Therapy In Shadow

I've sent out links to my blog to various people in my life whom I wanted to share this experience with. Close personal friends, select family members, and what-not. I am aware that I speak of sensitive subjects about people on here. But I hope that the people I speak of aren't offended by what I say. I try very hard to consider other people's feelings when I put them in here. Saying this, something happened with my mother that I need to address.

Yesterday, we went to my parents house. Mom was acting kind of strangely. Jessie an I are excited about a July 4th party that we have been invited to. This is an adults only party, not kid friendly. Not saying that its going to be some mass orgy of the flesh or anything, just a bunch of friends getting together, having a few beers, and playing on the adult size slip and slide. This is the first adult party we've been able to go to since our bachelor/bachelorette party before we got married over 6 years ago. Its been a while. Laura offered to watch the kids and we took her up on it.

Strange Instance #1
Upon mentioning that Laura was watching the kids, mom got weird. She got her back up and did that weird thing with her mouth when she's holding something back. Let me make something perfectly clear. I DONT doubt that my mother can care for our children. But life is more complicated than that. Since Lyrics diagnosis, its no longer about care, its about medical necessities. I am NOT confident at this time that my mother can care for Lyric in a medical way. And to be honest with you, I dont think she is either. I see her hands tremble nervously when she's working her pump. I see her asking the same questions over and over again. I see her improperly checking Lyrics blood sugar in a way that will give false readings. I see her reassuring us that she knows how to do this, yet goes so far into it that she begins to try to reassure herself.

I love my mother very much. I want more than anything for her be able to take the kids for an afternoon and not bat an eyelash about it. But this is all about experience with handling type-1 diabetes, and she just doesnt have the experience yet that makes us feel 100% ok with her taking the kids. But that time will come eventually. It just takes effort on everyones part to make it happen. I fear though that she may view Laura watching the kids as a dig to her abilities, as if to say we are robbing her in some way. I dont know.

Strange Instance #2
My mom reads this Blog. So I'm sure she's getting some kind of weird perspective on all this. While we were at my parents house, I asked my mom if she liked my blog. This question made her feel really uncomfortable. She said that "it was sad". Now, how am I supposed to take something like that. Seriously. So, I enquired a bit. She was frazzled in her reply. "I dont know why I think that I just do! Do we have to have a deep theological discussion all the time about this?!?". This was followed by a half assed laugh that felt more forced than genuine. She was clearly dealing with something.

I would sure like to know exactly what is sad about this blog. I'm taking some pretty wonderful things that are happening in my life and opening them up to all of my friends. I'm going down the list of the huge amount of positive things occurring daily, major perspective changes for the good, learning compassion and tolerance. It doesnt seem sad to me at all.

Is it sad that I've experienced this away from Christianity and the realizing of my struggle makes my time as a christian sad?

Is it that I could do this in Christianity, even though I've tried? Like I'm missing our on something better?

Is it that she could never share as intimately as I would like all the wonderful things that are happening to me due to her misconceptions?

Why is it so sad? I think its wonderful. Thats why I'm sharing it with people.

I view this as a tremendous step backward from out talk last week. Mom opened up to me in a way that she rarely does then. I felt as though she was truly ok with what I'm doing with my life. But apparently, its just sad.

The hardest part about writing a blog, is to continue to write in that blog. Its REALLY easy to just throw it off for a day. But, when you do that you begin to build things that you want to write about until eventually the next post becomes this massive thing. I'm at that point this very moment. So sorry if this seems a bit wordy.

While I was at the office, one of our clients drive a VERY expensive car. His wife drove it in and was experiencing some transmission issues and it had to be towed. Now, this person is filthy stinking rich, to the tune of this vehicle costing $100K and he didn't even bat an eyelash about it. For all my life I would dislike a person like that. I would accuse him of flaunting his wealth and pushing it in my face. How dare he even drive that car in public while there are people in this world who are really struggling. But this is the view of the class war. The Have's and the Have not's. All of my life I have been one of the Have not's. But now its an ok thing. I'm happy in my financial bracket. This isnt to say that I want to stay here, but for now it works. As we age, our concept of "A lot of money" changes with it. When I was a kid, my dad would give me $5 in quarters to go down to the gas station and play Double Dragon. It was a TON of money that allowed me to play for hours! But in perspective, thats really not a lot. In fact, $5k really isnt a lot on the larger scope of things. In this mans perspective, $100K is the same to my $5 when I was a kid, all about perspective. For the first time ever, I didnt judge him because he was rich. I judged him on his heart, and he's a pretty good guy. I just didnt know until I stopped disliking him........maybe he'll hook me up with a high paying job in the Caribbeans. Here's to hope

