I remember when your mom first asked me to meet her father and extended family. I was at first flattered but that gave way very quickly to an overwhelming feeling of dread. People tend to either like me right away or think something is wrong with me.
When she started to introduce me to the important people in her life, she took a huge leap of faith. You don't want people close to you to think the person you are hanging out with is wrong for you. When you start those introductions, you expose yourself and that other person to scrutiny that you may not normally welcome. Family, friends, and extended family are coincidentally those people who can really hurt your feelings because they have known you so long. These are the people who really know how to hurt your feelings.
It is a part of having a new significant relationship that is a complete but necessary pain in the ass.
I first really met her Dad when I was putting in a flagstone walk at her house. I shook his hand and while I was working made small talk so we could break the ice with each other. About 10 minutes into small talk he asked what my intentions were regarding your mom. It was like trying to open a window slowly and having someone opening the same window with a large brick. After that uncomfortable pause (for me, not him) I told him that I liked her a lot and we were both figuring out where this was going to go. He told me that I must be serious about her because I was putting in flagstone for her. I repeated the same thing and your mom manged to come over and save me. She was adept then (and now) at keeping me from falling in large holes that are hell to get out of.
Meeting her older brothers and sisters for the first couple of times was a lot worse. Her brothers and sisters were welcoming but regarded me with a healthy suspicion. Nothing is more awkward than to be at a family or friend gathering and being the new guy. Trying to participate and be part of conversation is like jumping rope with razor blades. You can get chopped up to bits if you jump in at the wrong time. Your mom's brothers and sister had a sense of humor much like your mom and were OK with letting me sweat a little. In their eyes, she was worth it. Now that both of you are old enough to bring that person over, I understand (and appreciate) why they would have made me work for your mom.
Of course if I had stopped to realize that the one thing I had in common with them from the start was a deep and abiding love of your mom, all of those first awkward first meetings/holidays/occasions would have went much smoother for both of us. Damn Occum and his razor for coming into my life so late.
Love Dad
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Sunday, August 25, 2013
The worst thing I ever saw
I get asked from time to time what is the worst thing that I ever saw as a firefighter. It is the kind of question that I never could answer very well. It is impossible to describe a graphic traumatic injury and give it the appropriate amount of weight. These traumatic injuries assault all of your senses at once in a way in a way that nothing else does. It always seems that the worst of these incidents started with a person who made some incredibly bad decisions to start the chain of events.
The sense of fair play, what is right and what is wrong can be tossed out of the window in the blink of an eye. Everyone finds there sense of balance in a different way. It can become harder to do because we have preconceived notions about how we are supposed to process this kind of information. Note here that stiff upper lips and trying to sort it out on your own is the wrong thing to do every time. Too many people love you for you have to do that. People who believe they are unloved are self absorbed an ignoring the people who do love them.
There is a Yin and Yang aspect to almost everything. Yin and Yang are the things that appear opposite to each other but are interrelated to each other (a shadow cannot exist without light). This is true in all aspects of your life. I found it especially true in the FD.
The day our engine crew was on the scene of an fatal accident involving a semi truck and bicyclist, there was two very distinct aspects to that day. A very tough scene to manage and work through. But along with that was a humbling display of courage by people whose lives changed in an agonizing instant that day. Human beings have an amazing will to live and take care of each other when everything in their immediate lives goes to hell. For me the quiet, selfless courage that people display under the worst case scenario affirms every good thing I believe about people. You always have a choice on what you choose to see when things get bumpy.
People grieve, their hearts break, and it is not always fair but they keep pressing on for each other, that is the best of who everyone is.
By the way the worst thing I ever saw as a firefighter was a mother crying at the loss of her son.
Love Dad
Monday, August 19, 2013
Force and Detail
You both were very stubborn and very curious as kids.
