toxic masculinity

I've heard the term "toxic masculinity" used a lot recently.  I don't think I had ever heard it before a year or two ago.  I've never been the most masculine of men, but I'm not by any stretch effeminate.  So, I think I can maintain some objectivity on this specific subject.  Rather than write specifically on this subject, though, what I would like to do is use it as an illustration as to why terms like this are particularly frustrating.  Specifically, labels like this are used by people on all sides of an issue to either label everything they don't like as evil or to portray themselves as being under attack.

A real, valid, and useful definition of "toxic masculinity" would probably be something to the effect of, "Socially reinforcing negative behaviors in boys and men by creating arbitrary standards that associate negative behaviors with masculinity and positive behaviors with femininity."  I've seen and fallen prey to that.  Boys need respect from their peers, and a lot of times doing the right thing is also doing the girly thing--or so I have felt.  I've been the boy/man left to feel less masculine for doing the right thing.  I've been the boy/man who did the wrong thing in order to feel or appear more masculine.  I've also negatively reinforced behavior among others.  As a society, in our smaller sub-cultures, and in our families, this is what we should be addressing.  There will be disagreement about how that's addressed, but I'd hope we could agree that this should be a priority.  This gets at the root of a lot of criminal activity and actions that leads to broken families.  It's a big deal.

All of this being said, there are those who would want to take advantage of the term to knock all things masculine.  These folks are not be in the majority by any stretch, but they can be vocal.  I've definitely heard plenty of opinions about how everything in the world would be better if it were run by women.

As a counterpoint, there are those who hear people taking advantage of the term and assume that "toxic masculinity" is part of a larger cultural attack on masculinity.  As a result, they do not take as seriously the crimes committed through "toxic masculinity" because they sense a danger in giving too much cultural sway to the anti-masculinists.  They also view any criticism on the things they deem masculine as an attack on manhood itself.

This situation leads to the pitched battles we see today in society where people dig in and fight each other rather than understanding each other.

Perhaps the real antidote to the current situation is for discussion to move beyond blaming toxic masculinity, and to focus on what real positive masculinity is.  It can't be just what women want it to be, or what men want it to be, or what "the man" wants it to be.  It needs to be naturally masculine, but having a positive effect on society.  A lot of the traits I consider to be masculine do that already, and so the challenge is not changing everything about men but rather identifying the places where they go astray and focusing on those.  I'm sure this could be done for women too, but I haven't heard the term "toxic femininity" referenced in the media yet so I haven't given that angle much thought.

I think these sorts of issues come up with a lot of terms we use today, and have potentially been issues in the past as well.  I've heard tens of definitions of "feminism."  By some definitions I'd be a feminist.  By most I would not.  But the ambiguity around the term allows people to throw the word around in an argument and seem like they have a well-formulated position when they don't understand the basics of what their "opponent" believes.  I'd bet that if people to get beyond the term and focus on the issues the term represents that a lot of our arguments would melt away into societal compromises and solutions that almost everyone could agree with.

Labels should be short-hand ways for us to shorten the description of something we already understand rather than tools we use to keep from learning about what we don't fully understand yet.

feel loved

When you think of the feeling of love between spouses, boyfriend/girlfriend, or whatever, how do you define it? What does it mean if a person feels loved? I believe that this is the most fundamental difference between men and women, and this discovery is a multi-year process that I am still walking through.

A long while back I wrote something about not needing to feel loved. Ultimately, I've determined that this is not true, but only because of the way the word is defined. Almost every time I have heard the phrase "feel loved" used it has been applied to some need I identified as feminine. I don't generally have the same needs as a woman, so that verbiage feels inaccurate.

I really did not think in terms of actually needing love until Golden and I read The 5 Love Languages together a few years ago, and that only because the author kept speaking in terms of "feeling loved."

However everyone has needs.  That's part of the human experience, and I'm certainly no different.  If those needs are or are not getting met I have not historically gauged it in terms of whether I, "feel loved," though. I have discovered over the years that the phrase, "feel loved," makes more sense to the women in my life (especially Golden) than other phrases that I might use.  While to me the words might be "respected/disrespected" or "important/insignificant," the words "loved/unloved" appear to communicate feelings better.

Now, when I think of whether I or anyone else feels loved I try to reinterpret, "feel loved," with, "feel like my needs are getting met." I know these aren't perfect apples-for-apples phrases, however this makes much more sense to me.  While we all have different needs, we are all alike in that we do have needs. So, this is how I am resolving this minefield of a phrase.

song of songs

FYI, the topic below is somewhat adult in nature, but it is Biblical.

Along with teaching Sunday School, I also alternate with someone else teaching a men's class at church.  I could take the easy way out with video series, and I am leaving myself open to the possibility in the future, but I have been doing expository teaching through different books of the Bible.

What I hate teaching (or sitting through a lesson on) the most is something that everyone in the room already knows.  If I know a passage or a topic has been taught repetitively and I don't have something new to bring to the table, I really don't enjoy teaching the lesson.  Because of this, I am drawn to teaching things that others have not focused on, for one reason or another.

All of this is to say that I decided a while back to teach the Song of Songs in the men's class.  I used two books in planning my lessons (The Song of Solomon: An Invitation to Intimacy by O'Donnell and Exalting Jesus in the Song of Songs by Akin and Platt). I am going to be wrapping up the series in early August, and so have pretty much gotten through the entire book.  I have included some thoughts I have about teaching the book below.

