Cats

I miss my Greenville friends. I'm just letting you know.

If you don't understand, maybe watching this video will help you get a better idea of why Gville people are extremely missable.

Come near

This just occurred to me: I bond with people through music.

Today I am sick. I feel like a bright blue balloon that was blown up too much and tied too tight with bright red string. You see, these colors when placed together and colored too brightly make my eyes sore. Blessed be the color bind ones in times like these. And also, yes, I feel as though my head and face is blown up. Put those two together: no good! No dice!

So, today I skyped with one of my best friends in all the earth, Sarah Sharpe. She is fab my friends, most fab. She's in Nicaragua right now with her family. They're missionaries. Anyway, we skyped for 3 hours and 22 minutes. Fab!

And we talked about music and listened to music and stuff. Sarah, Katie (our 3rd musketeer) used to turn off the lights, lay on the floor, and listen to music. It would cause us to be emotionally ready for the musical experience. We'd feel subject to the journey. We couldn't see. It was dark. So all of our senses turned to listening and hearing, and receiving the music.

I realized today the truth of the fact. I bond with people through music. I make things musical all the time. Even if to the normal person, they are not musical at all. It's like I'm inviting people in, to become nearer and dearer to me.

So, yes. We listened to music today.

Sarah is probably my longest and most devoted fan in regard to my own music. She and Katie have songs I've written recorded from when I was 14 or 15 on to now. Sarahs musical herself, but it's more of a hobby than a professional passion.

That sounded funny.

If passion were a profession, I think it'd come naturally for me. That's be cool. "Hey, I'm a professional passionate."

Ok, I think you all believe I'm a sickling now. I'm gonna go now.

Happy June!

Dreadfuls

This is the song I mentioned yesterday. Please, be merciful. I am no recording engineer, and my garage band work is by no means wonderful.

I think I'm gonna start posting more of my songs though, because it's just like blogging... I'm sharing what's on my mind. The only difference is a song is more musical.

Here are the words



Dreadful
The darkness
That surfaces the deep
Mindful
The spaces
I hushed, they tried to speak

Pre
Dreadfuls in my hands
They try to fill the cracks

Chorus
Separate
The black and the white
The darkness from the light
The dreadful dusts ignite
Delegate
The wrongs and the right
The lovelies from the night
The dreadful cuffs collide

V2
Delightful
The rain drops
That gather in the street
Beautiful
The night sky
To ponder as we sleep

Bridge
My left hand and my right
Are thrown inside my pockets
The reaching's reached the end
And I'll never hold the sun


Ok, since this is my blog, I'm going to explain this song. As a songwriter, I actually don't like explaining my songs. I take that back. I LOVE explaining them. But a good songwriter shouldn't have to. So I try not to. The song should do that. I shouldn't have to. But since this is my blog, and I write and yap all the time, I'm going to explain it.

I read in Genesis 1:2 this:

"Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the spirit of God was hovering over the waters."

I was just stunned with the imagery and the beauty of that.

And listen to this... verse 3 says this:

"And God said 'Let there be light,' and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness."

Ok, how amazing is that... God created light when there was darkness. And He saw that it was good, and then He separated the light form the darkness. If you read my lyrics, maybe it's starting to make sense now...

And Genesis 15:12 says this:

"As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him."

Ok that was when God spoke to Abram in a dream. I read the word dreadful, and felt like singing it would feel good. And i liked how darkness was called dreadful.

Now put all of those verses together. And what my song means is this:

The absence of light is darkness. Light is what came because of God. So in my song, I state the dreadfuls. The darkness. The darknesses that happen in life. And how there are spaces and ditches in life that the enemy can fill with His darkness. So the first verse where it says "dreadful the darkness that surfaces the deep," That's like saying the darkness exists. And "mindful the spaces I hushed, they tried to speak" is like saying the darkness is mindful of the life (my life) it can claim, and how I try to keep away from it.

"Dreadfuls in my hands they try to fill the cracks" is like saying darkness tries to hold my hand. Like the spaces between my fingers, perfect for another hand to occupy. Like a thief, cunning and sweet until it gets what it wants. Like the enemy uses cunning and sweet language to try to sway us, so does darkness (dreadfuls) try to take us for fools and cause us to stumble. Cause us to believe lies. Holding another's hand is such a soft, gentle and sweet gesture. Saying dreadfuls try to hold my hands is like saying the enemy uses cunning schemes to cause me to fall.

So the chorus is like calling the separation form the light and darkness. By calling attention, and declaring the difference, by calling the enemy out on what he tries to do, he is exposed. "Dreadful dusts ignite" it's like saying the enemy is exposed.

And "the dreadful cuffs collide" is like saying the bondage of the darkness is broken.

"Delightful the raindrops that gather in the street" is basically showing imagery of freedom. Also, this is where it would never make sense to anyone without me explaining it... I read through the story of Noah that day I wrote this song, and the rainbow was a promise of God's faithfulness after rain. So there's that connotation for me by mentioning rain. Also, what creates a rainbow is light coming through a raindrop as the spectrum. Yeah. You never would have guessed my meaning for that huh...

Then "beautiful the night sky to ponder as we sleep" is like saying sometimes we're taken by the beauty of darkness. Sometimes we find it lovely. Sometimes the enemy is so wonderfully crafty, we mistake his deception as truth. And it exists even when we aren't there to take notice of it. Even when we sleep.

