The One Thing I Did As A Kid No One Does Anymore

My old stomping grounds: Pilot Butte Cemetery

Today was a good day for the simple reason I went back to my roots: I walked places. I dropped the van off at the shop to get a state inspection and for an oil change then walked 20 minutes home. Later on I walked the 20 minutes back to pick it up. Then I walked to work. Later on I walked home. It was cold, the wind was blowing and it took an hour out of my day to get everywhere, but it was great.

It was just like when I was a kid back in the day in Bend, Ore. Maybe it says more about my age than anything else, but I must be one of the few people in this country who walked to every school he attended -- starting in kindergarten. I was telling one our daughter's teenage friends the other day how I walked to Trinity Lutheran kindergarten -- a whopping two blocks -- and crossed a highway to get there. Of course, Highway 20, or Greenwood Avenue as its also known, carried a little less traffic in 1974 than it might now. But our daughters' friend was horrified that a 5-year-old kid would walk across a highway. Her horror is misplaced. I grew up in a different time, a different place. I consider myself lucky.

When I hit first grade I walked to Bear Creek Elementary, meandering through Pilot Butte Cemetery to get there. I was saying how much I enjoyed the walk to school. Maybe not every single day -- before global warming it used to snow in Bend as I recall -- but I just loved having that quiet time before and after school. I got the blood pumping -- it might pump more today if I was walking seeing as how a cougar was spotted in a nearby neighborhood last fall -- and got some exercise and got an education along the way. By the time I hit middle school I could have given you a walking historical tour of Pilot Butte Cemetery, including where to find the grave of a Civil War veteran and the grave site of a man born in 1845, the earliest birth date of any tombstone I had cataloged in the graveyard. To this day I have a soft spot for graveyards.

Miss Nesting, Mrs. Flanary, Mrs. Shepard, Mr. Powelson, Mr. Moore. My teachers at Bear Creek from 1st-5th grade.

From Bear Creek Elementary I matriculated to Pilot Butte Junior High. It was a longish walk to what's today known as a middle school. A couple of blocks down 11th Street, across Highway 20/Greenwood Avenue -- oh, the horror! -- then snake around the northwest flank of Pilot Butte. A lot of the time a few of my buddies, RB "Rand" Smith, Brian "BT Express" Thomas and Brian "Schwartz" Fleck, would assemble at my house and then ride our bikes to school. Either way, it was a great way to start and finish the day, from my perspective. I had a little adventure dodging cars on Highway 20 -- I never stopped when I crossed the highway and figured, rightly, the cars and trucks would yield -- a little communing with nature navigating the trails snaking through the juniper trees and sagebrush and then, of course, the exercise.

After three years in junior high it was off to the big leagues and a half-mile or so walk to Bend High School. I recall getting to school on some days with frozen hair. Seriously. I wouldn't wear a hat -- things have changed since then, obviously -- and would often leave for school with wet hair. Again, back before global warming it got cold in Bend in the winter and there were days I would use first period to thaw out my hair. Sometimes I would run home for lunch and then run back to school. Of course, there were plenty of times my homies and I would hit Sweetheart Donuts down on Third Street. Those were the days. I remember spending 35 hard earned cents on an eclair donut from Sweetheart Donuts. Can that be right? What does 35 cents get you anymore? Certainly not a donut.

The days of walking to school are long gone. Times have changed. In addition to the occasional cougar that might be prowling around, there's all the other stuff you have to worry about. For starters, I bet there's a little more traffic on Highway 20/Greenwood Avenue these days, especially considering there's about five times as many people in Bend now than when I grew up there. Then there's the general concern that a little kid walking alone through a cemetery might get abducted. That's definitely in play. Or that walking to school in snow might somehow constitute child abuse these days. Would Ma and Pa Sabo get busted for child abuse for letting their kid walk to school in the snow?

As I was walking back and forth through metropolitan Gloucester Point this morning, it brought me back to crisscrossing northeast Bend from the mid-70s into the late '80s. I go back to what I wrote earlier. I was a lucky kid.

To get an idea of what my walks around my neighborhood are like lately, check this out: Gloucester Point walkabout

*Author's note: A special thank you to Katherine Cockrum for snapping some photos of my old stomping grounds today and sending them to me. As a side note, her brother is none other than my longtime Bend homie the BT Express himself. And her husband is my friend and former Bend High School cross country teammate, Joe Cockrum. God bless you all.

