I once got into a heated argument in a restaurant in Elat, Israel on whether or not chick flicks were as damaging to relationships as porn. My position: yes! In fact, it is worse because chick flicks are more subtle...

Welcome to part 3 of my series on Marry Him! an article written by Lori Gottlieb in the magazine The Atlantic.

In my formative years, romance was John Cusack and Ione Skye in Say Anything.

What fascinates me is she uses the same person as my favorite writer Chuck Klosterman in Sex, Drugs & Cocoa Puffs

If Cusack and I were competing for the same woman, I could easily accept losing. However, I don't really feel like John and I were "competing" for the girl I'm referring to, inasmuch as her relationship to Cusack was confined to watching him as a two-dimensional projection pretending to be characters who don't actually exist.
Page 2, Sex, Drugs & Cocoa Puffs

As a single, 20-something man who has a bit of an ego and no problem asking women out, I completely understand what he is saying. In the marketplace of "dating," I can't compete with Say Anything. I don't compare with Matthew McConaughey in How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days. And if they were real people, really "competing" for the same woman, like Chuck, I wouldn't mind losing to them. But they aren't real! And you know full well the real John and Matt would make awful boyfriends and worse husbands.

And before you respond, "ohh I like those movies, but I don't expect that in real life," all I have to say is bull crap! Chuck is correct again when he writes:

[men and women] will both measure our relationship against the prospect of fake love...The main problem with mass media is that it makes it impossible to fall in love with any acumen of normalcy.
Page 3-4, Sex, Drugs, & Cocoa Puffs

A couple of months ago or so I had a conversation at Starbucks with one of my "Stolen" girls. She is smart, funny, attractive, successful, ambitious; simply put: she is amazing. But she said something that floored me. She signed up for internet dating. What!? She even made the statement that, modesty aside, she thought her and [a couple of her friends] were real "catches" but they never get pursued. They don't get asked out.

And while, yes, I will beat up on men for becoming wusses (especially within the church), I have to say they have some justification in being wusses given that the perceived expectation is so high. Which brings me back to Gottlieb's comment on settling...

Based on my observations, in fact, settling will probably make you happier in the long run, since many of those who marry with great expectations become more disillusioned with each passing year.

I have to give her the point for today (if you are keeping track, settling is up on not-settling 2 to 1). I sometimes think I would be happier abandoning my expectations because I have come to realize these expectations are built on fictionist fantasies. It isn't that I don't want to find true love, it just seems that true love is fundamentally different than what we have seen. And just as I don't expect my wife to be Pamela Anderson, I shouldn't have to be John Cusack.

When I was a junior in high school, the book "I Kissed Dating Goodbye" came out and was all the rage. I read it, objectively, and grabbed some good principals, but overall "rejected" the basic premise. Sometime later that year, a rebuttal, but less popular book came out called "I Gave Dating a Chance." I liked it better, but still rejected most of the premise, because frankly it was mostly the same as "I Kissed Dating Goodbye." One called dating courtship, and the other called it, well, dating. I'll get back to this later.

If you have read this blog for more than 10 minutes you know I am usually not satisfied with Christian music or books. Why? Because they aren't about life. They aren't real. They give the same cheesy, bullet pointed responses which don't communicate effectively. When done, I always feel like I just drove a Porsche but kept it in 1st gear.

From what I heard from others, Rob Bell's writing promised to be different. So needless to say I was excited to read his new book "Sex God," because we all know the official topic of this blog is sex¹. We also know that my favorite writer is Chuck Klosterman - sure I might not agree with some of his lifestyle choices, but he is brilliant when it comes to culture. I was expecting Rob Bell to be the "Christian" version of Chuck Klosterman. He's not. If Chuck Klosterman is a Porsche reaching 4th gear², Rob Bell is a Porsche in 2nd gear³

I could probably write a 5,000 word blog on this book. I am going to try not to. Here are my three main issues with the book.

