seasons

seasons fascinate me. they're one of the main reasons i love pittsburgh. we have the pleasure of encountering the characteristics of every season throughout the year. summer is hot, winter is cold, fall and spring are transitory. it's beautiful to experience them all and they all have different memories associated with them.

fall provides pennsylvania with some of the most incredible scenery. driving across the state in october provided a miraculous display of colors spread across the hills and mountains. i can't help but carry around a camera between september and november in hopes of catching just the right autumn scene. fall gives you it's own beginning, associated with the beginning of the school year. it gives you new hope for a new academic year as well as reconnection with friends who have been gone for some or all of the summer. playing football in the backyard and going to games as a child, then as a teen, then as an adult are vivid memories.

winter may provide some of my favorite memories. six inches of snow can change the appearance of everything. for some it means a hectic drive to work, but for others it simply means a walk home so quiet that you can hear the snow landing on your shoulder. my fondest winter memories, besides the obvious playtime in the backyard as a child, are of riding bikes with andy and mike to centre plaza for weekend hangouts. i still remember the night i met, or became closer friends with, many of my current best friends today; riding up to centre plaza in the cold and watching the killers perform "when you were young" on snl. that winter of 07-08 provided many jaunts to shadyside, often too cold to have actually considered the bike rides we took.

spring is the awakening. nature is done with it's season-long nap and everything is in full bloom. we are given that fresh start we've been hoping for and, for pitt students at least, the schoolwork seems almost over. remembering what it's like to play basketball outdoors is a welcomed struggle. how warm does it have to be to wear shorts outside again? 40? people are abuzz in the streets because it doesn't hurt your face to avoid the scarves anymore.

and then there's summer. childhood was filled with 9 months of pining after the summertime. let's finish school, let's go out and play. to a point, it remains true your whole life. grilling out, playing wiffleball in the backyard, and spending nights with a beer and a friend on your porch are all you need to enjoy the heat.

every season provides a re-awakening, a fresh start. they're distinct in their own ways and keep life from being monotonous for the whole year. different music can be associated with different seasons. right now is the bright eyes season and soon we'll be transitioning to death cab. sure, there are negatives to the heat of the summer or the cold and snow of the winter, but where would i, or we, be without those benchmarks to remember times past?

image

saturday i was journaling at camp about the idea of image. church camp speakers frequently talk about this idea at retreats, i think. it makes sense. in high school, Jesus isn't cool. doing drugs and drinking and having sex is cool in high school, but going to church and youth group and reading the Bible really isn't. image was a lot different in high school than it is at my age, having graduated from undergrad on to grad school and almost into the "real world".

the other day i bought some cheap jeans from wal-mart. i'm generally opposed to wal-mart's practices, but that usually gets outweighed by the fact that i'm a poor grad school student and can't pass up $8 for new jeans. i'm pretty proud of spending so little on jeans. i bought two pairs for half the price it usually costs for one. no, they're not abercrombie or some other stylish brand, but they do the job and they don't look bad. this is not a decision i would have made as a teenager. teenagers are constantly challenged to improve their image by wearing cool clothes and acting cool all the time to impress others. how would people have felt about me in high school if i wore wal-mart jeans every day? maybe they wouldn't have cared, but i wasn't about to find out.

as we grow up we grow out of these external insecurities. we wear what feels comfortable. it's convenient that hipster crazes have brought sloppy dressing back into style so we can wear hoodies, jeans, or flannel and still feel like we're dressing hip. but the fact is i don't care how i look anymore. that's saying a lot considering several of my fellow students in grad school will come from work wearing nice dresses or shirt-and-ties while i'm sitting in the back with my avett brothers t-shirt and ripped jeans. sure, there's pressure to dress to impress, but as we get older i think we ignore that pressure a little more. or maybe that's just me.

but, as was pointed out by a close friend tonight, our insecurities change from external to internal. several of my friends have been getting married or are currently engaged. most of my friends have full-time jobs and live on their own. some of my friends are now even homeowners. the insecurities we develop as adults is the comparison we draw between ourselves and our friends in our maturity and our life stages. it's hard for me to wait tables while some of my friends are making enough to pay mortgages. it's unsettling to see girls i've dated getting married. and at times i feel immature when i have a 10-page paper due in two days and all i can do is pick up a guitar.

last night at the open door bj told us, in so many words, that comparing ourselves with others is a way to take the joy out of our lives. the truth is that God really does have timing for us and our lives. any time we compare ourselves with others we will feel like failures. we will always see the great things in others and not in ourselves. i see how good my friends are at playing instruments and think that i'll never be as good as they are. i'll see other friends playing sports and realize that i'll never be as good an athlete as others. i see a lot of my friends settling into marriage-situations at my age, or maybe even younger, and i'll feel like i'm falling behind. the fact is that i don't even want to get married right now, so why does that bother me? i'm not bad at guitar and i was even told recently that my voice isn't bad, so why should i worry about being some kind of expert? and i'm above average at a wide range of sports, so what does it matter if i'm not the best at any one in particular?

