I find it funny right now, so much has happened in the last 3 weeks and yet I find it hard to find anything to say. So many people want answers to their many questions, and the occupational therapist said that if I typed this out it mghit make me feel better, so...here we go.

Sorry if it's disjointed....I did have brain surgery.

Roughly 3 (or was it 4?) weeks ago, I was having insane headaches that would not go away. No matter what I did, no matter what pills I took, they would not go away. It felt as if my skull was trying to break free of it's skin covering to explore the world. I wish I could describe the pain, but suffice it to say I didn't leave my bed much those weeks. Headaches were the Godzilla to my brain being Tokyo. Does that make sense? It does to me....So eventually I found myself in the emergency room of the local clinic. First time they gave me a shot for a stress headache and it seemed to help.

Alas, they returned, and so did I to various emergency rooms. Various tests were run, IVs slammed into my veins leaving me feeling like a human pin cushion. CAT scans, X-Rays, MRIs...all in an effort to try to figure out what was wrong with Paul. Every time I was sent home with a bottle full of pain pills and an overall clean bill of health as far as they could tell. Of course this was not to be.

I awoke early on a friday to realize that, well, I couldn't see. And it wasn't that I was seeing things...I knew the TV was on because I could hear it and thereby locate it. And I knew the lights were on because I had passed out from pain the night before, forgetting to turn them off. So there I was, lying in bed, blind as far as I knew. I freaked, started screaming, and soon we were off to the hospital yet again.

Ugh....this part is going to be hard to write. Not because it was hard on me or anything, but everything became such a blur to me at this point I just kind of threw it all together. So I'll tell you the things I know went down.

Abboott Hospital in Minneapolis is where most, if not all of this, went down. I arrived on a friday, put in ICU for a night, got two spinal taps (I still have the marks to prove it). Prognosis is that I had a rare ghost tumor; basically it was blocking the CSF from getting back down to my spine and thereby was putting excess pressure on my optic nerves. Doctor said I had 3 weeks, max, and my eyesight would be gone.

Surgery had to be done, and surgery was done.

2 hours under the knife, first cutting into my head to put the shunt in place, then down on my abdomen where the tubing from the shunt would drain out to. Fairly average surgery, so they said. But it hurt, and still almost 2 weeks post op I still have pains that I can't explain away.

I was told it this way, and I might be using some kind of nursing terms here cause of my background, so if you have any questions, don't be afraid to ask.

Take your head off for a second, crack it in half. Pull the brain out...okay, you see that boogery-looking material surrounding where the brain used to be? That's cerebro-spinal fluid, or CSF. Basically it operates as a cushion for the brain in the chance we slam it forward, backward, side to side, etc....CSF covers the brain and runs down the spinal column, allowing protective covering as it goes.

This is where my problem came in...through some random throw of the genetetic stick, Paul got screwed again.Put simply, a ghost tumor is an unidentifiable mass that was stuck in my brain. It wasn't allowing the CSF to go back down, and therefore building up pressure in my skull and eventually optical nerves.

So that's where I am now, lookng back on all of what happened and not yet fully believing. I knew I was there, I knew I was going thrrough it, I continue through it. It just seems like somerhing that never happnes to anyone.

But oh well, it did, and I continue on with it.

I thiank the people who came out to see me in those times, and the phone calls I never expected. Kind of funny how at your lowest you truly find out what you're truly worth to people.

These are post-op pics of Paul. If you don't like suture lines or pudgy white fat stomaches, look away.

_



-Paul

Current Mood: drained
Current Music: Motion City Soundtrack-This Is For Real

Right now I should absolutely be doing homework, the assignment is due in roughly 5 hours and I have a paragraph done on what needs to be a two page paper. Oh well, back to the subject at hand.

If any of you know me, you know while doing work I like, nay, need to take many useless and unproductive breaks. Usually I'll read an article online and comment on it or just listen to music, but this time, oh man. I unearthed a gem I completely forgot I ever buried. I was looking through my recent Word documents to see what I had written and something named Banta was on the list. So I clicked, I read, and I laughed. And now, now I share it with you, for I feel the entire world must read this. Look out though, it might blow your mind right out of your skull through the zygomatic bone. That would hurt so bad you have literally no idea.

Yeah, read on. Comment, or not. I can't control your fingers.

Right now is the earliest I've been up in over a week, hell, possibly 2 weeks. Another Banta coffee house gig, another month ends and yet another begins. Weird to think I have only seen this cycle 25 times and am already calloused to it. The changing of months, the movement of days, the way clouds dance through the sky, the way the sun rips through the dark of mid-morning to reveal a new day, it's nothing short of amazing.

