so, this is christmas

Tim Tebow believes everything he says. I know this because I used to be Tim Tebow. Well, not literally, of course, you dumbass. I mean I used to say the things Tim Tebow says and I used to believe the things Tim Tebow believes.

There’s a temptation among “non-believers” to lump all “believers” into a single category of “crazy religious people.” It’s actually quite easy and fun to do this, especially when the majority of religious people seem to fall so readily into the “crazy religious people” bin. You’ll know they’re genuinely crazy religious people when they take pride in being labeled as such and then proceed to picket military funerals or strap C4 around their belts and ride the bus. I’d like to suggest that this level of “crazy religious person” is actually quite far down the periphery of religious folk and Tebow is definitely not in their ranks.

Tim Tebow is passionate in his belief and love for Jesus. (I’m going for the Most Obvious Sentence of 2011 Award). Although this may be classified as crazy by some, it is not disingenuous. Tim Tebow is a devout, well-intentioned, evangelical Christian in the truest form. This is why he is so beloved. This is why he’s treated like Jesus Jr. within his community of faith and observed like a zoo animal by the rest of the godless horde.

While some may be dismissive of the idea, there actually is quite a large spectrum of belief and praxis within Christianity. The diversity of theology and culture is what makes the faith fascinating (to me, anyway), and what we’re seeing in Tim Tebow is a classic evangelical Christian. Evangelicals wear their God-lovin hearts on their sleeves. In theory, they don’t do it to show off or be prideful in their piety; they are up-front in their expressions of faith because they believe that Jesus is the most important thing they can offer the world. This is the underlying philosophy of short-term overseas mission trips: while clean water and food and a sustainable economic infrastructure are great, the Gospel is the most important thing I can give to my Third World neighbor. Jesus is the bread of life, not you know, actual bread.

So, when Tim Tebow says his annual summer trip to Dad’s orphanage in the Philippines is what makes him most happy, he means it. It is his adherence to a higher calling. It is living life in the most fulfilling way possible - the way Jesus would have done. Evangelicals believe it is their duty to be the hands and feet of God. That means everything they do, whether in word or in deed, is intended to honor the Almighty. As an Evangelical, everything matters: what I say, what I do, how I walk, how I dress, how I behave in front of Brent Musburger.

I’d bet a year’s salary that Tim Tebow has read or heard about a book called, The Prayer of Jabez. It’s a pocket-sized text based on the prayer of a little-known character in the Old Testament named Jabez who invoked a simple prayer: “’Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain.’ And God granted his request.” Evangelicals interpret this prayer to mean, “bless me so that more people will be within my sphere of influence.” In other words, “God, help me be successful so others will look up to me and I can tell them all about You.”

Every time Tim Tebow wins a game, his territory is enlarged and when he mentions his faith or thanks God in an interview or Tebows after a game, he’s doing you a favor. He is sharing with you the most important message he knows. Like The Secret before The Secret. He may not be preaching to you directly and he may not be holding a bible study in your home, but he is bringing God into your conversation, and that honors Him. Tebow believes that his actions and expressions of faith, no matter how indirect they may be, will somehow compel you to be like him. The crazy thing? When you’re Tim Tebow, it works! Tebowing toes the line of irony because it’s often done in jest but is also a huge win for the evangelical Christian community. When was the last time words like “faith” and “God” have so dominated the dialogue of sports? Tim Tebow is God’s bulldozing hype man into the secular world.

When asked by reporters about his frequent conjuring of the Lord in interviews, Tim Tebow disarms the questioner by responding, “If you’re married, and you have a wife, and you really love your wife, is it good enough to only tell your wife that you love her on the day you get married? Or should you tell her every single day when you wake up and have the opportunity? That’s how I feel about my relationship with Jesus Christ.” While godless heathens like Chuck Klosterman are surprised by such a lucid reply (jk, CK, i love you, I’ve got all your books), it’s just one of many canned analogies Evangelicals are taught from an early age. There will be more, especially if you start questioning his beliefs. Tebow will explain the Trinity to you by comparing it to the 3 molecular phases of water (ice/water/steam=God/Jesus/Holy Ghost). Tebow will talk about the faith of Abraham and Job and he’ll encourage his teammates by reciting a proverb about iron sharpening iron. This is what a good Christian boy does, and he does it earnestly.

