Hiatus.

After eight months of being "close", I can now honestly say without stretching the truth, I am actually close to finishing my project. My to do list consists of:

1) One mandolin track
2) One guitar track
3) Two vocal tracks
4) One more entire song
5) Final Mixing/Mastering
6) Making the final choice on album art
6) Sending it out to get it duplicated
7) Throwing a long awaited CD release party
8) Feeling good about my accomplishments

On a side note, I apologize if I ever offended anyone with being distastefully indie and/or ridiculous.

The Iron Heart String

You and I both know
You're more than your health and the way you respond to drugs
And although sometimes you forget
I never will

When they take over your body
You touch my face and engulf me in a sea of utmost affection,
Apologizing for not always being able to show
Your relentless love

When they abandon you
You lay in a desolate pool of stale emotion
Yet distantly hold me through an iron heart string, otherwise known as Brahman
Apologizing for not always being able to show
Your relentless love

There is no shame in hindering the bliss
To strengthen the iron heart string
To get stronger
The fibers first must tear

Veiling the honest trials that are Ours
Is to remove the opportunity to share it all
On sunny days, we will still swim the sea of utmost affection
And even when the sea becomes a desolate pool
The iron heart string that connects me to you
Will still be

Small World? Or is God Just Running Out of Faces (and Same Faces/Same Glasses Combinations)?

I'm sitting in a Nashville Panera staring at this guy who look strikingly similar to "Mr. Lemonade No Ice British Lisp" from Denny's. If, from here, I didn't see ice in his glass, I wouldn't know any better.

Being completely sure of something for once is so completely wonderful.

"There's so much love I want to cry."

Idealism.

"I would like to find a school that teaches only philosophy and history, and is run out of a house in the mountains that you can only get to by hiking miles through thick forests."

-Nathan Ponzar

Despite it all, I'm mostly happy.

I'm floating again. Too far from this. Too far from that. Waiting only on time itself.

This is my public vow to not worry so much. To constantly pursue what could be better for the future, but never at the expense of that which is already wonderful right now.

Over-caffeinated, tranced, and sitting only at fifty-one percent. [but it's better than forty-nine]

My favorite spot [here] is the place where the grandiosity of the city and the lake meet on a quiet edge of a dock.

And I like Nashville now. I like living by the highest point of the city. I like being able to have the word "engineering" in my major and being a red songwriter in a class filled with green songwriters. I like bike paths and the twenty-four hour coffeeshop with all the eccentric people. I like sitting around the smoke pit on a thursday night and sharing a road with Ben Folds. I like the wizard man from circle k and living in thinner air. I like it. Just like I knew I would, despite all the times I said I wouldn't.

Peace, relatively.

Life as a Continuous, Radical Stream of Events

"Throughout history, attempts have been made to contain those experiences which happen at the end of the limit where the mind is vulnerable... Those moments, those what you might call liminal, limit, frontier, edge zone experiences are actually now becoming the norm... And when we are obviously entered into that mode, you can see a radical subjectivity, radical attunement to individuality, uniqueness to that which the mind is, opens itself to a vast objectivity... The moment is not just a passing empty nothing, yet - and this is the way in which these secret passages happen - yes, it's empty with such fullness that the great moment, the great life of the universe, is pulsating in it. And each one, each object, each place, each act leaves a mark. And that story is singular. But, in fact, it's story after story."

-The calm black man who makes sense to me, Waking Life

Thus Begins the Apocalypse.

I can't believe I did it.

Haven't you heard? October is the new January.

And This is Only the Beginning

I can't get over those mountains.
The ones that stand between where I am and where I'm going.
Suspended on [a different] sidewalk.
With the same friend.
Straddling the border between where I must be and where I want to be.
Where the air is thin
And you can't help but
Laugh at everything.

The things that matter
To me.
Not to them.

To make a decision, you don't have to be completely sure.
.:EDIT:.Just more sure than the alternative.:Edit:.
Or nothing would get done.
Sometimes, all you can do is
Close your eyes and leap.

Well baby, this is it.
I'm jumping over the mountains.

Sharing Cigars, Overlooking the Cumberland...

It was brought to my attention:

The Western view of enligthenment is the fulfillment of every desire.
The Eastern view of enlightenment is the elimination of every desire.

I think I understand where we went wrong.

