Song of the month (March): Lynyrd Skynyrd – Tuesday’s Gone

Although I was going to post a black keys song, ANY black Keys song, instead I decided to go with the rightful song of the month. I did get into the black keys though. I discovered them in March, downloaded one of their songs and listened to a lot of their stuff on spotify.  They are a great band and if I had become attached to one particular song, I probably would have added it. 

However, at the end of last month I went on a huge beach side camping trip with my buddies. I played the role of DJ for the party and played some of my favorite party jams. On the last day of the trip we all stood around and drank a few last beers. We packed up a few things, and we looked around that beautiful campground and it was then that I got a bright idea. I pulled out my phone and played Lynyrd Skynyrds “Tuesday’s Gone.” It is a tune that carrys nostalgia, good bye’s and good memories throughout its entire 7 minutes. Wen I played it, everybody stayed quiet for a moment and listened. My buddy mike finally broke the silence with, “This song is making me all nostalgic and $#!t! haha My job was done. I am also working on a video with this song as its soundtrack.

Lynyrd Skynyrd – Tuesday’s Gone

Train roll on, on down the line,
Won't you please take me far, far away.
Now I feel the wind blow, outside my door,
I'm leavin' my woman at home, oh yeah.
Tuesday's gone with the wind,
My baby's gone, gone with the wind.
And I don't know, oh, where I'm goin'.
I just want to be left alone.
When this train ends, I'll try again.
I'm leavin' my woman at home.
My baby's gone

Tuesday's gone with the wind.
Tuesday's gone with the wind.
Tuesday's gone with the wind.
My baby's gone, with the wind.
Train roll on
Tuesday's gone with the wind.
Tuesday's gone with the wind.
Tuesday's gone with the wind.
My baby's gone, with the wind.

Train roll on
Train roll on many miles from my home,see I'm,
I'm ridin' my blues, babe, blues away, yeah.
But Tuesday you see, a she had to be free.
Somehow I got to, to carry on.
My baby's gone.

Tuesday's gone with the wind.
Tuesday's gone with the wind.
Tuesday's gone with the wind.
My baby's gone, with the wind.

Train roll on...train roll on...
Roll on train...roll on train...roll on train
Train roll on...the train, it rolls on
Train rolls on I can't change, I can't change,
I can't change, I can't change,I can't change...
Ride on train
I can't change
Train roll on
Lord, I can't change
I can't change

Song of the Month (January): Smashing Pumpkins - Tonight, Tonight

I watched a movie about a 10 year high school reunion and there was a cover of this song on it.Its a very nostalgic song. It reminds me of many memories. Like when i was in high school and i was heavy into rap so the first time i heard this song, it was annoying to me. Or when I used to watch Road rules as a kid and i heard it again and it just made sense in the context in which it was presented. It was one of those situations where you heard the song hundreds of times when it was popular, yet it never made sense to you and then it disappears just as fast as it came. Then one day it reappears later in life on some classic rock station as it did for me and it not only makes sense, but it brings a familiar feeling with it and i loved it. That's why it was my song in January.Enjoy it folks!

Smashing Pumpkins - Tonight, Tonight


Time is never time at all
You can never ever leave without leaving a piece of youth
And our lives are forever changed
We will never be the same
The more you change the less you feel
Believe, believe in me, believe
That life can change, that you're not stuck in vain
We're not the same, we're different tonight
Tonight, so bright
Tonight
And you know you're never sure
But you're sure you could be right
If you held yourself up to the light
And the embers never fade in your city by the lake
The place where you were born
Believe, believe in me, believe
In the resolute urgency of now
And if you believe there's not a chance tonight
Tonight, so bright
Tonight
We'll crucify the insincere tonight
We'll make things right, we'll feel it all tonight
We'll find a way to offer up the night tonight
The indescribable moments of your life tonight
The impossible is possible tonight
Believe in me as I believe in you, tonight

A Beautiful Mess...

When I was 21 I went searching for a job at the Chico mall. I wasn't going to leave that mall until I had a job and I ended up finding three. One was at Radio shack, the other was at a verizon wireless store, and the last was at sears hardware. I went with the first one to hire me, Sears. I later found out I got both of the other jobs, which would have paid me a lot more. Well, until I learned how to sell, after which I was making some decent change.

I remember not liking Sears at first. I sat there at my crappy job quiet, isolated, confused, hating the managers, hating the folks I worked with, counting the minutes until the day was over. I hated that job but now, looking back, I realize that keeping that job was one of the best decisions I ever made. It didn't seem like it back then. All I could see in those days was annoying people, lazy hypocritical managers, and low pay, which blinded me to what God was doing in my life.

