Grace Culture: Why Cancel Culture Needs to Go

Everyone sucks. It’s a pretty well-established fact of life. I suck. You suck. Your mom sucks. Hilary Clinton sucks. Donald Trump sucks. The Queen of England sucked. Name your favourite or least favourite person alive, and I can tell you with absolute certainty that they definitely suck. The very first thing we learn to do upon exiting the womb is suck (in a literal sense, but also in a figurative sense). It’s in our human nature.

There’s an entire tirade in the Bible about this, actually. It’s particularly referring to the Jewish and Greek folks who would have engaged with this writing at the time, but you could swap in any ol’ demographic and get the same idea. Black or white, cis or trans, Christian or atheist, and anyone and everyone else. We. All. Suck.

“None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.

All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one.”
Romans 3:11-12

Recently, I’ve learned a lot of my favourite creators suck, too. And I’m not talking incredibly famous people, but people who are just like me, people who create and share things. These people are musicians and bloggers and writers who just so happened to reach the right amount of people to “make it,” whatever that even looks like. But the point is, I could be any one of them.

It’s exciting. It’s humbling. It’s scary.

One of my favourite YouTubers is apparently a nightmare to work with. Another took a picture with all her friends — who just so happened to be skinny, white-passing, and attractive by our narrow Euro-centric beauty conventions — and spun the post as body positivity. One of my favourite podcasts of all time got derailed because…I’m still not entirely sure. Stevie Nicks’ landmark song has a title that’s quite literally a racial slur. And I could list every infraction ever committed by my favourite guitarists, from John Mayer’s general fuckery to how Richie Sambora drove drunk with his daughter in the car. Even my beloved Chili Peppers aren’t innocent, sexually assaulting a fan in the early 90s and citing a porn star who was literally underage at the time she was active in the industry as a muse.

I’ve always wanted to be famous, ever since I was little and ran onstage at some show because I was mad the actresses were getting attention instead of me. I used to daydream at great length about becoming a rock star, crafting entire scenarios in my head about what my life and career would be like. I imagined the inevitable biopic that would be made about me, my internal dialogue becoming a narration of the story of my life from the perspective of someone who thought I was cool enough to make a movie about.

But at the same time, I don’t know if I can handle being famous. And that’s simply because I suck. Certainly not as much as some of the creators I mentioned above, but I still suck. I’ve said and done things I regret a lot, and I’m just lucky that I wasn’t in the spotlight at the time. Because I honestly don’t know if I could handle the criticism, even if it was justified. Especially if it was justified. I hate the feeling of being wrong, almost as much as I hate the idea of ever hurting anyone.

As a creator of any type, there’s so much pressure to be perfect, not just looks-wise but as a person as well. We need to be a role model. I don’t think that’s a bad thing. I think creators should strive to be positive influences for their fans, and I think creators should be held accountable when they inevitably fuck up. Some of those things might be unforgivable. Should the allegations against Michael Jackson be true, for example, we definitely need to stop holding him up as an idol. Should we stop listening to his music? I think that’s an even more complicated issue that I’ll probably address in a future post. But for relatively benign “maybe I didn’t realise this was racist at the time but now I know better” kinds of problematic behaviour, I think we need more space for grace. Because God knows I’ll need it.

I want so badly to make waves as a musician or writer, but sometimes I find myself paralysed by the pressure to be above reproach in all things. What if something I posted ten years ago on Facebook resurfaces and shows me as a total asshole now? You have to put yourself out there to get any ounce of fame, but in the process, you open yourself up to so much scrutiny. And sometimes I wonder if I could handle that. I cry if someone looks at me funny (I describe myself as “the stereotypical Pisces” for good reason). I think I could handle the press or some anonymous Twitter denizen calling me ugly or untalented. But if someone attacked my character, something I take more seriously than my looks or even my art, I’d probably lose it.

I hate the term “cancel culture” because of its association with the anti-“woke” (read: anti-any media that’s not cishet white male) rhetoric, but I think it’s time we cancel cancel culture to an extent. Rather, we need a grace culture, one where people are free to fuck up and be able to redeem themselves. We need to have open conversations with each other about why we suck and how we can suck less in a way that’s not defensive or vilifying. We need to be open to learning from one another.

