9-12-2011
I washed out at my club championship on the second day this weekend. I then did something that I have never done before and I likely won’t ever do again. I withdrew from the tournament. I did so because I was going to Austin for the game and I wanted to be with friends much more than I wanted to be on the golf course again. I think there was some Divine Intervention in my second round play…
Have you ever had something happen to change your plans and that small change lead you to a place you really needed to be? Sure you have. You might not have recognized it, but it has happened. You likely have recognized the event and the change of plans that the event caused, but maybe you didn’t recognize the trickle effect and ultimately the “where and why” you ended up .
I ended up in a Baptist Church in Cedar Park, Texas outside of Austin on Sunday September 11th. The significance of the specific church is real for a number of reasons. The main reason being the churches very real and consumed involvement with the relief effort for those people in Bastrop and Steiner Ranch and other surrounding Austin areas so affected by the wildfires in Texas.
The Pastor, Will, came in with a harrowed look and an urgency that was evident before he spoke a word. On the 10th anniversary of 9-11, there was but one mention of the tragic events of 10 years ago. The memories were still prevalent in all of our minds and we spent time talking about that day after the service, but the fires of today in Austin Texas took center stage instead of the fires in New York 10 years ago.
I often live in my own little world and I often worry about my own little problems and I often distract myself playing my own little games and worrying, I hate to admit, mainly about me. I’m selfish and I know it. I didn’t say I like it, but I recognize it. So, I don’t think it would surprise anyone to hear that I didn’t know much about the devastation that the fires have caused up to this point. Yes I know it’s been dry and yes I knew there were fires and yes I even, in a friend of a friend of a friend… way, heard a specific story about a person losing their home. So I was aware there was an issue, but I was not AWARE.
I wasn’t AWARE until the preacher pointed out a lady in the front who lived in Bastrop and he told us that her house was one of 7 still standing in a subdivision that had 66 homes until last week. That I heard. That I understood. I needed to be in that church to really understand. I needed to see the pictures of the homes burned to the ground. The pictures of the black dirt and ashes that is all that is left of a families memories.
The message of the sermon was the relative irrelevance of most of our everyday problems and some of the mindless things that we tend to distract ourselves with when there are those with real problems and real loss. I needed to be reminded and really be AWARE of these realities. So I don’t have any money and I’m going through a divorce and my company just got sold and there is uncertainty in the future and so on and so forth. Those are not real problems; there is no real loss in any of those things. Losing a child or a husband or a wife or a loved one in a fire because some whack job flew a plane into a building is real loss. Losing your home to a fire and your neighbors losing their homes is a real problem. Not debt, not your job, not the latest rumor someone started about you, none of it is a real problem and none of it is real loss.
I needed to be in that church on River Place drive, with people I love, becoming AWARE again of what real problems are and what real loss is. I needed to think about fires. The fires of 9-11-2001. The so very present fires of 2011 in Texas, the fires of the Federal building in Oklahoma City, the fires that came in the form of hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the Devil Storm of 1900. The fires of the earthquakes and the Tsunami in Japan and the others that have occurred in the past. I needed to remember the fires of the car crashes that killed John Mattingly and Patrick Phelan and Edward Grippon and Chris Kansas and Nick Finnegan and the countless other cherished loved ones that die every day. The fires, that are the bullets and bombs that kill our soldiers everyday across the globe. I needed to think about those things and think about what real loss is.
Well I remember now and I am more AWARE. I am blessed and I am thankful for all that I have. I am thankful for the love in my life. I have the love of and share my love with so many wonderful people and that group expands every single day. I am thankful for the resourcefulness that I have been granted that allows me to have a wonderful life. I am thankful for the breaks I have been given and the escapes God has granted me, on so many occasions, that allowed me to stay on this earth for one more day. I am thankful for so much. To every single one of my friends and my family, I am thankful for you and I am grateful to you for your love, kindness and generosity. Where I have failed any of you, and I know that I have, I am truly sorry. We all make mistakes and I try to make fewer every single day.
What are you thankful for? Have you thought about it lately or do you just take it for granted? Who are you thankful for? Have you told them lately? Don’t get hung up on the bumps in the road. They aren’t fires. Become AWARE and live life to its fullest with thanks and love in your heart. Don’t take it for granted ; pay it forward. There are real “Fires” out there every single day and chances are good if you are reading this nonsense… you are not in oneJ. So from the Pot to the Kettle… WAKE THE HELL UP AND GIVE THANKS! We got it pretty good.
To those of you that are in any way affected by a “Fire of Life” of any type, I am sorry and you are in my prayers and in my heart. To those of you like me that have been lucky enough to avoid most of them, I am grateful for that and my prayers are that we can all avoid them. As they say, “Don’t sweat the small stuff”. To God for re-routing my course and leading me to that church in Cedar Park, thank you for the detour.
Love, Happiness and Prosperity to All and to All a good night….
WJN
