Ten Years Ago ...

Sally and I got married.

Honestly, I'm as shocked as anyone that we made it. Yet through God's provision, and through a continuing testimony of love and forgiveness, here we are.

I know that we also wouldn't have made it without the love and support of our friends and family. And for that, we thank you.

[And it's also Maunday Thursday]

The Thin Yellow Line

So BFF Jon and my co-editor, Jerry Gordon, were over for dinner. My boys, ever eager students of male bonding conversations, were in rapt attention as we discussed the simple rules to going to the bathroom (we’re talking “away games”). Ultimately, this left them more confused than when I tried explaining race relations in this country. Plus, I’m not sure I knew all of the rules. Apparently there is as much ritual to this as a Japanese tea ceremony. Anyway, to wit…

The two most important rules:
1) No talking. There’s nothing you need to talk about in there. This is a sacrosanct moment, filled with doubt about your shortcomings and subtle homophobia.
2) Maintain the pee line. This means keep your eyes straight ahead, never dropping down. You know where your equipment is. Just reach down and handle it.

Keep those rules in mind at all times. However, there is a protocol one must maintain. Upon entering and facing the row of urinals, one must go to the furthest empty stall. When the next person comes in, they must go to the opposite end of the row. Should a third person come in, they should go to the middle. However, this is where things get a little tricky. That third person has to figure out if there IS a middle urinal. It’s important to leave space enough to leave the every other urinal space between men. Therefore, you know if a man has designed the bathroom, because there are an odd number of urinals.

The only acceptable time to go to a stall (other than to poo) is when there are no available urinals. Similarly, you’re not supposed to use the kid urinals unless there are no others available (but you still need to maintain proper spacing). Use your best judgment when it comes to these.



And now, troughs. This is a lowest common denominator pee event. It’s nothing less than a free for all/Lord of the Penises, er, Flies. Simply space yourself out as best as you can. If you know you will be facing a trough situation, remember, no open-toed shoes, flip flops (especially at the Indianapolis 500 track - if your choice is that trough, it’s better to stand outside and piss where everyone can see you).

There should be no handshakes or celebratory gestures of any kind while in the bathroom.

Do NOT cross streams. Under ANY circumstances.

There was some question about stalls and how to handling a no toilet paper situation. This is easily enough avoided if you simply check your stall first, but sometimes you just have to go and don’t think to do your due diligence. In the event of no toilet paper, you have a few options: 1) if the bathroom is not busy, you run to another stall or make a break for paper towels (pulling up your underwear is optional); 2) if you’re a man’s man or in a crowded bathroom, you sacrifice your underwear to wipe with and then go commando for the rest of your evening.

And as I told my sons after this informative and instructional seminar, “now today, you are a man. Or at least you will be once you’ve mastered the art of crop dusting a room.”

BFF Jon and Co-editor Jerry are available for school lectures and Boy Scout meetings if you need them.

Transitions

It’s been fully acknowledged that 2009 was a rough year. It was a year of major shifts, having shed or been shed of a destructive relationship, a church, and my job of twenty years. It also finally feels like I’m coming out of a near year long depression.

It’s easy to become risk averse. Life and responsibilities need to be met, and can make us afraid to take the risks necessary to do what you need or want to do. You can end up in a comfortable situation, make enough money to get by, and be dogged by the feeling that you aren’t where you want to be or doing what you’re supposed to be doing. I know that I had a position that allowed me a flexible schedule, and thus the time to do the stuff that really mattered to me. It became more readily apparent that my job no longer mattered to me, which is sort of the point: work became numbing and could be done on muscle memory. Until I couldn’t. It wasn’t fulfilling, wasn’t where I wanted to be, wasn’t what I wanted to do and it showed.

There’s a tension that we live in. Work is hard and it’s supposed to be. It doesn’t mean you have to hate it. It’s a matter of matching your passion to your need. I could never be a mechanic. We’ll ignore the fact that I couldn’t pick a wrench out of a line up and am not known for my ability to do physical labor. It’s just nothing that holds any interest for me. However, I have a friend who is a mechanic. You get him under the hood of a car, and it’s like watching poetry. Working with cars is his passion, he loves it, and he’s doing kingdom work. He donates his time fixing up cars for folks, helping out ministries when he can. His passion is infectious … though I still won’t be picking up a wrench anytime soon.

So I’m seeing this time as God’s permission to dream … within reason. Our safety net has been removed and we have to trust in our good Father for provision. As I try to move from occupation to vocation, having been freed to pursue who I am supposed to be and figure out where I’m supposed to be—as well as use my gifts and passions—I don’t want to be irresponsible either. It’s a lot easier to take risks when you are single and without kids. My wife, however, has apparently become accustomed to little things like insurance. And food. Now is a time for dreaming. Right now, I’m exploring the life of a freelance writer and what it means to use my gifts and passions in a missional sense.

If you could do anything you wanted, what would you do?

Are You there, God? It’s Me, Maurice

This year has sucked.

It’s been filled with a seeming unending list of disappointment and unanswered prayer. There have been marriage issues and employment issues which has often left me pissed at You (OF COURSE we reserve the right to complain: because we value our free will until our choices make a mess then we're all “why didn’t You do something?”). This year has seen the drama and trauma of us switching churches, has been a relational nightmare as circles of friendships broke and realigned. It has seen my parents and more than a few friends and family get divorced. My mom alone provided a roller coaster ride between her retirement, divorce, cancer scare, surgery, engagement and move back to Jamaica.

During the dark times, I felt alone and abandoned with the silence making me think of You as grandpa asleep on the couch while chaos was breaking out all over.

So needless to say, it’s been a little hard to hear You.

Hard to see and difficult to hear are different from absent, however. Sometimes faith requires its own CSI crew to look for evidence of your presence. Though, honestly, I don’t have to look too hard. You held my marriage together which was a miracle unto itself. Counselors had no words, friends were at a loss, WE didn’t know which way to turn, yet You held us in your embrace. You strengthened our community and friendships, showing me that Your church isn’t one lone body, but a worldwide one. You opened doors for my writing and helped me to not only find myself but revealed what I’m called to be. And You’ve walked me through the dark times, to the point where it’s like the pain was so overwhelming at times, I blacked out, and yet found I had been carried along without my realizing.

I’ll be honest, I can’t wait for 2009 to be over with. I’m trusting You for 2010 and looking forward to what You have in store for us. As ever, You are an artist in my life. Thank You, not only for the storms but for them passing and carrying us through them.

Merry Christmas from the Broaddus Family

(And yes, this is the actual Broaddus family creche scene, complete with black Joseph, white Mary, and a mixed baby Jesus). May God bless you with the very best gift during this Christmas season ... Himself.

Of the Father’s love begotten,
Ere the worlds began to be,
He is Alpha and Omega,
He the source, the ending He,
Of the things that are, that have been,
And that future years shall see,
Evermore and evermore!