Even If It Kills Me

TW: sexual assault

I write this from my hotel room at GLR, the annual music therapy conference for the Midwest-based students, practitioners, and academics. It’s hard to believe the last time I was at GLR, I was still legally married to my ex and COVID hadn’t yet happened.

So much has changed.

The last GLR I attended was in Cincinnati. I remember all too well. You might remember too, if you remember this post (HUGE FUCKING TRIGGER WARNING ON THAT ONE). That was the year my dream of becoming a music therapist was stolen from me, when the aftermath of the rape I experienced on that trip tainted the very field I longed to be part of. Suddenly, everything related to music therapy reminded me of the person who violated me. My mental health got worse. I started drinking heavily. Soon, I wasn’t able to keep up with the coursework, and I dropped all my classes.

I’d already left the music therapy program once, due to my mental health, but this seemed insurmountable. And reentering the program after that felt like pushing a boulder up a mountain with a toothpick. I’d already given up twice. Surely I was too damaged to ever be a real music therapist.

But I’m here. I’m still here.

As of writing this, I’m not only at the conference, but I’m gearing up for the prestigious Undergraduate Symposium, where I’ll be giving a presentation on music therapy and autism. All of my current grades are, by some miracle of God, in the A range. I’m meeting with my professor to discuss internships in a week, and I won a research fellowship that paid for my entire senior year, and then some.

It doesn’t seem real. I shouldn’t be here, but I am. And I owe it all to the people who have helped me through recovery — my wife, my family, my professors. And to myself. I fought like hell to get to a place where I’m staring down graduation at last, where I’m finally on the cusp of claiming the title of MT-BC for myself.

This GLR feels almost poetic. I’m back at a hotel not unlike the one I was assaulted at, but I feel safe. I feel whole. Everything has come full circle, and my dream of becoming a music therapist feels not only within reach, but no longer tainted by the hands that hurt me. I’m not going to let trauma steal the very reason I was put on this planet — to heal through music. I am not too damaged.

On my 30th birthday a few weeks back, dad said something that made me tear up a little. When he briefly died on the operating table after a massive heart attack, he said my then-very-young niece appeared to him and said he couldn’t die yet. But he finally told me the rest of the story.

She said he couldn’t die because he had to see me graduate.

I’m not turning back because this time, it’s personal. I love my dad — and myself — more than I hate my rapist. I’m going to get this degree and this certification in spite of everything. In the words of Motion City Soundtrack, I so wanna get back on track. I’ll do whatever it takes.

Even if it kills me.

So Long and Goodnight: How My Middle School BFF Shaped My Entire Life

Strap in, guys, gals, and enby pals. We’re in for an emotional roller coaster with this one.

This is your last warning. You *will* cry.

I think every thirteen-year-old girl has a chosen name. Think back to when you were thirteen and you wanted to be called, I don’t know, Renesmee or something. It was definitely inspired by something cringy like that. Me? I tried to get everyone to call me Sophitia, like the badass Greek sword-wielding action mom from the Soul Calibur series.

Definitely *not* a MILF (mother I’d like to fight)

No one called me Sophitia, of course, save for my dad (until my mom made him stop). Well, him and Chelsea. Or, shall I say, Helena.

Her cringy thirteen-year-old chosen name was Helena, like the My Chemical Romance song. She insisted it was pronounced “huh-lay-nah,” not “hel-en-uh.” True to the girl in the music video of the emo standard, she had pale skin and a tall but slight frame and dark hair and piercing blue eyes, all of which she took pride in. She was gorgeous and she knew, but you couldn’t help but love her nonetheless.

I don’t remember exactly how Chelsea and I met, but I remember her as an absolute spitfire who hurled herself into my life with the intensity of a tigress. She was spirited, witty, and strong-willed, the kind of girl who stood up for me in the face of notoriously cruel grade school bullies. For a solid two years, we were practically inseparable. Those years were filled with memories I’ll never forget. Like Thursday nights at my church’s youth group, getting all giddy over which cute guy talked to us. Or staying up late during sleepovers on my bedroom floor, telling each other stories until we fell asleep. Or editing our MySpaces together on my family’s computer, and the one time I got interrogated because my mom found “emo boys kissing” in my search history. Thanks for that, Chels.

