Sweet like honey!

Wow, it's 1pm and I've got only a small scrap of work completed for the day. That being said I have just started. I thought I'd share my mood though before I embarked on what most definitely will be an adventure that is my Monday.

Something about the air of the day feels good and calm. It could be that I'm again alone in the suburban house that I live in. My parents are away right now and my aunt is visiting and helping take care of my Grandma. With these visits always comes a certain degree of craziness. She has a way about her that isn't bitter or worn down by the matters of past years and the day to day grind, an energy about her attentiveness to everything that is quite impressive. It's also different than my mom who bears the stresses of the every day and the past 25 years. Yes, there's something amazing about my aunt and at the same time, something that my family can sometimes find to be too much. Now that she's taken Grandma out and the energy in the house has somewhat normalized I find myself thinking about my family dynamics and how I react to certain things like my aunt and her ways. I was thinking this morning about children who have lost a parent or something like that and are forced to live with an aunt or someone great but someone that is definitely not their parent. It's such a hard thing I think. That person can be amazing but as creatures of habit, no matter how good, bad, high strung, etc our parents can be we come to love them just as they are. They could be the most imperfect people on the planet but yet we love and defend them. If I were in the situation of being raised by someone else other than my mom I think I'd have some serious rebellion problems. It's weird. I'm not that type of person yet I feel like I understand why I'd react in those ways. Change is sometimes hard eh?

Anyway, that's not the direction I was thinking to take this morning but I guess it was sitting on my heart as I ate breakfast. Now the house is quiet and the reality is that I've had an amazing day so far. I woke up admittedly late... Well technically, I woke up on time, turned off all my alarms and slept for another two hours. So yeah, woke up late and got straight outside to wake up while walking. This is something I've really come to enjoy in the past few weeks. It's given me time to wake up, get the blood flowing a little for the day, get some sunshine and pray a little. That being said my brain is such a scattered mess in the morning, the only constant is the pacing of my footsteps but I think God understands. Anyway right now I'm sitting at my computer after my breakfast and feel super blessed to be doing what I am right now, to have friends that are supportive and care so much and all of that. A guy couldn't ask for much more. Well except someone to love but all in time right? All in the right channels and all that too. This morning I took a quick peek on plenty of fish again. I had deactivated my account quite a while ago and with a look at a few profiles I knew there wasn't anything there for me. A friend of mine said something about love recently that has stuck with me the last few weeks. "Love finds you when you're poor." She quickly followed that with "I'm broke so I think I've got a good start." Amazing! It is true though and has been true in my life. Love really does find you. When you're seeking for it, it just doesn't happen. Love should be easy, at least at first.

Anyway, deep breaths, I'm running behind on a few very important jobs so I better get to it. Crank the Phoenix and chair dance my way to victory this afternoon.

Peace, love and rock,

J

Such a good night. I feel better.

I think this is another ft post. It's just what I'm feeling for tonight.

AH! Amazing. Tonight was another ft with some loud singing and I absolutely loved it. I'm not sure what the exact reason was but I have a couple ideas. There were no drums for worship tonight. I think a friend is in town. Someone I don't know but I think his name is Reg. He plays the almighty cello. And he was playing tonight for worship. So it was Andrew on Guitar and vox, Reg, the man on cello, Joel and Brad shared bass duties and Christine took the reigns on keys which was awesome. I didn't know she played piano. Sometimes simple arrangement changes can really bring out the best in the singing at ft. I think it might have been a combination of that and a pretty moody day with the rain and all that. I think it was the first time we had service and could hear the rain and cars going by splashing the water in the street around. It added another layer to everything. Of course I closed my eyes lots during service just letting it out when I could actually hit the right notes haha.

