Man, Has There Been Music…
Posted on | July 26, 2010 | 2 Comments
I know I’ve touched upon music and it’s effect on my life in many, many posts here and there but the last few years have been absolutely filled with it!
I simply couldn’t be more grateful. Hands down, whenever Mel and I talk about the benefits of moving south (particularly to NC) we always inevitably end up on the music scene here in the triangle area.
It seems only fitting really…
I say this because literally every chapter of my life has been wrapped in notes and melodies, tied with a bow woven in whispers, crashes, lilting tones, thunderous beats, blips, bloops, screams, layers of harmony, finger plucks, incredible rhythmic poetry and lyrics based on nonsense and literally everything I believe in.
Put simply, music has always been with me. So it makes sense that it somehow followed me here.
Mel and I have a soft spot for the music we love and share (I’m sure I brought this up, but it literally brought us together. Seriously.) and while most couples wax and wane between genres and styles, somehow Melinda and I have remained synced up. Like some great cosmic DJ pressed two records from the vinyl of our psyches and has been using them in tandem ever since. We’ve run the gamut in tastes (our steady line up lately has been a mix of folk, metal, industrial, blues, hip hop and synth based pop/alternative) and I imagine we’ll always remain eclectic, but in last few years we’ve been really fond of the folk movement that’s bubbled up amongst, for the most part, our age group.
So many uber talented people from our generation are ditching their prog-rock/punk bands to grab a banjo or acoustic to sing about what’s truly in their hearts. And, frankly, there’s a hell of a lot to sing about. So yeah, we’ve been latching on to those folks a bunch, taking what they’re saying to heart and hopefully taking some of that fire with us into our day to day actions.
Just this last week saw one of our favorites! His name is Joe Pug and when he sung one of my favorites live at Local 506 in Chapel Hill, I had the iPhone out filming! So I’ll leave you with that! Enjoy! (lyrics follow below the clip,they’re really amazing!)
Lyrics to Hymn #101 :
Yea I’ve come to know the wish list of my father
I’ve come to know the shipwrecks where he wished
I’ve come to wish aloud among the over dressed crowd
Come to witness now the sinking of the ship
Throwing pennies from the sea top next to it
And I’ve come to roam the forest past the village
With a dozen lazy horses in my cart
I’ve come here to get high,
To do more than just get by.
I’ve come to test the timber of my heart
Oh, I’ve come to test the timber of my heart
And I’ve come to be untroubled in my seeking
And I’ve come to see that nothing is for naught
I’ve come to reach out blind
to reach forward and behind
For the more I seek the more I’m sought
Yea, the more I seek the more I’m sought.
And I’ve come to meet the sheriff and his posse
To offer him the broadside of my jaw
I’ve come here to get broke
Then maybe bum a smoke
We’ll go drinking two towns over after all
Oh, we’ll go drinking two towns over after all.
And I’ve come to meet the legendary takers
I’ve only come to ask them for a lot
Oh they say I come with less
than I should rightfully posses
I say the more I buy the more I’m bought
And the more I’m bought the less I cost
And I’ve come to take their servants and their surplus
And I’ve come to take their raincoats and their speed
I’ve come to get my fill
To ransack and spill
I’ve come to take the harvest for the seed
I’ve come to take the harvest for the seed
And I’ve come to know the manger that you sleep in
I’ve come to be the stranger that you keep
I’ve come from down the road
And my footsteps never slowed
Before we met, I knew we’d meet
Before we met, I knew we’d meet
And I’ve come here to ignore your cries and heartaches
I’ve come to closely listen to you sing
I’ve come here to insist
That I leave here with a kiss
I‘ve come to say exactly what I mean
and I mean so many things.
And you’ve come to know me stubborn as a butcher
and you’ve come to know me thankless as a guest
will you recognize my face when gods awful grace
strips me of my jacket and my vest
and reveals all the treasure in my chest
Tags: concerts > day to day > music > ruminations > thoughts
Searching for That Elusive Tranquil Sea…
Posted on | June 26, 2010 | No Comments
Image definitely borrowed. I'd love to see something like this some day though!
(Warning! – Diary-type post ahead!)
For the bulk of my life I’ve tried to keep an equilibrium in my head. I learned at a fairly early age that being reactionary rarely gets you anything where the end result is optimal or productive. It always ends up with both parties trying to lessen the “drama” through compromise. So I’d sit and I’d observe for a bit, then I’d formulate a plan of action that, hopefully, benefits both parties. My objective would get met and, at the very least, no one walks away inconvenienced or worse, pissed.