There are more “crazy religious people” within the Christian faith than I can shake a stick at; and at times, it seems the hypocrisy of the church knows no bounds. It’s the diversity of belief and culture that’s led to the proliferation of hundreds of denominations and the unbelievably asinine nature of “church drama,” but if all the in-fighting has honed one skill, it’s our ability to spot a fake. No one is faster to accuse a believer of hypocrisy or impure motives than a fellow believer. I’ll tell you this: no fellow believer doubts Tim Tebow’s motives. He’s criticized for being calculating and throwing religion in your face. Well, that’s because he is. That’s what he’s trying to do. In everything he does, whether in word or in deed, Tim Tebow wants you to look at him and think about Jesus. If Tim Tebow sold steak knives for a living, he’d be the same way. Except he’d be the “crazy religious steak knife guy.” Football is just what he happens to be doing now. He wants to win games and be the best quarterback of all time because it broadens his territory. His final destination is not money or fame or victory, they are means to an end: to hype Jesus on the biggest platform in America; ‘cause Elway ain’t done shit for Jesus.

Tim Tebow is modest about everything except his faith. That’s because he’s following the words of the Apostle Paul: “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile” (Romans 1:16). In a world full of Jews and Gentiles, Tim Tebow is not ashamed and he’s not lying.

I knew the weed was kicking in when my fingers became cold. My body temperature was dropping and I felt my head bobbing back and forth with the motion of the bus. Not violently, but in a way that made my head feel about 3 pounds heavier.  

And then came the intense focus on listening. “I have super human hearing right now!” was the first thing I muttered when I was fully lit. I could hear everything: the drunken, murmuring up front, the three clowns arguing about nothing a few feet away, every word to Theophilus London playing in the background, the crunch of Fritos beneath someone’s feet. I was taking it all in. I wished my hearing would stay that way; listening with such clarity and focus. 

Everything was funny. Every insight, groundbreaking. Every moment deserved my undivided attention and love. I was hunched over with my arms crossed into my chest and just staring, listening to my terrific friends and being thankful. I kept making mental notes to remember how thankful I was to have such amazingly funny and entertaining friends, each with his own “classic” identity that amplified itself when inebriated, or at least when I was. I’d keep it together and giggle like mad every 2 minutes when someone would say or do something that so perfectly summed up who they were:

“I’m really feeling like opening these shades is what I wanna do right now. Yea guys, let’s open these shades and see the sun.”
He opens the shades and the rays of a perfect sunset splash in.
“Wow, this is the best idea I’ve ever had in my entire life. It’s such a beautiful sunset guys.”
Without missing a beat, someone yells from the back: “Shut the fuck up.”
I laugh hysterically. So classic those guys! 

I wanted so badly to write on that bus, to remember what I was feeling and record my thoughts about the characters around me. I was high and freezing. My sense of hearing was incredible and moving proved to be overstimulating. So was eating. Someone tossed me a fun sized Snickers bar and it kicked my ass. Chocolate and nougat pounding away at the tip of my tongue. I raised my hand to get the attention of the drunken horde:
“Guys, this flavorful chocolate bar may have been a huge mistake on my part. It is just too intense for me right now. Please be careful.” 
We all laughed. I was hilarious.

While I kept climbing I became more still, listening harder. I was now picking up subtle changes in road noise and hearing the small rattle of a zipper from the luggage packed behind me. My vision was in tilt-shift, adjusting my focus as I listened in on a quiet conversation up front:

“I’m not f*cked up right now. I’m fine.”
“Yes, you are! Don’t lie!” I yelled across the bus.
Everyone’s head turned.
“Why are you listening in on our conversation motherfucker? How did you even hear us from back there?”
“Cuz I told you, I can hear EVERYTHING right now motherfuckers!!”
We all laughed. I was hilarious.  