I still remember when (names withheld by request) getting you dressed was a 90 minute ordeal. You just refused to wear the clothes that we tried to put on you. It did not really matter if it was a dress (hint on who this was), pants, shorts, or God Forbid - shoes of any description. After wrestling with you for an hour to get clothes on you and your hair brushed, the first minute we walked out of the room you took all of your clothes off. The day it all came to a head, was an epic 2 hour battle to get you dressed. It was so frustrating that day we had to take a break. Sitting at the table we were planing our next strategy on how to trick, convince, or coerce you into clothes. After settling on a plan we walked into your room prepared for battle and there you sat on the floor dressed like a circus clown. Every piece of your clothing was a different color and on backwards and you were beaming. From that point on you had a lot of latitude in what you wore and going places was a lot easier. You always have had boundaries, but forcing you to wear cute matching outfits was never high on the list. A side note, a lot of people who saw you then did not think there was anything wrong with you, they just assumed that something was wrong with us as parents because we dressed you like that. Having a happy, really badly dressed kid was better choice than the alternative.
When ever you force anyone to do something, you will always get the bare minimum results back. That universal role extends to family, loved ones, work associates, and random strangers.
I also remember (again names withheld by request) when you were sitting in your room in front of a large garden level window. Your sister was out in the yard (hint on who this was) and I was sitting in your room with you. You pointed to the window, broke out in a big grin and wobbled over to the window. I patiently explained the whole window thing and how you should not have lean on, push, or kick the window because it would hurt you. You looked up at me and I was thinking I am a damn good Dad because I took all that time and explained it to you and I was sure by the look in your eyes that you understood completely. I leave the room and was going to tell your mom what a great dad I was when I heard glass breaking in the room I just left you in. My heart fell out of my chest. We both ran back in the room and the glass in the window was broken, cracks from the center to the outer edges of the window. I realized that I neglected to mention not to attempt to open the window with your forehead. You were unharmed, I removed a small pin drop of glass from your forehead. That was hard to do because you were laughing your ass off. For reference this is the equivalent of watching a high speed car wreck happen in front of you and the driver stepping out of his car laughing.
More detail is not always the right thing. The more detail the more limiting something becomes. I realized after I spoke to you in your room your pea head only processed the first 4 or 5 words I said. Remember the Occum's Razor rule.
Love Dad
I still remember when (names withheld by request) getting you dressed was a 90 minute ordeal. You just refused to wear the clothes that we tried to put on you. It did not really matter if it was a dress (hint on who this was), pants, shorts, or God Forbid - shoes of any description. After wrestling with you for an hour to get clothes on you and your hair brushed, the first minute we walked out of the room you took all of your clothes off. The day it all came to a head, was an epic 2 hour battle to get you dressed. It was so frustrating that day we had to take a break. Sitting at the table we were planing our next strategy on how to trick, convince, or coerce you into clothes. After settling on a plan we walked into your room prepared for battle and there you sat on the floor dressed like a circus clown. Every piece of your clothing was a different color and on backwards and you were beaming. From that point on you had a lot of latitude in what you wore and going places was a lot easier. You always have had boundaries, but forcing you to wear cute matching outfits was never high on the list. A side note, a lot of people who saw you then did not think there was anything wrong with you, they just assumed that something was wrong with us as parents because we dressed you like that. Having a happy, really badly dressed kid was better choice than the alternative.
When ever you force anyone to do something, you will always get the bare minimum results back. That universal role extends to family, loved ones, work associates, and random strangers.
I also remember (again names withheld by request) when you were sitting in your room in front of a large garden level window. Your sister was out in the yard (hint on who this was) and I was sitting in your room with you. You pointed to the window, broke out in a big grin and wobbled over to the window. I patiently explained the whole window thing and how you should not have lean on, push, or kick the window because it would hurt you. You looked up at me and I was thinking I am a damn good Dad because I took all that time and explained it to you and I was sure by the look in your eyes that you understood completely. I leave the room and was going to tell your mom what a great dad I was when I heard glass breaking in the room I just left you in. My heart fell out of my chest. We both ran back in the room and the glass in the window was broken, cracks from the center to the outer edges of the window. I realized that I neglected to mention not to attempt to open the window with your forehead. You were unharmed, I removed a small pin drop of glass from your forehead. That was hard to do because you were laughing your ass off. For reference this is the equivalent of watching a high speed car wreck happen in front of you and the driver stepping out of his car laughing.
