Pictures are Painful

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When I first heard Ed Sheeran's song photograph, I liked it a lot more than I do now. I used to like pictures generally a lot more than I do now. Eight years ago when I started exploring Nevada, I took a boatload of amazing pictures, pictures that reminded me that I actually did those things because they were the only proof I had that I did anything interesting with my life. When I first started teaching, I used them in my first evening lab meeting as part of a break the ice thing to show what I do when I'm not doing science. However, in my hallway outside the bedroom, I once had a collage of eight pictures hung to chronicle my closest and best friends. All but one of those picture frames is now empty because those people all vanished from my life except for my hiking buddy, and it's a painful reminder of things I would rather forget.

We take pictures to remember things that bring us joy. In capturing those moments, we make memories last. You see, science suggests that your memory is not fixed. When you reminisce, it rebuilds neural networks to those things. This is why at each retelling the story may change. It's not a lie, it's just that each time you recall information your brain links neurons differently from the last, putting different information together. Over time, without a reason to reflect, your brain forgets things in order to free "RAM" for new information and endeavors. It's why things grow dim over time; your brain has more to do and fewer resources dedicated to the recall of things long passed. Without the pictures, I start to wonder if those things really happened or if they are just dreams or hallucinations. Without anyone around to corroborate, I might as well have made up the whole thing.

At the bottom of the hall closet, I keep a box of pictures of people who were once important to me. I know where it is if I one day want to look at it, and one day a few months back, I made the mistake of opening it and glancing at the contents. It was painful. It reminded me of things I had actually almost forgotten, things that are no longer true, people who were not true to the promises and representations made. It reminded me of things I never realized, disappointments I encountered, and people who once mattered. From 1997 to 2013, their faces gazed back up at me and reminded me of loss. They remind me of the past. They remind me of pain.

My hiking buddy doesn't keep or take many pictures. In fact, I think he only has four. He used to take them, but now he just asks me for pictures from our hiking trips and the like. I have more pictures of him in the six years we've been friends than his family has in his entire life. His four pictures are of us together at Sequoia in 2013, his ex wife, his daughters, and our friend who died in 2013. That's it. He told me that he does that on purpose to forget. Over time, it feels less painful because it feels less real. Maybe it was all a dream. Maybe it happened differently than he recalls. He can't look back at pictures or letters or other remembrances and refresh his neural networks. He gets over it because he forgets about it.

Wouldn't that be nice? Unfortunately, even without them, I have eidetic memory meaning that even without the pictures, transcripts, letters, and memorabilia, I can remember. People keep marveling at my ability to recollect. Trouble is that I remember things that nobody else does because they no longer mean the things they told me. Trouble is that I remember everyone who leaves. Trouble is that I remember almost everything ever said to me even without the pictures because the pictures appear in my mind's eye. I know so much that is no longer true, and that's painful.

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. If the words associated with the pictures are no longer worth anything, then the pictures are pretty worthless. So what if we made memories for ourselves of our love and life and laughter? If they are people who no longer admit they ever knew us, like Peter did to Christ, what difference does it make to have those pictures or keep them?

When I visited my kid brother in June, I discovered that he and his wife take very few pictures, particularly of my neice. This is the same little girl to whom I was the baby whisperer years ago. I took pictures of her primarily for my parents. I took pictures primarily for my brother and his wife who will want to remember their little girl. I took the pictures because this little girl for some reason trusts me and loves me. I told my brother that she's obviously a bad judge of character and so he'll have to watch her as she gets older. I took the pictures because for once I thought I looked pretty dashing and handsome; maybe my niece enhances my looks. I took the pictures because the morning I left when she thought I had left without saying goodbye she went to her room and cried. I took the pictures because she gives me hope that women will miss me, love me, appreciate me, and want to be with me. I hope that she makes good choices and that we have a good relationship as she gets older. i want to be the kind of uncle to whom she can turn in troubled times because we built a relationship of trust when she was young. They say kids have a sense about good people. I hope that's true, because I'm tired of being lonely, and because I wish I could forget things I no longer have to see.

I got stood up to go on a date hiking today. I had the day off, so I went anyway. It was a gorgeous summer day on the mountain. It was also a wonderful thunderstorm. I sat alone in the mountains and thought about all the cool things I do that nobody knows. I thought about all the cool things I have seen that nobody else I know has. I thought about all the people with whom I shared intimate and wonderful things who no longer share anything with me. I don't look at the pictures. I don't have to.

Lost in the Woods

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As I previously mentioned, at the end of this weekend's hike, Metro Police went up the hill looking for two teenagers lost in the woods after a weekend camping trip. I found this particular event tragic and completely unnecessary. I also found it an interesting allegory for our life here in general. Far too many people think that we're just like those two boys. Those who think there is no God think we're lost in the woods. Those who think there is a God divide into two camps- those who believe in a passive deity who leaves us to fend for ourselves and those who believe that God dropped us off on purpose with purpose. Here are the details: according to police, the father dropped off the boys to hike/camp on the mountain and then just showed up to get them on Saturday. When they didn't show according to plan, he went to work and left others to do the work of looking for the boys. I hope they bring him up on charges, and I hope they find the boys.

If there is no God, then our life is as pointless as a walk in the woods. I go hiking frequently because it gets me out of the heat, gives me good exercise, and puts me in contact with good people some of whom find my being there to their benefit. However, if there is no God, there's really no point in my going to the great lengths of driving 50 miles to the trailheads, packing water, wearing the right gear, and being safe. When I die, that's the end, so why go to all that effort? I could just "eat, drink, and be merry" down in the valley and never be lost on the woods. Where we live and what we do matters only to our posterity, and so it would be unwise to go anywhere even remotely dangerous. Between the weather hazards of thunderstorms and flashfloods and the geological issues of high altitude and slippery slate, nobody would wander in the woods for fun. Plus, there are cougars, eagles, and other potential biological hazards. The mountain offers nothing to posterity unless they can get up there.

What bothered me most was the behavior of the father. Rather than go along with his kids or join in the rescue, he just went to work. God didn't drop us off at the trailhead with a bit of string and a sharp rock and then disappear to do his own thing. What kind of a father leaves his kids to fend for themselves and then doesn't care about their disposition when they don't make the rendezvous? Personally I find it suspect that there's been no word. I know from personal experience that one of the hikers in my escorted group had cell phone reception at various spots along the trail. I know that my V3 RZR works at places where no other phones do like in the visitor center. They should have been able to get a signal to someone. It's not like it's easy to hide on our mountains. One young lady from South Carolina described the mountains here like so: "I'm used to cute little hairy hills not these jagged and naked peaks". We saw the helicopter flying around, and we think it came near us thinking we were the hikers they sought. They weren't looking in the right place, but even if they were, you'd have to try to hide like in a cave or by some large trees or something far from the trail. If these kids are lost, they are either hurt or they are trying not to be found.

Contrary to that scenario, God is a loving father who sent us here with purpose and on purpose. He armed us with the right gear, provides us guides for the journey in the form of parents and prophets to teach us, particularly those whose parents are absent or deficient in their instruction. More to the point, like Metro, God provided for a way to rescue and redeem us when we become lost, if we get harmed, and when we can't get back on our own. He sent His son to go get us, and His prophets cry in the wilderness so that we'll know to what source we make look for remission of our sins. God gives us direction, provides us with a map through Holy Scripture, and equips us with living waters and the bread of life to sustain us in the wilderness. He sends us to the mountain because He knows it makes us strong. He does not leave us to wander alone or to find our way back without help.

