The Snow Princess

The Snow Princess... priceless

Left with a little bit of time this morning to go over some photos we took around Christmas and caught a glimpse of this one, which in particular made me pause and think about how blessed I am to have such a beautiful family. My daughter, who is night to our three boys being day, melts my heart and makes me passionate about the tender things in life. Never did I imagine a woman, or baby girl in this case, would have such sway over an aged and callous heart as have I. God knows us so perfectly, he sends us what we need to mold us according to HIS WILL. Thank you Lord.

A Game of Candy Land and You Cheated

First post in a while but I was inspired by tonights events.

Our game of Candy Land tonight turned into quite the melodramatic temper tantrum. Actually right this second my oldest son, Cole, is receiving a spanking from his mother because he has been throwing a temper tantrum of spinning head pea soup spitting proportions over losing the game to his brother Jonah. He claims that "daddy cheated", while what in fact happened was he continued to move his brothers game piece around the board while we played and on the last play he had moved it so close to the Rainbow Kingdom (that sounds like a scary place) that Jonah's double blue card made him victorious. I just happened to be the unlucky one to move Jonah into the winning position and declare his victory. Cole then proceeded to act out a scene from the Exorcist, claiming I had cheated by moving Jonah's piece for him, since he could not easily reach across the board and do it himself I had no choice; also he had been moving everyone else's game piece or his own in the wrong direction the entire game, so why wouldn't I help him out and end this form of slow torture.

Parental Warning: If you do not own Candy Land, do not buy it. If you have then burn it immediately.

Scottish Roulette??

Aren't the Russians the ones who invented this foolish idea of brutish male bravado? Well, of course they are the unlucky people associated with this unfortunate game or whatever it is, so much so that if one was to say, "Roulette" and nothing else I am willing to bet most people would think 'Russian'. Of course we make exceptions for all the hopeless Vegas addicts who cannot get past the roulette table.

Tonight though, agitated by life's tortuous pitch and yaw, I am left to wonder why I cannot, read the writing on the wall, so to speak. I am a lot of things and one thing I believe I am is a thinker. To a fault even in that I tend to over analyze issues long after they should be laid to rest. Tonight my thinking has brought me to the conclusion that God created me the way I am, through His infinite knowledge and ability to see all time, for some great event which I cannot even comprehend. He created me many things, but most of all He created me stubborn. Bull-headed, persistent, single-minded, hard-headed, head strong, determined, mulish, unyielding, resolute and any other synonym one wants to lump in here, but what it all comes down to is when I get an idea stuck in my brain you can all but forget about changing me.

Now the value of this character trait is as varied as the synonyms above are in their descriptions, however it seems lately my idiosyncrasy is more a liability than anything else. Who do I have to thank for this? Can we attribute it to rearing? I am not certain how fair this is since I spent my youth ping-ponging between my parent’s homes. Deep inside my being I believe the fault belongs to the Scots. Sure there is some English, Irish, and German mixed in, but we all know who the most stubborn of these is.

So I continue in my pig-headed myopic dithering even while destruction courts me the entire way, a sort of Scottish Roulette if you will. This has almost been the natural way of things most of my life. Sure there have been moments of quiet calm but those have been few and far between. I almost feel like it is my destiny to live in this tempest.

With this in mind I am left asking what God’s purpose is for a man like me. I love to work in a fluid environment. I love to help people. I don’t like being hovered over by a supervisor or boss. I don’t like a strict routine or schedule. What does this spell? Why has financial success for me all but stopped since I sold Bumper Man?

I don’t have answers for these questions. I do know that despite my over the top, one hundred and twenty percent commitment and effort to making Owner/Builder work we have nothing to show. After three trade shows, two seminars, about thirty appointments, countless phone calls, handing out thousands of flyers, expensive billboard advertising, emails, postcards, and on and on, we have NOTHING. We are now in more debt than we have ever known and for what? I used to have an answer. I used to believe people would want to be intimately involved in the construction of their own homes while saving thousands of dollars. I used to believe I would be providing a service desired by others while truly blessing them. Now I am not sure.

Once again the question is begged, what has God planned for me and my family? Can I keep up this game of Scottish Roulette? Does God really give one the desires of his heart?

Now it is time to abandon success and the pursuit of financial stability for something different, something new, but something God has purposed me for.

The question is What?

Wipe Away the Cobwebs

We have, or I suppose I should say, my wife has started a cleaning business. I am more the sales person than anything else. Oh, and do not forget moral support. Moral support is very important after all.

So, do we know what we are doing? Yeah, we can clean really well given all those white glove inspections while stationed with the Marine Corps but when it comes to running a cleaning business well, we will have to see how this all works out. No doubt this is going to be more work than either of us have imagined but then we are only guilty of what every other human being is guilty of in underestimating the task before us. There really is no better way to know whether you can handle a task, outside of any planning that may be done, than to dive in and pray you do not drown.

One neat feature to this is that we, Sugar and I, will be working together more than we have in a very long time and I believe this is going to help our marriage. We will be wiping away the figurative relational cobwebs while doing the same to literal cobwebs from our clients living spaces. Many people I know have said they cannot work with their spouse. I cannot give a judgment here in either direction only because I have yet to experience this but like to think we are going to work very well together. Ask me how it's going in a couple of months and we will see if I have an answer for you.