Resisting the Wind

Come.
Come with me now
To a dying, strange, and broken down town.
Down town.

I know if I go, then I'll never think of you again.
I know if I don't, then I'd just be resisting the wind.
And I can't rightly stay.

Now all we see of the heavens, turning
Are great balls ironically burning, burning
Stuck in our last destination.

I've defeated cars
But I'm bound
bound
bound
bound
bound
bound
bound

I know if I go, then I'll never think of you again.
I know if I don't then I'd just be resisting the wind.

Now I'm alone and I'm waiting.
Silently my heart is aching, aching.
Every last piece of me breaking, breaking down.
Down.
Down.

Turning.

The earth is turning, always turning as we go
In fact we're turning as we're turning being turned. Turned around.
We're all so tightly wound
We don't know where we're bound

Remember when the world was small?
The size of your neighborhood and Florida.
Shamelessly dancing down the hall
To records that were picked out by your mother.

And we wait around for answers like the answer's bound to come
But no one ever promised us we'd figure it all out
And now it's cloudy. Can't see the answers in the stars.
And I got clumsy. Dropped and broke my crystal ball.

Remember when the world was small?
The size of your neighborhood and Florida.
Shamelessly dancing down the hall
To records that were picked out by your mother.

Now Mother cries when you confess the invalidity in your white dress.
You just wanted love.
Like people go without goodbyes like people come, but we don't welcome them.
Who is there to blame?
For all the world's unhappy people living out there calls
Behind isolated fortresses made out of crumbling walls.

Remember when the world was as small?
The size of your neighborhood and Florida.
Shamelessly dancing down the hall
To records that were picked out by your mother.

I Did It Again

!!!

People go without goodbye like people come without a hi.

We are here
      For a long time. For forever.
Wake up, Child!
      Make a promise to your mother.

            [Go.....]

Know I fear
      For the others. For the others.
"You can't force
      Me to love her. Me to love her."

            [No.....]

Colored faces. Everyone.
      I will speak on behalf of you
      And walk a mile or two in your shoes.

            [We shall.....]

We shall conglomerate
      and mix around
      and procreate

Harboring your pain
      Like it's all you have to show
      For a life filled with hate

Aren't you tired?
Aren't you tired?
Aren't you tired?

You're making me tired just watching you.

We are here
      For a long time. For forever.

            [Go.....]

Belmont sings Chicagoland in harmony.

She says, "I don't really dream. I just write songs in my sleep."

I've defeated cars, but I'm bound to this street.
It's a perfect day, but I think I'd rather just sleep.

I grew a pair of wings, but I think I'd rather walk.
I've got a lot to say, but I'd rather not talk [about it].

I'm an optimist, but I'd rather sit and cry.
It's time to live it up, I think I'd rather just die [for now].

They all say they know, but they can't tell me why.
Skepticism falls and suddenly, it's like, "I think I know better."

He says, "I don't really dream. I just assume it's all reality."

And in a way, I guess it is.

Drinking Chocolate Milk Out of Coffee Mugs. Daily.

We rode bikes and talked about bigger things in Centennial Park. Mr. Puerto Rico is an excellent surfer, skateboarder, songwriter, and he was salutatorian of his class. He gives off this little cousin-like aura, but it's honest, so the company is still worth the while. He stripped down and ran through the fountain at Vanderbilt. I said, "Maybe next time."

On the way home, I made an ice cream stop at the gas station off of twenty-fourth and wedgewood.

"Spoon?"
"What?"
"I said, do you need a spoon, or are you going to lick it out of the container?"

She smiled and so did I.

It's not so much a fear of the new as it is a fear of a lack of the old.

Tomorrow, I shall buy a long, comfortable, cotton dress because few things make me feel better than comfort and looking pretty simultaneouly.

It's so close I can taste it.

Bittersweet.

But I'm too excited to cry and I feel too loved to be sad.

Thank you Nathan [Black] for the accurate portrayal.

No, seriously... that's pretty accurate.



http://www.flickr.com/photos/lyleb/show/

Do What You Love. Don't Do What You Don't Love.

"Is that a quote from Jake's on Main?"

"Man, you're good. I always get caught when I use other people's originality and wittiness and try to make it my own.... But just for the record, that second part was all me."

"Zing!"

