Fixing my door...

In the midst of my daily routine, I have suddenly found myself reconsidering the true value of the commodity of patience.  Patience is not something that I can go shopping and acquire a booster, reload, or cart full at any local establishment.  In fact, to me, just learning how to access this behavior from within the ocean of other types of responses stored in my habitual personality is a daunting task that I confess to be extremely challenging.  Yet so many of you that are close to me keep telling me that I am one of the most patient individuals you know and cannot believe how much I am able to put up with before I literally blow a fuse and resort to other measures and behavior.  I was not always this way, in fact I remember being much more inpatient than patient throughout the pages that I am able to recollect of my life.  Something deep inside me has changed; the core storage of my instant replies and the impulsive actions that follow their release have been altered and somehow tamed.  Personally, when hurtful and frustrating moments knock on my door and push their way in regardless of my efforts to keep them outside of my life I still feel an incredible urge to grab them by their hypothetical necks, tighten my grip, and defuse their powerful effects.  However, something else inside me pulls my hands down and brings me to an almost complete halt instead.  Is this good or is this not so good in the end?  I won't lie, the jury is still out on my own assessment to the real value of these changes in my own behavior.

It could be that I have become more of a victim; a survivor if you will.  I read about it all the time with the life stories of those which have been handed incredible difficult or painful moments which in the end numb their responsive behavior to the point of allowing the negative effects to simply perpetuate themselves through time.  Another alternative could be that I have lowered my parental expectations so low that at the current level it makes very little sense to take aggressive action in order to achieve any true change.  Or could is just be that I have in some sense lost the sense of hope that is required for other kinds of responses to want to come out and play? 

The choices are many and even though I have just given you a taste of how some of them can be very unappealing, there are other possible reasons that could also describe why it is that so much has changed and given me a larger supply of that enviable patience response.  One explanation that immediately comes to mind is rooted on the basic principles of human learning behavior.  Learning, in its fundamental mechanics requires me to substitute old information with newer and more updated information in order for it to be effective.  How many times to I have to embark in an ineffective particular type of behavioral response before I decide to stop applying it?  Sooner or later, the lack of success in one type of action typically will lead me to either try something different, or in some cases nothing at all.  For example, I the last two and a half years in which my oldest son has lived with me 100 percent of the time, he has broken into my room to many times to count searching for something when I was not there to grant him physical access.  I've learned that threats, angered responses from my end, consequences, and punishments don't make any difference in the end.  Once the next moment in which his impulsive personality finds itself needing something that might be stored in my room and I am again not there to grant physical access, everything that I did in response to the previous incident of invasion of my privacy simply goes out the window without any rhyme or reason, and much less fear or remorse.  This kind of behavior I understand is tied to his differently wired mind.  I have learned that since I do not have the power, ability, or resources to make any changes to his twisted mental wiring, me going down a path of anger simply affects my own physical and mental health and very rarely if at all affects him.  In fact there is actually very little motivation on my part to even fix the physical damage he has caused over time to the side door of my room since I already know that it will happen again.  He has broken the door while I am on travel for some of the dumbest reasons.  For example, when asked why he's broken my door to get in his response has been: "...because I needed soap...because I needed shaving cream...because I needed batteries...because I needed a charger for something...because I needed shaving blades...because I needed some medication...because I needed money...etc."  I've tried pretty much every trick in my book to convince him to please wait or ask his mother while I am not there for whatever it is that he suddenly needs from my room, but in the end it simply happens again.  As I have said before, he never lies about his behavior and actions when confronted or asked.  So the superficial reasons are always easy to learn.  It is the root of his behavior and actions that are so hard to understand.

When I got home yesterday my privacy had been invaded again with his intrusion into my room, this time needing money.  Interestingly, I rarely ever say no to him when he asks me for cash, as long as the amount and his request is done so in a reasonable manner.  "Dad, can I have some money for food...for clothes...for something I need?"  And my typical response is "sure."  I actually don't feel abused when he asks, since he typically does so in a good way and truly not that often.  I did feel extremely hurt when I discovered that he had taken a cup full of about twenty dollars of change from my closet shelf without asking while I was not home.  My blood raged, my pulse increased, and instinctively I got into my car and drove to his mother's place where they were having Thanksgiving dinner to confront him, probably not a good sign of parental self control.  As I walked in I found the three of them at the dinner table and even though every bone in my body told me to walk away and not say anything, I somehow could not resist the urge to open my mouth and say a few words.  "It really upsets me that you would steal from me...I rarely ever deny you of anything you ask me, especially money...it really hurts that you would do such a thing," I said with a calm, low volume, and none aggressive tone.  "How much did you take?" I asked, to which he replied "Twenty dollars in quarters."  Then I simply apologized for having brought it up during their dinner, told him that this made me very sad, and just walked away.

I am sure you understand that this is not about the money.  Most people can probably read the above and recognize that this is all about trust, respect, and maintain a certain degree of dignity with your own flesh and blood.  Later on that same afternoon I walked into the house to get my jacket that I had accidentally left behind on my previous entry and as I walked into my home he simply walked towards me, gave me a hug, and walked away.  Honestly I am not even sure if that was an apology or just our common greeting, but either way it did do some good somewhere inside me because afterwards some of my resentment went away.

