The Silver Lining?

Let’s be honest; every great line in every gripping play, thrilling script, or repeat-button worthy song only add up to a collective of ideal situations. They are what they are — just lines. In reality, absence makes the heart wilt, the body numb, and the mind fog. These horrible afflictions are our best defenses. They harden. They tranquilize. They cloak. The silver lining lies in what we make of ourselves in overcoming our own defenses. In allowing ourselves to be vulnerable. In accepting the present and forgetting both past and future. In rewriting history’s greatest lines with ourselves as the major players. The lead roles. The inspiring characters.

Lines are just lines until someone draws the curtain, calls out “Action!”, or lays down the recording arm. If the lines are not lived then they die as empty words scribbled in a notebook.

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Why in the hell am I still rambling on?

I have an urge to write something prolific but I just consumed a fairly large amount of alcohol so this will probably turn into a garbled mess of rants. Or maybe it will lead to the next great American novel. Did Kerouac start drinking before he wrote? Or did he start writing before he drank? These are the stupid, quasi-serious topics I debate with myself when I drink. That’s why I rarely drink. Tomorrow morning I will wake around nine and check the social networks I belong to. This post will have probably been fed into my Facebook notes by then. I will cringe at my idiotic questions. I will cringe at the stupidity of the night’s events and why I even headed to the newest local watering hole. I will probably not delete this post, instead remaining optimistic that no one wastes their time on my thoughts anyways.

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Lost Mementos

Years ago I lent my first acoustic to a friend. He lent the guitar to another friend. I never got it back but last fall I saw it in the kid’s graduation pictures. It looks like it got some use and as for me? Eight guitars and several other instruments later I can honestly say it probably wouldn’t have gotten used as much for the rest of it’s life. Certainly not enough to feature in graduation pictures.

Lost mementos occasionally find new homes. Keep that in mind and apply it in different areas of your life. It makes letting go easier.

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I can bend and not break or I can break and take it with a smile.

What, exactly, defines a good person?

This is the question that’s been on my mind recently. A question probably sparked last week after watching coverage of the Haiti crisis. The remarkable thing about the natural disaster was how many American lives were thrown into chaos so far from home. Last Friday I posted a link on my Facebook to a page displaying information on how and where people could donate to relief efforts. The further that information spreads, the better. In our advanced society we have the ability to support charities that save lives with a few key presses. I donated $10 via text to the Red Cross in less than a minute. No paperwork. No credit card authorization. It’s just added to my phone bill at the end of the month. I also gave $10 through Paypal to the Save the Children fund.

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So it comes down, and I don’t know anything.

It doesn’t take more than a couple glances at a post or two here to see how much music plays a part in my every day life. What’s kind of funny is how my subconscious attributes different soundtracks to different parts of my life. Sometimes they’re very obvious picks, like listening to Angels & Airwaves on the entire trip to one of their shows or rocking Motion City Soundtrack on the way to Minnesota to see them on Warped. Sometimes there a little more random. The Ataris’ Blue Skies, Broken Hearts… Next 12 Exits album is tied very closely to memories of my high school band trip. More specifically, every song on that album reminds me of two things from that trip. The first was walking into a local music store in Milwaukee and picking up their So Long Astoria album. The other was a card game in the hotel hallway. Nothing else significantly sticks out. I have faint memories of a symphonic workshop and hackey sack at either the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee or outside a museum. Maybe both.

My high school choir trip to Memphis, Tennessee is similar. My 30GB iPod was full but Cartel’s Chroma was pretty much the only thing I listened to the entire time. It was more or less exclusively on repeat the whole trip. I remember much more of the trip, but that album pretty much brings to mind the bus. Memphis is a trip I wish I could get a do-over on. It was way more interesting than my band trip and more my kind of thing, but I remember being in the worst mood ever the entire trip. Someday I’ll go back for a Memphis/Nashville double header. Chroma is still one of my favorite albums of all time, but sometimes it feels corrupted. That feeling sucks.

Then there’s the seasonal albums. The Format and Limbeck will always mark Spring and early summer on my audio calendar. Without fail. blink-182 is always going to be the hot, dirty part of mid-to-late summer. Fall is any indie and/or acoustic track I can find. Phoenix and Blind Pilot seem to be taking over this season. Fall is also when my pen hits the paper a lot more.

There are soundtracks for people, places, and feelings. Times and experiences. Rain or shine. There are tracks that will instantly put me in a good mood, regardless of who I’m with or what surrounds me. There are tracks that I can’t listen to anymore. There are albums that make me sick. There are songs that I’ve put in the back of mind. They are songs I cannot forget but need to find a mental cure for before I can listen to them again. These are the notes, the chords, the tempos, & the phrases that make us who we are. How could someone not be into music?

Dear Santa,

I want iTunes giftcards.

Sincerely,
Luke

I love the holidays.

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