So why am I reflecting on all this right now? It’s because I’m facing the next big shift in life. My daughter is moving out of the house. She’s going off to college, leaving our protection and venturing out into her own life.

And this truly is a big shift. In fact, raising kids is full of big shifts, and each one is a potential stumbling block or stress point or whatever you want to call it. And those stumbling blocks have the potential to strengthen or destroy the marriage relationship.

When my daughter was first born, that was a huge shift for us. The transition from two people to three, one of them being completely dependent on the other two, is huge. There needs to be a complete refocus of energy on the part of the couple. Your time with your spouse suddenly becomes the child’s time and that is stressful.

The next big shift was when Deanna started school and suddenly somebody else is in charge of caring for her for a significant period of time each day. She also brings home ideas and concepts that belong to other people, and so as parents we were forced to learn to deal with that, to unify our position and to try and teach her how to filter out the crap while instilling the set of morals we wanted her to embrace.

One of the hardest shifts was when Deanna became a teenager. And it wasn’t because of bad behavior or anything, it was because suddenly she needed more space, more independence. The child goes from complete dependency to wanting to stand alone almost over night and for parents this is hard. It’s hard to admit you are not the center of this kid’s life anymore. For moms I think it can be emotionally crippling because they’ve invested so much emotional time into this kid and now they just aren’t needed in the same way. So there’s a gap that forms. I remember that Michelle and I really had to re-adjust and refocus on each other and remind ourselves that we’re married and that our relationship with our child should not take priority over our relationship with each other.

We made it through that shift, and now we’re facing the next big one. But honestly, I think because we took time to refocus on each other during the last shift, that we are much better prepared for this one, which is the final cutting of the tether. I think Michelle and I are closer than we have ever been and we are working as a team better than we ever have. So when Deanna leaves and it’s just the two of us in the house, I think we’re as prepared as we can be to move forward.

Of course this won’t be easy. I’m going to miss my kid to be perfectly honest. I really enjoy having her around (even though she can be a moody little sh*t at times). I think Michelle is going to be affected even more for the simple reason that there’s no other woman in the house now to talk to. So this is our challenge. And the question becomes; How do we adapt? How do we pull together and find new areas in our relationship to explore and embrace? There’s the a potential to become bored, or depressed, or just to drive each other crazy. I’ve seen it happen with other couples. So we’ll have to remain focused and find the best way to move forward together.

I’m excited though. I’m excited for Deanna. She’s embarking on what is going to be an exciting time in her life. She’s going to be surrounded by creative people and be given full freedom to explore her passion. I know she’s going to be successful.

So here’s to the next big shift. I’m looking forward to seeing how this plays out.

I’ve been following this story closely. I’m interested in it because I’m a big Apple consumer, but also because our church has humanitarian groups working in China. I am currently building a website for one of those teams and I’ve had the opportunity to sift through hundreds of photos of how most Chinese people live and the conditions they have to put up with.

So I watched the ABC show and I honestly find it laughable that anyone could label the working conditions at Foxconn “slavery”, or “forced labor” or even “bad”. And I think these stories are surfacing not because we give a rats ass about the Chinese. Heck, we have millions of mexicans working in worse conditions in our fields, do we care about them?  No, America is jealous of China because we have become a nation of fat, lazy, selfish, phony, ungrateful bastards.

It’s true. Look how we have the gall to complain about working conditions in China. Wow, these people have to work in spotless factories that have soccer fields and internet cafe’s, free schooling, food for less than a buck a meal, and they have to pay $17 a month in rent,  and work 12 hours a day! Good lord, the tragedy of it all!!!! Why aren’t we as concerned about the immigrant working 12 hours a day during the 100 degree central valley heat right here in our backyard? Hmmmmm….

Let’s assume though for one second that we are actually concerned about Chinese working conditions. I’ll put it in perspective. Who among us only pays 4% of our salary for rent? I pay over 16% for mine. Foxconn workers end up paying about 9% for food if they eat twice a day in the cafeteria. That’s exactly what I would pay if I ate in our cafeteria twice a day and our plates are nowhere near as big as theirs. Also, they don’t pay taxes, because they fall under the minimum tax bracket. So they get to keep roughly 85% of their pay after expenses. I pay around 30% taxes and I’m lucky to sock away 10% for savings on a good month. Doesn’t sound so awful all of the sudden.

