Is winter almost over yet?

It had to happen sometime, but I wasn't ready for it this soon! Today, I saw snow for the first time in 4-1/2 years. I'm not feeling the winter wonderland thing.

While lounging around in a t-shirt and shorts for the last 4 winters, I occasionally thought that I missed the changing seasons and cold. That was delusional thinking. I've spent 42 of my 46 winters in places like Chicago, Montana, Colorado, and Boston--this was no shock to my system or anything like that. It just sucked. Having to get up early and drive extra carefully, hoping that you don't get stuck somewhere or get run off of the road or have some other winter tragedy befall you.

If anything did happen, i'd have to explain why i don't have better tires, an ice scraper, warm clothes, a hat, gloves, or any of the other things that sane people living in climates that have snow in October should have. Sigh....

This is the view from the school entrance next to my room.

This makes me want to go to California!

   

she's not coming home

I have a friend who is trying to find his daughter since she left after a problem/misunderstanding that they had. Even though the situation is completely different, i can empathize at the moment because sometimes it feels like my own girls are lost. When you are on the other side of the world, it is hard to reassure someone that you would do anything to find and help them if it came down to it.

Gone to the Movies is an incredibly haunting and beautiful song for me. Semisonic captured the mood of loss and melancholy perfectly. If you've ever lived in a big northern city, you can imagine a cold night when rain is starting to turn to snow and the yellowish-orange reflection of the lights is magnified by the low cloud cover. That time is coming soon as we rush toward November. Sigh...i don't think that i'm ready for a long, cold, and lonely winter.

Rock history in the making

My music prediction--we are on the verge of a big upswing in the ROCK life-cycle. Even during the drought years, you can usually still find something pretty awesome to f'in rock out to, but I live for the periods of plenty.

**another unfinished post. Its been a few months since i wrote the above, but i still believe! 

staring into the abyss

A rambling attempt to put together a narrative on life in the middle of an internal and external, (yet, gladly, metaphoric) typhoon.

there are a lot of extremes banging around right now. I'm leaving behind a lot of bad things and moving towards a lot of good things. I mean good and bad in the most stereotypical, comic book, archetypal way possible.

1. Know that people, and humanity as a whole, are capable of unimaginable good.
2. Know that people, and humanity, are also capable of what we wish was unthinkable evil.
3. Expect people to be as good as they can be.
4. Prepare for people to fall far short of being as good as they could be.
5. Learn to hope that you will be pleasantly surprised by people.
5. Learn to accept that you will be disappointed by people.
7. Give thanks when people try to be as could as they can be.
5. Show grace when people fail at being as good as they could be.
6. Don't tolerate evil for any reason or under any circumstance.
7. Don't give up.
10. Don't think that you are any different than the rest, when it gets right down to it.

**This is an old, unfinished post that i decided to put out there. I realize that there is no 8 or 9. I have no idea what i was thinking at the time, so you can make up your own 8 and 9. Thanks ;)

This is a draft post that has been sitting around for awhile, so i don't remember why or how this video relates to anything above. It is a great song, though.

the day i tried to live

I appreciate and enjoy Soundgarden more with every year that passes. I haven't really figured out how that all works--some bands fade for me, while others continue to grow on me for years. Soundgarden is  pretty epic.

Lately, i'm feeling really close to packing up the kids and wandering the earth in search of something more than the existence that i find myself in. All of those choices along the way really do add up to something, good or bad. If i could throw it all away and start over, yet still keep my wife and kids somehow, i would.

There is something going on that i can't quite put my finger on. On an individual basis, i think that we are becoming more aware; on a collective basis, we have lost the plot. Either that, or i'm just losing all patience for the bullshit that we (I!) seem to love wallowing in.

Words you say never seem

To live up to the ones inside your head

The lives we make never seem

To ever get us anywhere but dead

The day i tried to live

I wallowed in the blood and mud with all the other pigs

I woke the same as any other day you know

I should have stayed in bed

The day i tried to win

I wallowed in the blood and mud with all the other pigs

And i learned that i was a liar 

Just like you

restless souls

I've been catching Ray LaMontagne's song Beg Steal or Borrow on KBCO Radio pretty often lately. He's been putting out great work for years and i've been enjoying it a lot in the last few weeks. Beg Steal or Borrow captures a spirit of restlessness that makes me want to pack the car and go.

I think that the voice got me on a Canned Heat tangent.

Show a little faith, there's magic in the night

In just a few hours, on the other side of the world, it will be Maylin's birthday!

Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen has always reminded me of May and the escape that we'd eventually have to make from Angeles City and the Philippines. With apologies to Bruce, I changed one line in the spirit of my asawa's birthday.  

Happy birthday, my love. Hopefully this will be the last birthday that i'll miss.

The screen door slams, Mary's dress waves
Like a vision she dances across the porch as the radio plays
Roy Orbison singing for the lonely
Hey that's me and I want you only
Don't turn me home again
I just can't face myself alone again
Don't run back inside, darling you know just what I'm here for
So you're scared and you're thinking that maybe we ain't that young anymore
Show a little faith, there's magic in the night
You're sure a beauty, and hey you're alright
Oh and that's alright with me
You can hide 'neath your covers and study your pain
Make crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rain
Waste your summer praying in vain for a saviour to rise from these streets
Well now I'm no hero, that's understood
All the redemption I can offer, girl, is beneath this dirty hood
With a chance to make it good somehow
Hey what else can we do now
Except roll down the window and let the wind blow back your hair
Well the night's bustin' open, these two lanes will take us anywhere
We got one last chance to make it real
To trade in these wings on some wheels
Climb in back, heaven's waiting down on the tracks
Oh oh come take my hand
Riding out tonight to case the promised land
Oh oh oh oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road
Lying out there like a killer in the sun
Hey I know it's late, we can make it if we run
Oh oh oh oh Thunder Road, sit tight, take hold, Thunder Road
Well I got this guitar and I learned how to make it talk
And my car's out back if you're ready to take that long walk
From your front porch to my front seat
The door's open but the ride it ain't free
And I know you're lonely for words that I ain't spoken
Tonight we'll be free, all the promises will be broken
There were ghosts in the eyes of all the boys you sent away
They haunt this dusty beach road in the skeleton frames of burned-out Chevrolets
They scream your name at night in the street
Your graduation gown lies in rags at their feet
And in the lonely cool before dawn
You hear their engines roaring on
But when you get to the porch they're gone on the wind, so Mary climb in
It's a town full of losers, I'm pulling out of here to win