• I never appreciated the true spiritual value of the Song.  Marriage represents the Church and Christ, and so the quality of union we have with our spouse reflects how we value the relationship between Christ and the Church.  The purpose of the Song is to celebrate and promote Godly marriage that properly reflects the relationship between God and His people.
• I never appreciated the context and target audience of the Song.  This is probably a song (or series of songs) meant to be sung at a wedding celebration, and targeted to unmarried girls.  One can imagine singers taking the roles of husband and wife, and a choir of girls singing the "friends" parts.  Who the target audience is explains a lot of the content in the book, not the least of which are the three commands in the Song to not forfeit one's virginity too quickly.
• I did not appreciate that reading this song literally is a relatively recent approach.  For centuries commentators assumed that the book is a metaphor for God and the Church or God and Israel.  The Song couldn't be about intimacy between a married couple because that would degrade the Holy Scripture.  This is a perspective that seems laughable today, and it is a ridiculous position, but it was the de facto position of all of Christianity and Judaism for over a millennium.
• Some weeks were flat-out awkward because my sources assumed that if something could be describing a very intimate part of the body or intimate action that was probably the correct interpretation.
• I used to have a real problem with the Song because I believed that the man in the Song was Solomon.  One of my sources (Akin/Platt) believes that this is true, but my other source (O'Donnell) believes that Solomon is only introduces for comparison purposes.  This is appealing for a few reasons, one of which is that it solves the very difficult challenge with the book that the Song does not describe a polygamist's marriage.  This would conflict with the mutual ownership that the woman expresses throughout the Song (Song 2:16; 6:3; 7:10), as well as with the fact that polygamy was not God's perfect ideal for marriage.  I agree with O'Donnell that Song of Songs is written by Solomon to describe a different, idealized couple.
• I did not realize that the Song was written very much with the intent of praising the value of virginity.  Apart from the commands to wait for love in the Song, there are a couple of clear indications that the woman (This song is targeted to girls) saved herself for marriage.  First, in the honeymoon chapter her husband refers to her body as a locked garden and a sealed fountain, indicating that she has closed herself off from men until this time (Song 4:12).  Second, in the conclusion the woman describes herself as a wall in comparison to a door, which likely establishes her virginity because a wall is not entered but a door is (Song 8:10).

The most practical lesson I have gotten from teaching Song of Songs is that a husband has a responsibility to praise his wife's beauty to her frequently and in detail, and see her as his standard for beauty, Likewise, a wife has a responsibility to periodically make herself physically available to her husband.  Those points sum up about half of the book.

I am looking forward to being done with this series.  That is less about the awkwardness of the topic and more about the time I have to spend in preparing these lessons.  I'm ready for a less-involved series.

why i'm a tightwad

I used to watch Suze Orman quite a bit.  It could have really been any personal finance advisor on TV, but she was the one who was on CNBC on Saturday nights years ago when I had an hour every week.

The thing I always noted about the show was that the people featured on it tended to fall into one of two categories.  The first category were the people who made every right financial decision in the book, had great jobs that allowed them to do what they were supposed to do, and called or wrote into the show more to brag than to ask for genuine advice.  The second were people who made a lot of bad decisions, or who were in unfortunate situations such that their finances were in shambles or close to it.  I never felt I fit in either category.  That, plus no longer having the spare hour every week, caused me to lose interest in the show after a couple of years.

Like most people in our demographic, we are in between these two extremes.  We are nowhere near destitute.  We aren't in the impossible ideal where many financial advisors say you should be either.

One of the things I have wished existed was some way to indicate whether you're making the right financial decisions.  I am not concerned with decisions about investments, or things of that nature.  As ridiculous as it sounds, I just wish there were guarantees that if I made such and such decision or put a certain amount of effort into work that this would cover all of the unforeseen things that we'll need to handle in the years to come.

I know that the worry that drives this is sinful.  I'm trying to repent of this, but I'm still human and I still have human drives.  It is something God is still working on in me.

The real problem I have been butting up against is that on a basic level I don't know what my responsibility is and what God's responsibility is.  Both the Bible and American society frown upon men who do not financially support their family.  What that actually means and what responsibilities it entails seems fluid, though.  What one person considers being financially responsible another considers not trusting God enough, or putting career in front of family.

Because of all of this I sort of default to being a tightwad since it's the safest option.  If I don't allow many frivolous expenses it's not my fault if some day if we're unable to cover some important expense.

I know this seems silly coming from someone in my situation.  I've got a decent job, a couple of degrees, and no student loans.  I still think about it, though.

marker words

The professor who taught my undergraduate Business Communications course offered a free service to review students' resumes and provide recommendations for modifications.  She definitely helped me craft what was the first draft for the resume that I would continue to use for years to come, so for that I am immeasurably grateful.  There was one minor thing that always stuck out to me that I have thought of throughout the ensuing years.  She recommended that I note that I was looking for an environment that offered employee empowerment.

Employee empowerment was a specific concept that she taught in one of the classes I took from her, though I don't remember which  one.  I took three classes from this particular prof.  The idea was simply that a business that espoused this belief allowed employees the leeway to make decisions (and potentially mistakes) because the net result for a good employee would be positive.  It's not a bad concept, but the phrase has always been odd to me.

What seems weird about the phrase is that I don't believe I have ever in my life heard a man use the word "empowerment" or "empowered," even though I have heard several women use it.  It seems like one of those words that I suspect both sexes have that serve as markers for, "A woman said this," or, "A man wrote that."

A few other words that stick out to me as marker words that a woman said it are "blessed", "tacky", "sweet", and "vile."  I may have heard the odd man or two use them, but they show up far more in women's vernacular.

