The Difference

There are some blog posts that are spur of the moment, and then there are some that you really plan out. Some moment happens and you say to yourself, ‘yeah…I’m going to blog about this.’ And then you replay in your mind what you’re going to write about all day and get excited thinking about. (Then when the moment comes your internet is crap and you’re forced to type your thoughts first in Microsoft Word and then copy and paste…)

Now that I’ve built this blog up to be something that it probably won’t be…here we go.

Music is an incredible thing. It has the ability to bypass the brain and hit the heart. It has the ability to take you back to a moment in time and you don’t just remember it, you feel it. Last night I was with a friend and I had my itunes playing in the background. Then, I felt it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSTQ1tkmjv0

The song is called ‘Catastrophe and the Cure (Four tet remix)’ by Explosions in the Sky. There’s no words…which makes this song perfect for smoking hookah. Some of my favorite nights happened in my backyard in Kansas City and as this song came on it took me back to one of those nights. For those of who you don’t know or were not able to participate, there was a little ‘tradition’ if you will. On a nice summer night I would have friends come over and the evening consisted of about 4 key essential ingredients: booze, fire, hookah, and music. I LOVED these nights. These nights were great because there was no schedule. You came over; you forgot what time it was; you just enjoyed yourself; you just lived; you appreciated it for what it was. You would walk in and the house would be littered with pockets of great conversation. An ‘explosion’ of electric guitar, drums, base, and some kind of digital keyboard would hit you and it seemed to relax and excite you at the same time. The noises varied as your eyes passed over friendly and familiar faces. A short walk through the living room and kitchen, down the stairs with the super low ceiling, and into the basement with the mini fridge. Inside several types of beer are discovered, but how can you pass up a Kansas City favorite Boulevard Wheat? A little twist and your mouth appreciates the taste of a locally made brew. You feel relaxed; you feel comfortable. Just outside the door are flickers of orange and yellow and faint laughter. With beer in hand you pull open the back door…and there I am: huge smile on my face, hookah hose in hand, Boulevard at my foot, and fire and friends in front of me. Some dude from Mighigan is perfectly playing the sounds of Damien Rice with a scratched up guitar. Why is it scrached up? Something about a disillusioned moment after Guatemala... A chair is open next to a shaggy haired Antonio Banderas look-alike and you sit down. I’m begging people to watch this guy breathe out ‘dragon smoke’ as a wild smell of cherry and lemon-lime hits your nostrils. A hearty man with a gut drawn laugh sits straight across from you with a giant smile, beer resting on his stomach, and glasses glinting from the fire. A laugh seems to smack you in the face as you look to your right and see a man telling some ridiculous story using all kinds of hand motions and outlandish vocabulary. There's a chill dude with long black hair and you find that all you want to do is be this guy’s friend. You overhear some story about the time that he blew up a glass cup in the sink with a waterproof firecracker that he didn’t know was waterproof. Diagonal from you is a face that you’ve seen on some kind of State Representative brochure….Mike something. The hookah hose gets passed to you and all of a sudden some super ken-tense dude sits down next to you. Is this the same guy from the Wolverine movie? Regardless, you feel your manhood is at stake as he challenges you to see how long you can breathe in the hookah. The flavored air hits your lungs as you hear the counting off of numbers and the muffled sound of bubbles. 20 seconds…30 seconds…40. ‘Come on,’ shouts some dude with glasses and a comb over, ‘if you can do 40 you can do 50.’ As your lungs force you to pull the wooden tipped hose away you overhear a story about the time this guy swam laps and almost died because of this same ‘philosophy.’ ‘Hey! What are you doing?’ shouts some Nebraska farm boy with an incredible ability to pierce the ears. You find that your beer is empty and it's time for another. You make your way inside and your eyes meet another friendly face wearing a K-State collared shirt. The second beer is drank while you are enchanted by this man's ability to tell stories about our country and politics.

The night goes on, the beers get drunk, the tobacco gets smoked, the wood gets burned, and the music gets played. People begin to file out as Justin Paton and myself make our way to another tradition: the showing of ‘The 5^th Element.’ It’s not a good movie (Justin, I’m sorry, but let’s be honest. There’s a reason why it didn’t win any awards.), but a tradition nonetheless. You find a seat next to what's left of the party and watch Bruce Willis destroy aliens. Your eyes are heavy, but as you begin to drift a sudden and random phrase rattles you awake from the dude that has passed out on the futon. It's time to go. The night ends...

This is what I miss: the sounds, the stories, the smells, the images, the fire, the people. As I was recounting all of this to my friend I realized something. When I have recounted moments in the past there was a bit within me that missed them so much that I wanted to be there again. It would take me away from the present and leave my embittered at the fact that I couldn’t be there. However, this time was different, another piece of evidence to me that I am growing. I don’t miss these moments because I want to escape the present. I miss these moments because I appreciate them. I appreciate the sounds, the stories, the smells, the images, the fire, the people. They are all a part of my life. They were meant to be experienced, but not to be held onto; not to be used as an escape. They were meant to be loved; to be missed; to be appreciated.

This is the difference.