As a father I’ve tried to prepare for the delicate, difficult, and even sometimes embarrassing questions that my kids will inevitably ask. Ask me anything related to religion, morality, or the human anatomy, and while I may not have all the answers, I’m at least not surprised to hear the question. But nothing — and I mean nothing — could’ve prepared me for the question Megan asked me last night:

“Daddy, what would you do if I went to Texas A&M?”

After I regained consciousness, I explained as sweetly as I could that I would have to disown her but that I would be absolutely heartbroken about it.

OK, I didn’t really tell her I’d disown her. But is it that unreasonable to ask that your first-born child change her last name before moving off to college? I don’t think it is.

Clearly I have failed as a parent to properly educate her on the ways of the Texas Aggies. How smart, well-grounded young men and women move to College Station and become brainwashed into the Cult of the 12th Man. One day they’re well-mannered, intelligent adults, the next they’re shaving their heads, building structurally unsafe bonfires, and “Whooping” every five minutes. And then when they get older, they have little Aggie babies with maroon diapers emblazoned with a broken longhorn logo and “Saw ‘Em Off” written in burnt orange Comic Sans. And no grandchild of mine will be humiliated like that!

Megan’s new-found affinity for A&M, thankfully, isn’t due to indoctrination but rather her dream of one day becoming a veterinarian, and practically speaking, there aren’t that many vet schools in Texas. I could try leading her to a new dream, for example the exciting world of Information Technology, but frankly I can’t bring myself to crush her soul like that. Or I could try to persuade her to look outside the state for another vet school, but then I start thinking about out-of-state tuition costs and my head starts hurting. My only saving grace is that she’s is only 10 and a lot can (and will) change between now and high school graduation.

Of course, I’ll continue to love her unconditionally and support her no matter where she goes to college or what she does with her life. She’s my daughter, and I’ll always be her dad. And nothing will ever change that. Even if she does end up going to, well, let’s just not think about it.

Previously:
I hope they follow me
On dragons
The circle game

Of course, trivia buffs know that the first video ever shown on MTV was The Buggles’ “Video Killed The Radio Star”. But the first video I ever saw on the basic cable network (you know, back when they actually showed music videos), was “Centerfold” by The J. Geils Band.

That was in late 1981 or early 1982. Which means I was 7 at the time and in 2nd grade. My dad had moved into an apartment across town and had gotten cable, which was amazing in and of itself. I remember going over there one weekend and him showing off all the dozen or so channels, which were changed using one of these. I was hooked instantly. And I wanted my MTV. (It was also at his apartment where I first saw “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”. While eating Taco Bell. I’m not sure why I remember that, but obviously it made an impression.)

Now, would I ever let my 7-year-old watch a video about a former high school crush-turned-Playboy model? (A song, by the way, that contains probably the best lyric ever: “We’ll take your car, yes we will / We’ll take your car and drive it / We’ll take it to a motel room / And take ‘em off in private”.) Um, that would be a no. But strangely the thing I remember most about that video isn’t the girls prancing around, it’s the drum filled with milk.

Hey, I was 7. What do you expect?

Our house backs up to an undeveloped greenbelt, and we have a 4-foot wrought iron fence along the back. Because the HOA wouldn’t do any landscaping behind our house (like they were supposed to), we had a hard time keeping the grass trimmed along the fence, so I took matters into my own hands and decided to trim it myself, which required climbing over the fence because we didn’t have a gate at the time. While Christy was busy studying for school and the girls were watching TV, I climbed up onto the fence and hopped over. And that’s when everything went to hell.

I landed on the uneven ground wrong, hyperextending my left leg as I fell. Hearing a pop from my leg, I knew instantly I had hurt myself pretty bad. Nothing appeared to be broken, so I tried standing to see if I could put any weight on it. Nope. Back to the ground. A minute or so later, Christy came out and asked if I was OK. I think I said something, but I don’t really remember.

