2023-10-10T16:08:53+00:00

Artists

October 10, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

Who are my favorite artists? That’s what the site wants to know today, and I have lots and lots of answers.

I recognize the idea is to lists singers, writers, painters, filmmakers, right? Morrissey & Rodin, Roth & Tarantino. There would have been a time that I would have jumped at the opportunity to make a list and explain (in great detail) why for each. Actually, I would still love, and may, in fact, do just that.

But I’ll start this list, not with Morrissey, but with my sister, who spent last week seeing U2 play at that new ball in Las Vegas, then Cirque du Soleil then next night, then visiting Red Rocks the next. I have a picture where she was, apparently, flying. In another one she was doing handstands on sand – I get those a lot. She’s a yoga master, and like all yogis, she yogas everywhere. She is now in her 50’s and has figured things out, to where her life is wild, imaginative and blindingly vibrant.

Next are my neighbors, who are teachers and young parents. Their daughter is a fireball of talent, which is fairly predictable, because her parents are overflowing with abilities, like musical superheroes. They’re also kind and funny, and last month brought home materials and built a deck onto their home. I guess their superhero-ism isn’t only musical.

You see, I think the greatest works of art are not albums or films, but our lives. We’ve all been created with limitless creativity and possibility, and when we can spot it, it’s exciting and hopeful. We are all inspired to do the same. It’s like invitations into our own lives, where we are free to run as fast as we can (whatever that means, whatever “running” is for any of us.)

The last one in this list is the one I’m most familiar with: The Angel. As the walls of her employer crumble, she is graceful and more and more stunning every moment, even as some of her dark hair is replaced with gray. Everybody with sense is abandoning that ship, yet she stays, she says “to care for her people.” Her people are, of course, all people. Now, completely superficially, she’s the most beautiful woman I know. I sometimes have to be careful on Sundays, I can easily lose my train of thought when I see her. But in a surprising twist, she’s way better inside, and I can think of no better compliment than that.

These artists, and their creations, aren’t perfect – it’s no accident that 2 of them are 2 of the people I know the deepest, and have had the biggest arguments with – but great art never is. We love Kurt Cobain and Against Me, we connect with them in ways we never could with Britney Spears and Backstreet Boys. The latter are sterile and produced, and the former are authentic and messy. Notes are missed, we might not understand the words, they’re flawed, with sharp edges. We love them. This is art, it’s the expression of the soul, not necessarily technical prowess, but humanity and, in that, intimate connection.

My favorite artists are Jetpack WordPress bloggers, self-publishers, youth sports coaches, RNs & CNAs, realtors, landscapers, therapists, teachers, secretaries – There’s no end to this list, I really could go on and on. I picked 4 to name here because…well…there isn’t a why. Part of my artistic call and talent is to point out awesome wherever I find it. There are constraints to this format, but there are no constraints to my life. And if every moment I can recognize and appreciate the countless artists I see, if every moment I can love another person and their art, then my life will be a masterpiece, too.

The Machines, pt 2

October 5, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The site prompt today is asking what my life would look like without a computer, and I couldn’t care any less about that. That bell has been rung, that box has been opened and burned and there is no stuffing technology into a new one. In addition, everything I’ve done today has included a computer.

The alarm on the Angel’s phone woke us up. Then I went to the gym, where I checked in via the Planet Fitness app, catalogued my workout on a Notes app, while I listened to The Baller Lifestyle podcast on Google Podcasts. Afterwards, I watched tv while I ate my breakfast, then completed a Title IX training online (required for my job at the school.) Now, I am listening to a “You Might Like” AI-generated playlist on Amazon Music while writing Jetpack blog posts on my iPad.

Feeding the animals in this house, brushing my teeth, and eating breakfast are the only things I’ve done that didn’t employ a computer. We won’t even get into the systems included to manufacture, market, and sell the pet food, person food, and tooth paste into my hands and mouth. I wonder if there is anything unrelated to our machines.

I also wonder how I feel about that.

