Details In the Fabric

While reading this blog post, please indulge yourself in listening to the song which this blog post is concentrated on.

Lyrics

Calm down
Deep breaths
And get yourself dressed instead
Of running around
And pulling on your threads
And breaking yourself up

If it's a broken part, replace it
If it's a broken arm, then brace it
If it's a broken heart, then face it

And hold your own
Know your name
And go your own way
Hold your own
Know your name
And go your own way

And everything will be fine

Hang on
Help is on the way
And stay strong
I'm doing everything

Hold your own
Know your name
And go your own way
Hold your own
Know your name
And go your own way

And everything, everything will be fine
Everything

Are the details in the fabric
Are the things that make you panic
Are your thoughts results of static cling?

Are the things that make you blow
Hell, no reason, go on and scream
If you're shocked it's just the fault
Of faulty manufacturing.

Everything will be fine
Everything in no time at all
Everything

Hold your own
And know your name
And go your own way

Are the details in the fabric (Hold your own, know your name)
Are the things that make you panic
Are your thoughts results of static cling? (Go your own way)

Are the details in the fabric (Hold your own, know your name)
Are the things that make you panic (Go your own way)
Is it Mother Nature's sewing machine?

Are the things that make you blow (Hold your own, know your name)
Hell no reason go on and scream
If you're shocked it's just the fault (Go your own way)
Of faulty manufacturing

Everything will be fine
Everything in no time at all
Hearts will hold

-Jason Mraz-Details in the Fabric-Feature James Morrison

In order to understand this song, you need to hear the lyrics and read them at the same time. Honestly, this may be one of the most relaxing songs I have ever heard. In addition to the slow strum of the guitar and the soft chords, the lyrics echo the message of the song. I have yet to hear a song that matches the lyrics and the tune more perfectly.

It is in the lyrics that I find the most meaning in this song. In a sense, it is very carpe diem, "
If it's a broken part, replace it. If it's a broken arm, then brace it. If it's a broken heart, then face it." This is lyrical in the less than subtle undertones that one can change whatever they want in their life if they put their mind to it. Although this is an excellent philosophy, I no longer subscribe to it because there are many things in life that are intangible and not able to be changed.

But later in the song Mraz sings, "Are the things that make you blow. Hell, no reason, go on and scream. If you're shocked it's just the fault. Of faulty manufacturing." In a semblance, he is accepting that no one is perfect. Which isn't true. This acceptance of imperfection is what builds our lives as humans. One can go throughout their day thinking everything is, "hunky-dory" and that they never make mistakes or are infallible. But in fact, they are either ignoring the truth or they are actually perfect. But in fact, no one is perfect. Everyone has flaws, and it is in the confrontation of these flaws which humanity thrives. We must accept our flaws; for they are things which we must learn from.

To conclude the song, Mraz sings, "Everything will be fine.Everything in no time at all." Which in fact, in the juxtaposition, means that things were always fine. It is this interpretation of the final lyrics of the song which I indulge. As stubborn as one (or I) may be, one must accept that everyone makes mistakes. And, it is in the confrontation and either conquering or being conquered by these mistakes that we live out our lives. In the end, one must know that, everything will be fine, or, "if it's not ok, then it's not the end."-Unknown






I sincerely hoped you enjoyed this journey through my form of "wisdom" and the anaphora(?)


-Scott

Serendipity

Tonight is a good night (3/17/20110).

Tonight is a good night for "mucho" reasons.

Tonight is a good night, one on which I have decided what I am going to compose my This I Believe about:

Change.

While I am not going to reveal the exact ideas I have developed in here, I have thought about Change and why this would be such a good concept to write the This I Believe about.

 

Some good reasons...

• It is something that we are surrounded by.
• Change can come in many forms.
• It is a necessary force in life.
• Change is constant.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  (ps. Did you notice the anaphora at the beginning?)

An example of a This I Believe.



"I believe evolution. It’s easy. It’s my life. I’m a paleoanthropologist. I study fossils of humans, apes, and monkeys, and I teach college students about their place in nature.
Of course I believe evolution.
But that is different from believing in evolution.
To believe in something takes faith, trust, effort, strength. I need none of these things to believe evolution. It just is. My health is better because of medical research based on evolution. My genetic code is practically the same as a chimpanzee’s. My bipedal feet walk on an earth full of fossil missing links. And when my feet tire, those fossils fuel my car.
To believe in something also implies hope. Hope of happiness, reward, forgiveness, eternal life. There is no hope wrapped up in my belief. Unless you count the hope that one day I’ll discover the most beautifully complete fossil human skeleton ever found, with a label attached saying exactly what species it belonged to, what food it ate, how much it hunted, if it could speak, if it could laugh, if it could love, and if it could throw a curveball. But this fantasy is not why I believe evolution — as if evolution is something I hope comes true.
After all the backyard bone collecting I did as a child, I managed to carve out a career where I get to ask the ultimate question on a daily basis: “Where did I come from and how?” If our beliefs are important enough, we live our lives in service to them. That’s how I feel about evolution. My role as a female Homo sapiens is to return each summer to Kenya, dig up fossils, and piece together our evolutionary history. Scanning the ground for weeks, hoping to find a single molar, or gouging out the side of a hill, one bucket of dirt at a time, I’m always in search of answers to questions shared by the whole human species. The experience deepens my understanding not just about what drives my life, but all our lives, where we came from. And the deeper I go, the more I understand that everything is connected. A bullfrog to a gorilla, a hummingbird to me, to you.
My belief is not immutable. It is constantly evolving with accumulating evidence, new knowledge, and breakthrough discoveries. For example, within my lifetime, our history has expanded from being rooted three million years ago with the famous Lucy skeleton, to actually beginning over six million years ago with a cranium from Chad. The metamorphic nature of my belief is not at all like a traditional religious one, it’s more like seeing is believing.
So I believe evolution.
I feel it. I breathe it. I listen to evolution, I observe it, and I do evolution. I write, study, analyze, scrutinize, and collect evolution. I am evolution.

Holly Dunsworth is a postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Anthropology at Pennsylvania State University. She co-directs excavations on an island in the Kenyan waters of Lake Victoria, where the fossils date back some 18 million years."

This I Believe