Been learning to do my own rewiring recently. Today I was able to convert a dimmer switch to a motion sensor switch without any help. I know, this is standard stuff for most guys, but due to a bad incident as a kid, I have always shied away things that spark. My friend Josh has been helping me by letting me watch him, then recently, fielding questions and coming to check my work, etc. Awesome! So today I went to tell Josh that I had swapped out a switch on the main floor that we call the “kid room.” What he realized without me saying so was that I hadn’t called/texted him with any questions about it. That’s some progress right there!
And then I tripped at the finish line:
Oh, shut your pie hole. They look like they could be brothers. They just…aren’t.
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What a great night. Tonight, Crystal and I achieved one of our big goals associated with moving into our new house: we had a neighborhood get-together where we invited everyone on our street over for dinner and socializing. We handed out 40 invitations and while only 6 families took us up on it, we had a fabulous time with those who did, so thank you to everyone who turned out!
When we moved out of our last house in Gladstone, we realized that there were people that we had shared a property line with for over 10 years that we had never met. There’s no other way to say it other than we felt that this was pretty much unacceptable and that we had dropped the ball. It’s really too bad that it took us moving away to make us realize this. As we packed up the moving truck, we vowed that this would not be happening again, especially given that we plan to stay in this current house until we’re too old to get up the stairs. For us, tonight was the final sign that we had officially “moved in.” The house is no longer under (exterior) construction, most of the pictures are hung, the main floor has been painted and we have had a couple of groups of people over, but these were our previous friends just coming over to our house like they always have. This evening we met a bunch of new friends. No one in attendance had we known longer than three months and several, we met just tonight. It was awesome!
It has been noted that many Americans today are voluntarily insulated from each other. They get home, park their car in the garage, close the garage door behind them and step into their lives already in progress without seeing another soul. We happen to now live in a neighborhood where it is not uncommon for the grass mowing and basic landscaping to be hired out. Now, I don’t begrudge someone from having their lawn mowed for them, but for this discussion, it it noted that it further cuts into time spent outside where other neighbors can see and interact with them.
Community is very important. Humans are by nature social beings and by and large, we like to interact with each other. One of the reasons that coffee shops in particular have always flourished is that they provide people with a place for community to happen. Churches are now beginning to renovate and either retrofit a coffee shop into their existing space or include them into their new plans like crazy. Why? Because community happens around coffee shops, the same way it does around food. While I no longer have a La Marzocco espresso machine in my home *sniff*, we were able to feed everyone some killer basalmic glazed pork loin and, as my Southern Belle Grandmother likes to call it, “visit awhile.” No agenda, just an in depth meet-and-greet.
Our main goal goes a step further than just knowing our neighbors. Hopefully, tonight was the beginning of our investment into the lives of the people we met. We very much want to not only know the names and faces of those who live on our street, but we want to know about them, knowing what matters and why. As time passes, we want to share in their victories and help them get back up when life hands them a defeat. Proverbs 18:24 states that “A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.”
You don’t get to see the fulfillment of that promise by holing yourself up inside your house all the time and daring the daylight to come through your tightly drawn blinds. Sure, that might mean that someone might occasionally see you with your curlers in or wearing those sweatpants that only you like, but hey, give it time. Eventually you’ll catch them the same way so it’s all good. ”But, then they could find out that my family and I aren’t picture perfect!” Well, at least in all the people I have ever found, you’re not so what are you hiding? The cordial wave to the other guy going out to his mailbox should not be the extent of your relationship with a neighbor. People get the fake facade all the time from others (or, as we like to call it in churchworld: the Sunday Face) as they move throughout their day; around your home should be the one place that you can let your guard down a bit. It’s pretty refreshing to have someone ask you “How ya doin’?” because they actually care and are not asking some throw away question just to be polite.
What we found tonight were people who had needs that we knew we could eventually at least attempt to fill. One young couple attends church somewhat far away and they don’t really have a support network around them to help them with the day to day stuff of raising their young daughter who is about Isaac’s age. We can do that. Another lady and her daughter had a husband/father whose work had assigned him to a different state, so he was going to be gone for an extended period. Missing your man? C’mon over, Crystal always needs help droolling over that Maks guy from Dancing With the Stars! Across the street from that family was another family whose husband/father is a pilot and is also gone on overnights a bit. Yep, you can come, too! And baby-sitters. WOW! We will never have the need to drive the baby-sitter home again. Ever.
To be sure, everyone was doing just fine long before we arrived, but I know from our own experience that it’s always nice to have another outlet to fill a quiet night or another couch to plop down on if you need to work something out via an outside opinion. Sometimes, you NEED time away from everyone for a season, but other times it’s great to be able to reach into your local community without having to even start up your car.
So what are you doing next weekend? Invite some people you don’t know over! Get all crazy and invite someone that lives on your street more than three houses away from you! Invest in other people. In my humble opinion, that’s where the greatest dividends in life are paid out.
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Yoga |ˈyōgə| - A Hindu spiritual and ascetic discipline, a part of which, including breath control, simple meditation, and the adoption of specific bodily postures, is widely practiced for health and relaxation.
