A Home Song

This past week, I had a very unique experience. For the first time in my life, my home was shared with no one. Ever since my birth, the houses that I lived in always contained more than merely myself. For the first 19 years of my life, I lived with my family. After that, I spent two years in different houses throughout the northeast of Brasil. Following that, I spent eight months living with various roommates who all became good friends. Finally, I have spent the last glorious 15 months living with a woman. Not just any woman, but my wife. My beautiful, lovely, artistic, and wonderful wife.

However, her artistic nature sent her off to New York to meet with artists, studios, guilds, museums, and anything else associated with her chosen interest. Naturally, my intentions were to be with her, yet my interests left me here. Her trip to NY left me with the opportunity to live alone. Never before have I spent evenings by myself or slept under a private rooftop. 


What makes a home anyway? Do construction workers take into account the inhabitants of their creations? Does anybody think of the perfect mix to solidify a home? I have a theory:

First, home is a place where you expect to feel wanted. Take the young university student for example: he/she anticipates that, once past the front door, the feeling of received will be love and desire. 

When I went to Brasil, I wondered how I was supposed to make it home. Here is a great example of the places that I assumed to call home:

The Yellow one is mine, the rest of the street follows.  We basically share walls.

I wasn't entirely sure how I was supposed to make a glorified shed (with no ceiling and empty inside areas) a home. Little did I know in six months time I would be used to the environment. I anticipated coming here each night to relax and sleep.

While there, I encountered people who spent time around my home city (Orem). My greatest query, left unanswered since I didn't have the nerve to ask the question, was this: Did you enjoy coming back home (to Brasil from Orem)? In my mind, I somehow contrived that living in Orem, UT was infinitely better than living in a place similar to the picture above. However, I overlooked the quality of life that the family and friends can bring to someone. If I had asked the question, I'm sure the answer would been in the affirmative. Anyone would choose this^ over somewhere else if it meant feeling wanted.

Second, home is a place of familiarity. Take a lesson from my cat. Her name is Willow: 

When she first came to our home, she would not come out of her pet carrier. She was extremely timid. Her mom passed away soon after she was born, so she wasn't sure exactly what to expect with life. For the first couple days, she found hiding spaces under the cabinets where we couldn't reach her. She would never emerge, even with toy and tuna offerings. We grew worried...

However, with cats, they need to become familiar with a new place before they can be themselves. They need to associate their smell with their surroundings, and they need to associate humans with food, care, and affection. After the two nights under the cabinets, Willow reappeared. Nowadays, she can't spend five minutes away from us. Even as I write this blog, she sleeps under my chair. If I were to move to the bed, she would most likely follow. Willow, just like us all, need familiarity to call a place a home. I feel that for us non-felines, familiarity comes much more from other people and much less from surrounding circumstances. 

Lastly, home needs to be a creation. Wherever people decide to live, whether alone or together, they need to feel a personal investment in that place. This could be pictures of those whom we are most familiar with. The personal investment could also be as simple as personally choosing a place to live. 

Take this for example: this is a picture of our bar. We barely finished re-panelling the back of it with a white bead board. We are both have no experience in home improvement, but we still were able to make it look nice! It's our own personal touch to the place we call home!

So, if I had any advice for anyone who is searching for someone to share their home with, it would probably be something like this: Seek out those who you miss in their absence. Chances are, if you are excited when they come home after a week or more away, you'll probably be just as excited to see them  after being apart for any incremental amount of time. 

I conclude with the words of Henry Van Dyke: emphasis added

"I read within a poet's book 
A word that starred the page:
"Stone walls do not a prison make, 
Nor iron bars a cage!" 

Yes, that is true; and something more
You'll find, where'er you roam,
That marble floors and gilded walls
Can never make a home. 

But every house where Love abides,
And Friendship is a guest,
Is surely home, and home-sweet-home:
For there the heart can rest."

Moments musicaux

I barely came home from another jazz concert that I attended, this time at BYU. At this particular concert, much of the charts they selected weren't my taste (which is okay). I was listening with disdain, wondering when the intermission would come. 

However, right after the intermission, the lead tenor came out on stage. With the spotlight on him, and no one in the background, he started to play a simple bluesy rift. Bop-bop-baaaaa....over and over again. 

Pretty soon this simple rift became a maelstrom of notes. He was playing bass for himself, melody, and even high color notes. All single handedly.Mind you, there were some parts where he wasn't even playing notes. He was merely tapping keys and breathing air through his instrument and it was still musical. 

The band meandered out after five minutes and complemented his solo. He then went off: up and down, up and down, playing two notes at a time (which is nie impossible on a saxophone). Oh my goodness, I couldn't believe what I was hearing. 

The piano had a solo about halfway through the song, but he had to wait for about one minute for all the applause to die down from the tenor solo. He then plinked out a few notes, but the audience wasn't listening. We were still in shock from the tenor player. Luckily, he got back up to finish of the song.

Now, I'm not a big fan of standing ovations. I feel like many people give them out of sympathy, rather than actual musical genius (and especially in the Utah area...we give them out like free samples). I especially am not a fan of it in the middle of a concert. But, when this tenor was done with his song, I was up (luckily with the rest of the crowd) because I had experienced what I considered to be one of those profound "musical moments" that only happen in life a few times. 

These "musical moments" occur when something you just witnessed and heard shot through your body and made you gasp in awe. Every time you experience them, they make you feel like your life had just changed in some awesome crazy way, merely by listening to sound. A beautiful, ravaging, phenomenal sound. 

