A view about manhood

I attended a track meet yesterday. My twelve year old daughter was competing against other girls. Her best event is the hurdles which is one of the first events of the meet. During practice Tuesday, she took a tumble on the hurdles. She landed on the asphalt and the wounds were visible. My concern at the meet was to how she would react at the first hurdle. They hadn't practiced since Tuesday so this would be her first time over a hurdle since her tumble. I didn't get a chance to talk to her before hand, but she had stated at home that the injuries didn't bother her. She always looks out of place at the starting line as the other girls are at least 6-8 inches taller than she is. When the gun went off, she started off well with the other runners. She came to the first hurdle and stopped. She didn't have her steps right. She crawled over the first hurdle and continued the rest of the race with no problems. She wasn't able to catch the others in this short race but I wa...

Lately, here in Lawrence, it seems like there is road construction everywhere. The problem is getting across the Kansas River from either direction. My problem is that anytime I need to get anywhere from work it is on the other side of the river. The city of Lawrence has been working on North 2nd St since last fall. This is one of the roughest riding intersections I've been through. Maybe it will be better when the work is completed. The next inconvenience is the Kansas turnpike entrance being completely closed for 7 months. Next add the bridge on Highway 24 to the east being limited to one lane to resurface the bridge. That takes going around to the east to avoid traffic out. (Which would be miles added). Then today I get an e-mail from the KTA that starting next week there will be some delays on Hwy. 59 for beam placement for the new turnpike bridge. The e-mail also stated that this would not effect any turnpike traffic. What does that matter to me- I can't get on the turnpik...

My wife Kim and I attended a Family Life Weekend To Remember recently. It was a great weekend. The weekend is designed to focus your attention on each other, eliminating as many of the distractions of everyday life. Friday evening opened with a speaker telling us that through the weekend we would come up with some key things to remember. These would be things that would make your marriage stronger. I had overlooked this page 1 until the Sunday session. Of course my wife had been keeping up by writing down a few things. I had some ideas in my head, just didn't take time to write them down. There is a huge difference between in my head and on paper. The "in my head" tends to get forgotten or lost. If I write something down, I am forced to look at it and remember why I wrote it down. The following are some things that I wrote that day. I need to encourage Kim more. I sometimes take her for granted and need to acknowledge what she does for me much more often. I need to liste...

Calling Planned Parenthood’s Bluff Posted using ShareThis

I am puzzled by a talk show that I saw recently. I probably shouldn't be puzzled. It happens all the time. It's when a host or mediator puts some predetermined premises on a question and then asks the guest to try to answer the question. The question in this case was about how the United States could cut taxes and reduce the deficit. He also put the stipulations that domestic programs couldn't be cut and that foreign cuts couldn't be taken because of our need to maintain the world power status. I don't know how this question could be answered. The domestic cuts couldn't be allowed because as we grow older we rely on the government more. His premise was that the idea of "less government" only applies to kids or young adults. I guess what he is getting at is that I need to grow up and rely on the government. My thought is that he needs to grow up and take some responsibility on his own life. This country needs people to stand up and take personal respons...

I proposed to my wife fifteen years ago yesterday. I put off asking her to marry me until the day after Valentine's day. The reason for this was my grandma's funeral was on the 14th. I wanted to remember this day as a special day with no negative aspects involved. We were married later that summer. In the time together we've gone through some changes. One of those changes is how we view the marriage relationship. I first tried the traditional view of marriage in which the husband is ruler over all. We lived in this model a very short time. I would like to stress the word "short". You will also noticed that the word "I" was used in the sentence. The short time in this model is a good thing because we probably wouldn't have been able to move beyond the 50-50 marriage in which we both worked as partners. This partnership model will only work a short, set period of time. It didn't work very well for us as well. A business without a leader (which is w...

Lately I have been feeling overwhelmed by the lack of free time in my schedule. Looking at this statement I can see where my problem starts. It lies in the word "feeling". There is certainly nothing wrong with having feelings or having emotion. All human beings have feelings and emotions. That is what makes us unique when compared to other animals. But the statement above is "self" focused. As I step back away from the previous week, I can see clearly where everything was done when it was supposed to be. I was distracted by the many small things that were occupying my time. Each of these things were very small and in the grand scheme of things would never amount to any hill of beans. I didn't look beyond the problems that surrounded me. I needed to focus on one thing at a time and let the learning opportunities come to me in order. I like (feelings again) my world to be planned and orderly without surprises. The past week has given me the chance to learn from my...