I've always made myself a martyr for something. In my previous christian walk, I was taught that I had to suffer for my faith. That somehow if we suffered enough, whether it be from fasting or denying yourself a particular object that you've wanted, that you will win favor with God for your sacrifice, mimicking the sacrifice that Christ made on the cross. But by Christian theology, God doesnt want us to suffer, he did it for us. This is why I dont understand Evangelicals today. For some reason they seem to think that denying themselves something perfectly legitimate and non-sinful will bring the closer to God. Biblically, Christians are supposed to live life in abundance, yet are called to seperate themselves of this world. Thats the true quandary for me. The Bible says that sin is the breaking point for communication to God, that sin covers us and effects our ability to hear his voice, yet, we are born in to it. So, ultimately, none of us can truly hear the voice of God. But, this is where Jesus comes in to play, yet they dont live by his words. He told us to go into the world and preach the good news of Christ, yet said to turn away from worldly things. Many people do this at the cost of the person that their ministering to and their own happiness. I remember a time when I was on the worship team a few years in to my service. A young man was standing away from the Church having a smoke, not bothering anyone and not close enough for anyone to be effected by it. All anyone in the church could say was negativity towards him, that he should be doing that here, almost as if none of them had any addictions that they were fighting through. Me, after hearing the venom that was dripping from their gluttonous little mouths went to the guy and bummed a smoke off him. We talked for about 10 minutes. He was really cool and going through some pretty hard problems that I helped him talk out. Everyone kind of looked at me funny after that.

So heres my point with all that, getting back on track. Denying yourself something that doesnt effect your christian walk or is labeled sinful by your own personal law is hypocritical. For many years, as I stated before, I denied myself some pretty big things because I thought I was supposed to to be a good Christian. The breaking moment for me is when my weed eater was stolen off my front porch. This really burned me up and I wrote a letter to our local paper, just dripping with sarcasm about it.

To the guy who stole my weed eater off the porch. I must say that I was a bit shocked as I left my house that morning and noticing that my weed eater was missing. I checked out the local pawn shops and filled a police report as anyone was supposed to do. Needless to say, I was a bit perturbed. Even more so perturbed that you had also stolen the mix can off of my porch as well a week or two later. I’m a man of simple pleasures. All I wanted on my 30th birthday was a weed eater. I just wanted to cut my small lawn, be left alone, and be 30. It’s important that my home be warm for my stay at home wife and 2 kids (in which my 1 ½ year old has never slept through the night and my type-1 diabetic 4 year old who struggles with an incurable potentially deadly disease). All this time going through the same financial struggles that everyone else is going through. It seems as though I’m not going to be getting it back so I have a request of you. I ask you to please steal the line that you will eventually be in another week anyway. I wouldn’t want my weed eater’s career in the lawn maintenance industry to be but a shattered dream. It will be sitting on my porch, and I’ll even leave the light on for you. We wouldn’t want you do deal with the agony of stubbing your toe in the dark.

I had a woman track down my phone number and give me a call early the morning it was published and offered to buy me a weed eater. I didnt know how to handle the situation. I turned it down because I was able to borrow my Dad's trimmer at any time and I didnt want to put the lady out. about 30 seconds after I hung up the phone, I regretted it. How often to great things come our way in life that we miss out on due to our misconceptions. This person was GLAD to do it, and felt compelled to. I not only robbed myself of resolving an issue, but I robbed her of feeling good about a generous act. Kind of a foolish thing to do when you think about it. But good fortune came why way and I took it this time. A client of may father's stopped him in a local hardware store and told him that he read my article and commented on how much he liked it. He gave a weed eater to my dad to give to me just because he "had a spare lying around". This spare was loads better than what was stolen from me. And I decided to let good things happen to me and I took it. God I love that trimmer, its a tank. And I now have the new perspective on life. I MUST allow good things to come my way and accept them at that moment. I refuse to set myself up as a martyr for a cause that I'm not even aware of that will deprive me of good things. Isnt that what God wants anyway? Christian or otherwise?

