When will I listen to me
At the end of last month I did a post that I tried to bury under a much longer post about my dad. It was dealing with my frustration about my recent change in appearance and how I felt like I was disappearing. I wanted to bury it because I just wrote it and posted it to get it out of my head---but it sounded kind of like a pity party and so I hoped no one would find it.
However, you guys found it, and not only did you find it, and I got more responses to that post than I every have before. And I thank you for that. You're words of encouragement were heartfelt and gracious, and did much to help my anxiety.
I did exchange a couple of emails with the wonderful Deb, and I thought I should share a portion of what I told her to kind of fill in the picture. After she got more details than were in that quick post, she said things started to make more sense. So I started to think, that's only fair then to put things in context for everyone. Here's what I wrote:
"This year has been so strange. I feel like there is a cosmic plan to strip me of every preconception of myself, so that I can be built up again new and different. Sort of like basic training. I keep thinking that the demolition is done and start getting all prepared for the renovation and then something new comes along and says "oh, no. not quite yet. still have some more scraping to do. This won't hurt a bit." But, of course, it always does. I guess that little post was just an articulated grimace of sorts. But be assured. I keep plodding on, confident that the new day will bring more exciting adventure. My addiction to novelty comes in handy here---it keeps me thinking that tomorrow will always be worth the wait. And reminds me that there was a lot of cool stuff in today too."
That all still holds true. From the keeping on by placing one foot in front of the other, to the reformation that my psyche is going through. Over the last couple weeks it's taken a new turn.
I have recently had a discussion with my wife where I came to understand that in much of the way I've been piloting our family ship, things that are important to my wife get taken care of on sort of a 2nd tier basis. As time permits. If we can afford it after everything else is taken care of.
I understand the things she desires and I endeavor to take care of them. But the things that come first will involve me, the kids, the family as a whole. Rarely a special moment for the mom. I have always preached to my kids that love is not a noun, it's a verb. That it's not a feeling, it's a decision---one that is most vividly expressed when it requires sacrifice. But I'm understanding more and more that I may be preaching mostly in words, and I do understand that in most cases, preaching with words should be a last resort. Like the Francis of Assisi quote, "preach the good new---use words if necessary." Action is a most dynamic catalyst. And in that, I'm beginning to see I've been lacking.
So I made a promise. We have recently started a project for my wife replacing our chain link fence with a natural wood finish, gothic top picket fence. And my daughter's Sweet 16th Birthday is coming up on us, which my wife has also taken deeply to heart and would like to make a special event for her, our only girl. When these two things intersect, the mandate is clear. I could see how I could demonstrate to my wife that things that are important to her are important to me, and important in general. So I made a promise. A promise that I would put the priority of that fence on the top of my list, all other things that might could happen that weren't emergencies would be put aside for the time being. This, so I could pursue that task with a passion I might put on things that were important to me first.
And it seems that as soon as that promise was made, that the heavens decided that this was far too significant to be merely a promise. It would become a pledge---and a pledge only becomes golden when it is tested. So this is to be my test.
On the first weekend after I decided this was to be my course, I would be working alone to add the pickets to fence posts my father and I had already put into place a few weeks before. It had rained for several weekends in a row in the meantime, preventing any progress. It was crazy. It was as if the rain had looked at my schedule, found any free time, and decided to show up there. So, long last, it was looking like I was going to be able to get to the fence.
Then the first bomb dropped. My brother called from his home, three hours to the west, and told me of the wonder news. His inlaws had won a pair of tickets to the Husker football game this weekend. He also had their two regular season tickets that they were letting him buy from them for this weekend's game, and now he was inviting me along and allowing me to bring guests!
You may be asking yourself, what the heck is a Husker? It's a term of affection, short for Cornhuskers, which is what the Nebraska University sports teams are called after. Like Hoosier, or Yankee or Broncos. And what is a cornhusker that they may be called after that, you ask? It's a person who harvests corn and peels the husk off it--and since so much of the state revolves around corn, it's what stuck. Writing this right now, it's kind of stupid sounding seeing it explained out of context like this. But then, what the heck is a Hoosier? And for that matter, how weird is the word blog? Say blog 10 times fast and it starts to sound like you're gagging.
