From our first week living in South Pasadena, I have been an evangelist for Heirloom Bakery. Positioned at the railroad tracks on the corner of Mission and Meridian (“Historic Route 66,” the signs declare), it caught our eye on the very first day we explored our new neighborhood. On Saturday of that first week, after a packed few days of my program’s summer “boot camp,” Alison and I sauntered inside the bakery—with a hope supplied by the testimonials of many Yelpers.

We were first struck by the charm of the cafe (clean, a looming glass pastry display, quaint seating, a chalkboard announcing “Now serving dinner!”), then the friendliness of the employees. The baked wares looked delicious enough, and we settled on splitting a chocolate croissant and a breakfast sandwich. Of course I ordered a large cup of coffee—dark, for here. We paid and stepped outside to enjoy our breakfast in the California morning air.

I can make no claims to being a coffee connoisseur. Though employed as a Starbucks barista for half a decade, I was a late bloomer to the delights of brewed coffee—only arriving at my current love by way of the commercial route of flavored creamer. But I know when coffee tastes great and when it doesn’t; I like my coffee bold and unapologetic. I’ve been to far too many reputable diners and breakfast establishments that compromise their tasty solids with weak, namby-pamby coffee. I may not be a connoisseur, but I do have high standards.

With the afterglow of too many episodes of Twin Peaks in my mind, I held up my left hand, palm out, as I took my first sip of the swirling, steaming brew, tan with cream. What splashed my tongue was something so absolutely unexpected in its pleasure, all the more rich for its surprise. Bold and dark, strong and smooth, this coffee walked—no, danced—the razor’s edge between the snares of weakness, bitterness, and burntness. In the duration of one cup, I had boldly crowned a new king: Equator Coffee.

The croissant and sandwich were no less delectable; it was no fault of their own that they failed to inspire my heart to fall to its knees in adoration like the coffee. The sandwich—generous portions of eggs, bacon, and fresh tomato housed within succulent scratch-made bread—was incredible. Since that Saturday, we began going every Saturday with religious fervor, and I’ve discovered many other favorites (number one the buttery almond croissant, simultaneously dense and airy). There has been no going back from Heirloom, and I have found no equal. I immediately began verbalizing and tweeting exultant proclamations about Heirloom and Equator, with no ulterior motive other than the joy bubbling from my heart that demanded sharing.

Two weeks ago, after a long and somewhat frustrating job search, my wife became employed by this amazing bakery, and now we are there far more often than every Saturday. The coffee is no less exquisite than that first day, and I’ve never had a bad cup. I fear that, with her saturation and behind-the-scenes perspective, my wife may one day burn out on Heirloom’s delights. But may it never be so for me, a devoted lover and spreader of the good news of Heirloom. May it never be.

Alison and I have gotten quite adept at consolidating our junk to a single carload and moving it thousands of miles to new residences. Not only have I accepted the minimalistic lifestyle necessitated by the trifecta of low income, transitoriness, and limited space—I’ve actually grown to enjoy the freedom that comes with fewer possessions and the catharsis of purging my junk. We are an obese society, not just in terms of physical fat but material fat as well. Most of us walk around with the clutter equivalent of spare tires and jiggly thighs, and my itinerant relocating has resulted in a liberating kind of liposuction.

Another aspect of this that we’ve gotten used to, and I dare say even learned to enjoy, is owning no permanent furniture. We move to a new location, then beg, borrow, or buy off Craigslist whatever we need: bookshelves, chairs, a coffee table, a desk. With the exception of fabric-centric items like couches and mattresses—where the unknown variables of previous ownership range from foul odors to sentient bacteria—I’m perfectly content to use only second-hand objects to rest my food, clothes, or rump upon. We buy these items on the cheap, and when we’re ready to move again I have no qualms re-peddling them on Craigslist and recycling them back into the great circle of lower-middle-class life.

The benefits of this pilgrim style living are many, but one of the key downsides I’ve found is that, when we move into our new location, it hardly feels like a home. Stuff—be it furniture, art, decor, or simply the particular arrangement of clutter—is often what makes a house feel like home. We took to California with us only what we thought we’d need and little else. Thus, gone are the bookshelves teeming with varied and colorful old spines. Gone are the drapes and curtains that warm up a lifeless room. We left behind all that we didn’t “need,” but I’m learning that it’s all those needless things that make me feel at home.

So the dilemma now becomes, do we simply accumulate more “new” stuff to populate our empty apartment and transform it into a happily cluttered nest? Or do we open the door every day to a depressingly spare monastery of blank walls and an open floor? Hoarding is one vice that I am able and only too willing to let go of, but I’m starting to miss the pleasant domestic side-effects of being a pack rat.

One of the tougher vices I try to resist—now that I’m in the golden land of Hollywood—is the insidious act of schmoozing. It’s been hard not to schmooze ever since I started getting access to B (and occasionally A)-list composers, but now that I have the ability to communicate with various celebrities (both garden variety and the film-score-nerd brand) via email, phone, and in-person, the temptation is all the more alluring.

By schmoozing, I mean glad-handing, sweet-talking, or sycophantically approaching someone who I think can elevate me in some way. It can include asking for favors or privileged access, or simply the act of talking to someone. Schmoozing can be for the purpose of advancing my career, worming through the right channels to get access to the top dog, or maybe just for bragging rights. These are all temptations, some more seemingly “legitimate” than others.

I struggle knowing where the line is between appropriate networking and schmoozing. It’s a simple fact that “who you know” often plays a huge role in getting the jobs and opportunities you want. There’s nothing inherently greasy about making beneficial connections. To avoid being a schmoozer, I do my best to put myself in the celebrity’s shoes, to avoid coming across like a used car salesman, and erring on the side of not being pushy enough. I actively keep my distance at times, or wait a little longer to call back, or discard that drafted email.

