Why?

Some twenty years ago, our little family of five set out to camp overnight at a lake about an hour’s drive from home.

Expectations were high.

So high, in fact, that we stopped at Walmart along the way and bought two identical Scooby Doo fishing poles, both the same color, each about three feet long, and a Styrofoam cup full of slimy worms.

The sweet daughter, who had been helping me recently on the job, and, who had spoken of her deep love for salamanders when we found one under the valve box we were digging out, professed no love whatsoever for the worms.  (And, truth be told, when I tossed the salamander at her during the time of professed love, there was a deep gasp and shudder as she removed herself from thence.)

We got the tent set up.

 We got supper ready for when we came back to it from our fishing excursion. 

We set out to haul in fish.

I took each of the Scooby Doo’s and rigged them each with an identical hook from the same compartment in my tackle box.

I took a worm from the brown slime and tore it neatly in half.

I put one half on the one hook, and the other half on the other hook.

I saw a school of fish about 30 feet offshore top feeding and tossed the line of each Scooby Doo in nearby. 

Both bobbers were within five feet of each other.

Whereupon the one young lad began to haul in fish, and the other young lad stood disconsolately nearby, hauling in nothing.

And, I stood nearby asking, Why?

Why, when I had purchased the poles from the same shelf, rigged them with the same type of hook out of the same compartment, and cast both lines in myself, within five feet of each other, why did one boy catch fish and the other didn’t?

Why, later in life, whenever there was a raffle drawing, the boy who had pulled in the fish always won a prize and the other didn’t?

And the question remains, and although perhaps in a bit different format, the crux of it remains the same.

Why is it always me that prints the last page of paper in the printer and I am the one who has to restock it?  (Even though I’ve purposely held off my printing jobs when I knew the paper was getting low, it still landed on me to fill it.)

Why is it always me who seems to be the one who gets the last square of toilet paper and I have to try to turn around and reach the new roll from the back of the stool?  Or, horrors, be the one who finds out too late that the public restroom stall they are in is out, and there is no extra roll in sight.

Why is my group number always in the 7 to 9 range when it comes to boarding my flight?

Why is it always me sitting at the corner, and I see the vehicle approaching and it appears to be slowing down, but no blinker, so I sit and wait, until, of course, it turns just like I thought it would?

Why is it my soda that gets a full cup of ice and a half cup of soda?

On the other hand . . .

Why did the dude at the rental car counter upgrade me without extra charge?  Not once, but twice, in fact.

Why did I happen to be in the McDonalds drive through and when I pulled up to pay, they said the folks in front of me paid for mine?

Why did I find the exceptionally kind, generous and loving family to marry into that I did?

Why does my wife love me?

Why do I have two boys, (one who catches fish and the other who catches other things just as or more important) that make me feel like life is worth it?

Why did I happen to luck out with the daughters I got?

Why has it been that I have friends who stand by me, regardless of my disposition?

I’m suspicious this last list of why’s could be quite a bit longer than the first list.

Wait a minute.  Has anything I have typed up to this point made any sense?

. . . .I wonder how I could rig the toilet paper though . . . .

Delight

She was older, maybe 20 years or so more than I.

She made an attractive picture as she stepped out of the pharmacy.

Her neatly coifed hair was that beautiful hue of silver that some folks are blessed to have before it goes all white.

Her grey tweed jacket was a shade darker than her hair and her glasses were of a later fashion.

Even though she was older than I, she was well put together and looked not much older than I.

But her hesitation at the edge of the curb told me her true age.

The pharmacy was very busy that day, and she had parked farther away from the building than she was comfortable with.

And between the curb and her car, a large patch of sheet ice glimmered and slanted down and away from her in the mid-morning sun.

“Get going on that,” I thought, “and a person wouldn’t stop until they were wedged halfway under a car on the other side.”

I stepped up beside and asked quietly, “May I help you to your car?”

She accepted without hesitation.

As we traversed the ice, she kept saying, “I hate this ice, I hate this ice.”

When we came to the far side of it and within steps of her car, she thanked me, and I was grateful she didn’t gush with it.