2009 Broaddus Family Christmas Party

With the second novel of my Knights of Breton Court series done (finished about 12 hours before this picture was taken) and the contents for the Dark Faith anthology set, the Broaddus family turns its attentions to entering the Christmas season with our tenth annual themed Christmas party. They started out as murder mystery dinners but quickly got too large. This year's theme was "Musicals" though we were very generous about what was considered a musical. Any excuse to celebrate with our friends/family.

Your hosts


With lips (and yes, for those following along on my Twitter, I finally got the lips removed from my head)









Dueling Sweeney Todds








best male and best female costume winners











You can check out the full gallery on my facebook (or view even more shots at my wife's facebook account). One more time though, our very strange family. We wouldn't have them any other way:

Belly Pride (aka Eat THAT Kate Moss)*

To know God is to know beauty; to know beauty is to know God. Just as God is the source of all truth and goodness, God is also the source of all beauty. God is the Supreme Artist – the Creator of all. Thus, everything that is beautiful reflects God’s artistry. Indeed, God is Beauty itself. –Rich Vincent








I was bumping around Amanda Palmer’s web site as well as the fatshionistas web site and was reminded of a few things. We have reduced beauty to surface matters, not thinking twice about being retouched, computer enhanced, reimagined through surgery in order to achieve the makeover of our false selves. We’ve reduced beauty to that with is merely pretty, setting cruel standards (impossible thinness and youth), the endless pursuit of which changes us and our definitions of beauty.

The tragedy is that beauty is so often determined from the outside that we’re left in need of constant validation. We cling to a fundamental insecurity about ourselves to the point where we can't recognize beauty in the mirror. We are taught to be ashamed of our bodies, disgusted by any part of us that fails to meet up to some metric impressed upon us by others. Forgetting that beauty can be self-defined and self-determined. And easily recognized.

Admittedly, I was thinking about this while staring at my wife’s belly. It’s not a 25 year old belly. It’s a belly that has seen the birth of two children. A belly that has stood accused of being evidence of pregnancy. A belly that has caused her to defiantly retort “no, just fat. Thanks for asking when I’m due though.” It’s a belly that isn’t afraid to go swimming in a two piece bathing suit.

What impresses me is that it’s a belly that won’t be shamed by others. That won’t be belittled by the short-sighted or narrow-thinking. It’s a belly that won’t be defined by modern society’s pressures of beauty and physical definition because her sense of beauty isn’t rooted in what people think of her. It’s a belly that demands appreciation on its terms. It’s a belly that won’t believe the lies of her past won’t be condescended to and won’t be pressured by others.

Hers is a belly has been tested and persevered. Held a marriage together through good times and bad. Sure, that belly has dieted, exercised, but it still knows how to enjoy the occasional hot fudge brownie sundae. Hers is a belly that has lived and loved life. A belly that is fearless. A belly that demands to be known, loved, and appreciated.

A belly that knows peace and contentment because she knows that she is a beautiful creation of God, His perfect daughter.

Sometimes it takes a spiritual eye, a discerning eye, to truly appreciate beauty. A spiritual perception of glory, the loveliness of holiness, and the preciousness of grace ... all the things that come with being created in God’s image. All beauty reflects its source, namely, God. When we experience beauty, we experience God. Sometimes we need to be reminded how much we need to still grow to appreciate the beauty around us.


*Hers is a belly that says “it’s your blog, why don’t you take a picture of YOUR belly.”

Look What My Nipples Have Done*

At the World Horror Convention I did my first reading: my essay “Man-O-Gram,” first published in Morbid Curiosity #8. Morbid Curiosity, a non-fiction market for true life tales of horror, sadly came to an end with it’s tenth issue, but my essay has been included as part of the best of collection, Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues: True Stories of the Unsavory, Unwise, Unorthodox, and Unusual is now available from Scribner. This collects 40 stories from the cult nonfiction magazine, Morbid Curiosity. These are the editor’s favorites about growing up Mormon in the bathtub of the dead, assisting a friend’s suicide, attending a Black Mass, and, well, my essay. Though this violates my rule on sustaining the author’s mystique, I thought that I would give a sneak at the beginning of the story here:

The plastic plate of the x-ray machine lowered with a whir as I stood against the cold metal beast, naked from the waist up. All I could do was stare at my breast while it was positioned to be compressed between the plates wondering “how the heck did I get here?”

Early in her pregnancy, my wife’s doctor diagnosed her with a condition called placenta previa. While the doctor explained to both of us the nature of the condition, all I heard was “You can’t have sex with your wife.” Seven long months later, my wife was still recovering from her C-section. As a first time mother settling into a routine of nursing, any broach of her bosom area was met with the rebuke of “Those aren’t for you” and my hands getting slapped. At that point, I didn’t trust myself bumping into furniture. My Saturday nights were reduced to TV watching and cold showers.

Before the Divinyls’ “I Touch Myself” gets cued, let me get on with my story. One day in the shower, I spied my wife’s breast self-examination chart. Okay, it had been there the length of our marriage, but every time I stepped into the shower, all my mind registered were pictures of breasts and every time it took a minute for me to realize why they were there. Today was different. I looked around (because that’s what you did when you are about to do something potentially embarrassing) and performed the self-exam.

I felt a lump.

Now would also be the time to mention that I suffer from hypochondria. Unfortunately, it was matched by my great dislike for doctors, so I sat around a lot obsessing about what I might have, while not actually going anywhere to do anything about it.

I noticed a pain in my bosom (I’m trying to say bosom as often as possible, not necessarily to avoid offending anyone, but to try and hide my soon-to-be-copious use of – read: obsession with – the word “breast”). The pain was so great, I decided to ... call my sister. This wasn't as bad as it sounds: my sister was in nursing school. (Well she was taking English and speech and other pre-requisite stuff.) She told me that it might be an ingrown hair or an infected spider bite. So I was like “cool”.

The next day, the pain in my bosom woke me up. I decided to squeeze my breast. White liquid started came out from around my nipple.

The story only gets worse from here. To laugh at my terror, go pick up the book:

-The book’s home page

-The book’s home page at Scribner

-The book’s trailer

-The Amazon page


*This is probably why I’m rarely asked to blurb stuff.

Sally Baffles Me

I suppose I’m long overdue for an update on my life as some folks have been wondering. To be straight, we’re still working through things, taking life together day-by-day, week-by-week, month-by-month.

