these fallen leaves of mine

"Lately music has been my compass: it's neither the map, nor the road but a steady constant that can help me make sense of the both.

Most of the time, the songs that I write are more honest than I am. Sometimes I don't play certain songs for people because I'm not ready for that sort of honesty.

I don't write many happy songs, at least not lately. Which is odd because I'm a fairly upbeat guy. So I've got a few theories as to why this might be the case

It might be because life wears down on you. And you lose that part of yourself.

Or it could be because the songs are the only place where these types of ideas can find a release- like a dream where your subconscious is trying to tell you something.

Or perhaps I don't write songs when I'm happy. You know, a celebration requires a few friends and depression requires solitude.

Either way songs have become my way of finding beauty in the midst of chaos and the pain. It's a way of finding redemption for mistakes and regrets that I have.

In this way I feel like the creative process brings me closer to God. As a creator of a song I get to take all these broken fragments of failure and chaos and weave together something beautiful and meaningful. Decay. Death. Pain. Fall. And if God is a songwriter then these fallen leaves of mine can be redeemed."
-Jon Foreman

My Promise

I almost forgot my promise! But alas, I did not, so here is my REAL blog post.

Life has been pretty good to me lately. There are some things that need to be fixed, but there always is, isn't there? School is frustrating and stressful, but I enjoy it. Mostly. I've met some new people and some old people. Joined some new things. My routine life is beginning again, and I will be quite busy. But things are good. I enjoy people. I hope to be able to be around them more.

Well. Now that I think about it, I don't really know what a real blog post is supposed to be. Deep and insightful? I dunno...let me know what you want to read about. lol. and I'll type about that.

Jon Foreman concert is tomorrow! Perhaps my Switchfoot love shall rekindle tomorrow night. We shall see.

Anywho, I have nothing else to write about SO I'm gonna go back to playing piano. Heh. COMMENT!

hello

school school school. it's just not cool.

i'm tired. and stressed. and frustrated. and annoyed.

sigh. sorry. i felt like i should post and then i just complained. as always. i promise i will post an actual post this weekend when i have slept well and am happy. :)

simply.

"As every breath I take tugs me closer to my death, I await for someone to rip this boredom out of my chest and remind me what my purpose is. I pray to my God, learning to trust in Him more often, because I know He will not let me down. If ever anyone will let unsatisfy me, it will be a beautiful letdown. I wait in this uproarious silence for a voice to say, "I dare you to lift yourself off of the floor..." I need to get out there, I need to make a difference. I have to stop this deadly routine and get the hell out of here. I want to make a difference. There is hope. We need love. Love is the movement. Get up, get up, love is moving you now."

i just read that from someone's profile and i felt a sort of beauty in it. so i thought i'd share. and once upon a time my myspace said "I want to change the world, or at least witness it change in a good way. We need change. We need hope. We need love. There is hope. Love is how we get change. Love is the movement." and that is still just as true... i'm also seeing more and more that in order to be a part of that change i don't need to be famous, i don't need to move away.. i can do it here.. right now i still feel limited.. but i think next summer i'm going to try to go somewhere for a month to work.. not sure where or how but i want to. i believe we need each other, we need hope and that we don't have to leave our hometowns to do it. anyways.. i've been thinking about maybe trying to work with 'the simple way'.. they're based in Philly i believe.. but i'll have to look into that more. They've been mentioned in the book i am currently reading many times.. and i didn't realize this until now but i think they might have been mentioned in a TWLOHA blog once.. or maybe switchfoot?? idk.

i'm gonna go clean my room.. school is creeping up on us.

neglection.

i know, i know. and i'm sorry... hopefully i'll get some goods to post on here in the coming days/weeks/months.

my summer has been pretty good. how is yours going? (or ending?) i went on a mission trip a few weeks ago.. and honestly, i don't feel like i did much of anything or got much out of it. however, it was my first so maybe i wasn't really sure what to expect. Then i spent a week reading East of Eden by John Steinbeck. not a bad read. And of course this week is the Olympics! Was anyone else watching 4x100 mens relay in swimming last night? it was absolutely amazing.. and watching it live was so much better than the clips. (you can watch it here) i also plan on reading The Irresistible Revolution: living as in ordinary radical by Shane Claiborne this week. i really don't know much about it but i'm going to find out this week. And hopefully i'll be reading Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer sometime soon as well.

What have you done this summer? Got any good books or memories? Photos?