One, he quotes from Song of Solomon (which is good) but fails to acknowledge that a.) Solomon had hundreds of sexual partners, and b.) the Song of Solomon text implies that the "beloved and lover" were not married yet.

Now, I am not looking for a book to justify pre-marital / extra-marital sexual activity. Why? Because I still think a case can be made for sexual "purity". But Bell fails to communicate his point because he refuses to acknowledge, in full disclosure, the entire sexual narrative of the Bible.

Two, he continues the Christian myth that women aren't interested in sex as a pleasurable act, but only use it to attain other relational perks (i.e. feeling love, feeling beautiful, etc...)

I can't speak for generations past, but from my extensive conversation on the topic and cultural insight, I just don't believe that to be true (anymore?). Women are (almost?) just as interested in a sexual relationship as men.

Three, Bell fails to recognize that God is the Creator of sex as something creative and fun.

"Sex God" continues to portray marital sexuality as boring and vanilla. It still makes the ambiguous statement that "sex is good" and leaves it at that. I have written about this before, so I am not going into detail (one | two).

I know this is a shock, but according to research (I can't believe it took research to know this) the #1 reason people have sex is because it feels good. While there are 237 other reasons, because it feels good is the number one reason we enjoy and/or tempted to have sex. Sex God fails to acknowledge this with any sort of depth or genuineness.

Here is at least what I liked about the book. On page 105 Bell states:

If you have ever given yourself to someone and had your heart broken, you know how God feels.

Bell acknowledges that God never intends for life to be easy. He never intended for life to be pain-free. Which brings me back to I Kissed Dating Goodbye.

My ultimate problem with "I Kissed Dating Goodbye" is that it was a lesson in "avoidance theology." God can't possibly want us to have pain, therefore, we should avoid that which potentially causes pain (in this case: dating). That is a crappy way to live life and I at least respect Bell for standing up against that.

Their is one other reason this brings me back to "I Kissed Dating Goodbye" and "I Gave Dating a Chance". I was hoping when I read this book, it was going to be so good, that I could take writing a sex book off the list of books I am going to write.⁴ That turned out to be false. Now I still feel the Christian arsenal is missing a good book on sexual practical theology, so it looks like I should start working on a rebuttal⁵.

WOW! I KNOW! It took me a long time to wrap this one up. And I stopped in a particularly awkward place for three months. But it is a good thing I stopped when I did, because I would have just wrapped this sucker up and moved on and it would have sucked.

I work crazy hours normally, and November & December are the worst. So right after our Christmas Eve service (we are talking 12:10 am on Christmas morning), I left for Indiana. For the next two weeks I did very little besides hang out with friends, play with Jadyn, and relax. It was great. I also picked up the new book of one of my favorite writers, Chuck Klosterman, entitled Chuck Klosterman IV. As always, it was incredibly insightful, particularly to the conversation we are having about pornography. I call this, this Steven Tyler’s Surrender:

In 2002, I interviewed Aerosmith's Steven Tyler about drugs and groupies, and he said something along the lines of, "Having sex with the same woman a thousand times is way more interesting than having a thousand one-night stands with a thousand different women, because those one-night stands are all the same."...Every aging rock god (except maybe Gene Simmons) eventually comes to this same conclusion; in fact, anyone (famous or not) who decides to get married is unknowingly agreeing with Steven Tyler. At some point, most people decide that sleeping with the same person improves the quality of their life, even though it eliminates romantic choice. We all unconsciously understand this. However, nobody consciously believes this is true until after the fact. If you ask any single man if he'd prefer to (a) have sex with a thousand different women or (b) have sex with one woman a thousand times, he will always stake option "a", even though he knows this decision is virtually guaranteed to make him feel awkward and alone.