After going very public with our situation, I mentally braced for the worst: expecting the relief of public humiliation, the security of the pillory. I’d go to church, sit by myself, then leave. Only in the last two weeks have I even taken Communion. I was accused of wearing a look which came across as arrogance or impenitent. It’s not like I can claim that a charge of arrogance would ever be misplaced with me, but ironically, the look has been that of a person ashamed to be seen in the church. Ashamed to be seen with his wife. Ashamed to be seen with a community he served so hard and betrayed so dearly. A person entirely uncomfortable with the idea of people loving him and with the idea of people forgiving him. It’s one thing to talk about it and know about it, it’s entirely another thing to experience it. And the whole thing has me … baffled.

Because after we blogged, prayers came in from around the world. The horror community wrapped itself around us. Meals were cooked for us. Folks dropped us notes which were not only really appreciated, but carried us through some dark moments. There were those who dropped everything to come sit with us. Those who planted themselves firmly in “my cave” not only to hold me to account and keep asking me the hard questions, but to make sure I got back up, dusted myself off, and keep on the path of becoming who I am meant to be and live.

I don’t know what to do with any of that. I seriously don’t know what to do with or how to process the love shown to me. Which brings me to the title of this blog, though I might be better off saying that love baffles me. Sometimes I feel like a kid being force fed medicine: being held down, thrashing about like the most uncooperative of patients … while those surrounding me patiently love me back to health.

There are times when the shame and guilt threaten to overwhelm me, days when I was drowning in it. And it became easy to believe that God had washed His hands of me or that was too dirty and guilty to be in His presence. It became easy to forget that the Doctor was in, and He came for the sick, to treat the wounded (even those with self-inflicted wounds). He then reminded me that I was right where I’d always been: in the cup of His hand, showing me what it means to be loved.

Love stays right there with us even during the ugly and dark times. Love sees the person you are meant to be and helps moves you along toward becoming that. Love doesn’t let you off the hook, nor does it want you to define yourself by your sin or failures. You can’t outrun love.

There are times in our lives when we don’t listen to our hearts, to what we know to be true. We may betray ourselves. Our friends. Our family. Our community. God. We become lost. There’s no way to undo the mess I’ve caused in people’s lives and the hurt Sally has had to go through, all the damaged relationships surrounding us, all the broken Shalom, all of the betrayed trust. There’s no way for me to go back and undo years of bad choices. Lord knows I wish I could. Just like I know that forgiveness takes time. All I can do is attempt to live a life of repentance.

I still find it difficult to believe in and listen to love. And there still may not be a happy ending at the end of this story. But I have learned this much: in chasing after a dream, it’s easy to miss the beauty and love in front of you. And I pray to one day be worthy of it.

Broaddus Family Tradition Continues

Summer 1978. Franklin, Indiana. My childhood friend, Michael McDuffie, and I were the fastest kids among our friends. We had a long standing debate about who was the fastest between us. Watching this display of alpha male preening was my father. It was late in the afternoon, he stood on the porch in one of his “ready to go out” outfits, dressed to the nines, pimp shoes in full effect chuckling over us.

“I used to be pretty fast in my day,” he said.

“Yeah, right.” We didn’t mean to sound as dismissive as we were. Well, maybe we did. We were all of 7 and 8, masters of the playground. My dad was old. Big, as in 250+ pounds big. Taller than both me and Mike stacked atop each other. Smoking his cigarette, drinking his “warm up” drink. Obviously, there was only one way we could settle this.

“You want to race us?”

“I guess I could give it a shot.” My dad walked the length of the brick paved road (it was the last brick paved road in the city. To this day, there remains a small strip of the street that is brick-paved to remind everyone of how the street used to be). He set his drink and his cigarette at the finish line and walked back to us.

By now my brother and some of our friends gathered on our front porch to watch. Me and Mike grinned broadly at one another, all but high fiving ourselves in anticipation.

“Someone want to count it off?” my dad asked.

Our friend Missy shouted from the porch. “Ready, set, … go!”

Mike and I were fast. Mike and I both went on to have some pretty good track and field careers through junior and high school (until both of us ended up having similar spinal surgery which ended our sports career).

My dad, in his slick dress shoes, reached the finish line and had time to take a drag from his cigarette and a swig from his glass before we crossed the line. He didn’t say anything. Just walked back to the porch, our friends parting for him in awed silence, as he went back into the house. He never did mention that he still held all of the track and field (as well as many of the football and basketball) records in Franklin High School.

Summer 2009. Indianapolis, Indiana. My boys Reese and Malcolm were running in the gym in the Harrison Center during one of our First Friday tours. They asked me if I could race with them. So I set down my “warm up” drink (it was wine and champagne night along the First Fridays tour), and …



So we can add this to the list of Broaddus Family traditions (okay, I'll admit, I was trying to grab my drink in mid-leap). What scares me is wondering if my dad wasn't running at full tilt either.

Nice Website, Nicer Sister

Because I’m not above occasionally using this blog to pimp things, my sister Ro has launched her web site, Ro’s Many Hats. From the site:

I'm a stay-at-home mother of three who loves to try new things and share what I learn with those around me. If I can help, I'll certainly try to.
From braiding hair to making candy, I consider myself a "Jane-of-All-Trades." There's so much that I already enjoy doing and I look forward to learning and trying many more. Among those are:

· Hair braiding, natural do's, extensions and traditional styles
· Makeup application and eyebrow arching
· Scrapbooking
· Making custom chocolates and truffles
· Typing and computer services
· Violin and other stringed instrument lessons
· Event planning
· Child care
· Tutoring
· Beginning Spanish lessons

And because I’m in complete suck up mode, I’ve been instructed to encourage you to vote for her newest, Orion, as a Beautiful Baby.

Go check them out.

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

Elvis: At a certain point, letting your audience into your personal life isn't necessary good for either side.
me: that's my dilemma. i've always had two audiences. it may not be good for the fiction fans, but my non-fiction/blog fans ...
Elvis: Do you really want to be Jim Bakker?
me: so you think i should just "move on" and go back to normal blogging?
Elvis: I think you can make a dignified "Thank you for listening during this difficult time for me and my family. We're working on this very hard together and appreciate your support, and out of respect for my wife and children, and to allow us the privacy we need to repair the damage that has been done, I'll be moving on to other topics in this space. Thank you"

My friend, codename: Elvis, is like the Jewish grandmother I always wanted, but he's right. It's the life of a public figure. Which isn’t to say I won’t occasionally re-visit this topic, if only tangentially. I write about what I’m thinking about or thinking through. I’ve appreciated hearing from folks, even if I didn’t have a lot to say in response (hello, cleared inbox). I appreciate how many of you shared your own struggles. And my family appreciates the thoughts and prayers. Believe me, we need them.