Blackberries are not to be trusted. They have stirred up a double dose of trouble and love. A first kiss and an... engagement. That's right. I'm getting a brother-in-law.

Without warning, a massive thunderstorm swept over the roof of my house in the middle of recording "Portland on a Train". I'm keeping it.

"Headed towards the great unknown for a walk in the rain."

And then for good measure, I kept recording the next twenty minutes of the frantic breaking-down of patio furniture and downpour occuring outside my bedroom window.

I've always found it odd that creatures are so incredibly attracted to light. Take the gnat on my computer screen right now. I've tried flicking him off at least five times, but he always keeps coming back for more. And I don't think it was the flicking. Or take the moth that literally commited suicide in the campfire last week out of an inability to say no to the beauty of the flame. I completely understand the idea of being attracted to light for the sake of making life easier [like how I turn on the light when I enter a room], but I do not understand spending two hours sitting on a computer screen or sacrificing my one and only life for the sake of a millisecond of pure bliss. There's something bigger going on with this whole light thing.

Crickets chirp in the background of "Cigarettes". It's beautiful and gives hope to my clock situation.

Speaking of "clock situation"... the current clock situation is telling me I have to be up for a shoot in seven hours. My beautifully ironic wake up call for sleep.

Two Hours of Driving. Twenty Minutes of Blackberry Picking.

And walking through what looked like a ghost town county fair with my pigtail braids and bucket in hand, everyone so in love [except for me], I declare "I'm gonna go get me a man."

But alas, the only man to be found was Mr. Red Shirt who was doing a very poor job at enforcing the rule of keeping the pickers from eating un-paid-for berries straight off the vine.

Eh, who am I kidding? I don't even want a man. I do, however, now want to go eat some more blackberries.

Citronella Candles From the Patio Placed All Over the Kitchen

I appologize for the unidentifiable nature of a few of these:

a guitar, a door [some days, you just gotta get some doors], tobacco pipe, banana, cup of coffee, yours truly, Nathan, brain [the future Socrates], bicycle [which was going to have an "x" through it, but that's kind of morbid...], tomato, bird [droppin' our food for the birds on the ground], and the Picasso's sign

Oh, the people that remind me of the important things!

There's a surreality that comes with a darkened restaurant, fifteen minutes before closing time. Citronella candles from the patio placed all over the kitchen, raising the temperature of an already unair-conditioned building. Trying to distinguish pink from white from yellow over the glow of an unallowed cell phone [overlooked tonight]. A couple of crying children. A couple of hysterical security guards. Just after a [hard] goodbye. The day before my last.

Learning to Crochet Over Chocolate Chip Pancakes.

We were undoubtedly the most attractive ones at IHOP. Especially moreso than the scene kid in the corner who never got off his cell phone and had the same haircut Aimee had in seventh grade. You know which one I'm talking about.

Nathan and I rang in his twentieth year with Seinfeld and teddy grams. But not until we discovered that my car stops going at 393 miles.

I have this horrible concept planted in my head. When I was a child, my father had an old Ford truck from 1981. The needle on the gas gauge was never over the E. Never. Either it didn't work, or he was one of those people that would just put a little a gas in every day, never to fork out more than five dollars at any given trip to the seven-eleven. Either way, I never really was able to fully grasp the idea that past the E would actually cause your vehicle to cease the rolling of its tires and the turning of its engine.

Until tonight. [Live and learn, but watch for speeding cars as you awkwardly fumble with the red can. I would hate for you to die the day before your birthday.]

At the beginning of the summer, Aimee planted sunflowers. Now, the shortest of the bunch is eight feet tall and the head weighs more than a small dog. The remains of one that was too heavy for its own good lays on our deck, the seeds half harvested and the carcass rotting away in the ninety eight degree weather. To make a long story short, I feel that sunflowers are not only offensively large and gruesome, but we also have plenty of sunflower seeds if anyone wants any.

It's getting close, and it's starting to feel real. So real that today, I bought silverware.

And Friday starts my last Friday [and so forth].

It Doesn't Surprise Me, But It Keeps Me Up Anyway

Can't sleep.

It's chai and recording logistics for me.

Or I could just eat the book that holds the plan.

Meh.

We used everything we brought and didn't need anything we didn't have.

this week. [yes, that's my salvaged foam]



I've drunken sixteen cups of chai, spent twenty consecutive hours in the wilderness, and locked myself in my bathroom to record seven hours every night.