There was a time where I would have identified as Luddite, opposing any and all forms of so-called “progress.” Maybe I would have been one of the revolutionaries destroying machines, attempting to destroy industry in the early 1800’s. (I suppose it’s still there a little – I did say “so-called” and put quotation marks around the word progress.)

I guess The Machines will kill us all – or keep us alive to be used as batteries for their cold future, but until then, I’m not sure I mind their existence too much. For just 1, we know each other only because of the new lines that connect us. For another, this AI knows me and my musical tastes better than I do. The Baller Lifestyle podcast has 2 hosts, 1 in New Jersey & 1 in California, and has given me more pleasure than I can possibly express.

They have created The New Religion, as they’ve made the old ones easier to adhere to. But which one are we following? At which altar are we worshiping? Is it the Christian church we livestream from across town, or the country? Or is it the screen we’re staring at? Is it our Bibles and Qurans, or the presses that print them?

I once heard the story of David and Goliath was actually a story of the conflict of infringing technology. Goliath had all of the newest armor and weapons, David had a slingshot and stones. We read how that went, but despite losing that battle, has Goliath won the war? Who knows?

When we download our “free” apps, it’s important to know the glaring fact that, without a product to buy, we are the products being bought and sold. And that’s ok. These free apps in the Meta-verse are great, we simply have to have our eyes wide open. When we use any social media, we are being manipulated, and probably the problem is when we can no longer recognize that manipulation. When we think the Facebook feeds we receive are the actual news instead of carefully curated tools to increase our time and clicks, that’s when The Machines (and their shady developers) win. Right?

If we are blind and passive, the New Religion becomes our religion. I don’t know what progress is, but I do know where we’re heading: wherever we choose. Either we choose love and kindness and beautiful connection or we choose to not choose, blissfully asleep, we become the blobs on the BNL spaceship in Wall-E.

Now that I reconsider, maybe I was wrong earlier, maybe I could care less.

3 Jobs for the Site Prompt

September 29, 2023September 29, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The site prompt is to list 3 jobs I’d pursue if money didn’t matter, which is a terrific door to enter, especially today. You see, it’s my birthday, and it’s interesting how things change over a lifetime.

When I was a younger man, birthdays were about celebrating me. (Now that I say it out loud, it seems like it should be a day to celebrate my mom – I was a 10lb baby – but maybe I was the best gift for her already, right? Ha. Anyway.) But now, pretty imperceptibly over the years, they have morphed into celebrating the people that are in my life. No longer celebrating me, but celebrating you for pouring into me in such wildly different and always beautiful ways.

I try to be a pretty thoughtful person, authentic and self aware, which leads me into days and moments where I look backwards & forwards, but mostly, I look around. Where am I? Who am I, who have I become, and who am I becoming? A birthday, as my phone is busy with well wishes and funny gifs, is a good day for that sort of thing.

So, as for 3 jobs. 3. Lead singer in a rock band. I wish I could sing the songs I wish I could write. My sister and I are always grateful that we have been given the gift of feeling songs so deeply, we cry easily at chord changes and perfect lyrics. Given the choice, I would have written “I Can’t Help Myself,” by Gene or “Hey Jealousy,” by the Gin Blossoms, and been a bitchin’ front man, doing high kicks like David Lee Roth and being cool, like Billy Idol.

2. Superhero. This kind of goes without saying, we’d all put superhero at #2. We’d rescue our love interests, catch bad guys, return purses, and just generally set things right.

And at 1. Pastor of a local faith community, which, in a wonderful twist of fate, is the one I actually have. I used to say I have virtually no skills, certainly none with which I could ever make a living, but that turned out to be untrue. I’m not overflowing with cash or anything, but that never mattered too much to me. In every way that does mean anything, I am the wealthiest person I know. Falling in love with Jesus is the best thing that ever happened to me, for a million reasons.

As I look at the 3, they’re very similar, aren’t they? I never connected that, until this very moment.