A Difference In `Justice' In America And The Middle East

Refugees arriving on a Greek island

A good friend of mine told me the story of a little boy with an arm that ended in a stub below his elbow. My friend was a volunteer soccer coach in a league of refugee boys in a large Midwestern city. The boys and their families were Muslim and had left their homes behind to come to America. They hailed from places like Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Eritrea and Syria, countries that swallow up their residents in sinkholes of bombings, shootings, starvation and other means of violent death.

One day at soccer practice my friend asked the Iraqi boy what happened to his arm. The boy explained that years earlier, when he was 4 and living in Iraq, he had stolen something in the market. He was caught and under Sharia law there was a stiff price to be administered for his crime. The penalty he paid was his hand that was hacked off.

Four years old.

I have a memory myself of stealing something in the store when I was a young child a little older than the Iraqi boy. I was standing in the checkout line at Wagner's Supermarket in Bend, Ore., and managed to filch a piece of candy and put it in my pocket. My memory is that it was a piece of hard candy. I glanced up to meet the stink eye of an older woman in line behind us. I don't recall anything happening to me; apparently the lady didn't rat me out. I certainly didn't lose my hand.

I tell this story because I've thought a lot about the refugees from the Middle East and Africa. We've all seen the pictures and read and watched the stories of the people who risk their lives to flee their countries in hopes that at least they may live. Or there's stories like that Iraqi boy, the one with the arm that ends in a stump.

I would encourage you to listen to this recent teaching by David Platt on the Biblical response to the refugee crisis. I have plenty of thoughts on the refugee crisis that I'll share in one or more upcoming posts. But listen to Platt's message as I found it enlightening: Message on refugees

The Faith Race That Goes To The Committed, The Courageous

Back in my college running days. That's me on the right there, the one you wouldn't recognize these days.

My last college cross country race was held on a warm, sunny November day in a big, hilly park in Fresno, Calif. It was 1990. I was 21, married with a little boy and in my senior year at the University of Portland. The race was an NCAA regional meet, my last chance to qualify for the national cross country championships and I was running with the big boys from the West region. All the Pac-10 (back when it was the Pac-10) schools were there along with big schools from other major conferences.

I was ready, if not a bit intimidated to race with the elites. To qualify for the NCAA championships your team has to be in the top three. Or for individuals, you have to be in the top three from non-scoring teams. I had a legitimate shot. A very good shot. The race was 10 kilometers, or 6.2 miles. I always felt like we were at a slight disadvantage racing in California at that time of year because in Portland it was 50s and raining sideways, so a warm day in the 70s was a bit taxing for us and not something for which we could prepare. But that's not an excuse. The conditions were the same for everyone.

As the race went on I knew our team was in the running for a shot at the NCAAs and I was as well. I remember distinctly with a half-mile left thinking that this was the last cross country race I would ever run. In high school I had been fortunate enough to be a part of an amazing turnaround. My freshman year of high school, when I started running at Bend High School in Oregon, we were horrible in cross country, finishing somewhere close to last in our district. By the time I was a junior we dominated our district and finished second in state. My senior year we destroyed the competition, winning the state title by 69 points. That state title was by far the highlight of my high school athletics experience.

College was similar. My freshman year we weren't that good, but by the time I was a senior we had a shot -- albeit something of a slim one -- to get to the NCAAs. So with a half-mile left in the race I did something that I never did. I sprinted. I never had much of a kick and usually conserved energy for the very end of the race, maybe the last 100 meters. Not this time.

I don't recall how many runners I passed but it was a lot. Maybe six, possibly eight. Could be more. I absolutely crushed that last half-mile. And paid the price for it. As I stumbled across the finish line in 11th place, two runners who kicked much later burst past me. But I had beaten them to the line and the officials pushed me in front of them in the finish line chute.

Gasping for air I literally stumbled through the line on legs of rubber and I remember the strangest thing happened to me. I couldn't keep my eyes open. I was so exhausted I literally was falling asleep as I walked through the chute. I found a picnic table and promptly crashed onto the bench to go to sleep, or possibly die. My teammates probably thought I was dead, maybe just nearly dead at best, and kept trying to help me up to walk me around and keep me alive. I would have none of it. I told them to leave me alone. I just wanted to sleep. Or maybe die.

