I Did It and You Will Too

Boys, I saw something funny earlier this week.  It was this meme:

I can't begin to tell you how true this will prove to be in your life.  Sadly though, for me, it's not entirely accurate.  If this was a true representation of my life and search for adolescent interestingness (yes, I know that's not a word), it would state the following:

"I used to strain and yearn to figure out how to be 'with it'.  Most of the time I looked like so many pubescent fools before me.  Now that I don't care anymore, I can truly see how there really was no 'it,' other than tucked away in the unreachable recesses of 'coolness.'"

A little wordy, for sure, but all too accurate.  The information flows at mind-blowing speeds these days.  I'm going to tell you something that will probably freak you out a little, but when I was a teenager, the internet was a brand new, sparsely inhabited wasteland of slow dial-up (look it up) speeds and AOL chat rooms.  It certainly could not be relied upon to keep one up to date with the current status of hip, when one was trapped in a small backwards Southern town.

So, I searched.  I tried things out.  Surely at some point I'd strike it hipness rich by donning the appropriate look, attitude, or music scene.  What I'd never considered was the fact that those in my peer groups were just as hip ignorant as me.  Here are some of the highlights of my unrealized quest:


In the sixth grade we took a field trip to the Mississippi Agriculture and Forestry Museum.  It's ok, take a breath.  I know that sounds a little too exciting to imagine.  In reality, it was INCREDIBLY boring.  *Funny side note:  While wondering through the museum I would've never guessed that among the exhibits and photos on the walls was the cutest picture of my future wife, and your mother.  She's going to kill me for this, but here's the photo)

Your Pop used to run a dairy farm when your mother was a child, and to think that I probably saw this photo that day, thinking nothing of it, is still a pretty neat thought.

Anyway, the one hope to salvage any fun out of this incredibly boring day was left up to the ability to use the little spending money I was given by mom and dad to purchase just the right item from the General Store.  Now, like you're probably imagining, the General Store at the Ag museum was not filled to the brim with the coolest of items.  There was pralines, beef jerky, polished stones, fake arrowheads, etc.  Just your usual crap.  Certainly nothing worth spending, nay investing, my precious $10.

That's when I saw it.  It was if a light from God, himself, shone through the window at the preordained time and angle to reveal to me his wish for my investment.  There, gently hanging from a swiveling rack near the register hung a simple, yet elegant cross.  But, this was no ordinary cross like those the wealthier kids would wear gaudily strung up by a blasphemous gold nugget necklace.  No, this cross was classy and subtle.  It was a beautiful statement of commitment to God and fashion.  It spoke to me.  Hell, it spoke WITH me.

Oh, it seems that I may have forgotten to mention that the cross was to be worn in the form of a magnetic earring.  

Give that a moment to sink in.  I'll wait.

Surely by now you understand why I was unable live without that cross delicately clinging, with what little magnetism it held, to my ear.  I was able to ensure it's stability if I held my head at just the right angle.  Sure, my neck got a little sore at first, but it was a small price to pay for individuality and religious freedom.  My mom said very little about it when she picked me up from the bus.  It was as if she knew what was coming next.

I remember, in stark detail, the look of surprise on my dad's face as his 12 year old son be-bopped through the front door, with an apparent neck injury, and a shining beacon for Christ dangling from his ear.  While I'm sure his inner emotions consisted wholly of glad tiding of great joy, his outward expression of that joy consisted of instantaneous rage as he leaped from his chair and was across the living room in a split second.  Before I could even mutter the word "magnet," he'd ripped it from my ear in one swift motion.  I'm lucky, really.  He was so overcome with jealous envy of my new prize, that had it been a real earring, I could've been really quite injured.

It didn't take long for it to sink in that mine and my dad's ideas on individuality were quite different.

This was only one of a handful of missteps towards cool.  Here are some bullet points of the highlights from the next few years:

Bell-bottoms were not designed for 5'3" teenage boys
My hair was far too doo-doo brown for the red hair dye to really set up
Platform combat boots look awfully similar to high heels
A boy flipping his long hair out his eyes really does look like he has a tick in his ear (who knew)
No matter what Eddie Vedder says, flannel just makes you look like a bum

I did it.  You'll do it too.  It's just part of the journey.  For goodness' sake, it's the only thing that can explain leisure suits, big 80's hair, and emo culture.

You'll do it.  But, it damn well better be a magnet too.

The Ever-Ending Joy of a Know-it-all

Boys, times will come around in this life where you'll have the right answer.  They're usually outweighed by a plethora of times where the right answer is inexplicably absent.  Nevertheless, it's exciting to have the answer.  Maybe that's why I love trivial factoids so much.  I've always loved to memorize the tiniest, most unimportant little facts.  You never know; maybe someone, someday will fancy you their hero because you happened to know the top speed and type of transmission of the 1955 Chevy Bel-air two door hard top.  That info would surely come in handy, someday.  There you'd sit, beaming with pride, as onlookers gasped at the randomness of your knowledge.  Surely they would be so taken with it that they would COMPLETELY gloss over your social ineptitude and the curiously symmetrical bowl-shaped haircut that your mom swears is stylish.

But, sadly, you'll probably just come off looking like a know-it-all little vat of who-gives-a-crap facts with a borderline autistic ability to find meaning in the meaningless.

