Dare to Dream

My son wants a second guinea pig.  Yes, that does imply that our previously mandated pet-free home currently has one……  He’s been saving his money and has reached enough critical mass in that regard that he can see a light at the end of the “waiting tunnel.”  I caught him last night looking through a catalog of “pig” accessories and making a list.  I realized in that moment he was dreaming.

=> Insert tangential story…..

As many know, I own a small business.  The years from my arrival on the Harkraft, Inc. scene (1994) to 2007 were an amazing ride.  Exponential growth, employee bonuses, so much business that we were letting our customers down with our inability to maintain great service levels.  Then…crash.  Without losing one customer our sales went from $6m to $1.2m in 18 months.  I had excruciating conversations with 30 of our 42 employees and in May of 2009, my business partner and I stopped taking any income out of the organization.  I was “fine.”  I knew this was what I had signed up for when I bought in and signed personal guarantees on all major purchases (including a 30,000 s.f. building we now couldn’t afford).  I also knew this would simply be a short-term blip in the Harkraft story.  What I didn’t know was that I was wrong.  I also didn’t know the personal price I would pay.  As I climbed into the “bunker” and entered survival mode, I stopped dreaming.  It took an August 2011 trip to Oregon and 64 acres of land to realize this…and to start the process of remembering how to start again.

Dreaming is something that–my wife tells me–marks my life.  It’s central to who I am.  After watching my son, I believe it’s central to all of us.  I have learned in subsequent conversations with friends that it looks different for everyone–but without it, we are muted.  I tend to dream big (not better, just big).  Crazy things that stretch the limits of my marriage and our finances.  Fittingly, it always starts with a question, “What if we……?”  (e.g. “What if we sold everything and moved to McGregor, MN, home-schooled and I got a job at some local business?”)  After 25 years, Jennifer has come to not just tolerate these dreams, but encourage them.  She calls it “The Pendulum.”  She knows I am swinging wide and knows I will either come back to center–or circumstances will change to meet the swing.  A dear friend asked me to explain how the dreams actually work for me.  My response was enlightening to me as I had never really put it to words.  I realized that I dream in connections.  I envision the connections that will occur between people sitting in a sauna I would want built at the cabin.  I dream of people sitting around an over-sized campfire laughing about the other people getting muddy riding 4-wheelers on 64 acres of land I dream of buying.  I don’t dream of designing or actually building the sauna.  Thankfully, there are people who dream those dreams.

After speaking with quite a few people about this, checking my own heart and watching my son, I’m left with a question.  Is dreaming directly correlated to money?  I’d like to think not.  I was fairly confident that it wasn’t.  But now I’m not positive.  I’m thinking it’s “freedom” in the bigger picture but that seems inexorably tied to money in our time on earth.  Why do we have to ask people the question, “So if you had more money than you could spend, what would you do?” to get them to speak of their dreams?  It seems we’re unable to utter them until we’re invited into a discussion that has no financial boundaries.  It’s like it gives us the freedom to be absurd.  But why do we think our hopes or dreams are absurd–on any level?!

It’s then interesting to note how infrequently the answer is, “Exactly what I’m doing now.”  Motivational speakers have addressed this disparity to death–and I refuse to go there.  But I do still ask myself, “Why not dream it….whether it’s financially feasible or not…..not to create a 5-step plan to achieve it…..just because if feels good to dream?”

The same dear friend speaks of “trades.”  We trade our time for money, our freedom for family, and so on.  If we like our trades, we’re content.  If not, well, that’s a life of unhappiness.  To dream of a bigger/different house yet decide the trade of more hours working isn’t worth it is still a wonderful dream.  It’s the dreaming and awareness of our trades that I’m fighting for.  Dreaming is good.  It’s hopeful.  It’s enlivening.  And it makes for great conversation.  It shows our hearts to those we care about.  I love hearing dreams from simple to “big and hairy.”  Love it.  Dream on.

I’m So Bored!!

Okay, Harrison and Olivia, this one’s for you…..

