HOTEL LE CHURCH

MY LIFE (AND WHAT'S GOING ON- BLAH BLAH BLAH)

Day 3 of my fantastic new life in the North Pole. Yes, it has gotten colder than the other day, but I still haven't found need to wear two jackets at once.

There have been services every day since I get here except yesterday, in which me and my loving father took to watch the 6 hour epic: "The Tin Man" (one of my all-time favorites). Of course, no movie day is complete without getting totally junked up on 'pop, chips, and coke. I'm paying for it a bit today, but not unbearably so. It was definitely worth it.

Also, we're not staying a crampy motel anymore, or the camp ground that we had planned to go to yesterday, but the church fellowship hall: living quarters complete with a kitchen, 3 bathrooms, a storage room filled with boxes, a large auditorium, and a multipurpose room, which we set up camp in. By 'camp' I mean we put our suitcases on the tables and laid down 1 air-mattress, and 1 clump of chairs to be used as a makeshift bed (there was only one air-mattress). It wasn't actually that bad though. I'll admit my "chair bed" fell apart a few times in the night, but I think I've set it up now in a way it won't have that chance again. +15 chair building exp.

MY SPIRITUAL LIFE (AND ALL ELSE THAT MAY RELATE TO IT)

I had to change the title so I could blog about this, but for the last couple services, I've been leading worship. That's right! Little Garrett, who can barely hold a pitch is now not only singing louder than everyone else, but is required to do it! Fortunately there isn't a whole lot of "musical intimidation" here since the multiple people who sang when me and my dad weren't singing, were reeeeeaaaally (and I mean in the kindest way possible) awful. I'll try to post a video so you can hear at some point, but until I have enough internets to do that, you'll just have to imagine a seal doing it's mating call while playing an accordion.

I know this sound horribly mean, but let me try to redeem myself. Even though the pitch, timing, and playing were less than desirable, the people playing it were incredibly passionate. It was like they really meant the words they were saying, even to the point of breaking out into tears, or maybe that was just part of the song.

But seriously, I find I'm far more inspired when people who can't sing, sing loud and with all their hearts, then when people who are fantastic musician are at work. You aren't so much distracted by how much you enjoy the song, as you’re just pulled into a spirit of worship by watching and listening. It's hard not to join in when people put that much into it.

MY STUFF (AND STUFF)

Still working on producing that demo for AE (Atmosphere's End, not American Eagle. You laugh, but it gets old when people think you're playing an instrument for a clothing company all the time), but I've actually been spending a lot of time just working on music in general. Not writing new music with a guitar or piano so much as working on understanding the ropes of Protools' MIDI interface a bit better.

I've been specifically trying to master a style of music known as "Dubstep". I have an appreciation for every style of music, but recently I've really been interested, and have been listening to a lot in this genre. I've got to say though, it's more challenging than anything I've tried to produce before. There are so many specific elements that make up the style, and each are just as difficult to create. It's hard, because I'm not sure I have half of the software required for a lot of it, but I'm making due. I'll try to post a clip or two of what I've been coming up with, although I've ended up with a lot more dance than good beat-downs. Maybe I'll just throw together a montage of them all so you can hear for yourself how much of a hard time I'm having.

Anyway, 'driving down a road that's made of more ice than gravel, so I better go.

UNTIL NEXT TIME.

(3 hours later)

OR UNTIL I LEAVE AND COME BACK LIKE 3 HOURS LATER AND DECIDE I NEED TO BLOG AGAIN:

BISON. About 30 seconds after typing “UNTIL NEXT TIME” We had to slow the truck down to about 20 KPH. Not because of some stupid speed limit laws about school children or something, but because the road had become flooded with a small herd of buffalo/bison.

I felt like such a city kid, yelling and gawking at the simplest of wild life. Robert was super chill. Oh yeah, did I mention I found out “Steve’s” name is actually Robert? True say. Anyway, the real reason I needed to come back on here was to tell the story of Desmond. Not Desmond from Lost, but Desmond from Manitoba (the less well known show also by J.J. Abrams).

Desmond was a church going guy, but really screwed his life up a while ago, and hasn’t really been living the life of a Christian for a pretty long time. Last night, something hit him. I don’t know what, but the conviction was so strong, he just felt he needed to give his life back to God, and he needed to do so quick-like. He got in his car and drove off to the closest church. No one was there. I mean, what do you expect? People are just going to chill at the church all day on Mondays? Yeah, that’s what all the cool kids are doing… obviously not, because there weren’t any “cool kids” at the church either.

Desmond kept driving, looking around for someone else to ”show him the way”. This guy was just hungry for God. Finally, after searching the back shelf of his brain for any remaining memories of the location of just one more church, success: He spotted a large tabernacle with the lights on. It just happened to be the building that my dad and I were staying in. He pulled into the parking lot and knocked on the door. He was greeted but my ever attentive father, who let him in.

They talked for a while. I wasn’t there, so I don’t know everything they talked about, but I do know that it ended with Desmond giving his life back to Christ, and that’s the important part anyway. Great story, right? But see, that’s not even the funny part, and we all know funny parts are the best parts!

FUNNY PART: We were originally going to spend last night in a camp site (like I said earlier), but at the last second, some guy (he owned the camp I guess) said he actually wouldn’t have the space for us to set up. We only found this out after we had packed our bags and were driving down the road. Robert offered for us to just stay in the motel again, but my dad insisted we stay in the church since he didn’t like being so cramped up. Robert with cool with that, and I had no qualms, so we “set up camp” (see paragraph 3).

Just around the time Desmond decided to go soul searching, my mom called. Dad picked up, and since he wanted to be all personal and private and whatever, he decided to go into the auditorium. ‘You seeing this now? Had we not ended up having our plans to stay at this guy’s camp messed up, or had my mom not called at that exact time, or had my dad not wanted to be all private-y and stuff, the lights wouldn’t have been on in the auditorium, my dad and I wouldn’t have been there, and Desmond might not have ever gotten his life right with God again.

God is so boss…