Anchored in Writing

My Interaction with Money

2012-01-19T10:00:00.000-08:00

Money is my handicap, my ball and chain, my bondage, my sinking ship in so many ways. I am just good enough with money not to draw too much attention to myself, no knocks on the door taking me away, no tow trucks repoing vehicles, and no foreclosure signs tacked to the door.

If I made less money I would be screwed. I often wonder what my life would look like if I made half. There are days I dream about downsizing. Not to hurt anyone, or maybe just because I am doing a terrible job with the whole money thing. I do not know, I am trying to step out of the equation. It is a slow process.

How do you do with money?

As Good as it Gets

2011-12-02T09:18:00.001-08:00

No this blog post is not about the movie, this is about my perspective. Lately I have began to embrace that now my life is and perspective have finally began to sync together. I had lived with the notion that my 'better life' would be just over the horizon. Today I now see my life and better life as one in the same. This shift has allowed me to live today with more peace and grace, and not be frustrated I am not living that better life now. I am living it, it just took me a long to realize it.

Cloudly Water

2011-09-22T03:13:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since I changed into a less open person to the general public in my writing. I began when I started dating Jamie, and the new interest into who I was. Before we met, I thought about what I wrote but didn't care much about who was reading and the impact the forever aspect of writing on the Internet created as an impact. Part of this change was healthy, the other part in some aspects of my life took the process of transparency from brokenness to renewal and put it away.

I would like to think I could write again from a place that is honest without hurting those in my life. To begin my life is still not perfect, I have small successes but I am still bouncing along trying to sort out boundaries and what is healthy for me. There is a lot more shit in my life. Some of it falls out of the pull up Judah sneaks out during the transition of potty training. Other parts of this are the toys that I step on all over the house. Or the extra collection of wash cloths in the shower that never seem to get washed unless I gather them up in frustration. There seems to be more of that lately. Too much shit to go around and not enough organization in my life.

Rock This Next Time in Denver I dare Ya!

2011-09-10T08:46:00.000-07:00

Okay I still got it. I am forty-three years old and can still rock this move one handed. This is Gate C32 in Denver. I just started this a couple days ago!

A Flying Story

2011-08-16T15:23:00.000-07:00

I carry an emotional weight of this story with me, and I will forever, after you finish reading perhaps you will understand exactly why on many levels. There are days that start and end normally, perhaps even from the outside looking in viewed as a success, but the vast amount of life packed into the middle is far from normal or a success. These days can end up being blocks that either we build upon or that end up sinking us. Unexpectedly, the memory of this day came back into full view and I decided to write it down and share it.

This event happened on or after the spring of 1994. I was flying for my parent’s business, Lockhart Air Services. I was scheduled to fly the Cessna 185 floatplane to pick up a group of native outdoorsmen at a remote lake, south of Landsdowne House. They had travelled to this location a few weeks earlier during the last of the safe snow and ice on snowmobiles and needed a floatplane to pick them up. Normally a pilot based in Landsdowne House would be scheduled to complete this trip, but the seasonal training had yet to be accomplished. Without another pilot ready to I had to leave out of Pickle Lake on a series of flights before I side tracked over to pick up the group. This early in the spring is called breakup, and many lakes still had ice on them. There were only a handful of the lakes were completely free of the winter ice.

The first part of the day was going well. I was quickly regaining my pace flying the C-185 floatplane from stop to stop. I would normally be flying the larger De Havilland Beaver, however it was still being converted from the ski plane configuration back at the maintenance base in Sioux Lookout, a couple hundred miles away. I had several years experience flying this airplane, but it wasn’t the normal aircraft I was assigned and I had to make adjustments on the different aircraft characteristics.