Now let’s look at what the alternative would be if these workers could not work at Foxconn. They might be working in another factory, like a garment factory or something where the conditions are really bad because they don’t have high profile clients like Apple. Most though would probably be living in the countryside working family farms and not making ANY profit at all, they’d just be surviving. Many would be living in places with no plumbing and no clean water and would be relying on humanitarian teams like the ones our church sends over just to get basic water filtration in place so they don’t have to drink the same water they defecate in.

So I think it’s really a matter of perspective. Would I do these jobs? Not now, because I don’t have to. I have 30 years of experience and skills built up that make me more valuable to employers. But I did do menial jobs when I was young and inexperienced. I worked at a cash register for $3 an hour yet loved it because it gave me opportunities I would not have had if I was unemployed. Does that mean I was a “slave”? Does that mean some corporation was “taking advantage” of me? Of course not. It means I was selling the abilities I had and profiting from it. Apparently that’s slavery now. My how things have changed.

But what I think is really bugging America is not the perception that the Chinese are being treated poorly. It’s really the fact that they are working, while we wallow in our own self pity. We want the world yet we’re not willing to do anything for it. We’d rather cruise around in our Hover-Rounds because we’re too weak and lazy to actually walk on the legs God gave us while we stuff our fat faces with fast food, bitch because we only have 500 channels of TV and complain about our triple shot, soy, vanilla freaking foo-foo latte with two carmel pumps being made wrong. It’s pathetic.

America, it’s time to quit complaining, get off your ass and make something happen for yourselves.

I saw my family back in December and while it was a good visit, I’m reminded at how many challenges they have. Years of drug abuse, and lack of strong leadership have left our family with a lot of problems. I don’t want to get too personal here and start spilling crap about my family, but there’s so much disfunction it’s not even funny. I love my family, but I’m glad I don’t live close enough to get sucked into all the garbage.

The other thing that’s been kind of sucky is just that I haven’t been to church or bible study in over a month. I think that’s having a big effect on me. On one hand, church is different for me now. I think having my wife work there and having to hear all the back end stuff that happens on a day to day basis is really getting me down. When I go on Sunday it’s hard to concentrate. Maybe I should start going to a different church just so I can focus again. lol.

Anyway, on an up note, the post Christmas Detox is going pretty good. Have to work back up to daily workouts again and get back to eating right. My weigh in is tomorrow and I expect at least 3 pounds, maybe 4 lost. So that’s a good start. If I can keep that up, I’ll be down to 200 in 30 days with no problems.

Still trying to figure out where my Epic Ride 2012 will be going as well. Thinking Sturgis, but then again, the ride there is going to be awful. Flat and boring. It would be cool just to be able to say I went to Sturgis, but it doesn’t seem like a great ride. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll just do a long tour through Northern Cali and southern Oregon. Last time I was up there, there was a ton of stuff I wanted to see but didn’t have time. I think I need more of a leisurely adventure this year instead of doing 500 miles a day.

Well, that’s all that’s going on. Peace.

The talk I hear is this: Christians are claiming that God is winning football games for them and Tebow’s success if proof there’s a God. The other side counters that God must be pretty shallow if he lets Christians suffer in other parts of the world while he wins football games in America.

Both arguments are completely idiotic.

Here’s my take. I don’t think God gives a crap about football. What I think God really cares about is bringing his creation, people, into a relationship with him. God wants us to know him and he wants to love us and us to love him. And if God is doing anything through Tim Tebow right now, he’s making his presence known. Not by winning football games, but through the words and actions of one of his creations.

I think when you look at it that way, then it becomes clear that God is also working every bit as hard in places where Christians are having a tough time. When I went to Ethiopia a few years back I saw this first hand. People in absolute poverty having their spirits lifted and hope instilled in them because they were learning about Jesus.

So my fellow Christians, if you’re gloating over won football games, knock it off. You’re totally missing the point and screwing up the message. Take this opportunity not to say “believe in God and you’ll win the playoffs”… but take the time to share what the gift of Jesus really means. It means a relationship with our Creator. It means forgiveness, personal fulfillment, peace, compassion and love, in all circumstances.

