life goals

Someone in our church has been teaching a marriage class Wednesday nights.  Golden is unable to attend because she teaches a pre-schooler class, but I've had the opportunity to regularly be there.

Much of the early portion of the class has been focused on avoiding contemptuous behavior and attitudes as well as becoming friends and allies.  I don't think I act with contempt a whole lot, though I'm sure I'm not perfect.  One thing that the class focused on regarding connecting with your spouse is learning more about each other's goals, desires, histories, etc.  Through this I've started to think about the fact that, while I have vague goals for life, I haven't really articulated them.

Golden and I talked about this aspect of the class and its associated book, and so we agreed to work on listing our goals for life and for our kids.  As I sat down to write about it I realized that, while I have an idealized idea of what I think a contented life looks like, I don't have a long bucket list of items I need to accomplish in life.  I don't know if this is good or bad.

What I would consider a contented life looks pretty selfish to me at the same time.  It largely boils down to wanting to have time to do such and such thing that is personally fulfilling but doesn't enhance anyone else's life.  I think that just comes from being a parent with less free time than I'd like.  At a different time in life the contented life list would look different.

Regarding the bucket list, I have precious few things on the list I really feel like I need to do, and the things that are on the list are completely negotiable.  As an example, I'd like to travel at some point, but where doesn't matter much to me.  Is having a more specific bucket list more fulfilling?

I think that part of why I have avoided creating a bucket list of measurable goals in the past is that it's not always realistic to check things off such a list.  Will I get a bad attitude about the things keeping me from accomplishing the list, or will it be a hit to my self-worth if I can't reasonably accomplish the things that I have put out there that I want to accomplish?  While I haven't explicitly thought this, it is just easier not to share all of what I might have as a goal, especially if I haven't fleshed out the specifics of it.

So, my question to you is, do you have specific or vague life goals?  Do you have a literal bucket list?  Are there things you assume you'll start doing later in life when there's time to do them?

provide a boy

Golden and I both always wanted a boy and a girl because that is what we both grew up with.  We didn't, and I still don't, think of either as being easier or harder to raise, or more or less fun to have around.  Golden had another pressure that I never understood, though.  She felt that she needed to provide me a boy.

I wish she never saw this as a burden, because I always considered the idea silly. Since I never got the impression that it was a big deal to my dad, and it isn't a big deal to me, I always assumed the idea of having someone carry on your name was a dying artifact of a bygone era that modern people didn't care about.  While we did have a boy--and a wonderful one at that--I wouldn't have cared if we only had girls, other than that I would have felt bad for Golden for the burden.

In the past few years I have actually heard a few men make comments about this that have shocked me.  They implied that having a boy was much better than having a girl.  There are actually men who care about this!?  And not only that, I've heard this from some who consider themselves "progressive"! Unless I felt pressure from my parents on this I cannot fathom it being a huge deal what gender my kids were.

We're happy with our boy and our girl.  I can honestly say I would be just as happy if we had two boys or two girls, though.  We love them both!

no problem

A while back—probably a year or two ago—Golden asked me why I always respond to people thanking me with, "No problem." She noted that, "You're welcome," would be better. Old habits die hard, so I have not really changed things, though I think about it more. I do think that this has exposed a difference in how I think versus how she and I am sure many others think, and I would never had even considered it had that conversation not occurred.

I do not know this for a fact, but I suspect that most people answer one way or the other, and do not alternate between the two too much. The reason I think this is that there is a very specific reason that, "No problem," seems natural to me. If someone does not have that same personality quirk, I would suspect that they would tend to use, "You're welcome," more than, "No problem," as well.

For one reason or another (or a hundred) I am very highly motivated not to put someone out. I view it as a personal failing to have unnecessarily inconvenienced someone. I called it a quirk earlier, but I think that most people don't like inconveniencing others. At the extreme I reach it is a flaw or worse. It has caused me more problems than good, for sure. So, to me the act of thanking someone is a form of apology for requiring them to go out of their way. I like to receive the response, "No problem," because this signals that the person in question is not bothered by being put out.

I suspect, though I do not know first hand, that those who prefer to hear, "You're welcome," prefer that because they are more likely to see someone doing something for someone else as a gift. The "You're welcome," would then signify that the gift was sincerely given and can be genuinely appreciated.

Do you have a preferred way to respond to thanks, or a preferred way for others to respond to your thanks? Do you have your own theories regarding why someone would prefer one response over the other? I'd love to hear about it in the comments.

ten years

A couple of weeks ago was the ten year anniversary for this blog.  When I look at life as it was for me then and now I don't know if I am more surprised by the things that have changed or the things that have stayed the same.

