I have a really hard time connecting to music that doesn't feel like I'm somehow solving a puzzle that applies to my life.

I consider myself a person like everyone else, and I take my time writing my records because I feel like it captures more of who I am. You have a much greater chance of hitting on themes and points...that could play into someone else's life in a larger way.

It's always strange to read the things you've hoped for in the past because by now those hopes may be spoken for or gone, transformed or altogether forgotten. Like time, hope can be so senseless. It can carry us up mountains or lie us in the quicksand. But like time, hope is unstoppable, inevitable, and blind. Sometimes we travel fast, hurdling towards the unknown, sometimes the unknown comes hurdling towards us while we watch time standing still.

And when I got sick I felt confident that if it was the last thing I ever recorded before I left this earth, I would be really proud of it.

But planes land and so do I, and suns rise, melting away the grounds cool protection. I am finally free, if only for this moment. And should that be the case, then know that I am throwing a parade in first class as I speak. Art has again saved my life, my love and me. What next? Who really cares? Certainly a toast will be in order. Make mine a double.

And seemingly as winter has become spring, confusion has become insight.

Today I felt like a part of something awesome, the human race. I know it can be ugly; it really is in so many ways. But today there was nothing ugly to see, just people trying to be better. And maybe that's the key. Not resolutions and forgotten promises, but instead a commitment to do this year a little better than the last. I'm feeling good about this one. I really am.