Together

A farmer who had a quarrelsome family called his sons and told them to lay a bunch of sticks before him. Then, after laying the sticks parallel to one another and binding them, he challenged his sons, one after another, to pick up the bundle and break it. They all tried, but in vain. Then, untying the bundle, he gave them the sticks to break one by one. This they did with the greatest ease. Then said the father, “Thus, my sons, as long as you remain united, you are a match for anything, but differ and separate, and you are undone.” (Aesop)

Scripture’s tale of the Tower of Babel holds an amazing statement by God, “If as ONE PEOPLE speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.” Since Ancient Hebrew has no punctuation, bold lettering, underlining or other techniques to emphasize a word or phrase, Hebrew will double up words for emphasis. The word for ONE is doubled and it sticks out: ONE people and ONE language!

People as ONE, unified, and together are VERY powerful and that is why God doesn’t let it happen very often.

It is like so many GREAT things in human nature where we humans were given amazing gifts from God that can be used for good or evil. The gift of sex turns into the evil of abuse. The gift of creation turns into the evil of the Ubermensch, Eugenics and other genetic engineering. The gift of ONE, a people united can be the curse of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Soviet Union or it can be a United States that built an aircraft every 15 minutes in 1944 while having over 3 million men fighting to defeat evil.

We believe, falsely, that in the United States we have a democracy. We don’t have a democracy, we have a republic. As far back as Plato’s “Republic” and again in Alexis de Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America” and even in the “Federalist Papers” on which the US Constitution was based; democracy was feared and called the “Tyranny of the Majority.” Our Republic or “representative democracy”, guaranteed in Article IV of the Constitution, means that our elected representatives can vote AGAINST the majority of their constituents.

A people as ONE can rescue or defeat. A people as ONE can squash the minority or assure rights of all, whether you agree or disagree. We can do so much good together. We can do so much harm together. Tocqueville both feared and admired this balance of power. He said that the United States will be great as long as its people are good. But what happens when we cease to be good? What happens when the majority of people and their representatives are no longer good? When bad people are united and in a majority we must prepare ourselves for a tower of nonsensical babbling. Oh, wait ...

Somebody’s gotta be WRONG!

The shot went up and a majority of the basketball players coalesced around the hoop to see if it went in or not. It was towards the end of the game and the shot or rebound was VERY important. Under the basket the seven-foot center seemed to crawl over the back of the six-foot guard as they fought for position to get the rebound. The center literally fell over the top of the guard to get it. The whistle blew and the home crowd was cheering for the foul had to be on the center as he crushed the home-town guard. When all was sorted out the referee referred to the guard as being the culprit and his number was displayed on the fingers of the unbiased judge. The crowd went nuts in anger as the scoreboard replay clearly showed the foul on the huge center crawling over the back of the guard. Somebody’s gotta be wrong here. It was either what the crowd saw or the replay seemed to show over and over again OR the referee was wrong in what he saw. One of the advantages of TV versus being at a live game is the TV’s attempt to get every angle of the play. Four different versions of the same play from four cameras showed an obvious foul on the seven-foot center, but the fifth camera told a different story. The fifth camera from underneath the basket by one of those crazy guys who sit on the sidelines risking imminent harm; showed that the smaller guard had locked his arm with the center and pulled him over: an obvious foul by the guard but hidden to 4 out of 5 cameras and 20,000 screaming home team fans. Somebody was right and the ref made the right call.

There is no middle ground, no compromise, no “letting” someone else be right once. Somebody was right and somebody was wrong.

I’ve been doing some Ping Pong playing recently and usually it is just the two of us playing. If the ball hits the net on a serve you must do the serve over, but sometimes one sees it hit the net and the other doesn’t. Who is right and who is wrong. They can’t both be right. If there was a line judge she could have told us which, but normally it is a “do over” and no point for either. That doesn’t change the fact that one was right and one was wrong, it doesn’t matter about the person’s “perspective” or “feelings.” Somebody’s gotta be wrong.

We have lost the right and wrong in life today. In the last 30 years we have come to believe that BOTH are right and no one is wrong. We call it tolerance, perspective, opinion or just feeling but nobody is wrong anymore.

Here’s the thing. If nobody’s wrong then nobody’s right either and we have no need for referees. What it WILL degenerate to is the seven-foot center beating on the six-foot guard because whoever wins that fight will get the call his way. Might will make right and then only the weak will be wrong. What we need is some standard or referee outside the game to make the calls for us so that the weak will not be pounded on by the strong. We need some kind of rule for life and living that will help us determine which is right and wrong like lines on the basketball court. What we need is an unbiased judge that can make the hard calls of who is right and wrong and even offer mercy to those who are wrong sometimes to help them get it right the next time. Because somebody’s gotta be wrong.

But where, oh where can we find such a rule for living? Where can we find such a standard that we can put up in our courts and schools and assembly halls? Where can we find that sense of right and wrong and that unbiased and merciful judge?

Who’s Image?

Our local Las Vegas paper today talked about a laughing chimp’s link to our laughter. Researchers in England tickled the babies of humans, orangutans, gorillas, chimps and bonobos and measured the sound “traits” that were made while tickling. Then mapped the sounds on a genetic tree and found three matches all the way up the tree to an ape ancestor that made those sounds and passed them on to all of its children: human and ape. Experts praised the work. “It gives very strong evidence that ape and human laughter are related through evolution” said Frans de Waal.

Last year the Spanish Parliament passed a resolution granting apes “human rights”. Pedro Pozas, the Spanish director of the Great Apes Project told The Times (a UK magazine) “It will doubtless be remembered as a key moment in the defense of our evolutionary comrades.” Pozas also said, “We are seeking to break the species barrier, this is just the point of the spear!” While keeping apes in zoos will remain legal, the animal rights group claims 70% of the apes in Spanish zoos live in “sub-human” conditions. The article goes on to tell us that in addition to humans there are three OTHER genera of apes: gorillas, chimpanzees and orangutans. And that humans and chimps share 99 percent for their active genetic material.

Okay, where do I start?

This is a perfect example of a world without salt and light. When humans take God out of their thinking there is nothing to separate them from an ape. So it would be natural for a pagan thinker to want to grant apes “human rights” since we are nothing more than shaved chimps. It is a simple accident in the evolutionary chain that we got a bigger brain pan and so can sharpen sticks better and don’t need to wear diapers.

Seriously, it is hard to take these people seriously but they seriously are having an impact on our society. The Spanish movement is a back door way to ban the “evil” of bullfighting which the animal rights people have been trying to destroy for decades. Especially since the only apes in Spain are in zoos. In the USA all of our meat choices have been usurped by animal rights activists claiming cruelty in how they are butchered, milked, or made into leather. The price of meat has doubled since butchers now have to be sensitive to the “feelings” of the animals. Christians HAVE TO enter the public debate to be what we are commanded to be: salt and light. This kind of crazy activity can only move forward when Christians sit back and do nothing. When someone says, “Apes are humans too” there is no one with the guts to give them a V8 bonk on the head and say, “What are you? Stupid?”

Animals are precious? YES! They are a beautiful part of God’s creation and God has a purpose and a plan for them AND as part of God’s creation they will be made new and be a part of the new heaven and new earth coming at the end of time. BUT animals are NOT created in God’s image and we have been given the responsibility to care for them and also God gave us every plant and beast for food. That was BEFORE the fall of man (Gen. 1:28-30). But Pagans and Christians alike have distorted our relationship to animals and have demoted humans to equal status with animals and in some times lesser status. It is to the point in Spain and many parts of California that we are made in the animal’s image and not in that of our creator. Look in your mirror, look in your heart, look at the fact that you are even THINKING about this topic; in who’s image were you made?

The Ticking Time Bomb

Next time you prepare for a party here’s what you need to do. Buy a pack of mint Mentos candy and drop them into each chamber of an ice tray, fill with water and freeze. At the party make sure you have plenty of WARM Coke around in need of ice. Serve the Coke or Diet Coke with ice and a smile. It should take only about five minutes for the glass of soda to erupt like a fifth grade science project. Sit back and enjoy. The reason I know this is because I just got “punked” with this trick; to the great amusement of all those at the meeting around me. Last time I accept a Diet Coke from THAT friend.

My brothers and I used to play a lot of practical jokes on each other. I can remember a lot of them on me when I was a young kid and as I got older then I would be able to participate in them. One of the fun pranks I played in High School was taking a hot water bottle and filling it with chunky, milky oatmeal and then adding a little red food coloring. We would get a plastic tube from the hardware store that would fit into the top of the hot water bottle and head off to the local Denny’s restaurant. After eating a bit one of us guys would make the correct noises and press on the hot water bottle in his jacket forcing the oatmeal mixture up and through the tube and throw up all over the table. This was done, hopefully, with the waitress and a young family around. After the mess is spread all over the table you had a choice: run out or stay in. In the run out scenario we would simply leave to the great relief of the waitress and people around us. In the run out scenario you must have most of your food gone so you get the fun AND a free meal. In the stay in scenario when the waitress comes and offers to clean up and move you to another table (along with all those sitting close by) you simply say, “No thank you, we’ll take care of it.” And then you proceed to eat the oatmeal. It always helps to say something like: “I LOVE the big chunks!” THEN you laugh pay for the meal since the looks on the people’s faces is priceless.

I also remember a High School prank gone wrong. No one got seriously hurt but five of us were suspended and facing my parents with it was the ticking time bomb. I can still remember the gut wrenching feeling of the principal calling my dad. As usual I feared what my parents would do more than what the school would do as punishment.

