Those Christmas Lights

        They don't see what's broken inside of you because your broken parts are part of your perfection to them. They are family, and to them, you cannot be replaced in a world where everything is replaced.

        I've always said that you can choose your family. This isn't popular with people who have great families and I get that. Laura has a great family, and they are always there for each other. Others who's families could fit into a small room may see it differently. I had two blood relatives at my wedding. My mom, whom I love, and my brother, whom I love. I think that family organically happens with life. You meet these people that you like for one reason or another, and they end up being uncles or aunts to your children. Laura has friends that are family to us and so do I. I think it's beautiful. I think the world is disconnected and separated into terrible categories and labels. It's a really nice feeling to know that someone in this world loves you no matter what. That they are gonna take your side in this world, and kick your ass in private.

        I got to do something really fun and cool today. I got to take the ice where the Red Wings play. I got to play hockey with my friends. We were excited and came out to the ice early to look around and take pictures. As I looked into the huge arena, I got to see all of the families of my friends that came to celebrate a really good day with their dad, or brother, sister, friend, or child. Watching them all take pictures with their family put things into persepective for me. I've been in a bit of gloom this year as I usually am this time of year, but watching these people love each other deeply is a reminder that this life is so great. It's great that I see these terrible things at work, which I've desensitized myself to, then come home to a little boy and two girls that don't see my faults, or forget them quickly. And a 19 year old girl who will drop whatever she is doing to see me. I'ts a warm place. Today felt like Christmas. Any day that feels like Christmas is a good day.

        It is way too easy to focus on the negative. Laura and I find ourselves thinking this way so much and we often remind each other that although the negative is destructive, the positive is a really good reason to keep smiling...to keep forging ahead...to keep reaching our hands out to other people. I'm so thankful for the people in my life that have reached out their hands to me when I needed help to get up. You all know who you are. I hope I've told you how great you are. If not, I will.

        I went to lunch with Will and Joe's mom and dad last week. I struggle when seeing them during the holidays because I don't know what to say to them. I think about my own kids and what it would be like to lose them and I cannot figure out a way to reconcile the fact that those two are still standing...and smiling. As my brother's mother was taking me home, I got this overwhelming sadness all of the sudden that she was going to drop me off and that would be that for Christmas. I had this feeling of dread that I had wasted the time I got to spend with them feeling uneasy. It was at this moment that I remembered that I slept under their roof probably a thousand times. I ate at their table. Their dad took me to canoing trips with them.

        In the car, and all at once, I remembered that they are my family and they chose me as much as I chose them. I felt gratitude. I felt love. I felt sadness, but also togethernes in that sadness. I felt so thankful, because at some point in our history, they stopped seeing me as this loud and often annoying kid and they started seeing me as family.

I can't wait to see the rest of my family this Christmas.

     







Sing.
Migrate.




Thanks for reading...Z

The Ghosts of Christmas' Past

        Nothing really has changed about Christmas. Every year, I get excited to put the lights up on the tree and string them across the front of my home. There is something so gratifying about putting lights on my home for me. It's mine. What lives in it is mine, and I am theirs. I work all week and enjoy listening to the same Christmas music on my way that I listened to last year and the years before. They all take me back to the reasons I have always loved Christmas. No matter how bad things had been for me in my life, there was always a savior for me on Christmas.

        I was such a lonely kid. But when I think about Christmas now and remember, everything was so beautiful and perfect. I'd sleep under the Christmas tree, or alternate between the tree and the floor heat register and watch the lights promise me something that no human could ever fulfill in me. I can't think of a single Christmas growing up that was ruined by anything. I'm sure my mom had a few, but she was strong enough to not let me see that. She was always really good at redirection with those kinds of things.

        I moved out and experienced Christmas on my own. This was in a really bad time in my life...the worst actually. Christmas became a thing of sadness for me for reasons I could not even describe at the time. I'd think about all of these great Christmases and get really sad and feel more lonely. So I'd walk around the neighborhood and look into people's front windows to see them be families. Super Creepy, I know.

