Saturday, June 30, 2007

America, the Beautiful - Day Two

Today’s journey of 500 miles took us through Colorado’s magnificent Rocky Mountains, including Glenwood Canyon, and on into the farm and ranch country of northeast Colorado and western Nebraska. I was reminded that it was from the summit of Pikes Peak that Katharine Bates was inspired to pen the words to the beloved hymn praising America “from sea to shining sea.” Our lodging in North Platte is adjacent to a corn field which Mary and I walked the perimeter of to stretch our legs after another long day of driving. Lincoln is now within striking distance and we should be joining Mary’s mom for Sunday dinner. There are so many things for which to be grateful, not the least of which is the liberty to explore this great nation.

Friday, June 29, 2007

America, the Beautiful - Day One

We drove a little more than five-hundred miles today from Las Vegas to Grand Junction. Utah’s beauty is nothing less than awesome and we will be seeing more of the same as we drive through the Colorado Rockies on our way to North Platte. For as disgusted as I am with the state of America these days, the upcoming observance of Independence Day reminds me just what an amazing country this still is. I do not fear a violent enemy attack as we cross state lines freely. I do fear the ignorant morons that have taken to our highways with gas-guzzling monsters that literally endanger our species. But to have the freedom to get in our car and travel in relative safety to visit family and friends who also live in peaceful and harmonious communities is precious. I am truly grateful to all those--great and small--who contributed to the freedom I enjoyed today.

Thursday, June 28, 2007

It's the Boys Against the Girls!

My very quick assessment indicates that there are 50 males and 203 females employed by the Family Support Division. Being one of the males places me in the distinct minority, a position that I don’t find to be all that comfortable. This disease is compounded by the fact that the majority of the “real men” are attorneys and investigators which makes us “girly men” an even smaller minority. Now consider that a significant portion of the females employed by the Family Support Division are former or current “customers” that have, in many instances, a justifiable hatred of men in general. Boy! Do I need a vacation! When visiting Nebraska next week I think I’ll look up a few of the drinking and hunting buddies I made while a pastor there (please recognize the sarcasm here) and suggest that we go out into the fields and kill something so that I can feel like a real man again. On second thought, I’m not sure that I have any shoes that go with my hunting outfit, so I may just hang out with Mary and her friends, and then I’ll feel right at home.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Wednesday in Las Vegas

There are so many subjects worth thinking about. And yet I find myself laboring to place these little black marks on the screen. Depression is a nasty disorder. It hovers on the outskirts of consciousness most of the time, but by the time it has quietly slipped into the center of things it is often too late to do anything about it. I try to do my part. I take my meds. I try to think happy thoughts. I try to remember all the many blessings for which I am grateful. But it’s still there, somehow managing to take the edge off the authenticity of my efforts. I really don’t know how long I’ve been depressed. That’s the insidious nature of the beast. It hides itself through its omnipresence to the degree that one can’t remember what it was like without it. “Hello, darkness, my old friend; I’ve come to speak with you again.” There is solace in knowing that I am not alone. There is comfort and strength from the love that doesn’t question whether or not I’m worthy of it. It is time to push it back where it belongs so that I can truly embrace and enjoy lucidity; for tomorrow is another day.

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Tuesday in Las Vegas

Shortly after arriving at work this morning my iced coffee missed my mouth and went all over the shirt that Mary had just finished washing and ironing. As I tried to get over that insult my iPod Shuffle lost its charge and I’ve been without my musical accompaniment ever since (it should be ready to go in time for my afternoon break). As I started my lunch I remembered that I forgot to exchange last week’s issue of TIME for the current one that arrived in yesterday’s mail. My supervisor made a special—and rare—trip to my cubicle to inform me that last February I missed two steps on a DOCK entry. The reader can perhaps understand the trepidation that’s building in my mind toward the rest of the day. I need some R&R and its coming just in the nick of time. Mary and I are leaving Friday on a road trip to Lincoln to see her family. It’s been quite a while since we’ve done that much driving, but the Prius’ marvelous mileage in addition to circumventing airport security is creating a welcome adventure. So, I need to make it through the next two-and-a-half days without further incident. What was that ripping sound I just heard as I was bending over?

Monday, June 25, 2007

Don't Worry, Be Happy!

