only 74 cents here, boss!" (I wanted to ask if that's how he welcomes everyone into the state.) I watched Erica count five pennies, but he wasn't lifting that gate and we wanted to get home, so I reversed the car (careless driving again?), dug up that last penny, apologized, and he scowled at me. I tried wishing him a Merry Christmas but he closed his window before I could finish. He lifted the gate and I blew my horn as I left. (Not very loving, I know...do you think less of me?)

We arrived home safely around 2:30AM and I woke up the rest of the car. I felt young again.

And yet, with a car full of sleeping people, I kind of felt like a dad.