[taraleigh]

In my last journal entry (“Texas, Will You Marry Me?”), I spent a lot of time picking on Nashville. But over the past week, I have been reminded of all the reasons why Nashville is still a pretty great place to be. And that’s why I offer big apologies to Nashvegas tonight. Here’s how it all began:

I started my 10-hour drive from Dallas to Nashville last Monday around 2:30pm. It was raining and the sky was darker than usual… and a weird sort of loneliness began to creep in. I usually enjoy being alone, so this was strange and unfamiliar. I didn’t recognize it right away, because I couldn’t trace the root of it... I didn’t want a boyfriend, didn’t miss anyone specific, didn’t question my place in life… it was just this core ache.

Backtracking, I realized that I had been surrounded by large groups of people for a good portion of the last six weeks. While I’d had the drive-time to myself and hotel rooms to myself, those just served as nice breaks from the hectic activity. But now, I was facing down a 10-hour solo drive and a few days of downtime before hitting the road again for the next leg of the tour. Then I started thinking about the rapidly approaching holiday season, and how I hate feeling alone at that time of year. So I called everyone I could think of and talked to them on the phone, for nearly the entire drive. It was a bit of a cop-out, I guess… perhaps I should’ve been praying or something like that. And sometimes I did. But mostly I talked to people with skin.

On the other hand, something inside me did not want to go home. I wanted to keep trucking, moving on to the next city where I could sleep alone in my hotel room and wake to meet up with dozens of new people. I called a friend who also lives this strange lifestyle, because I needed to know if other people ever felt this way. It was weird… here I was, desperately needing my community to embrace me, but wanting to run from that into the strange arms of an empty hotel room, new faces, and a foreign city. My friend related not only to my feelings, but also to my confusion about them. Assured that the feeling would pass, I made it through the rest of the drive without calling anyone else.

The minute I got home, I got sick. I had been fighting the flu for the last few days of my Texas run (it’s rampant there right now), but God had been gracious enough to hold it at bay until that leg of the tour was complete. I started shaking, so I took some medicine, and sacked out. When I woke up the next morning, I was really sick. Despite the previous night’s emotions, I began to feel very grateful that I wasn’t in a lonely hotel room somewhere. My friend Kelly called and insisted on bringing over all the necessary “sick foods.” She braved the germs and forced me to give her a hug! I couldn’t believe it!! Later, Christine brought over Popsicles and Sprite. Seriously, my friends here are some of the most loving people I know.

Tonight my friends had a big Thanksgiving Extravaganza, and I was slated to bring “Corn on the Cob-ble”, so I went despite the fact that I still felt a bit weak. I want to tell you a little bit about my friends, so that you will understand why they make me love Nashville.

I don’t even know where to begin. There are 50-60 of us, I guess. And our “social director” is the only married guy in the bunch. He’s an uber-popular web designer who has set up a cool little mailing list that we all use to send each other the latest info, like… which one of us has a concert in town that night or who is throwing a party that week. It’s not only an easy way to plan my social calendar, but it’s also a great way for me to stay connected to my community while I’m on tour. It’s good to not feel entirely disconnected when I’m gone.

Tonight, there were about 35 of us at the Thanksgiving party, and we were there for several hours, talking and mingling. Later, there was a moment when it occurred to me just how different these friends are than most others I’ve had in my life. When just a few of us were remaining, someone said, “I want to talk about our favorite things about all our friends!” So we listed everybody and talked about what great qualities they’re gifted with. I don’t ever really remember having a conversation like this before… saying great things about people, behind their backs.

One thing I recounted for them was the time that a group of us went to see “Bruce Almighty” and I sat beside one of our other musician friends. During the previews, there was a trailer for the new Charlie’s Angels movie, and he turned to look at me and talked incessantly for the length of the trailer, because he wanted to distract himself from watching. He said, “I don’t need those images running around in my head.” That is just exceptional… do people like this exist? For real? He’s not some dorky, straight-laced, legalistic PG-Nazi. This is a cool guy who tells extremely funny jokes and who loves Jesus, all at the same time. I love my friends!

Three of our guy friends who share a house don’t subscribe to cable (even though they are the rare few who could afford it) because they don’t want to have to fight that battle with temptation. Some of my girlfriends seriously hold each other accountable about their clothes and their actions. I’ve had guy friends call me on things like gossip. These friends encourage and challenge me in a way I’ve never seen. None of us are perfect, obviously. Some of us struggle with things like addiction or pride or whatever. We make mistakes, and sometimes they’re “big” ones, if you’re into that whole unbiblical-gradation-of-sins thing. But all I know is that I have never had a community like this in my entire life.

And I love that it’s not about keeping it in our little bubble, either. These friends teach me so much about showing love to the rest of the world in a visible way. Matt Wertz and Dave Barnes are both musician friends of mine who are a part of this group of friends. One night after we played a show in Indiana, Matt, Dave, and I went out to eat with a couple of people from the show. The people weren’t believers, so they had no reason to act like it. They said and did things that would shock most churchgoers. But I sat there and watched Dave and Matt hang out with these people and just love them. The next night after another show, I pulled Dave aside and told him how much he had earned my respect and how much I had learned from him. This is real stuff.

So Nashvegas, full of metrosexuals* and Land Rovers and entirely devoid of trucks… it is where my heart is fed. This is so what I need. And I thank God for it. I still love you, Texas, and maybe I’ll see you someday soon. But it’s good to be here for now… it’s good to be home.

*metrosexual: a heterosexual man who tends to have all the style, taste, and high-maintenance habits of a gay man (think “Frasier” or any guy you know who highlights his hair and talks about his Diesels like they have a soul).

[management]

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