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Funny how things turn out, Part IV

  Let me start off by first saying that sometimes I can be a real idiot.  Okay, that on record, here’s what happened.

  So, after my last update I decided to try to move on.  After all, I was a good guy, right?  I could date around and find someone to be happy with, right?  I was still part of a singles ward where the possibilities were almost endless, right?  I could find happiness even if it was with someone else, right?  …RIGHT?! 

  Well, apparently not.  Once you know a good thing it’s easy to leave it.  It’s a lot harder to leave it alone.  Sarah was a very good thing.  She was a good person, kind, caring, bold and unapologetic.  I knew that I was falling for her – in truth, probably already had fallen for her – and yet she was gone, again.  I tried to get involved in my work.  I tried to get involved with my singles ward.  I tried to resume friendships from across the world that I had been neglecting.  And it worked for a time as a distraction.  I even wrote more in my blog. 

  You may see from my blog that it is rather eclectic already, but obviously I write about what is on my mind at the time.  It was about this time that I decided to write about the nature of constancy, the importance of making a decision and sticking to it.  I wasn’t writing it TO anyone, but it was obviously on my mind.  I also was turned onto a song by Julie Atherton by a dear friend.  I even wrote an entry about how frustrated I was with my current lot but decided it was too much.  I was blaming people for things and I was upset when I wrote it, so I thought better of posting it. 

  It had been some time without any contact from Sarah.  She had gone silent.  No blog updates, few Facebook updates.  Well, that’s not exactly true.  She did go to Vegas…   I missed her.  But she was moving on and I tried to as well.  Until one night, I saw that she was on Facebook and I shot her a quick message to just say hello.  Small talk.  Mostly I just wanted her to know that I was okay and that I was still willing to be her friend.  Quickly, it seemed, we fell back into old rhythms with how we talk.  When I realized what was happening, I caught myself and tried to steer the conversation in a different direction. 

  Then I did something idiotic…  I asked her for dating advice. 

  Yup, I was that bone headed guy who asked her what to do to make contact and a good impression on someone else.  My reasoning was sound.  I thought two things.  First, we had always been totally honest with each other and she knew me very well as a result.  Second, if we were going to be friends this is something that I would talk with a friend about freely.  She was hurt and upset that I had asked her.  When I asked her to explain her reaction and I explained my reasoning for asking her, she told me that she doesn’t know how to be “just friends” with me.  At first, I thought this was a bad thing.  I thought she meant that we couldn’t have any kind of contact because it was too weird/hard for her to stay in contact. 

  Once again, I was wrong.

  The next several weeks were a blur.  Seeing her again.  Holding her again.  Hearing her voice.  Seeing that moment of realization when she thought she felt something but was unwilling to say it out loud.  I knew.  I knew that it was all over for me.  I knew that I had fallen and fallen hard.  My schedule was absolutely insane with work, my boys and this new show I was involved with that took most of my evenings during the week.  Still I made time to see her.  Even sacrificing my precious sleep to do so. 

  One night after spending the evening together, I wrapped her in my arms and sighed.  When she asked me what the sigh meant I simply said, “I love you.”  It was the first time I had said it out loud.  My heart was pounding as the words left my lips.  I remember thinking that this was one of those before and after moment where everything in our history from now on would be measured as before I said it and after I said it.  She told me that she knew and I was content.  I didn’t expect her to reciprocate my sentiment.  After all, our story thus far had been me developing feelings for her well in advance of her. 

  Then it happened.

  As it was getting late, I realized it was time for me to go.  I was getting ready to leave and she reached out and took my hand and said she loved me, too.  It felt totally normal and natural, like it had been said hundreds of times before and as a result it took me a second to realize the impact of what she had just said.  She loves me. 

  SHE LOVES ME!!!!

  That was some time ago now.  The words don’t get old, their meaning only intensifies. 

  What an adventure it has been getting here.  I have known Sarah for 7 months now.  I am in love with her.  What kind of adventure is in store for us from here?  I don’t know.  But I look forward to it.