After making it to the ER, the doctor initially diagnosed it as a sprained knee and told me to follow up with an orthopedic doctor if it didn’t improve. Obviously, it turned out to be quite a bit worse. I spent the next two weeks on the couch with my leg immobilized. The orthopedic doctor determined that it was an in fact a tibial intercondylar eminence fracture and that we’d have to wait to see if it would heal on its own. It eventually did, but not before I developed a blood clot in my leg.

Turns out I’m positive for Factor V Leiden, a common hereditary disorder which increases your chance of developing blood clots. (My mother, sister, nieces, and at least one of our daughters have also tested positive for it.) I spent three days in the hospital to be treated for the clot and was then on Coumadin for another nine months.

Today, I’m off the medication and the fracture has long since healed, but I still deal with a lot of pain in my knee. I’m also much more paranoid about reinjuring it or developing another blood clot. And I’m also still paying off the hospital bill, which will probably linger for a while.

The moral of the story? Obviously, don’t do anything stupid. Easier said than done, I suppose. And if you have any family members who’ve had issues with blood clots, get tested for Factor V Leiden immediately. Had I known I was positive, I could’ve gotten on blood thinners immediately and would never have had to go to the hospital.

But I think the deeper lesson is this: Sometimes things just happen. I blamed myself for a long time for causing the injury and all the misery and hardship to my family that came with it. Heck, the blood clot itself could’ve been fatal. But at the end of the day, it was just an accident, and I had to learn to let it go and move on. I was having a crappy summer up until then, mostly due to work, and had I not gotten injured, I probably would’ve bitched about my workload for another couple of months. Instead, I ended up coaching my daughter’s soccer team just a week after leaving the hospital. (I actually showed up to the first practice still on crutches and spent the entire season with a leg brace on.)

I’m gradually getting better and hope to eventually run (or at least complete) a 5k with Christy. And I’ll likely be back on the sideline coaching my girls’ soccer team this fall. I may not be 100% by then, but at least I won’t be on crutches.

Previously:
About nothing in particular
I signed up for WHAT?!
August, you suck too
Goodbye, July

I try to be the best father I can for my kids, and as the song says, I don’t want to let them down. In the end, I hope I will have done enough and set the right example for my kids to follow. But more importantly, I pray that they’ll keep running toward “this hope that I can’t see”, Jesus Christ.

Remedy Drive – Follow Me

Why do some stars have to fall?
And why do some hearts have to break?
But today your only question for me is, “Can we go outside and play?”

Why do some ears miss the call?
Is this free will, or are we pawns of fate?
But today your only question for me is, “Can I stay up late?”

And son, I don’t have all the answers
And I don’t want to let you down
All I know is that I’m running towards this hope that I can’t see
And son, I hope you’ll follow me

Why is the moon turning red?
Why is there war, why is there hatred?
But tonight all you’re asking of me is, “One more story before bed”

And son, I don’t have all the answers
And I don’t want to let you down
All I know is that I’m running towards this hope that I can’t see
And son, I hope you’ll follow me

Keep on running, child, keep on running
Keep on running till the race is done

Son, I don’t have all the answers
And I don’t want to let you down
All I know is that I’m running towards this hope that I can’t see
And son, I hope you’ll follow me

Happy Father’s Day!

Previously:
Lesson One
Defining ‘manhood’

About a week ago, we finally got around to seeing the animated movie How To Train Your Dragon. It’s a great movie, and the kids loved it. Of course, when it first came out, I couldn’t help but to joke that it looked nothing like the book, that book being Donald Miller’s To Own A Dragon.

Interestingly, though, I think there might be some thematic similarities between the two.

Miller’s book, subtitled Reflections On Growing Up Without A Father, deals with the subjects of manhood and fatherhood and the difficulties of coming of age without a father. Fatherhood is likewise a driving theme of How To Train Your Dragon. In the movie, a scrawny, bookish boy named Hiccup tries to win the approval of his battle-hardened Viking dad Stoick, but the distant and cold Stoick cannot accept his son unless he becomes a fierce warrior like himself. When Hiccup refuses to slay a dragon, he’s rejected, left alone while his father leaves to wage war without him.