Most of the good friends with whom I created these blogs have moved, though I believe that some of those plans were already in the works when the blogs were started.  We lost our good friend Forrest along the way, as well as my co-worker at the time, T-Bop.  We aren't guaranteed tomorrow, and I did not properly understand that ten years ago.

The things I am the most embarrassed about from my former days are the issues I was apparently working through and the fact that I had a far lesser grasp on essential doctrines than I thought I did.

Regarding issues, everyone has them but they're more obvious for some than others.  I have made significant improvements over the last ten years, and I'm sure that's partially just part of the process of aging.  There are more things I'm confident that I understand, I care somewhat less what people think, and I have a better grasp on my own personal quirks than I did before.  Life can be a positive journey in that respect.  I still need to mellow out quite a bit, though.

Regarding doctrine, I'll just say I'm a bit mortified. Ten years ago I was as well-read in the Bible as a twenty-five-year-old can be, but I lacked a depth of understanding.  With every discovery I make in study I gain new embarrassment regarding things I used to say.  Some positions I have held in my doctrinal journey have been borderline heretical, and so I have had to correct and repent of some erroneous positions.  You live and learn, but this is serious stuff.

I have always been the sort to stick around in one place, so I still work in the same job but at a higher title. This time ten years ago I was in the process of deciding if that was really the path I wanted to take.  When I committed to getting my MBA ten years ago, that was a commitment to stay in this job for a long while because I was getting tuition assistance.  I will confess that I had some serious questions about the wisdom of that path ten years ago, though I believe I took the best route forward.  That, of course, comes from someone who values consistency, so staying at the same place for ten years naturally feels best.

The biggest difference in my life from ten years ago, though, are that Golden and I now have NJ and CH in our lives.  I cannot fathom too many things that changes the nature and priorities of your life as having kids, and there's plenty of positive and negative that can be said about it.  We love ours, though, and are so proud of the progress they have made in school, church, and elsewhere.

Finally, this year Golden and I celebrate our fifteenth anniversary.  When I started the blog we were looking at five years together, and that seemed impossibly long.  It doesn't feel like fifteen is remotely possible.  Part of that is because I still feel like we are learning more about each other each day.  She is aging far, far better than I am, and I am fortunate to have her.  One thing that you get out of fifteen years of marriage is perspective on the things that make a good or bad spouse.  I have a good wife.

I hope to be able to keep this up for another ten years.  Obviously, I do not post like I used to.  Life responsibilities guarantee that.  That does not mean that I do not appreciate having this outlet, though.  I hope all who still read this get some enjoyment out of it.

kids' independence

This is the first year that both of our kids are in elementary school.  That in itself is quite a change, as we have had four years of having a kid in preschool leading up to this year.  For whatever reason, something that happened today is as significant in grasping that our kids are growing up.

The elementary school that our kids attend is laid out in a confusing way.  The primary hallway is circular, but there is also a branch off that circle that leads to further classrooms.  As such, Golden had walked NJ (whose classroom is difficult to find) to his classroom a couple of times and CD to her classroom for the past week.  While NJ has been walking to his class alone for several days, today was the first day that CD walked to her classroom without Golden.  NJ passes that classroom on the way to his classroom, so he was supposed to help her get to where she needs to be.

I was thinking about that this morning.  As a parent I am used to my youngest child at all times being under the direct supervision of an adult.  In this case she was under the direct supervision of her eight-year-old brother (obviously, in a setting where there are responsible adults).  The idea that our youngest is now at the age where there can been short periods of time where she has that sort of independence gives me pause.

As a dad, this is all exciting.  I think that it is more difficult for Golden as a mom.  We both know that our kids are growing up.

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.

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.

rules and relationship

I have spent a lot of time in my life trying to reconcile the passages in Scripture that can be interpreted legalistically with the passages that outright state that legalism is not what God is looking for from us.  I alluded to this a while back, but how could God in one moment tell us that we don't earn salvation and in the next list the sorts of sins that people who don't get salvation commit?  Certainly, this is partially answered by the fact that we sin because we are sinners rather than being sinners because we sin, but there was still something I wasn't getting.  There are still things we are supposed to do or not do and it still smacks of legalism.

The strongest example that I could give of a Scripture passage that seems on its face to be legalistic is probably Ephesians 4:17-5:21. I have heard many, many of what I have considered legalistic sermons quote pieces from this passage.  It's tempting to do because Paul is pretty straightforward about a few things that believers shouldn't do.  While I have always also felt bad to have a lowly opinion how the passage was used, I also always felt that I was right about this being the wrong approach to the passage. It was only recently that I noticed that the passage itself actually address the potential legalism in 4:22-24, in that our goodness is something God creates rather than something we earn.

"You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness."