It's so easy to miss the majesty of the world if you don't slow down. Unfortunately slowing down isn't really permitted in the world we live in, sometimes it's actually frowned down upon. I'm guilty of that myself, mostly when I'm driving. I love going fast, always have, but what am I in a hurry to get to? I don't think I've ever slowed down and enjoyed the drive in my 8 years of driving. Not really sure of what my point here is…I just feel like we're a hurried people when we really don't need to be. If you're two minutes late to work your job is still secure, just work two minutes later. If you're five minutes late to a date if they really want to see you they really won't care.

Right now, listening to John Banta hit various guitar strings in various barre-chord variants is one time I can slow down and look around and it's enjoyable. I have nothing to do today, other than get my paycheck and worry about how I never have enough money to feel comfortable. Maybe hit up Perkins after this and get some second world quality food into my stomach. That reminds me, what's this whole third world country thing about? What countries are first and second countries and what made third world countries so horrible, so third world? Was there a vote and Zimbabwe lost horribly? You know…assuming Zimbabwe is third world.

I can only assume that America is all up in first world country thing.

-Paul

Current Mood: busy
Current Music: Sleep Station - After the War

I'm struggling to find an opening sentence for this one, so I'm just going to jump into it. Sorry for the confusion if there is any.

It came to my attention yesterday that Josh and Megan, some point in the near future, are going to approach me and ask me to no longer be part of the youth service thing. When I was told this, I just rolled it off as if it meant nothing. With school coming up and then getting a real job, it's not like I'd even have time for it, so whatever.

But now...it's really starting to get to me a lot more than I thought it would. I feel a combination of shame and rejection when I think about it. I've been doing the whole youth thing as long as I've been at Lighthouse, which would be five years now. I've seen it go through various transformations, from Schienke, to Chris, and now to Josh. I've been there for all of it.

I admit, I'm not the best youth leader, I don't uphold how a youth leader should look. I don't get horribly excited about worship, I don't say the best things, I swear, etc... I take full blame for that, as I've had people talk to me various times about it, and yet I didn't change, call it being stubborn if you want, because I can't think of any other reason. But then another part of me chimes in with "Well, at least I haven't been faking who I am." And I think, more than likely, that's been my downfall.

I haven't grown, religiously, at least noticeably, in the last two years. I've just been chugging through, hoping for change. It hasn't come, I've become disenfranchised with most of what we do, preferring a book than worship.

Not to sound cliche, but maybe I'm too real, or maybe I'm not real enough. I don't really know.

But it does bother me, it does bother me that I haven't grown. But then again it's my own fault...how is anyone supposed to learn something if they don't put effort forth?

Yeah...scattered entry. People will read it though, I'll get comments, yeah.

Current Mood: disappointed
Current Music: The Hush Sound-Out Through The Curtain

This is a writing I did a while ago but never got around to posting. It was written during a prayer time at a wednesday night service. Church stuff..it's a good time to write. Here we go...

So it's come to this, someone I care about seriously contemplating suicide. And he's so young and has literally so much to live for. Not just experiences, but at the age of 13 most people really do have a lot to live. But yeah, he's at a hospital type thing right now doing the daily regime of counseling. It's so weird to think he's there, but it's for the best.

We prayed over his mother today before she took off to see him for the first time in two days. She put up a brave front, but this quickly fell apart once she started talking about him. I just have to wonder how helpless she must have felt, not realizing these things had been going on in his mind, not realizing he had a knife in his room for other reasons than opening packages.

Prayer was pretty classic: Full healing, brokenness, an anointing from the Lord, etc... Now, I realize God is power, I mean, He' God. He's been God since the world was created. But at other times I feel that He doesn't use His power all the time. Not that I hold ill will about it, but I was never healed of my ADHD. I've been on pills since I was eight and honestly don't expect to get off them any time soon, if ever. They've just become a part of my life, a ritual if you will. Wake up, take a pill. Every morning for the last 12 years has seen the same thing.

I guess my point here, since it's not at all clear right now, is, and not to doubt God here in any way, but pills work. There is scientific proof that pills for depression help with depression, pills for anxiety work for anxiety, pills for high blood pressure work for high blood pressure. It's what they do...and honestly that's my struggling point right now.

As a follower of God I believe He is all powerful. But at the same time I believe in the validity of medication. So although I want my friend healed, I believe more in pills than the Lord. It's what I've known for the last 12 years.

Now I feel as though I'm failing the Lord more than I already do.

-Paul

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Making April - Runaway World (Acoustic)

I wrote this one yesterday while out at Bethany enjoying a rather rousing worship service. Of course me being me, I put on my headphones and escaped into my own little world. While there, I ended up writing this rather impassioned and angry entry on the notebook that thank God I brought.

Remember, this is just my opinion, but I'm more than open to other's on this topic.

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Every day of the year the Lord is crying for the lost, the unsaved, the ones who don't know. He has angels watching over them, even these angels cry for the lost.