I'm not exactly sure why but I decided I wasn't going anywhere after service tonight, it just seemed like a proper mood to be a bit productive and reflective to myself. I think there's been some underlying tension with some things this week. I have an inkling of what it is but I won't do that venting just yet. I think a few others could see it in me. I think it made me a little tired for the day. I thought about things that might have changed from a few months ago and it all seems to make sense. There's a slight bit of insecurity seeping back into my life. I guess that's normal though because I've spent so much of my life being timid and holding back. I'm aware of it all though and I'm sure it's going to fade pretty quickly this week.

Oh, I did have a pretty amazing week. I got lots of work stuff done though not quite as much as I was hoping for. I also went to take my G driving test for the first time. I didn't pass it but for the first time in my life, I've failed at something and I wasn't destroyed about it. It's not that I didn't care or anything like that but I felt a little more mature about it. I was comfortable that I took the test and did fairly well but had a few things to work on. I know I'll ace it next time no problem. Weird how things like that work. Like many things the past little bit, I feel like it was supposed to happen that way. It ties so well into things I've been reading and thinking about trying, giving things your all and it's not the end of the world if they don't work out. I'm reading a great book about takings risks actually. I kind of feel like these past couple months has been me packing my bags for the rest of my life. I'm growing so much and learning so much about myself and little things like that I can carry around for a little bit and refer back to them.

Funny enough the sermon tonight was about seeds and growth. Things tying into each other... so good. It kind of made me think of a friend of mine I know that's really searching for something solid to sink into in this life of constant flux. I think I should invite her out to ft. Perhaps I will. The thing is I have no clue what she'll think about the actual service. I guess we'll find out if I have her out.

Anyway, I think I should get back to all that work and stuff drawing jailbreaking mongooses. haha.

Peace, love and rock,

J

The Quickest Update!

Let's rock!

It's Monday! Hooray!

The week was a rough one. Lots of work, many late nights and almost all nighters, working till 4am and waking up at 7 to go to work and do other things like bake corn bread (which was delicious). I'm so glad I made that corn bread. I had some in client office work meetings that went really well and made a little money doing that so that's always happy. I think I was biting a little bit too much off at one time this week though because I have another cold. It's a slight one and my body is battling it pretty well considering I haven't done too much to increase my sleeping to give me a fighting chance. Echinacea, effervescent vitamin c, and extra strength daytime cold medicine at my side but a pretty peppy attitude is in the forefront. I fell great. Being active is great and though I wish things were a little slower right now, the pace of coming and going and working and just dealing with it all is great for me.

The weekend was amazing. I was privileged to attend a listening party for a friends CD to figure out the order and which songs would make it on his upcoming full length for summer. All the songs were amazing and I'm still in awe of the talent of this one man band/writer. Such a diverse style too. That night I really felt at peace though I was really tired from the week. I even had crazy amounts of work to do when I got home but it was all worth it. Music and close church friends rock. I think it was my first chance to hang out and witness my friends baby in full fighting force. She's awesome!

Friday there was a house show with some church friends and it was such a hometown kinda night everyone just chilling. It's so good when we folk get together at events outside of church. So fun. And the air is still pretty great. They're all a great group of people and it gives people new to the church an opportunity to come out and be part of something new. I got to know a few people a little better too. I called it a short night, gave some good friends a ride home and headed home myself straight to bed. I did have a nap in preparation for the night and it was definitely a good call.

Saturday called for an impromptu wine and cheese party. Super good food, super good company and an amazing host made the night super success. It was hard but I tore myself away for an hour or two to go see Four Year Strong and Set Your Goals. If you've never heard set your goals, definitely pay attention and take a sampling of some of the stuff when it's released on the 21st. I have a leaked version (SHHHH) and it's amazing. That being said, I'm definitely going to buy it (ON VINYL) when it comes out. The album is easily one of my favorite this year. And I like it a lot better than the current Four Year Strong disk. They need a new full length soon! Anyway, returning back to the party, I talked to people I never had before from ft. Getting into conversation, I ended up staying till 3:30. Enoch is the host with the most for sure. Thanks so much!