Music was an integral part of our friendship. One of our favorite activities was dressing up like our favorite rock stars and putting on shows for ourselves. Being obsessed with Bon Jovi, I had us dress up like Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora. She was Richie because her hair was darker, even though I always liked him more. She’s the one who introduced me to the emo genre that defined my taste in music as I grew older. She loved this song called “Fer Sure” by The Medic Droid, and in the car she’d always sing “Kick off your stilettos and THROW THEM IN THE BACKSEAT” loud enough to obscure the fact that the actual lyrics were “fuck me in the backseat.” And of course, there was Helena and Sophitia, our cringy chosen names that doubled as our stage names. We would have these big dreams about someday starting a band together, and she wrote a little song with a melody that still gets stuck in my head to this day.

Something changed after a trip up north together, though. I asked if she had the sunscreen we bought while there and she accused me of accusing her of stealing it. What transpired was a platonic breakup worse than any of my romantic breakups have been. It’s such a stupid thing to ruin what was one of the most important friendships of my life. A girl’s BFF-ship at that transitional age of late preteendom is so important, and just like that, I lost her.

What followed was radio silence for years. I watched her grow up from afar. She joined the military, married, and had a son. Me, I went to college and had a couple of rock bands that didn’t work out. But as adults, she reached out to me and extended the olive branch, and we reconnected over our shared spiritual goals and, of course, music.

We were never as close as we were as kids, though, because shortly after we reconnected, a little global health crisis called COVID-19 happened, and all our plans to meet up fell through.

She then had a private health crisis of her own. On the warmest Christmas morning in memory, I got a text from one of our old mutual friends.

“Hey Jess, I’m so sorry to hear about Chelsea.”

I couldn’t even cry. I was numb. All these memories came flooding back like a tidal wave. I ran to my guitar and immediately started strumming the old song she wrote, and suddenly, I knew what I had to do. That day, I turned her melody into a full song she’d be proud of.

My only regret is she’ll never get to hear it.

Life is so short, and we take moments with our loved ones for granted. The next time you hang out with your best friend could be your last, and you wouldn’t even know. So cherish every memory you get, because in the end, that’s all we can carry with us through life, and those memories are what carry us through life.

So long and goodnight, my dearest friend. I’m a better person for having known you.

Cyrus vs. Shapiro (and Why I Actually Find Myself Siding With Benny This Time)

Ah, Ben Shapiro. Enemy of wet pussies everywhere. Surely you’ve heard of him. When he’s not busy clearly not getting his wife off, he’s writing some astute observation on popular culture and denouncing how “woke” we’ve become as a society. And by woke, he means committing the heinous crime of, uh, acknowledging queer people exist. As if we have some kind of big gay agenda.

The real gay agenda is just a planner with every day labelled “nap cutely with girlfriend” in purple sparkly gel pen.

While I typically do not ascribe to his politics, they say a stopped clock is right twice a day. Here’s one such example:

Although “calling out literal Nazism” is such a low bar, it might as well be a honky tonk in hell.

And here’s the other:

If you didn’t catch the reference, he’s critiquing “Flowers” by Miley Cyrus, which is a veritable bop. Now typically, in a Cyrus vs. Shapiro battle, I’d be firmly on the side of Miley. I love Miley. And why wouldn’t I? She’s a raspy-voiced pansexual icon who can write a decent song. She’s basically me if I were way cooler.

And I would 100 percent wear this outfit.

But I think there’s some truth to what Shapiro is saying, as much as typing that makes me want to rip off my head with my bare hands and hurl it from the nearest window. I think there’s a serious toxic independence problem among young left-wing folks like me. Let me explain.

For a long time, people like me who were assigned female at birth had a single expectation in life — get married and start a family. We were essentially forced into being wives and mothers throughout most of history. Thankfully, the tide has turned and women are allowed to follow their passions outside of the home. We’re no longer limited by societal expectations.

But in freeing ourselves from the historical pressure to marry and reproduce, we’ve lost sight of the importance of love and family. Now I’m not talking about the traditional nuclear family of one man, one woman, two and a half kids, and maybe a dog. Families come in all shapes and sizes, and maybe blood isn’t what ties you to your loved ones. But in our effort to eschew these norms, I feel like we’ve swung too far to the other side, where we feel like we don’t need anyone anymore. And that’s such a lonely life to live.

