Music...It's One Of The Reasons I'm Here.

So I'm coming to the recovery point of my crazy last couple weeks. There have been a lot of really positive things that happened this week. I've been practicing my trumpet and piano every day. My tone on my trumpet is getting so much better. A year ago I would never have thought that I could play this well. But the Lord has blessed me this year. He has given me the will and determination to make the time to practice--usually somewhere between 9 to 12 PM.
For keyboarding class I'm working on the part of the Moonlight sonata. It's coming a long pretty well. I think this piece is really helping me to work on playing while looking at the music and not so much at my hands. I usually just play parts of a piece over and over until it's memorized then memorize the next part until I have the whole piece memorized. So far I do not have this song memorized except for one or two chunks of the piece. Yet, I've just about got the whole piece down.
That last paragraph may not have made a lot of sense to a lot of people, but the point of it was; I'm getting much better at piano.
I didn't spend much time...okay, I didn't spend any time this last week on my vocal stuff. And that's not a good thing, 'cause I'm taking voice lessons...and paying for them too, ugh. Today my voice teacher said that he felt like I hadn't been practicing as much as I had the week before, and that he could tell cause all the ground that had been gained last week had been lost this week. All that to say; I really need to practice my vocal stuff more.
Tonight I have a rehearsal with a band that's going up to Washington this weekend. We have a gig up there. I'm pretty excited about that.
Right now I need to go eat dinner. laters.

*Sung* I've Been Workin' On My Home Work

It's been a pretty crazy last couple weeks.
The week before this last one I went on my college's music tour. 150 students, a handful of chaperons, two vans, three trailers, one small bus with a wheelchair lift, and one mondo big bus. Four days--Thursday through Sunday. Seven performances in all. Three schools, three churches, and one retirement home. Jacksonville, Medford, Ashland, Roseburg, and a couple other towns. I was playing trumpet, singing in the concert choir, men's choir and chamber choir. Set up and take down six times (twice a day for three days). It was intense.

Then this last week I had to give a speech. Technically it was supposed to be ready by Monday in case my name was drawn, but it wasn't ready. Yet, for some reason the Lord spared me. Enough people signed up to give their speeches that day that I didn't have to give mine. Come Wednesday my speech still wasn't quite where I wanted it to be, but yet again enough people signed up, and the Lord spared me Wednesday. Come Friday only two of us were left that had to give their speeches. Thank the Lord mine was ready by then. I still don't know if it was too long or not, but it went over pretty well.
Monday the teacher for my writing class didn't show up. So when Wednesday came around and I didn't have my outline for my paper ready to turn in (because all my time had been devoted to my speech), the Lord spared me yet again by delaying the due date on the outline. It would have been delayed till Monday, except that there is no school Monday. This gives me plenty of time to do some research so I'll have an idea of what my outline should look like.
I didn't deserve any of this. It would have been completely right for me to have been caught each and every time, and for my grade to have been docked for it. For a while I couldn't decide whether it was just God showing his love for me and that He's here for me, or if he is just delaying my punishment until I am so far behind that I will really learn my lesson. But then I realized it could very well be both. He is showing me that he cares about me and that he knows what I'm going through and how I feel about all this stuff, and that He's here for me. But if I don't learn my lesson now, it will eventually get to a point where I will be caught, and it will be all my fault.
I wrestled with this whole thing. I'm still wrestling with it in a way. I mean, like I said before, I deserved to be graded down. Some teachers wouldn't even have allowed me to make up the ground if the assignment wasn't done. But God didn't put me in classes with those teachers. He put me right where I am. And He has been watching over me.
It drives me crazy. Why? Why would He do that? I had no right to be spared. I deserved to fail. And yet, when I called on His name He heard my cry. I hear my friends talk about their impossible teachers. My friends who work hard and get their assignments done early and well. And yet they have teachers who tear them apart and leave them feeling more abused than educated. Why couldn't God have spared them? I'm sure He could have.
But each of us has our own lessons to learn. Not necessarily academic lessons. But lessons in patience, trust, hope, peace...etc. Lessons in the things of the spirit.
Please change me God.