What’s the point of practical jokes? Joy for you and embarrassment for others? Taking people down a peg? Initiation? There is nothing wrong with a practical joke. If people cannot laugh at themselves and their foibles and fears then they are simply taking life too seriously. But sometimes the joke gets carried too far and people get hurt either physically or emotionally. In the middle of the joke be prepared to stop at any time. If you really think about it, you will find you know the exact time that joke went bad. All it takes is for someone to stop, explain, and start the laughing at themselves. Stop it before it goes bad. I had to clean the Diet Coke off my clothes and try to dry out, but I was looking for the next person to help with their drink. Can I get you a Coke?

Es Es Percipe

If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it: did it make a sound? Better yet, if no one ever saw that tree from its life to death: was it really there? This is the realm of the existential philosopher. “Es es percipe” means “to be is to be perceived.” Perception is reality so when something is not perceived it doesn’t exist. I told my wife I was going to a movie and when I came home I was accosted with questions of where I was because she never “HEARD” me tell her. Since she didn’t hear it, it wasn’t real.

We now base our existence, our reality, and our laws on what we can perceive. We make judgments about people and things based on what we see, feel, and hear. We base our reality on what our senses tell us but are they the best way?

The problem is that we all have filters or sunglasses that taint our perceptions. We can both look at the exact same thing and come up with a totally opposite perspective of that reality. If you don’t believe me find a mixed group to join when a president is speaking: one group will hear only negative and the other only positive. Whether you listen to Bush or Obama you will only hear and see what your filters and sunglasses will allow you to. Every now and again something happens to knock those perceptions out of our heads. But it takes an event like 9/11 to do that and it only lasts for a short period of time. Witness people now saying 9/11 was a conspiracy.

So if we both perceive the world in totally different ways how can we get at the truth? In our court system we have a judge and jury who are supposed to look, listen, smell, touch, and taste the evidence to come up with a consensus on the truth. That’s the best we got now. We all know of people who bought their way out of the truth, people who lawyered their way out of even being judged, and people who lied so convincingly that our perceptions changed. Our laws our now based on our PERCEPTIONS and no longer on something outside ourselves. We say it just “feels” wrong or right.

We fight. We argue. We cajole and cry. We try to come up with some consensus and seem to spin our wheels on the grease of compromise. What can save us from the wretched state of our own perceptions? Wouldn’t it be nice to have some kind of standard of rule and measure that we could compare our actions to; where we would know for sure if it is right or wrong, true or false, good or bad? Something like our Standards for Weights and Measures where we know and can check if a pound is a pound and a yard is a yard. Maybe it would be some kind of standard that we could hold up to our politicians to see if their actions are right or not. Or maybe some kind of standard that we could impose on Wall Street and our corporate moguls that would keep them honest and treat their employees fairly. Or even some kind of standard of behavior that we could teach our children in school so that when they get to running this world they will have a rule to guide their actions.

Where would be get such a standard, such a rule of behavior. If we could find one I think it would be EXTREMELY important to make sure we post it wherever people gather and in our courts and in our schools. It would be great to find a standard like that because until we do we have reality based only on our perceptions and we are now finding out how flawed they are.

Natural Laws

I am going to cheat this week by simply regurgitating something that someone sent me some time ago. The Laws aren’t original to me though I have edited some of the comments to more ME. There are laws in this universe, similar to the Law of Gravity, that are immutable and unavoidable:

Law of Mechanical Repair: Whenever you get your hands REALLY dirty, your nose will itch.

Refined Law of Gravity: Anything, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.

Law of Probability: The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act

Law of Random Numbers: If you tap in a wrong number, you never get a busy signal and someone always answers.

Law of the Alibi: If you tell your boss you were late for work because of a flat tire, the very next day you will have a flat tire.

Variation Law: If you change lines (or traffic lanes) the one you just left will always move faster than the one you are in now.

Law of Close Encounters: The probability of meeting someone you know increases dramatically when you are with someone you don’t want to be seen with.

Law of Results: When you try to prove to someone that something doesn’t work, it does.

Law of Biomechanics: The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.

Law of the Theater: At any event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle arrive last.

The Starbucks Law: As soon as you sit down to a cup of hot coffee, you boss will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold.

Law of Logical Arguments: Anything is possible if you don’t know what you are talking about.

Law of Appearance: If the shoe fits, it’s ugly.

Law of Commercial Marketing: As soon as you find a product you really like, they will stop making it.

There you are: hard, fast and immutable laws of our natural life.

Keep your Powder Dry

Had lunch with a “friend” recently and we were discussing the current financial situation in America. There is a bailout mania going on right now that is more deadly than this N1H1 virus going around. This friend caught it and I must admit it is an attractive virus. He stopped paying his mortgage and stopped trying to find a job; he is waiting on his bailout to come his way. “After all, they are not going to let banks fail, or big companies fail and so they are not going to allow foreclosures so ... why pay my mortgage?” He is now 4 months behind. And he is challenging the banks to foreclose so he can declare bankruptcy and have all the credit cards he’s been living on cancelled and still have his house and big TV but at a lower payment and rate. The government just extended his unemployment benefits for another six months so he has not had to work for more than a year now and is getting paid for it. He collects over $300 in food stamps (actually a non-embarrassing ATM card now and not stamps) per month and that MORE than covers his food, in fact he “sells” some of his food to neighbors so it doesn’t get lowered.

He told me he would like to go back to work someday but, for now, it is more profitable to be a “deadbeat.” AND it’s easier. Bailout mania.

I have almost always worked. I remember when we were first married I had to collect unemployment checks and was so embarrassed I swore I would never do it again. Even during my time laid off at the factory I worked roofing houses or driving semi’s to keep working. So to make unemployment a lifestyle is beyond me. But it is becoming more and more a strategy and not safety net as originally planned.

Another unemployed person I knew told me week after week that she was “trusting in God” to bring her the job she was seeking. Not just A job but THE job; she had turned down other jobs because they were not the one she was hoping for. But she had faith that God would bring her the job of her dreams.

“Trust in God but keep your powder dry.” This statement is attributed to Oliver Cromwell during his battle in Ireland in the 1850’s but it is just as true today. Trust in God: yes! Hope: yes! BUT continue to work, plan, and prepare. You CANNOT simply sit back and hope the wind blows fortune your way. Hope is NOT a strategy. You must lean into the wind and move forward.

These two friends may someday find the job of their dreams. But it is more likely that the job of your dreams comes AFTER you kiss a lot of frogs. Jobs aren’t found, they are made. Make yours, whatever it is, a good one. Don’t hope for a bailout or a rescue.

The floods hit the Midwestern town and a man was forced to the roof of his house. The first boat came by and told him to jump on. “No” he said, “he had faith that God would save him.” The second boat came now that the water was up to the roof. “No thanks.” He said. “He had faith God would save him!” The water was now over his house and he was treading water.” The third boat came by and tried to pull him in. “No” he insisted. “I have faith that God will save me!” He died. He got to heaven and asked God “Why didn’t you save me in the flood?” God looked pretty frustrated as he said “I sent three boats!”

Hope and faith are not strategies. They are they comfort you have while you are working your hardest.

Nothing Gold Can Stay

It was shiny and new. I wanted it so bad when I saw it perfectly placed on its perch in the store. It was shiny and new. I was at the store for something I knew I needed yet the thing I didn’t know I needed sent to me its siren’s song. “Come, look at me! I am shiny and new!” The debate raged between Gollum and Sméagol in my head for the precious. You have the money and you deserve it because you have worked so hard. You have the money but you have better things to spend it on, you need to save more in this economy. Yea, but it really isn’t that much money. It is more money than I should be spending right now. Yea, but it is shiny and new! I know but, well, it is shiny and new. I bought it.

I don’t know where it is now. If you asked I could probably find it but it isn’t shiny and new. This is a perennial problem in people with many parables to prop our difficult decisions, but we continue to pander to the pretty. It is shiny and new! Whether it is a Matchbox car or the latest Muscle car, the perfect shoe or the right amount of Carats; we opt for the shiny and new.

Shiny and new is neither in the harsh light of the next morning.

Robert Frost captures this in his poem “Nothing Gold Can Stay.”

Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

Adam and Eve’s shiny and new was a forbidden fruit; what’s yours? Remember what it looks like in the naked light of morning because nothing gold can stay.

Big Boys Eat Dirt

The kids were old enough to play in the yard; not quite by themselves but not totally supervised either. I was working outside and placed them in the sand box while I went about my chores. Periodically checking to make sure they didn’t get out of the fenced in area and sending a few encouraging “big boy!” words their way. I came back to find one of them shoving a hand full of dirt into their mouth and then looking up to smile at me with his huge blue eyes, sand on his cheeks, a brown/black tongue and brown/black drool all down the front of his shirt. After barely suppressing a laugh I did the obligatory “eww... big boys don’t eat dirt!” and helped him wash it out with the garden hose. After many such eating experiences, some even grosser, we have a healthy, well-adjusted 20-something to be proud of.

I have since come to believe that I was wrong. Big boys DO eat dirt; that is IF they want to grow up as healthy big boys. Today’s parents spend WAY TOO MUCH time protecting their kids from every germ, bug and clump of dirt. A study on over 11,000 kids, done by Discover Magazine, found that “an overly hygienic environment” dramatically increases the risk of eczema and asthma later in life.

This is the very idea behind childhood immunizations. You introduce a small bit of the disease into the child’s system so that the antibodies are built up for if/when the BIG attack comes. Immunization is the practice before the big game. Exposure to germs and bacteria is common and needed. You have over 1000 species of bacteria that occur naturally in/on your body.

This overprotection from every bug and germ is also call “first child syndrome” because usually you go crazy protecting that first child from every possible event that you just read about in the 100 raising-your-child-right books you just ingested. By the time the second child comes around you sit way back and relax for the ride. By the third and fourth child you forget their names and let them eat whatever they want as long as they are quiet.

Now seriously, you don’t have to go crazy and expose your child to every disease infested mud pool you find, but letting them play in the dirt at the beach and eat a handful or two of sand won’t kill them and might even inoculate them. Big, healthy boys DO eat dirt.

