pontifical man

I surprised Melissa with a trip to the movies the other day. It wasn't the grand romantic gesture I worked it up in my mind to be but it sure did make her happy and therefore was a success. We saw Enlighten Up about a documentary director making a documentary about a young man she hand picked to be the center of an experiment to find meaning in yoga. It was mentioned in the film how it seems she should have just performed the 6-month experiment herself since it was her own diminishing faith in yoga that prompted her to devise the scheme. But she held that she wanted to see if yoga could have "transformative" effects on the uninitiated. Nick, the subject, said he had never considered yoga or any spiritual endeavor before agreeing to submit to Kate's , the director, plan.

The film seemed to come at yoga from nearly every angle people approach it from except for perhaps someone who would consider yoga offensive, if there is anybody. They did talk a little about how in India, at some point but perhaps not in modern day, people talked of Yogis as demonic wanderers who steal away children and wreak general havoc as opposed to individuals who are merely yoga enthusiasts. Other than that they explored the physical and metaphysical practices associated with yoga. Nick began as a willing skeptic and Kate as the waning believer. By the end they weren't much closer to discovering "true yoga" or a universal transformative power it might hold. The actually ended up nearly right where they began with only a greater sense of the history of yoga and a vocabulary useful in discussing its various forms. Sure it was only six months but I expected a little bit of transformation or perhaps maturing. But perhpaps this is all we can hope for. More knowledge, no wisdom. The two seekers did find they had a deeper desire for the purer things in life: family, health, quiet meditation.

I wonder if their journey's flaw was the fact that they said they were pursuing a means to be happy and fulfilled. They didn't request wisdom or even greater insight into living at peace with others. They kept wanting to find a wholeness in-and-of themselves. I suppose one could spend a lifetime pursuing wholeness in all of its manifestations and never be consumed by it because it seems to me that looking at one's own self constantly gives you the same view consistently. Perhaps if spending ourselves on everyone else and in effect being that magnanimous person of grace before we feel like we have attained what we think is required to live in such a way we will gain a truer perspective of ourselves and see G-d. I think a greater virtue than pursuing inner peace is to make peace.

As it happens, I am devolving. Reverting back to a lackadaisical and also sleepless me has exhausted my will. Thankfully last night was the first and only time this has happened but it shall be the last. I stayed up until five-ish o'clock watching metal music videos and reading years old comments on my myspace. I haven't even visited my myspace in months. This was my first tip off that I was acting suspiciously.

But it wasn't just my behavior. My very feelings went to some strange, familiar, and less me now kind of place. I think was about three o'clock that I was watching some "music video interpretation" of the song "ravage ritual" by the band zao that some sadly misguided kid made for a school project a few years ago and posted on youtube and at this point I realized something very wrong was happening to me. It is hard to explain. I was sitting there actually feeling as though what I was watching was important in some soulless way. And this after three hours of watching OnDemand freezone music videos at my in-laws' house. (bytheway the video for "Airport Surroundings" by Loney, Dear is quite terrific).

I could not conjure a reason convincing enough to actually just go to bed until I was so burnt out and lonely that I nearly wept all alone. Pathetic. It is a glorious truth that yesterday is in the past.

can't be bested

It was a journey and a half getting to and from Chicago. The journey was the understood one involving the car, the trailer, the five people in the car with the snacks and the music. Developing with my friends and my wife into a musical entity that we are more and more proud of and confident in is the half.

I make the distinction because the physical movement had its beginning and its end. The band certainly had its beginning, even if it was when Melissa was born it had a definite starting point. But it has an evolution that defies an absolute ending. It is that faux/possibly actual immortality brought upon a group of people by playing music. Not to downplay other creative efforts but there is something undeniably enduring about music and its ability to engender or inhibit growth in people and culture.

When we were playing last Friday night I think we all felt that. We felt different for sure. There was progress from the beginning of the show to the end of it. It is somewhat sad that we only played one show that weekend. I think the progress leaked over into the next day or two but it seemed to slow as there became more hours between the present time and the end of the show.

Cody's girlfriend, Lindsey, came with us and did a bit of filming of things along the way. She teaches film and different aspects therein at a local community college here in Omaha. Having her around and my older brother's fascination with movies has caused me to consider the finer points of film making. I don't know much about film but I know what I like. I guess that is the case for most people, or all people, rather.

So there.