2015: A year of change.

2015 has been a year of change for me. Unless you were unfortunate enough to be frozen in carbonite by a galactic bounty hunter, it's safe to say, your life changed a bit as well.

I should start with the most apparent change; I have lost over 100 pounds since last January.

I would like to say that it was just a lot of hard work, disciplined dieting, and strenuous exercise that was the catalyst for this change. However, most of you know me too well to buy that story. No, the past several decades of poor eating habits, and a less than active lifestyle, let me put on 5 pounds a year and over that time my health started to decline. Starting to develop diabetes and high blood pressure was the tipping point for me, and I decided I had to do something. Something other than what I had tried in the past.

I elected to have gastric bypass surgery. From the initial consultation with my personal doctor, to the interviews with the Bariatric Surgery staff, all the lab tests, and monitoring, it took about four months to get a date for my surgery. For anyone who has been through this, or is thinking about having bariatric surgery, let me just say, it is not fun. At all.

Having you guts cut open and re-plumed is not for the faint of heart. It hurts like hell for the first week. Gradually, it gets a little better each day, until two weeks has passed and it only feels like you were hit in the belly with square nosed shovel. I won't bore you with the details, but you don't eat a lot, and by that I mean hardly anything at all. It's pretty much an all liquid diet for a few weeks. Slowly you get eat solid foods, like six string beans, or half a scrambled egg.

I am a terrible patient and did not follow the eating guidelines very well.  That will come as a shock to no one, but whenever I crossed the line, I paid a hefty price by throwing it right back up. Anyway, you get the idea; no fun, lots of pain, and some vomiting, kind of like a Nicolas Cage movie.

It has been eleven months since my surgery, and my weight has stabilized around 235. That was my personal goal, but I'm sure my doctors will want me down around 200. That would be fine, and I think I can get there over time. I'm much more active now, I ride my bike downtown four times a week, and my back and knees feel a lot better. My blood sugar is doing great and my blood pressure is just a tick over normal now.

It is strange to me how some pretty drastic changes can happen through a little bit of effort, while some require a herculean undertaking.

I stopped getting drunk 15 or 20 years ago. I just decided to stop. It didn't take a lot of will power to do it, I just made up my mind and stopped drinking more than one (of anything).

I won't say I quit drinking. I still have a occasional beer or a single shot of bourbon every once in a while, to the amazement of some of my friends who didn't know me in the old days. Today, I can have a drink, and don't feel the need to have another. Thank the Lord for that. I know many people who cannot stop at just one. It's better all together if they don't drink at all.

I guess that is how I was with pizza and cheese burgers. I still have those today, but I can only have one slice of pizza or maybe half a cheeseburger. I'm cool with that. I wish I could have just decided to stop eating pizza after one slice, but I couldn't, and if I had done nothing, it probably would have killed me.

Do you need to make a drastic change in your life? In your relationships? In your health? Do you need to take action in a certain area of your life that is slowly destroying you or your family?

I hope it is just as simple as making a decision. I really do.

If it's not, and if it's something you have decided to change many times in the past, only to fail; do something different. Reach out for help. No one will think you're weak because you need help. I certainly won't. I stopped drinking with little difficulty; I had to have to serious surgery to stop eating half a pizza at a sitting.

You can do this. It may take some serious effort, and yes, even some pain, but I can tell you from where I sit right now, it is worth it. Totally worth it.

If someone you care for needs help, support them, but get them help.

50 is the new,,,oh Hell, 50 is still old.

As I sneak up on my 50th birthday, certain things are becoming sharper in their focus.

Time; which once seemed in infinite supply, seems more finite, much like my patience.

Purpose; which I once thought would somehow find me, seems to be lost, and without a GPS and distracted by pretty flowers.

And lastly Relationships; trying to sort out the ebb and flow of people in and out of my life.

Let's start with time. Time is a constant. It flows like a river, free of any restrictions as it marches unencumbered to its destination. There is no damming its path, no constricting its volume. It will follow the path of least resistance and we are powerless to stop it. Much like the growth of the federal government.

I like to think of time as the $5 bill I received as a birthday gift when I was around 7 or 8. For a child, (back in the early 70s anyway) $5 was an enormous amount of money. I remember getting that $5 bill and heading to the Oak Run Store with my friend Johnny. This was back when a candy bar was .25 cents, or maybe they just went to .35 cents, it's hard to remember. Anyway, we bought an obscene amount or sugar laden food items, which included a box of chocolate-covered, marshmallow pinwheel cookies.

