carbonated joy

A while back there was a Revolutionary war reenactment at a historical site near our home. It was living history on display. A middle aged militia gathered on the field of battle. During the week, these brace souls were bankers, teachers and real estate agents. On the weekend, they were patriots or loyalists. They assembled to resurrect a long resolved rebellion. The reenactors had studied all the finest details of the skirmish. They knew all the facts of the fight. They recreated it all in brilliant, intricate detail. They dressed the part with dusty tricorn hats and buckled shoes (both of which were very uncomfortably fashionable in the 18th century). They shot homemade muskets, and lived in tents for the weekend. It was all very loud and impressive. But, at the end of the day, when the gunpowder settled, there was no surprise. Everybody knew the ending. There was serious drama, but, nothing had changed. I wasn’t sure if the guys portraying the losing army were hoping for a different outcome, but if we recreate history the outcome is always predetermined. So they are left to fight the same fight over and over.

That’s fine.
It was very interesting.
But, sometimes real life becomes one long war reenactment.
We fight the same fight over and over.
We stir up the sludge of the past and we refuse to move on or let go.
We study all the details. It’s not hard to review the memories, they are seared into our psyche. We carefully memorize offense, we revisit rejection, and we rehearse revenge with great detail.
We reenact.
We relive.
We fight the same fights over and over again in our personal and professional lives.
Our pain stained battlecry is “You hurt me, you offended me, I can’t forget that.”
Sometimes the fight gets no farther than our head and our heart. Our opponent isn’t even aware of the struggle. That doesn’t make the collateral damage any less real.
When we reenact the same old fights, the outcome is always predetermined.
There is serious drama, but nothing changes.
Maybe it’s time to assemble the troops, because it looks like the militia have a decision to make.
Reenact OR recreate?
We can choose to relive history or make history. It’s the difference between a rerun and a revolution.
We can reenact.
We can continually live out a ever repeating life loop. But, Revolution is not ignited by repetition.
Stop the reenactment!
It’s to lay the homemade weapons down
It’s time for…
The most disarming of words…
Forgiveness.
Forgiveness is the ultimate revolutionary act.
Forgiveness…
Can you imagine?
It turns things upside down.
It sets things free.
It refuses to fight the same fights over and over.
It recreates.
We can forgive.
We can recreate.
Why in the world would we want to live in the midst of a perpetual fight?
Let’s refuse to be reenactors of conflict.
Let’s be recreators of peace!
Let’s fly the flag of forgive.
Let’s be the ones who proclaim…
The revolution will not be repeated.

Do you remember Valentine’s day in elementary school?
It was a big deal.
You would carefully craft a beautiful box with paper and Elmer’s glue. Then you probably decorated it with paper hearts and glitter.
You would proudly put it out on your desk, hoping that it would fill up with cards that reassured you that someone actually likes you.
We hungered for paper affirmation, hopefully with a heart shaped sucker attached.
You wanted the construction paper heart with two simple words scrawled in crayon…BE MINE.
We all want to be loved.
Then in middle school, the student council would sell cheap carnations the first two weeks of February. For a dollar, you could publicly proclaim your passion. On Valentine’s Day the student council officers would deliver the color coded fundraiser flowers to your home room.
White carnations meant “I like you as a friend”. A red carnation meant “I LOVE YOU and, even though we are only 11 years old, we are SURELY meant to be together FOREVER!”
OH MAN!! I wanted a red carnation!!
You patiently sat at your desk, waiting as the elected dispensers of carnation cheer would pass out their flowers.
Everybody got to see who was loved, liked or left out.
There was always that one person who got 20 carnations, while your desk sat empty. (At least mind did)
You tried to act like it wasn’t bothering you (at least I did), but inside a part of you was dying.
We all want to be loved.
Then you grow up and realize that sometimes love stinks.
We have all felt alone…we just want someone to say two simple words…be mine.
We wonder…
Can anybody find me somebody to love?
Sometimes our paper hearts get stomped on, sometimes it seems like we are alone and Valentines Day comes along and rubs our “aloneness” in our face.
The crazy thing is that the deepest desires of ours can’t be met by another person, by an imperfect love…we need a love extravagant.
At the risk of sounding hallmarky, the One who crafted your heart longs to hold your heart.
He calls you beloved.
He loves you with a love extravagant…
A crazy little thing called love.
I know that love…
It has captured me, it has set me free.
I have been wooed by an uncontainable and unexplainable love…a love that accepts and arrests me…a love that gives…a love that constantly whispers “Be Mine” to my insecure soul.
A love that finally equips me to love others.
We all want to be loved.
It all boils down to that simple invitation to be known, to be loved, to be HIS.
Listen deep….your heavenly Father says to you two simple words…be mine!
We all want to be loved.
It turns out that we are.
Be loved!
You aren’t alone…you were NEVER alone!
The One who created you, who has memorized everything about you, calls you beloved.
You are greatly loved with a love extravagant.
So…
Be His!!
Be LOVED!!