I've mended five old frienships, slept a full six hours every night, and [nearly] finished two whole songs.

I've gotten overwhelmingly confused only once, broken only three guitar strings, ruined only one relationship, and had only four manic episodes.

Alright... five.

[switching lenses until the scenery changes]

I don't believe in bad intentions.

Only in the misunderstanding of good intentions.

Sorry?

:-\

Dancing shamelessly and completely behind the wheel.

Broke into Busch Wildlife. Ate sunflower seeds by a lake. Talked about music and philosophy. Got one tick each.

We were fixed to watch Waking Life, and instead, upon walking up the path to my front door, we simultaneously let out very large "AH" moans, signifying we had forgotten to pick up milk, soy milk, chocolate chips, whipping cream, and bisquick for the mother.

I sped [we really wanted to get back and watch that movie!], saw a cop, slowed down, watched him for a mile and a half through my side mirror [because my rearview mirror is non-existent], apparently was swirving because I was watching him out of my side mirror, and got pulled over in the Michael's parking lot. He was very nice and the experience was more pleasing than not. He also saved us two trips by informing us that both Dierbergs and Schnuck's were closed. Thank you officer. What a wonderful first "getting pulled over" experience.

I woke up to the sounds of many laughing middle-aged women above my bedroom. There had to be at least four or five of them. Walked upstairs. Nope. Just my mother and one friend.

Staring at the mic stand to which I attached my home-made pop filter. It's an embroidery hoop and a pair of tights with the legs still attached. Find something to smile about.

I have to be home tonight some time between 10 and 11. I don't know why. My mother won't tell me why. My friends don't know what I'm talking about. Aimee does, but she won't tell me what it means and she's out of town anyway. It's apparently a "surprise" that I'll "enjoy". I am baffled and terrified.

And on a final note. I have a conversation obligation tonight. I'm not sure what I want. I guess that makes "whatever happens" seem like "what was supposed to happen". So just go with it and find contentment with whatever the situation brings.

It's not so bad.

My stomach turns thinking of this year in retrospect. Or it could be the pizza.

I met a fifty-six year old man last night named Pat while sitting outside Picasso's working out recording logistics. We sat on the edge of the store next door and talked for four and a half hours.

Four and a half hours.

Sometimes I forget the feeling of honesty and shamelessness that comes with openness toward strangers. Then some stranger comes up and asks you want you're working on. You say songs. Then you compare calluses. Etcetera.

The night is a blur, but I remember philosophical conversations, observing drunk people, talk of where his life as a musician has taken him, bouncing positive energy back and forth [and acknowledging the act of doing so], his ex-wife, mushroms in a cave, the potential of Mohammad and Jesus being one and the same, a "protective energy shield" he put around me, and us simultaneously saying, "That's not spirituality."

Some things.

Still :-]

Today, I'm feeling upward. That could be due to my general ability to see optimistically or to simple luck with internal chemicals, but I choose to attribute it to my new pair of shoes.

I made friends with the lady at the mall who stops you to polish one nail and rub lotion on your hands. She had a beautiful name that I cannot remember. I explained how I would love to support her commission-based income, but simply could not because my guitarist hands could not sacrifice their armor for silky smoothness. She understood. We exchanged myspace names. The rest is history.

Recording is nothing like songwriting, but equally as important in the creation process of music. I'm catching on much faster than I thought I would and as of about an hour ago, I decided that pro tools is actually not out of my league. Who new manuals actually make learning programs easier?

I'm moving in three weeks. I have:

things to buy
/slash/
packing to do
/slash/
a float trip to go on
/slash/
a job to quit
/slash/
relationships to mend
/slash/
recording to do
/slash/
changes to make

...

My heart does a simultaneous hop and cry.

[listening to dates with fate]

Takes me back...

He hates it. Thinks it doesn't meet what he's potentially capable of.

I love it. Proves that you can still impact people in incredible ways despite imperfections. Incredible ways.

All he wanted was to know he was able to impact someone in a life-changing way with his music. Well there you go. [Sorry if I can't convince you so. Sorry if hearing you did wasn't as satisfying as you thought it would be.]

"It's always better to hope for something better than to know that it's not coming your way at all."