I tried to think of marker words for men, but I must have a natural blind spot to it.  Everything I have been able to think of has too many exceptions to be usable.  As an example, in the past most crass language probably served as marker words for men, but things are different today.

Are there any marker words that you have noticed in your interactions?  Is there a word or phrase that, if you see it in an article or book, you immediately have a guess at what the author's gender is? Do you disagree with any words I mentioned above?

despicable assumption

Of the myriad of movies that our kids like, Despicable Me 2 is near the top of almost everyone in our family's list of enjoyable films.  Seriously, it's worth watching, whether you have kids or not.  If you haven't seen it, stick it in your Netflix queue, or plan on renting it, or whatever you do to see older movies.  It is that good.

Having acknowledged how entertaining and brilliant the movie is there is one glaring issue I have with it, and I have embedded a clip that illustrates the problem below.



I apologize that this is going to be fairly dark considering the source material, but it is what bugs me every time this scene comes up.  I genuinely cannot enjoy this scene, and this might ruin it for you too.  If you don't want this scene ruined skip the rest of this article.  I'm serious on that.

I want you to imagine for a moment you are that horrible woman on the date with Gru.  You're sitting at a table dining with your date when you decide to humiliate him in a heartless fashion.  You reach for his toupee then everything goes black.  You regain consciousness the next morning in your own bed, you are sore and bruised, and you have no recollection of anything that happened after the beginning of your meal.  What would you assume had happened the night before?

If I were that woman I would assume that Gru had slipped a roofie into my drink.  Even though the woman was not mistreated in the way she would probably assume, there very few scenarios where what this turn of events will not scar her.  It's played for laughs because we assume the woman deserves to feel a little bruised the next day, and the physical damage can be written off with cartoon physics and all, but the emotional damage that she will experience in this situation would likely far outweigh any physical pain she'd experience. This is a serious issue even before considering the real possibility that Gru would loose his girls and wind up in prison based on strong circumstantial evidence that he is a loner with psychological issues who must have badly mistreated his far-more-attractive date on that night.

If you read through that, I am sorry to spoil that part of the movie for you.  The rest of this film is entertaining, though this scene is unfortunately key in establishing why Gru should care about Lucy, so it can't be easily skipped.  It's just one of those scenes that I'll just always have to grit my teeth through.  Now, maybe it will be for you as well.

boring silver corolla

I destroyed the engine in my car a few weeks ago.  I don't know all of the details, but somehow oil was not getting to all parts of the engine, and so I burned it up one morning on the way to work.  Due to this, I had to purchase a car fairly quickly so that we would not have to deal with the complications of being a one-car family for too long.

My thinking was that I wanted an affordable car that would last a long time and get decent gas mileage, so I found a low-mileage Toyota Corolla, and now that is what I drive to work.  It's exactly what I was looking for-a practical means to get to the office-but I have been going through a bit of a grieving process because I don't like having car payment.  That is not what this is about, though.

When I got this car it was not due to flash.  While a modern Corolla is not an ugly car, a Toyota will never excite anyone. That point was driven home while I was watching the following advertisement during the Super Bowl.


I also found the following commercial in looking for the first commercial.


The silver car in this ad is essentially the one I just bought.  Talk about timing.

Honestly, I prefer to drive an unassuming vehicle rather than a flashy one, and I'm happily married, so commercial doesn't bother me.  Also, I know that much of the difference is in the vehicle colors, but I prefer the silver to the red as well, so that says something about me. The type of man who drives a red pickup is not me. So, while I didn't really take it personally, I did let out a, "Hey now!" when re-watching the, "leave him to be with him," part of the commercial.

What can I say, though.  My priorities are boring.

sports praise

As a full disclosure before I get into this I want to note that there are a handful of famous athletes that I look up to, so I'm a bit of a hypocrite with what I am about to say.  One justification for this is that in most cases I do not admire an individual simply for his athletic ability.

Women are judged by their appearance, and men are judged by what they accomplish.  Neither of these are right, but both will be the way things are for a long while.

I have been astonished by the number of people I have seen lately who have gone out of their way to lavish praise on specific sports players in ways that they might not do the same for a Joe nobody.  This has been especially noticeable with Mariano Rivera retiring, Peyton Manning having a career year, and a lot of people wanting to compare Michael Jordan to LeBron James as of late.  While the players praised play at a level that indeed requires incredible dedication, I have to believe this praise is somewhat absurd.

Are any of these people ever going to hear most of the accolades bestowed upon them?  They'll hear a tiny percentage of it for sure, but is there any real value in arguing about who the best basketball player in recent history is or waxing eloquently over a quarterback who impresses you?  Ultimately, it is pontificating about arbitrary information that does not meaningfully affect anyone in earshot.

I have been thinking about this due to the value statement I opened this post with.  Those sports figures are valued because of what they have accomplished (and may still accomplish) through their physical and mental abilities, as well as their willingness to train, and due to the efforts of countless coaches.  Does that change their value as people, though?  Is Peyton Manning worth more than a gas station attendant because one has accomplished a lot in the sports field and the other works a low-prestige job?  Would I be as excited to have the gas station worker's signature or autograph as Manning's?

I am sure that the allure of celebrity is relevant in every culture, but I believe in the West we especially look up to sports figures because we value individual accomplishment in men.  While you have to have won the genetic lottery to have a chance at being a professional athlete, you also typically have to have a strong work ethic to succeed.  Since everyone knows that great effort is necessary to perform at that level it makes those sorts of celebrities admirable.