More detail is not always the right thing. The more detail the more limiting something becomes. I realized after I spoke to you in your room your pea head only processed the first 4 or 5 words I said. Remember the Occum's Razor rule.
Love Dad
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Expert
I am an expert in most of the things I no longer actively do.
I was reminded of this when we were out having a couple of beers and eating out in Winter Park in a nicer brewery. There was this 5 year old that was raising hell. This kid was screaming his head off and the desperate mom was not sure quite how to handle him. I remember thinking that I would know how to handle that, I would never let my kid do that in a public place.
Flash back to 1994. A WalMart parking lot on a warm summer day. I was looking at your angelic sleeping face in the car seat. You fell asleep in the car a lot and your mom quietly shut the car off and rolled down all the windows. She said she'd be right back and RAN (yes RAN) into the front entrance of the store. The minute the automatic doors closed I had a pending sense of doom. The wind was blowing your long bangs over your forhead and you looked so peaceful. And then, your eyes opened with a start, and your head rotated a complete 360 degree's and your angelic brow furrowed.
I knew what to do. I reached through the open window, unbuckled you from the car seat and almost had you in my arms before you let loose. You did not cry like a normal kid. Honestly I do not know how to describe it and give it the right amount of weight. I was not able to hold you to my chest because of how loud it was. I pointed you away from me. You are the only kid I ever knew who actually set off a car alarm (it happened that day). Picture me the -original Cool Hand Luke -carrying you face out, bathed in sweat and trying every Dad trick in the book to slow you down or get you to breathe. The Saturday Wal-Mart crowd actually parted and made a path for me up to the front door. Moses and the Red Sea got nothing on me.
Your mom heard you before I walked in the door in the back of the store and ran (yes RAN) to the front of the store. Not for you, she was coming to save me. She simply said your name and held out her arms and the horns went back inside your head and that inhuman howl stopped as abruptly as it started and you smiled at her. Your mom will never receive sufficient credit for those days. At the age that you frequently scared the hell out of me, she had nerves of steel, nothing scared her.
We did the walk of shame out of the Wal-Mart (how many people can say they have done that?) and went home without the stuff we came for.
And 19 years later (give or take) I am the expert. I can watch another young couple take the walk of shame, secure in the knowledge I would know how to handle that. I am an expert.
Be careful of experts. If a person needs to convince you how expert they are, there is a good chance they are those hindsight kind of experts. Always make the distinction between expertise and experts. Expertise is the pursuit of excellence. Experts are guys know everything about the stuff they no longer do.
Call your mom and thank her for all the hell you raised as a kid that you don't remember.
Love Dad
I was reminded of this when we were out having a couple of beers and eating out in Winter Park in a nicer brewery. There was this 5 year old that was raising hell. This kid was screaming his head off and the desperate mom was not sure quite how to handle him. I remember thinking that I would know how to handle that, I would never let my kid do that in a public place.
Flash back to 1994. A WalMart parking lot on a warm summer day. I was looking at your angelic sleeping face in the car seat. You fell asleep in the car a lot and your mom quietly shut the car off and rolled down all the windows. She said she'd be right back and RAN (yes RAN) into the front entrance of the store. The minute the automatic doors closed I had a pending sense of doom. The wind was blowing your long bangs over your forhead and you looked so peaceful. And then, your eyes opened with a start, and your head rotated a complete 360 degree's and your angelic brow furrowed.
