Closer to my Future

Dr. Dave Buck of Houston and I had been in my hotel room planning for things that need to be done to advance the work that we’ve been doing in L. A. At six o’clock I told him that I had to meet some friends for dinner and he got up and walked with me to the elevators.

The doors open and as I took a step to get on he grabbed my arm and pulled me back. “Hold on! I need to tell you something.”

Now there were three very attractive girls who happened to be on the elevator and I was very much looking forward to the ride down from the 14th floor but the doors slid shut and I’m just left to think about what could have been.

I turned and looked at Dave. We’ve known one another for six years. He is a pioneer in street medicine, teaches medicine in Houston and is currently developing hand held electronic medical records that can be used on the streets. I’ve visited him in Houston and he had visited me at Union Mission. We’ve blindly stolen from one another’s work.

“You know something Mike you’re different from the way you used to be. You’re warmer. I mean you’ve always been nice and stuff but you’re different.”

I was taken aback because this isn’t the kind of things that friends normally tell one another; especially those who only see one another four or five times a year.

“I think that it’s good,” he continued, “you don’t seem as burdened or as heavy or as hurt as you used to be.”

We embraced and I thanked him and we rode an empty elevator down to meet my friends.

It is true over the past several weeks that people have been telling me that I am different from how I used to be. “You look good!” they tell me though when I look at myself in the mirror I think that I look the same.

I called my friend Bob Colvin recently who went through major transitions in his own life last year. “Mike you sound great,” he said after we talked for a few minutes. I told him that he did too and while I thought that I sounded like I always do, his voice was lighter and friendlier than I remembered it.

At dinner in a Brewery because none of us could stand anymore Japanese food, Gordon and Valerie from Hawaii wanted to know about my future. Valerie reads my daily musings and we write from time to time so she is pretty current on what’s happening in my life. Afterwards we found ourselves back in the hotel bar quietly talking what we want our futures to be. It was a conversation full of encouragement.

“You’re so much closer to your future than I am to mine,” she said at one point.

I think about all of these things and know that they are true though it takes other people telling me as I’m not at a place where I can recognize them for myself. It’s probably true that most of us fail to see the changes that are taking places in who we are and how we live. We get better or we get worse, happier or sadder, emptier or fuller and we don’t recognize it as it is happening. Then we wake up one day and we are in such a different place than we ever thought we would be.

Today is my last day working before I return to my Sabbatical (except for Tuesday when my new partner has me scheduled to do all kinds of things). The last two weeks have been a world wind of travel, people and activity.

And it is coming to an end with affirmation from different people and in different ways that I’m headed in the right direction, happier… More content…less burdened… warmer.

Closer to my future.

Taking it to the Streets!

“I’m really afraid that there are going to be more of you than there are people on Skid Row,” our host told us.

She was addressing a room full of 170 doctors and nurses who are heading out to practice medicine on the street as part of the International Street Medicine Symposium. Dr. Susan Partovi and Michael Arnold have worked to serve as our hosts in L.A. And have organized teams that will invade homeless camps throughout the city.

Yesterday I got to welcome everyone to this year’s Symposium. It is the sixth one and it continues to grow every year. I serve as the Chairman of the Board of Directors and am one of the few non-medical people associated with the effort.

What started out as a small grass roots movement in Pittsburgh has grown and we’ve invaded Santa Barbara, Houston, San Juan, Atlanta and now L.A. And these folks are doing amazing and holy work.

Hand held electronic medical records that can submit for billing as health care is being delivered is ground breaking stuff. These folks are preparing for the future of health care which will turn the current system on its head.

Now if you are sick you have to drag yourself out of bed and go to where health care is --- be it a hospital, a Health Care Center, or a doctor’s office.

If you step back and take a look at that system, something is wrong. It is the responsibility of the person who is sick to go to where the help is. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Should help go to where the need is?

Doctors used to make house calls because they understood this back then. Fewer people were admitted to hospitals because of this. Health care costs were a lot cheaper. Insurance companies didn’t rule who got what and how.

So today these guys are demonstrating that all over again and they are starting with the worst of the worst, crazy and intoxicated people living under bridges, in abandoned buildings and on subway grates! And they are pulling it off!

These crazy patients stop going to emergency rooms and getting arrested thereby saving the rest of us millions of dollars. They learn to trust people again, get properly diagnosed, stabilize and move into their own apartment. They get jobs and then they pay their own way. Some always will need someone to hold their hand but this is a hell of a lot cheaper than continuing to arrest them over and over again. And it stops them from going to the hospital emergency room multiple times every month.

My friend Johnny O loves to look at the mug shots posted every day by the Savannah Metro Police Department. He is looking for his friends I think, but then again Johnny O is not like the rest of us! He finds amusement in the craziest of places.

“We could save ourselves a lot of money if we’d stop arresting the same person over and over and over again,” he recently told me sitting at the counter of the Breakfast Club. “These are people who drink, are sick, and get arrested for peeing in the bushes. It’d be cheaper to do it another way.”

And he is exactly right. And the Street Medicine movement is proving that! And after it is proven with the crazy and drunk person bundled in multiple clothes and pushing a grocery cart full of crap, then we’ll swim upstream and prove that it is cheaper to take health care to the rest of us too.

And soon I hope, when we are sick and hurting in our bed, a nurse or a doctor comes to us. Rather than making us go to them.

I mean this stuff isn’t rocket science.

Today in L.A.

As soon as I got off the plane my cell phone was buzzing and Dr. Jim Withers of Pittsburgh was calling. Jim is the founder of the International Street Medicine Institute and I serve on the Board of Directors. We are here for the sixth annual symposium and almost 200 health care providers will gather, share best practices and hit the streets to give health care to people who don’t have it.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“Just landed. What’s up?”

