| Shrimp!: This was the speech I delivered at graduation. I had been asked to prepare it by my principal Mr. Steeb who is an awesome guy. I grew to be his friend over a period of 5 years and I learned that he was quite a cool guy. When he asked me to simply make a speech up for the heck of it I wondered why. I figure he knew I was unabashed at being truthful and straightforward with my "address" as it was printed on the program. I used the speech as a platform to be bluntly honest about school attitude. The fact that whether or not we get good or bad grades in school is irrelevant. HOW we achieve our results is what matters. Sadly I may have pushed a few buttons with people who got good grades but in doing so didn't hold the greatest attitudes toward other students. My objective in writing this speech was to break from the norm grad speeches that..zzzzzZZZZZZ....just don't hold the audience's attention and use the all too used buzz phrases like...."the future"..."the next step"...and the ego stroking "success thus far" category. Being honest here...I think from watching the video over a few times...I got a pretty dang good applause...hopefully that meant I achieved my goal. Plus shortly thereafter we rocked Rossville with our earthshaking diploma encore via the airhorn salute...MWAHAHA!...sorry Mr. Steeb. |
| Wahoo!: This was an editorial I sent to the Frankfort Times that addresses the concept of graduations...in short I can only say that this was in response to some varied critism of whether or not it was right to cheer individually for students when getting their diploma...sorry but those who think it isn't right should understand that 13 years is experienced individually and therefore...in my opinion we have earned the dignity of yelling...WAHOO...if we feel so inclined. |
| Then the Morning Comes: I wrote this in mid December of this past year when I was enduring a pretty tough schedual of waking up every morning to this experience, and this was just the commute. The piece speaks pretty much for its self. I use very little symbolism because the prose is meant to convey the sheer reality of the situation. I want people to read this and feel like they are there. I want the reader to shiver just from seeing the words knowing what it must be like. For those of you who may not have yet experienced Chicago winter...come here sometime and just stand on the Lake Shore Drive riverwalk just beside Michigan Avenue and face the lake. You'll know what I mean. |
| My Angel & You Felt Wonderful Tonight: These 2 pieces were written some 3 weeks apart but form a single piece in seperate modes. The first section entitled "My Angel" is a "thank you" directed toward the Lord for sending Ash into my life. I have loved this girl all of my life. I have adored her personality and her care for all people with such tenderness. I have carried her picture with me for years whereever I went, and do to this day. I have never gotten the chance to outright tell her my inner feelings straightforth due to our seperation of distance and my infrequent visiting abilities. Section 2 of the piece titled "You Felt Wonderful Tonight" is an address to that very concern. It is a visualization of my thoughts of her and what I battle in my mind each time I am lucky enough to hold her knowing the time between such events is extensive. p.s.- the phrase "voice of an angel" was the stimulant for the creation of the first piece which lead to the 2nd piece due to the need for a further development of why she is viewed thusly. |
| The Simple Choices We Make Everyday: This was written in under 15 minutes due to a fevered rush of creative feelings. I had just returned from experiencing what is written in the piece. It is actually a series of inter-connected events ...Brandon and I's trip to the beach in the summer, the elementary school recess, and the kids playing cricket in the parking lot. These events are all stimulated via the trip from McCormick Place down to the 31st Street Bridge which in itself is a symbol of our daily walks with God who gives us the path beneath our feet yet allows us to find the meaning in why we are there and the strength to take the next step. |
| Mr. Ugly: This was something that I worked on for over 5 months thinking, editing, and experiencing. The actual meeting of Mr. Ugly was first at the Lake Meadows Center but happened every so often all across downtown and in the lower loop. Each time I saw in him familiar traits of the homeless and street walkers I have many times, but I also noticed his use of new tactics and prods meant to gain a response from travelers and pedestrians. I merely wanted to express a fundemantal question to the reader in this piece: What would you do if you were there? I express both my feelings of guilt and digust that I encounter in the situation hoping to spawn the reader's own mental descision to make itself evident. This question is made obvious in the close of the final paragraph in the next to last sentence. But there is an anti-truth in the final sentence which makes the reader hopefully see its misleading effect: if Mr. Ugly is just an actor in a "one-man show"...why does his act effect me, the audience?...which shows the irony of the fact that there are no "one-man shows" because the actual person who stands alone in the spotlight of decision is the reader having to decide for himself what he feels. |
