Category Archives: belief

American culture, belief, Culture

The War on the World

On October 30, 1938 America went into a panic.

We were being invaded by Martians. Or so we thought.

The Mercury Theatre on the Air performed a Halloween radio episode directed and narrated by the great Orson Welles. It was an adaption of the H.G. Well’s novel, The War of the Worlds – which was first published in 1898.

None of this matted when people tuned in and heard the broadcast – missing the intro which stated the show was a dramatization – and believing that an actual alien invasion was occurring.

It caused mass panic and outrage, with the media proclaiming cruel deception against the broadcasters. People immediately called for changes to Federal regulations pertaining to the FCC.

Nearly 80 years later, we’ve come no further, except the roles have reversed.

The media causes the panic now.

Look no further than our current Ebola crises. Now, as a disclaimer, it is clear that the Ebola threat is real and it can/should be a concern, but the manner in which it is purported, you’d think it had taken out half the world’s population, largely due to its by-minute coverage and sensationalized reporting.

There were more Ebola experts on CNN’s split screen the other night than people who currently have Ebola in the United States – or that have been married to Kim Kardashian.

An anchor for NY 1 warned of the dangers of consuming mucus and feces that might come from an Ebola patient. No, really. That happened. Apparently, this was a warning we needed to hear and heed.

Common sense and logic go out the window in these situations. You play with the strings of the puppets long enough, they become tangled.

The media is our machine of mass influence, whether through TV or Twitter. And it must keep the machine running. It has to feed the beast.

This is why you get three weeks of Malaysian Airline coverage in the spring – there was nothing else to cover than moved the needle – what consumes the fear and panic more than a vanished flight, theories and mystery?

We are getting more of this with Ebola. While we never want to make light of a serious illness, some of the coverage has been comical – from sites writing research articles regarding Ebola – and covering themselves with the disclaimer “we don’t know for sure” and “no one should panic.” They are certain you need to quarantine for 21 days – except they need more data to prove that.

If you want to stop making people panic, then stop putting things out there that make people panic. Don’t report what isn’t known.

The New York Times published an article on Sunday about those in quarantine. It cautioned against paranoia, fear and cruelty – only to tell stories of paranoia, fear and cruelty.

The reality is anything can happen to us. Most of the time, the odds are it will not. We could have an Ebola outbreak in the United States. We could also have an asteroid smash into Earth tomorrow. Both are plots from movies (“Outbreak” and “Armageddon”), but the disease outbreak seems more logical to most of us as a thing that could actually happen.

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Or it could only seem that way because we have absolutely no understanding of the universe and the way space works and what’s out there. The asteroid theory is only outside the realm of believability because we do not understand it, we cannot see it.

But both outcomes can be terrifying.

That is, if we let them.

We can blame the media for preying on our fears and perpetuating all the panic, but we’re allowing it to happen to us.

Fear is a very real and human emotion – it’s why we both like and dislike horror movies at the same time. The mind is a very powerful place and goes as far as we would like it to – or let it. Deep within our subconscious is something that triggers us to fear one thing that sparks most all forms of fear: death.

Our fear of death prevents us quite often from living life. We’re afraid to die because of the perceived unknown of what happens after. Even for those who believe in a form of religion or faith, there remains some element of fear for the majority of people. There are no reports from beyond, nothing to be seen, no audio to hear.

You can be at peace with this and live life free of fear – or succumb to its darkness and attempt to do what no one truly can and avoid death. Good luck with the latter.

It’s one thing to be safe, cautious and somewhat guarded with the world. It’s quite another to allow yourself to submit to the panic and fear perpetuating society currently.

And why does this fear play such a pivotal role for the future we’re trying to safeguard?

Because we are freely giving up liberties for the out of convenience; we subjugate control to feel protected, thusly making us less so all the while.

We’d rather give up certain things now to protect a future we want to have – except it might not look anything like what we’ve envisioned. That would be something to fear. The more we give away in our freedoms now, the less we have in the future.

But we’re a short-term society.

We want things now. We want them cheaply. We long for instant gratification and instant satisfaction, unwilling to wait for the natural surprises, for the well-earned payoff. Better yet, we prove unable to show patience or faith.

