Why I never wanted a dog again, and why I now have a dog

I didn’t want a dog, ever again.  You see when I was little, I had a dog that was from a litter of puppies and it was the runt.  All the other dogs were given away but I was able to keep this one and I named him Critter. 

Critter was my super best friend; Critter would sleep with me and was MY puppy.  We lived on an acre of land and our dogs roamed free.  About 29 years ago there were no leash laws and our 2 dogs roamed everywhere.  Critter explored and did other type dog things.

One day, Critter went exploring and never came back.  I remember I stood at the top of the hill where we lived on Parker road, which was gravel at the time, with a little sign I made in crayon and stopped cars driving by at 30 miles an hour to show them my sign of my “missing dog”.  It was a great crayon likeness of my dog, but alas no one had seen Critter.  Hours turned to days, and then weeks, then months and my puppy never came home.

Fast forward to about 8 years ago when my then 3 year old daughter Katie was talking about puppies and kitties and fish.  Being all cutesy as a 3 year old can say those words.  I was speaking with my mom about owning a dog again, and regardless of the horrible dog smell that comes with them, didn't want to go through the possibility of losing an animal the way I did when I was just a wee lad.  Relaying the story again from memory to my mom during one of these “why not get an animal conversation” about my crayola endeavored hunt for my lost Best Friend she mentioned “Oh Critter, Yes, He was killed when he got hit by a car.  We found him on the side of the road but didn’t want to tell you.”

Let me take a break from this story real quick to stress the importance of closure and the annoyance of ambiguity.  Parents, please teach your kids that things DIE.  My parents would often buy me a kitten only to have the dog from next door to run off with it in its mouth.  They would then buy me another kitty, replacing it.  Obviously I was not perceptive enough to deduce that the cat was a different cat.  Shame on me, but still.  Looking back I laugh with such bitter, bitter tears.

WHAT?!  Killed?  Seriously?  Needless to say I was dead set against getting a dog.  And just a little more dead on the inside.  We had made it to 3 kids and still the level of pet we reached was 3 fish won at a Carnival event.

I didn’t want to be one of those families that got a dog and then got rid of it because it was to hard of a responsibility to take care of.  I also knew that a dog’s lifespan is 12-15 years tops.  Any dog purchased I knew, would grow to be such a part of the family that when either 1 or 2 of the kids were going to be going to college, we would lose this family member.

Pessimistic?  Sure.  Do things die?  Yup.  Have I seen people ditch dogs because they got tired of dealing with an animal they decided to take on?  Sure.  I wanted to avoid all those things.

Fast forward a few years to my son Brandon.  Brandon for all intensive purposes is the most content child I have ever met.  You can ask this kid what he wants for his birthday or for Christmas and he will list 1, maybe 2 things.  That’s it.  If people have dozens of presents to open around him but he has the 1 or 2 things he had asked for he is extremely happy.  Well, one year he asked for a puppy.  A puppy he could take care of all to himself and train and run and play fetch with and chase with sticks and setup obstacle courses and yadda yadda yadda.

Problem was Brandon was afraid of barking dogs.  He would wince and jump whenever a dog would do a “dog type thing”.  It didn’t even have to be a big dog; small dogs would spook him as well.

            I tried to sand bag the topic, told Brandon he was to young, the fence needs fixing, that dog poop smells, that dogs DIE, and finally that he should start researching dog breeds to find one he really wanted.  That last one I hoped would have bought me a few years; at least until he would outgrow the want for a dog I prayed.

Then one year it happened.  Brandon didn’t want 1 or 2 things anymore.  He just wanted a puppy.  A puppy is not a thing, a puppy is a living it.  And whatever it was going to be I could tell Brandon wanted it real bad.  So I finally made him a deal and said we would get him a puppy for his 8 year old Birthday.  We started looking at Golden labs and Border Collies and all sorts of good family Dogs.

I had one ace in the hole left.  Our fence in the back yard was in need of repairs.  I told Brandon that even before we thought of getting a puppy – the fence would have to be fixed.  I mean you wouldn’t want to lose your puppy the first day you have it Brandon do you?  It will run away and get hit by a car and then YOU will be standing with a crayon drawing of your puppy and thus the circle will be complete.

I’m not bitter.

Brandon understood this and I thought I had finally closed the deal on this.  Until one day Katie told me that a friend of hers said that the local animal shelter had closed down.   This animal shelter had been around in Homer Glen for 30 or more years.  I told Katie there was no way this shelter would ever have closed down without it being announced in the local paper.  But she said she was sure her source was right.  So I said to her we will stop by after we had some lunch during our Daddy and daughter time.

