Welcome to my world.... : JESUS! REMEMBER ME?

From age zero to fifteen, my momma "raised me up" in the Word of God Church. Sunday meant an hour-and-a-half of singing followed by an hour-and-a-half of preaching, more singing, and 30 minutes of additional prayer time tacked to the end. . . not counting Sunday School of course, which started an hour before the main service and coincided with Adult Bible Study and a brief 15 minute adults only a capella "warm-up, pre-worship" worship. A clarinet and a guitar made an appearance for the main service. "Adults only" made me assume the "warm-up" also came with a weekly session of free "partner counseling". Thankfully my father stayed home to sun-bathe in the back yard, snuggled comfortably adjacent our GIGANTIC 15 foot satellite dish. We occasionally picked up the signal of an avant-garde video-art channel from someplace outlandish like Fiji and a kid's show from Brazil with a topless host named Xusha. I would wake up extra early to catch her bouncing up-and-down with a parade of puppets in tow while I would scarf down a bowl full of Captain Crunch and wait for the bus.

We held services in a cramped double-wide trailer. Only 10 families attended on a typical Sunday: 3 working class black families (the son of one family, a poet, shot himself in the head), 2 working class southern white families (both raised goats and home-schooled), 2 middle class families who didn't socialize with anyone else in church, and 3 working class Hispanic families. My mother and I would visit a retirement home once a week to minister to one elderly congregant in Spanish. My mother would minister at least. I didn't understand Spanish. He was a former Franocist, didn't speak English and hated me. I was only there to play dominoes and lose.

Before the double-wide, our congregation met every Sunday morning and every Wednesday night in the private gym of Béla Károlyi-- tyrannical god to a slew of famous Olympic athletes including Nadia Comǎneci, Mary Lou Retton, Kim Zmeskal, Kristie Philips, and Karrie Strug.

That's all to say "Sunday" meant FOUR FUCKING HOURS of church for poor lil' Colbie every week. Four! Sometimes 5! Not counting Royal Rangers on Wednesday. This lengthy Sunday sampler is nothing trust me-- nothing you can't chew thru on a lazy afternoon at home (after church of course).

I'll hand a First Class gold-plated ticket to Heaven to any brave soul courageous enough to finish the whole thing. No skipping.

:-)

Scroll below to listen or download HERE. Just remember, this isn't even HALF of one of my childhoods in church.

Sonsick -- San Fermin

Southern Sun -- Boy & Bear

Stay Young -- Okkervil River

Juene Et Con (cover from Damien Saez) -- Scala & Kolacny Brothers