Seriously though, I feel like I’m just surviving lately. I’m kind of walking through life and not really doing anything cool. I sit in front of the TV or computer and just watch what everyone else is creating and it sucks. So 2012 is going to be about stripping out the noise and creating instead of just consuming.

Therefore, here are my 2012 New Years resolutions:

1.  Spend less time consuming. Didn’t I just say that? I’ve already started this one by making this blog post, killing my twitter account and killing my Google + account. I’ve also deleted about a dozen “friends” from Facebook.

2. Create music. Bob from SOS and I are going to write some tunes and today I’m going to re-string and re-wire my guitar and start recording ideas again. I was listening to some old stuff Frank and I did with Smoke This and I really dug it. I have a lot of ideas, I just need to get them on tape.

3. Create art. I haven’t done any serious sketching in decades. I’ve been kicking around starting my own clothing company but I’m not happy with other people’s art. So I think I need to just put in the time and make my own. I’m gonna do it.

4. This is a professional resolution. I’m going to earn my first certificate on my way to becoming a Microsoft Certified Professional Developer. Here’s why; I’m getting old. The young guys coming up have time to spend doing open source stuff and living for code. I don’t. I have a family, a house to keep up, and other hobbies that bring me joy. Also, I don’t really fit in with the new brand of coder. I don’t like fancy coffee, or listen to John Mayer and I don’t really like talking about coding (or any technology) socially. What I do know is that I have 20 years of corporate IT experience. I think this certification will bolster that experience and also give me a much needed skills and confidence boost.

So there you have it. It’s all about creating and being productive this year. Yes there’s the usual stuff like keeping in shape and continuing to foster my relationship with God, which is not trivial, but i’ve already managed to work those things into my life. I don’t need a resolution to continue them.

I hope everyone has a productive and exciting 2012! God Bless!

Every year I do a post on my anniversary and try to pass on a little information about how the heck we’ve lasted so long. It’s kind of mind blowing every year to look back on everything we’ve been through together. It’s also interesting to see the responses from other people.

I think people were more amazed at how long we’ve been married when we were around year 16 or 17. That blows people away. If you get divorced within the first 10 years, I don’t think anyone is really surprised by that anymore. They just assume you didn’t try. If you get divorced between year 10 and 15, it’s really sad, but all too common. So if you make it to years 15 to 20 or so, it’s really amazing to people. The funny thing is, once you pass 20 years of marriage, it’s no longer amazing to people. They just expect you to be married forever now. It’s old news.

I think marriage in a way works like that too. Once you’ve been with a person for so long, hopefully you’ve worked out all the kinks, and that person just becomes an extension of you. I think that’s where I’m at now. Michelle is such a part of everything I do, that I could never imagine her not being there. Or worse, somebody else being in her place. We’ve learned to deal with each other’s quirks, we’ve learned to work together and depend on each other, and so even the thought of starting over and dating and all that just completely preposterous. Besides, do you know any single people in their 40′s or older? I do, and generally speaking there are good reasons they are single. Not all of them are messed up, but most of them are. Just saying.

Anyway, the longer I’m married and the more I watch my younger married (and divorced) friends makes me realize a few things about how to stay married. And I think it comes down to how you approach your relationship in the first place. On my Facebook account I have several female friends that go through a new relationship about once a month. And their attitude when they get a new guy is all about how good they feel. I think people who approach relationships with the attitude that they are doing something to make themselves feel good are always going to fail.

Marriage is not about making you feel good. If you want to feel good, go buy a freaking car, or some new clothes or something. Relationships are about being part of a unit, a team. Let that sink in. If you could play football pretty good and you went to a coach and said “hey coach, I want to play football because I think your team will make me feel good”, the coach would kick you off his field. Each player is chosen for a team strictly because of what they can put back into the whole. I think that’s the secret to marriage. Marriage should be entered into with the idea that you have something to offer to the team, and you’re going to give 100%. If both people go in with that attitude, that relationship can’t fail.