We ate the entire box on our walk back to his house. By the end of the day, we had eaten enough candy to make ourselves miserably sick and I still had about $1.75 left.  Later that week I went with my mom to town where I bought some football cards (I was never a big baseball fan until later) and maybe a MAD magazine or two. My point being, the five dollars was gone and I had very little to show for it.

I think back to my teenage years, my 20s, even my 30s and wonder what my life would look like today if I spent less time chasing after pinwheel cookies and focusing on something of greater value? Who knows, if I'm not careful, I may look back on my 50s and wonder what the hell was I doing with all that extra time as well.
I wish I could take some of that time back. But I can't; it's gone. Spend your time wisely people. Spend it with the ones you love. Spend it doing what you love. In the end, it's your most valuable asset. 

Purpose. What is my purpose in life? If anyone knows, please feel free to let me in on the secret.

As I get older, I start to wonder if there is anything more important than figuring out my purpose on this spinning blue orb circling the M class star in the middle of our Milky Way galaxy.

For me, the easy answer, being a Christian, (and a terrible one at that) is to live the way Jesus would want me to. To love Him above all else, and love others as much as I love myself. Most of the time, I find this to be an impossible standard to live up to. It would be easy to give up and say, "Lord, you know what weak material I am made of, can't I just try to be nice to most people and not kill anyone?" I find these are the one-sided deals we pretend to make with God.

We always try to change the rules to fit our lives, and to keep ourselves as comfortable and safe as possible. That isn't what Jesus called us to do. We are to follow Him. There will always be risk, pain, and conflict when you follow Jesus; it's a certain as the turning of the earth. The reward? A truly priceless, yet free gift, given to us as a debt paid in full.

Is it worthy of my best effort? You bet it is. Even as I know I will always fall short, I will get back up and try to do better tomorrow.

I have other purposes that I am committed to, as a husband, father, friend, employee, etc.  I hope I have lived up to these endeavors, and pray I will continue to grow and learn as I get older. In all these things, what I always strive for in everything I do, is to help people. I know I'm not going to change the world, but if I can help a few people along the way, I would be satisfied with that. Make a difference, even a small one.

Relationships are tricky. I must admit, I am not very good at them.

I'm not sure if it was my semi-solitary upbringing on the ranch, or it's just the way the Lord created me, but I am content when I am by myself. It's not that I don't like crowds, or parties, or being with friends. I do. However, I am just as happy alone with my thoughts. Sometimes that comes across the wrong way to people, and I apologize. While I am outgoing, and can make friends easily, I am not very good at cultivating and growing those friendships. My best friends are the people I sometimes don't talk to for months at a time, but when we do talk, we pick up right where we left off. I should work on this. I will try.

As far as being a husband, I am far from perfect. You can ask my wife; she knows. I don't consider myself to be malicious or do anything to try to be hurtful or careless. I think mine are mostly errors of omission. Having been married for twenty seven years, there are many times I take my wife for granted. I get wrapped up in me, and what is going on inside my head and forget that she is the other half of this partnership. Her thoughts, feeling and concerns should be just as important to me as mine. I could write a book on all the dumb things I have done in our marriage, but let's just say, I love that woman to pieces and thank the Lord for her all the time.

I have written about my children on many occasions, and whatever I said still goes. (I think, I'll have to go back and read it again)

I am so proud of each one of them. Steven is a kind, thoughtful soul. He is intelligent, talented and will always do the right thing. Abbie has grown into wonderful young woman. She is hard working and kind. She is smart and funny, and has a goofy side to her that I think she gets from me. As talented as Steven is with a guitar in his hands, Abbie is equally talented on horseback. They follow different passions, but they both love what they do and it is joy to watch them. If I can only get Abbie to breathe when she rides in competition; I'm afraid she will pass out one of these days.

All in all, I have no right to complain. The first fifty years have had some wonderful highs, gut wrenching lows, and a lot of time somewhere in the middle. I am more than content to have my faith, my family, and my friends.

To quote Eddie Vedder,
"Oh I'm a lucky man, to count on both hands the ones I love.
Some folks just have one, yeah, others, they've got none, uh huh."

Follow your dreams: and other such nonsense

We are told, by seemingly everyone these days, to follow our passion. However, I would like to ask this question; is that always a good idea? Seriously, is following your dreams always a good idea?