Marked

  Everyone knows someone somewhere who seemed different from other people previously encountered.  Someone who seemed to have that little extra twinkle in their eye, perhaps or that little half smirk that would pop out whenever the conversation turned toward a particular subject.  Surly even now you can think of someone that just seems to “get it” when you try to talk about an experience you’ve had but have difficulty articulating.  We may consider these people to be seasoned, knowledgeable, experienced or even wise.  Funny thing is that age, while commonly associated with the wisdom of experience, has little to do with this curious phenomenon.  I tend to think of these people as having been marked by experience. 

  For example, the young woman who grew up in a fairly religious and conservative community who, though always considered to be a good girl, had to reveal that she was pregnant at 17.  Or her family who are so incredibly loving, understanding and giving to others, but in quiet moments have that little hint of something extra glinting in their eye as if to say, “I understand.  I’ve been there.”  These types of people seemed almost more genuine to me than others who were seemingly without flaw.  Certainly I felt more comfortable and trusting of these wonderful people than I would of some plastic someone who had never screwed up before. 

  It has been my personal experience to find this phenomenon very commonly among those who have been divorced.  There is an almost instant kinship between two people who have shared a common experience so emotionally tumultuous.  I remember meeting a particularly talented younger actor who was just concluding his divorce.  I could see instantly that there was something that had changed him from who and what he was before to the man that stood before me.  Though we had never before met, we were able to talk at length about our shared experiences.  He would ask me questions about my experience and offer information about his and vice versa.  We talked for several hours and parted ways as instant friends. 

  I imagine this is the draw of collegiate fraternities across the country.  Perhaps the hazing that is endured by pledges of different houses serves to cement the bond of brotherhood more than anyone but those that have experienced it would understand.  On a larger scale, I feel this is what draws men of the armed forces together over so many differences like race, religion, background, upbringing, social class, etc. and allows them to be brothers even if they didn’t engage in the same fight.  I have witnessed two men with 35 years difference between them realize and instant brotherhood upon learning that the other was also a marine.  They had both served their country, both fought in real combat, both suffered the loss of friends and both been marked by the experience and they saw this in each other.  Once a marine, always a marine. 

  Many different things can mark you.  It can be as simple as first love bitterly lost.  It can be death of someone close to you.  It can be merciless ridicule because of your appearance or because you are different from others.  I can be that you have witnessed something truly awe inspiring.  It could be that your life as you knew it was shattered and you had to rebuild a new one.  It can be that your expectations were not met.  It could be that your wildest expectations were exceeded.  It could be that you have seen true greatness in people.  It could be that you have seen the face of pure evil.  Having children can mark you.  Having children with a disability can profoundly mark you.  Experiencing the limits of human experience, good or bad, can and will change you and it leaves a mark on your life and your experience and you are no longer unblemished.  I would describe it almost as a loss of innocence, but it’s so very much more than that.  It’s almost like an awakening of understanding; like a change in the way that you think and reason.

  Now, I have always been a fan of things that have character.  A book well-worn with use and time is far more appealing to me than a brand new book with the spine never having been cracked.  So too with furniture: like the bookcase that has a gouge where a child hit it with a toy in a moment of frustration.  Or the art that has perhaps one or two brush strokes that seem like they shouldn’t be there.  Some would look on these things and consider them flaws, impurities or imperfections… I consider these things to be the character of time well spent and a life well served.  This is also true of people. 

  The battle weary with their thousand-yard stare burning through the unseeing distance may seem broken when looked on by the untrained eye, but these are the good ones.  Those who have been battered and beaten by the tidal currents of life’s ebb and flow are the real people.  Those who have been touched by the heat of the refiner’s fire and are changed by it are the genuine article.  These are the salt of the earth.  After all, it’s our imperfections that make us unique and truly make us great.  Life was not meant to be put on display under glass.  It was meant to be lived, dirty, messy, painful, horrible, wonderful, amazing, loving and brutal, it was meant to be experienced in order to change us.  

  That’s life, what can I tell you. 

Sleep

  Those of you who know me and are reading this will probably know the love affair I have with sleep.  You will also probably have heard the stories of my wonderful bed and how much I love it, too.  I love sleep and think it is about the second best thing in the whole world. 