So, you have to stop yourself.  Stop yearning to contribute to every single problem that anyone has ever had.  Form a complete opinion, not just the hot topic words du jour.  Nothing in the world continuously reminds of this than election season.  Boys, God only knows what the political world will look like by the time you are grown, especially considering the exponential dumbing down of the U.S. voting populace in 2012.  Knowledge takes time.  It takes living.  But mostly it takes exposure.  These days, politics feel more like a dangerous game of three card monte.  You only see the blur of hands gingerly moving about in a carefully orchestrated dance built on misdirection, leaving you begging for any hint, albeit slight, of which one to choose.

People are busy.  Forty hours are usually unable sustain a growing family alone.  So we're pulled.  We are pulled to our kids, to our jobs, and to our ever declining hobbies.  We are stretched, like too little butter and too much bread. I always loved that phrase.  It's so descriptive that I actually gulp at the thought of trying to swallow dry bread.  I digress.  Once we are stretched to the point of breaking, the last thing on your mind is trying to research who to vote for, or their political history.  So you make a terribly easy choice.  You vote on religion, or party, or style, or a snazzy speech or two.  What you're miss are the details.

You miss the curiousness of a junior Senator, with very little political background suddenly becoming the next great hope.  You miss the son of a former president and head of the CIA whose cabinet is immediately filled with the same power players who've been in and out of every administration in the last 40 years.  You miss an orchestrated power couple built for speed and selling power.  You miss an extremely aggressive manipulation of religious pandering to buy votes, with very little return other than a growing divide.

A divide of the populace.  The deeper the divide, the easier for thinly stretched, well meaning people to pick the obvious good rather than the obvious evil.  The republicans are obviously greed infatuated corporate monkeys who love nothing more than to use the Good Book (giant print edition) to crush in the skulls of anyone who ever thought Nancy Pelosi had a good idea and the democrats are obviously evil God-hating satanists hell bent on couch surfing the day away and goosestepping all the way to food stamp line.

That's what we're told.  That's what we're sold.  Carnies and rubes.  And it works.

It breaks my heart and confuses my mind to see two groups of generally good people, so connected by their humanity, their struggles, their nation, and their God attack each other so viciously solely based on simply picking the wrong card.  "But Jamey, we ain't connected by our God.  I'm a baptist and that crazy liberal ain't even read Leviticus."  I believe we are connected because we are created.  We are created by a God that loves us.  You're not loved more than another.

Kids always ask their parents which child they love the most.  I did.  I'm sure you will.  I never understood what was so hard about picking a favorite when I was a child.  I was sure it had to do with not wanting to hurt the lesser child's feelings.  I was ignorant of a parents' love.  You're not loved a little, a medium amount, or a lot.  You're loved.  It's a definite, complete state of being that is so powerful that it is only insulted by assuming that a lesser love could ever exist.  I feel the same way when I ponder the Love of a Creator for all of His created.  We are loved.  It's that simple.

 But we look for wars.  We look for battles.  Every since little boys imagined their first tree limb to be a tommy gun, or every little girl longed for whatever it is little girls long for, we've all searched for conflict.  It's exciting to have a cause.  It's exciting to have an answer.  Today it's called the war on religion, or the war against the constitution, or the war on human rights.  I've seen no declaration.  I've seen no attacks.  It's not war.  It's a discussion, and discussions benefit from input, and from collaboration. 

Quick question for you.  Who's winning?  Who are the great victors raising their flag high atop the battlefield.  Republicans?  Democrats?  I doubt either group feels like they are winning.  I would imagine that they mostly just feel opposed.  Opposed to the rhetoric.  Opposed to the speeches.  Opposed to the ignorance from both sides.  Opposed to the lack of peace.  All the while, the divide grows.  It grows until we feel like strangers with no bond.  It grows until we tire, but are ever stoked to action by those that actually benefit. 

So boys, I challenge you to dig deeper.  To ignore the noise.  To seek no wars.  To seek only those things that bind us together.  And if you haven't figured it out, this isn't simply about politics.  It's about how you live every day.  If you constantly tout your own answers, you'll undoubtedly miss the truth.  If you constantly seek conflict, how can you ever be expected to find peace?  

Changing Spots (This Might Hurt a Little)

Boys, there will come a time in your lives, hopefully many of them, where you count the till.  That is to say, the till that is your life.  It rarely happens in youth, but seems to be an almost daily occurrence as the years pass and the calendar begins to work against you.  The till, in this case, is an assessment of where you came from (the influences and inspirations), where you are (as honest and brutal as necessary), and where you want to go (pipe dreams and all).   Sometimes the answers revolve around you as person, or you as a father, or you as a spouse.  Sometimes they may not include much of you at all, as you take account of those around you and those with whom you've chosen to associate.  Either way, I hope one thing for you; that you would be honest with yourself.  No matter the cost or the repercussions.  That honesty will serve as your true North and will hopefully clear your path of the distractions that keep us from who we're truly meant to be.  That said, I can only pray that my own decisions in this, and yours, will prevent or lessen the inevitable "what could've beens" that mortality tricks all of us into believing.

From my earliest years, that I can remember, I was always a musician.  Be it the piano, the trumpet, or singing, I was always involved in music.  The curse of it was that it came easy.  That's not meant to be boastful or braggadocios, but rather, it's meant to be telling.  That statement, being fact, points toward what held me back from counting my till for many years.  In school, other subjects didn't matter, I had music.  When the time came to choose a college, it didn't matter.  Wherever I went, I knew I'd make music, and would more than likely be successful at it.