Being a GenXer,  I was not beaten over head the head with this notion to the extent that my children were. Today when you sit your little ones down to watch a kids/teens movie, these messages will be central to the story. Be yourself. Believe in your dreams when no one else does. Follow your heart. Follow your dreams. You can do anything if you try hard enough. You can change the world.

I know it makes for good movies, but is it good advice?

Who am I to do battle with Walt Disney Studios and the billions of dollars they have made selling this idea with movies, music, books, backpacks, t-shirts, theme parks and commemorative Christmas ornaments? I'm really not doing battle with the idea of following your dreams, I'm just saying lets step back, take deep breath, and think about this.

Let's take the idea of following our dreams and see how that plays out in real life. I consider myself lucky enough to have a few things I am passionate about. I'm not talking about my family, as they are my driving passion, my main concern and the biggest responsibility in my life. No, I'm talking about the interests, hobbies, and passions that make up all the things I would rather be doing when I'm not doing them.

For me they are; music, writing, the outdoors, art, making things with wood or steel, and a host of others. Given the choice, would I rather have some type of vocation centered around one of them? My honest answer is yes; probably.

I do know people who have taken the thing they love and turned it into a successful business or career. That seems like a wonderful thing. Are they the lucky ones? I would think so. What about everyone else?

What if you are passionate about art. You have watched all the movies about believing in yourself, following your dreams, and you set out to change the world with your art. You study art, create art, live for art, try to sell art, try to teach art, but you can never make enough money for a first and last month's rent deposit? What message does that send to you? Are you a failure? You stayed with dream when everyone said you're crazy, you believed in yourself when no one else did, and it didn't work out. Now what? Do you become dejected? Bitter with the world, with yourself? Will you now have to 'settle' for some other 'meaningless' job to pay the bills?

I love music, and I would love to be a professional musician. It is a huge part of who I am as a person. I have always wanted to play music and sing. The singing part comes naturally to me, but the guitar/bass part is where my fingers and brain part company. I play bass well enough to get by if you keep it simple, but I understand my limitations. I am not gifted with that kind of talent. If had started playing music much earlier, by this time in my life I could have been a respectable musician, which I am not.

Instead of following my dreams, I followed the dreams picked out for me by my father. When my father passed away, so to did those plans. I had to make it up as I went. I also had a family and needed to make some sort of living.  I took whatever work came along. I have worked construction, heavy equipment operation, driven trucks, cowboy, network cabling, inside and outside sales and project management just to name a few. I have been happy in each of those jobs; Save one. I briefly sold cars while waiting for my contractors license. I hated that job. I was good at it, but making money by helping people make bad financial decisions was not for me.

I have dabbled in freelance writing, and I enjoyed it. I would consider doing that again, but only on the side. Much like my music, I enjoy writing, but I'm not that talented. I believe I could have made a living in almost any vocation, including ones that share my passions, but it didn't turn out that way.

Am I miserable? Am I working at a job I hate? One that crushes my soul and strips away my happiness? Not at all. I actually love my job. I get to meet new people, learn new technologies, and it's a great place to work with good benefits. My job enables me the financial means to enjoy my passions and interests in my spare time and since I no longer have to travel for work, I have that time. But even if I didn't have a good job, and believe me, there have been times when I didn't, I think I would still be happy. Why?  I think it's because I define success differently than a lot of people.

What I am trying to say is following your dreams is great, but it shouldn't be what defines your success. What if your dream is to be a professional baseball player, and you are extremely talented. There are three hundred million people in America. That means there are tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of extremely talented baseball players trying to get one of the 835 roster spots on a big league team. Dreams do come true, but the odds are very long indeed.

Could you take your passion for baseball find a way to work around the sport you love? Broadcasting, sport phycology, personal trainer, marketing, transportation, or even grounds maintenance. Being around the ballpark everyday would be cool, even if you were not playing. Could you work around the thing you love without being at the center of it? Could you feel successful without fulfilling that childhood dream? I hope so.

Even if you make your dream come true, will that guarantee your happiness? You could create a piece of music that hits number one on the charts, or have your art hanging in a prestigious gallery and get written up the The New Yorker, or write a novel that gets made into a motion picture staring Matt Damon. Cool. Let's say you make it, let's say you are financially and critically successful doing the thing you love. This may sound harsh but, so what?

