Hope in Humanity

   
     Everyone is mad about something. Someone has hurt them in some way or someone has stirred up the wound another person has made many years ago. Both ways, anger ensues. I am an offender. Lines piss me off. Slow drivers piss me off. People who don't wave when you let them go first piss me off. People that say nothing when you hold the door for them piss me off. I'm not wrong I don't think, in being slighted, but I am probably wrong in caring if they do these things at all. People are rude and mean and I probably should have already figured this out and expected it. But I don't want to expect the worst in people.

     I think the real problem here is the people that do right. I think they should be blamed for the entire world expecting something better. They do these selfless acts and bleed for people they have never met. They give their money and time to help strangers in need...and they don't even have the common courtesy to take credit for their disastrous mistakes. They are the reason that people still believe in goodness. They are the sad ones.

     When I get really bound up inside with anxiety and anger, I think about things that no one can destroy. No one can destroy the sky you look up to at night...at least not yet. No one can destroy your memories of beautiful things...unless dementia has sunk it's terrible teeth into you. No one can destroy who you are inside. It is you and you alone that does that.

     We can't control the things that have made us angry. This is an issue that I have battled for the last 6 years. We can control our response. This is also an issue I have battled for the last 6 years. It's easy to blame other people for the things that someone else has done. It's easy to forget the things that you love about being alive. I think many people forget that other people are also human, so we train ourselves to stop caring about them unless we have a really good reason to.

     When I get really mad, I usually want to destruct myself or someone else. In the times I succeed in not acting out of anger, it's usually because I remembered the reason I loved the people that have hurt me in the first place.

     I think about laying in a huge open field at night with the fog moving in on us. We were wearing the same leather jackets, three shades of the same brown color. We all had rockets and those rockets had wicks that would send them into the heavens. They also had parachutes that would help us find them when they fell. We laid on the grass with the dew treating our faces no different from the grass as it surrounded us. We talked all night. I don't need to explain that; we all have had those conversations with someone we love dearly. In the end, we would get up and one by one light those rockets and watch them disappear into the sky. We didn't even look for them. I don't think any one of us wanted to know that they ever came down. These were the nights that make me smile when I am so angry at them. They help me hang on to hope in humanity.

   





Sing.
Migrate.



Thanks for reading...Z

Who Are We?

   

      We are only vagrants passing through. You take a look at the world and where it's been and where it seems to be going, and it kind of gives you a perspective as to what you really are. To each individual person, we are these amazingly complex and unforgettable people. You me, no one has ever been me or could share the same past or present. Yet to history, we were barely here. If you didn't do something historically terrible or historically wonderful, you were just another fish fly that was just passing from the last to the next for a day. It's a disastrous thought really. It's sickening to think that we don't actually matter.

    All of the things that happened to us that mean so much to us. All of the people and moments that we would die to preserve. The moment you realized your friend was no longer just your friend...but your family. The moment you looked into your date's eyes and knew she would be your wife. The moment your kid's breath blew hot onto your face as they were sleeping on your chest. These are the moments that make life absolutely beautiful, but we are a blip on the radar of what has and what will be. It's a really terrible thought if you don't believe that God has made you for a specific purpose. If you believe it is just another day closer to ultimate death, then I feel for you.

     I don't think that's the case. I believe we affect the future. I believe that because of me and my wife, my kids will love their kids more than their own lives. Then those kids will carry our love to the next and the next. I believe God loves all of us individually.

     He loves even if you are a screw up. He loves when you do everything by the book. God loves absolutely everyone.

    People who are religious sometimes get too caught up in their religion and forget the point of what Jesus was. He died. He actually bled actual blood for the worst sinner you can think of. His forgiveness and grace is the entire point of why He was a Savior.

     I needed a savior more than many. I needed a savior to save me from myself. I needed a savior to lead me through very dark times that I couldn't see my way through. I need a Savior this very moment to lead me to where He is.

     I think the world is full of hatred. I think we can all agree. I think America is particularly spoiled. I think American religion has at least partly, lost it's way. We judge good from evil. We label everyone according to our own standards. We think politically instead of spiritually. I think we should be something different.

     I think we should be students of learning. I think that we should work on being educated. I think we should be spiritual. I think we should work on being educated scientifically. I think we should educate ourselves spiritually. I think that we should work on actual tolerance...not the tolerance that's based on hating the intolerant. I think we should think. I think we should care. I think that we should let God do the judgement and focus on your own house.