Chuck Klosterman IV (page 210-211)

I could pretty much just let you read that, and it would say enough. But I am too stupid to stop there. This communicates what I was talking about in the previous post way better than what I said. And here's why: Steven Tyler's reputation. If anyone should know the "glory" of sleeping with thousands of different women, it would be Steven Tyler. But here, you have an aged rocker, admitting something so universally true, and so reputatiously alarming, that there is little you can say to disagree.

I think porn is like this. As I have admitted earlier in this post, I have seen thousands of images of porn. And I agree with Steven that, in the end, they are all the same. Really porn is just the allure of the interesting, but in actuality it is pretty dull and only alludes to the truly interesting, a healthy, fun, erotic, monogamous relationship with the same person for many, many years.

The question is going to be, am I going to be like Steven in continuing to feel akward and alone, or am I going to strive to live my life in full realization and trust that the God who created sex, knows how best to "do it" and surrender my life to Him.

Still to come:
Sat - What God has to say and steps to avoid using porn

P.S. I included the date of this post back in the August "week" so that when people read it in the archive, they won't notice there was 3-month gap between posts (until they read this of course).

P.P.S. For more incredible observations from Chuck Klosterman, and my theological insight related to it, click here

Also, If you haven't read all the posts on pornography, you need to start at the beginning or else you won't get the full understanding of where I am coming from with this post. Click here

The rise in pornography use over the past 15 years is attributed to one thing: the internet. But to blame the internet for this rise is really quite ridiculous. Why? Because the internet doesn't force anyone to do anything. First the blame should first reside with those of us who "demand it." But to just leave it there doesn't make much sense either because people haven't really changed, so why has the demand increased? Because of what the internet allows for us to do, and what the internet allows for porn producers to provide.

Before I continue I should say that what I am about to type are not justifications for using pornography. They are reasons internet porn has increased the usage by everyday Americans...Americans that 30 years ago would not have thought of buying a Playboy. The reasons are very male centered. I wish I would write from a female perspective (especially with the stats that show massive increase in female usage), but I can't. So alas, I am just going to write about what I know - maybe for the first time. But I digress.

The way I see it there are four reasons porn is better than sex.

1.) It requires no commitment whatsoever, and on the surface appears to have no baggage. You can access it when you want. If you are too tired, that's cool, you don't have to do it. Your "partner" in this excursion is never "too" tired. She is always ready and available. When your done: she doesn't want to talk, she doesn't want to snuggle, she doesn't want anything. You just turn her off and go about doing (usually sleep) whatever it is that you want to do. There are no phone calls in the morning. There is no expectation of life change. It is all about attaining pleasure and moving on - there's nothing to commit to.

2.) It's super easy to find, which means it takes no effort to attain. There are no awkward pick-up lines. There are no "am I looking" outside my league type of feelings. For those that believe in sexual purity before marriage, there is no long (did I say long...) wait until pleasure can be attained. (Usually) No one even knows you are doing it, so it is private! In a matter of seconds I can have any girl, scenario, act, etc...it's super easy.

3.) It's anything and everything you could ever want, how you want it, when you want it, and often with illogical ability to have "different stuff" at different times. This is where it gets crazy. Internet porn allows for any of your wildest fantasies to come true...and beyond that, often times more than one of your fantasies to come true at the same time (which is totally illogical). If I want to be sleeping with a cheerleader, while receiving a blow-job from some sorority girl, while eating-out some girl you have seen at work, while having pool sex, that is all logically possible inside the brilliant imagination of the human mind - while just logistically impossible in reality. Porn images heighten this experience.

4.) Internet porn is typically average looking woman. I think this is the most profound point and I stole this from Chuck Klosterman and I left my book at home so I can't quote him. BUT...Playboy were always these GORGEOUS women (ones most of us would never come in contact with on a daily basis) in strange, exotic situations (which we wouldn't visit). Internet porn changed all this. It took (usually) attractive, but not gorgeous women (ones we see everyday) and put them in situations that we are in everyday. If you have a girl at the office you fantasize about, you can probably find something similar to her on the web. If there is a girl in a class you like, there is something on the web you can find that looks like her and puts her in a situation you would find her in. I think ultimately this leads to the subconscious reason porn is wrong (which we'll get to on Friday), but for now we should recognize that because of its normalcy, porn attracts normal people.