But you see, something happened along the way.  I lost my true North.  While I gained great enlightenment and enjoyment from my musical career, I saw no future.  There was no path.  In fact, most of my years of performing had only brought seclusion and loneliness.  It wasn't necessarily the cat's meow to be a great baritone in small town South Mississippi.  And the competitive nature of the college environment only seemed to further separate me from having relationships with my peers.  It was dog eat dog, but I didn't have an appetite.  That's not to say that I wasn't competitive.  I was.  Voraciously so.  The problem was that winning never gave me what I wanted, and losing never hurt as bad as it should.  This was never more greatly emphasized then when I decided it would be a good idea to go out drinking tequila the night before the finals of a regional singing competition, where I felt I was favored, and ended up being so hungover when it was my turn to sing that I forgot the name of my piece and who composed it.  I sang well enough to win, but it was so obvious that I wasn't IN the competition, that I ended up finishing second.

This was the first sign.

If I'm going to be honest, the second sign was my general mental condition at the time.   I wasn't living for a future.  I was selfish.  Your mother seemed to be the only person in my corner, as she always has been.  Maybe to a fault.  Maybe she should've ditched the head case, or maybe I'd disguised just how deep my despair ran even to her.  Either way, she was on board, and we began to plan for the future.

Somewhere along the way, 9/11 happened.  The world seemed bigger, and scarier.  In truth, maybe the sensationalism of it all worked a little too well on an early 20's know-it-all.  Either way, I began to wonder a scary thought.  "Was music my only skill?"  Had I spent so many years taking the easy road of expectations, that I'd forgot that life was about the challenges we don't see, or the fears we've yet to dash?  Either way, I knew that it was time to make a move.  This was further reinforced by one of my professors who gently suggested that there was no way I would ever be a successful music teacher.  I think her heart was in the right place, but she had all the tact of a bulldozer.

It was clear.  My spots were destined to change.  The time had now come to be uncomfortable.  To be unsure.  Nothing makes you more unsure than boot camp.

That's right, I unceremoniously dropped out of college, with one semester to go, and enlisted in the Coast Guard.

It seemed like another crazy and half thought out move to most, but to me, it was just what I needed.  I needed to be in the pack.  To struggle.  To fight.  To fail.  I needed to see that I could prove myself wrong; that I could move the mountains of doubt in my mind, no matter how small the rewards.  What happened next is a story for another time.  But the winning wasn't in the result; it was in the trying.  That's what changing your spots is.  It's real, unadulterated trying.  Yearning.  And those who come with you?  Those are the ones that are worth it. 

Don't Believe Everything (Anything) You See

Pay attention kids.   I'm going to explain to you one of the most important lessons of your life.  You know how people say, "there are two kinds of people in this world: Those who like (insert something trivial) and those who like (insert secondary trivial item).  Well, those people are wrong.  The world is divided into two types of people, but it doesn't have anything to do with pop culture, music, movies, or food.  The world is generally divided into carnies and rubes. 

Carnies are those people that wake up every morning dreaming of how they can get a two inch advantage on the nearest rube by running their con du jour.  Rubes are the unsuspecting masses that are usually too bored by the mundane manor of their existence to offer up the tiniest bit of cynicism toward what they're being told.

You'll see it on television, politics, religion, and in any kind of art.  One of the hardest realizations of your life is when it hits you that some jerk got one passed you because you were too busy watching the card in his right hand, while his left was stealing your wallet.  It happens.  I happens because the input is too great.  Capitalism has led to an increasing population of wolves scratching and pawing to make you their next meal. 

So, here are some simple steps to help you steer clear of the carnies in your world.

1.  Question Everything.
I was raised in an environment that was not pro-questioning.  Much of that probably had to do with the fact that I was the last of four children and my parents were most likely exhausted.  Plus, I was a curious little twerp.  The kind that at 6 years old believed that I deserved a justifiable answer to why singing at the top of my lungs during dinner was unacceptable, morally.  Because I said so didn't cut it.  I wanted to know my parents' motivations for their responses. 

As much as I annoyed my parents with trivial questions about everything, I completely supported my right to do it.  And I'll always support yours.  Don't take anything at face value.  As overwhelming as the answers may seem, always try to figure the world out at a motivational level.  The same things that drive you, drive others.  Trust me......or don't.

2.  There's no such thing as a limited time offer.
That slimy salesman who's telling you that it's now or never is full of it.  Everyone needs groceries.  Everyone has a house note or car note that comes around every month.  He's going to need your twenty bucks just as bad next month as he does today.  The only thing on this planet you can control are your decisions.  Take your time and make a good one.  Don't let someone with motivations other than your own make your decisions for you.

3.  Don't miss the forest for the trees.
Usually, the big picture is the right picture.  Every decision you can make is made up of details.  Sometimes the details are used to take your mind off of the big picture.  "Ooo, this shiny new car gets 3 mpg more than the one I have.  I'll save TONS."  Sure, but the one you have is half paid for, and the financing charges will drive your monthly payments up by 20%.  Big picture:  You have a car.  Stop right there.

4.  Don't believe anything you see on TV.
You're not the audience, you're the market.  Never forget that.

Now, here's the point in the blog where I tell a ridiculous story that is loosely based on the moral above.