This process of dealing with just about everything has developed a ton of habits that have nourished incredible relationships and love. Because of it, I’ve floated down this crazy river of life mostly unscathed. I’m certainly not perfect. For a variety of reasons I won’t go into here, I can never achieve that “tranquil sea” in my head that we all read about (though I’ll always try). I think it’ll always be dark, deep and perpetually turbulent. But what I can do is make sure that any situation that has to do with me, is as fair and just as possible.
As I said above this works for the bulk of the time but every once and a while, everyone’s indifference and self-serving agendas mount a full on attack on my day and if this assault keeps up for a few days my walls begin to crumble.
The last two weeks definitely did that to me, and I have to admit: I really let it all get the best of me. I hate wallowing, but I totally went there, short on everything (mostly patience) and really downtrodden (lots of “WTF am I doing with my life right now?!” being thrown around).
A whole range emotions were involved but in the end, frustration started kicking in. I know better than to let these types of situations affect me like this, so whenever this funk clouds my judgement, I check myself. It’s really hard to do because it makes you stop and rewind back through it all. But in the end, I recognize where my weakness was and I emerge from it all a little bit stronger. I never spend significant time beating myself up or criticizing, I just accept the bump in the road and motor on.
So while I hate it when anything unimportant (in the grand scheme of things anyways…) get’s to me, I’ve also learned to welcome the resolution to it all. Yes, the slog through it is hellish, but the punchline (trust me, what I dealt with was ultimately a joke) is a great thing to realize and leave behind.
When Tech is Fun For Me…
Posted on | May 23, 2010 | 1 Comment
Site: www.wordcampraleigh.com Twitter: @wordcampraleigh / #wcraleigh
I know, I’ve spent a good amount of time lately talking about walking the fine line of living a tech infused life and simply living. Reading my past posts I’ve noticed the somewhat negative tone that’s in them and that’s a little bit of an unfair sentiment. There are definitely times when my interest in tech has been extremely rewarding and this weekend was definitely one of them!
Starting this last Saturday the city of Raleigh hosted it’s very first Wordcamp!!
Wordcamp is a giant gathering of folks who work with, or are interested in, WordPress (the open source project that Mel and my sites run on). There were all sorts experience levels there from core and theme developers to folks who simply use WordPress in their day to day blogging rituals. The event was filled with hour long presentations that dealt with the various aspects of a WordPress site like media embedding, plugin development, monetization of your site, integrating other external services, theme development theory, you name it! It was pretty much covered!
To say it was an out and out IT geek fest would most likely be an understatement, but rarely have I ever been in such a group of said individuals that was so accommodating and interested in what everyone had to say. There was a real sense of community that wasn’t about the typical belittlement that goes on these types of gatherings. Sure there were the usual debates about hardware and operating systems (mostly Mac versus PC) but when it came down to talking about WordPress, it’s past, present and future, folks were all business and there was a ton of good sharing going on. I learned some good stuff and can’t wait to apply it to my future creations! Seriously, it was top notch!
When I started developing sites in WordPress years ago, I was kind of going with my gut, figuring something this intuitive and easy to use would naturally be adopted by the populace. So you can imagine how psyched I was to see the size of the community that an open source project like WordPress has generated in the Triangle area. The entire even was almost completely sold out! On a weekend before a long weekend no less!
I truly hope it was successful enough to throw another one next year! I honestly don’t see how it couldn’t have been!
Well done Raleigh!
[geolocation]
On the Fine Art of Periodically Pulling the Plug…
Posted on | April 21, 2010 | 2 Comments
Since my early to mid 20’s until now (34 years), I’ve been a constantly connected individual.
It all started when my first IT gig out of college gave me a bag phone for my car (basically a HUGE bulky cell phone) and then helped me pay for my first laptop (an enormous, yet incredibly well-made Dell Inspiron).
Since then, I’ve been reachable just about anywhere.
And in all honesty not much has changed. Though I have gotten a lot more cagey in my old age. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE the ability to get information from pretty much anywhere. I love moderating and updating my sites from the passenger seat of a vehicle speeding up the highway to anywhere. I love documenting and sharing my interests with the world at anytime I feel the need to. I adore keeping tabs on the handful of people very near and dear to my heart.
It’s all become surprisingly important to me.
But it’s also a fine line that I walk, as I already spend at least 8 hours a day, 5 days a week staring at a glowing screen trying to earn a living. Then I come home and sit in front of my screen again, spending much needed time for myself and my interests. It is needed, but there comes a time where it becomes entirely too much. I get cranky and life seems suddenly very cramped. And before I know it (often too late unfortunately), I realize I need to step away. Whether I want to or not.