None of these reasons justify the usage of pornography. All of them are built under the false pretense that sex should be about me attaining maximum pleasure at any cost, and with no regard to my partner. There is nothing wrong with sex being pleasurable. But just like eating (remember the cheeseburger) cannot solely be understood as attaining pleasure at all costs, so too, healthy sexuality must recognize that there are limits (and consequences) when looking outside the boundaries of sex's design to attain pleasure. We'll get more into why this is later, but first we need to understand that porn's growth is due to its overall normalcy.

Upcoming:
Thus: What If My Partner Doesn't Care
Fri: What God Has To Say
Sat: Methods That Help

About three months ago, Sister Hazel magically re-appeared as a dominant force on my music playlist. It's good to have them back. What I have always loved about Sister Hazel is what I typically hate about most bands: they sing about the same thing in all their songs. It seem that, with Sister Hazel, either someone in the band has gone through an incredibly hard break-up in life, which they have never recovered from, or their song writer has. I own 16 songs of theirs; out of the 16 at least 7 of them I interpret to be about this break up (in case you are wondering they are Best I’ll Ever Be, Champaign High, Life Got in the Way, Your Mistake, Killing Me Too, Your Winter, and Hopeless.)

Oddly enough, an 8th song of theirs I own is called Thank You, and it appears to be about a break-up, but the guy is actually glad the relationship has ended. Maybe this is a different girl. However, my theory is that this song was written in the all too common anger stage of the break-up where instead of admitting you want someone back, you get nasty mean. Anyways, I digress.

In college, my roommate had a name for this particular ex-girlfriend in my life. He called her “The One Who Got Away,” and I think the name is accurate. I find this is a common story amongst those who are single and in their 20s. I imagine it gets all the more common in our 30s. This is not to say that we sit around, longing for the day that person will return (although we may not mind that if it works out). No, it has a profoundly different stigma in our life. One I think Sister Hazel and Chuck Klosterman can relate to.

In his book “Killing Yourself to Live” Chuck writes:

“The first girl I loved was someone I knew in sixth grade. Her name was Missy; we talked about horses. The last girl I love will be someone I haven’t even met yet, probably. They all count. But there are certain people you love who do something else; they define how you classify what love is suppose to feel like. These are the most important people in your life, and you’ll meet maybe four or five of these people over the span of 80 years. But there’s still one more tier to all this; there is always one person you love who becomes that definition. It usually happens retrospectively, but it always happens eventually. This is the person who unknowingly sets the template for what you will always love about other people… But that person still wins. They win, and you lose. Because for the rest of your life, they will control how you feel about everyone else.”
-Killing Yourself to Live (Page 232)

I love how Chuck says this “usually happens retrospectively.” I find this ironic in my own life. As the one girl in life that I have told that I loved, I certainly did not love. Since then, I haven’t told anyone I loved them, including the one girl I most certainly did.

But as Sister’s Hazel says, life gets in the way. We can’t control that. We move along with our lives. Pursue different things. Live in different areas. And ultimately, that template of love is all we have left. But it is still worth it. Every second of the relationship was worth it, and every second with out the relationship has since been worth it. We all need that template. Because when life gets in the way, we at least know what we are longing for and the way life should be. And that gives me hope that one day I will find this love again, and this time, she won’t get away.

It’s the last day of Chuck Klosterman week, and I think we have all had a lot of fun. But if you didn’t, in about 200 words you will see why I don’t care. It has got to be hard to write books about your life experiences and still keep your friends. It is this dilemma that Chuck decides to bring “Killing Yourself to Live” to a close.

