Tag Archives: random

The essence of all my blogs compiled into one

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(I’ve built this blog around yesterday’s post of the supposed most used words of all time in my blog. I don’t know if I believe that these are the most used words…but if they are, the following post is what my blog is all about. I’ve highlighted in bold the words off the list)

This is a rant, it is a series of amazing words ranting about life, about our story as radical or simple as it may be or will become. This is a blog for all you brothers, fathers, mothers, and even Josh and Alex. The time has come to remember, remember who we are, remember how to love better, be better parents (especially you Alex), and finally finding the capacity to let go of the way we’ve lived our lives Monday through Sunday trying to create a future void of disappointments. Tumors, cancer, radiation treatments, growing old (as if growing old fits on this list) fill(ed) our minds and keep us busy. But its not only those things that cause disappointment and make us feel in need, its also the ‘good‘ things of life that keep us busy—things like owning land, pursuing love, getting things (more and more and more things!), building a family, saving money, looking pretty, getting the right job, looking cool…the list could go on. These are good things, not things to be regarded with hate or distaste…and yet do they produce a life worth living? Christians build churches, they build nice buildings that are filled with nice people and complete structures of hierarchy that are intended to be a part of the life-producing system…but do even they produce a life worth living? The reality is that even if we’re given more than our one life, say even three lifetimes to pursue all these ‘good‘ things we will never arrive–because arrival is a myth. It’s like you’re flying your dad’s airplane in search of the right place to land only to discover bad news that you’re flying over the ocean (killer illustration right?). In the end if we spend our energy on all these things we’ll simply be churning cream into butter accomplishing little that is new, radical, or better than what we currently posses. No, the message that we need to be reminded of is to circle back around to where we started–we must tell a story with our lives, we must be patient enough to allow the time it takes to live a story that is worth telling–a story of depth, a story with purpose, a story that is bigger than ourselves. This is the story that Jesus invites us into: one of death to self, one that’s not just about the pursuit of love but the personification of it, and of hope that transcends silly things such as cancer, church buildings, and looking cool. So live your life in a way that’ll be worthy of a party come death…and don’t wait ’till tomorrow, start today.

My Thoughts on the Future of Our World

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What is it about flying cars? It seems like since the beginning of time our dreams of the future (of the ‘year 2000’) included flying cars. And yet here we are driving on the ground and flying in planes. I guess our sci fi movies wouldn’t have been as cool had they dreamed of a future where information could be shared wirelessly, where you could spend money you didn’t have if you just swiped a piece of plastic, and where Starbucks ruled the world.

Here are some of my predictions of the future in no particular order:

  • Angry Birds will come out with a game for the X-Box platform
  • Purgo hardwood floors will become even more prevalent in our homes
  • Pennies will be eliminated and we’ll start using our dollar coins (but we’ll choose to call them loonies like they do in Canada…’cause that’s kind of awesome)
  • Those slap bracelet things will become popular again
  • Books will still be around and a slew of new brick and mortar book stores will open that don’t use ‘the digital age’ as an excuse for non-innovative or successful business practices.
  • A hologram will become president
  • Toilets will be considered an opiate of the masses
  • Upon finding out that cloth bags are bad for the environment our economy (which was built on a platform of cloth bag usage) will crash
  • Ikea stores will get bigger and they will introduce a new “stay and camp for the night” alternative
  • Our national anthem will be re-written to the tune of “twinkle twinkle” so that it can be more universally accepted
  • Women will stop painting their finger nails
  • Puzzles will be cool again
  • A counter movement to the wireless age will emerge. They’ll use corded phones, connect to the internet via land lines, print only on computers they’re plugged into, email colleagues by throwing paper at them across the office, and most importantly they’ll refuse to cut umbilical cords so as to keep a wired connection to their mother forever.
  • Oh yeah, and I do think there will be flying cars.

Quilts and their stories

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At any given moment my bed will be covered by a number of different blankets. Each one tells a story.

  • The ratty blue quilt that’s barely holding together, the one we take on picnics and to the beach was made for my by my wife. It’s the only full sized quilt she’s ever made and she made it for me. This quilt has been to two foreign countries (Texas and Portugal) and its been a mainstay since she gave it to me after I graduated from high school and before I left her for two long years. I love this blanket ’cause it reminds me of her.
  • The tan quilt was made by my family and was a gift to my wife and I for our wedding (ok, the ‘gift’ was about a year or two late). It’s got stitches from my nieces, my cousins, my sisters, my mom, and maybe even a few others. I love it ’cause it represents my family and my marriage to my wife.
  • We also have a giant quilt covered in awkward photos, funny quotes, and meaningful words. It was given to us by the Renovatus Church community when we waved goodbye to our six year long love affair with them in January. Each square was designed and made by a different person from that community. I love this quilt because it represents such an important part of my life that includes some of my most favorite people.
  • My mom made me a small blanket that is so worn it’s barely used. It’s covered in pictures of my family and its squares are made from fabric of my childhood. I love this quilt because it reminds me of my family and my childhood.
  • I have been given two quilts during my time fighting against cancer. One was made by my aunts and my grandma. It has the scent of frankincense (a scent important in the Christian story and also an important herb in fighting cancer). My sister and her whole church also made me a quilt. It was stitched on by strangers and loved ones alike and has ribbons stitched on that are associated with central nervous system cancer awareness. I love these blankets because they’re reminders that people are praying for me and my family.
I love the story that my bed tells (ok, that could be take the wrong way now couldn’t it?!) While these blankets don’t capture everything that matters to me, they catch much of it. So please know that if you love me you’ll make me a quilt…or else.

