Dividing by Zero

A Fouse by Any Other Name....

2012-02-05T11:50:00.000-08:00

The other day at work, I was talking on the phone to a sergeant from the Montana National Guard regarding some training my company is offering to provide to his unit. I had never communicated with him before, so when he called and told me his name, I wrote it down, as I usually do when I am speaking to someone I have just met, so I could address him using his name. I like to be called by name, and I find that most other people do also. I wrote "SFC Kincaid." Later in the conversation, I told him I would need to research the answer to one of his questions, and I asked for an e-mail address so I could send him the info. He responded with something like "james.kinkade@xxx.com."

Wow, I thought, "Kinkade" instead of "Kincaid." I had never encountered that spelling of his last name. It gave me pause because it made me realize that I had been guilty of doing something that has irritated me to various degrees most of my life. I had assumed when I heard the sergeant's name that I knew how it would be spelled. In fact, I confess that I thought I knew how it "should" be spelled.

Having grown up with an unusual surname, with an unusual spelling, I should not be surprised when someone else's name is different from what I expect. The fact that my name is F-O-U-S-E (not T!) has allowed me to observe, and often be irritated by, the way people respond to other people's names. As I alluded to in the last sentence, people often think they hear me say "Steve Foust" or "Steve Faust." In my younger days, when I was more easily irritated, I would silently accuse them of not listening. The problem would then be compounded when I would try to spell it for them. More about the spelling later...

Someone with a less unusual name, with a simple spelling, might not see an issue. I used to sometimes wish my name were Anderson or McDonald, anything I wouldn't have to be continuously have to spell, or explain. As a child, I always believed that rules were important, including rules about spelling and grammar, and I was somewhat embarrassed by the fact that my last name seemed, at least to some people, to be "misspelled," because it was different from what they expected. Also, it always drew unwanted attention to me when I had to spell it for people. I would have preferred to be more anonymous.

My feelings about my name were also effected by the attitude my father had about it. He grew up in East Texas, where the name Fouse is much less unusual. In fact, it was well known in his neck of the woods, partly because it is less unusual there than in Oklahoma, and partly because of some notorious redneck cousins of his, whom he always referred to as "those Sorry Old Fouse Boys." Evidently, although he usually didn't have to spell his name when he was back home, he did have to clarify that he wasn't one of THOSE Fouses. He also was determined to prove that he wasn't like them, and instilled in me the desire to live in a way that would bring honor to our name. I never met those Fouses, and I'm not completely clear on what made them so "sorry," but I was always aware that Dad wanted me to help him prove we weren't like them.

As I said before, I always had to spell my name for most people. I learned from my efforts at this that people often don't listen to what you say, rather, they hear what they expect. I learned by observing my parents to offer the spelling without being asked if I wanted people to get it right. So, we would say, "Fouse, F-O-U-S-E," or "Fouse, like House," and, "The last letter is an E, not a T." But it was often to no avail. The letter F sounds too much like an S, so sometimes I would get "Soufe." Sometimes, despite my best efforts, people would write "Foust," because that was what they expected. My favorite example of this is once when I was at work, on the phone, trying to explain to some ditz on the other end how to spell my name. I reverted to "Fouse, like House, except that the first letter is an F." She replied, "OK, so that is F-L-A-R-S?" What? I told her indignantly that I didn't know about her, but I didn't spell "house" with any Ls or Rs. My office-mate called me Steve Flars for years after that.

Another issue with our name is that people often want to pronounce it "Foose." I had an English prof in college, Mrs. Shanahan, who was from up North, whose attitude communicated that she considered herself a cultural missionary to the desolate Outback of Oklahoma, because she taught literature as if she were bringing the Gospel to heathens. Evidently, she thought it was part of her Calling to teach me how to pronounce "Fouse," because despite my repeated corrections, she always called me "Mr. Foose." She would ask me a question in class, always referring to me as "Foose," and I would always begin my response with, "It's Fouse." I did this once too often for her to be able to bear, evidently, (how dare I correct the mighty English Professor?) because one day after my retort, she said, clearly annoyed, "See me after class." She started our conversation with, "Why isn't your name Foose?" She was expecting me to justify the way I pronounced my name! I was ready for her, though, because I replied that the name is German, not French, and was an Americanization of Foust, which probably came from "Faust." She replied, "Oh, that's too bad." I guess she thought a French name or a pure German name would be more exceptable. I don't know, but after that, she usually referred to me humorously as "Mr. Foose-Fouse." Whatever.

So, what if my name had been Anderson or McDonald, or anything with fewer issues attached? Would this make me a different person? Mrs. Shanahan knew that none other than Shakespeare himself had dealt with such a question, when his ill-fated heroine Juliet opined, regarding her main squeeze Romeo:

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call'd,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes
Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name,
and for thy name, which is no part of thee,
Take all myself."

Julie was declaring that her man would be the same guy if he didn't have that pesky name, not just Romeo, but worse, "Montague," which made his family sworn enemies of hers. I understand what she is driving at, but I don't completely agree with her. Romeo's name was part of what made him who he is, just like all the other experiences of our lives. In the same way, if I had been "Steve Roberts" instead of being called what I am, I would be, at least subtly, different from who I am. I would have missed my experiences with Mrs. Shanahan and with the Flars lady, and a thousand others like it. I would have had other experiences resulting from having a different name. Perhaps I would not have paid much attention when SFC Kinkade spelled his name for me. Perhaps I would be more likely to think that people's names, and they themselves, should be more like what I expect them to be.

So, although, I still get annoyed by people who misspell my name, it is less of an issue than it used to be for me. So someone can't spell my name? I know who I am. The Sorry Old Fouse Boys aren't much of an issue for me anymore. It has been almost 60 years since my parents came to Oklahoma, and they did a lot around here to clarify the difference between THOSE Fouses and THESE Fouses. My wife, our children, and our grandchildren also provide lots of reasons to be proud of who we are. My married daughter Rachel told me that she still includes Fouse in her name because she proud of who we are. My daughter-in-law Amy told me she is proud to bear the name Fouse. Lots of people around here know us now, and sometimes we don't even have to spell "Fouse." A great philosopher once said, "I am what I am. " I am, too, and proud of it.

Important Stuff I've Learned

2012-01-14T17:50:00.000-08:00

Today, January 14, is my birthday. This year it falls on Saturday, which is the day of the week on which I was born. This coincidence led me to discover that the calendars for 1956 and 2012 are the same. In other words, every date in 2012 will be on the same day of the week as it was in 1956. (This is not all that unusual an occurrence. It also happened in 1984, the year my daughter was born.) Also, I was born in '56, and this year I am turning 56. I wonder what cosmic significance that little co-inky-dink holds? Probably nothing more than the fact that I am approaching decrepitude. However, I think the coincidences are interesting, and sometimes they really do mean something.....

I have heard it said that Time is the great thief. When I look in the mirror, I notice a few things it has stolen from me. It would be easy to bemoan the parts of myself that are not quite like they used to be, and like I wish they still were. I often think of people I have loved that I won't see again this side of Heaven. Time took them from me. Those little children of mine are grown into a wonderful young man and woman with children of their own, but sometimes I get nostalgic for the days when I was the most important man in their lives, before Time moved us all into different stages of life. So, I agree that Time has stolen things from me that I loved. However, I also know that I traded the joys of my younger days for new joys, and for some insights that I didn't have back then, for lessons that Life has taught me, sometimes through hard times I would rather have gone around than through. I'd like to share a few of those lessons.

It is important to learn to accept ourselves, to embrace who we are. There are lots of things in life that seem to conspire to make doing this difficult. Sometimes parents, schools, and religious institutions cause us as children to focus on the things about ourselves that are less than perfect. Advertising today certainly makes it difficult for anyone who has ever been near a TV, a magazine, or the internet to feel good about the way they look. Often, we see others and think they are closer to what we should be, smarter, better looking, or more successful. Pardon me for saying so, but all this kind of thinking is just bullshit. You are who God made you to be. You have been shaped by your environment and your heredity. It doesn't change anything to hold yourself in low esteem, or to try to be something you aren't. Jesus said we are to love our neighbors as ourselves. That implies we are to love ourselves. This does not imply that we aren't to try to better ourselves when possible, to achieve all we can. But despising and belittling ourselves doesn't change who we are. Approaching life from a position of self-love empowers us to be who we were meant to be. There is only one of each of us. We should all be radically ourselves.