“Consider the kind of extravagant love the Father has lavished on us—He calls us children of God! It’s true; we are His beloved children.” – 1 John 3:1

Dear sweet grandchild of mine…
I can’t wait to meet you!
You will soon be the new kid in town.
I can’t tell you why, but I get a peaceful easy feeling every time I think that we are taking you home one of these nights.
Your GiGi is pretty excited, all she wants to do is dance with you.
We will show you off at the sunset grill in a New York minute.
We won’t even mind doing your dirty laundry.
The heart of the matter is that love will keep us alive as we take it to the limit.
Ice capades, amusement parks and tea parties, we are gonna live life in the fast lane, like a couple of desperadoes, and the end of the innocence will be no where in sight.
I can’t wait.
Big Papi

Home…
Home is a happy word.
At least it should be.
Home is supposed to be a word that smells like fresh baked cookies, a word that hugs, a word that wraps you up like an old quilt and warms you. Home is a word originally designed to sound like a sweet, familiar song that soothes your soul.
Home is meant to be a wide open word, an ever expanding word, always ready to set another place at the table. It is a word that breathlessly runs to meet the friend, the stranger, the outcast, the prodigal and says “I’m SO glad you are here!”
Home is a word meant to be shared.
It’s a word that should be more about generosity than geography.
Home was always meant to be a happy word.

Ten years ago TODAY we landed in North Carolina. We had packed everything we owned into a u-haul truck and our Scion clown car and we moved across the country, Diana, Delanie, me and our two beagles (one of which was handicapped).
We left Texas in the rear view mirror, and we ain’t been back. (That REALLY sounds like a line from an old country song!)
As with any new start, We left behind friends and failure, story and celebration.
The last few years in Texas had been really hard. But, tough times don’t last forever.
We felt beat up and beat down, we felt done.
It was clearly time for a do-over. Fortunately, God does do-overs! Everything changed with one phone call from our friend, Angela. She invited us to discover Durham. She was opening an office and wanted Diana to join in the adventure. That is why we moved to North Carolina. We had visited, but we really didn’t think we would ever live there. By this time, as a family, we had lived in Virginia (it IS for lovers, you know!), Oklahoma, Indiana (for a brief moment in time), Oklahoma AGAIN, and ALL over the Republic of Texas.
I remember as we got closer to the East coast we saw something we hadn’t seen in a while…trees. Delanie rolled her eyes every time we gushed about the foliage.
Speaking of trees, we learned that you can’t have too many roots, and it’s never too late to put down more.
We planted some new roots.
When we moved, I didn’t have anything job wise lined up in NC. I was leaving a really cool church plant and a semi promising telemarketing career behind, I was finishing up a book and I was pretty sure I would soon be a full time, bestselling author. (Now two books later, I’m still waiting for THAT to happen!). I ended up working at a fun park with some really amazing high school and college students who taught me a whole lot.
I got my first tattoo in Raleigh (and my second and my third).
I was the editorial cartoonist for the Raleigh newspaper, that was a cool dream come true.
We were smitten with the state, so much history, so much beauty. We were a few hours away from the mountains OR the beach!! It’s ALSO a great place to live if you are a sports fan! We went to Hurricanes Hockey games, Bulls baseball games AND we sit through EVERY Angels softball game, those were our favorites…Delanie played for the Angels. She was a fantastic catcher.
Durham was a tough time for Del, she was a middle schooler in a new town. But, tough times don’t last forever.
After two and a half years, we moved to Charlotte.
I started a wild adventure as a 44 year old middle school pastor.
We reunited with some incredible friends, and we have made a bunch of new friends and picked up some new family members along the way.
We discovered NASCAR!!
We became big Panthers fans (even when they aren’t winning).
God has set us up with a house and a yard.
We can’t wait to see what the next ten years hold.
More joy, more stories, more art.
AND a new little human to share it all with!!!
Our first grandchild will make her public appearance in a few months in North Carolina.
We have now officially lived in the Tar Heel State longer as a family more than anywhere else.
Our roots go deep and they go wide and now they have the unmistakable tint of Carolina blue.