  While in flight school, I had the chance to study sleep extensively.  I began looking into it as it pertains to air transportation safety at first, but as I found out how it works and what works better to get a great night’s sleep, I became fascinated by the technical aspect of sleep.  The simple fact of the matter is, though we know much about how sleep works and what it kind of does, we still do not know why we need to sleep. 

  “Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleave of care
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast”

  --William Shakespeare, Macbeth

  I suppose I could regale you with the process of sleep and how it works, but I won’t; Sufficeth to say that sleep, for me, serves a multi-role purpose in my life. 

  First, sleep is a healer of the body.  During specific stages of sleep respiration is increased while blood pressure is decreased along with heart rate and body temperature.  While in this state the body, which is amazing in and of itself, goes to work repairing the normal damage inflicted on it during the day.  This is the stage where muscle tissue it regrown, dead cells are sluffed off and carried away to be disposed of and other “maintenance” procedures are completed to allow the body to function.  This stage is particularly important for those who are much more physically active during the day than others.  This is also the stage in children where they grow. 

"And if tonight my soul may find her peace in sleep, and sink in good oblivion, and in the morning wake like a new-opened flower then I have been dipped again in God, and new-created."

            --David Lawrence

  Second, sleep is a healer of the mind.  While you dream somewhat through the whole night, you really only begin to experience vivid dreams later into your night’s sleep, usually after the fourth of fifth hour of sleep.  This is when the body has completed most of its physical repair and can now turn to the repair of consciousness.  This is when the brain, magnificent and mysterious, literally “cuts off” communication with the rest of the body and begins a pattern of sleep that is incredibly similar in brain activity to being awake.  This is the time when a person experiences deep dreaming.  This is the time when the subconscious mind, which is far more perceptive than the conscious mind, “downloads” its contents into the understanding of the mind and begins to sort out things that were not possible to process during waking hours. 

  Have you ever been so frustrated by something you were thinking about that you just couldn’t find a way to understand?  Then after getting a good night’s sleep, you take a second look at what was so frustrating and it just seems to make sense.  During REM sleep, neural pathways are formed between stored information in the brain which allows access of information between related subjects.  It’s like the most advanced cross-referencing software you have ever imagined on steroids.  This is the time when emotional confusion is understood.  This is when intellectual dilemmas are worked out.  This is also the time, I believe, when personal, individual, divine revelation can be received and understood.  More on that point in a later posting.

  “The bed is a bundle of paradoxes:  we go to it with reluctance, yet we quit it with regret; we make up our minds every night to leave it early, but we make up our bodies every morning to keep it late.”

 

--Charles Caleb Colton

  Third and finally, sleep is a chance to lay down the cares of the day.  It’s like a miniature death that allows you to lay aside your frustrations and worries of the waking world and succumb to the peaceful bliss of infinity.  If sleep is the microcosm of death, then I do not fear death and will welcome it, but for the pain of those left behind, when it comes.  Sleep is a chance to reassess and realize what is really important.  It is a chance to take the longview of things. Sleep allows me to begin to fathom the mysteries of the universe and even gain a little understanding and a few answers to the unanswerable questions of life. 

  Now, here’s the punch line.  Why, you may ask, when I feel so strongly about sleep do I often forsake it in favor of time doing other things?  Why do I spend time with other people instead of seeking the wonder of the sleep I have just described?  The answer is simple.  Because I choose to. Because it’s worth it.  Because I feel that time spent with that person is worth more than the sleep I am giving up.  Because, as wonderful as sleep is, as amazing and blissful as it can be, real life and real people and real interaction is worth so very much more.  If you are one of these people that take the place of sleep, feel loved, valued and cherished.  You are the first best thing in the whole wide world.

Loss

  I had a dream last night.  I don’t know what it means, but it left me pretty shaken when I woke up today.  In my dream my family was hiking through a forested, mountainous area with large, full trees, rocky trails, birds, animals, the works.  It was beautiful and serene.  My parents and sister were there laughing and talking with me, my brothers and our kids.  It was picturesque, really.  I remember the impression, now after waking up, that it had been a wonderful time of fun and adventure and that we had really enjoyed the day. 