“Lucy: Chuck, please don’t write a book about women you used to be in love with…I just want to go on record as saying that the idea of writing such a book is dubious.
Chuck: But if I don’t write the book, there will be no record of this entire conversation. Your disdain can only be voiced if I do the opposite of what you suggest.
Lucy: Well fine, just don’t complain to me when all those idiot bloggers write things like, ‘Ultimately, the author should have listened to his friend Lucy Chance.’ Because you know that will happen.”
-Killing Yourself to Live (Page 234)

Let me just say Lucy (on the record), that this blogger is glad Chuck wrote this book. And this brings me to my final point during Chuck Klosterman week: you can’t always listen to your friends. This is not to say that you shouldn’t ever listen to your friends, as often they are our best sources of accountability and reason in our lives. However, sometimes, you just got to do what you know you need to do.

There is a lot in Jesus’ life that didn’t make sense. I always laugh at the people who e-mail us at the show and use comments like, “God gave us a brain to think with and to reason with and not to use it would be wrong.” I always think this argument is a mute point. Why? Because this question is in the same category as the “when did you stop beating your wife” question. You can’t really disagree with it, less you are a moron. But if you agree with it, you are basically conceding to anything anyone wants to say that originated from his or her brain.

Yet God himself says that His ways are not always our ways. And while He did give us the ability to reason, and He does expect us to use it well (like all gifts), sometimes reason has to take a backseat to faith. It doesn’t make sense “to turn the other cheek.” It certainly doesn’t make sense to give money to the poor. And forgiveness is about the most retarded thing I could think up. Yet God wants all three of these elements (and others) to be an active part of each of our lives. And while our brain (and Lucy) might sometimes tell us otherwise, we have got to do what we know is the right thing to do, and pray that God uses it to touch the lives of others.

Chuck, while I would encourage you to find the transforming power of God in your life, I can say with the utmost confidence your book definitely touched my life.

It’s day five of Chuck Klosterman week, and today’s passage I have to say is personally the most entertaining of the entire book. The context of “Killing Yourself to Live” is a road trip Chuck takes to different locations of famous music industry deaths. One finds out quickly that this book really isn’t about a road trip, but about his past (and present) love life. Now this I can relate to. Chuck has an imaginary conversation with all of his girlfriends as if they were all riding in the car.

Quincy (Girl #1) says, “The year you spent ‘killing yourself’ to make me love you … I thought that was us being best friends. But you see that kind of behavior as the work you’re forced to do in order to sleep with people you want to sleep with.”
Chuck responds, “That’s not true, I would do anything to go back to that year when we weren’t having sex.”
Quincy responds: “You say that now, but you’d do the same thing if we went back to 1996.”
Lenore (Girl #2) pipes in: “I kind of have to agree with Quincy on this point. Chuck you do tend to repeat the same behavior over and over again, and all you really change is the person involved.”
[Skip ahead]
Dianne (Girl #3) joins the conversation: “Chuck, it really bothers me that you seem fixated on beautiful women in problematic situations, particularly women who are already in serious relationships.”
-Killing Yourself to Live (Page 117-121)

This conversation reminds me of high school. And let me put a little context. My high school dating life had something called the “Big Switch.” Sophomore year I dated someone name Emily, and Adam dated someone named Laura (although there is some dispute on whether or not they “officially” dated, but they did). Then junior year I dated Laura and Adam dated Emily: switch #1 (this is all while someone named Keenan dated someone named Teresa). Now senior year, I dated Teresa, and Keenan dated Laura, switch #2.

Now you say, wow, pretty incestuous, and you assume that we just dated around the circle of friends. But that is the amazing thing about all of this, that wasn’t the case. In fact, none of us were mutual friends (you could argue Emily and Laura were friends because they were both cheerleaders, but there is some dispute about if they were really friends before the “big switch” or because of the “big switch”).

But this was my angst during high school, especially senior year, because my life felt like the imaginary conversation Chuck had with his ex-girlfriends on the road trip.