Each of us is that boy lost on the mountain. No matter how old or wise you think you are, the mountains of mortality can conquer any feeble human efforts. The air is thin, the heat is on, the rays of sun can burn, the rocks can give way, the predators are on the hunt, and so many things threaten to kill us. God also knows that only when we stand in holy places and leave behind the din of the devil's dissonance in the Vegas Valleys of life can we find peace, repose, and rejuvenation. When in doubt, we look upward, go upward, and rise above the temptations of the carnival barker. We go into the wilderness and trust that God will guide us and rescue us when we go astray or fall into perils, whatever form they take. He is the Father whose work it is to make sure His sons get home safely and grow as a result of their time on the mountain. Throughout antiquity, mountains were the places to which men went to become men, to commune with God, and to purify themselves for their lives. He did not leave us unprepared or unable to prepare, and He doesn't ask us to go it alone. There is a law given, punishment affixed, and a repentance granted, which repentance mercy claimeth. We are all lost in the woods, unaware, unprepared, and unable to get home alone. He is the good Father, and His son is that search and rescue team that braves the wild in order to bring back the prodigal, the stray, the wounded, broken and lost. He is our father, and He loves us, each and every one, and His grace is sufficient for the meek.

Lost Things

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Over the past few weeks, I've thought of my loss and seen a lot of other people lose things that mattered to them. Sometimes it's simple things that are just things, possessions. Sometimes, it's opportunities. Sometimes unfortunately it's actually people or chances for relationships with people dear to us. I miss my grandparents. There are times I'd like to call them up and ask them questions, and if a vocational opportunity I'm pursuing opens up, it would have been nice to call them up and give them some good news. Not all loss is tragic. We usually think of the tragic ones, but I am old enough and wise enough to realize that sometimes it's time to thank God for the unanswered prayer or unrealized opportunity. Neither my sister nor I are upset that any of our past relationships didn't work out as we hoped. Most of them were just people we used to know, and we're glad of the blessings. If we're wrong, maybe God will restore our loss, but maybe, just maybe He really does have something better to give us.

Yesterday, I accompanied a group at the behest of the Forest Service to the peak. Most of them were minors, but I felt good when I would decide to stop briefly and some of these much younger and sleeker youths were excited to have a rejoinder. We took our time and ended up on our hands and knees over a short portion of the trail covered by a recent rockslide. I took the opportunity to remind them or teach them for the first time that the ultimate goal of every hike is to return to the car safely. When we reached the bottom, this philosophy was reinforced. At the bottom, Vegas Metro Search and Rescue put together a group to go up looking for two teenagers who went missing. Of course, since I was up there today, they were interested in talking to me in case I'd seen anything useful, which I unfortunately did not. I hope they find the lost boys. I fear for them.

All around the neighborhood, there are posters and papers asking for help in recovering lost pets. I haven't seen any predators in my zip code for a while, but I know they are there, and odds are these lost pets are long dead. I've lost my share of dogs, and once I lost a Kat that was very dear to me, and I hurt for these people, because I know what it's like to lose a member of your family. I look at the posters, the pictures, and the pets, and each time I hope I will be able to find one of the lost and help return it to those who love their lost Kats, but so far no luck.

Elsewhere, opportunities of a lifetime slip away. Both of the volunteer supervisors up on the mountain have missed out. One of them actually injured herself; the story she told me doesn't jive, but the pain is certainly obviously real. Now, she probably won't be able to hike to the peak before the winter prohibits a safe journey, assuming we get a normal winter here. The other because she doesn't answer the phone or text messages has missed out on chances to leave the office and hike. I myself missed a deadline for an opportunity, and although it's not permanently withdrawn, I have to wait at least until next year to try again. Weather sometimes gets in the way, and sometimes it's traffic. Those are less tragic. The most tragic opportunities lost are those that people decide to pass up, not realizing that this is the opportune moment. I know I've invited plenty of people to things who decided not to come, decided not to join me, and sometimes I went anyway. It's just sad because our lives could be so much better until we decide not to allow them to be that way.

I know there is a social acceptable period of mourning for things lost, and for some things that period has expired. So, I forget about them long enough to forget why I need to. I busy myself with work, with hiking, and in conversations. I also bury myself in books, rereading Thomas More and the works of Dickens, and of course perusing the words of prophets and scripture in search for meaning and direction. The best thing about my belief system is that it teaches us that lost things can sometimes be returned or found and that other things that are forever lost can be replaced or upgraded with better ones. This truly is a gospel of the restoration of all things. It reminds us that Job had more in the end than the beginning, that Lazarus was blessed and comforted for his privations compared to the rich man, that on God's right hand and in His right hand are goodly and good and glorious things. Sometimes He prunes and dungs and digs about in the garden, and sometimes that feels painful to lose things or parts of ourselves that were dear to us, but when the fruit finally appears, it is glorious and wonderful.

Yesterday I harvested the only pomegranate and the only peach I got to keep from my trees this year and enjoyed both of them tremendously. I know that it's about more than the actual fruit for me. I love my garden. The fruit was a bonus. It was also a very tasty one. I lost quite a few fruits for various reasons, and maybe it made the fruit I was allowed to keep seem all the more savory. Maybe losing those things made the remainder all that better quality. When we can focus on a few really good things, maybe they're better than when all sorts of putative fruits and pursuits encumber the branches of our lives. Sometimes losing things can be good. Four years ago, I "lost" something, and it led to a better place, better opportunities, and although one particular fruit for which I hoped appears to have shriveled up on the vine, even the consolation opportunity seems good. It won't give me 8 of 8, but it will make 6 of 8 and 7 of 8 even better, and that's good too. Sometimes in order to get something better we have to lose something good.

What People Regret

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Sadly, today, Jared Fogle confessed to a series of pernicious felonies, marking a truly regrettable end to what might have been a wonderful story. He got fit, got a family, gained a fortune, and lost it all, and will likely rightly go down with a millstone hung around his neck. For most of us, our lives will not end with regrets quite that dramatic. At the end of days, most people seem to regret things that kept them from greater and deeper relationships with people. They work too much, hold back their feelings, run away from people who love them, engage in activities that force them to regret, and end up spending time with the wrong people. Ironically, when people are young, most of the choices they make lead to shallow and transitory associations. I mentioned earlier this summer how volunteering with the Forest Service on Mt. Charleston is the best thing I've done to socialize in this town. For a long time, I've wondered how to meet the kind of people I want to meet in a town where people party, drink, and objectify each other but only for the moment. On the radio this morning, the DJ mentioned a recent poll about things people regret. Basically, they break down into a few categories. They are first off things that God abjures. Then, as aforementioned, most of them amount to transitory and ephemeral things that society insists will make you happy. Ultimately, some of them categorize into things that take away our freedom and opportunity. Of all the words of tongue and pen, the saddest are these- it might have been!

