Am I nuts?

Posted on 10/10/2009 by RLW3

I must be a glutton for punishment…

I did it again this weekend…

I went straight from work yesterday and drove for 8 straight hours. Why???

Another of my “crazy” ideas…

8 years ago, I learned of a product that caused incredible growth in vegetation. I read how his product could cause black walnut trees to mature in 15-20 years rather than the usual 50-80. Black walnut is one of the most valuable hardwoods in the United States. Ever since I read of that, I wanted to visit the Hazel Hills Nut Tree Farm in River Falls, WI.

Our lease expires in about 8 more months. At that time, I will have to make my yearly decision as to where we will live.

If we are going to buy a house, I have to decide what kind, where and how much land do we want? I figure that if I am going to grow black walnut trees, this is pretty much the time to do it. I mean, how many more 15-20 year seasons do I have left? I am in good health and all, but I’m not gettin’ any younger!

And, before I go and plant a bunch of trees that I hope to harvest 20 years from now, I want to be sure that the product really works as advertised. It would really mess up my retirement plans up if the trees actually took the usual 50-80 years to mature!

I decided to take off this weekend because I suspected that  global warming (yes, my tongue is planted firmly in my cheek) might cause winter to arrive earlier than usual. And, winters in Wisconsin and Minnesota can be brutal!

It turned out that my timing was impeccable! When I woke up this morning, there was 3/4″ of snow on my car!

…on October 10th!!!

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It’s starting to get cold

Posted on 10/09/2009 by RLW3

To pick up on the last post’s theme…

By next year, all of my children will be launched into their own lives. My wife and I are entering winter.

But, our winter has come in the midst of turbulent seas. Our season of rest will not be like Thoreau sitting at Walden Pond and pondering the meaning of life. It will be more like surfing. I have to decide where I want to go and how to get there while the surface of the water under my feet is constantly and quickly changing.

When I was still a relatively new convert to Christianity, I learned a very important principle: we should reason from the whole to the part.

When I am deciding what direction my life should take, I must first consider the following:

What is happening in the world around me?

What is happening in my country?

What is happening in my state or city?

What is happening in my life?

Just last year, millions of people’s plans for retirement were suddenly and radically altered by the collapse of the stock and credit markets. What was happening in the world economy had a direct effect on individual, personal plans.

Their change of plans will have a direct impact on others whom they have never met. Jobs that would have been left vacant for new workers to fill will now have two people vying for them.

Change is in the air but so is generational and ideological conflict.

It seems that the world’s dictators are growing in strength and confidence every day. My nation’s elected leaders continue to spend money that we simply do not have. What will happen to our currency? Will it become worthless? If it does, what will I do?

What will life look like when spring arrives? What role am I being fashioned for? What part am I going to play? What is my next step?

I’m glad that I am not busy. I am glad that I have time…

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Leave me alone!…but on the other hand

Posted on 10/08/2009 by RLW3

For nearly two decades, I had TOO much to do. I was building a custom car, reading and studying for my life calling, mentoring younger men at church, working very hard at a job I didn’t like and remodeling and adding on to a house that I lived in with my wife and four children!

…all at the same time!

I am getting a great deal of time alone these days…

Yesterday and today, both my wife and daughter have had to work at night. They get home just before I climb into bed…if I stay up late.

Since I have to leave at 6:15 in the morning, I have recently gone a day or two without talking to them.

I suppose I should be grateful…

I invested the time in a very important, time sensitive project that was beginning to weigh on my mind…

But, I miss the company…the conversations…the companionship.

I guess this just proves how much my wife and children have changed me.…

or maybe not.

I am an introvert by nature. I understand that to mean that I am energized and motivated internally. An extrovert is energized and motivated by people and therefore seek out social contact and excitement. Neither is better or worse than the other…just different.

The differences show up particularly strong at social events. My extroverted wife LOVES ‘mingling’ at parties. I, on the other hand, find it VERY stressful. I just can’t do it. Each time, I make a valiant effort but I am like a third wheel.

Usually, after expending enough effort to enable me to tell my wife (with a clean conscience) that I DID try to mingle, I find a place where I can just sit and watch people. Inevitably, I am eventually joined by others who are like me and we then end up engaging in a great conversation that makes some of the extroverts a little jealous.

I think this also partially explains why being a husband and father has been so fulfilling…

My wife and children have become this introvert’s very close friends.