Now you say, whippedy-do, what does this have to do with me. This all gets back to relationships. Why? Because of this. Jesus said that to understand Him you had to approach him like a child. Now this does not mean that he wants us all to be children for the rest of our lives. No, God designed us to grow and mature. However, as I have gotten older I have realized how true Jesus' words about faith are. The more childlike that faith can be, the “trueer” an expression of faith that really is. And sometimes I think love is like that too. Love never used to be complicated. It never used to play games. It was just love. And while we all need to mature out of high school, sometimes I think we need to de-mature in love.

Thus, parents (and youth ministers) shouldn’t keep high schoolers from dating, but rather use this time to cultivate healthy dating patterns that include trust and accountability. Realize that there is a lot to learn from these relationships about oneself, members of the opposite sex, and life in general. And if all my girls got together, they’d probably agree (or maybe that’s just the imaginary conversation in my head).

P.S. The photo above actually has all three of these girls in the photo. Can you spot them, besides the obvious?

You know what seems to suck about being a Christian (and I think if we were all more authentic we would admit this)? What sucks is that nothing ever seems to be enough. It seems like we “sell” Christianity on the simplicity of the gospel. Then when someone becomes a Christian, we complicate it by adding things to do. Then when those things are done, we tell people that God expects them to in turn be responsible for all the people who have yet to come to this realization as well. While not a Christian, Chuck Klosterman experiences this in an Arkansas hotel room – admittedly while high – while watching a show on “Christian TV” that goes something like this:

“The protagonist [Steven] is a teen…who is torn apart by temptation. But what’s interesting are the things Steven is tempted to do; he is not tempted to try drugs…nor is he tempted to have sex…Our hero is never involved in any of that sh#*. Steven’s gut-wrenching crisis…is the temptation to not save his adolescent peers from doing all of those terrible things. In other words, he is not frayed by a desire to go down on his girlfriend or the desire to get drunk and feel cool…His problem is that he wants to merely ignore all the kids in school who are going to hell."
-Killing Yourself to Live (Page 99)

What fascinates me about this is that I was Steven in high school (although admittedly, unlike Steven, I was also tempted to go down on my girlfriend). But what people like Chuck will never understand until they too are “tempted like Steven,” is that it is precisely the charge to “make disciples” in an unfriendly world that makes faith in Jesus for an intriguing life.

Five years out of high school (and 3 years out of my teens) I find myself working at a church (which as I have stated before, I don’t usually like telling people I meet). What I miss the most now that I work in a church is how few people I run into that aren’t Christian. It drives me nuts. But I find that all people are pretty much like this – Christian or not. If you work in NYC and are 30, you are somewhat of pretentious individual surrounded by other pretentious individuals. If you are white, wealthy and in your 50s, most of the people you play golf with are also white, wealthy and in their 50s. But a faith in Jesus is about bringing all of humanity into community centered around the Cross (which is totally different than a plain, vanilla, “we-are-all-the-same” community).

Jesus wants all of his followers to spread the “good news” to people we come in contact with. However, unlike most “evangelism” movies, this doesn’t usually take place with the random guy on the plane, or by preaching on the street corner. After all, Jesus doesn’t just want followers, he wants relationships. These relationships are between Him and his followers, as well as His followers and other followers, as well as His followers and those yet to be His followers. While nothing may ever seem to be enough in the Christian life, I think we should all admit that it is this drive to surround ourselves with people different than us that makes life intriguing enough to be worth living.

Woody and I sat up at a Big Bear, California cabin on a Worship Band retreat in August of 2004. Woody had an incredibly hard job, in which I truly felt bad for him. He was replacing the eternally popular Chris as APU’s campus pastor. As we sat and I shared what little wisdom I had about our campus, the point I kept reiterating is that this campus wants someone who is authentic. We don’t care what you struggle with. We don’t care what you’ve done. But what we expect is that you will be real with us. This is why our generation (you know, the one who doesn’t have a name but is after Generation-X and sometimes gets lumped in with them) is unique. I think Chuck Klosterman might agree.