The same sort of thing happens with women as well, but in regard to appearance.  As an example, Marylin Monroe gets quoted a fair bit, but few would have originally cared about her were it not for her appearance.

My real point is simply that I wonder if the human tendency to praise celebrities more than everyday people points to a deeper issue that we as humans do not know how to value ourselves or others appropriately.  There are some really valuable people in low places, and athletic ability and looks seems like a lousy measure for determining how valuable they really are.

love at first sight

I watched Warm Bodies this past weekend.  I did not love or hate the movie.  It was interesting enough.  The movie was a love-conquers-all zombie flick regarding the transformation of zombies back into something more resembling living humans.  That's not really a spoiler, as that's the selling point of the movie's trailer.  Also, the plot is directly influenced by Romeo and Juliet to the point that the main characters are named, "R," and, "Julie."

The storyline relies more on the power of relational love than most other movies with a romantic bent that I have seen.  It's love that drives the zombies' change after all (also in the trailer).  Part of that relational love thing was something that annoys me in most love-conquers-all stories—that initial romantic puppy love is the powerful love that conquers all.  In the movie it is not only puppy love that drives the change, but the main plot follows what I consider a puppy love relationship.

I know it seems only lightly related, but as long as I can remember a common question in movies and TV shows has been whether a character believes in love at first sight.  Frequently, some character's arc then sends them through a love-at-first-sight scenario.  In Warm Bodies, there is a love-at-first-sight scenario, but the writers built in some rules for how zombies work to make it not really love at first sight even though it totally is.

I have long wondered at the appeal of love at first sight for two reasons.

1. It seems like a lot to throw into a (potential) relationship way too early.  Love—real love—is wonderful, but also burdensome.  Real love involves willingness to sacrifice even when sacrifice is not reciprocated.  It is selfless.  That's a huge deal.  People are human, and being in a real romantic love situation before you have any idea what that person's strengths, weaknesses, quirks, and flaws are is a recipe for pain and disillusionment.  Will you choose to sacrificially love someone if you find that your life goals and priorities conflict?  Is that willingness something you want based solely on initial physical attraction?
2. Since loving at first sight implies severely limited knowledge of the other person does this mean that the person who idealizes love at first sight is attracted to people who make impulsive and unwise relationship decisions?

My guess is that the people who dream of love at first sight are not actually thinking about love when they dream.  I suspect that most people who long for love at first sight fall into one of the two following categories.

1. They want a serious relationship rather than a casual one so bad that they dream of someone skipping the important initial stages of the relationship.  Those initial stages of the relationship are the part where each person finds out about the good and the bad things about the other before putting their heart on the line.  Maybe this person does not figure that he or she will get past that stage if it is not short-circuited?
2. They want the self-esteem boost that comes from the knowledge that they are so hot they can cause someone else to stop thinking rationally.

Now, there are things that I do believe in at first sight.  I think strong physical attraction (mutual or otherwise) can appear at first sight.  Disgust or disdain can occur at first sight.  Intrigue frequently occurs at first sight.  Most frequently, I believe that indifference occurs at first sight.  One thing that I do not believe ever occurs at first sight, however, is true love.

the one who is loved

At any given time I have a few open thoughts and questions about Scripture in my mind, and so when I read Scripture I am more attuned to those thoughts and questions than I might have been prior.  As an example, I have been more attuned as of late to passages that appear to imply that we do or do not have a choice in our justification due to the fact that it is a topic that a friend of mine has pushed to the fore lately.  If I am consistently and objectively reading Scripture and I have kept specific issues at the top of my mind my belief is that those passages that support or do not support that position should jump out at me.  However, It is not my intent to talk about resistible or irresistible grace today, but rather about love.

A few years ago I noticed that all of the passages that I could recall about love in the Bible presented it in terms of sacrifice or humility.  So, for the last few years as I have read I have paid attention to what the Bible says about love, and thus far I have only seen that perspective confirmed.  There are certainly times when sacrifice is not the obvious focus, but it's amazing how often it's an unavoidable theme.  This is true from the love Boaz shows to Ruth (Ruth 4) to the love Hosea shows to Gomer (Hosea 3) to the love I mentioned in my previous post that Christ showed to us (Romans 5).  It is even true in the love that husbands are supposed to show their wives, as Christ's sacrificial love is the example that Paul uses as a template in his instructions to husbands (Ephesians 5).

This addresses something seemingly minor issue that bugged me since I was a kid.  John was known for referring to himself as the disciple whom Jesus loved.  Factual or not, I always thought this sounded prideful and not fitting for Scripture.  Now, when I view this through the perspective of sacrifice I do not see this as a prideful statement, though.

Luke 7:36-47 illuminates this a bit more for me now, though it flips who is showing love.

When one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, he went to the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table. A woman in that town who lived a sinful life learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, so she came there with an alabaster jar of perfume. As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.

When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.”

Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.”

“Tell me, teacher,” he said.

“Two people owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he forgave the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?”

Simon replied, “I suppose the one who had the bigger debt forgiven.”

“You have judged correctly,” Jesus said.

Then he turned toward the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but this woman, from the time I entered, has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet. Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little.”

As an aside, when I read this a few months ago in Sunday School I could not get through it without choking down some (many) tears, because this image is so beautiful.  The town prostitute who knows she is scum shows more love to God than a pious religious leader, and the reason is that she knows how wretched she is while he wrongly supposes he has little that needs forgiven.  If there is not a better illustration of who the true Gospel should and does appeal to I have not heard it.