Being dispatched out to a location required the use of the basic four party description to where the remote camp was located. The three men signaled for pickup using a HF radio back to their town, the receiving radio operator would then call someone who spoke english, who would then call either my father Howard or myself to make the booking. Like I said a four party description often had a few challenges on exactness. There is an art inside the art from the experience of learning just where every camp was located and transferring these locations as ink marks on each years new VNC map. After all that communicating and translating I was dispatched out to now be flying overhead and spotted the three men standing on the shoreline waving. I circled overhead the remote waters and planned out my landing and takeoff spot, noting winds direction, wave action, water depth, and sunken obstacles. After the typical approach to landing, I taxied up to the shoreline, cut the engine and drifted up to the rocky and icy shore. We decided the first load was going to be just the moose meat and cargo. I loaded the aircraft to the maximum weight limit and readied for engine start and departure northeast to Lansdowne House. Without a scale pilots use the waterline reference on the backs of the floats to mark an approximate weight load, this day the backs of the floats had little space showing, a sign of a good ‘northern’ load.

A float pilot had to be quick to push off the shore and jump in and start the engine. Carrying the momentum was important as waves and winds could either be hinderances or an assistance. I had made several starts and stops before this pickup without incident. This time however I found the battery had not enough charge left to start the engine. As I mentioned the remote site where I was making this pickup had no dock only a rocky shore with areas of ice still frozen between the boulders. The loaded aircraft was spun outwards and pushed off the rocks to avoid the wave damage as it was now heavier and was being pushed back upon the rocks. With insufficient battery power to turn the engine over I was now drifting freely on the water faster than I could paddle back, the water was also too deep and cold to jump in and pull the aircraft back to the shore. As I mentioned this location was a couple hundred miles from the nearest repair building and in these spots you fix things yourself and keep going.

There is a procedure to start the engine by hand, and normally this would be accomplished with the plane secured to shore or a dock. Considering I had the ability to do neither I had to try to start the airplane by hand floating freely upon the water. This procedure had me opening the passenger door of the aircraft and standing upon the right float positioned behind the propellor. Normally, I would enter and exit from the left hand side, and I had to climb across the front seats and cargo to exit onto the float of the aircraft. I would then hold onto a handle attached above the engine cowling with my left hand and grab the propellor with my right hand. I had to quickly pull the propeller through the compression of the engine to try and start the aircraft.

Before I exited the aircraft I had set up the fuel pump, mixture and throttle as appropriately as I could to add just enough fuel to the engine so when I pulled the propeller through there would be enough fuel to keep the engine running. Once the engine started I needed to avoid the propeller and shuffle under the wing strut and open the door and climb back into the aircraft. I think most people can understand that when the aircraft is secured it is much safer. I was doing this all in a floating aircraft away from shore towards the middle of the lake and into larger waves. The three guys watched from shore helpless to rescue or help.

When attempting to hand start an engine the compression of the engine makes it difficult to start. It is a tricky maneuver and in this particular case it was a day that I would remember for the rest of my life.

As I held on with my left hand, and reached with my right hand for a long swing I remembered to pull back quickly as the engine caught. There is an anxiousness when doing this in the best of circumstances, doing this on slippery surface only added to the danger and risk involved. I gathered my courage quickly as the situation was quickly worsening as drifting with a heavily loaded aircraft in large waves could capsize the aircraft as well.

The engine started quickly, with the throttle set measurably too high. I was now instantly traveling well beyond taxi speed directly back towards the rocky shore with me standing as a passenger on the right float of the plane and no one behind the controls. I didn’t need to work for NASA to understand this picture was not exactly part of the plan. I quickly ducked below the wing strut avoiding the spinning propeller inches away. On the first attempt to open the door the slip stream of the engine was too strong. I couldn’t open the door this brought instant panic and an adrenaline rush fueling my next attempt. The handle on the door is narrow and slender and sits flush with the door, the adrenaline overtook my whole body with fire , heat and energy. I grabbed the handle as hard as I could, and weaseled my body into the crack of open the door to push it apart with my shoulders. I could sense I was racing towards the rocky shore, and a disastrous fate flashed before me, wreckage, injury, and ... As I struggled with opening the door and pressing against the slipstream, it feels much like your hand out the window of a car, and I reached across the front seat and pulled the mixture killing the engine. This was a momentary relief, the aircraft was still racing towards the shoreline. I quickly slipped backwards out of the cockpit and back underneath the wing strut towards the front of the float to stop the aircraft. I yelled for help and jumped into the icy water to stop the aircraft from hitting the rocks. I managed to get it stopped without serious damage to floats of the aircraft.