IN CLOSING

Even funnier, is that my old pastor (still not aware that I'm a Wiccan) spoke to me about it, asked me if I had gotten a new trimmer, and that he liked the letter I wrote in. I told him no, and he didnt even attempt to try to help me out with it. I know you may view this as a selfish expectation to put on him, but theres a history there that I'll get in to another time that made that emotion perfectly legitimate. Amazing to me that a man who is willing to give so much to those who he doesnt know would be willing to not give to one of his close friends in need. Seems as though he should be worrying more about his current flock leaving in droves more than his potential new flock getting false expectations. A bit harsh I know, but like I said, I'll get in to that history at a later time.

There are moments when I wish this would slow down a bit. With my rejection of Christianity and adoption of a Neo-Pagan belief I experience something profound almost every few days. Its almost exhausting. Now that Father's Day was over I thought I would be able to have a smooth ride for at least a week without something happening. I was wrong.

Hey! Day after Father's Day! The wife and I planned on going out to an improve comedy show at a bar in Asheville. Now, we were both stressing as the day came because this is the first time we've left the kids with someone for over an hour and only the second date night my wife and I have had in about 2 years. We were long overdue. But, this is a massively complex scenario. Lyric's Diabetes was the real playing factor in all this. Jessies mom took the pump training course months ago and has watched Lyric for an hour here and there while we ran to the store or what-not. Nothing hardcore. She knew the pump well enough to give proper insulin and knew how to use carb factors. On the other side of the coin is Dorian. The little man loves his mama. If he wakes up at any time after going down for the night, he wants mommy and come hell of high water he will get it. So, we were stressing. A lot! We agreed to let the kids stay up as late as they wanted. This way Lyric feels like she is having a special visit with Grandma as she RARELY goes to bed past 8pm. And Dorian will pass out and be oblivious to the world until at least midnight. Our plan is perfect. All we needed was for Lyric to have good Glucose numbers during the day to get her properly set up, and she did. Holy shit this just might happen.

Laura came over around 6:30. Jessie went through 30 minutes of explanation of proper child care and kitchen layout tactics. I literally had to shove her out the door. For her sake though, I was right there with her, but I'm more of an internal kind of person.

MONDAY
AT THE SHOOOoooWWWwww!!! 1
The bar was an interesting place. Non-descript, kind of slightly maybe in a location that could be referred to as out in the middle of nowhere. But a nice place. We received a VERY warm welcome when we walked in by all our friends. They understand that we cant get out very often due to our situation and I cant appreciate them more for sticking in there with us. Its been a hard couple of years. We pulled up a table, ordered some hot wings and alcohol and watched our friends, the OXYMORONS, do their thing.

It was a fantastic show. Funny as hell. We sat and laughed for a few hours, ate good food, and drank. Unfortunately, I was the DD so I could be nearly the lush that my 3 Sex On The Beach wife was. But that's ok! It was still a hoot! Though it was somewhat tainted by our worry of Lyric's sugars. Laura was awesome enough to send us text messages of her readings and what she was doing with her food. We stayed 100% informed and it was a relief. After the show we sat around and talked to all of our friends we haven't seen outside our own home in a while. We got to be adults for a change.

Now, all of my friends who where acting in the show have been with me for over 10 years. They have stuck with me through some of the hardest parts of my life and all of the weird feelings that come from that. This also includes my recent rejection of Christianity. they were happy for Jessie and I. Really happy. Not that we rejected our faith, but that we found something that we KNEW was right for us and wasn't judgemental or hate filled. It was like being the old Mike again. I missed that little bastard. We only got to stay for about an hour after the show, but it was one of the best hours I've had for 2 years......socially of course!

When we got home, Dorian had crashed and was put to bed. Little guy just couldn't hang. Lyric was still up and didn't want to see Grandma leave. After a 10 minute exhaustion caused melt down, she finally went to bed and fell asleep in under 5 seconds. The wife and I stayed up until about 1:30 and went to bed. It was a good day. I've had too many of those back to back. Something is bound to happen.

TUESDAY
The Blow Up
When a couple changes something in their lives as big as we have, certain things need to be discussed. We have changed our views on a major cornerstone of our perceptions of morality and goodness, and that trickles down into a huge amount of other topics. One of them caused us to have the first major blowup since our exodus.

