Two Seasons: Christmas And Baseball

Forget everything you learned in grade school about there being four seasons, Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter.  There are only two seasons that actually matter, Baseball and Christmas.

Christmas embodies all that life was meant to be

Baseball Equals Life As It Is
Baseball is life itself, or at least the most accurate metaphor we have for life.  The grueling 162 game season must be played out till its end, day after day.  It begins in the spring, with every team, every player, full of potential and hope.  The grind of each game, each inning, continues through July and August, wearing down those ill prepared for the long distance nature of life, sapping the energy of those who have stuck around one year too long, and cutting short others' promising careers with unforeseen injuries.

By September many teams have been eliminated from a chance at the post-season, but the games must still be played, though they seem meaningless to those with no hope of continuing into October.  But even on those teams there is opportunity for individuals to excel.  Baseball, like life, is a game where success is rare.  If a hitter fails to reach base safely 70% of the time he is considered a star.  For a team to win a few more games than it loses is reason for celebration.

There is more to success in baseball than numbers or even victories, at least for those who know what to look for.  The batter who gives himself up to move a runner into scoring position, a shortstop who cheats a little toward to the middle of the infield against a hitter who tends to go that way, the hitter who takes an extra pitch or two in hopes of wearing out a tiring starting pitcher in the late innings and a team that plays to win even after they've been mathematically eliminated from contention are all admired by teammates and opponents alike.  And, as in life itself, it is often these small moments of striving that give us the courage to face another day.

Christmas Equals Life As It Could Be
Christmas represents life as it was meant to be.  The mystery of the Creator becoming the created, the One given for all, He who was wronged making the ultimate sacrifice to be reunited in fellowship with those who have wronged Him are all a part of Christmas.  The hope and joy inspired by the season, the generosity and goodwill expressed by so many is but a foretaste of what is to come for those who recognize the true meaning of Christmas.

Christmas embodies the hope, peace and love that can only be found through a relationship with the baby born that first Christmas.  Promised through and to Abraham when he said, "God will provide the lamb."   Born for the purpose of dying in place of all us, paying the debt that we owed to him.

For those of us who know Him, Christmas presents a tremendous opportunity.  The message of the Gospel is plainly stated in the lyrics of many of the songs of the season, songs that are sung not only in churches but also on the radio and through the sound systems at malls and department stores all across the world.  And people, even those who make no claim to faith or who would never attend a church service, have memorized these words and sing them every year at this time.

Christmas is a season to celebrate and give thanks and to share what life can and will be like if we but embrace the message.

The Biker Lifestyle

If I have one regret in life, it's that I didn't start riding a motorcycle 30 years earlier.

How It Started
It was St. Patrick's Day 2007, a Saturday.  Teri (my wife) and I were taking Kelsey (our daughter) and her then boyfriend (who shall remain nameless) to the Georgia Aquarium in downtown Atlanta.  Irish folk music on XM radio was our soundtrack for the ride and a light drizzle welcomed us as we waited in line for close to an hour.

We'd been at the aquarium for a little more than an hour when my cell phone rang.  It was my son Caleb who at the time was stationed at Fort Sill in Oklahoma.  "Hey Dad, listen to this," he said and I heard the rumble of a 650cc engine as he fired up his brand new Yamaha V-Star Classic.

I was infected.  The biker bug had bitten me and begun its incubation period.  Over the next six weeks I researched motorcycles tirelessly.  I learned about engine displacement, bore and stroke, compression ratios, chain vs. belt vs. shaft final drive systems, air cooled vs. liquid cooled, fuel injection vs. carburetors.  And I looked at all the different styles and makes, cruisers, touring bikes, sportbikes, Yamaha, Suzuki, Kawasaki, Honda, Harley.

Spec sheets and model comparisons were shooting out of my printer until it ran out ink, twice.  Motorcycle forums and online biker magazines were added to my web browser favorites.  I did a couple of "just looking, thanks," stealth runs to my local big-four Japanese dealership (there wasn't a Harley dealership in Newnan at that time).