I knew what to do. I reached through the open window, unbuckled you from the car seat and almost had you in my arms before you let loose. You did not cry like a normal kid. Honestly I do not know how to describe it and give it the right amount of weight. I was not able to hold you to my chest because of how loud it was. I pointed you away from me. You are the only kid I ever knew who actually set off a car alarm (it happened that day). Picture me the -original Cool Hand Luke -carrying you face out, bathed in sweat and trying every Dad trick in the book to slow you down or get you to breathe. The Saturday Wal-Mart crowd actually parted and made a path for me up to the front door. Moses and the Red Sea got nothing on me.
Your mom heard you before I walked in the door in the back of the store and ran (yes RAN) to the front of the store. Not for you, she was coming to save me. She simply said your name and held out her arms and the horns went back inside your head and that inhuman howl stopped as abruptly as it started and you smiled at her. Your mom will never receive sufficient credit for those days. At the age that you frequently scared the hell out of me, she had nerves of steel, nothing scared her.
We did the walk of shame out of the Wal-Mart (how many people can say they have done that?) and went home without the stuff we came for.
And 19 years later (give or take) I am the expert. I can watch another young couple take the walk of shame, secure in the knowledge I would know how to handle that. I am an expert.
Be careful of experts. If a person needs to convince you how expert they are, there is a good chance they are those hindsight kind of experts. Always make the distinction between expertise and experts. Expertise is the pursuit of excellence. Experts are guys know everything about the stuff they no longer do.
Call your mom and thank her for all the hell you raised as a kid that you don't remember.
Love Dad
Monday, August 12, 2013
Grandma
Grandma left for California today to see her older brother for the last time today. They were very close in age and like you guys they were co conspirators in all of the trouble they got in when they were young kids.
He is diabetic, who has stopped his dialysis in the last couple of weeks. He is having cardiac events every day now and prognosis has changed from weeks to days. Grandma and her sister are racing the clock to get out to see him. The best hope is that she can look into his eyes and that she can see him looking right back at her.
For all the people you love, you can never tell them how much you love them and be done. You will always be at least one " I love you" short. It is supposed to work that way. Funny how things work, you know if you tell someone to *uck off, you can be completely done and finished with just one (you will never be short one *uck off). It is always going to be more work to love someone.
So you need to call her in the next couple of days when she gets that brutal heart punch. And if you ever wonder what to say, it is as simple as saying how deeply sorry for her loss and you offer to help her in any way you can. The depth of another person's grief is something you will never be able to measure, prevent, or mitigate. Profound grief is the most personal thing any one person will do and it is something that people come to terms in a way and time that is unique to them. But when the cloud of grief clears momentarily and they understand that you are there, it makes all the difference in the world.
When people die, it is like cutting a hole in a wooden floor you are standing on. The hole never goes away, it is always there. You learn to step around it, it is an absence that you always deal with, every day. For Grandma, she has a couple of big assed holes in her wood floor (my dad, her parents, and brother). Calling her does not fix any one hole, but it does for a moment make her stop focusing on them.
There is nothing so elegant as letting someone know you are thinking of them when the shit is hitting the fan. You can't control the shit or the fan but you can assist with some of the clean up.
Love Dad
He is diabetic, who has stopped his dialysis in the last couple of weeks. He is having cardiac events every day now and prognosis has changed from weeks to days. Grandma and her sister are racing the clock to get out to see him. The best hope is that she can look into his eyes and that she can see him looking right back at her.
For all the people you love, you can never tell them how much you love them and be done. You will always be at least one " I love you" short. It is supposed to work that way. Funny how things work, you know if you tell someone to *uck off, you can be completely done and finished with just one (you will never be short one *uck off). It is always going to be more work to love someone.
So you need to call her in the next couple of days when she gets that brutal heart punch. And if you ever wonder what to say, it is as simple as saying how deeply sorry for her loss and you offer to help her in any way you can. The depth of another person's grief is something you will never be able to measure, prevent, or mitigate. Profound grief is the most personal thing any one person will do and it is something that people come to terms in a way and time that is unique to them. But when the cloud of grief clears momentarily and they understand that you are there, it makes all the difference in the world.