But, as the seasons change in nature, so they change in life. Winter is setting in.

The leaves (my children) have fallen off the tree. They are no longer pulling sap up from the roots of the tree.

I am being forced to rest. I am being forced to step back and look at life from a broader perspective.

I am 50 years old and in reasonably good health.

I do not think that I have begun to walk in my calling yet.

My heart impatiently paws at the ground with it’s psychic hoof wondering, “When does the next race start? What is the next race?”

That question seems to grow in scope nearly daily.

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Not my cup of tea…

Posted on 10/06/2009 by RLW3

My youngest daughter is taking a choir class. She had a concert last night…

I like to listen to good singing…

But after the 45th deedle-dee sung in row fashion, I began to get a feeling that was very similar to that of going “shopping” with my wife.

First, my chair became uncomfortable…

Then it felt like it was shrinking…

Then someone sucked all of the air out of the building!

I started counting how many people I would disturb if I got up to find some air. If I went to my left, the body count would have been atrocious. If I went to my right, I would have to uproot 4 people…and that doesn’t count the people behind them who wouldn’t be able to see!

I was trapped!

I looked at my watch…

I looked at the program…

OH NO!!! They are less than 1/3 of the way through! This is never going to end!

I spent the rest of the concert trying to remain inconspicuous while writhing in pain.

When they sang a song with the words,

“Five hundred, twenty five thousand, six hundred minutes…

How do you measure a year?”

I actually turned the program over, got my pen out and calculated how many minutes there were in a year!

Do you understand what I just said? I chose to do math to relieve the pain!

When we got home, my daughter asked me how I liked it…

I didn’t want to hurt her feelings…

but I knew that she would see right through me if I lied…

“That was tough…I had a hard time.”

What I go through for my kids!

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The same but different

Posted on 10/04/2009 by RLW3

If it’s Sunday, that must mean that we are visiting another new church…

Sure enough…

Yesterday, while visiting my new Nissan mechanic, I saw a nice looking church. I went online to see what they believed. It looked like a very good match!

This is our 1oth different church that we have visited!

Once we were inside, I learned that it was a Pentecostal church!

That explains why their statement of faith lined up so closely with my own! The roots of my own Charismatic faith grew out of the Pentecostal movement which largely sprang out the Baptists which branched off from the Puritans which separated from the Church of England which broke from the Catholic Church oh so many years ago!

I’ve never been to a real Pentecostal church before. I liked it.

My wife and I are in agreement…

We are going to go back!

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I did g-o-o-o-o-d!

Posted on 10/02/2009 by RLW3

The surprise didn’t come off exactly as planned but it still worked like a charm!

I arrived at the restaurant first. Fifteen minutes later, my wife zipped by me and entered the restaurant. I walked around the restaurant looking through the windows. My wife was seated at a table at the restaurant’s entrance alone!

Hmmm….

I called our friend…

She had accidentally gone to a different Mimi’s Cafe. I told her that she didn’t need to come because I could still surprise her.

The moment I walked through the door with a pink rose in my hand, surprise, confusion and disbelief started clouding my wife’s face!

“Lo-ord (she used my real name), what are you doing here?…”

“Where is Lauren?”

“She’s not coming.”

“I just talked to her. Did you talk to her?”

“Yes, I talked to her and she is not coming.”

“What do you mean? What are you doing here? Did you plan this out with her?”

“Yes.”

The disbelief and the surprise lasted for AT LEAST the next 20 minutes.

Yep…

I am a popular man in my home right now!

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Now it can be told

Posted on 10/01/2009 by RLW3

My wife just started her 12-8:30 shift at Costco.

Since she doesn’t have any access to the Internet, I can let you in on a HUGE secret!

Everybody celebrates their anniversary…

well, maybe not quite everybody…

people forget or stop liking each other…

but, you get the idea.

But, how many people celebrate the day they proposed???

The idea first came to me last year. I was creating a family version of a “This Day in History” calendar. When I put this date in, I wanted to start celebrating it.

My initial plan was to take her out on a date tonight. So, I asked her to ask her supervisor not to schedule her to work. Obviously, that didn’t work out quite right!

I was less than thrilled when she told me on Monday night.

“But I am off on Friday! Can we go out Friday night?”

I was thinking, of course we can…but that is just a regular date.

While driving to work yesterday morning, I got a brilliant idea…

I called Lauren (her only Kansas City friend that I also know well) and asked if she could help me recreating our date when I asked her to marry me. She loved the idea!