Plenty of people achieve success. Are they happy? Did their success turn what they loved into something unrecognizable? Did they or their manager, agent, or studio take over their project and slowly turn their passion into a commodity to be packaged, marketed and sold like soda pop? Did the fame, money and success make them happy?

Will they be playing their one hit song in an Indian Casino thirty years later to pay for alimony, and child support payments? Will they be in and out of rehab? The tabloids are filled with successful people that come to find out they had achieved their dreams, only to be miserable. Maybe they were chasing the wrong dream.

What if you redefined your goals and your dreams? What if your dream wasn't to have success as a (fill in the blank)? What if your dreams were about you as a person and not what you do? What if your goal was to be a better person today than you were yesterday? What if your goal wasn't to change the world but to change one life at a time? What if your dream was to try to be positive influence on those around you? What if your dream was to be the best version of yourself you could be?

That would mean, no matter where you find yourself, you are in charge of your success. You could be working in a recording studio, producing music, or working at radio station as a production assistant making minimum wage. You could be working as a professional plumber (and they make a very good living) and still get together with your friends and play music a few nights a week and live a wonderful life. You could work as a therapist, really helping people, and paint, draw or write poetry in you spare time.  Wouldn't you consider that success?

The great thing about living life with the goal of being a good person is it makes you a bit tougher when the world hits you with a setback. You will know that your job is not you. Your house is not you. Your bank account is not you. The only thing that is really you is how you treat others, and how you view yourself.

Being a good person doesn't mean being perfect. We are all going to fall short at times. There will be peaks and valleys in life, they are unavoidable; health issues, relationship issues, financial issues, but you can choose how you deal with every one of them.

No matter what today threw at you, tomorrow is another chance to succeed. That is a dream I can follow.

Change is hard.

Of all the things we encounter, in the short time we spend in this world, not many of them stay constant. Sure, you can say that the sun will come up tomorrow in the East, and barring a meteor smashing the earth out of its orbit, that is true. However, even our sun is slowly dying. In 2.8 Billion years or so, the sun will balloon into a Red Giant as it expends the last of its energy, before ultimately shrinking into a Black Dwarf; a cold ball of carbon drifting trough the universe. Much like the line from Fight Club;  “On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.”

As humans, we like to think the things surrounding us are more or less permanent. When we're young, we think we will always be young, or at least we think old age is way down the road, and doesn't trouble our thoughts too much. We live in America, where we are the sole super power in the world right now, and have been for a few decades.

Many younger people do not remember the 'duck and cover' nuclear attack drills we had in elementary school. I'm not sure how crouching under my wooden desk would have saved me from a hydrogen bomb, but that is what we were instructed to do.

There was a great unease in my youth brought about by the existence of another super power with a larger military, nuclear weapons, and a stated goal that they would bury us. I'm sure 9/11 and the following years of war and terrorism are in the back of everyone's mind old enough to remember it. Still, there isn't that macro threat of the Cold War where one day the whole world would be incinerated as the USSR and the US engaged in a thermonuclear warfare.

Even with the resurgence of Russia, and the oncoming development of China, we are still the lone super power on the globe, for now. Give it another 30 years and China will compete and ultimately fill the void for global dominance. Young people will be astonished as we face off with China over natural resources, technological dominance, and Geo-politics. They will say, I remember when they built all our iPhones and TVs, why do they want to take over Japan and South Korea now?

Like I say, change is something, we as a species, are not very good at. Now, there are some people who are very good at spotting trends, and changing dynamics whether it be in business, technology, politics, or culture. These are the people who said, in ten years the big book stores will be a thing of the past. We laughed at them and said, hey I just became a Borders Rewards member, there is no way this place is closing. They just put in a coffee bar, free wi-fi, and beside, people will always want to browse and buy books in a store. Five years ago the same people said Best Buy, Radio Shack and electronic super stores will be gone in a few years and they may be right. I think Radio Shack just filed for bankruptcy last week.

Humans are the same way when it comes to our personal lives.We don't like change, or I should say the majority of us don't like change. Some folks out there, and thank the Lord for them, never like to sit still. They crave change, and are always looking to the future for a better way. However, most of us desire the steady, constant path where things go right along without much tumult or agitation. As long as we do what we've done before, we  will be safe. As long as I keep showing up for work and doing it the same way, I will always have a job. As long as I treat my family/spouse the same way, they will always be there. As long as I live my life this way, I will receive this result.