So. These 48 years that brought me here, with you, have been awesome – full of loss, pain, tears, heartbreak, laughter and unspeakable joy. I’m surrounded by the greatest people, doing the things I love to do; deadlifts, puzzles, watching dumb documentaries, listening, breathing, holding hands, kissing the Angel, loving God (and everybody else), and and and. That list could go on forever, I really love to do tons of things, but mostly I love to be here, now. So, how did I happen to get here? What did I do to deserve a life like this? Nothing, nobody deserves a life like this. We just accept it, as the amazing grace that it is.

I am a very simple man, and I am overwhelmingly thankful. To paraphrase the best Dr. Seuss book, Horton Hatches The Egg: I am happy, 100 percent.

What Is Truth?

September 26, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The title of this post is a very famous question asked of Jesus Christ by the Roman governor Pilate. He didn’t mean it as an actual question, he wasn’t asking. It was more of a rhetorical comment on the relativity of truth, if it even exists at all. If truth is a sliding scale, then it is simply based on the whims or preferences of the population, and of little to no use at all.

A few weeks ago, I watched a Netflix documentary called Nobody Speak: Trials of the Free Press. It purported to be about the legal battle between a website called Gawker and Hulk Hogan. It seems the Hulkster had made a video of himself having sex with his buddy’s wife, and somehow, Gawker got the tape and made it public. Is this the kind of thing that qualifies as news? Is this what people want to see? Before we are very quick to answer, we should replace “Hulk Hogan” with “Kim Kardashian” or “Paris Hilton” or “Pamela Anderson.” Of course we don’t want to see Hulk Hogan’s sex tape, but apparently, we do have an insatiable appetite for the sex tapes of young women, and we really don’t care too much how they are procured.

I say purported because the doc was actually about the person that funded the Hukster’s lawsuit, which he won, and another case of very very wealthy people attacking a media outlet that published a story that was quite unflattering. It was about news and truth and the effect of money on those 2 things.

The other documentary I watched was Eat The Rich, about the GameStop stock market manipulation. It was great – you should watch that one – but in it, a stock broker simplified the entire situation: He said (and I’m paraphrasing), if a company is healthy and well run, it’s stock price will go up. If i’s not, it won’t. That’s how the stock market works (or is supposed to work – there are lots of factors that can tamper with that purity, as you can imagine). The GameStop event represented the absolute divorce of stock price from the actual business. What was true didn’t matter at all.

These 2 documentaries had almost nothing in common except a Pilate-eque perspective of the truth, namely, that there isn’t any. You just get to choose what is true. I hesitate to say our culture, because it appears that it is every culture, for as long as human beings have been walking on this earth, that wants to ground truth in our own experience and opinion. Instead of The Truth, it’s ‘the truth’ or ‘my truth.’

When you see a news story, do you believe it? Does it matter if it’s on Fox News, Facebook or CNN? When you see statistics about COVID or the pros/cons of masking, do you trust what you read, or is it “fake news?” Our relationship with the truth has always been tenuous, but now it seems nonexistent, and there’s no way that can be a good thing. If nothing is real, nothing is sunk into stone, then how do we ever find the comfort that comes from consistency? There simply can’t be consistency when facts are a matter of perspective and objectivity is a myth. No wonder we all have such anxiety.

Who knows? Maybe there isn’t any Truth, maybe there never was, but I’m pretty sure none of us believe that. Instead, maybe there has always been Truth, maybe it’s always been the same Truth, and maybe we need to hold onto it a little tighter.

So, This Is What This Feels Like

September 18, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The Angel is home from work sick today. She works in an elementary school, so early-September illness is part of the job description. As we all know, children are sometimes very cute, and they are always germ farms, little individual super-spreaders. Everybody feels great when school starts, but as the runny noses (wiped on forearms and sleeves leaving slime trails like giant slugs) begin, viruses and infections are generously given to all inside. It’s inevitable, we take our turn and move on.