        I married this woman this one day, and got what I was promised under that tree. I made it my mission to string up the lights on Thanksgiving or a day or two after. Took them down in March, but who's counting. I got to be the family in that front window. My kids came into the world and the only thing I wanted to do was what my mom did for me. I wanted them to believe something very special about Christmas. Something very comforting about a savior being born that would make it all better. Even if everything seemed hopeless.

        The last bit of Christmases have been marred with some pretty terrible stuff. It makes it difficult because I have become at odds with my favorite time of the year. The feeling now makes me so happy and so profoundly sad. My favorite thing is when I get to see Andy and when I get to see Jeff and his family. These are people that are family to me and I don't get to see them much. Then, that reminds me that two of the most influential people in my life aren't here anymore, and that is my worst thing.

                                     I guess the word I would use to descibe it is: Disappointment.

        They were supposed to always be here, with me and for me. But they aren't anywhere I can see them. Me and Will used to cut class and sit on top of his car in the park to kill time. We weren't killing time. We were making the very best of it. We would talk about our future and we were both present in each other's. Me and Joe use to used to carve our names on everything because we wanted to come back decades later and remember what we were when we were kids. So I guess the Ghosts of Christmas' past come to haunt me now.

                                                                          The good news.

        God is still good. Jesus is still our savior. I am still the guy I wanted to be in that front window, albeit a bit more broken. I string up the lights and love watching my kids play in the snow that is now blanketing Michigan, giving millions of kids a day off of school tomorrow. I shield my kids from the things they don't have to see. I think of times with my brothers who were everything but blood to me, and smile. I don't get lonely at Christmas anymore. I am full. I am what little kids under trees want when they are praying hopefully and lonely to an invisible God.

God is good.
God is with us.
God saved me.
Even when it hurts everything inside me to admit.




Sing.
Migrate.




Thanks for reading...Z

The Pact (A Short Story)

        

        In order from left to right, Danny, Tom, Jim, and Carey; the four adopted sons of Sam and Edith Cone, sat around the table on the first Sunday of May. The agreement they had made to Edith was that they would come eat dinner together on the first Sunday of each month. The agreement was made individually with each child on the day they were adopted.

        Danny was the oldest; adopted from an orphanage just outside of Baltimore. He was found living on the streets before being arrested for loitering and taken into custody. The Cones had gone to visit him three times before having the courage to adopt him. Edith couldn't have children of her own, so it was her decision to adopt only children that were considered too old or too troubled to be adopted. She told Sam that it was such a waste to adopt a new baby, when there were all of these older kids running out of time. She sat down with Danny on the playground slide and made him the deal. "Once you are old enough to leave my home, you must come back every Sunday to eat with us. That's what real families do, and we would really like to you to be a part of our real family." He agreed and the papers were signed that day. Danny struggled to find his way for a while, but as he grew closer to Edith and Sam, he started to see himself inside instead of outside.

        Tom was adopted from Fort Lauder-dale, Florida. Tom was in and out of foster care homes as fast as they could place him. Tom really, really liked to burn things down. He was smart about it and methodical. He would never leave any evidence that the fires were started on purpose or by him at all. At first Tom was polite and quite with the Cones. He ate properly, got good grades, and kept up after himself. About 5 months into his residence with the Cones, their garage went up in flames, burning down all of their photos and keepsakes that were put in there to make room for his bedroom. Sam awoke early the next morning and got Tom out of bed and took him to the pier. They sat down on the edge of the pier, kicking their legs over the side for a couple of hours until the sun came up. Sam didn't mention the fire to Tom and Tom didn't speak at all. The next week, when all of the debris was cleared, Sam built a large fire pit in it's place. He handed Tom a box of wooden matches and told him that if he felt the need to light fires, this pit was the place; not their dinner table.

