This’ll go on my desk, when I have a desk on which to put pictures.

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So it turns out I’m absolutely atrociously bad at writing Facebook status updates. My writing tends to be long-form, verbose, scientific… delving deeply into topics like dental materials. Fascinating to me, boOOoring to others.

I’ll come up with this idea for a status update. For example, on the forthcoming 100th anniversary of one of the greatest maritime disasters of the 20th century: “The fourth smokestack on the Titanic wasn’t for smoke. It was for ventilation and esthetics.” I think that’s such a cool piece of trivia, because there are pictures where you can clearly see someone looking out of what is ostensibly a smokestack. So yes, that’s the type of status update I’d be writing. Not… good. Few share the same curiosity about the way things work, and even fewer will want such trivia dropped into their “stream” of updates from their friends. I guess it makes things seem like work to them.

Anyhow, the typical status update would be more like this: “Guys, the Titanic was real! #mindblown”. I could keep practicing, but I don’t know if I want to get better at that type of thing.

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I bought Mykala tickets to William Fitzsimmons on her birthday in January, and we finally got to see his show the other week. It was probably the best concert to which I’ve ever been. When the opener got up and just played a song on his acoustic guitar, sans-mic or pickup, I realized the earplugs I brought might be overkill (for once). I hate the cotton-eared feeling you get when you’ve been listening to loud music for too long. I’m also not a huge fan of hiding the (still embarrassing) fact that I’m wearing earplugs in a venue whose sole purpose is, ostensibly, to facilitate listening.

So, then William Fitzsimmons takes the stage. And, I think, Mykala and I expected him to have the more delicate voice that is his singing voice. It’s sad, beautiful music and he sings it with a voice that matches. By contrast, his onstage personality was funny and his voice was deep and commanding. Our audience was, for the most part, extraordinarily well-behaved; it was like listening to great music in your living room. I think the venue where we saw the concert, The Cedar Cultural Center, is a gem of the Twin Cities. The age range of attendees was 17-60 years, and you could tell these people were really here to listen and enjoy capital-m music.

Right now, my favorite song from William Fitzsimmons is Fade and then Return, but I think the best song of that night was Everything Has Changed. Really, shockingly good.

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I think I’m holding a vigil tonight. And not in the sense of “I think I plan on it,” but rather I mean “I think this is happening right now.” So, what is the subject or purpose of my vigil? I’m reminiscing about life in school at St. Thomas and the U while looking ahead at my life. This involves a lot of mindless clicking around on Facebook, which I usually try to avoid. I find myself regretting things I both did and did not do in my past, and wondering about the future. I’m listening to Sigur Rós. It’s a quarter after 1 in the morning. Mykala is asleep on the couch.

I don’t know what my life is all about.

I guess, I’d just like to start working. I know I’ve the training on the basics, and the skills to fill in the gaps, but it’s hard not knowing where I will be spending my working days. I just want to contribute some stability to this little family. I want to give Mykala the option to not work and focus on school for a while, if that’s what she chooses. I want to be the provider, someone who can be counted on.

It’s probably time to sleep, now.

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I think this is an uptempo house remix of a 70s funk song? Pandora + late night = GET YOUR FUNK ON.

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I’m waiting for the right combination: a patient with a sense of humor and a mildly but not-too-difficult extraction, to try out this little gem: “man… this is like pulling teeth.”

Or, it’s possible that I should just keep that one to myself.

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The pollen outside today was actually visible. It was raining pollen onto the car, and I could see many little granules of it running in delicate rivulets down the glass. Surprisingly, both Mykala and I seem to either be getting used to the constant congestion of allergy season or our bodies are adjusting. Mykala might have mono, and by extension so might I. Both of us have histories of remarkably poor ear nose and throat health. My future children (not yet on the way, though Mykala and I frequently talk about you in the abstract), if you are reading this, I am very sorry for your ears — you can blame both myself and your mother.

Anyhow, Mykala and I went to Menards and bought a hammock today. I was saying “we can’t afford it” before. Mykala was saying “if we can’t afford this, what can we afford?” Also: cost per use on a hammock gets really low — it’s a lot of relaxation for not a lot of money. After reassessing the financial situation, and wanting to bring joy into my wife’s life, I relented — we bought a 500 pound-capacity stand with a colorful cloth hammock. We put the whole thing together on the patio, atop the garage in the duplex here.

The whole contraption took up half the patio!

“I, uh, well don’t think it’s going to work,” said Mykala. “How will we do anything else out there?” She was, of course, right. So, I began packing the whole thing back up again, to be returned. It looked like someone had done the same before, because when I unpacked the thing, the scratches and ragged tape seemed to indicate that someone else had gone through the same exercise. Oh well!

Someday, we’ll live in a house with a yard, and we’ll put up a hammock on the green grass. We’ll drink ice tea. The dog we don’t currently have will chase the kids we haven’t yet had and the little kiddie pool we haven’t yet bought will slowly warm up under the sun of a summer we haven’t yet started.

As we once again take the wheel of lives whose courses have long been dictated by decisions 8 years in the past (dental school being one of those), we begin to realize the weight of the future. The endless possibilities leave a person breathless. So, as we jump from now into next, we hold one another tightly.

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