Ever devoted to my good friends I was determined to make it for breakfast at 9:30 in Mississauga so I drove home and got to bed around 4:15, slept fast and woke up at 8. I was on time for breakfast!! Amazing!! I think it's easier to wake up when lots is going on cause I just go with the flow. If the flow is waking up when the alarm tells you, I go with it. haha.

Sunday was an awesome morning breakfast with good friends, hanging out with my sister for a bit of her birthday and then ft service. The sermon was remarkably short for ft. Usually they go for an hour. I was a little surprised as I'm sure a few others were but I heard later this was due to the morning service that was just starting up. Since they have less time to tear down afterwards, and it was the first week of the morning service they didn't want to run over. That's going to be tough. I hope that as they sort out the morning service, the night service will continue to be that flagship service where we do get the word like usual or something like it. But all in time. I think it's remarkable what is happening at ft and so far everything has gone so well. I wonder how well our new space would handle a fully acoustic set. I think a few of us that like singing are really hankering for another one of those. Oh.. before that happens we might want to fix some of the overheads to some of the songs. The arrangement to some of the words gets a little out of order. It's on a few of the best songs at ft too. Ah.. just kinks. We'll totally get to them in time.

The greatest thing... new faces! Although we had morning service that day, the church was still pretty full. There were new faces everywhere. Before the sermon we get to stand up and say hello to the people around us for a little bit. I find that always helps when you see new people. You're able to walk up and say hello. For anyone new it means a lot. If anything, I think we could have that portion a little bit longer in weeks coming when we have a lot of new people. I'm sure I saw a few people that didn't get any hello's. My heart goes out to them and I really do hope they come back next week.

Anyway.. quite a church related weekend but an awesome one at that.

So not the quickest update ever. Probably the most vague batch of information ever yes.

Thoughts on all of it later. For now.. Yeah I'm late. Gotta roll!

Peace, love and rock!

J

Saturday

A little post of energy before bed

I don't know if there is anything quite like a little bloggy before bed. It's like a bed time snack for your thoughts and emotions and instead of making you feel full and sleepy, it lets your mind be at peace and empty or perhaps just a little less full, less reeling from the moments before you write the post.

Well tonight I come to the bloggy not because my mind is reeling. I wanted to write about a guest preacher we had at freedomize (church) tonight. At first I thought I'd put something simple like "Todd Cantelon... Much Love". That expresses a lot of what I mean to get out but I feel that may be too exclusive. Only people that might have been there might understand or even have a remote idea of who Todd Cantelon is. That was more like a facebook status post. Here's a little more. Todd was 1 of 2 people responsible for the "church plant" that is Freedomize Toronto. Freedomize Toronto (ft) is the church I go to and love and call home. The term church plant is basically an equivalent to a business start up but in more churchy terms. Instead of starting a business, you're starting a church. Instead of getting customers, you want to get a congregation that will return every week and be part of a community. I can imagine it would be much easier to start a business than a church simply because of what's involved and what's at stake when dealing with a church. It's peoples beliefs, problems, outlooks on life, God, Jesus, their upbringing and so much more. If Todd didn't have a grand vision of ft from the beginning I wouldn't likely be going to church right now and my life wouldn't be nearly as fulfilling as it is. I could still be having my miserable Sundays before the drudgery of the week took me away on Monday.

Anyway today was about much more than just Todd being at ft. He was guest preaching. His sermon was super passionate and gave me (and many others as I found out) insight as to how ft started off, what it was like in a time before I was there etc. Todd speaks very um... loudly at times, sometimes his delivery is even Chris Rock-esque. I found myself laughing at moments when the delivery was so close and humorous in tone. The message comes from a great place though. The sermon mainly focussed on Jesus being living water and with that water we would never be thirsty again. Todd was also clear that this did not mean provision. In fact he drew a very hard line between the stars we idolize and their millions of dollars and rockstar lifestyle and a follower of Jesus. Which do you think he would have said the happier was?