This weekend I went camping with my buddies from the sears days. Good guys and great friends that I would have missed out on if I had picked a different job. Three out of the 10 guys that I chose to be my groomsmen at our wedding next May worked with me at Sears. After all this time I finally realize why I worked at sears and not at the other places.

What I'm trying to say is that sometimes the near future looks bad. You wish yourself out of those stages in your life because you can't see the greater scheme of your life. You never know what God will do to make the situation better. He creates a beautiful mess out of the irreparable. For that I am eternally grateful!

The Good Times

I went camping with my buddies this weekend. I had a blast. We fished all night, ate hot dogs, chopped it up with the boys, talked, joked around, laughed, and the end of the night we went catfish noodling, lol. As I sat there and talked to one of my boys, I realized he wasn’t fishing even though it was supposed to be a fishing trip. I asked him why and he said, “it doesn’t matter if I fish or not, I’m just here to hang out. Even if I don’t catch anything, I will always remember being here with you guys all night and having the time of my life.” It made total sense.

It might have been a quick weekend all night fishing trip but the memory will be with me forever. Everything from talking to my buddy lee about his relationship problems to trying catfish noodling for the first time ever at 5am will remain with me for the rest of my days.
It’s not about the duration of the moment but about the moment itself. It’s about the people that are with you, making the moment and sharing it with you. The moment may not make a huge impact, but it still changes you in a good way. It may all seem insignificant, even trivial, but it isn’t, not at all. It is those moments that remain with you for the rest of your life. They are what gets you through difficult times when nothing is clear. They are what make you smile when you’re having a bad day. A good time is more than just a momentary thing, it lasts a lifetime. So treasure the moments, they are what life is made of.

Begin With the End in Mind

“So I begin with the end in mind.”- from the song “disconnecktie” form the band Norma Jean

I moved to Chico in June of 2000 and left in December of 2006. In between there was a time of dreading the beginning, great times that I can recall to this day, and bad times that made me wish it was all over. And then there was the end. The last days that I lived in Chico, my going away parties, quitting jobs, sad faces, and a realization that the moment I was in would never come back again. The end had arrived.

I arrived at my old Church in January of 2002 and I left on May 1, 2009. In between there was a period of disconnection from God, A surrender to His will for my life, accepting a youth pastorship position, experiencing times full of God’s blessing and times that I wouldn’t wish on anybody else. And then, there was the end. The Last few weeks announcing my departure, talking to my staff, my parents, my pastor, the church congregation, the presbyter, the youth group, and one last toast to end it all. The end had finally arrived.

This week was my first weekend actually leading our block team into Bennett Hill. I was able to lead the team, double check if they had done their work and thank people for coming out. What’s interesting is that it was so much work that I got lost in the moment and before I realized it, my first day was over. I spent a while stressing over it too and in a blink of an eye, it was over!

I’m looking at my first opportunity in Ministry at the Father’s House and I realize that the end is closer than I think! I can go to sleep tonight and wake up to a few years down the road, Married to the love of my life, possibly with children, having made some close relationships, perhaps having become a Pastor at my current church or being released to plant a new church, with the realization that the season that I am just now beginning, is over and I’m ready to start a new one. With the end having finally arrived and a new beginning on the horizon. So I begin with the end in mind…

The End of Rituals...

This morning I am thinking about ritual (defined as - any practice or pattern of behavior regularly performed in a set manner). Specifically I am thinking about rituals of my past and how they have been affected by modern innovations. And yet it’s not only my rituals that are being affected, they are all of our rituals and sometimes we don’t even notice.
Let me offer a few examples. But first, go ahead and press play on this video as it is the soundtrack to reading this post! lol