  Then in an instant it all changed.

  My boys were running around the trail up and down a sloped section of the path, goofing off and playing tag when suddenly my youngest, J, slipped and fell.  Due to the slope of the path he began to tumble backward down the trail like some sick version of a cartoon character snowballing down a hill.  I didn’t realize that he was falling until right at the end when he tumbled right up to the rock that I had rested my day pack on. 

  I was concerned as any parent would be as I picked him up and brushed him off.  I knew that he would begin crying at any moment so I began to calm him.  Now, it has been my practice for a long time to help minimize the “artificial hurt” -- the additional crying and carrying on that a child feels due to the fear of something they experienced that they think should hurt regardless of whether is really does or not -- to pick up the boys and immediately praise them for how awesome a fall they had just pulled off. 

  “Wow,” I said.  “That was an awesome fall!  Did you see how far you rolled when you fell?”  J, was sniffling as he looked up at me with those huge eyes and dust smudged face, but he smiled as he was trying to be brave.  I looked over to my parents who had seemed not to notice the fall and were still talking to each other.  When I looked back to the face of my son it was stained red and the hood of his jacket was blood soaked.  I reached over to the picnic basket and grabbed a handful of paper towels to mop at his face and I called my father over as calmly as I could to help me.  I laid a paper towel over the wound on my sons head and it immediately soaked through with blood. 

  I calmly told my father to go get the park ranger.  My father, who was still laughing slightly at something he had been talking about, didn’t seem to see the urgency of the situation.  Instead, he came over to coo at J and began to dust off his pants.  Again, I told my father to go get the park ranger and to call 911.  Again, my father ignored me as he was talking to J and encouraging him to be brave and not cry.  With my hand over a mess of towels that were now soaking through and coating my hand in my sons blood, I finally shouted at my father, “Go get the f***ing ranger!!!”  I remember that I was looking at my sons eyes as they sleepily began to close while I screamed this last plea for help both in my dream and in reality.  It was this call, out loud and in real life that woke me from the dream.

   I don’t know what dreams are for.  I don’t know why I remember some dreams and forget many others.  What I do know is that upon waking from that dream, I feel a profound urgency to hold my son and make sure he is alright.  I had the sense after waking that as my son closed his eyes in those last moments that he was dying and for that split second, I knew the pain of the loss of a child. 

  Just yesterday I was told that my parents were going to be attending a funeral for one of their missionaries who had lost their 8 year-old son.  I knew almost all of my parent’s missionaries and viewed many of them like brothers so to know that one of these friends had outlived his own son was very hard for me to hear.  No man should have to bury his own child.  No man. 

  It took me back to when I had stood with my cousin as she and her husband had to lay their son to rest.  He had been sick for a long time and the mixture of pain and grief we felt was swirled together with relief and bitter-sweet happiness at his departure from the pain and suffering of this life.  I was a new father at the time and my oldest was just a baby, but I remember very distinctly the weight of grief I felt both for my cousin and as I imagined losing my own son.

  They say that God only gives you the trials that he knows you are strong enough to handle.  I know that one of my greatest fears is having to learn about the pain of loss first hand.  I have already lost much.  I have needed to rebuild my life many times and through it all, there has been one thing that I have never lost but always been afraid of losing: my family. 

  Here is the wonderful bit.  I can’t lose them now.  Not even to death.  My family is forever.  They are bound to me by eternal right and I will never lose them.  My boys are my boys through all the dimensions of time and throughout eternity.  I know without a shadow of a doubt that even if I am asked to be parted from them temporarily by the veil of death that I will hold them again.  This brings me peace in quiet moments and, with time, I know it will bring peace to my friend and brother. 

Effing irresponsible

You know the great thing about blogs... the irresponsibility.  No one really ever has to answer to anyone.

Fine, fine line...

  At the risk of being repetitive with posting song lyrics, a friend of mine sang this song last night and I liked it so much that I had to share it.  The music is simple and beautiful.  If you're interested, you can listen to the whole song here.  Thank you, Dimples.

