Tides and Transitions

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Contents

Introduction: Tides and Transitions..................................................1Chapter 1: Growing Up................................................................9Chapter 2: Development, New Roles, Teenagers.........................................31Chapter 3: CEO: Shannon, THA, Elder 2000-2008........................................84Parting thoughts on Tides and Transitions............................................1121) "Tide Makers".....................................................................1172) Homilies..........................................................................1223) Definitions and what people will tell you behind closed doors.....................1394) Curriculum Vitae..................................................................144

Chapter One

Peter Senge defines learning as "a process that occurs over time and always integrates thinking and doing." He goes on to say, "Learning is highly contextual.... It happens in the context of something meaningful and when the learner is taking action."

"We attract who we are, not who we want."

John Maxwell The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership

Summer 1983

James had an accident today at Spring Creek. He wobbled on the dam and we watched helplessly from twenty feet and he over corrected to fall toward concrete. Miraculously, he landed on his bottom, but popped back against the dam and split his right forehead open about 3/4 inch. He stopped crying when the blood had all been washed away revealing a full thickness cut and visible skull. We came into town and Bill Turner sewed him up. He thrilled and amazed me several times.

1) He quit crying quickly and repeatedly asked me if it happened to me when I was a little boy. I lied, said it had, and that Baba had taken care of me. He seemed relieved when he finally heard me really convince him it would be ok.

2) He told me over and over then that he was ok. "I'm ok."

3) He wanted to know if the doctor at the hospital was my friend when we were driving to town. He wanted to know if Shannon was where I worked.

4) I asked James, all the while awake, to squeeze my fingers if it hurt. He paused, squeezed my fingers, then asked so politely if he was squeezing too hard and hurting my broken finger. He was squeezing my fingers, but remembered my broken finger in the midst of this.

5) On the way to the car I asked him if he wanted a popsicle or ice cream. He said he did but could we eat it at home. He had held up well, but he wanted to come home, he had had enough.

I should mention John and Lisa's role in this. Lisa offered to get ice immediately and took off for the house. We told her we would all be coming. John was most upset. He was paralyzed with tears, asked if James would be ok and then whether or not James would need stitches. It really got him until he realized that James was not going to die.

An amazing package not yet three years old. Amazing memory, perception, and bull of a kid who refused to panic going into a different world.

John's gum may have gotten him through. He chewed it through the entire episode.

    Pee Wee

    I saw him on first
    Standing, wondering,
    Curious, ready.
    He held his left elbow
    By his right hand
    Behind his back.
    Listing to the right
    He stared at the batter,
    Waiting, patiently.
    When the ball was
    Hit, he broke to first
    In anticipation.
    The ball in left field
    Allowed him off the
    Bag, watching.
    He resumed his
    pondering of bigger
    days, bigger players.
    Bigger plays and
    What ifs. John
    On first base in June
        1983

Sunday Before Labor Day

John and I went dove hunting today. John got real soft hearted and I have to tell the story. I shot a dove, and John jumped to go get it. I subsequently followed and he was softly patting it. When I walked up he said, "He's so quiet and still". I offered to take the dove, he gave it, and I jerked its head off. What was done was done. John "compensated" and said he was glad he had blood all over him, but it got to him. Before the 5 year old macho returned, John had grown some.

Maybe that is the difference in kids and grownups. We block a lot; don't let it get to us. I didn't really think; I put the bird out of misery. John was really thinking. A wounded dove with him, a young boy, out hunting with his Dad. He just couldn't do anything but pat that dove. It was wounded so badly it couldn't fly or move well, but its wounded quietness struck John. In a brief moment, he told me all. No silliness, beyond acting like a man, he told me what he was feeling. It was a moment I cherish because I saw his plain true feelings, the ambivalence of it. It was tough for him; it made it a tough moment for me too.

9-4-83

"Thanks Dad"

The fall of '83 was involved in soccer. Lisa usually played at noon, John around two o'clock. I enjoyed watching Lisa evolve in soccer.

I think that in the early fall she was barely sure of who won and she was tentative. Near the end of the year, she had improved dramatically. Lisa was playing on the front line on offense and nearly scored a goal several times the last four games or so.

At the last game I saw in its entirety, Lisa's team, the Blue Bombers, took a thrashing from the Diamonds. Lisa's team lost by 6-0, and the Diamonds had one girl who virtually dominated the game.

I encouraged Lisa when she came to the sideline after the game. Lisa was beet red and when I congratulated her on a good game she burst into tears. "They smashed us six to nothing or something." I tried to help her by telling her they played well. I tried to tell her the fun was just playing. I tried to tell her that we had been beaten far worse in softball, yet she cried on, really crushed.

