I've been thinking

I was thinking....

I was thinking about being almost 36 years old. Thinking about what life has been, especially since High school. High school. HALF a LIFETIME AGO.  I thought about my friends. Friends from school, friends that I made after graduation, and friends made after getting married. The majority of them have not been a part of my life for several years. Some of that is because they moved away, but some of them live less than 5 minutes away.  I had a "sad" thought. Some of the people that I used to be closest to, I may never see again. And that's a shame. It's a shame that life becomes so stressful and busy that you neglect friends. I don't have a close family, and always considered some of my friends more as family than friends. But now I find myself looking life in the face,  wondering what the point is...  where does time go? Why do people just leave your life without a trace?   How can someone be so close to you,  yet so far away?  Life doesn't have to be that way. It's a choice. If you make time for what is important, then you will make time for WHO is important.

So, I have decided that I'm going to try to reach out to old friends....  Try to make the most of this life,  have as much fun as possible and hopefully, leave someone a little happier than I found them.

 

Not my typical post

This is my first "blog" in a while, and it is not my typical topic. I generally don't talk about this kind of thing, but this week has been ANYTHING but typical. This will not take many words to give my opinion.

So here it is:

Cops who shoot people, when there are other ways to handle the situation, should face justice. Protesters, who become violent, should face justice.
Black people and white people (and any other races) should be able to live and work together with no problems.
If you're the leader of a "group", and someone commits murder in the name of the group, and you don't condemn it, then you should be charged with involuntary manslaughter.
The ONLY hope for the country to heal is to understand the need for the guidance and forgiveness of GOD.

Until next time,

Peace and prayers for all

Sometimes things happen that make you happy. Other times, sad things happen. The fact is, life is full of ups and downs, happy and sad. It's how you react to them that makes you the person you are. I've learned that I have to react to everything in a positive way. Whether I'm happy and enjoying life or things aren't going so great, I have to be thankful for what I have or what I am going through. Friends are a dime a dozen and come and go, depending on their mood. Family is, well, family is weird. But GOD, he is the same everyday and only wants to see you smile, even if it's through tears. Today, I am smiling through tears. Maybe not physical tears, (since I rarely cry due to my immeasurable manliness), but tears of the heart.  With my grandpa dying this afternoon, it makes me see how precious time is. Time with my wife and kids. Time changing diapers and holding hands. Time spent putting band aids on "boo boos". Time waiting out the meltdowns and tantrums that occur when children are upset. Time spent wondering how I'm going to pay for college. Time spent talking to my wife, late at night, until words no longer make sense and sleep interrupts me mid-sentence.  You see, time is the most valuable currency known to man. You can spend it on bitterness and regret, or you can spend it on gray hair, laugh lines and memories that will be passed down, through conversations, to your kids and grandkids. Stories that will bring smiles to your loved ones faces long after you're gone.   I choose to spend it on the memories.

Until next time

Peace

The Bernie Syndrome

It begins in public schools.  During registration, you're given a list of school supplies that your child needs, to have a successful school year. Typical items are pencils, paper, folders etc.  But, far too often, the list includes more than is necessary. Why?  So that there will be enough to share with other kids who may not have enough supplies.  What?  Why do parents have to buy extra stuff for other children?  If every parent is given the same list, doesn't that mean that every parent is buying extra?  Wouldn't that mean there is a surplus?  Where does all this extra go?  Do the schools save the extra for next year?  (Sounds like the surplus in SC. 900 million dollars left over but they're wanting to raise the gas tax. That's a whole different post...)

Fast forward 13 or so years and these children are voting in their first election.   They've spent their whole childhood being indoctrinated into thinking that everyone should give a little more to be sure everyone else has plenty.  They hear political candidates talking about the rich needing to pay more, so that college can be free,  healthcare is guaranteed to all, etc.  These kids buy into it because they've always been taught that if you have more, you should give more. Now, they're young adults with very little income and they figure that the rich owe it to society to pay more so.....you know, free stuff for all.

