A Good Thing

Every year I try to make a New Year’s resolution that will improve my life and make me happier. Obviously there are a lot of things about myself that I would change if I could, and the start of a new year seems like an excellent time to reflect on my life and set new goals. Problem is, this year I set a fitness goal, kept at it for 30 days, and then in February forgot all about it. Probably pretty typical for most of us.

So this morning I sat down and starting thinking… What is it that I could truly do - and stick to - that would make my life better? First off, I’m definitely one of those “overloaded” people that enjoys being busy all the time. Here’s a short list: I have a large family with four children and seven grandchildren, plus a wife that I am totally devoted to.  I own my own business, which keeps getting busier and busier and I’m helping with my wife’s charity, which is also growing exponentially and requiring more time from both of us every week. On top of that, I’m a golf nut and an aspiring writer who tries to write Monday Messages every week!

Whew… No wonder I’m tired sometimes. But when I wrote out the list above, I realized that these are all things that I enjoy, things that I want to do. I mean, it seems like my life is all about Me and what I Myself want to do… and when I really think about it… that can’t be a good thing!

So that got me thinking... Instead of dreaming up resolutions about how to make my life better, what if I came up with a way to make someone else’s life better!

I know plenty of friends, family members, and business associates who are struggling and could use a little help and/or encouragement right now. But how? I had no idea until I walked through our garage at lunch time today and spotted dozens of freshly written letters of encouragement. My wife makes sure that every filled suitcase her charity supplies to Foster Children also includes a handwritten letter of encouragement. Perfect! My new “New Year’s Resolution” is to start this week and write and mail (via USPS, not email or text) a letter of encouragement to a different person every single week. Even if I have to give up some of the stuff on my list above, so be it, because I am committed to writing 44 letters between now and the end of the year in order to do something good for someone else… now that has to be good thing!

A life isn’t significant except for its impact on other lives. 

~ Jackie Robinson

A Wonderful Feeling

I’ve been doing something lately that I haven’t done in years. I’ve been going for walks while pushing a baby stroller. And here’s the cool part. There’s a baby girl in that stroller, Blakely, who makes me feel like maybe, just maybe, she thinks I’m great. And let me tell you, that is a wonderful feeling!

Funny thing is, she’s only 19 months old, but yet I can tell that she fully trusts me. I hold on tight to her stroller, and I talk to her, and I sing to her as we travel the neighborhood. I do my best to make her smile and laugh… and she does smile, and she does laugh. And she makes me laugh too! Fact is, she is possibly the happiest little girl I have ever seen, which rubs off on me in a really good way. I mean, it’s pretty hard to frown around someone who is so darn cute.

But I know we don’t live in a rose garden. There are cars that go by us way too fast, and dogs that bark and growl way too loud, and a whole world that is full of all kinds of danger and trouble. Blakely doesn’t know that yet, so that’s good… for now. She just knows that she likes to go out in the world in her stroller and on car rides with Grandpa, and that Grandpa says, “I love you”, a lot. But she will slowly discover that the world can be a really tough place and that not everyone will hold on to your stroller so tightly.

Blakely trusts me and her Grandma very much and we appreciate that. But I wish there was some way that we could help her learn how to deal with the troubles that will eventually come as she struggles to grow up and make a life of her own. But what can we do? Maybe trust is a good start. In fact, maybe trust is the key because “to trust” means to rely on another person because we feel safe with them and have confidence that they care about us. Trusting in someone also provides the security of knowing we are not alone, which gives us strength and courage. And that got me thinking…

I am blessed to have a loving and devoted wife who I trust completely and who trusts me just the same. But if I were to lose her, I still have someone I talk to every morning, give thanks to every night, and trust implicitly because He told me that He would never leave me, and I believe Him. That too is such a wonderful feeling!

For He has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you."

~ Hebrews 13:5

Pain and Failure

Have you ever had an accident, been injured, or felt the pain of failure? If you’re like me and active at all, then you’ve probably been hurt through physical pain and stung by failure many times in your life. Whenever I got hurt, my Dad would always say, “If you use your head you won’t get hurt!” However, it’s human nature to suffer pain at times, but it’s never appreciated. Then again… maybe it should be!

Last Saturday, I was doing a large and very difficult Parking Lot Light Pole Inspection at a major shopping center in Ventura. I asked my son, David, to help me with the job and we decided to leave at 4:45am in order to beat the traffic. The traffic worked out fine on the way there, but the job turned out to be one of the hardest we have ever tackled.

I was fortunate to have my son helping me because he is extremely fit and strong. So he was able to lift the heavy cast aluminum pole base covers at the base of each pole and he was also able to cut down thick thorn bushes that were blocking our access to the base of the poles. It was hard work, but we kept at it for seven straight hours. At that point, we only had one pole to go, and of course it was completely buried in a hedge with thick, super sharp thorns.

