The trials of life and its Curveballs

A brother Scot Sanders gave me this at the beinning of my 2nd (and his 3rd) deployment to Iraq. I retain it with me today.

DO WHAT IS RIGHT ANYWAY

People are often unreasonable,

Illogical and self Centered;

Love them anyway.

If you are kind,

People may acuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;

Be kind anyway.

If you are successful,

You will win some false friends and some true enemies:

Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank,

People may cheat you;

you spend years building,

Someone could destroy overnight;

Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness,

They may be jealous;

Be happy anyway.

The good you do today,

People will often forget tomorrow;

Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have,

and it may never be enough;

Give the world the best you've got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, iIt is between you and God;

It never was between you and them anyway.

What we can learn from Children

I am back in the land of the Hindu Kush. The mountains have very little snow left revealing their jagged teeth that reach for the haze-blue sky. Here in a land filled with tribal factions where the big voting event (2 days ago) followed a series of threats including one where the Taliban would cut off any "purple-stained" fingers.

The winds of 120 days provide gusts from the northeast and kick up sand in the air. It has cooled here and there is a bit more crispness to the night.

On to the subject of my blog today...

A dear friend and brother in arms, Chris lost his oldest child a few weeks ago; his son, David was 24 years old and the oldest of 7 children. I learned of this tragedy from Chris while riding across the Cooper River Bridge with my own oldest son and his wife. Over the coming days I found myself thinking a lot about Chris' loss, and the thoughts came in and out of my awareness as I prepped to depart yet again to Afghanistan. I followed the emotions on the Facebook posts and the comments left on the obituary page set up. The funeral was on a Friday when I was in Norfolk.

Chris commented on a small vignette with far reaching implication of a discussion he was having with his family about an upcoming trip to a cabin - one of David's favorite places. His youngest son, AJ who, when told that his oldest brother would not be at the cabin they were going to, proclaimed, "...yes he will be there, he'll be driving a cloud." And I thought, here was wisdom in its truest and most innocent form - wisdom that is spirit inspired rather than created by man.

I told another friend of this and commented on how children - by their nature - have not been yet conditioned by the world and how pure thoughts like this are. He told me of another story of when he was 4 years old at his father's bedside. The Doctors had said that the father had days to live. Amidst all this sadness, the 4 year old boy said to his dad, "come on out of bed, dad and play some ball with me." His father told him that one comment changed his whole attitude and also his will to live - that indeed his son through his natural want to play with his dad gave him the inspiration necessary to pull through. His dad revealed that story to his son 15 years later.

I know my brother Gary was and continues to be encouraged by his own son, Nick during his recent struggle with illness.

Children give me hope and encouragement. And they sometimes have a better understanding of the life-death-life interface than we do. The way things have gone in recent years, I wonder if we are leaving a better world for our children. I think we can though, if we just see God and act, through our children's eyes.

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22 Aug 09