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There’s no better feeling than knowing you are where you’re supposed to be.

I’m sitting on a beach in Surf City, North Carolina. A night sky filled with stars, the shadow of an ocean blowing the summer breeze, and cool sand are here with me. Fireworks are shooting into the sky along the beach, showing signs of life in the small neighboring towns which hide in the darkness.  We have a handful of our own and are as eager as a child with a box to unwrap to start the fire that produces such an explosion of color. A cooler filled with beer is in arms reach, as well as a blanket and enough beach chairs for the small group of extraordinary people I came here with.

Take a walk to where the ocean meets the sand and close your eyes. Feel your body sink into the ground as the fingertips of waves reach out to cover your legs. Be there for a while, alive, as a conscious observer of the now, standing in the midst of an ocean which has been singing before ears were around to give audience. Look at the brightest star in the sky and feel as close to it as you are to the sand crabs which look upon you with a similar fascination. Take a few steps around and notice the sand light up when you move. There’s an explanation for this but don’t go looking for it, just enjoy it. We don’t get enough opportunities to wonder anymore.

It’s too dark to see anything but the sparklers stuck into the sand back at our campsite. We follow the light back and lay down on the blanket. The Milky Way runs across the sky directly above us, creating a spider web of foggy light that divides the countless stars. Shooting stars remind me of the paradox of life, as you seem to see everything when you look nowhere. To see one is to look beyond the facade, behind the curtain of our modern existence, and into the wonders of the universe that surrounds us yet somehow hides from our everyday eyes.

At some point you have to leave, it’s inevitable. Say goodbye to the moment and walk back to the house a few blocks away. You will never be younger than you are today, so go for a late night swim in the pool. Relax every muscle in your body, close your eyes, and sink to the floor. You feel like you belong here because you do. This is where you came from, what you’re made of, and what you will one day return to: weightless and worriless.

Looking at the same stars I gazed upon over a decade ago makes me feel like time is slipping away, as if it’s something I can control. Time doesn’t fly. Flying is an action, something that living creatures do to travel. Time travels effortlessly. It is the same today as it was millions of years ago and as it will be in a million years from now. Time is not the water that we float on, or the wind that pushes our sail, but instead the presence of the unknown and untouchable terrain that life’s stream flows through. If you think about time in hopes of grasping it, it’ll slip away before you can recognize it for what it is or is not. In the now you can only do one thing. Every decision in the now is made independently of everything up stream and everything down. Right now, I’m swimming.

Stay at this beach house yourself: http://www.vrbo.com/484104
When you sit on the picnic tables on the porch think of me, because I built those things!

I’d much rather spend my time contemplating the mystery of life than the actions of other people. While both are incomprehensible, one process leads to celebration and the other frustration.

When the news becomes a “who done it?” TV show, I tune out. When people start speculating and speaking from a place of anger, I tune out. Everyone rightfully has an opinion, but not enough people approach their belief with the uncertainty it deserves. What I know is that two families lost a child in this tragedy. Everything else is speculation and I choose to not let that consume my time. I’m not making the right decision by not following the Trayvon case; I’m just making my decision.

I know there is a cause worth fighting for, however, I knew that way before the spotlight landed on this unfortunate event. If you feel strongly one way or the other about a cause I urge you to look for other people who feel the same way and align yourself with them. The people who don’t unite usually only stand in the electronic picket line as long as the spotlight keeps it warm for them. This wavering consumer confuses the anger produced by ignorance with the anger inspired by passion.

Don’t allow yourself to be entertained by a tragedy. Become informed, create an opinion, and act on it if you feel the fire. One piece of wood can’t stop a calf, but a fence can move a herd.

It’s been four months since I last posted. I’ve had a hard time viewing anything as worthy of words since I lost my grandfather. It’s like flipping the channel from a news story of great tragedy to a cartoon; it just doesn’t feel right. Nevertheless, I know I have to take control and allow myself to analyze the world again to continue growing, for a tree doesn’t stop reaching for the sky when a leaf falls from it’s arms. Before I get back to trying to decode this world, I need to catch up on a few things.

