More Than Fine

I don’t remember exactly how it happened, but twenty years ago, I stumbled across some music from an album titled Beautiful Letdown by a band called Switchfoot. I was confused by the band’s name (I had no idea it came from the surfer world – we don’t do much surfing in the PNW), but I really liked the music. I liked it enough to buy the CD, and immediately it became my “go-to” music for my commute back and forth to work. Not only was I taken in by the music, but the lyrics spoke to me. Maybe better, they spoke for me. From the very first song on the album, I found an expression for things I felt in my soul about life and faith and about wanting more out of both in a way that felt genuine and honest.

We want more than this world’s got to offer

We want more than the wars of our fathers

And everything inside screams for second life

We were meant to live for so much more

Have we lost ourselves?

(Meant to Live)

Each song seemed to pull something out of me that I found difficult to express on my own about the struggles and beauty of trying to mesh Monday-through-Saturday-life with this thing we call faith on Sundays – the sense that there is something more than what we see on the surface, something deep inside us compelling us to live differently, more intensely, for the sake of another reality that we can’t yet fully see or understand.

It was a beautiful letdown

The day I knew

All the riches this world had to offer me

Would never do

In world full of bitter pain

And bitter doubts

I was trying so hard to fit in, fit in

Until I found out

I don’t belong here

(The Beautiful Letdown)

The tension is here

Between who you are and who you could be

Between how it is and how it should be

I dare you to move

I dare you to move

I dare you to lift yourself off the floor…

Like today never happened

Today never happened before

(Dare You to Move)

My wife, Sandy, soon joined me in my enthusiasm for the album, so on family road trips, our kids (my son, Colby, was 10, and my daughter, Calli, 6) were forced to listen to our poor attempts to sing along. It didn’t take long, though, before their poor singing joined ours, and we turned the music up a little louder so Jon could cover up our sad performances (we nailed background vocals with the rest of the guys, though, each time “gone” was sung). I have vivid memories of the darkness of the night outside surrounding our Honda Pilot as we were approaching the small town of Soap Lake, where my parents lived, and all of us giving one last encore performance before we pulled into Grandma and Grandpa’s driveway. Of course, that was twenty years ago, and my memory has probably morphed a bit into what I want to believe. Nonetheless, Beautiful Letdown was a family favorite.

I quickly figured out that Beautiful Letdown was not Switchfoot’s first album, and the previous music these guys put out was pretty good too. Soon I had The Legend of Chin, New Way To Be Human, and Learning to Breathe in my possession to add to the daily commute and road trip mix. I was hooked, and I have been ever since. But not only did I get hooked, Colby was hooked as well. He became as big of a fan as I was. When Nothing Is Sound came out, I’m not sure which of us was most anxious to get it. The same was true for Oh! Gravity and Hello Hurricane. By then, Colby was following the band closely, and he became the one letting me know when the next album was coming out. By the time Vice Verses was released, he was pushing to go to a concert. Switchfoot had become my favorite music because it was good, but as a shared passion with my son, it became something even more. As he was becoming an adult, he was finding the same connection with life and faith through the music of Switchfoot that I had felt.

Over the last few years, our shared passion has taken us to a few concerts. Along the way, we managed to acquire a set list from Jon, drumsticks from Chad, and a selfie with Drew (Tim and Jerome are still in our sights). More importantly, Switchfoot has been a unique point of connection that has endured for twenty years. But the connection goes beyond being fans of a band or being passionate about their music. Switchfoot has given us both a way to bring our feelings about our faith to the surface – words that are sometimes difficult to find on our own, but when we hear them sung in a Switchfoot song, it resonates with us and makes sense to us in ways that other words do not. It was no surprise, then, when Colby’s choice of a tattoo while in Nepal was a quote from a Switchfoot song – “we are once in a lifetime” from Needle and Haystack Life. The year-long mission trip, The World Race, had stirred things inside of him that were best expressed by the lyrics of Switchfoot. It was with their lyrics that he chose to remember his experience and to be reminded of what he had learned.

A lot has changed over the last 20 years, but Colby still tracks Switchfoot’s activity and keeps me up to date on the latest news. Last winter, he shared other news as well – our first grandchild would be arriving the following summer! The necessity for cross-country trips to Charlotte, especially in Sandy’s mind, escalated enormously. Without much hesitation, she not only booked our summer trip but started looking at another in October.

Knowing Sandy’s intent to visit in October, Colby added some frosting to the cake and sent me a text – “If you come here with mom in October…” – followed by a screenshot of the dates for the Beautiful Letdown 20th Anniversary Tour 2023. Right there in the middle of the tour, conveniently in the month of October, was a stop in Charlotte. The next day, before I really had time to think about how I would make it work with my job, came the update that Colby had in his possession two tickets, and the second one was mine if I came.

How do you decline an invitation like that?

Saturday morning, we fly to Charlotte.

The Switchfoot concert is on Monday. But it is more than just another concert, it is about more than seeing Switchfoot. It is a unique kind of celebration. As Switchfoot celebrates the 20th anniversary of the album that launched them into the spotlight, Colby and I will celebrate 20 years of sharing a passion for Switchfoot that goes beyond music, and we will both have flashbacks of singing at the top of our lungs in the Honda Pilot, on our way to Grandma and Granpa's house. Monday will be a celebration of music, but it will also be a celebration of an unspoken understanding, of a mutual feeling about life and faith, that Switchfoot seems to be able to put words to. It is a celebration of a relationship with my son, of a common bond through Switchfoot that brings me joy and makes my life better. Switchfoot will be on stage, but the real reason I am going is Colby. As much as I enjoy Switchfoot, without Colby, this would just be another concert.