According to the survey, here are the results:

The top 5 for men was:

Having a tattoo done - 32%

Behaviour whilst under the influence of alcohol - 31%

Drug use - 24%

Sustaining sporting injuries - 16%

Having children too young / before I was ready - 12%

While the top 5 regrets for women were:

Sexual encounters and/or one-night stands - 28%

Not learning to drive – 25% (this sounds odd, but I know quite a few women who haven't)

Broken friendships - 23%

Having children too young / before I was ready - 18%

Having a tattoo done - 14%

God abjures certain things for a reason. Both groups regret tattoos to a great degree. Like it or not, people judge you for your tattoos. The woman with whom I hiked this weekend told me her boyfriend has some, and he suffers because of it. Although he may be a good person, what's on the outside often tells us about things on the inside, and if you choose a tattoo that sets off an alarm in someone else, it doesn't matter sometimes what else you do. God wants us to be judged for who we are, so when we change how we look, we make it more difficult for people to see our hearts and true selves. Yes, I have a beard, but it comes off in minutes if you really want to be that critical. When we do drugs in order to escape ourselves, we often discover things about ourselves that we do not like. Since Tracie died two years ago, my buddy has spent about $40K on alcohol, meaning he's wasting his substance in riotous delusions. He doesn't remember much, and the alcohol doesn't help. When he sobers up, the pain remains, meaning he needs more alcohol to escape the pain again. Meanwhile, he's lost time and opportunity to serve God, learn about God, and reach out to God's children to help them and nobody won except the purveyors of perniciousness. I notice that many people regret children when they are too young, but they don't seem to regret sex before they are ready for the consequences. There's a reason God commands chastity- He really cares how children get into the world. God asked us to love our neighbors as ourselves and so to treat one another as we really are, as parts of the human family. He gave us our bodies so we could serve him, so when we injure them, mark them, incapacitate them, or let others abuse them to slake their lusts, we in essence say we do not appreciate the gift.

Ironically, most of these regrets are things that common parlance equates with living life to its fullest. The world would have us believe that living it up means doing whatever whenever for whatever reason we imagine. Eat, drink, and be merry! If it feels good, do it! Yet, people seem to regret engaging in things at times or in ways that God forbade. Drinking, partying, espirit de corps via tattoos, and rushing into things are endorsed by the world in order to be cool. Truly, if you don't you get left out, laughed at, and censored from their lives. I know so many women who think I'm boring and useless because I won't entertain them and spend all my substance trying to garner their attention. Especially in a town where being a 9 out of 10 in the looks department makes you average, they should be the ones trying to capture my eye, but I digress. All of these regrets are selfish things. All of them are about US. All of them are things of one moment and no moment at all. We are too proud and too selfish and too impatient to trust God, and so we have our reward. We got tattoos, drank, slept with tons of other people, went after fame, ignored our true friends, and so we have what really matters to us.

Particularly in America, I find this list interesting. Many of these regrets are things that limit our freedom and opportunity. Although advocates of certain activities claim that drugs, parties, and intercourse are about liberation, they often lead to bondage and limitations. Some people cannot get good jobs because of tattoos or because of prior drug use. Some people need a certain pay in a job because they had too many kids or because they had kids with the wrong person. Some people can't keep friends, jobs, a residence, or their own wits because they did too much of this. When I discovered yesterday that Robin Williams contracted herpes, I wondered if that contributed to his mental depression. I know that his escapades filled his life with lots of empty yesterdays during which he did neither what he ought nor what he truly enjoyed. Winter indeed must be cold for those with no or few warm memories. If you can't remember your past or don't choose to because of the pain, what do you do as you get older and remember? You regret, and it's more pain than before. Empty relationships, broken friendships, busted bank accounts, chemical dependencies, none of these free us. Some of them hurt us. When someone years ago who jilted me suddenly turned to me for help, I told her that it struck me as odd that she demanded something from me that she would never offer if our positions reversed, and she withdrew her request. She did not however withdraw from friendship, and I hear from her periodically. Far too many people continually choose bondage and captivity of Egypt for her comforts, her affirmations, and the tranquility of her servitude rather than risk the animating contest of freedom. They prefer the so-called "sure thing" and pick wealth, looks, and membership in the GOBNet, and they have their reward. Not surprisingly, many of them regret it now, and more probably will when they grow closer to death.

As difficult as I find it to live my life, I live a life largely without regret or reason to feel guilty. I am unashamed of my past and unafraid for my future. Like you, I made mistakes, but you need not suspect me of anything untoward like you can of Jared Fogle. Mostly the things I would change are decisions I made based on inaccurate or incomplete sets of information. Since then, I came to content myself with simplicity, and I satiate myself at night knowing that I'm true to who I really am. Like Picard says in the Star Trek TNG pilot, if we're going to be damned anyway, we might as well be damned for being who we really are. When I look back, I pursued relationships with every woman I felt might make a good help meet, dear wife, and life mate. I nurtured friendships with people as best as distance, time, and communication lines made possible. I stuck with my family and was blessed to belong to a family worthy of familial piety. I loved, I forgave, and I waited, and sometimes I still wait hoping that those I love will repair the breaches between us. I know that others have regretted leaving me. I recently realized that one former girlfriend actually tried to return, but I didn't notice because it was a feeble effort to heal the large scars she left when she burned me for being too fat, too old, too bearded and too divorced to be worthy of her.

Look at these regrets, and you'll see that people did things that hurt their ability to stay true to themselves and to make their own fortunes. You can't really legitimately regret choices made by others, but these kinds of choices mentioned above in the survey results limit other options and rob us of precious moments. Neal A Maxwell once said that moments are the molecules that make up eternity. In a moment, we sell our substance sometimes for a mess of pottage. We do this to fit in, to be cool, to have company rather than be alone, to conform, to compete, to comply, and to gain status. Too many spend their lives pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content, when deep within, they longed to be true to themselves. I know people who had kids or married for tax purposes or to fit into the social paradigm. Most people I know who do drugs or drink do so for company or to gain favor with "friends". Most people I know with tattoos did so for camaraderie or for remembrance of friends and things long gone or to rebel against their parents. Most young people compete in sports for money or fame or for pleasurable company acquired thereby. When you lose desire or ability to keep up with these things, you sometimes find that all of your friends vanish quickly and irrevocably. If they can walk away, then maybe they weren't really your friends at the beginning. I regret that I sometimes was a poor friend, and I regret those who were poor friends to me. That's the beauty of Christ's Atonement- repentance helps us restore what we regret into things about which we can rejoice. In our return to love, to faith, to fidelity, to obedience, and to righteousness, Christ swallows our regrets and replaces them with rejoicing and rejuvenation and rebirth. I hope you will return, to Him, to me, to those you love and repair things. The life you save may be your own.  The love you save may be your own.  Love is the only thing you really take with you.  Your heart knows the truth, so trust it because life is short.

Word to the Wise

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When I pack my bag to go up the mountain, a great deal of the volume and mass comes from extra water bottles I carry. Mostly these become nothing more than ballast to help increase the difficulty of the hike, but they are also there because we always meet someone who is unprepared. This weekend, I couldn't believe how many people were woefully unprepared and inappropriately outfitted for any degree of time in the back country. While I tip my hat to many of them for making the effort and seeing it through, I wonder if some of them bit off more than they can chew.

Two families of the same national origin came up on us without enough water, and one group had none at all. I normally carry five liters or so, and I gave away all of it except for what I needed for myself, and we watched the family consume everything we gave them. I gave them advice about going earlier, bringing the right gear, and maybe using a different trail with better tree cover and suggested they return to the car. They ignored me. The second family had like six kids, and the kids looked ok, but kids also don't know how to tell what's wrong, and by then it will be too late. It annoyed me because the parents put children unnecessarily at risk and because they pressed on anyway even though it was a bad idea.

All I can do is share with others what I find wise. Even if I could compel them to do what I demand, I know that you can only invite, entice, and hope that others will follow good counsel. In the end, each of them, however oppressed they may feel, is his own master. I met the only surviving son of the mayor of Innsbruck while in Austria. His father, when Hitler annexed Austria, flipped Hitler the bird instead of giving the NAZI salute and was shot dead on the spot by the SS. All of his sons were sent to the Russian front, and only this one man survived. Maybe it was a bit reckless, but that man made a decision and sealed his courage with his life. He didn't make anyone else resist the oppressors, but he set a good example.