In these verses we see that the way to do the right things is not to just to accept Paul's chastening and be better people, but to put on a new self and allow God to change the attitude of our minds.  The idea that we're going to stop stealing if our nature is to steal (4:28), or to stop slandering if our nature is to badmouth (4:29), or to do any of the other things listed in the passage without God changing our attitude is ludicrous.  Our role is to put off our old selves (4:22) and not give the devil a foothold by clinging unnecessarily to that old self (4:27).  It is God who actually performs the changing of our attitude and allows us to put on the new self that is created by Him if we let Him (4:24).

I am posting this on Valentine's Day for a reason.  I remember early on in my relationship with Golden I kind of dreaded Valentine's Day, not because I didn't love her, but because I was scared I would break some unwritten rule about the day in what I gave her or did for her.  You can say it doesn't matter all you want, but in the first few years of a relationship when you haven't had many Valentine's Days together there's no telling what will be interpreted as, "I don't love you," or, "You aren't special."  Now, Valentine's Day does not worry me too much because I understand better what makes Golden feel loved and appreciated.

That Valentine's Day fear of triggering some unknown rule violation is like taking a legalistic approach to God.  Early on when we are new in our relationship we have these rules that we follow, even if we don't always understand them, because we don't know if we might accidentally make God mad by doing such-and-such a thing.  As we grow in the relationship, though, we should not require rules to understand the life He specifically wants us to live.  While some things are flat-out wrong as if they were serious rules that should not be broken, it is the fact that they violate our relationship with God that is wrong rather than that they break some arbitrary rule.

For example, someone who is married should not have to have a rule that says he or she should not cheat on his or her spouse to understand that cheating is violating their relationship.  Having to create a rule that says, "No cheating," while perhaps necessary in fragile times in the marriage or when one spouse is a little dense, can frankly be insulting that it was necessary at all.  Likewise, as we put on the mind of Christ there are some things that we should intuitively know we personally should or shouldn't do, even though there are not official rules created for them.  They may or may not be fine for other believers, depending on what specifically God is requiring of them, but our obedience in this case should not be to a rule book, but to our heart.

The most important aspect of this, though, is that when God expects something of us, it is through Him that it is possible to complete it.  We cannot ever be good enough for God.  This is important because it flies in the face of the popular, yet legalistic, attitude that says I have to continually try harder in my own power to measure up to God.  My role is to submit, put on Christ, and let Him make the necessary changes that will result in me doing the right things.  When Jesus said that his yoke was easy and his burden light (Matt 11:28-30) He was implicitly stating that we would not be doing the bulk of the work ourselves.

A further point that builds off my belief that sin is not breaking a rule, but rather violating a relationship, I think one of the greatest dangers that faces the modern church is the generational rifts and resulting isolation that appear when sin is defined through cultural rules.  In both liberal and conservative churches, Evangelical, Mainline Protestant, Catholic, et al, I believe the priorities are typically in enforcing social mores rather than using Scriptural principles to lead people to an ever-strengthening relationship with Christ.  Those are the gnats we strain out while swallowing a camel (Matt 23:23-28).

manic pixie dream girl

Cracked has several times in the last few months referenced a specific story character type that has been grating at me for the last few years, but didn't know had a name.  The character type is called the "Manic pixie dream girl." I will refer to this character as MPDG from here on.

I would encourage you to follow the link and click on the example movies to get an idea of what I am talking about. However, Nathan Rubin, who is the coiner of the term, describes the MPDG thusly:

"The Manic Pixie Dream Girl exists solely in the fevered imaginations of sensitive writer-directors to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life and its infinite mysteries and adventures. The Manic Pixie Dream Girl is an all-or-nothing-proposition. Audiences either want to marry her instantly (despite The Manic Pixie Dream Girl being, you know, a fictional character) or they want to commit grievous bodily harm against them and their immediate family."

The MPDG is absolute proof that Hollywood is less concerned with realistic relationships than with idealistic fantasies that ultimately result in a painful break-up or divorce. What usually happens is a straight-laced and highly-structured male character is introduced and we find out that he is not happy with life because being structured means he obviously is broken. He meets the MPDG and decides to change his approach to life, though it varies how related and in what order these events are. Hilarity ensues. There is relationship conflict, and the conflict is resolved by the highly-structured male accepting the MPDG's approach to life and progressing in a serious relationship with her. Movies where I have noticed this are Elizabethtown, Stranger than Fiction, and (most egregiously) Yes Man.

Apart from the fact that the MPDG as portrayed in the movies would not likely exist in real life, movies do real harm in romanticizing a personality type to people with clashing personality types. I can see where in real life an MPDG would be intriguing just long enough to get into a serious relationship with that person and realize the horrible mistake that has been made. True free spirits should not typically be merged with structured people. The movies kind of get around this by implying that this is a journey for the structured male character, and he will change for his beloved MPDG, but the whole idea is ridiculous. The tendency toward being structured or free-spirited, on the whole, is not a choice. A structured or free-spirited person might force themselves to live their opposite for a time, but after a while that would be a miserable existence.