I was especially touched and surprised by those that called. They had an eerie similarity to them. The caller would express disappointment in me – you could hear the sadness and even anger in their voice – for me not being the man they believed/wanted me to be. Yet they still loved the man that I am. If nothing else, it really drove home the idea that there are no private sins, as if the repercussions would only impact a few. One friend quoted from the book Alcoholics Anonymous:

"The alcoholic is like a tornado roaring his way through the lives of others. Hearts are broken. Sweet relationships are dead. Affections have been uprooted. Selfish and inconsiderate habits have kept the home in turmoil. We feel a man is unthinking when he says that sobriety is enough. He is like the farmer who came up out of his cyclone cellar to find his home ruined. To his wife, he remarked, `Don't see anything the matter here, Ma. Ain't it grand the wind stopped blowin'?'"

And that we could replace "alcoholic" with the sin of our choice. Sure, there were those who simply threw Bible verses at me or outright disowned me or who “checked in” simply to gloat, but I expected a certain amount of that. I did want to pass along a note that I received from “a fellow beggar”:

With Love from Seraphim:

"Your identity is no longer that of an adulterer (or pick your flavour of sinner).

You have been washed in the blood of Jesus. The old man is dead, the new one is here. You are a new creature in Christ. Sin shall no more have dominion over you. However, since we are still waiting for the Redemption of our bodies, from time to time, willingly and/or un-willingly we may fall into sin. The Old man is dead, but seeks to live again thru us. Don't let him.

If you do, do not fear. We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous. He knew that we would continue to sin after coming to a knowledge of the Truth. So He made provision for us. If we confess our sins He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and will cleanse us from all un-righteousness.

It is important to fight against sin. It is important to strengthen your inner - spiritual man thru fellowship, prayer and daily bible reading. Sin can hurt us, and it grieves God. But He has given us the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:13) who is with us 24/7 interceding on our behalf to the Father, not to mention that Jesus is on the Right Hand of the Power on High also interceding for us.

Do not give into despair. You are not alone. There are other members of the body that still struggle with the sins you find yourself struggling with. Find them and help one another to bare one another's burdens. Stay Accountable to each other. The difference between a sinner and a righteous one is that the righteous one gets back up.

And there is a prayer I want you to memorize. No, it's not scripture (and you should find the promises in the Word that speak to you and memorize them, they will help in your fight against sin):

"O Lord my God! I have done this because I am what I am and so nothing can be expected of me but such transgressions or even worse, if Thy grace does not help me and I am left to myself alone. I grieve over what I have done, especially because my life has no righteousness responding to Thy care of me, but still I continue to fall and fall. Forgive me, and give me the strength not to offend thee again and in no way to digress from Thy will. For I zealously wish to work for Thee, to please Thee and be obedient in All things"

And the after prayer instruction would be this: Having done this, do not torment yourself with thoughts as to whether God has forgiven you. The Lord is near and listens to the sighings of His servants. So calm yourself in this certainty and, having regained your calm, continue your usual occupations as though Nothing had happened." (Taken from Unseen Warfare - St Theophan the Recluse.)

Be Encouraged.

Now back to your regularly scheduled blog.

***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

Prayer of Repentance

It takes a while for repentance to travel from your head to your heart. I don’t know, maybe that’s part of the process: First getting your mind around things then it slowly sinking into your heart. So this morning, right in the middle of work, things finally hit me and left me laid flat out.

Lord, I’d pray that against You and You alone have I sinned, but that’s not quite how I feel. I’ve hurt my wife. I’ve hurt my children. I’ve hurt my sister. I’ve hurt my closest friends. I’ve hurt my church community. I’ve hurt people I barely know. I’ve failed at so much, I still can’t put my mind around it.

And I ache.

I ached at the depth of my sin. I ache for all the pain that I’ve caused. I’m humbled before You, Lord. I’m at the end of my ability to control my own life, at the end of trying to spin the story of my life.

I’m tired of lashing out in pain.
I’m tired of hurting.
I’m tired of not truly connecting to people.
I’m tired of living life so afraid of being hurt. Of being rejected.
I’m tired of putting on such elaborate artifice and calling it “me”.
I’m tired of the walls keeping me from loving and being loved.

Forgive me. I long to experience You, to truly experience You. I want the new life You’ve called me to. And I pray for the faith to believe that it’s there for me.

***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

For those wanting to know where my wife stands during all of this, she too has been blogging (seriously, it’s how we roll). Just as fair warning, her blogs are pretty raw (and she does name names), but she writes for herself.
-How much is too much and when should I give up?
-Sometimes “I’m Sorry” doesn’t always cut it

The most painful episode of Homicide: Life on the Streets (my second favorite show of all time, right under The Wire), is the finale for Season four. Frank Pembleton, the character I most identified with, has a stroke (which, also happens to be my greatest fear). I have only seen the scene once. Every time I come across the show in re-run or in a DVD marathon like I’m in the middle of right now, I fast forward through it.

Season Five opens with him returning to work, the job he loves, the job he had so much of his identity in. Humbled, not quite the man he once was, perceived differently by those around him (or he defensively projects/anticipates being seen differently by his colleagues). Part of him is lost, struggling with pride as he tries to find himself and his footing in life.

I still haven’t gotten back into my usual routine, but life goes on. I have good days and bad days. The good days find me clinging to family and friends, limping through life like the walking wounded. The bad days find me treading water in the grips of despair. Being lost, not knowing who I am, not knowing how to move forward, realizing just how many people I’ve hurt. And how deeply. You may think you know the consequences to the deeds you do in secret, but you don’t know. You’re too busy being caught up in the selfishness of the moment and doing what you want. Thus an older brother becomes the specter of things you hated in your father. A friend becomes every woman who intruded on your parents’ marriage. Or any relationship. And you realize how forgiveness will be slow in coming. If ever. Trying to figure out what relationships to trust in.

There is an alienation that accompanies sin that can lead to the sort of intellectual (and emotional) anguish that can drag us into the pits of despair. To feel alone or abandoned to an uncaring environment. Where we feel unloved and unknown (even if we’re unknown because we refused to let anyone truly see us … for fear of being rejected and abandoned). The kind of spiritual loneliness which has us feeling alienated from God and those around us. Even for those of us who are long used to wrestling with our demons, it’s easy to spiral into depression. You just want the knot to untie in your gut. You just want the darkness to recede a little. You slip into a dark place. It becomes easier to give up. Why bother to go on when it all seems so hopeless. You think, if ever so briefly, about hurting yourself.

[Despite my reassurances that I’m far too self-involved to ever kill myself, there have been some friends who check in regularly to make that I don’t. One going so far as to remind me that I have a two year waiver on my life insurance (Hey, sometimes gallows humor is what gets you through).]

The most difficult part of the shame/despair cycle is not letting your sin define you, to let your mistakes become your identity. It’s easy to hate yourself for your sin, or rather, the consequences for your sin. Part of the process is simply sifting through feelings of shame versus feelings of true repentance. Shame for how long things went on for. How comfortable and easy things became. It’s easy to retreat into the “safe place” of “there’s something wrong with me.” That there’s something worthless and twisted about me which causes me to make the sort of decisions that places my marriage, friendships, and other relationships in jeopardy. A place where I can wallow or find my identity or try to fix myself. Yet, this kind of “redemptive wallowing” is a counterfeit conviction of guilt. This is more a reaction to doing something unacceptable.