Personally, I love being married. I love the idea of having children someday. I love the idea of raising them alongside the people I care about most, my chosen family (cue Rina Sawayama — again). And yet, a lot of folks my age will never get to experience that kind of unconditional love. They’ll mindlessly bounce from one shallow friendship or fling to another. I don’t think it’s healthy to live like that.

Maybe “family” is a dirty word to a lot of young queer and progressive-minded people. Our blood families may have disowned us for our beliefs or identities. But we’re adults now, and this is our chance to take back what should have been our birthright — a family who loves us relentlessly and unconditionally. The concept of family isn’t a liberal vs. conservative thing. It’s a human right.

I’m not saying I don’t get Miley’s side of the story either. Breakups suck, and one of the most cathartic things you can do is write a song about it (something I obviously know nothing about). But after your tears have dried, dust yourself off, get back out there, and love again. Go meet your future spouse(s), best friends, chosen family. Don’t let getting hurt keep you from the beauty that is having meaningful relationships. Let me say that again, in fancy letters:

Don’t let getting hurt keep you from the beauty that is having meaningful relationships.

As human beings, we were made to love. We’re not lone hunters. We are like lions, and we need the support of our pride to live the most fulfilling lives. Sure, Shapiro went on a bit of a tangent that’s not entirely related to Miley’s song (which is mostly just a fluffy heartbreak song, to be honest), but I think he has a valid point, as much as it pains me to admit it.

(The bass in “Flowers” still slaps, though.)

Polyamory 101: Answering the Basic Questions

It started with a conversation with my coworkers about our planned futures. I mentioned I wanted kids someday, and I’d be the one carrying them.

“So you’re planning to get a donor?” one of them inquired.

“Yeah,” I said. “It’s between one of my wife’s good friends and my girlfriend, who’s trans and had her you-know-what preserved before transitioning.”

“You have a girlfriend too?” another coworker asked.

“No, she obviously means a friend who’s a girl,” the other said.

“Actually,” I began, “I do mean girlfriend, as in a girl that I’m dating. We’re polyamorous.”

Can of worms, now open.

Cue me getting bombarded with questions about the lifestyle choice, which I don’t mind answering at all. But it made me realize just how little the world as a whole actually knows about polyamory!

That’s where this blog post comes in. I want to answer some of the common questions I get about being polyamorous (a word that literally means “having many loves”). I’m not super open about it yet, but I’m trying to change that, because I think the world needs to know there’s nothing wrong with not fitting into “the norm.” Which leads me to my first question.

How did you realize you were polyamorous?

I never “realized” anything. In fact, I’d argue that being poly is more of a conscious lifestyle choice than a sexual or romantic orientation. No one chooses to be attracted to the same or opposite gender, but I’d argue that everyone has been attracted to more than one person. You haven’t had just one crush or partner your entire life, have you? It’s what you choose to do with these feelings for multiple people that determines whether you’re monogamous, ethically non-monogamous (basically polyamorous), or non-ethically non-monogamous (a cheating asshole). If you’re monogamous, you choose to disregard any feelings for other people and commit to a single person, which is completely okay! But if you’re ethically non-monogamous, you and your partner(s) are open to the idea of dating other people as well, so long as everyone is in the know and consenting. And the second you cross the line into not telling your partner or partners you’re dating someone else, that’s just cheating, and you suck. Yes, it is possible to cheat in a polyamorous relationship!

As for me personally, I’ve never been all that jealous in relationships anyways, so when my wife and I first got together and she mentioned she was poly, I just went with it.

So you’re all dating each other?

Absolutely not.

Some polycules (we prefer that term over “throuple,” by the way) are cool with mixing all together. Those are kitchen table polycules, as in everyone gathers at the table together and does life with each other.

My wife is not into that. She prefers to keep our relationship separate.

It’s not that she doesn’t like my other partner (who I’m not going to name, as she’s not openly poly and queer at this time). She simply isn’t interested in her like that, and she’s not a very social person anyways, so we don’t all sit in a circle and sing kum-bah-yah or whatever. She’d rather me go out and spend time with my other partner, then come back and spend time with her afterwards.