Miller reflects on that sense of rejection in his book:

There was a book with pictures of a boy riding a dragon through the clouds, smoke and fire coming from the creature’s nostrils, the boy leaning in as the dragon ascended over a pleasant village. And I remember wondering what it would be like to own a dragon, to lie across the monster’s spine, inching toward its neck as the beast jolted into flight, thrusting through the milky pretext for heaven that glows over Houston, up and above the weather where my dragon and I could watch lightning fight itself into exhaustion.

I bring this up because in writing some thoughts about a father, or not having a father, I feel as though I am writing a book about a dragon or a troll under a bridge. For me a father is nothing more than a character in a fairy tale. And I know fathers are not like dragons in that fathers actually exist, but I don’t remember feeling that a father existed for me. I know they are real people. I have seen them on television, and sliding their arms around women in grocery stores, and I have seen them in the malls and in the coffee shops, but these were characters in other people’s stories, and I never stopped to question why one of these characters wasn’t living in our house. I don’t say this out of self-pity, because in a way I don’t miss having a father any more than I miss having a dragon. But in another way, I find myself wondering if I missed out on something important.

The common message of both the book and the movie is this: fathers matter to their sons (and daughters). Children want desperately to be loved and accepted by their dad, unconditionally and without fail, to know that they themselves matter, and not just in fairy tales or stories of Vikings and dragons.

Previously:
Why does Donald Miller hate Texas?
(Re)defining ‘manhood’
Lesson One
Defining ‘manhood’

Anyway, I didn’t really have anything in particular to blog about, so I thought I’d throw a bunch of random things into one big post and let you pick out the stuff you’re mildly interested in.

First off, college football. I normally post a lot of college football stuff every year, but I haven’t written anything all season (which is now almost over). So what did I miss? A horrendous year for the Texas Longhorns but another undefeated season for the TCU Horned Frogs for starters. The Horns will bounce back, but not easily. They’ll (hopefully) fire a few coaches (Greg Davis, please?) and be a lot stronger next year. Of course, so will most of the other Big 12 South schools. Tech will be better, OSU and A&M are getting stronger, and OU is always a threat. The days of Mack Brown just showing up and being handed an automatic victory are over, at least for the foreseeable future. They won’t have another crappy season next year, but they won’t be undefeated either. I would say 9-3 is probably realistic. Not that that will appease the powers that be, but whatever. Parity in college football is long overdue.

As for TCU, the big news as of this morning is that the Frogs are jumping over to the Big East as of 2012. I’m not really fond of their decision. Yes, it puts them in a (weak) BCS AQ conference and gives them more national exposure, but that doesn’t make it the right thing to do. It seems like a short-term solution to a long-term problem. A stronger Mountain West conference, bolstered by Boise State, would likely be in contention for an AQ bid within a couple of years, but now TCU will be stuck a conference that sucks in football but dominates in basketball. Of course, the MWC — even with AQ certification — still wouldn’t have the big TV contracts that the Big East does. So perhaps the choice is really between Versus and ESPN. And really, there’s no contest there.

A big plus for TCU bailing on the Mountain West, though: We won’t have to see the Frogs play at Boise State. The Broncos come to Fort Worth in 2011, and then the Frogs will be in the Big East the next year. I’m sorry, but I just can’t watch Boise State games; that horrendous blue turf makes my eyes bleed.

I’m not about to complain if TCU doesn’t make it to the National Championship this year. Playing in the Rose Bowl against a very good Wisconsin team is not a bad consolation prize at all.

This past Sunday was my first week back in the Children’s ministry at church. I had sat out my last six-week rotation due to my leg injury. It was really good to be back. I genuinely love serving there, and I had missed being a part of it. Not sure yet what this rotation will be like. Last year we did a very big and involved Christmas pageant, but thankfully I don’t think we’re doing that again.

Speaking of my leg, it’s doing a lot better. The fracture is healed, and I’m gradually gaining my strength and stability back. Now I just have to pay off the rest of my medical bills.