I on other hand, I just experienced a living nightmare in several unguided steps that began and ended without physical aircraft damage, but had left me completely charged and exhausted. The embarrassment of the situation was the last of my worries, I was now exposed to hypothermia, shock, and still in the middle of nowhere with half a day or more of work ahead of me with an airplane without a charging battery. I can just imagine what these three men thought of getting into the aircraft with me later that day.

I quickly had the people on the shore secure the aircraft with a rope on the tail. I took the front passenger door off the hinges and rested it inside of the aircraft across the front seats and reattempted the whole start procedure all over again. This time I could reach inside the cockpit without the obstruction of the door and adjust the throttle back to proper rpm for idle. All the while standing on the float, I secured the door, making sure not to drop the door pins in the water, and climb back into the pilot seat to taxi the aircraft away from the shore for take off. I had to repeat this fragile and potentially deadly start procedure seven more times that day. Seven more times, the flashback of the event burned the memory into my heart and mind. I flew from point to point going over this event in my head, wondering just how lucky I was to escape with little permanent result, just a building block.

At the end of the day in Pickle Lake I shared the event with my father Howard and we changed the start procedure in this event. The new procedure was to take the door off to remove the obstruction of the door in the event of the throttle being set too high. This would come in handy as alternators would stop functioning from time to time and pilots had to be able to start the aircraft by hand. Something I myself did almost on a biyearly basis. As dangerous as this was there is a skill set needed for operation and survival when flying in Northern Canada.

As I looked back upon this event there are a lot of times the beginning and the end of the day are normal, it is what happened in the middle that changed and shaped me. In writing these words my fingers are tingling, my heart is beating harder, and I just shake my head at the Post Traumatic Stress reaction that still beats through my body today.

It was just another day, I flew thousands of them, this one I will remember forever. If you are safe at the end of the day count it as a blessing, I know I needed to relive this to remember this for myself.

Back in Dallas

2011-07-01T17:14:00.000-07:00

Five years ago I came back to Dallas a little less sure what to expect. It was a city where I once lived and where part of me died. Now all this time later, my life is something different. I no longer live in the same city, I am remarried and a father, as well as we are expecting child number two. The old ghosts have all disappeared. It funny that what was so important seems to get lost in those translations of trying to figure out what everything means. Life is good, and I like it that way.

Stumbling Through Injury

2011-05-08T14:24:00.000-07:00

For the last two years I haven't been able to run without pain then swelling. For the last two years I have struggled to keep pace with those who have never been much for slowing down. That hopefully will change with the knee surgery I had a couple weeks ago. I injured my knee initially as a grade school kid. I remember not being able to squat to play catcher as a kid. I remember not being able to jump off my left leg as well as my right leg in high school and in college. In college I took my physical activity up a level playing university basketball. It was during my second year of college that my knee began to lock. This led to my first surgery December 20, 1990. The surgery was a success and my strength and ability was reborn. It always takes a while for your body to recover and reset after an injury. The muscles and tracking can be thrown out of line and have to be rebuilt, and retrained to return to a new normal.

Somewhere along the way I re-injured my left knee. I went to the doctor last year, and was advised to suck it up till I really needed it. Well this year I needed it. I topped the scales at 15 pounds above my college weight and refused to give into size 38 jeans full time. They were only on short term loan. A couple weeks ago I returned to the surgeons table and underwent my second scope on the left knee. So far the recovery from surgery is going well. You start out with the usual this doesn't hurt while the local area is still numb. Then you go through the I need pain killers and ice stage. This is followed by where are my crutches and ice cream state. Slowly though you begin to think it is going to get better.