It was fun while it lasted and it lasted a more than a few discomforting hours. Edibles are to be taken with caution, boys and girls. I think it’s real what they say about our true selves being revealed under the influence; in vino veritas. I suppose that means deep down I’m just a giggly bitch who loves his friends and wants to write about how great life is. What I miss the most, even more than the super human hearing, is the courage that comes with the high. Well, not so much courage as it is diminishing fear and insecurity. I needed a guitar and a mic on that bus. I played DJ without giving two shits what other people thought about the music I was playing. It was good enough for me. 

This is all stoner talk and I sound like an imbecile, but I swear I had some genuine bouts of clarity while I was high. I was happy and grateful and brave. I wanted to write and make music. I had deep empathy and compassion for the people around me, as flawed as we were. I was a funny sonuvabitch too. I’d like to think that’s who I really am. I’d also like to have the super human hearing back. Classic me. 

This is where I grew up. 
This is why I am the way I am and why these kids will probably be too.  

Frederick, MD 21702.  

Vince Gill at The Troubadour 11/16/11.
Can’t remember the last time I paid $25 to see a 20-time Grammy winner play a venue that fits less than 250 people. Did I mention he played for 2 hours and 45 minutes with no intermission or opening act? This is why I love country music.

The guitar playin warn’t bad neither.

Vince told about a dozen stories throughout the night. Stories about his badass judge dad and his inspirations for songs like Cowboy Up (Levitra) and Go Rest High on That Mountain. He spoke a lot about his first time playing the Troubador 35 years ago. He was 19, had just moved to LA and the Troubadour was his first gig. In the audience that night? His two biggest idols: Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell. Vince actually covered one of Rodney’s songs that night and was invited up to the dressing room. He and Rodney became best friends and Emmylou wanted to write with him. Talk about fate. 

Back for the first time in 35 years last night, Vince walked up on stage, strapped in his tele and took a good long look at the audience staring back at him. No greeting, no wave, but he had that trademark Vince Gill-ian warmth in his face and the first words out of his mouth were, “it’s gonna be some crazy shit in here tonight.” The band rolled into One More Last Chance and kicked ass for the next two and a half hours. 

Feist at The Wiltern 11/12/11

Chilly Gonzales opened. Funny and brilliantly entertaining with his spiel on politics and transposing well-known major key songs into minor. Minor version of Ode to Joy and Happy Birthday were particularly “jewish” as he noted. Chilly’s piano playing is furious and reminds me why the piano is in the percussion family. Loved it.

Feist is a songbird in every way. She sings her between song banter. Her voice is clear as a bell and her guitar playing is sparse and tactful. The songs take on a whole new life (as they should) in a live environment and her music is so incredibly dynamic if you let it breathe with a full band onstage. Metals has a significantly darker tone than her previous two albums, but the sounds were deep last night. The highlight for me was My Moon My Man which was timed perfectly and loud as fuck. Love it when drummers do that. 

(photo credit: Timothy Norris)

It’s always the morning after that’s most revealing. Whether it means recovering from tragedy or reveling in triumph, the morning after is what defines us. Throughout each of our personal histories of break ups, and birthdays, and pink slips, and funerals, and graduations, there come those mornings when we can’t believe what just happened the day before. Sometimes we wake up numb to it, like we almost forgot. When we lose a loved one it seems we become surrounded with daily reminders of their absence: a picture, a scent, a sound.

September 11th was the most significant global event that affected each of us personally. For those old enough to remember, it shook us then and the shock of the day is still palpable. The aftermath of that one morning has shoved and wriggled its way into our lives in innumerable ways. But now, looking back 10 years later, I remember September 12th, the morning after. I remember being relieved that I could return to my routine. I remember feeling thankful the chaos was over, and naively certain that the terrorists were done for now. I imagined the potential devastation of repeated, relentless attacks and I prayed for our country’s protection. It was a confusing morning, but eerily peaceful. Pensive.

In some ways, it feels like it’s taken 10 years for the collective morning after to arrive. Reading and watching all the memorials and commemorations yesterday it felt like the last 10 years were just a chaotic mix of reaction and adjustment to the events of that morning. But now, 10 years later, maybe we’ve finally turned the clock to greet the morning after. To reflect and remember and to turn our ‘new normal’ into a better normal: a grateful return to routine but with hearts and minds moved for the better.