It is interesting to watch as celebrities have pledged and donated millions of dollars – or in Paul Allen’s case, $100 million – to fight Ebola. While generous and hopefully extremely helpful, it is also fair to say that these outbreaks and situations may have been under better control or even cured had that money been shared long ago. But we only do what we must when pushed or threatened.

You see, fear rules most of our society. It always has. We were afraid of King George and what he might do. We were afraid of the Indians, the Spanish, the French, the Japanese, the Vietnamese, the middle East. We’re not alone in our fear, mind you. Countries and groups the world over are fighting out of fear.

We pretend we’ve changed, that our past has impacted our future through an education. We act like we are smarter. But we’re making the same mistakes. We’re reacting out of fear. We’re easily swayed by propaganda. We panic and overreact, just like we did during numerous past conflicts in the world.

We’re afraid of each other and what we might do to one another. So we put each other in quarantine, in concentration camps. We refuse to give certain rights and liberties – all out of fear. And we give up our personal rights and freedoms for the very same reason. We don’t trust the governments of the world? We don’t trust ourselves.

History repeats itself. And the only winner is fear.

FDR was right: “The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.”

The war on the world is not conducted with armies, religion and weapons. It is conducted through the mind, through persuasion and fear.

Currently, we are weak and easily swayed.

Of course, based on our past, I’d say we’ve always been this way.

2014 looks an awful lot like 1938 – and many different years before it.

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belief, Culture, faith, family, Philosophy

A Bit Childish

It happened again today. In fact, it nearly happens every day.

Someone said it.

“You have FOUR kids?”

I might not ever get used to my reaction to their response, which usually consists of a mix of sarcasm, wit, a nervous laugh or a simple, “yep.”

No matter, it happens all the same. One day it might be the visitor to my office at work, noticing my family photo and asking, “are they all yours?”

our familyNah. I just liked the frame.

For a while, I used to think it was because we were younger and I took it as a compliment. For a bit of time, I was slightly embarrassed. Not of my family, or how many of us are there, but the implication that we’re not normal, or that the world thinks that’s too many kids.

We see or hear it everywhere.

At the grocery store checkout line, when three gallons of milk hit the counter, five quarts of strawberries, two loafs of bread and quantities of goods some families would not use for a month, the clerk just glances at me like I must be throwing a party.

I am, lady. Every night at the kitchen table. You should see bedtime. It’s like a rave.

Nowadays, I just feel bad though.

Oh no, not about us.

I feel bad for those who think that 1) there is a set amount of children that bring happiness and 2) they should certainly voice their opinion in not so subtle ways that lets me know they think my wife and I should have a lobotomy before having another baby.

We may be crazy, but the amount of children that comprise our family has very little to do with our sanity level, frankly.

People boldly ask if we are having anymore: “You guys are done, right?”

But if what was actually being thought was said, it would sound like this: “You can’t possibly want ANOTHER kid? What are you, insane? Why would you do that to yourselves?”

When my wife and I had our youngest a few years back, people wondered if we were trying or if it was an accident.

Um, what’s the difference again?

As someone else recently said in a blog, there is no more or less value to a child that is planned than one that is not.

This stigma that all “normal” families come in twos, one of each gender is a notion that prevents spontaneity and frankly, a true enjoyment of life.

Those that know me know how meticulously I clean and pick-up (even when dinner is still happening). So why would I bring more children into our home to add more cleaning and picking up to my already troublesome synapse that won’t allow me to let it all sit?

Because, it was never my decision to begin with.

Something greater than I put me on a path to meet my wife, for her to already have an 18-month old that I would come to treasure and raise exactly as if he were biologically mine. And something beyond human control decided my wife and I would have the children we have when we had them.

There are many in life that want children and cannot, for a variety of reasons, have them. This is whom I think of when I feel my face turning a little red upon the insinuation we’ve done something weird.

I do not think any of us know what normal is, anyway. We all come from families with diverse and wide-ranging backgrounds, with different beliefs. A wide-collection of blended families, second marriages, steps, in-laws and all the like. yet somehow we end up worried about sleepless nights? You pulled all nighters in college! Dirty clothes? Do you remember how your socks smelled after a ball game as a teenager? Worried about the cost of college? You didn’t mind dropping down money for a guy’s trip to Vegas or a girls shopping weekend in New York.