The male coach came to the rescue. Harold told Lisa that the Diamonds lost 15-3 at the first of the year. He said, "The Diamonds got smashed worse than we did. They got creamed!"

Lisa quit crying and giggled! What had helped was that the Diamonds had been smashed. Justice had been done by Harold's simple explanation. The Diamonds probably had felt worse than even the Blue Bombers felt this day. We could go home. Vengeance is ours.

Thanks Coach, sit down Dad.

October 10, 1983

Campfire at Sundown

Silently, I watched him sitting on the steps watching the fire. John was excited about charcoal, grills, fire and cooking meat. He sensed a chance to help and fire I think always fascinates young boys. I watched his fascination with the embers and remembered the two big fires I had started as a young boy.

John was drifting into a daydream-like stare that occupied him. No sound distracted him. I could only imagine his concentration at the gray coals and pecan embers, as it smoked, cracked, and glistened in orange fire. It was twilight, John had not taken a nap and it was just right for a drifty thoughtful moment: age 6.

October 26, 1983

A Trip Backwards

I felt like I grew up in Ridgewood Park. We came back to spend a couple of hours in the park and I reminisced about my life between the ages of seven and seventeen.

Our house, during my school years, was across the street from Ridgewood, roughly a twenty acre park. A creek runs through the park. It is bordered by two streets, a railroad track, and now, a fire station. We revisited it with our three children and they were quickly attracted. They ran and played among the playground equipment, going from one ride to another. The equipment hasn't changed in thirty years. The colors are different; the rides painted innumerable times, but unchanged.

I was caught up in the memory of the days when I played paddle tennis, touch football, and pick-up sticks. During the summer a Park Director was provided by the City Park Department. The directors taught us new games, supervised us, and were the lifeguards during swimming. We swam from 2:00 – 3:00 PM in the four foot wading pool during the weekdays – no diving. I learned to play chess at the park and we had organized (park vs. park) softball leagues, paddle tennis tournaments, even table game tournaments.

I could go to the park at 9:00 AM during the summer and spend all day there. I played touch football during the fall and sometimes tackle. We bundled up during winter and played everything. In the spring we played baseball on the diamond. It's where I broke my nose playing catcher in a game of "scrub". In the spring and summer we watched the men and women play fast and slow pitch softball. By gathering empties for the old man in the vending pickup, we could exchange the empties for candy.

When the porch light went on across the street, it was the signal to go home. I then emptied my blue jean cuffs on the back steps before going in, then entered, tired, dirty, but happy.

Now, twenty five years later, I was back again with my kids; watching them run from one activity to another.

In my teenage years the park served another purpose. As I prepared for football and basketball, it became a training ground. I laid out an imaginary track around the park. I suppose it was about one-half mile in circumference. When I could run this track three times I knew I was close to pre-school conditioning. The basketball goals served for running my lay-up drills and for dribbling practice.

The park was also the scene of some of my greatest crimes and punishments. I set fire to some cedar trees around Christmas time one year. My Dad had to come beat out the fire. I used the Katy Railroad to flatten out pennies on the track as trains went by. The problem was finding the pennies after the trains had passed. Finally, we took wet moss from the creek and graffitied it onto the walls of a tunnel that supports the railroad track. The moss stuck, in fact, is still stuck to the top of that tunnel. Sadly, my graffiti has been joined by the spray can, dirty word type.

The creek level is lower, the paths are different, and the trees have grown up. The softball field has been replaced by a recreation center and tennis courts. When I visited, the park was all different, yet all the same. In a way strangely melancholic, I saw the same grass I played on. I knew that the young kids playing soccer regarded it as their park. I knew that twenty-five years from now one or two of them would look back on Ridgewood Park with the memories of closest friends. I suspected they would want to bring their kids back to Ridgewood Park too, probably for the same two reasons I had.

11-28-83

John

"Daddy, you believe in Adam and Eve

"Not really, John. I just think it's a great story about how the Jews thought the world began", I said. "It is a story so those people would know about God".

"I didn't believe it either. God would know you should wear clothes."

John Stultz January 23, 1985

Primary Pulmonary Hypertension

I walked into the room to see Paulette. I wasn't sure how I was going to discuss pulmonary hypertension with her. It is a severe diagnosis and by the time I saw her she had a severe case of pulmonary hypertension, untreated (if there is any treatment).

I could not get out of my mind when I was talking to her that the young age of 22, she was dying. No children, no grandchildren, no house, no retirement.

This was not a new feeling. I had felt this in talking to other patients but her mother did not know how sick she really was and Paulette did not feel sick, just a little short of breath.

