Familius

'Round Bedtime

                   'Round Bedtime

             (A Villanelle for My Daughter)

                  by Tim J. Myers

When will sleep subdue this noisy cub?

It's 10 p.m., but still she wants to take

her seventy-one-piece tea set in the tub.

This is what she wants, and here's the rub:

Until she's all played out she'll stay awake.

Oh when will sleep subdue this noisy cub?

She'll scream if I (before that final glub

of water down the drain) should undertake

to lift her precious tea set from the tub.

She's belting out a tuneless rub-a-dub--

the tiles echo till my eardrums ache.

Oh when will sleep subdue this noisy cub?

I might assuage my dolor at the pub,

but cannot here shake off the urge to break

her seventy-one-piece tea set in the tub.

She's out now, but she cries for frosted flakes.

The bathroom floor's an unnamed little lake.

Oh when will sleep subdue this noisy cub?

I fish her floating tea things from the tub.

Tim J. Myers is the author of Glad to Be Dad: A Call to Fatherhood, published by Familius and forthcoming May 2013.

Complaining vs. Communicating

Our post on Do Not Complain received some interesting discussion, where readers provided examples of what’s good about complaining including better tables at restaurants or making people treat you better. It might be semantics but the debate continues:

There's a difference between complaining and communicating. To complain about a table at a restaurant would be to say to yourself or others "What an ugly table. I can't believe they'd put us here. I hate this table. Blah, blah, blah." That brings everyone down and is no fun. Another option is to ask, "Would you be willing to sit us at that table over there? It has such a beautiful view . . . we'd be so grateful." That is not complaining. That's a reasonable request asked politely. They might move you or they might not. The point is that if they don't move you to still focus on what you do have, a table at a restaurant with people you enjoy. The location is minor compared to the opportunity to break bread with someone. 

There is too much to be grateful for to waste time on what's unpleasant. Lift your spirits and focus on what's right. 

“People won't have time for you if you are always angry or complaining.” —Stephen Hawking

Happy Thanksgiving--Be Grateful

“An ungrateful man is like a hog sitting under a tree eating acorns and not looking up to see where they come from.” —Anonymous

Do Not Complain

I listened to a lecture where the speaker read from his ancestor’s journal. She had walked across the United States during the mid eighteen hundreds to escape persecution. It was midwinter and the family had reached Wyoming. Snow, ice, sand, and wind bit at their torn and ragged clothes as they tried to make the last few miles to camp.

The narrator, the wife and mother, recorded how her husband, weak from starvation, fell in the river and had to be dragged to the other side by a man on horseback. They were able to get him to camp, where they covered him with a thin blanket and tried to feed him some ground wheat and water. He was too weak to swallow. The wife lay beside him in her clothes and listened to hear her husband breathing. Around midnight, after falling asleep, she reached out and found him cold and stiff, dead from starvation and exposure. She said there was nothing they could do but lay “beside his corpse and pray for dawn.” The next day some men laid her husband in his blanket with thirteen others who had passed that night on the cold ground and covered them with snow. The ground was too frozen to dig graves. They then continued their journey, losing fathers, mothers, and children along the way, mourning, but making steady progress toward their destination.

The speaker paused and said after he read this entry that he would never complain again, that he did not understand suffering and had no right to complain. He said, “In life pain is mandatory but suffering is optional.”

To complain fuels suffering. Acknowledge the pain but choose to not suffer. Do not complain. It is a corpse. Instead bury it, pray for dawn, and move on. Life is ahead not behind. 

Be Grateful for Your Challenges

I listened to an interview with NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Steve Young today where he repeatedly said how grateful he was to play against the very best and experience significant on-field challenges. He mentioned that at times he would go across the field and hug the opposing quarterback, thanking him for the opportunity to play against him, that the experience had made him better and more appreciative of how challenges helped him grow.  

He said learning to deal with being down four points in the fourth quarter and having it be third and ten prepared him for life after football and that the challenges of being a father and husband were far greater than anything he experienced on the field.

It’s true that life is more challenging than football. It’s true that the challenges we face are but exercises to help strengthen our resolve and improve our skills.

Be grateful for your challenges. They will make you strong.

“Now therefore give me this mountain . . .” –Caleb (Joshua 14:12)

Image courtesy of Lori Nawyn and is from an upcoming Gratitude Journal, published by Familius

How Are You Doing?

When we ask "How are you doing?" it's often meant as a greeting rather than a question. But when asked sincerely, it's an opportunity to find out if someone needs help. By checking up with people, particularly family members, consistently showing that you care about their welfare, eventually your radar will improve and you'll know what to do to help.

