When you see this face, what profession do you see in the mug and behind the eyes?

Grease monkey at McDonald’s? Water slinger at an H2o company? Courier? Landscaper? Child care worker? Uniform and mat delivery guy? Airplane baggage handler? Grocery store management? Janitor?

Theoretically, yes, whoever the person in the picture, they could be capable of doing or being any of those titles. Maybe they’ve attempted all and more. But the question remains.. do you see (and equally important does he see) him as one of those?

Cat out of the bag, that’s a picture of yours truly. Truly. From today. And I can attest that I have held all those positions and actually more. None of them spoke to me. None of them were me.

The argument can be made that the vast majority of people hate their day job and therefore I need to be grateful to have one and put my head down and suck it up. Yes, I do enjoy eating and having a home etc but I also want to realize and actualize the main reason I am put on this earth and as of yet, I have not done that.

I’ve been hungrily writing for the past four years or so and have since the birth of this seen myself as a writer. I’m a firm believer in where your heart is, then that is who you are. But going even deeper into who I am, there was always one thing that spoke to me the most. One thing I could identify with. One thing I could lose myself in, no matter how many times exposed to it. And that, my friends, is metal.

To clarify, I’m not into working with sheet metal or wielding. Some of those metals are indeed heavy but the heavy metal I refer to is loud, pounding, thrashy music.

There was a period in my adult life where I somewhat left it behind. A person’s musical tastes are of course allowed to be vast and one would say I mellowed out, for a brief time anyway. The death metal especially. But only to rear its head once again in remembrance that besides my calling to Christ and my calling to parent three children, metal was and always will be my audio playground.

This is the time for a resurgence. The world is overpopulated with garbage flavored crap pop music and it’s taking over the entire next generation. Since birth, I’ve raised my kids on trips to the mall with Metallica blasting or a road trip to an amusement park with Fear Factory rumbling on the speakers. Yet what are my kids into by choice?? The Weeknd, Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber. I’m aghast.

The world yearns for the rebirth of metal and dangit, mine wants to be the face of it. Don’t believe me, just watch.