Early in our relationship Golden heard someone describe similarities between partners in a relationship as money in the bank and differences as loans that will have to be paid back with interest. I can appreciate that far more now that we have been married more than a decade. We are very similar in a lot of areas, and those similarities have limited the issues we have had from our differences. In the course of our relationship most of the differences between us have resulted in or will result in some sort of compromise. Those compromises are sometimes easy and sometimes hard, but they always require care and effort and some pain.

My theory as to why the MPDG is so frequently worked into movie plots is that the character is something of a fantasy to freelance workers like writers or directors.  This free-spirited non-existent girlfriend never pressures them to get a real job or asks whether they paid the water bill.  She doesn't get upset when he gets distracted in his work or hobbies for days or weeks at a time, and doesn't care if he spends his money frivolously because she only exists for the moment.  In truth, all the MPDG character does is romanticize irresponsibility.

There are certainly other grating character types that show up in movies a lot, but I think the MPDG has to rank among the most annoying for me.  I say that as a structured man who doesn't believe he needs fixing.

cute

I mentioned not long ago that a lot of words have different meanings to men and women. I don't have a good way of judging how well this applies to all men and women, but one word that has stuck out to me, especially when I was growing up, is "cute." It is completely possible that I am alone on this, but that word has devalued a lot of compliments in my life. The following example uses my grandmother as an example, and I have chosen to use this since she has passed and so will not read this some day in the future with embarrassment.

I like to share things that I think are funny with others. So, if I come across something I think is genuinely funny I like to share it. More than once when I was at my grandparents' house I read some joke I liked out of a Reader's Digest to my grandmother, to which her response was to say it was cute. It wasn't a huge deal because I knew it was supposed to be a compliment, but that was never the response I wanted.

I think "cute" is a go-to generic compliment for a lot of women because the word implies the sort of thing a lot of women want to be or that they want to own. In my life I've heard a lot of women say things in the vein of, "You look cute in those earrings," or "Those shoes are so cute," or "You have a cute baby," or "You two look cute together." In most contexts; though, the word is feminine. I haven't heard many men use the same sort of compliments, and it sticks out like a sore thumb when a man actually does say something like that.

The real problem is that a compliment is only effective if it makes the recipient feel how he or she wants to feel about himself or herself. Giving a man who would prefer to be masculine feminine compliments or a woman who would prefer to be feminine masculine compliments drains the value from those compliments.

In thinking through this I realized that I do not know which compliments men give that aren't really compliments to women. Is there a reverse version of "cute" that I am not aware of? I should probably learn before I start giving Golden or CD compliments that mean less than I think they do.

the more i seek you

The more I seek you
The more I find you
The more I find you
The more I love you

I want to sit at your feet
Drink from the cup in your hand
Lay back against you and breathe
Feel your heart beat

This love is so deep
It's more than I can stand
I melt in your peace
It's overwhelming- Zach Neese ("The More I Seek You")

I have only twice heard the song with the lyrics above. The first time was in a church service several months back, and when I got home I had to email a few friends to ask them if they were as uncomfortable with the lyrics as I am. The second time was this past Sunday, again in a church service. Simply put, I can't sing the song. If I sing it it sounds like I'm singing to my boyfriend. Since I am a straight man that is a problem. One could argue that if I were a straight woman and felt the same way that would be a problem as well.

I discussed this with a few other friends tonight, and one important point that came up in the discussion is that without knowing that this is supposed to be a worship song most people would conclude that this was a slightly erotic love song. Giving the song context might make it a little better, but my mind simply cannot properly go from the physical relationship that the words imply to true worship.

The point of this post is not really to whine about the song, however, but to pose a few questions to the men and to the women who read this blog. Please note that I am asking because I am trying to understand how a song like this could get past the censors, as it were.

To the women, if you sang these lyrics in a worship service would it be worshipful as to God as God, or would it be worshipful to God as a significant other, or perhaps something else? Do you have any problems with seeing God as a significant other (like a boyfriend or a husband)? Do you find the lyrics above imply a physical or romantic relationship? If you were in a church service and heard that song would it occur to you that a man would be uncomfortable with the song?

To the men, do you agree with me or do you feel like this is not structured to be a romantic song? Could you sing it as a worshipful rather than a romantic song? Are there other songs that make you uncomfortable for the same reason I am uncomfortable with this song?

