Hard Call

Thanks to Jamie's recommendation, I am now reading John McCain's latest book, "Hard Call: Great Decisions and the Extraordinary People Who Made Them." The book describes great decisions made throughout history, telling of those individuals who possessed composure, wisdom, and intellect in the face of life's toughest dilemmas. The first chapter is about two of my sporting heros, Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson. Branch Rickey's goal was to break baseball's color barrier, and he chose to have Jackie Robinson be the player to do it. I have long been a fan of the old Brooklyn Dodgers, and have read many books describing their history, their players, and the fans that they have touched. In the spring of 1947, Jackie Robinson became a part of their amazing history.

"Branch was the man who built two of baseball's greatest dynasties [the St. Louis Cardinals and the Brooklyn Dodgers], but he will always be remembered for the decision he made so skillfully to bring America's game to all Americans, to do something as big outside the ballpark as it was inside. He had seen something in Jackie Robinson that was greater than his athletic prowess. He had looked for a great baseball player with principles, courage, and dignity. The man he found had those qualities, as well as a temper he really didn't mind showing when provoked. He was a brave and driven man, but an often angry one. And Rickey saw something else in Jackie Robinson that maybe even Jackie wasn't sure he possessed. He saw a man with the courage and strength to maintain his composure under the most trying circumstances, a man whose pride could become a self-effacing dignity. He saw the man who would represent on the field and off the ideal American, and who could make integration, and long-delayed justice for his race, heroic to white America. They shook hands on the deal and made their country a better place."

John McCain, "Hard Call"

What hard call have you had to make in the past? What difficult decision are you now facing? Do you lean into other's advice when you face these challenges, or do you go it alone? What part does God play in the process?

State Fair

The Great Minnesota Get-Together kicks off today! I am taking a vacation day from work tomorrow (Friday) and spending the day at the Fair. It sounds like Eric is going to be joining me, and possibly Dan, but only if he isn't working that day.

Every year, I spend at least one, if not two days, at the Fair. It's been a tradition of mine for the last handful of years. Growing up, my family never went, but in my adult years I have made it a priority of mine.

The day is usually spent eating way too much food, and wandering around the fairgrounds checking out the booths and exhibits. Whether it's a breakfast burrito, cheese curds, pronto pups or corn dogs, fresh lemonade, a chocolate shake from the dairy barn, mini donuts, all the milk you can drink for a buck, and Sweet Martha's chocolate chip cookies, food is the highlight of my trip!

Do you enjoy the Fair also? What's your favorite food(s)? What is the must have/must do event for you? I can already smell the food, and I am getting very hungry!

Patience

I have never been good at waiting for something. Whether it's waiting for microwave popcorn to finish popping, the toaster to finish toasting my bread, or for the clock to creep along until lunch time and then for the end of the work day. Each Spring I cannot wait for the baseball season to begin, or for that matter for the snow to melt first. Whenever there's an exciting event on my calendar, I cannot wait for that day to come. I currently am in graduate school working towards my masters in school counseling and I cannot wait for classes to be done, even though I still have almost two years left, so that I can begin working in a school. These days, I'm having a really hard time waiting for a phone call from a special person in my life.

I can never understand why it is that I have to wait for something that I want - I want what I want, when I want it. However, I think God has been teaching me to trust in Him first, while I wait for the things I want most.

"The end of a matter is better than its beginning, and patience is better than pride."

Ecclesiastes 7:8

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness..."

Galations 5:22

"[B]eing strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light."

Colossians 1:11-12

Wildness

"Wildness! We've run out of it, even up here in Alaska.

People need to be reminded that the world is unsafe and unpredictable, and at the drop of a hat they can lose everything, just like that. You couldn't have predicted that. I do it to remind them that chaos is out there, and he's lurking beyond the horizon, that's why. Well that, and sometimes you just gotta do something bad just to know you're alive..."

Chris, Northern Exposure (1990's TV drama)

Shakespeare

"Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come:

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved."


William Shakespeare, Sonnet 116

One Step at a Time

It won't be easy - nothing that is worthwhile ever is. Whether it's rebuilding walls or relationships, there are difficulties ahead, but also many rewards to be gained.

"[B]ut I said to the king, 'May the king live forever! Why should my face not look sad when the city where my fathers are buried lies in ruins, and its gates have been destroyed by fire?'"

Nehemiah 2:3