a warm & sunny afternoon in Cincinnati

I wrote an entire post on how much I like Lana Del Rey's music, especially "Born to Die" and "Video Games." But then I accidentally deleted a couple paragraphs. I'm not rewriting any of that, because I simply don't care, and writing about music just isn't something I do well. Suffice it to say that I really like these two songs, and you might, too. Her voice is haunting and effortless, I think that's what I like most. I tried getting her music videos onto this blog, but playback isn't allowed for copyrighted content. So I'm going to just show you something wholly unrelated to Lana del Rey, although I still think you should check her out. 

Both are video shorts, and I know the first one won some type of award. 
The second one is of interest only if you've played the video game Portal.

the 43rd week

This is what I woke up to Sunday morning.
Literally. Not figuratively-speaking.

Monday. I woke to wind and rain, and I worked out and went to The Anchor before closing 600 with Emily. After work I drove down to Crittenden in Kentucky for a grill-out with the usual Monday Nights Crew: Blake, Amos, Ams, Andy, John, and Brandy (Isaac sometimes joins us). Blake grilled some amazing burgers topped with grilled portabello mushrooms (and crisp cooked asparagus on the side). We played with the dogs and went crickin' down at the creek behind the house, and the sunset turned blood orange and we played some F1 racing before people started trickling out. I stopped at a truck stop before getting on the highway and bought some Nyquil and chugged it, since I've been staying up later and needed to be up at 5 A.M. the next day, and within the hour my body was shutting down, and I was staggering around like a drunk. I haven't used Nyquil as a sleep aide since the Dayton Days, and the amounts I took were far more than my drug-weaned body could keep up with.

Tuesday. I woke groggy for an early morning, hungover from the Nyquil, only to realize that I didn't open till Wednesday. So I went to The Anchor for a couple hours and sought to sober up with coffee, and then Amos and I closed shop. He had to stay late to do some managerial duties, so I jetted to Northside and hung out with Gabe and Emily for a bit. The highlight of this cold and windy night: a grade-A feast of toast and bowl after bowl of Rice Krispies. The snap, crackle and pop is like crack to me.

Wednesday. Tiffany and I opened, and I went over to The Hilltop after work to try their new bee's knee's cappuccino, their effort to draw people away from the sweeter coffee drinks to the basic staples. It was delicious, and I entertained Tiffany's kids for a little bit in Student Life. Kids can be a lot of fun sometimes. I took a nap and went by Brandy's place off Vine Street before a trip to The Anchor followed by a long and winding drive up Sycamore Street to a run-down bar called Milton's. That was a fiasco, and I spent the rest of the evening hanging out with Ams, who will be spending a long weekend in Portland with Rob & Mandy. I'm so jealous. 

Thursday. Amos and I went to The Anchor before closing down at 600. We were slammed right at close, and that sucked. Being store manager, Amos is expected to get his manager's duties done while closing, which means that when we close together, I'm essentially the other closer. It's getting frustrating, for both of us: for me, because I'm doing the vast majority of the work; and for him, because he hates the fact that I'm doing the vast majority of the work when his responsibilities also include closing. We're hoping something from higher up will bring an end to the chaos. In brighter news, Luke--one of the roasters across the street at Rock Bottom--is our new roaster. He's part-timing at the brewery and behind the roaster, and he's a pretty cool dude. Having an actual roaster, rather than the company's president doing all the roasting, should help lighten some of the chaos (if only a bit). It was a pretty low-key night and an early bedtime preceded by a heart-warming conversation of sorts with my favorite Wisconsinite. 

Friday. After opening with Stephanie I jetted up to Tyler's place in Centerville. We got dinner at Wendy's and spent the evening playing MW:3 and watching BBC Life while chowing down on fried ice cream. We smoked cigarettes on the porch and the warm weather gave way to slashing rains and billowing winds, and it grew cold and we talked about Dylan coming into town this next week and how awesome it's going to be for the three of us to hang out again, just like old times. He'll be down in Cincinnati next weekend, and I aim to go up to Dayton once or twice more to see him before he heads back across the ocean to Mozambique. Tyler went to bed around midnight, and I sat on the porch in the cool and listened to the rain and then stayed up till 3:00 A.M. playing video games, watching Workaholics, and hammering Tyler's pantry. 