To take this from another perspective that is on my main topic, there is much love where there is much sacrifice and where there is much forgiveness.  Where the woman above passage showed love in response and proportion to Christ's sacrificial love, the love that John received from Christ was great because it was in response to his own sinfulness.  So, saying that Christ loved him much was saying that he had a lot bad in his heart that Christ had to sacrifice to atone in him.  Christ's love is proportional to the natural darkness of our own hearts.  That being the case, I am a man who Christ loves very much as well.  I know how voluminous the darkness in my heart is that needs to be forgiven.

pride & prejudice

For Golden's birthday we watched Pride & Prejudice.  The version we saw was the two-hour one with Keira Knightley rather than the the five-hour one with Colin Firth.  Obviously, the book and the movies were not made with me mind, so my opinions on the story are probably of little consequence.  Also, I can only truly comment on the shorter movie because I have never seen the longer one, and I gave up on the book four chapters in the one time I attempted reading it.

Back when I attempted to read the book it was because I had been told it offered insight into a woman's mind, and I am always interested in understanding how others think.  It took me little time to realize that I was not capable of discerning what insight was available. There was too much about the story that was supposed to resonate with the audience that failed to resonate with me simply because I am missing the part of the brain that is supposed to resonate.  Also, I couldn't keep the sisters' names straight.

One thing about the movie that perplexed me a bit was how much of the story was intended to be social commentary of the society in which Jane Austin lived.  Elizabeth, The main character, is largely defined by how much she is not like her off-kilter family members on one side and the members of proper high society on the other.  At least in the movie, is Elizabeth supposed to be the character with modern sensibilities surrounded by people who are at least a little bit off-center, or is she simply supposed to be a participant in her environment who actually does fit in just like everyone else?

This idea of social commentary stuck out to me because I think that one of the greatest appeals to the story to modern women is that it hearkens to a time that many find easy to idealize.  If the story is actually supposed to negatively reflect certain aspects of that time period that is an interesting contrast the people who on some level wish they lived in that time period.

Like everyone I have my own escapist entertainment as well, so I am not one to judge.

the volcano sisters

Lately, the kids have really gotten into the TV show called The Backyardigans.  I am enjoying this because it has long been one of my favorite kids' shows.

The idea of the show is that five kids play in their back yards, and whatever storyline they imagine up during play time is the story for the show.  They play pretty much any characters a kid could think up from pirates to spies to traveling polka musicians.

One specific episode sticks out as a favorite, though, because I think it is so illustrative of a lot of relationships I have witnessed (and most assuredly not my own).  This is the episode entitled "The Legend of the Volcano Sisters."

In this episode the two girls play the Volcano Sisters who control the volcano on an island, and the boys play the Luau Brothers who are planning a luau on the island.  The girls announce that they are unhappy and announce that the volcano will go off if the boys are unable to address this.  Not wanting their luau ruined the boys run off, sure that the girls want something grand.

One boy climbs up a mountain to find the giant Very Heavy Tiki Mask on Tiki Mountain and brings that to the girls.  They announce that this is not what they want.  The next boy swims into the ocean to grab the Shiniest Pearl and brings that to the girls.  They reject this gift as well.  This point of the story is summed up in the song "Huka Pele," and this whole sequence is why I love this episode.  To see the guys running around clueless while the girls make demands is simply hilarious to me.  Finally, the last boy presents his idea of what the girls want.

The final boy brings a flower to the girls and asks them if they would like to come to join them for the luau.  Of course, this final boy actually did figure out what the girls wanted.  They were not looking for some spectacular gift.  They just wanted to be included.

There is probably more I can say, but I will leave it at that.  I truly just love this whole scenario from the episode.

parenting a princess

Our daughter Cd likes princesses.  A lot.  It's hard to blame her.  At least half of the entertainment targeted toward girls her age features the protagonist in a princess role (or a girl seeking to be a princess through marriage in Cinderella's case).  Of course she is going to latch onto the fact that the female protagonists that she likes all tend to have one specific role.  I am not sure how I am supposed to feel about things like this that the kids like.

In this case, part of my complication comes from the fact that I don't truly know what the appeal of princesses is to a girl.  I understand the draw that a boy has to superheroes or sports figures because I understand pretty much all of the fundamental needs and desires those roles fulfill in boys.  While I may have some good guesses, I don't truly understand the fundamental needs and desires that are being addressed through the princess character.  Is it being pretty and wearing pretty clothes?  Is it being special, because the princess is so important?  Is it being sophisticated (which I predictably misspelled until my spell-checker caught it)?  Is it the idea of being able to have all of your desires and whims be catered to?  Is it about having the power to be able to care for those who you care about?

With the superhero character I understand the positives and negatives.  Superheroes tend to be characters of action in a black and white world, and that action is violent with little repercussion due to hidden identity, so aggression glorified is the biggest danger.  A secondary danger is that the superhero fantasy validates the view that athletic ability (through genes or through military experiment gone awry) is the basis of a man's value.  The basic superhero fantasy is that by being able to do the things the superhero does you earn respect from others and self-respect you might not otherwise have.  Also, younger boys may not get this, but the fantasy extends to being a shortcut to proving your worth to a girl (be it your own equivalent of Mary Jane, Lois Lane, or Rachel Dawes).  I feel I can parent around these and other elements of the superhero character fairly easily, since I generally understand them.