Screw all that crap. Let me tell you what yoga really is…
The day started like normal, with the angel of near death visiting my bedchambers once again at the same unholy hour. I stumble downstairs and hear that we’re doing “Yoga X” today. Oh JOY! Up to this point in my life, my only contact with yoga has been via Wii Fit, which I am sure is lacking a bit from a full workout since the poses are just one at a time. Whatever, I have unlocked most of my Wii Fit moves and it’s mainly just standing in bizarre positions and breathing a lot, right? Right? How about NO.
When I was in high school, Saturday wrestling practices were the “best” under this one particular coach. You were going to work your butt off, that was a given, but that’s where the crazy stuff came in. Like having to climb up that 30″ rope that went floor to ceiling. No big deal right? Not unless you were inverted with your feet over your head and had to do it. THAT had some suck on it, let me tell you. Or when we would be bridging backwards, resting all of our weight on our head/neck and your tip toes with our chest and belly bottons being pushed up towards the ceiling. Again, not bad until you are handed a 50lb. weight bar, sometimes with more weights on the end and are told “Here, bench this.” while maintaining that same position. That dude was a sick twist of a coach as far as that stuff was concerned, but I can say this: we were in excellent shape and we were mentally prepared and most of the time, we won under him. I actually saw several things today that I recognized and now know that my coach had to have had some brush with Yoga at some point.
So okay, Yoga X. How bad could it be? I have never heard a conversation about Yoga where something called “Downward Dog” was spoken of positively and I now know why. I have already talked about how I recognized that I needed to stretch out a little more and get more flexible overall. Yep. Still singing the same song, only today, any shred of doubt about it was erased. We start in with the warm up. Not bad. I can stick most of the positions with just little minor adjustments. The DVD Instructor gives good tips on things to be sure and not do, as well as lists some variations based on your skill level. Cool, cool.
I thought that we had moved on to the real workout, but apparently we were still in the warmup phase. I should mention that this particular program is a full 90 minutes long, 50%longer than most of the other programs. Anyway, we go on and start in on poses and moving from one position to another. I’m fumbling along, but I’m getting there. After about 20 minutes in, my body is growing new pores to sweat through because it wasn’t generating enough through the existing ones. I feel tension building up in my groin and I start thinking how good it is that we’re done having kids because there might not be any coming back from this…and then I hear something that I have never been so glad to hear in my life. WHUMP! WHUMP! WHUMP! ”DADDEEEEE!” It’s Abigail who has woken up early. ”Daddy? Will you sit with me?” OH, YOU’RE DARN RIGHT! HECK YES, I’LL SIT WITH YOU, PUMPkin!!
Saved by a 3-year old.
After some vicious eye-rolling from Crystal, she startes to try to make me feel better by telling me about how hard it was for her a couple of weeks ago when she started doing this particular DVD and how much better it is now. Mmmhmm…Really glad for you. So, I sit with Abigail for awhile and then a new section of poses and stretches comes up. At this point, I start thinking that A) I AM doing this to get in shape and sitting on the couch isn’t going to get me there and B) how familiar will I really be next week if I am still doing some of the moves and poses for the first time? Fine, fine. Whatever. So I jump back in.
The Instructor merrily announces that it’s time to “Bring It,” which is code for “Your life is about to really suck until I say otherwise.” Now, this is kind of a rhetorical question, but if anyone knows the answer, please post it in the comments for the rest of us.
What the hell kind of pose is this?
Is this REALLY needful and helpful?
I mean, YAY! for physical fitness and all of that, but REALLY? I think some of our Hindu friends got some bad hookah or lost a bet or something when they came up with this. It’s like a game of H-O-R-S-E with body contortions and this pose was the “E” that someone went out on and someone was all bitter about it so they gave the pose a name, which made it “legit.” H-O-R-S-E-S-H- – - – - is the name that I gave it. I just sat down. My body straight up declined the offer. Thanks but no.
So, from there we move into laying on our backs, legs in the air, feet together feeling stuff spread that probably shouldn’t. ”Now, don’t forget to breathe!” the Instructor chimes. ”Buuuut my pancreas is constricting my airflow and I think my sternum and xiphoid process just cracked. Is that bad?”
But it’s cool, I can swing it. There’s only like 20-30 minutes left and I can tell that we’re about to be done with the feet over the head thing and I’m thinking that I’m in the clear, but I was clearly unprepared for what happened next. I think that a full description would be filed under “TMI,” so I’ll just give you the end result: I started farting uncontrollably (as if THAT wasn’t TMI!). I mean, hey, it happens and whatever, but MAN! I was really embarrassed by that! Usually you have SOME kind of notice, but NOOOOO! Not today! Crystal starts laughing to hard that she falls out of her pose, I’m turing red and blue at the same time while trying to find a source of fresh air. Abigail, who had been trying to pose with us informs me that she doesn’t want to do that part and…wow. Not my finest moment.
So, through the rest of the falling, not holding my pose, looking up at the TV when I should have been looking somewhere else (head position is crazy important I found out.) and doing what I could to look like the folks on TV, it was…a first time through. Can’t wait to do it again next week and Crystal better be right about it getting easier. Better get to bed since I have an”angel visit” here in about 5 hours. I better drop weight and/or get buffed up or else the P in P90X is going to stand for “Pissed!” Just sayin’.
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