so i went to see bill mallonee of the vigilantes of love last night at the abbey pub. it was a drizzly cold night, which was unfortunate because i'm sure a lot more people would've showed up if the weather had been better. it's too bad because bill did a lot of new songs. those who did make it were appreciative however, and they should be loyal fans coming out on a sunday night with the weather being as crappy as it was. okay, so it wasn't raining cats & dogs, but after the warm weather we were having last week, it was enough to depress the hell out of me. i considered staying home myself, but changed my mind around 9pm. i'm glad that i did. bill is definitely one of the most talented singer/songwriters in indie rock that i know of.

an interesting side note to the evening is that i got to meet bill's manager tim white of the wildwood agency. when i stopped by the goods table to buy some cds, he said he saw me taking photos of the show and asked if i could send them to him. i'm always happy to supply artists & their agents w/ the photos i take, so that was cool. then when i got home and looked up his agency's website, i was intrigued by their vision statement which you can go read yourself if you want here. i especially liked the quote by dan taylor (i think he's an author) at the end: "mistaking this active life of faith for an institutionally backed and culturally bound belief system is similar to reducing the mona lisa to paint-by-numbers." i found it interesting because it kind of sums up my own disillusionment w/ most of the formal church and expresses my own desires nevertheless to express and to discover truth creatively and personally in my own life. but i need to get a hold of the truth first i guess... when i looked at the agency's roster of artists, i noticed that there were a lot of names i recognized (and one band i'd photo'ed a couple weeks ago). one of the bands was the violet burning, which was kind of freaky for me because they hold a special place in my heart. i had been thinking of them these past few days, especially of one of their cds that they put out recently. i wanted to listen to that cd, but i was afraid to because it always moved me so strongly, and i didn't know if i was ready to have that happen to me right now. i did actually put it in my car cd changer this morning, and i forgot which number it was and i basically played russian roulette w/ the cd player to and from work. i didn't land on that cd yet, and now i know which one it is, and i'm too scared to play it...why do i get this weird feeling that meeting tim white from this agency was not an accident?

so the saga of sarah's search for the one thing that is everything continues...for all you friends of mine who are worried i'm going to turn into one of them right-wing fundamentalists, calm down. you know i never was one of those to begin with and i'd rather die than go that route (although there are some people i love who fall in that category god bless 'em). no matter where i end up in my search, if i don't get to be myself, i won't go for it. plain and simple. i just know that there has to be a way for me to find truth and be able to live it out as sarah and not some cookie cutter bible thumping numbskull (god bless 'em). if god ain't flexible to accomodate that, well, then, i'll just be moseyin' right along. but if i do find what i'm looking for, i'm not saying i won't be changed...but i'll be changed into more myself, i just know it, even though that doesn't make any sense. i believe that when you find the truth, you are freed to be who you really are way deep on the inside, so it's really not a compromising of yourself but more of a consummation or completion. at least that's what i'm hoping for cuz otherwise i'll be searching for a long time...but this is important to me so bear with me...

i will be busy working (my paying job) this week to finish a salary survey that is life or death (well, not really--it'll just look bad for me if i don't get it done) and must be emailed out by friday. ugh...so i'm going to bed early and waking up before the sun makes it back to our side of the earth. anyways, here are the lyrics to a song that kind of captures how i'm feeling these days:

“i want to know i want to know
will it make a difference when i go
it makes a difference that i’m feeling this way
with plenty to think about and so little to say
except for this confession that is poised on my lips
i’m not letting go of god, i’m just losing my grip” – when i go by over the rhine

today’s soundtrack—
summershine – bill mallonee & the vigilantes of love
films for radio – over the rhine
something about airplanes – death cab for cutie

-peace out

when i got home tonight from the hospital and checked my email, i found these pictures in my mailbox. meet joshua mars robertson, certified flight instructor and pilot extraordinnaire, a.k.a. my best friend. leave it to josh to send me webcam photos that would take an otherwise exhausted cranky girl like me and instantly throw her into a laughing fit. god bless long-distance webcam best friends. god bless friends.

