Journal entry for: 1-5-2001

Happy New Year!

     Andrew here. I'm finally back home for a little while, and it'snice. We had a great holiday season, and I hope it was the same way with you. First off, I'd like to share some good news. We have finalized plans for a tour with Caedmon's Call this Spring, which will be a lot of fun. We've been talking about getting together and doing some shows forever, and we finally were able to pull it off. The tour will run through the month of March, and will be mainly on the West Coast, for those of you that are always writing and asking us to get out that way. It will be a lot of fun, and we're excited to spend that time with our friends. The opening act on the tour is Sandra McCracken, who just this Saturday was married to Derek in what was, quite possibly, the most amazing wedding I have ever been to. She's incredible, and the show will be a lot of fun.

     In other news, we missed the first show of our career on New Year's Eve. Huge apologies to the crowd in Bangor, Maine. Due to a giant snowstorm, which covered the whole of New England, we were stranded at the Philadelphia airport for about 34 hours or so. (Motto: Nice place to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there...) Every airport in Maine was shut down, so we ended up getting flown back to Nashville just in time to miss the New Year's countdown by about two minutes. And then we went to bed.

     For the majority of January we'll just be getting everything back in order from the holidays and the theft. A few of us are working on other projects here and there, which is also fun. Being off the road for more than less of the last two months has been a really great thing. I would have rather been touring, because that's what we do, and it's weird when we're not, but it was really great to be able to be home for a little while. I was able to really get involved in my church, and more importantly, in my friends' lives. Bono gave a couple of quotes in the last issue of Rolling Stone about friendship that I thought were pretty cool, and helped me to sort of realize this. It's just a really good thing when you're around people that you love and who love you, and who know you well enough to tell you when you're being stupid or wrong. That is such a noble thing. Not being stupid or wrong, I phrased that weird, but in being a true and honest friend. That's something I haven't always had. I think you can even tell that from a few of the songs on Better Than This. I've just been very encouraged in my faith, in my discipline, and in my art by good friends. I think that's something we don't give a lot of credence to, but oh, what a sad thing it would be to be without. Anyway, that was kind of a random point, but it's what was on my mind this morning, so it's what you get.

     We've been working on some demos of new songs for a new album to cut maybe this summer. We're excited about those. We're looking forward to the tour and getting to the West Coast. It'll be great just to play again, to get to make some more music, and it'll be wonderful to see all of you again. We hope you had a wonderful Christmas, and that you are settling into the new year. May God show you truth, beauty and grace. Thank you all, once again, for your support, for your gifts, and most importantly, for your prayers. A band is nothing without an audience, and so it's because of you that we're still here. Thank you, and we'll see you soon.

Grace and Peace

Andrew