Repentance offers the opportunity for a fresh start. But it is a process. Wallowing in your guilt is just as stifling as not facing your sin. Godly sorrow, realizing just how much you’ve sinned, missed the mark of being the person you were meant to be, and how much you deserve to be separated (yet aren’t), is the beginning. Without this hope we wouldn’t be able to escape our mistakes or history of hurts. We could only rightly despair of our past and live in regret. But, with repentance, our failures do not have to be final.

[Part of me feels like I’m trying to talk myself into believing what I already know.]

We were created in God’s image. Yes, we’re sinful, but that can be redeemed. We have to face what we’ve done and repent, then realize that at some point we bear the consequences, whatever they may be, and move on. Repentance is an internal matter, between the “sinner” and God. Those on the outside aren’t in a position to judge the nature of the repentant one’s heart. As much as we may want to see them “act” repentant, it’s a fine line between wanting a demonstration of contrition and the appearance of people wanting to keep making the person who disappointed them pay/remind them about their sin.

Still, probably the most difficult thing to deal with is being loved and forgiven (however tentatively) amidst all of the disappointing, hurting, and breaking of trust.

***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

Emotional Affairs (aka, No Longer “Just Friends”)

A lot of folks keep wanting an answer to “why would I risk the life I had built?” or “how did I end up in an affair?” as if somehow that would make things easier to understand. People come back to “was there something missing in your marriage?” In fact, I’ve been asked “how did you get there?” often enough (as well as it being a question I’ve wrestled with for quite some time) that I’ve decided to go ahead and blog about it.

A friend shared with me that there is a song called, "Slow Fade." It is all about how we don't set out to have an affair, the decisions are small at first, and like the proverbial snowball rolling down a hill, it gets out of control before you know it. I should probably begin by admitting that I don’t do relationships well. I’ve freely admitted to the train wreck that was my dating life and it’s not like things got magically better when I got married. The thing that’s going to draw me to a person, the thing that makes me notice them, is their intellect. Whenever I can have an intellectual give and take with someone, there is an automatic spark I’m going to have with them. And that’s how things started.

The lie began in benign ways. “The other woman” seemed to just get me without trying. Not just that, she affirmed me. She liked me, looked up to me, and was like a personal cheerleader. And I did the same for her. It’s as addictive an effect as it is intoxicating. You start thinking why couldn’t all relationships be like this, so easy, to have someone unconditionally in your corner, having your back. Or how we really connect and make a great team. We made time and to see each other, just wanting to spend time with each other because we so enjoyed each other’s company. Ministry opportunities became an excuse. Choosing classes to allow for tutoring time or learning more about a shared perspective. Reading and writing were a shared passion and point of connection. Even spending time as a part of my family’s life (which makes it doubly fun navigating those conversations with your children why someone who was such an integral part of your life is no longer in the picture).

In short, we became best friends, sharing the details of our days with each other. Sharing time, space, and heart space. Within a couple years, we’d racked up 2100+ pages of online chat (I don’t delete anything, even the stuff I say I delete, and one time I put it all into a Word document to see how much we talked. And this doesn’t include the last two years or so of conversations). As anyone who has done any online chatting knows, that’s a lot of time spent and intimacy robbed from my wife and children. It’s not like that fact was lost on either of us. Yet we were perfectly comfortable describing ourselves and believing that we were just friends.

A strictly physical affair would be easier to get over. As crass as this sounds, one person nailed the point as “you gave her your heart, not your penis”, telling yourself that if you don’t cross a certain physical line, that things weren’t so bad. Instead you find yourself vowing to be the best friend possible, to never leave or abandon; to be there for her no matter the cost; because you want to be that guy, that special someone, the one who never fails. It all sounds so very romantic, even noble. And it wasn’t real.

Having watched one too many Hollywood love story or romance, you can create all sorts of stories in your head. A person or an unattainable relationship becomes romanticized into a Muse. The tale of star crossed lovers, tragically kept apart by circumstances they can’t control; or the tale of best friends whose love can triumph over any adversity. Easy to do when you have an idealized relationship. You don’t have to do the hard work of making a life together, the fitting together of two lives. The hardest part was the preoccupation of my thoughts and heart as they constantly drifted to her; the prioritization, in time, deed, and thought, of her over everything else. Looking back, that’s probably the hardest part: half the time, you don’t even know if the feelings—as intense as they were—were even real so find yourself sifting through to see if any of it was true.

Part of the healing process has been the willingness to give her (even the idea of her) up. I know that part of me will always be haunted by her, that’s just reality. You give away a piece of yourself, your heart, you don’t get it back. But I’m committing myself wholly to the relationship with my wife, the one I want to know and be known by, rather than cherish old memories of a relationship that may or may not have even been real. Still, I pray for forgiveness for misusing my position of authority and how this might have damaged a young life. These are some of the sins I have to own for myself (though, yes, I’m perfectly aware that she made her own decisions).

For all of the idealization and romanticizing of everything, she was an illusion. It’s easy to fall for the illusion of a relationship when the reality of a real relationship proves too “hard.” It’s the same kind of illusion of a relationship a writer can have with their fans, which this is quite analogous to (in fact, this may have been a case of): we have a different and complicated relationship with our audience, opening ourselves to them, laying our souls bare for their consumption, and thus making a connection point with them. They are inclined to be (unconditionally) supportive and it’s easy to get caught up in the constant validation. The relationship is inherently unequal and that can potentially be exploited, even subconsciously.

Real friendships, real relationships are harder to forge and harder to maintain. It’s harder to face and talk to people who aren’t caught up in being a constant ego boost. That’s not what good friends do. It’s certainly not what good spouses do. Good friends/spouses see you for who you are, the entirety of your sinfulness, and love you anyway. They aren’t there to stroke your ego, they’re there to share and carve out a life with you. It’s the only way to build a real relationship and a real life. A life built from the coming together of equals.

I’d love to be able to point to a rough patch in our marriage—somehow that would make it easier to justify—but there wasn’t one. Ultimately, if there was something missing from my marriage it was me not valuing my wife’s friendship. To put it simply, I have an inability to make my wife my best friend. As much as I go on about communication, there’s often something about marriage that strains people’s ability to talk to one another. Walls simply build up over time if the relationship is not checked, cleaned, and maintained.