My effort was seemingly noble, yet all for naught. Our team finished 4th and I was the 4th individual. My cross country season, really my cross country career, was over. Since then I've looked back on that race and comforted myself knowing how hard I fought that last mile. I've even used it in messages I've preached at Calvary Chapel Gloucester about finishing the race well. To push yourself to the limit.

Yet that's not the truth. I've thought about that race a lot over the past 25 years. (Wow. Has it been that long? Mercy sakes.) And while it's a nice narrative I've told over the years it's not quite right. I've been wrong to talk about that race in the manner I have. It's long past time to come clean. I'll explain.

Here's why I've been thinking about this. I see too many Christians practice their faith exactly the way I ran that race. We all gather at the starting line -- that moment when you come to faith in Jesus Christ and make Him your Lord and Savior -- and from that point there are some who really go for it and are all out for the Lord. They are passionate, unwavering and zealous and the love of Jesus shines in them and through them. They are lights in a dark world, continually pointing people to Jesus, being compassionate, loving and radiating His grace. I admire them greatly.

Others run comfortably, more or less lukewarm. This is your typical Christian and a group I would characterize as the vast majority. Some flat out dawdle and others, sadly, drop out. But for pretty much everyone who sticks in the race there's a sprint at the end as the realization hits them that the end of their life is near and they want to "do something for the Lord."

So what really happened in that race of mine 25 years ago? In every cross country race there comes a point fairly early when you have to decide your level of commitment. The great runners push themselves to the limit from the start. For me, the moment of truth in that 10k in Fresno came around two miles into the race. At that point I backed off a bit and didn't fully go for it, opting to conserve my energy until the end. I played it safe. I ran comfortably, easily within my limits. It proved to be a decision I would regret. And still regret. Why not just go for it? It was my last cross country race! Ever!

Here's why I made the decision I did. I simply lacked the courage. And commitment. The race doesn't always go to the fastest or strongest. It's often to the most committed. The most courageous. That wasn't me on that day.

Which brings me to my Christian life. And yours, if you're a believer. What's your level of commitment? What's the courage meter of your faith? Are you coasting? Have you settled?

I've settled in my faith far too often. I've coasted in my faith far too often. It's too easy to just back off -- daily Bible reading, prayer, sharing my faith, pressing into the Lord, missions and other elements of the Christian faith can all take a back seat to "life" and its distractions and enticements. It really comes down to who Jesus is in my life. And yours. Is Jesus worth living for? Worth dying for? Didn't Jesus lay down His life for you and me?

I say all of this because I'm wrestling hard with some major decisions. It has everything to do with my level of commitment and the essence of my faith. I'm guessing you have these decisions to wrestle with as well.

It's the two-mile mark and time to make a decision. What's my level of commitment? What's yours?

The Meeting

Julie & me, circa early 1990s

It was a meeting ordained by God. I believe that completely. On April 30, 1989, my good friends Mark and Bob Webber -- twins who had grown up with the former Julie Young and attended school with her in Canby, Ore. -- hauled me to their friend's house to meet her. I was just finishing my sophomore year at the University of Portland, but the track season was continuing and the Webbers and I were training together. I was staying with them at their home in Canby, heading up to school during the day for workouts, and in the evenings we would make the rounds of town meeting their friends. All of whom happened to be young women. Go figure.

The night I met Julie in her living room she was 8 months pregnant. Her former boyfriend was long gone and she was living with her parents. I distinctly remember thinking something along the lines of, "Wow. She looks really good for 8 months pregnant." (Yes, it's true. I kept her pregnant pretty much since then, eh?) We had a great time together that night and spent a lot of the evening laughing. Two hours after we left late that night, Julie went into labor. The next day she had Brenton by C-section. The Webbers and I drove up to the hospital to see her and her new baby and of the three of us, I was the only one to hold Brenton. I've always liked babies. Still do it would seem. I think perhaps that must have made an impression on Julie.