She is going to meet my wife for coffee at Mimi’s Cafe. She is get a table and sit in such a way that my wife cannot see me walking into the restaurant. The two of them will then sit down and place their orders. Then our friend will get up to go to the bathroom and I will walk in…

exactly like I did 24 years ago! 

Back then, my wife knew that I was going to ask her to marry her any day. The only question was when…

She was certain that I would meet her when she got off the plane from her family reunion…

But I wasn’t there.

She thought I would ask her at a church event the next day…

But I didn’t

When Rebecca asked her to go to dinner before the home Bible study, she grew suspicious. However, after they ordered the food, she concluded that it wasn’t going to be that night. She dropped her guard and relaxed.

Boy, was she wrong!

She was so surprised when I walked up to the table that she shielded her eyes with her hand…almost like a little child trying to hide behind a skinny, little tree.

She later told me that was the first time that she had ever been surprised in her life!

I couldn’t believe that…

“What about Christmas?”

As a child, she would sneak into the closet with the Christmas presents, open them, see what she was getting, put them back in the box, tape it shut and then pretend to be surprised on Christmas morning!

I don’t think she has a clue about tonight either…

But the 2.3 million regular readers of this blog do! (LOL)

Stay tuned!

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Home alone

Posted on 09/30/2009 by RLW3

Bunch is working at Costco…

Cakes is working at The Bonefish Grille…

Bean is glamming it up in Dallas…

Kimba is thriving in Nashville…

Big A is setting the world on fire in Philly…

and I am home alone in my apartment here in Kansas!

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Two years is just in time for me

Posted on 09/28/2009 by RLW3

We have been limping along with just our two trucks to get the my wife and I to work and my daughter to and from school. We have made it work, but I REALLY don’t like the idea of my wife driving Wild Bill, our OLD F-150!

Well, tonight we replaced the Honda.

While fixing the Maxima’s rear window last weekend, I heard Dave Ramsey do a radio advertisement for Country Hill Motors. They primarily sell $3-12,000 cars. I had heard of them before but had never gone there. After hearing Ramsey vouch for them, I decided to check them out.

On Saturday morning,I had to take my wife to work at a different Costco. Since I was in the general area, I decided to hunt them down and check them out.

I was greeted by a great salesman! You know a great salesman when you meet one. They don’t pressure you or try to sell you anything…but you WANT to buy from them.

I told him about hearing the Dave Ramsey ad. He said that they had applied for that 2 years ago.

“Really? Why did it take so long?”

“First, he went through all of our financials to make sure that they were a viable company. Then he sent secret shoppers to see how we dealt with people. Then, some of those secret shoppers bought cars…and then brought them back for service when something went wrong to see how we serviced them. He finally endorsed us when he came here for his live event at the Kemper Arena a few months ago.”

They advertise that if you buy a car from them, they will service it AT THEIR COST! That is HUGE!

I decided that I like them enough to buy a car from them! My wife is now driving a 2004 Oldsmobile Alero. I’ll let you know how it goes.

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Now I know…

Posted on 09/27/2009 by RLW3

In our search for a new church, I have noticed that the Baptists have the most impressive buildings!

Now, I know why.

Today was our third visit to this church. We like the pastor. Not only is he a man of God, he is a MAN! There is no cowardice or compromise in him!

The last time we came, he addressed the church’s lack of financial support. Today’s sermon, nearly a month later, was all about tithing. 43% of the families in the church are faithfully tithing and 57% are not!

After the service, we went to a vision luncheon…My wife agreed to that when one of the assistant pastors called.

I need to take her phone away!

After the fried chicken, mashed potatoes and corn, the senior pastor and the executive pastor informed the attendees about the church’s history, its programs, etc. At the end, they asked us to fill out a sheet with our personal information. I was fine with the name, address, phone number, e-mail address, children’s names and ages, birthday’s, etc.

At the bottom, they had a little Excel table showing yearly incomes ranging from $20K to $260K per year with the amount that should be tithed if you get paid weekly, bi-weekly or monthly.

Then they asked what my salary was and wanted to know the amount and the frequency that I was willing to commit to tithe! They even had blocks for MasterCard or an ATM!

While I don’t have a problem with the church asking its people to tithe but…

that’s aggressive!

I declined to give that information and said that I needed “a little more time” to decide whether I wanted to become a member.

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