Most retarded people seem to be happy. This may not be the most insensitive, politically incorrect thing I’ve ever said, but it has to come close. But my casual observation of those who are not endowed with great intelligence (as is determined by those who identify themselves as intelligent) is that they enjoy a degree of contentment and happiness that results from not knowing (or caring) how deprived they are in comparison to those who seem to be chronically unhappy as a result of all that they do know. Jesus spoke of the happiness of children as a way of better envisioning what God’s reign on earth looks like. Confident of belonging and being loved without knowing any better lends credence to the notion that ignorance truly is bliss. The childish acceptance of belonging to one’s Creator is obviously more conducive to happiness than is the more “mature” obsession with having to think it through in terms of validity and veracity. Could it be that we’re not happier simply because we think too much? It’s probably time to wrap up this segment before I offend the enlightened, the intellectual, the intelligent more than I already have. If I can think of a way, however, to retard myself (yes, I see the contradiction) it may be well worth the effort just for the happiness.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Maybe It's Something I Just Ate

Ever since I listened to the Chief in Little Big Man proclaim “It is a good day for dying” it has stuck with me as one of the most profound things I’ve ever heard. The most objective, practical view of this thing we call “life” informs us that the great common denominator is its end as we know it, and that even the wisest person on earth cannot say with absolute certainty when that inevitable transition is going to occur. Therefore, it makes sense to treat every precious moment of life as if it’s our last. The adolescent shield of invincible immortality persists into our supposed maturity and in the process throws our priorities completely out of whack. There was a brief period after September 11 that no one left the house without remembering to say “I love you” but the emotions subsided. I have an ever-growing list of things that I want to do tomorrow or the next day, but if I seriously comprehended that tomorrow is not guaranteed I would surely give attention to the most important matters today. If I knew for certain that today was the last of my earthly existence there would be a certain urgency to reconciling, forgiving, loving, and letting myself be loved. Not only would I press harder for the tying up of mundane loose ends but there would be a most sincere focus upon harmonizing with the eternal. When we wonder what could ever transform the world into a better place, it occurs to me that the key might be living every day in such a way that it is a good one for dying.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Another Day

I’m back to work today. Nothing much has changed. There are still unwanted and neglected children in Las Vegas; indeed, the world. As someone who still prefers a window seat on airliners so that I can watch the heavens and earth pass by, it is impossible for me to understand that for some people the miracle of a child is anything but. We all see them everyday; the children born out of wedlock, the children of divorce, the children. They understand the implied message loud and clear: you’re not wanted. What are they to do? A very unscientific guess on my part is that an average child support award is somewhere in the neighborhood of $300 per month. How in God’s name is that supposed to compensate for the feelings of abandonment and insecurity? We Americans humor ourselves by believing that the law can handle everything, that we can legislate morality. Really? In our pursuit of self-gratification we are literally throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Excuse me, it’s time to start hunting down more absent parents to get them to cough up the $10 a day that must make it possible for them to sleep at night.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

I’m home today recuperating from yesterday’s bone marrow biopsy—I milk these occasions for all they’re worth. It hurts, I can’t shower for 24 hours, and…well, you get the idea. Apparently there is no cause for alarm, but my oncologist does seem a bit more motivated than usual to learn why one of my counts has gone from .004 to .011 (I really should have paid more attention to math class).

My sister, Kim, sent me a youtube link that I forwarded to everyone in my address book. I expressed my concern that we need to exercise caution when viewing such productions by being alert to the Bush Administration’s seemingly successful tactic of confusing support with patriotism. Anyway, it’s worth your viewing and contemplation, not to mention that it has provided me with a shortcut to today’s post.