It is important to accept other people as they are. This is sort of a corollary of accepting ourselves. In fact, I believe that if we don't first accept ourselves, we probably won't do such a great job accepting others. There will always be people in life that annoy, irritate, or even enrage us. There will be people who stand for things we oppose, people who believe in things we abhor, people who hurt us time and again. I believe it is in our own best interest to accept people as they are. This doesn't mean that we shouldn't sometimes suggest to people important to us things they could improve about themselves, or ways they could change to make our peaceful co-existence more easily attained. It does mean, however, that people are who God made them to be, just like we are who he made us to be. Hating someone for who they are or how they live does not change them. Refusing to forgive someone who has hurt you does not change them. Indeed, carrying all those negative feelings around hurts us more than those they are directed to. Remember what Jesus said about loving our neighbor? Spreading around God's grace freely is very liberating. I recommend it highly.

It is important to laugh -- often. This is an important lesson to learn. I believe that God gave us laughter to help us deal with the stress and strain of everyday living. You can worry and fret your way through life, but what good does that do? What does it change? Nothing. If you can find a way to laugh every day, several times each day, you can more effectively deal with the things you have to cope with. As e e cummings said, "The most wasted of all days is one without laughter." There are all kinds of medical benefits that laughter provides us. The other day at work, we were having a typically stress-filled day, and somehow several of us began joking around, and soon we were all laughing, and dealing more effectively with what we had to do that day. Someone a few rows over in the cubicle jungle later told me that she didn't hear the jokes, but she heard what she called "joyous laughter," and her spirits were lifted too. And have you ever noticed that if there is a strained relationship between you and another person, laughing together seems to remove the tension? It's miraculous. My advice is to laugh often and laugh loudly. As the Eagles sang, "Lighten up while you still can "

So, if I could travel back in time, say to January 14, 1977, these are the things I would try to explain to the 21-year old Steve Fouse, because he did not know these things, and maybe he could have benefited from learning them sooner than I did. There are other important things I have learned along the way, but a lot of them aren't very interesting, like, "the more you eat, the more you want," and "save early and save often," so I probably wouldn't bother him with those things. It probably wouldn't matter anyway. He'd probably have to learn his lessons the hard way, just like I did.

The Sound of Silence

2011-12-18T15:37:00.000-08:00

This time of year we often hear the beautiful old song "Silent Night," which speaks of the "heavenly peace" of the night when Jesus was born. As the song continues, it tells of how the silence of that night is shattered, and the witnessing "shepherds quake at the sight" of an angelic choir heralding the birth of Christ. The silence of that night represents peace and calm, but the end of that silence is welcomed because it brings something better.

The classic rock duo Simon and Garfunkel are also famous for a song about silence. However, unlike "Silent Night," which uses silence as a metaphor for peace and well-being, "The Sound of Silence" has a different message. As Art Garfunkel says in the video linked above, the song uses silence to symbolize people's individual inability to communicate with one another, and their failure to love one another. The song uses stark images of a vision the narrator experiences, a vision of city streets, neon lights, and the sound of silence, which, for me, represents the results of love-term isolation:

"And in the naked light I saw

Ten thousand people, maybe more.

People talking without speaking,

People hearing without listening,

People writing songs that voices never share

And no one dared

Disturb the sound of silence."

People not communicating. People not relating to one another. People ignoring one another. People going through the motions of interacting without really knowing each other. People not having the courage to end their isolation. Although Paul Simon wrote "The Sound of Silence" in 1964, its message is perhaps more relevant than ever. A 2009 article from Psychology Today calls social isolation a modern plague: "Remarkably, 25% of Americans have no meaningful social support at all - not a single person they can confide in. And over half of all Americans report having no close confidants or friends outside their immediate family. The situation today is much worse today than it was when similar data were gathered in 1985. (At that time, only 10% of Americans were completely alone)." Consumer Reports from 2010 says that such isolation is not only bad for a person, but can actually shorten one's life.

To personalize this topic, I know that my wife Dana and I are somewhat isolated from people outside our extended family. We work. We come home. We are tired. We are both introverts and we tend to be a bit anti-social (keeping it real!), so we don't socialize much (except on Facebook). Very little. Hardly ever. Most of the people in our neighborhood are just like us, so we haven't had much interaction with them, either. For the most part, we have been fine with this state of things, each of us being content with the company of the other, occasional visits with our children and grandchildren, who live out of state, and with my mother and Dana's brother and sister-in-law, who are local.

Usually, Dana and I are fine with this arrangement. I sometimes wish we had a more active social life, but I haven't done much to change it. I just chock it up to people being busy and the state of our society. Instead of front porches and "y'all come" attitudes, most folks today, including us, have patios out back with privacy fences and "please call first" attitudes. When I was a kid growing up, we had stay-at-home moms and neighbors who knew one another and helped each other out. Now many people value their privacy over a feeling of community. When they aren't working, they mostly want to be left alone. They don't want to be bothered and they don't want to bother anyone else. I am convinced we are paying a price for these attitudes.

My attitude about how much community I need was changed drastically last Thanksgiving night. Dana and I were at our daughter's house (380 miles from home), and, having enjoyed the holiday with her and her family, we were sleeping when my cell phone rang a little after midnight. It was my home security company: "Mr. Fouse, we have movement in your house." They went on to inform me that the police were on their way. I could not believe what I was hearing! I reacted physically by beginning to shake. I kept saying how cold I was, but Dana (an RN) later told me that I was experiencing a rush of adrenalin. What do you do when there are thieves in your house and you are 5 hours away? I eventually spoke to the policeman who was in my house responding to the call from the security company. He told me that the burglars had thrown a rock through the glass patio door in our bedroom and entered there. When I told him I was facing a long drive home, he asked me if I could call someone to secure my house. That was an excellent question. My mother was out of town for the holiday also, so I couldn't call her. Being Mr. Independent, I hate to ask anybody for help. But, in this case, I had no choice. So, I called my neighbor Wayne.

Wayne is my neighbor to the east, and he has always been a better neighbor to me than I have been to him. He is retired and has lots of time to visit with neighbors. He is friendly and outgoing, but not pushy. Remember Tim Taylor's neighbor Wilson on Tool Time? That's my neighbor Wayne. Except that I have actually seen his face He had offered to help with things around the house a few times, so I knew he was the one to call, as much as I hated to. I found his number on the internet and called his house. When he answered, I told him I was sorry to wake him, to bother him at that hour. He said he didn't mind, that my alarm had awoken him earlier. He told me he had been outside when the alarm went off, but he hadn't seen anyone. There wasn't any way he could secure my house with a gaping hole in the door, but he promised to keep an eye on it until I could get home. Talking to Wayne calmed me greatly. Just knowing there was someone friendly here made the situation seem less dire.

Dana and I drove all night and made it home about 7:30 the next morning. Not much was gone, but our sense of safety had been shattered along with that glass door. When the police arrive later, Wayne talked to them, and commiserated with us. Richard, my neighbor on the west, came out and said that he had also heard my alarm. He helped the police locate some items that were stolen from my mailbox, items that the police used to try to get the culprits' fingerprints. When I brought home the replacement door from Lowe's the men who live across the street helped me move it into the house.

Simon and Garfunkel have another song about isolation. Long one of my favorites by them," I Am a Rock" is about the ultimate anti-social person, who proclaims, "I am a rock; I am an island. I build walls, their fortress deep and mighty, that none may penetrate...." Many people today, although they might not overtly express those ideas, live them out in their lives. I know that I have been prone to self-imposed isolation, although not to the extent of the Rock in the song. Cutting yourself off from those around you becomes a habit, a way of living that is hard to overcome. I have come to realize that, as "The Sound of Silence" puts it, "silence like a cancer grows."

