Month: June 2013

Have you ever used racial slurs?  I have, more than once I’m sure.  Sometimes I’ve used them out of anger.  Spitting out the words because they somehow gave me a brief but embarrassingly satisfying way to vent some particular frustration.  Sometimes I’ve used them because I thought I was being funny, a sophomoric way to evoke laughter from someone, much like many modern day stand up comedians do.  Those who use profanity seemingly with every other word because they aren’t creative or clever enough to entertain with original thoughts or ideas.  Do I believe that using a racial slur is an ignorant way to express myself?  Sure I do.  But does the mere use of certain words make me a racist?  Obviously there are people who will tell you that they do.  Those who believe that all things said, in some way hold hidden truths and meanings.  I for one don’t subscribe to that theory.

Our country has put itself into a box.  We have become a place where words carry more weight than actions.  A place where one ill timed, misinterpreted, or yes, ignorant word can wipe out an entire life of accomplishment or kindness.  We enjoy extracting one statement out of many, and using it as a gauge to measure ones character, ignoring all other factors.  How many of us would be able to emerge unscathed from the scrutiny of our past comments?

We have backed ourselves into a corner.  Admit to using a racial slur and you’re labeled a racist.  Paula Deen comes immediately to mind.  Deny ever using one and you risk being labeled a lying racist.  Those of you who are old enough will be able to remember the circumstances surrounding Mark Furman, one of the lead investigators in the OJ Simpson murder trial.

We’ve become so defensive that we have begun to link together the terms racism and criticism.  Criticize an individual of another race, black or white, and take the chance of being accused of painting the entire group with the same brush, as if criticism and racism are synonymous.  The fact is, at times we are all critics.  Maybe we are critical of  people who choose to live in our society as uncivilized animals rather than productive human beings, as takers rather than givers.  Those people sometimes happen to be white, and sometimes they happen to be black, or Asian or Hispanic, or Indian.  Choose any ethnicity you like, still, for the majority of us, our criticism is not driven by race, it is directed (to paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.) not at the color of ones skin but at the content of their character .

It’s been interesting to watch the reactions during this recent Paula Deen case.  I would’ve loved to have been in the board room at Food Network or any of the other companies that decided to discontinue their association with her, if only to hear the discussion of how they would express to the public their disdain for all of the “terrible” things she has said.  It would’ve been fascinating because in most cases I don’t think these companies are all that morally bothered by anything she has said or done.  I also don’t believe that any of them really think she is a racist.  If they suspected she was, then they should have fired her long ago.  Their dilemma and fear is that if they don’t punish her they risk being viewed as racists themselves, and while it may be the cowardly way out, they’re making what they believe to be the politically and financially correct move.

I’ve also watched with interest the people who have portrayed themselves as being injured by all of this.  The people who delight for reasons known only to them, in seeing themselves as victims of injustice and discrimination, often where there is none.  The people who are really not as offended as they want you to believe they are.  The people who just want to be a part of making an example of someone.

If you’re reading this as a defense of Paula Deen, please read again.  The question of her alleged racism is something only she knows the truth about.  It’s between her and God.   Racism is wrong.  Always.   But when will we learn that sensationalism and over reaction is not the way to bridge the racial gap that exists in this country, and as long as we think it is there are no winners.

My wife and daughter were walking past a local grade school with our grandson and dogs yesterday.  At the same time a drum and bugle competition was being held at the nearby high school and apparently the competing squads were given assigned areas to practice before it was their turn to perform.  Some parents of the squad were milling around on the sidewalk in front of the school my wife and daughter were attempting to walk past.  As they approached and tried to pass, the “adults” on the sidewalk refused to step aside and my family was forced into the street in order to go by.  A big deal?  Maybe not, but it got me thinking how apparently giving a kid a uniform and telling him how great he is does not only promote bad parental behavior in the world of sports.  I guess it bleeds over into the rough and tumble world of drum and bugle competitions also.

For about 12 years I coached a youth basketball team for one of our local Lutheran grade schools.  The very first thing any of my players were talked to about, long before learning how to pass, dribble, or shoot the ball, was something called respect.  Respect for your coaches, your teammates, your opponents, the referees, opposing fans, you name it.  All else was secondary.  The speech was always given to them in the presence of their parents.

Four years ago our team was fortunate enough to be very good.  We took third place in the state at the Illinois Lutheran Basketball Tournament and were invited to play in the National Tournament at Valparaiso University in Indiana.

Playing a team from Iowa in what was a double elimination format, we both had one loss, meaning the loser of this game would be out of the tournament.  Both teams were fighting hard, we were leading by 3 points with about a minute left and decided to go into a stall offense to prevent the other team from getting the ball back and possibly tying the game.  As we passed the ball around to keep it away from our opponent some parents from the other team, one guy in particular started berating our players.  Shouting at them to “Play the game!”  He then got the crowd involved, chanting “BORING, BORING!”  It really rattled our kids, remember we are talking about 7th and 8th graders.  We ended up losing the ball, the other team got it, scored, and were now within a point.  Fortunately we got the ball back, made a few free throws and hung on to win the game.  Eventually we would lose our next game and be eliminated from the tournament also.

As I was leaving the gymnasium a car pulled up along side of me and rolled down the window.  A woman stuck her head out and said, “I want to apologize, it was my husband who was yelling the loudest at your players.  But I have to tell you what one of your boys did.”  Oh no I thought, here it comes, if one of my players said or did something to make our team and school look bad I’m going to go nuts.  “What happened?” I asked.  “One of your players came up to my husband and said,” “Sir, with all due respect, all we were trying to do was win the game.”  “I loved it!” she laughed, “My husband had no response.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen him speechless before.”

