Fall is in the air and it’s time for another installment of Acoustic Blend! This month we are hitting the rewind button and revisiting a playlist from last October, featuring Richard Shindell, Mandolin Orange, and Andrew Peterson.
The theme is “Stories that shape us,” and you can read the original run-down of the episode here. While I have your attention, two things: First and foremost (since I am emailing you this month) Acoustic Blend is still on the air! I am told that WFYI will begin managing WBAA in January-ish, and that at this point they plan to keep Acoustic Blend around. Good news!
Secondly, on last month’s show I invited you all to attend the Collaboration album release concert at the Delphi Opera House next Friday, October 15. Well, that concert has been postponed (take note if you bought tickets, and contact the Opera House) but in its place is Michael Kelsey and Friends. Guaranteed to be a great show!
I’ll leave you with a passage from one of my favorite storytellers, Donald Miller. This is from his book Through Painted Deserts, which chronicles his journey from Texas to Portland, Oregon in his early twenties.1
And so my prayer is that your story will have involved some leaving and some coming home, some summer and some winter, some roses blooming out like children in a play. My hope is your story will be about changing, about getting something beautiful born inside of you about learning to love a woman or a man, about learning to love a child, about moving yourself around water, around mountains, around friends, about learning to love others more than we love ourselves, about learning oneness as a way of understanding God.
We get one story, you and I, and one story alone. God has established the elements, the setting and the climax and the resolution. It would be a crime not to venture out, wouldn't it?
It might be time for you to go. It might be time to change, to shine out.
I want to repeat one word for you:
Leave.
Roll the word around on your tongue for a bit. It is a beautiful word, isn't it? So strong and forceful, the way you have always wanted to be. And you will not be alone. You have never been alone. Don't worry. Everything will still be here when you get back. It is you who will have changed.
Acoustic Blend airs this Saturday, October 9 at 8pm EDT on WBAA AM 920 in Lafayette / West Lafayette, and streaming live on wbaa.org. You can view the playlist at barrettmyers.com and below. ‘Til next month!
For more Through Painted Deserts (and road trips) check out May 21: Road Trippin’