‎"Silence propagates itself, and the longer talk has been suspended, the more difficult it is to find anything to say." -- Samuel Johnson

However, my experience with the burglary taught me some things relating to our places in society, and about myself.

First, whether we know it or not, we are part of a community. My neighbors are part of my community, and I am part of theirs, even I don't know them well or rarely speak to them. I know that because I realized that morning when the police were at my house that Dana and I weren't the only victims of that burglary. When my security was breached, theirs was also. When my alarm sounded and woke them up, their silence, their peace was shattered, too. Because if my house could be violated, theirs could too. If hoodlums could destroy my property and steal my possessions, it could happen to them to. Indeed, in a way, it did happen to them.

Secondly, no matter how independent I prefer to be, I really do need people -- for practical things like helping me carry heavy objects, and for emotional support, like a friendly voice on the phone when I am facing a crisis. Like it or not, I need other people, just like they need me.

So, what am I going to do about what I have learned? I know that I am not going to become an extrovert, but I do intend to be more open to being in community with people, to whatever extent our relationship calls for. I want to look for ways to be more sociable, to reach out to people. Writing this blog has taught me that when I am honest about myself, even just in a blog, when I talk openly about things that matter to me, things that might make me feel vulnerable, I give other people permission to do the same. I want to do that more in my real-world interactions with people as well.

About a week after I was burglarized, Wayne was out front when I came home from work. He and I visited on the curb for several minutes, talking about the burglary and about our families. Before he left to go in, he told me that he would like to give me a key to his house, and to let me know when he was going to be out of town. He asked me to watch his house during those times. I told him I'd be glad to and asked him to do the same for me. He said he'd be glad to.

I guess that's a start.

Circles

2011-12-03T18:14:00.000-08:00

If you have wandered away from Facebook into that mysterious new world called Google+, you know that on that social network, instead of sending and accepting Friend requests as on Facebook, you add people to your Circles. The people whom you add can add you to one of their Circles, or not, as they choose. There are various pre-established Circles, such as Friends, Acquaintances, and Family. Users can create and name whatever Circles suit their purposes.


Left-handed? Who knows.....

So if you know a lot of people who are Left-Handed Cross-Dressers, you can create a Circle to group those people together. People being added to circles don't have to approve of your adding them (unlike accepting a Friend request on Facebook), and they are in fact unaware of what Circle you put them in. Some of the Cross-Dressers you know might not be left-handed at all, they might be right-handed, or even ambidextrous, but you are making the Circles, so they don't get a chance to correct your mistaken ideas about them.

Human interaction, both on the internet and in the real world, is so often about categorizing other people. I suppose the most basic categories we all establish are Like Me/Not Like Me. (Or maybe Acceptable/Unexceptable.) We all make judgments about other people based on all kinds of things, some of which are not very fair or accurate. How often have you made a mental judgement about someone you just met based on how they look or what they are wearing? If you are like me, it has been pretty often. We do this without even thinking about it, sometimes without even realizing that we are doing it. "Look at that person. He/she is so (fill in the blank). He/she is probably one of those people who (fill in the blank). He/she (is, is not) someone like me. Therefore, he/she (is/is not) acceptable."

I learned a big lesson about myself a couple of years ago, when my wife and I were on an outing with our daughter Rachel and her son Ian, at an art museum in Oklahoma City, I think. Ian was about 2 years old at the time, and we encountered a young woman in the museum who had a child about that same age. I am ashamed to say that the young woman immediately fell into my "Not Like Me" category because she was extremely tattooed and pierced, much like the young man in the photo above, except that she was wearing a shirt.

I confess that it would never have occurred to me to speak to her, because her outward appearance said all kinds of negative things to me, based on my assumptions about people who adorn themselves that way. So I was surprised when my daughter spoke to her, asking her her child's age, and generally engaging her in the kind of conversation young mothers often share about their children. I was further surprised when the young woman seemed pretty much like Rachel in her demeanor, her love for her child, and the way she spoke. It was clear to me that despite the way she looked, the young woman had more in common with Rachel than I would ever have imagined. In fact, she seemed like a sweet person. The fear and loathing her appearance has inspired in me disappeared.

"Just because you are blind, and unable to see my beauty doesn't mean it does not exist. " -- Margaret Cho

People my age remember very well the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, and how African-American people struggled to gain rights and privileges afforded to other races in this country. As children, we were taught that racial discrimination is wrong and destructive to those who are victims of it. It is now unthinkable to me that I would despise someone based on that person's race. If I ever find myself making assumptions about someone based on that person's race or ethnicity, I become aware of it and admonish myself to adjust my thinking. In general, racial bigotry is now considered socially unacceptable, at least among the people I know. However, unfortunately, other kinds of bigotry, categorizing of people, and "circle drawing" are still second-nature for lots of people today, engaged in without their even noticing they are doing it.

The kind of thing I am talking about is based on people putting others into their "Unacceptable" category based on what those other people believe. In our politically fractured society, it is common for politicians and everyday people to demonize those "on the other side of the aisle" because of their belief system. This kind of thinking about "Outsiders" is also common among religious communities as well. I was reminded of this yesterday when I read an interview with Jim Palmer, author of Divine Nobodies, Wide Open Spaces, and the upcoming Being Jesus in Nashville. In his books, Jim writes about being a follower of Jesus outside traditional Christian institutions. In this interview, Jim talks about the his controversial upcoming book, in which he describes his experiment of attempting to be Jesus to the people he encounters. The interview also discusses the fact that the content of that book caused him to lose his contract with a major Christian book publisher, who deemed it too unorthodox.

Jim also discusses his observations about how often people in religious communities indulge in the practice of excluding and demonizing other people: "The hallmark of Christianity seems to have become who is excluded, which can include anything from a theological litmus test to what you wear to church on Sunday mornings. Since leaving institutional church and writing about my journey of shedding religion to find God, I have received hundreds of emails from other nobodies who feel judged and marginalized by Christianity, including Wanda the Waffle House waitress who’s only crime is having tattoos and wearing her Waffle House uniform to church, where people stare at her like she’s a whore and avoid talking to her after the service. "

How often do we exclude others, make them feel judged and marginalized, based on what they believe or how they look? This happens in all areas of our society, not just churches. Why do we do this? What is it about people that makes us need to draw circles that include some, but exclude others? I have thought a lot about those questions, and I have reached some conclusions about them.

First, it is natural, and not always destructive to make judgements about people and to categorize them. On Google+, the purpose of the grouping people into Circles is to create sub-communities of people with something in common, so that that grouping can better enjoy their cyber-socializing. In the real, world, we do similar kinds of things through clubs and other kinds of organizations. Also, some of the judgments we make about people are useful, while others are not. In the case of the young tattooed woman at the museum, it would have been logical for me to assume, based on her appearance, that she liked unconventional (to me) modes of self-adornment. However, I made the mistake of assuming lots of things about her that may not have been true, and some that were definitely not true based on my daughter's conversation with her. In short, I dehumanized her. I made her one of them rather than the individual that she is. I rejected her without knowing her. As with the my imaginary Google+ Circle for Left-Handed Cross-Dressers, I did the categorizing, I made the decisions about her without her input, indeed without her knowledge.

I believe that we often dismiss people, both within ourselves and through our actions towards them, in ways that diminish both them and ourselves. I believe that this is contrary to what was taught by Jesus, who told us to love God first and to love others as we love ourselves. I also believe that, through this kind of thinking, we often cheat ourselves out of knowing someone different from ourselves, and from enriching our own experience by what we might learn from them. I am proud that my daughter spoke to that young woman at the museum, and I am glad that I was there when she did.

For me, Rachel was drawing the circle a bit bigger. I hope to do the same.

"He drew a circle that shut me out—

Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.

But Love and I had the wit to win:

We drew a circle that took him in!"

