Doctor scared the living crap out of me yesterday
It's one thing to know you're not living a healthy lifestyle. 'tis something completely different when it's your doctor who tells you that if you don't make changes you're going to be up the creek, in a broken boat, and without a paddle.
Having to start thinking about PSA, cholesterol, BP, BMI... it just sucks
Talking 'bout a revolution
Tracy Chapman (Tracy Chapman)
Don't you know
Their talkin' about a revolution
It sound like a whisper
Don't you know
They're talkin' about a revolution
It sounds like a whisper
While they're standing in the welfare lines
Crying at the doorsteps of those armies of salvation
Wasting time in the unemployment lines
Sitting around waiting for a promotion
Don't you know
Their talkin' about a revolution
It sound like a whisper
Poor people gonna rise up
And get their share
Poor people gonna rise up
And take what's theirs
Don't you know
You better run, run, run...(+9)
Oh I said you better
Run, run, run...(+9)
And finally the tables are starting to turn
Talkin'about revolution
Yes finally the tables are starting to turn
Talkin'about revolution oh no
While they're standing in the welfare lines
Crying at the doorsteps of those armies of salvation
Wasting time in the unemployment lines
Sitting around waiting for a promotion
Their talkin' about a revolution
It sound like a whisper
And finally the tables are starting to turn
Talkin'about revolution
Yes finally the tables are starting to turn
Talkin'about revolution oh no
Talkin'about revolution oh no
Talkin'about revolution oh no
All Around The World
Lisa Stanfield
Spoken:
I don't know where my baby is
but I'll find him, somewhere, somehow
I've got to let him know how much I care
I'll never give up looking for my baby
Chorus:
Been around the world and I, I, I
I can't find my baby
I don't know when, I don't know why
Why he's gone away
And I don't know where he can be, my baby
But I'm gonna find him
We had a quarrel and I let myself go
I said so many things, things he didn't know
And I was oh oh so bad
And I don't think he's comin' back, mm mm
He gave the reason, the reasons he should go
And he said so many things he never said before
And he was oh oh so mad
And I don't think he's comin', comin' back
I did too much lyin', wasted too much time,
Now I'm here a'cryin', I, I, I
Chorus
So open hearted, he never did me wrong
I was the one, the weakest one of all
And now I'm oh oh so sad
And I don't think he's comin' back, comin' back
I did too much lyin', wasted too much time,
Now I'm here a'cryin', I, I, I
Chorus x 2
I'm gonna find him, my baby
I did too much lyin', wasted too much time,
Now I'm here a'cryin', I, I, I
Chorus
I've been around the world, lookin' from my baby
Been around the world, and I'm gonna
I'm gonna find him
Chorus
Dreamlilne
Rush (Roll The Bones)
He's got a road map of Jupiter
A radar fix on the stars
All along the highway
She's got a liquid-crystal compass
A picture book of the rivers
Under the Sahara
They travel in the time of the prophets
On a desert highway straight to the heart of the sun
Like lovers and heroes, and the restless part of everyone
We're only at home when we're on the run
On the run
He's got a star map of Hollywood
A list of cheap motels
All along the freeway
She's got a sister out in Vegas
The promise of a decent job
Far away from her hometown
They travel on the road to redemption
A highway out of yesterday -- that tomorrow will bring
Like lovers and heroes, birds in the last days of spring
We're only at home when we're on the wing
On the wing
When we are young
Wandering the face of the Earth
Wondering what our dreams might be worth
Learning that we're only immortal
For a limited time
Time is a gypsy caravan
Steals away in the night
To leave you stranded in Dreamland
Distance is a long-range filter
Memory a flickering light
Left behind in the heartland
We travel in the dark of the new moon
A starry highway traced on the map of the sky
Like lovers and heroes, lonely as the eagle's cry
We're only at home when we're on the fly
On the fly
When we are young
Wandering the face of the Earth
Wondering what our dreams might be worth
Learning that we're only immortal
For a limited time
We travel on the road to adventure
On a desert highway straight to the heart of the sun
Like lovers and hereos, and the restless part of everyone
We're only at home when we're on the run
On the run...
A memorial for Ron Schipper (emphasis mine)
Duane Willhite '79
After reading Bob Schueler's comment about wishing he had the mature mind while in college to absorb Schipper's full impact, I feel I must share my story. It wasn't until 7 years after graduation that the light went on for me.