Hocus Pocus

I looked at the blank stare from the elderly ladies in the nursing home and knew I just gave them more information than they wanted. The question was: “Where did that Bible come from?” And I went into a 15 minute historical recitative of the Bible and its origins. After the blank stares I asked “what?” She smiled and said, “I just wanted to know if you got that Bible from the desk over there.” I got it, but I didn’t get it.

I took my three kids and sat them down in the chaos that used to be our living room. I said that we have had lots of fun and I loved playing with them but now was the time for cleaning up, mom was coming home in about an hour and NONE OF US wanted the repercussions of mom coming home with the house looking like a tornado just went through. “So our Lego armies and airplanes had to have a final battle and put away, the toys needed ...” and I went on to explain what had to be done. We put our hands in the center of the circle and cheered: “Go TEAM!” I went to the kitchen to tackle the mess there while the three of them were to restore the living room. A half hour later they were still playing. So much for calm conversational compliance now came stark, strict instructions. They got it but didn’t get it.

“Daddy, why are they washing that baby? Didn’t they give her a bath at home?” said one of my kids trying to understand the latest baptism in our church. After explaining the spiritual significance of it all, he said, “They still could have done it at home.” He got it but didn’t get it.

Sometime in the 1500’s kids came to Catholic Mass to witness the priest in Latin saying “Hoc est enim corpus meum” which means “This is my body...” and it seemed magical to them how the bread turned into the “body” of Christ. As kids do: they played, practiced and perverted the Latin into (you guessed it) “hocus pocus.” The phrase turned into anything that will magically change from one thing to another, and eventually into something that “falsely” turned from one thing to another; a magician’s sleight of hand. They got it but didn’t get it.

They got but didn’t get it. It sunk in but not quite far enough for complete understanding. Sometimes we nod our head too soon. We tell others we understand when all we have is an unsteady grasp with mentally oiled hands. Many of the problems in our life are caused by us saying we understand – too soon.

STOP! Ask one more question to make sure. Repeat what YOU think they said to make sure that is what they REALLY said and not just mental hocus pocus. It would be better to understand now than to get into trouble when mom gets home.

Holy Days

If you had to put your money on the most popular holiday it would have to be Christmas. This is the day we celebrate the birth of Jesus with presents and “good will” towards all people. This holiday is celebrated worldwide now, even though most of the world doesn’t believe in Jesus they still think giving and getting presents is a good idea. The second most popular holiday is Thanksgiving. This is an American holiday, which Canada also picked up and is making its way around the world as a day of giving thanks to – who or what? Most of the world will give thanks to one god or another. After that I don’t know what is most popular. Maybe Halloween or New Years Day or even Valentine’s Day; Easter is up there too as a time of bunnies, baskets, and bonnets.

It was not like this 1000 years ago. Back then, without question, the most popular and significant Holy Day, or holiday, was Easter. Easter was at least a week long and the only week off peasants had through the whole year. Cathedrals and churches alike were filled each of the days as they relived the Passion Week of Christ. From this developed the “Stations of the Cross” and the pilgrimages, and even the Crusades. It was drama at its highest with actors actually whipped and wearing a crown of thorns, bleeding themselves into a holy ecstasy in their devotion. The week was culminated on Easter Sunday with entire communities emptied of flowers so the church could be overflowing with the smell and look of resurrected life.

Interestingly enough Easter actually was named after a pagan goddess. It was an Old English word for a month on the Germanic Calendar (Eostur monath) which was the equivalent of our April. Some believe the goddess Eostre was connected with some folk customs with rabbits and eggs. Most believe that is a modern day Halmark addition. Previous to Easter (899AD) it was called Pascha (Latin for Passover) and celebrated as an alternative to the Jewish Passover.

The second highest Holy Day for 1st millennium Christians was Ascension Day. 40 days after the Resurrection Christ ascended into heaven “to sit at the right hand of God the Father.” The third was the Harvest Festival which would be the equivalent of our Thanksgiving but occurred closer to Halloween in the calendar. Finally, the fourth celebration was Christmas, not such a big thing back in 1000AD.

As with a LOT of things: the date is not important. What is important is what the celebration means. So this particular Sunday is not the actual Sunday when Jesus rose from the grave – so what? It is important that we celebrate his resurrection and what that means for us. Easter has been filled with bunnies, chocolate, and colored eggs – so what? As long as it doesn’t detract from what we are truly celebrating and what it should mean to us. So let’s celebrate, let’s party, and God will smile.

We’re All Full Up Here

I was having a discussion with a friend over a lunch about the recent divorce of a mutual friend. The reason for the divorce was the drug addicted ways of the husband and the controlling ways of the wife. BOTH contributed to the collapse of the marriage; we decided and then my friend said something that has stuck with me since then, he said “we are all in search of our own dysfunction.”

We have heard of dysfunctional homes, co-dependence, dysfunctional marriages, and, yes, all of us are in search of our own dysfunction. I think when my friend said that he could just have easily said “we are all in search of our own excuses.” It would be great if I could put a label on my quirks, call it a dysfunction, get grant funding or social security for it, and never work again in my life. My dad punished me with a belt when I was young – okay – can’t work anymore because of the mental trauma I suffered as a child. One of my brothers hung a spider from and long hair right above my sleeping face and gently woke me, I can still remember it and see it 45 years later. I applied for grant funding for all of us with “spider-trauma” and I expect to research it from my couch and big screen TV for the next 20 years. Then I will find another dysfunction, find a college professor to research it for me, and then take more years off.

My friend could just as easily have said “we are all in search of a reason to shirk responsibility.” We all feel that tendency, especially today, if coffee spills and burns us it is MacDonald’s fault for making the coffee too hot. If a small traffic accident, a mistake, happens then both insurance companies fight over who will pay what to whom, lawyers seek a slice and mistakes become excuses for others to be irresponsible.

After an accident I admitted that it was my fault and the policeman didn’t believe me. He made me write it down and say it again in front of someone else. I am still paying for it in high premiums and a “record.” I am not perfect, in fact FAR FROM IT! But I refuse to use my dysfunctions as an excuse for not working. Nor should you because it is our nature; we are all in search of our own dysfunction.

I like Jack Nicolson’s response in “As Good as it Gets” when someone tried to share their dysfunction. He said “peddle crazy someplace else, we’re all full up here!” In my opinion so is this world.

Finding Answers vs. Finding Questions

I think the record for one of my kids at age three or four was 32 questions in a row. Daddy, why? And you string along a litany of “whys” and “becauses” until you are exhausted and finally end with either “I don’t know” or “BECAUSE I SAID SO!” Every parent goes through this rite of passage but is it a rite for your kids or for you?

I don’t believe, in the minds of the kids, the ANSWERS are important at all. That is why they so easily brush the answer aside, find a key word and attach a “why” to it to form the next question. Asking the question has a purpose beyond just getting an answer. I believe that when a child starts with “Daddy, why is the sky blue?” he or she is really asking “Daddy, will you pay attention to me?” and when, after the 13th question “But why can’t I eat my boogers?” he or she is really asking “Do you love me?” and after the 30th question “Daddy, but WHY do you and mom lock your bedroom door?” he or she is really asking: “Daddy, do you REALLY love me?”

Now let us transfer that same concept to adults. We, as adults, ask some of the stupidest questions but most of the time we really don’t want to know the answer; we have some other purpose in mind. Most often we want to make a statement. When we ask someone “what, are you stupid or something?” I really don’t think we are looking for them to answer the question, we are making a statement.

In a politically charged arena a reporter will ask the question “Why don’t you believe in a women’s right to choose?” and you should know immediately that the reporter is not really asking a question but making a statement. The statement, in the form of a question, from the opposite viewpoint would go like this: “Why do you believe a new mother should not kill her child by chopping it up into little pieces, sucking its little arms and legs up with a vacuum cleaner, and throwing the baby out with the trash?” Now is that a question or a statement with some kind of purpose in mind? The purpose is often to get you caught in an answer that can be manipulated to a headline: “Politician doesn’t support women” or “Politician wants to kill babies!”

When someone comes to me as a man of faith and asks “How can there be a God when there is so much bad in the world?” I can answer that question or I can seek to find the purpose behind it. Chances are they don’t want an answer or won’t be convinced no matter how good the answer is because THE ANSWER IS NOT WHY THEY ARE ASKING THE QUESTION!

When your child asks his 51st question in a row; scoop him up in your arms and say: “Because I love you!” When people ask stupid, strange, or loaded questions attempt to go behind the question and find the purpose. Life is not about finding answers; life is all about finding the RIGHT questions.

The REAL You

At a gathering of business “friends” I tend to sit back and people watch. I have this tendency to categorize and analyze and try to get under the skin through the simple observation. A man, small in stature, receding hairline, a bit overweight, and rumpled suit made his way from one clique to another like a bumblebee sucking a little nectar and moving on to the next. The fact that he hovered over all the small groups didn’t strike me as much as a common phrase I heard him say in each. It was something like: “I really hate these parties, I am such an introvert, and they drive me crazy!” And then he would go on to the next group of flowers to buzz the same interjection. As a wallflower myself, I found his introvertedness extraordinarily extroverted.

If it looks like a duck and acts like a duck the chances are: it’s a duck. It really doesn’t matter if the duck thinks it’s a dog, it’s still a duck.

The REAL you, the authentic YOU is doing what you promise and not just “being who you are.” BEING is way to nebulous to pin down and most people are pretty poor at judging who you are trying to BE. DOING, on the other hand, is easy to see and easy to judge. A wise man once said that it is “by their fruit you shall know them.” He didn’t say you can know them by what they ARE or what they are BEING.

A person of any religion can come up to you and claim “I am a person of faith.” But what if their actions are the opposite of faith? What if they are filled with worry? What if they are filled with violence and abuse? What if they lie, cheat, and steal? Where is their faith? What if it acts like a duck?

