GENDADS

…but it is what it is. 

My computer crashed, and I pretty much followed.   Four lost days trying to recover vital data lost to TWO backup systems, using wife’s laptop and old email data, waiting for the repair, getting a whole new computer from the warraty program…and transfering all that “stuff”. 

I actually survived that crash.  Not so sure I’ll survive this one.

I thought you’d like to know the silence wasn’t your fault.  Don’t worry, won’t last long.  Meantime, this generational father is struggling over the setback to the book.  Decided to keep a journal of the evolution of a book.  Might turn it into a book itself, but the title, “Love and War,” has already been taken. 

Thanks for bearing with me; and double thanks to Carolyn for bearing with Mr. Mopy. 

Just can’t help my self.  Now, THAT is significant.

The response to tracking the difference between “success” (every solid American’s standard of worth) and “significance” (those imprints that are found deep in the hearts and lives of others and cascade to ongoing generations) has been instructive.  AND it has reinvigorated my own journey.  It is always open to tweeking. 

Navy LT “JV” teaching sailors in a church basement.  Can you tell it’s an old picture?  Any thing significant?  You’ll see.

“Significance” is now my mantra, will probably be so until some concept more engaging comes along.  Matt (co-author and soninlaw) offered “worship” as the cornerstone upon which significance is built.  Ok, but not the “act of worship.”  It’s a life focus of worship of the Lord God, the One to whom all signficance will be address and Who will judge it in the end.  How’s your life of worship coming?  Significant?

But let me offer one more piece.  It came from a senior Navy chaplain to the Marines, a friend who knows his way around the church, the military and real combat, and the family.  Ollis Mozon simply quoted a Chief of Chaplains.  It stuck with him, now it sticks with me. 

Read on slowly and take in these simple wise words. More

 He sat across the table at a mid-east restaurant in Philadelphia.  It was way long ago, about the time I was 50.  Two remarkable things happened that fateful night.  First was insignificant, but, boy do I remember.  The second changed my life.  There was still plenty of that ahead of me. 

Burned on the retina of my mind, which now has forgotten lots of stuff, but not this, is the belly dancer.  It’s not why you think.  After all, I was sitting across from a now world-honored missionary leader and class and football team comrade.  Oh, and best friend.

 Why is Captain Taylor eating a Strawberry sundae in Indonesia signficant?

While we concentrated on the Humus and Pita Bread and changing the world of missions–honestly, much of what is true in missions today all began there–this young gal in veils with an appropriate middle-east pulchritude bee-lined for our table.  The Devil made her do it.  I was a Navy captain in dress blues straight from the Amtrak station, from the Pentagon, from the Admiral Nimitz “War Room,” now a congressional lobbying office.

 Circling our table twice with her veil screaming, “Come hither, sailor,” the Devil and the Belly Dance slithered onward, trying one more time just before Souvlaki.  Now that was memorable.  It was not significant. 

Which brings me to fateful item two.  Maybe you’d best read on More

I’m cheating.  Sorta.  I wrote this following on my weekly post for Legacy Dad, a lively blog you should subscribe too).   Carolyn liked it so much, she said I should post it here.  That eases my work day…that’s how I describe heading off in my big Freightliner truck-cum-writing studio to the nearby desert to set my keyboard to Generational Fathering , the book that WILL be done by summer (if you haven’t visited, check it out).  

Let’s get serious about defining two words we normally don’t associate with each others.  Doing so will define your life.  For dads, it will define your legacy. 

Ready?  Ponder the value of significance compared to success.  It would be a story of my journey.  I’d better do this in two parts. 

I tell you from experience—which I will related in detail in a couple of days—that  the difference is vast, life-shaping, eternity framing.  This post is timely if late.  My laptop crashed on the Friday of my normal LegacyDad post.  This month we want to set before you that mysterious, though huge, difference between concentrating on raising children who will become successful  or on children who will be significant.  Impressive and well-off vs world-and-eternity changers.

Sound a bit heavy?  ‘Tis.  That’s because, dad, if your son or daughter does not pick up the difference by hearing and watching you and their mother, the distinction is likely to be lost.  The hallmark of full American achievment is found in one word that is underscored and highlighted and set in bold type by the Millennial and post-Millennial generations that identify your children.  That word:  “SUCCESS”.  ”I’m entitled to success. It’s the American way.”    “Stand aside, watch ME go!” 

But, Dad, you MUST get this right.  Better read on. More

Very difficult days for the writer in me.  Daily posted in Christmas week.  Loved it.  Good response.  Then several days of travel from the kids to SoCal.  Distractions in reorganizing life back home; a holiday of sorts from writing.

Getting back to the writing cycle is hard.  Cycle?  Writing comes from the heart, filtered through the head and all that goes on in there.  If it’s a passion, good writing makes it way throught the guantlet.  Despite distractions, detours, roadblocks, and speedbumps the heart makes its way through the keyboad.

And did I forget to say the pc that supports that keyboard can be a detour?  Not like ink drying on the quill or the lead breaking, a dying laptop is an “overthe cliff” detour !  Three full days only partially recovering a crashed computer.  Took an hour just to get back up on GenDads this morning and the loss of my email address book means I’m drifting. 

PC-less just days before I finally launch my “Writing Getaway,” four days a week away writing “Generational Fatheirng” ’til it’s done.  Forced into wrestling with life and writing issues, I’m forced to inventory and re-assess.  Entering a new cancer protocol, missing my extraordinary grandchildren, and sharing extreme health conditions of my wife; this stuff makes you think.  Such is the winding road from heart through head through keyboad.

Why is this worth posting?  Some of you are readers, some are writers.  Whichever, I pose you the question.  Is there something down there worth pushing and pulling through those detours?   If you’re a writer do you just write head stuff ?  If a reader, do you have anything down there worth delivering if you did have the writing habit?  Why not write something to someone, even yourself, when you come up with an answer.