And I finally reached the point a while ago where I just stopped caring and ignored it. If the need to validate your own decisions comes from a condescending remark to someone you do not know, have at it, hoss.

Just submit your question and you can choose from one of my canned responses:

  • I do not know what I am doing “big picture”
  • I am aware of how much college costs nowadays and we’ll figure it out when the time comes
  • The youngest does indeed have red hair. You may be surprised, but my wife and I have known for some time. You have this many kids and you don’t know what’s coming out.
  • We may or may not have more children. I do not know because my DeLorean is in the shop (something wrong with the flux capacitor).
  • No, they are all different, you know, like you are. So no, that one doesn’t like ketchup, she isn’t a huge fan of onions, that one over there took a little longer to learn to read. In the end, I trust they will manage all the same.

The question we often get is why? Why so many? Why would you put yourself through that kind of running around? Why would you go to Disney World eight years in a row? That’s not a vacation! That’s torture. How can you run around all the time to various events? Aren’t you always cleaning up the kitchen?

Because look at them. They are magnificent. They are filled with wonder. They may each do something really awesome in this world. It might be because we took them to Disney for eight years in a row. It might be because they shared time together and with us.

Because why not?

Because this is normal to us. Because I don’t know what to do when I’m not counting heads. Because the peace and quiet are overrated. Because I act like a kid, it makes it more acceptable to play with their toys and games if they are mine. Because I love my wife. Because I cannot imagine life without each one of them. Because they were meant to be here. Because I like to give advice. Because it’s better to share in their joy and accomplishments than my own. Because they are funny. Because.

It was never our decision to begin with.

As is often the case in life, it’s your perspective that shapes it more than anything. If you think you’d be too tired to care for a large family, to provide them each with individual love and time, as well as a group, then you are right. If you think it’s too much of a burden on your plans, then you are right.

But for us, this was our plan: We have no plan.

We think the same thing we did 10 years ago. My wife and I love one another, our children and we will see where that takes us.

So far, this has been one hell of a trip.

We just needed more car seats than most along the way.

Sorry we’re not sorry. It’s normal to us because something allows us to handle it and cannot allow others to understand it.

As I said, it was not a decision.

It never will be.

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belief, Logic, Parenting, Philosophy, Religion, Santa Claus

Believably Unbelievable

Another calendar year has nearly come and gone. 

We’re facing “The Holidays” again, left wondering where 2013 went and feeling like spring or summer was just last week when it was months ago.
The reminders of the passage of time are all around us, constant notifications that the world continues to press on, whether we want it to or not. And we’re constantly battling the notion we may be missing the good stuff.
My most recent encounter with this came earlier this week, when my family renewed a family tradition of watching Christmas movies, like “The Santa Clause.”
And as my seven-year-old daughter climbed into my lap, the scene near the beginning that is the crux of this enjoyable farce hit home: the conversation about whether Santa Claus is real between Charlie and, and…Tim Taylor, er, Tim Allen – wait, I’ve got it – Scott Calvin.

Our children haven’t asked us about Santa being real yet, really, just like they haven’t asked about Jesus or heaven being real. 

That is not meant to combine the two onto some equal ground, mind you, but to merely point out the association of belief in something you cannot see. 
So many logical, rational and data-driven people will tell you it is dangerous to foster notions of a fat man in a suit taking presents to every child in the world that’s been good in one night, just the same as many non-Christians or atheists question the legitimacy of Jesus – from conception to birth to death. 
Now I’m not looking to turn this into a religious forum, it is not my job to judge beliefs one way or the other against my own. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. 