I can name only a couple of other "musical moments" (i.e. singing beautiful choral tunes in a NY cathedral, witnessing Sissel sing an absolutely piercing (in a good way) european christmas carol, being blown away from the first hearing of First Circle by Pat Metheny).

A couple summers ago, I was working in landscaping mowing lawns. I was listening to a new live album from John Mayer. He covered a song called "I don't need no doctor." My goodness, I stopped mowing and stood still with a shocked look on my face. Like "did I seriously just hear what I think I did?"

Anyways, musical moments! Look for them, appreciate them!

And as an anecdote, Thank you SO MUCH to all the musicians who have put on a performance. Thanks for sacrificing other things to be a part of a group that creates music. Thank you for promoting music in school and in other places where we can grow to appreciate and cherish it. 

Secrets of the soul

In honor of New York's Fashion week which occurred last week (#NYFW), I thought it would be appropriate to share some thoughts and history about my take on fashion. 

First, a background:

I was a wal-mart clothing shopper until the summer of 8th grade. What can I say? When your parents pay for your clothes, you go where they take you. My dad loves the old jeans and free-company polo, so that was about as much fashion as I'd ever know until I was 15. 
My friends and I made a daring escape to the mall to purchase clothes that we thought were cool. For the first time in my life, I was able to purchase clothes that I actually liked. During that time until the beginning of high school, I bought clothes that I thought looked good on other people. 

Pretty soon I began to buy dress shirts and ties and other such articles of clothing (at age 16!). The things I bought looked so nice, I didn't take any of them with me on the mission (two years in the hot sun of the equator would demolish them). I'd keep up with the stores and find screaming deals everywhere. It's probably the most feminine that I'd ever be.

One of the sad moments from growing up was watching a friend of mine win the "best dressed" category in the senior yearbook. He liked to wear sweats to high school....almost all the time. I was a bit indignant about this, since I 'carefully' (I use this in the male sense...carefully means 'gave 1-2 minutes of consideration') chose most of the outfits that I purchased and wore. 

Fast forward to today, and back to that feminine thing: When I started to date the woman that would become my wife, I started to find clothes for her. We'd go shopping constantly on my invitation. I know this is rare, because I see all the other men at the store whose wives dragged them there to replace the clothes they bought years before. I introduced her to Banana, Nordstrom, J. Crew, Kate Spade (more on this brand later), Saks, Bloomingdales, Calvin Klein, and all the outlet stores and brands that go with them.

Nowadays, I get more excited to find more clothes for her than myself. This is due to the fact that women have much more of a diverse style than men. I enjoy finding new outfits and unique looks in women's clothing. There is more to explore in the women's fashion than men, and since my wife is so nice, I am allowed to see the different outfits on an actual being and not just a model (actual beings are much prettier than models).
We've moved on from brands like american eagle, levis, and aeropostale (no offense to the brands) and now we dream of Burberry, Vera Wang, Badgley Mischka, and other designers. We wonder, "If we had the money, would we honestly have the guts to buy some of this stuff?" Sometimes yes. 

This brings me to Kate Spade. As a man, I love this brand. I think it has an awesome style for women. I follow them on twitter and send things to my wife about new styles they create. If I could get her anything, it'd probably be a bag or heels from this designer. 

Even as I describe this, it sounds very strange to me. But what the heck, I enjoy fashion. Consider it a guilty pleasure; in this case, the guilty part being when I feel like less of a man looking at designer dresses.

New place in P.G.

This last week I went to a new ward (for those of who you aren't familiar with the mormon church, a ward is a congregation of people who attend church, usually contained within a certain geographic location). Hopefully, no one in that ward follows me yet... because one of the funnest things about a new wards is the opportunity to meet (and profile) some of the personalities one meets in the first couple weeks. For example:

Bone-crusher: You meet him with a handshake. However, his vice-grip gives you the impression that: his life really depends on the power of his grip, or he works with crabs and lobsters. Within 1-2 minutes, you already know his calling in the ward, and you can't help but notice the Christmas ties still being worn at the end of January.

Up at the front of the congregation, you meet Squidfingers. He directs the music with as much enthusiasm as the conductor of the Boston Pops. Usually, the conductor uses his/her right hand, doing a small triangular motion in front of their body. But not squidfinger: He keeps two arms above his head and shoulders, creating complete circular motions with his hands while directing every beat and subbeat to every hymn. Even though you might sing with as much energy as squidfinger gives, you notice everyone around you with their nose in the hymnal, already accustomed to the arm-waving and finger-flailing.

Then, with greeting in the hall, you meet cardboard-tote lady. She carries a handle which is connected to something that resembles a cardboard briefcase. This caught me by surprise, because I had not seen a cardboard tote since the early nineties (when I was in the kid-section of the church called Primary). Her personality is very frivolous, jumpy, and social, rather like the person in line at the grocery store that shows you the wallet-size pictures of their kids or the girl you never want to meet at parties. I immediately predicted that she worked with the Primary kids. Yup- hole in one. She is in charge of the primary.



I started this blog last month. Now I've been fully integrated in the new ward and teaching the youngest class in primary (more formally known as "sunbeams"). I've met more people, played basketball with the guys, and helped create strawberry shortcake for over 200 single members of the church who are ages 30-80; that's another story in of itself.

My favorite part about premature profiling comes when you get to know the people you profile. They are always so much cooler when you get to know them for real! It's a fun way to remember names, hobbies, personalities, and situations. This also makes journals and memories way more enticing to read over again!