Recently a friend of mine posted a scanned copy of our 6th grade class newsletter. I was tagged in the image and when I looked at it I saw that there was a short story that I had written about a Russian named Vladimir and a really large donut the size of a sheet cake.

Wow, 23 years ago at the age of 10 I was already writing about food! As I read through the story it was obvious that I didn’t have any real creative writing style, but, the story had a beginning, a body, and a conclusion and the grammar was awesome for a 10 year old.

I remember growing up I was always writing poetry, some of it inflammatory, but mostly it was simple rhymes and short stories.

Why didn’t anyone ever tell me back then that I should be a writer when I grow up?

There are a few things in life that come easily to me, the most natural thing I do is dance. It is something I do well without any thought or practice. For me “dancing by ear” is similar to the way people play music by ear. You don’t understand how you do it, you just do.

Later in life I realized I was pretty decent at spatial concepts and understanding balance in design. I’m no artist, but I can sense when something is right.

I think that in our culture we often direct our children down a path that seems to fit something that is accepted by society as great: Doctors, Lawyers, Fireman. We ask “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Instead of asking, “What do you LIKE to do the most?”

Perhaps if we asked the latter question we would better be able to direct our children down a path that they will not only excel in, but they will also find satisfying.

I think our society and culture is wasteful. We spend hours of time and thousands of dollars forcing students to take years of math and science. Instead we should probably have our students get a general grasp of the math and science they need to relate to all parts of society as a whole, however, I have never needed to use Algebra and I’m not sure the 4 years of my life spent in Algebra classes was time well spent. What if instead I was thrust into a creative writing class, dance, art? What if once we got to high school we spent those 4 years finding out what we excelled in and then by the time we got to college we could really intensify those areas of study and then we would be awesome at our careers.Instead we force high school students to endure 2 more years of information that we should have already learned in the previous 12 years of our education and then, once we’ve spent thousands of dollars learning these “basics” we finally get to the meaty subject of what we are going to be doing for the rest of our lives and we spend just 2 years on that. It doesn’t make sense.

Now here I am at 33 years of age and I just now fully understand the areas that I am good at and I’ve spent years and thousands of dollars acquiring skills in an area that I only sort of enjoy and I will never seriously excel in without a lot of work and effort.

So my choice is to either throw away the investment that I have made in my education, or to live a life doing something that I only partly enjoy doing.

I, personally, should have been a writer, or a dancer, or possibly an interior designer. What should you have been?

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When parents have their first child they look at it as a bundle of joy filled with wonder and potential. To them it is perfection, however, they forget that even Charles Manson, Hitler and Bin Laden started out as sweet babies.

We are born as gardens filled with a variety of seeds that spring up and grow throughout our lives. Seeds of doubt mixed in with envy, greed, lust, deceit, cruelty, anger, selfishness spring up weeds that desperately try to choke out the flowers of love, joy, peace, kindness, self-discipline, and faithfulness.

When we are born it is our parents job to landscape our lives like a skilled gardener.  Hours should be spent weeding out the bad and nourishing the good. In a garden that isn’t cared for beauty struggles to survive.

I think in life we often feel that we can just sit back sometimes and coast. We like to keep things low maintenance and instead of getting our hands dirty and digging into the root of the problem, we just clip it back or pay someone else to take care of the problem for us. In my own life I’m working on weeding out some bad habits and planting some good ones. I’m digging deep to unearth some deeply rooted weeds that have threatened to not only choke out the good things in my life, but to destroy me entirely. It has only been by the grace of God that I am the man that I am. If left to my own devices I feel that I not only have the imagination, but also the resources, to successfully destroy everything that I have worked hard for in my life.

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The title of this post is from the husband of a very popular mommy blogger. I love both of these people and this isn’t a “hate” post or anything like that, it is rather a post about how people that are passionate about their ideas often feel that the opposing party is being a baby or whining when they are being passionate about their ideas.

As I’ve gotten older one of the things that I have come to realize about “Hot Button” issues is that they are complicated and both sides normally have very valid points.

Healthcare
Abortion
Religion
Politics
Same-Sex Marriage
Evolution v. Creation

These are just a few topics that come to mind when I think of people being extremely touchy. Why do we feel touchy? Because we feel threatened. When you give one person a certain freedom we may feel, whether it is a realistic fear or not, that we are going to be giving up something that we hold dear.

If I say yes to free healthcare for those in need, what is it going to cost me? If I say that abortion is okay, then where will humans draw the line on playing God? If we say yes to Same-Sex Marriage will that erode traditional family values?  If I say I accept my neighbors religion and that religion happens to believe in human sacrifce where does that leave me?

