Pobody's Nerfect

I'm not one to quote dumb signs, but this one made me laugh. It was on a changeable church sign down the road and this is all it said.

In the last year or so my memory has been shot and I've been making a lot of mistakes, missing a lot of things my bride has said to me or forgetting the things she's already told me. In all honesty I wasn't distracted and I wasn't ignoring her. I really would forget conversations we had. Fortunately I went to the doctor in August finally to get a referral to a dermatologist for some suspicious skin places. When I went, instead of giving me a referral, the doc just did a complete physical, my first since I was in college more than 20 years ago. As a result of this physical, I found out some things I needed meds for and some other things just to keep an eye on.

I'm glad I went after a year of nutrition monitoring and exercise or there's no telling what meds I would have been on. My family has all kinds of medical history that are hereditary that I should be dealing with, even at 40, but because of my diligence in the last year, much of that has been eliminated, or at least delayed.

But I discovered some things that could be the cause of some of my memory issues, as well as other things, and when I told my bride about it, she finally began to believe me. Soon enough, at the counsel of some friends, I asked for another blood test. When I told my bride about it, of course she had her doubts and accused me of "self-diagnosing" when in reality, that's what I was trying NOT to do, hence the tests. Long story short, I had the test done, asked for a referral to a specialist, and have since worked with him in diagnosing and treating the issue. Some of my numbers have balanced out and there are still some things that we're going to have to figure out, but we're working on it.

Here's the point: for a long time my bride was frustrated with me for ignoring or forgetting or not paying attention, etc. In reality, what has happened is that I'm not who I used to be, but it's not entirely my fault. I DO struggle with some things and there are things that I should do, that I don't feel like doing sometimes. And sometimes more stuff piles up than I can get to. And yes, sometimes I'm just lazy. But I pushed to find the solution to the problem and I'm glad I have, and so is my bride. What was once hard for her to believe now brings relief because it's true: my forgetfulness had an actual root cause that was not a personal attack on her.

What was most difficult for her, I think, was that she's never known me to be sick or seriously injured. I've never spent much time at the doctor. For years we've been to specialists and hospitals for her ailments and surgeries. I've taken care of her, cleaned and dressed her wounds, etc. Now in the past few months, I'M the one that's going to the doctor and having tests done. Maybe it scares her a little as we get older. At the same time this is going on, I'm physically the most fit I've probably ever been. I guess it just doesn't compute.

All that said, she's now relieved and excited that I have nothing seriously wrong, even though I will apparently have to be on meds for the rest of my life. It's just a minor inconvenience and if I miss a day, it's not a big deal

I said all that to say this: pobody's nerfect. The sooner we realize that as a rule, our wives aren't trying to hurt us, the better off we will be. Now, in all fairness, there are some husbands and wives who are manipulative, controlling, and abusive intentionally. These individuals are unhealthy and need to be addressed head-on. Some husbands and/or wives just don't know how to fight fair so they take cheap shots; some DO ignore or avoid each other because of any number of reasons, mostly discontent. But if a husband and wife are trying to love and honor each other, they can learn to fight fair and to discuss things openly. They can learn to take care of each other and to walk with each other through all of life's demands and rough circumstances. Sometimes one spouse will need more care, then later the other spouse will need it. It's nothing personal and it doesn't need to become selfish or vindictive.

Grooms, consider the imperfections of our wives and compare them to our own. What can we overlook? What can we get past? And what takes conscious and consistent effort to overcome? While we all know that "nobody's perfect", are we willing to accept that fact for our own families and to live accordingly?

Breaking Jesus

Recently on a discussion forum, a friend of mine made an excellent post about her journey of faith and I thought it was an excellent post. With her permission, I've taken her phrase and will share with you an off-shoot of thought.

Her words:

I walked by our bookshelf tonight and my husbands childhood crucifix was laying on the bookshelf. I had accidentally knocked it off the wall a couple weeks ago and broke it and it had been laying on the bookshelf with glue setting ever since. And I looked at my bookshelf of journals and bible studies and books I've read over the years and how they represented the journey I have been on since that first day all those years ago that I broke who Jesus was in my life and let God come in and reshape that. It's like my bones had been broken and had to be reset properly. It was just as painful I can assure you. I held the LDS church dear, it was my familiar place, it was my work ethic, it represented my family and my community. But it had caused some of my bones to be set wrong and I never grew right. Once I went through that breaking and resetting I started to grow properly. And I kept growing. (Thanks, Robin!)