When I was a kid, my mom would take me and my sisters down to the local movie store to rent movies. We would walk around looking at the movies by genre. My older sister would check out chick flicks, my other sister would check out teeny bop comedies and I would look for action movies or cartoon action movies. Meanwhile my mom would talk to the lady who worked at the video store. We would bring my mom about 2 movies each and she would tell us to narrow it down to one. We would put one back, she would pay, and we would pop pop corn and take turns watching our movies. It may not seem like a huge deal, but for me, those were great times! Fast forward to 2011 and we have replaced that ritual with one word: Netflix. Meanwhile the last of the video stores (blockbuster) is beginning to close down all of their locations. Goodbye blockbuster nights!
Another example. Since the beginning of time the process went like this: Man saw woman, man was captivated by woman, man approached woman, man talked to woman, man attempted to woo woman, man and woman fell in love, and the rest was history. Then technological innovation came into play and all of that changed! Welcome to the world of online dating! This includes sites such as: zoosk, match.com, plenty of fish, eharmony, perfectmatch.com, etc. This is an outstanding innovation; it makes it easier to meet people in bulk with the comfort of never having to leave home. The problem, it cuts out the ritual! Men no longer have to approach women at the social functions. People no longer have to socialize. Men don’t have to sweat and get nervous as they work up the courage to approach her in front of all her friends to ask her out at the risk her saying no. This is good for gutless guys, but it cuts out all the magic of that moment when she says “yes” when she could have said “no!”
One last example. Whenever I would go to the mall I would always go straight to the music store. I would cross my fingers and hope the CD (or tape, lol) I wanted was there. I would walk (to the back of the store) to the rap section, flip through the various other CD’s, find other CD’s I found interesting, and finally set my eyes on the CD I wanted. I would look at the cover, look at the back, read the track names, walk to the front of the store and pay for the album. When I got home I would rip off the plastic cover, pop the CD into the player, lie in my bed, and read the lyrics, and check out the cover art. For me, this was the most important ritual of my life. And What did we replace it with? Itunes. “Digital cover art.” Music right at your hands that never really touches your hands.
My only question is what’s next? Will they close down movie theaters and have new movies on the internet? Will they close down grocery stores and have it so you can order groceries to be delivered straight to your house (which I wouldn’t doubt they already have). Will they make it so that we get rid of ritual, human warmth, face to face conversation, and friendship? In many ways I feel they already have. Please don’t misunderstand me! I love Itunes, I love Facebook, I even love blogging! But they will never compare to buying a CD at a music store, hanging out with friends/ socializing with people you don’t know, and pouring your heart out to a friend who genuinely cares. I love technology but I wish I didn’t have to trade in the beauty of ritual to get it.
Your opinions? What rituals do you miss? What is the next thing that will be eliminated by technological innovations? Do you like the way things are today or do you prefer the past way of doing things? Do I sound old because of this post? lol

Forever Missed...

I’m so glad I was born in the eighties and grew up in the 90’s! I had a chance to listen to the music of two of the best and most meaningful artists of all time, Kurt Cobain and Tupac Shakur. I think about this new Generation and I feel bad for them. They don’t have a voice for their generation, a voice to express their frustration, a voice to state their case, a voice to articulate what they are too scared to say without being ostracized by those that have it all together.

To me Kurt and Pac were the heart and soul of the 90’s. Even though they were from completely different worlds they had so much in common. They both came from single parent households, they both had a turbulent adolescence, they were both homeless at one point, they were both super talented, their voices were full of pain that bled out through their music, they both became the greatest in their respective genres, they both spoke from the perspective of the misunderstood, the frustrated, the depressed, the borderline insane, they were both extremely talented, extremely successful, and they both died in their 20’s.

I could picture them meeting each other, being awkward at first having come from different walks of life but talking, realizing that they were similar souls and deciding to have a beer as they relive their turbulent lives through nostalgic stories and poetic memories about their lives. That meeting would have been the stuff of legends.

The thing about Kurt and Pac is that they made those that were misunderstood, depressed, disliked, and different feel as if somebody was writing symphonies set to their everyday lives. The young and misunderstood of generations X and Y found artists that weren’t just making music but were creating vivid portrayal of the lives of countless teens and young adults by admitting that they were different when everybody wanted to follow the flock. They were themselves in a world where everybody is trying to be anybody else but who they actually are. They showed us beauty in imperfection, reason in misunderstanding, and unity in being disenfranchised. They spoke volumes that continue even years after they have been gone and will continue through those that understood them because they understood us… because they understood me…

Song of The Day: Kenny Chesney - Just Not Today

Feeling Nostalgic today and listening to an old Kenny Chesney CD... Enjoy!

