Throw Away the Script

Each political season, there is a lot of discussion about which campaign is controlling the narrative.  The campaign that controls the narrative controls how others perceive the two candidates, for good and for bad.  Candidates can be painted as out-of-touch with middle America or empathetic to the plight of blue-collar workers.  Once the narrative has been set, news stories are tailored to fit into that prescribed narrative.  But narratives are often, perhaps usually, false.

Narratives occur in our personal lives as well.  We create narratives about what people are like or how events transpired and then interpret the events in our lives in a way that supports those narratives.  Anything that fails to support those narratives is discarded, either consciously or unconsciously, as clearly not being correct.  Everything we can use to support a narrative, however tenuous, is kept and used to build on the often-false support that preceded it. 

At some point, the narrative, now riddled with exaggerations or falsehoods, becomes our truth, and confronting that truth may seem too difficult a task or emotionally dangerous.  We need to stop and ask ourselves, “What if I am wrong?”  A risk, of course, is finding out that you are, in fact, not wrong; that all the bad things you have imagined are correct.  To be sure, knowing the truth stings more that just thinking you know the truth.  At least knowing the truth allows you to move forward without lingering questions or imaginings. 

But if you are wrong, and your narrative is largely just a product of your imagination, how much pain and anxiety can be avoided?  You will have freed yourself to move forward without the burdens that go along with false narratives and let yourself see people for who they are, not who you imagine them to be.  As difficult as it is, I think it is worth confronting the fear and risks.  The payoff in the long-run is too valuable.

I Want to Know Your Plans

As you may have noticed, music has played an increasingly important role in my life over the past year.  I find myself digging deep into song meanings and the phrases the artists use.  It is not unlike trying to pull apart a poem Crystal writes or shares with me; I want to try to find out what is buried deep in it, find out its true meaning.  This video was shot at the Brighton Music Hall on November 30.  It is Max Bemis of Say Anything, a guy and band that has been present at some pretty pivotal moments of our lives.  The song is "I Want to Know Your Plans" and the lyrics are pretty straight-forward.

Consequences of Unfinished Discussions

The other night I had a dream that we had a baby. It was a boy, I think, and he was probably 9 months or a year old but it is hard to tell being so far removed from that period in our lives.  I woke up somewhat sad.

A few years ago, we had preliminary discussions about having another baby, either through adoption or biologically. The discussion was never completed, in large part because it involved an number of issues  and we didn't have all the answers. Maybe I lacked the faith to just believe that we would do a great job as parents, just like we had 2 times before, or maybe I was just selfish and did not want to bear any additional burdens. Not having that conversation and not trusting in Crystal's gut that we were meant to have another child are a couple of the biggest regrets of my life. I feel those regrets every time we are around babies and toddlers.

Recently, we broached the topic again.  Together we decided that the baby train had left the station. Our family of four would stay that size. I don't think it was an easy decision for either of us, but we made it together and support each other in it.  And, perhaps most importantly, we had the discussion.

I can't help thinking though, if I trusted myself more back then, our youngest child would be around 2 today.  He'd probably be getting up from an afternoon nap to see his big brother and sister come home from school.

Walk Through Hell

Perhaps one of the my favorite songs in recent years is "Walk Through Hell" by Say Anything.  We were lucky enough to see Max Bemis perform it live at the North Star Bar in Philadelphia this spring.  It was a highlight of the show.  Thanks to my iPhone, you can enjoy it too.

Remember to Breathe

I had originally planned to name my blog "Remember to Breathe" after the song by Dashboard Confessional of the same name.  The gist of the song is to "remember to breathe, and everything will be ok."  I have invoked that mantra a lot over the past year and probably will for the remainder of my years.  So, in honor of that, this is a live version of the song from a concert at the House of Blues last December. It was a special night with a special person.  At that concert, we got an autograph from Chris Carraba with that quote.  Here's the video; maybe later I'll post a picture of the tattoo that later got based on Chris' inscription:

Thoughtful Thursday

If I was a writer and had the skill and patience to write a memoir, this would be the first chapter.  I think.


     I cannot say with any definitiveness when human life begins.  This is a question best left to theologians, scientists and philosophers.  What I do know for certain is that I was born on February 5, 1972 but that was not when life began for me.  For the first twenty or so years of my life, I merely existed; occupying space on this planet and little more.  It wasn’t until March 7, 1992 that life began for me.

Finding My Voice

For the better part of my life, I have tried to blend into the background; to do nothing to attract unnecessary attention to myself.  I became very good at it.  I excelled in school yet few teachers knew my name or face.  I kept jobs others could not because I knew how to stay out of the range of our bosses’ fire. 

For the most part, this has usually served me fine.  I cannot honestly say it has served me great, but I got by.  What I did not realize is that the very trait that helped me survive for almost 39 years, one that I thought was a strength, was also the trait that was going to bring me to the lowest point of my life, where I stood to lose everything that held any meaning to me.

I have spent more than a year working to climb out of my personal abyss to find my voice, and in many ways, my identity.  My voice may only be a whisper today, but someday it will be loud and strong.