There's a great horned owl hanging out in our neighbor's back yard, but I haven't seen it yet. My parents are visiting from California. They drove here. They brought their dog. My dad walks the dog a couple times of day and reported seeing this huge bird that came swooping out of a tree near our corner. He said it was the biggest bird he'd ever seen so we looked through the Nebraska Bird Book (like you do) and found the bird. Now I want to find the bird with my own eyeballs.
I want to see lots of things with my own eyeballs. My friend offered me tickets so I could go and see Jason Isbell at the Sokol with my own eyeballs, but I had to decline the offer. I sing with Jason in my car almost every day and it would've been cool to be there in person. You can't do everything, ya know?
Tonight is the last Advent midweek service for the season. We'll eat a soup supper in the school gym provided by the Care Committee, we'll practice in the fellowship hall really quickly, Jon will not do the pre-service hymn sing so that pre-service music can be performed. The high school youth will do the readings, be the ushers, play the music. I am the choir director and the chime choir director. I am not at all trained in those areas. Tonight the choir will sing two songs, the chime choir will play one, the strings ensemble will play hymns while the congregation is lead by the youth in the candlelighting portion. Between now and then I will be directing in the bedroom mirror to get ready.
My eyeballs have been looking at a painting by Monet for the past week trying to write a song about it. I'm almost done. I loved it for about 20 minutes and now I don't. I'm gonna finish it anyway. I'll consider it a stepping stone to the next song.
Stepping stones. So many. This day gets us to that day. This task makes room for a new one. One closing heralds commencement. One turn shows you an angle you hadn't yet considered. I have to change my position if I'm gonna see that Great horned owl.