I mentioned back in August that I had volunteered to coach my daughter’s soccer team. We wrapped up the season at the end of October with a record of 2-5-1. I learned a ton along the way, and I think I’d be much better the next time around. What surprised me most was how emotionally invested I got, and that wasn’t always a good thing. I let my frustration with the players and parents get to me too much, and I had to learn to let it go and just have fun. I think that’s where experience helps.

Also in October, I started a year-long commitment with the rest of my church to read through the Bible in a year. I’m happy to report that I’ve kept up. So far, I’ve read Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers in the Old Testament and John, Romans, Hebrews, and Acts in the New Testament. It’s been very interesting. One of the cool things is how the Old and New Testaments parallel each other. You have the story of Creation in Genesis and then another “In the beginning” in John. The introduction of the Mosaic Law in Exodus and then a contrast between the Law and grace in Romans. A detailed list of sacrifices in Leviticus, and Jesus as the ultimate sacrifice in Hebrews. The beginning of Israel’s disobedience in Numbers, and the beginning of the apostles’ obedience in Acts.

As interesting as it is, though, my faith has definitely been challenged. The more I read, the more questions I have. And the more questions I ask, the more questions that branch off from there. I can definitely understand why someone would read the Bible and walk away an atheist; much of it makes no sense whatsoever by modern standards. I guess that’s where faith comes in. I don’t have to understand everything or have all the answers in order to accept it. And that’s actually a pretty liberating realization.

My wife has asked several times what I want for Christmas. I can think of a lot of stuff that we can’t afford but not a lot of things that we can. When I was growing up, I always had a Christmas list that was ten pages long; nowadays I have a hard time coming up with ten things total. I guess that means I’m getting old.

By the way, get off my lawn!

While I’m on the subject of Christmas, can someone please explain why we as Christians put more emphasis on Christmas than on Easter? We have this huge month-long celebration for the birth of Christ, but His death and resurrection are a much bigger deal if you ask me. So I vote for moving all the pomp and circumstance of Christmas to Easter. Who’s with me?

Previously:
Thoughts on Genesis
I signed up for WHAT?!
August, you suck too
Wait, that was it?!

From the south, there is no industry to indicate a great city is near. Soon we will crest a hill and beneath us will rest a modern skyline complete with a towering cluster of buildings, factories, and freeways in a grand display of the New South. Dallas is the Seattle of Texas. It is what Chicago used to be. But no single man built the coming town. Dallas blew in on the wings of a Gulf coast hurricane and rained glass and steel onto a field of bluebonnets. It’s an odd town, though. A big, Republican, evangelical city where you can’t drink, girls wear black dresses for dates on Wednesday, and the goal is to join the local country club like your daddy and his daddy before him. When you build a city near no mountains and no ocean, you get materialism and traditional religion. People have too much time and lack inspiration.

We crest a hill and there she stands, just as I recalled, puffed up and proud of herself, all bustling with activity and shining in the late morning sun. Cars line the distant freeways thick and slow, bumper to bumper, moving together as if they were connected like an endless train. The highway rolls straight toward city center, through suburbs, past parks and soccer fields and strip mall after strip mall after strip mall. If there is one thing they have in Texas, it is land. There is no need to build things tall and close together; everybody gets an acre; you get an acre to live on, an acre to work on, an acre to park your car in, and an acre in case you need an extra acre. Driving to work or the store may take you an hour because nothing is close together; no space is conserved because, save the cosmos itself, there is nothing quite as big as the state of Texas.

There is but one Texas, and for Texans there is need for nothing more. A country within a country, these people believe they have found the promised land. Businessmen wear thousand-dollar suits with ten-thousand-dollar Stetsons. They drive king-cab trucks to their office jobs while their wives drive SUVs filled with kids in transit to and from school, band practice and football practice and cheerleader practice, and so on. And they have these little white stickers on the backs of the cars that read, “Michael … Plano Football” or “Michelle, Redmond Cheerleader” advertising their child’s achievement like a political statement, teaching their kids that what really matters, what Daddy really loves, is what you do. Give me something I can brag about to complete strangers stuck in traffic. Brilliant. I will have to send my mother a sticker that says “Vagabond” or “Late Sleeper.”

