Mike died!

A voice starts his fade...

But it won't be lost...

I want to capture it here.

I thought about him tonight while running ...I just had some coffee (Real SB...from other friends..from Seattle).

Ok, first off who was he? He was a friend of mine...brought into my life by another friend...His name was Mike. I used his name on purpose, he would have wanted it that way. Mike had a big problem with drugs, he would have wanted you to know that! He was a Christian (at least that's what he said), and he would have wanted you to know that. He died suddenly last week...and from what I can tell it was from the drugs...Damn dumb...

I let him down a-lot. I hate that about myself. I hate that I can't just "be there" when someone needs me. I hate that I have to prioritize my time carefully...and I sometimes miss...like this one....like Mike. 

So what about him...well...he was a freakin mess. I remember when he went off the steroids, and looked normal for the first time. He felt skinny..but he smiled anyway. He was a MESS. His life was all over the place...his world was always spinning out of control...he had bad anger problems...but 

but

Boy did he cry...he really cried...he really mourned. I was with him when he did it sooooo many times at the coffee shop.

He was exactly who he was...and he didn't hide it. He was authentic...screwed up to the hilt....but authentic.

That's his legacy you know.

A fearless close up view of the human soul..unabated... expressed by a life lived naked.

I always laugh at that word...naked...what a great word though. "They were naked and not ashamed"...if you think that has to do with clothing...I think your missing a-lot. I am often without clothes in my fallen state and "not ashamed" (arrogant dork!)...it wasn't their cloths...it was their souls. If you haven't figured it out I am talking about Adam/Eve....and...Mike

He would smile at you and tell you anything you wanted to know...even the crap.

I want to be naked too...I want to learn to live unafraid of what you think...I want to be me...God knows me (it isn't like I am fooling Him)...so why should I worry about you. I guess I am afraid of being lonely...afraid that everyone will leave me...funny though...I wonder how many would actually (and maybe for the first time) be attracted to me...funny thought.

One more thing about Mike...he called himself a Christian...a druggy Christian. I don't know who reads this, but I want to defend an aspect of him for just a moment.

The Christian life is like a marathon (I run them so I can speak a bit to this). Imagine a finish line...and someone starts one mile from it. When they come across it a few minutes later...they would look awesome...they probably would have been able to go the whole way without stopping..they would have barely broken a sweat. 

Now 3 hour and 30 minutes later...here I come...I look like hell.

I smell bad, my body is screaming, I am hunched over, I look like I just fell down a flight of stairs...and I feel worse than I look. 

The point is though I started 26.2 miles back. And I have pushed it through...through every pain..through every ache...I pushed it through.

So there we stand...me and the guy who started a mile away and me...

Who had the bigger accomplishment?

Who has really taken on the challenge?

duh...

This is the Christian life. On the issues, some start close to line where they can conquer their weaknesses...some start way further away.

Today...I ran a measly 4 miles....what made me think of him on my run though was this. 2 miles in..I stopped...I stopped...It was too much for me....so I just walked for a minute or so...2 little miles in....we of the "trade" call that a bonk.

I bonked.

Mike had come a million miles in his life...but last week...he just bonked...that simple...

Sometimes, people just bonk.....wait though....what did I just think of...

I thought of God..saying what my wife would say if I bonked in an actual marathon....what she would do if I bonked...

She would take me in her arms...console me..and remind me how far I really had gone (training and all)...

Ahhhhhh yes....a simple human with compassion..... how much more did God just hug Mike....

Way to go dude...way to go...good bye buddy!  Your screwed up..messed up..naked...authentic... voice won't completely fade...no way...

you would have wanted it that way!

It holds in the middle

She DRAMATICALLY changed my life. She added days of time back on to my time here on Earth. Days wasted on a futile act. Because she did two things.

She listened and learned
She passed on the knowledge and the love

Here's the story.

We were at dinner, a bunch of us and her. She overheard a conversation between my buddy Nick and I. She saw where we were weak and stepped in. She heard where we were wrong and risked correcting us. She told us the truth. Now please recognize, we thought we had the truth. We thought we were on solid ground. We thought we were soooo bright. Smarty-pants would be a good word for us. But we were wrong. Again.

Nick and I were talking about......
Eggs.
Yes Eggs.
The best food ever.
But those little white squiggly things.
I thought they were umbilical cords.
Gross.
I spent minutes of my life...always removing them...searching them down...with a slippery spoon.
FRUSTRATING

She said...no...they are just a rope of egg white.