--Edwin Markham

(Inner) Space...The Final Frontier

2011-11-20T11:48:00.000-08:00

Have you ever much thought about human emotions? How accurate are the things we feel versus the things we know or determine by logic? Can we always trust our emotions? If not, when can we trust them? Are the answers to these questions the same for everyone, or do they vary with individuals? Personally, I have never been sure how much to trust my emotions. In a previous blog I explored a negative experience I had with emotions in my life, so I am a bit leery of relying on feelings too much. Still, I think denying our feelings is denying a part of our humanity.

When I was a teenager, my favorite TV show was Star Trek. If you are a SciFi geek like me, you know that the five-year mission of the Starship Enterprise was to explore "Space, the Final Frontier...To boldly go where no man has gone before." Although some of the acting was atrocious (think William Shatner), the stories were compelling and the themes dealt with contemporary issues such as war and racism. We got to meet all kinds of aliens that were really intended to get us to examine ourselves and our fellow Humans (as opposed to Klingons or Romulons, for instance).

The alien from Star Trek that made the biggest impression on me was the Enterprise's science office, Spock. Like all Vulcans, he was devoted to Logic. The defining characteristic of the Vulcans was that they had learned to supress all emotions. Their history had been a bloody one, like that of Humanity, and so, to save their race from completely killing each other off, they had learned to suppress their emotions and rely only on Logic. Their philosophies disdained all emotions. They lived their lives based solely on what their enlightened intellects told them. Or did they?

The original Star Trek series was soon cancelled due to poor ratings. But the show and its characters lived on in the imaginations of us Trekkers, and it was eventually revived in the form of movies and a new show, Star Trek: The Next Generation. This show took place 100 years after the original series. It featured better acting (think Patrick Stewart), better special effects, and an even more enlightened bunch of Humans and aliens. (Lingering sexism still present in the 22nd century apparently ended for good in the 23rd century. The TNG crew's mission was "to boldly go where no one had gone before.") And this show introduced ship's counselor D'Ann Troi, who was a Betazoid, and therefore an empath, or one with the ability to sense others' emotions. So clearly, Troi is the antithesis of Spock. While he was all Logic, Logic, Logic, Troi was all about Feelings. Not only was she into her own emotional adventures, she was the ultimate busy-body, going around the ship sampling what emotions other members of the crew were feeling. This served her well in her role as ship's counselor, and her psycho-babble was often sprinkled with her impressions of what others were feeling. I don't remember her relying much on Logic.

The dichotomy between Spock and Troi, and between their respective alien races, is made more interesting by the fact that they are both half Human. So, Spock's devotion to Logic and Troi's emphasis on Feelings are watered-down, sort of, by that pesky Human DNA. If only each didn't have that unruly Human half, they could be completely devoted to a more enlightened path, one of pure Logic, or pure Emotion, depending on their inclination. (Could the writers of these shows have been more subtle?) Especially with Spock, many stories dealt with his struggle with the feelings from his Human side, the part of him of which he is ashamed. Troi is hampered by her Human half in that she can only read others' emotions, not their thoughts, as full-blooded Betazoids can do.

I have often dealt with similar struggles in my own life, although perhaps not to such a degree as Spock and Troi. My wife Dana tells me that I am much more logical than she is, and I agree with her. She is definitely more emotional than I am. I am sometimes too logical and she is sometimes too emotional. I guess that in our marriage, I am Spock and she is Troi. As you can imagine, conflicts have arisen because of these differences. But as our daughter has said so eloquently, about her own marriage, what is wrong with Dana is good for what is wrong with me, and what is wrong with me is good for what is wrong with Dana.

But to say that either of us is more one thing than the other is not to deny that other part of ourselves. I am often struck with how well thought-out some of Dana's opinions are. She has taught me important things that she has determined through her own use of logic. I usually prefer to rely on rational thought, but sometimes I am most sure of things that I just intuit, things that I just feel.

I have often told Dana, and she has not objected, that motherhood is a form of insanity. Is it logical to love someone, even your own child, so much that logic and reason concerning that person are only minor considerations? I would say no. However, I am loved that way by my own mother, and I am thankful that Dana loves our children and grandchildren that way too. I don't believe, however, that a mother's way of loving a child diminishes the importance of a the usually more logical love a father extends. A kid needs to be seen more dispassionately by a parent, perhaps to prepare him for the way the world will see him. I also recognize that not all mothers and fathers love their children according the emotional/logical patterns that Dana and I tend to follow.

This post didn't exactly go where I thought it would, but it is a start. I expect that I will deal with this topic again later. The important idea for me in all this, is that I often face a Spock-like struggle regarding the things that I feel and the the things that I think. I think that others probably face a similar struggle. I tend to mistrust or deny my feelings in favor of a more logical viewpoint. My wife and others approach things in the opposite way. They tend to believe what they feel more strongly that what they think. Why do we have some different approaches? Which is more valid, logic or emotions? If the answer varies with each situation, then how do I know, how do I decide? Do my answers to such questions only apply to me, or are some of them universal?

I don't know, but, it is clear that as Spock and Troi and all the other aliens and Humans in Star Trek zoomed around the universe at speeds exceeding that of light (despite the objections of Mr. Einstein), they learned as much about their own inner space as they did the galaxy. That inner journey is one we can all boldly take. And, as Spock would say, it will be .. Fascinating.

Prophet of Doom...But Only Kinda

2011-11-14T17:11:00.000-08:00

This morning I have realized once again that I have a great talent for making things worse than they are, for imagining the worst possible outcome in many situations. I do this even when logic tells me that a more favorable outcome is likely.

As I begin this blog entry, I am sitting at my dining room table, looking out the patio doors and watching the culmination of events which reminded me of this Prophet-of-Doom bent of mine. The man from the natural gas utility is out back repairing the leak in my gas meter. This is the best possible outcome for me, both financially and in terms of convenience. I know this from experience.

Two years ago this month, we noticed a strong smell of gas in the back yard. The source of that smell, we soon learned, was a broken gas line from the gas meter to the house, which we had to replace at our expense. This project was both expensive and excruciatingly slow, and it involved the plumbers tearing up our back yard and endangering the lives of our mature trees. We were without natural gas -- heat and hot water -- for at least a week. So, when we smelled gas out there again recently, I immediately remembered that bad experience and wondered if we were in for a recurrence. After all, we had survived the Great Oklahoma Quake of 2011, so maybe the line was broken again. As I sniffed around out back, I didn't really think so, though, because the smell really seemed to emanate from the gas meter, instead of being all over the yard as it was in 2009. It was probably just a leak in the meter, which would be Centerpoint Energy's responsibility, not mind. Still, bad things do happen....

Once when a friend at work confided in me that she was dreading a family dinner she was going to attend that night because of some drama she anticipated, I attempted to comfort her by saying, "Things are always worse than you expect them to be.... Wait, no...." I had meant to try to comfort her with the a statement of the exact opposite, that things are never as bad as you expect them to be. I did comfort her because she laughed loudly at my parapraxis, and, as it happened, the dinner turned out fine. But my slip really did echo the ambivalence in me about whether future events will be wonderful...or horrible. I am always willing to allow for the possibility that the Sword of Damocles may be hanging over my head.

This fact about myself is not one that I like to admit, even to myself. I really want to believe that the glass is half-full and I try very hard to believe it. I tend to be optimistic when given a choice, but the real truth is that for the me, the glass is half-full, but it is also half-empty. It could be either, who knows?

I have tried to analyze why I am so often willing to fear negative outcomes. One part of the answer, I think, is that we are conditioned by the news media to fear things that might happen, for example their annual story about the impending End of Mankind from the Flu strain of the year. The media loves bad news, and is not above making things seem worse than they for the sake of ratings. Another reason for my healthy fear of the future is that I like to be in control. If I can imagine bad things before they happen, I can be prepared, and maybe begin formulating a solution for whatever I might face. Also, I hate surprises.