However, the princess character is sort of giving me fits.  Is a princess a noble character, and is it noble to want to be a princess?  Is CD going to learn the right lessons from a typical Disney (or similar) princess character, or is she going to pick up bad traits?  Will she learn from the very stupid decisions the characters often make, or will she learn that those stupid paths are correct?  Will she learn that a lot of the guys these girls fall for in the movies are generally the types to be avoided?  Will she fantasize too much about being in a situation where others live to cater to her desires, or learn that she needs to take responsibility for a lot of the things in her life?  Will the fact that these characters are impossibly proportioned lead to body issues?  I know that I am probably over-thinking this, and I do not want CD to miss out on experiences that other girls her age have.  I just know less than I don't know about what girls get out of the princess fantasy, and that makes me uncomfortable.

the dad who works too much

I recently saw a Lifetime movie the title of which I don't recall that belongs in a very specific niche genre of movies.  It is a movie where the central focus is that a relationship is restored to a functional state once the man in the relationship discovers that he has focused too much time on his job at the expense of his family.  I can't begrudge this about the movie too much , since this is the type of movie that would be well-targeted to Lifetime's typical audience, and I did enjoy it more than I would have expected.  These type of movies do get to me on some level, though.

I have mentioned this before at a time in my life when this was much more of a sore spot for me than now, but I'm still a bit sensitive to movies where the fault is placed squarely on the husband who places work above family.  I know there are a lot of men who focus more on their work than their family, but it oversimplifies a complex issue.  It also usually couches the issue in terms that make the husband irrevocably the selfish bad guy who is the only person who needs to change for the relationship to be made functional again.

Most breadwinners in situations similar to the characters in these movies are not working long hours to afford a nice summer home, but rather to provide standard of living that they see as important.  The movies do not usually appropriately portray the inherent split priorities trying to be a good dad and a provider can be in the best of situations.  What we learn from this sort of movie is that if a man has to spend a lot of time working or if he pursues his career dreams at some family sacrifice that he doesn't really love his family or is not committed to them.  So, the women in the audience who feel like their men care about work more than them are supplied with a erroneous perspective that will only add harmful conflict and tension to the relationship.

I should acknowledge that of course the fact that this is a sore spot for me says a lot of negative things about me.  Of course it says that I view financial and other types of responsibility differently than I should, and it will be a long time before that is not true.  Of course it means that I still need God to set some of my priorities right.  All of this is something that I have been trying to allow God to fix in me, but old tendencies die hard.

As is obvious, this is a sort of soapbox for me but I have said enough of my peace.  Is there a specific sub-genre of movie or type of character or common plot twist that sets you off like this, even when you find the movie overall enjoyable?  Do you have a movie soapbox?  The obvious caveat to answering that question is that it reveals something about you as well.

rolling in the deep

In what appears to be an embarrassingly growing trend in me liking songs about women standing up to or wishing revenge on their exes (What's that about?), I'm finding that I'm somewhat drawn to Adele's ridiculously popular Rolling in the Deep.  The lyrics are not written for me at all, but for whatever reason I enjoy the song.



I have every reason to not like the song.  I think it's the anthem of a woman who does not understand the role she had in someone leaving her, so she wants to stew in revenge mode.  One line from the song, emphasized below, gives away the singer's mistaken perspective.

The scars of your love remind me of us,
They keep me thinking that we almost had it all.
The scars of your love, they leave me breathless,
I can't help feeling,

We could have had it all,
Rolling in the deep,
You had my heart inside your hand,
And you played it to the beat.

This hearkens back to something that I noted that I have learned in the time since being married.  Many phrases mean something completely different to a typical woman than a typical man.  In my opinion the "it all" that they "could have had" has almost no connection with whatever the guy who left her wanted in the relationship in the first place, and that is why he left her.  He didn't understand her and she didn't understand him.  She had some fantasy about the relationship that she assumed had meaning to him, but that he probably did not even know existed, and so things played out the way they do when two people don't understand each other because they're only concerned about fulfilling their own irrational fantasies.

I am torn on enjoying this song for this reason.  Vengeance fantasies feed off self-righteousness, and this song is definitely a revenge fantasy, but in this case it seems screamingly obvious that the self-righteousness is unfounded.  The woman isn't without the man because she is too good for him.  She is without him, can't figure out why, and feels self-superior because she is stuck in the mindset that her fantasies should have been their fantasies.

I think that a lot of the popularity for this song comes from the fact that a lot of people—while it would be women in this case men are just as guilty—see relationships as ways to meet their own fantasies without concern for the other person's needs.  When the other person either takes advantage of the him or her using the fantasy or breaks up recognizing how much effort the relationship is going to be, a song like this speaks to the person whose heart and fantasies have been broken.

This is probably too much thought to give to a pop song, isn't it?

the talk

During my typical morning contemplation in the shower this morning it occurred to me that either NJ or CD will probably ask about where babies come from in the near future.  NJ just turned six, but hasn't asked yet largely out of lack or interest of things baby-related.  CD, at three-and-a-half is very interested in babies, so I was wondering who would ask first.

A mere eight hours later I caught Golden explaining to CD in very simple terms where babies come from.  CD had told Golden that babies were cut out of mommies' bellies.  Golden explained that this sometimes happens, but there is usually a different way for the baby to come out.  Golden did a great job of giving the right amount of information for where CD is without acting awkward.

Golden and I have long agreed that we would be up front and honest as possible to questions about where babies come from, and eventually questions about sex.  There are a lot of reasons for that, and we both agree that the benefits of being up-front outweigh the drawbacks.  All of that being said, I don't feel real confident I know the line where to balance over-sharing information.