There's a Fine, Fine Line

There's a fine, fine line between a lover and a friend;
There's a fine, fine line between reality and pretend;
And you never know 'til you reach the top if it was worth the uphill climb.

There's a fine, fine line between love
And a waste of time.

There's a fine, fine line between a fairy tale and a lie;
And there's a fine, fine line between "You're wonderful" and "Goodbye."
I guess if someone doesn't love you back it isn't such a crime,
But there's a fine, fine line between love
And a waste of your time.

And I don't have the time to waste on you anymore.
I don't think that you even know what you're looking for.
For my own sanity, I've got to close the door
And walk away...
Oh...

There's a fine, fine line between together and not
And there's a fine, fine line between what you wanted and what you got.
You gotta go after the things you want while you're still in your prime...

There's a fine, fine line between love
And a waste of time.

  I promise I am still working on my other posts that are coming soon.  They should be up in the next couple days.

The Easy Way or the Right Way.

  I have been thinking about the nature of “the easy way” for the past couple days. 

  Why is it that the hard way and the right way are usually one and the same?  Everyone has heard the expression, “Nothing worthwhile is ever easy.”  There have been books written on the subject.  Far greater men than me have discoursed at length on the subject ranging from simple philosophers to God himself.  So, why is it so hard? 

“Now I have come to the cross-roads in my life. I always knew what the right path was. Without exception, I knew, but I never took it. You know why? It was too damn hard.”

                                --Al Pacino, Scent of a Woman

Imagine for a second that you come to a fork in the road of your life and you have the chance to choose between two roads.   One is rocky, fraught with danger, uphill and treacherous.  The other is paved, smooth, sloping downward and beautifully manicured.  Which one seems more attractive?  Be honest! 

  Now for some more information… You have to make the decision in your life blind, meaning you do not know the end of the road from the beginning.  You can see a ways up the up-sloping and difficult road to where it bends around some rather treacherous looking boulders and that’s all.  Likewise with the paved, attractive road, you see a ways to where the road banks around a beautiful pond and passes out of sight.  You are free to choose either road, but once chosen, you may not turn back. 

  For a long time I was the type of person who would seek the easy road.  I have, on occasion, known the right path and intentionally turned from it because I knew how hard it would be.  What’s worse is I knew the reward at the end of the right path that I was forfeiting and I still turned from it.  Why?

  I was a coward.

  Well, either that or I am self-destructive.  For a long time I made a habit out of coasting through life.  I considered it a personal triumph to be able to find that beautiful balance point where I would reap maximum reward for minimal effort.  I am told that this is a common trait of the intelligent.  I guess most intelligent people are lazy.  Looking back, I wish I were a little dumber and a lot more hard-working…  I wish I had learned to work at an earlier age.  I may have to write more about the subject of work again later. 

  For now, let’s go back to that fork in the road for a minute.  Now, I said that you have to make the decision of which path to take blind, but what if you knew where you were trying to go?

“Which road to I take?” said Alice.

“Where do you want to go?” asked the Cheshire Cat.

“Well, I… I don’t know.” Alice answered.

“Then,” said the Cat, “it doesn’t matter.  If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.”

  What is your ultimate objective?  Where do you want to go?  Who do you want to be when you get there?  What do you want to be like?  Who do you want with you when you arrive?  These are hard questions for someone who is directionless. 

  But you know the great thing?  Unlike the choice of the fork in the road, we'll always have a way back.  If you would rather ascend the mountain than coast to the valley floor, you need only make a choice.  Make the choice.  Don't apologize for it, excuse it or call it by another name.  Make the choice.  Own it.  And rise above the easy way.

Funny how things turn out, Part III

  Have you ever been frustrated by something that you know to be true?  You know that something is valuable and meaningful and when you try to tell others about it they just don’t “get it.”  You try and try and change your words and try to explain things in different ways to get your point across but in the end, it makes little or no difference to the person you are trying to tell.  I have felt that way. 

  I consider myself to be fairly eloquent.  I have known the power of the spoken word.  I have known the ability to use words to make others see perfectly in their own heads the idea that you are describing.  It’s really rather gratifying to have that kind of experience.  It’s also really frustrating having had that kind of experience to not be able to bring it about when you want to. 