I believe that people in general fear the future, and they use various intellectual gyrations to attempt to control it. One example is the idea of Karma, common among Eastern philosophies. This is the same idea expressed commonly as What Goes Around Comes Around-- you do good stuff, you get good stuff in return; you do bad stuff, you get bad stuff in return. My favorite anecdotal evidence for the reality of Karma happened once in traffic while I was driving to work. I made a perfectly safe, legal lane change into the lane in which a black pickup with darkly tinted windows was traveling. This enraged the driver of the Demon Truck so much that he changed lanes himself to come along side me, hung his head out the window, blared his horned, and vehemently shot me the bird. Of course, he was too busy with these important activities to attend to his driving, so he slammed into the car waiting at the stoplight in front of him. Instant Karma! However, the idea of Karma breaks down when you consider the driver who was rear-ended. What did he do to deserve what he got? Nothing that I could see.

Another way that people try to manipulate what may be coming their way is called the Law of Attraction. This is the idea that your life events are governed by the way you think. If you think, "I need more money," you will continue to be in need. If, on the other hand, you think, "I will get more money," then you will focus on making that happen, and therefore, it will happen. I think there is some truth to this. In my own experience, if I decide that I'm having going to have a good day, my day will at least be better than if I have told myself that this was an awful day. I just don't think that positive thinking can always change everything. Some things are out of our hands.

That fact leads many of us to prayer, another way that people attempt to control the future. Sometimes people pray that God will prevent whatever bad thing they fear from happening. Sometimes they attempt to manipulate Him by telling him they know he won't let that happen, that He promised good things for us. Although it is true that we have all kinds of wonderful promises from God, there is no promise that bad things will never come our way. To me, those kinds of prayers exhibit a lack of faith, rather than being expressions of trust in God. I believe that prayer changes things, but often it is not the future that it changes. Rather, it changes me to be able to accept what I believe to be unacceptable, and to be willing to follow God through things I would prevent if I could. Things that I wish I could avoid.

When I was a kid, I heard that sometime in the far-distant future, in billions of years, the sun will become a supernova, and will expand in size past the orbit of the Earth. This was scary news, and a little disturbing, but not overly so, because I knew I would not be around to experience it. But I was never tempted to deny that it would happen. Ideally, I wish I could adopt a similar attitude about scary circumstances I may face in the future. While I generally believe that I have a positive future to look forward to, I do not choose to deny that bad things will also happen, or that a negative outcome may face me with the next problem I encounter. I cannot always be a glass-is-half-full guy. For me, that would be intellectually dishonest, and somewhat irresponsible. So, the next time I smell gas in my back yard, I will likely wonder if the line is bad again. But, I will also remember that this time, the glass really was half-full.

Dark Night of the Soul

2011-11-06T16:34:00.000-08:00

Recently one of my Facebook friends posted that a friend of hers had attempted suicide the previous night. The person who attempted suicide tried to reach my friend before her suicide attempt because she knew that my friend has once attempted suicide herself. My friend, who is the queen of provocative Facebook questions, asked if anyone else had ever experienced a dark night of the soul, and, if so, would they share about it. Lots of people had had similar experiences that they shared. Later I spoke to my friend on the phone and she shared more about her friend who had tried to kill herself.

Today I started thinking about those posts and that conversation again. I have often heard the term "Dark Night of the Soul," but I didn't know until today that it is the title of a poem by Saint John of the Cross. According to Wikipedia, the "main idea of the poem can be seen as the painful experience that people endure as they seek to grow in spiritual maturity and union with God." That sounds like a pretty good definition of a Dark Night of the Soul. For me, the definition would be "painful experiences that have the potential to teach us about ourselves and about God." That sure describes my own Dark Night of the Soul experience. More about that later.

I starting thinking about my friend and her suicidal friend today because of a seemingly unrelated blog published today by my son, Steven. In his blog today, which I encourage you to read and follow, Steven questions exactly what the Good News that Jesus brought is. He concludes with his own ideas: "the good news, is a simple concept that can be spoken many ways:

God loves you.

You can approach God directly.

The only thing keeping you from God is you.

The gods aren't angry.

You are free from religious obligation.

There is nothing you need to do to be right with God.

You are good."

Steven's blog relates to my own Dark Night of the Soul because of what that experience taught me. In 2005, I began to exhibit several symptoms that I did not understand. I began to lose my appetite for food. Indeed, very often, I could not force myself to eat. I began to lose a lot of weight. I lost interest in almost everything. I remember having extremely dark imaginings about the future, such as being sure that I would someday be left all alone by the deaths of all my loved ones. Soon I was sleeping less and less. All of these things kind of crept up on me, so it was easy not to realize that I was having major issues. At about the same time, I had begun taking a new prescription for digestive issues. I did not know at the time, but this drug is associated with feelings of anxiety in those who take the medication. Soon I was suffering from extreme anxiety. "Extreme" doesn't really express it. I remember often thinking that I would start screaming any moment. I understood very clearly what people who have panic attacks go through. I remember once being in church and thinking I was going to run screaming from the building any moment. These feeling were not unusual for me during that time. However, I managed to keep it together and never made a spectacle of myself.

Prior to these experiences, I had long been a fan of the Ballard Street comic strip. One of my favorites, which was a single panel, showed a mildly agitated older man sitting by himself. The caption read, "Once again, Stewart finds himself alone with his own brain." Funny stuff, I've always thought, and I was often reminded of it when I was experiencing that terrible anxiety. I was literally afraid to be alone, not because I thought I would harm myself, but because those feelings were always the worst when I was alone. There were often times when I did not know how I could endure another moment.

In those moments, I would pray, "God, please make it stop." The answer was always the same. "I am here." The anxiety often didn't lessen for a while, but I always remembered after God spoke that I could endure what I was going through. No matter how dark the experience, God was always there with me. In those darkest moments, He seemed so close to me, not in some far-off Heaven, but right there with me as I went through my Dark Night of the Soul. In my mind, I could cut my eyes to the left and kind of see Him there.

I eventually quit sleeping altogether, so I went to my doctor. I quit taking the prescription that caused a lot of my anxiety. The doctor gave me some stuff to help me sleep and something else to help with the depression. As the former Newt from Monty Python said, I got better. I don't know why I had to go through that. I don't know if it was caused by God to teach me what I learned, or if it was just circumstances that converged to create a really bad time for me. Either way, it changed me forever.

For one thing, I am much more tolerant of seemingly aberrant behavior. How do I know what someone is going through? A lot of people dismiss depression and other kinds of mental illness as weakness, or a lack of faith, or the result of bad choices. Those things may sometimes contribute, but we should not blame victims of those kinds of conditions any more than we blame people who have cancer or heart attacks.

Another way it changed me is that I now realize how really frail we all are. Life is sometimes hard and it wears us down. Sometimes simple things like not getting enough sleep, or some weird drug side-effect can push us over, or pretty close to, the Edge. This is not something to hide or be ashamed of. This is part of being human.

If I had never faced a Dark Night of the Soul, I might not be as confident in my own resiliency. I might not know that God is right next to me and how much He loves me. Those are good things to know for the next time it gets dark.

I'm OK, You're OK.

2011-11-01T17:43:00.000-07:00

Recently my friend Jim Palmer posted the following quote on Facebook:

"If you could really accept that you weren't OK, you could stop proving you were OK. If you could stop proving that you were OK, you could get that it was OK not to be OK. If you could get that it was OK not to be OK, you could get that you were OK the way you are. You're OK, get it? - Werner Erhard

This quote was interesting to me for several reasons. One reason is that it convoluted as hell, and took a little concentration to discover what old Werner was trying to say. Secondly, I have been thinking a lot about the topic of being "OK" lately, so this quote fed into that. Also, it reminded me of a popular self-help book I read back in the '70s, I'm OK, You're OK by Thomas M. Harris, MD. It was a pop- psychology work that advanced the idea of being "OK" as having a self-image that included feelings of self-worth, competence, and, you know, OK-ness.

The book was about transactional analysis, which was a fancy way of saying figuring out what happens when two people interact. Dr. Harris said that there are four basic models that describe the dynamics between people:

I'm Not OK, You're OK
I'm Not OK, You're Not OK
I'm OK, You're Not OK
I'm OK, You're OK

Harris said that the most common situation was number 1, meaning that when two people interact, usually they each feel the other person is a valuable, worthy person, a got-it-together member of Homo Sapiens, and that they themselves are not. Sort of, "You are a fine, acceptable person worthy of love and respect. I, on the other hand, am Pond Scum."