But belief is simply an opinion with conviction, and some choose to back up their beliefs, convictions and opinions with facts. Others with emotion. Belief is just an acceptance of something as truth or factual – with a heavy dose of perception of what we allow ourselves to emotionally accept as true or fact. 
We use facts, pictures, models, graphs and statistics to prove what we want others to believe, but in our world, belief is an emotion, a feeling.
You can show me all kinds of numbers on why Android is better than Apple, or vice versa. All it comes down to is what I like, what I think once I use both products. We can argue over politics, but that’s as much belief and emotion as anything else. We try to use facts and figures there as well. We even break down human relationships to statistics and figures, qualities, advantages and disadvantages.
But what about what we cannot explain? Why someone lives or dies through an ordeal? How certain events have inexpiable outcomes, how they defy logic and science and physics? What makes you happy and sad?
Research has found that the brain is sensitive to any form of belief that improves the chances of survival. Just like that, we have our answer for why we love, why we believe in God – or do not – and for the purposes of this prose, why we choose to allow our children to believe in Santa.
It’s an idea, more than an actual person. Does Santa exist? I don’t know. 

But neither do you.
Perhaps he did hundreds of years ago, like any legend, and simply delivered toys one year to the children of some small village. 
We often say that when people pass on, they are in a better place. We do this for a variety of reasons. Perhaps we believe it, perhaps we’re saying it to someone for comfort. Is that true? I don’t know. But it brings us some sense of peace all the same.
So is allowing your children to believe in such an idea detrimental? I don’t know. 

But neither do you.
It can foster vivid creativity, as the pure imagination of what happens in the early hours of December 25 runs wild. If at any time you believed in Santa as a child, just think of the mental images and scenarios your mind envisioned. 

Again, this is not endorsing Santa Claus the person, more explaining the idea that allowing belief is a good thing.
We truly don’t know what happens when we die. There is no absolute fact because no statistics, figures or images can support it for us. But the belief or lack of belief in religion, in mythical holiday figures, is more or less a coping mechanism in our brains for just how big and unknown the world is. It would be quite difficult to deal with the vastness or mystery of it all if we did not cope through belief.
For some, enjoyment and peace in life can be found in believing in a reason, a higher power. For others, not believing explains a chaotic theory of life. Either way, the person has chosen that path as a way to believe in the purpose of their own existence.
Life is an emotion, a sensation, really – that has no explanation. There may be all kinds of statistics, but those statistics are just numbers really, not people.
For the logical, Santa Claus is as much a farce as creation, as believing in miracles. For this group, for example, saw the end of the Auburn-Alabama game last week as merely the end of a sequence of statistics that led to a low probability that occurred given the right set of circumstances. In fact, the probability was .007%. 
For the emotive, it was a game won out of belief, out of some special moment that occurred because of want, need, desire. And belief.
It really comes down to choice: what you choose to believe – but believing in something, all the same.
As a man, built on gut reactions, emotions and feelings, I see the creativity, the vivid imagination of my children, who currently believe in Santa Claus, who can see heaven in their minds and think Disney World exists in the sky (because we take off on an airplane and land there) and I believe that these are the kinds of children who might grow up to do something really cool.
I don’t know if that means cool as in changing the world cool. 

But neither do you.

At the very least, if allowing the perception or the belief that such a figure exists fosters special neurons in their brains to fire that spark imagination and creativity, then I am personally fine with that. Even after they stop believing in that figure, those neurons and synapses will still continue firing, still dreaming, still creating. Because they believe such things could exist. 

This is how you create. And creating is good.

It’s the step that happens before all those statistics showing how effective or ineffective the creation was. And when you create something, it has to be believed before it’s seen.
Funny how that works.
Seeing isn’t believing.
Believing is seeing.
And perfectly fine for you and your kids if it happens to be a large old man in a red velvet suit who squeezes down chimneys, eats cookies, never finishes the milk and reverse burglarizes your overly decorated home on a secular holiday.
Just go with it.

Before another year passes and you miss out on all the good stuff. 


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belief, children, family, travel baseball

The Value of Maybe

This Sunday will officially end another season, another year, really, of travel baseball.

Some cannot – and do not – understand why we do it, my wife and I. Why would we spend so much of our hard earned money on team fees, equipment, uniforms, hotels, gas, lessons? Why would we spend so much of our most precious commodity – that of time – doing this?

After all, our oldest son is 11. One of hundreds of thousands of boys playing baseball, of thousands playing this thing called travel ball. We cannot possibly believe he will make it big, can we? We cannot actually believe he’ll get a college scholarship and advance to the MLB draft, right? We can’t be that naive.