What do I think of Miller’s assessment of his home state?

In short, it’s a load of self-righteous, elitist crap that perpetuates a bunch of outdated, liberal stereotypes about Texas and the people who live here.

To be fair, he’s not completely off the mark. Yes, we have a lot of strip malls and materialistic soccer moms and ugly glass skyscrapers left over from the real estate boom of the 1980s. Yes, we have a lot of mostly flat land that allows for people to cheaply build out instead of expensively build up (which is also why we weren’t as affected by the housing bubble that crippled many other parts of the country). Yes, we have a lot of traffic, made worse by all the families relocating here for work. Yes, we have a lot of churches (which Miller, a Christian, seems to think is a bad thing). And yes, we’re proud of our kids’ achievements, although I highly doubt that’s a trait confined within our borders.

But as for the assertion that Dallas is a “big, Republican, evangelical city where you can’t drink, girls wear black dresses for dates on Wednesday, and the goal is to join the local country club,” I have no idea where that came from. OK, maybe in the “old money” parts of Dallas, there are still country clubs. But I think if you asked anyone in Uptown, Oak Lawn, Deep Ellum, or Oak Cliff whether they fit this mold, you’d get laughed at. (Or in some cases, shot.) And since the publication of Miller’s book, Dallas has elected or re-elected numerous Democrats, including district attorney Craig Watkins, Dallas county sheriff Lupe Valdez, and U.S. congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson. And to my knowledge, none of them wear thousand-dollar suits or ten-thousand-dollar Stetsons.

I think, though, it’s Miller’s last paragraph that really pisses me off the most. Specifically the part about “what Daddy really loves is what you do.” Is he serious? Does he really believe that all Texas fathers only care about what their children achieve in school or in sports? This, the same guy who founded The Mentoring Project, a non-profit organization aimed at providing male mentoring to fatherless boys? The same guy who serves on President Obama’s task force on Fatherhood and Healthy Families? Does he really believe that we are really that shallow? As a proud Texan and an even prouder father, I can honestly say that that’s not true at all. I love my daughters unconditionally. I’m proud of who they are, not just what they do. And I know other fathers who feel the exact same way about their kids. Why would anyone assume that a parent is that superficial just because they have a sticker with their kid’s name on the back of their car anyway? To me, it says that that parent loves their child and is involved in their life, something I would think Miller of all people would encourage. But I guess not. I guess I better run out to my car and remove the Upward soccer magnet so that I’m not judged by anyone on the way home (in the suburbs, where I live with all the other materialistic evangelical Republicans).

Give me a break.

Miller’s multi-paragraph diatribe against Texas is the kind of pretentious nonsense you would expect from some liberal Oregon hipster who’s too cool to ever come within a mile of a Chili’s, Walmart, or anything else that wasn’t locally-owned and organic — unless it was considered “ironic”, in which case it’s OK. But the thing is, Miller doesn’t strike me as that kind of person, which makes me all the more disappointed in him. I’ve read and enjoyed all his other books, but I have to say I’m genuinely saddened by the gross mischaracterization in this one. Maybe he can be forgiven on the basis that this was his first book, originally published in 2000 under the title Prayer and the Art of Volkswagen Maintenance. Maybe he’s matured since then and come to different conclusions about his home state. But it really doesn’t matter to me. Twenty-two pages in, I’m done with it. I still love his other books, especially Searching for God Knows What, but I won’t be reading any more of Through Painted Deserts.

I just can’t.

Previously:
‘Blue Like Jazz’ movie on hold indefinitely
Politics, the emerging church, and Donald Miller
Every state wishes it could be Texas
Don’t mess with Texas
Dallas is foreign to me even though I visit there every day

A few months ago, I wrote a blog post about defining “manhood”. I concluded that manhood couldn’t simply be reduced to biological or emotional maturation, but that it was the result of a conscious choice to take responsibility for our lives.