I narrowed it down to a cruiser between 500cc and 1000cc with shaft drive.  There were actually quite a few models that fit those specs, so I did a little more research.  At the time both Yamaha and Suzuki were offering pretty good financing deals so I focused attention on those two manufacturers.

Finally, I figured if the V-Star was good enough for Caleb, then it would be good enough for me.  And the 2007 model was available in white, something that at the time, for reasons I can't fully explain, appealed to me.  I called Cycle City (our local dealer) and yes they did have a V-Star Classic in white in stock.

Saturday of Memorial Day weekend Teri and I were at Cycle City.  I went straight to the white V-Star and sat on it.  Within seconds a salesman was standing next to me.  I asked for the guy I'd spoken with on the phone, Bobby.  He was with another customer, so I strolled around, looking at helmets and other gear that I knew I'd need.  Meanwhile Teri was looking at a used Kawasaki Eliminator.

Bobby found me looking at saddlebags.  We went back over to the V-Star as I told him that we'd spoken earlier in the week and what I was looking for.  We talked about the V-Star for a couple of minutes and then he said, "Before you make up your mind for sure, let me show you this."

Parked a few bikes away was a blue-purple (or blurple) Suzuki Boulevard M50.  The Boulevard had more of a chopper-muscle style with bobbed fenders compared to the full fenders on the V-Star.  The Boulevard was also a little bigger, with an 805cc engine compared to the 649cc power plant on the V-Star.  The Boulevard also had two other features that the V-Star lacked, liquid cooling and fuel injection.  It was the fuel injection that pushed me over to the Boulevard side, though it was a little more expensive.

Bobby sensed my resistance at the additional cost, so we talked a little more and with the deal Suzuki was offering he got the price within sniffing distance of sticker on the V-Star.  We filled out some paperwork, I took the tire replacement option (a total waste of money, don't bother with this if it's ever offered to you) and the pre-paid service deal (which was definitely worth the money, over the three years of the agreement I more than got my money out of it with oil and fluid changes and valve adjustments).  Bobby ran the paperwork back to the finance department, a tech took the bike into the shop for final prep and I picked out a Fulmer helmet, Tourmaster jacket and Cortech gloves.

My ride, the 2007 Suzuki Boulevard M50

 

This whole time Teri was looking around, but she kept going back to the Eliminator.  "Do you want it?"  I asked her.  She took a minute to answer and said, "No...not today.  I can ride on the back of yours." 

Twenty minutes later I was geared up and sitting on the M50 in the parking lot, thinking I was going to ride it home.  I was wrong.  I had little a trouble mastering the friction zone on the clutch and stalled it three times.  One of the techs rode it home for me.  I spent the rest of the weekend riding up and down the driveway.  Once I'd done it ten times in a row without stalling I ventured out into the neighborhood.

Over the next two weeks I got my motorcycle permit and signed up for a Motorcycle Safety Foundation (MSF) course at a Harley dealership up in Cobb County, about 45 minutes away.  The earliest the course was available was August.  And I started riding further, with Teri following in the car.  That lasted for almost three weeks and then Teri realized I was having all the fun.  So it was back to Cycle City.  On the drive over she said, "If the Eliminator is still there we'll get it, but if it's gone, maybe I shouldn't get a bike."  It was still there, and I rode it home myself.  By that time a Harley dealership had opened in Newnan and Teri took her MSF course a week after I'd finished mine.

Embracing The Biker Lifestyle
Picture in your mind a biker.  Chances are you thought of a grizzled looking bearded guy in a leather vest with tattoos, a one percenter, a member of an outlaw motorcycle club (MC).  In the last few years the image of motorcycle riders has improved, thanks in large part to TV shows like American Chopper, Monster Garage, Biker Build Off and the two Ewan McGregor documentary series, Long Way Round and Long Way Down and the John Travolta movie Wild Hogs.  But shows like Sons Of Anarchy, while well written and compelling, and the History Channel's Gangland continue to portray the stereotypical outlaw biker.  I'm not talking about those guys.