I have spent much of the past 30 months of my life praying for both my son's and my own healing.  In fact, the word "much" truly does not do justice to the amount of time I have lifted my words and heart to God during these difficult times in my life, which brings me to my final assessment as to why it is that maybe I have found so much patience in my daily responses and actions lately.  It could be that the reality of my behavior is more likely tied to the psychobabble I mentioned earlier in this post.  However, not being an expert in psychological behavior gives me the luxury to instead give God credit for my deep well of love.  So again I pray...

"Dear God, please fill my heart with what it is that I need to keep going.  I so often feel empty and with so little hope with regards to my son's behavior.  I do trust that You have a plan, and that this plan is well on its way to being obvious.  In fact, thank you for what it is You are doing to heal us both even though I cannot see it yet.  Amen."

Dad

Boo!!!

Once again, as so many other times in the past 25 years, I was unfortunately not home for Halloween.  Many of you might think and even say "what's the big deal...it's not like Halloween is a holiday."  The statement holds true to just about anyone that does not have a child.  However, for most of us that have kids we understand that the gory night of ghosts and ghouls is much more than just a freaky day for children to go out and dress up in their favorite costume and ask for candy.  Halloween is the day that once a year we get to experience the curious world of fear, fun, and silliness all mixed up in one, regardless of age, gender, and our social status.  If you are curious about how creative and original a bunch of nerdy engineers can truly be, invite a bunch of them to a costume Halloween party and be ready to laugh your head off all night long.  The same is probably true for so many other careers that so many of us have in which seriousness takes the lead on a daily behavioral basis.  As a parent, I can't remember a day of the year that made me smile more intensely than when I would hold my boys by the hand walking down the street in our neighborhood as they would tighten their grip when we would walk by a scary house.  Interestingly though, regardless of the fear of the moment I can't remember a time in which the choice was ever made to not go in and get some candy.

Today my children are already 15 and 18 years old respectively, yet I would of given anything to be able to still be with them yesterday night instead of out here at sea doing my tedious job.  A few weeks earlier my youngest son made his typical request, "dad, are you going to be able to help me make my costume this year?"  We've kind of gotten into the habit of "making" things instead of buying them.  To be totally honest, the last thing on my mind on the week just before having to get on a airplane and land on an aircraft carrier and then catch a helicopter ride to another ship was having to spend a good ten to twelve hours making a Halloween costume.  The though crossed my mind more than once of how great it would be if he would simply ask me to take him to the costume store to buy an outfit this year.  However, once I started making the costume with my youngest son it all came back to me, the reason I do what I do even though my older man's body is constantly telling me to stop doing it, is quite simple.  It is during those moments when we look at what we are doing together and both find ourselves respecting each other more than ever.  This is something that is hard to put into words.  He probably sees in me the reliable old man that gives into his quirky request to make the most awkward looking costume imaginable, and I see in him the loving boy that even though today he has already grown a full beard, inside he is still a child.  He respects my sense of not backing off from a promise, I respect his sense of giving me enough credit to think I can pull it off once again.  Last year the costume was Pyramid Head from Silent Hill.  This year it was The Butcher, again from Silent Hill.  The names of these characters do not do justice on how complicated making their costumes can be, but go online and do a picture search and maybe you'll understand what I am talking about.  Finding the right kind of  material to build the props is a project on itself.  Building them is definitely an adventure.

I started searching for materials at least two weeks ago which was definitely not enough time, but in the end we still got most of what we needed.  Cutting, gluing, painting, filling, sanding, taping, screwing, and detailing took a good twelve hours which from the processes just mentioned you can probably understand why they cannot all be done consecutively even if you wanted to.  On two occasions we took off in my car looking for a hard hat, an apron, spray paint, and a few other materials that eventually all came together to help complete the project.  I opened up the garage and we got to work cutting cardboard, gluing things, sawing the hard hat in half, painting, and on and on I can go into excruciating details since now I am an expert at building the most esoteric helmet I have ever seen.  It fits on half of the individuals face exposing only one eye and is made to look as if it was made out of rusted iron.  Every once in a while he would tell me that he needed to go finish some homework and I would stay on the task knowing that if I waited for him to be 100 percent available I would not be able to finish it before having to leave on my work trip.  Diligently he would come back almost every half hour to see if I needed help holding things while I glued parts together and also taking pictures with his phone to later post on his own blog some of the steps of our creation.  More importantly, while we worked together we talked, shared, and bonded immensely.  I'm glad we did this together, most of all because I was not going to be able to be home on the spooky night to come.

I know it goes without saying, but I wanted to share with you this short moment in my life as an example of the things I sometimes do to be able to connect with my kids.  They might look like men, but deep inside they are still children seeking for answers in their lives that sometimes come in the form of simple acts of sharing.  Doing things with your kids is a powerful tool to stay in touch with them.  It takes effort on my part even if I make it sound easy.  I have to drag my tired butt out of bed and get up earlier than I really want to during the weekends in order to find the time to do these things.  Lately I have found myself going on hikes when I am not feeling so well, or am more tired than I care to admit to my oldest son.  However, I also confess that I have no regrets because in the end I feel rewarded by that short moment that we connect and are able to see eye to eye.  If you find yourself disconnected with your teenage kids, maybe it's time you take a closer look at how you pick your moments to connect.  It is not always when it feels right, and much less when I feel ready, but for sure I've learned to take it when I can get it...that is how spooky love can be!

Dad