We all know those kinds of hypocritical fanatics and that is not what I want you to remember from this column. I want it to be positive because in that same BEING vs. DOING issue lays a strategy for life.

You could spend your time wondering and worrying if you are a person of faith; worrying about your eternity, wondering if you are who you should be; or, you could spend your time DOING it. You could spend your time wondering IF what you say you are is really you. OR you could just act like that all the time.

Just ACT; just DO what you should do. That is enough; you can save all the angst for your cigar and cognac discussion in a leather chair somewhere.

Inspiration

"Father, FATHER, the sleeper has awaken!" inspires me every time I hear it. It is from a corny sci-fi movie. (Can you name it? Look it up on youtube and be inspired) I love going to movies and I think that one of the reasons is that I love to be inspired. A good yarn leading to a climax of faith, conscience, or critical decision where the hero agonizes and knits together quote that will inspire you beyond the comforter of the movie. Something we all could and SHOULD relate to.

Here are some of my favorites in no particular order:

"I may not be able to carry it for you Mr. Frodo, but I can carry you!"

"Get busy living, or get busy dying!"

"Do or do not do, there is no try!"

"There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path!"

"There's no place like home!" (Okay a little old and corny, but I grew up with this movie!)

"I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast!"

"Tell Meryl, to swing away!"

"It's only after you've lost everything that you're free to do anything!"

"What we do in life echoes in eternity!"

"Every man dies, but not every man truly lives!"

"Nephew, from this moment on, call yourself Vincent Corleone!"

There are many more quotes that make me laugh, make me cry, or are just fun to say but these inspire me. They give me goose bumps when I hear them and bring tears to my eyes. (email me your favorites and I'll post them on my blog.)

The previews are over, the music starts, the curtains open a bit more, and with popcorn and soda in hand I search for the inspiration in the darkened theater. We all need inspiration, will you join me?

Add your favorite quotes with the comment feature, I would love to read them. Add the movie they come from. If you don't recognize these quotes. I'll add them later after you struggle with them a little. Steve

Hiring Part Two

I am now ready for the interview. Sometimes they surprise me and wipe out my first impressions but usually I have only two questions for them...

When I was interviewed and trained to DO interviews I was given a book of questions to ask or choose from. I started with the book and the interview took over and hour and I would dutifully write down their answers so I could consult it later and remember why I hired them in the first place ... how stupid is that.

Here are some stupid questions to ask in an interview:
- Are you a self starter?
- Do you consider yourself a people person?
- Are you a leader?
- Are you a Green Bay Packers fan?
- Do you have a problem with overtime?
- Did you get good grades in school?

All of these questions will get only one response. They are basically an intelligence test and not interview questions. If ANY ONE answers “no” to these questions don’t hire them. These are leading questions and don’t get under the skin of the person.

Here are some good questions:
- Define integrity.
- What is on your bookshelf right now?
- Who needs you?
- Tell me about a time when you got in over your head and what you did about it.
- What is the greatest event in your life so far?

When I was a rookie I had the first set of questions and wondered why I really didn’t know my new employee. When I became a little seasoned I evolved to the second set of questions and enjoyed the people I worked with. After hundreds of interviews I broke even those questions down into just two. Two questions told me what I needed to know about the person beyond the non-verbal’s described in the last column. Two questions to get below the surface:
- What do you expect from me, your boss?
- What can I expect from you, my employee?

Confused? Not really, you can find out a lot about a person from those two questions. See if you can tell which I would hire based on the following answers.

What do you expect from me, your boss?
- A paycheck
- A chance to prove myself
- Two weeks paid vacation
- A company car
- Experience, guidance, and knowledge

What can I expect from you, my employee?
- My best, everyday
- Eight hours, minus breaks of course
- My support of you, to make YOU look good
- Loyalty
- The extra mile
- 40 hours a week, with time and a half for more

Which would you hire? Maybe the more important question is: Which are you?

Hiring Part One

The nervous twenty-something sat down at a chair I offered him in the break room of the factory where I was hiring. Within a few seconds of meeting him I had a pretty good idea of whether I was going to hire him or not. Some had resumes and ties, some had torn jeans and a ratty shirt, but most had a scared look on their faces. I set them at ease with an offer of something to drink before we sat down and began the interview. After doing hundreds of interviews and hiring dozens of new employees into the company I got pretty good at getting to know people quickly. Let me give you a few quick observations about hiring for jobs.

Resumes are for pinheads. Any good manager can tell more from a handshake and a look in the eye then they could ever from a resume. Only in the MOST technical of jobs do you even need to know any kind of proficiency in tech stuff. You can ALWAYS teach someone to fix and maintain but you can RARELY teach guts, brains, perseverance and interpersonal skills. I know a lot of idiots with great resumes and there “ain’t no fix for stupid.”

Never trust educational background. With less than 50% of our high school graduates knowing how to read and most universities teaching you political views instead of calculus; I would never trust education. Most people learn to take tests. “Will this be on the exam?” And they forget as soon as the last paper is handed in. How much education and where you got it isn’t important. My degrees are more a testament to my perseverance and patience than they are to my knowledge.

Be prejudiced. Hire based on certain prejudices. I am NOT talking about skin color or gender, which makes no difference. I am talking about hiring the RIGHT people for the RIGHT job, whoever that may be. I have felt pressures from every front to hire people who were not right for the job but they were “right” for some other reason. I was asked to hire a person because their family worked in the company, because they came from a certain school, because I needed more minorities in my departments, because they had seniority, and even because they just needed a break. Resist the pressure against hiring the RIGHT person for the RIGHT job, be prejudiced.

Get under their skin. So many interviews I have been in, on both sides of the table, never get under the skin at what the person is really like. How do you get to know a person in that short of time? They walk in. Are they late, RIGHT on time, or early? You see how they are dressed. Are they OVER dressed, appropriate, or UNDER dressed? You shake their hand. Is it strong and confident, wimpy fish-like, crushing, or Monkish where they wipe after they shake? You look them in the eyes. Are they scared, averted, piercing and deep, or bloodshot? You offer them a drink. Do they graciously accept and thank you, decline and thank you, offer to pay, or have their own and pull out a JB from their pocket. You sit down with them. Do they slouch, sit at attention, cross arms and legs, lean towards you or lean away from you?

You haven’t said a word yet but you probably know whether you are going to hire them based on the first few minutes of meeting them. I am now ready for the interview. Sometimes they surprise me and wipe out my first impressions but usually I have only two questions for them ...

On Being a Pain

Let me apologize ahead of time but I am going to whine for a few minutes. It is not my normal character to whine but I have a point at the end so please put up with it for a paragraph or two.

I cannot walk without pain. In fact, I don’t remember a time since I got out of a cast after my first knee surgery in High School where I have walked without pain. So for over 30 years and six knee surgeries I have dealt with knee pain. The problem is, when your body is out of balance with knee issues I walk funny and after 30 years of walking funny it has affected my back and for the last 15 years I have had back problems. Almost two years ago now I broke the foot on my “good” leg and had to have surgery to put things back together again. So now I have pain on the “good” leg. Instead of just hurting every other step I now hurt with each step I take. I won’t even bother you with all the fingers I have broken and jammed to make each grip painful and rings almost impossible. Nor will I tell you about all the teeth I have missing from growing up with a masochistic dentist and all the oral surgeries. I just won’t tell you about those things. I fall asleep thinking about how to minimize pain, I get out of bed because of pain, each step I take during the day is filled with pain, and I have to sit in certain chairs to minimize back pain.

I am constantly told to try this doctor, or to try this medicine, or this exercise and am given countless home remedies to help with pain. It’s not incapacitating, it is just there; constantly there.

I’m used to pain. I’ve seen enough war movies now that “pain lets you know you are alive” has become a cliché. I have come to accept pain and, in fact: come to use pain for good. The easiest example of this is my proclivity to getting up at 5:00 am to start my day. I would not have the self-discipline to get up that early if my back would not be screaming at me to get up. Pain keeps me humble. I used to run, jump and play with unusual talent and it all went to my head; now I watch from the sidelines constantly fighting the urge to get in the game, invited into the game, yet realizing I cannot. My wife had to threaten me with not taking me to the hospital for my last knee surgery because I could not admit I couldn’t do it anymore, I couldn’t admit that I couldn’t.
We have to look at pain as motivation and not as an excuse. Too many of us claim pain to exclude ourselves from having to work or being fruitful. We become users instead of producers, takers instead of givers, and whiners instead of winners. Take a long hard look at your life and ask yourself “am I using pain as an excuse or motivation?” You get hurt – okay – take a minute to look yourself over, brush yourself off and then GET UP! I know, I know, now I’m just being a pain.

The Present

What a difference a century makes. Geologists and scientists talk about billions of years, biologists and evolutionists talk about millions of years, historians, preachers and philosophers talk about thousands of years, I just want you to look back at the last one hundred.

Most of you weren’t around one hundred years ago but your parents and grandparents were. Picture them and their lifestyle one hundred years ago. Especially when they talk about “the good old days” and the converse “when I was young, I had to ...” you finish the sentence.

One hundred years ago the average life expectancy was 47.
One hundred years ago only 14 percent of homes had a bathtub.
One hundred years ago only 8 percent had a phone
One hundred years ago there were only 144 miles of paved roads with a speed limit of an outrageous 10 mph.
One hundred years ago the tallest structure was the Eiffel Tower.
One hundred years ago the average wage was 22 cents an hour.
One hundred years ago 95 percent of all births took place AT HOME.
One hundred years ago 90 percent of doctors had no college education.
One hundred years ago most women would wash their hair once a month and used Borax and egg yolks to do it.
One hundred years ago the top causes of death were Pneumonia, the flu, TB, and diarrhea would kill you.
One hundred years ago marijuana, heroin, and morphine were available over the counter at local drug stores.
One hundred years ago there were only 230 reported murders in the whole USA.