Looking back – I think this was a setup.  I am not sure how or why but I am almost positive.

Walking into the shelter there were some new puppies shipped in and none of them looked extra special, so we went in a looked at the older dogs in another LOUDER section.  I hate barking dogs, I hate the sound of it.  Nothing screams desperation like a barking dog, or a Mime.  I hate them; I don’t get what they are supposed to be? Are they a clown?  I don’t get it.

The older puppy section had large barking dogs, except in one cage was a Siberian husky named Logan.  Logan was a female dog – who gives a female dog a boys name?  Logan had a rule on her card.  Must be only dog in house.

My daughter and I stared at Logan.  She stared back.  She wasn’t barking, but she would sniff our hands and try and be petted.  We must have stood there for 3 minutes watching her.  We walked a few steps away and she did something I could never forget.  She howled.  I have heard coyotes howl and other dogs howl, but this was a different.  She sounded lonely.  I walked back to her and remember looking at her and thought instantly, you must miss your family.

I asked the shelter about Logan and sure enough she was there for only a few days and had come from a home with other dogs and a 3 year old boy who was her best friend.  She was dropped off with a note from her previous owner and you could tell the woman who wrote it was heartbroken for having to give Logan away.  It turns out Logan is very much the Alpha female and during feeding time struggles became the norm.  There was so much contention that separate feeding times didn’t resolve the issue and in order for peace to be maintained Logan had to go.

Must be only dog in house.

I came back to Logan again after talking to the Shelter owners and I looked her over again and knew right then, this is our Dog.  My wife knew it as well when she first saw her.

Logan’s been a part of our family for about a month now.  Every night she greets me when I get home, just like the kids do.  We play in the house and go for nice walks at night together.  She is already 5 years old, so I know in my heart, if all things go perfect, I have her for another 7 to 10 years.  But if they don’t go perfect, just like every other member of our family, we are all made better for having her in our lives.

The fear of losing something or someone shouldn’t keep us from loving them.

Was it some mystical bond formed back at the shelter?  Was it man and beast coming to understand each other?  No. 

It was a boy who wanted a dog and a dog who needed a family.

The odd thing was the boy who wanted a dog wasn’t Brandon. 

It was me.

Fight CLUB!!!!

Growing up, I hated the Cargo Net in Gym.  It stretched all the way up to the top of what looked like a 220 ft ceiling.  When you are in 3^rd grade, that’s what it looks like at least.  I would get about halfway up, you know when the other kids start to pass you and I would freeze, just stop climbing and think to myself, ‘What the crap am I doing?!”

I didn’t make this decision you see.  It was made for me by my legs and arms.  As I was climbing up, my extremities reminded me that if and when I should fall the only thing to soften my blow to the wooden gym floor below was the ½ inch pad or gym mat as we were told it was called.  My limbs proceeded to convince me that the gym mats only purpose was to keep me from dying, and that they did not want any of their bones broken. 

I would have made a lousy pirate.

So, believing that, I complied and proceeded to climb back down, listening to the wussy limbs that were attached to my wussy body.

When you get older you realize there are just some chances though that you have to take.

Drinking urine is not one of them, unless it’s a survival thing.

But you must start learning to trust things…like cargo nets, people, some Mexican restaurants in neighborhoods with no stray dogs, car mechanics and should you have to travel this way, airplanes that fly livestock.

When I was training to learn how to fight, something that scared me to death was getting hit.  There is nothing more idiotic than putting a pair of gloves on you hands, with another full grown adult and agreeing that you are about to beat the crap out of each other for 2 minutes at a time.

With enough training though, something amazing happens.  Frank Trejo said it best,

“Kenpo is just like Music...No simple formula seems to exist, what can be discerned is a grand simplification in a way a cord sequences in a melodic development...you hear, see and feel the sound or movement before the muscles engage”. 

In due course of sparring and training you begin to trust yourself a little bit more each time and become more confident of your own abilities.  You find yourself making statements to the other guy, who is shaking like a leaf mind you with enough nervous energy to punch a hole in the wall, saying “Don’t worry, if I get hurt, it’s my own fault.”

I mean…who says that?  Really?

But it’s true.  When you have been experienced enough to know the damage you can take and the pain you can bear and still continue it isn’t arrogance that drives you on, it’s your own personal experience from pushing that breaking point above and beyond the top of that Cargo Net.