I've mentioned before that I'm an object lesson kind of guy and stuff like this is the stuff that God uses ALL the time to shape my thinking. I can rarely go any length of time without having some spiritual truth hit me through the simplest life lesson. In the case above, Robin refers back to her re-shaping of her understanding of God, Jesus, and her own identity. Earlier in her post she speaks of beginning her journey of freedom by opening the Bible with just a notebook and just reading and taking notes about what she understood or received. That shelf held all those memories of study time and journals and truth revealed. Seeing the broken Jesus next to her journals gave her the perfect image of her journey.

In Robin's case, she came from the Latter-Day Saints (the Mormons). But she's not the only one who needed to "break Jesus" and reset her understanding of Him. I've grown up Baptist my whole life and there are things about Jesus and God and my faith that I still wrestle with, even as a Baptist pastor. Truthfully, I struggle with breaking tradition from faith, the truth of Scripture from what I thought was truth from Scripture. It's something that I think we all struggle with, yet something that many (if not most) of us would rather not confront. Honestly, it's just easier not to.

Last night I went to a young woman's home with a couple of other church members, to thank her for visiting our church and to ask if she had any questions about us. From there we began to talk about her understanding of Jesus and what it meant to be a follower of Christ. She had all kinds of good answers, but even after the course of a lengthy conversation, it was clear to me that she didn't quite get what He did for her, for all of us, and how she should respond. As we were leaving, we expressed hope that we would see her again and that she would find the answers and understanding she needed.

Shouldn't that be the prayer of all of us, regardless of our belief system? Shouldn't we all pray, "God, the real God, fill in the blanks of my beliefs. Plug the holes of my misunderstanding. Show me Who You really are and what is truly required of me. I'm willing to drop my labels and just understand Who You are, to follow You."

Grooms, you may be wondering why I chose to post this here today. The simple truth is, it's my blog and I can put whatever I want on it. The second truth is that I felt this is what we all need to do: seek the real God, whether we have a deep understanding, no understanding at all, or some convoluted mixture of tradition and truth. It starts with us, gentlemen. If we are to lead our families, we first have to understand what God requires of us and then we can pass that on to our wives and children.

Ex Nihilo

I'm an odd person. It's true. I'm terrible with math for whatever reason, yet I can remember a series of numbers without much of a problem. Not as much now as I used to, because my memory is shot (but I'm looking into it). But I used to be able to hold information. As my dad would say, "I've got a mind like a steel trap." Of course this would usually be amended with, "Once something's in there, it's never getting out."

Either way, my point is this: I can remember things like that. I'm also very visual which helps me to recall stuff. I'm terrible with names, but I always remember a face. I have been known to re-introduce myself to people whom I have met because I don't often remember where we've met. our town is small and sometimes I'll see someone on the street and later at church where I'll introduce myself. On more than one occasion I'll hear, "We've met before," which quickly brings an apology and a quick statement of my personal shortcomings.

Because I'm visual, however, I often associate people with their cars and I associate their cars with their license plates or stickers/magnets. My bride drives with her eyes forward. She has actually driven past me while I was running and didn't even notice it was me! For my part, I will see a car that looks like what a particular friend drives and will notice the license plate to see if it's them before looking in the window. It's all instinctual. There are several pale blue Toyota mini-vans, blue Ford pickup trucks, and white Toyota Landcruisers, so the license plate is a good identifying mark when I see one of those ubiquitous models.

Here's where I'm going with this (that was all back story): Every time I see a certain car model locally, I immediately look to the license plate to see if it's my friend. The license plate says, "Ex Nihilo." In case you're wondering, this means, "from nothing." My friend who drives this car is brilliant and has pushed very hard for a long time to build a base of understanding of her faith, called "apologetics". Her license plate is a statement of faith that God, Who has always been, created the universe from nothing (ex nihilo). It's a statement of the incredible power of God and of His matchless ability.

You may have heard the joke about the scientist who approached God and said, "Listen, God. Science has come a long way. We are at the point where we can create a person in a test tube using only raw DNA. So thanks for the help, but we'll take it from here."

"You don't need me?" God said. I created man from dirt. I'm still a step ahead of you. If you can create man from dirt, then I'll be impressed."

"Okay," said the scientist, "I'll take that challenge. We'll both try to create a living person from dirt. If we can do it, then we'll both know that we don't need God anymore."

"Fair enough," says God. "Let's get started." At that the scientist reaches down into the dirt and starts shaping it.

"What are you doing?" asks God.

"I'm making a man."

"No, no, no. You go get your own dirt."

The point of the joke is that God created everything without any help from any available resources. This woman's license plate said that clearly. Unfortunately after about 20 years of marriage, she had enough and left her husband. Obviously I don't know the whole story and I won't place blame. I can see fault on both sides. What I do know, however, is that she has no interest in the things of God. She says she knows what she needs to do, but she doesn't want to do it.