But her relief was palpable, nonetheless.

And I?

I walked away filled with delight.

Because I know Someone who delights to help me, and I was grateful I could pass His help along.

Sing Glory

“Music is math,” he said.

He was taking a break from serenading the shoppers at an upscale clothing venue when I happened by.

He was a professional pianist.

He told me he had to take two years of college math before he could even touch his beloved music.

He raved about the predictability of music, about its orderliness.

He said if a song is written correctly, and you know your music (or math) you can tell what’s coming next without seeing a copy of the music.

He asked if I had anything I wanted him to play.  I asked if he knew ‘The Old Rugged Cross,’ and he struck the chords off systematically, ending with a rousing crescendo that left me spinning.

Later in life I would come to know a small part of his knowledge.

I would learn that a song properly written will have the total number of measures divisible by four.

I would learn that if they weren’t divisible by four, that an inner rhythm in each one of us would stumble in the area that was written incorrectly.

I would learn that each chord could be broken, or rearranged, but never without the third tone. 

And I would learn that if I doubled the third tone, in a major chord that is, that I would drive any sensible singer slightly insane.

I also found out, later of course, that each chord has its own companion chord that is needed to resolve the tension remaining from any discord within itself. 

And at an even more basic level, each note has its own companion note that is needed to resolve the tension remaining.

And, I found out that just as my pianist friend said, music is very predictable in this way. 

That if tension is introduced, it must always be resolved before the end of the song, or the singer won’t enjoy the song enough to come back to it again.

Later I would learn the intricacies of major and minor chords, and how a half step, placed in exactly the right place, changed each of them into the other.

I would find that certain progressions make for dead spots in the music and other progressions made things sound off key.

I learned that discord, when used correctly, is actually a beautiful thing.

I learned that we humans are beings of need for predictability and harmony, and how with a prolonged brush stroke of the opposite of those two, whole nations have been swayed into different and dark moods; how personal respect and clothing styles have been changed because of the lack thereof.

And so, 20 some years later, I come to agree with my pianist friend.

Music is math.

But I’ve also come to learn that math, in and of itself, is sterile.

And I’ve come to realize, over and over again, that the song the angels sang to announce peace and goodwill, had predictability to it, without a doubt.

But it also had something else, I believe.

It must have had within its very fiber the echoes and feelings of the glory from whence it sprang.

Elsewise would we still sing it today?

There’s more to music than math.

There is glory within it, that springs straight from its eternal source.

Sing that glory, and you and those around you will be filled this Christmas season.

Blessed tidings to each of you.

Easy, Big Fella

I have two weaknesses, for sure, that I know of.

Each of them involves western clothing stores.

One has to do with long sleeve shirts.

The other has to do with a certain section where paintings are displayed.

And, perhaps in a move better for my finances, I spend more time at the latter.

The paintings intrigue me.

Their cost leaves me speechless.

Through the years, there is one that always arrests my attention.

It’s a picture of an early morning round up; guys are choosing their horses for the day.

In the forefront stands a huge cow horse.

Evidently the horse feels threatened, or knows a long day is ahead, and is letting his intentions be known.

What gets me every time though, is the cowboy at his side.

He stands unruffled, saddle in one hand, and a kind, steady hand on the horse’s shoulder.

All around them is chaos.

But the scene distills down to just those two, and somehow, I know the horse is going to be okay.

And I’ve always sort of envied that guy with his hand on his horse. 

To me, he seems like a real man.

*****

The moon was barely a gibbous sliver in the southwest sky.

The wind, a constant presence, blowing it’s thirty-degree chill right into my bones.

I looked up and saw one lone planet above, and brief smatterings of stars intermittently glimmering through the haze.

In front of me was a 14 x 14 inch junction box that was already partially filled with large ought wire and their corresponding junctions.

We were there, Austin and I, to do an interconnection between our customer’s new solar array and the main service.

We were there late, around ten or so, to do the connection after hours so we didn’t disturb the workday and employees. 

It didn’t help that it was a multimillion-dollar company we were working for.