But this is a big deal in Nebraska. Our state University football team holds the NCAA record for the most consecutive sold out games ever. They've been sold out since November 3, of 1962. On home games, the Memorial Stadium in Lincoln becomes the third largest city in the state. They've won 42 conference titles and 5 National Championships---the most recent 3 being 1994, 1995 and 1997. Prime years in my fandom. The coach that took us to those titles retired from football and was promptly elected to congress where he is currently representing Nebraska still. The new coach's previous job was with the Oakland Raiders where he took them to the Superbowl. This is a big deal in our state.
And since tickets haven't been available since 1962, when some one says "I've got tickets, you want to go?"--you go! I've only been once, when I was 11 and my uncle called from out of the blue on a Saturday afternoon. I was home alone not knowing what I was going to do for the day besides getting a haircut, and feeling a little bored. And the next thing I knew I was whisked away, finding myself walking out of the tunnel into the stands at Lincoln like when Dorothy opens the door to see OZ for the first time. The colors were so vivid---the green of the turf, the red and white of the crowd. It made everything that had gone before seem to have been in black and white.
But I had made a promise. I can't say that I was completely graceful about the whole thing, but stuck to it. I didn't go. My wife, not being a football person, needed a metaphor to understand. I told her that it was like some one coming and telling her that the Odd Couple with Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick was in town and here are free tickets. She said if it was those two in town in The Producers, she'd go. But I had made a promise, so I didn't go.
But I did make sure Robo got to go with grandma and his uncle. I found out at his most recent Parent/Teacher conference that he wrote about that Saturday for an English assignment titled, "If I could live any day over again it would be. . .".
The second bomb dropped like a payload off the Enola Gay. I knew that it would be coming, but I didn't know when. They never really talk about it. Not until right before it's ready to happen. I have no idea why they can't give people a little planning time, but it's not their practice. So that Thursday as I was looking around online, I see the article on a national news site. I found out on the internet about this event happening locally. But that's par for the course.
The Apple store was opening.
THE APPLE STORE WAS OPENING!!! What kind of a cruel, sick joke is that? I have been following sites that track Apple store openings for more than three years. I found out about one coming to Omaha last November and have been tracking hints of progress across the internet ever since. And still I am taken off guard. And I can't go. I CAN'T GO! And I didn't. I made a promise, and a promise is a promise, even if you have knitting needles stabbing you in the stomach.
The crazy thing is, I still haven't been there and it's been open going on two weeks. With both the wife and the daughter in rehearsal every night, I am being responsible dad getting home as soon as I can so I can be with the boys while they go off to rehearse. No one really understands my pain with this store. Maybe this is part of the healing ---to help me let go of this sickness. A little.
And the final blow. We found out this last week that we have to have the 80+ year old sewage line in our house replaced to the tune of about 5K. And what can you do. You don't argue with sewage. There's no winning that argument. You just do what has to be done. Hello bank loan.
So here I stand. Not sure if I've started the building up yet, or if I'm still being stripped down.
I know that the glass is half full. But sometime the half full part looks at the half empty part and asks me, "Are you ok with that? You're really just going to let that sit there like that? That non full part? Really? Don't you think you should do something about it??" It gets me to wondering how capable I am of filling that other half. Even a little bit. The world feels so big, and I feel so small. So it just sits there, mocking me.
What I think I'm finding is that the best way to make the glass fuller is to find a smaller glass. Then if things work out better than you've planned you have a cup runneth over kind of situation. And in the end, the size only matters if you let it. Or when you let those for whom it is a big deal set the agenda. Hope is still the defense against despondency. Even false hope is better than no hope at all.
And if the world thinks it foolish and the dreamer a fool, truth is, between half empty and half full, no one really knows for sure which one is the lie. In the end, to me, even taking the risk that I might be embracing a false hope filled with light seems to more sense and preferable to wrapping your self in a nettle blanket filled with thorns and broken glass in the name of pragmatism.
But personally I feel like the bright, warm place on the carpet seems to be filled with more truth than lie. And like Switchfoot says, the shadow only proves the sunshine.
However, you guys found it, and not only did you find it, and I got more responses to that post than I every have before. And I thank you for that. You're words of encouragement were heartfelt and gracious, and did much to help my anxiety.