One of the major goals of the volunteer program on the mountain is to encourage safety. Although the Spring Mountains are much prettier, cooler, and lusher than the Vegas valley, they still sit in the middle of the desert. By this time of year, many of the springs are reduced to a trickle, and I reported to the dismay of folks at the visitor center that the last spring before the peak appears to be dry for the summer. This is not the first time I gave away my water to help others who were unprepared, and it won't be the last. It vexes me to think they disregarded my counsel and kept going anyway.

We're all human, and sometimes we make mistakes. Sometimes I'm wise, and sometimes I'm otherwise. I have learned my limits, and I know my body and how to tell when it's had enough. The ultimate goal of every hike is to get back to the car safely, especially when you are responsible for other people. All we can do is teach them correct principles and let them govern themselves. It's the only way for them to really learn and really grow and really be their best. Any time we attempt to dictate terms, unless there is imminent danger, we rob them of learning opportunities. I hope both families are ok, because I have gone home and slept for hours before because I was absolutely exhausted, and I'm a veteran hiker!

Fortunately for us, in our larger existence as well as for these hikers, there is a Rescue. When we come into duress, search and rescue teams will try to help save us. When we find ourselves in despair and under condemnation, there is a Savior who came to save us. Of course, in that moment, someone needs to know that you need help and you need to accept it. I can't rescue anyone who doesn't want to be saved. I can send boats, helicopters, dog teams, missionaries, friends, and prayers, but unless you actually want my help it will not help. I find it funny because these hikers eagerly chugged down the refreshing waters of dihydrogen monoxide I gave them, but if I tried to talk to them about He who gives living water, they would probably ignore me. Part of why I go to the mountain is to get closer to God, not because I'm at higher elevation but because I'm away from distractions. However, you may not find Him if you don't come with what's necessary to reach and approach His throne. Word to the wise- it is not shameful to accept help or advice. You can always go hiking again. Gas is cheap. Life is not, and all too often it's too short for us to make the kind of mistakes that leave us thirsting for righteousness but unwilling to go where God tells us to find it.

They Have Their Reward

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Considering the challenges of my life, I'm doing rather well. You don't need to know all the details of the way things stack up against me, and some things may be looking up soon vocationally/financially, but I have overcome some difficult hurdles. I'm not part of the GOBNet, and I don't really have connections, but I'm doing well considering that I tend to stir up trouble and invite resistance. Some things I lack because I'm either unwilling to do what it takes or unwilling to do what people demand. I don't get into bidding wars; if I'm willing to pay the price for something I will. Up on the mountain just before we finished our hike this weekend, we passed a line of ford mustang models. Some of them looked really nice, but that's not how I choose to spend my time and money driving an expensive car up a high mountain to see who I can impress. That's not the reward I seek.

Particularly in Vegas, it constantly strikes me as odd what people seek. Fancy titles, fancy cars, and large bank accounts seem all more interesting to people than venerable careers, moral families, and peace of mind. One coworker told me proudly of how her son's internship in San Francisco transformed into a $250,000/year job with Google. I'm glad that he was able to capitalize on his education. I told her that I could never work for a company that I found morally reprehensible. It's why I turned down an offer to go work for a solar power installation company. I think it's a canard. I also know that solar is capped at 3% whereafter the rebates dry up, and you'll have to pay the whole bill yourself. Far too many people will trade image or wage for their good name. I am not one of them. On the way home from the mountain, I watched a bright yellow ferrari approach from behind at breakneck speed. As the car passed, I glanced over at the driver who happened to be a very attractive woman. As the car pulled away, I caught the personalized plate which tells everyone how she affords the car. STRIPPR Well, that's just not the kind of woman I would be proud to introduce to my parents, and I told my mother so last night.

One of our speakers in church reminded us about something that we all understand but sometimes lose sight while we are in the world but not of it. What is our motivation? What is our end game? Are we working for the transitory rewards of a mortal realm or for the rewards of a greater? I understand why people decide to accept the tempting allure of gold, glamour, girls, glitz, and grunge. What God promises us is difficult to comprehend for our infinitesimal minds. It's not really as simple as "you can have one marshmallow now or two if you can wait five minutes", assuming you're into marshmallows. God promises that if we give up the marshmallow we can have something better. Often He withholds information about what that is, like the NV Governor's Fitness Challenge, and even when we know, it's kind of vague and ethereal. Worse, when we get what the NV Governor gave me, it hardly seems like a reward while others eat, drink, and carouse. Well, they have their reward. God isn't obligated to give them anything, and even if He were, in choosing those mortal distractions, they show what master they truly serve, and it's Dionytic.

Like the next man, I like rewards for what I do. Rewards help you measure accomplishments and give you feedback about your effort. We look forward to graduation to get that diploma to lock in our accomplishments in order to measure ourselves and our efforts. My paternal grandfather held back his own vocational aspirations on a promissory note from a family that not only never delivered but ultimately drove the company to complete financial ruin. Men continually promise things that don't happen while offering different terms to other people. It becomes difficult to trust that God will deliver on His promises. We keep getting the short straw, and so when someone offers us a marshmallow it's tempting to take it however unsatisfying it may be because at least then we got something. The fancy cars, flashy women, flush salaries, lofty titles, and pleasurable company of socialites and elites looms large because we can see it and touch it and experience it. God's promises seem unlikely because most of us have never left earth, and even those who have admit we have no clue what the universe actually holds. It's frustrating because we seem to reap differently from we sow, and others seem to reap what we sow. God promises us "something better" and "soon" but doesn't necessarily mean the same things with those words as we do. I'm not tempted or even competitive to get into stripping to buy a bright yellow ferrari any time soon, but I'm not really after that. I have to ask myself what I'm really hoping to achieve in life.

A story illustrates why people find it difficult to trust God and His promises. A man asks God how long a million years is to Him, and God replies that it's a minute. The man asks God how much a million dollars is to Him, and God replies that it's a penny. The man asks God, "May I have a penny?" To which God replies "In a minute". For this reason I believe we have so many examples of deliverance and miracles in the Bible to remind us that God will lead us out of Egypt, water us, feed us, and lead us to a land of promise. I know that He did that for me four years ago, so I know He can do it again when He feels it's the right thing to do. I am eager, as you might be, to have the blessings in this life and enjoy things I know and understand, things that other people have and enjoy and probably don't appreciate, rather than waiting for a putative and undefined reward at some undetermined future point. However, it's important to keep in mind that many of those things we can see are only rewards to certain people in certain places at certain times. God offers us something of a more lasting nature.

Every semester I teach nursing chemistry, I end up warning the students against doing the job for the pay. Although I've never been a nurse, I know it's handsomely compensated because they ask you to do things other people won't do. You will have to wipe up people when they defecate, bind up bedsores, come in contact with tuberculosis, cut through LOTS of fatty tissue, and deal with people who are perpetually in a bad mood because they are in pain, even when many of them caused the circumstances they now bewail! You don't join the military, the FBI, an ER staff, or any of these handsomely compensated career fields for the pay. They are paid well because they know it breaks people down. How long can you actually be a stripper? How long will you be able to last? How long will you live? How will it affect the quality of your life? Would you really be proud to tell your parents or your Father God that you spent your life doing it? You were paid well, and you have your reward.