Over the next couple of weeks as I stuck around Canby to finish out the track season, I managed to trick Mark or Bob into visiting Julie. One time we were at a park playing tennis and I said, "Doesn't Julie Young live around here?" In a matter of minutes we were paying her and Brenton a visit. Over the summer I would write her letters and managed to drive the 3 hours to her house from Bend for visits. It was within a few months of meeting that I confided to a friend I was going to marry her. He thought I was loony. To get to the point, exactly 16 months after Brenton was born -- Sept. 1, 1990 -- we were married at a church around the corner from her house.

I am forever indebted to Mark and Bob for introducing me to the young woman who captured my heart. And I am still so in love today. I admire my wife so much. Her beauty, her patience, her love, her perseverance, her faith, her strength. She has what I would call a pure relationship with her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, an active faith and pursuit that defines who she is and will be. It's a part of Julie that attracts me to her. One of many things. I love her laugh. From the beginning that's always something I loved about her. Hearing her laugh makes me believe that no matter what's going on around us, all is right in the world. She makes beautiful babies.  I always say my children have their mama's good looks. The other day she had her hair pulled back and I don't know how to explain it but there's something about when she wears her like that ... it makes me a little crazy for her. Heh-heh.

We've had some hard times. I've lost count of many houses we've lived in and how many moves we've made. She's followed me across the country and back, with all sorts of kids in tow, more than once. She's endured difficult pregnancies, hard births and miscarriages (I wrote about one here: 12kidsandcounting.blogspot.com/2010/01/stay-with-me.html) and managed to survive a knucklehead husband. I've said some hurtful things over the years and those I regret deeply. I've spent too much time being selfish and not enough time giving her the time to pursue creative outlets. I want that to change. I could go on but what I really want to say is that it makes me smile to think about spending another 25 years with my beautiful, loving and forever patient and kind bride. I love you Julie!

Subtle Differences Between Boys And Girls

It's frequently that I give Julie a hard time about her childhood. Her childhood comes up typically when her sons are doing things that are completely foreign to her, which can involve anything from belching and other bodily function contests, to new and inventive uses of small explosives. Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating about the explosives, but it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibilities. I mean, now that the statute of limitations has passed I may have participated in some Fourth of July sparkler bomb manufacturing back in the day in Bend, Ore.

Julie, however, fondly recalls games with her three sisters of "Beauty Pageant" and all-night dance-a-thons and baking contests. Really? Fond memories of my friends and me entail menacing the rural Bend sagerat population with BB guns, golfing in the cemetery, peeing contests (length and duration of whizzes were compiled, with bonus points if you could write your name in the dirt) and games of tackle football that were really good when blood was drawn.  It's really entertaining when our older boys get together, which happens all too infrequently now that they are college age and older, and reminisce about the good old days. Typically the reminiscing involves petty thievery of household items and goods -- their favorite is when they pilfered the TV out of the downstairs living room in which a visiting auntie was sleeping and managed to haul it up to their bedroom to play video games all night -- boxing matches, small-time gambling over board games with the loser typically forced to strip buck nekkid and run around the outside of the house, terrorizing babysitters and various combinations thereof.

Now our teenage girls can laugh and giggle all night about their shenanigans as well. Craziness such as playing mermaid in the bathtub, their secret inside jokes that still make them cackle, all-night mani/pedi parties and when things got really out of hand marathon sessions of Pride and Prejudice movie watching. Somehow our girls have survived all that madness!!!

This all came to mind the last couple of times I visited Target and Wal-Mart with a bunch of my kids and hit the toy aisle. Take Olivia, my 6-year-old. She goes right to the doll section and eyes all the dollies and clothes and bling and accessories and mercy sakes can it be excruciating for her to try and settle on just one or two things with her birthday money. On the other hand there's Judah. He's 3 and you cannot imagine the sheer thrill he experienced when he came across the Despicable Me "Fart Gun." When he first pulled the trigger and that "gun" emitted the sound that can entertain little boys -- and big ones, too -- for literally hours on end the sound of his maniacal laugh filled the stores. That gun passed so much gas in the hands of Judah the earth's temperature rose measurably. I am thankful Julie didn't make those trips when Judah was blasting away. I'm sure she would have been horrified, even after two decades plus of raising boys. As for me? Well,  I admit it. I grabbed a gun and started pulling the trigger, the howls of laughter peeling forth.