My Father’s Name

I was caught off guard recently when a colleague called me by my father’s name. Now, my name is a distant derivative of my father’s, so I guess I should not have been surprised. After thinking about it for a while, I realized that it wasn’t so much a feeling of surprise, but one of overwhelming gratitude. My father is a man of devout principle and integrity. Through out the years he has always been the perfect blend of strength and tenderness. Not only did he teach me how to love, but also how to fight and more importantly, what was worth fighting for. To be associated, however unintentional it was, with his name and character was extremely emotional for me.

As amazing a feeling as that was, I couldn’t help to think how much more meaningful it would be to be associated with the characteristics of my Heavenly Father. As a Christian, one is called to be an imitator of Christ. Talk about your ultimate role model! As a son I have never wanted to let my father down. As a Christian I have never wanted to let my Father down. Unfortunately, I have often failed on both accounts. Thankfully they have forgiven a repentant son.

My prayer is that all children could know their Father’s character and love.

Counting my blessings, R.T.

Backyard View

When attacking a problem, I have been taught, and try to teach, to study it completely. To walk all around it, viewing the problem from every angle possible. As to gain perspective and insight before trying to solve it. Often when I am sharing this strategy I relate a story from “back in the day”. In high school there was group of adventurous friends who enjoyed spending weekend nights doing what we referred to as rural ruins reconnaissance or RRR.

RRR involved locating and exploring abandoned old rural homes and farmsteads. Most of these locations had stories of mysterious and unexplained events , even hauntings attached to them. I am sure your own community has or has had such places. We would go out armed only with flashlights and our imaginations hoping to find the mysterious Cat Man, the headless cowboy, spook light or any other unnatural entity. (Just a little note here, during all of our RRR adventures we were never destructive nor left with any more than that which we came.)

Back to perspective, on one particular RRR outing we had climbed over a fence and walked along an over grown earthen inclining driveway about a quarter of a mile when we came upon a an old boarded up two-story home. From our vantage point at the top of the drive we could see that on three sides of the house all access points were securely boarded up with the exception of one upstairs window well out of our reach . As we stood there believing that our adventure was to end before it truly began, one of our group saw movement and then a figure in the upstairs window. Just as we were all about to flee for our lives down the drive, leaving our dignities to fend for themselves, we heard the familiar voice of our friend calling down to us from the window. He had walked on around to the back of the house, only to find that approximately half of the back side of the house had rotted and fallen to the ground. If we had all walked around this house, we would have found it exposed much like a giant doll house. Many times problems in school, business and life are like this, if we could only change our perspective of the situation we might be able to see to the heart of the problem.

The RRR crew never did find any evidence to support the urban/rural myths we were chasing, but those two summers were not a total loss. Some of the friendships forged through those summer months have lasted for over thirty years. During that period we have all had to face our own real “demons” from time to time and the lesson learned that particular night has proven invaluable.

Enjoying the view from the backyard, R.T.