So as it is the Angel’s turn now, we watched the Reese Witherspoon vehicle Sweet Home Alabama today. As far as rom-coms go, it’s above average. But there is one very notable, very surprising, characteristic.

Reese is someone called Melanie, Jake/Josh Lucas is her childhood boyfriend. They marry, she moves away and meets McDreamy (from Grey’s Anatomy fame) – Andrew/Patrick Dempsey – and they want to marry, so she has to go sweet home to Alabama to secure Jake’s signature on the divorce papers. All sorts of hijinks ensue. You see, she hasn’t told anyone from her new New York life that she was ever born, much less from embarrassing (but wonderfully quirky and endearing) parents in Alabama, and was once married. (I’ll spoil the ending in a minute.) Obviously, it’s fairly rote, could’ve been written by an early AI rom-com program.

There are a few movies, like the Karate Kid and the Hunger Games, where the stars/heroes are the worst. Daniel Larusso and Katniss Everdeen are, by miles, the most unlikeable characters in their respective stories. Reese and Josh Lucas are terrible, the script says they are “in love,” but they clearly hate each other’s guts. Their marriage was a train wreck, and honestly, it’s good she moved away and they both moved on (sort of).

Moving on in the same way we hang on to old awful relationships because we’re seeking “closure,” whatever that means. This mythical “closure” doesn’t have anything close to the power to make these relationships healthy, but we hang on and Hollywood calls it romance. Go figure.

The great big exception is McDreamy. Our recent pop culture creates, almost exclusively (except for superheroes), caricatures of men, where they are always confused, embarrassing, and ‘hilarious’ in their utter uselessness. They are Raymond Barone, we shake our heads and laugh.

McDreamy is awesome. Not only is he gorgeous, but he is principled and classy, he loves Reese unconditionally and forgives her lies, deception and infidelity. It’s quite jarring to see a man played like this. He’s confident and assured, which allows him to choose her, not because he needs her or that she completes him (2 reductive movie tropes), but because he will love her, they will love each other, without balls, chains, manipulation, or co-dependence. That’s what he thinks. That’s what marriage is. She does not want this kind of adult relationship, though.

She leaves him at the altar, and he says precisely what we are all thinking, as we watch a deep, positive depiction of masculinity: So, this is what this feels like. Yes, this is what it feels like to be left at the altar, but it’s also what it feels like to see our expectations met by a man who behaves well; kindly, gently, selflessly. He is a unicorn, at least on film. But he exists in real life. I know many just like him, and it is absolutely beautiful to watch and enjoy.

She made the wrong choice, to be sure, but we all won. Sweet Home Alabama is an A.

Telemarketers and the Old Man

September 12, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The site prompt today is, “What personality trait in people raises a red flag with you?“ I’ve actually been thinking about this very thing, sort of. I’m probably going to sound like a severely old man, which maybe I am, in a paragraph or 2.

Telemarketers is a new documentary series on HBOMAX or MAX or whatever it’s called now. I couldn’t wait to watch it, it appears to be everything I would love. It isn’t. I turned it off midway through the first episode, so anything I’d have to say about it is incomplete. It’s entirely possible that there was a Shyamalan-esque shocking twist, where some sort of purpose was revealed. I did learn a few things, but not enough to view it as anything but a waste of valuable time. The people in it are proudly uneducated alcohol- and drug-addicts, ex-convicts, slackers (not the charming kind) and swindlers.

The telemarketers in the doc have not been given a bad deal and working to rebuild their lives, accepting anywhere that will give them a chance. They cannot find jobs because they have been poor employees. There is sex in bathrooms, drugs on desks, calls are made drunk and high. I’m not sure why anyone would send money through cold calls, but as it turns out, they are (gasp!!) a racket. The companies try to milk unsuspecting marks on charitable promises where the charity gets fractions of cents on the dollar. Whatever. We all know it’s a dirty, dishonest business.

What I want to ask is why this movie was made? Why would these people want to film themselves behaving like animals let out of their cages for the day? I know, the idea is to expose the company they work for, but they work for them, fully aware of the scam. In detailing their irresponsibility (in the job and how they do it) so shamelessly, who is really being exposed?

