Day 26

this is for thursday, by the way, but its early friday morning. every couple weeks i'll go to bed early to catch up on sleep then be good to go again. i'll pry head to the kitchen to see what i can find to eat before laying back down to wait for daylight. i also had some weird dreams earlier and am not sure what they could've meant.

today was a good, chill, and overall solid workday. this morning the music and video department head had me screen and pick some christian music videos from a fresh dvd that had come in the mail. some of the bands just couldn't pull off the 'hard emo christian rocker' skin and their darkness was just awkward and creepy. there were a few solid ones of other genres that i chose though. i fought partiality for needtobreathe's 'washed by the water' video because i'd seen them in concert a few weeks ago, but i ended up deeming it a solid candidate for use this summer. after that, i wrote a script for a short video we'll shoot this weekend for a side-show sort of presentation for the summer camps. hopefully i'll direct it as well.

don miller's podcasts were a welcome voice-over for the day and i paused workflow a few times to read an old, online rolling stones interview with bono that miller actually refers to at one point. u2's incessant popularity with the other staff at this camp almost made me skip the whole article altogether until musical references to lennon and dylan kept my interest. frequently hearing switchfoot coving u2 songs is as cliche as it gets, but oh well.

a few minutes ago i woke up in the middle of having a dream. there were pen marks and words written carefully on the palm of my right hand. somebody told me that this was absolute truth, and i tried to read and believe and understand what they exactly said, but was suddenly flashed to a scene of busy, city-street walkers. people that didn't know or care about me would half-heartedly shake my hand as they walked by or would occasionally put up a high five with a nod. smears soon replaced the carefully-scripted words and i woke up in my bunk, checked my hands, and considered the balance needed to living right whether it be in the confines of a safe christian camp or the flowing masses of impersonal society. each has its dangers. 

seriously, what a weird thing to scrape up from a dream at 3 am.

by the way, i've managed to upload the blues jam me, my roomate, and the music/vid department leader did for a talent show a couple weeks ago. its rough, i should warn you.

Day 15

today was my day off and i slept until 1:15 in the afternoon. with sleep out of the way, i'll be good to go for however long i'm up for tonight and for the beginning of another work week tomorrow morning. after awakening and having one jam session with some peep and doin some good work in 'blue like jazz', i went for a short run to the fitness barn and lifted for a while before running back in time to shower and have dinner.

i found satisfying and incredible clarity and calmness as some of us drank hot tea and leaned against the rail overlooking the trees and water- the kind that comes after running and lifting and showering and eating meat and chillin. after dinner, the whole camp headed into town to dairy queen, but instead of going on the bus some of us took the orange tercell with the excuse we would be going to wal mart afterwards.

in wal mart, we managed to play hide and seek and accomplish some successful isle-sliding before splitting up again and hiding around. on the way back to camp, i took my empty mcdonald's iced coffee cup and, under the inspiration of dave, taped it to the top of his little orange car. the ride home was filled with hilarious expressions of other passengers at stoplights and such who desperately tried to gesture to our attention the presence of that little plastic cup that still managed to stay solid on the roof as we were driving down the road. it was silly, but it was a ton of fun.

then tonight, the two new zealanders shaun and paul and i went up for a jam session and ended up with some quality material and beats and sounds and ideas. i've been listening to our recording over and over since. this will be built upon and expanded over the summer. i've made prospective plans for next week to go to a music store where one of the staff chick's brother works so i might get a discount on harmonicas and one other potential purchase for the addition of our little band.

last side note, i've discovered couchsurfing.com. this amazing international community offers access and shows availability from chill, usually art, outdoor, music, writer, or photographic-oriented student or teacher denizen who have an extra place to stay for pre-arranged, overnight travelers. the profiles also show levels of availability that range from offering a couch for the night to the willingness to meet prospective guests over coffee just to discuss common areas of interest and such. i have a three day weekend sat-sun-mon next week so me and a couple people might try this out sometime during that time.

i've still not made it out to the dock to spend the night. i want to quite badly but by the time we're done jammin or listening to music or chillin around, it's just too late for it to be worth it. like right now.