A lot of my relationships are one way: I give (outward) to them. I don’t let folks in enough to let them be friends to me. I keep people at a distance, including my wife. It’s easier, no, it’s safer for me. There’s less risk, less chance of being hurt. I’m not good at letting folks in, my wife included, contenting myself to live within the walls I’ve erected around my heart and life. Believing, in the quiet corners of my heart, that maybe I was meant to be alone (and others might be better off if I were). Better to be guarded than risk the pain of living in a fallen world, with its broken relationships and propensity to cause hurt. But ultimately, that’s no way to live. To shut out the pain means to shut out the potential joys, the love of friends, family, and a spouse.

I’m not going to claim that me and my wife are perfect. I don’t think there is a “perfect” counterpart to, well, me. As quirky and temperamental as our personalities are, we mostly work. One of the things I hate most about all of this is not only how bad I’ve hurt my wife, but how she has to walk through the aftermath with me. She gets to be judged as too trusting, if not foolish, for remaining with me. She gets to hear “how did you not see this?” from herself, much less from others piling on.

Emotional affairs are tricky to navigate. The betrayal of an affair is about the shared connectedness which is meant to be reserved between husband and wife being shared with another. But while you can’t help who you fall in love with, you can choose what to do and how to act upon it. I loved two women, neither particularly well, and both to their detriment. Not only can I not afford to wallow in the “what if” game, I also can’t afford to live in regret. I don’t have to carry the shame, internalize it and let it define me. What I have to do is be a better man, a better husband, and a better child of the living God. That’s the journey I’m focusing on now.

***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

On the Idea of Confessing

As I’m still processing the rubble of my life, there have been two comments/questions that have popped up fairly regularly. The first is “doesn’t it feel good to be finally free of all the secrets?” My answer is “no”.

I’ve alluded to it before, but I had no intention of confessing. I was pretty content to go to my grave with my entire closet of skeletons. Here’s the thing, there are some situations where you may know they are wrong, but part of you is simply not strong enough to change on your own or, frankly, doesn’t want to give them up. In my case, my confession hand was forced.

Two days before, me and the person I was involved with had decided to “break up” (although, given our history, the emotional affair would have probably continued). Already that week, however, some pastors had confronted me without knowing, simply suspecting that something was going on with me that needed to come to light. The weekend “all hell broke loose”, she had ended up confessing to friends. Two separate prickings of the conscience, walls crumbling down, and guilt finding voice. Coincidence to some, God’s hand in action to others.

[With such a reading of events, it’d almost be tempting to be mad at God for the rubble of my life at the moment, but it’s kind of hard to be mad at God for a self-created mess. Seriously, what am I going to say? “Darn You for letting me get caught!”?]

So the short answer is heck no it doesn’t feel good. Nor does it feel especially good for the soul. It feels painful, ugly. It feels like ripping off a bandage only to find the putrefecation of flesh. Exposed woundedness isn’t easy and doesn’t feel good. That’s the point: we can’t get to that place to begin healing without first cleaning out the wound. So no, it doesn’t feel good, but I know it is good.

The second comment/question revolves around the issue of why would you confess also on your blog? Prudence dictates that the matter ought to be kept private and dealt with it in house (if for no other reason than readers will forever be reading things into my work). But this was a choice my wife and I made after talking it through. The fact of the matter is that this sin didn’t just affect my family. It impacted all of my relationships: friends, siblings, church members. We wanted a sense of public accountability. I can’t just run and hide, nor did we want things swept under a rug. That’s partly how we got here in the first place.

It’s easy to feel so caught up in your sin, so absolutely lost, that you can barely form the question “where do you begin to expose the lie?” Seriously, you’re caught up in the moment of being selfish and doing what you want; doing what feels good at the time, with no regard for long term consequences. Oh, you may think you understand the consequences, but you don’t know them. Part of you is afraid to tell, afraid of consequences, to be sure, because the repercussions can ripple far and wide (Loss of relationships. Loss of trust. Loss of respect.). But you’re also afraid of the reality of who you are, drowning in lies to the point that you don’t know where or how to turn for help.

Confession isn’t easy. You may get to that point where you’re out of excuses. You can’t blame your age, your naivete, your parents, your personal history/baggage, someone else tempting/manipulating you. You can’t play the victim. You can’t “spin” your mistakes. No, you have to start by being truly honest. You look in the mirror and realize you made a decision, your own decision. And you have to put on your big boy pants and own up to it and bear the consequences. Saying it out loud that first time, admitting to yourself what you’ve done while simultaneously trying to get your head around the enormity of it all. The truth may come out in drips and drabs. Sometimes it may even be easier to confess to a stranger or another friend rather than your spouse or whoever it is you may have directly hurt. But to hear it out loud, from your own self, makes it real. You can’t help but begin to own it.

“You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free” (John 8:32).

Just know that the truth also hurts, but the truth is do-able. We don’t like to be reminded that we’re sinners and we bristle at the thought of being told what to do. That wall of pride shoots up because we want to do what we want to do. Repentance is a call to action, to change, and repentance begins with confession. With many acts of healing, things hurt before they get better. However, only then can we be opened up to freedom from the past and be prepared to look forward to the future with hope.

***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

For the Record …

I’m not going to apologize for this blog turning personal. It’s my blog. Sometimes I just have to use it as my own therapy, though it’s rare that I write about what should be personal and private issues. Especially when it seems like I should be tending to other issues. But you do what you have to do in order to move forward:

Yes, I’ve stepped down from leadership at the Dwelling Place.

Yes, I’ve made a wreck of many of my relationships and have a lot of work ahead of me if there’s to be any kind of reconciliation.

Yes, Mo*Con is still going on.

Yes, I blew up my old message board. I do have new a small hang out space on Brian Keene’s board.

And I’m writing. It’s not always going to be so personal, but this space has always been about what I’m thinking through. As it stands, I've barely gotten these blogs posted and my inbox is filling up. I don't think I can face it right now, but I’ll leave you with this message I received from a friend (I've been on the phone all week and STILL owe a few people a call):

big tight hug silently claiming all of God's promises for his children who love him,
who love him imperfectly but love him nonetheless, as he continues to love us.
in spite of ourselves.
praying for Christ's light to pierce through palpable darkness.rage.grief.destitution,
praying for an increased measure of faith to minister to unbelief, self-pity, self-mutilation, self-loathing & loathing,
praying for hope,
your sister in Christ who needs God's grace & mercy as much as the next person,
you are loved.
it's absolutely true, you don't deserve it...none of us do.
don't forget to read the end of that sentence, maurice. NONE of us do.
Christ sees us in all of our crapulence
and whispers and shouts and assures us
and waits for us to remember & believe that
yes, we are loved.

And yes, crapulence is now my new favorite theological term.


***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

Double Lives

So I’ve really been stuck on the question “how did I get here?”

Who I am versus who I’m trying to be. It’s not like I set out to become “that guy.” In fact, becoming “that guy”--the cheating spouse--had been what I had always thought I had been striving against being. I’ve seen the statistics of people, ministers in particular, who have had affairs. It doesn’t matter how “far” it went: an affair is an affair.