        Jim was adopted straight from an emergency shelter that was housed inside of a juvenile correctional facility in Cleveland, Ohio. He had been severely beaten by his father and had been hospitalized. Jim didn't speak much at all; only offering direct and short answers to specific questions. Despite his dismal non-verbal communication tactics, he excelled in communicating with his fists to anyone who would listen. This behavior got him bounced from school to school and kicked out of church forever. Jim would often be taken home by the police and handed over to a very weary Edith and Sam. Jim raised his fists to everyone but those living in Edith and Sam's home. They were family.


        Carey was adopted from a juvenile correctional facility he had earned residence with a year prior for spray painting penises all over the interior walls of his school. Carey was the jokester. He had a way of making Edith laugh at inappropriate times, such as church and ceremonies. Of the three other brothers in the Cone house, Carey was the easiest to get along with. To him, everything was a joke and he seemed to never get angry. He was the smallest and youngest of the kids, and relied on his three older brothers to keep the bullies at bay. He made a lot of enemies with his mouth and they, (mostly Jim) had to back him up.

...


         The four were all adopted within 5 years of each other and did not become instant friends. They did gradually become brothers, sharing in the hobbies and talents of each other. Danny would help them with mathematics and wanted to become an engineer. Tom was the best basketball player they had ever seen and eventually got a scholarship to a small university. Jim played hockey throughout high school and would eventually become a brawler in the boxing ring for small change. Carey always said he wanted to own and run a rubber chicken factory. They would all laugh, but they had all seen him staring at the stars and reading books about other planets and constellations.        



...


        When Sam had died, they no sooner got his funeral arrangements settled when Edith passed too. The four boys buried their parents next to each other in a cemetery just two blocks from where they lived. They made a new pact: They would walk here to see their parents after they had eaten together on the first Sunday of every month.

        The pact held up and they broke bread together and visited their beloved parents at their grave every month until the first Sunday of April that year when Carey didn't show up. They would find him dead at his home after having succumbed to the side effects of using too much heroine. A side effect of being a clown to people who don't know better. He hadn't fooled them though. He was cremated and his ashes given to his brothers to decide what to do with. It didn't take long before they figured out what to do with them.

...


        "Hey Tommy, you gotta light?" said Jim. "Ha! Funny Jimmy, you got any teeth left? I got an extra apple right here..." Tom replied while pulling out a middle finger from his pocket. Jim reached across the aisle of the plane and punched him in the arm. Jim continued, "Hey Danny, what do orphans get at Christmas?" Danny sighed, "what do they get Jimmy?" "Lonely," Jim replied. Tommy sat silently shaking his head, then spit out some of his drink trying not to let Jim notice he was laughing. "Still not sure why we have to do this on Christmas. We are leaving the snow in Boston on Christmas for the desert? I like the sun, but not on Christmas," said Danny. Tommy replied, "Like you got anyone but us to celebrate with anyway Danny. Might as well do it where things are easier to burn."

 ...

Danny: Well, here we are. How do we do this?
Jim: You didn't forget Carey's rocket did you? If you did, you're going over this cliff with him.
Tommy: I got it in my bag. Should we say something?
Danny: No Tommy, we are just gonna chuck him off the Grand Canyon and walk away.
Tommy: Come on man.
Jim: I'll start. You guys shut up. Alright, what's got 5 arms, 3 legs, and two feet? The finish line at the Boston marathon.
Danny: (Holds his hands over his face, feeling terrible that he is laughing). Carey would have liked that one. Ok, my turn: A man is talking with his wife the other day and he asks her to tell him something that will make him happy and piss him off at the same time. His wife thinks for a moment then replies...Your penis is bigger than your brother's.
Jim: Funny because it's true isn't it Tommy.
Tommy: Wait, you slept with my wife?
Jim: Size don't matter.
Tommy: Alright idiots, my turn. In kindergarten class, the teacher tells the kids to come up and write something exciting that happened this morning. Little boy Johnnie walks up to the front of the class and grabs a piece of chalk and writes the word "Period" on the blackboard, then sat back down. The teacher looked in bewilderment for moment, then needled Johnnie for an explanation. "What's that mean Johnnie?" He says, "I don't know, but this morning my sister said she missed one. Then daddy had a heart attack, mommy fainted, and Uncle Bob shit is pants.