I am also open to input beyond these questions. Golden made an excellent point that she could sing the song from the perspective of a child/parent relationship with God. I really can see that, though I still can't shake the romantic relationship idea strong enough to sing it in that way. If anyone else has any other insights I would love to hear them.

feminism

I have been thinking about a post on a perspective on Feminism for a while but haven't really known which way to take a topic with such a wide scope and that is so potentially explosive. Since my interest in Feminism has to do with the ways that it has impacted my thinking I decided to focus on that. Unfortunately, since I am looking for oddities in my thinking, this may look like an attack on Feminism. This is not intentional, though, as I personally believe Feminism exists out of necessity. If I were a woman having to deal with some of the men that I have met in my life, I would probably see a very strong need for nearly all Feminist ideals as well.

I have especially thought a lot about different approaches to the genders in the past few months as I recently completed the book Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters: 10 Secrets Every Father Should Know by Meg Meeker. I initially decided this would be a good book for me to read since I do not have experience raising a girl. Many of the book's theses challenged my opinions which I believe originated in Feminist thought. One point in particular was that most girls on some level associate a strong father figure who sets and keeps strict rules as a dad who is "being there" for her. A constant emphasis in the book is that girls are frequently given so much space that they are not entirely convinced that they are worth being protected. Since I grew up in a relatively strict home this does enlighten some things for me, but it also creates a conflict in my brain.

I know from what my own needs were as a kid that boys operate a bit differently from this and that their need for respect often (not always) contradicts the strict approach. Strictness, especially with older boys, needs to be offset with something that they can use to feel respected. What that something is probably varies and is something that I need to investigate further for NJ's sake. The fact remains that what I am reading about what girls need differs from what I know that boys need. The problem I have is that I now almost feel forced into a double standard for how boys and girls ought to be raised. While I am thankful for the new perspective on double standards, I am uncomfortable with the fact that I have now been forced to reconsider whether some are better in place than abolished.

This talk of explicitly supporting some double standards is not meant to sound sexist. I am not only referring to double standards that appear to negatively impact women. Something that I don't think gets acknowledged is that many double standards disproportionately impact men, and that they do not only target women. Reactions to cross-dressing and the expectation on men that they will bring home the bacon are examples of double standards that impact men more than women, but accepting them does not make a person sexist.

Another reason I have been thinking about Feminism a bit is due to a news story that ran a couple of years ago. A study was performed that established that men who believe in traditional gender roles made more money. The headline from multiple news sources read something to the effect of "Sexist Men Earn More Money." The article titles left little doubt that only a sleazeball sexist would believe that it was ideal for his wife to watch the kids during the day.

Aside from the abortion issue (I'm not going into that today), if there is one position that traditional Feminism takes that does really irritate me it is the assumption that traditionalists are sexist toward women but not toward men. I know far more women who are vocal about wanting to be stay-at-home moms than men who are vocal about wanting their wives to stay home, but it seems the only person who can be sexist in this equation is the man. An enlightened opinion is one that either says it is the wife's choice or one that says the wife has to work outside the house. My perspective put bluntly is that if it is sexist for a husband to expect that his wife should stay at home, then it is sexist for a wife to expect that her husband should work so that she can stay home. I don't believe either positions are inherently sexist, but it is hypocritical to hold one view and not the other. The simple reason that men who believe in traditional gender roles make more is that they believe they are fully responsible for their family's income so they take more steps to make more money by working longer hours at the office, taking second jobs, getting more education, etc. If a man is less traditional and believes that he should not be fully responsible for the family's income, then he will be less likely to make serious sacrifices to bring in more money.

In our situation, Golden had to work for a year because our finances necessitated it. Both of us preferred that she be able to take care of NJ and CD (it was only NJ at the time), but she felt more strongly about it than I did. Am I a sexist for preferring that Golden be able to stay home with NJ? Is Golden a sexist for strongly pushing for that option? What about with our decision for Golden to work a year while our finances improved? Would I have been sexist if I insisted on Golden working so that I could stay home with the kids? I probably make more money than I would if I was significantly less traditional because I would not have sought work positions with the sole intent of being able to provide for my family. I would have probably gotten a degree in a less practical field if I had bothered with a degree at all.

While my actual view leans more traditional, it is more that each family has to decide what is the best way for things to be run. There are situations where both parents working outside the home makes the most sense. There are situations where it is ideal if one parent stays home and watches the kids. There are a million other combinations of part time work, or friends and family watching the kids, or baby-sitting co-ops, etc. The point is that believing that one of the options above is ideal for your family or is ideal in a typical situation does not automatically make you a sexist.

There are other points that I could make about feminist thought that are both good and bad, but these are the ones that have been on my mind. As always, I am more than willing to discuss in the comments, but I always prefer that things stay civil and don't get too political.

it is finished

I walked the line last night. After four-and-a-half years, eight or nine semesters (depending on if you count the semester I skipped), and what I calculated to be just short of two hundred classes, I am done with my degree. I thought I would be graduating with honors since my GPA is 3.97 (this is me bragging), but this program apparently does not have a cum laude system. As I like to do, I would like to post some observations about the graduation process.