Christmas time is made of traditions.  Most of them have little to do with why we celebrate the holiday, but we hold to them because the makes us comfortable.  Nothing is easier to control than comfortable people.

One of those traditions in my day was a ridiculous Christmas movie called, "A Christmas Story."  It revolved around a young boy in the 1940's struggling to deal with whether his one Christmas wish would come true.  It's a funny movie that we watched every year.  Towards the end of the movie, his family's all too important Christmas meal is destroyed.  In a last ditch effort to salvage the holiday, his father takes the family out to the only restaurant in town that's open on Christmas day. 

Skip to Christmas 2006.  Jackson was two years old.  We'd celebrated our respective family Christmases at both families and left Jackson with Amanda's parents for a few days.  The plan was for him to return home to find the goodies Santa had left behind.  The truth was, that I was active duty Coast Guard at the time, and was assigned to stand gate guard duty on Christmas day.

So, Amanda and I returned home on Christmas eve and worked tirelessly to assemble Santa's gifts.  When dinner time came we were faced with the harsh realities of a bare cupboard and empty stomachs.  We rang up a few local eateries to see if anyone was open.  No luck.  That's when my mind flashed back the "A Christmas Story."  Surely, if they were able to find a meal on Christmas eve, we would be able to find something.  So we headed down to a brand new Chinese buffet that had just opened near our house.  The "open" sign flashed with the distinct glimmer of fried rice hope.

We spent the next half hour or so scarfing down indiscriminate meats coated in copious amounts of soy sauce.  We dined along side the saddest collection of Christmases gone wrong that the imagination could assemble.  We stuffed ourselves and headed home.  After a couple of hours watching television, we killed the Christmas lights and hit the sack.  After all, I had to report to work at 0600.  Work was over an hour's drive away, so I'd need to be up and running by 0430 at the latest.

My mind raced with the excitement of my child's Christmas, time spent with family, and a fortuitous meal as I drifted off to sleep.

Now look, it was December.  It was cold outside.  Not freezing, but pretty chilly.  Surely this was the reason that I was roused from my sleep somewhere around midnight.  My feet were like icicles.  The rest of my body was cozy and warm, but my feet were freezing.  I couldn't explain it.  So, I got up and put on a big, thick pair of tube socks and returned, carefully to bed so as not to wake Amanda.  Ten minutes went by and my feet were still shockingly cold.  So much so, that my entire body began to tremble uncontrollably.  So, I got up and put on another pair of 1980's chic tube socks.  Ten minutes later, still trembling.  Something must be wrong. 

I finally got the courage to wake Amanda up and explain my condition.  She checked me for fever, but everything checked out.  So, I spent the next hour or so tossing and turning in extreme discomfort.  By body pulsed, quivered, and even began to convulse a little.  You know how I said earlier that you should question everything?  Well that doesn't apply to the small voice in your brain that gently recommends that maybe you should be near a toilet.

Thank the Lord I listened to my still, small voice.  No sooner than reaching the bathroom did I begin vomiting.  I'll spare you the lovely details, and tell just this one thing.  At some point, you run out of things to expel from your body.  The bad part is that your stomach never relays that information to your brain, so the dry heaving continues.  After two hours of vomiting and heaving I began to be concerned with the state of my eyeballs.  I strained so hard that I was sure they would pop out of my head.

This leads to Amanda entering the bathroom to check on me, only to find me hunched over the toilet, heaving with my hands over my eyes to protect them from the power of the repetitive thrusts.  Truly, a sight to behold.  Kids, marriage ain't always pretty.  But, it is usually funny.

Somewhere around 0330 the sickness subsided.  I hurt.  Notice how I used the word hurt as a verb?  That's because I wasn't hurt.  I actively, and continuously hurt.  Which part, you ask?  Every damn one of them.

My bout with apparent food poisoning had left me a whimpering, weak, shell of a grown man.  I barely had the strength to raise my head.  I struggled to find my cell phone and locate the phone number of the watch leader.  She would be my only salvation from any continuation of this nightmare.

Now look, I'm an emotional guy.  I'll tear up over movies, or the occasional sad episode of extreme makeover home edition, but I don't usually cry from pain.  I get mad and drop a curse word or two, but not tears.  The same cannot be said as I heard my calls continually go straight to the watch leader's voicemail.  There I sat, slumped over in the dark, my uniform shirt half on and unbuttoned, with one pant leg barely pulled up past my knee, too weak to get fully dressed.  Seeing this scene, Amanda pleaded for me to come back to bed, then relented and helped me finish dressing.  You know you're in bad shape when your wife has to tie your shoes for you.

What happened next is a mystery to me.  Somehow, I blinked and was standing in front of the gate at work, wearily staring at Chance, my guard mate for the next twelve hours.  Chance and I were friends.  If I remember correctly, he looked at me and accused me of showing up to watch intoxicated, as I stumbled to my post.  I relayed the story of my evening to him and he was kind enough to allow my to rest in the guard shack until a relief for my watch could be found.

Around 1000, my relief showed up, and I headed home, stopping by the gas station to pick up large doses of gatorade.  As I walked through the front door of our house I collapsed onto the carpet, unable to gather the strength move.  I called out to Amanda, who was now just as sick as I was, to let her know that I'd made it home.  We both slurped down some gatorade and went back to sleep, all day and all night.  Lesson learned.