        Danny and Jim stood silently shaking their heads at Tommy. Jim cracked a grin, then reached into Tommy's backpack and pulled out a small model rocket. He sat it down on the red rocks that overlooked a vast hole in the earth, too large and deep to fathom it's origins. Danny said, "I did the honors of putting Carey in it at the hotel, so we don't have to taste him in this wind. You're welcome." The three brothers sat down on the rock and waited for the sun to finish it's descent below the horizon exposing the innumerable amount of stars in the galaxy. "I can kinda see what he saw in looking at this," Jim said. "Yeah, me too," Tom replied then continued, "Let's send him off, I'll take care of the pyrotechnics." Danny hands him a lighter while grinning. Tom puts the fire to the wick and sends the homemade rocket into the Christmas night sky. They watch it flash, burn, fade, then go dark as it soared into what looked like space to them.


        Jim asked, "You guys ever wonder where we would have been with ma and dad?" They all look at each other and nod. He continued, "Me either." Jim pointed out into the sky. Danny put his hand on Jim's shoulder and watched his tears fall to the dirt. Tommy, picked up his bag from the ground and said, "Goodbye you little bastard, may God kick you out of Heaven for that mouth." Danny said, "Merry Christmas my brothers.


     
     





Sing.
Migrate.



Thanks for reading...Z

Thank You

   

      It's Thanksgiving! At least it was Thanksgiving. I've always said that a great day ends only when you fall asleep and let it go. Today, I am thankful for everything. I'm not going to make a list this time, but there are so many people in my life that make me who I am. The ones that love me, show it. The ones that don't have served to make me a better person. Both teach me to seek the best in myself...and to see the best in everyone else.

     I think that if you were to closely look back at your life, you will find God's provisions everywhere. At every wonderful turn, you will find one of His own smiling. At every terrible fall, you will find one of His weeping with you. I like that about God. He answers tough questions. People always ask where God was when these terrible things happen. The answer is simple. He was the person closest to you, holding your head to their shoulder.

     Christmas is hard for me. I feel it coming in...this sadness and loneliness. It starts with a fleeting feeling that they are gone. It comes back with this desire to crush me. It won't.

     I look back at the things that have almost killed me. I look around and there they are. On the train tracks, it was Joe. When Will died, it was Laura and Andy. When Joe died, it was Laura and Jeff. There was always a person who loved me deeply to pick up the pieces.

     I look back at those terrible times and see them picking me off of the pavement for months. I'm so thankful for God and the people He has put into my life to save me continually.

     Christmas time at "In Search of Whales" has been pretty bleak for the last several years. Understandably. But this year, I want to write about the one holiday that I think is truly beautiful. The day that God cared so much that He put Himself, His Son, His Spirit, into a world that would kill him violently...because He loved us. He saw me. He saw you.

     While I haven't represented a person who loves God very much lately, I do concede that He is active in my life. I see Him everywhere and that reminds me that He loves me.

     Christmas may be hard, and I may write about it's difficulties, but I'd really like to write about the joy that Christmas has always brought me. When I was a kid, I was really sad. But there was something about Christmas that was magical. I bet you can relate. This Christmas, I'm going to write some Christmas stories. Stories that remind me that this day is all about Jesus. I am reminded that, as a teenager I wanted to go to sleep forever. I tried to make that happen and He stopped me. I lost hope in myself and everyone around me. He sent the right people to heal me. I gave up and I gave up. I wanted rest, but He was always there to save me. All because of a baby being born a refugee in a foreign country.


Sing.
Migrate.



Thanks for reading...Z

Memory

     There was this symbolic thing I picked up from the movie "With Honors" somewhere in the 90's. When something that means something happens, you pick up a rock from the ground below you...or the nearest rock to you. This will be a stone memory of the event. I liked it in the movie. I now have a collection of rocks in a shoe box. I remember every one of them.

