oxymoronic organic outrage

trader joe's gets an award for being the only thing (other than my general despair) that i've blogged about twice in a six month time span...

when i think "trader joe's", i think "organic". and when i think "organic", i think of such things as kindness, love, a general sense of well-being, janis joplin, patience, an appreciation for the earth and the humans who inhabit it, gentleness, songs like "dust in the wind", self-control, and other positive life-reinforcing things.

however, none of these things apply to the parking lot situation at the trader joe's in st louis park.

you would think that the kind of people who shop at trader joe's ("organic") would be generally happy people. people who care just enough to bypass the big-box stores like rainbow and cub, and the cake-eating stores like byerly's and lund's. people who enjoy the earth, humanity, and the virtues that make this a better planet and us a better people. so i don't understand.

i don't understand why, when waiting in line to enter the traffic jam known as the trader joe's parking lot, i am honked at and bumper-kissed. i don't understand why SUV's try to park in 'compact cars only' parking spaces. and i don't understand why, when i willingly relinquish my right to park in the lot and park three blocks away, i am then almost run over (yes, a pedestrian) by two different vehicles, who apparently didn't have enough other-than-self awareness to realize that there were other people in the parking lot besides themselves.

all it would take to make that parking lot work would be a pair of ears unstopped, a pair of eyes opened, and a smidge of patience. that's it my friends, that's it.

but fear not my fellow st louis park trader joe's patrons. that peaceful organic feeling you expect upon your arrival still awaits you... in the store. so let's hope these angry organic shoppers can keep their anger in its rightly ordered place: their car. because what the world needs now is more angry drivers who drink RsBT-free milk and grain-fed beef.

but i am in the safety of my anger-free home now, and there are at least three things i can smile about: the honeydogs' new album amygdala spins in the background (you must buy this album), percy sleeps soundly by my side, and there is a really good glass of red wine next to my left hand. i shall dwell no longer on the oxymoron of organic angry people.

"everyone take two steps forward"

it is a cold, blustery friday night in january and the choices lay before you: stay home bundled up on your couch where life is safe, things are predictable, and no one will put any demands on you… or go out and brave the wind of winter to seek out some form of friday night entertainment. although it may seem so, this choice is not an obvious one. going out in the dead of a minnesota winter involves dressing in layer-upon-layer of increasingly unflattering outer-wear that you peel off in reverse when you arrive at your destination, at which point you will have to find a safe corner to stash your enormous pile of clothing that is approximately the size of a small pony.

but on this particular friday night in january, the honeydogs were playing a show at the varsity theater, and who would choose the couch over the honeydogs?

so on went the layers of clothing which warmed my soul all the way to the varsity theater in this my beloved city of minneapolis. if you've never heard of the honeydogs or their music, they hail from this the land of sky blue waters. you may know their mid-90's super pop song "i miss you" in which front man adam levy croons "i miss your laughing lips, i miss your eyes and hips, do you miss me, cuz i-ee-i miss you". i only know the song because whatever gentle sir i happened to be dating at the time put it on a mix tape for me, which i subsequently destroyed with the endless cycle of stop-rewind-play that i subjected this poor little honeydogs song to. the inevitable slowing of tempo and dropping of pitch meant that the shiny brown tape would soon come flying out of my tape deck and my brief love affair with this pop song would come to an end. but this little mix tape left a mark upon my musical memory, along the lines of "the honeydogs? sure, I've heard of 'em". forgotten in the following years of my developing musical taste, it wasn't until a new millennium, a friendship with matt patrick, and his recommendation of their 2003 album "10,000 Years" that the honeydogs squeezed their way to the forefront of my musical heart.

i will say this about the honeydogs… once you're "in", you are IN and you will never get out. you'll find yourself singing along with the melodies even though you've never heard them before. you will love the lyrics but you won't be able to explain exactly why. the beautiful melodies, honest musings and unpredictable chord changes are a rare and glorious mix of wit, intellect, craft, and beauty, landing the honeydogs somewhere inside the camp of american roots music.

back to the concert… the honeydogs finally took the stage after an audible barrage of two humorous but talented opening acts. thunderous applause, shrieking girls, confused introverts, the usual. we had been sitting at a table near the front, but everyone knows that when the band you came to see takes the stage, there is no table in the sense that "there is no spoon". and so we rose to our feet and made our way into the pack that had congregated near the stage.

what is it about every single concert, that there is always this curious gap of about 8 feet between the front row of people and the edge of the stage? round about the middle of the third song of their set, levy shouted into his mic "everyone take two steps forward… two steps forward… ONE-TWO" and like puppets who cannot disobey their puppeteer, everyone took exactly two steps forward, one-two. and you could feel it. the temperature of the room changed. it was as if someone pulled the 'engage' string on all of our backs. i wondered if perhaps levy was concerned about the crowd that had gathered in the back of the room. perhaps there was no space for them. two steps forward will solve any problem, right? one-two. simple enough.

by four or five songs later, that 8 feet had gradually regained it's rightful place between the crowd and the edge of the stage. and again, levy into his mic "everyone take two steps forward… ONE-TWO", and again we stepped one-two. and just like before, the temperature changed, the crowd came to life. "there must be quite a crowd in the back of the room if we have to keep stepping forward" i thought to myself.

by the last few songs of their set, most of the human-bulk had left the building, leaving about 100 devoted honeydoggers to relish in the remainder of the show. but levy kept asking "two steps forward" and we kept yielding, reclaiming that 8 feet of ground, over and over. i was beginning to suspect that levy wasn't merely monitoring crowd control, but perhaps he knew what he was doing… after all, you don't become a rock star without knowing a thing or two about humanity and its nature.

i'm sure that adam levy never meant for me to take this to where i'm about to take this, but stay with me.

we are the masters of collaborative disengagement. even when we pay $10 of our hard earned money to be 'entertained', to be engaged by and drawn in to an amazing musical experience, we can't hold on to the energy it takes to remain engaged for more than 3 minutes. someone has to remind us to take "two steps forward", over and over, to reclaim the distance we have put between us. we shrink back together, like a herd, like a glossy reminder of how bored we really are, how forgetful we can be, and how enticing the lure of slumber is. our minds wander, and in a breath, those 8 feet return to reclaim their rightful place.

there is this glorious metanarrative that is being played out around us every day. yeah. every day we get to wake up in the middle of something that is already going on. and if you listen, you can hear it... Someone reminding us to come to life, to take two steps forward into the dark… to wake up and engage, even though falling back seems the easier option.

this is what it means to be formed and reformed in christ. to choose and remember to engage. because the life and light of christ is already in us, within us, around us, and before us. there is no 8 feet that cannot be stepped into.

ambient distance will always take precedence over my ability to push forward, through, and out of the places that feel like stone. but with my hands to the ground and His hands on my face, He says "just take two steps forward… two steps forward. it's going to be alright. just take two steps forward." one. two.

you should really see the honeydogs in concert next time they come around. it'll change your life.