Sweating Through

For some reason, I sweat heavily at times. I say at times, because I could be giving a talk in front of a packed crowd with the room temperature being 85, and I won't sweat a drop. Other times, like last night, the room temp was around 72, and I was dripping by the end of twenty minutes.

It used to happen a lot in college during comedy shows. It was never that salty, smelly sweat like I was working out or out of shape, it's always been a flop sweat kind of thing. Yet, unlike flop sweat, it doesn't just happen when I'm nervous, but the flop sweat can also happen when I feel completely comfortable and prepared. It tends to drive me nuts.

I've always had the problem though, ever since I was a little kid. I remember that after elementary gym classes, I would just be literally soaked with sweat. Other kids would accuse me of holding my head under the faucet, and I'd have to tell them, no, I just sweat that much.

Anyway, if I haven't disgusted you too much yet, last night's talk went okay. It was a talk I was giving for the first time, and I probably didn't put nearly as much oomph into it as I could have since I was just standing in front of a youth room and delivering it after a Mountain Dew chugging contest, but I guess it went all right.

The leader of the group, Todd Zylstra, gave me a ton of encouraging words after it was over, like he's always so good at. But I know Todd's a really great guy, so I'm never sure if he'd actually tell me, "Boy that was a rough one, huh?"

The group was very respectful though. They laughed at the right times, and listened at the right times. They're one of my favorite groups to be up in front of. I'm starting to think that I can be kind of boring though. Sometimes I may find certain Bible stories more compelling than the people I'm talking to, it's kind of hard to tell. But like always, this group treated me very well, and it was great to see all of them again.

I take off for Sioux Falls, South Dakota today to meet up with ministry friends Mark Elgersma and Danny Fergen. We're going to be hashing out some type of plan to offer ourselves up in a speaker / musician package deal for youth events. I'm really excited about the opportunity, and the fact that if it works, I'll be guaranteed the chance to work with people I really like and respect.

Anyhoo - My next speaking engagement is not for two weeks. (Winter's always a little slow for me.) But I think I've got three between November and December. I'll make an effort to update more regularly between jobs this time, I promise.

Till next time,

Jason