I think my impression is largely due to the fact that the people with the more extreme opinions are most likely to share them, but it seems to me that most of the opinions I have heard about discussing sex with kids has been from either extreme.  Either parents are over-sexualizing their kids by not protecting them from knowledge about things until they are mature enough to understand them or they are causing them to be sexually repressed by making natural things appear evil.  I'd like us to strike a proper balance, but that's a fine line to establish.

I think that there are certainly some real dangers to both extremes, but my real concern is that I feel that if this is something that we cannot discuss in our household that damages Golden's and my ability to influence NJ's and CD's understanding of sex, and can cause serious problems and heartache later.  It is a parent's responsibility to ready their kids for their adult lives, and sexuality is a huge part of that.  We would be failing as parents if we ceded this responsibility to whatever will fill in that knowledge gap.

Here's hoping and praying our next talk is not for another couple of years, though.

blood and pastels

Easter, and Holy Week in general, is one of my least favorite holidays.  By rights it should be among my favorites because it represents the event that forms the foundation of my religious beliefs and my relationship with Christ.  It just seems so feminized, though.

This may come down to the fact that the real holiday is considered Easter and Good Friday is a day leading up to the ultimate holiday, but when I think of the Crucifixion and Resurrection I am disappointed with the emphasis on pastel colors and dressy attire.  I'd mention cute, furry animals as well, but that opens a can of worms about pagan roots on some of the celebration that I don't care to debate here.

In my thinking, Christmas should be the more feminine holiday and Easter should be the more masculine holiday.  Christmas is about birth and potential.  Easter is about violent death, death's defeat, and promises fulfilled.  Mary is as much the symbol of Christmas as anyone because God used her humble spirit for His glory.  Christ is the symbol of Holy Week because he showed what true humility and sacrifice was.  Christmas is about love and commitment in new relationships (Mary and Joseph), and Easter is about what love costs in a mature relationship (Christ and the Church).

We all choose how to celebrate and contemplate the holiday, but there are also cultural expectations within the church regarding how the holiday should be observed.  I wish you a great Good Friday and Easter as we all contemplate Christ's sacrifice and its implications on our lives.  This is what I will be doing this weekend.

goals in marriage

This indirectly builds off a short post from earlier about communication in marriage.

I should note that this is not about some specific discussion or argument that Golden and I are having.  This is about me reflecting on how our approaches and motivations have been very different throughout our lives together, and we have not always identified that fact.

When I was seventeen, a Holiness pastor and general contractor I worked for told me something that irritated me at the time, but I have grown to understand.  He told me that romantic relationships at my age at the time were unwise because someone that age doesn't even know what he wants.  While I believe that God intentionally designed people to be very interested in the opposite sex at that time in life, I think my former boss was right about not knowing what you want at that stage of life.

I think the most difficult lesson that I have learned in marriage that has been that different people have different goals in life, and aligning them can be difficult or impossible.  It sounds so straightforward and easy to address, right?  Goals seem like obvious things that can be discussed with a future spouse and potential landmines diffused very early in the relationship.  It isn't so simple, though.  Goals like wanting a house or a certain number of kids by a certain age, or to make a certain amount of money or to own certain big-ticket items are only the tip of the iceberg when compared to the wants and motivations from which they are derived.

I'll pick an example that doesn't apply to Golden and me.  A couple may agree that they want to buy a house by a specific age.  While it will appear to both parties that they are in significant agreement, there is still far more not agreed on than agreed on.  What type of house do you agree you are going to buy?  Does one spouse want to buy a fixer-upper and fix it up and the other not want to spend the time?  Does one spouse prefer to spend on form and the other to spend on function?  Do the spouses agree on how much they will put down and who is ultimately responsible for coming up with the down payment, mortgage, upkeep, insurance, and taxes?  Does one spouse expect new furniture and decorations for the new house?  How hard and fast is that age limit?

This is only scratching the surface, but where one spouse assumes that they agreed to a smaller house with a big yard and a two-car garage that both spouses would work to save on until they got a 50% down payment even if it takes a few more years, the other might think they agreed to buying a split-level in a specific color with four bedrooms, two baths, and a good-sized kitchen with a 10% down payment or whatever they happen to have in savings at the age in question.  No one is more at fault than another in this scenario, but all of these little assumptions that one party had that the other did not will lead to both parties feeling like the other is not holding up their end of the agreement.  "He said we could buy a house when I turned thirty," and/or, "She said we would both sacrifice until we could afford a nice house," will lead to arguments and resentment.

So, all we need to do is be ultra-detailed in laying out our life goals, then come to a consensus about how to get there, right?  That's much better than before, but it's still not enough.

As I noted before, at least in my personal experience, even when you know what you want in life, you don't really know what you want in life.  You may think you want to be rich, but what you really want is peace, and what is necessary to reach a specific salary by a specific age causes more net anxiety than being moderately poor.  You may think you want to have a house full of kids, but you really are just drawn to always nurturing a baby, and when your kids get older you feel less fulfilled and more and more exhausted.  You may think you want to continue learning or improve your marketability, but you really want the honor and respect that comes from a graduate-level degree and letters after your name.  The long and short of it is that if you do not really know what you want your spouse does not know either, and any discussion about life goals without self-awareness is going to be incomplete.