For me it has always been about today. Not living for today as hard as I could in each of the last 2 years. No the today I am talking about being a father and being able to play trains, catch and run around with sore face muscles from smiling and joy. Today is here, the today I planned for as I tried to save my knee, and the today that has a two year old that wants all I wanted for him and MORE!!!

I have stumbled through the last couple of years in pain, and discomfort. I have allowed myself to change pace, and I am now going to have to shed this cloak of reserve and live again with passion and energy. I still need to rebuild the strength in the muscles, and the rebirth of the form of the knee without discomfort from torn internal tissue.

I look forward to enjoying today as it should be, to the fullest, at last.

Before Facebook

2011-05-03T12:54:00.000-07:00

Before there was Facebook, there were blogs. I used to blog more frequently. One particular post on the Sioux Lookout Hotel, and my memories of Stomping Tom coming to perform was noticed by a long lost friend. We connected as writers, and during that course of time I sent them an email in reference to an environment they were caught in. It was something that I could relate to, and I shared my journey through that and how I was able to pull myself through with help. I also explained how to protect yourself through the sound principles that many people do not always know that are available.

A few days ago I received a message of thanks for that connection. A connection that isn't as strong today because I have allowed my transition to Facebook to water down the connection. Dilution, is something that other people contribute to, and we allow. I am going to readdress that, because making an impact on people through intention is more important, than the weak flavor of ice tea.

Self

2011-02-01T19:39:00.000-08:00

It is interesting to find so many references to knowing who you are in my studies and reading. Who am I is the whisper in my ear? Who am I is the voice speaking across the room? Who am I is the scream from my own heart? Who am I?

I am a harmonizer according to my personality test. A people pleaser and a tireless worker. Well mostly tireless. That is till you push my button, and thankfully with forgiveness there are only a few people that push that button. They are the ones who want me to be their version of Lance, not Lance's version of himself. I needed to find out who I was without defending off a false facsimile of me.

I wonder do you know who you are and can you answer that question if you are asked?

My one word mission statement for this year is impact.

A Cell Phone Photo Adventure of the Lockharts

2011-02-01T13:58:00.000-08:00

There was a time when my imagination had a larger part of my everyday life. For me imagination is like telling a story and how your heart and sense of humor distracts you into joy along the way. You are telling the story, but as you tell it joy interrupts the progression of the tale. You seem to get lost in the world dancing around your tale, and soon find that the company that you keep is just as important to be included in your heart as the story you are reflecting from the heart.

As I loaded these photos from the memory of my cell phone to the hard drive of my computer, I knew that there was a story there, my story with many people included in it. There has been many wonderful moments of imagination and joy in these photos. Many are not in order but they surprisingly have enough continuity to have a story within their presentation with small side stories attached along the way. You will see moments of history, geography, physical changes, and growth of my family. It is beautiful for me to share this with you all. All three of four for sure! Enjoy!!

My Adventures of the Mind

2011-01-31T08:37:00.000-08:00

This is lifted from a message I sent, written to a friend.

Funny story, the crew flew from Burbank to Las Vegas and fellow Canadian William Shatner was on the airplane in the last row. You know Captain Kirk, and @**&%*(&@ my Dad says. In Burbank they use stairs to board off the tarmac in both the front and back, and he boarded in the back and sat in the very back. Me being a trouble maker spent the whole flight devising a devilish plan for a photo op. We ironically had three female flight attendants without a uni-brow and that were attractive enough for my scheme. I wanted to get Bill in the cockpit with the girls doing a sort of Bondesque photo. You know a fake pose holding a gun, and a few sets of cleavage and smiles all around type. You may picture it now, from the letter you submitted that started, I never thought it would happen to me...

Well the whole flight I am working my plan, calling back to the girls to set this up and to see if they would go for it. I got the camera ready, cleaned up the cockpit, put away the USA today etc... Well we land in Las Vegas and old Billy is a little wobbly, more than a little. I am trying to get him up front, and the missing link operations agent from Vegas is eclipsing the opportunity trying to Bogart the Negotiator with the ladies photo op for a photo with himself.