You reveal the present when you describe the past. When Grandpa looked back saying how hard it was when he was a kid and how kids “have it so easy today.” He isn’t really talking about the past. When Grandma fondly remembers life on the farm when she was a kid in the middle of her confusing, hectic, internet-filled life she really isn’t talking so much about the past but making a comment on today.

We define the present when we reveal our past. Part of that is the teacher in all of us wanting our friends and family not to fall into the same mistakes that were made in the past. But part of it is our mind making an attempt to grasp the un-grasp-able. Our mind is trying to wrap gift paper around a cat and place it under a tree with a pretty ribbon, but it just won’t sit still. Even the smartest man who ever lived was conflicted with this attempt to wrap a cat when he said both:”there is nothing new under the sun” and “no one knows the future and what is to come”.
The best we can do is unwrap our particular part of knowledge for others and share. It doesn’t matter if they listen or not, we have done our part to define this crazy world just a little and that is why we have added 40 years to our life expectancy and ALSO why most of us die from abusing our body. I’ll just praise God for my shower and shampoo.

Cloud Cover

The old wood smell overtook me as I slid between the pews. My feet still couldn’t touch the ground as I climbed up next to my father in the uncomfortable silence. As I yanked on the tight collar of my brothers out-grown shirt my clip-on tie was exposed for the fake it was. Fifteen minutes before the organ music signaled the start of the service we were sitting in our mentally assigned pews along with most of the members who had theirs staked out as well. Ten minutes early was late and got you the front rows or maybe even the Fellowship Hall where the folding chairs signified a lower status of worshipper. The lights seemed to work but as the organ began playing I looked up at the expensive chandelier-like fixtures and it was as if the dark wood of the room sucked the light out of them. It was a cloudy Sunday morning.

There’s a certain slant of light,
On winter afternoons,
That oppresses, like the weight
Of cathedral tunes.

(Emily Dickinson: There’s a Certain Slant of Light)

I sit in my office unable to get any work done. It feels like a blanket has been laid over the world as the clouds came. The world isn’t dark it’s just – wrong. I don’t mean the light, white, airy clouds of summer days where you fashion them into animals and funny faces; I mean the dark, purplish clouds that lay low like fog with substance. They don’t bring a good cleansing rain but they tease you with a little spit and dust circles on your car: winter clouds bringing a chill and with a depression chaser.

Heavenly hurt it gives us;
We can find no scar,
But internal difference
Where all the meanings are.

We’ve all felt the clouds laying on our life like heavenly hurt and too often the place where light should shine is the place that absorbs and takes more light from us. All we want to do is find a comforter and huddle in a corner chair and wait for it to pass but that is the exact opposite of a health.

After the first song where I stood trying to hold an amazingly heavy hymnal when all the professionals sang in four part harmonies a child, not much younger than me at the time, rang out with a “LA LA LA LA LA LA” after all other music had stopped. It was as if a ray of sun burst through the clouds and the stained glass windows to blind me with joy. Even my father smiled; pass the pink peppermints, I can make it through this!

With deference to Emily let me add a verse:

There’s a sky full of light,
That’s always, always here,
So push cloud cover away
And see the Light that’s near.

Good Wife’s Guide

Housekeeping Monthly, 13 May, 1955

Have dinner ready. Plan ahead, even the night before, to have a delicious meal ready on time for his return. This is a way of letting him know that you have been thinking about him and are concerned about his needs. Most men are hungry when they get home and the prospect of a good meal is part of the warm welcome needed.
Prepare yourself. Take 15 minutes to rest so you'll be refreshed when he arrives. Touch up your make-up, put a ribbon in your hair and be fresh-looking. He has just been with a lot of work-weary people.
Be a little gay and a little more interesting for him. His boring day may need a lift and one of your duties is to provide it.
Clear away the clutter. Make one last trip through the main part of the house just before your husband arrives. Run a dust cloth over the tables.
During the cooler months of the year you should prepare and light a fire for him to unwind by. Your husband will feel he has reached a haven of rest and order, and it will give you a lift too. After all, catering to his comfort will provide you with immense personal satisfaction.
Minimize all noise. At the time of his arrival, eliminate all noise of the washer, dryer or vacuum. Encourage the children to be quiet.
Be happy to see him.
Greet him with a warm smile and show sincerity in your desire to please him.
Listen to him. You may have a dozen important things to tell him, but the moment of his arrival is not the time. Let him talk first - remember, his topics of conversation are more important than yours.
Don't greet him with complaints and problems.
Don't complain if he's late for dinner or even if he stays out all night. Count this as minor compared to what he might have gone through at work.
Make him comfortable. Have him lean back in a comfortable chair or lie him down in the bedroom. Have a cool or warm drink ready for him.
Arrange his pillow and offer to take off his shoes. Speak in a low, soothing and pleasant voice.
Don't ask him questions about his actions or question his judgment or integrity. Remember, he is the master of the house and as such will always exercise his will with fairness and truthfulness. You have no right to question him.
A good wife always knows her place.

You must excuse me a minute, before I comment on this I have to go throw-up for a bit.

Maturity

Here’s another one of those quirky thoughts that happened to me in the most strange of circumstances. I happened to be taking out the garbage this morning. Now this is a pretty common occurrence for me for the last 40 years or so, but this was a little different. The garbage can has a plastic bag liner in it; you know the kind, with the red plastic draw strings for closing and carrying. Now the can was jammed full of garbage to fit more in and because I was lazy and didn’t empty it before it got too full. So there is a challenge in front of me.

When my mom would make me take out the garbage I would simply pull the red strings and yank the garbage out of the can as quickly as possible, jam back in it what spilled and roughly run it to where it was supposed to go. Inevitably, the bag would burst and garbage would spill all over the kitchen or hopefully, somewhere outside. I remember getting angry at mom, at my brother who deposited the smelly banana peels, and at my dad for not making the dump close enough to toss the garbage out the kitchen window. Then, since no one would pick up my case, I would get another bag, jam it full, finish the job and be angry for a few hours.

All this I thought about this morning as I pulled the red strings on the garbage bag and carefully wedged it back and forth to remove it from the garbage can. Slow at first but it eventually gave completely to me like removing that one great, unshredded piece from the crab leg. No spillage, no broken bag, and a quick tie to bring it outside.

The lesson that came to me was on maturity. I think maturity is like that. When we are young we have all the energy and little experience in garbage and in life. We will “rush in where angels fear to tread.” Life sends us lessons like picking up stinky banana peels where we have to make a decision: do we learn from this or do we get angry and take our foolishness out on everyone? If we learn then we take one more step up the ladder of maturity, and someday may reach a certain level of wisdom.

The fool lamented to King Lear that he should have grown wise BEFORE he became old in Shakespeare’s play. I pray that for all of us.

There are; however, many advantages to youth. As I brought the perfectly removed bag of garbage out and was thinking these profound thoughts I missed the curb on the sidewalk and tripped. The bag broke and spilled all over my driveway. Nice.

New Year’s Day YEAR, Part 3

The steady roar of the tractor pummeled my ears until I couldn’t hear it anymore. It was steady and consistent as I made my way down the field disking last year’s corn stubble into the ground. Disking was a fairly easy job, especially compared to cultivating where you had to watch and concentrate on the position of the tractor related to the crop or you would cut out the crop. With disking all I had to do was make sure the ends overlapped a bit and buzz down the field. But then it came, that slight change in the RPM of the engine. Before the change I wasn’t even registering the noise of the engine but the slightest change in RPM and I was at full attention. I looked behind me and saw corn stalks piling up in front of the disk instead of being chopped up by it. I raised the disk a bit and watched the disk eat the stalks like a shredder chewing paper.

All it took was an ever-so-slight change in RPM of the engine. The engine I didn’t consciously hear before the change. An anomaly jarred my brain back to attention.

While our brains are fantastically amazing they are also lazy. They will not “pay attention” to things that are the same, the usual, or the ordinary but they will JUMP to attention at things that are different, Unusual, or extra-ordinary. Don’t believe me? Don’t know what I am talking about? Tell me if you have experienced this:

You are calmly sleeping with crazy noise going on: partner snoring, fan, trains going by, TV on, etc; and then you hear a “click” of your front door. Tell me you don’t STARTLE awake. Or, you find yourself at work and don’t remember actually driving to work.

Or just maybe last year went by and you hardly even remember it. Nothing different happened, nothing new stopped you in your tracks or startled you, it was just another year that blew by without you even noticing. You lived it, you survived it, your brain filed it away and you were barely aware of it.

Let’s NOT do that again this year. Now there are things that will make your year memorable that are not necessarily good. Things like death, job loss, traumas, or relationship breakups. I would like to suggest a few things to make this year memorable in a positive way. Here’s my list (feel free to add to it):

- Skydive.
- Drive a NASCAR car at over 120 mph.
- Start your own company.
- Take a trip, NOT just a vacation to hang at a beach, visit the pyramids, the acropolis, the Great Wall, or Red Square.
- Go on a mission project of some kind for at least a week: build a hut, bring water to a village, work at a clinic, and play with kids who don’t speak your language.
- Become an expert at a new hobby.
- Start your own website.
- Write a book and self publish it.
- Fast (drink only water) one day a week and pick one week to fast the whole week (water plus vitamins).

I will guarantee that if you do these and add a few to it. Your new year will be memorable and your brain won’t be able to file it under a “boring” and “skip over” year.

New Year’s Day YEAR, Part 2

There is no doubt that God, the devil, and other people are going to throw a slew of “stuff” your way in this coming year. It doesn’t matter whether you work at home or in an office or the field or don’t work at all: stuff will head your way. Stuff happens.

As we begin this New Year together I want you to consider the fact that over the last year you handled the stuff in three different ways.

You REACTED (badly) to stuff.
You RESPONDED (well) to stuff.
You INITIATED new stuff.