It’s the morning after that will define us as a nation and I think the clock may have finally clicked over. Let’s rebuild. Let’s revive. Let’s be renewed as Americans strong in resolve, deep in compassion and ready to lead. Just as 9/11 was a collectively personal experience, 9/12 must be the same; each one of us, making it our personal duty to make life better for one another. And considering the hell we’ve just walked through together, that would be one heaven of a morning after.

So, last night’s Saints-Packers game was classic proof that I am indeed cursed. I’ve joked about it for years, and then the laughter turned to tears as I watched my Skins fail year after year after year. The curse is no joke and I’m gonna prove it now. 

I started a site to track all my NFL predictions and analyze what happens to them. I’ll probably make some gambling folks good money along the way. If you’re into the NFL or curious about my curse or like to bet on games or if you like anything that you enjoy then you’ll probably find this palatable: Cursed Bets

And now, a shameless self-aggrandizing excerpt: 

If you’re wrong, you’re wrong. How is it a curse?  

It’s not that I’m wrong, it’s how close I am to being right. Anybody can be wrong, but it takes a special kind of curse to string you along til the last possible second - only to be wrong in the end anyway. It’s a cruel suspense, but I’m sure it’s thrilling for the people who bet against me.

Game 1, week 1 of the 2011 season is a perfect example of my curse. The Saints were 4.5 point underdogs to the defending champion Packers. I took the Saints to cover in what I thought would be a close, high-scoring shootout. It was an incredible game: 2 TDs on special teams, Aaron Rodgers throws 3 TDs in the first quarter, Drew Brees lights it up in the second half. Down 27-42 in the 4th quarter, the Saints score with 2:15 left in the game to pull within 8. They fail to recover the onside kick. Green Bay ball at the Saints 45 and the defense only has one timeout. Game over, right? Nope! The Packers can’t convert on 3rd and 4 and are forced to punt with 1:05 to play. The punt is perfectly executed and it looks like they’ve pinned the Saints at their own 1 yd line. Game over, right? No, wait! The ref calls it a touchback - Saints ball at the 20. Drew Brees is in shotgun with 1:01 left and no timeouts. He throws 4 beautiful passes to drive the Saints down to the Green Bay 11. With :03 left in the game Brees drops back and throws a laser to the end zone - incomplete. Game over, right? No, wait! Pass interference on AJ Hawk! Saints ball at the 1 yd line! They’re gonna score! They’re gonna cover! The curse is lifted! Last play of the game with no time on the clock: Mark Ingram, halfback dive from the 1 yd line. Splat. Stonewalled. Game over, Packers win 42-34. After the game, Trey Wingo tweets: “76 points… and it takes a defensive stand from the one, on an UNTIMED play to seal it.” Profootballtalk can’t explain why Sean Payton, one of the most brazen playcallers in league history, lost his nerve on the Saints’ last chance.The curse lives on. 

oh what, nobody cares? ok got it.

22 Navy SEALs among 30 U.S. Troops killed in Afghanistan as NATO helicopter is shot down

This is absolutely tragic. There aren’t enough words or accolades to describe the extraordinary courage and sacrifice of our armed forces, especially when we lose 30 of our finest in one horrific incident. The War on Terror has gone on for nearly 10 years now, and it’s still surreal and sobering any time I hear of soldiers dying; it damn well better stay that way. The death of a soldier should never feel casual or be confused with one’s personal beliefs on war or violence or politics. They deserve better.

A soldier’s life lends itself all too easily to cliche because he is a real life hero. Unfortunately, our limited bank of hero vocabulary has been reduced to over-the-top cliches for the caped euphemisms in our comic books. The words feel empty in real life.

Since the news of OBL’s death, I’ve become mildly obsessed with Navy SEALs; reading accounts of the raid from every major publication and finishing a few great military memoirs along the way (Seal Team Six, Lone Survivor, The Things They Carried). If there’s a common theme to be drawn here, it’s that SEALs are not like you and me. There is an innate determination and resolve that can’t be faked and a sense of duty that is hammered into them through the most brutal training program on earth. These guys live on the edge so someone like me can enjoy a cushy life in the middle. 