On the People’s Court (which, tragically, has been cancelled), litigants regularly posture and perform in very embarrassing ways. Kids think vandalism is supercool, violence is somehow a badge of honor, and loudly proclaim a lack of basic communication skills. Do I sound old??? Yep. But it’s not just the children, it’s everyone who dresses like they’re going to the beach instead of court, talks like it’s a locker room and not nationally syndicated tv, disrespectful in every way to the judge, the system, and themselves.

I’m really not a prude and have never said, “get off my lawn!” Fight Club is my favorite movie, Dave Chappelle is my favorite comic (just like everybody else), I’ve never blushed at explicit lyrics or ultra-violent content. I have an email address, write a blog, have Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat accounts (though I don’t use 2 of them), stream tv shows. I’m old fashioned AND wildly progressive.

I just wonder if the 18 year old boy named Dean on yesterday’s episode of People’s Court is even aware that he embarrassed himself. When the audience laughed, did he know they were laughing at him? Or if the makers of Telemarketers spent countless hours wrestling with the question of if the movie was important enough to outweigh the public humiliation of their own actions?

Here’s the honest truth (and my next post with be about our tenuous relationship with the truth, but this is absolutely true); these moments where we de-value ourselves, where we settle for what is clearly so far beneath us, devoid of any shred of dignity (or what the site prompt would call red flags) are so uncomfortable for me because I love them, love us, so much. I want to wrap the Dean in my arms and tell him he doesn’t have to do this, doesn’t have to be so sad, that he’s worth more than that. I want to shelve Telemarketers to protect the people inside, who don’t yet know they deserve to be protected. I want to show & tell them they matter, they’re enough, here and now.

I want us all to look in the mirror with such a deep love for what we see that we would never allow that person to be treated so awfully.

A Theory and A Resolution

September 4, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

I have this theory. Let’s say a person is ruining their life by, for example, listening to tons and tons of Dave Matthews Band albums. This is an objective perspective, no rational human could disagree, he/she is taking a sledgehammer to his/her precious life.

In scenario A, you don’t really know him well, if at all. If you walk right up and tell him what a huge mistake he’s making, “Repent!!!!” there is a 0% chance he will change this abhorrent behavior.

In scenario B, you know her very well, you are friends (not just online social media “friends,” but actual friends), BUT she has not asked you what you think of her choices, including this DMB mistake. If you, at that point, as a good friend, give your opinion, she will take it kindly & graciously, carefully consider your words and act appropriately 7% of the time.

In scenario C, a perfect storm occurs, and a very good friend asks you what you think of her choices, especially this Dave Matthews embarrassment. Now, you have a deep, solid relationship, AND she has asked you about this wrecking ball that is devastating her soul. When you answer her specific question, there is a sky high 21% chance of action.

This begs an interesting question. If my (admittedly anecdotal) theory is even close to correct, why would we ever reach out to another? Scenario A – the equivalent of sandwich boards on street corners – has no upside and could quite possibly end with physical violence. Scenario B and C have little hope for positive outcome and often ends with hurt feelings and/or distance & division. So why would we risk it?

We love each other, and we are called to care for each other, to be our brother’s keeper, that’s probably why. If we see a car bearing down on a pedestrian, wouldn’t we push them out of the way? Isn’t it our responsibility to push them out of the way? If we didn’t, aren’t we nearly as guilty as the driver? What kind of world do we live in, if no one is looking out for anyone else?

Of course, I’m not talking about simple personal preference, sticking our noses into everybody’s business, trying to ‘save’ each other from the wrong toothpaste or type of apple. This is real life.

I don’t take it well, when somebody I know and trust pulls me aside to critique or question the path I’m on. But certainly I should. It’s incredibly hard for them to do what they did, and it probably has been sitting heavy on their shoulders for months, trying to invent any reason to not confront me. Unless they are arrogant animals, in which case, it’s not courageous at all and is instead, wildly ego-centric and completely insufferable. I think I’m going to be more open to this kind of feedback, as my New September’s Resolution.