When people die, it is like cutting a hole in a wooden floor you are standing on. The hole never goes away, it is always there. You learn to step around it, it is an absence that you always deal with, every day. For Grandma, she has a couple of big assed holes in her wood floor (my dad, her parents, and brother). Calling her does not fix any one hole, but it does for a moment make her stop focusing on them.
There is nothing so elegant as letting someone know you are thinking of them when the shit is hitting the fan. You can't control the shit or the fan but you can assist with some of the clean up.
Love Dad
Good Time
Sometimes you got to pull a good time out of a crappy circumstance. Because in each crappy circumstance there is always a good time trying to surface. My motorcycle trip was like that this year. It was a lot of ego induced headaches punctuated by amazing stretches of road.
We generally leave at 4AM to see the sun rise on a stretch of beautiful Wyoming road. This year we were parked in front of a Motorcycle shop in town until noon, waiting on a repair for a friends new bike. We all waited because we agreed that it was all or nothing. All or nothing is almost always going to be a bad idea, even if is done with the best of intentions. In this case, instead of one guy having a tough day, everyone had a tough day. In retrospect it would have been so easy to divide and conquer. When you chose All or Nothing and everyone is going to have a bad day, it is not a good choice....ever.
When we arrived at 8PM on a Friday night and the guy driving plugged in the RV, there was burning smell and a popping sound. For the duration of the stay, the RV ran on a hour or two of generator. Food in the refrigerator went bad, AC was sporadic, and none of the electronics worked. And what did a bunch of type A people do drive the resolution of this? We walked to town and had a couple of beers and when this did not fix it we sat around in folding chairs giving bad advice to the one guy who did try to do something. These careful, detailed, concise observations of a problem without anyone taking any kind of tangible action is what I written about before - The Circle of Hope (COH). One of the problems with the COH is that your observations become more insightful and detailed when you continue to fail to take any kind of action to resolve your issue. If your observations about a problem in your life are becoming really insightful and powerful, you may be in a COH and not realize it.
There were of course the time when we elected to just enjoy the company we found ourselves in. Surprizingly, these were the times when were sitting in a uncomfortable folding chairs, with warm beer, eating ears of corn boiled in a pan on a borrowed grill. A great time despite all our attempts to be miserable. I love it when that happens.
Today's crisis is tommorrows great story.
We generally leave at 4AM to see the sun rise on a stretch of beautiful Wyoming road. This year we were parked in front of a Motorcycle shop in town until noon, waiting on a repair for a friends new bike. We all waited because we agreed that it was all or nothing. All or nothing is almost always going to be a bad idea, even if is done with the best of intentions. In this case, instead of one guy having a tough day, everyone had a tough day. In retrospect it would have been so easy to divide and conquer. When you chose All or Nothing and everyone is going to have a bad day, it is not a good choice....ever.
When we arrived at 8PM on a Friday night and the guy driving plugged in the RV, there was burning smell and a popping sound. For the duration of the stay, the RV ran on a hour or two of generator. Food in the refrigerator went bad, AC was sporadic, and none of the electronics worked. And what did a bunch of type A people do drive the resolution of this? We walked to town and had a couple of beers and when this did not fix it we sat around in folding chairs giving bad advice to the one guy who did try to do something. These careful, detailed, concise observations of a problem without anyone taking any kind of tangible action is what I written about before - The Circle of Hope (COH). One of the problems with the COH is that your observations become more insightful and detailed when you continue to fail to take any kind of action to resolve your issue. If your observations about a problem in your life are becoming really insightful and powerful, you may be in a COH and not realize it.
There were of course the time when we elected to just enjoy the company we found ourselves in. Surprizingly, these were the times when were sitting in a uncomfortable folding chairs, with warm beer, eating ears of corn boiled in a pan on a borrowed grill. A great time despite all our attempts to be miserable. I love it when that happens.
Today's crisis is tommorrows great story.
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