She played third base on a softball team
Had a pretty good arm and real nice swing
I was working part-time out at Gentry's farm
I had thing for a girl in a uniform
After the game she was mine, young, wild and free
Yeah old Mr. Gentry was pretty cool
He said son I'd know where I'd be
And what I'd say if it was me

One of these days
We're gonna have to grow up
Have to get real jobs and be adults, someday
Just not today
Have to worry about things out of our control
Like kids, love and money and gettin old, someday
Just not today, just not today

Had a rope swing hangin from a sycamore tree
By a deep little spot on white sand creek
Used to walk barefoot, down a little dirt path
We'd throw out the beach towels and
Lay on our backs
Had four wheel drive trucks parked up in the shade
With those speakers blasting
We never knew how much we really had it made,
Without a care in a world we'd say

Have to show some maturity, responsibility
Pay the old fiddler, face reality
Maybe tomorrow the older and wiser
Will be, god love us we'll be

Just not today
Just not today

lyrics corrected above-
I was workin part out at Gentry's farm
Were guna have to grow up
By a deep wood spot on white sand creek
We'd through out the beach towels and
With those speakers blasted

Ghosts From the Past…

"And though we are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are—
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will;
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield..." - Alfred Lord Tennyson

Do you pay attention to time passing you by? Every once in a while I will intentionally remember the past, what I have been through and who I have spent my years with. I recall seasons of life that were much different than today, its almost like it’s a different show but with me as the main character.

If I think back I can remember the age of 16 in high school as a senior. I can remember the internet being born, baggy pants, playing football, the spot with my friends, red bandanas, gangs, lowrider magazine, pagers, cruising, and a whooole lot of drugs. But even more so I remember my friends at the time. Young jovial faces gleaming with potential and the false pretense that they were invincible. I remember believing that I would ride next to those faces forever and that we would somehow avoid time and stay young and dumb forever.

I can remember the age of 18 as a freshman in college. I can remember 8am classes, hangovers, pepsi’s and sandwiches, drinking keystone lights, drugs, stinky dorm rooms, late night parties, bad eating, attempts at staying in shape, shoulder tapping, black N Milds, NFL Blitz, stealing backpacks to sell back books and ten page papers. But I also remember helping my friends move out of their dorm rooms, hungover from the night before when we partied like rockstars, drunk as hell with the knowledge that that night was the last night some of us would ever see each other.

I remember the age of 20, having come to Christ and still in college. I can remember afternoon classes, knowledge of campus, teachers, classes and the town. I remember bus routes, computer labs, my apartment with my cousin, my very first cell phone, internet chat rooms, discovering rock music, moot court, internship, helping out with the youth group, and aca taco burritos. I can remember staring at faces that faded into another life, never to be seen again.

I remember the age of 22, being a youth pastor, working at Fed Ex and Sears. I can remember being busy all the time, I remember Chico, CA, My apartment on the northside of town, summers at the bear hole, little ceasars pizza’s and the Legend, getting my Durango, and trips to Monterey. I remember dust in the wind, learning that people could look you in the face and lie to you and forever and friendship were an oxymoron. And yet I remember the sweetest face that I would ever meet and realizing that God could use a person to show you how much he loved you.

I can continue doing this for days, remembering the years just as quickly as they fade but I’d rather not. As the seasons of life have passed me by I realize that I have been so many different versions of myself. I have grown up little by little, quicker in some seasons than others. It’s crazy to think how seasons in our life change and at times we don’t even notice it. Faces come to mind that I thought would be with me forever and at this moment are foreign. Moments and words that I thought were burned into my heart have healed and been replaced with fresh wounds but also with positive memories. Views that were once commonplace now the backdrop to moments that are frozen in time and captured by my mind.

Welcome to life, is it what you thought it would be?

Love God, Live Life, and Laugh Loud!

It is so crazy how things turn out. One minute you’re laughing it up with some friends, the next thing you know, they’re ghosts from the past. One minute you’re sitting at your regular hang out and the next, that place is just a spot that you pass right up without even looking at it. One minute you’re alone wishing for love and the next your wish came true and you have been with them for 6 years. :)
I have lived lots of routines, had lots of friends, worked a few jobs, hung out at a few places, had tons of laughs and enjoyed every minute of it! I have also felt sadness, had animosity with enemies, shed tears, lost friends, missed opportunities, doubted God and hated myself for periods of time. It’s crazy to think that when you are stuck in the thick of a situation you never feel like it’s going to end. Good times wished to stay and bad times prayed away but they all pass us by without a hint to their conclusion. Then when you realize that it’s gone it’s already been a year or two and you find yourself deep in a nostalgic day dream.
You can’t change the past and the future is only a minute away. So you remember the past times that made you who you are, you let them bring a smile onto your face today and take that joy into your future. You move forward, knowing that yesterday made things what they are today and so today will make tomorrow what it will be. Work hard, achieve goals, live dreams and buy nice things. But above all don’t forget to love God, live life, and laugh loud.

