Learning About Love: A Chronology

Fall 1969, Freshman at Oklahoma Baptist University: I was eating in the dining hall with my roommate, a basketball player on scholarship. I was a drummer on percussion scholarship. Apparently there was a "mission" of sorts for upperclassmen ministerial students to see how many wayward freshmen they could bring into the fold. Their approach to us was: "Are you guys a part of the "elect?"

I grew up in church, my dad was a pastor. I knew the lingo. I replied, "I'm a Christian; not a Calvinist." The leader of the group said to his posse, "Come on boys. Let's not cast our pearls before the swine." They collected their trays and King James (not Lebron) Bibles and left.

Fall 1970, Sophomore at The University of Tulsa: I was at the BSU for lunch (always eating). The BSU director saw me and asked me to come by his office. He told me of a church that was looking for a part-time music director. He knew I was a musician; he didn't understand that drummers don't make good church musicians--especially in that era where drums were considered pagan instruments that inevitably lead to dancing and sex. But the church paid $25 a week--where do I apply?

At that church a wonderfully kind and gracious woman took me, and every other young musician in the church under her wing with encouragement, grace and support. Her name was Betty. She had a daughter. In fact, she had three daughters and two sons, but she had this one daughter...

New Years Eve 1971: I asked Betty's daughter, Arlene, to go out with me on a date. Betty's husband, Ernie, was a Farmer. I was a long-haired drummer who drove a VW Bus. Arlene said yes, and I guess Betty and Ernie did too.

Valentines Day 1972: I asked her to marry me and she said yes! I asked Ernie if I could marry his daughter and he said yes too!

June 16, 1972: With my dad officiating, we were married. (I'm sure there was some "discussion" around the community about the hurried nature of this romance and marriage. So to remove any doubt we waited eight years to have children.)

June 13, 2014: Today is my Amazing-Missus' birthday. We will celebrate with coneys at Coney-Islander in Tulsa. It's sort of our place.

June 16, 2014: We will celebrate 42 years of marriage. And once again I will marvel at the fact that somehow or another this beautiful soul(mate) of mine chose and chooses to love me.

My Amazing-Missus on the farm where she grew up.

See that's the thing about LOVE; it is about choices and decisions and our wills--our free wills. I will admit though that I cannot deny the Hand of Providence.

I have laid out here a very brief history of how it all happened, but when I look back on our romance and life together, I can see pieces that fell together. And, yes I get that my choice of words makes it all sound fairytale-like.

The theologians will tell me I can't have it both ways, i.e.: "Either you believe in pre-destination or you don't."

But I can have it both ways. I can believe in an omniscient God who gave me the choice to love Him or not. I believe and know from 42 years of experience, I can meet a woman who chose to love me and still chooses to, and I know that can't be easy so much of the time.

So do I believe in Divine Providence? Yes, I do.
Do I believe in free will? Absolutely.
Do I really believe you can have it both ways? Without a doubt.
So, yes I do believe in Destiny. I do believe in Fate. I do believe my Amazing-Missus loves me. And I love her. And if that love comes only from a pre-programmed puppet of some kind with strings pulled by a heavy-handed god, it wouldn't be beautiful at all.

Once again, I will rely on the wise sage, G.K. Chesterton to help me with the words: 

I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act.
Gilbert K. Chesterton

Gone Fishin'

Remember these:

Creek Chub Plunker
Heddon River Runt
Paw Paw River Rustler
P&K Bright Eyes
Cordell Super Shad

Someone posted a "poster" on the Facebook that read:

You can't buy happiness
But you can buy fishing gear
And that's kind of the same thing.

Apparently the wisdom here is not the promise that fishing brings happiness, but the buying of the gear (tackle, as it was called when I was a boy). So it is not necessarily the hunt for the elusive trout that rewards but rather the hunt for the fly that might lure him. I can get in to that kind of happiness.

I have a wise mentor whom I speak to often about this second-coming of age. He asked me a few years ago if I had a hobby. No, not really, I honestly replied. He warned me that if a guy doesn't have a hobby well before he retires he won't start one.

I'm afraid he's right. So, I thought, why not spend some time here at About POPS, exploring some hobbies old guys can do? Let's start with fishing.

But where to start? Bass Pro? You walk in there and it is apparent that for these people fishing isn't just a hobby or relaxing past time; it's an obsession.

Obviously though, fishing has served many an old-timer well. Heck, it's even biblical. There is a big difference though between Jesus and Jimmy Houston. The biblical fishing was done by guys in groups using nets. You could have handed Simon Peter a Zebco rig with 30 lb test and a True Temper Cripple Shad, and he would have... well, I don't know what he would have done, but I bet once he figured out what the rig was for he would have laughed and said, "Why would I catch fish one at a time?"

My Idea of Fishing.

I'm not sure fishing is the hobby for me. I tend to over-romantizize the whole experience. I have an aversion to chiggers, ticks, and mosquitos. I tend to lack focus and patience. But there is one thing I love about the fishing hobby: the fishing stories. Fisherman are so fortunate. When they get together they have something to talk about besides politics, religion, and their health issues. So while I'm not much of a fisherman, given the choice of spending leisure time knee deep in a cold stream trying to cast a fly in just the right spot and sitting at McDonald's drinking coffee with a bunch cranky, bitter old pharts; pass me the stink bait and the OFF®!