As I was driving Harrison back from fencing last week, I saw a familiar sight.  We passed a small neighborhood playground and I saw one young (barely walking) child and one parent.  The child was wandering aimlessly through the equipment and the parent was standing and watching.  I was immediately overcome with the intense feeling of boredom I felt during those years.  There, I said it.  Sorry, it’s the truth.

As many of you know, I’m not a huge fan of kids.  I don’t understand them and don’t find great joy in fawning over them.  I didn’t grow up baby sitting, didn’t have younger (or any) siblings.  I’m actually not sure how we decided to have them.  Certainly glad we did and love mine beyond any ability to have previously comprehended.  Still, not sure it was a great idea to set myself up for more failure…….

I have never really been someone capable of boredom.  I’m an only child.  I developed elite skills in this area.  There’s always something one can do to fill time.  Children, though, provided opportunities that took me to new levels.  I am charged with two things in this early season of my children’s’ lives.  (1) show them the love I have for them and (2) keep them alive.  I’m trapped.  Ignoring them doesn’t accomplish either.  Paying moderate attention (making sure they don’t run in the street or eat sand) only accomplishes #2.  Nope, trapped.  I stand around, smile, laugh, walk to the other end of the playground, walk back, stand at the end of the slide, put them back in the diaper-shape swing, take them out again…..bored to tears.

Love you both dearly.  So glad you’re now someone I can talk–and listen–to.  You’re even starting to enjoy doing some things that I enjoy too!  Wouldn’t trade you for the world.  Just want you to know that if you ever find yourself wandering around a playground wishing you were anywhere…ANYWHERE…else, you’re not alone.

Bring Out Your Dead!

For some, the title here will resonate with fond memories of Monty Python’s “Holy Grail.”  For me, the scene illustrates the absurdity of death and the stigma attached to it quite well.  The “dead collector” moves through the city with a wagon and a cow bell shouting, “Bring out yer dead.”  People load bodies onto the wagon and they are carried off.  Absurd and hilarious when one poor fellow being carried out feebly announces, “I’m not dead.”  “I’m feeling better.”  “I don’t want to go on the cart.”

It seems no one wants to go on the cart.  Interestingly not even Christians believing that streets of gold and mansions await.  Many of them live their whole lives focused solely on the day when they “get to go home” — missing all the beauty of this journey.  I often wonder why they don’t kill themselves to get there sooner.  Maybe that’s an “unforgivable sin” and they’ll end up “down there.”  Not worth the risk, I suppose, so they limp along….

In any case, I’m intrigued by the whole idea.  I have no need to make sense of it, I just enjoy wondering.  I’ve experienced a fair amount of death in my life–more than average for my age, but far less than some (4 grandparents, 1 mom, myriad pets, family friends).  Enough to give me a comfort level with it that some might experience as calloused or insensitive.  For me it’s more of a keen awareness that I don’t share the drama that surrounds it like others do.

My grandfather died on Easter Sunday (he had Alzheimer’s and was “dead” many years before).  Dad went in the den to check on him, came out, whispered something to my Mom.  She told my Grandma.  We all went in and said goodbye (to a dead body–how odd).  The coroner came, zipped him up in a bag, wheeled him out and we had dinner.  My grandmother died in the hospital holding my hand.  This is actually fairly impactful.  You can feel the life force leaving someone’s body–odd and beautiful.

My Mom used to call her body a “tent” that she couldn’t wait to be rid of (arthritis, overweight, etc.).  I tend to agree.  We invest so deeply (time, money, pride, esteem–low and high, emotion) in our tents and they clearly have little to do with who we actually are.  Grandma was gone–I’m simply holding hand.  Grandpa was gone years before his tent got the message he had moved out.

As a result, I find it difficult to engage in the drama of death.  We won’t understand it until we experience it yet we universally define it as “tragic”–particularly if it was “before their time.”  What is that?!  When is “my time?”  I’d love to know so if I hit it on the nose or surpass it, we can post it at my funeral and no one needs to feel bad…..  It seems much of the tragedy and drama is wrapped up with those left behind.  We assign meaning to all that was left undone (we wanted more time with them, we had things we would have told them or resolved with them, we determined they had more life to live).  The finality of it brings sorrow–but it doesn’t have to be heavy.

