Well, my wonderful wife is out enjoying God’s green earth on the “extended” camping trip.  My in-laws and other relatives have a small fleet of trailers and other camping paraphernalia, and when they go to the secret-free-camping-spot-that-if-i-tell-you-i’ll-have-to-kill-you-cause-then-it-would-get-too-crowded and if its coordinated by the “Colonel” (My father in law) then all the gear gets dumped up There for a long time and then if the stars are aligned one lovely wife and three precious children can suntan, swim, read, eat, sleep and see the occasional ranger presentation on scat for a month.

She should actually be back on Thursday, but I thought I would take the little invite that Patti gave me and do a little guest post.  So I’ve warmed up my frozen chili, put my nice fresh piece of plastic wrapped processed cheese on top to melt and I’ve unstuck most of the keys from the “upstairs” computer that the kids have been kind enough to dump “stickiness” into, and here goes.

First of all I want to express my views on wife-bloggers.  It is my opinion that my wife can blog about whatever she wants to and in as much detail as she wants to without any input or editing from me.  Sometimes she asks if she can post details about a conversation or about a fight or something, and I always say yes, and she doesn’t even have to ask.  I don’t edit it either.  Whatever her memory of events, or how she felt, or how she took what I said, and mixed with whatever mood she was in that day, is what she posts, and I don’t edit it or even comment on it.  I do this for a couple of reasons:

1. This is her blog, not mine.  If I wanted a blog, I would have one. I certainly know how.
2. I trust her.  After 11+ year of marriage, I know that my wife loves me and our marriage and won’t do anything to hurt it or me.
3. It’s a story. We are a normal Christian family that is trying to make sense of how everything works out in life, and we are committed to making it all work.  If you stay tuned, you might learn something from our my mistakes
4. It’s therapeutic. Patti gets a chance to put in words what she’s feeling.  I’ve watched her through some very difficult years handling things in different ways, and this is a positive thing, let me tell you!

But let me also point out that it’s not ME.  You have seen her emotionally worked out version of noteworthy events that have happened, but you have not talked to me.  I do exist outside of the blog and I do have beliefs and my views of events and my feelings (that’s right I’m a guy and I used the word “feelings”!)

I noticed that this issue should be addressed when Patti was posting about me going to see the doc about depression.  In my mind, its not that big of a deal.  I’m having trouble sleeping which makes it harder to deal with stress which makes it harder to sleep, etc., etc.  I “get motivated” by some friends to go and see a doc about it ’cause it worked for them, and he gives me some pills to reset the sleep clock.  This does not seem like a big deal to me until Patti posts about it.  You see there’s been a bit of depression on her side of the family and some of it really impacted her as a kid, so when I come home and say “the doc says I’m depressed” it sent her into a short freak out.  Then she posts about it.  Then friends that live close by and read this blog start giving me the I’m-really-sad-for-you-do-you-think-you’ll-live stares.  Hmmm…

I think I know what stars feel like when they are written about in tabloids and then everyone is feeling really sad for Jennifer and then really siding with Brad because they think that somehow they actually know Brad and Jennifer because a story told them something emotional. Whatever?!?

I will tell you as a footnote that Patti makes every effort to be true to the story and accurate in the details.  She may have faults, but not lots and definitely not lying.

So here are some overly personal tid-bits about me:

- I’m 6 foot 2 and have never really “struggled” with weight.  I do gain weight, but it only takes me the equivalent of a half hour of meditation to drop it.

- I’m starting a small business called JC TECH SERVICES that God told me to start with no capital.  My project in all this is to get to know Him better and let Him guide me through it.  Apparently this is where my stress comes in cause I haven’t been listing all that much.

- When I was 21 I married my best friend for life! We decided to grow up together and grow old together.  We’ve gone through a lot, but there is NO QUIT! Once things were not so great, but God told me that Jesus was spit on beaten (go watch the Passion) and He still loved them all, and that if Patti wasn’t beating me with a “cat of nine tails” then I had to love her. I said yes, and then discovered that unconditional love in marriage is the only kind that works.  Our marriage has gone uphill ever since.