They are looking for answers and HE IS THE ANSWER. Not churches, not worship music, not hopping around with their arms raised high. It is as simple as this...God is the answer, the gap filler, the light in the dark alley of your life.

So many people think loving God is acting out for Him, screaming, jumping, waving of flags, fasting...and they're wrong.

Loving God is talking to Him, reading His word, trying to live a life as He would like you to.

I hate acting-out-type people. Well, not hate them, I just hate their thought that they must act out to get His attention. It is a selfish, them-sided way of worshiping. Hooray if it works for them, awesome actually. My only point is that it's not needed.

When I was a non-believer, and thank God for those times because it gibes me a different view on all this, I thought worship was a joke. Not because I disliked the song, heck, some were pretty catchy. Not because of the message, even as an atheist I tried to respect other beliefs. But because of what I saw on the ads for those worship music mix CDs on television.

Old people jumping around, flushed cheeks, hands in the air like they're a true playa. From my view point it didn't make sense why they did it, how could doing that get you closer to God? But clearly they knew what they were doing, and as an outsider, I just accepted it as par for the course of being a Christian.

So when I became a Christian, I thought you had to do just that, raise your hands in the air, scream, jump, dance around, or God would be angry at you for not worshiping Him correctly. So like every child raised equally by parents and television, I did what I thought I had to.

Only one slight problem existed: I was doing it for myself, not the Lord. I was doing the motions and the sounds because I thought I had to, not because the Lord directed me to. I was generally the first up from during One Way, screaming, swaying, throwing my arms up towards the cross. Every now and then I'd get a glimpse of the God "feeling". A force flowing through my body that took my breath away and caused tears to start flowing. But still, it didn't suit me.

It seemed to me, as it does now, that by raising hands...etc, you were asking of even demanding that God work through your time line, that He come down to you. What? You can't force God, no this is wrong.

So now I choose to sit and wait for Him to come on His own time line. Sure, I've gotten looks from people, comments about me being the only one sitting in a room of standing people. I hate yet to defend myself with more than a dismissive "Yeah...whatever." Perhaps for the best, as the explanation would take too long and make me even more of a black sheep at church.

I have found what works for me, that is all that is important.

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This is where I thought I was done writing, in fact I had affixed my signature and date to the bottom of the paper. But of course I had one more thought to go for, and I'm honestly proud of this one. I'm not proud that I get angry at a certain person when I think about this quote, but that's neither here nor there.

And here it is:

Some people will say that the blood of Jesus wasn't spilled so that I could sit during worship. These people are missing the point completely.

-Paul

Current Mood: hungry
Current Music: Mashlin-Violet

If the title of this is correct, I really love my dog Lobo more than I ever thought I could.

Tonight is the last night of his life. Right now is his last 12:55am of his life. Right now is the last time he'll sleep at the foot of my bed in his life.

Right now is the last time I'll fall asleep knowing he's alive, albeit with a cancerous tumor jutting from his jaw.

And it's killing me inside.

I love you Lobo, and I really don't care who knows it. You've been the one constant thing in my life that's happy to see me, no matter how you're feeling. And I've never said "Thank You" until now.

There's so much I want to say to him, so many meals I want to give him that I'm not supposed to give him. I want to go out and buy him the biggest, most expensive juicy steak I can find. But yeah, that won't do anything now, it's not like he could eat it.

I suppose it is for the best, but I know I'm going to cry for a while tomorrow.

It's going to be a somber drive out to the vet, and an even more quiet drive back.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust...nothing is permanent.

-Paul

Current Mood: sad
Current Music: Death Cab for Cutie - What Sara Said

Random quote of the day:

"I can get sexier right now." - Cora Gray.

Yup. My friends are really odd. But I love them for it.

-Paul

Current Mood: good
Current Music: Michael Covering Weird Al's "eBay"

I know it to be true in my heart, and after this I will know it to be true in writing.

On Thanksgiving day I was out throwing a ball for our dogs. I noticed Lobo, my dog, was grabbing the ball, dropping it, licking it, and walking away. This is not normal behavior to say the least.

Usually he's all for the ball throwing. Just the sight of a tennis ball will have him jumping for joy on his back legs until you throw the damn thing...so I had to investigate.

I looked at him, noticed there was blood in his mouth and went in for a closer look. There was a growth on his lower right jaw, so I freaked out, ran inside and told the parents of the situation. My mom and I took off for the local emergency 24 hour vet to find out what was up with Lobo.

Half way through the wait, my mom was worrying about people showing up at the house (we had Thanksgiving here) and took off. So there I was, alone in the vet clinic with my dog. A growth on his lower jaw that I was praying was just a slight infection that would require some antibiotics to go away. The vet gave a far less hopeful diagnosis: tumor.