I never should've listened to that stupid Ralphie kid and his degenerate father!     

The Daunting Rescue of Mr. Snappy

I have a theory. It's not a deep or overly complex theory, but I believe it to be true. I believe that most, if not all, of the conflicts in our modern world are directly tied to man's inability to focus on empathy. I don't care if it's war or arguing over a parking spot. It's all the same. Notice I didn't claim that we lack the ability to be empathetic. Only a complete sociopath truly lacks all empathy. Rather, it's the fact that we lose focus on empathy. As soon as we assign ourselves a little task to complete, other people's adjacent tasks or objectives simply become obstacles.

Think about it. How many times have you had a time sensitive task to accomplish, only to be delayed or sidetracked by everyone and everything around you? If you're like me, the answer is EVERY time. That's not bad luck. It's the fact that you've lost focus on the fact that our society is a very complex and delicate balance of needs versus resources. When one's need imposes on another's resources the system breaks down. This is true from the simplest of tasks all the way to the causation of haves and have nots. So where does the fault lie? In you? In that other person in your way? How about the innate unfairness of reality itself?

This goes back to one of the most key lessons my father ever taught me. You can not control other people. You can only control how you react to other people.

This requires a focus on empathy and perspective. Human nature is selfish. It's not that people are selfish. No, I don't believe that. I believe that a majority of people, if prompted, tend to behave in a socially equitable manner. The problem is that once we become adults there are fewer prompts in our lives. That's why it's so important to select a partner that has the ability to truly help you maintain perspective. If left to your own devices, your focus will most likely turn toward some false importance to your tasks, forsaking the needs and resources of those around you.

My hometown, Purvis, MS, is a painfully small town. All the sidewalks are promptly rolled up far before sundown. Streetlights tell time and steeples litter the skyline. It's in South Mississippi, so it's very hot most of the year. This leads to finding creative ways to stay cool. My parents had a pool installed when I was a young child so, for me, that was never a problem. However, those without a pool were left to their own devices. This usually led to swimming holes and creeks.

If you've never swam in a creek, let me educate you a little. First off, creek water is damn cold. I mean blue lips, shaking legs, and chill bumps cold. The only thing that slows the onset of hypothermia is the fact that you must constantly swim for you life in fear of water moccasins. If you're not familiar with water moccasins, let me educate you. You know how, when referring to snakes, people say something like, "oh, it's more afraid of you, than you are of it." Those people are NOT referring to water moccasins. They are terribly aggressive and they love hanging out in creeks.

The safety precautions associated with creeks are not what I would call thorough. Usually, you just walk up to the edge, look for snakes swimming on the surface (for about 7 seconds), and jump in. The initial shock of 45 degree water takes your mind off of the snake issue, broken bottles everywhere, even the rusted out washing machine. I never understood why every creek near our home seemed to be an outdated large household appliance repository.

As if this experience wasn't enough of a test of wills/manhood, the boys in my town inevitably took it a step or two further. One specific creek out in the country was crossed by two bridges that were adjacent to one another. The smaller bridge was for cars to cross the creek, while the larger bridge was a rail crossing.

The car bridge only sat about 12-15 feet off of the water and was our backwoods version of a high dive. The rail bridge, and I'm guessing here, was probably about 50 feet off of the water and was thus used for only one thing, a man test. Now I never saw anyone jump off of it in person but the stories of those that did were that of legend. Let me set the scene for you. To reach this bridge you had to climb up a very steep hill, mostly composed of gravel. Once at the top, you would walk out to the center of the bridge and peer down at a landing zone which was only about 12 feet wide. There were no depth markers and you definitely couldn't see the bottom, due to the mud. You had no way of knowing your plunge would land you smack dab on top of a discarded Maytag.

This may sound like a crazy venture, but the combination of shame and boredom is a powerful cocktail. I was not insane, and was sure that I'd probably chicken out, but that didn't mean that I shouldn't at least climb to the top to appear brave. I still remember the climb up. My friend Allen and I struggled to reach the top, all the while attempting to compromise, while still saving face, over who would be the first to jump. But something happened on the way out to the center of the bridge. As fear led me to stare down at the cross ties of the rail line I saw something amazing. There, wedged between two of the ties was a giant turtle. He had obviously slid on to his side and become stuck.

My heart began to race with fear for the turtle. What if a train came and the cross ties shifted? He could be crushed. After all, there was no telling how old this turtle was, or how long he'd been stuck here. Allen and I quickly devised a plan. We would each pick a side and see if we could slide him out.

We obviously took into account that this could be a snapping turtle. Everyone had heard the legend that if a snapping turtle were to clamp down on your hand, only a strike of lightning would make him release his grasp. Who's got that kind of time?

It took us quite some time to extract the big guy. Once we got him out we were faced with a very precarious situation. There was no way we could just leave him to be hit by the next passing train. So, we picked him up and walked to the hill that we'd painstakingly climbed just minutes earlier. We looked at the gravel, and the incline, and decided that there was no way we were going to be able to get him back down the hill without one or both of us falling to certain peril.

That's when we devised our master rescue plan. It was so obvious. It was staring us in the face the whole time. Turtles are armored and amphibious.

Satisfied with our plan we quickly shuffled to the center of the bridge, counted to three, and released our new friend to his life of freedom.