If Doc Harris was right, it's pretty sad, don't you think?

If it is true, why would it be true? As I said, I have thinking about this issue for awhile. I think there are lots of reasons that contribute to feelings of inadequacy in people. The specific factors at play with a particular individual depend on his or her life experiences.

I mean, think about it. From our earliest experiences, parents, teachers, siblings,playmates, religious authorities, and the world in general spend a lot of time pointing out our failings. "Do better in school. Don't fight with you sister Don't eat so fast. Big boys don't cry. If you don't behave, Santa won't bring you anything. Don't sin or you'll go to hell. Keep your eye on the ball or you'll strike out again."

Also, we have Madison Avenue to thank. Who could ever live up to the images we see in advertisements, images that set up what we often perceive as the standard we should attain? If we just looked liked them, lived their life, we could live happily ever after.

I don't want you to think that is turning into one of those whiny recitations of how my parents damaged me, how the world doesn't understand me, and an oh, woe-is-me laying of blame. I was blessed with good parents who did not abuse or misuse me. I did well in school. I always got presents at Christmas, and I never seriously worried about going to hell. My point is that the world is full of negative messages about our relative merit as people, and we all take our licks.

There is an old saying that one "Aw, Shit" undoes a thousand "Atta Boys." I know this is true for me, and if Dr. Harris is right, it must be true for lots of people. Maybe for most people. Somehow it is easier for us to believe the bad messages about ourselves than the good ones.

I have realized recently that I am often less kind to myself than I would be to my worst enemy. I don't consider myself a perfectionist, but I have often felt that somehow I just don't measure up to what I ought to be. I know a woman who, who when she makes a mistake, often proclaims out loud, vehemently, for all to hear, "I am so STUPID." This woman is not stupid, but she is willing to believe the worst about herself, to generalize one mistake into a general assessment of her entire level of intelligence. In other words, she doesn't give herself the benefit of the doubt that she would give to other people. I do the same kind of thing, only I keep it to myself.

Another factor in our unfairness to ourselves, I think, is that we often consider being proud of who we are, what we have done, and our abilities, to be arrogant or overly conceited. Part of my musings about being OK has been to figure out some of those positive things about myself. I managed to come up with a few, which I modestly described in my previous blog.

So, getting back to that convoluted quote by Werner Erhard. He took the long way around to say that we all have issues, we all have things we don't like about ourselves, and lots of imperfections. Quit trying to be perfect. No one is perfect, but everyone is OK. All of us are children of God. Jesus said that we should love God and love our neighbors as ourselves. "As ourselves," did you get that? There's a command, or an assumption, that we would love ourselves. Think about that. Think about the ways you are unkind to yourself. How could you be nicer to yourself? What have you got to be proud of? I bet there are lots of things.

I'm not perfect and neither are you. But, I'm OK. And you're OK. OK?

The Cost of Living

2011-10-29T14:28:00.000-07:00

Yesterday on the way to work, I was busy driving, listening to the country radio station, and dreading a couple of things I knew were facing me on the job. Man, I wished it were Saturday instead of just Friday. I did not want to go work, having endured a week with an extra ration of BS and stress at the office. Then the new song by Ronnie Dunn came on the radio and gave me something else to think about.

The song is about an unemployed family man looking for a job and the impact his situation has had on his life. Take a listen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWjkDfRcCus&feature=related

One of the things I like about country music is that it often expresses feelings, and deals with conflicts, that are common to many people. This song is definitely a case in point. I am fortunate in that I have been steadily employed since 1979. Prior to that, I endured a brief period of unemployment that had profoundly negative impacts on my self-esteem.

Maybe that brief period of unemployment taught me something about myself that lead me to stay in my current job since March 1981. That's right, I've been at the same job for over 30 years. As you probably gathered from the opening sentences above, there are days when I would rather be scraped raw than go to work. Or at least I tell myself that. I'm not sure it's true.

I started out to be a high-school English teacher. I loved the idea of teaching and English-- books, ideas, writing-- was always my favorite. So, I went to college and prepared for a career in teaching. My idea of who I was and what I wanted to do in life was all wrapped up in my being a teacher. It was who I was.

So, it came as a big shock to me when I was confronted with the realities of teaching in the public schools. I hated it! Most days were a huge struggle. And there was that one instance when I assaulted a smart-aleck student... but only a little. Anyway, I had to do something else, but what would I be? Who would I be?

After a couple of years of teaching, I stumbled into work as a technical editor for a local government contractor. Before long, I was doing work I had never imagined and discovering that I was good at it. I was promoted to more technical jobs and given increasing responsibility. The salary I earned was much more than I would ever have made as a teacher.

Still, I dealt for a long time with reconciling what I was doing with my previous idea about who I was. I had never dreamed of being a technical editor, technical writer, training developer, supervisor, wearer-of-many-hats. Wasn't I just doing this to pay the bills, to provide for my family? Wasn't I selling out just to support my family?

For a long time, I felt that I was selling out. I could not get away from the idea that I should be doing something big. I should do something that mattered. However, I am above all things a practical person, not much of a dreamer, really, so it always made more sense to me keep doing what I was doing. We were living where I wanted to live, and my evil, devious employer continued to seduce me with good pay and attractive benefits. Those bastards! So, I just kept on keeping on.

I know that those I love most have felt that I made a huge sacrifice by spending my life in offices and cubicles. My wife still thinks I should be a novelist. I'm not so sure. I know that I can write, but I don't think I have much talent for making up stories, at least that I know of. Probably I contributed to their wish that my life could be different because of my sometimes too-frequent complaining about my job. If I had it to do over, I would complain less and spend more time enjoying my life.

Because in recent years, I have come to realize that working hard, making a wage, and providing for my family is doing something big. It is something to be proud of, and I am proud of it. Also, I have realized that in 30 years of doing something every day, you become the thing that you do. And ultimately, to a large extend, we choose what we do, who we become, whether we realize it or not.

My job has taught me things about myself I would never have learned otherwise. At the risk of sounding arrogant, I am very good at what I do. I am organized. I am able to manage multiple tasks successfully. I have an analytical mind. I am a good supervisor, respected by those who work for me. This last one really surprises me because I am by nature an introvert. I have endured the stress, the endlessly changing work environment, and BS akin to what Dilbert endures, and I am still standing.

I am thankful for every day that has gone before, and I am looking forward to the ones to come.

"One day at a time- this is enough. Do not look back and grieve over the past, for it is gone; and do not be troubled about the future, for it has not yet come. Live in the present, and make it so beautiful that it will be worth remembering." --Ida Scott Taylor.

The Same Black Line

2011-10-29T13:21:00.000-07:00

One more repost from Facebook. Something that is interesting about this one is that I refer to the song "The Same Black Line" as being by The Gin Blossoms. Of course, it's not, it's by the Wallflowers. Duh! I even posted the YouTube link and never noticed that I had gotten that wrong. If anyone who commented on Facebook noticed my error, they didn't mention it.

The Same Black Line

by Steve Fouse on Sunday, September 18, 2011 at 3:37pm

Sometimes it seems that events in my life conspire to cause me see things in new ways. This has been the case the last few days, and some thoughts that have rattling around in my brain have congealed in new and meaningful ways for me.

The first event was the other night when Dana and I decided to watch a movie. I had put one on my Netflix queue that I was interested in because of someone I know. The movie is The Woodsman, starring Kevin Bacon, who plays the subject of the movie Walter, and Kyra Sedgwick, who plays his girlfriend Vicki. At the outset of the story, Walter has just been released from a 12-year term in prison and has returned to his hometown. He rents an apartment from the only landlord in town who will rent to him, and he is able to return to his former job, at a lumber yard, where he eventually meets Vicki. Walter is obviously a very troubled, unhappy man, filled with self-loathing and fear. He is estranged from most of his family because of what he did. He especially wants to see his sister, whom he loves dearly, and her daughter, who was just a baby when Walter went to prison. His sister won’t see him, but her husband Carlos is friendly with Walter and visits him and shares news of the family with him.

