Ponderosa

I'm often reluctant to put anything of much substance or consequence onto this ripple in the electronic sea. It's just an impersonal medium (among other reservations). But on this Friday morning, sitting in Cups Cafe on Barnett Shoals Rd., I'm willing to break down...

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This part of Athens feels like somewhere else I’ve been before. Payson, perhaps, on the weekend in between Workcrew? Or is it Flagstaff, on all those mornings, old and recent, reminding me of cousins and ghosts? Whatever it is, the music swimming from the iPod to my ears feels so safe and comfortable. As though it knows me better somehow on this morning. The way he’s screaming, the way the music is building and building, until both of us are up and away from this place, transcendent like the fireflies You showed me that night. Everything fits together, everything fits together. It’s all some grand production. And don’t let them tell you that makes it less meaningful. Just because there’s drama afoot doesn’t mean this is fake. No, no, quite on the contrary. We’ll dance and sing and play with all abandon, because we know we have the privilege of doing so on a stage fit for kings and queens. This means everything. So take it or leave it, it’s up to you. But if you stay, if you engage, you will find that the strife, the struggle for breath, is the best, the only, thing you can do.