I'm not talking about these guys

When I talk about the biker lifestyle I'm talking about the sheer joy you can only experience by punching the starter button and leaning into that first turn out of the driveway on your way to it doesn't matter where.  You become acutely aware of the slightest change in temperature as you roll down a slight incline.  You feel the gust of a tractor-trailer traveling in the opposite direction.  It is at once mind clearing and demanding of your total concentration.  It is ultimately about the ride, but there's more to it than that alone.

Nothing I've been involved with has started more conversations than motorcycles.  Complete strangers will come up to me in a parking lot and ask about the bike, how long I've been riding, where I got it, how much it cost.  They'll say how they've always wanted to ride but just never got around to it.  If they're a fellow biker they'll share some of their favorite rides or invite me to come and ride with their club.  On the road every other biker is a brother (or sister) and gets and returns the biker wave, left hand, first two fingers pointing down.  While the number of women bikers, and their percentage among all bikers, are increasing every year, a female rider (as opposed to a passenger-there is no such thing a motorcycle "driver") is still rare enough that Teri will often get a "Woo-hoo, you go girl!" from passing women cagers (a "cager" is biker speak for someone in a car).

Motorcycling For The Empty Nesters
Once Teri got that Eliminator we discovered that motorcycling was an activity we could share both on and off the bikes.  Our son, Caleb, was already out of the house with a family of his own.  And Kelsey, our daughter, was then a junior in high school, just a little more than a year away from going off to college.  It was the perfect time to adopt a new, shared lifestyle.

We bought a couple of books, Proficient Motorcycling and The Complete Idiot's Guide to Motorcycles and read them together.  We shopped online together for accessories and gear, visited Cycle City often enough that we're on a first name basis with most of the staff, and attended motorcycle shows.  We helped each other install saddlebags on both bikes (and then on Teri's new Kawasaki Vulcan 500, and then on her latest ride, a Kawasaki Vulcan 900).  We put a rider's backrest on the M50 and a windshield on the Vulcan 900.  We got each other heated gloves for Christmas one year and a bluetooth motorcycle intercom set the next. 

Teri's most recent ride, the 2009 Kawasaki Vulcan 900

Kids?  What kids?  Did we used to have kids?  Actually we're not totally empty nesters yet.  Kelsey still lives at home and commutes to school.  She will, on rare occasions, accompany us on an outing, riding on the back of my bike.  About the only thing we're still putting off is a multi-day trip, since we don't want to leave Kelsey alone for a weekend, not that she'd notice we were gone.  But there's still plenty of time for that once Kelsey moves out on her own.

Ride Your Own Ride
Teri prefers to have a specific destination in mind when we ride.  That's fine with me.  We've enjoyed planning out our rides almost as much we enjoy the ride itself.  We've found some wonderful restaurants within a couple of hours of home.  There was Butlers Mill in Graham, Alabama, a little buffet place on the banks of the Little Tallapoosa River that specializes in seafood, or is catfish technically riverfood?  It's in an old cotton mill not far from the Georgia state line.  We've also ridden to Juliette, Georgia and had lunch at the Whistle Stop Café, site of the movie Fried Green Tomatoes.  A little closer to home, and our most frequent ride to eat spot, is Senoia Coffee & Café, where they roast their own coffee and serve a mean cheesecake.

We don't always ride together.  When she was working dayshift at Newnan Hospital Teri would ride to work.  And when I was employed full-time I rode every day unless it was raining or below 35 degrees.  I still ride when I have on-site jobs.  And since the beginning if one of us is riding solo we always call the other one when we've arrived at our destination.  When Teri and Kelsey do a girls' day out I'll take off on the M50 and just wander with no particular end in mind.  I've not always known exactly where I was, but I've never been lost.