If we take an objective look at life, I'm not sure how we come up with this notion of "do the same, get the same". We feel as though we are entitled to that steady, consistency of the way our lives are right now. I think that type of mentality is a dangerous thing. Things are changing all around us, all the time. We just have to start looking up from our daily tasks, our daily routines to spot these trends. Otherwise we will be blindsided by change.

I love technology. I stared in the IT infrastructure field 20 years ago. I started at the bottom and worked my way up, learning everything I could as I went. When I started there was a distinct stratification to the industry. Cable pullers were at the bottom, fiber optic technicians were towards the top. Terminating fiber optic cable back then was half skill, half artistry. Cleaving a bare fiber, smaller than a human hair, by hand and then polishing it with finer and finer grades of sanding/polishing paper took a long time. Making figure-eights on the paper with a polishing puck was all done by feel. If you screwed it up, you clipped off the end and started over. It took me a few months and a few dozen clipped ends to become good at it. It took me a few years to become really good at it.

Today, the ends come pre polished and you can use a fusion splicer to connect them to the fiber optic cable. The splicing machine is so precise, I could train most people to use it in a day or so. That is change. Not to say that new person will know how to use an optical time domain reflectometer or OTDR to test it, or perform all the other tasks that come with the job, but it is getting quicker, and easier to learn and do these tasks. Less training time, and more reliable tools means fewer fiber optic technicians are going to be needed in the future. Or at least their skill set will have less of a premium placed on it. That's why I am constantly keeping up on wireless technology, as our industry moves towards the mobile client.

I have mentioned the OODA loop before, Observe, Orient, Decide, Act, and it has become a model for me. Why am I doing what I'm doing? Can I do it better, or can I get better results? How can I get those results, what steps do I need to take? Then, act on the plan. Start the loop again. This process is not only applicable to individuals, but groups, businesses, churches. Any entity that has to deal with change.

I have been through a big change in my personal life recently. My weight has been an issue with me since high school. I was a skinny, active kid living out in the country. As I got into high school, I discovered fast food, and beer. Thankfully I also discovered sports. I was a three sport athlete in high school, so I was always training, lifting weights or competing. When I graduated, I kept my eating habits, but not my work out habits. Every year I put on three to five pounds or so. After a thirty years I found myself fat as a tick and becoming increasingly unhealthy.

In that time I had tried many diets. I lost and gained back twenty pounds, forty pounds, etc. When I started to become diabetic, that is when I knew I had to do something. I started the process of looking into gastric bypass surgery last fall, and this January 29th I went in for surgery.

This is not an easy endeavor. The pre-op work, weight loss and the surgery prep itself are no fun at all. The initial week to ten days following my surgery were painful and frustrating. Two weeks in, and I started feeling better. I went back to work my third week, and was back to normal work, no restrictions in six weeks.

I am now two and a half months out from my surgery and I'm adjusting to my new life. I have lost about sixty pounds so far, and feel better. I do look at eating in a different way now.  Eating is not something I plan my day around as I did in the past. Some days I have to remember to eat. Some of my favorite foods I can't eat right now. Others are fine one day, and not so fine the next. My new, smaller stomach has its own set of rules. What it likes, how much and how fast to eat it, these are things I will have to think about. Break these rules, and I will pay a price.

This surgery, this decision, has and will change my life. I hope for the better, but time will tell. I could have done nothing, and continued to watch my heath deteriorate. I could have  started another diet, and maybe this time, it would have worked. I'll never know. Based on my past experience, I am doubtful. 

I say all this to point out that change is inevitable, but not always easy. You will not be the same person you are today this time next year. Things will happen, situations will change. you will change. The trick is, will you be one directing this change, or will things, people, events direct it? I understand that life happens, and sometimes events are outside your control, but how you respond to them is not. Your response is entirely up to you.

If you cannot change the past, (and you can't) you must move forward. What will you do? Will you sit down and turn inward in protest to the unfair card you were dealt? Will you get angry, bitter, and resentful at the people, the situation, or even God for letting this happen? How will you respond? How will you handle this change?

These can be scary questions. However, there is another side to change. What if we choose to do nothing? What if we choose not to see our relationships falling apart? What if we refuse to see our changing work place situation? What if we choose to stay on this same, "safe" path we have been on? What if that safe path leads nowhere? What if we lose one, two or twenty years keeping our head down and plodding along this path because we are afraid to face change. What if we grow comfortable in our apathy?