You get a line and I'll get a pole, Honey,
You get a line and I'll get a pole, Babe.
You get a line and I'll get a pole,
We'll go fishin' in the crawdad hole,
Honey, Baby mine. 

A Father's Day Gift That Keeps On Giving

I STILL PREFER TO WRITE; on good old paper with a pen or pencil. I know, I know, I carry in my pocket an amazing little device that is all at once: phone, camera, music-player, calculator, encyclopedia, atlas, GPS, cookbook, calendar, notebook, ocarina, "book", pedometer, radio, dictionary, mailbox, newspaper, gossip source, and on, and on--not to mention a computer more powerful than the room full of computers once used by NASA. And like you, my life as I know it today, depends on that little sucker, so it goes with me everywhere I go.

But still I prefer to write the old fashioned way. Now I feel like the hypocrite that I am, because as is always the case, I'm writing this blog post on my MacBook Pro, using an app called iA Writer®, which, when I'm done and push the appropriate keys, will send it to the "world" via a service called Squarespace®. My faithful subscriber(s) will automatically be notified of the new post by the miracle of something called Mail Chimp®, and Twitter® and that ubiquitous force known as the Facebook®.

But still I prefer to write the old fashioned way. So I carry a pen and a little memo book called Field Notes. For years I've kept a journal. I did quit for awhile to be honest. Some misguided soul broke into my vehicle in our "gated" community and stole a bag containing my notebook computer, which could be replaced, and two journals I had written in almost daily for a year, which could never be replaced. Disillusioned by the violation, I decided journal-keeping wasn't worth it. But it is.

I highly recommend Field Notes books as a great tool to successful journaling. Field Notes is developed from the legacy of the memo books of yore. Something all of us old guys will recognize.

As a sort of challenge to all you "men of a certain age" out there to start a journaling habit, I have an offer you can't refuse.

For all you women and children who tolerate us "men of a certain age", if you are in need of a one of a kind Father's Day gift, here you go. But as they say, "Don't delay; quantities are limited." Seriously. I only made 3 sets.

Field Notes did a special limited series of Field Notes memo books for each state. I have bundled one of each book for the eight states along the Mother Road--Route 66. Plus I've thrown in an extra "Oklahoma" edition, plus a few other treasures like a Field Notes pencil, a Royal Pine car air freshener, and more.

Did I mention I only made 3 sets?!

So the first three people to send me an email at hey.pops.hey@gmail.com to say, "I want one of these sets and I'll put my check for $48.00 (shipping included), in the mail as soon as you tell me I'm one of the lucky three", will be the winners.

SPECIAL "ABOUT POPS" LIMITED EDITION FIELD NOTES ROUTE 66 BUNDLE

Life As Story

FOR A WHILE NOW I've been working on a project called, "Storyline." It's the brainchild of Donald Miller. The project is about creating a life-planning process based on the elements of story and was developed combining the principles of screenwriting and storytelling.

I'm a big fan of Donald Miller--for several reasons: one, he is an excellent writer; two, his ideas of looking at our lives as STORY makes a lot of sense to me.

I love bildungsroman. Some of our most timeless and treasured stories are bildungsroman. You know the ones:

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton

Bildungsroman are stories where the protagonist "comes of age." They're about maturity, passage, and developing morally and psychologically. This word, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, is a German word meaning "novel of education" or "novel of formation."

For us Baby Boomers, movies like The Graduate, To Kill A Mockingbird and Rebel Without a Cause are examples of this literary genre. Some of my other favorite coming-of-age films include: Dead Poets Society, The Breakfast Club, Stand By Me, and most recently Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom.

We all have a personal story, we're living it, and sort of making it up as we go. No doubt you remember a version of your first coming-of-age. Maybe it centered around puberty, or a religious event, or a rite of passage like the new found freedom of a driver's license. Maybe it came through a trial of some kind: losing someone close to you, a loss of innocence--something that required you to grow up fast.

Today there is a state or condition called "teen angst". I don't know if it existed when I was a teen or not. If it did, maybe it didn't have a name. In a way, this "second coming of age", as I like to call this time of impending "retirement", has some of the dread, uncertainty, and anxiety that the first coming of age had.

Quote by Donald Miller. Image from Pinterest.

Back to Donald Miller and this whole life as story point of view--Donald wrote a memoir of sorts called, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Life. Here's one of my favorite lines from the book:

“Fear is a manipulative emotion that can trick us into living a boring life.”
― Donald Miller

He's right; you know. Recently I found an Airstream that would have been a great fit for us. It was Used, but in great condition at a fair price. I disguised my fear of doing the deal behind a curtain of being wise and discretionary and responsible. A crock of BS, as the kids say. I was just afraid. Not that this is an example of a life-altering moment, but it is real. 

There's so much more I want to say on this topic, but I'm getting close to the "optimum word count for a good blog post." So I'll sign off with final words from Donald Miller from the same book:

“Once you live a good story, you get a taste for a kind of meaning in life, and you can't go back to being normal; you can't go back to meaningless scenes stitched together by the forgettable thread of wasted time.” ― Donald Miller

P.S.: I highly recommend you watch the movie, Stranger Than Fiction, with Will Ferrell and Dustin Hoffman. It's a great movie about life-as-story.