The bridge
"My left hand and my right
Are thrown inside my pocket
The reaching's reached the end
And I'll never hold the sun" is basically saying when darkness (dreadfuls) try to hold my hands and I realize it, I try to pull my hands away and throw them in my pockets. Sometimes that's like taking matters into my own hands, and instead of reaching towards God (light), I go to myself instead. Then I cannot hold onto God (light/sun), I'm too busy keeping my hands in my pockets.

And then when that happens, it calls for calling out the darkness (dreadfuls) in the act, and finding the light once it can be separated from the darkness. Because it is Good, like Genesis 1:3 says. The light was good, so it was separated from the darkness.

Ok. That's my song, and the reasons behind it.

Leave me a comment if you have any thoughts, for I would love to hear anything good or bad.

Update

Well... much to catch up.

I started a ton of new goals for this summer. One of those goals is reading through the Bible by August. So far so good! I'm only on Day 2:) But it's a lot, let me tell you. But I've been loving it. I think God speaks to me a lot when I read. I think it's a primary way He speaks to me.

Another thing I'm aiming for is writing a song a day. I'm on day 3 of that. Again, so far so good. I'm at least lyrically writing a song a day. Sometimes I don't have time to put music and melody to what I write. Last night I spent like 20 minutes writing one. understand that this experiment is not about crafting perfect songs. More like taking whatever I have and making it work, and even if it doesn't work, I go with it. It's something new for me. I wanted to try it.

I heard that Jon Foreman writes a song a day. I've tried to do it too in the past, but I get too picky. I think I've reached the end of being too picky. It's all about flexing the muscles. When people work out, some days they feel like they could run miles more, and then other days, you can hardly make it to the end of your usual route.

Such is life with songwriting as well. Yesterday I wrote something that was really weird. It was inspired out of what I read in my Bible. It's really rather indie compared to my other stuff. It's really funny actually.

So that's what this experiment is about really. Whatever comes out of me, I go with it. It's full of harmonies and weird words.

It makes complete sense to me. But I doubt it would make sense to many people. But it sounds nice, so I don't think it's that big of a deal. It's so different than my normal stuff.

I think I'm in this place in life... where whatever happens is what's gonna happen. Whatever songs I write are the songs I'm gonna sing. Whatever God puts in my path right now is what He's putting in my path. A new theme of mine is that my plans fail. And praise God that his purpose prevails.

I'm extremely exhausted right now if you can't tell. I think I'm gonna try to make some music too before I go to bed. I had a melody idea for the song I wrote tonight.

And I wanna start posting new songs as I get them done over the Summer. Why not. I mean I talk about the songs all the time, I might as well post em so you can listen to them. And any responses would be amazing.

Ok, this is the end of my update.

The truth is

Our plans fail. But His purpose prevails.

I'm sad now

Well, the tat is not tattooed yet. But that's only because Zach has too much homework tonight. He's finishing up some summer class stuff.

So, some time soon. Fear not all of you who anticipate. It will happen.

So, tonight I have been extremely nostalgic. I miss my friends at Greenville. I miss taking naps and waking up to Trina staring at me from her bed right across from mine. I miss walking into the bathroom before I've even really opened my eyes and making a fool of myself to my neighbors as they're blowing their hair dry. I miss enjoying the music Diana has on while she's taking a shower. I miss the hilariousness that would happen outside my window from the Kinney boys. Trina and I would laugh even though the words were quite profane. Quite.

I miss the long walk that would take too long every time from Tenney to wherever I was going. I'd take it now.

I miss running up and down College Ave with Kirstie.

I miss hanging out in the lounge with Blakeley and Em. I miss seeing our adorable cleaning lady, and complimenting her on her new haircut.

I miss seeing Elijah from across campus, and keeping eye contact the entire time until we spontaneously swing dance, and then act like nothing happened as we continue on our way.

I miss seeing Storm walk into the lounge in Whitlock, and saying, "One fif?" And that hilarious double chin "uhum, yeah gurl." look says it all. And bam, beautiful harms (harmonies) would occur instantaneously.

I miss running to the library again and again during our vespers practices.

I miss David in the DC. He'd make my gluten free stuff a lot. And he was hilarious. I'd pretend to boss him around sometimes. Maybe I wasn't pretending. But he was a good sport. Sometimes his cooking wasn't the best. But he was fun.

I miss just knowing everyone, and loving on them as I walk from class to class.

I adored those long and late nights in the studio with so many amazing people. Being creative, and fully feeling and enjoying the music we've made.

I miss completely destroying my arms and my carpal tunnel from doing Cartwheels swing dancing.

I miss taking Kirstie's clothes all the time, and then never giving them back... I gotta mail her basketball shorts back. And her sweatshirt. It says her name on it... no one would believe it's mine...

I miss everyone. I miss the DC and eating with everyone. And laughing. And crying like last Tuesday... it just all came down on me at once that I was leaving and not coming back as a student.

It's all hitting me now too, since Nathanael left Tuesday, Courtney left yesterday, and Storm left today. I miss them all, and now I'm sad. That's all I have to say really. Now I'm sad.

Guess what

I'm getting a tattoo.

It's funny, because I guess I forgot (?) to tell a lot of people. Next time you see me, I may or may not have a tat on my hand.

I'll tell much more about it once I can post a picture of the completed result.

Right now, I'll just say this. Worry not my dears. I would not brand myself with words or anything really, if it were not for a really personal and meaningful reason.

I want to glorify God in everything I do. I pray that God establishes the work of my hands. Like David prayed in the Psalms. And whatever I do with my hands, I want to be founded and created out of hands and a heart devoted to glorifying God first and only. Not just above all... but only.

So. That's all I'll say right now. Maybe you'll see a picture soon. Maybe.... tomorrow.