It’s been a little over two and half weeks since the chopper was downed in Afghanistan and the world’s moved at a blistering pace since then: Somalia is starving, London riots, rebels liberate Libya, an earthquake shakes the eastern seaboard, Steve Jobs retires, Amy Winehouse did too, in her own way and Bert and Ernie’s sexual orientation remains ambiguous. Albert Haynesworth is a Patriot for god’s sake. August 6 seems like ages ago. It’s too easy to forget nowadays. 

And then I saw this

(photo credit)

That is Hawkeye. He belonged to Petty Officer Jon Tumlinson who was one of the 22 SEALs killed on August 6th. In the middle of Officer Tumlinson’s funeral, Hawkeye walked up to his master’s casket and laid down with a mournful sigh. 

There really isn’t much to say. It’s heart wrenching. It hurts to think about our best coming home in flag-draped caskets and a shame we allow ourselves to move on so quickly. We’ve created an age of perpetual news and narcissism to numb the pain and discomfort of raw emotion. But still, there’s Hawkeye with such purity in his display of grief; there is no politicking, no cry for attention, no agenda.

What must a dog think when he encounters death? It must be such a hopeless sadness. While we two-leggers lean on our collective myths about heaven and hell, a dog is cruelly trapped in a state of consciousness that lives in the moment, but with deeply seeded memories of the past. The dog cannot cope or dwell or even deny; he mourns in bewilderment, lies down with a heavy sigh and eventually follows his new master home. But he never forgets. Nor should we. 

Central Command confirms 6,194 U.S. casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2003. 2,292 soldiers under the age of 22. 4,439 under the age of 28. The world is a terrible place sometimes. Take time to remember. Don’t buy into the asinine notion that “the best thing we can do is move on with our lives and do the things we enjoy.” Fuck you if you believe that. Soldiers don’t die so you can play golf and jerk off. They deserve our time and remembrance. Learn about them, thank them, remember them. Sing, write, dedicate. Do something. Read this. By all means take a minute of self-reflection to be thankful and mindful of how amazing we have it.

And if you pray, then pray for their families and their friends and their souls. Pray for their dogs and that we may be more like them.

3 years later and she’s as hot as ever. Me - not so much. 

Sometimes I listen to music and I feel my heart punching out of my chest, like it’s been prematurely stuffed in a coffin and needs to pound its way out. I’ve been wanting to write about music for a long time and I still can’t summon the right words. It’s just so fucking visceral. Music rips you up and shreds you. I can’t write about music because it’s more than emotion. It’s this indescribable experience where each song is like a life: all the growth and change and harmony and discord of a lifetime condensed into four minutes. This is what makes music relatable and diverse and indescribable - how does one articulate life? Every song is a life. Some are bland and mediocre and others are sung by Donny Hathaway. Some lives are shy and others are Freddie Mercury. Some songs are trite, or boring or unoriginal and some lives are too. I’d argue that our taste in music should expand as we mature and gain a deeper appreciation for life - seeing beauty and value in places we hadn’t before. If you make strong, sweeping judgments about entire ‘categories’ of music, you probably feel the same way about certain categories of people and lifestyles too. Every song is a unique life, don’t be a bigot.

I don’t mean to sound bombastic with some overwrought metaphor about life and music, but music is fucking awesome. It’s 4 AM and I’m psychotic on caffeine and amped from all the fist pumps I threw watching fireworks. I killed the lights to calm down, slid on my headphones and lost myself for a few hours. Actually, that’s not true, I found myself for a few hours. Nothing sustains focus like music. My greatest joy is when a song is allowed to be foreground noise: every high hat, every note, every hand clap, the lightly throbbing wurlitzer somewhere, all of it. The perfectly timed first syllable of a lyric and the breath that comes before it. It’s so undeniably real. It’s life. 

