Tuesday, May 08, 2012

things are gonna be great / at 28
So maybe it'd be considered cheating to specifically pick the new birthday song, but I don't really care. My rules, my game. Besides, "In the Light" reflects (ha) what I didn't feel I did well this past stressed-out year, and hence what I need to keep working on this year. (And isn't it nice to have a song that I actually know the words to rather than a general knowledge of melody and chorus?)

[Fun fact: it's the Truman male a capella group True Men's version that plays in my head, no disrespect to dc Talk. (I wish I could find a link to share.) Further fun fact: it's the same version I played over and over the first week I lived in the new apartment (before Jessica moved in) to help me fall asleep. I was on a flat mattress--or the couch, depending on the day--and there was crying. Bless you, younger Hannah.]

Sometimes I like playing "follow the margin citations," which is how I jumped around the Old and New Testaments last night, though originally starting in Psalms. We need the light, whether as a scientific principle or a symbolic representation of God. Light warms us, nutures us (whatever vitamin I don't get enough of because I'm always inside a dark room ... and growing the leafy things I don't usually eat unless there's a burger attached), and guides us through and out of darkness. One of the first verses I've learned due to theater is from the top of John: "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness does not comprehend it." The light that we need so badly to survive is a mystery to the darkness it conquers, just as it is a mystery to us who naturally have that same darkness in us. (Who here really remembers all the talk in science class about photosynthesis or electricity? Science Major David, please don't buzz in.) Maybe all this made more sense in my brain last night at midnight-ish, or even this morning drafting it on the bus. I just know I can be petty, and intentially mean, and I sometimes lie to actors (even when it's not to their benefit), so I need the light as much as I can soak up at any given time.


3 comments:

Hannah said...

(Please don't let my reflective melancoly fool you - it was a fairly grand day. Once we got past the awkward company morning meeting, there was bacon and orange slices and good lunch company and sparkly shoes and a plush Dalek, so I'm having a fantastic day.)

Travis said...

I love that song. It has often convicted me of my own failings as well, while simultaneously giving me the encouragement that grace is not dependent on my performance. I can't count the number of times I've heard (was going to quote part of the song, but realized I'd have to quote the whole song to do it justice) and thought, "I feel just like that right now."

youknowwho:-) said...

When i think of that song I actually think of the squid squad when we were trying to set lights in the black box. Ron told someone to move into the light and Chris broke into that song.... Ahhh memories