Everyday bravery

There are a lot of days where I feel like I really annoy my friends.

I'm weird. I say stuff that I'm not supposed to say. I'm all mushy & gooshy & am sort of like an open sore some days. I left all my feelings seep out & yeah, it's kind of messy & gross. Responsible people seem to save their emotions for more rational times....

... most of the time what freaks people out is the random expressions of "I appreciate you", "you're wonderful", "you're fantastic", "thank you", "thanks for being my friend"... all kinds of stuff like that.

For me it's important that the people around me know they matter to me. I don't want to be in a car wreck & thinking about all the people I need to phone to tell them I love them... I sort of hope they know now & hence try to tell them in the 'now' instead of waiting for that last moment.... (though there never seems to be enough time/space in a lifetime to tell people they're loved.... there always seems to be room for one more time, one more expression).

But it's weird. Part of it is living life like you're dying (which I guess I am, just slowly). Part of it is this random thing from a Billy Crockett CD. On one of Billy's live albums, he intros his song "Thankful Boys & Girls" with a comment about the janitor in his friend's brother's church. Apparently if you ask this janitor guy, who has the not so fun job of cleaning the place, how he's doing, he always replies with, "Grateful"

...this quote has stuck in my heart for years & hence why I sign a lot of my e-mails (including pretty much all the work ones) with "Thanks,"..... it's sort of in recognition that nothing that happens in my life is 'deserved' or 'earned'... all is gift.... and this helps me be aware of how much I am given great gifts, especially by my friends.....

....despite the thoughts of global warming, relationally it's a cold world out there & it is such a rare thing to find anyone who cares even a little, let alone to find the rare & precious gift of a true & lasting friend.....

...but one of the things that freaks my friends out, is that I tell them that I admire their bravery. Tell people you admire them & it freaks them out (it does me). Maybe it makes us feel like we're on a pedestal, some precarious height from which we're sure to fall. Maybe we're all wired for 'Crabbuckit' (this phenomenon where you can leave a bunch of crabs in an open bucket & none of them will escape 'cause as soon as one tries, the others will pull them back down). There seems to be this thing in us, this twisted part of us, that cripples our own success. We never really accept compliments 'cause we figure we don't deserve them or something. We never really believe in ourselves & so when someone else tries to push us up towards the bucket's mouth, we end up pushing ourselves back down going, "I'm nothing special" (& yeah, I'm probably the worst offender with this).....

...so telling someone they're admired is freaky enough. Telling them they're brave get's even worse. The only people who get to be 'brave' in our society are like firefighters & police officers, people who "run in when others run out"... the rest of us, we just live day to day, we get by. This is not bravery......

There's another Billy Crockett tune (among many) that I love that is just a weird little song:

Mark and Sammy—Billy Crockett and Milton Brasher-Cunningham

Chorus: Mark and Sammy and Sammy and Mark
Knocking ‘em out of the old ball park
Mark and Sammy and Sammy and Mark
I need another one from you.

New year’s day was warm this year
How beautiful did our future then appear
How quickly it turns, how fragile our soul
And here’s the look, the pitch, the swing
And now it’s gone, gone, gone. Chorus.

Someone had a childhood dream,
They’ll tell you ‘bout
How it slips away unseen
The long I live the less that I know
But I love the sound in that stadium
When you are bound for home. Chorus.

What makes the great ones anyway
You find your one thing and get up and do it again today
I swear they aren’t giving that stuff away.
So I find my guitar
And I walk to the light
And I vow to try again
To be the man I’m made to be tonight

Mark and Sammy and Sammy and Mark
Knocking ‘em out of the old ball park
Mark and Sammy and Sammy and Mark
I’m playing this one for you.

It was written in the one summer where these two guys, Mark & Sammy (& I forget their names 'cause I'm not a sports guy), were battling it out for the home run record. First one guy would break the record, then the other guy would break his record & then the first guy would break the record again... and, if you're into baseball, it was this exciting time of watching two people excel.

I love this song 'cause it paints a picture for me of this idea of 'every day bravery'.... It's not like these two ball players were anything 'epic'. It's doubtful that they had qualities that made them larger than life. Their claim to fame was that they were good at hitting home runs, and so each day, each new game, was another chance to face their gifts & talents, to face the expectations others placed on them, to face whatever fears & baggage they had, to pick up the bat one more time & try to swing for the stands.....

What made these guys 'great', what made their story take on 'epic' proportions (or at least earned them a song from Billy) was not these great super-heroic things, it was just the ever day faithfulness of taking what they were good at & choosing to do that, over & over again....

I love the imagery of Billy taking his gift, picking up a guitar, walking into the blinding stagelights to look at an audience he can't see, to put fingers to guitar & hope that the magic hits, to hope that the night is one more moment when the word becomes flesh & where he connects with some greater creative force & this force/voice speaks through him something that will connect with his audience in some way more than just a 'cool' show.... (not that there's anything wrong with 'just' a cool show, but it's that connection that (I think) artists crave).....

... but this is the same every day bravery I see in my friends. Being a listener, I'm lucky enough to be entrusted with knowing (in a lot of cases) where my friend's hurt. I know with them the risks they take in sometimes the simplest of decisions. I know often just how many fears they face/confront, to try to embrace the gift of who they are for one more moment & to reach past all the crap that others have told them to try, one more time, to reach for something more than just the status quo.

This is one of the many things that helps make me so enamored with my friends. They are people rich in heart & very gutsy people... I hope to learn from them & keep finding my own every day bravery....