My Commuter Husband

He leaves about 5:30 am 

Last week I walked into the garage to  find my 48 year old husband mounting my foam pumpkin to the back of his bike. MY foam pumpkin!

Because, why not? As if all the his reflective gear and wheel lights aren’t enough to warn drivers. And it’s Halloween week after all.

Many people ask about Jay’s sudden onset of crazy, riding to work three times a week, 20 miles each way, an hour and 15 minutes each way.

It’s simple….

He’s nuts.

He hasn’t always been that way. He’s always been a very even tempered kind of guy. But when he finds something he loves,he goes all out. For instance, he married me 23 years ago! But I digress….

First it was the 1976 Chevy Nova that he painted and souped up in college. Then is was the 1963 Triumph TR4 he got from a college friend’s grandma for free, restored and souped up. I won’t attempt to describe what “souped up” means but I know it involves big engines.

If you don’t know where to find Jay, you go to the garage.

And that is still the case today. You can find him cleaning his bike, airing up his tires, putting on additional parts and packing for his commute from Liberty to downtown Kansas City.

Yes, DOWNTOWN!

I’m not sure how it got this crazy. It started about 5 years ago when he found an old bike at his sister’s house and fixed it up to give it a spin so he could ride with our neighbor. I would constantly make fun of their cute spandex shorts and brightly colored tops. Why on earth would someone wear that stuff?

Then he got me with the cycling bug. I now know why he wears those ridiculous clothes (comfort and safety) and why he loves the sport so much. As someone with bad knees can tell you, cycling is the one thing besides swimming that doesn’t hurt the knees. And I really enjoyed riding with Jay and eventually other neighbors as well.

Over time we participated in the Bike MS, Copper Triangle and various other rides for causes that involved distance and mountain challenges. These felt like amazing accomplishments!

I guess he got bored with these races so he added “commuter” to his list of accomplishments by finding a safe route using back roads all the way to his downtown office where he can shower and change and do it all again in the afternoon.

He has also learned to use the bus on days when the weather is not cooperating (although he will ride in most anything).

Good thing there was no traffic when he
snapped this picture!

Commuting has it’s ups and downs. He gets his workout in with a purpose instead of just riding around in circles like I do. We have a discount on our car insurance because he drives so little now. But occasionally he will have a flat tire that causes him to be late. The roads in Missouri aren’t very kind to cyclists.

Overall, the guy has found a hobby he loves that is healthy for him and keeps him happy which keeps his family happy. It’s good for the environment too!

The only negative is that people don’t understand cyclists here in Missouri like they do in pretty much every other city we’ve cycled in. Las Vegas;  fantastic bike paths.  San Diego; best ride ever along route 1. Colorado; heck you see people in Denver riding in their work clothes through downtown.

We have some work to do in teaching people how to share the road so that the emergency bracelet I bought for Jay to wear never has to be used.

People often ask if I worry about him. Not really. I think I’d worry more if he wasn’t keeping himself healthy physically and emotionally. I’m proud of him. He’s nuts and all this biking takes up too much time in my opinion, but for now, we go with it…..with a pumpkin on the back.

Jay's Copper Triangle finish...a few hours faster than me:)

Best part about finishing the Copper
Triangle (80 miles in the Rockies)
was the hug from my son! That's
proud father in law in the background!

Dream bike ride, Route 1
San Diego

Catch Phrase

Recently my brother, an English teacher in St Louis, called my attention to a new catch word being used by teens. The word is  "Wait....".

"Wait, did you see what just happened?" "Wait, did you actually catch the ball?" "Wait, when is the test?"

It's a craze among pop culture like so many others in times gone by. We overuse words like "awesome!" and " cool!" We talk about "making connections" .....

I admit I'm at fault for falling for all of these catch phrases. My new favorite term is "salty" meaning annoyed or bothered. Sometimes it's just fun to say!

There are some catchphrases among Christian culture specifically that I try very hard to NOT say. I actually did some research on this and found the term "Christianese". Then I read this article my brother sent me on this very topic.

Wow, so I'm not alone in my thinking on this.

Here is one part of the article that makes my heart pound:

Someone is lonely; the Church says “get plugged in.” Someone is struggling, and it is shrugged off. “You should really get into the Word," we say.

These phrases are not the beginning of the discussion; they are the end of it. They are a reduction, a door closed, a bow tied neatly over the whole complicated thing.

But at the heart of the Christian faith is this: We were broken, and we couldn’t figure it out and, instead of sending us some tired cliché, God sent Christ. The Word, John called Him. He had hands and feet, dust-covered from all that walking.*

I think my entire family shares the sentiment that to be Christian does not mean isolating ourselves amongst other Christians. We talk about this often.  It means loving and caring about all people. It means recognizing that although we might strive to be like Jesus, the truth is that we are not nor can we ever be. And the fact is, Jesus would not speak a language that all couldn't understand.