the fact is that God has created me as a masterpiece, as the speaker said this weekend. i've been created in this way for a reason. i'm in graduate school now to better equip me to serve the Lord in the future. i may not be as good as christian at playing guitar or singing, but he's not as good as i am on drums and that's how God has created us. it's hard to sit back and watch my friends progress in their lives as i sit back and do schoolwork again, but i also need to realize that when i'm done i'll have my masters degree and will be ready for what's next for me. it's not about having the confidence to wear inexpensive clothes anymore, it's about having the confidence to live a different lifestyle.

jared anderson's song, "rescue", speaks to me intensely every time. my favorite line is "this world has nothing for me", and that's the absolute truth. i don't serve anyone on this earth. i don't serve my managers or my professors or my classmates or my co-workers or even my friends. i serve the Lord Jesus Christ and no one else. through the Holy Spirit i do good works for the people around me, but this world has nothing to offer me besides the opportunity to share that Spirit with the people in it. that's the image i am called to project.

ephesians 2:10 - For we are God's masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so that we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.

introduction to interactivity

friends,

thank you all so much for reading my blog. i don't know why you do, but you do and i appreciate it. i've received many compliments and encouragements and it means a lot to me. you start a blog to write down your thoughts and see if anyone's interested in reading them, so when it's reinforced that people are reading and want to read more it makes me happy.

my next series of blogs will be about restaurant etiquette. by series i may mean 5 or 3 or 1, who knows. but i plan on writing about this subject because i think people need to read it. am i qualified as some kind of expert? no. i'm just writing because a year and a half ago i never worked in a restaurant and since working as a server, host, and busser, i've learned a lot that i didn't know before. so i'd like to share these things with you in hopes that we can all become better restaurant customers.

do you like this idea? do you not like this idea? do you have suggestions about what you might want/need to know? please comment and let me know your thoughts.

jake

direction

graduate school started a few weeks ago for me. classes, schoolwork, reading, it's all back and i'm not particularly excited about it. graduate school is a means to an end for me. i can't find a job, i want a job at a college, so i'm in higher education management. makes sense right? i thought it did, at least. that is until i got to my classes and realized that about 95% of my program is considerably more motivated and career-oriented than i am. this made me wonder; am i not motivated enough? am i missing something? are my priorities out of whack? why am i the only one in the class who seems to have things on their mind besides school?

so let's investigate. american society today has different priorities than it once did. people in the professional realm seem to place quite a bit of importance on money. maybe that's not the difference. but people in my class talked about how people in our line of work may choose to be single longer because they have long hours and lots of moving from job to job. working their way up the professional ladder to bigger and better careers seems like the motivation for people in my classes. who doesn't want bigger and better though? i mean, i could always use more money. but what are they sacrificing by making these professional moves? relationships? friends? time to themselves? i'm pretty sure i have little interest in sacrificing those things.

so now i start thinking about why my mindset is different than my classmates'. my focus in my career is pretty much to make enough money to provide for myself and my family. that's it. i don't have any big career aspirations. i know my dad raised my family on a pretty modest salary, put us all through college, and raised quite a beautiful family, life, and home. and he never became president of anything. were his motivations wrong? is there something missing? my thoughts are no. my priorities are different than my colleagues. do i want to be president of college? sure, it'd be cool. am i willing to put forth those long hours and sacrifices to do so? i doubt it. is that so wrong?

my motivation in my life right now and for the future is pretty simple; be as happy as possible all the time. that's it man. why on earth would i want to do anything else? heck, that's selfish enough. i haven't even mentioned the part about my faith calling me to serve God in all that i do; the other goal in my life. so what kind of motivation does that give me for my career? i want to move up the ladder, find a job i like, make as much money as possible. but the more money i make, the better i can provide for my family, the more my wife can stay home and care for our kids, the more i can donate to my friends in ministry and other worthy causes.

my short term goal isn't anything complicated. right now i want to enjoy life as much as possible while graduating. in two years i want to get to seattle. i want to live there and get started in the higher ed realm. that's it. and that might change between now and the time i graduate. what i do know is that my friend jenn seemed to enjoy being an RD at seattle pacific university and that looks pretty good to me too. at least it'll pay more than olive garden.

all signs point west

this is the third time i've tried to type this entry. i think it's just hard for me to put into words exactly what i'm thinking and feeling since returning from seattle. anyone who's been there knows why it's amazing. anyone who hasn't been there needs to go. when i left two weeks ago i said there was a 40% chance that i'd end up there after graduation from grad school. as time goes on, that percentage grows. i can't get the city off my mind and i don't know if i will until i return.

it's like an ex-girlfriend who dumps you but gives you definite hope that things might work out with you two. i see things that remind me of her all over the place. styles of clothes, death cab songs, my sounders fc scarf. i can't get away from it. my journal started with seattle and is just full of seattle memories and thoughts. what doesn't help is that i returned to pittsburgh to find some newfound schoolwork and a less lucrative job than when i left. not only is it less lucrative, but i don't know how many more tables i can serve before i just take off my apron and walk out. basically, my vacation life in seattle seems infinitely better than my stress-filled life in pittsburgh.