Jesus taught us that we can tell our true motives by the identity of our treasures. He also warned those of us who really care about the world to show it by living lives that accumulate treasures in heaven rather than those on earth where moth and rust corrupt and where thieves break through and steal. The great paradox of temporal success is that the more you have the more you are obligated to pay to furnish protection for the rest from other people. My car, my decor, and my house are not really appealing because nobody wants to drive a 20 year old Saturn, sit on heirloom furniture, own old books they will never read, or collect what I collect. Nothing I own is terribly liquid, which protects me from losing it. Like you, I like to be paid what I feel I'm worth, particularly when I have coworkers who do less and earn more because they are blood relatives or boot-licking toadies of the upper muckety-mucks. However, none of that really tends to make them happy or elevate them to the kind of life I seek. I'm not a party goer, a fan of the beach, interested in fancy or classic car collecting, or in the kind of lifestyle concomitant with the kind of opulence seen in the lives of those who luxuriate through licentious lifestyles. I'm not interested in that life; I'm not interested in those rewards. Those people aren't happy, and the saddest part is that may be all they get.

Honestly, my life and needs are very small and simple, and that pleases me. When I pray, mostly I discuss opportunities for intimacy with a specific someone as my wife, because I have everything else I really need and want. When I ask for more money or opportunities to earn it, it's really about having it now to save for a rainy day. I'm really not interested in hobnobbing with elites or with the kind of ilk that normally coalesce around strippers and the like, so I don't need the trappings or the money. I'm not interested in keeping up with the Joneses, let alone getting ahead of them. My needs are small, I buy them all at the five and dime.

Whatsoever rewards to which we attain in this life we will receive. That's the law of the harvest. In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, we see that the rich man, who was rewarded disproportionate to his virtues, finds himself wishing for what Lazarus has in the end while Lazarus, who was denied those opportunities finds himself in a place of rest and peace. You can buy companionship but you can't buy good company. You can buy plastic surgery or quality food, but you can't buy health. You can't buy friends. You can't buy virtue. You can only buy the authors of history to paint you in a different light to counter the slander that later arises. Eventually the truth leaks out. Eventually you tend to look like you deserve. Look at Charlie Sheen and unfortunately Bill Cosby. They are reaping what they sowed I believe, and they have their reward. Now comes the day of reckoning when the bill comes due. Many of these people have their rewards and will not get anything better. They might not even get another marshmallow. Everything comes with a cost, and so as I continue to pay the price I look forward to a worthy reward on a distant verdant shore.

Update 9:46PM Paradoxically enough, I just read this same topic in an October 2000 address from Neal Maxwell that says what I said much better. I still remember the sound of his voice, and I miss his sermons and wisdom.

Update 26 Aug 13:32PM  Yesterday, I was headhunted to go work in the QA lab of a medical marijuana facility.  I've turned it down, despite the exceptionally lucrative pay rate, for many reasons.  It's not somewhere I'd be proud to work or like to tell anyone I work because it will attract people into my life that are not the kind of people with whom I prefer to surround myself.  It would be a job, just for the money, but most of the people there are true believers in marijuana as medicine despite recent evidence to the contrary.  It would also require me to take a job repugnant to my morality and to the sentiments described in this post.  It would have doubled my salary.  I don't dance.  I will keep taking the Kobiashi Maru and trying to save the ship because, even if it can't actually be done, it's the only solution worth pursuing.

Illusions and Images

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As a child, my parents took us to feed the ducks, and I learned to respect them for their abilities and their beauty. When I grew up, I realized that it was mostly an illusion, an image, and that the truth beneath told a far different story. You see, when a duck swims on the lake, he looks calm, cool, and collected, but underneath the water, he's paddling frantically like a maniac! From Shakespeare I learned that most of what you see is a play, and as I watch other adults, it vexes me that most other adults believe in, seek after, and engage in puppetry designed to create illusions and images rather than truth, that they act because they are selfish mostly. Very few things are as they seem.

I ran on the treadmill for 20 minutes at lunch while watching CNN which amounted to nothing more than propaganda. They were absolutely excited about the reestablishment of diplomatic relations in Cuba, but it's nothing more than the parliament jester's foist on the somnambulent public. There were no protestors at the ceremony, because John "Served in Vietnam" Kerry invited them to an alternate venue which will probably not be televised. Cuba continues to jail dissidents, and now the American flag waves above a building there as if we endorse and support it. The media, filled with repeaters rather than reporters, regurgitates the talking points of the left and celebrates it. Later, they switched to a celebration of the Iran nuclear weapon agreement, as if it's something good for American. They tell themselves "Only Obama could go to Iran", but what other reason could they have to enrich uranium besides to make weapons? After that, they discussed the democrat debate tonight and celebrated the thought of someone who can "get things done" as if getting things done is the point.

The story is told of a work crew in the British Congo. They were tasked with building a road deep into the jungle to allow the British Empire to essentially rape the country for resources. It was a fastidious and efficient operation. Work crews rotated in and out on rail lines so that the work never ceased although the workers themselves rotated out and slept full nights away from the site. Materials arrived on the coast, traveled by rail, and fell into place under the swing of the finest hammers as civilization came to the bush. The crews penetrated the formidable jungle at breakneck speed. Eventually, an engineer fresh from Manchester climbed a tree to view the progress from above and found something alarming. He scampered down and went to the chief foreman to report. We're on the wrong side of the river. Shut up, we're making great time. Action isn't synonymous with achievement.

I look around sometimes at the people around me and wonder what I'm doing wrong. I am not earning as much as I thought or even as much as my fellows. My sister will probably outearn me by leaps and bounds in the military. My neighbor's girlfriend regularly sleeps over or joins him on vacation trips. The folks at church have attractive wives, lofty titles, and gaggles of children. Students have physiques not necessarily consistent with their diets or activity levels. However, I know that most of what you see is a play. Years ago, one of those "perfect families" in my parents' congregation suddenly fell apart when the wife left the husband with her kids from a previous marriage because she just didn't feel like it anymore. We do not know how other people's lives really are. We do not know all the facts. We do not know what will happen. We only know what can. It is foolish to assume that the best is happening for others or that everything we do will lead to happily after happily. I know that sounds pessimistic, but it's also honest. It's important to properly manage expectations.

The greatest liars in the world are those who convince you that everything they do is virtuous and that everything in their life is earned. The truth is that we are all subject to grace and mercy that we do not deserve. Even when we live lives of virtue, God immediately blesses us, and so we remain continually indebted even when we serve Him valiantly. Even when intentions are noble, the fact of the matter is that evil men will always try to take advantage of others. Although edited to more modern prose, I've read the letters of Thomas More and know he did in fact say essentially the following:

If we lived in a State where virtue was profitable, common sense would make us good, and greed would make us saintly. And we'd live like animals or angels in the happy land that needs no heroes. But since in fact we see that avarice, anger, envy, pride, sloth, lust and stupidity commonly profit far beyond humility, chastity, fortitude, justice and thought, and have to choose, to be human at all... why then perhaps we must stand fast a little --even at the risk of being heroes. (A Man For All Seasons; emphasis in original)

Most people do what they do because they hope to profit from it regardless of its virtue, real or imagined.  In order to achieve this, they "clothe their naked villainy with odd old ends stolen forth from holy writ and seem saints when most they play the devil" (Richard III). I don't know if any of us really do anything with pure motives. Deep down, we act because we hope for that watermelon at the end. Deep down, we do what we do to make a world that conforms to our sense of morality. That does not make ours better. It makes it our preference.