     I grabbed a little green stone pendant from the Meijer grocery store vending machine when we bought the pregnancy test that confirmed that I was going to be a father for the first time. I picked up a rock the first time I stepped foot in the Scottish Highlands, the place I ultimately came from, and a place I had wanted to go my entire life. I picked up a pebble that was next to my shoe when I kissed my wife for the first time. I knew we would be married.

     I know why collectors collect things. These are things that mean something to them. Ebay is still in business because of our nostalgia. We want what we used to have and lost. Somewhere we or our parents threw those things away without us knowing how much they would meant to us. The collected is the last bridge to our youth. I have a house full of relics. You have a house full of relics. When grandma dies, you ask for that one piece of her belongings that equate you to her and you hold then tight to your heart.

     I have a clown that Will's mom gave to me that means more than most non-living things to me. It means so much to me because it not only connects me to Will, but because it connects me to her. I have sweaters and hats and photographs. They all mean the same thing. I have a connection to what is lost to me that I can still touch.

     I think a lot of art is made out of this feeling of connection to the past. It's sad really. We...I long for what I can't get back. I want to see my brothers again. I want to just watch us make all of those dreadful mistakes again. I want to build the world largest penis on a snowman the world has ever seen again. I want to fish in the night while all of you are sleeping again. I'll be sure to put our catch into the video store drop box again.

But I can't.

     It is because of the "can't" that we try so hard to relive or redeem the past. For some, the reason we do this is to remember. For others, it's to forever punish ourselves for letting go of such beautiful things. Both are true for me. I would never want to go back and stay there. I wasn't really happy then. I only see it as happy now that it's gone in some ways. This is an illusion...a trick our minds play on us. I would want to go back for a few hours and just watch because it would hurt me so badly to do so. Doing what makes it hurt worse makes it feel better, but eventually makes it worse. Really, the only truly happy moments I had then were spent with Will, Joe, Andy, and Jeff. Half of those people left my sight. So I cling to the last two. I cling to the past. Some of those times were beautiful and some were the heartache of being a foolish teenager.

     It is very easy to idolize moments in your life and people because of your emotional attachment to them. We tend to put blinders on the things we idolize. I think the best me hasn't happened yet. I think we are constantly improving...even if that means we have to be purged from the ass of the devil to get there. My Creator isn't done with me yet. He isn't done with you either. Isn't ever great story of redemption built from the foulest manure? It's all about hope.



Sing.
Migrate.




Thanks for reading...Z

There Go My Heroes

Aging may be the most cruel part of the curse of mankind. As you get older, you get more wise and are actually better suited to handle the things that you messed up in your youth. But now you are too old to try again. It's a cruel joke that the things that wreck you make you better. It's seems like there should be a better way to grow up.

No one gets out of this without scars. No one.

It's sad because I don't think that was God's intention for us. I think He wanted beauty and joy and all of the wonderful things we want for our own children. Yet we messed up. It's a hard thing to explain without making people angry, but yes, two people did mess everything up for the rest of us.

But it was bound to happen. If not them...me.

For instance, tonight I watched my senior homecoming basketball game with my son, who is really starting to love basketball. I wanted him to see his dad doing something he was really good at. I rewound the tape...yes tape, and hit play. Immediately, I saw myself on the screen and so young. It was hard to watch at times. I was cocky on the court because I was really good. My son watched the game and the way I carried myself and told me "you were cocky." A twelve year old told me that. I was chirping at the other team and show boating. I haven't touched a basketball in at least 8 years and while I watched that game with my son, all I saw was what I should have done if I were smart at the time.

The video was bitter sweet nostalgia for me because I got to see both Will and Joe play on the court with me...so totally alive and young. Faces without fault. Bodies uncrushed.

Everyone has a hay day. These are the times that you relive to your kids for the rest of their lives. This was mine. I had most of my brothers and my friends right there on the same wooden floor. We laughed and had fun and had no idea that 18 years later, half of us would be dead.

I watched Joe, who got to play because he had convinced the principle to allow him to if he gave his jersey to a kid who forgot his own. He wrote a new number on his shirt made with tape and played the greatest game of his life. In the video, you could hear me shouting for Joe every time he scored or stole the ball. 18 years later and he is gone.