The reason I was interested in this movie is because of the crime of which Walter was convicted. Walter is a pedophile. He was convicted of molesting little girls. When he confesses this to Vicki, he says, “It’s not what you think. I never hurt any of them. I liked smelling their hair.”

As I said, I was interested in seeing this movie because of someone I know. I have a friend whom I have known literally all my life. Our mothers, who were neighbors, were pregnant with us at the same time. I was born about a month before he was. We were childhood friends and buds in high school. I was best man at this wedding. Last year he was convicted of molesting his grandson. His sentence is 10 years in Howard McLeod Correctional Center in Atoka, OK. With time served prior to his trial, his projected release date is April 1, 2019. Then he will be on probation until May 2034. He and I will turn 78 that year.

The crime of pedophilia is a heinous act, destructive to helpless children. In Oklahoma, those convicted of this crime must register as sex offenders for life, cannot live near schools, daycare centers, or parks, and are generally outcasts from society. I have heard that mental health practitioners and the courts consider pedophiles as beyond rehabilitation. Once a pedophile, always a pedophile.

For awhile I thought that my friend couldn’t have done such a thing, that there must be some huge mistake. However, the local paper said that in court, when he plead guilty to avoid going to trial and bringing further pain to his family, the judge asked him what he was guilty of. He said, “I touched my grandson’s penis.”

The Woodsman was a powerful movie, despite the difficult topic and the misery Walter lives in. Walter fights his demons and, with the help of a therapist and Vicki, struggles to become what he calls “normal.” But when he is persecuted by some co-workers who discover what he did, the stress Walter feels becomes too great, and he seeks relief in his old habits. He follows an 11-year–old girl Robin, whom he has previously befriended. He talks to her in a secluded area of park, eventually asking her to sit on his lap. The girl’s reaction becomes a turning point for Walter.

She tells him she doesn’t really want to sit on his lap, that her father asks her to do that when they are alone. She says that when she sits on her daddy’s lap, he moves his legs around in funny ways. She says it makes her feel nervous. But because she likes Walter, and because she is an innocent little girl, she tells him she will sit on his lap if he really wants her to.

In that moment, Walter’s focus changes from his own pain to Robin’s pain. He gets an inkling of what her father has done to her and of the pain he has caused her, and, therefore, Walter has an understanding of what he has done to his victims. He tells Robin to go home. The movie ends with some hope. Walter and Vicki move in together, and Walter seems to have moved past his fear and self-hatred. It seems that he believes he has changed.

The second event that moved my thinking along was a profound Facebook Note yesterday from my friend Donna Pratt Ridge, titled “I SEE You.” In this note, Donna talks about the labels we put on other people, and how those labels separate us from people different from ourselves. She concludes with this: “At our core we ALL want to be acknowledged. To be loved. To be accepted. To know we matter to someone. Because I have been challenging myself lately in this area, I also challenge you to become aware of your tendency to label and purposely catch yourself doing it. Then push past that and SEE the person you would have otherwise written off. Talk to them. Get to know them. Engage them. And in so doing you will find the beauty. SEE them. Namaste. The divine in me honors the divine in you.” Thanks, Donna.

The third event was this morning, when I was working on stuff for my job at our kitchen table and listening to Pandora radio. A song came on that I had heard many times, but never paid much attention to. Music often speaks to me in powerful ways. The song is “Sixth Avenue Heartache,” written by Jakob Dylan and performed by the Gin Blossoms.

The song is about something that Dylan experienced when he was younger. There was a homeless man in his neighborhood who was always just there. Jakob never spoke to him and didn’t really know him. The old guy played guitar like Jakob did. One night Jakob heard a gunshot and a scream. The next day the homeless guy is gone from his usual spot, although his guitar and his other stuff are still there.

The chorus of the song says

“And the same black line that was drawn on you

Was drawn on me

And now it's drawn me in

6th Avenue heartache.”

I don’t know for sure what Jakob Dylan means by “the same black line.” For me it stands for our connectedness as humans. Jakob woke up to the fact that, although the old man was just some homeless guy, a stranger, he and Jakob were not that different. God made the homeless guy the same way he made Jakob. He is saying that all of us live with something, some pain, something that isolates us to a degree, something we hate ourselves for. I think he is saying that the next guy’s heartache is the same as mine. Indeed, the next guy’s heartache is MY heartache, if only I will realize it.

If you have stuck with me this far, thank you. The point I am getting to involves my new approach to living, to following Jesus. In my former life, without ever realizing it, I denied the black line that was drawn on me. Because I am a Christian, because I am not a sex offender, or a homeless guy, or any of a thousand other things, because I am a gainfully employed, responsible citizen, I was separate from the part of humanity that lives in misery and degradation. Now I know that we are all connected by our humanity, no matter what our circumstances, or what we are guilty of.

My friend’s crime and subsequent conviction has affected me in profound ways. I think about him almost ever day. I have been at a loss as to what, if anything, I should do about it. Should I reach out to him? At times, I have hated him for what he did. However, having known him for so long, I have some insight into the pain that drove him. I don’t excuse his actions, but I think that, seeing his pain, I can understand somewhat.

Understanding can be a beginning. When Walter understood Robin’s pain, it brought the beginning of a change in him. As Donna says, when we SEE someone, or understand them, we aren’t as likely to isolate ourselves from them.

I’m with Jakob Dylan. The same black line that was drawn on you was drawn on me.

What’d You Say My Name Was…?

2011-10-29T13:19:00.000-07:00

Another Repost from Facebook.....

What’d You Say My Name Was…?

by Steve Fouse on Sunday, March 13, 2011 at 4:49pm

Lately, I’ve been noticing more than a few side-effects of reaching the time of my life when my age is a speed limit. Seems like my joints ache more and I get tired easier and stay tired longer. Also, I’ve noticed a few little memory lapses that are annoying. These are not completely new, but they seem to be occurring more often.

I had an example of this last week. I was trudging away on the cross-trainer at the Y on Friday morning, watching Fox and Friends on TV. A young man came on to report on the quake in Japan. He identified himself as Peter Doocy. Familiar, I thought. Oh, yeah, one of the anchors of Fox and Friends is named Doocy. This must be his son, I thought. He’s probably working as a college intern. I was sure that this was the case, because he also looks like his dad. I just couldn’t remember his dad’s name. Mike or Bob, or something like that, one of those single-syllable man names. But I knew it wasn’t Mike or Bob… What was that guy’s name? I knew that I knew his name.

It’s not really a big deal that I couldn’t remember Mr. Doocy’s first name, but it annoys me because I have always had a great memory. I still do if you ask me about something that happened sometime back in the last millennium. 1974 I remember like it was yesterday. (Seems like it was.) The last ten minutes is sometimes a mystery to me.

I have always been the family historian. Being an army family, we moved a lot and I have always kept a list in my mind of when we move here and when we moved there. I could figure out how old I was when something happened if I remembered where we were living at the time. My parents would ask me the names of neighbors from the 1960s and I always knew.

My talent for this was always particularly useful to my dad, who was never that great at remembering even when he was a young man. He was particularly bad with people’s names. He sometimes slaughtered the pronunciation, so that Capt. Bonial (“bone-ee-ul”) became “Capt. Bonnell,” and Sgt. Mirabella (Italian for “beautiful view, “ so it was “Meera-bella”) became “Sgt. Marrbella.” Other times, he didn’t mispronounce the names, he just didn’t get them quite right. My favorite example of this is Mary Hazel Head.

Mrs. Head was our neighbor when I very young, about five or so, and during part of the time we lived next to them, my dad was in Korea. Maybe that explains why he could not remember Mary Hazel’s name. The Heads were good neighbors and my mom was fond of them. Their son John and I were playmates. The dad was Kenneth. John and Kenneth and Mary Hazel Head. It seemed impossible to me that anyone would ever forget this.

