I'm a big music fan, but I can't say that I've ever been a major fan of a lot of music made before I was born.  Now you may think that makes me kind of a shallow music fan, but if you ask anyone who knows me they could easily prove to you that that isn't the case.  I have a deep appreciation for all kinds and genres of music, except swing and ska because they aren't real genres of music, just dreck.  To get to the point though, something that one of those groups making music before I was born wrote deals exactly with what I'm thinking right now.  Simon and Garfunkel performed a song called "I am a Rock" (written by Paul Simon) in which Paul Simon essentially espoused the idea that he had no need for friendship or love because they had the potential to cause pain, and he was perfectly content, alone, in his own hermetically sealed world.

Well, let me be the first to say - or at least one to say - that Paul Simon, although a gifted song writer, is not a great sociologist.  I've tried the whole "I am a rock, I am an island" thing before, and it's not all it's cracked up to be.  We all need friends.  We all need a support group of some kind.  We were never created to be all alone.  God created us to live in realtionship with him, within a family, within a church family, within a community.  The move to Swift Current has been a good one overall, but it has had its drawbacks too.  The church and community are great to live in, but making friends here certainly hasn't been easy.  I'm not so naive as to think a person can make best friends overnight, but it's been a year and a bit now, and I don't feel I'm much farther along in the process than I was a year and a bit ago.

I'll restate it again so there's no confusion, we love being here, but not having any real close friends or family here is not easy; especially on days off.  So to my friends and family, you know who you are, know you are loved and missed, and here's to hoping for another day off or long weekend soon when I can see some of you again.