Personal, Inner Conflict

The Apostle Paul captured my dilemma in the seventh chapter of the letter to the Romans. While I have such grandiose plans and dreams for my life, ministries I want to be in, even just my daily life - the way I honor and cherish my wife, the time I spend on my children and the manner I communicate with them, and the rest of my family and friends I want to be with and care about - these are the things in my life that are the hardest to accomplish. I feel like this diatribe could easily swing into a pity party, but that is not my focus. As Paul finishes his thought on sin in Romans 7, he says (vs 24, 25) "What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord."
I am almost fifty years old and I am still learning how far I have to grow, how much I do not know, and just what a creep I am. After all, I can look back and see the goober from high school, or the moron that went from college to college and never accomplished anything. One failed marriage, children and step children that neither listen to or respect any adult, save me personally. I have been attempting to receive a Bachelor's Degree for almost 5 years, and California Baptist University started me off with a two-year Associates Degree I received 15 years ago. Jobless, and still playing games with my school for my degree, I struggle to stay UN-depressed.
I truly believe that there is a plan for me. Like Paul, I thank God for the gift of his son, Jesus Christ. I need to walk in that light. I need to seek His face and do what pleases Him, and then my concerns about my life will not be as ominous or depressing.

Friendship

How can you patch a torn or punctured friendship? What is the recipe for strengthening a bond between buddies, without damage to marriages, children, jobs, and such? What is a friend? How does one define the extent of friendship?

There are individuals who have come across my path and made a lasting impression on my life. Many I called friends and yet I haven't seen or spoken to them in over twenty years. There are a small number of folks I have attempted to reconnect with whether they be college or high school friends, and for a multitude of reasons the reconnect never happened.

So now I sit, a half century old with an ex-wife, wife and kids from late twenties to grade school and my sweetie and I have talked a lot about our lack of friends. No couples to hang out with, go out with, invite over for a meal and a relaxing evening. The funny (weird) part of the story is that we as a family are involved in so many different things, and we can't ever find even one couple or other family to hang with. Church, Work, our school, and the kids school, PTSA, Little League, Dance, AYSO, and Pop Warner are all places to find folks for friendships.

David wrote in the Psalms 22 that "Iron sharpens iron, So a man sharpens the favor of his friend." Jesus parable about the man who had company unexpectedly drop in and he went to local friends to borrow food, receiving a rather negative response. Asking, regardless of the inhibitions or expected reply is the key to that lesson. Other Bible references to friends are in the negative, as in worldly influences taking focus from God.

The question is still how do I restore a friendship, or build one that is meaningful?

Vacation

Time to get away. Not for me, who has had about the most unproductive summer on record. Not for my kids, who have had a great summer of dancing, baseball, Disney Channel, their niece, and their brother back from Japan. This getaway is for mom. Working 50 - 60 hours per week, taking time out of sleeping to volunteer for D3's dance recital, S4's All-Star Baseball games, and any family time we had.

She is single-handedly taking care of this entire family. Her parents get sick, and she's there. Any child has a problem, she solves it. She is the embodiment of "Wonder Woman". She takes a vacation to get away. She needs to 'veg' for a while. She has earned this. Unfortunately, in lieu of a Club Med week on a Caribbean Island, or a Cruise, or hiking a 14,000 ft. peak, her vacation will consist of ten days on the northeast prairie of Colorado. She deserves much better.

Life With A Bachelor of Arts

I have worked for this degree for over two years. My loving and oh, so patient wife has inspired, cheered, and helped me every step of the way. My children gave up daddy time to allow me to write, read, and study. Our financial situation during this period of education has deteriorated to dismal, because during this process we supported my D2, her boyfriend and their daughter, my precious and beautiful granddaughter. In addition, S3 decided to move in with us because of his trouble with his mom and step dad, and we could not say no. So Pam worked and worked, I worked part-time, and was a student full time. Nine total mouths and bodies, with needs and wants and only two contributing to the financial well being of the whole.

Don't get me wrong, D2 worked her butt off to support herself and her daughter, and she went to school full time on top of her full time job. She had money for her new car, including gas and insurance, her partying lifestyle, and childcare for daughter, and she paid us a stipend just for a help with food and some bills, but it never was enough to cover their expenses. We spent our savings fixing up our house for them to have a private apartment - type place, and then our monthly bills got bigger and bigger for three years.

A high school student, S3, has many needs. He needs to be inspired to finish school, do his best in order to learn the most, and absorb as much attention and energy from a family as physically possible. Much of this energy is taken in chauffeuring from place to place, the funding for everything he needs and most of his wants. Very hard in the long run to make a child of divorce (we had a total of four) buy in to a "family" plan and help work WITH a family instead of "All for One" and screw the All plan.