Everyone has some challenge, and focusing a little of your time on someone else's challenges, helps keep yours at bay.

So, how are you doing? 

When Death Visits

We realize that death is part of our life experience, but it’s a shock when it comes. Two days ago a good friend passed away when his plane crashed. He was an exceptional Air Force pilot with decades of experience flying many different planes. Soon after takeoff his single engine plane went down in the northern mountains of Utah.

He and I worked with the Boy Scouts and each summer took our sons and other boys on what we call high adventure trips. Among other adventures, we hiked 50 miles across the Grand Tetons, we paddled our way to Shoshone Lake, the largest fresh water lake west of the continental divide, and we hiked to the Cirque of the Towers in the Wind Rivers. Each trip was a fantastic experience of how to explore and enjoy life. Out in the wilderness of the Western United States we came to know and love each other as different men with similar objectives—to help young men become good men, husbands, and fathers.

There will be no more adventures with him. However, memories are a great balm to troubled souls. Our lives are built on these experiences and we become something greater than we started out because of the role people play in our lives and the experiences we share.

Be grateful for the shared experiences you have and continue to seek more of them. They will enrich your life beyond the grave.

“Thou shalt live together in love, insomuch that thou shalt weep for the loss of them that die . . .” Doctrine and Covenants 42: 45

Dare to be Bold

“Long have you timidly waded

Holding a plank by the shore,

Now I will you to be a bold swimmer,

To jump off in the midst of the sea,

Rise again, nod to me, shout,

And laughingly dash with your hair.”

—Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

The Problem with Trysts

Once again infidelity has hit center stage with General David Patraeus’ alleged tryst. It’s now gone from national security to soap opera with additional people getting caught in the scandal with emails, topless photos, and security breaches. While the news pundits will debate this for days, it’s a simple issue. Fidelity comes from the Latin Fidere. It means to have confidence in or to trust. To be unfaithful is to break confidence or trust.

Sexuality is the most significant relationship we can engage in, because symbolically the sexual relationship allows two people to be one. This symbolic act is one reason why sexual relationships are discouraged before marriage by the majority of religious societies. To be one requires two people to have fully committed to the relationship, regardless of the challenges that arise over their lives. To physically be one prior to any formal and long-term commitment invites a relationship of distrust that, while possible to mend, can create lasting questions.

Complete fidelity within marriage is important for the same reasons. Spouses have promised and committed to be one in purpose and the sexual union consummates that commitment. When a spouse breaks that commitment, trust and confidence is broken as well. Sexual relationships without full, long-term commitment, is a one-sided affair. And if it is an affair, then the question is, were you lying during the first relationship or this one? Regardless of the answer, it’s difficult to have trust and confidence in you.

Changing points of view argue that sexual relationships before marriage, starter marriages, periodic trysts after marriage to spice up one’s love life, and even emotional affairs through pornography and social media are acceptable if not encouraged.

Such behavior and belief is naïve. Trust and confidence are attributes that all people desire and which are critical to a productive and fulfilled life. To earn them one must be faithful and the relationship between husband and wife is deserving and predicated on such trust and confidence. The more trust and confidence we have in our relationships, the better and more fruitful they become. And while it is possible to learn from someone else’s mistake, society is much better off if the mistakes aren’t made in the first place.

Drop Your Sword

This morning I had opportunity to speak with a gentleman who is alienated from one of his sons. They had a falling out, so to speak. The father is frustrated and the son is angry. We talked about the issues and they both have right to their feelings. He asked me what to do. I said, “Take the sword out of his hand.”

To take the sword out of someone’s hand, you have to admit your own failings and say you are sorry for whatever you might have done to cause pain. When you have admitted that they have every right to feel angry and you profoundly feel sorry and let them know this, the sword is removed. They can no longer attack you with it. They might reject the message or choose to hang on to their pain and anger, but the sword they continued to sharpen hoping for some emotional retribution is dulled and eventually falls to the ground.

The point (no pun intended) is that for our own sake, deciding to cast aside our sword and invite family members to drop theirs can lead to healing.

As we were ending our conversation, a woman came up, tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Thanks. I  didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I heard what you said, and I needed to hear it. Thank you.”

We all have a sword. And we’ve all caused someone to take up her sword in defense of her feelings. Cast it aside and invite your family to lay down theirs. Life’s too short to sharpen a sword on the rough bitterness of some long ago wrong.  

"The best way to destroy an enemy is to make him your friend." --Abraham Lincoln