Nick believed her...I forgot she said it at all.
Nick tracked it down.
Nick FB her and said she was right.

Holy Crap..it is just egg whites holding the yolk in the middle. As a matter of fact the more of it there is the fresher the eggs are.

NO WAY!

Yes way.

The math here....I probably have eggs on average 5-7 times a month.

I spend about 2 minutes (if you include getting the glass out and then the spoon and then cracking the egg and then fishing it out of the glass and then washing the glass).

so

2 Minutes * 7 times a month
14 minutes a month * 12 Months in a year
168 minutes a year * 34 years left on Earth (if I die at 72)
5712 minutes over the rest of my life / 60 minutes in a hour
95 hours/ 24 hours in a day
about 4 days.

She saved me 4 days of my life fishing out the squiggles and wasting my time.

JACKIE....THANK YOU!

quietly

Jackie....thanks!

He Drank The Whole Dang Thing!

$20...what would I do?


I would...well not much.... I can make $20 by making a 5 second phone call.

But DUDE!

He drank the whole thing....for $20

He drank the whole syrup carafe at Village Inn
In one fell swoop he drank it.

That's like a 1000+ calorie moment

OH MY LORD!

He then turned pale...but he was OK

I almost got sick myself watching him....

Funny I kept moving further away from him thinking "I don't want to be hit when it comes back around"

Funnier...after it was said and done...I actually felt closer to him and had a new strange respect....

DUDE!

$20....maybe it was worth it....!

Risk for gain....

Thanks for reminding me..


This time it was $20

Next time (if I re-learned my lesson well)...maybe it's for someone's soul....

Hope Castaway

Flowers.....check
Candy.......Check
Drive a hundred miles...CHEck
Get to the meeting place an hour and a half early....CHECk
Hoping for the end on loneliness.........CHECK!

Cute old guy. Asking about my "daughter" (my wife). Talking about his spunk. "I drive that Dodge Ram out there"(it was tricked out by the way), "I have a Miata too". "I go to Hawaii and snorkle every year", I do "horse cutting" (I still don't get what that really is). And on and on he went.

Then there was us. Four of us total. Me, my wife, one of our dearest surrogate daughters, and a sister of an old friend. We were already in deep relationship. We already could taste the love between us. We were completely fulfilled with each other.

Cute old guy. My new buddy. He had been around the Sun 73 times. And he was there for a blind date. He had met her on the internet (LDS singles). She was in her 50's, but he wasn't sure if she could keep up with his lifestyle. Nope not sure at all. But that wasn't the point...if memory serves correctly he "was so sick of being alone". A huge home in Wyoming, a million accomplishments, a big life...but not even close....not even close enough for fulfillment. It had to be another person.

So there he was. Alone...but waiting...just hoping...

We had to get going. I would have love to have met "her".

Then our surrogate daughter called...the "girl" never showed up.

She didn't come.

She left him alone.

She broke his little heart.

She may never know how much she missed out on.

A person who would love her desperately.
-------------

I have nothing big to say here this time.
No quip.
No opine.
No metaphor.

Just thinking to myself...I think I have adopted his hope.
I wish I could carry that burden for him.

Cute old guy!

Floating Down

There we were at a Starbucks. Yep that glorious place where you pay big bucks for brown water and a chance at shifting your life. There we were having a bold conversation about living, and mostly about loving. Why would you ever describe it as BOLD? Why not heart felt, why not deep...why bold. Because boldness is where the heart changes...its where rivers that have been flowing since the persons first breath are turned.... the behemoth stands in the middle of the river and the course of a life is changed.
Risk. Nothing more than the willingness to lose the other person as a friend, and possibly lose any hope of ever being with them again. Not so scary if you remember that life is brief (I call BS..it is sooooo hard and scary).Life is brief though, no it really is. Ask my friends whom I have lost. Ask Craig, Ask Burke, Ask Dave. It's a speckle of dust floating down from a ceiling...nope shorter...it's more like that brief instant it catches your eye as light catches it...it's that brief. God I miss knowing that I could see those guys anytime. The ones I lost...but thank you God that I know the question really matters because I lost them.


So the question is asked

The BIG one...The BOLD one..the ONE

"are you lovable"? ...

stop...no really stop here....

are you?

or another question...are you loving them?

Please stop reading...please walk away...please please please stop and consider it...I went too fast in telling you..... so stop.

Don't pass it by....life is lame on the other side....so very lame

The fake side of life...the distraction to the question, the question we capitulate too is so limp. The other side is found in life being only about what you want and can't have...or what you want and how to get it.