I did exchange a couple of emails with the wonderful Deb, and I thought I should share a portion of what I told her to kind of fill in the picture. After she got more details than were in that quick post, she said things started to make more sense. So I started to think, that's only fair then to put things in context for everyone. Here's what I wrote:
"This year has been so strange. I feel like there is a cosmic plan to strip me of every preconception of myself, so that I can be built up again new and different. Sort of like basic training. I keep thinking that the demolition is done and start getting all prepared for the renovation and then something new comes along and says "oh, no. not quite yet. still have some more scraping to do. This won't hurt a bit." But, of course, it always does. I guess that little post was just an articulated grimace of sorts. But be assured. I keep plodding on, confident that the new day will bring more exciting adventure. My addiction to novelty comes in handy here---it keeps me thinking that tomorrow will always be worth the wait. And reminds me that there was a lot of cool stuff in today too."
That all still holds true. From the keeping on by placing one foot in front of the other, to the reformation that my psyche is going through. Over the last couple weeks it's taken a new turn.
I have recently had a discussion with my wife where I came to understand that in much of the way I've been piloting our family ship, things that are important to my wife get taken care of on sort of a 2nd tier basis. As time permits. If we can afford it after everything else is taken care of.
I understand the things she desires and I endeavor to take care of them. But the things that come first will involve me, the kids, the family as a whole. Rarely a special moment for the mom. I have always preached to my kids that love is not a noun, it's a verb. That it's not a feeling, it's a decision---one that is most vividly expressed when it requires sacrifice. But I'm understanding more and more that I may be preaching mostly in words, and I do understand that in most cases, preaching with words should be a last resort. Like the Francis of Assisi quote, "preach the good new---use words if necessary." Action is a most dynamic catalyst. And in that, I'm beginning to see I've been lacking.
So I made a promise. We have recently started a project for my wife replacing our chain link fence with a natural wood finish, gothic top picket fence. And my daughter's Sweet 16th Birthday is coming up on us, which my wife has also taken deeply to heart and would like to make a special event for her, our only girl. When these two things intersect, the mandate is clear. I could see how I could demonstrate to my wife that things that are important to her are important to me, and important in general. So I made a promise. A promise that I would put the priority of that fence on the top of my list, all other things that might could happen that weren't emergencies would be put aside for the time being. This, so I could pursue that task with a passion I might put on things that were important to me first.
And it seems that as soon as that promise was made, that the heavens decided that this was far too significant to be merely a promise. It would become a pledge---and a pledge only becomes golden when it is tested. So this is to be my test.
On the first weekend after I decided this was to be my course, I would be working alone to add the pickets to fence posts my father and I had already put into place a few weeks before. It had rained for several weekends in a row in the meantime, preventing any progress. It was crazy. It was as if the rain had looked at my schedule, found any free time, and decided to show up there. So, long last, it was looking like I was going to be able to get to the fence.
Then the first bomb dropped. My brother called from his home, three hours to the west, and told me of the wonder news. His inlaws had won a pair of tickets to the Husker football game this weekend. He also had their two regular season tickets that they were letting him buy from them for this weekend's game, and now he was inviting me along and allowing me to bring guests!
You may be asking yourself, what the heck is a Husker? It's a term of affection, short for Cornhuskers, which is what the Nebraska University sports teams are called after. Like Hoosier, or Yankee or Broncos. And what is a cornhusker that they may be called after that, you ask? It's a person who harvests corn and peels the husk off it--and since so much of the state revolves around corn, it's what stuck. Writing this right now, it's kind of stupid sounding seeing it explained out of context like this. But then, what the heck is a Hoosier? And for that matter, how weird is the word blog? Say blog 10 times fast and it starts to sound like you're gagging.
But this is a big deal in Nebraska. Our state University football team holds the NCAA record for the most consecutive sold out games ever. They've been sold out since November 3, of 1962. On home games, the Memorial Stadium in Lincoln becomes the third largest city in the state. They've won 42 conference titles and 5 National Championships---the most recent 3 being 1994, 1995 and 1997. Prime years in my fandom. The coach that took us to those titles retired from football and was promptly elected to congress where he is currently representing Nebraska still. The new coach's previous job was with the Oakland Raiders where he took them to the Superbowl. This is a big deal in our state.