This sounds appealing, especially when you're living on ramen noodles and mayonnaise sandwiches while working your way through college. The problem is, that this doesn't solve anything. The rich people are the ones who run companies. Those companies create jobs. Those companies sell their goods or services based on cost vs profit. Raise taxes, they raise prices. Raise prices, working people can afford less.  When working  people can afford less, politicians begin to say "raise minimum wage". Raise minimum wage, cost of doing business goes up. This causes prices to go up, causing the higher minimum wage buying power to go down.  It's like reading the same page of a book over and over but never turning the page. No matter how many times you read it, the story never progresses.

But the sad thing is that the millennials will accept this as normal or necessary, because they've been conditioned to think that it is normal. But it's not. Normal is working for what you get and striving to do better today than you did yesterday. By doing that, you will eventually have the things that you need and more of the things that you want.  I'm not rich, but, if I ever am, I want to keep what is mine and I don't want government deciding how much I get to keep.

The Bernie syndrome is a dangerous thing for a free society.


Until next time....

Peace

Winning, Losing & the Super Bowl

Super Bowl 50.

The game was the exact opposite of what everyone expected. Except for the Denver Broncos. They KNEW they were going to win. Faced with the reality that very few people believed in them, they decided to believe in themselves. There was a list of reasons that they were supposed to lose. The media pointed them out everyday for a week. But the only list that mattered, to them, was their list of reasons that they WOULD win. Game day finally arrived. Sixty minutes of football and two hours of empty commercials later, it was the Broncos who were the champions.  Why? Because they wanted to win and were prepared to handle losing, should it have happened. After a Broncos turnover, the team rallied on the sideline and made up their minds to fix it on the next possession. After a Panthers turnover, you saw pouting and disbelief in the eyes of key players. Major difference in the two teams ability to handle failure.

Here's where I get "political". For the next 24 plus hours, the story is focused not on Denver, but on Cam Newton. Apparently he didn't react gracefully enough to losing. He showed his disappointment by walking out of the post game press conference. For that, he's painted as a "sore loser" and "spoiled brat". But, is that not what society should expect?  Isn't that the way that we have set everything up to be?  Let me explain.

It all started with the political correctness movement that began some years ago. The notion that everyone has the right to not be offended. To not have their feelings hurt. Eventually, we were telling our kids that there shouldn't be any winners and losers. Everyone gets a trophy. That way, everyone feels good about themselves. To make an extremely long story short,  I'll sum it up like this; Cam Newton is doing exactly what our society has come to expect. Or, at least it SHOULD be expected.  The very same people who go out of their way to make sure that nobody is going to have hurt feelings are complaining about the fact that someone doesn't understand how to handle losing.  And it's going to get worse if we continue down this path.  Presidential candidates are running on a platform that everything should be free. Forget hard work, let government help you. Free college. Free healthcare. Free housing. Free puppies. You get the idea.  You can feel the Bern now, but when life slaps you in the face, you're going to feel a different burn. And it will hurt.

Back to Cam Newton. If he has such a hard time handling disappointment and failure with 100 million dollars to his name,  how can we expect the average person,with maybe 100 dollars to their name, to handle it any better? Unless society stops picking flowers for everyone and get back to preparing our kids to handle life, our country will go down in flames all for the sake of feelings.



Not going to be a popular opinion, I know. But truth is truth.


Until next time,

Peace

Family and the Bridge to Nowhere

So, you're on your way home from work, and you are thinking about how great it will feel to relax for the evening.  The closer you get to home, the more your bladder works. Suddenly you realize you have to pee, very badly. Your thinking shifts from relaxing your mind and body, to relaxing your bladder. You pull into the driveway, run in the house and the first thing you hear is the sound of little kids and a random mom arguing. Did you walk into the wrong house?  Are you dreaming? Did someone just "punk" you?  While relaxing your bladder, you begin to realize that those voices, that drown out the sound of urine hitting toilet, are the voices of YOUR wife and kids. Yes, they're arguing about something that makes no sense.

You find yourself thinking...thinking of running away to somewhere. To anywhere. To nowhere. You think of that famed "Bridge to Nowhere" and you start planning out how to find it and drive on it until you reach the end. You wonder if you can swim from there to Russia. You imagine yourself drowning in shark-infested waters, because that would be less painful than hearing the females of the house  having an estrogen shootout....