All in all I enjoyed the sermon. It's dynamic, it's message, it's impact and the fact that I'll likely be thinking about it all week long. Like I said before. Todd Cantelon... Much Love.

I think the sermon came at an interesting time in my life though. Sometimes sermons at ft can ring that little bell at the top of the tower. Yknow the one with the giant mallet you have at carnivals. It makes a slide whistle sound as it goes up and makes a "DING DING DING" if the thingy goes all the way to the top. Yeah. That happens when the sermon is so on the money. This sermon wasn't in exact time like that but I feel like it might lay some groundwork for the week ahead.

Yesterday, Saturday night, I decided I might actually stay at home, get some work done and lay low for the night. I had a number of places to go but at the last moment I figured in light of the weeks events with my parents, I might make an effort to be around and stayed home. I could get some work done and hang out with the parents and chit chat. Unfortunately, the end result was I didn't get too much work done, I did read a bunch but I also talked very little with my parents. I was around them for the whole night for the most part but they spent most of the day being tired from their day out and focussing in on that damn tv box. I really wish sometimes we didn't have a tv at home. (Sometimes... shhh). For some reason the doing nothing for the night only served to make me feel lethargic. I had great sleep the night before and yet I was pretty exhausted and did nothing from 11pm onward. I slept for another long period last night and slept past my alarms today finding it almost impossible to wake up. I think I fell back asleep 3 or 4 times before shooting out of my bed fearing it would happen another time. Then today it took me nearly forever to leave the house. I had all intentions of getting into the city really early, working on a few things I need to get done and hanging out a little before church. I ended up having time only to get to church, chat for 5 or 10 and sit down. So crazy.

I've learned something from this. Over the past few months I've got my motivational patterns almost down to a science. I know full well that Saturday night is not a productive night unless I'm sitting next to someone I'm actually working with. Past 6pm on a Saturday I should be getting ready to get out of the house for part of the night because if I don't, I will probably go crazy. Sitting at home on a Saturday night often leaves me feeling like I'm stuck somehow in where I am in my life thus the lethargy kicking in. Right.. I've learned something! I've learned I should probably stick to things I know definitely work for me and stay away from certain things I know absolutely don't. Staying home on a Saturday night to get work done if I'm not super excited about it.. that would be on the definitely not list.

I feel that I should mention that I don't have a necessity to go out, spend the night on the town, spend money, be a baller etc. I think the need for me is to be social. If I had someone to spend time with and be social with here at home, a sister, a significant other, a parent that wasn't pooped from their day that would be awesome. I think when I leave the house on a Saturday night I'm really just seeking some social time, some time to chill out, chat and perhaps do something a little random. I could just as easily spend a night in with a friend or roommate if I had one, making pasta and checking out some movies but I don't have such a luxury right now. You may wonder why I feel the need to mention ALL THAT. Well I recently thought about it myself. I was asked a question regarding to my constant going out, constant adventures in the city. A friend commented that I'm always going out and I must have lots of friends. I don't know that that's really the case. It's just that I have a need to be social, to be close with my friends, to spend time with them and all that. Having solidly booked activities like band practice twice a week, rock climbing once a week and church on Sunday makes evenings already half occupied. I have to say that it makes scheduling interesting sometimes but I do like to be active in music and physical activity and spiritual activity. It almost ensures a well rounded week.

Anyway, I think this post has become like many of mine in the past little bit, too long, too late at night. I don't have too much more to post. Oh I'll mention one more thing.

On Friday, I walked from Leslieville, stopped in to see a friend at work, and walked all the way to the Toronto Outdoor Art Expo while taking pictures. I walked around the expo for 2 hours or so then headed back to my car parked in Leslieville (on food again). It was such a great day. Mind you, the walk took about 6 hours in total. I'll miss the opportunity to do things like that when I have a fulltime job.

It's bed time. Early morning wake up and work session.

Peace, love and rock,

J

Cough update

Oh and my cough is gone! Hooorah!

Love ya,

J

Welcome to Saturday! Party all let's dance!