Neither did it help that, due to unforeseen circumstances, we would need to do our connection, inside that already busy box, live, or in our jargon, ‘hot.’ 

Which means we couldn’t turn the electricity off.

I shivered, but not from the cold.

It looked like it could be a drawn-out job.

I held the light as Austin carefully sorted the existing wiring out.

I watched and listened as he slowly talked himself through the plan.

We wrapped tape around our tools as an extra precaution and set to work.

I observed as Austin, with a surgeon’s precision and steady hand, made his first move.

We did the neutral first, as it was the least loaded of all the conductors.

Next was phase one, which was carrying around 20 amps. 

Blue light flashed around us as it arced while we pulled it from its socket.

It went easily enough.

Next was the wild leg, which was carrying nothing, so no arc, but still a definite injury or death if contacted with our body.

The box was getting fuller, now, and the cold wires stubbornly refused to bend.

After some muscle, the wild leg was done.

Now for the last phase.

This one was carrying more amperage, and, the box seemed soo full.

I had the skitters by this time, and had to take a firm grip on myself when the blue flame leaped out upon disconnect.

Finally, we were ready to reinstall the last leg.

And things happened really went fast for a bit there.

Because it started arcing immediately upon contact with the lug.

This wasn’t good.

If not corrected soon, it would weld itself into a new position that would end in a phase that didn’t carry anything.

And the multimillion-dollar business would grind to a halt.

Austin’s hand flew to push in on it. 

On instinct, my hand jumped to his and pushed down as hard as I could.

We both felt it sink home, and quickly tightened the lug.

I exhaled a shaky sigh and looked upwards, thanking the One who had put His shield between us and a very bad end.

The stars were gone, the moon settled in the west.

Somehow, I like to think that I almost heard, ‘Easy, Big Fella,’ last night, as I saw my son’s steady, sure hand against all the pent-up energy, and maybe, the same kind of men that observed that chaotic morning scene and mastered it in that long ago picture may still take their place among men today.

Here’s a link to the authors site if you wish to view the painting.

Easy Big Fella – Clark Kelley Price

I’ll Scratch Your Back, If You Scratch Mine

More and more, it’s becoming to do so.

I’m guessing the advent of social media has been a large influence.

And, with the advent of social media stars become superstars more quickly.

But neither you nor I are stars, much less superstars.  (Forgive me if I insult you.)

It’s a popular, even fashionable, entanglement. 

One where each side coyly digs for the scratch on their own back by enumerating the good things in the other side.

There’s another word that looks and almost sounds the same as coy, namely, cloy.

And that’s how the conversation turns when each side wants the other to scratch their back.

Some of the synonyms of cloy are, syrupy, sticky, sugary, sickly, and saccharine. 

In a word, gross.

But it’s amazing how easily we plumb the depths of our own base nature.

And all we get, if the game is played fairly, is the same base nature given back to us.

The Next Step

I remember the first time she told me about it.

We were sitting out on the front porch of her Grandparents cottage.

It’s the same cottage I’m at now, with the same shower water that drives into my back like flintstones, because of the pressure behind it.

It was a sunny afternoon, almost too warm, but then, what can you expect for summers in the south?

I was sitting on the bench swing with the straight backrest, and the longer we talked, the squirmier I got.

She sat poised, thoughtful.

We hashed about this and that, and then she dropped the news on me.

I went from squirmy to stunned in a nanosecond, and I’m guessing my move wasn’t lost on her.

She told me she was going to start nursing school.

My mind blocked off for a bit while I processed that info.

Because, the first thing my mind said was that she was shooting herself in the foot.

For starters, she wasn’t married, and I figured this move would do serious harm to that thought.

And secondly, I knew a bit about the rigors of nursing school, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to see her go through all that agony.

Thirdly, I knew some in her family were squeamish about blood, and even if I didn’t know if she was or not, I wasn’t sure how much support she would get from them because of that.

Of course, this whole thought process didn’t take very long to deliberate on, and in small minute I heard myself voicing my support for her proposed life choice.