So in our flesh and humanity, we try. We try to be like Him. For many of us that means conforming to a certain mold of what we think a Christian should be. And I get that...I really do!

When I am talking with another Christian sister I use Christian catch phrases. I know that she will know what I mean. Those phrases are a quicker, deeper way to get to the heart of the matter.

Maybe, just maybe, we can still love Jesus and be real people so we don't isolate ourselves into our own little clique. 

Because it's not just non-believers we might be putting off. It's other Christians; new Christians, young Christians. We need to speak their language. Jesus came to earth as man and situated himself amongst real people. He tried to fit in so he was relatable. I think we can do the same.

We can try to follow the example of my favorite pastor in England. We affectionately call him "The Rev".

He started his church with only a few and it grew to a small Sunday gathering of about 25. After services you would see him talking to the people he had invited to church; people he had met while gigging in pubs or possibly walking the streets.  The Rev found the people that needed Jesus most and invited them in without judgment. He was not afraid of what church members would say about being in bars playing bass. He was not scared of the homeless, the broken, the lost.  Isn't THAT what we need to try to be?

Acts 4:13 When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.

When someone is hurting we say "I will pray for you"....but do we? Maybe we should say "I just prayed for you."

When someone is depressed or anxious, the first thing we do is throw out Bible verses saying to cast our anxieties on Him....but does that heal our anxiety or depression or make it worse for that person when they realize that no amount of "casting" is actually working?

And telling someone that it's all in God's plan is fine but the conversation should start there, not end.

But then, Jesus has never really been about what’s easy.

He’s walking that long dirt road with those road-worn travelers. He’s saying it fresh, cutting through the cliché, making it all new.

He’s talking, listening, explaining, discussing.He’s staying until the words add up.

Until they see that it was Jesus' Word all along.*

We have to find room for humanity amongst the divine. The Rev will tell you there is room for both.

Quoted material from : http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god/church/features/28625-shoot-christians-say

Find a job doing something you LIKE so you can do what you LOVE.

Recently I've been in discussions with my son, a 19 year old college freshman.  Like many other kids his age, he is struggling with pressure to decide his career path. He's always wanted to be a doctor, but as reality has set in and classes are underway, we are asking him, "Is really what you want to devote your life to?"

 As we have talked, one thing has become clear;  he somehow missed the talk from his dad on "Nobody on their death bed every said they wish they had worked more."

This sentiment is a major core value of my family. We like our jobs, and when we are at work we work hard. But our jobs are not who we are. Yet somehow this was missed when it was applied to his life and his future.

There is a whole camp out there that tells kids to find a job doing what they love. And wouldn't that be a great thing if we could all do that? Yes, this happens for a small percentage of people, and it usually comes with some inconveniences to say that least. If you are a pro athlete you may have to move around a lot. If you are a writer or artist, your income may be inconsistent. The goal is to find something that works with the lifestyle you want to have.

What if we could all get a job that we are truly passionate about? Think about what you truly love to do.  More than likely this is a hobby for you, but not your profession. We can't all be professioal athletes, photographers, writers, cooks, singers, artists, travelers, historians and the list goes on. Sure, I would love to be the next Travel Channel writer or get paid to ride my bike, but if we all did that then our world wouldn't work.

So how can we teach our children to find something they really like to do, that they are good at, and that will pay the bills so they can do what they love? Well, I think this has to start at home. Kids looks to their parents to first learn what life looks like. If you are working too many hours, working at home at night, disengaged with your family, too busy to do family outings then you have this all backwards. And why not talk about these things as a family? I promise that we did this, but clearly not enough!

I just read a blog post byAaron McHugh called Blowing Up My Life to Start Over. Look at what he says about his life before he made a big change:

• I work way too much and I Live my life way too little.
• I want words like “lingering” and “relaxed” to be used when my wife describes how her husband lives.
• My priorities are all wrong: 80%. 18%. 2%.
  • Work is always in first place with an 80% portion.
  • Life (family, friends, marriage, kids, community) in second place with an 18% sliver of the pie.
  • Play or Adventure is under portion control with a meager 2%
• My marriage was on the skids.
• I was taking a pocket full of medication every day just to keep it together.
• My day job was immensely stressful and consuming.
• I felt stuck, exhausted, and desperate.

Maybe some of you recognize these things in your life. It's scary because we have one life on earth. Why are we working so much? And obviously it may not just be your job that is sucking the time out of your day. There have been countless articles and studies about kids and families that are overscheduled.

Do you live to work or work to live?

To sum it up:  Live Life. Play. Eat. Rest. Love and fit in some work along the way. Repeat again tomorrow.