Yea, that seems to be a moment that makes you question yourself and the reason you're here. You wonder why the heck you are stuck here in this moment, having these thoughts. Suddenly, you hear the sound of a 6 year old girl talking to you. She's saying "Bye, I love you."  In that moment, you remember that the kids are going to a birthday party. The reason for the fuss, well, they're running late. Hey, they're female so it's expected.

Suddenly, that bridge to nowhere doesn't seem so appealing, and NOBODY wants to be eaten by sharks. These moments make a man. The moment that makes you want to run away, makes you stronger. But only if you stop, look at yourself, and decide that the bridge to nowhere is a lonely drive, and shark bites are painful.  Man is not meant to be alone. With the woman, comes love. With love, comes marriage. With marriage, comes family. No kids? You still get in-laws. That's a whole different level of crazy....save that for another post.

Anyway, my point is that family is everything. Nothing makes you stronger. Nothing makes you feel more happy. Nothing makes you love more deeply. Nothing makes you a better person.  And nothing makes you want to find that bridge to nowhere, and drive to the end.



Just ONE of my many thoughts.

STILL more to come...

Peace

Men, beards and a lack of manliness.

There was once a commercial for Dr. Pepper 10, showing a man  with a long beard, catching fish with his bare hands and eating tree bark, among other "manly" tasks.  It proclaimed that Dr. Pepper 10 was the "manliest low calorie soda in the history of mankind".  It was a portrayal of what is commonly thought of as a "manly man". 

The other day, I saw a guy with a long beard, slick hair and the frame of a lumberjack.  He must have been 6' 2'' and about 220 pounds.  Manly, right?  Well, he was wearing a shirt with pink flowers and had a "man purse".  Something wrong with that picture?

Well, that got me to thinking;  "What happened to men?".  Men were, once, men.  Men were the ones who made sure that the family was taken care of.   The ones who worked for a living and were proud of the fact that they were self-reliant.  Men were men.

Well, in today's world, with the outcry from spineless males who refuse to take responsibility for anything, there is, apparently, a new definition of "man".  It seems today that men are encouraged to explore their "feminine side" as if there is something wrong with their "masculine side".  They are told that if they believe in the traditional family model, that it makes them a bigot.  They are told that if someone is offended by their beliefs, that they should change their beliefs to spare the feelings of the offended.  They are told that there should not be a distinction between MEN and WOMEN.
The media, politicians and the so called "Civil rights activists" are blurring the lines between the XY chromosomes and the XX chromosomes.  Men's restroom?  Bigotry. Women's restroom?  Bigotry.  Men's clothing store?  You get what I'm saying...
If God is real, then he creates us as either male or female, without mistake.  If evolution is the correct theory, then we have to trust that nature gets it right.  Otherwise, we wouldn't exist and the dinosaurs would still rule.  Either way, no matter what belief you have, it is foolish to think that someone can be born in the wrong body.  Tell a young girl she's a boy long enough, she will believe it.  Tell a child he's stupid long enough, and he/she will believe it.  There's power in suggestion.  Tell a man that he shouldn't act manly long enough, he will raise boys to be women. 

But, back to my original point.  Today's man has a whole host of obstacles to overcome if he wants to live a life that includes "traditional values". Sure, it is easier to just go with the flow and be "sensitive" and "aware of your feminine side", but it is natural to be a man.  Nature didn't make it easy.  It isn't easy to support a wife and kids.  It isn't easy to settle down and be faithful.  It isn't easy to set an alarm for 6:00 a.m.  But that's what makes us men.   The fact that we do what is not easy, because it is the right thing to do.  Just as our ancestors hunted animals, with sticks and rocks, to feed their family.  Not easy, but the right thing to do.

My hope is that today's man will get past the politically correct mumbo jumbo that oozes from today's society.  That he will quit drinking Caramel Toffee Mocha Lattes and get back to basics. Get back to being fathers.  Get back to being honest.  Get back to being MEN.