I’m actually a fan of grief–provided it’s grief without regret.  It’s appropriate, it’s healing…it’s necessary for transformation.  Grief with regret is debilitating and can render us hopeless and useless.  It’s the result of not staying “current” with ourselves and those we care for.  As I have said in other posts, staying current is a life pursuit of mine and when it works, my experience of death changes.

My biggest question in all of this is what is death really?  Is it possible that we have made it into something that was never intended?  Is it possible it’s simply a new chapter in our endless story?  We have made death final and tragic.  What if it’s like a close friend moving away–sad, but not tragic….even if we never reconnect.  Maybe even an exciting opportunity for them!

We desperately want to believe that in death we are reunited with spouses, friends, family, pets that have “gone on before us.”  I’m actually not quite sure how that’s going to work.  Does my dad live in his heavenly “mansion” with my mom?  What about when his current wife dies, does she move in with them or does she wait around and hook up with her ex when he dies?  Very confusing.

When I keep asking the questions I reach an end that doesn’t support conventional “wisdom” on how this all works.  What if the next chapter has little–if anything–to do with this one.  Same characters but new story.  What if it’s a beautiful community of people in perfect harmony with their Creator and one another with no “categories” of relationship (i.e. wife, best friend, second best friend, child, etc.)?  What if everyone gets to live in, wear and drive whatever they want (assuming we have bodies) and there’s no status or stigma attached to “things?”  I know lots of people who wouldn’t want a mansion.  Do you think they’d be forced to live in one just because they were super good in their time on earth?  Pretty absurd.

In any case, here’s what I’m left with–sorry if I offend.  We live, we die, we do something unknown after that.  Not tragic, just is.  Make the most of this chapter–whatever that means to us.  There’s no standard on this one (regardless of what the media–or our parents say).  Follow our hearts, love deeply, leave no stone that interests us unturned.  Stay current.  If you die before I do, I’ll be sad–but I’ll move on…as quickly as I can.  If you want something more than that your opinion of yourself is too high and you’re wishing me ill will.  I’ve got more living to do and I’m sure you’ve moved on to other things.  See you in the next chapter….

Heresy!

It’s heresy!  Right?  Anything that challenges, questions or accepts the possibility that God doesn’t fit in an evangelical box that fits on a stage in a church must be condemned and shut down.  I’m a bit lost in it because I still hold some feeling of “responsibility” to speak truth to someone who has “strayed” or “backslidden.”  What is that about?  Is that truth or is that part of the arrogant christian experience.  We’re right and everyone else is wrong–or somewhere in the process of potentially being as spiritually pure as we are.  When I see someone doing or believing something I have determined is “fallen” I have been taught that it’s my job to speak into that and guide them back from the dark side.  Fairly absurd–I think, but I can’t completely rid myself of it.

A ray of hope (in the journey to “love and let love”) is that I am increasingly disgusted by the responses I see to books and movies that ask questions or explore possibilities that God is bigger than we think–or that The Church has failed its people.  What’s the harm in asking?  What’s the harm in allowing possibilities?  Where is this fear rooted?  Why does someone else’s questioning and beliefs have any impact on their/my faith?

My guess (and it’s only a guess–but it’s based on having lived this way previously) is that christian beliefs only have truth (or power) if everyone agrees.  There are roots of pride and arrogance in having the answer (and the Bible to back them up–which no one can argue with….right?) but is seems most strongly based in fear.  “What if there’s actually more truth than the small box that I hold?”  “What if all my work of having everything figured out and categorized was for nothing?”  “What if I will have to live the rest of my life holding contradictions and inconsistencies–yet remain peaceful?”  “What if I’m not strong enough to let someone else believe something different from what I do?”  The result:  shut it down at all cost…..  No questions, no problems.  I hope to move increasingly further from this group of silencers….

Man! That Was One Great Funeral!!

Figured it’d be fun to post on my 42nd birthday about my 40th birthday.  What does that have to do with a funeral?  Well, let’s see…..