At the same time all of this is going on, some of my other friends who have had a rocky marriage from the start nearly 15 years ago, are recently and for the first time, openly displaying affection. What happened was that the wife finally backed her husband into a corner and said that their current marriage was unacceptable, they had issues they needed to address, and walking away from a fight was no longer an option. He had been wanting to address stuff for a long time, but felt alone and ashamed. Together they decided to make a change, to do their part and to work with God as He does His part. It's only a recent development, so things are still fresh, but their desire is right.

Why the long post, and why the weird title? Because, fellow grooms, I'm telling you that if the God who created everything from nothing, wants to heal your wounded, broken, even shattered marriage, don't you think He has the power to do that? Don't be discouraged. Take heart. Yes, there will be challenges and you will have a lot of work ahead of you, but God can do it with you if you're willing. You can't have the attitude of "I know what I should do, but I don't want to." You have to want it and you have to be persistent, but don't give up.

I've seen and heard of lots of stories of God turning around and healing marriages. I refer you to Gemma, whose blog "Passion Within Marriage" is linked to the right. Read her story. Coriander blogs about her own struggles and God's healing power in "My Heart His Heart", also linked at the right. I have friends who have divorced and a few years later re-married each other with renewed passion for each other. In my own marriage, just this past weekend, my bride had enough of my recent attitude and called me out on it, enabling both of us to express our concerns and to reconnect.

Listen, gentlemen, I've said it before and I'll say it again, I'm on this path with you. I haven't figured it all out. Many of your marriages may be more healthy than my own, but I'm learning and I'm trying and the Lord has been so good to me and to my family.

So if you think God has nothing to work with, you're in luck. Nothing is all He needs.

Catch a Tiger by the Tail

Made you look!

No, I'm not going to talk about Tiger. Not directly anyway. Everyone else is doing that. Instead, I'm going to talk about everyone else surrounding him.

First, the women, "paramours" as referred to by one editor. There's a waitress, a porn star, a reality show contestant and at least ten others. Whatever we know or don't know about these women, we know they are of weak moral character. How do we know this? Because they slept with a man they know was married. Regardless of anything else going on in their lives, this we know. On one of the entertainment news shows, someone said, "A man will only be as faithful as his options." That is an outright lie. A man will only be as faithful as his character. Everyone is faced with options and opportunities to do the wrong thing. What determines whether we do it, is not our option to; it's our desire to. Quite frankly, a weak man was tempted repeatedly by weak women, and chose not to fight. The same thing can happen to us if we are not careful. In fact, for many of us, it already has.

Second, his wife had a role in all this. I don't know exactly what it was and I'm not blaming her for his wandering, but somehow she played a part. How do I know this? Because the connection was lost between the two of them if they ever truly had one at all. I don't know how they felt about each other at any point, but I know that when she had confirmed his infidelity, she went after him with a golf club. Again, I'm not placing blame squarely on either one and I'm certainly not defending Woods. But I do know that no one goes from deep, heartfelt passion and love for a person to instantaneous desire to crack his skull with a pitching wedge.

Everyone else. One of the comments that angered me the most about this whole thing came from fellow PGA golfer Jesper Parnevik, who said, "I'm sorry I ever introduced her to him." Apparently Elin was the Parnevik's nanny at the time she met Woods. What's worse is the other comment he made. "It's a shame she went after him with a wedge. She should have used a driver." What a horse's ass. Pardon my language, but is there really any other way to say it? While Parnevik's marriage may be intact (for now at least), his schedule is practically the same as Woods' and his opportunities may not be all that different. It only takes once, and you don't have to be near as rich or famous or attractive as Tiger Woods. I'm sure I've had opportunities that if I were so inclined I could have followed. And I'm neither rich nor handsome.

What does this say to us, fellow grooms? It says to keep our focus where it needs to be, to love and care for our wives and to make them our priority. When we have even a hint of anything that remotely resembles an opportunity to turn from our marriage, we need to mentally or physically reconnect with our wife. If you feel the pull, check your thoughts and bring to mind an especially arousing or emotional time in recent history: a passionate lovemaking session, an enjoyable and relaxing vacation together, a time when you just laughed together, anything that connects you with your wife. Call her on the phone just to hear her voice and to tell her you love her. Whatever you have to do, gentlemen, do it. Often our behavior affects our attitude. Acting first, regardless of how we feel at the time, stirs our hearts to feel what we are already doing.