But if I have a friend who is fixed on self-destruction, Scenario B or C, where I’m as sure as I can be that it’s not a personal preference, and is a Dave Matthews-type situation, I’m going to try a 2 prong approach. First, I’m going to offer my perspective, with no judgment or expectation, in love and in gentleness. Well, the no expectation part is the second prong, which might just be part of the first. Maybe it’s just a complex 1 prong approach. With no expectations, I will take a breath and offer my heart, and if they do nothing with it (if they’re one of the 79%), I will be ok with it. I will lay down my insatiable desire to control in deference to the relationship and my love for them. I will try be ok with it and try to lay to rest that big nasty roaring bloodthirsty control monster in my head.

This is my theory and my resolution. Wish me luck.

Why The Safety Dance Is So Important

August 29, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/1 Comment

The Safety Dance is an ‘80’s song by Men Without Hats, not the be confused with the far superior Australian legends Men At Work. The biggest difference, to help us keep them straight, is that Men Without Hats had, as far as I can remember, 1 pretty good song (and a singer with a questionable haircut), and Men At Work were awesome.

In the grander scope, Men At Work are important. Down Under and Who Can It Be Now? are the monstrosities, but Overkill is the best. Lead singer Colin Hay gave significant contributions to the Garden State and Scrubs soundtracks. We are better people with better lives with Men At Work in them.

Men Without Hats, on the other hand, are mostly forgettable without the overwhelming number of ‘80’s 1 Hit Wonder compilations. But what I didn’t realize is how valuable The Safety Dance is to us today, in our current situation.

The song has one of the very worst lyrics ever written. “We can dance, we can dance,” (and here it is, get ready:) “everybody look at your hands.” It’s horrible, only there because it rhymes, as if a 2nd grade student wrote a poem at recess while everyone else was playing 4 square. We all cringe because there’s nothing else to do with it.

Meaningless awful lyrics are nothing new, but what’s interesting is that The Safety Dance also has one of the very best lyrics. “We can dance if we want to, we can leave your friends behind” (and here it is, get ready:) “’Cause your friends don’t dance and if they don’t dance, Well, they’re no friends of mine.” Awesome. I happen to agree, but the judgment twisted into the wordplay makes it so perfect.

It’s weird that the same band wrote both, creating a sort of dissonance. Our brain doesn’t know what to do with this. Are they embarrassing songwriters, or brilliant? Can both be true? Or does one cancel out the other? Does the bad drag the good down, or the good pull the bad up? Or. Or does it not matter at all, it’s just a dumb pop song and who cares about pop songs?

What I know for sure is that the last question is totally wrong. It’s not a dumb pop song. In fact, it can have a ton to teach us about moving around in an increasingly fractured world, where so many of our perspectives are from behind lenses of fear.

We are encouraged to set up divisions based on one facet of our personalities, one particular category (whether it is how we vote, wear our hair, shoe size, our color, sex, nationality, or anything else). In other words, we separate ourselves because others have an “everybody look at your hands.” We define others easily, cutting them up into pieces and then locking them in boxes based on just 1 piece.

The thing is, most everybody has a “your friends don’t dance and if they don’t dance, then they’re no friends of mine,” too! The reason I like everyone is the same reason I like The Safety Dance, because I choose to overlook our “everybody look at your hands.” Maybe not overlook, but I do choose to not judge the entire song because of one lyric.

I have an “everybody look at your hands,” and so do you. Everybody does. Maybe mine is that I voted for Donald Trump or Joe Biden. Maybe yours is that you have an addiction or a rough, checkered past. Or that you didn’t. Or that you live there, or wear that. Those things don’t have to close every door to keep us in & them out because somebody convinces us that we should be afraid of or distrust just one lyric in an otherwise good song. Our worlds get smaller, darker, and scarier with these overreactions.