We've done a few group rides.  Quite a few churches in our area have motorcycle groups and we've ridden with a few.  There are a number of Harley riders in our own church and we've been out with them a time or two.  The wife of a colleague of mine recently finished up her Master's degree and treated herself to a motorcycle.  Teri and I took her on her first "group" ride, just the three of us.  We went to Warm Springs, Georgia, another of our favorite destinations and home of FDR's "little White House".

Still More To Look Forward To
I'm still very satisfied with the M50 and I think Teri will be happy with the Vulcan 900 for quite a while.  But I still check out the new models every year.  I've already picked out a couple "next" bikes.  My first "next" was the Kawasaki Mean Streak, but they discontinued that model before I was ready to trade up.  Lately I've been lusting over the Kawasaki Nomad and Voyager, something a little better suited to a multi-day trip (cause Kelsey will eventually strike out on her own).  I also kind of like the Harley Fat Bob, if only it was liquid cooled.

Truth is I'll probably have picked out half a dozen new "next" bikes before I'm actually ready to buy.  But there will be a next bike, or three.  And when (if) I ever get too old to hold a two wheeler upright at a red light there's always a trike.  See, that biker bug that bit me back on St. Patrick's Day 2007, it's incurable.  I only wish it had bitten me 30 years earlier.  I'm just sayin'.

Dancing In The Minefields: The Married Lifestyle

This monogamy business, it's hard work.  "I do are the two most famous last words.  The beginning of the end."

The happiest couple 07-15-1978

They're Dropping Like Flies
I reconnected with a dear old friend on Face Book recently.  I've known him and his family for 18 years; his wife was pregnant with their first child when we met.  They are no longer together, separated in 2008, divorced in 2009.  Financial difficulties played a role but that wasn't the sole reason.  Good Christian people, both of them.  That didn't seem to matter. 

Through Face Book I've found quite a few long lost friends.  A good many of them have thrown in the towel on marriage.  Face Book itself played at least a contributing role in one of the break ups, maybe more.

Love, it would seem, is not all you need.  At least not that romantic butterflies-in-the-stomach, light-headed, sweat-on-the-brow, ringing-in-the-ears kind of love.  That kind of love is fine for what it is.  And it's that in-love sensation that leads many couples to the altar.  But like the flu, whose symptoms it shares, that kind of love will pass.  Oh, it can come back, but it's elusive, and you have to work for it.  For too many, once that initial wave is over, so is the marriage.

A Little Marital Advice
Teri and I met in September 1977.  We were married in July 1978.  I know that love-at-first-sight phenomenon.  And I know it can happen, to the same couple, more than once. But going into it no one dreams it's going to be as hard as it turns out to be.

Many people have given us advice over the years.  The two that I remember the most came from grandfathers.  The day before our wedding my Grandpa Stirmel told me, "Lots of people will tell you that marriage is a 50-50 proposition.  It's not.  It's 100-100."

On the celebration of their 50th wedding anniversary, Teri's Grandpa Forester told me, "That's a long time to spend with one woman."

The kind of love that is required to sustain a marriage is an act of the will.  It's hard work and resolve.  To more fully grasp what is necessary to make a marriage work it helps to understand where marriage came from and what it represents.  God cooked the whole thing up.  Some would say He ordained it.  And while there are very real here and now, on this world, in this life reasons for it, ultimately marriage is a metaphor for God's love for us in Jesus. 

Without getting into a theological discussion, allow me to make one more point on this particular part of the topic.  On the night before He went to the cross (which was necessary to make the relationship with us possible in the first place) Jesus sweated blood in anticipation of what He was about to do.  That should give us a hint as to the level of consideration marriage deserves before it is entered in to.