We also need to be mindful of how we treat others who fall. I'm sure Tiger feels helplessly alone right now. His marriage, custody of his kids, his career, and his endorsements are all in danger of being stripped away from him. Remember, Tiger's a man. An ordinary man with a rare skill at golf. Nothing more. May we learn from this that there is a lot more to the story of the man than what the media is telling.

I used to have a poster that I think I've mentioned on here before, but it bears repeating: "I used to pray for justice. Then I remembered myself and prayed for mercy."

Origami Superman

Oh, yeah. You read it right. I said origami Superman. And do you know why I said that? Because I met him this weekend. Sure did.

To quote Paul Harvey, "And now, the rest.....of the story."

This week, the east coast was buffeted (did you like that? Fancy.) by storms from the Atlantic. In our area, there was massive flooding, schools were canceled and the governor called it a disaster area. As a result, my bride and daughter both had extra days off and we took advantage of that. Friday the weather had let up enough that we could go get a gift for our daughter's friend whose birthday party was the next day and we figured our little girl could do her Christmas dreaming in the toy section of Wal-mart (and she did). In that same shopping center was an Arby's (don't judge me). We all enjoy the occasional beef and cheddar and mozzarella sticks, so we went because it had been a few months.

In the kid's meal was a prize, but it was hard to determine what it was except that it involved something with superheroes and "assembly required." It was Sunday afternoon before my daughter asked me, "Daddy, would you help me put together my toy?" Who could say no to that? Naturally I shoved her onto the floor by palming her face and stepped over her to watch the Redskins game.

I'm just kidding.

It was the Vikings.

Really, though, my princess and I sat together at the kitchen table and tore the perforated unassembled anatomy off the card and I began to roll and fold and tuck the tabs and answer "What's that?" with every piece I touched. For forty-five minutes. At the end of my labor, there before me was a squared-off, bobble-headed, loose representation of the Man of Steel: my origami Superman. As my daughter hugged me and told me thank you, his hand popped off.

Not my fault. Design flaw.

I explained to her that this wasn't much of a toy and that he would probably come apart as she picked him up and sat him down or played with him. Fortunately she really wanted Wonder Woman, but she got Superman so she figured we had better put him together. Just like me, it doesn't matter to her how cheap or badly made something is, if it's unassembled, it needs to get un-unassembled, and pronto. It took me longer to put it together than she actually spent playing with it. That night I came home after a meeting and finishing a paper for school, and the Man of Glossy Cardstock lay still partially assembled, albeit headless, in that same spot on the table. My daughter had abandoned him for her old standby: Barbie. But really, who could blame her?

My bride reminded me as I grumbled through our little project that I was doing this for my daughter only because she asked me to. And I loved her. So here are a few object lessons to take away from this, so pick the one that most applies to you (which is often the one we most actively avoid).

1. Just spend time doing dumb stuff for your wife and kids because they love you and you love them. Who cares if it will last? My daughter will remember that I put hundreds of stickers on her dollhouse, drank imaginary tea, played little-girl board games and fed her sleepy-time baby doll imaginary milk from an empty bottle. And she'll love me for it.

2. Just like I did for my little girl, only because she asked (honestly I was hoping she wouldn't), Jesus tells us that if we who are wicked can give good things to our kids, how much more will God, our Father, give us good gifts? There are some things that may not make an eternal difference, but God doesn't mind blessing us with them, only because it makes us happy. It's not as much as we'd like, but it's certainly more than we deserve.

3. I spent a lot of time on that stupid cardboard inaction figure, knowing it was going to fall apart the first time anyone touched it. Invariably the tabs came out of the slots, the head unfurled, the hands popped off, and the cape ripped. Shocker. But how much time do we spend on things that won't last? We know that our job will be over in about 30 years, give or take, our car will need to be replaced eventually, our house will be sold or will have to be repaired or renovated, and our gadgets will soon be outdated and we will want the latest and greatest. And yet we spend so much of our time on our origami. Our paper world will fade and tear and eventually blow away or burn up. So, gentlemen, let's commit to focusing on the things that will last, the things that will hold for all eternity.

FINALLY!

It's been a long month for my bride and I. As soon as school started back, our lives started going haywire, but the beginning of October hit like a truck. My bride has fibromyalgia, which means she is in constant joint and muscle pain. In her case it's usually her back and neck, but it's really everywhere. Stress adds to it, too, but even when she's relaxed she hurts. She usually pushes through every day and keeps going through the rest of her life regardless, so when she has to stop for not feeling well, I have to take notice.