I’m an only child of two only children.  For other “onlies” out there, you understand that this means I accompanied my parents to many “adult” events.  My parents were almost a generation older than the rest of my friends’ parents (they had me when they were 37) which doesn’t seem old now, but it made my grandparents pretty old.  By the time I was 15 I had lost all four of them and attended more funerals (they had many friends that died before they did) than I could count.  I remember being struck by how sad and awkward they (funerals) were.  The benefit, I suppose, was that I developed fairly solid skills for navigating sad and awkward situations (hospitals, nursing homes, etc.).  I also developed fairly solid opinions about how I might do things differently (more on that in another post).  I got a chance to do a bit of that at Mom’s funeral.

I turned 40 in 2010 and my wife did an amazing thing.  She worked with a dear friend to set up a blog entitled “Words:  A Blog in Honor of Warren Eck on Occasion of his 40th Birthday.”  I had no idea this was happening and people were invited to post anything they would like to say about me (it all ended up being good stuff, which is pretty cool).  She gave some guiding questions in case people didn’t have a spark but left it wide open.  People posted stories, memories, impacts, thoughts about the future and more.  Jen and I went to the cabin for a brief kid-free birthday weekend and she pulled the leather chair up to the fireplace, set a computer in my lap and said, “Happy Birthday.”  I read for close to an hour and wept as I “heard” the voice of each of those I call dear in my life shower me with love, support and celebration.  I sat humbled…honored…amazed…struck by the possibility that these things they were saying might actually be true.

As it settled in, I realized that I had been given the unique opportunity to attend my own funeral.  Most people have little idea the impact they are having in this world.  Our loved ones hear it through hugs and tears in a funeral home–but we rarely hear it while we’re here to let it in.  To let it comfort, challenge and change us.  I am fortunate to have those Words saved on a hard drive (and I have used them to keep “The Funker” (see “What The Funk) away more than once) and they are really, really nice words. 

What struck me most, though, was that they affirmed none of the things in me or about me that I thought they would.  None of the things I expend energy to create or worry about were listed.  There was nothing about how I look, what I wear, where I live, what I drive, what job I have, who I know or things I have achieved.  Without exception, they spoke of things that are uniquely me (i.e. can’t change or improve them) that touch their hearts and bring some kind of meaning to their lives.  Every….single….post.  Unreal.  I’m such a messed up performance-based junkie that I actually toyed with the idea of trying to amp those things up.  What a joke.  The point, I realized, was that I was liked….for me.  What a birthday present–and what an awesome funeral.

If you’re around me at all, you’ve most likely heard me use the phrase “stay current.”  For me, this means wanting everyone I care about to have a “funeral” like mine.  I don’t ever want to have regrets.  I would hate the thought that someone I love didn’t know how great I thought they were….while they were alive to believe it.  My Mom’s funeral was that for me.  She an I were current.  I knew she adored me and she knew I loved her deeply.  I had sadness, loss, grief over time I wouldn’t get to have again–but no regret of things not done or said.

Thank you to each of you for being current with me and for taking the time to tell me the truth–even when it’s hard.  I live a rich life full of process and transformation as a result.  Bring on the next year!

The Old Guys in the Basement

Well, many have heard me go on about this, but I want it recorded for posterity so here goes…..

Every Tuesday, a bunch of old guys hang out in my basement (12 to be exact).  “Men’s Group”  They’ve been meeting weekly for close to 30 years now and I’ve been watching.  I’ve watched their trajectory and their stability.  Each brings something unique to the group (which can be a unique thing for groups).  One was in sales, another a company CEO, another a small engine mechanic, another a banker and on and on.  Not only do their backgrounds, retirement accounts and “social status” vary but so do their political and spiritual views.  It’s odd (or unique).  The only common thread seems to be Tuesdays, desire for community and the idea that everyone is worth hearing.  What if that’s enough?  It seems to be…..  Their support for one another runs deep. My Dad tears up when he talks about them. They celebrate small (and large) victories, see each other through hard times and, when needed, carry a wife and Mom–in a box–to her final resting place.

