Hi Readers.  Today I'd like to write a little introspective.  Hopefully you'll find some meaning in it for your own life.

I'm single man with two children.  I was once a single man with no children.  I was once a young boy with dreams.  

One day my brother died, well he took his own life.  And this had a profound impact on me.  I won't say exactly how, that's my secret.  But despite that affect, I was deep inside a good natured young man with dreams I believed could come true if I worked towards them.

Then I had a child and life changed in a blink of an eye.  Again I was deep inside still a guy with a fun loving outgoing attitude, just more serious about what was most important. I had priorities.   Then I married.  Again, still the same person in many ways but I needed to make changes so that both myself and my wife would be happy. 

I prospered during marriage in some ways, in other ways I was denied some happiness.  That's life.  But again, things changed.  And again deep inside I was a guy with a zest for life and good spirit. 

Through-out my life I've had let downs, betrayals and misfortune.  But I've never lost my spirit to be happy.   I must say being a parent has been a simple solution to happiness.  Maybe it's the reason for my continued happiness...

Through-out it all I've been happy knowing who I was.  I've been proud of who I am and what I accomplished.  Not for others but for myself.  From the days in a band to making a spot on a football team and so much more.   And yes, my greatest achievement is my children. 

If you've read my blog, you've seen a great deal of ...   more »

Can't help but want to wax over the little things today...  My youngest started tying his shoes this week without help for the first time.  It reminds me of the day we took off his training wheels.   My oldest son is happy too, but mostly because he doesn't have to do it for his brother any more. LOL

But it makes me think.  How often these moments come and go in our lives and when they are gone, we can lose them forever.  Certainly when my children are 20 or 30 they will never remember or care about when they individually learned to tie their shoes.  But I do.  I always will.  The magic of remembering the looks on both their faces the day they got it on their own without any help.  Not much about them is exactly the same when it comes to first times of doing things.  But in tying shoes... I can see them both looking up at me after pulling the knot tight... "Dad!" 

Meanwhile there are so many things I witness them do together and those moments are also ones I remember vividly.  Just a couple weeks ago they were at a birthday party at a rock climbing gym.  They both did me proud and that competive brotherly spirit wasn't overbearing.  They supported each other and THAT is something about them I will remember a lifetime as well.  It really is the little things.  You just have to slow down to see them and appreciate them.   The moments you get are the moments you make.

You want these moments to last a lifetime because they grow up so fast.  I am very proud of my children today. 

I'm watching the ball game tonight.  Just relaxing.  My son is away today...  I played paintball then skated twelve miles, people watched in the park and visited with friends.  My mind and body are fried.  I'm just relaxing.

Then a commercial comes on that didn't just wake my senses, it took me back in time.  I won't say what it's about or what it's selling; not important.  There is this guy, he's in the hospital while his wife if sleeping and next to her is their newborn baby in his Plexiglas crib ...right near her side.  He reaches in and cradles his baby.  His baby looks at him and he has that epiphany moment where he knows what is life is all about. Life is bigger than him.  If you are a parent hopefully you've been there. 

And this took me back in time when my second son was born.  It was an innocent time.  I can't put it any other way.  Maybe I was naive, maybe I just wanted to believe my life was perfect.  It doesn't matter.  What matters is that moment.  The entire afternoon of my son's birth is etched in my mind.  A long video of events from my wife calling me in the woods telling me it's time and us talking while I changed to us driving the convertible to the hospital with the top down.   A traffic jam was at the mall.  A plain clothes police officer displayed a furious face at me as we drove down the side of the road, then as we neared him he could see my wife with in her passenger seat leaning back with her belly full.  His emotions flashed in an instant to empathy if not embarrassment.  He waved us through as fast as he could. 

I ...   more »

It's amazing to me that bias of editors can reach this level.

The headline of this Time Online UK web article reads:

She's Like A Moose Going After A Cabbage

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article4671858.ece

The point of such a headline and article is to once again make out Americans or in this case the evil Republican Party of Americans as imbeciles, backwoods thinkers, dim, over-patriotic, and the list can go on of negative attributes.

The representation of last nights speech by Governor Sarah Palin is at best unfair and at worst propaganda to fight against our country being anything remotely close to classy.   No offense to the British biased media but America has come a long way from the typical 'stupid' American wandering other countries in sneakers and bad shirts with dress socks on while wearing shorts.   And we certainly don't expect others to speak English while visiting other countries.  In fact, we do more keeping to our own borders as we know how unwelcome we are treated in most other countries. 

We got the message. 

Now these other countries expect us to run our elections based on the needs of the world or their fickle desires?

America gets it more than you know.

To my fellow Americans, Republican or Democrat.  Read the article above and realize what we face.  Today it was a Republican facing ridicule.  Tomorrow it could be a Democrat and be warned, should either Democrat or Republican be voted to the White house this fall, either one will be expected to do the worlds bidding or made a fool of. 

Sad that our country has helped so many countries around the world and this is the reward we reap.