There was a guy at our studio whose name was John.  But everyone called him “Big” John.  Sure he had muscles and a face like a thoroughbred, but I mean, he was THAT big.  One day, I was told he had begun training not for an MMA bout but for a straight boxing match.   Hearing that information I understood he was going to have to train a bit differently.  He must have gotten bored in those coming months because he wanted to spar one night and not box.  I thought sure, why the heck not.

“Big” John and I squared off and within 30 seconds I realized something.  Sometimes…just sometimes, you run into those individuals who are too stupid to feel pain.  I realized after the first….oh I don’t know, 20 hits, that no matter how much I struck “Big” John he was going to just keep coming.  This is where I discovered that sometimes your best just isn’t good enough.  I could hit him, move and lock him up, but in the end, he just didn’t respond to any “pain stimulus” I was laying down. 

And then he hit me.

The first one came about a minute in.  He had been measuring me up the whole time.  He figured out how I telegraphed my punches, knees and how I worked the environment around me.  The first shot was enough to make me see stars; the second dropped me to my knees.

Now, depending on multiple things like your training, character, heart and discipline your conscious mind no longer controls your next set of reactions.  You either stay down, and put your hand up in that universal “give me a moment” wave. 

Or you realize you got hurt, and it was your own fault, and you move.

In fighting, I realized how close to an analogy to life it really is.  Constant struggle is what builds and defines a Human being to shine brighter than others, especially when they succeed.

As a Christian I hear often that God wants to test you to see how much you can bear.  I respectfully disagree.  God doesn’t want to see how much you can bear, he already knows.

He wants you to know where your breaking point is, and through training make the realization that with Him you can be greater than you think you are.

Isa 41:15  Behold, I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument having teeth: thou shalt thresh the mountains, and beat them small, and shalt make the hills as chaff. 

Canada - Thou Foul Villain!! - Part Deux

I knew after halfway burning down part of Canada that there may be a day, or a time in my life I would have to return to the land sometimes referred to as North Wisconsin.

There came a call from my supervisor and one of the VP’s about 8 years ago and said that we purchased an office up in Ontario.  And the question was – who in IT has a passport?  I knew I had a passport.  In fact – I was one of 2 people in IT that had a passport, and the office integration was a 2 person job.  But, was it too soon?  Were the old wounds healed?

Canada and I never got a fair shake together.  The first time I went there it was to discover nature and bears and lightning and rain and stuff.  Canada instead showed me its dark side…which contained nature and bears and lighting and rain and stuff.  This time though, it had to be different, this time it was on my terms.  I was going into Canada to integrate an office for America.  Land of the Free and Home of the Not being Canada.  I would hoist Old Glory over their front door and declare them part of the USA corporate machine.

That didn’t happen.

I arrived in Canada with 4 days to accomplish a 7 day project.  You see in America, much like the Dollar vs. the Loon our time is 30% more efficient than their time. Their clocks have no 5-7PM on them, it’s true.  Instead, Canadians appear to use that time to visit restaurants not FROM America.

I should know.  One of the places we would dine at was called the Outback Steakhouse.  Now I know what you’re thinking, Craig we have those here, that is an American Establishment.  You are so right, but Canadians think this eatery is from Australia, making it more palpable to visit.

There are only a few things from this trip that I really remember.  Most of my time was spent in a room trying to upgrade the IOS on a Pix520 Firewall using a soldering gun and an rs232 cable.  I became familiar with the Microsoft ISA server.  I spent 2 nights putting antivirus on 15 workstations and removing all sorts of internet porn.  Yes, Canadians love their internet porn.

We (my coworker and I) visited several places while there; talking with staff at restaurants and even a church we visited.  Everyone we talked to had the same line of questions.  How long you in for, what are you guys doing, where you staying at?

It’s when we got to this question that people seemed to offer the most colorful reaction.  You see, we were staying at a Holiday Inn Express, and although the hotel we were staying in was very nice, clean and tidy with friendly service it appears everyone was aware that around the Holiday Inn Express there were several murders that week.  How exciting!

Another memorable moment included a trip to the local mall and radio shack store to try and find a specialized part I needed for a piece of Cisco equipment.  This inadvertently led to a “battle of wits” with the Shack employee Doug.  Michael Jackson had just released a new video that was playing on all the screens, and hiding my USA identity I asked Doug how that particular video was selling.  He said it was great everyone loved it.  I replied “Yeah, but he isn’t as popular in America anymore.”

