"According to a recent report, more than two-thirds of recent immigrants to the USA send money home regularly. The worst-paid, poorest people in the country manage to save enough to send some back to the old country. The US Ambassador from El Salvador says that the two million Salvadorians in the U.S. sent enough money home to account for 13 percent of the GDP of his country." - via Seth Godin

Since I changed timezones a week and a half ago it's been like my life has gone up a gear or two. It's a good thing overall, but, as with all change, has taken a while to get used to and make sense of.

I've just moved in with Peter and Ellen, who have just got married (see flickr for evidence). Their wedding was lovely, helped largely by their decision to rent a large house where their family and friends could stay the night before, and night after the event.

The ceremony itself was held in a beautiful 18th century Lutheran chapel, in the middle of the Skåne countryside. It began with an amazing composition on saxophone by Andreas, which set the tone for the musical expressions that followed. I missed most of the formalities because I was taking photos and therefore didn't have translation.

Afterwards we headed to Tomtelund (santa wood) for a wonderful meal interspersed with speeches and my new favourite Swedish tradition - whenever people tap their cutlery against their wine glasses the couple had to kiss! There was also song that the band played, everyone accompanying, as the bride and groom lit their candles, then lit the candles of their neighbours, until everyone was holding a glowing candle which they then passed back to the couple (photos to follow). Later we had dancing (live band and dancing with partners).

All in all a lovely day.

Word of the Day: Skumpa (a slang word for Champaigne)

Another great podcast...
Christian Sexuality in a Sex-crazed World by Steve Nicholson at Evanston Vineyard

A short story begins...
(please read this first)

As Joe stood, the bead of sweat that had been welling on his forehead trickled down, leaving behind it a thin trail. The smoke that hung in the air and the hushed voices of the listeners were almost enough to make him run.

He wasn't the first. There had been Katie, the alcoholic, and Davy, the heroin addict, but this was his turn...
"I'm Joe, and I'm a consumer..."
"Hello Joe," the crowd responded. He didn't know whether to feel relieved, or bolt.
"I've been clean for two weeks, three days, six hours and..." He paused to check his watch, "thirteen minutes."

The crowd began to clap, some to cheer, but he could tell that they weren't convinced.
His addiction had echoes in their own experiences. While he had no physical compulsion, no tangible cold-turkey, his was the trigger, the source of each of their addictions.

Joe, a recovering consumer, was surrounded by consumers, by those who turned to the drink, the hit, or the toke for solace. Each on an endless search for that feeling of happiness, that temporary high, to aleviate the deep throb of their bitter pain.

The precision of the last words off his lips revealed the struggle that the last two-and-a-bit weeks had been. The whole time he had battled with a nagging feeling that it is impossible to recover from this affliction. Can someone really live in the twenty-first century, in the 'developed' west, as a non-consumer? Is there a feasible model for such an existence?

Joe knew how easy it is to replace one vice for another, like the heroin addicts turning to cigarettes, or the alcoholics becoming 'religious.' Deep inside his longing was not for an alternative dependancy, but for freedom, freedom from that hopeless numbness that led him to consume. Freedom from the 'I' that day by day tightened it's grip upon his senses. He could barely remember a time when he was connected, where he didn't feel the need for alcohol to mediate his contact with his fellow man, or when the television, playstation, or broadband wasn't a medium for escapism.

One of my worst afflictions is perfectionism coupled with a fear of failure. This bears particular weight when it comes to what could broadly be termed 'artistic expression.'

I recently wrote a poem entitled "on why I don't write (for public consumption)" which expresses these fears. While I have a great memory when it comes to situations and things other people have said, I am lame at remembering, or completing, artistic endeavours I have started. The result: a 26-track mindisc of songs begun, but never finished; journals and stray sheets of paper strewn throughout my room. Each of these represents a moment of inspiration that I failed to follow through.

Today I found the following, entirely imperfect, start to a short story. I don't remember writing it, and, but for the handwriting and that I discovered it in my bedroom, I might have thought it someone elses'. Nevertheless, it is mine.

While I may be terrified of failure and gripped by utter perfectionism I'm aware that until I begin to take risks and put my work 'out there' I will not improve. I remember grappling with Dylan Thomas' In My Craft or Sullen Art while in school, asking "was poetry just something he was born with, or did he have to work at it?" (the basic first question in the writer's own mind).

I'm not asking you to compare me with Thomas (please don't) but I do want to make space for taking a deep breath and exposing my writings in the hope the I might someday improve. So here goes...

(more to follow...)

Want some chord sheets for worship songs? click here

How exciting, season 3 of Lost begins tonight in the US...

hello, goodbye
You know the saying "come rain and shine..."? In this wonderfully Welsh autumn it basically serves as an ongoing weather report. One moment it's t-shirt weather, the next coats.

Yesterday I visited Reuben at Rocketfuelled HQ for a little design party/gathering/(extended) coffee break. It's great to have friends who are in a similar field of work and with whom you can share the frustrations of working for the best boss.

In the evening I met up with Hannah, and later Dani. I was in school with Hannah and we figured out it had been six years since we last hung out! It was really nice, and really surprising that so much time can pass and you can just kind of pick up where you left off.

Life is a bit weird at the moment because it feels like I'm hooking up with people I haven't seen in ages, rediscovering old friendships and even starting some new ones, but in just eleven days will move countries...