Newsweek, however, has a slightly different definition.

According to the liberal scribes at Newsweek, it’s time for a “New Macho”, where men are more likely to be stay-at-home dads or have jobs traditionally dominated by women such as teachers or nurses. They point to Sweden as a role model due to their mandatory paid paternity leave laws. (Never mind that Sweden has one of the highest rates of out-of-wedlock births in the world or that Swedish men are often forced to pee sitting down in order to squash their masculinity.)

In such a world, they argue, men are allowed to indulge in “decorative manhood” such as hunting, man caves, and other “retrosexual” hobbies such as The Art of Manliness blog, The Dangerous Book for Boys, or Dirty Jobs (all personal favorites of mine), just as long as we are are still changing just as many diapers as our wives and spending just as much time at the grocery store.

Of course, I completely agree that men should share parenting and household responsibilities. Fathers are critical for the health and success of their families, and not just financially. Yes, you should change diapers and shop for groceries and scrub toilets and be involved in your kids’ school and coach their soccer team and do anything else that’s required because that’s what mature, responsible parents do. They don’t sit around, expecting their spouse to do everything for them; they do their part, out of love, out of respect, and out of a sense of duty.

But don’t try and tell me that in order to be more of a man, I have to be more like a woman. That may work for neutered Swedes, but that’s not the kind of society I want to live in. And it’s certainly not the message we should be giving to our sons, many of whom are already growing up without a father or other male mentor in their lives.

Yes, we need a “new macho” that includes involved, loving, dedicated husbands and fathers. But we also need husbands and fathers who are proud to be men, not because it’s fashionable, but because it’s who God designed them to be.

Previously:
Defining ‘manhood’
Economist: Marriage is ‘necessary for good economic development’
Single parents cost taxpayers $112 billion
Lesson One

Megan plays in an Upward Sports league, a church-hosted Christian sports program aimed at teaching kids the fundamentals of sports while also ministering to them and teaching biblical values. Players are given positive encouragement and equal playing time, allowing them to develop their skills and have fun without an undue amount of pressure to win. They’re also given recognition for their hard work and contribution to the team, promoting the benefits of teamwork while fostering a sense of individual accomplishment.

Unfortunately, not all sports programs are this positive. A couple of years ago, Megan and Erin cheered on a city league Pee-Wee squad. The coaches and parents on their squad were all pretty supportive, but the football parents? Not so much. Most of them were very encouraging to their little linebackers, but a few of the parents acted like they were trying out for the NFL. OK, so this is Texas, and we take football very, very seriously here. But these are 2nd-grade boys we’re talking about, most of them barely able to stay vertical in their oversized helmets and pads, let alone run a perfectly executed fade route.

I cringed a lot during those games, sick of hearing the criticisms spewing from these loudmouth parents, and it really ruined a lot of the experience for both the players and the cheerleaders. By the end of the season, the girls had had enough. They had no desire to cheer again, and I don’t blame them.

But Upward is a completely different story. Yes, the players strive to win. But more importantly, they have an opportunity to learn and develop in a positive and rewarding environment, growing both on and off the field. And ultimately that’s what youth sports should really be about.

Previously:
I signed up for WHAT?!

Yesterday, I did the unthinkable. I volunteered to coach my daughter’s soccer team. Which I may have to do by myself with no assistant. And I’m still on crutches with a fractured tibia. And I’ve never coached anything in my life.

I’m an idiot.

In all fairness, though, practice starts in less than a week, and Megan’s team still had no coach. And without a parent stepping up to coach, there’s no team. I couldn’t let that happen. And besides, I got pretty nostalgic thinking about coaching her since my dad coached my soccer team when I was little. (We were the Kongs, as in King Kong. Yeah, we were some bad ass 6-year-olds.)

So here goes, um, something. Good or bad, it’s bound to epic.

Previously:
August, you suck too
Goodbye, July