In my first year of being a head football coach at Sheffield, Iowa, coach stopped to recruit some athletes and probably more importantly, to check up on one of his guys. I was working on grades and my open book was littered with C's and D's for the sophomore biology students.
I had told myself I was a tough teacher, they had to work hard for good grades in this class. As we chatted Coach noticed my work and commented about how many poor grades there were in that class. I said, "Ya, they didn't do too well."
His reply was "It looks like you didn't motivate them well enough."
Whoa! I was wrong, its not about how hard you work or about how good an individual is. Its about what you've done to make those around you better. As an educator, coach, or in any leadership position, this is the lesson we take from Coach. This is his standard of success and how he won 287 games over 36 years and impacted all of us. He did amazing things to make us all better. Thanks Coach.
Coach Ron Schipper was the head (american) football at Central, the school where I did my undergraduate work. He was such a great man. Everyone who knew him was changed by him and even those who didn't know him directly (like me) where changed by the people he touched. The post above is the best homage that people can render to him or to anyone else that I can think of.
It's made me reflect a lot on life, choices made and disappoinments I've thought I made. It's an eye opener that people seem not to share the thoughts you had about things you did. It's a call to redouble the effort and to really be there, not just in the abstract but in the "here and now moment" where things really matter.
I think I'm gonna stay in Chico for another year or 2. As much as I bitch about it, Chico has really been a great experience and something that came at the right time for all the wrong reasons. Monday night I was having coffee downtown, enjoying my white mocha with a good book on my hands when I started talking to a guy I meet ocassionally when I'm there. Maybe in an oblique way he reminded me of what I want to do but, most importantly, he asked why I want to go get a doctorate; what is the driving force? It may sound childish but a lot of the impetus was the first in my family to do anythng academically. I've always thought it was odd to hear some of my friends from college saying "I'm the first one in my family to attend college/Graduate School" or "I'm the first one in my family to graduate from college/with a Master's". I always took that for granted since both my parents have masters (2 of them in the case of my mom 
). Sure, between my parents and I have done a lot academically but there is, there has to be more to that and I didn't realize it until I sat down to finish this post tonight.
I'm always humbled by what, I think is undeserved praise, although it's obviously deserved if people give it freely. I got a letter from antwerplettuce. It's a little handwritten note that touched something off that I didn't know was there. I've been told before that I'm my own worst critic and that it's not a healthy situation. I'll add to the chorus of comments: Your perception of things and the perception of those things for the people who are around you may be diametrically different.
In a post a while back I asked the open ended question based on Thoreau's Walden: "What does it mean to live deliberately?" I think I got an answer that is satisfying and who will let me do what I want now rather than wait another 7 years to get it: "Do what makes you happy while making the world a little better for those around you." I guess I've known it all along but a degree or where I am is not what makes my life a success. It's the people I surround myself with and the quality of the relationships I build.
Overjoyed
Jars of Clay (Much Afraid)
You name me
Who am I
That I should company with something so divine?
Mercy waits, Overjoyed
Prospect of finding, freeing
Freeing me
[Chorus:]
Love is the thing this time I'm sure
And I couldn't need you more now
The way that you saw things were so pure
Overjoyed
You name me
Entertain
Thoughts of peace can overcome anything
Mirror spins
Wicked tales
Here lies reflections of
Deceptions of
[Chorus]
Missing the me from you you gave to me
I don't like the one I have created today
Crossing nameless from the one I've earned
To be the one, the one you gave to me
You name me
Name Me
Finding, freeing me
[Chorus x 2]
Overjoyed, Overjoyed
On a day like today
Bryan Adams (On a day like today)
Free is all you gotta be
Dream dreams no one else can see
Sometimes ya wanna run away
But ya never know what might be comin’ round your way ya
Ya ya
On a day like today
The whole world could change
The sun’s gonna shine
Shine thru the rain
On a day like today
Ya never wanna see the sun go down
Ya never wanna see the sun go down
Somewhere - there’s a place for you
I know that you believe it too
Sometimes if you wanna get away
All ya gotta know is what we got is here to stay
All the way
On a day like today - the whole world could change
The sun’s gonna shine - shine thru the rain
On a day like today - no one complains
Free to be pure - free to be sane
On a day like today
Ya never wanna see the sun go down
Ya never wanna see the sun go down
Free is all we gotta be
Dream dreams no one else can see
But ya never know what might be comin’ for you and me ya
It’s gonna be
On a day like today...
Man I wish all Mondays were like this one
I get here with plenty of time, I hear that my coworker who's having to go through brain surgery is ok and is already scheduled and, to make it an even better day, I get news that the panel proposal I joined for the WebCT conference was accepted!
