...three hundred sixty-five...

I don't know what I think about blogging yet. A blog is a platform by which anybody can publish their thoughts, dreams, their rants and raves--basically anything they want. I find that unimaginably frightening.

It is kind of like cable tv. Even with more than two hundred channels, Speed 2 is the best option for my viewing pleasure as I write this. Just because there are more opportunities to communicate doesn't mean that anybody is actually communicating anything worthwhile.

So what is it that I believe that I can offer the blogging community? What makes me as a writer or blogger worth listening to? I am not the funniest person on the internet. Nor am I the smartest. So what can I offer you?

As I thought this through, I realized that I really have nothing new for you. I am never going to be the best writer in the world. I don't have the best vocabulary, or the best syntax. I do have strengths--if I can say that without sounding arrogant. But by no means am I a great writer. And I'm really not that great of a thinker. I try to dig beneath the surface. I try to understand. But the best I can do is stand on the shoulders of giants.

So what is the one thing that I can offer? Honesty. Brutal, uncompromising honesty. That is the only truly unique thing I can offer.

So here it is. Today is the one year anniversary of a plane crash. A horrible, senseless accident that took the life of one of my best friends. And I don't know what I feel.

Jess thinks that grieving is simply getting used to missing someone. I think she's right. I don't miss Ace any less after one year. I am just used to it.

I think about him all the time. I still have a hard time playing cards. I get depressed anytime I hear Linkin Park or 50 Cent. I think about him everytime I see an obnoxious belt buckle or a t-shirt with a not-so-hidden meaning.

Sometimes I think about him and I feel like I am about to explode. I feel like I have to hold everything in because if I don't, all of me will just spill out and there won't be anything left. And sometimes I think about him and feel so profoundly empty. I feel like someone sucked the life out of my chest. My throat and ribs tighten until I can hardly breathe.

I don't understand anything about Ace's death. I don't understand how it happened. I don't understand why it happened. I don't understand what I am supposed to be learning. I don't understand what God is trying to do.

But I am getting used to it. I don't know how. I don't know why. I don't want to. But I am.

I wrote this a year ago today:

I've never felt this way before. I desperately want just to sleep and make the hurt go away, yet every second I'm not crying I feel disgusted with myself. I feel jealous and angry every time they show his face on the news and every time the play the recording of his last phone call. I feel like they don't deserve to hear his voice. They aren't worthy to hear his emotion. I am filled with hate everytime someone who doesn't know him comes up to me and asks me how I'm doing, and reminds me that God is good, or that God's will is perfect. I hear that enough from the little voice in the back of my head, and every time that little voice speaks, my whole mind, soul, and body wish they could strangle that little voice.

I feel cheated. Cheated that I have only known him for 3 years. Cheated that I was gone so much of that time. Cheated that he left at I time that I wanted him to be here so much. Cheated that he won't see Jess's engagement ring. Cheated that he won't be able to show me around D.C. this summer. Cheated that he never took me up flying. Cheated that he won't be at my bachelor party. Cheated that he won't stand next to me when I get married. It's not right. He was supposed to be there for all of that. He was supposed to get married, and have me stand up for him. He was supposed to have kids. His kids were supposed to meet my kids. We were supposed to get together every Labor Day for a barbeque.

I just want to tell him how much he has meant to me. I want to tell him how great of a friend he was. I want to tell him how much I admired his confidence and self-discipline. I want to tell him how much I wish I had gone out partying with him. I want to tell him how gay those stupid belt buckles were, but how much I loved that he wore them. And the same with those shoes he had his freshman year. And his tie that says "On a mission from God." I want to tell him how much I miss him already.

I still miss him.

Moisture is the essence of wetness...

I realized today how fickle a thing beauty is.

After another morning of white-trashing it (sitting on the couch, watching tv, and reading), I decided to take the bike out for a ride. I didn't really have anywhere to go, I just wanted to stretch her legs. So I decided to try to get lost in the tangle of roads that fill the blank spaces of Dodge county.

Six songs later in my American Idiot/Dookie playlist, I stumbled upon a town called Lowell. Population three hundred something. As I rode down the main street, I was struck with the peculiar beauty of this town. It was as if this town had existed, untouched by anything other than time. Two churches looked comfortably out of place, and the river silently fell beneath the bridge. Two graveyards, one Main street bar, and a restuarant that looked like it had been converted from a garage. The buildings were in a state of disrepair that spoke only of time and distracted mothers. Clutter stared at me from boarded up windows, and the faded, lime green siding pointed. And then it was gone. The road was surrounded again by farms and hills.

I had to go back. I wanted to stop, and walk around. I wanted to bring my wife, and my camera. I wanted to talk to its residents, and to drink in its beauty. But as I drove back through town, I couldn't see it. It wasn't there. Now all I saw was white trash America. Crappy, run down buildings on crappy, run down streets. No beauty. No mystery. No life.

So what is it about beauty? Why can't it be recreated or controlled? How can something be so perfect one day and the next day, so nauseatingly bad?

I wrote a post in February about a song that made me stop in my tracks. A song that brought my past into perspective so suddenly that it made my soul dizzy. I couldn't remember how I had survived before I heard that song.

That song was on the radio last week, and I changed the station.

So why do we try to nail down what is beautiful or true or just?

Eight balls, yellow submarines, and vomit

Some people occasionally get in the mood to read a book. I don't. I become obsessed. I have to read. And I have to read a lot. I can't be satisfied with a few pages, or maybe some magazine articles, or even a regular book. I need to devour information. Lots of information. I can't stop until I have gorged myself on literature. It generally follows three main steps.

During the first step, I feel like I can't read enough. Life becomes an annoyance, because I can't constantly read. Sleep is frustrating. Eating wastes time, unless I have a book with me. I only want to do things that will facilitate me reading more.

The second phase consists of me entering a trance-like state. I practically stop being aware of words, pages, and chapters. I simply absorb the material. It is like I am injecting information directly into my veins. Time and space cease to exist.

Eventually I snap out of the second phase, and realize all of the implications and logical extensions of all of that I have been reading. After that, I generally have to do something. Write, draw, create, destroy--it doesn't really matter. It is like my brain can't handle all of the new activity, so it has to spit some back out.

I am waffling between the first and second steps right now. I'm sure you will be able to figure out when I hit step 3.

Now there really is a new laxative on the horizon...

No title could be more fitting for the post that I announce Josh Ledgerwood's entrance into blogdom.

Seriously, even though Josh writes with all the grammatical prowess of a chimpanzee on meth, his sheer mental potency makes anything he publishes worth reading.

I know that I haven't posted in a long time. It has been a weird week. I have quite a bit that I want to get out there, but I don't know if I will be able to verbalize it all. I will promise that I will try.

Happy Easter. Read what RuthAnn said about our wonderful Baptist tradition of completely downplaying the Lent/Good Friday/Easter season.