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rules: type your favourite color into pinterest (google also works) and make a moodboard

Thanks to @chucklepea-hotpot and @jinx-you-owe-me for tagging me in this!

@watercolor-rainclouds @greensleeves-redhead @europa-the-moon @yellowhood and anyone else who enjoys making aesthetic moodboards please feel free to join in

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There’s an alternate tuning to the guitar that I believe most guitarists are unfamiliar with. It’s DADGAD instead of EADGBE. It sounds really cool and if one were to mess around with the F# scale on this tuning it sounds great. I’m learning a song called gallowglass but cannot yet play it without using the sheet music. It’s very difficult to memorize the song. But my fingers are getting faster and more comfortable with the song. I have a CD that shows you what the song should look like with the finished piece but to be authentic about it I have not yet listened to it. Maybe I fear it would ruin the version that I have hidden within my head. Maybe it would but maybe it wouldn’t. At any rate that’s only one and I have a book with about 30 of them in it.

The acoustic guitar is such an under rated instrument everyone wants electric with heavy distortion and pedals. Not me. Just acoustic with a pick. I own a Martin which is a very expensive one but I saved all my tip money from delivery driving with it to acquire it. I even bought insurance on it. I change the strings once a month to make it sound crisp and clean. It’s my go to item in case of boredom. I have no audience to play for other than creating a YouTube of myself with it.

Sometimes I practice with a metronome other times I do not. I feel like my rhythm could use some work but that’s a matter of opinion. It always surprises me how when I’m playing or watching someone else play how much of awe struck I get when I see others play the same song that I was just playing. Perhaps it’s a disconnect between ear and hand on my part. I’ll never really know 100 percent.

Keep playing though. Make me an instrument of thy peace.

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Last weekend ogemaw county was beautiful. The birds were out mostly sparrows. Steaks on the grill and beer in my mug George Killians. The evenings spent with family were grand. The dock was put into the lake and later on we hooked up the trailer to the boat and took it down to the boat launch. Facing the port side with two ropes guiding the boat into the water without it hitting the dock. Others were there doing the same with thier own water craft. It was only a short ride back to our personal dock away from the boat launch. The water was clear blue and the sky was overcast. A loon made its call off in the distance. The sunset and the sky was gold.

I made my way to the local gas station and grabbed a few supplies the girls there running the store talking about the latest who’s who gossip. The smell of pizza wafting through the air. They remembered me from last time I was there. They understood that I wasn’t from there and treated me as such. It’s only a short ride back to the cabin after I received my supplies.

The sky grew dark and the stars were out. Millions of them. Without the light pollution from the city to cover the sky one can see a lot more of them. The moon was mostly full but it glided around the sky from time to time as it moved faster than any other the other planets that you can see with the spotting scope.

Ogemaw county has a great area and plenty of water craft for everyone. It wasn’t as busy as it normally is for everyone but it still was alot of fun. I hope to see it again soon. It’s simpler there. Like an oasis away from the world. And the hustle and bustle of the inner city where I currently reside.

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Catholicism

My Patron Saint, Ignatius of Loyola

My patron saint that I was confirmed with was St Ignatius of Loyola. He was quite an exceptional fellow. Of Spanish decent he created the Order of Jesuits. He and two others, Peter Favre and Francis Xavier. It was in the 16th century that he was around. During a tumultuous time in the renaissance. At the time Martin Luther King had just split the church in two during the protestant reformation of which I could write a completely separate article upon. Many people have written very long books upon these characters that I speak to you now of.

Ignatius was my patron saint because it was the closest I could come to experiencing god on my own through communion with my Patron Saint. I went to the Manresa Jesuit retreat every year, there are a few Jesuits that lead the way there. Of which will remain unnamed for privacy concerns. We walk in Silence except during mass or prayer. Everyone is completely silent during the three days that we are there. There is an agenda and you need to be in certain places at certain times but for an adult its easy enough. We all become the best versions of ourselves while we are there. It recharges ones soul, or gives us the oil for our lanterns that we all hold.

I think of the hermit that Ignatius was for a year while he was living in a cave away from Society. He learned the unholy spirit vs. the holy spirit at this time. It was very difficult for him especially being away from everyone. Living in a cave he experienced the deepest depths of his soul, the good bad and ugly of all things he had ever experienced. But he knew that Jesus Christ himself would never ask him to sin, while the evil one would try to slip through his own defenses that he had created for himself. This was called the discernment of spirits. You could relate it back to scripture I have memorized John 4:1. Ignatius had a way with words and people.