I offer no advice other than these two items:

• Change is coming, be the one out front directing it if all possible.  
• It is possible.

My memorial service.

I have wanted to do this for a while now. Listening to my favorite pastor, Francis Chan, I am finally beginning to understand that I owe my next breath to God. One day, maybe today, maybe in thirty years, my heart will beat its final beat. Whenever that day comes, there are things I wanted to say. While I am still drawing breath, I thought I should not waste another heartbeat.

First off, I am usually the one up front at these things so I wonder who is reading this? I may shame Dan Gallardo into performing it because he hates speaking in public, but I think he would do quite well.

Before I get into too much detail, I want everyone to know how much I love my family. My parents Walter and Alice, my step father Paul, my sister Lisa and brother in law Roy. I had such a wonderful childhood. Sure we had some ups and downs, but I was always loved, and I cherish those days.

I also love my wonderful in-laws, Don, Lois, along with Eric, Brian and the whole Meidinger clan. I’ll bet you didn’t know what a ride you were in for when I married dawn, right?

I must say that everyone loves their family, or at least that’s the way it supposed to work, and I hope I can cover in a few minutes the infinite amount of love I have for my wife Dawn, my son Steven and my daughter Abigail. If by the time you are reading this I have grandkids, I’m sure I love you too and keep giving your folks a grief, its payback time.

 Sitting here today, I am a very happy person, but that has not always been the case. I have and continue to struggle with being an anxious, worried, petty, vain, untrustworthy, angry, and hypocritical person. Some days I win, some days I lose, but in all days, I thank Jesus Christ for the strength to fight.

Much like a Labrador Retriever, I have been slow to mature. I still remember that kid from Oak Run, down at the creek with my dog throwing rocks at frogs, sticks, oak balls, whatever, pretending I was bombarding them with cannon fire. To tell the truth, I would still do this today if no one was watching me. I remember the crazy kid in high school, drinking to excess and acting like a lunatic. Why my parents ever let me have my own apartment at 17 is still a mystery to me. If I lived my high school days over ten times, it is no exaggeration I would die seven times.

I remember meeting my future wife, asking her to marry me without the slightest idea of what I wanted to do with my life, or how I would make a living should something happen to my father. Well, unfortunately, we had to find out. I was so unprepared for my father’s death and it set me back in so many ways. Emotionally, financially, and spiritually, I was a wreck.

If any person saved my life in those dark days it was Dawn. She stayed with me, even when she didn’t know what was going to happen, even when I was very depressed, even when I was wallowing in darkness, even when I didn’t deserve to be loved, she was there. Simply put, she saved me from myself.

She was my first love, someone who I was not looking for when I found her, someone I could not live without once we met. After our first few dates, we were inseparable. When I ran out of money and asked if she wanted to go out to the ranch and run around with my dogs as a date, she said yes, and I knew I found a keeper. We have been through so much; good times, bad times, heart aches and turnarounds. She has been a steady force in our marriage, trying to keep my wandering course off the rocks.

Our son Steven came into this world, and surprise, and again, I was not ready for it. I would like to think I was a pretty good parent, but I was unprepared. I owe him many apologies and ask for his forgiveness. I was not trying to screw you up son; I was trying to do the best I could. I think we are hardest on the weaknesses we hate in ourselves when we see them in others. I was way too hard on Steven, trying to correct my own faults through him.

One thing I hope I did right was stop trying to pound that square peg in a round hole like my father tried to. It became pretty obvious that Steven’s personality is different than mine, or Dawn’s. He is a ‘sit back and watch’ kind of person. He doesn’t like to meet new people, and it takes a while for him to make friends. I found this frustrating as a parent. Why isn’t like me? He wasn’t into sports, and for a guy for played three sports in school, this seemed strange too. He hated school, and I mean hated school. So I did the only thing I knew how to do, I just took with me everywhere. Steven was my constant companion on weekends when I wasn’t working, and he seemed to be okay with it. As long as we stopped off to eat at a good place, he was cool with it.