Edit: And to boot all the migration to Vista crap that I've been proposing over the last few months was accepted too!
8/26/2005
you are the light
I’m sitting at the pickup curb in SFO, earphones in. The song is You’re Gone by Marillion, a swirling epic of a pop tune, and I’m grinning wide at the world as it swims by me to the soundtrack of Steve Rothery’s guitar. The harried travelers around me are giving me funny looks, a twentysomething girl bopping to an invisible beat, smiling and nodding at them as they drag their luggage onto the crosswalks.
For months now I’ve had a love affair with this song, for reasons both rational and visceral. Our relationship unfolded in stages. The first was pure superficiality: it was catchy, I could groove to it and sing along with the chorus. In my playlist it landed in heavy rotation just because it felt good to listen to. I didn’t really know why. Then I realized that I couldn’t identify offhand what the chord progressions were. This is unusual for a pop song; they tend to string the same five chords in predictable sequences. Calling the changes in the average pop-rock tune is a piece of cake. This had me stumped.
The music student in me can’t resist a good puzzle, so I sat down at the piano one night with the CD player and took to pressing rewind. What’s this, D to A minor to E7sus4? Bizarre. Then the chorus changes key entirely to G, but with weird choices like Bb thrown in at certain moments. A bridge midway through changes key again to C. What’s most impressive was that the song manages to shift seamlessly between these different sections, so that initially I hadn’t even noticed anything peculiar. The verse is in a particular key, yes, but it flirts with chords outside its proper realm just enough so that when the chorus comes along, it seems as though we’ve been in that key the whole time — like watching an adjacent train moving backward, only to realize that in fact you’re moving forward. I was delighted with this clandestine bit of sophistication, hidden in plain sight, an inside joke of sorts. (I was aiming for something similar with Harbor, and its many odd meters.)
So…a tune with hooks, and a brain teaser to boot. But what was it about? Usually I come to lyrics late, only noticing a phrase here and there, and it’s rare that I care enough about a song to sit down and transcribe the words in order to interpret them. Maybe this is why they’re hard for me to write; they’re inseparable from the music, but I’m keenly aware of how secondary they often are to me as a listener. Sometimes all lyrics need to do is pass the “don’t-suck” test. If the music is compelling enough to carry the song on its own, and the words aren’t inane (or they’re incomprehensible anyway), that’s enough. Better, though, to discover something of substance in lyrics. If music is the body and production the clothing, words are the mind.
As it turns out, this is a song worth falling in love with for real. Lyrically it’s not a song for bopping in airports at all. Steve Hogarth sings cryptically of reeling loss — of a woman he loves? inspiration? the dream of how life might be? — and the words rush towards me like dark birds:
a thunderstorm breaks from the northern sky
chasing you back to the daily grind
you’re gone
and where am I
a haunted life, the ghost of your laughter,
the half-empty glassHere’sthe thing though: the music doesn’t match. It soars and dances, grabbing me by the hand and pulling me skyward, where the sun glints off black feathers and turns them iridescent. This is hope, in all its glorious oblivion to the facts.
And strangely enough the incongruity works — H’s voice reaches out, finds the grief tucked away in me, and dissolves it. I know, the song says. Come with me. It’ll be all right. Come see for yourself. The effect is Radiohead turned inside out: Thom Yorke utters platitudes over music so unsettling, I begin to grasp the madness of so-called normalcy. In You’re Gone, Marillion lays heartbroken words against a sonic landscape so full of beauty and optimism, I understand not only that healing is possible, but why it would be worth trying.
All this analysis is personal. You may listen to the song and find that it leaves you cold. But I’m in love with it, and the final reason is this: it makes me fall in love with everybody else too. Sitting at the pickup curb with earphones in I suddenly know, with an almost painful immediacy, my connection with each one of these people rushing past: their memories and talents and addictions and small triumphs and nagging regrets, and the way we collectively mess each other up and help each other out and change our world irreparably, exhilaratingly, one moment at a time. “You have the day/I have the night/But we have the early hours together” — each of us is ultimately alone, and yet there is that slim margin…I find myself on the verge of tears, and of bursting into laughter.
Was this the meaning the band was trying to convey in making this song? Probably not. Once it came to live with me it became something new, something other than what its creators intended. But the truth at the core of it, pulsing through the notes, is the same.
This is why I love music. This is what I hope my own music will do for someone else.
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