Nifty Noodles/ Real Steel

8/15/04 Sunday Fontana, CA
Dennis Kingsland has been a pastor for some thirty one years. For the last 17 at a small church on the corner of Cottonwood and Arrow Highway in the middle of the dying steel town of Fontana. It’s just 30 minutes from where I live. I agreed to sing for the morning service here… and I missed two turns trying to find it.

To say the least this church is miles away from anything that would look successful or promising. One of those little churches you pass on the road and wonder if anyone attends. Now I’m reminded of something Oswald Chambers said… “God has a way of putting his saints in the most “useless” of places”. ( suggesting that God’s idea of success is not the same as ours).

I spent only a few minutes before the service with Dennis. I was expecting some religious “pontification” from him as the “Carpenters House” has a “Holiness” back ground. I always worry around old school Pentecostals about the “scrutiny” they often bring to the table when meeting with “outsiders”. Kingsland is not such a man. No he is a man who is going through the ‘fires of sorrow’ to quote from Ozzie again. “A man who has been through the fires of sorrow has ample time for you.”

There was not the expected “look what I know” kind of attitude here. “I heard the song ‘I never lied to you’” he said… “I sat in my car listening to it and just cried”… he went on to explain a recent “defection” of church members and his own recent diagnosis of ALS, commonly known as Lou Garrig’s disease. It’s usually terminal with an average life expectancy of 3 to 5 years.

In five minutes or so this man changed my entire attitude about the whole event. My focus was different. I gotta tell you the atmosphere in this little church of some two hundred folks was so different than what I am used to, an absolute lack of “spiritual projection”.

I am not sure what it is really. A genuine humility before God… awareness perhaps of this sinful world as it is and not as I would have it.

They come to trust God for real here somehow… all I know is that there was something entirely different about the hour and a half of music that they let me present.

“God has a purpose for us even through pain” seemed to be the recurring theme in my new focus and the songs prewritten seemed to highlight something I have missed even as I have written the songs. It was like God took a highlighter to my lyrics and whole songs changed in their meaning. Don’t get me wrong… I orchestrated nothing here. Whatever was happening during this service was here before I was. I was just keenly aware of God’s grip on this community of believers. I drove home in silence pondering the difference… stunning really. Could the presence of God be so foreign to me that I would be startled by it?… or was it just surprising to find God inhabiting what seems like an abandoned location in a forgotten town on the outskirts of Los Angeles !?

This is the real great adventure! Unpredictability! Finding a gem in the gravel! Impressed with God himself who creates flowers in the desert where no one is looking. That is what Carpenters House is… a gem in the gravel… and Dennis Kingsland… is “blooming” in the sand he is in whether he knows it or not. God’s hand is on him dead center!

Live one day at a time…. Bryan D

Nifty Noodles/ Chino Hills Finally

8/13/04 Chino Hills, CA Friday the 13th ….
Celebrate Recovery in Chino Hills Inland Community Church finally pulled off the concert that has been postponed at least three times in the last 2 years. I was assuming it was a recovery crowd but most were outside visitors who had never been to this church.

We played the video clip about Radio Rehab… it has been an entertaining little piece to use at shows like this. So in a way I opened for myself as there is some footage of me playing the guitar through the clip.

The numbers were way off in the inventory this week so I’m not sure how much was donated to RR but I have much ground to make up in the next month to get out of the hole from the “bounced check incident”. The good news is I have shows coming up, nine of em in the next three weeks.

A little interesting side note here… I’ve been asked to sing on a few songs by a well known artist and to help write some lyrics for three songs to be pitched to another well known artist. I’m leaving the names off for now until we see if any of this actually transpires. But it looks hopeful that I might be gainfully employed in another avenue as a writer and singer, completely away from my Christian Music Career.

I was also offered a job with a church as a worship leader for a significant salary. I have to consider this without being flippant but I’m not too inclined to take on the politics of church even for the safety and financial benefit. I want to follow my passion… of course I’m not always sure where that is to be honest. But I am aware of the spiritual drain I’ve endured just catering to a Christian community.