During a heated discussion, my wife asked me if she had let me know sooner that she was a Wiccan, would I have left her. Now for a refresher, she told me this after a few years of keeping it a secret because at the time I was a fundamentalist evangelical christian. Most christian based marriages that are as hardcore as I thought we were don't make it through something like that. The Bible referrs to that as being "unequally yolked" and is HIGHLY frowned upon in the style of Christianity that we were involved in. I told her that I might have left her if she had told me sooner. That response didn't go well even though this was all in concept.

I understood why she was hurt by that. In my previous life I was able to not judge most people. I didn't mind gays, Islam, or anything else that the church told me that I should hate. Hate is just not something that was ever in me. Oh I despise a few things, but I don't hate. But being unequally yolked was something entirely different. I married a Christian woman. People in my life told me that she was good because she was a christian, as if it was some blueprint for the perfect marriage. But, I would have judged her for not only not being a christian, but a Wiccan, the absolute symbol of everything that I thought was evil. I would have judged her because she was no longer the woman I married. Pretty foolish huh? I'm sure we would have worked it all out of course. We love each other and have been through much worse than that. But it certainly would have made things difficult to the point that in the long run I don't think it would have worked out. After a few hours of tears and fighting, we finally reached the resolution.

Since the great conversion, I have had the opportunity to talk to people in my life that I knew well and apologize for being a judgemental christian asshole. But I finally realized that I never apologized to my wife. I never told her that I was sorry that I tried to fit her in to this mold of what I wife should be to a Christian man. I never apologized to her for my expectations of her being a housewife. I never apologized to her for being angry at her for not conducting herself as a christian woman. I finally got to. And damn it I cried again. What the hell is wrong with me! I'm not a crier! My wife has seen me cry maybe once in the past 3 years. She has now seen me cry twice in a week. I guess the typical christian standard for a man being strong and hard that I've been holding myself up to is starting to crumble. As much as I don't like being vulnerable like that, its very freeing and I'm sure there's more to come. I have always thought that a man like me doesn't cry. I guess I was wrong about that too. My only fear is that I become a blubbering fool and cry at the drop of a hat.

Old Mike was a prick. I've faced that. But new Mike is a taco made of bad ass drenched in awesome sauce. I'm liking how this is going. I wonder what will happen over the next few days. I'm actually looking forward to finding out!

At what point can a person know that a choice they have made was the right one? Its different for everyone, but I believe I hit that point this weekend.

I come in to my belief of Wiccan philosophies with a certain amount of baggage. My wife never really struggled with grasping the concepts of Wicca, or the life change. Its always been with her. but for me, with my Evangelical Christian background, its been a more drastic progression. I've come to realize that I have many walls built around me that prohibit true happiness in my life. This may be due to the mentality that a Christian is supposed to suffer somewhat through life, or to be a martyr for the cause. I do know that I have many more walls that I need to break down, but I've gotten off to a pretty damn good start.

Friday
Just about like any other Friday. I go to work, get the back deposit together, come home. After we got the kids to bed, instead of playing World of Warcraft (which you will find out that I am a whore for) we decide to watch a movie. We ended up renting YES MAN from pay per view, sat down with a few snacks, and chilled out. There was a scene in the movie that just about cracked me up. In fact, I was laughing so hard I had to have my wife pause the movie so I could regain my composure. But, something happened. Within the last 5 seconds of the laughing fit, I began to weep. And I'm not talking about laughing so hard it made my eyes water, I mean literally cry. I was taken back by it. I've never cried from laughing. It didn't take me long to realize that I haven't laughed that hard in several years. It was a freeing experience for me, it was beautiful in a simple way. It was pure joy and my heart ached because I finally found it again. Our lives have been so difficult the past few years with Lyric's diabetes and a new baby in the house. It was magic.

SATURDAY
Jessie's mother joined us in going to a place called Hot Springs. Its a way out in the middle of nowhere town full of old hippies and gift shops. The main draw is the natural hot spring water that is pumped into various tubs that people can jump in to and soak. Its a nice time. We had taken a soak while Jessie was going through her miscarriage with our first pregnancy. Going back there for me was like revisiting a painful part of my past, a very sad time. But it was ok as I had finally accepted what had happened those many years ago. We went to collect elements. We drove around for about 30 minutes, checking the place out and finally hit a spot where we could get access to the river. We didnt play in the water too long. Only about 30 minutes, but we collected our air, water, and earth in the mason jars we brought. The place had good energy, really natural. After we collected our dirt we drove back in to town and had a really good lunch at some gift shop/restaurant along the way. The kids crashed out early and Jessie and I played Warcraft the rest of the night. Got our toons to 62!