Stop......freeze.....don't move for a second...please ...go back to the center question and think about it.

Can you see it....That's it in a nutshell...all of real life summed up in a statement.
Every song,
every quip,
every thought,
every directional turn that you take,
every tear,
every hope,
every moment wrapped up in the question of loved and loving.

So me...oh the tuff guy, me with my so called boldness...you sitting there with a real human soul staring back.
Me with my own questions ...me with my lack of understanding of my own thoughts...Me recognizing that I set it free...me knowing that the BIG question is loose and running wild....


There we were at Starbucks..the brown water nearing an end......and it happened...the question asked in a way that matched the moment. In a way that matched the person...and then

Then the hands already shaky...moved
Then the eyes, so tuff...centered
Then the smile...dissipated
Then the tears...welled up....in us both

They knew their answer...and they telegraphed it to me.....and me...me...me with all of my insecurities...me desperately wanting them to know they were wrong...but I can't help this one...it's bigger than me. Should I have avoided it?

I can't fix it...

should I have left it un-asked...

dang it..I can't

I get in my car to head back to life, hating and second thinking the question. Why did I go there..why....why...why...why...why.

Then I blink again.... It has to be asked.

Why ..c'mon don't you see it?

It's the dust speckle...

isn't it weird....once you see it ---you --HAVE-- to watch it to the end. You ---just---care.

The stare

Preaching, singing the words were really good the music was acceptable and the moment was divulging itself as fully apropos. Some of the words threw my course in life dramatically, but the stare, yes the small squint of the eyes, that is what menaces my mind. Here’s the set-up. I went to hear some friends speak...dang they were good. Poignant and courageous would be an understatement. Then others stood to speak...sing...perform..that was predictable...a subway meatball sandwich comes to mind. The couple sat in front of me, the ones who were speaking. There kids transferring from position to position...our pew..their pew..our pew...their pew...stickers on the face...bioanicle in hand...get out of my way and give me your toys on their minds. But then...ha...the couple didn’t even see it, how could they? They were busy doing what adults do in these situations. Grabbing the kids, listening politely, thinking about the days business...but then. The dad gently caressed his brides hair. I saw it, and it endeared me, the middle child saw it too and he froze. He whom takes all things in accordance to his own worldview froze. He froze. He froze and I saw him do it. Then his eyes focused on the scene, and they slightly squinted. I live for this type of event. His entire life, the life of scattered needs and fleeting desires....focused like a pin point on his mom and dad...loving each other. Then I saw it...ever so slight but it was there...a slight upturning at the corners of his mouth. A whisper of a smile. He sat there for only a few seconds, and then went to join them and be close to them too.
This is what I took away...eyes are watching you, and Love is contagious....even when no one knows it....no too damn trite..

I took away that it matters...it all matters! More than you will ever know...to the couple ...to the boy..to me....

Wait...

That’s it...

The couple loved each other...The child was touched by that...I was touched by him...what did I do in that moment...????? Who saw me?????How did they react....
and is the ripple still pulsating out there somewhere...

thump...
thump...
thump...

Rock On.

What a holiday

This was a great holiday season for my wife and I. It was funny, with everything being so hectic, the crowds, the performances, the visits from guests, there was still a deep sense of joy and peace that was accompanying the lot. The highlight had to be the most unexpected thing. Sitting down with two friends and enjoying a cup of warm coffee and just talking. Wow, I personally received gifts that cost hundreds of dollars, I got new stuff that will fill the empty spaces (what’s left) in my home...but the time spent with them..that can have no value placed on it (I can’t say it was priceless because I think that may be trademarked...ooops just did).

Now was it because our conversation was so great....nope. Was it because we all became so much more enlightened...nope. Was it because we were finally catching up...nope..nope...nope. It was because there were four people sitting down together and being wholly authentic (something I haven’t done in a group setting in quite a while). The reason it was so impacting was that (in this day and age) there is such a draw to hide anything authentic about ourselves so that others will accept us and everything will be OK.
I HATE OK!

I am learning over and over that being in the dark does not make things OK, it makes things completely wrong and we lose the closest sense of connection there can possibly be (and this week proved that again to me). During our conversation we had (nice) conflict...we had laughter...we had “big reveals” ...and we made it through it all closer as friends and not further apart. I think each of us gave a little to the conversation and we each took more and more steps together as we gained trust.... man, I loved it and I am so excited to see where it takes our friendships.

I end this entry with one thing, the reason why I think it was so big (this conversation). I think this is how we were really designed to be.

Rock On!