I ask and he says no, and he looks like he has been embalmed as little as just a few hours ago. I missed the photo opportunity, then the operations agent I think scared Bill away from us as he cornered him into the jet way for a more boring photo. You know the type, stand still and smile as someone is wetting their pants next to you in excitement. Dang I think it could be the three girls wetting themselves not Igor from Norway!!.

Sadly now I am looking just for the cardboard cutout to make it still a reality. Sadder still that will be easier to find then a all female crew in 2011. It just doesn't happen any more. Cheers. I won't tell anyone about the letter you wrote as a teenager either, oops maybe that was me, dang!

PS William Shatner is 79 years old. I think God was looking out for me that day as I may have killed him in the cockpit with all that excitement. Man I am one lucky guy, the stories that almost happen to me are better than not.

Lance

The Book of Love

2010-09-12T17:18:00.000-07:00

Sitting down to let my heart explore the flutters of imagination and desire is harder to do. I have a life that is pressing before me, richer and deeper than the illusions of dreams created from imagination. The escape of writing had its appeal, now life is not lived in dreams or escapes, but in the rewards of a presence which is greater than these words collected together in reflection.

Do not step on love
for each step touches a heart
past footprints hide the beginning of smiles
masking joy that needs to be led free

I have learned not to step on love
as it is as soft as the wings of the bee
the joy to watch it free
in beauty and in spirit
bringing life and wings to flutter aloft

Investments

2010-08-13T20:55:00.000-07:00

Today I arranged and rearranged furniture in our living room, and bedroom. This isn't the first time we have done this, nor the second, or third. This is however important for a marriage when you mention arranging furniture and your wife gets giddy like a school girl.
Something we will have to sort through together is the old furniture we have that I bought pre married life. Life takes a while to replace the old with new.

2010-07-18T19:56:00.000-07:00

Two years years ago Jamie showed up in her Jeep Wrangler loaded up from leaving her job in Minneapolis and moving into my house here in Nashville as husband and wife. At the time I had already owed the house here for a year. After two years together here in Nashville I have learned there is a big difference between bringing a house into a person's life and bringing a house to life.

A lot has changed, I am not talking about how many times I have since helped rearranged furniture, that is a whole other story. I think it is remarkable how much has transformed in my life since that day she showed up for keeps. My life reflected back to being here alone in Nashville this weekend, as Jamie and Judah are in Wisconsin. It sure feels different without the life that she has brought into the house.

Each season together there has been a gift the greatest is making a house a home.

Fathers and Sons

2010-06-14T08:18:00.000-07:00

Around here you can hear Dada today he brought up his toy airplane and his chin was covered in sputtering spit as he mimicked the sounds of jet engines. I love our son.

Distorted Beauty

2010-06-13T09:15:00.000-07:00

There has been a lot going on inside the my world of beauty lately. Most of the expression of beauty from my heart has come through the interaction with my son Judah. That has left a bridge that needs to be continually connected with my wife Jamie. Both of us though have seen this addition in our lives as an adjustment to how we have shared our ability to express ourselves. We met through our mutual interest in writing, photography and connecting together through relationships. She continued, and I sputtered along. Her heart was still alive with beauty, and mine was still in the process of renovation and forgiveness. A process of reaffirming what I have found in myself.

There are times when we sit and listen to how to live, and how to share, and for a brief moment we reflect those words over everything else that we know. There is a difference between abandoning what our heart expresses through our touch, and repeating the reflection of others. It is hard to separate how we need to grow through our journey and what we naturally express through our moments of beauty.

There is a place without distortion of beauty, there is a place without the imprint of complications, there are many places where we can hide, but our heart is no place to hide. There is no perfect moment where it all makes sense, only knowing that can I begin to reconnect as passionately as I have once before. Several times before I have come so far only to retreat, I can pledge to continue, but the true test is to actually see it through to where beauty is restored as it should be.