Since my last post I have lost another great friend, Jason Hargrove. He was so many things to me- high school homie, college roommate, back up singer, body guard, party wingman, and above all a brother in a small group of friends who consider ourselves as such. I painted on the day we lost him.

Welcome home, Jason.
Where are we?
We are everywhere.
What’s next?
Anything you want and all the things you could never imagine.
Will I ever live again?
Jason, what you knew as life was but a nights sleep in the world of eternity. Do you miss a dream when you wake up?
No.
Well, good morning. You’re home now.

So far this summer I have seen my great friend Grayson get married in Charleston and my little cousin Julie get married in Delaware. People keep telling me this is what your late twenties is like in a joking manner, as if I’m supposed to frown upon the idea of getting together with my family and friends to drink and eat for free and dance all night. Weddings don’t make me feel old, my knees do.

I’ve also completed my first year of Graduate school at George Mason University. I’m studying Instructional Design and Development, which is teaching me the theories behind how people learn and ways to utilize those principles when designing and implementing different learning environments. I developed prototype webpages that do things like promote cultural awareness for exchange students, teach people how to avoid computer identity theft, and help Spanish speaking teachers develop lesson plans for teaching English language speaking skills. I’m still not positive how I want to apply this knowledge to build my career, but here are some things I know I enjoy:

• I enjoy audio and visual design. I don’t mean to say that I’m a great graphic designer or musician. In fact, I’ll probably never master those skills nor do I think I wish to. I love coming up with an idea and working with someone, who is talented and passionate about their skill, to bring that idea to fruition. I see what lives inside me for writing and performing inside them for playing the guitar, taking pictures, or designing graphics. I want to be surrounded by those people for the rest of my life and work with them to create something we can own.
• I enjoy coaching and teaching. I like speaking to people, connecting with them and helping them improve. I think I could find a similar pleasure in managing a production team… but what to produce?

My mind has undoubtedly been occupied on school and work, as I’m still working full-time on the ELA program I started a year ago and taking three classes a semester while doing so. I haven’t had as much time to write and perform but the good news is I’m taking the frustration that goes with that and turning it into music. I think my peers will be able to relate to my next project.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IEKhEB6LoA&w=420&h=315]

I’ll be turning 27 this Saturday and feel good about where I am and what is to come. I have a great girl, my family and friends are healthy and happy, and the music of my soul continues to resonate through my body. God willing the path before me will be as challenging as it is prosperous, for so much of my character has been built through moments I would have wished to avoid. I look forward to a future filled with adventure, art, and love.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/78703809″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

The Call- Wednesday, January 9th 2013

When you get the call, drop everything and go. 

I’m at work, recording actors for our English program. If I close my eyes I can picture their voices coming out of a radio in the corner of some over-crowded, unbearably hot classroom far from here. I see students with smiles on their faces like they’ve never been deprived. It’s what keeps me going. My phone vibrates— the screen reads: mom cell

“Hey, can you talk?”

I keep the recording going and motion to the actors I’ll be right back. This shouldn’t take long, she’s probably just checking in. A few minutes later I walk back into the studio, go directly to my seat and stare through the screen. I sit there shivering in the shadow of sadness, drowning in pain and fear, desperately searching for solitude. It’s dark down here. Eventually I pull myself out to tell my boss I won’t be able to come in tomorrow, a day we have a salsa singer in and I’m obviously needed. She asks why. “My grandfather is dying.”

The words wash over me, breaking through my ego like a wrecking ball swung at a damn built of twigs; Everything falls apart. My eyes hide in the lines of my palms as I cry uncontrollably, submitting to the emotion and waiting for a breath. My parents are picking me up on their way to Maryland tonight. The thought of seeing my father terrifies me.

I pray for a miracle.

The Fight- Thursday, January 10th 2013

When it happens, fight.

My mom ties a yellow hospital gown around my waist, hands me blue gloves and a white facemask. “You’ll have to put this on every time you enter the room,” she says. I peak around the curtain and take a few small, scared steps towards his bed. “Look who’s here”, says my dad, who is sitting in a chair on the other side of the bed. Pop turns his head towards me, puts his hand as high as he can reach it and says “Hi, mi”.