We were both hacking away at the hedge when all of a sudden I heard a loud noise right next to me. My son yelled out, “Wow, that almost hit you in the head!” When I asked him what it was, he crawled down underneath the hedge and pulled out a really heavy ball shaped 2-pound piece of solid aluminum. It had apparently fallen off of the decorative Light Fixture at the top of the pole. It was a near miss for sure, with potentially very serious consequences.

That was a close call and it got me thinking… You know that old saying, “Whatever doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger!” Well, here’s my new take on it, “Whatever doesn’t kill you, should make you smarter!” Therefore, I’m going to take my Dad’s advice to use my head… and the next time I go to work… put a hard hat on it!

Pain and failure should be our teachers, not our undertakers. 

They are temporary detours not dead-end streets.

~ William Arthur Ward

Ever So Perfectly

Early this morning I heard a loud noise. I sat up in bed and realized it was raining. Raining really hard, and really loud. It was only 4:45am, so I wasn’t happy about being woken up. Slightly annoyed, I trudged downstairs and stared out into the darkness, watching the rain bouncing off our concrete deck. My first thought was, “Won’t be able to go golfing today. Darn rain!” But then I had a bit of an epiphany. Without rain, there would be no golf courses. Heck, there would be no earth. Rain is a pretty perfect thing the way it nourishes our planet. 

And that got me thinking about earlier in the week…

Last Thursday my wife and I did some babysitting. As I looked down at our little 18-month-old granddaughter, I noticed how perfect her tiny fingers and toes were and I was reminded how amazing the human body is. The average human body contains over 20 square feet of skin and is made of up over twenty-seven trillion living cells. If you tried to count them at the rate of 1 per second it would take you over 2 million years to finish. Each cell is unique as is each living person. I wonder how we were made ever so perfectly.

Last Friday was a beautiful, warm sunny day, so my wife and I went for a walk around our neighborhood. Looking up I noticed our sun is extremely large. In fact it makes up 98% of the mass of our solar system and is so big that you could fit over one million earths inside of it. The most incredible thing is the precision of its distance from the earth. If it were even one mile closer we would melt and if it were farther away we would freeze. I wonder how it was created ever so perfectly.

On Saturday evening we went out to dinner and sat at an outdoor patio table. The moon was shining brightly right above us. Did you know that the moon plays a super important role in our lives. It regulates our seasons by stabilizing the tilt of the earth’s axis. If it wasn’t positioned with a one-and-a-half-degree tilt our oceans would slosh like bathwater at the mercy of a playful child. Basically, the moon keeps the earth habitable for us. I wonder how it got tilted ever so perfectly.

I know that not everything or everyone is this world is perfect… far from it. But when I take the time to notice the perfection in the simplest things around me, I have no doubt that we and our world were created ever so perfectly!

And God saw everything that He had made, 

and behold, it was very good.

~ Genesis 1:31

Hopelessly Hopeful

Some people would probably call me a hopeless romantic. Hopeless because I was born that way and at 68 there’s a good chance I’m never going to change. But not “hopeless” in the since that my heart and soul are filled with hope… and that’s never going to change either.

But is hope a good thing? I ask that question because some people believe that the definition of hope is simply – “delayed disappointment”. I disagree! I say that there is great power in hope, and it starts with faith and ends with love. Let me give you a couple of examples. 

• My wife has had a wide variety of health issues ever since I married her. (I know what you’re thinking, but I’m pretty sure it’s not my fault.) Her health issues include one lung that is stapled together, serious migraines that pop up at the worst possible times, and most recently a little toe that is pointing in the wrong direction thanks to a heavy piece of furniture. But do I think it’s hopeless to keep hoping she will be okay? No! 

• I also have a friend whose wife is struggling with a serious health issue. They have been to see countless doctors but none of the doctors have been able to figure out the problem. And I can see the pain etched in his face when he talks about his wife’s pain, but do I think it’s hopeless to keep hoping and praying that she will be okay? Absolutely not! 

So to those people who say that hope is delayed disappointment, I say wrong! Hope is – “powered positivity”. And here’s why. I believe there is great power in hope, and it starts with faith. If I care about my wife and friends and pray for them and let them know I am praying for them, it will make them feel good, strengthen them, and give them one more reason to be hopeful. And if I love them, and let them know they are truly loved, that too will provide encouragement and strength because trust me… love is the most powerful force in the universe. And that too is never going to change!

And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.

~ 1 Corinthians 13:13

Grasshopper

Do you ever find yourself getting frustrated and irritated with people? I’m not talking about friends and family so much (although I do have some relatives that can be super annoying), I’m mostly referring to strangers and just regular people in general.

Most of the time it’s just little things. Like two days ago I was in a busy grocery store and some lady parks her cart right in the middle of the aisle blocking my way, and she’s completely unaware because she’s on her phone probably gossiping with a friend. Or like when I was leaving the store and trying to back out of a parking spot, some yahoo is stopped behind me waiting for some other car way up ahead to back out, and there’s plenty of room for the yahoo to move forward, but he must be friggin’ blind because he doesn’t notice that my back up lights are on, so I can’t get out. Or like when I was on my way home, I was stopped at a red light. When the light turned green the stupid dufus in the car in front of us (four other cars and me are behind him) is asleep at the wheel and never moves until the light turns yellow, leaving the rest of us still sitting at the same red light. How can people be so darn annoying. It's enough to make you lose faith in your fellow man!