Bottom line is …. Money and safety are not my bottom line. I’m still looking for the adventure in the possibilities outside the box. I’m considering doing some demos for a girl singer in the next month but she is a friend’s daughter and a good singer. I’ve turned this stuff down to in the past… but strangely this time I did not.

I don’t know what the future holds but it feels like a new world to me and it’s not all bad.

O.K. So there’s that… Bd

Nifty Noodles/ Beachin'

8/10/04 Newport Beach, CA
I forgot to mention that I met the guys in the Village People on the plane to Seattle two days ago and I met band members for K.C. and the Sunshine Band coming back to LAX…. So see… I’m not the only old guy out there still doing it after the “shine” has worn off.

I joined my family and friends at the Beach this week… a yearly ritual to escape the heat in Riverside which is nearly unbearable in Aug. … One day and I’m already sunburned and saltwater logged.

Nifty Noodles/ Thurston County's Fair

8/9/04 Monday Lacey, WA
I toured the John Deere Tractor exhibit, looked at prize winning pigs and got a “paint on” Tattoo at the Thurston County Fair before “Headlining” the nights concert event. I couldn’t get a sound check because the pirate and his bird show was in progress and over the time limit. I drew cat calls from the crowd next door when I was getting levels set. So I just wandered the fairgrounds for a couple of hours.

Turns out though that the P.A. was rockin’! What I thought might be an endurance turned out to be an amazing gig. Walter Finch, the guitar player in my new band lives 5 minutes away and he came out and played a small set, just me and him… it was cool… we joked about calling ourselves the “pork-pie brothers”.

The mood at the show took a decided turn upon playing “I Love You With My Life” and then “I Never Lied To You”…the atmosphere at this outdoor venue changed. Now You know me… I don’t try to manufacture “spiritual renewal” but there was clearly something beside’s me going on here. There was a “spiritual interest” that I find unusual especially at a county fair . I could feel it and I’m usually the last to know!

It’s a new world I’m in. I feel no pressure and when things just flow in a spiritual direction I’m absolutely amazed. It wasn’t “church” or religion. It wasn’t Christian platitudes either. It was just “an atmosphere of divine presence”… to coin my own phrase. It was a lack of pretense on my part… effortless enthusiasm in the conscious presence of God… acknowledgement of this sinful world as it is and still being O.K. … it was hopeful and fun and filled with grace and freedom… I don’t know maybe the week off in the mountains changed my perspective too…

O.K. so there’s that…. Bryan D

Nifty Noodles/ Making Memories

8/6/04 Hume Lake Christian Camps
I’ve put over 300 miles on the motorcycle I borrowed riding the curvy two lanes around Sequoia National Park and King’s Canyon near Hume Lake, Ca.

I’ve come here for sixteen years every summer. I wrote a song for the camps that they still use in their promo material.

“Hume Lake is a refuge”… I sing. It is also a place of some of the greatest memories I have. Cave exploration, motorcycling,

sailing on the lake, camping with my wife and two sons, fellowship with the staff, campfires and watching bears destroy the ice chest,

jumping from the rocks into the kings river, hiding in the woods at night with my wife in order to watch our sons at camp, golfing with the goofy guys that run this camp, Frisbee golf with the camp speakers and counselors, mountain biking on the old railroads (now just trails),

reading about the logging operations of a hundred years ago, and the stars at night! Oh my… I’ve written many songs from here… most memorable was listening to the final cuts from the Christmas Is Jesus album full blast in the middle of summer.

Everyone should have a place like this, a place of reflection even when you are not looking for it. Sure God can speak to you around the Walmarts of life but there’s nothing like his whisper through the Ponderosa pines and how he speaks of his own longevity through the thousand year old Giant Sequoias. Very few things in life remain the same. There are some constant reminders here though that all is not lost.

Most of the faces have changed here now and this is my youngest sons last trip as a camper. I myself am in a different place now too. A place of redefinition. I’m clearly not who I used to be and past memories are just that. They are great but I must create new memories.

There were some uncomfortable places I found this week, alone on a long and unfamiliar back road in the mountains with no idea what was around the next curve. The thought that if the bike broke down there was no help coming by cell phone and it would be a long hike out caught my attention. (the battery on this bike doesn’t warn you when it’s exhausted and sometimes it won’t start) .

