Stories and other stuff

Part of figuring out where I'm headed in this life is taking an honest look back at the mistakes I've made over the years.  It hurts to know the dumb things I've done and the effect they've had on the people I've loved the most.  I had a chance to reflect on this a bit, mostly from something my roommate said to me about the stuff I moved from the house to the garage. As I looked at the stack of dishes sitting there, I had a chance to reflect on why that pile was so big.  Each one was purchased for my ex out of love.  Buying her stuff was my way of saying "I love you."  What she needed and wanted the most was just for me to stop what I was doing and just be there and spend time with her. She has a pile of things.  I have a pile of unkept promises. On my keychain, I have a little heart that says promise kept.  Sometimes I'll look at it and it reminds me that what I do matters more than the things I buy or give away.  My time matters; be it wit...

I forget the song, but one of the lyrics is:   I won't deny the worst you can say about me Having said that, a lot of what I get blamed for these days is stuff I used to do before Jesus found me.  I didn't find Him, by the way:  He wasn't the lost one.  I was.  I'm never going to be accused of being father of the year or anything.  I made a ton of mistakes with my kids.  I got yelled at about that this morning in response to a question I posed my first ex-wife.  I couldn't argue with what she said and right now, there's no point in trying to make it better.  Sometimes you extend the olive branch; sometimes someone takes it and beats you with it. I'm used to it. The thing is though, that I can't help but wonder why.  I'm not going to ask.  My son is a grown man and there's not really much of a reason to speak to his mother if she's not going to try and help me make things better.  I also know that sometimes, no matter what...

I haven't called the courthouse so I don't know for sure, but I'm pretty sure I'm single. It took the judge just a week to waive the 90 day cooling off period and said judge has had the divorce papers for ten days now, so I'm thinking it's a done deal. It's sad as I mentioned, but it is what it is and it's an answer.  Just not the one I thought was going to happen. So now what? I've been thinking about that for a while.  The whole Oregon thing is getting ridonkulous.  The little Oregonians are everywhere.  Jared and I saw a lot of them in Yellowstone.  I've seen one or two a day but it's where I see them.  The last two were on base and not the same car.  One had flashing lights on a white car behind it today as I left the Commissary.  I'm making bread after I type this. I have enough to do this weekend to keep me busy.  Apples and apricots are ripe.  June makes better jam than I and she's got seven half-pints of peach and ap...

I was gone for four days.  And in that four days, grass grew.  And grew.  When I got home, my yard looked terrible.  The church didn't look that bad at first glance, but the grass grew there too and it looked like some folks had a picnic and forgot to pick up their leftover stuff.  I had a lot of work to do. I spent three hours there on Monday.  Yesterday, I spent the better part of the morning working on cleaning up the front yard.  My neighbors had some work done on their house recently and the contractors never cleaned out the street gutters.  I took care of that yesterday.  They have a spring that popped up under their house several years ago and they pump water from underneath their house into the gutter.  It always makes a mess and with the dirt and gravel remnants left over from their landscaping project, I had a muddy mess in front of my house.  Not anymore, though. Today, I worked on the back yard and the pool somehow t...

If it's not already final, it will be by the end of the week, I imagine.  After all, it only took a week for the judge to agree that there's no point in waiting 90 days. I say that matter-of-factly because it's going to play into a story I have to tell about a speeding ticket.  The details don't matter and there's no sense of joy or rejoicing over the end of something that shouldn't have ended.  It wasn't my choice, though.  It was just time.  The only humorous thing I have to say about the whole situation is this: What aren't we going to talk about now? The kid and I went to Yellowstone and had a great time.  We even saw bears.  Three of the kind that live in the park and one of the kind that give out speeding tickets. Yup, lead-foot Coop got caught. The funny thing is that I don't speed anymore.  But the story of the traffic ticket isn't so much about getting pulled over, it's where  I got pulled over. Said speeding ticket was g...

From the NIV version of the Bible. Psalm 51 For the director of music. A psalm of David. When the prophet Nathan came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba. 1 Have mercy on me, O God,     according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion     blot out my transgressions. 2 Wash away all my iniquity     and cleanse me from my sin. 3 For I know my transgressions,     and my sin is always before me. 4 Against you, you only, have I sinned     and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict     and justified when you judge. 5 Surely I was sinful at birth,     sinful from the time my mother conceived me. 6 Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb;     you taught me wisdom in that secret place. 7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;     wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. 8 Let me hear joy and gladness; ...

I should have learned this lesson this week: Stop fighting. Last Friday, I caved in on the divorce.  I was just trying to do what I thought I had to; I wasn't fighting anything.  On Monday, things just started falling into place to get it done.  Either I'm going to be divorced by the end of the month or I'll have to wait two more months before it's final, but all of the paperwork has been filed, signed, and delivered. Then things fell into place to get the future former's things back to her.  When you quit fighting a battle that's already won, things just seem to go right. I should have said no to the boat.  I spent $150 I really don't have on getting the boat to the lake.  I caught one fish.  Then the storm came.  Then I jumped into the lake to get the boat on the trailer (by this time the trailer was missing a tail light) and forgot my cell phone was in my pocket.  Yup, I now need a new telephone on top of everything else. It's ti...