Saturday. The warm and tingling spring-like weather we've enjoyed the last several days has been replaced with gray and cloudy skies and cold autumn-esque rains. Tyler and I got breakfast at Scrambler Marie's, and I demolished a hefty portion of potato fries, a massive garbage omelette with three meats and four vegetables and two cheeses, as well as a stack of massive whole wheat toast and a pot of coffee. We parted ways, and back at the house I fell asleep for a good couple hours and then spent the evening hanging out with the housemates. Ams is having an amazing time in Portland, and Mandy shot me pictures of them together on the beach. I'm so jealous. 


Earth Day. I woke earlier than anticipated and went to The Anchor and finally finished scripting the last three chapters of Book One. Now all I've got to do is write them. Can I finish the book in a week? An ambitious thought: it could really swing either way, and I've no real incentive to get it finished than to plunge through another portion of The Quest (I love how it's in capital letters now; an evolving semantic). I went by the Verizon Wireless store to get a new charger, and I attempted to flirt with the sales rep and I think I succeeded, because she laughed and it sounded genuine rather than frightened. I'd consider that a win in my book, even if her first impression of me was me coming through the front doors hurriedly zipping up my pants (the zipper falls down, it's not my fault). Andy, Amos and I got Dusmesh for lunch, and I spent the afternoon napping and writing, and Blake joined the three of us for a trip to The Anchor where we dined on coffee and breakfast foods (well, they did; I had their pork tenderloin sandwich). We hiked over to Brandy's for a bit and visited with her, Aaron and Erin. It's easier to differentiate the two when it's written out. We drank beers and looked through old scrapbooks and perused Brandy's library of sorts. We relaxed back at the house, and I rounded out the night hanging out with Blake in his room listening to Damien Jurado tracks courtesy of Hot Sauce Waugh.

somebody that i used to know

happy holidays

the 42nd week

tentative dust jacket cover for my zombie story.
it looks like I got face-fucked by a bird's talons.

Monday. I woke early and finally got a much-needed haircut in Hyde Park, and I went to The Anchor and toyed around with my zombie serial novel The Procyon Strain. I didn't go in to work till 2:00, so I spent the early afternoon lounging around and hanging out with Blake, Andy and Ams. I closed with Emily, and afterwards I tagged along with Amos and his dad to the Red Green One Man Show at the Taft Theater. I used to watch the show when I was in high school, crowded around the Williams' big-screen with Pat D., Chris and Lee. I don't think Amos enjoyed it very much, but I enjoyed it for its nostalgic elements (you know how I am). Also, Red Green defined me (and Amos) quite well: success is defined by having a place you can go with a roof on it and a place you go to do stuff and get paid. Nailed it.

Tuesday. I went to The Anchor before another solid close with Emily. Nothing exciting happened this evening: a chill night with the housemates, playing video games and watching "Frisky Dingo." Ams ordered Chinese and I went on a frosty run to Wendy's.

Wednesday. The Anchor was unfortunately crowded (and surprisingly so), but my little booth in the corner was still available. Ha. My booth. It's gotten pretty ridiculous. How was the evening spent following closing shop with Amos? Other than fighting off the frigid cold and splicing wind, I did some writing and C. Isaac came over for a hot minute. His visit was the highlight, everything else dwindling in significance. I'm literally straining my brain in the quest for something we-- YES! Josh came over, and we researched involuntary manslaughter just in case one of us hit a kid. Our neck of the woods can get pretty hairy at times, especially with summer on the doorstep.

Thursday. Ana couldn't come in this morning, so I went in early to cover her shift. After work Blake and I went to C.C.U. and collected tree leaves to identify the trees around us. This was an impromptu adventure, yielding a variety of maples, some oaks, and a lonely blue ash. We went by the Hilltop to get drinks, and I caught up with some people I'd known in college (going on three years now, *gulp*). I told Blake, "It's so weird that so many people I know live not an eighth of a mile away from me, and I'm never over here." Claypole Avenue stops after our driveway. We joined Ams and Andy for dinner at The Anchor, and Andy played C.C.R. and Damian Jurado on the jukebox; it's a new tradition.

Friday the 13th (2 of 3*). I had to jet up past 275 to pick up some product. The place was located in a HUGE warehouse stocked with non-perishable food items and encircled by a towering razor-wire fence. Yes, bookmarking that on my GPS for the impending zombie apocalypse. Blake had his wisdom teeth taken out, and so he was pretty out of it. I spent most of the evening working on my zombie story.