The circles that he traveled in were very affluent. He would be found speaking to nobles rather than peasants. He spent a lot of time trying to make his leg that he had wounded during a battle look better. A cannon ball blew half of his leg off. His vanity got the best of him and spent most of his time trying to make it look better or not let others notice it as much as he did. There’s a lesson here that we could all take away from it, concerning vanity and how much time we all spend on making ourselves look better to others. In the end of his days, on his death bed, he truly regreted how much time he had spent on trying to make his leg look better than it did after he had been wounded in battle.

His life was completely changed when the cannon ball had hit him. He left the battle alive however and some soldiers got him back to safety. He was bored far beyond what he normally would be. The only thing he could do while he was healing was read books. The only books that were available to him at the time were books and stories of saints and the bible of course. He spent hours a day in bed with a wounded leg in a cast while laying in a bed reading books about saints. But to his fiery spirit he was restless.

Soldier, Sinner, Saint. That is my patron.

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My Patron Saint, Ignatius of Loyola

My patron saint that I was confirmed with was St Ignatius of Loyola. He was quite an exceptional fellow. Of Spanish decent he created the Order of Jesuits. He and two others, Peter Favre and Francis Xavier. It was in the 16th century that he was around. During a tumultuous time in the renaissance. At the time Martin Luther King had just split the church in two during the protestant reformation of which I could write a completely separate article upon. Many people have written very long books upon these characters that I speak to you now of.

Ignatius was my patron saint because it was the closest I could come to experiencing god on my own through communion with my Patron Saint. I went to the Manresa Jesuit retreat every year, there are a few Jesuits that lead the way there. Of which will remain unnamed for privacy concerns. We walk in Silence except during mass or prayer. Everyone is completely silent during the three days that we are there. There is an agenda and you need to be in certain places at certain times but for an adult its easy enough. We all become the best versions of ourselves while we are there. It recharges ones soul, or gives us the oil for our lanterns that we all hold.

I think of the hermit that Ignatius was for a year while he was living in a cave away from Society. He learned the unholy spirit vs. the holy spirit at this time. It was very difficult for him especially being away from everyone. Living in a cave he experienced the deepest depths of his soul, the good bad and ugly of all things he had ever experienced. But he knew that Jesus Christ himself would never ask him to sin, while the evil one would try to slip through his own defenses that he had created for himself. This was called the discernment of spirits. You could relate it back to scripture I have memorized John 4:1. Ignatius had a way with words and people.

The circles that he traveled in were very affluent. He would be found speaking to nobles rather than peasants. He spent a lot of time trying to make his leg that he had wounded during a battle look better. A cannon ball blew half of his leg off. His vanity got the best of him and spent most of his time trying to make it look better or not let others notice it as much as he did. There’s a lesson here that we could all take away from it, concerning vanity and how much time we all spend on making ourselves look better to others. In the end of his days, on his death bed, he truly regreted how much time he had spent on trying to make his leg look better than it did after he had been wounded in battle.

His life was completely changed when the cannon ball had hit him. He left the battle alive however and some soldiers got him back to safety. He was bored far beyond what he normally would be. The only thing he could do while he was healing was read books. The only books that were available to him at the time were books and stories of saints and the bible of course. He spent hours a day in bed with a wounded leg in a cast while laying in a bed reading books about saints. But to his fiery spirit he was restless.

Soldier, Sinner, Saint. That is my patron.

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St Benedict is my most favored saint although he is not my patron saint. He preaches stability and balance which helps me a lot in my life. He’s for the ordinary person. He isn’t some mystic although some mystical things have happened to him. He was such a good monk and favored among god that he was almost poisoned three separate times. He would pray before he’d eat something that was poisoned and behold something would come by and stop him from getting poisoned. First it was a drink, he prayed over the drink and the glass shattered in his hand. He later found out that a fellow monk was trying to kill him because the other monk was envious of him. On a separate occasion he was about to eat some bread that was poisoned. A raven flew from somewhere and snatched the bread right out of his hands. Saving his life another time. This happened to him quite often. He was living during the 6th century AD. He was the glue that kept Europe together during the Middle Ages. He wrote the rule to create monasteries. It’s a short read and can be bought at most book stores or amazon. If you’re interested in growing closer to the lord by all means St Benedict will lead you there.

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I like to keep big open empty spaces. The thing about emptiness is it makes it more useful. A cluttered area isn’t able to do anything because there’s too much stuff in the way. Some may call this the dao. The emptiness of fullness of an area determines its capacity to be used.

I often have a lot of thoughts and words running through my stream of consciousness so I turn to writing to help put them all out side of myself to empty the space within me. Just like a clean room or a big empty open space.