  My beautiful, wonderful, amazing, stubborn, frustrating dear…  doesn’t get it.  I am falling in love with her and she doesn’t get it.  She is afraid of hurting me and has walked away again. Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool my twice, shame on me.  Fool me three times and I am just an idiot for coming back again and again.  But how can I deny the way I feel?!  That’s right, this is the third time she has walked away.

  After my last update we decided to try being together again.  I told her that I had feelings for her and that I was willing to be patient with her to allow her to sort out the feelings she has for me.  I am a patient man… most of the time.  I know that she doesn’t realize what she feels or maybe just doesn’t want to acknowledge what she is feeling but there are moments when I can see it in her face.  She feels something.  She seems very practiced at keeping her feelings under control.  I can tell that she feels things very deeply but she won’t let me see into her.  She won’t let me know what is going on in her head or in her heart.  GYAAAH!  It’s so frustrating to be THIS close to something you truly want and have the ground fall out from under you. 

  Part of me is even more frustrated because I had moments when I wanted to be the one to say goodbye.  I even tried a couple of times.  I wanted to be the one to walk this time.  After she backed off the second time I decided that I was done.  But I wanted to be the one for once who did the leaving.  I wrote a letter to her, in fact, that told her very clearly that I was falling in love with her.  It also said that real love doesn’t ask anything in return and I was asking.  I wrote that I had found myself asking her to care for me and hoping she would.  I told her that I couldn’t wait forever and that I wasn’t strong enough to love her from a distance and support her while she found she felt for another what I felt for her.  I wrote those words while I was waiting in limbo for her to decide what she wanted but I never sent them.  My mind was already made up.  If she didn’t want me then I guess I’d be by myself. 

It was kind of surreal actually.  We had seen each other earlier that day and everything seemed fine at first glance, but something seemed off to me.  Now, if you have read any of my other posts you already know that I tend to worry about things.  I could very well have been worrying for no good reason, but it just seemed like she was hiding behind a wall, an emotional barricade, that was designed to keep everyone out, especially me.  It could have been that she didn’t know how she felt.  It could be that she felt a certain way and didn’t want to tell me.  It could be that she was trying to put me in the dreaded “friend zone” and needed some emotional distance first.  After all, if she really cared for me why would she hide what she feels?! 

  Later that night we got to talking and I asked her if she had any more information for me about how or what she was feeling.  She told me that she did not.  I told her about my perception of earlier in the day when things seemed out of sorts.  She said she didn’t feel like things were off.  Now, granted… I may have been pushing a little, but I just told her that I felt like I was the one taking all the risk because I had gone out on a limb and had told her the way I feel.  She didn’t know how she felt, yes, but the fact that she couldn’t tell me what she was feeling left me in limbo for ever.  I reiterated what I had said earlier and told her that if she needed time to sort out the way she feels that I would wait, but if it was different…  If she had already made up her mind and just didn’t want to tell me what it was that she had decided (I fully thought that she was going to break up with me, which is funny because we were supposed to be “just friends”) that it was a different story.  I told her that I felt like I was in a precarious position, trying to keep from falling for her and knowing that it was futile but still not knowing how she felt for me. 

  It was a potent conversation and I even caused her to cry with my words.  Not because I was mean or anything, mind you, but because I was asking and pressing for answers that she didn’t know.  It made her sad and frustrated to not be able to give me what I was asking for.  I again asked if she had truly not made up her mind and she told me that she hadn’t.  I told her that I would go on waiting.

  And waiting…

  And waiting…

  Finally she sent me a message telling me that she couldn’t do it anymore.  She couldn’t continue to keep me in limbo.  She said it wasn’t fair to me.  She was hurting me by not being able to return for me what I felt for her.  –Now, let me go on record her and say that she DID feel something!  I saw it! But still she had decided to walk away, to play it safe.  I just don’t GET IT!  Why would I be destined to feel this way for someone who can’t feel this way in return?!  So, she is gone… again.  But I can’t stop thinking about her. And that part sucks.  Still somehow, I get the feeling that she is still important.  I don’t know.  Maybe I am just going crazy.