Saturday. Andy, Amos and I got Dusmesh for lunch, and Andy went to work at Carew and Amos and I made not one but two trips to Clifton. Amos made this Classic President proud. We went to The Anchor later in the evening, drinking coffee and eating dinner. I wrote a good twenty pages. When we got back, C. Isaac and Josh A. were over, and we smoked hookah in the living room. The evening's twilight is best encapsulated in a phrase repeated not once but twice by two people to me throughout the day: "We tell no one of this." It sounds so mischievous, but I assure you: it's more classic than anything, something you'd expect at this house. 

The Titanic Centennial. The R.M.S. Titanic sank 100 years ago in 1912. Thus: the centennial. But I'm sure you got that. I slept in till 10:00 and woke to a warm, sunny day. I did laundry, ran to Carew for some coffee, and hit up Kroger for some groceries: eggs, bread, cereal and milk. I don't know why I always buy breakfast foods, but it's a shared trait in this house. When everyone rolled out, Andy made pancakes and I made eggs and toast, and Amos brewed us up some old Mexican chiapis. Even with its age, you could detect the chocolaty, graham-cracker taste. I'd forgotten how much I loved it. The afternoon was pretty low-key: I cleaned my room, ran some errands, and did some scripting for my zombie story. I went to The Anchor for coffee and to do some writing (only three more chapters, an epilogue, and then I'm done with the first book), and I was exhausted when I got home: creative writing can be quite draining. I colored a picture of a Styracosaurus and worked out to the tunes of Led Zeppelin. Andy, Amos and I grabbed Chipotle for dinner, and that was an adventure all on its own (and all because they ran out of chicken, thanks to one person ordering like 15 chicken burritos). People were not happy. Amos and I climbed onto our roof and smoked cigarettes and watched the sunset. 

* The first Friday the 13th was in April, and the second will be in July. Also: Jesse and Mandy closed on their house on the 13th of January, and Jared and Ashley did it on the 13th of April. 

journal entry - 4.14

Maybe the reason I can’t seem to find peace & contentment is because, quite simply, I’m a koala whose native land is ocean’s away, and how content can a pilgrim be far from home and alone in his wanderings? There’s more to it, I’m sure, but not less. As much as I try to forge some path going somewhere, and as much wrestling is involved in such forging, there remains that consistent thread running through it all. It’s what I want most, more than anything, and though I’ve tried to get rid of it, I just can’t. It’s always there, burning like an eternal flame, and peeling back the layers, what do you find? A beast imprisoned, rattling its cage and seeking to be free? No, you find a koala with a weak heart and fallen eyes, a wounded creature whose captivity has bled its resolve to fight. Peeling through the weathered journals I’ve kept for almost 13 years, I can’t deny that that which enflames my heart and crushes it at the same time, the desire clinging to my bones like a parasite, is the overarching dream of falling in love, getting married, and sharing my life with someone. 

A simple life with a simple love for a simple, old-fashioned girl. 

There it is, laid out for all to see, the most innate—dare we say primal?—desire of my heart. While I may be unsure of everything else, this much I know: for better or worse the deepest longing of my heart is to love and be loved, to find a helpmate, a life partner, a wife. “It is not good for man to live alone.” Countless heartaches, betrayals, and back-stabbings litter my pursuit of this, and skepticism runs deep. But skepticism may, in the end, just be an attempt to mend broken bones, my way of wrapping the wounds in gauze. This skepticism may be nothing more than some cerebral attempt to kill the dream because dreams “dead & gone” just don’t hurt as much. All I do know is that, for better or worse, hope’s stronger than skepticism, and I don’t want to be cynical. I want the cynicism to break, but I dare not let go for fear of detaching myself from reality and plummeting headfirst and with abandon into that chasm of hope, a chasm so deep that there may be no escape. In the end, skepticism may just be some fabrication, a coping mechanism of some sort, something I’ve built in my own heart and head to put up fences and hedges around hope to keep it from spreading like kudzu, to keep it from getting out of control. As much as cynicism may strangle life, its potency is nowhere near that of a hope dismantled.

