Everyday

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Write
Run
Think
Meditate
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Talk
Try!
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Reflect
Forget
Forgive
Hug
Listen
Be Grateful... everyday

Doing It "All"

 My wife had a conversation with my Dr. today regarding his concern that I'm trying to do it all. For almost a year I suffered unknowingly from a dying gall bladder. On top of this I was prescribed Lexapro following the death of my Father.This combination would result in excessive bloating, diarrhea, gas, stomach pain and exhaustion. Lexapro was only responsible for the last one.

Following the removal of my gall bladder on June 6th and being weened off Lexapro and "released" by my psychiatrist,  things have changed. I have strength, energy, digestion regularity and above all, a clearer mind. As I approach forty, I feel I've wasted a lot of time in my life. Whereas I once dreamt of fame and fortune and success I now have a new focus on more important things- primarily, what I can contribute. What I can leave better than how I found it. The legacy I leave for my children.Someday my children will study me, will analyze me, will ask what I did- what I contributed. As a Father. As a Husband. As a Man. I am trying to do it all. I have an incessant feeling of always being far far behind.

Skunks

We live on the edge of the Cathedral Area, Black and Midland. I have to deal with skunks on a daily basis. I wear a headlamp to go outside at night. My dogs collars have to have extra jingle on them so there aren’t any surprises. I use a plastic bb gun to fire into dark corners and bushes- not to harm a skunk but to flush it out. I make sure we have smoke bombs on hand- again to flush them out and we always have a supply of mint mouthwash and bottles of douche at the ready. I and dogs I’ve owned have been skunked many many times and I’ve found this combination to work the best. Mint mouth wash for the body. Douche for the face and eyes. We have a saying that it’s not a matter of “if” the dogs get skunked but “when” the dogs get skunked…

I walk my dogs just about every night with my headlamp on. I constantly rattle the dogs leashes to make noise, making “psst’ing noises”. I probably sound like a one man marching band walking down dark Cathedral Area streets. Knowing how infested our neighborhood is means always being skunk-ready.
Twice in the past couple of weeks I have seen a sign of hope (concern) due to the skunk population- the arrival of urban red foxes. A predator has decided our neighborhood to be a good hunting ground. As I close, I close the office window. A skunk has sprayed in the neighborhood.

Jeremiah 19

At the Willow Creek Summit there was a lecture on Jeremiah 19:10. If I got it right, Jeremiah doubted the impact he could have on non-believers by declaring his love of Christ.

10 Then break the jar while those who go with you are watching, 11 and say to them, 'This is what the LORD Almighty says: I will smash this nation and this city just as this potter's jar is smashed and cannot be repaired. They will bury the dead in Topheth until there is no more room. 

 They then past out pieces of clay from "Jeremiah's Jar" and you were to write on it a promise to yourself. A promise to be better you. A promise to make the world a better place. I held the piece of clay for a good ten minutes as everyone wrote their promises on them. The piece of clay felt like it weighed a thousand pounds as I felt my stomach turn over and my eyes began to tear up. After hearing a speech from Mama Maggie Gobin and her selfless sacrifice for the children living in squalor in Cairo and having the piece of clay in my hand I began to feel... small... worthless. I felt as if I had wasted a lot of time in my life doing irrelevant and unimportant things.

I vowed to stop being afraid, to stop making excuses, to, in the words of Cory Booker, "do sumthin'!"

I wrote,

Become a bright light for children in the dark. Be an upstanding example of hope 

I took all the speeches, lessons, tips, advice and everything else from the leadership conference and decided I needed to do something. Like Dick Anderson, the Director of OrhanNetwork said to me last year in Nicaragua, "Put the serving towel over your arm and serve the children".

Tomorrow I fill out an application for Big Bros./ Big Sisters as well as Teach for America.  

Milwaukee

We're in Milwaukee for our 4th annual Take the Kids to A New City and State Tour. These trips usually involve a hotel with a pool, a Major League Baseball game (if applicable) and a cool eatery found on the Food Network. We went to Louisville, KY in '08, Pensacola, FL in '09 (we didn't attend Minor League games in those cities because their respective teams, the AAA Bats and AA Pelicans were out of town).We did see the Reds at the Cards in St. Louis last year and this afternoon we saw the Pirates at Brewers. The game was lame. The stadium 'aight- it was too stuffy and the fact it was Craig Counsell bobblehead day meant it was packed. I tried to give back one of the 3 bobbleheads we received from the woman who gave it to me at the gate and she seemed shocked. I'm a baseball fan and even I only kind of heard of him. I definitely don't need three of his bobbleheads in the house. I'll take 3 Mark Buerhle bobbleheads but there's no way in hell our chronically late foursome would ever get to the Cell on time for that.

I decided I was going to eat Wisconsony and from the concession stand I ordered a brat, a Polish and a hot dog. I couldn't tell the difference between a brat and a Polish having only had one or two of either of them in my life. I decided whichever was which I didn't want the paler whitish one. However, I also felt bad to have to pass it to Dee so I kept it and gave her the reddish more leathery looking one that I wanted. I gave the hot dog to Jack who couldn't bring himself to bite it because of the black "gross" grill marks on it.

The game was aight as Dee and I agreed we shouldn't have forced the kids to sit in the car for 2.5 hours and expect them to sit in seats at a baseball game. They were too restless. Jack kicking the 32 oz. Diet Pepsi down the seat of the woman in front of us didn't help matters.

Later we swam in the cloudy pool and ordered room service.

Monday was redemption day as we went to the Milwaukee Co. Zoo. We saw all the favorites; lions, tigers (that were actually awake), elephants, penguins.

We all took a camel ride and saw a sea lion show. We even bought a painting on canvas painted by a sea lion named Slick. Nice two days.

8/12

8/12 is the date my wife suggested I start blogging. I've tried for years to keep a written journal. Just about every page is a new entry two or three or six months later than the previous one with the opening line, "Today, I'm really going to start doing this everyday!"... or a some variation of that empty promise. We've attended the Willow Creek Leadership Summit together yesterday and today. We saw and heard some pretty amazing speakers and leaders; Len Schlesinger, Cory Booker, Seth Godin, Michelle Rhee and Mama Maggie Groban among them.

Seth Godin, in his hilarious and great speech, made a point about true innovators never waiting for permission to do something. They just did it. They never stood on the playground waiting for someone to pick them for their team. they picked themselves. That the true innovators and pioneers didn't wait to be guaranteed payment or fame to do what they wanted to do. They did what they were great at because (I'm paraphrasing) they just couldn't help it. He said if you want to sing- sing! YouTube was a great microphone. If you want to write- write! Don't worry about not making money or not being published. As Jim Collins said at last years summit, get on the bus and just go. Don't worry about where you're going.

So today, I'm getting on the blog bus because my wife told me to. Not that she ordered me to but because she knew it would be something I would love to do and it could serve as record for my children of a journey I think began today, at about 10:45a, on 8/12/2011, after I wrote a promise to myself on a piece of broken clay. While I'm not going to profess to having "seen the light" or having been knocked from my horse like Paul, but after hearing Michelle Rhee speak of her courage to stand up for children in a crappy school system and listening to a selfless angelic-like Mama Maggie Grobin describe looking into the faces of children in the slums of Cairo and seeing God- something happened.I started to fall apart and I started to sob. I fought like hell to keep it in and I did. But one thing was painfully clear to me- I had to do... "sumthin"...