Stupid being human.

[tonight is a double post night]

I hold high aspirations and I have a huge spirit toward life. I play up independence, free thought, honesty, and discomfort.

And then I have his need to cling to other people who do the same.

Aimee talks about the need for what she calls "community." I would like to believe that it is an innate surface need that can be overridden, but I know that is not the case.

"I've got a body I'm bound to,
an overweight heart,
my feet in the ground,
and a planet I can't quite figure out."

I know that I wrote this. It's in my notebook and in my handwriting, but I do not remember it.

listening to [dark side of the moon]
just watched [a waking life]
feeling [overwhelmed with a sense of being and reality]

Heh. Reality.

So many keys. Everyone thinks they hold the one that will open the door. Assuming there is a key.

Reaching a place where there is no more throwing out of possibilities. Only adding to the old.

Nathan decided [this week] to become a college philosophy professor. I couldn't think of a more suitable profession. I hope he doesn't change his mind about this like he does with everything else.

I feel an overwhelming drive to create. Kind of like January, but a little less want and a little more need. And I'm down a key. Assuming there is a key.

I'm not really identifying with anything right now. Or rather, I'm identifying with absolutely everything, so I'm a messy conglomeration of all these pieces that typically stand alone.

"Looking back, the only thing that really mattered was connecting with people."

I appologize for the incoherency and the stream-of-consciouness naure of his post, but it's exactly how I feel.

Textiles, Fields, and Mississippi Love [a song]

To the left of the Mississippi stream
With a life that's a lot more like a dream
In a field that you like to call "your place"
Where you feel undeserving of the grace
From a love and a chance you were so luckily given

On a swim through a yarn and textile sea
You forgot and you over steeped your tea
Stocking up, making scarves in mid July
For the stranger you're out to satisfy
Who are cold and are searching for a piece of love

Honey, you don't see why love should change between friend and romance
Bicycles and clover chains and not needing music to dance
Mountains sing your lullaby

In the cold when you cut off all your hair
And our grandmother said you didn't care
Proved her wrong along Appalachian way
When you gave your ability to play
To a man who was aching for a song-filled trail

Honey, I don't see why you should lie on the driveway and cry
Wishing on the other side. You wait for the day that you die.
Then come better times.

But It Makes For Happier Farewells.

I've never not been the closest person to someone.
[Until now]

Me



All



Week.

My insides are sad.

I'm sitting two steps below the middle line [a ponzarism].

There are few things that are very good in life. Friendships with love and conversations and connections. Writing songs. Rivers. Sisters. Lying on the driveway staring at the stars. The hope of something better. The hope that things will be the way they used to be. "And above all else, love."

my heart is heavy.
I am sorry.
Cardboard.
Filetsr

and we take it for granted
and we let it go
and we fill ourselves with regret
but it is not there for us to hold.
it is gone, gone, gone, gone, gone, gone.

I speak of love often. Perhaps because I do not fully understand it and it baffles me.

I think I basically love everyone. I'm probably wrong. And if I am, which is most definitely inevitable, I can still whole-heartedly account for seven individuals.

Seven.
Seven in eighteen and a half years.

and we take it for granted
and we let it go
and we fill ourselves with regret
but it is not there for us to hold.
it is gone, gone, gone, gone, gone, gone.

A few months ago, I told one of my seven that I have a hard time distinguishing between "friend love" and "romantic love". It's true. It continues to be true. It's just... love.

love.
love.
love.

The hope for something better is a glutton. And the selfishness of possibility jeopardizes my precious "one every two years and eight months". And suddenly, one of the few truly good things in life is not good.

Perhaps nothing is good.
And perhaps nothing is bad.
Everything just is.
That's what one of my seven says.

I told Aimee I loved her the most.
She says she doesn't believe me.
I am crying.

and we take it for granted
and we let it go
and we fill ourselves with regret
but it is not there for us to hold
it is gone, gone, gone, gone, gone, gone.

[what have I done?]

Follow or Become the Line Leader

I'm ready.
I'm ready.
I'm ready. I have to go.

I can't be
I can't be
I can't be the one you know.

I'm trying
I'm trying
I'm trying to comprehend.

I need you
I need you
I need you to help me stand.

Speak of love like a catalyst and
Change is a piece that should never be missed and you
Wish on planes and pretend you know that
Things will get better as you go.