Today could be a day of a simple post but I'll just get to writing and see what comes out of my fingertips haha.

So the past week has been er... good and bad. Very productive, strategically, physically, mentally and also in work. It's nice to have a productive week. I guess the whole week starts on the past Sunday. I helped out at Freedomize with drumming. Freedomize or ft is a church I've been going to from Advent. They have a band or singer & guitar etc lead the songs (worship) each week. The band had 3 drummers essentially backing it up this past week, me stage right. It was pretty fun for sure. I wish we had spent a little time tuning the kits together before hand though cause I could have sworn that my drums weren't in tune with Mike's haha. Good enough for rock and roll though. I'll be attending a drum tuning clinic at some point this month so I'll get a better grasp on it all.

I've heard from different people that play for worship at church either they find it more difficult to be in that moment when they are playing or that they feel more in the moment of worship when facing the congregation and singing their heart out. I think I felt a little more like the first way. I wasn't entirely just flowing and doing my thing. I think I'm just very much not used to it. From the band, we've been practicing copious hours to play songs that I know every tiny bit too. It's where I'm most comfortably playing and this was definitely more challenging. I liked it for sure though. I hope it happens again and we perhaps plan a little tiny bit more ahead of time. The most important thing is that a lot of people commented that they liked how it all sounded. They were also all worried that we would blog their ears off by playing way louder than the band but we worked it out. This week is going to be a slimmer form of ft as there is a pretty massive wedding going on on Saturday. From what I hear, many attendees won't be making appearances this Sunday. I totally understand that though. Weddings can make for incredibly long days and the next day is definitely worthy of being a couch potato day or sinking into a good book and not moving.

This past Sunday after ft I got to hang out with a few people I had only briefly talked to before. One person is really new to not only ft but Christianity as a whole. It's a really great experience to hear them ask questions and to hear if they are unsure of things or that they're excited etc. It's also interesting to hear about their first experiences at the church as mine weren't too long ago. We all pick up subtle differences and one big factor I'm sure is that we're in a new building. We're all working really hard to make St. Stephens feel just like home and we're getting there. It shouldn't take long for us to settle. It's only been 5 week or something like that.

The week carried on and Monday was pretty interesting. The band practice was a little lackluster as we were short one person and some drama must be going on cause we were a little "off". Prayers for quick resolution! Anyway, the rest of the week I got down to some work I have been trying to slot in for some time now. It's taking a little longer (programming in flash eep) but it's going to be super rewarding once finished. I feel like I'm investing time in a good place. Tuesday night I hung out with a few more people from ft and had an Audrey Hepburn movie night. Amazing yes I know. I figure you are in one of two camps: You love Audrey Hepburn or you are wondering why I would want to hang out with people and watch an Audrey Hepburn movie. If you're in the second grouping my defense is this: I'm a hopeless romantic and Audrey Hepburn is a bit of a bad ass but a classy one at that. I love the dynamic. It was a pretty awesome night. To cap that off, I went to go see my friends IVS play. They play FAST punk rock. It was an amazing show and the crowd loved it. So good for them. It made me more energetic for practice on Wednesday. I was playing kind of like a wind up monkey, super fast too. I've been struggling a lot with fast beats for the past month but I definitely am getting up to speed and precision now... slow as progress is, it's so good.

Thursday I finally made it back out climbing since incurring a minor sprain to my ankle a few weeks ago. The good news is that I'm back in business. I still have to be a little mindful that it's not 100% healed and thus vulnerable but it hasn't given me any problems in climbing. It felt great to be climbing again and I hope to be back up where I was with my hand strength in a few weeks. We have a little crew of people who want to get out climbing now so it's great. Hmm.. I think I should invite a few more people out. We climb in Burlington so perhaps people from Hamilton might want to make the trip out. Hint hint.