The tears started welling up in the corners of my eyes when I heard that word...that cursed word. Even now as I write this I'm getting the choked up feeling in my throat. After the vet left the tears started flowing, not suppressed by any illusion of manliness.

Being alone was killing me, so I called home and asked if anyone was coming to pick me up. My mother had forgotten to tell my dad I needed a ride.

I couldn't stand being in the building anymore so went outside, tears still falling down my cheeks and onto my sweater. The cold fall air and slight breeze ripped over me...the lack of cars on the road and people walking around made me feel like I was truly alone.

Just a kid and his sick dog.

While I was at work today my dad was able to take Lobo out to our usual vet. They took samples from the growth, and results came back as badly as I had feared. The growth was so large that it has grown down into his jaw, which means one thing...Lobo has bone cancer.

Without treatment we'll have him for the next 3 to 6 months, possibly a year. And that's it, period. The timing couldn't be worse, with my parents being in Florida for three weeks straight from the end of February to the middle of March; that period of time just happens to fall nicely in the middle of the 3 to 6 month range.

What kills me most is that I didn't notice any growth before, didn’t notice that his cheek looked bigger than it was, so I'd be able to get him out and we could take out the cancer at the beginning. I've been kicking myself daily about that.

Guys, if you at all believe in the power of prayer, please pray that I have a little bit longer to say goodbye to Lobo.

God this sucks. I'm crying again. I have to go.

-Paul

Current Mood: drained
Current Music: The Hush Sound - Lighthouse

I've been putting of this post for about three days. I'm afraid it's going to make me sound like a bitter old man who doesn't like other people to be happy. Which is very far from the truth.

It's funny when I think about it, my very first entry (at least on my LiveJournal for you people out there reading this on my MySpace) I stated that this is my journal, and I was going to say what I wanted to, damn the consequences. But these days I'm almost overly careful not to offend anyone, careful to tip-toe around things that could possibly make anyone angry. Man, what happened to you Paul? But yeah...

I'm single right now, it's a repeating pattern in my life at this point. I'll somehow find myself with a girl, we'll try to work it out for 2 months and then something comes up. I won't go into what happened this time around, but lets just say it left me questioning if I am as great a guy as I once thought. Which in some stupid way made me start feeling bitter towards the idea of love. I'd start to say to myself "Self, if a seemingly great guy like myself can't find love or have love, how can anyone else have it?"

So, I'm bitter about love. Especially couples that are way too cute together. Or way too excited to be together. Or who were my friends before they started dating, and now whenever we get together to hang out I get the eerie feeling that I'm the third wheel. Or when one of my friends has a great girl waiting on him and he won't make a move. Or when I hear about so and so doing whatever in someone's basement.

Don't get me wrong, love is great. Hooray for love. But right now I just...yeah.

I don't get it. I don't get how some guys wait their entire lives to wait for someone to catch their eye; and how there's other guys who apparently don't have to work for it at all, it just falls in their lap.

Maybe I'm not bitter. Maybe I'm jealous, envious of what I had but no longer do.

Who knows. I'm out.

-Paul

Current Mood: envious
Current Music: Panic! At the Disco-Build God, Then We'll Talk

There are few things in life that a person puts honest time and thought into. Some people have restoring cars, some have finding rare vinyls. My chosen task is making the best sleepy time/crying CD I can possibly make. It's been going for about three years now, slowly gaining more songs. It's up to 21 songs right now.

I call it the smoove mix. It was originally going to be a collection of songs with a smooth groove, but that soon changed when I realized I was only putting songs on it that I'd listen to while depressed, going through a breakup, or getting over deaths in the family. So yeah, here it is.

Feel free to copy it, as you'll never have the true one. It's always changing.

1.) Snow Patrol - How To Be Dead
2.) This Day & Age - We Always Rewind the Best Part
3.) Copeland - Coffee
4.) Anberlin - The Symphony of Blase
5.) MuteMath - Progress
6.) Ben Folds Five - Selfless, Cold, and Composed
7.) Sleep Station - After the War
8.) Plain White T's - Hey There Delilah
9.) Keane - Hamburg Song
10.) Aqualung - Strange and Beautiful(I'll Put a Spell On You)
11.) The Get Up Kids - Like a Man Possessed
12.) Jupiter Sunrise - Steal Me
13.) Death Cab for Cutie - I Will Follow You Into the Dark
14.) Mae - Awakening
15.) Lovedrug - Down Towards the Healing
16.) Armor for Sleep - A Quick Little Fight
17.) Further Seems Forever - For All We Know
18.) The Format - Career Day
19.) Say Anything - I Want to Know Your Plans
20.) Iron & Wine - Such Great Heights
21.) Anna Nalick - Wreck of the Day

-Paul

Current Location: The Basement
Current Mood: dorky
Current Music: Acceptance - Different