There’s more than one way to be polyamorous, and sometimes that does involve multiple partners living together and coexisting. Should my girlfriend move to Michigan someday, she would either live in a duplex-type situation with us or have a separate house, and I’d split my time between them. But my wife and girlfriend wouldn’t ever live together.

So your wife can date other people, and you don’t get jealous?

Not at all! I simply don’t see love or sex as a finite resource. Now time is a finite resource, but I don’t think it’s advisable or healthy for even monogamous couples to spend every waking hour together. If you can balance your time between two or more partners and everyone’s okay with it, so be it.

Okay, this is a weird sex thing, isn’t it?

Not at all! In fact, I consider sex to be the least important aspect of both of my relationships, and it barely factors into one at all. That particular partner considers herself to be on the asexual spectrum, so it’s actually nice to be able to fulfill that need with someone else instead of guilting her into sleeping with me when she’s not into it. There is some overlap between the poly community and the kink community, but being poly doesn’t necessarily mean being kinky, and vice versa.

But you love one partner more than the other, right?

Again, not necessarily! Poly folks might have a “primary” partner who comes before the others. You could argue my wife is my primary because I live with her and I’m legally bound to her, but I prefer the term “nesting partner,” as it erases that sense of hierarchy in the relationships. I love my wife and my girlfriend in different ways. I have a very romantic relationship with my girlfriend. I want to watch the sunset with her and lay in bed serenading each other and see all of the wonders of the world with her by my side. On the other hand, I have a very familial relationship with my wife (which is why she’s my wife!). I can see myself having kids with her and being silly with them and watching them grow up together, the way she and I grew up together. They’re both very warm, heartfelt, fulfilling relationships in different but equal ways. As I like to describe the feeling, I love one like the moon, and one like the stars

But this is scandalous! Do you tell people about this?

If it comes up, yes. I’ve learned to be a little more open about it because things will never change to become more accommodating to poly folks if no one ever “comes out” as being poly. I’ve told my mom, and while she’s hesitant, she just wants me to be happy. She knows I’m not the “one husband and 2.5 kids with a white picket fence and a dog” type, and I never have been. I’ve tried living that life and it wasn’t for me. As I’ve said on here before, never break your own bones to fit into someone else’s box. I don’t know if the rest of my family knows, but honestly, it’s not their place to judge my relationships. I’m happy and everyone involved is happy, and that’s what matters.

I’m usually a little more open about being polyamorous with younger people. Older folks are a little more set in their ways and old-school about relationships, which is completely okay as long as you don’t try to force people into that box. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — there’s nothing wrong with straight, cis, monogamous couples and families. I’ve just learned that life is not for me.

Aren’t you a Christian? This is against God’s word!

Lots of people in the Bible had more than one partner. In fact, you could argue that the big 3 Abrahamic religions all condone polyamory. Well, technically polygamy — historically men were allowed to have more than one wife. This is likely due to the fact that 1. ancient societies were decidedly patriarchal and 2. women were more plentiful than men because they weren’t put on the frontlines of war. But God has never said anything condemning polyamory in particular. The only argument against it is the fact that things went sour for Abraham/Sarah/Hagar and Jacob/Leah/Rachel, but that’s less of an argument against polyamory and more of an observation about how sucky human relationships in general are. We all mess up, and obviously, the more people you add to the equation, the more there’s a chance someone’s gonna screw something up.

Thank you, imaginary person whose questions I’m answering.

Okay, this has all been very enlightening.

So that’s the long and short of polyamory and why it works for me. I’ll probably do a part two on what I think are the best parts of being poly are (like getting to eat ice cream and cry with your wife when someone else breaks your heart), but for now, I just wanted to answer the basic questions. Do you think you could ever be in a poly relationship? Why or why not? Let me know in the comments, and feel free to ask me any questions you might have left!

A Little Help From My Friends

I can’t do it alone.

Seriously. Every time I’ve tried to do anything by myself, I usually fall flat on my big dumb face. And if there’s anything I’ve learned about my particular brand of ADHD, it’s that I need someone else there to hold me to my word. Accountability is a necessity for me.