Don't let me
Don't let me
Don't let me lose what I know.

I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. I love you so.

Speak of love like a catalyst and
Change is a piece that should never be missed and you
Wish on planes and pretend you know that
Things will get better as you go.

I can't see
I can't see
I can't see the reasons the why.

Forgive me.
Forgive me.
Forgive me. I've tried and tried.

Come quickly
Come quickly
Come quickly into the glow.

And lead me
And lead me
And lead me through vertigo.

Sometimes, I think I'm messing up big.

Other times, I don't believe in messing up at all.
[wishing on the latter]

Love. [in a nutshell]

It means something different to everyone, which is funny, because it takes two.

Some say they know it at first sight.
Some say they know it after two weeks.

Some say it's once in a lifetime.
Some say there's no such thing.

Some say they don't know it until it hurts.
Some say they wake up one day and just know it.

I say it's independent of all other sources of the same.
I say it's independent of feelings.
I say it's always there and it grows through different factors.

Time.
Understanding.
Experiences.
Empathy.
Compassion.

"Love everyone. She, in time, sees that it makes her understand a little more."

And I am all about understanding a little more.

<3.

You are the best at what you do.

..edit..

[cliche, but I still believe it]

A [Fateful] Bench

The need to experience.
The need to create.
[He inspires me]

I want to use a million words, but a woman I hold in the highest of respects once told me...

"Poetry is saying as much as possible with as few words as possible."

I think that holds true with any art. Except in writing novels, in which case the author is free to ramble.

One more perfect poem. One more perfect photograph. One more perfect song. That will make me happy. Yes? Er.. maybe no.

Tonight, while sitting on a [fateful] bench, I had an epiphany. Audiences like "old, worn out" art all the same as the "new, innovative" art. And artists feel best while creating. Not after creating. While creating. So when an artist starts to hate the old, they must create the new to be satisfied. Which is really alright. It keeps the artist [temporarily] happy [until they hate and recreate], and it keeps the products popping, adding to what the audience already likes. So really, we have to hate our art, or we will never have the need to make more. And making [honest] art [when not frustrated] feels good.

Sometimes, my heart is so filled with passion, I have no greater desire than to capture absolutely every piece of beauty from absolutely everywhere and shove it into a ridiculously dense multimedia piece of love. Yes, if I could do one impossible thing, that would be it.

I'm in the mood [to go make stuff]. And make stuff, I shall do.

Love.

This is actually a[nother] song [without a title].

She climbs the highest mountain, reaches clouds, then takes a ladder to the moon
Where she will sit and watch the world
And contemplate the work of many men who claim they somehow scraped the sky
The never-ending, all-expanding

Wastes her time
Wishing on satellites
Now from the other side
She sees weren't stars at all
But at least they kept her hopes high.

Boldly jumps back down into a great expanse of water
Cannonballs.
To make a little splash into the earth
And rehydrate a thirsty man or two

It's cloudy
She's running home to beat the rain
But then the river rose
And brought a flood that found her anyway
And all that she could say was,
"Thank you. You know I would rather drown than die of dehydration."

Inspired most by people and by place,
She talks to strangers and runs away
Runs away, runs away
To distant lands with bigger views and
And distant lands better views than this.
Few lies, wider eyes

Where the general concensus
Is to love everyone
She, in time, sees that it makes her understand a little more

Soaring like a bird
Into the great expanse above her
She flies away
To sing a little song throughout the earth
And try to wake a sleeping heart or two

Now she's crying to
Someone that she's never met,
"What do I know? I'm just a child."
And then that stranger said,
"Honey, more than you led on to."
"I would rather give it all than live in hesitation."

Floating on a hurricane,
"Where will I go?
And can I hop this storm and take a plane?
There are safer ways to fly,
But either way, I'd rather roam than reach my destination."

Fuck this Shit.

Art. Love. Actions. Words.

Seek quality of those impacted over quantity of those impacted always. After all, what is the human race but seven billion individuals?

Quirked.

Comfort vs. Truth

Both vital to my happiness. Something's got to give.

Honestly, I have absolutely no idea.

Opposing Circles

I took a walk around the world, trying to get somewhere. Anywhere. But the Earth spun against me. Then for a moment, I stopped, and suddenly I was moving.