It wasn’t until later that day I realized how much wisdom was in her choice.

Nor how much courage.

I began to realize how much it must have taken to turn the page to this new chapter in her life.

(Or at least I thought I did.)

And I realized that it was the step that was headed in the best and right direction.

I realized then that she isn’t so much different from most of us.

I have friends who have been in the same situation, more or less, as she was, and I saw them taking this same step.

It’s a step that, when looked at with a cursory glance, seems headed in the wrong direction and away from everything safe and normal.

But it’s a step when viewed with more time and experience, shows it was actually the right thing to do.

I thought of how her life would have gone, should she have chosen not to take this step. 

It certainly would have constricted, I realized, as I viewed it from a few steps back.

And, what I thought in the beginning, that she might be throwing away any chance of other plans seemed completely opposite when viewed with this new insight.

I see people stepping forth to become schoolteachers, cna’s, secretaries, jobsite foremen, logistics managers, you name it, and I see them taking a step away from what they know, and a step into what that they don’t know.

And I applaud each of those steps.

Because it seems, when viewed from the other side, that each of those steps is the epitome of enrichment, regardless of how nonsensical they seem at the time.

For sure when I saw the 70 plus folks who showed up for her graduation yesterday.

Or when I saw her giant of a big brother turn her way and she tucked herself into his strong embrace. 

And I knew that embrace had been waiting just for this time to tell her what he thought of her, really.

Most of us know very little about nursing, or nursing school.

But we knew a lot about how the one graduating has enriched our lives in the past 3-4 years. 

I hope I will always have the courage to take that step, whenever it is presented to me.

Energy Drinks

I first heard him talking about them in the room nearby where I was sitting.

He was going on and on about how good it was.

He talked about the Italian soda, about the cream, about the blue raspberry flavoring, about the hint of coconut, and finally, about the infusion of Red Bull.

And that is where I more or less tuned him out.

Because, I have a thing about energy drinks.

And up to that point, I had kept myself pure, kept my lips unstained from such.

To be clear, coffee isn’t an energy drink.  In fact, as we speak, I am drinking some.

It offers up some caffeine, for sure.

But that isn’t so much what I have against energy drinks.

It’s the hype that I don’t do.

I can’t gather onto the shameless actions of these big drink companies that play into the hands of unsuspecting teenagers.

I get perturbed when I see all the rad sports that these companies have their name emblazoned in garish lettering on as the video flicks by while trying to maintain contact with some twisting, contorted human being that is in serious danger of life threatening injury upon arrival back with blessed earth.

I mean, how funny would it be to see coffee beans and their associated origins flaunted at such events. 

And when I step into the trucks of my boys and those hired on with us, I see tabs from any number of various drink companies stuck in the headliner and, in one case, encircling the entire cab roof . . . I must come to grips with the reality of really how successful these companies are.

But I can’t toss everything he’s saying about his drink out.

Afterall, he was the one who got me started on Ariat shirts, and that when I didn’t even know such a thing existed.

And that little sideline hustle of his has proved rather successful in my life.

Anyways, I mostly forgot about his sales pitch about those drinks, until one day he walked into my office with one of them, ferried all the way from its source, 20 miles away, dripping with dew, and extended towards me with unmistakable intention.  

Of course, I demurred.

But such wasn’t an option. 

I think, if I remember right, that I waited until he was out of my office to take my first pull on the straw.

And, I think if I remember right, I reconciled that first drag with the thought that it would only be one sip and then I’d leave the rest of it for my daughter, leaving me largely unscathed of the reputation of such an imbiber.

But the dumb thing is, I couldn’t stop.

It tasted so good I almost thought it was sinful.

And, lest I be less than perfectly transparent here, I sneakily made my way to a mirror when no one was watching, to see if, in fact, it had colored my tongue blue. 

And, stupid thing is, I’ve found myself driving twenty miles out of my way, on hot summer afternoons, or even just regular afternoons or mornings or evenings, to get that drink.

I guess I’m a member of the club, even if I don’t look as young as the rest of you all. 