My wife and I have been trying to get back in shape, which isn’t a new thing. Years of heavy drinking and treating our bodies like dive bars instead of temples has turned us into bloated, chonky, weak shells of our former selves.

The problem is whenever we tried to commit to working out or eating better, we let ourselves make tiny excuses until eventually those tiny excuses rolled into bigger excuses, and soon enough, we were right back at the start. Maybe we could stop drinking and smoking cold turkey, but starting a new habit was going to take a lot more effort. And help!

When we joined our local gym, we were invited to try working with a personal trainer. And just having someone to show us the ropes and cheer us on helped so much, so we signed on to have him train us weekly. (Even though we’re going to have to hustle hard to pay for it, ick.) And having someone hold us to our word is helping immensely. We’ve been training three days a week now and I’m already seeing results. It’s amazing what happens when you’re nice to your body for once.

But even if you can’t afford a trainer, just having someone else around to help you stay motivated works as well. Find a friend who wants to get in shape as much as you do. When you don’t want to work out, there’s a chance they do. And they’ll be the one push you to get in the gym and do the damn thing. There’s a saying in Ecclesiastes, one of my favorite books of the Bible for good reason (and not just because it’s an entire chapter of emo ramblings).

Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor:
If either of them falls down, one can help the other up.
Ecclesiastes 4: 9-10

Sometimes you need a little help, and there’s no shame in that! Think about a goal you want to accomplish, and find some folks to rally around you and fight alongside you. Maybe it’s working out and getting healthy, or maybe you’re trying to stay accountable for finishing a project. Just find your team and get moving!

Get Out of That Box!

I feel bad for leaving everyone on a sad note with my last post, so this one is more optimistic, I swear!

My wife and I stopped drinking earlier this year. Officially, for real this time. We haven’t had as much as a drop in the last several months. And frankly, I’m pretty okay with that. Sure, there’s some FOMO when my friends are sipping on a nice craft beer or mixed drink, but for the most part, I don’t miss it. I’ve lost weight, I don’t have no-reason hives nearly as often, and I’m not constantly in a daze from being drunk or hungover almost every day.

We were paying money to have a bad time.

Something peculiar happened when we stopped drinking though. We found ourselves unable to relate to a lot of our friends who did drink a lot or rely on drugs to have fun. Suddenly, sobriety was lonely as hell. I call these growing pains, though. As in, we’re finally growing up, but the people around us are stagnating. It’s a good problem, although it doesn’t feel good in the moment.

My old church and pastor are problematic for a lot of reasons, and if you’ve snooped long enough through my blog, you’d know why. But my former pastor did have a lot of wisdom I still love by to this day. One of his sayings was “show me your friends, and I’ll show you your future.” As 90s sitcom “special episode” as it is to admit, the people you surround yourself with influence you more than you think.

Think of it this way. If someone’s standing on a table for some ungodly reason, it would be hard for them to pull another person up onto the table with them. It would be much easier for someone on the ground to pull the person on the table down to their level. It’s best to climb onto the table alone. That doesn’t mean you can’t have any friends when you’re working on yourself, though. Maybe people will see that what you’re doing is weird and different and better, and they might even climb onto a table as well.

The point is, the road to getting better is lonely, but it doesn’t have to be. Instead of hanging out at bars and partying your life away, meet new people at gyms or church. Learn a new hobby and join a local group for it. Even online groups like r/decidingtobebetter on Reddit can be helpful. It sucks distancing yourself from old friends, but holding onto habits that hurt you in order to still relate to them is not worth it. You can’t keep breaking your own bones to fit into someone else’s box.

Get out of that box!

Why Anchors?

It’s a question I get asked a lot, especially during sandal season, when my little anchor tattoo is clearly visible on my left foot. It’s the symbol I chose to represent my blog, my business, and my spirituality as a whole. But where did my obsession with anchors originate, and why are they so special — dare I say, sacred — to me?

It helps to know a little about the traditional symbolism. In sailor culture, tattoos were popular long before they made their way onto the lower backs of even the most demure housewife. To these seafarers, the anchor represented stability. A sailor often got an anchor tattoo for a special lady, typically a lover or his mother, to remind him of the love and security he has waiting for him back home.