SUNDAY


I GOT TO SLEEP IN!!!!!!!!!! This is significant. Since Lyrics diagnosis, I have been the one to get up with her in the middle of the night to check her blood sugar. Jessie gets up with Dorian for his overnight feed and I assist her, more often with him now, due to her just being plain exhausted. I can honestly say I havent gotten to sleep in since October. So it was a wonderful way to start the day. When I came downstairs coffee was made, and Lyric was DYING to give me her Father's Day present. A hand painted coffee cut. Not usable, but still very pretty. It was really sweet. We lounged around for a while, Dorian was napping. When he woke up we went to my parents house and hung out in the backyard in the picnic area while the kids played in the dirt....well more like ate the dirt.

We got in to a very deep conversation with my mother about why we believed in Wicca. Now, this is my mom I'm talking about here. My psycho grandmothers child. Mom up until that point she had kind of pushed me away when I was REALLY talking about Wicca. I cant say I blame her with her upbringing at my Grandmothers hands. But she was very receptive, didn't turn her back on the conversation because it made her uncomfortable. In the past, she would put up her wall and shut me down if I ever spoke of it. It was a positive conversation and she opened up to me in a way she never had. A burden was lifted. Its almost as if she was the last bit of approval I was looking for with this whole thing. And I feel like I finally got it and she accepts me for who I am, not for what I believe. We had to leave, but Lyric was fighting a low blood sugar and covered in wet grass. So we suspended her pump, threw her in the shower, and let her sit and eat some food after she got out to bring her back up. Off to Rick's house.

Rick is Jessie's dad. He's an interesting guy, super intelligent, quick to be a smart ass. I like him a lot. He recently lost his wife to stomach cancer, but that's a whole other story that I'm sure my wife will eventually bring out. We stayed for a while, let the kids play and eventually left.

It was getting late, too late to cook. So for Father's day I had a romantic dinner at Taco Bell. It was oddly appropriate though, seeing as how our lives are hectic and this is not a rare occurrence. After the kids went to bed it was business time. Now, I'm not the kind of person to bring my sex life into the public eye. My sexual relationship with my wife is a very private thing. But to say it was awesome is an understatement. This is due to me letting go of some inhibitions and rolling with it. Turns out my perception of how I should conduct myself in the bedroom were a bit conservative. Ya, I talked dirty to her. It was freaking filthy. It would make Porn Stars blush. I'm sure the Bible on our bookshelf caught on fire from being around what we said........it was awesome.

IN CLOSING
What a wonderful thing. I feel like I'm experiencing life for the first time again. I've definatly made the right choice. After this weekend, there is very little that can convice me otherwise. My life has richness again.

I used to tell myself that "The greatest lie the devil ever told was that he didn't exist". This was almost a mantra to live by for several years for me.

When I moved into the Bible Belt of Western North Carolina I was truly searching for some kind of meaning to this whole thing and eventually became a Christian. Things seemed really nice for a while. I would go to church, come home, go to work. I was a music minister for 7 years, a youth pastor for 2 years. But I always had some kind of inner struggle with the concept of Jesus and God. I always viewed God as a loving father figure (even more so after the birth of our first child Lyric). But the more I went to church, the more I saw something that was not loving. Now, I'm not saying that I don't think that God is loving, I'm just saying that the God of the Bible and the God I experienced weren't the same God. And this same polarizing viewpoint also crept into the Christians I new in my life.

The Pastor of the church, I'll call him Paul for the sake anonymity, and I were good friends. I was a rough kid, long hair and various piercings. A respectful smoker, yet a bit brash in my political views. But he took me in, he saw a bit of himself in me. We would eat breakfast or lunch often. We took the youth group to various out of state revivals where people would be slain in the spirit and speak in tongues. There was an amazing energy to the place and I had thought that I had finally found the authority over my life I was looking for. Unfortunatly, after 7 years of service to the church, he asked me to step down from the Worship Team for being a smoker and then proceeded to not speak to me for a year. So, I lost my position in the church, and also a friend in 5 minutes that was 7 years in the making. The church, the people who are supposed to be the hands and hearts of their God were no longer righteous in my eyes. They had no more power and authority over their lives then any other person. STRIKE 1