 I was wondering what we would do with him when he asked for a guitar for Christmas; I think he was 13? Little did we know that we had just unlocked a side to our son that we had never seen. He played for a while, I bought a guitar too and we plucked around making noise for a few months and then he just slowly stopped playing. I thought this might just have been a phase that had run its course when one of those weird things happened. Dawn’s uncle Tom and aunt Carol came by. He heard Steven had a guitar and Tom is one of those misdirected musical geniuses, and he asked to see Steven play. He did, and then he picked up Steven’s cheap Chinese Strat knock off and made it sing. Steven seemed reinvigorated in his music and played, and played and played some more. He started playing at church with Peter Numann and he blossomed under Peter’s direction and Pastor John Withem’s encouragement. Dawn and I owe a great deal to Peter and John for seeing what Steven could become and giving him the chance to succeed.

Steven, you are a great son. Even when you were being a butthead, you were nice about it; which is more than I can say for myself. I love you so much, you inspire me. I worry about you at times, but I shouldn’t. You will always do what is right. You are stronger that you know, one day you will find that out and the world better watch out. 

Then there is Abbie. Abbie came into world in a crisis. She was 3 pounds 4 ounces and both her and Dawn tried to die on me, but with a lot of prayer, a whole lot of prayer, and their own stubbornness, they both pulled through. I have always said that Abbie was going to give me a heart attack, if I died from one, Ab, I was just kidding. You are great, it’s just that after Steven and his easy going pace, I was not ready for Hurricane Abbie. I used to say that Abbie never walked on her heels around the house, and I was right. She ran and stood on her tiptoes most of the time. She was a blur of activity, always moving, always running, and usually in her mom’s footsteps. We used to call Abbie, Dawn’s mini-me.

Abbie, you are kind, funny, up for every adventure. You don’t get bogged down in life; you seem to just roll with it. I wish I had your spirit.

If Steven was always with me, Abbie was always with Dawn. She used to go to work with her on Sundays and so I didn’t see too much of her on weekends. Abbie, unlike her brother is a “joiner” she wanted, and did, do just about everything. Soccer, volleyball, basketball, cheerleading, gymnastics, 4-H, riding horses, and I probably missed a few along the way. Abbie loves the ranch. Both, Gibson and Sugarland. She has such talent on a horse. She works very hard at it. It is her passion. Abbie’s love for horses and riding is very similar to Steven’s love of music. They both are naturally gifted and I have wondered at their achievements, and I could not be prouder.

I wish we had spent more time together as she grew up, and I am sorry for that. Maybe it’s natural to be more connected to children of the same sex, or maybe our personalities are not as similar and mine and Steven’s. Whatever the reason, Abbie, I wish I knew you better, and I wish we were closer. You have my quirkiness, my strange sense of humor, and you love to make friends. I cannot tell you how much I love you. Even if you think I love your brother more, you are wrong, he’s a guy and know what it’s like to be a guy. Young girls and women scare the hell out of me and I don’t know anything about being one of them, so you will have to forgive me for not knowing what to say, or the right way to act around you. But I love you dearly, and you make me so proud. You are such a good person.

To all my friends, and family, I thank you for allowing me into your lives and that you had a glimpse into my twisted little world. While many dying people say I have no regrets, I think that is a cop-out. I have many, many regrets.

I regret I was not a better husband, father, son, brother or friend. It wasn’t like I was out saving the world or curing cancer, I had the time and ability to do all those things, I just didn’t. I was too wrapped up being me.
I’m sorry, and I hope you will forgive me.

My deepest regret is not doing what the Bible tells me to do; love the Lord your God with all your mind, body, soul, and spirit and love your neighbor as yourself. While I believe that Christ Jesus died on a cross, and took my sin to the grave, came alive again and made me spotless in the eyes of God, I have been a terrible example to the rest of world.

If I could come back to change one thing, one mistake I have made, it would be that. I regret not bringing more people into the kingdom of God, I know there are friends of mine that do not have a relationship with Jesus, and that I could have done a lot more to ensure that their names are written in the book of life. This is my failure, one that I hope someone hearing this message will rectify.

 If I did you wrong, please forgive me. If you believe you did me wrong, don’t worry about it, I’m not.

Try not to cry for me here today, I am not in this box, I am not this bag flesh, if you dropped me on the way to the hole, I hope at least one person laughed. Nope, I am gone, but I am still with you, all of you. In your memories, in your hearts, and I hope to live on in your stories, I know there are a few really good ones.

Please know in the deepest part of your soul that I am in a better place, I am home. I am in the place I was made for, not here on this earth, but at home with my Lord. I hope to see you there, where we can spend eternity in the throne room of the God, crying out Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God almighty!

Now go get some food and hug my family.

Walter Christopher Lucas.