I am staying up here alone this week and Oswald Chambers has been speaking to me… “am I willing to reduce myself simply to ‘me’ determinedly to strip myself of all my friends think of me, of all I think of myself, and to hand that simple naked self over to God?”

“am I simply willing to be ‘myself’ and nothing more- no friends, no father, no brother, no self-interest- simply ready for death?”

“the comradeship of God is made up out of men who know their poverty. He can do nothing with the man who thinks that he is of use to God”…” we are here to be living monuments of God’s grace”….

Don’t know if that makes any sense to anyone… but those are the thoughts running through my mind this week.

I used to have a certain notoriety here that is now almost forgotten. I’m “this strange biker dude with frosted hair” staying in whispering pines lodge who comes and goes at whim. My music is spoken of by some who are recalling things that happened five and ten years ago… maybe that is the point I’m picking up from my devotionals. Don’t think for a minute that I am depressed here!

I’m fine but I’m looking at my own realities and how God is redirecting me. I’m probably lacking some enthusiasm for the future because I cannot see what it looks like right now… but I’m not depressed in fact I have felt little in the way of sadness.

Now fatigue is another story… I’ve worn myself to exhaustion pursuing leisure. Sleep has come easy. It’s Friday already and I put the bike back on the trailer to head home tomorrow. I’ve got to be in Washington state on Sunday. One last thing to do… a small concert for the folks here with a volleyball tournament. Interesting this time is that I never went in the lake… played golf down in Fresno and went to a Fresno Grizzlies baseball game that went 14 innings. The rest of the time I’ve just ridden the motorcycle through Kings Canyon to the roads end. And across the mountains on the General’s Highway. It’s been a dream of mine for years to spend a few days on a motorcycle.

Next I want to go to Utah through Zion National Park and on to Dixie National Forrest…. On my own motorcycle!

Oksotheresthat….bryan d

Nifty Noodles/ I need A Vacation

Home
Last week of July…. Played at two recovery programs Thursday and Friday, took me three days to recover from the concert I promoted myself. The whole while I was trying to get cut away footage for the DVD we’re producing.

Saturday afternoon I find out that the guy who wrote Radio Rehab a check for Four thousand dollars…was simply too good to be true. The check was written on a closed account and the phone number was not in service. Why someone would go to all that trouble is beyond me but maybe he gets to feel important for a few minutes.

I was only a little shocked but I did write more checks than I could cover. So there’s that. I’m not even angry at this point. I will overcome the deficit. I was disappointed at first but to be honest I was also overwhelmed by the over abundance of donations and the responsibility of it to begin with. So we’re back to a humble existence and I am grateful for the friends I have who believe in Radio Rehab and who defend and encourage me to move ahead a step at a time.

Saturday night I went to see a new friend in concert… Mo Grundy a blues singer and harmonica player. I joined him on stage at his gig before an outdoor crowd of about six hundred folks lakeside in the high desert. I played with his band completely without a sound check or a rehearsal…. “Don’t Help The Devil” and “Used Again”…. I was well received by the public at large who knew nothing of my history… I was just another old guy playin the blues.

Left Sunday morning for Hume Lake Christian Camps above Fresno California and just south an hour from Yosemite. Took my youngest son and two of his friends to their last summer camp. Hume Lake is a great retreat area so I’m staying here alone for a week in order to bring the boys back on Saturday.

I converted my boat trailer to a motorcycle trailer my self Saturday afternoon and traded my Speedster to a friend for his motorcycle for the week. First day in the mountains I put nearly one hundred miles on the bike riding around. I plan to sleep a lot tomorrow… and then there will be golf with my friends on staff at Hume Lake. And then sailing on the lake and Frisbee golf and maybe some paintball.

Oh, I’m talking about taking a night ride on the motorcycle with a couple a guys who have their bikes up here.

I’ll leave for Washington State next Sunday morning less than twenty four hours after getting home… but I should be well healed by then.

O.k. so there’s that….. Bryan D

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