Shack employee Doug replied “Yeah but they are stupid people, they’ll buy anything right?  They just elected the terminator as a Senator…”

Now…I can take a friendly jab or poke in jest.  I cannot however take a full on assault to my country’s intelligence from Doug at the Canadian Radio Shack.

I opened my mouth.  “Ya see Doug, its true Americans buy lots of Crap.  But what we don’t purchase we send to you ice chimps up here to buy. As far as the Terminator, he was elected as Governor not a Senator.  Our system of Government allows something like that to happen.  By the way, you can have Alan Thicke back”

I left the store…they didn’t have my part anyway.

In the end the office was integrated and no lives were lost around the Holiday Inn Express Hotel that week.

But just barely.

Theocentricity and other places to visit while Free-Willin'

I firmly believe it you speak with a British accent you are automatically smarter than people who don’t.  Idiotic?  Maybe… But were the Wright Brothers idiots for owning a Bicycle shop?

Yes.  Yes they were.  If they spoke with English accents they would have figured out that plane thing so much earlier.

I heard a new word this week and thought it sounded super smart.  If I could force a British accent I would say it all day long, maybe as long as a fortnight.  What’s a fortnight?  I have these with my kids sometimes.  It involves building structures out of couch cushions then having small pirate or ninja battles for the evening. 

But the word I heard was Theocentric*.  How awesome is that word?    I bet it can power a whole city, like hyperdynamics.  OK, I just made that word up.  But Theocentric is a real word!  Honest…

It means centering on God as the Prime concern.  Now I know I have both Christians and non-Christians read my blog.  I love you all.  So if you don’t wish to read about God this week, tune in next week for my part 2 telling of my second trip to Canada.  It will not be as preachy because…well, God doesn’t like Canada.  Especially the French side.

Ok, if you are still reading… there are things as a Christian I often have wondered about.  Many, many times I hear from people in Christianity about praising God every day.  And worship him, don’t forget to worship.  And thank him; you need to thank him for everything he has done for you.

And I begin to think to myself, wow, God seems pretty insecure if he needs all that.  What type of all powerful being needs me to tell him how great he is?  I mean, doesn’t he already know?  Cool kids in school knew they were cool, no one had to tell them they were cool, that’s what made them cool.

I had spent a lot of time on this, because if you ask other Christians these questions, they look at you sometimes like you must not have been reading your bible to see how awesome God truly is.  I understand the awesomeness, but God needs to be told he is awesome?

Someone said to me “But Craig, don’t you like being told when you do a good job, or when given praise for something you have accomplished?”  Well, yeah, but I’m not God.  I have self awareness issues and some psychosis and flawed perception of myself.  I am pretty sure the Almighty does not suffer my personal faults.  He’s perfect right?

Why do I need to tell God how holy he is?  He knows that right?  Or how good?  Is he not aware of that either?

I refuse to accept the assertion that the Lord in Heaven needs me to tell him for his own personal benefit how extravagant everything he made is.  It makes no sense.  How can a divine being require praise from a human being?  That’s like a 4 year old telling a physics professor that the professor is really good at counting the apples that are in the flash card picture.  The praise is insufficient and irrelevant.

So, I started digging into it and the answer was not that hard to find.

To the shock of some, it appears human beings in general are selfish.  Now I know what you’re thinking….Craig give me back my lawnmower you have had it long enough.

Follow me on this though.  Self preservation is very intrinsic to who we are.  We as individuals must make sure our basic needs are met (I am not going all Maslow here on you I promise), before we are capable of meeting the needs of others.  And when we become families, our selfishness extends to those we love.  We guard and protect our own.  As a man, husband and father I make sure the day to day needs of my family are met.  If I lost my job and times got desperate there is no telling what lengths I would go to protect my family.  I’ve never been in that situation, but I could imagine I would make sure my wife and kids had what they needed.

I don’t think we are all that different.  And I think God probably knew this.  Or had some idea.  Maybe a manual or something.

I notice though in my “Thanking God for All I have” requirement it forces me to stop and think about, on a point by point macro level what I truly do have, and what I should be thankful for. 

And it makes me… thankful.

I see my wife, who I still have despite some health issues.  My kids, two of which we almost lost to us during or before childbirth due to complications.  A job, when unemployment is 10%.  The fact that I am not French-Canadian.