And since tickets haven't been available since 1962, when some one says "I've got tickets, you want to go?"--you go! I've only been once, when I was 11 and my uncle called from out of the blue on a Saturday afternoon. I was home alone not knowing what I was going to do for the day besides getting a haircut, and feeling a little bored. And the next thing I knew I was whisked away, finding myself walking out of the tunnel into the stands at Lincoln like when Dorothy opens the door to see OZ for the first time. The colors were so vivid---the green of the turf, the red and white of the crowd. It made everything that had gone before seem to have been in black and white.
But I had made a promise. I can't say that I was completely graceful about the whole thing, but stuck to it. I didn't go. My wife, not being a football person, needed a metaphor to understand. I told her that it was like some one coming and telling her that the Odd Couple with Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick was in town and here are free tickets. She said if it was those two in town in The Producers, she'd go. But I had made a promise, so I didn't go.
But I did make sure Robo got to go with grandma and his uncle. I found out at his most recent Parent/Teacher conference that he wrote about that Saturday for an English assignment titled, "If I could live any day over again it would be. . .".
The second bomb dropped like a payload off the Enola Gay. I knew that it would be coming, but I didn't know when. They never really talk about it. Not until right before it's ready to happen. I have no idea why they can't give people a little planning time, but it's not their practice. So that Thursday as I was looking around online, I see the article on a national news site. I found out on the internet about this event happening locally. But that's par for the course.
The Apple store was opening.
THE APPLE STORE WAS OPENING!!! What kind of a cruel, sick joke is that? I have been following sites that track Apple store openings for more than three years. I found out about one coming to Omaha last November and have been tracking hints of progress across the internet ever since. And still I am taken off guard. And I can't go. I CAN'T GO! And I didn't. I made a promise, and a promise is a promise, even if you have knitting needles stabbing you in the stomach.
The crazy thing is, I still haven't been there and it's been open going on two weeks. With both the wife and the daughter in rehearsal every night, I am being responsible dad getting home as soon as I can so I can be with the boys while they go off to rehearse. No one really understands my pain with this store. Maybe this is part of the healing ---to help me let go of this sickness. A little.
And the final blow. We found out this last week that we have to have the 80+ year old sewage line in our house replaced to the tune of about 5K. And what can you do. You don't argue with sewage. There's no winning that argument. You just do what has to be done. Hello bank loan.
So here I stand. Not sure if I've started the building up yet, or if I'm still being stripped down.
I know that the glass is half full. But sometime the half full part looks at the half empty part and asks me, "Are you ok with that? You're really just going to let that sit there like that? That non full part? Really? Don't you think you should do something about it??" It gets me to wondering how capable I am of filling that other half. Even a little bit. The world feels so big, and I feel so small. So it just sits there, mocking me.
What I think I'm finding is that the best way to make the glass fuller is to find a smaller glass. Then if things work out better than you've planned you have a cup runneth over kind of situation. And in the end, the size only matters if you let it. Or when you let those for whom it is a big deal set the agenda. Hope is still the defense against despondency. Even false hope is better than no hope at all.
And if the world thinks it foolish and the dreamer a fool, truth is, between half empty and half full, no one really knows for sure which one is the lie. In the end, to me, even taking the risk that I might be embracing a false hope filled with light seems to more sense and preferable to wrapping your self in a nettle blanket filled with thorns and broken glass in the name of pragmatism.
But personally I feel like the bright, warm place on the carpet seems to be filled with more truth than lie. And like Switchfoot says, the shadow only proves the sunshine.
posted by Will at 2:31 PM
2 Comments:
. . . thanks for the reminder of the benefits of shadow . . . Life/God put them there for good reason, yeah . . . sending you a hug, and well wishes, and may godspeed you to THE APPLE STORE! :)
I was nearly disappointed..."NO, WILL, YOU CAN'T GO TO THE FOOTBALL GAME--YOU PROMISED!" I should have known you'd 'do the right thing.' :) And as much as you painted the football passion picture...once I saw the words "Apple store," I thought, "Uh-oh..." ;) Don't you hate these 'tests?' I do...it's so hard to see them for what they are in the moment...simple, yet deeply-felt reminders that love is most profound when it's given, rather than gotten. Just my opinion anyway.
Post a Comment
<< Home