Once upon a time there was a legendary place of legend in an enchanted place called Tulsa…
It was a big pink Mexican restaurant called Casa Bonita, which means “pretty house”. It was a pretty part of my childhood and young adulthood.
AHHHH, Casa Bonita…
It is a deep fried memory slathered in sweet honey. It is wonder rolled up in a flour tortilla.
You would go into this amazing stucco village. You would usually have to wait in line, so the anticipation would ripen like an avocado until you just couldn’t stand it! Then you would grab a plastic tray and choose between the all you can eat beef or chicken plate. There were other items on the menu, but when you can get ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT-TACOS, the choice is pretty clear!! You would raise a flag when you needed more tacos or another cheese enchilada. It was there that I developed a full blown love for all things Tex Mex.
One of the truly awesome, magical things was the space. You could eat IN A CAVE!!! There was a volcano that went off every 10 minutes. (It was probably the only working volcano in Oklahoma) There were spots that made you think that you were eating outside in Monterrey. In later years, there was a really cool game room. You could play some serious skeeball and win a giant pencil or lucky rabbits foot keychain.
There was usually a strolling Mariachi band made up of middle aged men. They would stand awkwardly close to you while you were eating, play an out of tune guitar and sing “La Bamba” and “Roly Poly, daddy’s little fatty”. If you didn’t make eye contact they would eventually go away.
One of the absolute best things was the Sopapilla, it was a ridiculously delicious deep fried bread pocket that you filled with honey!! They would bring you baskets of them. They were golden brown nuggets of heaven!
As you were leaving you got to visit the treasure room and pick some cool little trinket out of the treasure box.
It was a singularly awesome establishment . As a kid, I went with my grandparents and cousins and later my friends.
As an young adult person, I got to experience IT with my bride, We lived in Tulsa when Diana was pregnant with our daughter. That became our go-to pregnancy comfort food place. Diana would have a craving for a burrito or sopapilla and I was more than happy to go along. We would sit there, eat our weight in refried beans, repeatedly raise the flag and dream out-loud about our future.
Sometimes, some of the sweetest memories smell like fried food.
Casa Bonita closed a few years back, I miss it and it makes me sad that future generations will never get to raise the flag.
But now I say…
Don’t let it be forgot, that once there was a spot, for one brief shining moment, that was known as Casa Bonita.

From the badlands came the cowboys…actually, from the suburbs came the cousins.
Me and my cousin, Ken. One time we went on a trail ride with our Grandpa.
It was a big deal to us.
We had been allowed to tag along on this great adventure. It was a chance to ride a horse through the uncharted trails of north east Oklahoma and to sit around a camp fire, eat some beans, and maybe chew some beechnut chewing tobacco.
It was a big deal to Grandpa for different reasons.
He had invited us into his social circle. He was a proud chaps wearing member of the Oil Capital club, they rode horses in parades and took annual trail rides.
He wanted to show off his grandsons to his Cowboy buddies. We, on the other hand, just wanted to ride wild and free.
We were riding two Shetland ponies named Pinecone and George. They were spunky, stout horses who weren’t quite four feet tall. What they lacked in height, they made up for in personality.
I was riding Pinecone. We started out early in the morning, Ken, me, Grandpa and a bunch of old dudes on well behaved quarter horses. They were hardly riding wild and free. They were plodding along enjoying the ride, appreciating some beautiful nature. We were boys, we got bored fast. So we decided to race. We broke away from the slow moving pack. We shouted “YAH, YAH!” (That’s Cowboy talk for GO FAST LITTLE PONY!!) and they took off!! We were riding wild and free! We were going fast…well, as fast as a really short legged horse can run. They aren’t really built for speed, but that didn’t slow them down! The wind was in our hair and we were bouncing on our short steeds. It was briefly awesome and awesomely brief!!
We were racing back into the barn. We were clearly winning, although I’m not sure if that counts if none of the other participants know there is a race. They were too busy just enjoying the ride, except for Grandpa…
We were running wild and free right into the barn. I couldn’t slow Pinecone the wonder pony down. He was clearly wide open!! He ran until he stopped…suddenly…without warning…right in front of a metal water trough. He stopped so suddenly that he flung me right out of he saddle! I flew right into the water trough.
The good news was because I was riding a Shetland pony, I didn’t have far to fall.
The bad news was that water troughs are really nasty! Warm water, June bugs, leaves and muck and pony saliva!
I was soaked! I got baptized in water and horse slobber!
Grandpa yelled at us for being irresponsible. It was one of two times that I remember my grandfather raising his voice toward me. I suspect we embarrassed him in front of his friends.
When you break away from the pack and blaze your own trail, be ready to get yelled at, you will probably get messy. Let me tell you, from personal experience, It’s worth it! But, ALSO, remember to honor the ones who blazed the trails before you, the ones who paid for you to ride, the ones who invited you into the circle. They can teach you a thing or two about being wild and free.

I feel puffy,
Oh, so puffy,
I feel puffy and scruffy and uptight.
And I can’t help but wish
That right now was Friday night.