We don’t have to like every song, Dave Matthews Band and Slipknot songs still exist. But the radio is better, more textured and interesting when everything doesn’t look and sound and think the same. So are our lives. Imagine how many songs we turn off immediately after their “everybody look at your hands” moments. This is no longer an acceptable place to live.

The Safety Dance is so important because, if we can adopt a Safety Dance mentality, where we can hold each other’s 10’s and zeroes, and stop missing so much beautiful music, we can begin to rebuild our lives and our world in a brand new cool new-wave image.

Middle Ground

August 22, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

The site prompt is asking me what my top ten favorite movies are. I used to be a person who had lists like these at the ready, walking around hoping someone would ask. Desert Island discs, top 5 foods, books, drinks, moments, and on and on. Once, I made a Top 500 songs list, and took real time thinking if I actually liked Rebel Yell (Billy Idol) or I Will Remember You (Skid Row) more, listening many times to each. As it turns out, I like Billy Idol much more, but I Will Remember You won the song battle.

I can’t give you 10, but what I can tell you is Fight Club and Pulp Fiction are my top 2, and Point Break is the movie I watched, and loved, most often. I saw it more than 15 times in the theater! That was, of course, when movies were affordable, the one where I saw the most Point Break showings cost $1.

So lately I’m having a lot of trouble in my head. It’s not unusual that I think I’m losing my mind. Either the world around me is completely insane, or I am. But it has to be one, there isn’t an awfully wide middle ground.

For example, in a recent poll, more people trust Donald Trump than their anyone else in their lives; religious leaders, teachers, even their friends & family. What are we supposed to do with that? In this particular poll, he had a 71% rate of trust. Families were in the low-mid 60’s. I recognize that this was a poll of very specific people, but still. Again, what are we supposed to do with this madness?

I see us stay in relationships that are nothing more than evidence of a damaged self-image. Where partners treat us like so much garbage, and we fight to stay, because any relationship is better than none? We stay in jobs we hate that are eating our souls, because we’re terrified of ones that are awesome. Why? Is it me, am I the one that has lost my mind?

The school district in which I live is in ruins, and the school board is shockingly brazen in their ineffectiveness. They tell anyone who will listen what they can’t do, which includes everything, as far as I can tell. That’s not entirely true, they vote on who can take tickets at football games. There aren’t checks and balances, the administration is dismantling any semblance of trust or respect with almost every decision. Why? Doesn’t a crumbling district reflect on them? Of course, but rather drive the bus into a wall than be a passenger in one that arrives safely, right??? Leadership is in short supply everywhere, it’s not just our local schools and Washington D.C. that are lacking.

The final scene of Fight Club is one where the 2 main characters watch buildings crumble. The system is broken beyond repair, so in a final act of domestic terrorism designed to tear it all down, absolute zero, to start anew. I am no terrorist, will never destroy cities, but it rings true for us as a metaphor. Is everything too broken to continue, are we too lost to ever be redeemed?

They stand and watch, hand in hand, and it’s beautiful. It’s strangely, deeply hopeful. Today my son is meeting a basketball coach at 7:30am at a nearby court. This coach is waking up early on a summer day to pour into my boy. I’m meeting 2 friends this morning for breakfast and bagels, we’ll look at each other, listen, talk and laugh, and maybe cry a little.

I sort of knew where this post would end. I do wonder if I’m the crazy one, if our collective psyche is too shattered to repair. But you probably know I think we’re standing in the thin middle ground. The world is incomprehensible sometimes (a lot of the time), and I am a fool. But I absolutely believe.

I believe in the power of Skid Row to ease our pain for a moment, and connect us. I believe in holding hands dreaming of better tomorrows. As a matter of fact, I dream of better todays. I believe one person can make a difference, like a coach at 7:30am, for a 16 year old boy. He will see this morning that it’s not all lost.