The fact he calls me the right name eases half the tension in my body. I begin to notice things. The gold wedding band on his finger, the black spots on his feet, the watch on his wrist reminding a room full of people counting down that time doesn’t do such a thing. He never took that watch off.

We begin telling stories and laughing like everything is normal. It’s easy to forget we are pretending until I look over at him, his chest rising and falling as his body puts whatever strength is left into each wheezing breath. It’s hard to see him like this. My father takes out a poetry book and begins reading to him. One of my grandpa’s many nicknames is Poe, short for poetry.

His soul speaks in rhyme

His spirit is contagious

Uplift the world, when it’s your time

Go back to He who made us

The severity of the situation sinks in as my father begins to choke up and passes the book mid sentence to my mother, who continues reading without hesitation. I’m watching my father read poetry to my dying grandfather. The next thought, one day I’ll have to do the same. I grabbed my grandpa’s hand and dropped my head to the floor. The carpet holds no comfort.

We spend days staring at machines, looking for hope in blinking numbers and squiggly lines. Every step forward is followed by two back, more visitors and less sleep. The nurse who keeps trying to convince him to go to hospice, a place where people surrender, has been asked not to enter the room anymore. He says he has 10 more years so we aren’t interested in anything but solutions. The root of our family tree won’t be pulled out by anyone but God.

It’s time for me to leave. I joke with him about being a ladies man, fishing for a smile, avoiding the word goodbye. He shakes his head, opens his mouth and talks through his eyes. “I love you, Pop.”  Three days later my parents leave as well, as his situation has still not changed. My mom calls around 11pm when they get back to Chapel Hill to tell me he isn’t eating or talking at all anymore. They are heading back up on Friday to decide how to do the end of life. I hang up and cry until the tears are gone. My phone wakes me up the next morning. A call from home at 8 AM? This isn’t good.

“Hey buddy. So, Pop is gone. He died in the middle of the night.”  

The Service- Saturday, January 19th 2013

When it hurts, cry.

I’m sick. Between that and the crying I think I’ve gone through every box of Kleenex in Westminster. I’m sitting in the front row of the church that my grandfather was remarried in 17 years ago, 2 years after my grandma died of breast cancer. I was there when he married Jeanie, sitting on my hands and fighting to stay still as I promised I would. That was a difficult task for me back then. Today I have no interest in moving, or standing or accepting. On this day I’m sitting right next to Jeanie, watching her battle the thoughts of death and loneliness. My brother is to my left, to his left the rest of the family.

I dry my eyes and look up to watch my father give his eulogy. “My father was the happiest man I have ever known,” he begins.  He truly was a man who found happiness in everything, who stumbled into greatness and told the world the tale.  He was the captain of a fleet of anti-submarine helicopters when he was my age. Before I was old enough to recognize the significance of that he was my captain, as he drove my brother and I across the United States in a Winnebago for two months. I can’t believe he’s gone.

Leighton, my 6-year-old cousin, has jumped in between Jeanie and I. She shines the most playful smile at me then turns around to give Jeanie a hug. My mind goes back to when I was her age, wandering around my grandmother’s funeral service. I was as clueless as she is today. You can’t understand the sadness of losing life until you’ve lived long enough to know how delicate it is. She still lives in a world where consequences are made by parents. What a gift.

There is a time to mourn and cry. This is that time.

The Tree- Sunday, January 20th 2013

When life stands in the shadow of death, look to nature.

We have been heading south on the skyline drive for about 3 hours, stopping at almost every overlook to jump out of the car and take pictures. Stand on the edge, stretch your arms out and breathe the air of a great escape.

It’s close to 4 and according to the map we’re getting close to Big Meadows, the place where my grandmother’s ashes were spread 19 years ago. I go over the directions my aunt had given me at the service the day before. “There’s a dirt road across from a lodge. Follow it through the meadow until you find a tree. It was small when we were there last, it should be a little bigger now.” We’ll have to walk it.

The Miracle- Sunday, January 20th 2013

When you ask for a miracle, don’t expect it to happen on your terms. 