I felt like I was looking at a dead girl. I resented myself for it but it was an unavoidable feeling. Somehow this is all that needs to be said but it needs to be written down.

March 25, 1985

Weddings, Ceilings, and Full Circle

"We are family of the bride," Annie said as we were being escorted down the groom's side of the church. The usher slowly pivoted, reversing his directions and headed toward the left side of the sanctuary. I managed to dodge him, and then fell in behind the man in the tuxedo and my wife in the pink silk dress. The children weaved in and out of us, going from one side of the aisle to the other, touching everything possible. We sat down in the pew with only minor altercations about who should sit next to whom. Shortly after we were settled in, the candles were lit, and the wedding started.

The stained glass window above the altar was crossed with concrete supports forming a flower-like pattern. The evening sun shone through it and into the church. In the center of the stained glass pattern was the face of Jesus. As we sat down in the church, James pointed to the large stained glass that reminded him of his hand held kaleidoscope.

"Daddy," James said, "That glass up there looks like my telescope thing, but mine doesn't have Jesus in the middle."

I watched the ceremony proceed with fine precision until the soloist bumped into and almost knocked over the candelabra by the altar. I realized that the collision was heavenly planned. Every wedding has some goof, some cute little happening for people to remember and talk about at the reception. The candle collision was Becky and Tripp's little event, all planned out in advance. Of course, after the soloist collision, everything went smoothly.

I was sitting in my place when I realized that this was the ceiling that Tim, Keith, Carl, and Becky had grown up staring at. Ceilings in churches are important because they foster childhood daydreaming. Some of the greatest ideas come to mind staring at church interiors, especially ceilings.

Ceilings work nicely for daydreaming because the ceiling is the only acceptable thing in a church for a child to stare at. Kessler Park has a good daydreaming ceiling and I wondered how many hours the Boone children had logged in ceiling daydreaming, bored by preachers and children's sermons, actually aimed at adult minds.

Where did the Boone's usually sit, I wondered? Every family has a family row or area to sit in. I figured the Boone's to be front and right types. I meant to ask Carl later, but once the reception started, I forgot to ask him. I also wondered how two parents kept four children apart during the worship. Surely they developed some system I couldn't think of. The only way I could envision peace was to separate the parents by at least three rows with two children each.

I enjoyed the fact that the church was stuffed with people. Empty churches at weddings may be quaint and private, but they are depressing. Churches at weddings should be jammed. Just as funerals shouldn't be in funeral home chapels, weddings should be in full churches. All the important items at this wedding were perfect. Everybody smiled, nobody cried, and Becky and Tripp talked loud enough for everyone to know they meant what they said to each other.

As I watched the ceremony, I thought of the term "full circle". Becky was married by her brother and grandfather. Aunt Nell was married by her father-in-law and her brother, I believe. My mother was married by two brothers and her father. We were watching thirty-five years later, a similar marriage by family. No "outside" preacher rotating through Kessler Park did this wedding. No way. This wedding was performed by men who had literally watched Becky grow up. This wedding was performed by the Boone preachers. A nice touch ... "Full circle" seemed a fitting term.

I listened to the baritone at Becky and Tripp's wedding with intensity. My skin prickled, I felt goose bumps, and I wanted to say "Amen" as he finished. He was fantastic. It was like hearing the band play the National Anthem before my first varsity football game in junior high. As I listened to the soloist I thought of hearing my Alma Mater at high school graduation. He gave me the same feeling as when Aunt Nell sang "Bless This House" in 1956 when my family was safely moved into our new home on Trammel Drive.

"Full circle" is a good term to describe the experience of this wedding.

August 20, 1985

Palm Sunday and Frogs

At church this morning the Youth staged a puppet show. They asked the little children at the show's beginning if they knew what Palm Sunday was about. The little ones barely blinked and stared in anticipation. The puppeteers then told a lead-in story about frogs. When they finally got to the Palm Sunday part of the puppet show, I was convinced that the three and four-year-olds fell Palm Sunday had something to do with frogs. The puppet show held the kids attention that the logic of the teacher was eighth grade level.

Lisa's Nights – Slumber?

Lisa had her birthday party tonight, April 4. Her birthday is actually on March 28, but she "couldn't get it in". Soccer, dressage, Vienna concert, school, and being the acolyte at Sunday church all prevented the late-night requirements of her slumber party. Alley, Becky, and the Phillips, Rachel Reese, and Shanna, were all here. Oh yes, Jennifer Gideons. It is fun to watch them grow up. The Triggs provided Balloons by Julie, dressed as Raggedy Ann.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Tides and Transitionsby Dan Stultz Copyright © 2011 by Dan Stultz. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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