Worth The Price
In the end, it's worth it all.  Of course I say that without having reached the end.  So let me rephrase.  After 32 years, it's been worth it all.  It has, at times, been easy.  But not often and never for very long.  I'm not sure if I qualify as an expert on the subject, but I have managed to stay married to the same woman for more than three decades.  I've been married for most of my life, so I think I know a thing or two about it.  So here's my two cents for those considering marriage or who are married and may be having a rough go of it:  Remember who you are, and hang on.  And in the face of all the chaos remember to dance.

The love of my life

Minefields And Storms
Singer-songwriter Andrew Peterson has likened marriage to dancing in a minefield.  His song, Dancing In The Minefields says it better in three and a half minutes and 319 words than I could in 2500 words.  Thanks Andrew, for reawakening the romantic in so many of us.  Andrew's been married for 15 years, so he still has quite a few landmines to two-step around.  Those first 50 years are the toughest.  I'm just sayin'.

Dancing In The Minefields
Andrew Peterson

Well I was 19 you were 21
The year we got engaged
Everyone said we were much to young
But we did it anyway
We got the rings for 40 each from a pawnshop down the road
We said our vows and took the leap now 15 years ago

We went dancing in the minefields
We went sailing in the storm
And it was harder than we dreamed
But I believe that's what the promise is for

Well "I do" are the two most famous last words
The beginning of the end
But to lose your life for another I've heard is a good place to begin
Cause the only way to find your life is to lay your own life down
And I believe it's an easy price for the life that we have found


And we're dancing in the minefields
We're sailing in the storm
This is harder than we dreamed
But I believe that's what the promise is for
That's what the promise is for

 So when I lose my way, find me
When I loose love's chains, bind me
At the end of all my faith
to the end of all my days
when I forget my name, remind me

Cause we bear the light of the son of man
So there's nothing left to fear
So I'll walk with you in the shadow lands
Till the shadows disappear
Cause he promised not to leave us
And his promises are true
So in the face of all this chaos baby
I can dance with you

So lets go dancing in the minefields
Lets go sailing in the storms
Oh lets go dancing in the minefields
And kicking down the doors
Oh lets go dancing in the minefields
And sailing in the storms
Oh this is harder than we dreamed
But I believe that's what the promise is for
That's what the promise is for

Hopeless Change

The toughest decision on this post was how to title it.  Do I go straight SEO (search engine optimization) and somehow incorporate "Tea Party", "Republican" or "Nancy Pelosi"?  Should I fall for the veiled reference to the fallout of the Republican's new majority in the House of Representatives with something like "Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead"?  I considered "The More Things Change..." and "Too Little Too Late".

Ding Dong, The Witch Is Dead

But I like "Hopeless Change".  It has the same number of syllables as Obama's 2008 campaign slogan of "Hope and Change" while reflecting what yesterday's (Tuesday November 2, 2010) election has accomplished, at least as it applies to the overwhelming majority the Democrats had held in both houses of Congress.  And it pretty much sums up what that change will ultimately mean to this nation.

The Republicans and the Tea Party and Restore the Constitution folks will be celebrating, believing they've sent a message to Washington.  And they have.  Americans are tired of the way things in Washington work.  In the words of newly elected Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, "We've come to take our government back."  Problem is, the people who are expected to deliver the message are the very people we need to take the government back from.

Don't Expect Real Change From The Feds
The kind of change we need at the federal level is not going to be accomplished by the federal government.  No matter how many of the newly elected Congressmen campaigned on how bad Obamacare is (and it's worse than most people fully appreciate) it isn't going to be repealed.  Oh sure, the Republicans may manage to pare it back a little, but it's still going to wind up costing me and you way more money than we're paying for health care now.  It'll cost us directly in higher premiums for individuals and small businesses.  It'll cost us indirectly as those higher premiums are passed on to us as consumers in higher prices and in taxes to pay for it.