I’m sitting in the middle of a field, 3,000 feet above sea level, at a stop on the skyline drive called Naked Creek Overlook. It’s cold and the wind bites my skin through both jackets. I hold Lisa a little tighter. It’s 5:20 and the sun is beginning to fall behind the Blue Ridge Mountains in the distance, casting a shadow on the Shenandoah Valley beneath us. I can’t find a single cloud.

As the bottom half of the sun begins to slip behind the horizon the world becomes visible again. A gradient of colors hijacks the sky. As the sun begins to disappear a thought floats across my mind- I wish it wouldn’t go away. My lack of control makes me feel vulnerable; It makes me sad. I lay back and find the moon, take a deep breath and the thought drifts away.

I sit up and watch the sun fall behind the mountain that dares to stand in its way. The light is gone but the colors dance. The bright yellow that hugs the horizon is the first to give a bow. Then the reds slowly slip away, followed by the hazy green. We’re standing now; spinning in circles and watching the trees turn blue. The moon draws its curtain as the sun’s falls to the floor. There is no end. I say goodbye to my grandfather with a smile on my face.

This is the miracle I prayed for.

When you get the call, drop everything and go.

When it happens, fight.

When it hurts, cry.

When life stands in the shadow of death, look to nature.

When you ask for a miracle, don’t expect it to happen on your terms.

That was the last lesson my grandfather taught me before he turned the corner. I hope to enjoy the road as much as he did.

All of the good photos in this blog were taken by Lisa Luo. See more photos from her www.jiaimagery.com/

She was always there. 

Morgan’s smile was always one of the first things I recognized as my eyes adjusted to stage lights and shadows became faces. A crowd of comfort; a sea of support; her smile shinning from the darkness like a lighthouse, reminding me I wasn’t alone out there. The band would begin to play and I would grab the microphone, still working through the anxiety no one knew was there. Every once and a while I would look over at Morgan. If she was dancing, I was doing okay.

A drop of water will one day leave its home and embark on a long adventure. It will travel down rivers that move too fast and through lakes that seem to not move at all. At times it will feel cherished and loved, at others, lost and unappreciated. While it travels with purpose and determination, it will never truly choose it’s own path.

One day, when it’s as comfortable as it can possibly be, it will be lifted from the ground and carried into the sky. It will live in the clouds until it is once again needed on Earth, at which time it will come back for a purpose only its creator will ever know. Water, like the answers we search for, can’t be grasped by a forceful hand. The only way to hold it is to relax and let it go; to accept that there are some things out of your control. Water, like your soul, can’t be hurt by force. Punch it, burn it, throw it away… it will always find its way home.

Don’t let your ego trick you into thinking you are alone out there, somehow separated from others, from the world around you and most importantly from God. We are all built by a substance that is as soft as it is destructive. A substance that not only makes up our world but sustains it. You are not alone, in life or death.

I sat in the back pew, eyes closed, searching my mind. All of the sudden a realization showered me with the first positive thought I had felt all day. I closed my eyes a little tighter and listened a lot harder.

If it was true, I wouldn’t be able to see it.

I was finally getting the chance to come to Morgan’s show, as she had done for me so many times. She sang through the loving memories of friends, through the comforting words of pastors and the timbre of every voice in the choir. My senses began to sharpen. I heard her through the cries of a clueless baby and through the weeps of the old man holding her, equally as lost. I heard her through every amen that echoed against the rusty, white walls and even in the silence that filled the space between hard fought words. She was all around us; it was the perfect encore to the song of life.

When the curtain fell and Morgan took her final bow, we gave a standing ovation. Tears replaced applause and we cheered until the last drop.

I found my car in a very sad corner of Pohanka Collision Center’s lot- the place where cars are forgotten. I brushed off the vines hanging on the roof like tired limbs as I made my way to the back to remove it’s identity- “RZN2025”. As I circled the car in a melancholy daze I relived the memories that were all but written in the golden paint. The time I flooded the engine trying to drive through a hurricane to pick Larry up from class. The time I drove 14 hours to see a girl just one… more… time. The joy rides to Wrightsville Beach with some hooligans in the back seat and life in front of me. Ahh the good old days. I was instantly frightened back into the moment when a cat jumped out from behind the back tire. He took a few long strides before turning back to examine me. What business did I have in the shadows? This was his property now.