Monday, June 18, 2007

No Ifs, Ands, or Buts

Rachel and Rebecca made Father’s Day the best yet! Like marriage, fatherhood seems to just get better with age. The girls’ unique and distinctive expressions of love and appreciation highlighted this twenty-fourth observance of the day they qualified me for. I’m aware of some other reasonably functional nuclear families, and it occurs to me that we need to find a way to lift up these examples above the highly publicized glut of dysfunctional ones. Just like the individuals of which they are composed, families have unique characteristics which tend to defy sweeping generalizations, but I am going to be so bold as to suggest that there is one trait which virtually guarantees a healthy, functioning family: unconditional love. This is a tricky one, to be sure, because we humans seem to just love to attach conditions of one sort or another to almost everything we say and do. I will do this for you if you do this for me. And we’re very adept at leveraging the conditions we set into controlling power. I’m reasonably certain that I’m not the only one who has experienced termination as the result of the conditions being placed on a relationship not being met. I will love you if… However naïve we may have been at the time, when Mary and I vowed that we are husband and wife until parted by death we cut all the conditional strings tied to our relationship. When the option of splitting up was permanently removed, we embarked upon a journey of figuring out how to make things work. It was our choice, but making it eliminated the possibility of contrary or contradictory choices in the future. I like to think that it was into this unconditional setting that Rachel and Rebecca were born, and that in spite of all the usual disagreements and spats that occur wherever two or more are gathered together they never once worried about whether or not Mary and I love them. That’s a given. That’s unconditional. That’s what makes for happy, healthy families.

Thursday, June 14, 2007

A Fourth P for the Pod

I’m having so much fun with this exploration of fatherhood in preparation for Sunday’s observance of Father’s Day that I anticipate continuing even after the big day. Reflecting upon the three P’s I wrote about yesterday: procreation, providing, protecting; a critically important fourth came to mind: presence. The most natural and logical teacher of what being a father is all about is, well, one’s father. In my profession we euphemistically refer to them as absent parents, but we all know that there are many ways that a parent can absent her/himself from their child that are not as extreme as abandonment, divorce, etc. If the father is not present in the life of the child, then the child is deprived of all the benefits that presence alone can provide. I cannot claim to have been the perfect father, but I do know that every minute that I was not occupied by earning a living I was with my wife and daughters (Mary, Rachel and Rebecca may have something to say about the downside of this fact). I’m sure that it is not by coincidence that this week’s TIME has an article on The Psychology of Fatherhood, and I provide the link here to support my argument that simple parental presence may be the single most important thing in the life of a child.

PS
I keep hoping that TIME will invite me to join their staff of writers, but in the meantime I’ll just have to content myself with bringing to my readers’ attention some of the great stuff I find there. Such is the case with William Kristol’s commentary, Learning from Lincoln’s Wisdom. Anything it might have to do with the subject of fatherhood is truly remote, but it’s just an excellent essay!

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Like P's in a Pod

The human male’s contribution of sperm to the process of procreation has yet to be artificially substituted. Yes, through artificial insemination the means of delivery and reception have taken on new dimensions, but technology has yet to produce an artificial sperm. Thus, the human male is—at least for now—irreplaceable with regard to the propagation of the species.

The subsequent contributions of the male to the development of the offspring are more ambiguous, but they may be the defining qualities of a father. To provide for the well-being of the newborn and its mother seems natural enough, but an even superficial scan of the human landscape quickly reveals that this is a choice, not a requirement. I acknowledge that, because of what I do forty hours a week, I have developed a jaundiced outlook toward this facet of fatherhood.

To provide for a family may eventually include its protection. In contemporary American society this can be accomplished in a variety of abstractions ranging from income to shelter that don’t necessarily involve hand-to-hand combat. A nuclear family very likely will need some form of protection in order to survive, and with the mother being responsible for nourishing and sustaining the newborn in ways that are uniquely female the role of protector naturally falls to the father.

All of these attributes are volitional in nature. In other words, a male becomes a father and a female becomes a mother by choosing to do so. Evidence surrounds us that the choice to procreate, provide and protect are not involuntary or instinctual. Perhaps this is not true for much of the animal kingdom, but for humans becoming a good parent is a matter of choice.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

The Day Cometh

The common counsel is to write about what you know. As the national day of observance draws nigh, it occurs to me that having and being a father may justify my commentary on the subject. I am daily reminded that paternity and fatherhood are not synonymous. Indeed, the ability to impregnate seems to have very little to do with being a father except in the strictest biological sense. This raises the interesting question of whether or not biology is a requisite to fatherhood. I suspect that there are some men—and perhaps women—who are more genuine father figures in the life of a child than the male who donated sperm to the conception. So what makes a good father?