Before I had my foot surgery my doctor gave me a painkilling drug and I REACTED badly to it. It just made me dopy (more than usual) and sick and didn’t really take the pain away. He tried a new one and I RESPONDED well by staying clear-headed and pain-free. This year I am INITIATING a new policy of not acting like I’m twenty-something and will turn down playing on the softball team.

I told my warehouse department, all 25 of them, that they had all lost their jobs and they would have to reapply for their old positions under my new job descriptions. Ten of them REACTED BADLY to the news, filed grievances against me, discrimination suits and tried to make my life miserable. Twelve of them RESPONDED well and had their applications in within an hour of the job being posted. Three of them took the INITIATIVE and asked if they could help with the restructure and offered helpful ideas and possibilities for the new department.

Some stuff happens …

Think about what you normally do now. Do you REACT to it? How much of your time is spent REACTING to what people say, do or email?

The rest of your day may be spent RESPONDING to stuff. Responding to emails, requests, facebook stuff. RESPONDING is gratifying, it makes you feel good because at the end of the day your desk is clean and the pile of stuff is in a different spot than it was when you started.

And that’s it. You go home having spent no time INITIATING! We tend to reserve INITIATING for quiet times, good times, down times or desperate times. We wait until our REACTING and RESPONDING is done, which never really gets done, and people go through life never INITIATING a single thing.

I want you to INITIATE this year. I want you to pause your REACTING and RESPONDING and spend some time INITIATING something totally new and different. Some jobs are REACTING jobs and some are RESPONDING jobs but the best jobs are the INITIATING jobs. And here’s the cool part: ALL of us have a job that could take more of our INITIATIVE.

New Year’s Day YEAR, Part 1

By the end of this year would you like to say that you were “lucky this year!” or would you like to say that you “worked hard this year!”?

Luck is a paradox. Everybody wants it and no one can really catch the lightning of luck in a box. Unfortunately you don’t get to choose luck while effort is something that is totally available ALL THE TIME TO ANYONE!

So here’s a New Year’s resolution for you (most of which I stole from Seth Godin’s blog) in our crazy times.

First: Delete 60 minutes a day of “spare” time from your life. This can include TV, reading newspaper, commuting, computer junk, etc.

Second: Fill those 60 minutes a day with one or all of these:
- Exercise at least 20 minutes at a time.
- Read, relevant, non-fiction book or blog on your job or industry.
- Send three thank-you notes.
- Learn a new productivity tool: spreadsheet macros, Firefox shortcuts, graphic design, or new software.
- Volunteer.
- Blog or journal for five minutes about something you learned
- Listen to an on-line or CD class.
- Pray for more than 15 minutes in one sitting.

Third: Spend at least one day a week doing absolutely nothing but being with people you love.

Fourth: Only spend money, for one year, on things you ABSOLUTELY NEED to get by. Save the rest, relentlessly.

If you somehow pull this off, then six months from now you will be the fittest, best rested, most intelligent, best funded, and motivated person in your office. You would know how to do things other people don’t, you’d have a wider network and you’d be more focused.

It is entirely possible that this won’t change your life at all and you will continue to need more or better luck. But it is a lot more likely that if you simply do these four things you will find luck chasing you down. And you can change your name to Zeus.

The Dynamics of Walking through Crowds 3

Exiting elevators is an interesting experience for the dynamics of crowds. As weird as it may seem I just ride in elevators. Up then down, especially when it is busy because that is when the most crowd watching can happen.

You can find out who the polite people are and who the uninterested are. I still find a lot of chivalry within elevator etiquette. Men will still put their hand in front of the door so women and children can enter or exit. All will move around to make room for more if possible and someone will ALWAYS push the floor button when asked by someone buried in the crowd.

The Venetian Hotel and Casino is the world’s largest hotel/entertainment complex. It has over 8000 rooms which are all suites, millions of square feet in conventions space, more than twenty restaurants, a shopping mall, 5 major theaters for shows, a dozen small ones, and hundreds of thousands of square feet dedicated to slot machines. The problem is that it was built in three separate sections and is extremely confusing if you don’t know where you are going. Who would guess that the canal with gondola rides is ABOVE the casino or that they swimming pool is on the 10th floor and the main entrance is on the 3rd floor from the parking ramp. All this makes for great crowd watching.

I stand in the back of the elevator listening to some Phantom of the Opera music playing when people enter the elevator and see that the 3rd floor is pushed and I listen as they debate whether they need to go to the 1st or not to get to the casino. The push the 1st just in case. The doors open on the 3rd but it just looks like another parking floor. They ignore the signs that say “Hotel and Casino” with an arrow pointing the way and go down to the 1st floor and find another parking garage. Frustrated now they exit and disappear and I don’t know if they ever find what they are looking for.

OR: I stand in the back of a FULL elevator and wait. The 3rd floor opens up to the crowd and those in front exit, take a quick look right at the parking ramp and immediately turn left and the crowd follows them to the left as they exit the elevator. I follow too until they reach the dead end with more elevators. They all turn around en masse and look like lost sheep without a shepherd. The signs are everywhere pointing them to the hotel/casino but they just don’t trust them because they lead to the parking ramp. One adventurous couple will walk out of the elevator hallway and see a carpeted entrance and head up the ramp to the entrance. Soon the rest follow after they see the adventurous ones don’t come back. The crowd moves again.

I look at the signs again and wonder how they could be any clearer than they are. Crowds are crowds and they will blindly follow the one in front of them even though it ends in a dead end. You probably see where I am going here don’t you? I want to know if you just follow the crowds or if you actually pause and read the signs?

As the elevator door opens to this New Year and everything in front of you is new again I want to challenge you to read the signs and not just follow the crowd. I want to challenge you to be different and to make a difference. BE THE ONE people will watch to see if it works instead of being the one of many. Step out, step apart, step forward and make a difference.

The Dynamics of Walking through Crowds 2

I pull off into a dead corner and watch the people streaming through each other. The personalities come through in this seemingly simple, but complicated interaction.

I see some people who are VERY aware of everything going on around them. They are VERY careful to keep to the far right side of the slow lane and never venture into the middle of the road for fear of having to touch or, God forbid, interact with these strangers. They are shy, self-conscious, and usually have a thinly veiled fear which I can see without even seeing their face. The mix with the older and frailer with a fear that is totally different.

In the middle of the stream, sometimes fighting oncoming traffic I see totally different temperaments. Some are fearless only to prove they are fearless to cover up their fear. They are the Bangers who will not care about pushing their way through the crown. They are dressed differently but are really the same. Some are dressed in baggy clothes and sideways hats clinging to a belt loop and walking wide to keep only a planned view of boxer shorts in view. The same people are in extremely tight shirts and pants which closely resemble another skin to show their bulging muscles and tattoos. There are female versions of these two but more often I see the prowling female in Las Vegas. You can tell a lot about women just by the way she turns when she makes her way through a crowd. Will she turn away and protect herself as she brushes by you or turn and face you daring you to excuse yourself by her. Sometimes I even get a wink from “ladies” I am forced to get too close to. As I watched I saw a man turn around and pursue a wink but I never saw if he caught up with her or not.

The rest of us flow with the crowd, not faster, not slower, just with it. Calmly, patiently getting to where we are going with a pocket full of “excuse me” and “sorry” ready to doll out.

While in that corner I experience an anomaly: the traffic clears. As if a stop light clicked on around the corner the hall becomes empty. One at a time people come through and they seem lost. They don’t know how to relate without the crowd. The fearful stand more upright and confident as they make their way. The Bangers slow down because they have no competitors to be faster than. The “ladies” cover up and seem to shrink. And the normal people, well, we simply straighten out the corners and make it a little faster than normal.

I come away from this experience realizing that we NEED each other. Even those defiant and ornery would have no one to be defiant and ornery to, if not for the rest of us. Our trip through the mall hallway is a microcosm of our lives and interactions with each other. We need each other to survive and to move forward in life.

The Dynamics of Walking through Crowds 1

It is the holiday season and I find myself walking through a lot of crowds. My mind makes the move into the express lane as I begin to notice the flow of people and crowd MOVEMENT dynamics.

Most of the time you don’t notice the dynamics unless something happens to interrupt the flow: like chatters to stop the flow and gather in a lane blocking circle to look into a store window; like the young or the elderly who cannot keep up with the flow and feel the fear of bodies passing them on all sides; like some daring thrill-seeker who attempts to work his way against the flow; or, like the occasional face to face with someone coming in the opposite direction where you mirror each other when you sidestep until one of you finally stops and the other makes their way around you.

Most of the time it is simply amazing to me that we actually MISS each other in all the hustle and bustle of people. Without even consciously thinking about it we can weave our way through a crowd without touching a person, while talking on a cell phone or with a friend next to you, making your way around the slow ones, avoiding the oncoming ones, and kicking it into gear to make a corner on the inside.

I have been observing this walking through crowd dynamics for a while now and I think I am ready for my Master’s Thesis on the personalities involved. Let me give you a few and next time you are in the crowd see if you can pick them out.

The Floater. The Floater floats through the crowd seeming to flit from one small gap to another just in time to push ahead before that gap closes. They seem to be unimpeded by the number of people. You try to follow them but you seem to reach the gap in people just as it closes behind them.

The Brute. The Brute is usually a guy but I have seen female brutes as well. This is the person who makes it through crowds by simple, brute force. Instead of floating through open gaps like the Floater, the Brute busts through small gaps making them wider by shoulder banging the people on each side of it. Rarely do you hear an “excuse me” even though you and he might make eye contact and you end up rubbing your shoulder.

The Gabber. The Gabber gabs. Usually a group of three or more friends who spend their time talking, laughing and looking. Often the Gabbers stop at a store window oblivious to the crowd around them. Or they may simply stop in the middle of the expressway, forcing all the traffic around them as they laugh and gab. Sometimes a Gabber can be a single person who may be on a cell phone that needs to make an important point to the person at the other end of the call and so needs to stop walking and make powerful expressions with the free hand.