So there you have it. A football analogy for the success of marriage. This coming from a guy that hasn’t watched a game in 10 years. I must truly be getting old. I was going to use a rock ‘n’ roll analogy, but all bands are dysfunctional so I couldn’t make that work. Sorry.

Anyway, here’s to 23 years of marriage to my beautiful and loving wife. I could not imagine my life any other way.

Today though I got some bad news from the doc which is going to make this season even suckier, and it’s bumming me out. All my blood levels are out of whack again, and at over 200lbs I’ve put on quite a bit of weight from being in the 190′s a year or so ago. *sigh*.

I’m telling you man, maintaining my fitness has proven to be a ridiculously hard endeavor. It shouldn’t be because all it takes in 60 lousy minutes of jumping or running a day and not putting garbage into my mouth, but never the less, the discipline escapes me. It probably hurts me too that I don’t look fat, and nobody would call me overweight, so that makes it easier for me to justify skipping a workout or having an few extra beers here and there. But my bloodwork says I’m not as healthy as I need to be, and so to get there I need a sustained focus and work ethic.

The Doc says to lower my carb intake and cut the alcohol. That sucks because I really, really, really love my beer. A lot. And I suppose I could try just cutting back, but that never really works for me. If I cut something completely out of my life, it’s much easier to know when I’m cheating.

The bad part of all this is not that I’m a few pounds heavier, it’s that it’s a continual area of failure in my life. This is one of the few things that I really have a hard time making permanent. And I really, really hate sucking at stuff.

So here’s to a renewed focus on fitness. Again.

America is selfish. We’re like spoiled children constantly stomping our feet and screaming about things we think we deserve. And when we feel somebody else has something we want, we will do anything to get it. We slander each other, we cheat, we bend the rules, we make back room deals, and if that doesn’t work, we sue each other. And often we don’t seem to care what the fallout is. We don’t care who will be hurt, because we “deserve” to be “happy”. We’ve “worked for” it. This selfish attitude threads itself through all economic classes, all races, all political parties, and even religions.

Why is this? I think it’s because as a society, we simply don’t know who God is and what he planned for us to be. Many of us claim to know, but often we just twist that knowledge to suit ourselves. I think if we really cracked open the bible and just read the simple teachings of Jesus, just as they appear on the paper, and then put that into daily practice, the world would change dramatically.

Here’s a passage from the Bible that I think sums it all up:

If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.

Which of us can say that we are truly loving? This is the world view we should be striving to imbed into the American culture. And if we can do that, everything else will sort itself out.

Here’s the link to the article in the Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/24/us/24iht-currents24.html

The project is our fireplace upgrade. Our fireplace was still as it was when we bought our house 16 years ago. Gold trip on the doors, crappy tile surround, and a flat tile hearth. Not bad way back en, but clearly dated today. So Michelle designed a new one, and I put it in with her help.

It shouldn’t have take so long, but after finished in the hearth, I just dreaded actually putting it in. Moving a 200lb slab of concrete and laying it in place is not easy and I had to do some research to find out how to deal with a nasty crack in our foundation. That and summer vacations, etc, just pushed us way behind. But with time this weekend, and some help from my friends, We finally laid that sucker in place. Tiling the surround was fairly easy ands we knocked that out quickly.

So it’s finally done and i have to say I’m thrilled with the result. And the fact that we designed, built and installed the whole thing ourselves makes me very pleased with the outcome.

Here’s a phot of the before and after, and here’s a link to a photo gallery detailing the entire process from start to finish.

Sad.

It’s just so freaking hard to keep fit. But It’s hard not because of society, or genetics or any of that. It’s because of simple lack of discipline. I know what I need to do to stay fit, but I make tiny exceptions here and there, and then over time those exceptions congeal to become large problems, like 10lbs of weight I don’t want.

Take today; I went to the cafeteria and even though I work at a hospital the options were fried fish and chips, pizza, calzones, BBQ’d something or other, and a weight watchers chicken wrap. Now, I could have eaten the chicken wrap, but instead I told myself that one calzone is not going to hurt. Damn it.

That may seem like a petty example, but I sit here wondering, if I can’t even control something simple, like what I stuff in my face, how many other areas in my life am I making exceptions in? My spirituality? My work life? My personal relationships? And how long do I have before they pile up and become trouble?