- I love technical stuff.  I have an license for theatrical pyrotechnics, do a really good job of sound engineering, am teaching myself quasi-Object Oriented Programming in PHP. I like to take stuff apart and figure out how it works and have fixed every major appliance in our house at least once without needing to call anyone.

- I’m the life of the party.  I figured out way back when that I could be too big for life in a party and do things that were WAY TOO BOLD and people would like me and even follow me and never get to know me.  I hid behind this for years and Patti was one of the only people who ever saw past it. (Henri knew me too).

- I’m sick of masks, especially my own, and I have a lot to say about a lot of “Religion”. Real people are a lot more screwed up than “normal” seems to indicate.  How can we begin to help each other if we can’t even be real about who we are?  I’ve finally seen into why I used to hide and I’m done with it. This also explains why I don’t mind Patti posting about me.

- I like plastic cheese.  The kind that comes in its own plastic envelope, and when it melts, it creates another little plastic skin.  Patti doesn’t.

- I was born in New Zealand, went to school in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi before moving to Canada when I was 13.  I have all three citizenships to prove it.  By the way, Bay St. Louis was hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina and the guy that bought our old house is living in a FEMA trailer and had a nervous breakdown.

- I love skiing.  Snow Skiing.  I love going down the sides of a hard packed run and getting air off of the service road bumps that come up periodically and soaring through the air for 30+ feet at 50 MPH.  I almost got kicked off of Mt Hutt in New Zealand for doing just that.

- I’ve got big dreams.  I am a dreamer that has recently come to the realization that it does require some attention to detail to accomplish those dreams.  If When I finally master those disciplines, I will see some of my dreams come true.

- I’ve learned that Patti values our friendship more than me working really hard at accomplishing dreams.  She wants the dreams to happen too, but wants to be my friend through the journey.  (Sorry Patti)

- I think deep thoughts, and talk about them little.  I like knowing the information and enjoy being able to join just about any conversation with a good repertoire of banter, but avoid debate.  Not because I’m not good at it, just because debate seems to drive people apart.  When you are debating Evolution vs. Creation so that the evolution nit-wit (sorry if I just offended you) can see that creation must be right, therefore I’m going to become a Christian, just doesn’t work.  It drives them away.  They should be getting a little more love and little less judgement (deep thought: if the sin of Adam was eating the fruit of the “Knowledge of Good and Evil” then God must have intended us to not know the difference between Good and Evil - as in no judging people for anything.  Think about it.)

- I love my kids.  They are amazing mirrors of yourself and individuals at the same time.  When I first had Angelica, I heard a country song that was popular at the time called “The Maker Said Take Her” by Alabama.  I had heard the song before and thought of Patti, because she was my love interest.  Driving home from the hospital after she was born, I heard the song again and it was definitely for my daughter.  I cried… A lot.

- I’m a Bible thumper.  My parents raised me Christian, and though they were not perfect, they were not hypocrites. What they said they lived and it worked. As much as I wanted to run from things when I was younger, I couldn’t run from what worked.  It still works today.  I’ve lost a lot of “Religion” though.  I have a two way relationship with my maker, that plays a significant part of my life.  Other peoples rules don’t seem to stack up with that.

- I’ve just finished my chili and the cheese was the best part.

- When I go camping, I am in charge of the fire.  I always start my fires using a log cabin style and I always start them with one match.  I once started a fire using white gas and blew the log cabin to bits (thanks Henri).  My biggest fire had flames licking close to 40 feet high and was 10 feet in diameter.  It was hot enough to make grass more than 10 feet away spontaneously combust.  It took a good hot coal base and a lot of old Salmon Inlet Youth Camp bedding foam to make that happen.

- I like to give away Spam as a gift.  You know the meat that’s been pressed into a can that makes you woneder how broad the definition of “meat” is?!?  Then I say “Not all Spam is bad.” and everyone laughs.  And as far as I know, most everyone that I’ve given Spam to, still has it.

I just read all of what I wrote so far, and the post is getting a bit long.  As I said, if I wanted my own blog I would make one.  Maybe I will guest post again some time.  If you want to read the stories, be our guest, but if you want to get to know me, then invite Patti and I out to the Keg and we’ll talk.

(Spcial thanks to google’s from spellng checker)