As we peered down, I became more than a little concerned at his rate of descent. He also began a troubling tumble. I began to doubt if he would be able to stick the landing. My 11 year old brain assumed he would make a small splash and pop back to the top to the cheers of the crowd, like an Olympic diver. I was a little off. It seems that we both GREATLY overestimated the strength of his armor plating. Apparently, when a giant turtle hits water at 80+ mph they tend to explode as if they'd been rigged with dynamite.

Silence hung in the air, as time froze, so that our minds could fathom the unspeakable horror we'd just witnessed. We screamed in unison. I've never been so distraught over something my own hands had caused. That was the hardest part. As soon as I saw the first errant piece of Mr. Snappy fly through the air, the wind expelled from my lungs, and the obvious idiocy of our plan crashed down on me in pure, unadulterated shame.

This whole time, we'd only focused on ourselves. We were so excited to be "helping" this creature survive this horrible ordeal, that we'd lost touch with his reality. Sure, being stuck on a bridge sucks. But it's freaking club med when compared to being tossed off of it by two dumb kids. We viewed ourselves as saviors, never realizing that our method of salvation was completely idiotic. What in the hell were we thinking?

How could we possibly think that a turtle could survive a 50 foot fall? The truth was that we never even considered it. The logical option was cast aside for fear that we might be hurt. Instead, our little brains chose the option that was easiest for us, with hardly a thought as to the physics of the operation.

Our perspective was that we were heroes. His perspective, if he was capable of logical thought, was that we were executioners. All the good intentions in the world couldn't make up for the fact that we failed to maintain perspective.

Flawed Logic and Trembling Hands

Every new parent does it. We're told the truth, but we refuse to see it. "Our kid is different. I can tell," we say. So one week after Johnny is born, and the little guy gets a bad case of the farties, we all claim that not only did he recognize me, but that we shared a smile. "He was so happy to see me that he smiled his little cheeks off." Instant connection for sure. The truth is, babies giggle at gas. Hell, I'm a grown man and it still makes me chuckle.

This little delusion is the first lap in the marathon of parental milestone chasing. Everything in our lives is measured and captured. First poop, first words, first recognition of appendages, and even our dietary milestones. As an infant, the milestones are day to day. The older we get, they tend to spread out over years, and eventually, decades. Somehow, me getting to work on time at age thirty-two doesn't exactly necessitate that my parents dance around the living room proclaiming my brilliance.....sadly.

It cracks me up, and is a little confusing, every time I see one of those wacky commercials for a revolutionary product that will supposedly teach calculus to a two year old. I mean, every parent surely knows the importance of your infant's ability to design a suspension bridge! Meanwhile, the kid still craps in his pants. I don't get it. Why has the parenting world somehow forgotten the importance of the natural maturation process. No house has ever been built roof first. There is no reason to rush toward milestones. One day they will only exist in blurry pictures and even blurrier memories.

Not surprisingly, some of the milestones of my life were surrounded in humorous and somewhat uncomfortable situations.

I'm the youngest of four children. As I've written before, I'm much younger than my siblings. In 1985 I was six years old, while they were fifteen, sixteen, and nineteen. Most everything I learned at an early age stemmed from my eavesdropping on teen and adult conversations. I tried my darnedest to make sense of the world far before I should've. This sprint towards understanding came to a head one fateful night during a forty-five minute car ride.

My oldest sister, Diann, attended Jones County junior college in 1985. The school was about forty-five minutes from our home. I'm not sure what type of performance she was involved in, but whatever it was, it required the attendance of my mom and I. So, we loaded up in mom's BOAT of an Oldsmobile, and hit the road. My memories of this night are somewhat blurry, but that car is cemented in my mind. It was a dull red monster of a car, with a bench seat in the front, and a door that was three times my body weight.

Only a few miles down the road, my mother's peaceful drive became traumatic as I turned and asked, "so mom, santa claus isn't real is he?" She paused and then resolutely confirmed my suspicions. I remember her asking if it made me sad. If I remember correctly, I was more satisfied that this knowledge would certainly propel me into early adulthood. No more kiddie tables for this guy!

Once the seal was broken, I couldn't be stopped. For this day would bring about a reckoning. Over the next few interstate exits, we covered my conclusions on the actual state of the world. Santa was only the first victim of this conversation. His death was soon followed by both the tooth fairy and the easter bunny. With every question I grew stronger and sat a little taller, while my mom slinked into her driver's seat unable to come to grips with the reality that so many of her last child's milestones were collapsing at once. At this point she could barely look at me. She stared forward at the road as if her next glimpse would certainly find me sprouting whiskers and singing bass.

That's when she made the near fatal mistake of inquiring if I had any more questions. In fact, I did. I took a few seconds to get the wording just right, then turned to her and asked, "mom, what is sex?"

Now look, I have to give my mom some credit. She remained surprisingly calm as her blood pressure spiked to life-threatening levels. The blood rushed from her face and she quietly responded with, "well, (enormous gulp) what do you think it is?" I then began to explain, in a very elementary fashion, the fractured logic that I'd pieced together from many random conversations. As my skewed explanation reached a crescendo, my mom did the only thing her sanity would allow her to do. She diverted. She nodded her head and assured me that I was right, all the while praying that my questions would cease or that the exit for the college would come soon.