maybe that's why i want seattle so badly. because it's something new. it's something different. i don't know why. maybe it's the constant view of puget sound. maybe it's the coffeeshops, book stores, and record stores all over. maybe it's the wilderness just outside the city limits. maybe it's the friendliness of the people or the relaxed mood of the west coast. i'm not sure if i can pinpoint anything in particular. all i know is it's intriguing. so intriguing that i'm pretty certain it'll be the destination after graduation. if i can wait that long.

leaving

it's an amazing thing. it can change lives. it can make you realize what you've left behind. it can also show you what you've never seen and what could be. i haven't done a lot of leaving, but i'm about to do some and it intrigues me. it makes me wonder whether the grass is really greener. it makes me wonder what God has in store for me next. it also makes me wonder if i'll come back, or if i'll even want to come back.

tomorrow i'm taking a trip to seattle. this was really a compromise from a road trip i wanted to take around the country when i first thought of the idea. i wanted to do this after reading "through painted deserts" by donald miller. i wanted to check out something new, head west, find myself. so i talked myself down to a flight to seattle to visit my newlywed friends jenn and ron cepek. conveniently my friend scott decided to join late. we'll be there the same time, but on different flights. when scott and i were talking about the trip he said to me that there's something about flying across the country that makes you feel like you're leaving something behind. what makes my situation even more amazing is that i really am leaving a lot behind.

today i am a resident of economy borough and an employee of olive garden in cranberry. when i get back from seattle next week i'll be a resident of pittsburgh, an employee of olive garden in green tree, and a graduate student at pitt. this trip is the transition between one life and another. life will be different and it's a difference i've been looking for for a long time. i've grown fond of my co-workers in cranberry, but this isn't where i belong. and that's a lot of what i'll be considering on this trip.

my favorite part about the traveling portion of this trip is the fact that scott and i are flying by ourselves. this will allow for hours and hours of personal reflection. i'll be reading "on the road" by jack kerouac, listening to seattle bands on my ipod, and writing in my journal for hours. maybe during my layovers i'll have a beer and make a few friends on the way. the possibilities are endless. and the trip is all mine. i've had so much time to take time to simply think over the past few months. i've spent more time by myself over the past year than i have since i was in high school. this has resulted in growing as an intellectual by simply thinking more. i spend plenty of time at work and in the car simply considering life and what it means and why, just why. much of the result of this thinking has been documented in this blog. it's really been an amazing opportunity to re-connect with myself.

so what do i hope to gain from this trip? well, if nothing else i'll get to spend some time with some good friends. i want to see seattle and evaluate whether it's somewhere i'd like to consider as a future temporary home. i want to see the pacific ocean. i want to experience beauty that i haven't experienced before. i want to take time to be on my own. i want to see a fish tossed across the room, then have it for lunch. i want to taste a beer made in the pacific northwest. i want to meet someone i may never see again. i want to see and express my thoughts on the other end of the country. i want to see the people living in houseboats and think about what my life would be like if i joined them. most importantly i want to leave. i want to leave everything here and try something else. i want to get as far away from here as possible, knowing that i have the comfort of returning on the other end of the trip. i want to try it out and see what i think. then i want to come home and consider leaving again.

regret

i've been forced to consider my thoughts on life recently. i've made some decisions that may have upset some people and for that i'm sorry. when it comes down to it i have really become a war of head versus heart, as the death cab-inspired title of my blog reads. i find myself in a constant battle of what should i do versus what do i want to do. what decision is best for the long-run versus what decision is best for me now. will my reasoning justify my decisions, or am i simply looking for some roundabout way for my priorities to see right despite their wrongness?

rory cochrane ("lucas") once said one of my favorite lines in empire records, which may have been taken from somewhere else. "i do not regret the things i've done, but those i did not do". the way i apply that statement to my life is that i know why i make the decisions i make and do the things i've done. in hindsight i'd certainly like to have made some different choices in my life, but i know that if i went back and did it again i'd probably do the same thing because there was a reason for it. whatever i did at the time felt like the right thing to do. i feel like that's the reason most people make decisions.

life is a series of actions and reactions, so things happen and then we figure out how to deal with them. i am who i am, and where i am, as a result of what's happened to me. some things were controllable, some weren't. but what's the point of contemplating what could have been? the Bible wonders what the point of worrying is because it will have no bearing on solving the problems or making today any easier. sometimes we make decisions that alienate people or cause harm, but we learn from those decisions and they ultimately make us better people. if i spent time worrying about people disagreeing with decisions i've made then i probably wouldn't have enough time left over to make anything positive happen. our time here is short and there doesn't seem to be much need for regret in my eyes.

i haven't been close to the ideal model Christian in a long time. i could make plenty of excuses for it, too. maybe it's because i got burned out by ministry. maybe it's because i've been isolated in cranberry and haven't attended any Bible study. maybe it's because i've lost hope for getting into a full-time job and have given in to the frustrations of my current job. whatever the reason, it may make sense, but the bottom line is that i know what it means to be a Christian and i still have chosen to not share that love as much as i have in the past and for that i'm sorry. i'll learn from the past year and move forward. the basis of Christianity allows for second chances and hopefully that can be granted.