Some items are more black and white than others. There is a such thing as moral absolutes, most people just don’t want to use the Bible as a guide for moral absolutes. But if you don’t use the Bible, where do you get get your moral compass? Where do you find truth?

In the end we each must have to come to our own conclusions about what is right and wrong in life and we each individually will have to deal with the consequences of our actions and those choices. When interacting with people who don’t have similar beliefs as yours it is important to be respectful. Don’t name call, patronize, condescend or insult. Instead, seek to understand why they believe their believes and be prepared to intelligently back up your own.

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The dream sequence started differently. I mean, I was there and then suddenly I was grabbed by this girl that I knew and she started kissing me. It caught me off gaurd and I fell down. She fell with me her tongue locked in my cheek and me wondering if she was going to cut me with her braces. Braces? She doesn’t have braces in reality so why does she have them in this dream sequence?

Her blond hair and milk colored complexion paired with her rich red lips remind me of Gwen Stefani or one of those blond girls in a comic strip.

I should be delighted that some girl is throwing herself at me, but I am perplexed because this person, where did she come from and why all of the sudden is she here? At this skating rink?

It’s not a sex dream, I rarely have those even though in Psychology 101 we were told that most of our dreams were sexual, what? I don’t think so. I dream mostly of food and chocoloate chip cookies and working at the nursing home and Ultimate Frisbee.

The few times I have had sex dreams I always wake up before the sex. Does that happen to you? To everyone? It’s like one of those dreams where you have won the lotto or suddenly your wildest dream is coming true but before it fully comes to fruition you wake up.

But lately, my dreams are different. My day dreams are different too. I’m scanning girls all the time wondering if they could be the future Mrs. because the last futue Mrs. hopeful was not interested in the least and she let me know by ingoring my attempts at starting up a super-delicious romance that would have started with her and I and a plate of Thai and we would be laughing and eating Pad Thai and our lips would touch as we slurped on a really long and fat rice noodle and it would be like a scene from Lady and the Tramp and then later we would have a batch of puppies.

For real though, lately, something is up. I think being self-employed has left me with too much time to be alone and the time that I used to spend alone on the weekends was “ME” time but now that is all I have, “Me” time and too much of that and so yeah, I’d love to have a woman in my life that I could take to breadwinners and to watch Grey’s Anatomy with. I’d sit with her on the couch and massage her feet and listen to her talk endlessly about her day and what she wanted to eat for dinner and how her mom is stressing her out. I’d listen and I’d be grateful that my time was no longer all mine.

So yeah, something is up, perhaps I am finally growing up… it’s doubtful, but maybe.

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“You know the problem… I’m going to tell you the problem…” insert sigh here from my new friend who I only partied with once before, “It’s just that all of our friends have kids and we just aren’t there yet, you know?”

I was sort of taken aback at this point. Imagine me in a kitchen, single me who is looking at this gorgeous girl who has the most perfect husband, (seriously, he is almost as cool as wolverine) and she is wiping down a countertop with her petite hand and she is lamenting the fact that her friends are pressuring her to have kids.

I looked in my red glass and wondered if someone had slipped me a mickey or a double shot of rohipnol. For some reason I thought there were only two worlds that humans live in, Single and Married. Yes, I know there is a divorced category but that don’t count because they did, at one time, fall into one of these two categories. However, there is a third category that seems to be almost as cruel as the single category and that is the “Married with Children” category.

Single people aren’t complete at all.

Married people are only partially complete.

Married with Children equals completedness.

I have to admit though, I felt a little bit better knowing that even after your married you still deal with peer pressure on some level. It made me not feel so alone in my singleness, like really, it doesn’t matter what stage you are at in life, you are always going to feel pressure from society to be better or more than what you currently are. I mean give it a rest already, just let people be.

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What’s it like not being a Christian? What is it like not having any faith? What could possibly motivate you to continue on this planet if you think there is absolutely no purpose for our existence?

Lately I’m all “So What” all the time. I sit on my couch and as much as I know my life is pretty awesome as far as single guys lives I have to wonder – what next? So I get married, have some kids, grandkids, etc and then I die?

I remember when I was younger and at church they would talk about the rapture happening. The Lord’s imminent return was constantly a topic of discussion pretty much my entire childhood. I was fixated on it so much so that there were times I would hope that it wouldn’t happen because next week I was going to get to go to Six Flags or get my driver’s license or perhaps a girl I liked might like me back.