Anyway, the Heads moved from our neighborhood and then we left Lawton, first for Kansas, and then for Germany. When we moved back to Ft. Sill, Mom invited the Heads over for a cook-out. Dad had no trouble with John and Kenneth’s names, but he kept calling Mary Hazel, “Mary Ann” or “Mary Ellen” or “Mary Beth.” It seemed to me that he called her every Mary name there was except Sister Mary Elephant. All the adults were embarrassed by this, because it is the ultimate Faux Pas to forget a friend’s name. It only amazed me, because I had no frame of reference for forgetting a name. I can’t say that anymore.

As Dad got older, his issue with names only got worse, and he often called on me to identify someone whose name he was trying to think of. When he was young, it didn’t seem to matter to him much if he knew someone’s name, but as he aged, he often seemed desperate to think of whatever elusive thing he knew that he knew, but just couldn’t quite remember. Now I know how he felt.

He would say, “Hey, what’s that ole boy’s name at church?”

“Which ole boy, Dad?”

“You know that ole boy and that old gal he’s married to…. They sit up there by that fat old guy, what’s his name?.... Oh, you know who I mean; they sit over there by the organ. Always shouting ‘Amen.’ You know who I mean… His cousin used to be married to what’s-her-name’s sister.”

“You mean Eddie Worthington?”

“No, hell, I know Eddie Worthington. It’s that other ole boy. He’s always wearing those pants.”

“Mr. Miller?”

“No, why would I be trying to that think of that bean brain? You know who I mean; they’ve been going there for years. “ He would snap his fingers really loud, the way he always did when he was trying to think of something, as if that would help me remember.

“Do you mean Bob Swanagon?”

“Yeah, that’s him. What’s his wife’s name?”

“Vi. What about them?”

“What?”

“What were you going to say about them? Why were you trying to remember the Swanagons’ names?”

“Oh, hell, I don’t remember. Something your mother brought up, I guess…"

Like so many other things about getting older, it never occurred to me that I would ever be plagued with anything like my Dad’s issues with memory. But now it happens pretty often, although I don’t think I’m quite as bad as Dad used to be. Earlier today Dana said, “What were you going to say?”

“I wasn’t going to say anything.”

“Yes you were. You said, ‘Hey, Listen.’ Then you were distracted by something on Facebook. What were you going to say?”

“I don’t have a clue. I don’t even remember saying ‘Hey, Listen….” Another train of thought jumps the track. I call this not being able to remember that you forgot something. It always makes me wonder what else I’ve forgotten that I can’t even remember I forgot.

So, anyway, back to Mr. Doocy. I have a few memory tricks I try when something escapes me. One of them is to try not to think about what I want to remember and just wait until it “bubbles up.” This often works well if I am not desperate (like my Dad to used to be) to think of what I forgot.

But if I really want to know now, there are other things I try to use to jar loose those stubborn memories. One is to think of things associated with the thing I am trying to remember. Logical, right?

So, I tried to remember the other anchors on Fox and Friends. Gretchen Carlson, the pretty blonde, came to me right away. Then I remembered that the guy that’s not Doocy has an Irish name… Brian something! Yeah, Brian Kilmeade!

So, by now I was feeling a lot less lame, because, after all, I had identified two out of three of the Fox and Friends people. I had begun to feel pretty smart until I finally did remember Mr. Doocy’s first name.

I had been on the right track with the one-syllable man name idea. I was also right to feel sure that I should have known Mr. Doocy’s first name.

That’s because his name is Steve Doocy.

Game Changers

2011-10-29T13:16:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking I want to start blogging more seriously, but I want to consolidate some stuff I've written on Facebook with my blog. Here's one of those:

Game Changers

by Steve Fouse on Friday, March 12, 2010 at 4:42pm

I have been thinking a lot lately how suddenly a person's life can be radically changed by a single occurrence. Something happens, and everything after that is different. If that something hadn't occurred, things might have gone on as usual for a long time.

A great example of this on a national scale occurred on September 11, 2001. I remember thinking on that day that those acts of terrorism had changed everything. While that might have been an exaggeration, it is true that life is very different now from what it was before that.

Sometimes things happen in life that are so unexpected, so shocking, that they take your breath away. And after that, the future is changed.

I started thinking about Game Changers again several months ago when I learned that a guy I have known all my life, and who at times has been my best friend, had been arrested and was in jail awaiting trial for a most heinous crime. He eventually plead guilty, so it's hard to believe that he didn't do it, although for awhile I tried to imagine scenarios in which the whole thing was just a big mistake, a misunderstanding, and that everyone would realize that soon, and then things could go back to the way they were.

That didn't happen, of course, and now he is in jail because of something he did that changed everything. It changed the way he is seen by everyone who knows him, it changed his ability to make a living, it changed everything about his future. In some ways, it even changed the past for me, because if he could do THAT, then maybe he never was who I thought he was. Sometimes the stark reality of this Game Changer is still more than I can grasp.

More recently, a guy I had worked with for about ten years suddenly lost his job. He was a competent, hard-working guy whom I enjoyed knowing and working with. Suddenly, though, a real misunderstanding from his past precluded his continued employment. One day he was there; the next day he was gone. This was only a couple of weeks ago, so I still sometimes forget that this has happened. Then when I remember , it shocks me again. How is he going to make living? If not for this one thing, he would have continued working for years to come probably. If this freaks me out, imagine what it must do to him.

In July of 1991 or '92, I participated in a 5K race. I had been running for awhile, but I had never run in a race before. My goal for the race was not to finish last. Since it was July in Oklahoma, it was HOT. The result of that race was that I suffered a heat stroke and was in the hospital for several days. My wife (who is an RN and knows about these things) tells me that I could very well have died that day. I am grateful to God that I did not die that day, but I often think about the fact that I could have. It makes me thankful for every day since then, during which I have gotten to live a wonderful life with Dana, to see our children grow up, to get to know their spouses, and to know our grandsons.

Before this becomes too maudlin, let me get to the point. Nothing is certain. One unforeseen, completely unexpected event can change everything that comes after it. We worry about things that might happen all the time, but the things that really blow us away are the ones we never see coming.

Knowing this makes me resolve to better appreciate each day, all its blessings, and the challenges it brings. Tomorrow may bring a Game Changer.

2008-12-21T15:07:00.000-08:00

Fire and Light

Trinity Baptist Church in Lawton burned a few days ago. It made me sad.

My friend Shari reminded me that First Baptist Church here also burned back when we were in high school. Bobby Pittman and I skipped fifth hour to go downtown to see it. I didn't have much of a connection with FBC, so I don't recall that it had a lot of profound impact on me when it burned, other than it was kind of exciting to a couple of 17-year-old boys.

But the fire at Trinity really did make me sad. It is not my home church, but I have connections there. My friend Kevin and his family were long-time members. My wife Dana and I attended there when we were first married. Dana was baptized there. Brother Andy from Trinity married us. And my Mom reminded me the other day my Dad was also baptized there when they were first married. Also, Trinity has been a part of the Lawton landscape for as long as I can remember. It has always just been there on West Gore Blvd. as I zipped by, going to work, or to the Y, or wherever. It was just a familiar sight, part of my hometown and my past, something I didn't really think about too much. And now it is gutted by fire and will likely be razed so a new building can be built.

I guess this is disturbing because it was so unexpected. Without really thinking about it, I guess I just assumed that Trinity would always be there, just sitting there on Gore Blvd., where I expected it be, just like it always had been, as I zipped by. But I was wrong.

I told my friend that churches burning are a stark metaphor. (Both of us were English majors.) A burning church reminds me that things in this life are not as permanent as we might think they are. It reminds me of my own mortality. It says that the places and things in this world that we hold dear will not last forever.

But, as the pastor of Trinity said after the fire, the church does not consist of just the building, but of the people of the church. Likewise, our lives do not consist of just the temporal, familiar things we see around us, but in the hope we have in the One who established the Church.

The Apostle Paul wrote, "We have this treasure in jars of clay...." The fire at Trinity reminded me that I am a jar of clay with a treasure hidden inside.

Realizing that, I know that this life will include the loss of lots of places and people that I hold dear. If I were without hope, this would be more than I could bear, probably.

But Paul also reminds us: "Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

Merry Christmas, y'all.