Sleepy Time

Earlier today
My mind was going a mile a minute and still wasn't going fast enough.
Earlier today
I was racing against dead lines chasing after finish lines.
Earlier today
I was wasting maybe too much time.
Earlier today
I couldn't find enough time.
Earlier today

Now
I'm slowing down.
Now
I'm falling to the ground.
Now
My time is gone and never coming around.
Now
I'm going to go to bed and fall into deep, sweet sleep.

But What Will I Wear?!?

You know those things that you always thought, or still think that you would/will get away from after high school. I'm sure the list is different for everyone. Some people probably want to get away from their families, some from their town, and some just want to get away from specific peers who annoy or abuse them. The trouble is, even though you can leave one culture for a new one, all across the world man is still the same. No matter where you go there will always be those people who get on your nerves, or who will try to abuse you. People are people, and people are fallen, messed up, broken beings.
The thing that brings this up isn't a problem that has to do so much with people. Right now I'm thinking of something that I probably could get away from if I went to live in a different enough culture. School formals.
In high school I never went to them...okay, that's not true, and you can find my posts to prove it. I only went to my Junior and Senior year proms. But going into college I was kind of hoping I wouldn't have to worry to much about that aspect of our society for a while--especially going to a christian college. Well so much for that.
March 3rd, Winter Formal. Woo hoo. (that's a very droll and sarcastic 'woo hoo' in case you couldn't tell) I knew from the moment I saw the first advertisement that I wasn't going to go. But, as always my friends seem to think that I just need a big enough nudge in the right direction. There is one guy I know who told one of our mutual friends that he wouldn't consider going unless I went. He must have caught on early to the fact that I was serious when I told them I wasn't going to go. Smart guy. So what does our mutual friend do? She starts working on me; trying to convince me that I'll be missing something, or that she could find someone for me to take, or that I need to go for some reason. I don't blame her. She just doesn't understand what I mean by "I'm not going to go". And she probably thinks she's trying to help me.
At lunch today the subject came up. Our mutual friend wasn't there, but the other guy was(we'll call him James), and this other other guy('Fred') was trying to help us through our "problems". First it's the financial (that was the excuse James was riding on), then it's the confidence ('it's not that hard to ask a girl'), then it's the tactics ("Ten steps to getting your dream date for the big night"). I kept telling him 'it has absolutely nothing to do with any of that'. He kept asking me to explain what it was. I told him "It's psychological. I can't even explain it to you. I've tried before, but people just don't understand." Well, all I got from that was a jesting "you should pay a visit to such-and-such, the psych teacher". After a while I figured out what it was: He thought I had a problem. So I told him, "I don't have a problem, so why are you trying to fix it as if I do?"
The conversation didn't go anywhere after that. Just a few circles around topics that were already covered.
But here I am, still hashing my way through this social bog of people who seem to think there is something wrong with a guy that doesn't jump at the chance to dance with a girl. But I don't think there is anything wrong with me. I'm just patient.

Bad Kin!

I have a confession to make. Today I had four assignments due for four of my classes (that's one assignment for each class), but I was only able to turn in two of them.
I know, I'm ashamed of myself. I almost wasn't able to turn in both of the two that I did turn in. The second one I typed up literally 15 minutes before the class started.
I have no good excuse. No deaths in the family--that I know of. No major injuries. Not even some deep spiritual calling that kept me too busy to work on these assignments. I just simply allowed myself to become way too distracted.
It wasn't like I blatantly threw away my time. It was just little bits of time here and there, but it was a lot of little bits. I slacked off cause I didn't really want to start the assignments. It's strange how easy it is to convince yourself that you can spare some time for something when you really don't want to be doing something else.
So, I finally hit the wall. yesterday I spent all my time either in classes, the library, or working in a quiet room. I didn't even work in my dorm room cause I would probably just fall asleep.
This is going to be a tough term in a lot of ways. I've been learning a lot about myself. I recently realized that I am a terribly self absorbed individual, and that I don't know how to love people. I need a lot of help from God...I never didn't need a lot of help from God. In fact I need God to do everything if I'm going to change, cause I have already found that I'm not able to do it. I keep realizing that I'm messed up, and I keep wanting to change, and people keep telling me "at least you realize that you have a problem. that's more than a lot of people realize." I've heard that one a lot. And yet, here I am, still the sinful, self absorbed person I was a month ago, six months ago, a year ago, three years ago. I just keep running into the same wall. I need God to change me, cause I'm tired of being this person.
Pray for me?