A month ago I got a call at home on a Friday. It was the school nurse where my bride teaches and my daughter attends. I found out that my dear wife was hit with sudden abdominal pain, nausea, and a heat flash. After a visit to the doctor and some follow-up we were able to pin down some causes, but the pain is ongoing still. To add to that, last week she got the flu and after a visit to the emergency room, some shots and two IV's, she was given orders not to work for a week and to stay home. She did.

Needless to say we've been....um....separated for about a month. Thursday she finally felt well enough that all the buildup from the past few days, a result of a month's worth, got the best of us and we risked it. We couldn't wait until Friday. So Thursday night was passionate and amazing. We were unusually animalistic and literally couldn't get enough of each other! Pardon my imagery here, but I couldn't be deep enough and she couldn't be filled enough. Even after several orgasms on her part and a very strong one on my part, I just wouldn't go down, which surprised us both and we took as much of an advantage as we could.

Friday morning I still had to take our little girl to school and had to pick her up on an early-release day. We decided to take advantage and have a breakfast date, followed by some Christmas window shopping for our daughter. We got home around lunch and my wife had to make an important call and I told her I was going to take a nap on the couch before going to pick up our girl. A while later, my wife comes walking into the living room with a determination I rarely see. She immediately walked over and unzipped my pants so she could get to work. That led to an amazingly heated session on the living room floor. Before we could finish I had to go pick up our daughter. We had family night and were too tired to begin round two.

Until this morning. More relaxed, but just as passionate, we were able to spend more time together before getting breakfast. We are back on track it seems. We are under no delusion that our passionate weekend will be the norm from here on out, but we are certainly back in bed. We didn't like being derailed, but it was unavoidable and no fault of our own.

Do I have a point to this? Somewhat. Mostly I'm just excited about it, but I also want to encourage any of you who are going through a dry spell that if you can change it, to take steps to do so. Don't let a month turn into two, then six, then more. Make a move. If you can't change it, maybe you just need to ride it out and wait for a break, but pray for a break. Watch for your break and when it comes, jump on it. Your wife is your only legitimate sexual outlet. Take advantage of that and enjoy it as you can.

Batman in Flip-Flops

It's Halloween. Or Reformation Day, if you prefer.

Today my wife is sick again. Or still. I'm not sure which. But I am sure that she is too sick to go with our daughter to trick-or-treat. Our little girl wanted to go to the mall this year, which we had never done, and that's exactly what we did. We turned off all the lights in the house except the lamp by my bride's bedside, and drove to the mall.

Our daughter was a cat tonight (we have a rule about dressing scary, which is fine with her) and enjoyed her costume. For the next couple of years it will join her other dress-up clothes and costumes in the guest room closet. We'll see her in those cat ears and tail for months to come. But tonight she was one of countless creatures, super heroes, princesses, soldiers, pirates, and teens wrapped in foil.

Seriously. As we got out of the car to cross the parking lot toward the mall, we walked the entire way behind four high school girls with aluminum foil wrapped around their waists. And that's it. My daughter asked me what they were supposed to be and I answered the best way I could.

"Burritos."

Once inside we joined the throngs of kids and adults draped in costumes in a broad range of details. Some went all out in homemade costumes complete with make-up and accessories (sickles, wands, fake blood, etc.). Others bought costumes at their local Wal-mart, and still others simply wrote something on a t-shirt.

Batman was an odd mix of all three. His head was covered in a good mask and his costume was outstanding, higher quality than Wal-mart, lower than studio. He had a nice-looking utility belt, detailed and sculpted muscles, winged gloves, full cape...and flip-flops.

Why flip-flops? Granted, our little black cat was wearing white sneakers, not exactly puss-in-boots; but Batman in flip-flops? So close yet so far away. I know it was only a costume and it served its purpose, but for us, fellow grooms, we don't get that luxury.

What I mean is, we have to pay attention to details. If we are to be husbands, we are to look like husbands. We are to love our wives, display that love head to toe; honor our wives, alone and in front of others; protect our wives, from others and sometimes even ourselves; desire our wives, initiating and receiving strong sexual intimacy; and I could go on. I read an article in the new Runners' World magazine I just received and in it there was a man who ran a 50-mile race in street shoes (or dress shoes) because he had failed to pack his running shoes for the race! He finished the race without injury, but imagine how much better he could have run had he been wearing the right shoes.

Fellow grooms, let us pay attention to the details of our roles. We cannot be a cheap knock-off of a "real" husband. Even if we aren't quite studio-quality, we can at least give 1oo% with what we've got. Even the man who ran in street shoes finished the race, and Batman got his candy tonight, even in flip-flops. But your family is not make-believe and flip-flops just won't do.