Additionally, the anchor is associated with bodies of water, to which I’ve always felt a connection to. I’ve lived near the same river for a majority of my life, and being a Pisces, the element holds a spiritual importance to me. The shape of the anchor resembles a cross, which is significant to me as well, as my Christian-rooted beliefs play no small part in my personal spiritual practices.

But believe it or not, it goes even deeper than that.

I remember briefly dating a fellow musician my freshman year of college. He was someone I admired greatly, and still do, for his musicianship as well as his humility. He would tell me about how he made music for other people, simply because he loved the way it made them happy. Music was more than just his hobby or his job. It was the way he connected with others, and he viewed it as something of a sacred duty to use his talents to spread joy. His band used a lot of anchors in their symbolism as well, representing humility and groundedness. He never wanted to lose sight of why he did what he did. He never wanted music to become a selfish act.

That philosophy really resonated with me, especially as a music therapist-in-training, and despite the relationship ending, I held fast to the wisdom he had shared. Music — and all my creative endeavours for that matter — now held a deeper meaning to me, and I adopted the anchor as a symbol of staying humble and remembering why I do what I do. Getting that tattoo, my first tattoo for that matter, was my way of making sure I always had that reminder to put others first in all things. Music and life in general shouldn’t be about getting famous or hitting it big. It should be about leaving the world a brighter place than how you found it.

No matter how far I sail in this life, I won’t forget or forsake the people and places I hold dear. May everything I do reflect a heart of humility and love.

You Can’t Always Get What You Want

Scrolling through Instagram as I tend to do on a lazy Sunday evening, I found this infographic:

I could write an entire doctoral thesis on how this relates to my own life. Like, how I’m glad I didn’t end up a journalist, because I can’t handle that kind of pressure. Or how I’m glad I never reached Taylor Swift levels of fame, because, well, I can’t handle that kind of pressure.

I’d like to think I’m the fancy bejeweled Russian kind, though.

Young Jess wanted a lot of things that, in retrospect, adult Jess would have considered a nightmare. None more so than my middle school crush, who I absolutely believed was my soulmate.

Ah yes, the face of a woman who knew exactly what she wanted.

I remember crying myself to sleep over this kid, who will remain unnamed, but we’ll just call him Kyle. The way his floppy auburn hair jostled in the wind at youth group meetups, the way his blue-green eyes shone like sea glass at Cedar Point. I was obsessed with this guy in a way I’d never been obsessed with anyone ever. I didn’t think I was capable of having a crush. The closest I’d come before was strange thoughts about Ann Wilson from the band Heart and this dude from an American Idol knockoff no one remembers. I wasn’t supposed to have crushes on people I actually knew. That was preposterous.

But there he was. I was so enamored with him, I couldn’t imagine a single flaw in him. And young me thought this is what love is. I would have done anything for him. I would have let him walk all over me if he wanted. I would have readily given up everything that made me, well, me, if it meant a chance to have him. And I did. I changed the way I dressed to be more like his then-girlfriend. I started trying to be someone I wasn’t. And surprisingly, it worked! A few years later, I ended up dating him. And…it was anticlimactic. We kissed once, and there were no sparks. I had this boy of my dreams, but something wasn’t right. Shortly after, we broke up. it was mutual.

I had many crushes since, but none were as intense as Kyle. I think everyone needs a Kyle, just to show them what love isn’t. Love isn’t obsession. Love isn’t being a doormat. Love isn’t losing yourself to someone else. Kyle wasn’t a bad person. In fact, he was a great person! Just not my person.

Sometimes I wonder what life would have been like had I ended up with him. Before writing this article, I looked him up on Twitter, my last connection to the boy that changed my life. It was…mostly hockey. Some stuff about Bitcoin. A retweet of Ben Shapiro, which is probably not a good sign. But mostly just hockey. Even if middle school me got her way, she’d be miserable today. I’d be miserable today. I don’t give a shit about hockey or Bitcoin, and Ben Shapiro kind of sucks. And he’d be just as miserable with some eccentric artsy chick who likes Bernie Sanders and blogs for fun.

Sometimes we don’t get what we want, and that’s okay. I’ll let the Rolling Stones take it from here.