Day by day, month by month, and year by year, it becomes increasingly clear to me how hope may be such an empty enterprise. I want hope, I really do. I want to hope someone will see my worth and want to share their life with me, but it’s quite simply the case that I have no reason to hope for such a thing. Over the past seven years, I’ve dated 10 girls, and none of them saw a reason to stay. To me, that’s telling. As much as I may want a life of loving and being loved in that way, I know there’s no guarantee. Life simply doesn’t give two shits about the desires of my heart, and despite how well I’ve treated women, how I’ve respected them and cherished them, I still look like I’m 14, and (from my experience) girls would rather be used by a tall, dark, and handsome fellow than be loved and valued by a guy like me. Maybe wisdom is found in the cold acceptance of the bare facts, and the bare fact is that there’s no guarantee, no promise, that I’ll ever be loved like that. I used to believe, in a childish manner, that God would make it happen in due time, that he was concerned about my romantic aspirations and I just needed to be patient till he catered to my wants and whims. It’s a good thought, a comforting thought, but that doesn’t make it right. I wish I could believe that I had someone working behind the scenes for my own benefit, because it’d make things easier; but the problem is that I tend to think about things too much, and I can’t in good conscience buy into that anymore. I’m stuck in this stagnation, and I could be 40, 50, 60 years old writing these same things, and I wouldn’t be surprised.

But, then again, maybe it’s all perception. I’ve “dated” ten girls, each of whom saw something of worth in me. And if I’m honest, I’ve ended a good number of those ventures for various reasons, and in the process I’ve broken several hearts. I’m not proud of it, but neither am I ashamed: it’s a facet of dating. But girls have felt cheated, and at a loss, when I’ve called things off. Point of all this being, things may not be as hopeless as they seem. Yes, I look young; no, I’m not “tall, dark, & handsome.” But assuming all girls want what I’m not is ridiculous. Not all girls are attracted to the same “type”, and nor are guys: I’ll pass over the skinny, bleach-blond, suntanned chick for a cute, fun-sized girl every time. I like ‘em bigger, that’s just the way it is. And I’m confident not every girl wants a stately, chiseled, and exotic man; some may very well be in the market for a cute, funny, romantic guy, and that’s where I’ll be found. Dylan told me that I shouldn’t let my past affect my future, and I think he’s right. Yes, disappointment and disillusionment have checkered my career in this arena, but it’ll take only one change of fortune to shatter the cynicism taking root in my heart. It’s never wise to make a universal rule out of personal, individual experiences, and though hope may threaten to extinguish, I remind myself that life remains unpredictable, and though tomorrow may prophecy misery, there may be a fresh wind, a new light emerging with a new dawn. And so I’ll keep hoping, I’ll keep pressing on. My life may be marked by disappointment, but often overlooked is my own steadfast determination to keep going, to not give up, to keep the hope alive. I hope one day to connect with someone in that way, to love and be loved like that, and I’ll keep pressing on despite the encroaching darkness threatening to crowd out every ounce of light.

Am I stupid for wanting this, foolish for longing for a simple life with a simple love for a simple girl? Maybe, it’s quite possible. We koalas aren’t the sharpest. Be it stupid, foolish, blind, what-have-you, it remains nevertheless what I want more than anything, and that’s something to fight for. At times the hurt’s so great there seems no way out, and at times the defeats are so debilitating that I’m left crippled and nursing my wounds for a time. But always—always—I get back up and Keep Going. This hope’s too ingrained into the fabric of my being to be discarded, tossed away, dismantled. I’ve tried to do all that, I really have: but trying to kill this hope is like killing off a part of me. When’s all said and done, I’d be less of a person for it. I’m damned persistent and resilient, and I’ll try again, and again, and again. And maybe, somehow, that desire of my heart will be fleshed out in real life. I’ll stomach these disappointments, tend my wounds, try to learn a lesson or two, and Keep Going. Really, what else can I do?

on the road to the quest

This "quest" for the justifiability of the Judeo-Christian worldview isn't spawning as if in a vacuum. I'm not intellectually bored, craving some sort of scholastic stimulation. There's a reason I am here, and in seeking to determine the reason(s), I must be wary of the trap: "What caused X? Y or Z?" It's been shown, in every field of professional study, from cosmology to biology to ecology to psychology, that there are hardly ever single causes with single effects. As much as we'd like to live in a world as simple as that, the reality is that we don't, and trying to ascertain those things that have brought me to this point is challenging and humbling: I may have ideas, but in the end these reasons may or may not be legitimate. Perhaps time will tell?