As I said, I’ve been watching–and learning.  They–unknowingly–birthed “Guy’s Weekend” (a summer and winter cabin adventure, est. 1988) which has become such an important part of who I am.  Anchored by a core group of truly quality men, we are–I believe–building something similar.  Or maybe it’s been built.  Or maybe it isn’t even something you build….it just is.  In any case, I believe we share the unconditional nature of the “Men’s Group” in our ability to at times look past, but more often embrace, our differences.  I always tell Jen that I get to die first (can’t stand the thought of missing her) but if it doesn’t work out that way, I will be looking to them to bear the pall.

The learning part for me goes beyond creating “Guy’s Weekend.”  It leaves me riddled with questions about the meaning of life–particularly as a male.  If this is the end (sitting in a basement,  talking truth, about what matters most to us, with people who actually care, paying little–if any–attention to things like titles, income, house size, vehicles) why have I been ramping up all these years?  I’m not even saying the process, in itself, is bad.  But my stance toward it definitely has been.  I actually thought it mattered.  More is better.  I’ve been all about “biggerin'” (to quote The Lorax).  I biggered my house.  I biggered my job, I biggered my cars.  Again, nothing inherently wrong with this “phase of our journey” (25-65) except that I let it define me.  I let it determine my worth.  I willingly jumped on the “comparison train” and did my best to keep up.  For what?  So I could sell it all for a loss someday when I’m meeting in a basement on Tuesday nights?

Leaves me with some take-aways that I would love for my kids to own early in life:

1. Leave the judging (and comparing) to the only One qualified.  My Dad always said, “Everyone puts their pants on one leg at a time.” (except Olivia, but that’s probably just a kid thing…..)
2. Buy what you need, heck, buy what you want (there’s much joy and community to be found in some material things) but buy only what you can afford to own….and to lose.
3. Seek first to understand.  The Men’s Group started out of a Catholic Church.  One of the Men has ventured into Eastern Religion.  Now the group is reading “The Mandala of Being” discussing a chapter each month trying to “understand” Ralph.
4. Find community–or make one.  As introverted as I am, I recognize that I am not made to walk alone.
5. Recognize that this is a journey that better have value simply for the climb.  If I’m waiting until I get to the top to be happy, I’ll miss most of the beauty….and I may never get “there” anyway…..
6. Assume positive intent.  In the end, we’re all just trying.  Some are just more careful and less myopic than others.

So thanks elder-folk.  I love the weekly reminder to keep asking the questions.  The basement is yours for as long as you need it.

 

What The Funk?

Nope, not talking about the unrecognizable stuff in the Tupperware in the back of the fridge.  I’m talking about The Funk.  The dark place I go with some regularity–for no apparent reason.  I also call it an “unfounded sense of impending doom.”  I don’t get it.  One day I’m fine, the next I’m lost in the mire of all that I’m not.  In this place, I have an amazing ability to connect otherwise completely unrelated feelings and occurrences, give them global meaning and conclude that I am indeed worthless.

If you’ve never experienced it, you are fortunate–and I would love to speak with you about that.  Clearly you have a resilience and self-image I would like to model.  If you have, you hear me.  It’s odd.  There’s no particular trigger.  I wake up and I suck.  All the things I was good at yesterday are gone.  All my value to those around me is forgotten.  The idea that I am an unconditionally loved child of God, perfectly formed His image is laughable.  Then, just as strangely as it arrived….it’s gone.  No particular catalyst, just a renewed world view.

The Funk is so muting and overshadowing that I can only speak of it when I’m out of it.  In it there’s no objectivity and little–if any–hope.  I have no clarity and no belief that I will again come out of “this one.”  Like each new one is somehow permanent, “finally really true” and I have no memory of waking from the last one.  No one can help either.  I am so adept in that place at writing off truth from others as (1) truth that “may have been true but is no longer” or (2) that it’s coming from people who are ones who have to say that stuff (parents, spouse, etc.)–OR (3) it comes from someone doesn’t really know me.  If they did, they would clearly agree that I suck.