Immediately when I become thankful my attitude shifts to people who don’t have what I do because of loss or some other circumstance and it then motivates me to be more giving in general.  Being thankful generates contentment and makes me aware of others needs.

The “Be sure you Praise God for his Awesomeness and his Creation!” requirement forces me to stop looking at the mundane and look at the extraordinary.  I have caught myself sometimes, driving home from work, pulling in the driveway and although I drove home, not once did I take the time to notice a thing outside my windows besides what was immediately in front of me.  There are some people who post pictures on the internet and they capture stills of nature that are awe inspiring.  If you don’t take the time and force yourself to look at what is, you will fail to appreciate how small you really are.  Humans in their arrogance and all their shining achievements are dwarfed in comparison to a clear night sky.

Each one of the crazy requirements that I am told to do for God in the end doesn’t benefit God very much at all.  It just removes the focus off of me long enough for me to realize certain truths and realities that exist and that funny enough, God is pretty awesome.

Theocentric, centering on God as a prime concern, reveals more about my humanity and my place in this life rather than me, focusing on my needs, first. 

The Wright Brothers were famous, but they were also Christians.  They felt that studying God’s awe inspiring creation of birds and how they fly would lead them to the proper dynamics of propulsion and lift to take flight.  They left what they knew about flight and gliders and bike frames and saw something extraordinary.

*word provided by Yankee Biz: Poet, Muse and thinker of random accurate thoughts.

If Life was an iPod

I never use the shuffle on my iPod. It makes absolutely no sense why I would want the songs to play out of the order I originally placed them in. I allow songs to illicit emotional responses from me when I need them. Some songs put me in a different state of mind, some for reading, some for being at the gym, some for listening to in the car.




All the songs I listen to have a special meaning. Who I was with when I heard it, or a time in my life that is associated with a certain brand of music. Kind of like Christmas Carols are for Christmas.


So it occurred to me, if I use that shuffle feature it would disjoint the events and responses that I am looking for at that specific time. I know what you’re thinking – Just make a play list Craig and select that to play THOSE songs. Well I would, but my iPod is old and doesn’t have that feature. Besides, I would rather hate to change it for another iPod when I love it so very much.


And that got me to thinking about how much we hate change. Most of the time you would expect to see change as something we look forward to and anticipate. But it’s not. Change is scary. One minute Roxette is telling you to listen to your heart and the next minute nSync is screaming bye bye baby. And you think to yourself how the crap did nSync get on here? Was that in my library? Was it in my wife’s? Who would do that to me? But you see it’s too late. Your rhythm is off and the plan that you had of having Shiny Toy Guns sing Major Tom to you is gone, and you are stuck. Even if you switch songs by now the fruity bubblegum pop sounds of a boy band are stuck in your cranium.


And there was nothing you could do about it. Sometimes life appears to be the same way in an oversimplified context. We all have plans that we want to stick to, they look great on paper. Then, life throws in John Tesh, and you are like…what the crap. There John Tesh is playing along, and even though he doesn’t mean any harm you listen and say, dude….you were a host next to Mary Hart, Where is my Entertainment Tonight?


Let me put it in another completely off the wall illustration from a fictional story that doesn’t matter much. In Lord of The Rings, after the Hobbits destroy the ring and make it back to the shire, something happens to the lead character Frodo. He’s changed by his journey. The events that occurred in his life had, well, changed his life from super death metal play list to Enya. He had changed, even though others around him had changed in their own way to, they didn’t grow how he had.


Let’s take a quick look at how that all went down shall we?

GANDALF

Farewell, my brave Hobbits. My work is now

finished. Here at last, on the shores of

the sea, comes the end of our Fellowship.

There is GREAT SADNESS . . . MERRY SNIFFLES LOUDLY.

GANDALF (cont'd)

I will not say: "do not weep", for not all

tears are an evil.

GANDALF (cont'd)

It is time, Frodo.

SAM

(alarmed)

What does he mean?

FRODO

(gently)

We set out to save the Shire, and it has

been saved ... but not for me . . .

SAM

(shaken)

You don't mean that - you can't leave.

SAM looks down . . . FRODO is holding BILBO'S RED

JOURNAL out towards him.

FRODO

The last pages are for you, Sam.

SAM is SOBBING . . . MERRY and PIPPIN are DISTRAUGHT . . . .

