Hey everyone, so there are some pretty exciting things going on with the blog and the ministry right now. I’m going to start with the really, really big one:
The Wild Goose Festival
A few months ago, at the urging of some friends, I threw my name in as a possible contributor at the big Wild Goose Festival up in North Carolina in mid-July. Wild Goose is an annual gathering of artists, musicians, speakers, and storytellers centered around the movement of the Holy Spirit (hence the name “wild goose” which was a famous substitution for “dove” in early Irish texts). Speakers at Wild Goose include people like Nadia Bolz-Weber, William Barber, Shane Claiborne, and other progressive Christian voices on art, music, and justice. We already have a great relationship with Wild Goose because they’re the driving force behind the Intersections Festival happening here in Jacksonville in a few weeks. Intersections is designed as a miniature version of Wild Goose, so if you check out our local festival, you should have a pretty good idea what the big one is like. Anyway, I was accepted as a contributor, so Jessi and I will be heading up to North Carolina in July!
Publicity Photos
The Wild Goose coordinators had a request though: I needed a publicity headshot. The last time I took a publicity photo was 2011, and that was 6 years, 15 pounds, and several beards ago. Yep, my old headshot was from the 8,000 Miles blog, and as fond as I am of that photo, that fresh-faced kid is barely recognizable as me at this point. Good thing I’m friends with Britt Hester, the Shutter Rev. Last Tuesday, Britt and I grabbed some tacos and then headed over to Grape & Grain here in San Marco. We had hoped to take a few headshots in front of the whiskey section of the store, but we got a pleasant surprise when the manager told us, “You guys can go back and use the speakeasy if you’d like.” I did my best to hide my giddiness; Grape & Grain’s speakeasy (The Parlour) is one of the top cocktail venues in town, so it’s hard to express what a privilege it was just to stand behind that bar. Britt’s photos were outstanding. Check them out!
“Bar Chaplain: Cocktail Party” Video Series
We may have a new way to publicize this blog and help spread the Bar Chaplain concept. Our videographer from StoryHouse (the same one who makes Nathan Hamm’s videos) has been looking to get some more editing practice, so we came up with a really fun harebrained scheme together. Sunday night, we hosted a small cocktail party with a gimmick: any drinks I made for guests had to be filmed. Over the course of about two hours, we filmed 10 fully explained cocktail recipes and two shorts about the bar equipment I was using; each video was done in just one take with varying levels of guest participation. The videos are first and foremost fun, and as such, my technique is not intended to be flawless; all spills and mistakes are left intact. My favorite video to film was actually the mojito I made for my friend Matthew, and you’ll see why when it airs in a month or two. Depending on how the editing process goes, we hope to host one of these parties about every three to four months. Of course, that being said…
Back to Basics
With Beer & Hymns, bar bible studies, and our very full schedules, Jessi and I recently had a conversation about getting back to basics with the whole Bar Chaplain concept. Don’t get me wrong. Blogging and singing at Beer & Hymns and filming cocktail videos is some of the most fun I’ve ever had, but those things were always just entry points to the real mission: being a safe space for bar patrons to talk through their stuff. Starting in May, I’ll have fewer overnight shifts at the hospital, and Jessi’s classes will wrap up for the summer. This leaves us both with something we haven’t had in a while: open evenings. We’re planning to invest that time back into our local taproom (Aardwolf) and possibly the nearby cocktail spots as well (Grape & Grain and Sidecar). The Bar Chaplain blog has been up and running for six months now, but Jessi and I were sitting on bar stools and receiving people’s stories long before that. It’s time to get back to those roots.
So yeah, there’s some very exciting stuff in the works, and I’m looking forward to seeing where these next few months take us! As always, thank you for being companions on this journey, and know that your prayers, words of encouragement, and financial support make all this possible!