I hate the thought that my children go there (or may some day).  In the same way, I’m sure it breaks God’s heart to see me there.  He (like I) would want his dear little one to remain awake and alive in perfection that I am.  But there’s no getting me out.  It’s dark.  The power’s out.  Nothing to do but wait for daylight.

I’ve found no real solution but distraction helps.  I watch tv.  I listen to music (depending on my selection, this has the potential to make things worse….).  Or, I go to bed (usually the best option).  One interesting distraction I figured out a few years ago was to do something nice for someone in the midst of my dark place.  Some of you may have been the recipient of a “Random Act of Funking Kindness.”  It’s not ingenuine at all–just born of my hope to see some joy in this “night.”  It’s usually in the form of an email (because I rarely want to talk directly with people when I’m in this place).  I’ll pick someone I care about (either at random or if I know they are wrestling with something) and just send them an email telling them how great they are.  Now the secret’s out in case you get one from me…..

I have had Funks last for days and weeks.  It will take on a life of its own and I can find myriad opportunities to add to the “truth of the lies.”  Someone cancels a get together, can’t come to something I’ve planned, takes longer than normal to respond to an email.  Suddenly, “everyone’s figured out how much I suck and it’s only a matter of time until it’s all over–my friendships, my career, etc.”  Then, sun-up and we’re all good.  Absurd!

I figured this might get better with age, experience and maturity.  But no.  Same stuff, different age.  It’s all relative.  So today I’ll soak up the sun.  Don’t tell me if you see the Funker sneaking up behind me.  I’d rather not know…..

Jen – 2…..Warren – 1

So what’s the deal with keeping score?  It seems to infect most marriages and, left un addressed, will facilitate their slow death.  Jen and I have gotten to a fairly decent point with this after 25 years…but it used to suck and still lingers.  The funny–possibly tragic–part is I doubt she even knew she was  playing a game. 

I must have learned it from my parents (and I’m sure the endless sit-coms I watched growing up) and I had it down to a science.  Everything had a certain value attached to it and the point was to keep a zero (even) balance.  I unload the dishwasher and I can avoid some other upcoming unpleasant task.  I go away for the weekend with friends and I owe her “doing the kids” time when I return.  I give her flowers and she should like me more–at least until I say something stupid again…..  As I stated, I doubt this hits Jen’s radar at all.  She might have it on a global scale (see below) but I don’t think she does our relationship that way.  Oddly, even though I don’t do this much at all “against” her any more, it continues to plague me individually.  If she does something nice for me, I feel indebted on some level.

I see this everywhere.  Somewhere deep down we believe there’s a transaction-based stasis that goes in and out of balance based on things we do.  If I do this, that should happen.  I spend a fair amount of my career trying to “bank” good deeds/performance as I would never want to run the risk of being the one who “owes” something to the game.  It runs so deep that it infects every aspect of my life.  If I do good things, I will find favor with God and bad things won’t/shouldn’t happen to me.

The result is resentment (if things remain out of balance) and a complete inability to truly receive a gift.  What a waste!  Because I continue to struggle with this, I assume everyone else is doing it too.  So if I’m given to, I remain confident that they have “logged it in” are waiting for reciprocation–sooner than later.  Stop the madness!

Note to self:

1. Ask for what you need.  Someone shouldn’t simply “know” or “owe you” based on something you have done.
2. Life is not transactional.  Good choices generally result in good outcomes–but it’s not guaranteed and you have no reason to resent it when it doesn’t go your way.
3. Receive a gift as just that, knowing people love to give (like I do) and it takes from them if I don’t accept it unconditionally.
4. Rinse and repeat.

Help Me!

Been thinking about a couple of items that I originally thought were unrelated, but they are beginning to connect.  The common thread could be pride (which I detest–mostly because I see it ever-present in my life–and will speak more of in other posts) or maybe I’ve just thought about them enough that they’ve run together.

