musictubes.

You may or may not know this about me, but a large part of my childhood and adolescence was spent in front of a television. Whenever I tell people that Tim and I don't have cable, a part of me feels the need to quickly explain that I am not a pretentious hippie at heart - that a piece of me will always be a television fiend just like the rest of the world.

My family used to eat home-cooked meals (or buckets of KFC) while watching Wheel of Fortune and instead of "family game night," we had TGIF. I watched Inspector Gadget before I left to catch the bus for school, MacGyver when I got home, Alf while I did my homework, and, if I was really sneaky, Married w/Children, while I pretended to be asleep on the couch while my parents watched it.

Although television often got me through the daily grind of school work and extracurricular activities, my fondest TV memories are from my adolescent summers. On a typical weekday in the summer, circa junior high, I would roll out of bed around 10 and immediately turn on MTV. MTV, like mainstream radio stations, often played the exact same videos at the exact same time of day. One summer I awoke each morning to the smooth melody and mind-blowing rhymes of Skee-Lo's "I Wish." I would watch music videos through the morning, and only deviate periodically to check out Whose Line Is It Anyway? or MST3K over on the ComCen.

The other night, James Mann and I rekindled our love for watching music videos one after another in visual-audio bliss as we sat on my couch and looked up some of our favorites on the youtubes. It all started with a conversation about those old CD clubs that offered you 16 CDs for a penny, and 1 CD for $145. This led to a conversation about Wilson Phillips, after which we immediately looked up the video to their 1990 hit, "Hold On." We then watched Mariah Carey's "Someday" because James claimed it was her first hit single, to which I countered by queing her actual first hit single "Vision of Love." We then watched about 4 seconds of her new video "Touch My Body," but quickly switched because we realized how much it sucked (especially when juxtaposed to hits from her popstar past), but also because we remembered that Paula Abdul video with Keanu Reeves, "Rush." We then remembered that the best music video ever made was NIN's "Closer." Then we remembered when Johnny Cash covered NIN's "Hurt" and watched the first part of that video, but then I think Jim started to tear up watching Johnny's old wrinkly sad face, so he suggested we move on to some newer vids. So we watched some sweet videos by my new favorite band, CSS. They make good videos...I like "Alcohol."

In conclusion, if you haven't just sat and watched music videos in awhile, you should dedicate some time to it tonight. You won't regret it.

Feel free to post your favorite music videos in the comment section.

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I have not posted for a few weeks because I have been waiting for some interesting, funny, entertaining tidbit of information to pop into my brain to share with the World Wide Web (or with Seth, who may be the only person that reads this). However, since my brain has been void of such tidbits, I have remained silent.

To be honest, the last few weeks have been plagued with confusion, disappointment, anger, confrontation, frustration, sadness, compassion, and it goes without saying complete emotional weariness. I do not mean to complain about how terrible my life has been lately, or to confess a profound tragedy that has occurred. Maybe you have heard about some of the things I am writing. I would like to be clear that I am not writing about a singular event or incident or person, but several things that have come up in the last month. These incidents have forced me to reevaluate how I respond to others as a friend, as a leader in an organization, most importantly as a representative of Christ.

I guess I am publicizing this for a few reasons.

1. I want to be transparent with y'all about the things I am walking through - I guess that's sort of the point of a blog.

2. I want to encourage you to take a look at your relationships with people. How do you communicate with others? Are you aware of your own faults? Do you approach conflict with humility and empathy? Are you honest? Are you trustworthy? Do you listen? Really?

3. If you are lucky enough to have relationships with people who do trust you, who are honest with you, who are humble and understanding, please tell them how much you appreciate that. Tell them today. Tell them often. Remember that mature, healthy relationships are not to be assumed or taken for granted, they are rare and require much effort.

I hope and pray that through all this that I become a better person. That if I have handled things in an inappropriate way, that I can learn to respond differently in the future. I also hope that the hurts people have incurred along the way will be healed. That infractions on all sides would be forgiven. I guess these things go without saying, it's just that accomplishing them is very difficult.

All of that being said, I am really excited to hit up the Burgh for Easter. We will have a 3-for-1 Easter holiday complete with helping my mom move into a new house, Felton family fun, St. Mary's Catholic Church, BBQ at my dad's. Hopefully, the weekend will also include seeing baby June (Hooper)Mushrush, dying hard-boiled eggs festive pastel designs (perhaps Hannah Montana, Transformers or whatever new-fangled egg decorating kit is on display at Wal-mart), Easter cookies from the Donut Bank, and a brisk 2-mile jog.

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lovecare.