And Obamacare is only the tip of the iceberg.  Not only has government gotten too big, it's gotten too arrogant.  And by that I mean the people we have elected.  They have forgotten their place.  They tend to think of themselves, at worst, as rulers, and at best as leaders.  They have forgotten that they are, to put it in Biblical terms, stewards.  And we have allowed them to forget as we have forgotten that it is we, the people, who in this nation are sovereign.  Los Angeles Guns Rights Examiner John Longenecker has written extensively on this concept of sovereignty in the U.S.

A Long Line Of Sidestepping The Constitution
To be fair, Barrack Obama is not the first of our national stewards to overstep his authority, though he has been the most blatant.  This transfer of power from the people to the government, our relinquishing power unconsciously as our elected managers eagerly usurped it, has happened like a frog in a kettle.  You know the analogy, throw a frog into a kettle of boiling water and it will jump out, but put a frog in a kettle of cool water and then turn up the heat under it and the frog will boil to death.  In this instance we are the frog and the federal government has been turning up the heat for a century and a half or more.

It goes back even to good old honest Abe Lincoln when he suspended habeas corpus.  Then Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney defied that suspension and ordered a writ of habeas corpus.  Lincoln and the military didn't honor the Justice's writ.  Taney then ruled Lincoln's suspension unconstitutional and Lincoln ignored that ruling.  Franklin Roosevelt was a mastermind of sidestepping the Constitution to fatten big government with his New Deal alphabet agencies.  And of course under George W. Bush the Patriot Act was an egregious violation of Constitutional rights.  All of which, at least tacitly, paved the way for Obama's nationalization of GM and Chrysler, bailouts and Obamacare and the march down the road to America becoming a socialist state.

The Patch Over Of The Tea Party
Now the Republicans have taken control of the House and made major gains in the Senate.  As of noon today (Wednesday November 3, 2010, the day after the election) there were three Senate races that still had not been decided, Alaska, Colorado and Washington.  Without those seats the Senate stands at 49 Democrats, 46 Republicans and two independents, who both caucus with the Democrats.

John Boehner, Republican House Minority Leader from Ohio, who is expected to become the next Speaker of the House, calls the Republican showing a "mandate for Washington to reduce the size of government."  But, again, that's not going to be an easy mandate to realize by those at the federal level.  Not because there's anything stopping them from doing so, save their own self interest.

It started before all of the ballots had been counted last night.  Republicans are trying to annex the Tea Party.  If this was an episode of Sons of Anarchy it would be called a "patch over", where one MC (motorcycle club) influences a chapter of another, usually allied but weaker club to become a chapter of the stronger club so the stronger club can consolidate its power in a certain area.  The weaker club then has to wear the patch of the stronger club.

Republicans last night were talking about the need for party unity and strongly encouraging the so-called Tea Party candidates to moderate their stance in favor of said unity.  The TV network talking  heads repeatedly referred to the "Tea Party Republicans" as if the Tea Party was an official subgroup of the GOP.  The Tea Party can not allow that to happen, but that's a topic I'll discuss in the coming days.

Our Hope Is With The States
The real good news in the results from yesterday's elections is what happened at the state level.  Republicans have gained a majority of state governorships.  That's good news because if any real change is going to be realized at the federal level it's going to have to be initiated by the states.  After all, the federal government was created by and gets its authority from the states.  The bad news is that the states, like we individual citizens, the people, have largely forgotten that.

There has been some rumbling in the past year or so at the state level.  Several states have passed state sovereignty firearm legislation aimed at exempting firearms, ammunition and accessories manufactured, sold and kept in state from federal firearm regulation.  New Hampshire went so far as to add a clause making it a felony for a federal agent to enforce federal firearms regulations on firearms manufactured and kept in New Hampshire.  And a handful of states have passed or are considering legislation aimed at exempting their citizens from participating in any federally mandated health care scheme.

The states defend this type of legislation based on the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."  That's the part of the Constitution most often ignored by those in federal government.  And it may be our best hope to affect real change.  There are those two words again, "hope" and "change".  I guess Obama got at least one thing right.

I'm just sayin'.