Falling Down

We are all apt to believe what the world believes about us.
George Eliot (1819 - 1880)

Have you heard the song "Falling Down," by Atreyu? Driving home from work Thursday night this song came on the radio. I'd heard it before, but that night it caught my ear a bit more than usual.

I've had some time to think about what I wanted to say about this song, and keep going between a few different(?) themes...

1. I'm falling down... We're all dying in the end.

The idea of depravity and death in sin was one of the first thoughts that came to mind when reflecting on this song.

2. It's in your head... All the voices mistaken. (Shake it off, shake it off).

Donald Miller has a book called "Searching For God Knows What," in which there is a bit about a lifeboat and the way that we as humans think that the size of the lifeboat is smaller than it really is, that it won't last, and that we try to justify why we should stay in, and others should give up their spot in the boat. I'd go into it a bit more, but I don't want to spoil that chapter for you. This book is worth the read.

2.5. What are the voices in your head?

When I came in the that night (or maybe it was the next morning), I saw the quote by Eliot. "We are all apt to believe what the world believes about us." Amazing quote, given the timing of it. Did you know that ol' George's real name was really Mary Ann Evans, and that she published under a man's pen name so that her work would be taken seriously in her day?

I found it interesting that the opening lines of the song were:

"You're always looking back / Running from the past / You're always sweating me / About the next big heart attack / You're always looking over you're shoulder / Staring down the path / I'm falling down, falling down, falling down"

Notice that it's "you" telling "me" about what to worry about, though "you" are "looking over your shoulder"... Something comes to mind about logs and splinters, and eyes.

The voices are, all to often, mistaken. They can be loud, however.

Do you hear the cries of "failure" and "@#$% up" louder than you hear the voice saying "My son. My daughter."? Can you hear the Father calling you a child of the king, or do you hear what a lost world is telling you that you have to worry about?

I'm still not sure I've unearthed everything that is hiding in my mind about the correlation between this song and this quote. I think that I'll go ahead and publish and come back to this some other time, perhaps.

Thoughts?

Graphics

I've been working at updating the header graphic for the blog. It's mostly what I had up before... before it randomly disappeared.

It kind of strikes me that sometimes work, and jobs, can be a bit like dating. With work, sometimes you can go quite a ways with a small or, rather, unengaging project. However, as soon as things may pick up a bit, several other projects will be vying for your attention.

When I took this job back at the end of January, a company I had interviewed with several times finally called to offer a job.

When it rains, it pours, I suppose.

What's the forecast?

Camp.

Running sound for a yearbook camp this week.

I never thought about there being a camp for yearbooks.

Looking around, there are kids here from what looks like junior high and high schools. Today is the first day of camp. We are still in the first real session.

This one is on themes. They are currently talking about coming up with themes, and theme spin-offs.

It strikes me as "how to be creative." I know that it isn't, but it's close. They are teaching brainstorming for concepts, building themes off of that, and how to prepare that for application across the yearbook.

I'm sure that at some point I had something like this in a classroom, once upon a time... but I can't remember it.

This could be long. It might be interesting.

The weekend...

What a weekend!

I made the trip from Houston down to Corpus Christi for Mother's Day. I mowed the yard, grilled some steaks, pork ribs, and chicken breasts. Mom and Dad shouldn't have to cook for most of the week. I also helped Mom order a new laptop. I'm disappointed that I couldn't convince her to go Mac.

If we would call the weekend those hours between going to our jobs, my weekend ended today (Monday) at noon. In that time, I received two phone calls informing me of different friends/acquaintances passing away.

One was a little girl from the church I used to work for. She had been fighting a brain tumor since last August. She was in kindergarten. I got that call Saturday night.

The other was a friend of mine from high school, a few years younger than I. There was a car wreck. That call came in today at about 11:55 AM. I was just getting to the office.

What a weekend to lose such wonderful people. To Ali Christian and Mrs Bigbee, I pray for your comfort and peace in the loss of your children.

Revisiting...

So, the other day I was on IM later than I should have been... and after that, I couldn't really get to sleep.

I just wasn't tired.

I picked up on a project that I hadn't gotten around to for over a month. All that was needed was an artistic review and criticism... the constructive kind, not the "this is why this is terrible" criticism.

A day or two later, I looked over the response email... and the quoted text. Here's what I take away from that:

If I send you an email with a time stamp after... I dunno, let's say midnight (this one was probably around 2 AM)... There are going to be typos. It will also tend toward the flow of conscientiousness style of writing... ie, I'll probably be close to rambling on-topic.

That's about it.

I am using Jott messaging,...

I am using Jott messaging, and it's ability to write to my blog. I'm still testing out its capabilities to accurately transcribe what I say, so now and then there is an odd word that gets in there... (This post and the previous one I've had to go in and edit a bit...)

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So that toll way, while...

So the toll way, while in the morning a royal pain because of all the traffic... When your driving home at 2 AM... There's hardly a car in sight. It's a tough time to get off work but it's a great time for the commute.

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