8 Reasons Why Steroids are Bad

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Here are my top eight reasons why taking steroids sucks:

  1. ‘Roid rage. Steroids opened up in me anger that I’ve never experienced before. I could get mad at a fork if it didn’t make it to my mouth correctly…and thats no lie.
  2. Backne (as in back acne). I felt like I was in Jr. High again with my whole back, chest, and arms covered in acne! Good thing I’m not much of a swimmer ’cause all the girls would have made fun of me.
  3. Lies. Anyone who told you that if you took steroids you’d be better at sports lied. I’m not better at sports and I’m not stronger and as a matter of fact I think I’m worse at sports now than I was before my steroids. Needless to say I blame all of this on the ‘roids.
  4. Insomnia. Gone are the days of going to sleep at 1am and waking up at 4am everyday. While I do miss those quiet mornings (terribly actually) I don’t miss the lack of sleep.
  5. Water Weight. I’ve got chubby arm pits right now. Did you even know you can get chubby arm pits? It’s due to my body going off steroids, ‘roids cause your body to retain water in strange ways, for me this included asymmetrical chubby pits.
  6. Swelling. This is probably an extension of the water weight, but the swelling that happened in my face was creepy. In a matter of minutes I’d go from normal Ryan to Swollen-Faced-Ryan. It would happen almost immediately and could last for minutes or days. Not cool.
  7. Headaches. The day that I was finally off steroids was the day that my headaches began. For ten straight days I had pounding, debilitating headaches. They’d last from the moment I woke up until I fell asleep. For the first few days no cocktail of Vicodin or Ibiprofin would help and I’d just pound my head agains the wall waiting for relief.
  8. Foot Cheese. That’s right, I said it. While on steroids the bottom of my feet started to sluff off every day. Every day a whole layer of skin on the bottoms of my feet would just crumble off…it was gross…and messy…and would have been painful had I been able to feel my feet.

What am I doing?

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I keep asking myself what I’m doing. Or better yet I keep questioning what should I be doing? Part of me desperately wants to get back to life as normal. And so I have someone drop me off at the coffee shop down the street where I’ve spent way too many hours over the last two years. It feels normal to see old friends and to even to continue making new ones. In an effort to get back to normal the wife and I went out on a double date, I’ve scheduled a meeting or two, and I’ve been trying to frantically catch up on coordinating our second annual Compassion Vancouver event. In an effort to feel normal I try to walk as much as possible, do housework, and play and interact with the kids as normally as I used to. In an effort to get back to normal Jess has scheduled girl time with a couple different lady friends (though there’s never enough time!), we’ve done a couple mini-grocery trips, and run occasional errands. Normal stuff. Everyday life stuff.

But things still aren’t normal. My body still hurts; my back still feels as though there are ropes tying my shoulder blades together. My right side is still paralyzed and doesn’t work right; it cramps and as the day goes on my whole body stiffens and gets difficult and painful to move. I can’t bathe myself, I can’t drive, and can barely make it down the stairs from my bedroom without help. While my extreme emotions are not as extreme as they were even a week ago I still find myself having a short fuse with my wife and children. As a matter of fact the level of emotion in our family swings as quickly and extremely as our kitchen’s swinging door. The children, while early on ecstatic to be back at home with mom and dad quickly realized that life was not normal. Dad can’t play on the floor with them, he can’t pick them up, he can’t put them in bed, and he doesn’t have the same energy level he once did. Jones also knows that dad might have cancer and the thought plagues him. Every day he asks me if the tumor is benign. The kids recognize how stressed mom is, they recognize the burden she’s carrying, and they act up and intensify in order to compensate—and mom and dad have little physical and emotional energy to respond appropriately. We kind of constantly feel like bad parents as we respond in ways contrary to our normal parenting preference or methods. Knowing your parenting badly is a heavy burden to carry isn’t it? So we try to create breaks by having the kids spend time with grandparents—it is a blessing to have grandparents in town! But the kids want to be with us, they should be with us, they need to be with us…and yet we continually ship them off…because things are not normal.

I want them to be normal. I want to better participate in our Sunday Arnada Community Meal, to be available on Monday nights to dream the Grassroots Conspiracy into further reality, and to live into the rhythms that have defined our Community House for the last eight months. But the energy comes in spurts, the kids freak out in flurries, and my mental capacity to process through my schedule still seems off.

At times things feel almost normal. I want things to be normal. But things are not normal. Things can’t be normal. Things can’t be normal because we still have not received results from the Mayo Clinic. They told us that we should hear in the next couple of days. Of course they told us that we should have heard five days ago and they told us we should have known twelve days ago. If we find out results today that that I start chemo on Wednesday (I am completely making this up) normal will be defined very differently! If we find out tomorrow that a miracle has happened and the cancer isn’t cancer then on Wednesday normal will be defined very differently. If we find out tomorrow that we’ve got to wait another week normal will be very…well…

Until we get that message—whatever it is—this is normal I guess.

Maybe in-betweens ARE normal. I don’t know. I don’t know what I should be doing in this in-between. I think I’m going to keep trying to be normal—keep trying to go to coffee—keep trying to walk normal—keep trying to ignore my back pain—keep trying to not be a jerk to my wife—keep trying to be emotionally and physically present for my children—keep trying to work—or maybe I’ll just rest, continue to write my thoughts down, journal, let my back heal, read some books, and wait. Maybe I’ll do it all…or maybe I’ll just blog about it!

Thank you all for listening. My blog started in December of 2005 as a joke and has turned into a cathartic exercise that keeps me sane. I think its working!