Fatigue from Measurement

2010-06-12T20:12:00.000-07:00

I am lost in exasperation and fatigue when I find life doesn't follow the simplicity of my own thoughts. Each of us are different in some way, and understanding those differences for me are not always easy. Meaning well, we all mean well don't we? Understanding well, we all do not understand each other very well though. I find this a battle at times, a battle between intentions and understanding. When I try to understand others, or communicate in way that implies understanding I find myself measuring what everything means. I wonder why that is? Fatigue from measurement. Is there is no way to avoid this in how I process?

Money

2010-06-08T17:06:00.000-07:00

I am finding that 41, money has been a major issue in my life that I allowed to shape a lot of my emotional content towards my relationships. Now that I am married I have to separate the two in order to keep money from not shaping my relationship. There are times when the furnace needs to be replaced and it sucks, but love should never be tampered with by money.

Nashville Under Water

2010-06-08T03:28:00.000-07:00

Stepping Back into the Water

2010-06-03T06:16:00.000-07:00

For so many of us, the first swim after the long winter season is difficult. We have to ease our bodies back into the water carefully and adjust to the temperature. The same is said with writing. I have lost part of the art of expression without writing. I hope to find it again.

Lift

2009-11-18T14:03:00.000-08:00

As long as I could remember I have loved flying eagles, I loved receiving them and now as a 'grown up' I love giving them. Judah loves receiving them as well. I have also found that I gave my nephews Max and Jacob flying eagles before Judah came along as well. To me this is interesting that I love providing life for others to see their smile. Maybe it rubbed off on what I do as well? Perhaps, you are now free to provide life.

From the Kitchen

2009-11-08T15:48:00.000-08:00

I can hear the sounds of my keys being shaken and hit against Judah's little Graco walker. Jamie is clipping coupons and supervising Motherhood. It suits her very well. I am listening to the Nascar race and thinking about what is transpiring in Northern Ontario as a plane that I used to fly while employed by my parents has gone missing. It is hard when life presents a tragedy in the middle of everything that is good. I do not understand why, however we are praying for the pilot and the two passengers that were on the aircraft and their families. These memories can be haunting remembering close calls of my own throughout my career. I left most of that behind to find what I have now. What I have now though is still connected emotionally to everything I have ever been committed to. Part of me didn't want to know, none of us want to know about a tragedy in progress without an answer. This empties part of my heart.

A Resonating Heart

2009-11-04T13:58:00.000-08:00

A resonating heart has many spots
some weak some not
some are easy to see others are absent

A resonating heart has many lives
some filled with joy
others with pain

A resonating heart beats for life
simple yet repeating
for the wonder of it all

Mighty To Save

2009-11-01T17:18:00.001-08:00

Getting Weighed Down in Nothingness

2009-10-30T21:36:00.000-07:00

For me getting weighed down in nothingness is a constant struggle. It isn't exactly nothing, nothing is nothing, if that makes sense, or everything is something. It is a balance between what we do and not do as well what needs to be done and what needs to be left till when you good and well have to do it. The problem is learning when to do what needs to be done.

In my twenties I kept on saving for retirement and cashing it out, once to pay for my 737 type rating, which got me my job at SWA. Once to pay off bad relationship debt, which freed me to get remarried, ah the joys of freedom. So what I thought I was saving for became what I was living for. So that is not nothingness, but it was somethingness. It is complicated. I knew if I never saved it would never be there.

There has to be more to this nothingness. I think there is. It is the balance between what we want to do but don't. Intent and action is important. There is also that little thing in our life called avoidance, which does not always belong to us, but we soon own what others don't. It can be sad really, how we weigh ourselves down in our own nothingness. Never exactly where we want to be and where we need to be because of nothing at all that didn't get us to where we needed to be.