This has been about our deep and dismal financial picture. I received my B.A. degree to recreate a better picture. I can not get employed! So, my life with a Bachelor of Arts degree is just that, the same life with a pretty piece of paper, a tassel, and a funky black dress thing.

First Step - Done!

Bachelor of Arts in English from California Baptist University - that is what it says on my diploma. That phrase is completely awesome to me - "my diploma" - a road of many challenges and even more joys is behind me, and now in front of me is a new road. A certificate of qualification to teach in California, with classroom work, a test, and student teaching all lay before me.

It was a great celebration of accomplishment. My kids that were in Southern California were here share in my joy, with my fantastic inspirer and life partner I am very proud to call my wife, my folks, my in-laws, and my sister and her family, plus two dear friends all braved the desert sun, heat, and my company to wish me well. Their prayers on my behalf have been lifted throughout this process. They have asked, encouraged, and even nagged to help me get this part of the process finished.

So, here I go, ready or not, into phase two of the Teacher Plan. Thank you Lord, for Your blessings, Your love, and guidance over my life.

Anti-Prefunctory Parental Ponderings

Outside of my relationship with God and my wife, there is nothing more important than my children. I have a daughter from a college liaison, let's call D1, that twenty-three years ago I gave up for adoption to the man who wanted to marry my college friend. I have a son from my first marriage, he will be S3, and two from my present and final marriage, S4 and D3. My wife had three children in her first marriage, S1, D2, and S2, which means between us, seven people are walking the planet as a direct result of our choices.

When D1's mom thought it best I have NO contact with our daughter, but my family (parents, aunts) were still big parts of her life, I was able to stay up to date on D1's life. When she asked about me, she was told some sort of nonsense, and when she actively was looking to speak with me (through my parents whom she called Grandma & Grandpa) she was fifteen, so I wrote her a letter telling her how I wanted what was best for her, and her mom and the man that loved them both could make a good family for her. I was honest, telling her I loved her from the time she was born, but made choices because her mom and I weren't in love. Now D1 will be 26 next month, and she is a single mom with a one year old boy, and she lives on the east coast. She stays in touch via email and "Myspace", and she acknowledges me as a person. The irony is that my stepchildren and my own S3 treat me the same way.

Raised in my house, those children are just as uncommunicative, uncaring and unavailable emotionally as the girl who's only connection with me is biological. A symptom of the generation and our culture, I believe. However, that is a thought for a different blog. Now I have D2 who also had a child and needed my wife and my support for a time, and has an incredibly strange rationale for what she is entitled to. She doesn't refer to S4 and D3 as her brother and sister, just as "my mother's kids". This entitlement is shared unconsciously by all 5 of the older children. S1 is 26, and he keeps in touch to inform us about him. He has told us how he feels strongly that he needs to be more involved in his younger siblings lives, but only how they relate to HIM. There is no desire to relate to them. Examples - S4, an 11 year old, is very intelligent and has a communication level that S1 can understand. They chat for hours via Skype while D3, a nine year old, is dying to participate and listen and even tell her stories, but the parents have to intervene just to allow her any time at all. I am frequently perplexed by this phenomena, and then I hear stories of other children from a myriad of different ideologies and households who have the very same entitlement issues. I still feel quite guilty, even with the evidence society presents, for the following reasons:

My two youngest, S4 and D3, are still in the formative stages, elementary school ages. We have provided a great foundation of the importance of God, family, education, physical activities, and friends. D3 doesn't seem to get it. She just dances through life, making the same repeated errors, and her actions when explaining are simply, "yea, so what?" or a vacant stare that begs the question, "Hello, is ANYBODY home?" I feel like such a failure when I stand back and look at the large canvas of my family. It is my fault.

Ramblings

Happy New Year to all of my three readers - been a busy holiday season with Christmas, school, family visiting from Colorado for an all-too-brief time. My 94 year-young grandma came with my parents. It was a blessing to spend so much time with her. My niece had her right ACL surgically repaired the day after Christmas, which became a freaky and almost surreal time with my sister and my brother-in-law, but a great new beginning and opportunity for one of the sweetest people on this planet. My oldest niece is a humble, talented and gorgeous high school junior. She has never had more than a scrape or bruise, and now she is dealing with a major injury and repair. This process is slower than she imagined. She is young and very healthy, with a great orthopedic surgeon - she will heal to a point almost as good as new -

This is the home stretch of my Bachelor Degree - I must get back to my term paper on English and Education and humor - a goofy topic, huh?