The speakers for the night kind of phoned it in. Three people spoke, and only one appeared to have put much thought into it. The theme of the one decent speech was that having an MBA is great because you aren't tied to one industry. It was a good point considering the venue, but there was not a lot of meat even in that speech.

Someone mentioned that MBAs are not held in as high regard right now because they, specifically those that have gone into finance, are believed to be the cause of the current economic mess. Why isn't anyone pointing the fingers at the economists and actuaries whose models suggested there was no housing bubble? I'm just saying...

All of the graduations I have witnessed have involved the graduate handing a card to a person who reads his or her name as the graduate walks across stage to be recognized. While I was watching this it occurred to me that someone could crash a graduation rather easily if he or she knew ahead of time what the name cards were going to look like. I would not be surprised if some enterprising reality show tried a stunt like that in the near future.

I have not researched the traditions surrounding mortarboards, tassels, hoods, etc. Part of me wants to believe that some of this was a practical joke that got out of hand. I heard another graduate observing that the whole regalia is about as impractical as it could reasonably be.

I always planned on taking as long as I did for both family and economic reasons. Unfortunately, this meant that most of the people I new well in the program graduated in 2008 or 2009. I knew a handful of people in the ceremony, but not a ton of them. That is kind of a shame because I think the main appeal to me of a graduation is that there is supposed to be a shared camaraderie of what we have survived.

We brought both kids to the ceremony. They were apparently a handful. Golden and my mom dealt with them well, though. I was told that there were a lot of toddlers who had to be taken to the lobby because they weren't doing well in the ceremony. I'll leave it at that.

The main thing on my mind at this point is that I am just happy to have the whole process behind me. In the year or two before I started pursuing the degree I decided that I was going to get a masters degree sooner or later, so I am happy to not have that still hanging over me. If I take academic (rather than corporate) classes in the future, it will almost certainly be simply for my personal benefit and growth, though.

let's talk about us

There are three parts to this post. They could have been standalone blog posts, but they are somewhat related and posting them separately would make it look like I am in a rut.

First Part:

When Golden and I were first married I used to joke a lot about the cliche couple where she wants to talk about "us" and he wants nothing to do with it. I don't know why I found that specific cliche so funny, but I did. In reality, I am the more likely person to want to talk about "us."

I have always felt like my brain didn't really work the same way everyone else's did, so that has made me fascinated with how different people think. Even more so, once I was in a serious relationship then married I was amazed by how we come from completely different angles at things. I grew up my whole life thinking of the female brain as similar to the male brain with just a few preferences wired differently. While Golden and I think alike in a lot of things, our brains are very obviously more foundationally different than a few hardwired preferences.

I feel I have some pretty good reasons for wanting to understand relationships and the differences between men and women. First of all, it only makes sense that I would want to understand Golden and what makes her happy. Second, and almost as important, is the fact that I want to help NJ and CH have healthy relationships when they are old enough, and it has been my observation that the people most unhappy in relationships are among those who least understand the opposite sex.

Because of all of this, I have discovered that one of my recent guilty pleasures has been relationship-oriented books, especially those that discuss the differences between the sexes. The last book I read was actually one that Golden and I did together that I have heard so many other people discuss: The 5 Love Languages. While I found the book fascinating and it did start some very good discussions between Golden and me, I actually felt like I didn't perfectly fit into any of the five love languages discussed. For the purposes of the book I tested as requiring quality time. I did not feel that the description of someone who needs quality time perfectly described me, but I enjoyed going through the book anyway. A guilty pleasure is a guilty pleasure.

I am already figuring out what my next relationship/differences between the sexes book will be after I graduate this May. That's just one of the reasons that I am hopeful for a good summer.

Second Part:

Because I have historically struggled to understand what is romantic I subscribed to the the romantic tip of the week at TheRomantic.com a few months back. I found the website through a book of romance ideas. Since it is a romance mailing list I would expect that mostly men in need of ideas would be on the list. Apparently, I would expect wrong because the mailing a few days ago had an advertisement for a book for women wanting more out of their relationships. The ad intrigued me enough for the reasons that I have already mentioned in this post that I clicked on it and read through the page advertising the book. There is a lot there that I almost posted about, but I decided to limit it to the following slightly reduced paragraph from the website.

"If you're like most women, you probably love talking to your girlfriends about your relationship troubles, and -- yikes! -- asking them for relationship advice... unless she herself has a successful relationship with a man (very important!) -- it's unwise to take relationship advice or tips from your girlfriend (or your mother, sister, cousin or aunt, for that matter)."