When I was young, it was common knowledge that there's no such thing as a free lunch and that if it sounds too good to be true it usually is. I find it so exasperating as an adult to see so many adults promise us free lunches, to vow to give us the moon, and to see only the virtues in their own pet projects. The gal from Environmental Health and Safety lauded Obama Wednesday for clearing the bureaucracy of boot-licking toadies as if Obama didn't sow any himself, which is outrageous and incredibly naive. Krister Stendahl taught me that most people see their own side in its best light whilst painting their opponents in caricature. However, I watched CNN and saw that puppet show of propaganda today. More than that, as they spoonfed us hogwash, PEOPLE ATE IT UP. You see, people believe a lie for two reasons. First, they believe it because they fear it might be true. Secondly, they believe it because they want it to be true. I have said for years that people are not really looking for truth as much as they're hoping however clandestinely that the truth will validate what they already happen to believe. People want to be lied to. They want to be told that things will work out, that giving Iran weapons will end war, that electing Obama will end racism, and that redistributing wealth will wipe out poverty. Just because they can doesn't follow that it will or must work. There are far too many other variables out there to be sure. There are far too many PEOPLE.

One of my favorite cartoon strips as an adult is Dilbert, and in one that I hang at my desk, Dilbert explains the secret to frustration. It's OTHER PEOPLE. You see, it would be easy to bend the world to our wills if our will was the only one. That's why tyrants try to subjugate people. It's why bullies use force and violence to change behavior. They want to impose their will. They give us a rosy image and illusion and let us assume it must come to pass. The fact of the matter is that most people are really out there saying as Bruce Almighty, "My will be done". They are not humble, and so they cannot be virtuous. The humble and virtuous do not tell you that they are humble, qualified, virtuous, etc., because then they would become something else. I am glad I don't listen to the news. It angers me to see so many people buy the lies. Then again, I also think how much it must hurt God to watch so many of us actively seeking to be deceived when the Deceiver hopes to do precisely that. When I first started teaching, I opened the first night by telling students that everyone has an agenda. My agenda is to convince you that everyone has an agenda. Only when you realize that can you make wiser choices than I.

Gee, I'm Glad It's Raining

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It's rained in Vegas twice in the past week, and that's a good thing because August is painful for me in many ways. Yesterday, two years ago, I left a bright future behind and headed for Sequioia NP because that future had died. When I listened to the lyrics last night, I realized it said everything I felt that year and today.  I intended to cover this song, but I think I'll just let Jim Varney sing it for me. I only today learned that he died while I was a missionary 15 years ago.

Measuring Success

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It's very difficult to measure success, particularly because we do not always mean the same thing by the words we use. Before I joined the naturalist on the night hike Saturday night, we discussed our observations of the superficial and prodigious nature of many people that frequent the Vegas area. Most of these are the metrics measured by men, and so before you measure yourself or allow others to measure you, it helps for you to keep in mind what success means for you. Also, it helps to choose metrics that you can actually achieve rather than items that rely on the exercise of another person's agency.

For my own part and parcel, I use the following poem to guide my steps and measure the effectiveness of my actions. It's inaccurately ascribed to Emerson; I do not know it's original source.

To Have Succeeded

To laugh often and love much:

To win respect of intelligent people

And the affection of children;

To earn the approbation of honest critics

And endure the betrayal of false friends;

To appreciate beauty;

To find the best in others;

To give one's self;

To leave the world a little better,

Whether by a healthy child,

A garden patch,

Or redeemed social condition;

To have played and laughed with enthusiasm

And sung with exultation;

To know even one life has breathed easier

Because you have lived...

This is to have succeeded.

When I honestly evaluate myself, I fall short in only a few places. I am not always good at finding the best in others. I have a few antagonists in my life for whom I can honestly pray and on whom I can honestly evoke blessings. In the moment, I'm not so charitable. I don't have any children, and I don't laugh as often as I should, but I do laugh enthusiastically. Everything else I can honestly say at least once was true.

Far too often we choose to measure ourselves based on things we don't control. I remember shortly after my missionary service Dallin Oaks gave an address and abjured the use of such things as goals or metrics to judge our own worth. We cannot force others to choose the right, and when we do, it's often a facade or dissatisfying to all. We can invite, entice, and resolve concerns as we move forward, but ultimately success as a missionary isn't determined by convert baptisms, success as an adult isn't dependent on marriage, success in work doesn't depend on your wage, and success as a parent doesn't depend on having perfect kids. It's in doing the best we can with what we have, our honest best, all the time. When you finally learn how to be a dad, how to be a husband, how to be a disciple, that's your victory. When your son learns those things, it's his. You teach people correct principles and let them govern themselves. I am not a lesser man because I am single. I am different than those who are married. Different does not denote deficient. You decide only what you do. Other people make their own decisions too.

I've had some semesters and life chapters with which I'm not terribly happy. I also remind myself that I cannot judge my past self with present information. On honest reflection, I usually made the best decision with what I had under the circumstances. This spring, I buried all of my grandparents, and students could tell something was wrong, but I gave my honest level best to be on task, on time, on topic, and on top of my game, and they seemed to understand I was doing my best despite something beyond the classroom. I've spent time with people with whom I later parted ways. I don't like that because I honestly intended to be a good friend and brother. I wish I were a better man, and I wish those interpersonal relationships led to happier endings. I was true to myself, and I'm interested in making amends. There are honest critics out there; I wish there weren't, but I know my weakness. I need the Savior just as much as the next man. Hopefully one day He will give me success.

End of the Boy Scouts

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Yesterday, the scout leader in my congregation approached me and asked me if I would be interested in working with him, he having heard of my forest service experience. Honestly, I'm no longer interested in participating in scouting. I enjoyed my scouting experience as a boy, but I don't think the Boy Scouts of America share the same vision and same values they inculcated into me. My troop mates were also largely dorky, nerdy, awkward boys, but my leaders were honestly and earnestly and actively engaged in training us not just with the skills of camping and wilderness survival but also in helping us become leaders and self reliant. That's not what I see scout troops doing. When I see them on the mountain, the boys seem to be dragging along with the leaders passively if not actively resistant to the efforts of their leaders, and the leaders don't seem interested in teaching the boys to become men. We took an oath while I was a Boy Scout that I believe still exists. It includes the promise to "keep myself physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight", but I don't think the leaders or boys understand what that means.

Physically strength is key not only as part of masculinity and patriarchy but particularly given the time of ignoble ease and technological advancement. At the same time that evolutionists prattle survival of the fittest, they foster growth of a weaker species, one unable to hunt, trap, find their way with compass and square or even walk there. Although they portray conservatives as the party that leads to the sloth you see in Wall-E, they are those actually creating the world of opulence and portly decadence. Years ago, I wrote with outrage about the video game merit badge because I saw it as pandering to the boys instead of leading them to be men. Yes, we need to understand technology, but there are still places and times when the archaic saves lives. Also, far too many boys engage in video gaming long into adulthood, letting it consume their time, talents, and attention, and I even have cousins who play them too much. "Murder is no better than cards if cards will do (CS LEWIS)", and the adversary of righteousness only needs to convince good men to do nothing or at least do nothing useful, helpful, or beneficial. Add to that the number of overweight and obese boys led primarily by fat leaders. When I was a scout, we were usually wirey, skinny boys. Too many of them are fat, not from weightlifting but unable to even lift or carry their own weight. Most scout groups think of camping as something you do out of the back of your car, and while I do that and have done that, it won't help in the military, in the wilderness, in foreign lands, or if God forbid we revert to a time before civilization. Most scouts can't rely on each other let alone themselves, and I don't think they know how to rig up something to carry another if someone's hurt.