for those of you who don't know who josh is, he & i went to high school together, which means we've known each other for half our lives. josh & i were on the boy's swim team together. yes, that's right. i was on the boy's swim team. turns out a lot of my friends were on the team and i got hooked on the swim meets. since i was there for every single meet, the coach finally put me to work and i kept score. i didn't even know how to swim at the time, and i still got to take my yearbook photo w/ the entire boys swim team. josh was our star butterflier. i can't even describe to you what a thrill it was to see him do that event. anyways, josh & i actually became best friends over the course of the past year during which he trained in california to be a certified flight instructor. he's the one who hooked me up w/ olarn & connolly, two of the guys i hang out with the most these days.

josh moved a month ago to new york with his lovely girlfriend lielle. they just got an apartment and are experiencing the joys of cable internet access, hence josh's return to the webcam broadcast which i had been missing these past several months. it's strange...when josh was in cali, he was the one on dial-up and i was the one on cable internet. i was the one working and he was the one with no set schedule. now he's got a jampacked teaching schedule, and me...well, i better pray i stay employed.

anyways, this is the new york josh i refer to every now and then. my chicago josh is josh bearman, and you can read his blogger here. ok. now we're clear, eh? gotta go see bill mallonee of the vigilantes of love...

peace out--

today's soundtrack:
axxess & ace - songs: ohia
loaded - the velvet underground
naked - ricki lee jones
music for the morning after - pete yorn
the ghost of fashion - clem snide

just got home from being out in the neighborhood w/ connie & my cousin kris. it's been a while since we hung out, and it was good to be w/ the girls again. we went to the northside cafe & grill for dinner then headed over to the maproom where a rockabilly band was playing. they were called the wild ones, and they were fun to watch. a lot of elvis covers & other really popular songs from back then. the maproom has a million different beers from all over, and tonight i decided to deviate from my usual sierra nevada and chose victory brewery's hop devil. the venue was fun but loud; i am afraid i may have freaked out my ear drums a bit more than i would have liked to.

this picture (of me, kris & connie) was taken at danny's tavern by someone named nikki whom we had just met. i was pretty surprised that she held so still for an 8 second exposure considering the probability that she'd been drinking for a couple hours already. we had fun just talking it up, meeting people from the neighborhood, and generally hanging out. i think i will be going back to danny's. i have to say it was the darkest bar i've been to in i don't remember when. also, i hear that u2 go there when they are in town. i don't know when that'll be, but if i am in the area, i am there. i will definitely check out danny's on the weeknights and hope it's less crowded. i just hope it doesn't turn into one of those hip yuppie places in lakeview where you put on a mask at the door and hope people don't see the real you.

hanging out at local bars is always a fascinating experience for me, probably because i did so little of it during the age when most people do it. i always feel like an outside observer, kind of like an anthropologist, and i love to watch the people there, and listen to what they have to say. first impressions clouded by alcohol, shrouded in smoke and obscured by darkness set to whatever soundtrack being played at that particular establishment are always interesting, and i wonder what it would be like meeting these people on the streets in the sobering light of day. would they still buy into my "my knowledge is a mathematical zero" theory in the sunlit evian hours as easily as they do during the barely candle-lit booze-soaked hours of the night? would i still find them as interesting to talk to in their daytime occupations as i do in their careerless alcohol colored bar personas? i don't know...

ok. i am like way exhausted, so i will leave you w/ my soundtrack for the past day:
things shaped in passing -- the six parts seven (i like this cd more and more each time i listen to it)
other songs -- ron sexsmith
amplified heart -- everything but the girl
unforgettable fire -- u2
songs for the new year -- simon joyner
firecracker -- lisa loeb

as i was driving home tonight from the hospital after visiting with my dad, i saw a little girl around six years old in a bright pink fuzzy coat clutching her father's hand tightly as they ran across irving park road on lincoln ave. the two of them were laughing as they continued down lincoln, hand in hand. and i saw the father's face, and on it i saw written a look of delight and pure affection. and i thought back to my own childhood, searching for the memory of when i clutched my own father's hand as we walked down some street, back when i believed that i was safe from all the dangers of the world and of this life as long as i held onto my father's hand. i missed my childhood sorely, and i wished i could be that little girl again so that i could sit in my dad's lap and feel what it's like to be held and surrounded by unconditional love and total safety. the memories have faded over the years. i wish i'd known how much the memories would mean to me now, so that i would have preserved them better, filed them better.

tonight i finished douglas coupland's life after god for the 2nd time. i almost didn't get through it, and as expected by the end of the book, i was sobbing. i can't believe how much i relate to the narrator's feelings of loneliness and longing and anxiety and neediness and emptiness and restlessness. here's a passage in which the narrator's friend todd shares some thoughts...