FRODO hugs MERRY and PIPPIN, and last of all SAM . . . and

climbs on board the SHIP a look of WONDERMENT crosses his face . . . as

he STEPS FORWARD and ACCEPTS GANDALF'S HAND . . . finally

released from his pain, care falls from his face . . . he is

the young FRODO we first met so long ago.

SAM, MERRY and PIPPIN comfort each other as the WHITE SHIP

glides away from the DOCK ...

The WHITE BOAT sails away towards the HEADLANDS,

disappearing into the GOLDEN LIGHT of the SETTING SUN.

SAM in growing darkness, still follows the

departing SHIP with his eyes, MERRY and PIPPIN are already

preparing to leave.

SAM walks up the path towards his house . . .

A LITTLE GIRL toddles up to greet him.

SAM

Elanor!

He hugs his daughter . . .

FRODO Voice Over

My dear Sam. You cannot always be torn in

two. You have to be one and whole for many

years. You have so much enjoy and to be and

to do. Because Sam, your part in the

journey goes on.

ROSIE COTTON steps up and kisses SAM on the cheek

. . . she gives him a TINY BABY BOY to cradle.

SAM with his FAMILY . . . he draws a deep breath:

SAM

Well ... I'm back.

SAM looks at his LOVELY FAMILY with GREAT HAPPINESS, tinged

with a little SADNESS . . .

Frodo made a major life change, and it affected, well, everyone. But it mostly affected Sam. Sam had been with him the whole journey step for step.


People who walk so long together begin to build predictability in their steps. A huge change like this is often unaccounted for. And often unwelcome.


Our perception on friendships is that a constant effort must be made for the relationship to continue. In some cases this is true. I had two great friends in College. After I was married and had my first daughter, I lost contact with both of them and haven’t talked with either person for 12 years or so. These are people I walked on many journeys with in growing up and becoming a man. And they were both gone.


My perception on friends is now a bit different. Friendship is something that is at the same time both temporal and everlasting. I may not always have my friend near me, but I will always have the friendship.


And when they do leave, to quote a fictional Gandalf “I will not say: "do not weep", for not all tears are an evil.”


Sometimes, you are Fordo, sometimes you are Sam. And sometimes, John Tesh creeps in when you know CCR was up next.

The anomaly of belief

When I was younger I was brought up a Catholic and told as a child I had been baptized into the family of God.  Staying in the Catholic church I was then told I needed a Communion and Confirmation.  I was taught that the Eucharist was the changing of a piece of bread and some wine into the body and blood of the Son of God that I worshipped.

Looking back, I realized that I believed everything I was told.

I needed to tell a grown man my deepest faults and thoughts, I had to ask this man to absolve me using some divine right given to him that through the power of his authority would give me penance and the sin would be made right and my guilty conscience cleansed from the fact that I closed the window on my sisters fingers accidently and stuck my fingers in the Jello before it had cooled in the fridge.

I believed everything I was told.

As I grew older, I began to doubt what I was told.  A man was just a man, the bread and wine was just the same.  And nobody who was just as faulty as I could take anything away from me with a few poems repeated around a set of beads.

Belief, because of how it was grown led itself to inconsistencies.  Becoming more pragmatic in thought I reversed course and questioned my early childhood programming.  What was it I was being taught, why and for what purpose?  Do humans really need to be given a religion to identify with, to rely upon and gain comfort from.  Does the thought of not existing at the end of a life scare and entire species enough to invent an afterlife that cannot be seen?

If evolution is to be believed, at some point humans were smart enough to get together in groups long enough to develop relationships and collaborate enough to agree that something invisible controlled their lives.  Not just one set of evolved people, but all of them.  For without evolution, you cannot have evolved man making a fictional deity.  Man became smart enough to pretend.  It wasn’t that an evolved upright man could see storm clouds coming in with lightning and assume that must be rain.  No, they had to find purpose behind the rain.  They were after all ignorant, weren’t they?  Purpose had to be found for the sun to rise, for floods, for the tides, for the moon, the stars, birth and death.  All this had to be given a meaning for the why they existed.  Someone at some point, using some type of communication in the grunting non communicative world had to push the non-existent into existence.  It had to be man that does this, since no evolved animal believes in a greater being.  Snails, as far as I know have no god.  Nor do birds, or dogs, or shrimp.  Cats seem to fancy themselves rulers in houses, but no animal I know builds a shrine to what they cannot see.  Somehow, evolved man became dumber than instinctual animals.  And in fear of standard elements that occurred daily, weekly and yearly the invisible made itself visible to primitive beings by their very own imaginations.  Maybe, the point in creation for their weakness in themselves and more in the invisible came when communication began.  Could the very first language that developed among the new bipeds contain words for god or spirit?  If it must be so then at some point there must have been agreement enough that this great invisible power must be appeased and worshipped and honored.  But how can something imagined be appeased and worshipped and honored?  Man must now begin to set rules and regulations.  Man is so clever at this time.  Not only does he make a god, he develops laws around which to serve the imaginary emptiness that he envisions.  Evolution of his belief becomes refined at this point and as communities grow so does the idea of his god.