I enjoy listening to music, and sorting through thousands of music files built up to an impossible project. Months would pass and nothing. I love taking pictures and 50 000 pictures later, not sorting through has become another impossible project. I am weighed down in my nothingness. Sorting through this is one click at a time, in bits and pieces of time that are allocated to this.

In the music notes, I am now below 7800 songs, that are being listened to one at a time for a thumbs up or down. Now with the apple tv, what plays on the playlist is much more important. The same goes for pictures. I want to get them to a manageable level as well.

The weight of nothingness is lifting one small block of time at a time. It is an exhausting life catching up for my nothingness, and depression that I worked through. Maybe it wasn't depression, whatever it was it added to a lot of nothingness in my life.

The next step is a garage to be built this year. It is time to step forward and not always live for what I am saving for and save what I am living for. Or something like that.

This is a simple post, that sort of jumps around, however inside of this nothingness is a simple lesson. Engage in what you love sooner rather than later. See you soon.

Apple TV

2009-10-29T07:18:00.000-07:00

If you haven't heard about Apple TV let me introduce you to it. Apple TV is a wireless hard drive that is connected no your wireless network and to your television set. Apple TV links into an itunes account and plays your media content. It can play all your music, videos, televisions shows, and movies purchased through the itunes store. It can also play YouTube video content, and display your pictures. For Jamie and I what has been the most fun is the slide show feature of our photos. It displays multiple photos at once on the screen scrolling through continuously.

As the pictures scroll on the screen you are looking at ten or so pictures at once. The content is a great way to share and enjoy your photos. It is a lot of fun. It is worth a look. We bought a refurbished 160 GB model for our living room.

Die to Live

2009-10-28T06:40:00.000-07:00

I never thought about what I need to have die in my life very much till I met Jamie before we got married. Ever since then, God has been working on my heart in ways I never could have imagined that I would grow. Die to live, changed my life.

Having a Nice Night

2009-10-27T17:51:00.000-07:00

Dishes were washed in hot water
gold silverware were rinsed and set on clothe napkins
a pumpkin found its match
clean and hollowed
a dish was prepared and set to rest in the oven
the house smelled of autumn
spices and with apples
a little one walked around investigating the bigs

the house is definitely a home.

Black Ice

2009-10-26T17:37:00.000-07:00

Last week while flying I had the unfortunate opportunity to put all my training into practice. It was a startling event, that was like spinning on black ice for several minutes. Today I ran into one of the flight attendant crew that I was working with on that flight and we had a couple minutes to check up on each other. It was a great moment to say hello as we shared this event together. I am thankful for good co-workers.

Imagination

2009-09-05T09:35:00.000-07:00

There are many places that are only in our minds, that is till we walk into the picture and they now become part of our world.

Here in Central Park, hundreds of references to this place are in my life, this one though captures the imagination and wonder of it all.

The Lewis and Clark Experience

2009-09-01T10:06:00.001-07:00

Being a father is a fairly new experience for me, but I have learned a couple things. One of which is the Lewis and Clark experience when it come to baby poo. It is an exploration of the whole body, yuck!

Month Four

2009-08-30T11:38:00.001-07:00

Our Son Judah is four months old. It is a wonderful experience for me to learn how misinformed I have been about so much in my life. I do not find this funny, I find it puzzling how I have been so wrong about so much. Wrong about my parents, wrong about myself as a son and a brother, and simply wrong about being a parent. I have taken pride being observant and enlightened my whole life, unfortunately so much of this was self-centered.

One part of what my son has taught me is that life moves faster than we have time to prepare for. You simply have to keep moving and keeping up. Organization and sensitivity are mostly forgotten. That is hard for me as those are both qualities and skills that I value.

It was a Moment

2009-08-30T10:09:00.000-07:00

I was sitting at a window seat, quietly listening to music watching the ground pass beneath the wings. There were patches of green and yellow as the crops get closer to harvest. Inside of my mind, I could sense the openning of a door that has been closed for some time. I smiled and I knew that what I was looking around for like lost keys while you are running out of the door had been found. It was a moment.