I had to post this because, while it is a pretty obvious hard sell, there is one thing in there that is kind of true. No disrespect meant to single folks, but single friends who are the opposite sex of the person you are interested in are rarely the people to turn to for serious relationship advice. The longer you are in a healthy relationship the more accurate a picture you have of what are proper expectations from the relationship. It's next to impossible to give good relationship advice without a clear understanding of what expectations are realistic. Bad advice could very well lead you down either the path of expecting too much or the path of settling for too little.

Third Part:

I cannot count how many marriages I have seen where I think that those two people are fortunate to have found each other because no one else would have put up with (fill in the blank for him) or (fill in the blank for her). I am wondering if this is a cause or an effect. Are people very prone to find others who can deal with their quirks or am I just noticing the quirks that weren't addressed because they weren't that important to the spouse? Even more weird: Are the things that I think are so undesirable actually the same things that attracted their spouse in the first place?

I think wondering about the obvious quirks is probably a bit unfair, though. If I use myself as an example, I would not be overly modest if I were to say that anyone who thinks that I am a catch is either crazy or the one person who married me. Everyone has issues that make them challenging to live with and mine would probably drive most people batty in ways they can only dream. My very last roommate in college told me as I was moving out, "You're a good friend but a horrible roommate. You probably think the same of me." I did.* One of the best things about a good marriage is that you've found someone who will put up with your stuff if you can just find a way to put up with theirs.

* Since former roommates of mine read this blog on occasion I should note that this conversation did not happen with anyone who knows about this blog. I am quite sure that the person who said this wouldn't mind me posting it, though.

relational politics

Through the years I never really understood how people from different political parties came to the conclusion that it was a good idea to get married. Even more confusing to me were the high-profile relationships where people had, and still have, a vested interest in furthering the principles of their chosen party. As examples, the Arnold Schwarzenegger/Maria Shriver marriage and the James Carville/Mary Matalin marriage struck me as odd, though I certainly have never had enough information to know the dynamics of those relationships. In recent years I have modified my thinking about this.

Golden and I both have some strong political views about some topics, but I am amazed at how little we actually discuss political issues. If and when there are issues about which we disagree we may not even know what the other person thinks about the issue, let alone care about whether we are in agreement about the topic. I think I expected that marriage entailed a lot of discussion about politics because of the vast amount of conversational time that the married couple has to fill. I did not think of this as a good or bad thing, but I did figure it was inevitable.

While I do now understand how politics can be almost completely irrelevant to a married relationship, I do still think that there are some specific political issues that would be difficult to reconcile in a complicated situation. For example, differences on how the individuals feel about abortion could be the most major of issues in the event of a surprise pregnancy. For most issues, though, there are not an abundance of scenarios where a difference in viewpoints should affect my relationship with Golden. As a modern hypothetical example, if one of us supported the Democrats' healthcare reform plans and the other opposed it that would not really make any difference in our relationship. Our viewpoints on the issue will not change any major family decision that we could make and we very truly have little influence on the outcome of the issue anyway.

All of this is really quite academic because Golden and I most frequently agree when we even know each other's political views. It is nice to know that this is not something that is likely to hamper our relationship when we disagree, however. Having the freedom to focus on our important relational situations rather than getting bogged down in the things over which we have no control anyway is the absolute ideal.

ten-year goals

Since my birthday that ends in a zero occurs a few months before the new decade^* this provides me a double opportunity to review my last ten years and consider what I want to do with my next ten years. When I consider the last ten years, I am confronted by a lot of competing thoughts about how long and short the time has been. Ten years is a lot of time for things to happen, but it is also a short enough time to procrastinate on a lot of things that I thought I would have accomplished.

It certainly helps in my view of the last decade that about half was without kids and just under half comprises the time after we found out that we would have NJ. Life without kids is so much different from life with kids that I almost think of the past ten years as two separate decades. I am sure I am not the only person who has ever had that observation, though.

Ten years ago I was just completing college and did not really know what to expect from the ten years I had ahead of me. If I had to guess ten years ago what my next decade would include, I would have probably been selfish with my expectations. Few people want to talk about the responsibilities that they will take on more than the benefits for those responsibilities.

Interestingly, I am not much clearer on what my next ten years holds now than I was ten years ago. I know there are certain things that I would like to happen in the next ten years, but I always have a bit of trepidation about focusing too much on those. Sometimes those things that I would like to happen are just not possible or ideal and I don't want to be stuck ten years from now measuring the past decade by a standard that turned out to be unrealistic.