You realize how relative time is when you try to recap eight years. If I asked you “how were the last eight years?” I guarantee that you wouldn’t respond by saying “they were 2920 days.” Time only exist as the clock defines it in the present or immediate future. You know it’s 12 am, you know you have to get up in 6 hours, but you don’t think much past that. The past is built of memories, the future of goals and hopes, and the present of choices. Being aware of that can help you grasp perspective on many of the things that you worry about on a day-to-day basis.

Eight years was 5 towns, 7 albums, 9 jobs but only 1 car.

A couple weeks ago I lost my go-to never have I ever statement— “never have I ever been in a car accident”— when I hydroplaned across traffic, barely missing a tree and sliding down a hill heading right towards a river. The bushes stopped my car a few yards before I got to swim for the first time this summer. Ev and I pushed the doors open, our worlds still spinning, and crawled back up to the main road. The cops had already arrived. What just happened?

I traced my tire marks up the hill, next to the tree, over the streetlight that hadn’t been fully constructed yet (thank God) and across the road. It looked like the trail from a figure skater.  So many things could have gone wrong. How did we not flip? One second we were on our way to a party talking about how good life is and the next we were at the mercy of that pencil in the sky that puts the period on your sentence. Don’t worry momma it was just a comma.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2uUDkMYtrQ]

A lot happened to me in the last eight years and the Stratus was there through it all. If you know me you know it and most likely have some kind of story to go along with your memory. I invite you to share your story as a comment to this blog.

I finished cleaning out my belongings and walked away. I paused at the gate of that lot and considered going back for a few more pictures. Naa, don’t do it. One more flashback to 18 year old Mike using every dime he saved working at Panera for 3 years to buy his first car and I was gone, ready for my next test drive.

A few weeks ago I walked out of my apartment and thought to myself, something has to change. I think the wind heard me.

You have to recognize and react to a feeling like that. It’s there to remind you that whatever rut you are stuck in is escapable. Stress comes into our lives like waves crashing onto a beach and escapes the same way, hitting us with enough force to take us off our feet but retreating without enough pull to take us with it. My life’s a beach but my castle isn’t built out of sand. The tide only reminds me I’m human.

Spend time with your family and friends. If you ever really fall they’ll be the ones around for you. But this feeling that hit me as I watched the sky catch on fire wasn’t like that. I just knew there was more to the experience.

Happiness is a cup that has many straws.

A happy man doesn’t rely on any one thing to make him that way.  You should never have to try to smile but you should always be looking for excuses to do so. Don’t waste time blaming time. Strengthen your body and mind, the sharper you get the easier it becomes to carve out the life you want.

I’d like to think that the storm that came barreling through DC on my birthday was sent to push my sail. We walked out of the restaurant once the rain and wind had died down to find trees bent across streets and half the city without power. The tide had risen and turned my city back into the swamp it started as. Health and happiness came with the morning sun.

[slideshow]

I woke up on the morning of my 26th birthday in the basement of my grandfather’s house and released the album I had been working on for 2 years, Smoothie. I walked upstairs with a big, stupid smile on my face to have breakfast with my grandparents from both sides of the family. We went out and met up with my aunt and little cousin to have lunch. Later in the afternoon we went into the city and had dinner with some friends. The parents left after the crazy storm died down and we went out… with Ev in the trunk. The next day I had a show on U St. and I’ve been coasting ever since. 

Hanz is an old dog. He has reached the age where sleep begins to eat into your day like moths into a wool sweater forgotten in a lost closet. When you begin to realize how much energy it takes to simply get up, let alone say anything. He lays on his musty blue blanket, watching his brothers run around arguing about trivial issues with disappointed, cloudy eyes. Such wasted energy. We take him to the doctor because he’s starting to look skinny. A white coat smirks and tells us there is no cure for old. I can’t imagine wagging my tail after hearing such a thing but he always does.

Hanz is a German Shorthaired Pointer. A hunting dog who has traveled the world. At one time he was young and strong, strutting through the woods with his head high and his tail straight looking for his next victim. Time is now his prey and he kills it as well as the hares he chases in his dreams as his feet twitch and scratch the hardwood floor.