Mentally acuity fell by the wayside with the internet. Now that it's "easy" to get "answers", most of them don't look much further than the first search result page which is often riddled with advertisements and propaganda. Far too many of us don't do our own homework, write our own papers, or speak our own thoughts. Students copy articles from wikipedia, pay others to write papers, and parrot things they hear from the talking heads in the media. In a time of unparalleled access to information, we read and search less than ever before. Then, there are those who do not seem able to think or to contribute anything virtuous, of good report or praiseworthy. We pass on rumors, tell half of the story without the other half to support or explain it, give editorials as facts, and spread half truths and whole lies. Recently, some scouts damaged formations at Goblin Valley and then had the audacity to post it to Youtube, justifying their actions because "they'd fall over anyway". Yeah, in 20,000 years. Maybe. They don't seem interested in caring for nature anymore, just in using it to slake their own urges. One naturalist at Mt. Charleston told me Saturday that the park service and forest service have unofficially suspended affiliations with Scouting. She said the scouts often do more harm than good, seem disinterested in learning about and caring for the forest, and lack adult supervision. While we spoke, she told of a time when they observed leaders turn the boys loose after the day's activities and saw two go to town on a ponderosa pine with axes while others attempted to start an uncontrolled fire. I don't know that they teach scouts about cause and effect, choice and consequence, or leadership and accountability. The boys don't seem smarter for their scouting experience.

Particularly in our modern world, the need to live morally straight looms ever larger. As everything becomes relative, it's useful to have an anchor, a place on which to plant yourself, and a refuge from which to sally forth and in which to recuperate as you struggle against powers, principalities, and the purveyors of pernicious permissiveness. Nothing saddened me more than the recent adoption of gay leaders by the Boy Scouts of America. I don't know how you square that with principles of moral fortitude when no civil or religious organization ever founded itself on "your way right away" and "what feels good goes". When there's an exception to every rule, the rules lose their value, and people find themselves in fear of one another. Look at Ferguson MO. Each time a moral issue arises, the BSA buckles. They bow to pressure, and I don't even know why. I don't know anyone threatening to remove their boys, and I don't understand the clamour. I don't see gays pounding on the door to get in, and I can only imagine one reason gay men want to be leaders, and it created quite a clash with Catholic priests were caught engaged therein. I don't see anyone arguing for the admission of male leaders in girl scouts or boy leaders for that organization, because we all know why a guy would want to do that. I'm quite happy letting women lead girls and sticking with young men. I read an editorial yesterday claiming that the BSA was a way for "fringe" groups to "integrate" with the "mainstream" when it is those organizations that form the bulwark of the BSA not because we depend on it but because we intended to support those who shared our values. My Faith adopted Scouting to strengthen the organization and make the youth program more or less universal nationwide. Like Benjamin Franklin said, "we must all hang together or we must assuredly hang separately". Now that the BSA feels that turning Benedict Arnold on its largest benefactors serves its purposes, many of its strongest proponents will probably leave. It's sad. President Thomas Monson holds some of the highest BSA honors and spoke with vehement praise of the organization ever since I can remember; now he's poised to withdraw every unit of my Faith from its ranks and seek new berth. The BSA probably fears the almost certain exodus of the Church of Jesus Christ and the Catholic diocese in Dakota who are considering withdrawing support, not because they care about the boys but because they care about the money this will cost them. Moral societies are also religious, so hunting the religious from among us will not lead to morality or sustain society.

Whatever happens with the BSA, the organization it once was already died. They forswore their oaths and decided to serve another master years ago. Shortly before his execution, Sir Thomas More wrote his daughter a letter and told her, "What is an oath but words we say to God". I know that bringing up God, particularly in the modern pop culture, immediately invites resistance and results in deaf ears. The guilty take the truth to be hard. Focus on God is central to Scouting. The problem with scouting is not the scouts; it's the leaders, local and national, who seek glory and gold more than they seek fealty and service to God. It's the willingness of the Council to buckle to pressures of men rather than retaining loyalty to their Creator. It is an imperative duty that we owe to all the rising generation and to all the pure in heart to help them gain physical strength, mental acumen, and moral fortitude. Scouting used to do that. Now, scouting is more of a boy's club activity to babysit children and reward duty rather than recognize and encourage excellence. I am honestly embarrassed to be an Eagle Scout, not because it doesn't mean anything to me, but because it seems like boys earn it who couldn't pour piss out of a boot with instructions written on the heel. I did the work myself; too many of them wear the badge actually earned by their parents or pencil-whipped by their "leaders". If the Church withdraws from Scouting, it will die, not because of the membership (the church only holds like 17% of the scout units nationwide) but because the strongest moral force maintaining the Scout Law, Scout Oath, and Scout Ideal will be absent, making it even weaker against insurrections within and assaults from without. To paraphrase Ronald Reagan, I didn't leave Scouting; Scouting left me.

Unable to Help

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Over the last few years, I've felt fairly powerless to do and change things to a positive end in my life. Tonight, I felt more helpless than ever to help a friend while I watched him self medicate (with all legal means) after a series of unfortunate events. By the time I arrived, another recent "friend" was already there with him joining in the pity party by drinking and smoking with him to create a fog to block the pain and disappointment. I'm not sure what I did really helped, but I was there. In his dark times, I've been there. I just really felt helpless while I watched the pain washed over him until he succumbed to sleep and I drove home.

I think we all self medicate somehow. As I mentioned before, I turned to exercise and chocolate to cope with disappointment this year and in 2013. Others turn to narcotics. Some turn to intercourse. Most end up joining in the barroom antics of booze and blunts, smoking and drinking their woes away. I don't really know what to do. Every time something happens that disappoints our expectations, we all suffer from at least one symptom of PTSD. We revisit the event in our minds trying to change the outcome. When we can't, we try to change things some other way. We bury ourselves in other things in our lives, we bury our heads in the sand, and we busy ourselves in something else desperate to find meaning. Trouble is, as I wrote before, nothing really replaces it. Nothing can. We know this, so we find something to distract our brains and forget about it long enough to forget why we need to.

From the drinking to other distractions, I feel bad for people. Some of them medicate, study hard, and still get into Harvard, living lives that somehow lead to family, fortune and felicity. I feel bad for them anyway. Mostly I feel bad because people don't turn to Christ. I saw a post on the internet this morning attributed to a fictional character claiming that if you could reason with religious people there would be no religious people. Life without faith strikes me as an exercise in futility. If we're only here for a minute, then what does it matter? If we are just an insignificant byword in the opus of the universe, then it's hopeless, helpless, and pointless. If there isn't a power out there than can really uplift us, not just mask the pain for a few minutes, hours or days, then what can help? Are we really just desperate losers? What really can help?

I've been to funerals this year for my own kin, and I know that in the moment some of the trite cliches don't really matter much. Having faith and turning to a higher power is the only thing that gives me hope, helps me feel comfort, and keeps me going in the trough periods of life. I know it's early in this particular disappointment, and I know it will eventually get easier to handle. I also know that I still revisit some chapters of my life with frustration and disappointment. While jogging this morning, I remember telling myself that I did the best I could with what I had, but some days that's just not satisfying. Even when I feel God's approval and approbation, it frustrates me to think I've been in this house almost five years, in this city for eight, and home from my missionary service for 15, and aside from my age, I don't feel like much has advanced.

Someone once told me that the secret to success was showing up, another cliche I don't necessarily buy. However, if it really is true, then I've shown up. I stood at the graveside for my grandparents and watched relatives weep in pain. I wanted to have something to say, something to give, something to do that would help. I sat in a chair next to my friend tonight watching him piss himself into a drunken stupor. I wanted to say something useful, do something helpful, and know what to offer to help him. I had nothing. I still have nothing. I tried to call, and it went straight to voicemail. So, I asked God to help. He's pretty good about helping others, much more than about helping me. I really wanted to help him. I really want to help you. I think that's why I write this. I am hoping that you'll see you're not alone, that you'll see the wisdom in my choices, and that when I am otherwise you'll learn to be wiser than I. I try to be honest and personal and open. I try to be a good man. I remember that we all depend on Christ to be whole, to be healed, to be happy. I try not to preach. I tell you what I do and why and let you govern yourselves. I try. I really do try. I wish I were the kind of person whose life could show you that if you obey God will bless you. I'm just an ordinary man, and sometimes I am unable to help.

