Month: September 2013

Feed My Starving Children

So I’m feeding my grandson Leland the other day when suddenly it hits me, I’m really good at this, much better at it in my opinion, than either his mother or his grandmother, and the reason is simple, our approaches are polar opposites.

My wife and daughter are two very strong willed, goal oriented women. When it comes to getting something done, they want it to be done their way and in the most expedient manner possible.  As a result, feeding time can become not only a race against the clock but also a battle of wills.  Occasionally if Leland wants his bottle first and they’re in the mood to feed him his cereal, a fight ensues.  Many times I’ve sat at the kitchen table and watched him shake his head “NO!” quickly from side to side as a spoonful of oatmeal and blueberries is smeared onto seemingly every part of his face other than his mouth.  By the time his bowl is empty I’m sure he’s gotten only about half of his daily required nutritional intake because there seems to be enough food on his cheeks, nose and forehead to feed a small town.  Total elapsed feeding time from start to finish, about 10 minutes.

I’m a little more flexible.  I like to take the approach that we’re having a dining ‘experience.’  If I went to a fine restaurant with a good friend I wouldn’t dream of telling him in what order he should eat his food, and I don’t do that with Leland either.  If he wants his milk first, that’s what he gets.  If he wants to take a break so that he can examine the little blue dinosaurs on his bib, then we take a break.  And if I happen to miss his mouth with a spoonful of rice and peas, a damp rag is always there to keep his cute little face looking fresh and clean.  We talk, we laugh, we sing.  Total elapsed feeding time from start  to finish, about 40 minutes.

Before you get mad and assume that I’m saying I’m the better care giver, I’m not.  The love and patience my daughter and wife show this little boy far exceeds mine.  But our feeding methods are different, because while they see it as a task to be quickly completed so that they can move on to the next task, I see it as relaxing and fun.

I hope you can relate to what I’m saying, because if you can, then you will also relate to what I’m about to say next.

Recently I started to think about how I would feel if I could no longer experience the joy of feeding my grandson.  What if circumstances became so dire that I no longer had any food to give him.  What if the singing and laughing we do during mealtime were suddenly replaced with cries of hunger?  Thank God that when my Leland cries for more, I can open the cupboard and find more.  But what about those parents and grandparents around the world who can’t?  What about them?

The bad news is this;  Approximately 6,200 children die every day from hunger and hunger related disease, and there’s not a thing that grandpa or grandma can do about it but stand there and watch it happen.  6,200 a day.

But there’s some good news too;  Help is on the way.  On October 4th and 5th Immanuel Lutheran Church of Belvidere will host a food packing event where volunteers will pack 150,000 meals in 2 days.  These meals will be shipped around the globe in an effort to help alleviate world hunger and save kids lives.  The response to this event has been overwhelming, so overwhelming in fact that we’re already working on doing it bigger and better next fall.

So I’m making a plea that you prayerfully consider helping us too.  I’m not asking you to give till it hurts, I’m just asking you to give til it helps.  Whether it’s with your time, talents, or a monetary donation, we can all play a part in seeing that someones grandson or daughter goes to sleep with a full stomach tonight.

If you are interested in making a difference please click on the following link,  http://www.kintera.org/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=1062575

Thank you

Charity never humiliated him who profited from it, nor ever bound him by the chains of gratitude, since it was not to him but to God that the gift was made.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Cuban Heels and Cleats

Going through grade school in the 1960’s was a wonderful time in my life.  I can’t think of much, if anything, I would change during my years at James Giles Elementary School.  The friends I made and teachers I had are burned into my mind.  True, over the past 40 to 50 years some memories have faded and some things have been forgotten entirely.  However, I’m sure we all have certain events from our formative years that stick with us.

I was reminded of one such incident while looking at Facebook today.  Some former classmates were discussing our old school and it jogged a very vivid memory.  It was around 1967 – 68.  I was a  seventh grader with a lot on my mind.  One of the main things that concerned me at the time was trying to act cool.  Figuring out how to do that was almost a full time job for most boys of that age because being naturally cool didn’t come easy.  You had to look for an edge.  I found mine in Cuban heeled shoes and cleats.

Back then the same as today, the start of school was a time for buying clothes, shoes, and supplies.  Somehow (to this day I still can’t believe it) I was able to convince my parents into allowing me to get Cuban heeled shoes that year.  For those of you who don’t know what these are, you should Google them.  To be brief, these shoes were distinguished by the high thick heel associated with them.  After putting them on you appeared about two inches taller and they made every seventh grader who wore them feel like a bad ass.

But sometime during that school year something must have happened which made me feel not so bad assy anymore and I realized that I needed to kick my image up a notch.  In my mind the only way to do that was to add a pair of cleats to my Cuban heels.