Well, that sucked. So I'm going to re-write it.  I didn't even look to see if anybody actually read it.  I'm just gonna re-write it. On Monday, at the courthouse, the future former Mrs. Cooper and I talked about stuff.  She kind of left in a huff and left a lot of stuff here.  The first time we tried to get divorced, the attorney I hired told me not to toss anything I didn't want to pay for.  So I kept EVERYTHING. Everything is actually quite a bit of stuff.  A lot of it will get tossed because a lot of the stuff isn't pertinent to life anymore.  Some of this stuff she's going to want.  Some of it she probably doesn't even remember she has. Some of it is stuff I gave to her once and she gave back because she was mad at me.  She'll probably get that stuff too.  It's not that I don't want to keep it because I do use it but it's like this:  The stuff is just that; STUFF. This whole week has been about stuff.  It started ...

Yesterday about noon, my son hit me with this:  That boat of yours sucks.  I hate that boat of yours.  It always breaks down.  Why don't you get rid of the boat?  I hate that boat.  You see where this is going, right? Can we go fishing in the boat? Today's adventure has involved fix-a-flat, a trip to Henderson's for a wheel bearing dust cover and a stud for the tire.  It's shop-vac'd out and just needs a few screws replaced and it'll be good enough to go.  I went through the motor as best I could last year.  At least the lower end won't be leaking gear oil. This morning I had about an hour to work on it.  I added another can of fix-a-flat to the tire.  That usually lasts about a month.  I fixed some other stuff on it and vacuumed it out.  It still needs a few screws put back in it to hold the seats down, but that's a five minute task.  Other than that and re-installing the motor, we should be ready to go. If...

For as much as I think I know about God, I understand that I know very little about the Creator.  I mean that and that's part of being on a Christian walk.  As we go along, God shows us a little here, a little there, and when we get to Heaven, it's then we'll know Him in all His glory. I got to see a glimpse of God yesterday.  I also saw a glimpse of Him on Friday and it's that glimpse that's the impetus for today's blog post. The divorce thing isn't going well.  I didn't expect it to.  I still don't expect it to.  What I expect is that after tomorrow, there won't be any more excuses, from either of us. I suggested to the future former that we let God settle our dispute on Friday afternoon.  That was before driving down to Salt Lake to see my friend.  On the drive down, and far moreso on the drive home, two things began nagging at me.  The first was that maybe that was a bit over the top because with that suggestion was a caution that ...

This is gonna be an incredible two weeks and some amazing things are going to happen. Why? Because my youngest is here. But that's not why incredible and amazing things are going to happen.  This is why they will. We went fishing at Causey reservoir tonight and my son wants to talk to me about my faith.  And then he did something else.  He asked God to show up. And God did. My son has some problems with this whole thing of God's Grace and salvation.  He thinks it quite unfair that good people that don't believe in Jesus don't go to heaven.  It was a lot more in-depth of a conversation than that, but in essence, that's it.  It's not fair, he says. So he said he wanted to see God. We all know that no man can see God but that doesn't stop God from showing up.  The following things happened in the time span of fifteen minutes. A lake that had been calm as glass started almost boiling with the fish jumping.  Then the thunder and light...

Boy, I'm thankful for this week off.  I got stuff done! I waxed half of Chevron.  I know that sounds really stupid to say that I waxed HALF of my truck but it won't seem so dumb when I tell you the other half is going to be repainted next week sometime.  Chevron is headed to the body shop as soon as the right rear quarter panel comes in. I went fishing last night.  By myself.  It's the first time I've done anything like that by myself in a very long time.  I've gone fishing before by myself, but only once and that's because I wanted to get away from home, not because there wasn't someone to go fishing with. So thankful today to have the opportunity to visit with a friend this morning over a cup of coffee and a bagel.  Also grateful that we had time in the day to visit with a friend of ours from church who is in the hospital in Salt Lake.  My friend drove and I gave him the scenic tour of Salt Lake City proper so we could avoid the downtown t...

I wanted to share this with you.  I saw it on my Facebook page. After today's earlier post, and the love they showed me (a lot of them knew Wendy from the bakery) when I didn't know where else to go, it's a reminder that for all their flaws, arguments, exasperations, and imperfections, my church family sometimes gets it right and brings glory to God! Praise God!!!!!!

I saw something yesterday that really broke my heart. One of the people I go to church with is having a really hard time.  I know a little about it; enough that I can empathize and pray for a young couple that I've never been formally introduced to.  One of the great things about the congregation I worship with is that we have an opportunity to share our joys and concerns with each other.  Because of this, we as a church family have been praying for the struggles this young couple has faced over the past few weeks. Maybe it's because of all the difficulties I've been through over the last three years that I feel so badly for this young couple, the young woman in particular.  Yesterday, I got to see our church be the church.  We prayed for the struggles they're facing.  I've been praying for them all week because I felt a burden for them on my heart.  I've never really felt that kind of a burden before and I don't understand why it's there, but pray...