But then sometimes… something will happen that turns your faith back around. Like today I had a fairly large job to do way out in Riverside off of Box Springs Road. I had to inspect 57 Light Poles at a huge “Distribution Center” filled with semi-truck trailers, most of which are parked in front of light poles, making access difficult. But what really made access a problem was that the last three poles were fenced in behind a locked gate. It’s Saturday, so nobody’s around, and when I knock on several doors to the building I get no answer. At that point I’m 200 yards away on the far end of the building when I notice a truck driver opening the gate and driving in. I pack my tools into my truck and drive as fast as possible towards the gate. But as I arrive, the truck driver has already dropped his trailer and is heading back out.

The last thing I want to do is drive all the way back to Riverside on Monday. So I jump out of my truck and wave to the driver. He stops, and I notice he’s this big burly guy with a huge red beard, tons of tattoos all the way up his arm, and what appears to be a perpetual scowl on his face. I hesitated to ask because this guy was pretty intimidating, but then mumbled something to him about needing access to the yard. I swear he growled first, but then he asked me, “How much F*&#king time you need?” I politely replied, “About 15-20 minutes sir.” He thought about it for a moment and then said, “Yeah sure, I’ll wait right here for 20 minutes.” I was kind of shocked, but immediately grabbed my tools and literally ran to the first pole. And when I had finished all three poles (in record time I might add), I ran all the way back to my truck. But as I passed through the gate, I heard the gate motor click and saw the truck driver pulling away. I didn’t even get a chance to thank him for his unselfishness and surprising kindness.

So let’s just say that my faith in humanity was restored quite significantly. And while I’m at it, let me also apologize for…

 Saying that lady in the grocery store was probably a “gossiper”

That the guy in the parking lot was a “friggin blind yahoo”

And that the guy at the red light was a “stupid dufus”

Shame on me for not having more patience… and furthermore I think I’m going to go out today and get myself a full-length arm tattoo that says, Patience, grasshopper!

Follow Your Dreams

When I was just a boy of 14, I was very young and naïve. I had so many dreams, but I didn’t yet know what the world was really like or what the world would require of me. But it wouldn’t be long before I found out.

At that age I wanted a motorcycle because all my buddies had one, but my Dad could not afford to buy me one. So he suggested I get a part time job. Our neighbor who had a large 30-acre avocado ranch, offered to put me to work pruning avocado trees for $1.25/hour alongside his migrant workers. I had never had to work before, and I quickly found out it wasn’t fun. But I stuck with it for nine weeks over the hot summer months and made enough money to buy myself a brand-new Yamaha 175 Enduro. That was my first real “life lesson” and there would be many more to come.  

Two and half years later, my Dad retired from the USMC and moved us to San Francisco. By that time I was 16 and I had a truck, a motorcycle, and a part time job at a gas station. I hated the weather in the Bay Area and missed my life in rural Fallbrook, CA, so I begged my Dad to let me go back. He agreed, but only if I kept up my grades and stayed out of trouble. I left immediately and let’s just say I kept up half the bargain, my grades were really good. At 16 ½, I found myself living in a plywood shack on my neighbor’s avocado ranch and working part time at a gas station out on Highway 395. I was often cold, hungry, and lonely. I missed my family and the love and security they provided… and the life lessons began to pour over me like water flowing over Niagara Falls.

I remember not being able to afford a new pair of shoes and being embarrassed about it at school. But all that did was remind me that if I wanted something, I had to work for it. For the next few years, every time I found myself struggling, I would also find a way to survive. And with each passing month I became smarter and stronger. After graduating High School, I tried college, but I couldn’t afford it and didn’t really enjoy it. So I started thinking about my future and all the life lessons I learned living in that plywood shack and working at several different gas stations. For example… I learned that not every business owner is honest, that not every employee follows the rules, that the general public can be hard to deal with, and that if a rogue motorcycle gang like the “iron Horsemen” from Oceanside pull into your gas station, the best thing to do is to stay calm and stay inside the building. I also learned that if a drunk dairy farmer from Pauma Valley pulls into your gas station and starts yelling at you, you should run. I didn’t and I spent two days in the hospital, and a lot of money at the dentist replacing a broken tooth.

Funny thing is, I never did lose my optimistic outlook. My Dad warned me that life on my own would not be easy and boy was that an understatement! But at the same time, he told me to either call him or talk to God if I was struggling, so that’s what I did… I both talked and prayed a lot… and I would have to say that overall my life has turned out pretty darn good!

So… If I could go back and give some advice to myself as a teenager, it would be fairly simple.

1. Work hard and put out the effort asked of you.
2. Give people a chance but be careful who you trust.
3. Keep moving forward and believe in yourself.
4. And lastly, follow your dreams and make your own path, but don’t do anything you can’t tell your Grandpa about!