The questions never stop, really. From family, from friends, from co-workers. What we will do with our other three children when they say they want to do it, or something that conflicts? How do you take vacations? Don’t the other kids hate it?

Sometimes, we don’t have the answers, because, well, we don’t.

Honestly, we don’t know what the future holds. What we know – all we know, really – is what we value and what we believe.

We believe in our children. We’re not irrational, mind you. We’re aware of each of their areas of weakness, where they can improve and we work on it, tirelessly.

Some days, we’re more successful than others. Other days, two are pouting, one has melted down completely into a screaming banshee from some distant planet and another looks as though they haven’t ever been shown how to take a bath, clothe themselves or comb their hair.

It’s chaotic, it’s beautiful, it’s our life.

Right now, we have a son who has a gift and a passion for the sport of baseball. We’re following his lead, really. He has stated his goals and works hard at honing his skills. He lives it and breathes it.

And he dominates our schedule. Tournaments in other states, for three or four days at a time. We’ve seen the sun come up on the way to the baseball fields and been there long after it’s gone down. Our summers are blur of dirt, cheering, consoling, feeding snacks, sunscreen, sweat and a van full of passed out, dirty kids on a late Sunday afternoon.

Will we do it for the other kids? Whether it be gymnastics, soccer, basketball, chess, dance, theater or macaroni performance art, yes, we will.

And we’ll buy the Macaroni Performance Art team gear, to boot.

As so many know, it’s just what you do. What else are you going to do? Sit around? Nah, I can do that when I’m 50.

It’s not always easy. Nights of drop off and pickup, coordinating schedules, still in my business casual from work at 10:30pm. Eating dinner or lunch at weird hours. One heading to gymnastics, another to basketball, another a hitting lesson. Feeling guilty again asking for help from our family, another parent on  the team.

Yet even when weary, we find we would not change it. Our children are organized, responsible. They support each other, they get their chores done. They excel in school.

Could this backfire? Maybe. I don’t know.

But what I do know is that we’ll never tell them they cannot do something. Our job is to not only keep them safe and make them good-natured, productive members of society, but to subtly nudge them to attempt to be great.

We don’t want them settling for something, anything, when they are capable of more. Whatever they chose will be fine, as long as it was a choice. It has to be what they want. This is how, we’re convinced, they can do their part to live differently, to change the world in their special way, with whatever gifts have been given to them.

Rarely do I write solely about my family. I’ll have a hard time publishing this post, mainly because I always thought of pieces like this a “Come Blow Your (Own) Horn” moment. But that’s not my intention.

We’re not perfect, far from it, in fact. All any of us can really do in life is follow a combination of heart, instinct, some kind of faith or belief (in something) and a sense of right or wrong. The rest will figure itself out.

Do I know if this world of travel baseball is right? How can I? It feels like it. Do I know if we’re raising our children to actually do what we want, which is to follow their passions? It feels like it. And that’s life, really, just a bunch of moments built on feeling something.

Emotion is what gives life, well, life.

So I’ll take every dirt angel in the summer, every night spent washing a uniform, every time we’re squeezing in a movie or a family dinner that actually takes place at our kitchen table. I’ll take every road trip, every moment with the iPod plugged in and the whole family – including the 21 month old – singing “Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da.”

Our mini-van turns into a recording studio, a little traveling band: Mom, Dad, three boys and a girl. The lyrics to our song of life are noisy gyms, cracking baseball bats, football pads colliding, paintbrushes dipping into cups, toys strewn from one floor to the next, barking dogs, dirty dishes, sidewalk chalk, tears, laughter, and more laughter.

This is our life. And I wouldn’t want to miss it.

Right now, it’s travel baseball. In five years, it could be something else. Whatever it is, it will keep our family tight-knit, supportive and growing as individuals, and as a family.

My wife and I found our purpose, and it wasn’t for a job, a career or paying bills. It was to pour every ounce of what we have into the children that a higher power entrusted in our care.

We can’t know if we’re doing it the right way or the wrong way. We can only go on feeling it out as we go.

Maybe they’ll change the world, in their own way.

And maybe is worth everything.

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