The Clueless. The Clueless crowd walkers are the ones who gum up the works by simply disobeying the rules of the road. The rules are similar to driving rules. You MUST walk on the right side of the hallway or mallway. The faster walkers MUST pass closer to the middle but MUST NOT venture into oncoming traffic. If you stop you MUST get out of the way of both oncoming traffic and same lane traffic by going into a store entryway or a dead corner. The Clueless will stop and any time, will drive through oncoming traffic, will pass on the wrong side, or go slow on the wrong side. The Clueless just don’t follow the rules and believe they have no responsibility for the flow of the crowd.

There are more, like the Brood: the mom with kids trying to stick close, speeding up and slowing down depending on the temperament of kids and parents. The Entourage: with one leader and others hanging on his or her every word and comment and struggling to be the one closest to the leader. The Accessorized: Usually women with handbags like suitcases that can take out a whole row of the passing crowd or perfume that causes crowds to push AWAY from her. And many more.

Then there are the rest of us. Sometimes I experiment by being the Brute or the Clueless and just do things wrong to stir of the mix of the dynamic. Most often I walk amazed that things actually happen, that people actually move and that we don’t stand like sheep wondering why we don’t get anywhere. I think that might be part of what it means to be made in God’s image, that built-into-us-ness of progressing through crowds.

Despair.com

Achievement: We acquire strength in what we overcome.

Challenge: The greater the difficulty the more glory in surmounting it.

One of the things that drove me crazy at work was those corny motivational statements plastered all over the break room walls at the factory or office. You know the ones with the great pictures and the inspirational statements below them, meant to get you into a positive attitude about your work. If I was still in the corporate world I would go to this website I’ve found and substitute a few of the corny ones for these from Despair.com.

Cluelessness: There are no stupid questions, but there are a LOT of inquisitive idiots.

Consulting: If you’re not part of the solution, there’s good money to be made in prolonging the problem.

Effort: Hard work never killed anybody, but it is illegal in some places.

Laziness: Success is a journey not a destinations, so stop running.

Tradition: Just because you’ve always done it that way doesn’t mean that it’s not incredibly stupid.

Sanity: Minds are like parachutes. Just because you’ve lost yours doesn’t mean you can borrow mine.

The TV show Office and the cartoon Dilbert are full of Despair.com quotes and that is what makes them so appealing. It is the anti-motivational message that resonates with people, not the motivational ones. The majority of people relate to failure, while only a few relate to success and a manager standing in front of a cadre of employees spouting clichés becomes the opposite of motivation. At best they become the butt of jokes and youtube videos.

Motivation doesn’t come from outside sources. At best they are reminders of what we have inside but the switch is not going to come from a frequency of posters and clichés. Motivation, the opposite of despair, comes from considering yourself in a constant state of indebtedness. Most people don’t do that. Most people believe the world OWES THEM and doesn’t believe they OWE anything to the world or their God. Second, motivation comes from family. A supportive nurturing family breeds motivated people. And finally, motivation is a decision, not a feeling. Just because you don’t FEEL motivated doesn’t mean you can’t be. DECIDE to be motivated for whatever task you have and you will be motivated.

Motivation: Giving thanks for all, feeling family vibes, and choosing it.

Thanksgiving

A peasant may believe as much
As a great clerk, and reach the highest stature.
Thus dost thou make proud knowledge bend and crouch
While grace fills up uneven nature.

This poem, part of a larger work, called Faith by George Herbert struck me this Thanksgiving season.

I met a man who was “homeless” and looked it. His clothes were clean but still the smell of homelessness was around his unkempt hair and scraggly beard. He had the nose of an alcoholic and his weathered hands wrapped around a cup of coffee as if it would keep his whole frail body warm. We sat across each other in a charity dining hall, I was there to serve and he was there to be served and we filled our rolls quietly.

The din of a hundred homeless having lunch and conversation filled the hall as I removed his plate for him and threw it away. I came back with the coffee pot and offered it to him. His hands opened like saloon doors to allow me to fill his cup again.

“Is there anything else I can get for you?” I asked as I withdrew the coffee pot.

His simple response set me back on my heals, “Grace” was all he said and he took another sip. I searched his eyes over the brim of his cup and saw both a tear and a smile.

Grace is an amazing thing. It is something we all need, from the greatest clerk or judge, to the lowest peasant; homeless and smelly. It is something given to all in equal measure to all of us. It doesn’t matter who you are, what you do, where you are or where you do it; grace is there.

Are you thankful that grace doesn’t depend on your station in life?

Are you thankful that grace doesn’t depend on how much money you have or how popular you are?

Are you thankful that grace doesn’t depend on how good (or bad) you are?
Are you thankful that “grace fills up uneven nature”?

Our Own Sunglasses

Now that the election is over and all the political ads are finally done running and ruining my TV viewing we can take a moment to pull back and look at what just happened. Or can we?

I have had multiple (at least 10) different conversations with people from BOTH sides of the aisle on what just happened and I am finding an interesting phenomenon. I find that people still have their sunglasses on. People can look at the exact SAME event and come out of it with two completely DIFFERENT ways to describe the SAME reality.

It is normal, natural and a part of our human nature. The only thing that is not allowed is the sunglasses that say “I don’t have sunglasses on. I see reality as it really is!” The people who don’t recognize that they are wearing sunglasses that tints reality in one direction or another are the ones that are dangerous.

Remember those cool lenses that came in cereal boxes in the 70’s that were red. You would eagerly dig through the cereal box to find the little package and then use it to read secret messages on the outside of the box. The red lens changed the message and allowed you to read a different colored text beneath. That is us, only we all have different colors reading the same message but it appears differently to us all.

Your sunglasses are your worldview. It is how you look at the world. It is your perspective, you bent on life. Your sunglasses are inherited in part. Your sunglasses are learned in part. Your sunglasses are shaped by your choices in life. Your sunglasses are sometimes beaten into you by abuses in life.

Even the myth of unbiased news reporting is just that: a myth. The best you can hope for in news is the opposite: put BOTH perspectives next to each other and let them present their colored views as best they can according to their sunglasses and let YOU decide who has the glasses with the closest color to yours. Once you realize that everything you see and hear is tainted in some way you are a step closer to reality.

First, recognize you wear sunglasses. Second, recognize everything you see and hear is from someone who also is wearing sunglasses. Third, recognize reality is somewhere in the middle of all that and there is no way we will find it on this side of eternity. Because now we see but a poor reflection, then we will see reality face to face. I have said this before but it is worth repeating: there will be three surprises in heaven. The first surprise is who is there that we NEVER THOUGHT WOULD BE. The second surprise is those who are NOT THERE that we thought would be. The third surprise is that WE ARE THERE AT ALL! What are your sunglasses telling you?

The Loss of the Common

I was into one of my magazines, actually an Archeology magazine when I came across something unexpected. A Christian Pickup Line.

This is not something that you would normally find in a magazine on Archeology so it came out of the blue. The discussion was on the ancient city of Jericho and how much of an impact the story of Jericho has on our everyday life. Here’s the line, but you have to understand the biblical story of Jericho: “How many times do I have to walk around you to get your walls to fall down?”

So that got me thinking about what other pickup lines there may be out there, here are a few I found:

“I just don’t feel called to celibacy”
“What do you think Paul meant when he said to greet everyone with a holy kiss?”
“You know, I am really into relationship evangelism!”
“That halo matches your eyes!”
“Before tonight, I never believed in predestination!”
“Did it hurt when you fell from heaven?”
“The Bible says to give water to those who are thirsty and to feed the hungry, so how about dinner?”
“Is it a sin that you stole my heart?”
“Excuse me, is this pew taken?”
“Excuse me, but I believe one of your ribs belongs to me.”
“Oh, you’re cold? Maybe we should read Ecc. 4:11?”

There are even Christian break-up lines:

“I’m sorry; it just isn’t God’s will.”
“God loves me and must have a better plan for my life.”
“I think we should just be prayer partners.”
“I do love you, but it’s just agape now.”

Ouch! And more OUCH! Chances are, more than half of you who read this don’t get it. There is probably only a third of you who get most of them. And maybe only a quarter of you who know what predestination is in the biblical sense. For those of you who get these, how about you try to follow the Physicist’s pickup lines:

“You’re more special than relativity.”
“Heisenberg was wrong. I’m certain about what you’re doing tonight.”
“My last boyfriend wasn’t very stable. He spontaneously decayed last week and left me for a neutrino.”
“I’m attracted to you like the earth to the sun. With a large force inversely proportional to the distance squared.”

Wha? While we may understand the surface humor of it and maybe even laugh, but how many of us really know Heisenberg’s uncertainty principal? Or even what a neutrino is? Or why one of your ribs would belong to me? Or what Ecc. 4:11 says? Or what agape is? Or how the walls of Jericho came down?

What we lack is a common connection that comes from a common history but today, common connections are becoming very uncommon. While we may understand the words we cannot understand the context or meaning behind them. While the world is becoming flatter, it is sacrificing its depth in the process. We are losing the “common” in our history and while I can now talk to one thousand of you reading this many of you won’t get the joke – or the message.

Why I Write

When I was in High School as a freshman I would look at our school paper and the first thing I would read was the column by this ultra-wise senior who was also a basketball player. Talk about a trifecta: wise, senior, basketball. When I became a sophomore I began to think that I could do the same thing, they had no columnist for the Echo (name of our school paper) but I didn’t believe I was quite ready yet. By my Junior year I was on the Echo staff and learn to develop photographs (yes, this was still when we used dark rooms and had to actually “lay out” a newspaper since computers were not yet involved.) Then I submitted my first column. I don’t remember what I wrote about, but it was good enough for the Teacher/Sponsor of the Echo to give me a regular column. So when my first two knee surgeries took me out of any basketball playing I had to rely on my writing to attract the opposite sex. By the end of my senior year I felt I was a seasoned columnist. I wrote because I thought it was cool.