Mary and I are at that stage where our responsibilities of rearing Rachel and Rebecca have pretty well come to an end. It is a relief to realize that I am no longer required to dispense fatherly wisdom that was pretty much ignored anyway. Now comes our time to enjoy the intimate friendship with the adults that grew up before our very eyes; to reap, in a figurative way, the fruit of our labor. I am mindful, however, that taking motherhood and fatherhood seriously during those formative years was critically necessary to reach the point we are now preparing to enjoy. I invite Rachel and Rebecca (and anyone else so inclined) to comment on these and future reflections on what being a good father is all about.

For now, suffice it to say that human parenting—for better or for worse—is not instinctual. It is learned behavior, and so my continuing examination will reasonably focus upon the teachers.

Monday, June 11, 2007

Happy Days are Here Again!

Even if not official by the calendar, summer’s here! Las Vegas’ temperatures have already entered the triple digits several times, and the frequency of that happening will just get greater as we head for July and August. The Memorial Day gateway to summer has been passed through and we’re well on our way to Fourth festivities. Mary’s summer break has begun. Yes, it may be another ten days until its official, but summer is here. Each season is unique with its own attributes, but I’ve always liked summer because it means no school, family vacations, frequent trips to the pool, and so on. This will be the first summer in twenty-three years that Mary and I will spend without our daughters. I imagine that’s going to take a little getting used to. My Speedo doesn’t fit like it did before the girls were born, and I’m hoping that I don’t have to break it out this year just to take our minds off of the empty nest (although I’m sure that would do the trick). I’m grateful for the many means of staying in touch with Rachel and Rebecca that are at our disposal, and I’m looking forward to another summer of fun with Mary.

Thursday, June 07, 2007

Sweet and Sour

I didn’t realize at the time that as Rebecca and I lunched in Oscar’s plaza yesterday, it was the last of such occasions. She has decided to join her sister and brother-in-law in her hometown of Flagstaff, Arizona. Her present plans are to pursue a degree in education (following in her mother’s footsteps) while sharing her gifts and talents with that northern Arizona community. This is as it should be. According to Piaget and others, the goal of parenthood is to raise autonomous, independent children that will go into the world their own person. I feel that Mary and I have satisfactorily met that objective in two beautiful, intelligent, and loving women by whom the world is made a better place. That doesn’t make letting go any easier. I am grateful for albeit a brief period of time that Rebecca and I have worked across the street from each other. In many ways, I am envious of her freedom to move on as I dig my trench of social security ever deeper. I knew that the situation would be fleeting—which it was—but that enabled me to enjoy and appreciate it all the more. Now I can only admonish the residents of Flagstaff to treasure my wonderful daughters.

PS
Speaking of my wonderful daughters, I owe a word of thanks to Rachel for rescuing Tuesday’s post from its “lost in cyberspace” status. Perhaps I haven’t paid my e-blogger dues (this is my warped sense of humor; e-blogger is free :-) but something was preventing my ability to publish. My fantasy is that W finally got word of my open disdain for his imbecility and attempted to censor me, but the sad truth is that I’m just an old man that needed my daughter’s help. Thanks, Rachel!

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Where Is She?

My Aunt Esther celebrated her 90th birthday last Friday, and Mary and I had the good fortune of being able to attend. Among the many reasons for rejoicing was the reunion with my five cousins from that side of the family, an occasion for which none of us could remember the last time it happened. We have all aged quite a bit, but the good news is that we are all well enough to have made it to the gathering. That was more than could be said for the two uncles that have died and the aunt who is suffering dementia that is probably brought on by Alzheimer’s. There was one other of the elders not present, my mom. I am happy to report that she is alive and well, but through divorce she has been surgically removed from the Hanna family, thereby becoming persona non grata. The cousin nearest my age was the only one to ask about her. Apparently the rest of the clan has come to accept that she does not exist; not in the photos being passed around, not in the stories being told, not as an integral part of the history being shared. I know how incredibly painful this is for my mother, who considered herself the devoted wife and loyal member of the extended family. She has done nothing to deserve being exiled to the realm of nonbeing, but it has happened to her nonetheless. I reflect with a degree of sadness and dismay that those to whom I am so closely related are able to dismiss the one from whose womb I entered this world. I’m going to focus on those words of the Christ, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do;” until I am able to incorporate that truth into my being.