Item #1:  I find it so interesting that I am (and see others) drawn to eccentric, eclectic, “out-there” people who say what they think and act how they like without regard for norms or expectations.  I envy them feeling somehow trapped in a box.  The crazy thing is, my Mom was one of those people (she wore the wildest floral blouses, would laugh so loudly it filled a restaurant and would hug just about anyone within reach)–yet I think she built this box and I stepped in.  She taught me how to be “appropriate” in social situations: what to say at weddings and funerals, that you are always better off being over-dressed and–most importantly–what all the extra forks are for at a formal dinner!  I find that I adapt to my surroundings in an attempt to “fit in” or “be appropriate” and people no longer experience me (vivid memories of this from Junior High).  Notes to self sound like, “Don’t say what you think, say what you think they want to hear.”  All the while, the most compelling, energizing, impactful, magnetic people in the room are simply being themselves.  Pretty frustrated that somehow I’ve decided that approach won’t work for me……

Now I should clarify.  I am speaking primarily of situations where I don’t know people well.  Those who are dear to me get the real me–good and bad.  It is still a struggle to be fully me even then–but it’s a good fight and I am committed to it.  I am also committed to not building Harrison and Olivia sized boxes….but I’ve probably already started.

Item #2:  After my Mom had the stroke, we went to “The Caribbean” (a bring-your-own-bottle restaurant we used to frequent with my grandparents).  Jennifer and I arrived early in the Corvette.  Perfect tops-off day.  Dad and Mom show up a bit later in the wheelchair van he had recently purchased.  The Caribbean is (was) a dive.  Great burgers but not a level floor in the place.  Wheelchair access was not a consideration–and I’m sure rarely tested.  The back entrance had a vestibule and entry with doors so close together that they would need to be open at the same time for anything larger than one person to enter.  I walked up just as Dad was struggling and a man came from the inside to help.  Dad said no–kindly, of course–that he could handle it himself.  I watched the look on the man’s face and it clicked.  We love to help.  It fills us, gives us meaning, shows our strength.  Yet, as compelling as it is, we often refuse to allow those around us to feel that.  My Dad was too “proud” (as I often am) to give the gift of “needing.”  I don’t want to inconvenience people–particularly if it’s due to something I have brought on myself.  The same double-standard!  I never feel inconvenienced when I have offered help and it has been accepted.  I feel meaningful.

It also scares me to need something.  I don’t want to be seen as weak, needy, lost–yet that’s the truth on many days.  I’m afraid that somehow that will change my relationships.  Not surprisingly (in the double-standard vein), I have yet to find a time when I have thought less of, or changed my feelings about, someone coming to me in need.  Quite the opposite.  I am drawn to their core strength and self-awareness.

Looking forward to transformation in this……

Keeping Asking The Questions…Chiming In Here

Wow hun! So well put. I know I am just jumping right in here, with hardly a “Hello, here I am!” but I’d love to start off by saying I remember that about your Mom first hand. It is one of the flavors she left. One time in particular, I actually remember sitting around the dining room table at the cabin, when it had a red checkered table cloth on it (now it’s on the porch) with both of your parents. The light was dim and the air damp, very damp (before the air conditioning). There were candles going and it was another one of those nights we lingered around the table with coffee long after your Dad finished making his napkin mushroom and had probably already said “Well…” but your Mom didn’t listen. The year was 2000 when nothing was right and you were questioning absolutely everything–yourself, others, work, God. Your Dad was sitting at the end of the table with his head in his hands, uncomfortable and not knowing what to say to you. I looked around the room and took it all in…and your Mom put her hand on your back (it was a prayerful hand) and said just those words to you. “Keep asking the questions Warren.” I know it was only one of many times in your life, but that one stands out to me. Partly because none of the rest of us three had a clue what to do, and she did. The impact was so great that I can still see her and I can still smell the air and hear the candles.

People often spoke of her faith, and I know of what they speak, but the very practical faith of knowing that continuing to ask the questions would lead you somewhere…that God would give you some kind of answer is what stood out to me most…maybe it was the most real.  It was one of the ways she held your heart and gave you space to be you. I’d like to think that it’s one way that we were a bit alike when it comes to loving you (maybe the only way…ha!!). “Keep asking the questions,” I think, always fit with who I am and I am so grateful that she called it forth in both of us.

Thanks for getting us started on this journey Warren. I love where you take us and I love to follow you…and I love the mutuality of how that works for us!!