Thought Mashup 1/11: How to be simultaneously thankful for Swedish Engineering and A Goblin King (a quick thank you note to David Bowie)

I had another blog written for today… But then life crapped all over it. 

I am Thankful for The Holy Spirit and Swedish engineering. 

Do you guys know people who are like so talented that they make you want to never ever work at anything again in your life? I know two of them… and they are both under 20 and 21 years of age. They are the type people who you tell you want to learn how to do undertake some artistic venture and you are never surprised that they have been doing it since they were 15 and are totally awesome at it. 

“Hey… I want to learn how to program multi-oscillator synthesizers in logic.”

“Oh yeah … I can help do that …. I was programming dub-step in 7th grade to insert into my metal bands break downs.”

“Hey… Can you help me figure out the best aperture ratio for this light?”

“Oh yeah… when I was shooting wedding portraits after I got my drivers license I found that tricky too.”

Tragedy is alway awful but when it affect people who bring beauty into the world, to me, the tragedy seems heavier. That is why I have been heavy today as I heard that these incredible people were in pretty horrific car accident last night (You can see the details here). They were driving 1990 Volvo home from the airport and were hit by someone going 100 in a 35. It sent part of the car on top of a two story building. One of them was able to walk away and the other is still in the ICU. 

So… If you are of the praying type… would you please pray for these incredible beautiful human beings today.

Farewell to the Goblin King. 

I would love to say that I came to listening to the David Bowie catalog because I saw the genius of “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust.” But that would be untrue and not nearly as awesome. 

When I was younger my mother made a distinct effort to exposes us some incredible things that helped expand our imaginations. It was because of this, that we were exposed to a movie Jim Henson directed movie called “Labyrinth.” It stared Jennifer Connelly as Sarah who was a frustrated older sister who was forced to baby sit her younger brother toby. In her frustration, she pleaded to “Jareth the Goblin King,” played by David Bowie, to take the nuisance of her brother off her hands. Muppet hijinks then ensued and it was amazing. The movie was in regular rotation at the Shelsta house. Our favorite song from that movie, “Dance Magic Dance.” is regularly sung at family gatherings and then some conversations about David Bowie’s cod piece follows shortly after. 

I have since listened to most of David Bowie’s catalog. He used sounds that weren’t being used. He used stage theatrics, that would forever shape rock music… I am thankful that people like David Bowie exist, for all of his faults (of which there were many) he expanded the public imagination beyond the given reality. 

So from my inner 6 year old to the pretentious music historical of my twenties… Thank you Goblin King… Thanks Ziggy… Thanks David… for helping me see that the given reality is not the only reality that can exist.