Satisfied with my understanding of human biology, I stepped out of that car a new man. "Good. Now that we got that out of the way, I can certainly turn my attention toward world peace." My mom, on the other hand, was scarred. Her disappointment had turned to horror. Her legs were weak and no eye contact would be had as we sat through my sister's program. I can only imagine that she was somehow trying to figure out a graceful way to explain to my dad the traumatic events that transpired during our trip. Poor thing.

Post Script - My crude concept of human sexuality would lead to a very embarrassing scene some years later. I only remember sitting in my seventh grade health class, eyes as wide as saucers and hands trembling as I silently mouthed the words "SHUT UP."

The following years were relatively vacant of milestones, as I'd rushed through so many at a young age. During these years I focused on music. I played trumpet and sang. In junior high, I attended our local church, and was a member of the youth choir. At this young age, pre-puberty, I sang soprano. My voice was very childlike and I was more than happy to sing anything Bro. Von Kanel put in front of me. In those days, churches regularly participated in youth choir tours. This mostly involved traveling to a nearby state, singing in their local churches, and leading vacation bible school during the day.

This particular year, I was selected as the protagonist in the musical and was given a few critical solos throughout the score. For the first few churches we visited I sang my songs, in the intended keys, and did pretty well, for the most part. However, at some point during the middle of the week I began to feel a hoarse feeling in my throat. Something wasn't right. The more I tried to clear my throat, the worse it got. For some reason, those high notes that were once so clear, were now miles away.

Over the next couple of days I went from having a slight, soprano voice to a disturbingly low bass voice. The disturbing part comes when you consider what the members of the congregation saw. Out on the stage would walk this tiny little kid, with a suspiciously symmetrical bowl shaped hair cut. Expecting a mouse of a voice, they were shocked to hear something that more resembled a record player that was too low on batteries. My cute little upbeat songs, were not droning along like a funeral dirge. The pleasant smiles of the churchgoers were replaced with a combination of confusion and boredom. I was literally singing grown adults to sleep. It's hard to lift people's spirits when they are terrified that the performer may, in some way, be possessed by the devil.

These days, I'm thankful that most of my milestones have passed. I'm more than happy to age uneventfully and focus my attention on the milestones of my kids. But I swear to the Lord, if Jackson catches me alone in the car, and begins asking too many questions, I'm going to just pull the car over and walk.

God's Little Corner (Cue the Spooky Music)

There are many misconceptions out there about parenting. It's tough, but not for the reasons one would think. It can get a little pricey, but I'd probably find something to spend the extra money on anyway. The hard parts sneak up on you. It's discipline vs. compassion. It's supportive vs. domineering. It's finding out just how much chaos one can survive. But mostly, it's the logistics. Without kids, a trip to the store simply involves enough clothes to keep from getting arrested and a mode of transportation. With kids, it's an entirely different evolution. Your car becomes an appropriately nerfed rolling entertainment center. I'm not just referring to the portable DVD player. One must also assume that at some point one, or both, children will choose to self-entertain. In that case, a handy collection of age appropriate toys must be accessible.

Next, you must assume that at some point during your venture, no matter how short, one of the kids will express a bodily fluid at the worst possible time. This means you should definitely pack extra EVERYTHING and enough wipes to dam a river. Don't believe me? Make sure and read my other post, titled: "Seriously, How Did I Get Here?"

Various types of snacks and drinks should also be considered. It's damn hard to scream whilst chewing. I recommend a man bag, diaper bag, or purse roughly the size of Utah to ensure ample space. You would never believe the amount of goldfish a child can eat in one setting. That's because it's an optical illusion. It may look like the food is in their little mouths. Truth is, you'll find most of it the next time you remove your car seat. There, crushed into your seats will be the remains of thousands of sad little cheddar flavored fishies that never met their intended destination.

Once they are packed, your brain is so shot that you'll probably forget most of your own essentials. I would recommend making lists, but that's a sissy move. Live dangerously. Anyone can handle a stinky day or two, should you forget to pack the deodorant.

Packing the truck for our Thanksgiving trip was a nightmare. After all, this wasn't a simple trip up the road. We were stopping for one night in Alabama, to spend some time with my family, then pushing on to our final destination, Pigeon Forge. We would then spend three nights in a two bedroom cabin with Amanda's parents and her brother's family. If you're in to math, that's nine people in a two bedroom.

The cabin was a result of a last minute decision to take the trip combined with the fact that two million other families decided to share the same holiday dream. After looking on many various sites, with no luck, I was shocked when my father in law was able to acquire a cabin so quickly. Most of the ones we looked at were woefully overpriced or not available. My shock quickly turned to concern when we arrived at the cabin. First of all, it was suspiciously tucked away, down a long and winding one lane road. As we drove up to the cabin, and I literally mean UP, I became very concerned about the parking situation.

The truck came to rest at a 45 degree angle, and the parking brake whined sadly as the entire weight of the truck tested it's worth. While straining to keep from falling down the mountain side where our cabin was precariously perched, I instantly began to dread what came next. There was a very real possibility that the carefully packed luggage and assorted accoutrement would most likely tumble out of the truck, and down the hill, the moment I open the rear hatch. Luckily, only a few items shifted during transit and I was able to keep them from tumbling into the darkness.

(Cue the spooky music)

I've waited until now to reveal the primary source of my concern. Our cabin was named: God's Little Corner. Now look, I'm as God fearing a man as the next, but this name concerned me greatly. First, it's a little condescending. The all knowing, all powerful God of the universe certainly doesn't require a "little corner" to call his own. If he did, I doubt he would choose to place said getaway anywhere near Dollywood.