That seems like a lifetime ago and now I sit around praying for God to come already. I feel like sometimes I am going through the perfunctory motions of life – making money, paying bills, eating, sleeping – only to kill time, to have something to do before the end, which is really the beginning.

Last week as I was driving to Waco to do some IT work at the nursing home I couldn’t help but feel like my life is wasted. I’ve felt this for quite some time now and I don’t know how to change it. Perhaps this is where people get when they go into missions or they quit their jobs to do something amazing with their lives – like work at an AIDS hospice.

But even those things would only bring a marginal amount of joy compared to knowing what is in store for me when I leave this planet. I think sometimes it would be better not to know. Like maybe if growing up all I was ever told was that by believing in Christ kept me from going to hell and then right at the last minute – SURPRISE! – you’re going to the most awesome place, a place beyond all human comprehension. But instead I am like that kid who is told 6 months beforehand that he is going to get to go to Disney World and that 6 months seems like an eternity.

Maybe the entire purpose of this life is only to make us really appreciate heaven, these trials, these struggles, this inanity of life, perhaps without it we would just take heaven for granted.

And all of this just takes me back to my original point – if you don’t believe in God then what in the world get’s you out of bed in the morning? What motivates you? What keeps you from saying – So What?

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I can’t keep up with the trends, the SEO marketing gurus, the celebrities of the blogtwitfacebookflickrverse. There is just an overload of information. Everyone is pushing their product, the latest social network, the coolest gadget, movie, ringtone, digital download, web design, and the exhausting list goes on and on…

Instead, I’m going back to pushing the only thing that people want from me… ME. Or, maybe people don’t want to hear about me, but I sure like writing about me and so that counts for something. 

Lately I’ve been going through a mild depression and by mild I mean eating out 3 times a day until I can barely move, gaining weight and not caring about it and spending inordinate amounts of time alone and on Facebook. 

I think Facebook and Twitter have become the new World of Warcraft. Armies of people who think they are hip and cool by keeping up with all the latest status updates and witticisms from all of their 20 friends, sitting by their computer hacking out tweets on twitter all the while ordering Papa John’s pizza online and getting fatter by the moment. I know because I am describing MYSELF. 

I am becoming a tub of lard and spending more time in front of this dang computer than Michael Jackson looking in the mirror. sha – mon. 

Part of the reason I have become glued to my computer is because my job requires it, but I’ve noticed lately that my manic behavior leads me to do three things: tweet, eat, and spend. Sometimes all at the same time. I look at my BlackBerry for new messages at least 200 times a day. Even during a movie I have to fight the urge not to check and see if I have received a tweet or a txt message or an email. These little morsels of communication have replaced real interaction with friends more and more and allow me to stay someone connected all the while remaining safely disconnected from the reality that I am becoming a fat slob.

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These are just a few pics from my life when I was a leader at the Hangar. As you can see, I used to have hair and I was much thinner… but those kids will put weight on you cause they always want to eat at Taco Bell! I’m talking to you Nando Betancur!

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It’s only pretty when someone is shaking it up. 

As I watch the pieces of my life swirl around me I’m reminded that I like it like this. In the last few days I have found a new volume of laughter that was before untapped. I’ve enjoyed quiet moments just listening to the silence and allowing the world around me to move in its frenzied pace like a billion worker bees hopped up on caffeinated nectar. 

My only hope is not that my life won’t be shaken up again, but that I won’t be shelved and forgotten. I hope to always be fascinating to someone, a tiny moment of joy on a child’s face, a sweet memory, a flurry of dreams coming true. 

My world is a snow globe.

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I’d filled my mouth more times on Thursday than should be humanly possible, however, it wasn’t my best Thanksgicing Day showing. I didn’t eat any dessert on Thanksgiving Day other than a single chocolate chip cookie.  I also went to three Thanksgiving’s on Thursday but I didn’t eat as much as I have in Thanksgiving’s Past. What is going on with me? What is happening to my stomach?

Thanksgiving for me started with the Turkey Trot and then ended with a mini all-guy high school reunion. Most of the guys I went to High School with were in town including one of our coaches and so we met up at Rudy’s Barbecue and caught up on everyone’s lives. Most everyone had kids and a normal job. Bruce was doing a fellowship in Plastic Surgery, Rick, the quarterback of our football team was now a coach and Chris, one of my favorite people from high school is now a youth pastor. What surprised me most of all is how much we are all still the same. I’m still the “nice” guy of the group and as Chris and our Coach left I heard some stories about what happened in high school that i never even knew about. Not being close to many of these guys really kept me sheltered from some parties and a few other things that happen with men in highschool. There was a time in my life when I would have envied these guys and their conquests and stories, but for once, I was sort of proud of my naiivete. Sure I’ve indulged in my share of debauchery, but for the most part I have remaned pretty clean in my 33 years.

