The Rabbit Room

The Tree of Life and Our Collective Cultural Discomfort with Recognizing “The Glory”

[Editor’s note: This piece was written by our friend Mary McCampbell, who we are excited to have at Hutchmoot this year. Enjoy, and be sure to check out her session if you plan to attend.]

A few years ago, when preparing notes for a class discussion on Terence Malick’s 2011 film, The Tree of Life, I began to feel very uncomfortable about typing notes and viewing the film simultaneously.

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Albums That Shaped Us: Remember Us To Life

If you’re like me, you have some childhood and early adolescent memories of listening to certain songs that gave you a magical impression of seamlessness, as if they had always existed in all their wholeness, just the way they met your ears. You may remember exactly where you were and what day it was when you first had an experience like this with music—it may very well be that these memories act as threshold moments marking your awakening to the sheer scope of music.

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Gamble, Gambol, Ham, and Gambrel: On Inefficiency

The great thing about Google is that it takes you straight to the information you want to find (or, in any case, straight to the information that the Keeper of the Algorithm wants you to find). The great thing about every other method of organizing and/or delivering information is that it doesn’t take you straight to the information you want to find.

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The Pornography of Death

When I tell people I’ve written a book about death, hands down, the most common response I receive is laughter.

I take no offense, though. It’s not a cruel, mocking sort of laughter. We joke about death by instinct, the way an eight year old laughs when someone passes gas. It’s socially unacceptable, therefore hilarious.

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The Long Road Home

Almost twenty years ago, while I was at university, my parents decided to move back to the seaside village in Northern Ireland where I had spent the first twelve years of my life. We relocated several times during my teens and, for me, this latest move felt like a step backwards. I visited for their first Christmas “back home” with no intention of joining them on any permanent basis. On Christmas day a guy with ginger hair and a smile that was contagious gave the children’s talk in their new church. The response to his self-deprecating humor was evidence that he was not only well known but also well loved. Long story short, I ended up staying. Two years later we were married.

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The World Imagined by Bruce Springsteen

I know better than to say that I’m a Springsteen fan. It’s not because I don’t listen to Springsteen. I do. I have most of his catalog in my iTunes folder. Nebraska is one of my favorite albums, and thank goodness for The Rising and Devils and Dust, albums that did some justice to the experience of 9/11 and the second Gulf War. So, I’m plenty familiar with Springsteen and enjoy his music immensely.

Rabbit Trails #9

Click through for this week’s edition of Jonny Jimison’s Rabbit Trails.

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Everything As lt Should Be: An Interview with Andy Gullahorn

Back in November of 2017, I had the pleasure of interviewing Andy Gullahorn about his new record, Everything As It Should Be, the craft of songwriting, the balance between boldness and humility, and what he has learned from the arc of his career. I hope you enjoy our conversation as much as I did.

Andy is currently in the middle of a Kickstarter project to fund the finishing of his new record, and he’s got twelve days to go. Click here to learn more about the project and choose how to support him.

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