The first musical memory I have is of my dad playing rhiannon on his new hi-fi. That modest-but-unstoppable guitar lick, the light cymbal roll right before the bass lumbers in, the keys tinkling in and out between the snares on every two, lindsey’s syncopated right thumb - and that’s just the first 14 seconds. It builds and brews like the witch it is and a perfectly suited voice sings a perfectly suited melody. Perfect. If you don’t like rhiannon, fuck you. It’s still real to me dammit, not because I understand anything stevie nicks is [ever] singing about, but because it tells me I have a past. The song was a time and place and it’s followed me to wherever I am each time I hear it. It’s a reminder that life has a past and a present. Put life in the foreground and focus, listen for things you’ve never heard, remember the things you’ve already learned. 

I can’t think of anything else on earth that can release endorphins like a good song. Like shots of life racing through your veins. Ever hear a brand new song that you instantly love? Nothing in life is as pure and raw as that. When I hear a new song I love, I know I love it immediately. There is no deliberation. It’s no surprise that the most common subject of music is love; I know what love is because of music. A good song rips your heart out, punches you in the gut and induces a serene, knowing smile. A good woman will do the same. 

Music is truth. Even when it’s sampled and sliced and mashed up and scratched and beat boxed and autotuned and thumped over a tired old house beat, it’s truth. Perhaps a relative truth, but truth nonetheless. We can’t hide from it: we love what we love and hate what we hate. The brain engages in no mental gymnastics to love or hate a song. Go ahead, try to give yourself every opportunity to love a song you hate because a friend wrote it or a respected musician recommended it. It doesn’t work, the ear wants what it wants. The ear remains objective and unbiased because it can only enjoy what is true to itself. What a beautiful gift that is: to know who we are because we can’t help but love what we love. Music hones that gift like nothing else and I have a duty to maintain it for as long as I live.

Sounds good to me.

please touch me. please.

I never read fiction. I read to learn and I’ve always felt the ROI on nonfiction was so much greater. Also, I find it hard (and a bit foolish) to immerse myself in imagined worlds intended to entertain children. Maybe I’m too distraught when good things come to end and so I don’t let myself warm up to fiction, but from what I gather, the HP series are remarkable works of imagination and narrative. There’s so much to learn there. How does that much creativity and coherence come out of one person? It’s staggering.

Much has been written about Rowling, but my favorite part of her real life story is her date of birth (1965). She started writing the HP manuscript at age 30 and was published two years later. Creativity and genius are always associated with precocity, but the story doesn’t have to end there (Gladwell 2008). Brilliance can come at any age. This, more than anything, gives me hope.

I dread aging. It feels so unfair. So far, life has been a series of improvements - in mind, body, tact, class, esteem, acumen, generosity, love, patience, wisdom… and while I could cultivate intangibles forever, the body eventually breaks down; taking passion and energy with it. Fires slowly dying, remember? This is where adversity comes in, something to light a fire under your ass. Rowling got it when she realized she was the biggest failure she knew - divorced and penniless, unable to support her child. Rock bottom seems a cruel ‘foundation for success,’ but so it goes.

From what I saw in the final HP movie, there doesn’t appear to be a heavy handed theme of fate or destiny in the story. I love that. We have our guides, but the journey is up to us. There is no ‘meant to be,’ only what is. That feels like the type of story that would come from a woman unsure of coming success, ignorant to the mammoth role she’s about to play in history and culture. Harry Potter is many things, but the idea of Potential is most relevant to me. The HP story is about what might be and how one can get there despite both mundane and significant obstacles. One reads through 7 books because there seems to be no predetermined outcome, but Harry’s potential greatness looks like it might be just around the corner. The reader only knows as much as Harry knows and therefore can’t judge his decisions based on knowledge of future events. And it’s not just Harry either, the entire series; every character, every setting, every gimmick, is built on potential. What might happen if? And when “it” happens, “it” simply is. There are no judgments to be made. It happened and that’s the way it is now. Turn the page.

Life imitates art imitating life. There is no causality dilemma (chicken or the egg?), life comes first. Art is born from life. Real life: pain, joy, failure, success, mediocrity, loss, fear, loneliness, love - art lives there. I’ve just gotta find it. No more judgments; simply live. Make decisions and run with it, if it looks like you may have fucked up, try running a different way. Just keep moving, that’s the key. Maybe we’re only in Year One at Hogwarts - there’s always next year. Just keep moving. Turn the page.

All this without having read a single HP book. I’ve got a lot to learn, apparently.