Float, Soak, And Hold On For Dear Life

There are some things in life that I figured I would never have the opportunity to do; things that--in some way unknown even to myself--I kind of always wished I could do. Some of them I didn't even realize that I had always wanted to do it until I had already done it. Others I had known all along that I wanted to do it some day, but that it wasn't likely to happen.
Right now I can think of three of those things.
1: I always wanted to make a raft type structure and float on a river or stream or some chunk of water. It was my Huck Finn fantasy. Who wouldn't want to make a raft out of a bunch of debris and float around on it with pole in hand, pushing yourself along. Well, I wanted to. I'd tried to get some friends to help me achieve this goal, but that never panned out. Probably because they didn't realize this was such a big deal to me. That's okay, they weren't that interested, that's there loss. Well, I was finally able to achieve this dream a couple summers ago while working at a camp. We played this night game where there were two teams and we had to put a raft together out of a bunch of junk. We then had to get it to float all the way across the creak and back with everyone on the team sitting on top. If anyone fell off at any point the whole teem had to start over at the first bank. My team...was close to winning. Then people started falling off, and everyone gave up. I was still on top. So I just kept floating around. I went all the way across and back and had a grand ol' time. It was great. Dream complete.
2: This is going to seem really strange, but even though I always figured that I would never be able to go to college--let alone want to go to college--I figured that if I did go to college, I would have to get the full experience of working in the school dish room. That's right, I had a dream to work in the dish room of a college cafeteria. If my dad reads this, he'll probably think I'm a little crazy, but that's nothing new. Well, here I am at college, and I work in the dish room on Friday and Sunday evenings, AND I'm the janitor on Saturdays. Point made. Dream complete (or in the process. I still have to keep from getting fired ;-)
3: This is something I never knew that I wanted to do. I mean, I kind of always thought it might be fun, but it wasn't at the top of my list of things-to-do. However, tonight I found out just how much fun mechanical bull riding can be. That's right, I rode the bull, and I gave him a run for his money. The first time I got on it was pretty intense. There were a couple times I thought I was going off. So I just dug in and held on for dear life. I did alright...and then slid off. But the SECOND time it went on and on until I realized that it wasn't going to get any harder. So, I just slipped right off. It actually looked pretty cool. I just spun off the front of a moving bull. Dream complete.
'Nuff said.

The Agitator

I feel like typing.
Right now I'm sitting in the lobby of a dorm that is not my own. I don't usually spend much time in other dorms. (And just for clarification, I'm in a guys dorm, not a girls.) The reason I'm here is very interesting. Two words: Family Feud.
Monday night my dorm (being a dorm with a guys wing and a girls wing with a lobby in the middle) had a dorm meeting. In that meeting we played family feud.
With that much information one could deduce a lot of bad possible outcomes.
We played guys against girls. The stakes: Laundry room all week (we usually trade off every other day), lobby use after midnight all week (again, usually a trade off thing), and a pizza party on Thursday.
Now things are probably clicking. Have you figured out why I'm here?
Well, the guys lost the "feud". That was Monday. Now it's Saturday. Tomorrow is Sunday. I only have one pare of Sunday pants.
The conclusion: I'm here doing laundry. As we speak my clothes are spinning around and around in a pool or water and suds. And I'm sitting here killing time.