"i think about this...i think about how hard it is--even with the desire, and even with the will and the time--i think of how hard it is to reach that spot inside us that remains pure that we never manage to touch but which we know exists--and i try to touch that spot...what is you, scout? what is the you of you? what is the link? where do you begin and end? this you thing--is it an invisible silk woven from your memories? is it a spirit? is it electric? what exactly is it?...oh, i know you guys think my life is some big joke--that it's going nowhere. but i'm happy. and it's not like i'm lost or anything. we're all too fucking middle class to ever be lost. lost means you had faith or something to begin with and the middle class never really had any of that. so we can never be lost. and you tell me, scout--what is it we end up being, then--what exactly is it we end up being then--instead of being lost?"

lately i have been feeling so tainted and diluted that i find myself yearning for purity. i'm not talking about doing all the morally right things externally or following a bunch of rules. i believe that there is something about purity that inherently goes beyond rules and beyond morality. and as cloudy and foggy as i feel these days, i know that in me somewhere is that purity that i am longing for. i know it must be so, or else i wouldn't care about it. the way i envision this purity to be is like that little girl clutching her father's hand. i think it has something to do with putting all my hope, trust and devotion in something beyond myself, something i simply know and believe without a doubt to be my ultimate protector and my source of thoroughly complete happiness and unconditional love.

some people think that if they only find that one person to fall in love with for the rest of their lives, that would be the ultimate happiness. i don't buy that though. i was telling josh b. last night that i am now skeptical of romantic love, that i don't believe it's the end that i'm looking for. there has to be more. frankly, i have come to doubt my ability to love someone in such a way unless i first find that purity and soak myself in it. i'm not saying this out of being jaded. i'm saying this because i know that without this purity, i am only capable of being a selfish spoiled brat manifesting all sorts of symptoms of brokenness. i don't expect to become perfect. i just hope to be whole, to love purely and entirely, and to receive love purely and entirely.

recent soundtrack:
s/t - the ocean blue
see the ocean blue - tob
from the nest of idea - scientific
it's hard to find a friend - pedro the lion
ghost of david - damien jurado
i break chairs - damien jurado
misc. mp3s including:
will you find me - american music club
whole - ptl
invention - ptl
nightswimming - r.e.m.
talk about the passion - r.e.m.
perfect circle - r.e.m.
summer dress - red house painters
have you forgotten - red house painters
kyrie eleison - sinead oconnor
but not tonight - depeche mode
we walk the same line - everything but the girl
25 december - ebtg
notebook - the innocence mission
failure - kings of convenience
when all the stars were falling - lisa loeb
yesterday, tomorrow - denison witmer
everybody knows - denison witmer
you're beautiful - mojave 3
prayer for the paranoid - mojave 3
2 stones in my pocket - neil halstead
dreamed i saw soldiers - neil halstead
high hopes - neil halstead
a bunch of other stuff...

i just found out the weakerthans are coming to the empty bottle the same nite as the 764-hero/6parts7/swearing@motorists concert @ schubas on may 18th. AGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i was planning on seeing joe sweeney earlier that nite at schubas for the early show and then catching the 764hero show right after...but like how often do the weakerthans come to chicago? like not that often, those canadians...i don't know what to do...i am so spoiled it's sick. i mean, imagine if i lived in the middleofnowhere, usa. to be stressing cuz there are like way too many choices for live music is probably way stupid. but that's how i feel, so there. maybe i'll draw straws...flip a coin...clone myself...plant a recording device at one of the locations...keep driving back & forth between the two locations...cry...see how the spirit leads me...whatever. i wish i'd never found out about the weakerthans concert. then i would have been ignorantly blissful. ah, knowledge--what bittersweet turmoil you bring on my head.