(Fumes, Form, and Fashion, Part 3)
Suffocating. That’s how Amanda describes it. No, the office walls aren’t literally closing in on her. She isn’t fighting with anyone at work, home, or anywhere else. In fact, everything is really calm. Predictable. Safe. Consistent.
Or, to hear Amanda describe it, boring, ritualistic, depressing. Yes, suffocating.
Everything on the outside speaks of steady in an unsteady world. But something inside the 33-year-old wife, mother, and loan processor at the local bank is screaming for something new. Different. Something alive.
Amanda needs renewal.
What she may not realize is that with the urge to resurge, she’s standing at a dangerous fork in the road. More on that in a minute. [click to continue…]
(Fumes, Form, and Fashion, Part 2)
Something in the woods near his grandfather’s farm seems to call to Adam. Ever since he was a little boy and his dad took him hiking or hunting there, this is the place where Adam, now a father himself, returns. It doesn’t happen nearly as often or nearly enough these days. After all, Adam has responsibilities and stresses, and there never seems to be enough time.
For Phillip, it means a return to old disciplines that kept him in good shape throughout his 20s. Now pushing 40, the problem for Phillip isn’t knowing what to do. It’s finding the will to actually do it.
Jacob follows the trail of his biblical namesake. Just as the Lord called the patriarch back to Bethel – a place where he had previously encountered the Lord – so also Jacob is sensing a stirring to return to a place of spiritual life and growth he has known in the past.
Each of these are examples of a powerful and important tool of renewal and restoration, regardless of who you are. But this is particularly true of men. It’s why you often hear football coaches talk about “going back to the fundamentals.” The biblical language mentions things like “remembering the former days.” Check this out: [click to continue…]
(Fumes, Form and Fashion, Part 1)
Thomas Watson Sr., founder of IBM, often said, “Everybody, from time to time, should take a step back and watch himself go by.”
Good wisdom. But hardly lived. It’s reminiscent of the often-repeated story of the African (or Incan, depending on what you read) porters who carried the goods of an English (or American) type-A personality through the jungle with increasing pace for three days. Finally, on the fourth day, they matter-of-factly refused to go further, despite the pleas of the Western, time-bound explorers. When asked for an explanation, they simply said, “We have been traveling so fast, we have to wait for our souls to catch up with us.”
There’s a simple word for that, often reserved for quaint memories of the good old days or emergency sessions of the Jesus Name Disaster Management Club. It’s called renewal. [click to continue…]
I got chided a little this morning for good reason. Some desperately hurting people had written comments to this post, sharing the depths of their pain, fear, frustration and even torment, and I had failed to respond to any of them.
And though it’s a little foolish to lump the hurts of people all together in one reply, I did. You can find this response also in the comments section there (#10 added later), but I thought I would share it with a larger readership with the hope that maybe it would be an encouragement to you or someone you care about. God knows it isn’t the last word on pain. It’s just what I’ve learned through some of my own.
Below is my reply. [click to continue…]
One of my favorite pics of Grandpaw and Button
It was one of the many differences between us. Maybe it was generational. Maybe it had more to do with personality. I don’t know. To me it was silly at best, annoying it worst.
Corny, that’s it. It was corny.
But my dad did it without apology, and routinely yucked about it.
“This is so-and-so,” he would say, “but I call him [insert nickname here].”
To know him well enough to banter at all – which for him meant more than one conversation – usually earned you some sort of nickname.
The manager of the local bank: “I call her Cuz.”
A friend and pastor’s wife: “Here comes Trouble.”
His and Dean’s friend Dolores got a play on the pronunciation, for no apparent reason: “Doh-loh-reez.” [click to continue…]
You’ve probably never heard of Yarbo. Unless, of course, you’ve spent some time tooling through Washington County, Alabama. This unincorporated community, positioned halfway between Chatom and Millry, flies by your car window pretty fast on Highway 17. A couple of old chicken houses, an abandoned softball field, a few house trailers, that’s about it.
At least that’s how it looks through my window. Yarbo is a place on the way to some other place.
My dad had a different view.
On his regular excursions between Millry, his home at the time, and Chatom or Mobile, he would notice a singular figure sitting in the shade of one of those mobile homes. An older black gentleman would spend hours there, offering a friendly wave at passers-by. And there in the warmth of those Southwest Alabama summer days, my father found a kindred spirit.
He waved back.
Eventually he came to look for his nameless friend and would make a point of tooting his horn and waving. Though separated by all the things that make for TV news sound bites – race and economic status and culture and probably politics – each of these men found in a simple gesture a point of connection.
That wasn’t enough for my dad. [click to continue…]
I started writing this last Wednesday with an urgent prayer that I would get home in time to see my dad before he passed away. What would normally have been a routine knee replacement surgery poked a vicious bear called Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis. He would never leave the hospital.
Lynchburg to Charlotte
On the plane headed home from Lynchburg. Going home to a father who is going home himself. It seems that everybody – including him – has concluded that there is no fight left. He gets weaker every day and this morning he has some sort of infection that requires everybody to wear a glove and mask to be in the room with him.
I postponed the weekend trip to Lubbock. Cassie and Joel are on the way. They will get to Mobile ten minutes before I do. It’s just a matter of time.
It was both distracting and comforting to be at a conference filled with worship leaders, listening to people sing about victory over death and the power of the blood of Jesus – even the old standby “I’ll Fly Away.” It takes on a totally new meaning when my daddy is about to be doing the flying. [click to continue…]
Happy (Traditional) Tax Day! So… Stick with me on this.
Last week, in news you probably missed, some engineering experts sounded a major alarm to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The subject: Self-driving cars.
The concern: We’re not ready yet.
The evidence: Unresolved technical issues, including some accidents.
The request: Please, Dear Government Agency slow down your aggressive approach to issuing guidance for technology that is not ready for guidance yet.
That seems reasonable. Safe. Wise for someone whose name has the word “Safety” in it.
That creates some tension for the agency, however. After all, they have a job to do – a service to the American people. So Mark Rosekind, Director of the NHTSA, commented:
“Everybody asks, ‘When are they (self-driving cars) going to be ready?’ I keep saying they’re not coming; they are here now.”
Then he added this little revealing gem: [click to continue…]
One of the keys on my laptop no longer works properly. The key gets stuck some and mostly doesn’t work at all. The computer warranty covers the problem, but creates another one – namely the need to use other tools for about two weeks.
Ugh.
You should know, too, that the key does not belong to some random, rarely-used category of keyboardery. No, as the alphabet goes, that key’s a major player.
The Bluetooth keyboard from my desktop helps for now, but eventually my most trusted work ally must be surrendered to the tech people somewhere far away. But for now, you may note that the post you read comes from the faulty keyboard – mostly to see whether a whole post can be created apart from the help of that major letter.
Have you detected what letter’s AWOL yet? No, not the Q, X or Z. That would be too easy. No doubt you’ll trace the absent letter eventually. As you do, here are some lessons we can apply to our work and our personal selves. [click to continue…]