The constant influence of my grandmother traveled with me most of my life. She is an old school Pentecostal, tongue talkin, God fearing woman. Short and chubby she was huggable at a young age. She used to always make me crackers and cheese as we watched pirated VHS tapes she copied from the video store. She told me that Jesus was always watching and was ready to judge me. At family functions, she would attempt to minister to my sister who was a punker (back when punk actually meant something and Birkenstocks were meant to kick ass not look cute). It always fell of deaf ears. She was who she wanted to be. Unfortunately, my grandmothers influence turned oppressive after the death of my Grandfather. She literally lost her marbles and became a tremendously judgmental person and used the Bible to justify her actions. Its like she could say that anything she wanted no matter how rude or disrespectful as long as she said it was the truth. This influence was the most difficult to shake for me. If anything else I had the fear of hell to deter me from straying from the faith. STRIKE 2

Our daughter was diagnosed with Type-1 Diabetes just before her 3rd Birthday. This perfect little creature whome I love more than anything on this earth had just been given a life expectancy of 10 years less and a lifetime of struggle. If God doesnt create imperfection, then how could this have happened? Doesn't this fall in the line of the "Age of Reason" that many Christians claim to be truth to make themselves feel better that unsaved children dont go to Hell? This situation was compounded by my Grandmother (The crazy one I mentioned before) stating to me that "The sons of the father falls onto his children". As to somehow imply that its something that I had done. STRIKE 3

The breaking moment for me was attempting to rationalize a concept I adopted called Universal Salvation. I had thought for a while that the Bible has been used as a system of control for a while. I understand the will of evil men is absolute and nothing is sacred. What better way to enslave people then to paralyze them with fear of an eternal torment? To capitalize on their imaginations. Universal Salvation changed This concept really fit in to my line of thinking at the time. It goes something like this. The sacrifice of of Christ was for all men for all time, going back to Adam. This covered original sin and all other sins no matter how obscene, so no one goes to Hell. I presented this idea to a group of people that knew the Bible forwards and backwards and weren't going to shut me out for a differing opinion as Christians don't like to ask themselves basic theological questions. Atheists. It was a lively theological conversation and really fed my intellectual side. You can check it out HERE if you would like. My wife was also following the thread and we had great conversations over the span of a few days as well. But after a while, I realized they were asking me questions that I couldn't answer, and truly should had been asking myself. I started to sway a bit and really wonder if I was a Christian at all.

Towards the end of my time on the Atheist forums, my wife hit me with something VERY deep. She asked me that without the fear of God, what is truly keeping both her and I in Christianity. I really couldnt give an answer. After truly believing in Universal Salvation, the concept of damnation was no longer in my system of belief. She informed me that she always had a hard time believing in the Christian God, that there was something wrong with the whole thing. After about an hour of REALLY talking about our hearts and feelings, things were different. And in that moment, I no longer believed in the Christian God, the Bible, even in Jesus.

But she wasnt done with me yet. Turns out my wife had been a closet Wiccan for some time. She was afraid to tell me as a HUGE portion of christian marriages wouldn't make it through something like that, I was HARDCORE. And my wife made total sense to me from then on. She has always been a cloth diapering, anti-vaccing, booby baby mama. In touch with the earth and her love of people. A feeler of others emotions. Neither of us ever fit in to the typical christian mold, but she was unhappy in a way that a christian shouldnt be. It was something fundamental. She had been so unhappy for so long, but she was so afraid to talk to me about it. I love her now more than ever and we're actually HAPPY in our marriage for the first time in a long time. We had become stagnant. It opened up a massive door for our relationship.

IN CLOSING

This path that I had chosen to take for a lifetime, and over 10 years devoted, was crushed. Now, this took time. I think in reality I was closer to STRIKE 1,264,798. It was a culmination of many factors, as some listed above. But the one thing that kept me there was the fear that was instilled in me by my Grandmother and when she passes on, so shall ultimately my fear. I am a Pagan.

The greatest lie the church ever told me was that the Devil existed. Certainly a good matra to live by for a lifetime to come.

I've been going though a LOT of changes in my life and I feel like I need to get some stuff out every once in a while.

Our daughter Lyric has type-1 Diabetes and is still fighting her honeymooning stage. But she's getting more stable. Our son Dorian is 1.5 years old and has slept through the night for the first time recently. Both my wife and I have moved away from Chrisitanity and are discovering some interesting perspectives on spirituality.

So ya, lots of weird things going on.

So, I've just started this thing. Give me some time to get some stuff together. I should have the first few rounds up soon.