Cleats came in two styles, horseshoe, which looked exactly like you would think.  A piece of metal shaped like a horses shoe which got nailed on to the bottom of the heels of your shoe.  The practical purpose was to prevent the heel from being worn down, but the coolness factor of having these was off the chart.  The other cleat was kind of like a crescent shape.  Not as cool but still made a great clicking sound on the sidewalk.  They still made a statement.  “Hey, look at me, I’ve got cleats.  I may not look like it but I’m way cool!”

Mom didn’t want me to get them, thought people would think I was some sort of “Greaser” or something.  (Look that one up also if you have to)  But dad convinced her that with how I went through shoes, it wouldn’t be a bad idea, so off to Thom Mcan we went.  Once there I grabbed the first set of horseshoe cleats I could get my hands on and handed them to my dad.  “No, the crescent ones.” he said.  “But dad!!”  Now my father was a terrific nonverbal communicator.  He had various looks that could speak volumes.  The particular look he gave me this time said, “Son, we’re very close to leaving the store with no cleats at all.”  I understood and grabbed the crescent shaped cleats.

That night dad put my shoes in a vice, pounded the cleats into the heels and the next morning I happily clicked my way to James Giles Elementary.

As the bell rang and I lined up with my classmates to enter the school, I began to get nervous.  Something didn’t seem right. Something kept gnawing at me.  Approximately three steps into the building I realized what it was as my teacher pulled me out of line and said, “Mr. Massaro, please go down to the janitors room and have him take the cleats off of your shoes.  You know the rules, they’ll damage the floors.”  I began to say “But!!”  She just looked at me. Apparently nonverbal communication was quite popular in the 60’s and so I headed down to the janitors room.

I sat sadly as Mr. Merkle, the janitor, put my shoes in his vice and ripped out the cleats along with my heart.

That night I didn’t even try to hide what had happened.  When my dad came home from work I just handed him the cleats and explained the whole story.  “Did you know about this rule?” he asked.  “I think I remember hearing something about it.”  I answered.

Now here’s one of the differences between 1967 and today.  My dad didn’t call the local news station to report the “injustice” done to his poor little boy.  He didn’t even call the school to demand payment of the now mangled and unusable cleats.  What he did was deduct the cost from my allowance.

And mom?  The one who didn’t approve of the cleats in the first place?  Well she just looked at my dad and I and said nothing.  She didn’t have to.

A Wonderful Invention

I really want to believe that most of us are reasonable people, that it does not take all that much to satisfy us, that we can all get along pretty well.

When I say “us” I’m not including the occasional sociopath we meet who seemingly is unable to get along with anyone.  I have no answer for them.  I’m talking about “us.”  Our family, friends, neighbors, or merely acquaintances we encounter on a daily basis.   Average, decent, hard working people just like you and I.  In other words, the majority of us.  I believe that we can get along so much better.

Businessmen and women often like to say, “If I didn’t have people problems, I wouldn’t have any problems at all.”  No truer words were ever spoken in business, or in life.  Because while people can be the reason for each others happiness and success, we can also be the cause of each others stress and anxiety.

I want to believe that the keys to getting along can be quite simple.  For regular people like us, the simplest rules of courtesy are not difficult to adhere to.  Even conceding that those rules may vary depending on the person, even understanding that what one person sees as reasonable another may not, I still believe that some rules are so ridiculously easy to follow that they can immediately reduce arguments, hard feelings and damaged relationships by at least an unscientifically estimated 50%.  Here’s a hint, Alexander Graham Bell.

Rule # 1:  If you promise to call, then pick up the phone and call.  We’ll assume that when the promise of a call was made, the one making the promise fully understood how to operate a phone.  I think this is a reasonable assumption to make.

Rule # 2:  If you promise to be somewhere, then be there.  If you can’t be there, then follow the part of Rule # 1 which states, “pick up the phone and call.”  If for some reason you are having difficulty operating your land line or your mobile device, find a friend to assist you.

Rule # 3:  If you promise to do something, then do it.  If, due to unforeseen circumstances, you are unable to complete whatever task it is that you promised to do, then once again follow the portion of Rule # 1 which states, “pick up the phone and call.”

Rule # 4:  In those rare instances where life does get in the way and prevents you from being somewhere, doing something, or calling, then be the type of person who won’t allow that sick feeling in your stomach (the one you should have because you didn’t keep your word) to go away.  You still have a chance to make the wrong right if you just “pick up the phone and call.” 

Rule # 5:  If you’re the one waiting for that call, when it finally comes, understand how difficult it probably was for that person to make, and accept their apology graciously.

There, can we all agree on how simple that is?  No?

Then how about a Rule # 6?  Stop making promises.  After all, saying “I promise” is unnecessary if the promise is kept, and meaningless if it’s not.  And because life has a way of throwing us curves, many a friendship has been lost due to a broken one, whether intentional or not.

Leave the promises to God. He always keeps His.