| I AM NOT LIKE YOU: This was written more like a triple stanza of poetry yet I feel it is better as prose becuase it is an address to 3 sets of individuals: 1st the snobby aristocratic upper class of Starbucks� drinking yuppies of Chicago's Gold Coast...2nd the ghetto dwelling gang banger-mentality urbanites who find their life in drugs and guns...and 3rd the supposed friends who ignore their own by indifference and lack of concern. Each stanza style paragraph I set up as a juxtapose...ME VS. THEM. I show the ugliness of what each group does to hurt itself and others and why I do not count myself as a member of any of these groups even though each of the groups considers me a member of the remaining two. Hopefully the reader of this piece will be able to safely say that he/she does not fall into any of the specific categories for their own peace of mind. |
| Like Tomatoes?: This is a very complex symbolism prose. The metaphor presented here is much more than just me liking tomatoes. Before continuing this go back and reread th piece but everywhere there is a mention of tomatoes exchange that for "people". The concept is that people are like tomatoes...each different and unique in flavor, color and substance. We each have different qualities that make us desirable. I say "I like tomatoes with a thin skin" meaning that I am "like" a tomato with a thin skin. I take many things to heart and in my world this causes a lot of conflict because my industry is filled with very thick skinned people who care for no one but themselves and protecting their interests. The idea beingt that a thin skinned tomato usually has a lot of juice...a lot of flavor...color...productive seeds...its value is found on the inside just like deep humans and hopefully myself. When people have a thick skin or are the type who build walls to protect themselves emotionally, spiritually, or intellectually they are like those hothouse tomatoes....harsh....flavorless...uninviting....and when you look inside they are dry, without passion, without flavor, no substance and sadly unproductive. People say they want to be passionate..or want to be creative or whatever the case is...but continue to be the opposite...continue to uphold the ugliness of shallowness and become the norm of society just as consumers puchase low quality tomatoes. I also address how the good tomatoes ie the deep people in life should be treated. Find and cherish them. Don't just cast them aside because they eventually will darken and go bad without use. Creativity and passion must be stoked like a fire so I want people to seek out the people in their lives that are like fruit...as the Bible uses as an example...bearingt that fruit like a vine...an inter-connected strand of existence that supports itself though one another. The final sentence is a line inspired by 1 Corinthians 6:13 "Food for the stomach and the stomach for food." This meaning that people feed each other through their interaction and they cannot seperate the effects from each other. Paul quoted the Corinthians who said that eating didn't effect their salvation yet he corrected them by saying the mastery of ones actions is the backbone of salvation. So the line previous to this saying, "taken with a grain of salt" is a reference to the flavor enhancing power of salt which symbolizes the sharpening our understanding to the needs of others. |
| Practical: This is the dissertation of evaluations here at the school vs. my own concept of what "practical" education is. I personally dislike the idea of grades very much and wish people would eventually learn a better method. I have grown tired after 14 years of the continual repetition of pandering to the god of grades and seeking not to learn but to simply get a mark on a piece of paper that says we're achieving. I refer again to the Lord who didn't send his son to earth to give everyone a passing grade but to teach the understanding of life an its principals. |
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| The Road Music: This piece is, in short, about the highway. A place I love to be and continually find myself returning to. For all of my life I have traveled from one place to another whether moving or just making a road trip. I love to drive or just sit and be a passenger. Because in truth we are all one or the other...both on the road and in life. You either drive or let yourself be taken somewhere. This prose is symbolic of also our journey on the road of life and how we travel it. Do we just stare ahead and concern ourselves only with our immediate future or do we savor our trip and look out the window or engage ourselves with our fellow passenger's lives? The road music is something I feel everyone is familiar with. Because we all listen at some point to what we feel we need, upbeat jazzy happy music or soft melodious songs that help us feel something special deep inside. It may be John Denver and Randy Travis for one person or Creed and Cold Play for someone else. But either way the words we here are there for us in that tiny capsule to move us down the road and move us inside. I end the piece with a statement about my father. He has been the predominant driver on my trips on the road as well as the predominant driver in my life. Giving me an example of how to live and how to lead others. When he goes behind the wheel, I feel safe and thats all that matters to me sometimes because I know that when I go to sleep, I'll eventually wake up and it doesn't matter where I am, because I'll be safe since I'm with him. Just as I am with my heavenly father, who gives me peace. |