With all of that being said, I do have some generic goals for the coming decade. The problem is that they are not the types of goals that are easy to list. Very little is specific and measurable, some of it is private, and a lot of it is selfish. As an example of a selfish one, a goal of mine is to make more time to read and play video games. Some people would think playing more video games is a horrendous goal, but as someone who is highly strung and has had other priorities in the recent past I think the end result of doing this would be that I would be an easier person to deal with. It also represents a way for me to connect with NJ (I do have goals about connecting more with Golden and CD as well). Another goal is to, at some point, take the family to Florida to either Disney, or MGM, or Epcot, or something of that nature. If the finances for that do not work out, though, it may be better that that does not happen.

Something that I try to keep in mind with my goals is that something is only a worthwhile goal if I am willing to make a sacrifice to complete it. Graduating from a degree program qualifies as a goal because doing so requires a time and money sacrifice. Playing more video games only qualifies as a goal if I am giving up something else that I like in order to reach that goal.

Does anyone else have goals for the upcoming decade that are either the same as what has happened over the past decade or are a complete departure? I would love to hear about them.

* I understand that 2011 actually starts the decade, but does anyone really think in those terms? It is just a technicality based on the fact that there was no year zero.

nine

Today, well technically yesterday now, is (was) Golden's and my ninth anniversary. Most years I come up with something mildly sappy to post here, but this year it is just going to be an observation.

I think that most people in a couple, and even those who are poorly matched with their mate to start out, slowly become the perfect person for their significant other if only through familiarity. Golden is special because she started out perfect for me and has only become more so as the years have passed.

I love you, Golden.

two is different than one

When we decided to have NJ I was pretty intimidated about the whole thing. Since I have never been a kid person I had many questions as to whether I had the stuff to be a father. When we decided to have CD I had gotten past most of those concerns. We had our challenges with NJ, but very little of the problems were challenges that I felt incapable of handling. CD couldn't be too much different.

While both kids have their similarities, it is amazing how different the challenges are that we are facing with CD compared to what we saw with NJ. She has far different sleeping patterns, has different eating patterns, and even seems to move around differently than NJ (she hasn't really attempted to crawl yet because she can get across the room easier by rolling).

The sleeping habits are the ones that are causing the most effort for Golden right now, so that is what we are working on. Tonight is the first night of using the Ferber method to get CD to sleep. This means that we will probably be hearing some crying over the next few nights. If it means less effort in getting CD to sleep going forward, though, putting up with a little crying is worth it.

At least we can console ourselves that CD will be easier to potty train than NJ. Right?

typhoid baby

This weekend we are getting a good reminder of the value of taking steps to not spread germs. Golden and NJ both caught colds last week from an event that we went to and those have spread to CD and me. I have long believed that a cold was one of the worst things I can catch because I don't really get sick enough to skip things but I do get sick enough to be moderately miserable. The past few days this has been aggravated by NJ having a hard time getting to and staying asleep at night, and now CD going through the same thing.

I think everyone with kids has several stories about the impact of illnesses. It always seems to be a real gamble to take either of the kids anywhere because a significant percentage of the time the kids are in a situation where there might be germs (church nursery, carts at a store, restaurant booster seat, etc) they catch something that works through the family for the next two weeks. This is compounded by the fact that different people have different standards for how sick they or their kids have to be before they don't go to church, or the store, or a restaurant.

So, if we tend to skip a lot of things it is not because we are avoiding everyone. It's because we are trying to avoid everyone's germs.

the narcissistic parent

I have never really been a kid person.  That sounds worse than it should.  There is not much more to it than that. I can definitely enjoy my time around kids, but I simply don't go out of my way to be around kids.  Because of this, I always sort of felt that I needed to justify my intention that I would some day have kids. Having my own kids is different because they are my kids.  I have given a lot of thought lately to what the difference really is, and my conclusion is that it is a mild form of narcissism.

In my opinion there are no two greater kids in the world than mine and Golden's kids, NJ and CD.  That is natural.  I am their dad, so I should feel that way.  Everyone else reading this who has their own kids should feel that way about their own kids.  I think there is far more to it than that, though.  Almost every little thing that I learn about NJ or CD as they get older is something that I see in myself or in Golden.  These two people are combinations of myself and the person who I have decided was the perfect choice to spend the rest of my life with.  Since I love almost everything there is to know about Golden, I am bound to like or at least understand everything I find out about our kids unless I loathe myself.

I have to think that God created us like this to make it easier to get through the challenging moments in parenting.  I already know some of the challenges that NJ is going to present as he gets older, but since I see elements of my personality in him being a part of those challenges, part of me looks forward to them.  I am pretty sure that CD is going to present challenges of her own, but that either Golden or I will have some appreciation of her perspective in those challenges.

This also makes me think about parents who adopt and care for kids who are not their own as if they are their own.  I never really grasped it before, but the people who do that right have to be some among the most giving people in the world.  I have my narcissism (and Golden) to help me through the parental challenges.  They don't have that benefit.