And, I gather that others find it about as amazing as I do.

Right, Whitney?

She

She lies quietly by my chair during mealtime.

Looking on, one might think she were asleep.

She has taught me several things already.

One is, I must put my silverware down a bit more firmly when I am finished with my meal.

I didn’t know I did this, but she does.

Because she lies there, like she is sleeping, until she hears me do that, and then she raises her head, waiting, and looking patiently at me.

And I give her my plate to lick clean.

And the other thing she has reminded me of is that a man who lived in Galilee a long time ago talked about her.

If I remember right, humility was one of the keynotes in his two-sentence sermon that day.

We

She often says, “We.”

Like, ‘We’ should put the glass back in the lamppost out front.

Or, ‘We’ should clean out the car.

Or, ‘We’ should get the garden shed cleaned out.

And I think there must be some trick to it, but I can’t say for sure.

Because those are all jobs I normally do.

So, last night, when the last batch of freshly processed pears were semi frozen, I pulled them out and sampled them.

And I said, “‘We’ did a good job of getting these pears put up this year, didn’t we?”

Boy

He always called you boy.

Even though you were 18 by the time you worked for him that summer.

And, you were always just a little bit scared of him, even though you really had no reason to be.

Maybe you were scared because he was an established community figure.

Perhaps it was because he had been extremely successful in his farming career.

Or, possibly it was because he never let all of himself out to you.

You had a good job with him. 

He was farming with the latest equipment, and, you were privileged to be the first one to break in his brand new 4960 front wheel assist John Deere tractor.

You found pure enjoyment running that rig, pulling a set of 9/5 sweeps that cut a 40-foot swathe behind you. 

He was switching over to mostly dryland by the time you worked for him, but he did have one quarter that he still farmed with flood irrigation.

The throaty roar of the 496 motor churning out water for his crop made you smile every time you drove out to check it.

And, that particular field was a mile long, which was another interesting feature in a community where most fields were ½ mile or shorter.

You got your share of cleaning out bins of last year’s crop that had turned moldy and stank enough to make your eyes water.

And, in the off time of farming, you and he rebuilt old two-cylinder John Deere tractors, which, at that time, you didn’t enjoy so much, mainly because you really didn’t have a clue what you were doing. 

Later, when you worked full time at the local John Deere, rebuilding engines was your favorite, because by then you knew your way around engines more or less.

He had two sayings.

One you heard several times, the other you heard only once.

Both left lifelong impressions on you.

The saying you heard only once was after you had forgotten about an auger down spout.  You pulled through and the implement you were using was too tall and clipped the down spout and tore it off partially from the auger.

When you found him, later, and showed him the damage, he said, “Boy, I expect a few mistakes; proves to me you are working.”

The saying you heard often, and frequently coupled to the end of some discussion you had been having was, “Boy, nobody owes you anything.”

At first, that last statement stung, because you thought he had seen something in your way of doing things that prompted his saying it.

And maybe he had.

But, looking back, you realize more than likely he was speaking from years of experience and hoping to pass along a piece of wisdom that would do you well in the years to come.

The saying, “Nobody owes you anything,” has filtered through the dusty glints of your consciousness off and on through the years.

And it has served you well.

And, once or twice, has stung as it visits you again.

And, as you have grown older, you realize that within that saying may lie the true secret to happiness.

Maybe that is why the statement made to you by a retired navy officer made you feel the way you did. 

You had thanked him for his service to the country and he replied, while looking you full on with long range seaworthy eyes, “You are worth it, buddy.”

Or maybe that is why the lady at the pharmacy charmed your boy heart the other day when you stepped in and before you were two steps in, she said, “Hello Mr. Les.”

You knew she was out here from the Carolinas, and you knew she had the familiar southern English and politeness to her. 

But you didn’t know her name, and you realized she had made some effort to learn the names of the store’s clients in a community where she didn’t know anyone.

That’s when it all sort of clicks in your mind.

It’s the things we do for others, and the things they do for us, that we don’t owe, that makes for the greatest happiness, both in your life and theirs.