Laughed Until We Cried: Part 3

“Room 111 is two twin beds, who wants it?”
“We do” said Perla, and silvia as Mr. Griff read the room numbers off of the keys.
“Room 112 is a double twin bed, who wants it?”
“We do” said sara and janet.
“Room 113, one king size bed?” Apparently powder (who was my roommate for the trip) failed to hear when Mr. Griffin described the room as a single king size bed.
“We want it!” cried powder.
“What the hell is your problem,” I said, snatching the key out of his hand and handing it back to the teacher. “He said it was only one bed… for the two of us!
“Oh, my bad! Can we have another room?” Powder asked.
Much to our dismay, Mr. Griff just laughed and said, “Nope, you called it, you get it.”
We ended up having one bed for two nights for two guys. I told powder that he would be sleeping on the floor!

When we drove to the Shakespearian Festival I didn’t know hat to expect. At that point I thought I was all “hard core” so I didn’t read Shakespeare or anything for that matter. I knew I would be bored when I signed up for the trip but I didn’t imagine how fun a Shakespearian play could be with a bunch of fellow high school kids.

When we were about to enter into the stadium we encountered a gothic girl that had a bible on a leash and was dragging it like a dog. Ironically some of the kids cussed her out for dragging the holy book claiming that she was defending their holy peaceful belief system. I didn’t really believe in Christianity at the time so I knew the girl’s action was wrong, but I didn’t try to defend it either.

When we walked into the play I somehow got stuck in between the teachers and my peers. I ended up sitting right in between Mr. Griffin and Mrs. Bauhgn. When the lights went out, we began making barking noises (specifically a yell that sounded like, “Bhet!” This was a major war cry for our senior year) and yelling out “Gordy” which was a taunt towards a kid with who we had created great enmity, regardless of our former camaraderie.

People would tell us to be quiet but we continued to make these noises until our teachers told us that we would be castigated if we continued to ruin their evening. Being the creative kid that I am, I invented a little system to disguise our barks but continue to use them. It was a coughing spell with a “Bhet” in the middle (cough cough, bhet! cough cough). That would be something that we would continue to use in class when we got back home.

I remember actively attempting not to pay attention and the teachers verbally reprimanding me for doing so. As I watched the beginning of the play, I remember leaning backward in my seat a bit and closing my eyes for what I thought was a second. I woke up to the sound of hands clapping and people standing up. I had slept through the entire play. Lol

Laughed Until We Cried: Part 2

There we were in this interesting hippie town with no idea what to do. Our teachers had left us to run the streets by ourselves. In attempting to separate from the rest of the group I had violated an important high school commandment: Though shall not break up the herd! So of course after a while Sean and Alfredo decided that they wanted to rejoin the group and so we did. We ate at a little mom and pop grill off of one the main streets in town. The restaurant was completely empty until we arrived. We had two tables, one with me, my friends and a few extra’s and one with the square kids. I was high so I was super hungry and I remember ordering some huge burger and a coke. We were talking and as soon as I got my coke I accidentally dropped it. Luckily I didn’t get it on myself but it did in fact spill all over the table. When I told the waitress about the spill, she smiled and simply tossed me a towel. I remember thinking to myself, “how rude. I hope this place goes out of business.” This makes me wonder if the place has gone out of business in this recession. I hope so! Lol
After lunch Alfredo (gums), Sean (powder) and I began to explore the city. One of my observations of the town was that there weren’t many Hispanic folks in the town. In fact I seemed to be the lone ranger of Hispanic descent in the town. This was during my “everybody is a racist phase.” We walked around the town exploring, looking for girls and we found none. My thought was for us to return to the 4:20 parade and see if they ended their processions with some sort of rally. I figured that if we found them it meant free marijuana as I was running out quickly. We explored the entire city, or as much as we could cover by foot, looking for something to do with no avail. It was at this time that one of us mentioned that this town was “ass.” That day we re-named the town under the pseudonym that would grace the inner covers of all of our yearbooks when we signed our memories and valedictions: “Assland.”
Our rendezvous point was a park in central Ashland. We of course were the last ones to get there. Powder and I decided we were going to sit in the very front, the seat next to Mr. Griffin, which nobody wanted. The reason being that the back seats were considered the “cool seats,” not because Mr/ Griffin, or “stone-cold steve griffin” as he was nicknamed, hadn’t earned our respect. Mr. Griffin’s reputation preceded him, as stories about him permeated our school, which purported him to legendary status. Mr. Griffin was the teacher that was both easy going and intelligent. Had he owned a motorcycle and leather jacket he would have personified the stereotypical “cool teacher” role. Stories about him ranged from his adamant unbelief of time-travel to his explanation of the term “red-wings” to a seventh grade class, to the day he came to class with the same clothes he had worn the previous day due to an all night encounter with a lady friend. Mr. Griffin was easily the coolest teacher in school if not in the entire county.
We searched the town for “relax-inn,” our hotel paid for by the school itself. As a small school, our district didn’t have a lot of money. So when Mr Griffin was able to get our entire trip paid, we were not only surprised, but ecstatic to see how well the school would accommodate us. We explored the town for about an hour and a half searching for the “Vista Inn.” It was nowhere to be found. At first only Mr. Griff was searching for the place but as time went by we all started getting worried and annoyed and so we all entered the search. Every nice hotel we saw we would say, “Maybe that’s it.” We imagined fancy chandeliers, large indoor pools, a hot tub for us and the girls (don’t judge, we were just horny little teenage boys, lol). We kept driving up and down the same road and didn’t find a thing. Finally Mr. Griff made a turn toward a small strip of motels just off of the main road, we thought he was just going there to turn around but all of a sudden he exclaimed, “I think I found it.” Mr. griff brought us to the raunchiest, nastiest little run-down motel that you could ever imagine. We were all immediately struck with outrage and what did Mr. Griffin do? He smiled from ear to ear and simply laughed at our collective misfortune of staying at this little hell hole for the next couple of nights…