We put this back together, not trusting in Donald Trump or waiting for a school district to act responsibly, but in loving each other. In 2 hurting people holding hands and acting. When we look around, it appears to be a garbage dump, but that’s all a mirage. Yes, it might be garbage, but it’s not a dump. It’s not the end of the story, for the refuse or for us. It’s a gallery in waiting, where we can take these discarded pieces and make art with them. It simply takes some imagination, and the courage to jump.

Extra Cookies

August 14, 2023/The Bridge Faith Community/Leave a comment

I don’t know why we do the things we do. In the Bible, in one of the most relatable passages, Paul writes, “Why do I do the things I don’t want to do, and don’t do the things I want to do?”

It’s that way with me, too. I want to make great decisions, eat, say and do the right things. And yet I don’t. Why is that? And then, there is the maddening confusion and frustration as I watch others make the choices that will hurt them, and then they do this over and over again. I know full well that, as I write the words “others” and “they,” that “they” aren’t they at all, but me, and us.

Of course it’s confusing, how could I possibly understand another’s thought process when I often can’t understand my own?

I ask my boys why they do the things they do – I ask this for good, positive decisions as well as the ones that, umm, aren’t so good and positive – and they inevitably say, “I don’t know.” That’s probably what separates us, is a sign post on the journey to maturity, the self-awareness to know why. Maybe the decisions stay poor, or inconsistent, or irresponsible, but at least we know why.

A few days ago, the Angel and I had an argument over the day’s plans. I asked and felt she didn’t communicate and blah blah blah, same as every other argument. One of us didn’t communicate as well as we thought we did, or thought we had to, the other disagreed, and sentences get short and edgy. It’s the anatomy of a silly disagreement, and it’s over in seconds, as soon as we breathe and come back. So, I want the plans because I want to eat together (I value sharing meals, and I’m not too sorry about that) and know what, where, and when (I also value control, and I am sorry about that).

I wanted to be gracious and problem solve, but I acted more like a petulant child. But I know why I snapped at her, the good reasons why, and the bad. Adults know why. I know why I had the extra cookie: my wife baked them and they were awesome. I probably shouldn’t have had the extra one, I felt a little sick afterwards, but I do know why.

And it’s the why that allows, and encourages, us to change. Or not. If I choose to lay down my need to know and/or control (maybe they’re the same), then we can constructively address the meals and time shared without egos. That I would like to do. I know why I ate the extra cookie, and maybe the sick belly is worth it. As a matter of fact, it is.

I might have chosen abs over cookies when I was 18 or tomorrow, but today, I think I can lose 10 lbs AND eat the extra cookie, because I’d like to live a life where I can metaphorically eat an extra cookie, from time to time. Maybe that relationship is more important than waking up early to get to the gym. Maybe it isn’t, who knows? Maybe sobriety weighs more than the relationship. Maybe not. Maybe being in a current horrible relationship is heavier than leaving, the fear of leaving is greater than the pain of staying. It’s our own hierarchy of worth, and it doesn’t matter what our friends or neighbors or the gossip at work thinks about it.

The confusion and frustration may still be maddening (as I watch everyone, me included) make unhealthy choices, but if they are, indeed, conscious choices, then there isn’t much to say, is there? We decide, based on weight. After factoring our values, we ask, what weighs more to us? Not eating, or eating, that cookie? Needing to know/control, or kindness and understanding? Me or you? Now or later? All of these things matter, none is less, they’re just the worth we assign as the people we are now.

The only things that are unacceptable, in actuality, are to not know why, to not know the values, and to not use our internal scales. Once we can accept the ownership of our choices, we are free to change them if/when we want, as we change, as we transform into the kind of people who stay or leave, who stay up late or wake up early, or the kind of people who eats the extra cookie. Or doesn’t. We’re all different, and we’re vastly different from ourselves a month or a year or a decade ago. The things we valued then might not be the things we value today, we have to allow for growth in our lives. But we have to know ourselves enough to recognize what they are, to tell the difference between life and death.

Love With A Capital L

A journey towards living an inspired life of love in the modern world