I’ve thought many times of how proud I was of him and the words he used.  Sir and respect.  Words that he had obviously learned at home from his parents and that I was fortunate enough to be allowed to reinforce in him.

Now it’s four years later, we haven’t really stayed in touch, I see him or his parents around the neighborhood, we may stop and talk for a couple minutes or just say hello.  But he has invited me to his high school graduation party, and today I am attending.  I will know hardly anyone there but I wouldn’t miss it for the world.  Because you see, it’s a matter of respect.

I’ve decided to change my LinkedIn profile picture.  I think.  Maybe.  The one posted now is about a year old and no longer an accurate representation of what I look like.  Oh you can tell it’s me, but since it was taken there have been a few changes.  I have lost 25 pounds so my head doesn’t look quite as fat and round as it once did.  I’ve also changed my facial hair.  No longer do I have a full bushy goatee.  I’m now sporting a more trimmed look and have this little thing under my bottom lip which unfortunately I have to consider shaving off because I just found out it’s called a “soul patch.”  I don’t mind the way it looks but I’m embarrassed to think that people are passing me on the street and saying, “Look at the old guy sporting the soul patch.”  Does everything really have to have a name?! 

My current LinkedIn photo has me dressed in a grey sports coat, a white dress shirt (of course) with open collar, and the aforementioned fat head.  I thought a new picture, one with me wearing a dark suit and tie might look more professional and generate more employment opportunities.

Here’s the problem;  I hate having my picture taken.  To start with, I’m not what you would call a “smiley” person.  In fact one of my old bosses used to call me Smiley for that very reason, because I wasn’t.  Get it?  It’s called irony; the use of words to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning.  Kind of like when my wife says to me, “Hey good lookin what’s cookin?”  Translation; “Hey Quasimodo, where we ordering from tonight?”  So for me to have my picture taken and flash a sincere smile for the sake of convincing people that I truly am a friendly sort of guy is really quite a challenge.

I realized that to insure I would look my very best, I would need to employ a highly trained photographer using only the finest equipment.  With none available I settled on my daughter using the camera on her cell phone.  After just four pictures I started to complain that my jaws hurt from smiling too much.

The first one came out too dark and the second one came out too bright.  The third one came out just right, but my face looked kind of like the one we all used to make at our brother or sister when we were about 10 years old.  You know the face I mean.  The one where they would whine, “Mom he’s looking at me again!”  And mom would yell, “Stop it or your face will freeze like that!”  The picture even startled me.  It screamed, “Keep this man away from children and small animals!”  Not only would it not help get me a job, it might get me investigated.  Toning my smile down for the fourth picture helped a great deal, it came out really good.  In fact if I’d been holding a board in front of me that said Illinois Dept of Corrections with the numbers 84973061 on it, it would have been perfect.  My daughter suggested that we take one more picture.  I suggested she take a photography class, and with that the photo shoot was over.

On a positive note I now have four new pictures to choose from and none show me looking as if someone had filled my skull with helium, attached guide wires to my arms and attempted to lead me down 5th Avenue like one of those over sized balloons in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.  I may look like an axe murderer or a convict but at least not one with a fat head.

After reviewing my portfolio one last time I’ve decided the best one to go with is…….

Thanks for the reminder Lin;

Who are you?  Or maybe the question is better asked this way;  What defines who you are?

For the past God only knows how long, you have defined yourself as something.  A parent, a spouse, maybe both or maybe something else entirely.  Even with the kids now grown and no longer needing you to tie their shoes, wipe their nose, or place band aids on their scrapes, you may have still defined yourself as a devoted mom or dad.  Even with your marriage well into its second decade you may have still defined yourself as a loving husband or wife.  Or so you thought.

The last half dozen years or so, you suddenly realized that you may have been deceiving yourself.  At some point, you’re not exactly sure when, your identity became linked more to your job than to your parenthood or your marriage or maybe even your faith.  Maybe it happened when the kids, now young adults, became more independent and didn’t need you in exactly the same way that they once did.  Or maybe it happened when you were given more responsibilities at work and as a result began to feel more valued and important there.  Whatever the reason, somewhere along the line your job began to define who you were.  It happened so subtly that you never recognized it had happened at all.

Just to be clear, your job wasn’t one heartbeat away from becoming president of the company.  Not by a long shot.  But as you should, you took it seriously, putting in unpaid hours and giving up vacation time in order to get the job done.  You were given a title, then a different one that sounded more important and appeared more professional on your business card.  Same job but oh how impressive that new title sounded.  It didn’t really matter what they called you though, because whatever they chose is what you were going to be.  And if it meant giving up some of your free time to jump on a plane and go out of town on the spur of the moment, then that is what you were going to do, because dammit you were important to the company.

Ask your children if they ever felt neglected because of your job and they will answer with an emphatic “No!”  And you’re confident it is a true and honest answer because it wasn’t a physical change you were going through.  You were still the dad who coached the basketball team, still the mom who went on all of the field trips.  You were able to do the juggling act that rightfully put family before job, in the physical sense.  But while you were outwardly conducting your life in the same manner, inwardly you had begun to identify your worth as a person, with your job.

The danger of allowing this to happen should be obvious.  The danger is that one day, either by choice or by chance, your job will end.  When that day comes, are you going to feel less important, less productive, less needed than you did the day before it ended?  For some it will be difficult not to feel those emotions.  The good news is that with every challenge comes an opportunity to step back, refocus, and learn.

No matter their age, your kids have always called you mom or dad.  Your spouse has always called you Dear and your God will always be your God. Those titles have never needed to be changed in order to make you feel more valued or more important than you actually are.  Mom, Dad, Dear, and God have always been more than enough for anyone, they should be more than enough for you too.  Because your family and faith do not define what you are, they define who you are.