I need to unplug.
My love of info and pixels paints my life into a bit of a corner sometimes and though much of that time is either necessary or immensely fulfilling, a lot of that time is also simply burning up the minutes in a day. Winter is the worst for this behavior, but now that spring is gloriously here, I find breaking the habit is not only necessary, but it’s also irritatingly belated. I always realize that I should’ve done it a lot sooner and when I finally do, I find a lot of wonderful things patiently waiting for me.
Like my raised veggie garden beds!
A compost heap in need of turning!
Farmer’s Markets reopening!
The newest family moving into our bird house!
The local trails…
A dog that needs more walks (and a brushing).
Live music!
Books on the bedside table collecting dust!
It’s all of these things that patiently wait for me (sometimes constantly), to shake the haze from a brain over saturated with digitally enhanced brightness and contrast. I’ll always love digital age, it’s kinda part of my DNA now, but it’s not the most important thing in my life.
As I keep adding years under my belt, I’m learning more and more that life’s about movement. Getting my hands dirty, using my voice, feeling textures, getting more than a few blisters, holding the door open for anybody, saying “Hi, how are you?” and really meaning it, creating something I can hold, trying to hug your friends instead of shaking their hands….
It’s about feeling the heart beat; from the physical as well as the emotional.
Again, it’s about movement… of you and everything flowing around you. You simply can’t experience it sitting in front of a glowing screen. You gotta unplug once a while, or maybe even for good.
A fact I need to be reminded of every once and a while (thanks Mel 
)!
—————-
Now playing: Pixies – Where Is My Mind?
via FoxyTunes
Tags: day to day > eco ramblings > exercises > memories > ruminations > tech > thoughts
The Highs and Lows of Tech…
Posted on | March 19, 2010 | No Comments
So sometimes technology is like a big ole lump of clay for me to sculpt and make my own and, when it works, I’m in love with it. Like here for instance.
But sometimes technology is a big ole sack of chaos. Ruled by squirrelly electrical current and a crappy wiring job by the folks that built your house. 95% of the time we fair quite well in this department. Other times we end up with situations much like what I encountered last weekend when the external hard-drive that makes duplicates of all the files we truly care about, ended up sounding like a chirping “something” trapped in a sealed box of glass and sand.
Truly a double edged sword.
And it’s a perfect example of my love-hate relationship with it. It at once fits firmly within my value system (replacing many wonderful, yet wasteful products like books, CD’s, DVD’s etc…) all the while fostering a creativity that I’ve had and loved my entire life. It’s held all of my precious words, music and media for years faithfully, but it’s also turned it’s back on me with absolutely no warning, trashing everything in mere seconds. I’ve truly been devastated by it (I once lost 45 pages of a book I was writing. It wasn’t the whole book mind you, but still…) and I’ve learned a lot from those nutty little losses. But as much as I’ve lost, I’ve gained so much more.
Take news for instance. Because we don’t have cable, my information in life is strictly internet-based and with the apex of RSS feeds (or Twitter for the matter), I get fed only the information I seek. This leaves me to think for myself and find both sides of every story. My hobbies and passions are almost completely electronic now and because of this, I’ve found and read about so much more than I ever would’ve learned about otherwise. It makes a lot of material things seem bulky (physically and spatially) and, for most part, I don’t miss their physical counterparts. Not at all actually.
But (and there’s always a “but” when you talk about such things) even the light weight brain-stimulating zeroes and ones I play and make a living with, could ever replace holding Mel’s hand (or simply looking at her), hiking in the woods, feeling the sun on my face and a breeze between my fingertips, hugging a friend, helping someone in need, using my hands in the garden, scratching my pets behind the ears, looking up at stars, singing, dancing (even if I’m horrible at it), all of it… all those things you carry in your head and heart, right now and down the road. You can’t hold any of it. But that, in my opinion, is what makes up a life that’s worth genuinely smiling about.
These things constantly leave me with the sense of the immense importance of the balance of it all. The importance of unplugging and engaging life with all 5 senses. Being a geek for this tech stuff, it’s real hard sometimes. But those wants and needs aren’t any more important than the other stuff. I hear it all the time but it’s so damn true: life isn’t always fair and sure as hell isn’t easy sometimes.
It’s often sharing a vista with someone you love but it also can be attending a funeral. It’s hearing your favorite band under the autumn stars or helping a loved one through a really rough patch. It’s a life that’s yours and yours to live how you choose. It’s more than the sum of it’s parts.
Broken hard-drives and all.
Tags: day to day > eco ramblings > ruminations > tech > thoughts