“Somehow, it was acceptable to…make a joke about a massive earthquake as long as it happens in some distant place like Iran or China. I honestly believe that people of my generation despise authenticity, mostly because they’re all so envious of it.”
-Killing Yourself to Live (Page 42-43)

I am sort of surprised that someone from Generation-X would talk about a generation as a whole, as that concept seems to be pre-modern (you know, what happened before post-modernism came to enlighten us). It isn’t very post-modern to limit an entire generation to one specific distaste. But then again, those of us in the generation behind Chuck’s have a tendency to question both the pre-modern and post-modern. Why? Because we have authenticity, and this confuses those in generations behind us even though they are actually the cause of this desire.

I like to call our generation “Generation-D” for two reasons. One, we are the Digital Generation, meaning we grew with the advent of the computer (nothing like Oregon Trail in 2nd grade). We are also Generation-D because we are the Divorced Generation. Sure, we are not the ones getting a divorce. No, those are the great, self-centered, soon-to-bankrupt-social-security, baby boomers. Or more effectionally called, our parents.

In a world that seems to be built on lies and broken promises, we long for that which is true and authentic. It is why we are more into spiritually than past generations, but not necessarily into spiritual institutions. It is why we are more into political causes, but not politics itself. And it is this evolution of politics that I am intrigued to see develop. As the baby-boomers die off (those who aren’t authentic), and Generation-X gets older (those who hate authenticity), politics is in for a surprise when Generation-D demands authenticity. The days of partisism, wedge issues, and a Washington that becomes more and more of joke with every release of the Washington Post will hopefully, soon be over. That is, unless Generation-X decides to make a joke of us – just like Iran.

I have to say I miss college. I have now been out of college for exactly 1 year, 1 month, 19 days, 8 hours, 32 minutes and 7 seconds. All this time has created one thought: I loved college. The interesting thing is, when I was in college, I used those 4 years to come to the conclusion that I loved high school. Now this does not mean that I am living in a constant stage of nostalgia, unable to appreciate the moment. But what I don’t understand is why are these feelings so powerful sometimes that I just want to give up everything, call all my college friends, and get a job at McDonalds if it means I can be with them again like we once were. Day 2 of Chuck Klosterman week speaks to this.

“There are so many things that will never happen to me again, and I never even noticed when those things stopped occurring…They die long before you do. It’s astonishing to consider all the things from your past that used to happen all the time but (a) never happen anymore, and (b) never even cross your mind."
-Killing Yourself to Live (Page 130)

This is what I think saddens me the most. Waverunning at the Huntington Reservoir used to be one of the favorites of my summer activities. I have no idea when that stopped, but most likely, it will never be apart of my life ever again. I’ll never watch another high school football game with my closest friends in 20° weather. I’ll never walk again into a friends dorm room, or mod, or apartment after class, pop in a Friends DVD and watch the entire 8th season. I’ll never wake up at the Justice’s lake house to a beautiful morning, on the porch, reading my Bible, and waiting for the girls to wake up so we can go boating.

What kills me is that I don’t even know when this happened. Sure, waverunning stopped after I graduated from college and failed to return to Indiana afterwards. Football ended in November of 2000. But these are just time frames. I don’t want to know when these things ended. I want to know when these things ended. When did I wake up, and for the first time realize that those are memories of nostalgia, not next Friday’s activities. These things were so cool, so fun, so fulfilling, and I didn’t even notice them ending. I just moved along.

The All-American Rejects ultimately speak to this situation. We just Move Along and I don’t know why. I guess life doesn’t allow for you to stay put. So you either suck it up and move along or you become “that guy” who still living in high school. And being that guy is sadder then living with nostalgia.