Story Time

I'm almost finished with A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. The book is centralized on finding your story in life. That being said, I want to share my story.

My name is Dustin. I am the son of the most inspiring people on this earth; a strong-willed woman from Memphis, TN and the funny man and musician from Bratislava, Slovakia. My sister takes after my mom and is a great influence on my life. My five-year-old nephew is one of my best friends and calls me "Uncle Dusty". My niece is a beautiful two-year-old who grows up faster than I can even comprehend.

I was born in Nashville, a city I hope to live in once again. I moved to Garberville, California when I was 4, to the redwood forests and reggae beats. It was there that I first began taking piano lessons when I was 6. I still remember Pam, my teacher, and her strong British accent, always telling me I bound to do great things. I could not have asked for a better place to spend my childhood. Although I didn't get the traditional house on a street with many other kids (any other kids for that matter), I really began to appreciate the value of family. When it came time for high school, my parents decided California wasn't the best place to continue my education and made the move across the country to Jacksonville, FL to a small school named Douglas Anderson School of the Arts. I am grateful every day that my parents valued my education as much as they did, and for that, I thank them.

I can not say enough about my high school. Not your "traditional" high school to say the least. Instead of football games and homecoming, we had art showcases and musicals. People roamed the hallways singing, practicing their instruments for class, writing poetry, or reciting monologues (the list goes on and on). It was at DA that I met the greatest friends I could ever ask for. In addition, it was my freshman year that I first became truly informed about the love of Christ and all He has done for me.

So, here I am now; my 3rd year at the University of Florida studying music performance and political science. I have the greatest base of friends, the greatest family, and a purpose for life. Of course I have ideal goals or checking points in my story, but for now I can look back and say that it has been one with conflicts, climaxes, resolutions, and the best experiences I could have ever asked for. After all of that, I just want to say thank you to everyone who helped make my story what it is. Thank you for all those who provided me with struggles that I have had to overcome and thank you to those who have been there during the struggles. Thanks for being a part of my story.

"And once you live a good story, you get a taste for a kind of meaning in life, and you can't go back to being normal; you can't go back to meaningless scenes stitched together by the forgettable thread of wasted time."

"Life is like a piano...what you get out of it depends on how you play it."

These past few weeks have been great. I have really been put to the test with music this semester and the level of my artistry. I have been very satisfied with my ability to adapt quickly when a professor has an idea of how to change the music. This semester, I have already been given 2 extremely difficult chamber works; a Faure Piano Quartet and a Franck Piano Quintet. These piece really explore harmonic realms, making them very difficult to predict and play due to the frequent tonality changes. In addition, I am furiously trying to work on the first movement of the Saint Saens Piano Concerto No. 5 (The Egyptian) because I entered the UF Concerto Competition, which happens to be next week. As of now, I still do not have a for sure accompanist and do not have the piece fully memorized, boy do I have my work cut out for me...On top of all of this, I am preparing for my junior solo recital, which is the pinnacle of my undergraduate studies as a music major in the Spring. I hope all of those reading this blog will be able to make it! It should be around an hour of music that I have been working on since being at the University of Florida.

While still on the music theme, I finally caved in and bought a violin online. I have always wanted to learn how to play my entire life and now I have the opportunity to. That being said, I spent a ridiculously low amount of the set of 2 bows, rosin, violin, case, and extra strings and have not had the best of luck in terms of instrument and sound quality. Either way, it works well for a beginner. Unfortunately, violin is not really an instrument you can "teach yourself", so I have been slowly asking some peers in the music college for advice because as of now, I can only play "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". Hopefully I will be able to get the hang of it sooner or later.

Last bit of information: I have finally found the perfect church for me after searching since my freshman year at UF. During my first year, I attended Gator Christian Life, then later tried Wesley, First Assembly, and now Anthem. Anthem is a great church that seeks to welcome everybody from all walks of life, no matter where they are in their spiritual journey (that sounded a bit like the Community Group plug at Cru). I'm very happy to have found a place I can attend regularly and would love to introduce anyone who is interested.

I might save more about this for another post, but I wanted to say I am relieved all the drama with the Dove World Outreach is over and Gainesville can be cleared of its title as the "Qu'ran Burning City". This whole event was a poor decision made by the church and was only escalated by the excessive media attention.

Here's some music I have been listening to lately:

Jonsi- Go
Brightwood
Brendan James
Philip Selway