Second, I was sure the name wasn't referring to the fact that this cabin was so palatial and grand that it must be like a little piece of heaven.

Finally, I'm not a fan of being murdered in my sleep. Why was this place so readily available when nothing else was? Here we are, an unsuspecting family of do-gooders paying good money to meet our doom at god's little slaughterhouse. Sounds plausible, right?

Surely my fears would be relieved once we got inside and settled in to our new comfortable digs. Wrong. The owners of "God's Little Corner" wanted to make sure that we got the message. Every square inch of wall and shelf space in the entire cabin was chock full of figurines and paintings of angels. The Vatican would be jealous of such a spread. One could not find a place to sit where a host of heavenly angels weren't creepily staring at you. Amanda's brother even complained the next morning that he had a hard time sleeping because he felt like he was being watched the entire evening.

As we settled down for bed that evening we were faced with the ominous task of sharing a bedroom with two kids, one under the age of two. Some people don't think that humans possess the instinctive abilities that we see in nature. I disagree. If you've ever tried to sleep in the same room as a small child you will agree that we all possess the ability to move in complete silence, like a ninja. Because we know that one single grunt or cough could turn a peaceful evening into a gauntlet of pissed off kid. Once you're in bed, you feel like a prisoner. Not laying in a comfortable position? Tough shit. You're stuck there until morning. Lord knows you wouldn't want to risk shifting to your back. Next thing you know, he's standing up in his travel crib glaring at you. This glare can't be avoided either. You can't simply pretend he isn't there. If you do, he'll result to other means to let you know that if he ain't sleeping, ain't nobody sleeping.

Perusing the entertainment center in the living room was when the "culty" factor stepped up a few notches. The TV was accompanied by a VCR and a handful of VHS tapes of unrecognizably tasteful movies. We're talking MUCH lower rent than the dreck spewed out on ABC family. However, they did include a copy of Forrest Gump and Sister Act. Good lord. They couldn't even spring for the far superior Sister Act 2. Who were these monsters?

But no multimedia collection would be complete without an entire catalog of religious CDs from some random pentecostal housewife. Every CD cover was a unique scene of a heavy set, middle-aged woman in an indiscriminate floral dress staring off into the distance with a cheesy nature backdrop behind her. I'm not talking two CDs here. More like eight or nine. Apparently this chick was a big hit in the snake handling, jazz organ circles.

All of this led me to one very pressing thought: Webcams.

Yep, time to search the cabin up and down for the hidden webcams. My heart raced at the thought of some deliverance type psycho sitting behind a laptop sharing MP4's of my bathroom rituals with some businessman in Tokyo. After an exhaustive search, and no I'm not kidding, I was unable to locate said cameras. This guy was good.

The next day we decided the best place to eat lunch and enjoy some entertainment would be the Dixie Stampede. If you've never been, let me break it down for you. Your party, and 1100 of your closest strangers are packed in to a rodeo arena to dine in the darkness. They actually take pride in the fact that they do not have utensils. That's right, let's reinforce all the hillbilly, backwoods stereotypes out there by serving a four course lunch with no fork in sight. And we're not talking ham sandwiches. More like, cornish game hens, pork and even soup which you are forced to drink from the bowl like a refugee.

I've been a part of some pretty uninspiring performances in my day, but nothing compared to the energy of the Saturday lunch show we were privy to. This show consists of some basic horseback races with predetermined winners to ensure that we would all be on the edges of seats while at the trough. The Christmas portion even included some people dressed up as toys dancing to a collection of very austere Christmas muzak. It was like something out of an ambien commercial.

After surviving our lunchtime extravaganza Amanda's family shockingly decided to grant my request for the weekend. I'd read about this place called Cade's Cover that was supposedly a natural marvel, complete with wild animal encounters and breathtaking views. Bull crap. It was a single lane eleven mile road through some random fields. And wouldn't you know it, Nolan luck swept through the area like a toxic fog and scared away the animals. That's right. We saw two stinking deer and a handful of boring turkeys. What a waste.


But our trip was not complete. Nature was not finished screwing with us yet. Our entire eleven hour drive home was in a torrential downpour. Here's where you really earn your pay as a dad/husband. As soon as droplet number one hit the windshield, my entire family, Amanda included, entered a coma-like state. So there I am, driving through the mountains in a monsoon, while maintaining perfect silence in the vehicle. This requires copious amounts of caffeine and a vivid imagination. With every mile that passed, my mind did what it usually does; It relived. One of my more annoying habits is that I tend to dwell on encounters. I relive them over and over creating new and exciting outcomes to whatever the conversation was, at the time. I'm sure I would've looked like a complete psychopath, if Amanda would awaken to find me pantomiming a ten year old conversation, but at least we weren't careening in to oncoming traffic.

I guess that's how we are supposed to survive the logistical nightmare of having kids during the holidays. Find your own coping mechanisms. Find something to keep your mind off of the mind-numbing lengths you go to so that your kid can laugh and tell jokes with a cousin who lives far away. The jokes, hugs and memories are that much sweeter if you can ignore the fact that a horse-filled, sporkless lunch shouldn't cost $120, or that some Japanese CEO has pictures of you in your whitey tighties.