Yesterday I went to a house warming party and for once I was not driving. My good buddy Kev was DD for the night so I got a chance to enjoy some premium Japanese Asahi beer haha. Of course right? It was great. I just realized how much I'm not used to feeling drunk at all any more. It was kind of funny getting home, I vegged out, ate some food and crashed on the couch till 5. Ooops.

Hmm... I wonder if I have any deep thoughts a brewing... Climbing was a great experience this week. One of my friends said it reminded him of band practice when we were playing in a band together. There was always that guarantee that you could chat about what was going on with you if you had anything stressing you out, girl problems and epic stories etc. I feel the same. It's total bonding weather guys or girls come out.

Anyway, the current status of me is that I'm really happy. I have a lot of work to do, I wish I had woken up much early as well but I think my body was recovering from the lack of sleep from the past week. When I get into work mode, I tend to wake up at a decent time each day and get right to it. If I sleep in because of coming home last from practice, I get off track too easy.

I think I'm in a spot where I'm slowly learning the potential that I have. I am realizing just how many people are supportive of me and believe in my abilities so much more than I do. I've also realized a few people that don't have faith in those very same abilities. It was really surprising.

This week I got kind of a lecture about how I don't share much about my life with my parents. In certain ways it was funny to hear their interpretation of things. Their concerns being that they don't really know any of my friends that I talk about. The unfortunate thing is the friends they speak of all live in Toronto. Getting someone that lives in Toronto that doesn't have a car to leave the city to visit you in the suburbs is very difficult especially if they are new friends. My parents do often forget that my life almost revolves around the city of Toronto and not the burbs of Mississauga. My father made a comment actually suggesting that if they don't come to visit you they must not be real friends. I understand the logic but the fact of people today is that everyone is super busy.

Anyway, getting a little more serious, on the other side of the coin it was something tough to hear. I can't say I reacted the best way. I almost tried to resolve it right away and spew everything out at one time. What I'm doing right now, the work I'm working on, the friends that I was hanging out with that night, the locations of everyone and their linkages in regards to families, marriages etc. It would have been much to much for my dad to take in to process and probably impossible to remember. Not the best tactic I know but I didn't want to leave things half talked about before I head out for the night. It would have bothered me and my parents. The hardest thing about it is I don't feel that the communication issue is that much on my side. I think it could be attributed to the listening party. It's hard to keep pushing your stories about your days and your friends and work when constantly being cut off by other things that seem so trivial, being ignored due to something on a tv screen. If the communication has stopped I'm sure it has been something gradual and that I didn't want to have to fight to have my stories heard anymore. It's pretty painful to be mid story and see someones interest gradually slip from you to the television. Their interest slowly fades to long pauses and grunts to indicate they know they should be listening but probably aren't. The final straw is when you walk away and they don't notice, they resume their tv watching as if you didn't have a story to tell in the first place.

Grrrr.. haha.

Sorry about that. I guess it just needed to come out. The resolution is simple. I don't think I'll be fighting for attention over things, instead I'll just have to sell my life like advertising haha. Short informational stories that can be delivered concisely at some point during the day before tv watching begins. We'll see how it works out. I know the key is that I'll have to be patient and see what works and talk about it all. I can understand as a parent to one day realize you don't know much about what's going on in your childs life an be alarming. The unfortunate thing is the steps that take place to get you to that place. The steps that as a parent you might not remember. No one is perfect and being a parent is a tough job. I haven't made it easy. I was the last of 3 kids, the only boy, I've done things almost backwards from what my sisters did and I never moved away for school. Something tells me I should be given some slack for being a little different. I wasn't a problem child, I was by all intensive purposes a "good kid". It's interesting how different problems can develop depending on how you grew up and what you did when you were young. It surprises me sometimes that there is so much conflict between my father and myself. I think I should be turning to the big man for some help on this and make some actual non-smart-ass effort to genuinely improve the situation. I know I already feel better having put this out on here.

I wonder if my parents have ever read my blog? hmm.

Anyway, time to get some more work done and prepare for a fully random night.

Peace, love and rock to all,

J