In my college years and in my years in business my writing languished. I had things to say but no format in which to say them. Then came computers: God’s gift to budding writers. I started writing my first book of fiction in the late 1980s and it took about 5 years to complete. It was on 5 1/2 inch floppy drives and was about 220 pages. Only a few have ever read it, it was never published, not even attempted to be published, and I don’t quite know where my copy is right now. I wrote it mainly to see if I could, kind of like climbing Mt. Everest.

Then I became pastor of a church and out of the business world. I was asked to write a Bible Study for Teens and when it was published I had the bug again. (It’s called Workout! And you can pick it up at discount tables or Amazon’s used books for less than a buck). I also started writing a column again in our church’s bulletin/newsletter. Because I was the pastor they let me. Being forced to write a column every week created a hunger in me. First: a hunger for something to write about since you run out of ideas pretty quick, seriously, try it sometime. Second: a hunger for reading things, anything and everything. Third: a hunger for memory helps, since I had the greatest idea for a column that would have changed the world but I forgot what it was – I didn’t write it down fast enough.

Today I write for two reasons. I write because I believe I have a gift of taking something complicated and through stories and weird connections I can make it simple and easy to understand. And I write because it helps me to focus my thoughts clearly and precisely. So here is my advice to you:
- READ, anything and everything. Listen to Books, Lectures, Classes on CD. Magazines, Blogs, and Websites. This will make you a broad, well-rounded, and interesting individual, the life of parties.
- WRITE, anything and everything. Your own column, blog, a journal, or even start your own book. This will force you to focus that broad knowledge you picked up from your reading and give you a conviction in what you believe.
Read to build knowledge and it will make you interesting. Write to build focus and it will make you firm in your convictions and beliefs.

The Weak and the Strong

Who controls relationships? Is it the strong, type A personalities? Is it the older one? Is it the one who has the title? Who controls relationships? I find that it is the weaker person who often controls the relationships. This is counter-intuitive but hear me out on this one.

Isn’t it the weaker that becomes mad and throws a tantrum to get his/her way?

Isn’t it the weaker that becomes upset and pouts to get his/her way?

Isn’t it the weaker that becomes passive aggressive by underhanded yet quiet aggressiveness?

Isn’t it the stronger that calms and speaks of peace?

Isn’t it the stronger that seeks to find out what is wrong and initiates discussion?

Isn’t it the stronger that puts up with underhandedness with an understanding smile of forgiveness?

I find the stronger “giving in” to the weaker because the end isn’t important enough to use any means; because the battle will cause more pain than the wrong outcome. The weak seeks to control by threatening and tearing down while the strong seeks to GIVE by patching, watching over, taking care of, and forgiving.

Ghandi said, “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.”

The weak make the mistake to think that forgiving is like a gift that we can bestow on those who have hurt us. “Here, take this!” we say as we hand them our forgiveness. But that is the wrong view of forgiveness, or better: that is a WEAK view of forgiveness.

Martin Luther King Jr. said it best: “Forgiveness is not an occasional act. It is a permanent attitude.”

Considering forgiveness a permanent attitude can only be mastered by the strong. Living forgiveness is a barbell attempted only by the brave. The weak control by tantrums, pouts, and the inability to LIFT forgiveness and LIVE forgiven.

How strong are you?

Sphenopalatineganglioneuralgia

We had finally gotten to Clearwater, Florida after more than a day in our station wagon. The ride had given us a crazy sense of cabin fever cornered with nine people and their luggage in a small space. Car games gave way to bickering hundreds of miles before we arrived so one of the first things we did was stop at a local 7-11 that was close to my grandparent’s Florida home. I ran into the door and filled the biggest cup I could find (there were no Big Gulp’s at the time) and the thickest straw and proceeded to suck down a Watermelon Slurpee. All that cramped up feelings disappeared as fast as the red beverage. My brothers and I forgot our arguing and fights and considered which baseball cards to buy and who would pay for which.

Soon another problem emerged, usually as we made the last slurping sounds with our straws trying to vacuum up the final drops. THEN it hit us all: sphenopalatineganglioneuralgia! Better known as “brain freeze!” The painful headache that comes from something cold spending time on the palate (top part) or your mouth, freezing your nerve endings there and sending painful messages to your brain. Too much, too quick of a good thing causing pain.

Hmm. Do you see an application here? How about:

Gastroesophoganglioneuralgia: Shoving too much good food down your throat cause pain, obesity, diabetes, etc.

UNgastroesophoganglioneuralgia: Causing yourself to NOT eat.

Fearofneighborknockganglioneuralgia: A good neighbor coming over EVERY day, just to talk.

Lotterywinnerganglioneuralgia: Getting A LOT of money too quickly and losing it all in a year which is closely related to:

Spoiledbratganglioneuralgia: Getting everything you want, whenever you want.

Anything good that comes too quickly is not necessarily a good thing. As much as we would all like to be rich and have a lot of money. Most lottery winners will only tell of the pain and heartbreak it caused. We all know what those annoying but cute spoiled brats turn into: Senators! (that was a joke, by the way, okay, maybe not so much).

The corollary to this rule of thumb is that when things are worked at and built up slowly they will last longer and will give you more enjoyment. So ask yourself: Am I sucking at life so hard that I am getting sphenopalatineganglioneuralgia? Or am I building my loves, my life and my self slowly and steadily over time and avoiding the brain freeze?

Signs of the Apocalypse

At the movie theater Frankie and I got our popcorn and drinks and the total came to $12.75. I didn’t have a ten so I gave the young lady a $20 and three ones. She looked at me with a confused expression and then handed back the three ones. I said I didn’t want all the change and handed the money back to her. Again, confused she took the money, rang it into the register, the drawer opened and she handed me the three ones back with a quarter. “I gave your $23” I reminded her, “so I should get back $10.25.” And I gave her back the three ones. She took them, put them in the drawer, stared at the various bills in the drawer, and then counted out ten ones for me and handed the stack to me. It was no longer worth the effort I put the huge wad of bills in my pocket and left with my popcorn.

These are from the internet and anonymous:

I walked into MacDonald’s with a buy-one-get-one free coupon for a breakfast sandwich. I handed it to the girl and she looked over at a sign that also said “buy-one-get-one for free”. She said to me that they were already buy-one-get-one free. I was about to put the coupon away when she took and said, “I guess they are both free then.” She gave me the two without charging me.

One day I was walking on the beach with some friends when one of them shouted. “Look at the dead bird!” Someone near us looked up at the sky and said, “Where?”

While looking at a house, my brother asked the real estate agent which direction was north because, he explained, he did not want the sun waking him up every morning. She asked, “Does the sun rise in the north?” When my brother explained that, the sun rises in the east, and has for some time now. She shook her head and said, “Oh, I don’t keep track of that stuff.”

I worked at a technical support for a 24/7 call center. One day I got a call from an individual who asked what hours the call center was open. I told him 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. He responded, “Is that Eastern or Pacific time?”

My sister has a lifesaving tool in her car designed to cut through a seat belt if she is trapped. She keeps it in the trunk.

My friends and I were on a soda run and noticed that the cased were discounted 10%. Since it was a big party, we bought two cases. The cashier multiplied 2 times 10% and gave us a 20% discount.

I could not find my luggage at the airport baggage area, so I went to the lost luggage office and told the woman that my bags never showed up. She smiled and told me not to worry because she was a trained professional and I was in good hands. “Now” she asked me, “has your plane arrived yet?”

Words can be worth a Thousand Pictures

I read some amazing words today in Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s final address to the cadets ad West Point in 1962. The words themselves actually took my mind into battle with the sounds, smells and feelings of wars long past. The passage is too lengthy to put here but a simple internet search will bring you to those same words.

Pictures and graphics can do much to move you to action, explain situations, and even build memories. But there is something special about words put together in such a way that they take you, in your mind, to places never been. I have never been moved to tears by a picture or a good graphic but I have repeatedly been moved by a letter from a loved one, a song with words that make my heart sing, or a book that tugs on your emotions like a child wanting to play. I enjoy writing and I enjoy going places in my words, they work for me and I hope they resonate with you.

I could say that when I was young I used to play in our back yard. Or I could say:

My childhood on the farm is now filled with memories of the earth. The earth made up of the smell of fresh-cut grass as I rolled and rolled down a small hill in our backyard. I would get up dizzy and ready to do it again with our collie Princess running after me trying to figure out if I was hurt or playing. The earth made up of mudpies my sisters and I would construct in an old chicken-house turned bakery. Earth and water were the only ingredients but taste was only limited by our imaginations as we explained to the gas man who came on the yard that it was a chocolate chip cookie not a simple chocolate cookie as he thought. The earth made up the smell of freshly plow-turned furrows which would exactly fit my (full sized) GI Joe Army Jeep as it raced down the road until ambushed by the waiting enemy. Clods of dirt made realistic, exploding bombs as my hero fought unbelievable odds to eventual victory every hour of play. The earth made up of trees where I dared the impossible climb. Sometimes egged on by my brothers but mostly just to see what was up there. My first remembrance of fear was falling to the earth from a precarious limb and having the breath knocked out of me. The fear didn’t come from the fall as much as it came from the frantic gasps to get air into my lungs. Seconds felt like hours as I lay on my back in the grass wondering if I was going to die. Finally my body found the switch to activate the inhale almost like turning on a bank of breaker switches until you finally found the right one. The earth holds these memories for me and when I look at climbing trees, smell freshly turned dirt, get my hands muddy, or sit on a hillside the earth releases them back into my heart like hugging an old friend.

Words can be worth a thousand pictures.