I watched Will block at least 10 shots and grab a dozen rebounds in that game. As he left the court while time was running down, I slapped him on the ass and laughed with him. 13 years later, I would look at him in his eyes, knowing something was wrong and let him go. I wouldn't see him alive again.

Life is cruel. Sometimes it seems that the sun shines so bright on us that we actually get bored with doing well. Other times, we are faced with the shadow of death. Both are extreme moments we all have. Most times we are just moving on without being noticed.

But when you lose a body part, you notice really quickly what that means...you are now crippled.

I would have never labeled us the Dead End Kids if I hadn't already realized that there was something wrong with all of us. We embraced the label because we knew we were born to live or die right here together. We had bad things happen to us and didn't have a lot of friends, but what we had in each other was enough. We wanted to break things. We wanted to make people really mad. We wanted to howl and shout and wail at he moon and stars without any answer. We just wanted to live fully and honestly. We lied to people about who we were because we were not impressive. We fished in the middle of the night when everyone was sleeping. We all dumped girls because they didn't like our brothers.

Tonight is bitter sweet. On my chest lay two small vials of both of their ashes and two enormous holes in my life that won't be filled because I won't allow it. Yet I got to see Joe last night in my dreams doing ridiculous things as always. Two nights in a row and I've got to spend my sleeping hours with him. This means a lot because I haven't seen him awake or asleep in 3 months. When Will died, I saw him every time I went to sleep. The dreams were weird and cruel, but I got to speak to him. Joe died and nothing has happened. It may seem small, but for me it's kind of everything. The last two nights have been spent watching him screw up. Two nights ago, he was pouring kerosine into the hot tub we both were sitting in. Last night he was trying to get his fog machine to work so he could give it to me. Underneath, I knew he was trying so hard because we both knew he wasn't going to need a fog machine anymore.

There go my heroes.

What I have left is enough. I have my wife and beautiful children. I have my brother Andy and my dear friend and brother Jeff. We have all battled together in the trenches in one way or another and have held each other up when the other was too weak.






Sing.
Migrate.


Thanks for reading...Z

It Was Never About Fishing

It is cold in Michigan. Tonight it snowed. It usually doesn't snow this early. I guess the three proponents of global cooling might be right in which case, I am thrilled. I am one of the few that cannot wait until it is hard to walk on the sidewalk. I'd rather fall on my face slipping on ice than fall on my face tripping on a stick.

Reminds me of something very important. Every time it snows and gets cold, it reminds me of a Total gas station, which are scarce now if even existing at all. The four of us bought these winter flap hats made of wool and fur and used to go to this Total gas station to buy machine dispensed coffee before we headed out to our special place to fish in the middle of the night. We seldom went out before 11 PM. There were girlfriends and teenage obligations, so the night was our time...when the Dead End Kids arrived.

We never caught much and what we did catch, Joe would either torture or we would put into a local video store drop box. It wasn't about the fishing, it was about the time. Those times could never be taken from us. We spoke of things four guys would usually not speak about, we were not superficial. We were real. This time was real. The moon always stood at attention and glistened just right for us there. There was always magic. Even after Will died, we took his mother there at night and the snow blew like crystal across our faces and promised us something better. Reminded us that there was so much beauty left. Many people have a place like this. I think the common denominator is the beauty of God's creation and the way He chooses to manifest it to us. Those nights could have been anything, but to us, they were pure beauty and we knew it, and enjoyed every second of it as if it were going away.

It did go away. We seldom visit. We don't see each other as much as we would like. Sometimes we forget we even existed...That we even did anything worth remembering. Life does not allow it when you grow up. But I will never forget the magic we had there. I will never forget that we were different than the other kids. We were the Dead End Kids that dreamed of a world more beautiful right where we stood. We would die before leaving and we would die for each other.

I can be so grateful for that tonight.

Photo credit to:  http://winter-fairy-tale.deviantart.com









Sing.
Migrate.







Thanks for reading...Z