Take a look at the world old man. You can’t run out into it like you once could but I bet you see it clearer than ever. Each bark you reach down into your stomach to pull out carries a handful of wisdom that is thrown into the air and misinterpreted as simple requests to primitive ears. No wonder you stopped trying. Stupid humans.

Hanz’s body is constantly shaking. If you put both hands on his stomach and apply pressure you can feel the anxiety evaporate out of his body. What are you nervous about old man? Do you sense the rollercoaster of life beginning to slow down and return to a place that resembles where it took off from? Is there something you dreamed of doing that you never got the chance to follow through on? Or is the life of a dog not so complicated? Lucky you.

I saw a commercial the other day for a company called “A Place To Put Mom”. Good lord! How did we become to feel so entitled as a people? Just imagine… what if you could count the number of steps you were able to take every day? I bet you’d learn the world around you much better. You’d probably realize that most squirrels aren’t worth chasing but a family member leaving is always worth seeing to the door. What if you had enough time to write a book but only enough energy to say a sentence?  You’d probably speak timeless wisdom and, like the mighty tree that falls after centuries of living, expect an audience with eager ears.

Kane Smego tells this story better than I ever could:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXyQYPzOsqs]

I recently submitted my application to GMU for graduate school. I thought I would breeze through my personal statement. I do write a good amount and I know the topic pretty well. It ended up taking me about two months to get this (this is pretty heavy so brace yo self fool!): 

The World Conference on Education for All (EFA), held over two decades ago, was a monumental step towards equalizing educational opportunities for all children of the world. While tangible advances have proven that this concept is attainable, decades of concerted efforts have demonstrated that we must accomplish better results, quicker and more efficiently if we are to reach the ambitious education targets reinforced into the 2015 Millennium Development Goals. Indeed, most countries cannot wait for the luxury of the technological advances afforded to the best education systems. Therefore, a response that is appropriate, inclusive of key stakeholders, and meets the needs of the system in a sustainable way is more critical now than ever.

As a musician, writer and educator, I have studied and experimented with different forms of distance education. However, as technology continues to evolve, I realize that the skill set I have developed is only the foundation for a successful career in designing ways to effectively disseminate information. Particularly, I am interested in learning how appropriate technologies and innovations in instructional design, such as multichannel learning, can be used to enhance education systems among learners in the most marginalized communities. I am delighted to submit my application for consideration to the Curriculum and Instruction program with a concentration/specialization in Instructional Design and Development through the College of Education and Human Development.

While at George Mason, I intend to focus my studies on refining my skills for designing and developing effective instructional delivery systems. I look forward to studying with distinguished faculty including Prof. Kevin Clark and Prof. Brenda Bannan, whose respective research in computer game design and e-learning software directly relates to my career goals.

I was brought up in a family of musicians who embraced alternative forms of learning through the study of musical instruments and vocal training. However, it was not until high school that I began producing my own music. My music career includes the production of seven full-length albums, performing live at prestigious venues such as the Apollo Theatre in New York, as well as numerous music festivals, television and radio programs both in the United States and internationally.

After completing my Bachelors in English from the University of North Carolina-Wilmington (UNCW) in 2008, I moved to Washington, DC to follow my interest in journalism and video/audio production. I worked for five months as an intern in the Public Relations department of the Voice of America (VOA) in 2009, where I authored press releases, promoted programming through social networking and assisted in various studio productions. Since August 2009, I have been working as a Technology Specialist at Education Development Center (EDC), a global non-profit research and management firm, where I helped build and run a multipurpose studio, assisted with webpage development, audio and video production, and the creation of an interactive exhibit that told the story of EDC.