If I trace man back to pre man, back to pre creation I am left with a cluster of matter of energy that just existed.  A compression of matter waiting for, well whatever it needed to accomplish before exploding into the statistical impossibility that brought forth all light and life as we know it.  That matter just was.  There was no unseen hand, no direction and no plan.  It just was.

If this is my reality that it just was, then all of life is futile.  Families, marriages, relationships are a sham and complete hypocrisy of human existence.  Bettering oneself with education and goals of helping less fortunate are a weakness to a species meant to survive and dominate in order to thrive.  Our teachers should be nature itself and focus should not be on developed laws of man, but on survival of the fittest.  Eugenics should be employed to the fullest extent and the weaker cast off so the stronger can thrive.  Morals should be defined to a minimal.  Emotion should be seen for the evolutionary fault that it is and be modified out early. 

An atheist would have you believe that.  But along with my Catholicism, I doubt what I am told.

When I was younger, I remember being outside my house and staring at a sunset during a late summer dusk.  The clouds were very prevalent; they almost looked like rolling mountains in the sky set in deep crimson as in the distance the sun dropped below the horizon.  Overwhelmingly and fleeting at the same time was a sensation that beauty as temporary as this is eternal somewhere else.  It happens sometimes still.  A piece of music, a painting or still photo, a good conversation with a friend, all temporary moments that give insight into something greater than what they represent.

That appreciation, as any scientist would say is a chemical reaction of endorphins in the brain.  People begin to chase those experiences.  Some repeat the feeling with friends, assembling themselves a community of like minded believers.  Others around music, either playing or listening.  It is an embedded appetite in every human that reaches for something more and something distant.  It’s an appetite that was placed there for a reason.

I had never found a satisfactory fulfillment for this appetite.  Anything experienced did not create the same feeling of community or fulfillment the second time around.  Friendly gatherings finished and the next day made me feel alone.  I would chase that feeling as I got older in different avenues in my life.  Recently I heard it expressed better than I ever have before.

“Do you see the picture of futility that is represented? When men and women turn their backs on the creator God who sustains the universe, who rules over the nations, who is Father of humanity and who is judge of all the earth, when men and women turn their back on God as he has made Himself known, then they don't turn to nothing, they turn to everything.”

In an effort to search out a fulfillment for what strikes our hearts as beauty, for what calls to us as lovely and good and right and fair and just and eternal with a sense of belonging and community and acceptance we tend to habitually forget the one who put that desire in us the first place.

I cannot explain to people a life with Christ.  It’s impossible, because everyone’s walk with him is different.  To the non-believer it is fictitious and unexplainable, to the believer it is a shared perception but nevertheless equally unexplainable.

The totality can be summed up in a simple statement: Because He is, we are.

And because He is, there is no need to search for another sunset, no need for another party, another drink, another symphony, another concert, another poetry reading no longer the need to cut oneself, to deny the existence of something you cannot see.

At some point a certain piece of scripture, when exposed to an individual, burns in the heart of the person who hears or reads it.

If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;

Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.

Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it

Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?

And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

Eternity for a moment is grasped and peace is obtained, through faith.

You just need to believe…not what you are being told by a fallible man, but what you are shown by an infallible God.

The kindness of strangers is overrated

Over the summer I ventured into the city of Lockport. Normally I spend as little time in Lockport as possible, it’s not that I don’t like Lockport; it’s just that there isn’t much to do there. For some reason, the one main strip they have in the city catches fire often, I believe due to the fact that it is so depressed that no one visits. They have a vacuum store on State Street, but that doesn’t even appear to have the pull it used to have.


While in the city I was out door knocking and introducing the church I attend IN Lockport to the city OF Lockport. You would think at one point the two would have met, or at least waved to one another but in most instances, neither knows the other is there. Some people think, “Why Craig, that’s really strange.” Or “Why would you want to do that?” or my personal favorite “This is a Baptist church? You guys use tambourines in your service and stuff?”