Laughed Until We Cried: Part 1

There’s a song called, “Laughed until we cried” by Jason Aldean. Last night I woke up in the middle of the night and started to think of that song. The first verse is talking about a senior trip that the guy took with his classmates years ago and how they laughed until they cried while they were on the trip. I love the song and I love the idea behind the song.
And so it took me back to April of 2000. I wasn’t supposed to attend the trip to Ashland Oregon’s famous Shakespearian festival because I didn’t like all of the kids that were going. Plus I didn’t want to spend my hard earned drug sales profits on a trip to Oregon of all places (I had not yet discovered the beauty that is Oregon). During that time I was a young, crazy lil gang member with baggies, bandanas, slicked back hair and a pocket full of weed. My friends that were there: Alfredo (gums), Janet, Sean (powder), and Sara. These were my in-school friends, a bunch of studious, funny well-behaved kids that were in no way involved in the gang-banging mess. They were the ones that convinced me to go even though I didn’t want to. There was also the rest of Mr. Griffins Honors English Class. My group of friends were the ones that actually had a sense of humor, the rest were all squares.
So there we were on what would promise to be the trip of all trips. On the trip there were the six of us, plus Perla, a girl I had a crush on at the time. Long story short about Perla, we were good friends when I was a shy guy. Junior year I started talking more, and apparently she didn’t like my outgoing personality so she stopped talking to me. Senior year she got a makeover, got rid of her huge bottle cap glasses, put on some make-up and did her hair. After that she looked really cute so of course she got my attention again, lol.
Mrs. Baughn was driving the 1980’s SUV and would stop every once in a while to take smoke brakes. I tirelessly tried to convince her that she should share her cigarettes with me even though she was the teacher and I was a student, a request which she repeatedly declined.
As soon as we arrived in Ashland we all split up. Sean, Alfredo and I went in the opposite direction of the rest of the groups in order to smoke a joint without getting caught. Sean, simply along for the ride, was as drug free as a white preppy kid in high school can be. As we finished off our joint, we walked down to what seemed to be a main street. Just as we hit the sidewalk, we see a large procession taking place. We had no idea what it was so we watched them all go by and as soon as we read the signs, we understood that the moment was serendipitous! The procession happened to be a “legalize marijuana” 4/20 day parade! We joined in the procession and borrowed a persons sign walking proudly while screaming, “Legalize it!”
As we approached one of the street corners, we continued with our chant only to encounter the rest of the group from our school! The teachers were annoyed at us but Sara and Janet were flabbergasted at the surprising sight of us guys marching in the 4/20 rally. They even took a picture of all of us marching in the rally. The scene was so hilarious that even the square kids from our class had to release a laugh. As I was writing this I realize that I have NO IDEA what happened to that picture. Man, I wish I had it. It would probably make me smile huge right now if I saw it; all of our faces with huge smiles and bloodshot eyes, without a care in mind in a world that was still young and crazy…