Stand By Your Men

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This past weekend up on the mountain, there was some dissent in the ranks. Our coordinator this year is new and expectantly differs widely from the leader of yesteryear, and some of the veterans are unhappy. I never knew that guy, and I know this gal basically started only 10 days before I did, so I'm trying to be patient because she's earnestly and honestly trying to do a good job in my opinion. When I got home, I sent her a message of support, and I plan to pull her out next weekend for a tete a tete, because I'm willing to stand by those who stand by me, and if she's going to honestly give her best, I'll give her mine. We aren't really very good sometimes at standing by those who help us, those who love us, those we help, or those we say we love. Although this topic extends to likely far more areas than this, a few major venues where loyalty belong spring to mind, and a few recent experiences impress me to remind you to be loyal to people you claim you love. Even if you lose their loyalty, you can at least claim you were true.

Perhaps most commonly, we see this reticence to stand by people at work, particularly when it's run by the GOBNet. While working at Walmart, I sometimes logged in as Charlotte in months when she was falling behind on quota and pretended to be her for a while until her numbers were up to speed. Since I managed 130% of quota every week even with that, I didn't see that it mattered who did it as long as it got done, and Charlotte always gave everything she had. Other coworkers did the bare minimum, and so I appreciated someone who was willing to do everything she could to get the job done over those who were capable but restrained themselves from extra exertion. Contrarily, coworkers continually attempt to undermine me. When I took the transfer back in December, I tried to negotiate for a raise, but the guys in HR decided that they would start following the letter of the law with me. So, although other people got raises and special privileges, I got an ultimatum: accept the job at your current pay rate or we'll offer it to someone else. Fine. I'm watching you now. This spring, with a new department chair, I taught the lightest load I ever have, and this fall it looks to be even lighter. I get the feeling that, despite my performance, rapport, and value, they are going out of their way to encourage me to go elsewhere. After teaching a variegated, challenging load for years, giving up my weekends once for microbiology, and for trading sections to do what they needed most, apparently they feel they can get along without me. I guess they prefer a more desperate dupe to use as a doormat. It's my loss, but it will hurt them and their students far more than it hurts me. All it costs me is money.

We do this in relationships. Last Friday, I ran into a former student at the grocer from last summer's course, and she brought me up to speed. Apparently her boyfriend had a kidney transplant, and to her great credit, she stood by him through it all and helped nurse him back to health. She's not the only one. A friend of mine tried introducing me to a coworker years ago who, when we finally met, decided to stick with the guy she was dating and eventually married him. Another student several years back was engaged to a long time family friend and, although she was by far and away better than he deserved, kept to her promise and married him. Also last summer, a student of mine embroiled in a legal issue at work considered the sensibilities and cost to her brother and found a way to move forward without intentionally or secretly hurting his vocational chances, which I found praiseworthy. I appreciate the loyalty, the fidelity, the commitment, because that's what we're supposed to do. Regardless of your religious persuasion, most marriage oaths include a fidelity and faithfulness ideal to which we strive, that once married we stick together no matter what happens. I respect these people, and I envy at least a little bit those who benefit from their choices because I'm not sure anyone who told me they loved me ever really meant it. I could be wrong, but their silence and absence tells a different story. I keep standing alone. I meet lots of nice people, and some of them seem to like me. Eventually, despite assurances to the contrary, they find a way to reject me. Last month, two young women I met in May parted ways with me. The first because we disagreed over a SCOTUS decision; the second when she discovered of what particular Faith I was a member. I'm cynical and bitter when it comes to women because they all found some other man by whom and for whom to stand but weren't there when I needed them like they promised, and it sucks.

Worst of all, we do this in our families. I barely managed to contain my rage at my paternal grandmother's funeral when I heard some of my cousins roasting her as she lay in her coffin. I know Grandma Ruth wasn't perfect, but I understood from my frequent visits that she earnestly and honestly thought she was doing the right thing. However, I also learned since then that my amazing family is the exception. In far too many families, we find relatives who physically, verbally, psychologically, and sexually abuse their own kin, which I fear invites God's wrath on those people. They tell you not to go into business with family, because you'll probably get bilked. I know when I joined a kennel with my former inlaws, they never paid me back a dime. Everything we earned went to them first since the kennel was on their land, and despite the work I put into it, I never saw a red cent in return by the time they frittered everything else away. I will never go into business with family again. I've been told not to room with a friend unless I want to lose one, and although I've offered my spare room to some cousins here, I'm glad they didn't take the offer because I wonder if we'd dislike each other now. My closest male cousin in age is an example of how this ought to work to me. Years ago, I know that I did things to take advantage of him, but when I apologized years ago, he told me not to worry about it; he'd already forgotten. When it comes to people we claim we love, we should doubt the bad and believe the good because when we do not defend them we in essence betray them. It's how I know my ex wife stopped loving me because she believed the bad regardless of source, and in essence she abandoned me. Even worse, I know a woman whose boyfriend kept her prisoner while they dated, and I know at least one woman whose parents essentially imprisoned her as well (we used to talk about her stepfather as the Warden). Since May, I have met five female students willing to volunteer that they lost their virginity due to rape, sometimes from a family member. They refuse my help and stay in Egypt. I guess they stay because they aren't brave enough to leave, and unfortunately sometimes they go stockholm and adopt the same attitude and are lost to us. I know sometimes things seem beyond their control, but nobody I loved has ever come back, and so what am I supposed to conclude but that they were only significant for that season?

By contrast, my faith, my reason, my sensibilities and my peers tell me to stand by those who stand by me and who stand for right. Jesus was sad for Peter because Peter denied even knowing Him. He doesn't want us to be strangers, anonymous and dehumanized. He doesn't want any of us to say of another, "Now you're just somebody that I used to know". I know things change and people change, but I refuse to accept that real love can be so tenuous a thing that it takes many months to make but mere moments to destroy. My faith teaches us to reach out to the prodigal, even if they hurt us, despise us, and to pray for our enemies even if they seek to destroy us. I don't cut people off, but I have been cut off so much that I no longer know who to trust, what to believe, and the worst thing is now that I doubt myself. Can I discern revelation? Can I really read people? Can my judgment really tell me if I'm standing by and with the right people? Each time I think I am, eventually I find myself standing alone.

Stand by your man. Each of you has coworkers (and some have subordinates), family members, romantic interests, neighbors, and friends. Mostly they are good people, people who came into your life for a purpose. Only in standing by them can we affect them as much as we'd like and receive of their effects the things that God would like us to learn. The greater the distance, whether geographically, emotionally, intellectually, or spiritually, the duller our spark will seem in their eyes and the less our lives can warm and brighten theirs. If you tell someone you love them, show them, stay with them, and for God's sake, pick them and stand up for them and keep in touch with them. I was rereading A Tale of Two Cities this weekend, and I feel a bit like Darnet, as if in all of my life I have never been loved by anyone, and I think I understand why he was willing to throw away his life. If nothing else, stand by The Man and the Son of Man, because if your life feels and seems dark and dim like mine does sometimes, at least you can feel comfort in their presence. They don't always give me answers, but they usually give me comfort and peace, and I get enough sleep that night to last one more day. Stand by your man, your brothers and fathers, your sons and neighbors, your lovers and spouses, and your God and His Son. Make what you say have meaning. Promise me that all you say is true. Love me, that's all I ask of you.