Sadly there are no tambourines, but I have a deep desire to see people end up in a church that they enjoy going to. I have lived long enough to see what it’s like when a person does not have a church home. After my Grandfather passed away on my Dad’s side, we had a Rent-a-Rev come in and ask us nice things about my Grandfather. He scribbled notes down to try to assemble some aspect of my Grandfather’s life together and I thought for a moment how nice it would be that someone in some clergy actually had known my Grandfather. During the service it seemed so impersonal. Like a funeral Ad-Lib where you insert the noun and verb and adverb and come up with a story of the person’s life.

Now if you’re an atheist, I understand that a person who is a practicing well, anything seems pointless to you. But when you die I am sure you want people to say nice things about you. Like how hopeful you were for the future and stuff.

Back to Lockport though. Ending up on a street the first house I came to and knocked a woman came to the door. I introduced myself, said where I was from and asked her if she attended church anywhere. She proceeded to tell me yes and then began telling me how her son passed away recently, and that she really missed him and would like prayers from our church. She then asked if I liked puzzles.

“Puzzles?”

“Yes! Do you like them? My son and I use to do them all the time.”

Oh no…puzzles. I sort of guessed where this might be going. You see, to me a puzzle will inform you how obsessive compulsive you are. How something that sits on your kitchen table unfinished is just a physical manifestation of your failures in life and how you never completed anything, The very fact that the puzzle not being finished shows you don’t care enough about it to take care of it and see it develop into what it should be and that is why your puppy ran away and got run over. Oh no….puzzles and I, we don’t hang.

“Of Course I LOVE puzzles!”

How could I not like puzzles? Obviously an important activity between her and her son I was not about to tell her that puzzles and I have never gotten along. ‘Wait right here!” she said and walked back into her house.

No sooner can you say “I wish she was a catholic who thought I was a Jehovah Witness” does she come back to the door with not 1 but 3 puzzles.

“These were the last 3 I ever finished and would like you to have them.”

SIGH….why couldn’t she and her son had collected large screen televisions…

I take the puzzles, thank the lady and am on my way. When I get home I show the kids my prize, thinking they will take these puzzles and lose them. They disappear for several months never to be thought of again.

That is, until Brandon brought one out last week. He was sitting in the living room putting the pieces together and I saw him developing the same relationship I had with puzzles. No sir, the cycle of abuse must end now, we shall be victorious. I inform Brandon to put the puzzle back in its box (he had only take out a few pieces and it wasn’t hard to put away).

Brandon, Katie and I spent the past couple of nights assembling this puzzle. It has 3 horses on it. Running free on a beach somewhere. They look happy, content to be in puzzle form.

I immediately turn on my advanced puzzle making skills, taught to me many years ago. Build the border first. Yes…preciousss…the border first. You cannot bring order to chaos without a boundary. Without it, the Great Nothing will consume the 3 horses, and the beach they are on with the childlike empress and your puppy is run over again with your parents just telling you he ran away. The Border first!

After 1 hour the border almost assembled of this 300 piece puzzle and there is a missing piece. The border is incomplete.

I swear to you I wanted to quit right here. I already assessed the remaining pieces and none of them was the final border piece. My mind went into fix it mode…did Brandon lose it? Can it be on the floor? Is it at the puzzle lady’s house? Can I go over there and check for it? Would she mind?

I didn’t say anything to the kids, Katie had joined us and they were happily building out the 3 horses. But I knew, it didn’t matter. Even if you assembled the entire puzzle, by default it will not be complete. It’s unfinished.

Over the course of 2 days and a night the children went to bed and I furiously fit the rest of the pieces together to have ended up with 2 missing pieces. The border and a horsey is missing his femurs.

Now what’s the moral of the story? Could I call the manufacturer and request those pieces specifically? No, they are already out of print. Could I find the same puzzle at a garage sale and grab those two pieces? No, then I will have 1 complete and 1 incomplete puzzle. Was the lady at the door an agent of Satan and knew of my complex and gave me incomplete puzzles? Maybe…but I doubt it.

No. The Moral is children that when you go to anyone’s door, ever, for any reason, take nothing from them unless it is hermetically or factory sealed.

Honestly though, I enjoyed the time with my kids. Katie is 10 and Brandon is 7 and I will never have this time with them again. I am thankful that we were able to have fun together, just like the previous owners did.