The 800 Pound Jesus

I don't know who did this song first, but I know that Sawyer Brown did a version and so did Paul Thorn. Here it is:

"I saw a garage sale
Pulled up in the yard
Found a statue of Jesus
It was eight feet tall
He held out his arms
And he seemed all alone
So I loaded him up
And drove him home

Out by my driveway he
Looks down the street
With his long hair and sandals made
Of rebar and concrete
I painted him white with a long purple robe
He's a rock of ages on our gravel road

Chorus
He's an eight-hundred pound Jesus
Standing taller than a tree
He's an eight-hundred pound Jesus
A bigger man than you or me

I thought loosin' my job was
The end of the world
Till my best pal ran off with my best girl
I felt suicidal with no real friends
So I walked outside with a rope in my hand
Out by that statue there's a big old tree
So I stood on his shoulders
And I counted to three
I had every intention of buying the farm
But when I jumped off he caught me in his arms

Chorus

I wanted to return the favor to him
Cause I never had a more solid friend
So I planted some flowers
All around his feet
And I bought him a flock
Of ceramic sheep

Chorus
He's a bigger man
Than you or me"


My dad had that song on his desktop when I was back home two weeks ago and I wound up listening to it a lot. It got stuck in my head and in a very short time came to symbolize my trip back to Athens. Reading those lyrics or singing it to myself takes me back to the good times and bad times that I had there, which seems like a while back now, even it was only a handful of days in the past.

I was pretty depressed about coming back to Seattle. I knew that I would be though. It was something that I tried not to think a whole lot about, but in the months leading up to it, I always knew that when the week was over, it would be very hard for me to get on the plane to fly back to the northwest. Back in March, I tried to tell myself that I hoped it would be hard, because that would mean that I had a good trip. But that's not really even true, no matter what kind of time I had there, it could've been the worst week of my life, I still would've had a hard time saying goodbye to everyone all over again.

It's hard, those last hours that you spend with your family and friends before leaving again. Everyone is down, and everyone tries to play it off. I said to myself after Christmas that "If it's going to be this hard to leave, I'm not coming back home until it's permanent." Of course I didn't really mean that either.

When the plane touched down at Sea-Tac, I grabbed my bags and hopped on the shuttle to my off-site lot where I parked. Driving out of the airport, for the first time in a few days, I felt excited again. I'm going to be in Seattle for a while longer. The only way I won't be (barring some unforseen catastrophe) is if I screw up bad enough at work to get fired, or I quit. And I'm not a quitter. So I was looking around as we were leaving the airport, and I thought that to myself, that I could either bitch and moan about being away from Athens, or I could make the best out of this incredible opportunity that I have. You probably know which way I'll go. As the van turned down Hwy 99, I said to myself "you know, we can really make something play in this city."

You ever seen "Blue Chips"? It's a basketball movie, stars Nick Nolte and Ed O'Neill. It's pretty good. There is one scene where Notle, as head coach Pete Bell, is talking to a corrupt booster, named Happy. They are talking about a player who Happy "bought" who is suddenly discontent with his situation on the basketball team. Happy tells Bell "You can sell ice water to eskimos and you can sell this spoiled little BRAT on how happy he really is."

Sometimes I think I kind of acted like a brat about coming back up here after Christmas and then two weeks ago. This is what I asked for, this is what I wanted. I prayed a lot about the Amica job and about coming to Seattle. Even before I went to training and saw the list of openings, I was telling people that I hoped to wind up in Seattle. Go all the way back to fall 2002, I told my parents that me moving to the northwest wasn't a matter of if, but when. One of my co-workers comes out here and completely falls in love with this place. Says he'd move out here in a heartbeat. And while I do think that's perfectly natural to feel a level of depression about having to say goodbye to your family for a few months, I also believe that it's bratty to almost dread having to get on the airplane and come back. I was standing in the baggage claim in Atlanta when I touched down two weeks ago. I heard an all-call go over the PA for soldiers heading to Fort Jackson and Paris Island, which as you know, is the basic training site for the Army and Marines, respectively. I prayed for those kids, because I can't even imagine the nerves and anxiousness that they might be feeling. Those guys are, voluntarily, going to be seperated from their famlies and loved ones to defend our nation, our way of life, for the next three or four years..... They're defending a culture and way of life that allows me my standard of living. And I'M the one bitching about saying good bye?

Things are fine up here. I'm making money, making friends, and feeling more comfortable every day. I spent a lot of time on Wikipedia last week trying to learn more about this region, the Cascades, Puget Sound, all that stuff, because I want to be able to appreciate it more. I'm getting back into the routine of working and working out and have already signed up for another softball league this summer. And on that note, I think I'll drive out to Mt. Rainer.