I’ve always sort of prided myself in my forthrightness and living in plain sight, yet a good chunk of my life was still pushed into and lived in shadows. It’s disconcerting how easy it is to fall into a life of deception. To where lies become not just routine, but reflex. To where you can deceive yourself to startling degrees. I’m disgusted by how easy it is to be so deceptive, just like those closest to me are so hurt by not only being deceived, but also by not having seen it.

Seeing, hearing, remembering what we want—believing things we know not to be true—in order to justify what you want to do. Justifying the secrets by being afraid of losing everything, by claiming to being manipulated, by believing things you knew weren’t true in order to keep pursuing the course you wanted. Looking back, my life has always had a bubble of artifice about it. Nothing about me was honest.

I’ve always kind of hated the phrase “stumbled into sin.” It made things seem so benign. You have an implied image of “oops, I did it again.” But I see the truth behind it. Most people don’t leap into sins. Those sins sort of creep up on you, though we’re rarely innocent prey.

It starts in the little things. A comment here, a gesture there that you let slide, but it grows. Next thing you know, you’re setting traps for yourself (part of you hoping that you fail because that’s what you secretly want). The lies become deeper, telling yourself that you can handle it. How it won’t hurt anyone if it stays secret. You may even spin it into a positive (“you can better minister to or understand people’s sin because of your own”). Like a person who drank too much and has a regretful next morning, you may develop convenient amnesia. It’s a terrible thing to not be able to trust your own mind. Your own memories.

It’s like there are two yous: the true self and the shadow self. One is cognizant of the reality of your state of affairs (pardon the expression). The one that is aware of the sin you’re involved in. The one that cries out for help all the while ignoring life preservers thrown at you.

The other one lies. It buries secrets, even from yourself sometimes. It’s the one that squashes the pricking of your conscience by the Holy Spirit. You latch onto those convenient lies for your own mental and spiritual survival—so you can go through the motions of looking your wife, your children, your friends, your family, your co-workers, your fellow church goers in the eye as if you were a person of integrity—because all the while, the guilt, shame, and sense of dirtiness eats away at you like a cancer. Until it rots all areas of your life—mentally, physically, spiritually—until it erodes everything you touch.

It’s the side you don’t want to face because it means facing some truths about yourself.

The hardest part was coming clean. The “I know you did it, just admit it” conversations. I’d become so practiced at deception, even to myself, that a straight forward conversation became like pulling teeth. It’s reflex to want to minimize. It’s human nature to want to cover your behind as much as possible, blame other people for your own decisions. But there’s no moving forward without first laying it all out there. Naked truth time.

It’s hard to reconcile who we are (and want to be) and what we do. I always saw myself rather like Alan Shore from Boston Legal: a complex mess of hurt and pain who kept everyone at arm’s reach in order to protect them from him. Put succinctly another way by my wife, I don’t know how to be real.

Or let people in.

So the question isn’t just “how did I get here?” but also “where do I go from here?”

***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

Walking Through My Failings

I have been cautioned, cautioned, cautioned to enter into this gently (because as writers, we give enough of our lives to the public and they don’t need all of it). But I have to come at things a different way. Plus all of these blogs are Sally approved.

I am. For better or for worse, this is part of that tending. It’s about me owning up to things. A pattern had emerged in my writing and in my personal dealings that for all of my ability to communicate … I’m a poor communicator. I don’t share what’s going on with me. I’m about the quick joke or an opinion and moving on. Honestly, I don’t expect that to change anytime soon. But I am trying to be more open on all fronts.

Let’s be straight: I’m also a public persona. If a “secret” is out there, it’s out there. I’ll deal with it. The more public I’ve been in my triumphs, the more accountable I need to be in my failings. Which is what I’m ruminating about right now.

I can’t help but hope that I’ve (tried to have) been cognizant of my own sin when talking to folks about theirs. I know some folks thought that when I’ve talked to them about their sexual sins, they thought I was coming down on them, no matter how many times I may have said “no, believe me, I get where you’re coming from.” I remember one lady in particular who said “you know if you were single you’d be into the same sh*t.” I almost retorted, “no, I’m right with you, that’s how I know.” It’s hard to not feel (or hear) judging 1) when you expect to hear it and 2) when you’re judging yourself for your own poor choices.

It’s not about turning my personal life into blog fodder. Lord knows, I have plenty of other things I’d RATHER be writing about. I’ve seen folks turn their blogs into platforms of blame and finger-pointing. I have no one to blame and point a finger at other than myself. Is this an exercise in salving my conscience? Maybe. I have no answer for that. I’m walking through this. My wife is walking through this with me.

As humans, we’re fallible. None of us are beyond sin. Being a Christian does not make me more/less human. We’re experts on judging sin and walking through sin, but I’m curious to see what the journey of restoration looks like. (My counselor has already informed me that it’s not going to look at all like I might think). It’d be easy to run from my family, my friends, and my church right now. Leaving means I don’t have to face what I’ve done. Leaving means I don’t have to grow or change. Leaving means I get to go through the motions of starting over, a surface repentance, without having to face the person that I am.

We’ll see where this goes.


***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

There’s no point in sugar-coating things or dancing around the issue: I’ve been having an affair with a close friend of mine for nearly four years, a secret shame I probably would have gone to my grave with (telling myself that it was to protect all those who might be impacted, of course).

Folks wanted me to wait awhile before talking about this and I heeded their advice. I needed to tend to my family, however belatedly. I needed to approach a few other people who were at ground zero of all of this, the ones impacted most by my deceit and betrayal of trust. And I needed some time to think about things. It’s not like there’s a “good” time to come out about this. I’m still processing, actually, which is why I’m writing (read: you can feel free to comment, but I may not respond directly).

There’s no excusing it: it is what it is. I’m the hypocrite people think of when they think/talk about Christians, preachers, priests. Saying “at least we never went ‘all the way’” doesn’t ameliorate anything. Only going part way down a road doesn’t make it any better.

I know there will be the pulling away of some relationships. I know well-intentioned folks will be a chorus of “I knew it would happen” or “I knew it was going on.” I know that the … less-than-well-meaning folks will be quick to pick over my bones. Even now, I can feel my pride wanting to be defiant. Not wanting to give those who I’ve rubbed the wrong way over the years (and there are MANY) a moment of gloating. But there’s no room for defensiveness or angry retorts. The only posture allowed is the posture of contrition and accepting what’s coming. And living with it. Owning it.