After a year of working at EDC’s home office, I was given the opportunity to utilize my creative passion and musical inclination to provide field-based support for an Interactive Audio Instruction (IAI) program funded by the Colombian Ministry of Education and implemented by La Universidad del Norte (Uninorte) in Barranquilla, Colombia. In 2010, I began working in Barranquilla helping create the pilot radio program, English for Colombia (ECO), for national dissemination through the use of classroom radios. Additionally, I supported Uninorte by teaching advanced university ESL courses. I also continued to write my own music and perform with a Colombian band. As the lead songwriter and co-producer of ECO, I wrote and produced songs, played the voice of two of the main protagonists in the radio program, assisted as one of three studio engineers, and edited scripts to make sure proper English was used and lesson plans were engaging and cogent. To create these programs, I helped analyze the target audience to pick rhythms and instruments that were indigenous to Colombia, designed and developed the music with other local musicians, and formatively evaluated the programs in comparable schools before submitting them to the appropriate ministry officials for approval.

I returned from Colombia in November of 2011 and, since February of 2012, have been working with EDC on a new IAI curriculum design initiative that is intended to provide quality instruction for marginalized English Language Learners (ELLs) throughout Latin America. I am currently involved in all aspects of the technical design of these programs, which are ultimately being developed for dissemination on a national scale. As apparent through the ECO program, the advantage of IAI for developing countries is that it trains the teacher at the same time as it teaches the students, by providing instructions for good teaching practices throughout a thirty-minute audio lesson made up of dramas, songs and various activities at very low cost. With this experience, I will develop a more complete knowledge of the technical aspects involved in such multichannel learning technologies.

Completing a degree in Instructional Design and Development will provide me with the tools to further refine my pedagogical and technical expertise for curriculum design. I believe my academic and professional experiences, as well as my personal interests, have prepared me for success in my advanced studies at George Mason University. The proximity of the university will allow me to seamlessly apply what I am learning to real world contexts through ongoing support to EDC. I am excited to begin this next stage of my professional development that will combine the use of my creativity with proven pedagogical theories and models for improving education systems around the world.

I question my decision to go back to school sometimes. I question the decision of picking this path all the time. After I completed this letter though, I realized how much this degree relates to what I have done in the last four years and what (I think) I want to do in the future. I know the next couple years will determine a lot about my future and knowing that puts a lot of pressure on every decision. I want to continue doing things I’m passionate about but I also want to put myself in the best finical situation possible. Should I pay a lot of money and spend two years studying something if it doesn’t promise a job with a good salary after? Should I switch the entire game and be a lawyer or doctor?

I think about these things a good amount but the truth is I worry about them very little. I’ve been happy for the majority of my life and I’ve never been rich. I’ve had the opportunity to learn from people who have much less than I do and are still much happier than most people I know. A smart guy once told me, “happiness is a choice.” Choose wisely people. 

The voicemail from my grandfather: “I saw that Carolina lost. Keep your head up, there’s always next year.”

A lot of people will never understand how we feel right now. How a game could have such control over you. They’ll never understand why you switch chairs throughout the game trying to find the one that will help your team drop a shot as if it will make any difference. You do what you can to help, to get through those taxing forty minutes.

It’s not just a jersey. It’s not just a color. It’s a flag. It’s a reminder of everything good about the town you were raised in. It’s your family, your friends, the party you got your first kiss and the fires in the streets you jumped over as smoke disappeared into a night sky freckled with stars. It’s a chance to return, if only mentally, to a place you don’t get to visit nearly enough.

How would you describe the feeling? For me it is a gloomy, cheerless anger. It’s heartbreaking coming to terms with the idea that the season is over, that we missed our chance to capitalize on a squad that comes every five years. I despise the idea that if it hurts this bad for me it must be ten times worse for the players that fight for me. The anger I feel isn’t directed towards our opponent, but instead distributed between the refs and our own team. I feel like Barnes plays to not get hurt, like Roy doesn’t control the game in the last five minutes like he should, like a referee should know a travel when sees one and various other thoughts I know I’m in no place to even consider. I coached a middle school team of 9 players who could barely tie their shoes for two years. What do I know?

I wish you luck getting to sleep tonight Tar Heel nation. Tomorrow when this hurts a little less I’ll pick up the phone and give my grandpa a call back. His voice will do the same thing watching my Heels lace up and step on the floor does- remind me of where I come from. I urge you to wear something carolina blue tomorrow. We have to represent the great north state until our colors are streaking down the hardwood again next season.