Nevertheless, I've been trying to figure out precisely why I'm here (or at least trying to gain a decent vantage-point on the whole thing), and I believe that those things with which I wrestled for so long--namely, my hesitancy to embrace vocation and my difficulty in trusting God--are derived from deeper concerns regarding Christianity's validity. My hesitancy in plunging into my vocation may very well have been due to my own concerns regarding the truth of what I believed, and I didn't want to go down a life-path, in such a leadership role, with such uncertainty shadowing my every move. Personal doubts running in tandem with, and feeding off of, these uncertainties were enabled to grow, swelling into major barriers against trusting God with a growing conception of a deistic divinity. 

Depression, disappointments, empty prayers and a silence from the divine drew me first into, for a time, perceiving God as some cosmic sadist. But love and beauty would not exist if that were the case; they'd be anomalies at best. Seeing that the rain fell both on the good and the wicked, and that blessings come on both the righteous and perverse, and that one's opinion of God didn't affect the currents of one's life but, rather, simply shaped one's perception of it, I became increasingly convinced that God, if he existed at all, wasn't too involved in our world, if at all. The godless are no less fortunate than the religious are blessed, and both fall victim to the same tragedies, misfortunes, and joys that life has to offer. Statistically-speaking, one's friendship with God has no affect on the contours of one's life, but only on how we perceive our lives from the inside looking out. Where the religious see God's hand, others call it luck, fate, or destiny; whatever your take on it, neither can be verified. And seeing that we see God's hand in our lives best through hindsight, it became increasingly hammered into my mind that God was either simply not there or just didn't care. And though this is selfish, I think it makes sense: "Why devote yourself to God, why strive for him, why trust in him when he seems so apathetic, disinterested, and uncaring?"

Wrestling with my hesitancy to both trust God and go into ministry, I sought to deal with these issues, and made significant progress, before it became clear that these uncertainties, these doubts & concerns regarding the justifiability of the Judeo-Christian worldview, put a stop-gap between the wrestling with these personal hesitations and coming out on the (hoped-for) other side. I tried for quite a long time to dispel these doubts, to talk myself out of them. I kept telling myself "I know it's true, I know it's true" as if I were trying to convince myself of that fact. Perhaps lying at the heart of all my wrestling, and perhaps standing as the launching-point for this quest in the first place, are these personal doubts about God's involvement (or lack thereof) in our world. If God is involved, that's great. But if he's not, then what the hell is the point? Yes, this is something to look into, and I plan on it; but I don't want to bite off more than I can chew. I have what could be a very long journey ahead of me, and I must be patient. I'm sticking with the top-down approach of cascading assumptions because if, for instance, the assumption that God exists isn't justifiable, then this whole issue is rendered mute, and we have an easy explanation: "God doesn't seem involved simply because there's no God to be involved." If and when I get to the point of trying to understand how God works (or doesn't work) in our world, I know I must be conscious of an egotistical perception of God, of God orbiting around us rather than us around him; and I know much of this might be due to my inability to grasp the cosmic and far-reaching scope of God's plans that, quite simply, would go on with or without me; and it'd be wise to look into my assumptions about what God's love for me means, assumptions about what God cares about, assumptions about how he is--or is not--involved in our lives.

Asking how I got here is one question; asking where I want to go is another. Here we have the tension between End Goal & Desired Result. The End Goal is determining whether or not the Judeo-Christian worldview is justifiable in light of the evidence. The Desired Result is, if I can be quite honest, rejuvenation: I want the gospel to be true, I want the Judeo-Christian worldview to be a justifiable one, I want to come to have a fresh love for God and renewed direction and purpose. But I can't force myself to believe something that doesn't make sense, and though C.S. Lewis writes that he believes in Christianity because everything else makes sense by it, I am not yet to that point. Much of Christianity doesn't make sense to me, and I'm trying to figure out how to reconcile the paradoxes without doing logical gymnastics to justify my own desires. I honestly hope one day to get back to where I was: passionate about the kingdom, head-over-heels for God, energized by purpose. I want an end to this stagnation, this wandering, this emptiness. But passion can be misplaced, and maybe purpose is something we just need to create for ourselves, and being head-over-heels for something doesn't automatically validate it. Perhaps those days--and that person--are dead and gone, to never be resurrected or glimpsed again.