Another pitfall is that it is easy to ignore potential differences in what you want in everyday life because any rational person would agree that it's important.  This is where I place the whole women want to talk about their day and men want to mentally shut down at the end of their day.  She thinks that, of course, any rational person would want to talk about their day; and he thinks that, of course, any rational person would want some down time. Any rational person would agree that spending time with the kids is more important than working overtime, and any rational person would agree that working overtime to pay the mortgage to put a roof over the kids' head is more important than a game of catch.  Any rational person would lease a car so as to always be able to drive something nice and classy, and any rational person would purchase and own a car for ten years or more to avoid constant car payments.  Any rational person would agree with you about a plethora of things.

Something further that I am still grasping is that, while spouses should work on goals together, it is not one spouse' responsibility to assure that the other spouse's goals are all met.  This is hard for me for a number of reasons, some of them rational and some not.  It seems to make sense that if you put all of your relational eggs in one basket for life, so to say, that the other person has some responsibility to help you be fulfilled, but this can in reality be a horrible burden to place on someone and a horrible burden to accept.  Some life goals simply are not possible, or impose too great a burden on the spouse or family.  Some goals will be mutually exclusive with the other spouse's goals.

All of this comes back to the inability to communicate when you are both speaking different languages, and the importance of learning the other person's language.  I think that God devised relationships in this way to help us grow in ways that we could not otherwise, and the effort necessary to learn the other person's perspective and language is a big part of that growing process.  Either that, or all of this relational confusion exists for His amusement.  I'm going with the first option, though.

directions and empathy

Two things that should have occurred to me sooner about the differences between men and women occurred to me in the past week or two.  Both relate to earlier posts I have made, so I am linking to those previous posts below.

First, regarding the cliche about men not wanting to stop and ask for directions, I have long figured it was about admitting weakness.  That's certainly part of it, but I contemplated the whole process of asking directions and there's more to it than that.  I think the real issue is that men in general are not all that great with step-by-step directions.

A few of the worst arguments Golden and I have had have been due to our differences in navigating our way around.  She works very well with step-by-step instructions, but if I use them there is a good chance I'm going to miss a step or forget a key detail (Was it right or left at the green street sign?  Wait, all of the street signs are green!).  With widespread GPS adoption this is becoming a moot point, but I would bet that more men would stop for directions when the situation called for it if those directions were transmitted in map form.

Second, women liking movies and situations where they get to feel empathy and emotion, I have long figured that this was about women better understanding the nuances of their emotions than men.  While I still think this is largely true, I now think there is a larger factor that is more obvious.  Women like feeling empathy and emotion and men don't.  I did kind of say that at the end of the earlier post, but I just kind of threw it in almost as an afterthought.  Unlike my previous emphasis implied, I now think that every other factor pales in comparison to the enjoyment factor.

I am a more empathetic man than most.  This is something I say that with far more embarrassment than pride as it's not a very masculine trait.  I believe I can definitively state that I do not enjoy feeling empathy.  I often like the perspective it gives me, and I still usually want to understand situations from other peoples' shoes, but the actual feeling of empathy is simply unpleasant.  Maybe there is something deeper that causes me personally to dislike how empathy feels, but I suspect that this is something I have in common with most men.

My experience is that women often get something out of feeling and sharing each other's emotions, even when they are what I would consider unpleasant emotions.  I suspect that this is similar to the excitement a man gets during the daring parts of an action movie or video game.  Being shot at or in a fight would not be pleasant, but there is something about putting yourself in the shoes of a fictional person in that situation that is paradoxically exhilarating.  Likewise, sharing an unpleasant emotion must provide pleasure on some level.

So I guess the long and short of it is, news flash: men and women are different.

craigslist killers

A recent story that has been in the news, and has some extra significance for me because one of the perpetrators is from the town where my sister currently lives, is regarding the "Craigslist killers."  I do not know all of the details, but I do know that they lured men to their deaths with a job offer for only $300 a week, plus board.  That is what stuck out to me.  The people who responded to the ad were largely men who were beyond down on their luck.

One person in particular who was killed was Timothy Kern, who was described in the earlier linked article as taking the job to try to support his three kids.  I don't know that I have much to add to this, but that thought had a significant visceral impact on me.  The guy took a job, and one that ended up being too good to be true, paying basically minimum wage to support his three kids, and that is what ended up getting him killed.  Not to sound trite, but Mr. Kern just could not get a break.

These sorts of stories make me feel very fortunate for the opportunities I have been given.  Not everyone has the opportunity to attain higher education.  Not everyone is able to find work to pay for that education and life after the education—especially not in recent years.  Not everyone has seen provision throughout the situations of their lives like I have.  A lot of people are looking at a future where their skill set is unfortunately obsolete or will be out of demand for a long while through no fault of their own.

Why would I focus on provision rather than family when being thankful?  It is not because I am unthankful for my family, but because the ability to provide for a family is the basis for most men's self-worth.  In thinking about the men in this situation the thing at the forefront of my mind is how worthless a lot of them have to feel, especially those with kids they are unable to support.  Those of us whose hope is in Christ should not place our worth in temporary and arbitrary things like that, but God's work is certainly not complete in me.

All of this being said, who really knows what the future holds.  Maybe I'll be challenged with joblessness at some point in the future.  I hope not, but I wouldn't be the only one to have gone through it if I did.  Maybe things will get bad enough that I have to look into sketchy opportunities.  Again, I hope not.  I can be thankful in the good things that God has given me now, though.  What I would hate would be to run into hard times then realize too late how little I appreciated the good times when I was living them.

As an aside, if you're looking for someone to pray for Mr. Kern's children have to be at the top of the list.  I just cannot imagine...