One particular story that I thought was kind of cruel was the retelling of how this “ugly” girl was told that one of the popular guys was in crazy about her. Supposedly she called him for 3 weeks before finally giving up. There was a round of laughs because the joke was supposed to be on the football player, the fact that this ugly girl had his phone number, but no one gave any thought to the fact that there was a girl out there who was being hurt in this practical joke. 

I won’t pretend that I have not ever done something so cruel, but I can’t imagine looking back and not being sorry about it now. 

When I was in high school I remember I wanted to be more accepted by these guys, I wanted them to like me for me, but now that I am older I realized that would never have been a possibility. Not that I don’t think these guys on some level are all great guys, I just don’t know if their level of character meets my expectations. I prefer to surround myself that are better than me, that make me want to be a better person – because I can use all the improvement that I can get.

Hope your Thanksgiving was great!

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Trick or Treat
Smell My Feet
Give me something good to eat.
If you don’t, I don’t care
I’ll stick an apple down your underwear.

When I was really young I went trick or treating one time. I was batman and I had one of those hideous plastic masks that you strapped to your face with a piece of elastic string that invariably stung when it was snapped into place and then the mask limited your breathing and visibility. That year I truly was “blind as a bat.”

Soon after my first trick-or-treating experience we became Christians and we shunned everything in the world that smacked even remotely of sin or wickedness. This was a part of Christianity that I wasn’t too happy with at such a young age. To be stripped of this delicious priviledge – a night of free candy and fun costumes – was about as cruel as being born in a third world country and forced to grow my own food. It was so unfair!

Fortunately, the Christian church created fall festivals for those of us kids who didn’t partake in this forbidden candy apple and we were allowed to dress up as Biblical characters and spend the night in a safe environment surrounded by parents, friends and God.

I didn’t lament my loss of Trick-or-Treating as a child and fully understood the evils that surround All Hallows Eve. If you know anything about religion and history then you may know that the Christian church merged our holidays with the pagan holidays. If you can’t beat them, join them right? I’d heard of this practice but I had never seen a Wiccan holiday calendar until one day at work I saw it on a coworkers screensaver.  Easter, Christmas, and Halloween are the most obvious collaborations and we can look at each of these and see the Pagan influence.

If you look closely at Halloween you will find that for Wiccans this is their new year.

“Samhain (Sow-win, Oct. 31), Witches’ New Year, marks the death of the God and his the arrival in the Land of Youth, where he opens the gates so the souls can revisit their loved ones. It is said to be the day when the walls between the worlds are to be the thinnest and when contact with one’s ancestors can tack place. It is celebrated with the Festival of the Dead. This is a time of reflection on the year and a celebration of our ancestors.

So, there you have it, a holiday that celebrates witchcraft but one that we’ve slapped a bag of candy on and turned into something sweet. I’ll admit it, when it comes right down to it I don’t see anything wrong with trick-or-treating, it is the intent behind an action that makes it bad, but that doesn’t mean that I won’t educate my children to the truth and the dark side of this nefarious holiday.

Personally, I like to celebrate this time of year by celebrating the coming of Fall. You might see a pumpkin at my house and some fall colors, but you won’t see anything that is specifically tied to Halloween.

What are your thoughts on the matter?

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Look at John’s family, it makes me want to punch him in the mouf for being so lucky.

The Arquette’s aren’t nearly as pretty as John and Alison pictured above, but I’ve always had a crush on Monica from Friends – even though in this picture she looks a little mousy.

Okay, Dean and Tori are a beautiful couple. Tori never looked so good. I loved 90210, Kelly and Donna and the Peach Pit.

Hey, It’s Bill and Hillary Clinton… Couldn’t you just picture Hillary in a bathing suit by the beach reading a book in the Hamptons? It’d be one of those 1950′s bathing suits but bill would be wearing a speedo and surreptitiously checking out other women not realizing that Hillary has it all, brains and looks.

Guess Who… it’s Republican Presidential Candidate and his wife. Look at that bonnet she is wearing, it’s very demure and Little House on the Prarie – but I like it, who didn’t like Laura Ingalls?

And lastly, the beautiful Governor Palin who was Miss Wasilla a long time ago, whatever that means. This photo is from the beauty pageant. She’s what I’d call “A fresh-faced beauty”. I mean, who wouldn’t want to take this girl home to mama and then spend a lifetime with her?

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