It’s difficult realizing you’re not the person you thought you were. Or that you’re not the person others thought you were. Or, worse, you are the person some people feared you were. But the fact of the matter is that I have failed. I failed to be the husband I promised to be. I failed to be the father and example I hoped to be. I failed to be the friend I wanted to be. I failed to be the leader I was supposed to be. The worst part is, it’s not like I haven’t been here before. I’ve not made a secret of nearly wrecking my marriage six months into it. Doing the math, that’s half of our nine year marriage spent in one degree of infidelity or another. Which also means that much of what I have built over the years have been constructed on lies so maybe I am long overdue for having it all torn down.

I just wish so many didn’t have to pay the price for my sin.

I think of all the folks I’ve hurt and disappointed. I want to vomit. I’m out of tears. I’m out of lost sleep. I’m out of lost appetite. All the things which would have been a lot better served and thought of before hand. I’ve been quietly praying for some other tragedy to occur to distract from all of this, maybe place me in a sympathetic light, or even my untimely demise to spare me from facing folks. Because at heart, I’m a coward.

I’m weak, I’m corruptible, I’m fallible. I’m human. I’ve made a mess of things. But I have to believe there is hope for redemption.

Part of me doesn’t want to do the whole weeping, “I have failed” type blog or speech. Contrition is easy. Mostly what folks are contrite about is getting caught. After that, everything seems like self-serving spin control. Writing a blog is relatively easy because I’m doing it from the safety of my couch. Alone. Facing those I’ve hurt … there are long days ahead.

No amount of apologizing will make things right. Asking for forgiveness isn’t I’m sorry. It’s recognizing your offense before your Maker and people you’ve sinned against. Just like repentance involves a owning the impact of your actions and changing directions. Right now, I am numb to the point of deadness. I have often been less than sympathetic to self-created messes, even my own. But I’ve been informed that a self-inflicted wound is still a wound.

The bottom line is that I feel like I have no right to ask forgiveness from anyone. But I’m going to ask it anyway.

I’m sorry. Please forgive me.




***
Full Disclosure:

Secret Lives, Secret Shame

Walking Through My Failings

Double Lives

For the Record ...

On the Idea of Confessing

Emotional Affairs (aka No Longer "Just Friends")

Good Days, Bad Days (On Despair)

Prayer of Repentance

Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Blog

Police - by Reese Broaddus

So my oldest son, Maurice Gerald Broaddus II (Reese), has decided to try his hand at writing a story (this AFTER my two boys getting me to write a story about them). Anyway, I warned him that if I put it on my blog, it would be considered published and he wouldn't be able to sell first rights down the road. He told me he'd do a re-write and change the title, for now he just wants the exposure. Young writers.

Ah, good times ... I remember my first story. Looking over Reese's story, maybe we should back away from watching so many Law & Order reruns.

About the author:
At seven years old, Reese Broaddus is in second grade. He's been declared the new master of suspense (I explained to him that many new writers like to make extravagant claims about themselves with no track record to back them up. His response: "what's suspense?"). He once had a thing for Maurila, but now a young lady named Rachel is the love of his life (which I'm not allowed to write about in my blog). He lives at home with his parents and brother (I also explained that many authors tend to include their pets. He informed me that since we no longer have Midnight, his brother would have to do). He doesn't eat paste (I wish that all the professional writers I knew could claim that).

Prison (A Work in Progress)

Chapter 1 – Jail

One day there was a crime at Main Street. Tim robbed the Bank. He took $21,680. Tim went to jail for Thirty weeks. Tim’s wife Broke up with him, Tim was not that mad. Tim was more mad at the Police.

Twenty weeks later Tim’s son turned two years old. Tim was so happy he yelled and was jumping up and down, his face turned red. Tim got in trouble for yelling.

Ten weeks later Tim went to court. Tim’s ex-wife was there. He was so scared because his mom was also there. Tim’s mom was not that happy with Tim.

Tim was found guilty at court. Tim had to stay in Jail one more week. Then his dad came to visit him. Tim got in trouble by his dad.

Chapter 2 – Money

One day it was Pay Day. Tim dropped his money, another man stole his wallet with all of Tim’s money.

Tim was so upset he threw a fit. Tim called 911 and said someone took his wallet. “Someone’s a thief and snatched my wallet and walked away,” Tim said angrily.

Chapter 3 – Not at Jail

Tim was at his own home again. He was glad because he was not at jail. He did not want to find a girlfriend, but one day Tim found a girlfriend her name was Abigail. They are getting married in 20 months. Tim is going to get a job. Tim wants to have six kids.


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I Really Didn't Just Go Randomly Nuts Over the Weekend

For those who follow me on Twitter and thought I was having a random breakdown and became fixated on large motor vehicles, here are some accompanying pics from the site of the Extreme Makeover: Home Edition season finale (as it was being filmed here in Indianapolis):

At the Extreme Makeover: Home Edition site. The limo's about to pull up ...11:59 AM Apr 4th

We're waving to Ty! (well, not me. I'm strictly media, you know)12:32 PM Apr 4th

Move that bus already!12:56 PM Apr 4th

And now ... some cheerleaders are performing (because this day hasn't been long enough)1:01 PM Apr 4th

For the record, me and my film crew would have had this shot by now. Granted, there would be some random dance sequence in it.1:02 PM Apr 4th

I'd have Ty and Paige in the background doing the robot ...1:03 PM Apr 4th


The times are a-changin': First a black president & now black folks move into a neighborhood & the property values go up!1:06 PM Apr 4th

Countdown to security wrestling a Paige stalker to the ground.1:13 PM Apr 4th
Normally when you see this many white folks in a black neighborhood ... they're preparing to move away.1:22 PM Apr 4th

I'm convinced: this bus is never moving. In fact, I think I see the McFarlands unpacking their stuff in it.1:23 PM Apr 4th

I'm really starting to hate this bus.1:54 PM Apr 4th

All the writers are herded together. No, no ... we're definitely not gossiping about our papers...2:15 PM Apr 4th

Media secrets: "It's the last day with the catering tent. Bring the big purse."2:36 PM Apr 4th

The limo's FINALLY here.2:37 PM Apr 4th

MOVE THAT BUS!!!2:39 PM Apr 4th

No, seriously ... move the @+!%#!# bus.2:41 PM Apr 4th

Dear Extreme Makeover, if you know black folks talk in the movie theater, what'd you think would happen when you're filming live?2:45 PM Apr 4th

OMG ... tell me the family didn't just sprint up the street! (with a pack of white cameramen trying to keep up)2:47 PM Apr 4th

Ty's ass didn't move.2:48 PM Apr 4th

You can't stop us from having church out here. "Shout all you want to!"2:50 PM Apr 4th

From Bernard McFarland: "THANK YOU COMMUNITY!!!"2:51 PM Apr 4th

As a member of the media, I neither whoop nor hollar.2:55 PM Apr 4th

"Go on in your house, man. Make all them folks take off their shoes first."2:56 PM Apr 4th



Although, half the fun of my tweets are the fact that they're mostly context free.


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