Sing.
Migrate. T


Thanks for reading...Z

A Blog About Other People

     I don't have the creativity right now to express myself in a short story. I wanted to. I sat here and tried really hard to think of something, but there is simply no interesting story about "Hanging in there." When I say that, I mean that there is nothing at all new to speak of. I don't have any news or new feelings to express. Because of this, I haven't written anything to note of in a while. There is a Macklemore lyric that says "Ask more questions, talk about yourself less." I like it. I think there is real wisdom there. So this blog is for other people.

     I was struck by a car in the late hours of the night. I laid there in the turn lane unable to move. Car after car drove by and I looked into the eyes of many people whose gaze told me, "Sorry, I won't stop for you." Cars drove by and humanity was lost in my heart. Until a terrible smelling black homeless man came running toward me. He shouted for me to hold on. Help was on the way. He got to me and told me that he didn't know what to do. He told a gas station clerk to call 911 for me. He didn't know how to help me, but he did tell me how I humorously shouted "What!" when I was struck. He told me that he thought I'd be dead. No one asked him to do any of those things. No one was watching him. He was free of the fear of losing something that doesn't actually mean anything. He knew what humanity looked like because he maybe hadn't seen it in some time. Maybe I would have driven my car right by him while he was laying in a rode. I don't know. I hope not.

     It took me a long time to tell my future wife about the bad things I had done in my life. I hadn't murdered anyone with my hands, but I had killed a few with my words. I wasn't proud of the things God had forgiven me for. I had spent a lot of hours finding those people to apologize to. I had prayed for forgiveness and mercy. Then here comes this girl. I didn't deserve her and I knew it. I walked softly and was very slow to move because when you see a unicorn you are careful not to scare her away. I reluctantly took her on a walk I had taken every day for months to pray for forgiveness. I told her everything while trembling. She didn't see it. She didn't see the man I thought I was. She saw me. She loved me. That is a woman you marry. So I did. Holla if you see us! He will be the the two holding hands after almost 15 years.

     There are so many more. I'm gonna save them for future "About other People" blogs. Truth be told, I led with the homeless man story because I didn't want to be so obvious that my wife saves me everyday because she doesn't like the attention...just like any other hero.

   

   




Sing.
Migrate.


Thanks for reading...Z

Sane. (A Short Story by Caeden Coffman)

     

This is a short story written by my 12 year old son Caeden. He is on a horror kick lately and this impressed me. I hope you enjoy it too. 

     I was sleeping one night when I heard a faint noise like somebody was carving something. It immediately freaked me out so I put on my robe and went downstairs to see SANE written on the wall. I went up stairs to tell my parents when we got downstairs the words were all gone. The next morning I went downstairs to get a bowl of cereal, midway through I got a text from my best friend Ben when I went to get another bite I saw that my cereal started to move and it spelled the word sane. I went to go get my parents the word was gone. Later that day I got a phone call I answered it and in old raspier voice it said “Your sane Your insane.” After that I heard the door open then my dad yelling I rushed down the stairs and their was a man with a knife attacking my dad. He stabs my dad, and my heart sank as I watched him carve sane on his forehead. The man lunged at me with the knife pinning me down I shout “What do you want with me!”

He says “Your sanity.”

He stabs me and carves im sane on my head.

 

Love and sometimes...Ping Pong

   

     Growing up is hard sometimes, but in the end the getting there is so beautiful. Hard times lead to growth and good times lead to shared laughter. I've had the joy of growing up with my best friends. Two of them aren't walking the same earth as I am anymore, and that sucks. I get sad thinking about not being old with them one day going on one last adventure before we give up and die. But this blog isn't about that. This blog is about enjoying what is in front of you. A month ago, I got to travel with my family to the west coast to see my little brother. The mountains were awesome..and the sunset so beautiful from just below the clouds. But the best moments of that trip were spent in a basement buried in a mountain playing ping pong with my little brother and oldest friend Andy.

     It doesn't matter the time or distance between us. When we are in the same room, nothing has ever changed. There is a beautiful feeling that comes with nothing changing. We played ping pong all night. I lost every single game to a kid I used to exert big brother strength to growing up. For a few days, I forgot what I was missing. I've been trying to figure out a way to thank him for being a great host and a great friend, but most importantly a great brother. He may not be blood, but I'd bleed for him as if he were. Sometimes God chooses your family. We sang stupid songs in strange English dialects. We drove for hours. We smacked a little white ball back and forth until the wee hours of the morning. I wouldn't trade that week for anything.

     We have many more adventures ahead of us. But one day, we are going to be old and senile and we are going to be smacking a ball back and forth at some old man's home. We will look at each other and remember every adventure we have had together and laugh...because life was love and sometimes....ping pong.





Sing.
Migrate.

Thanks for reading...Z