But beyond the pitfalls of the more accepted act of networking, too often I crave the sweet fruit of posture and position that I think comes with chatting up so-and-so or displaying the personal note so-and-so sent me. I hanker to just call X person up and see if they can do lunch…and I question my motives. Ideally I want to be friends with these amazing people, but am I approaching them as I would a true friend…or as a film music god with enough clout to make my follow-up tweet glisten in the sun? Am I arranging for a meet-up out of pure curiosity or enjoyment, or am I doing it just to fill my ego bladder to bursting?

Not only is schmoozing a reprehensible characteristic (and reputation) to have, but it can do serious long-term damage to the relationships I’m trying so hard to cultivate. Must…resist…the schmooze.

I launched this blog on July 12, 2010—exactly one year ago today. This blog, this wildly confused experiment, this “sandbox” of my narcissistic introspection. I’ve spent many hours and words on subjects both random and esoteric. I’ve gotten a little buzzed off of the few essays that generated longer strings of comments, and on the shocking (to me) traffic statistics that are robotically calculated. (Someone in Sweden actually reads this thing?) I’m not sure how accurate those statistics are, and I’ve been conflicted over whether to pursue more traffic and try generating something bigger than a public journal.

But even without AdSense revenue and comment quantities that shrink the scroll bar, this experiment has been one of great and varied personal value. For the last year (with the exception of a few slothful interruptions), the blog has been my tri-weekly finger scales, my public excuse for sitting down and coaxing thoughts and syntax out of my gelatinous brain. Year one of The Greiving Process coincided (and perhaps fueled) my increasing determination to pursue a proper career as a writer. I used the content of this blog to apply to the creative writing graduate program at Notre Dame, and while it failed me in that endeavor, it did see me receive entry to a journalism program at USC (take that, creative writing!).

Say what you will about the content itself, the amount of work and energy represented by a full year’s worth of essays cannot but have helped my craft. I learned a great deal of discipline with my self-imposed quota of output, and my writing and rewriting skills have undoubtedly benefited from so much activity. In addition to all this, I’ve had interesting rapport with different readers in the comments, and been encouraged by the number and diversity of those who honor my quixotic ramblings with their precious time. I am grateful to the soundboards and lurkers alike, and the drive to keep writing would certainly have run dry without the presence of an audience.

I intend to continue hosing the internet with my evolving thoughts on religion, my monomaniacal obsession with film music, and the disturbing relics discovered as I plumb my own mind and history—whether the internet likes it or not. I will be extremely busy this next year, beginning in August when my master’s program sets sail, and I won’t have the excuse of vacuous hours at a temp job to pump out the same volume of content. But this last year of writing has been too valuable, the feedback too rewarding, for me to give it up completely.

At any rate, thanks for reading.

Read the introduction in Part I.

The Tree of Life begins with a tragedy, before we really care about the characters to whom the tragedy happens. Then, after watching a married couple grapple with their fresh grief—crying out to God for answers—we are jettisoned back into time to the beginning of the universe, where God’s enigmatic response begins to take shape. We witness the birth of all life, God speaking something from nothing…and then we return to the small Texas family, where we watch the birth and growth of the individuals whom the story is concerned with.

That’s a brief, inadequate, back-of-the-DVD-box summary of the film. What cannot be so easily summarized is the way in which Tree of Life vibrated on the same frequency as the invisible organ inside of me, the one stamped with eternity. The film opens with a passage from The Book of Job, and the narration throughout is packed with echoes of scripture—particularly scriptures wherein man cries out to God in confusion, sorrow, and anger. “Where were you when I needed you?” “We ask God to send healing for our wounds, and instead he sends flies.” “I can’t do what I want to do, and I do what I hate.” A young father strives after the wind of fortune and success, and starts to lose his family in the bargain. A mother is drawn and quartered between devotion to her husband and the affection of her sons. A boy is suffocated under the weight of his father’s authoritative cruelty, and embarks down the path of sin—against his own desires—to escape.

In other words: life happens. Life in all its mess, confusion, heartbreak, and glory. We chase after that which promises us happiness, and trample the only things—the only people—that really matter. Sometimes we lose those people before we had the chance to beg forgiveness, to tell them that our life was empty without them. And yet there remains the chance for release, for redemption. To let go of the weights and scars we drag from the past, and cross the bridge to something more beautiful—back into eternity.

The Tree of Life so exquisitely captures the evasive lightning of what it feels like to be a child. To grow up, to meet baby brothers, to run in circles on the front lawn at sunset. To love parents, yet also fear them. To discover death for the first time, to discover hatred for the first time. To timidly cross the Rubicon of sin and selfishness, and feel hopelessly unable to return to innocence. To stare into the heavens, looking for God, and finding nothing but silence. And then to discover God hiding in the tiny feet of a baby, in the marvel of white clouds pluming out of an oceanic sky. To find God in the people you took for granted, in the simple pleasures of family, in the room next door.

Perhaps it’s because I’m one of three brothers, or because I was homeschooled (and thus spent most of my growing up years with my family)—but The Tree of Life felt like a portrait of my early memories. I recognized the toy trucks; I remember sticking a flashlight in my mouth to see my cheeks glow red in the darkness; I remember the accompanying shame of first giving in to my selfish appetites; I remember hurting my favorite people. The film’s style is like going back to birth and running through disparate and half-remembered memories—which, to me, makes it much more profound than a standard plot. However it did it, Tree of Life bypassed my “movie brain,” and went straight for my spiritual jugular. To the place of memories and dreams, of guilt and joy. It spoke to my very core, where eternity and the things I love deepest are buried and—too often—forgotten. It made me remember the best and most important pieces of my life—and it taught me never to forget them.