“Joe is at the hotel and they won’t let him check in because he doesn’t have a credit card. Can you handle it and we’ll sort it all out later.”

“Sure. No worries,” I reply and hop into a cab for the ride to the Little Tokyo district of the city where we will meet.

$60 later I’m at the hotel looking for Joe. He is a formerly homeless Vietnam Veteran who lost his legs in the war. He is nibble in his wheelchair and is a member of the National Health Care for the Homeless Advisory Board and a member of Jim’s Board with me.

I found him in the hotel restaurant enjoying the Asian buffet. Joe has a grand personality and had charmed the waitress into letting him eat without checking in on the promise that I was showing up. Once you master panhandling it can always come in handy later.

“Hey Mike!” he bellowed when he saw me, forcing everyone in the café to stop eating and look at me.

He wheeled away from the table telling the waitress that he’d be right back and rolled beside me to the front desk where we checked in.

“Thanks Mike,” he grinned wheeling away, “I got to get back to my waitress.”

I suppose he was hungry for more than food.

Throwing my bag in my room, I took a walk through the Japanese district but the weather wasn’t cooperating and it started to rain. I made my way back to the Kyoto Grand Hotel and Gardens where we are staying.

“I recognize that cute butt,” I heard someone yell.

My friend Dr. Maria Brown of Chicago was sitting in the bar drinking and eating so I did my best Conner impersonation and strolled over to her. Maria is a teaching doctor who runs clinics for the homeless in the windy city. Anna Murphy who also treats homeless folks on the streets there. So we sat and talked and drank sharing with one another has friends who haven’t seen one another in a while. We mostly laughed though eyes grew moist a couple of times as we caught each other up. Maria keeps up with me on Face Book so she was more pointed in the things she wanted to know.

After they left, I ordered another glass of wine by myself. The bar was slammed and I was surrounded by laughing guys watching baseball and romantic couples holding hands and lovingly whispering to one another. I was an objective bystander.

I am glad to be here with friends from across the country who go to work every day determined to change the world from what it is to what they think it should be. These are passionate and committed women and men. I am proud to be associated with them.

And I’m mindful that while I restructure my life and have laid low at home, it is different when I am in Atlanta or New Orleans or L.A. I have rich and deep relationships in those places. I get a lot of requests from people and organizations to help them do something better or to emulate the things that I’ve done in my career.

So…it’s time to go dive in with them and figure out ways to make this a better place to be.

Goodbye Again

At 4:30 this morning I stumbled in through the door marked “Exit Only” at the Breakfast Club to be greeted by the owner Jodee who was there alone doing prep work.

“Morning Mike,” he said in a chipper voice, “going to the airport?”

I told him that I was and he got me a cup of coffee. We chatted for a minute as he told me that he’s joining Cheryl in Chicago for a wedding and he’s looking forward to the trip. He then wished me safe travels and I sipped coffee as I drove in grateful that there was someone to tell me goodbye and safe journeys.

I used to have that constantly in my life. Someone to wish me off and someone to greet me with love when I returned. I don’t anymore and it makes me thankful for the little things that really do mean so much. Too often we take them for granted when we have them.

Though Goddess did kiss me goodbye before I left the house but it’s not the same.

After I boarded the plane I was people watching as the other passengers drug their carry- on luggage towards their seats. At the Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport (which is an oxymoron) most of the passengers are from Hilton Head. More often than not I never see anyone from Savannah on the same flight.

So I sat there people watching when I recognize a face who is recognizing me at the same time.

“Micheal!” she said. “How have you been? It’s been forever! I was just at your place last week.”

I am terrible with names and had no clue who she was. I just recognized the face as familiar. Obviously she knew me from my Union Mission days and thought that I am still there.

“Oh, sorry I missed you,” I replied as she made her way passed.

This break from my Sabbatical has already gotten old. Three cities in five days last week, a day and a half at home and now I am off to Los Angeles for the rest of the week. It is for a good purpose as the sixth International Street Medicine Symposium is being held and I’m the chairman of that Board.

Almost 200 of us will descend on L.A, mostly doctors and nurses, who will take to the streets and help another city redefine health care for those on the streets. These are not like most nurses and doctors as they care passionately about those who have no access to care so they take the care to them. There’s something very Biblical about it all.

But to be honest I’d rather be on my beloved back deck continuing my pilgrimage back to myself.

Last night Rebekah came out to force me to have my weekly staff meeting with myself and we spent a lot of time planning for when my Sabbatical is over. We normally meet on my beloved back deck but I had already spent special time on it yesterday so I took them out to Stingrays. She gave me timelines and things to do before next Monday.

I sighed.

I told Jodee this morning that I am beginning to get a glimpse of what my new life is going to be. More trips will begin and end on airplanes where I’m surrounded by people that I do not know, traveling to as many cities as can be crammed into the fewest days.

All in all, I am OK with this. I like helping other people and travel is fine. But it would be a hell of a lot better, if there was someone to kiss goodbye and someone’s arms to fall into when I return.

So if you’ve got a lover, a spouse or kids that tell you goodbye or welcome you home, even if they often drive you nuts, be thankful for what you have. It is a special thing.

Political Decisions

The politicians are in full season spending money, making decisions, and running up the deficit. Good times if you are a politician though it pretty much sucks for the majority of the rest of us.

So I would like to share all time my favorite political decision that has ever been made. Of course it was on Tybee Island where I live though this is exactly the type of decision that many politicians make almost everywhere. In fact, if you have one that is just as good, please share it.

When I first moved to Tybee the island was even more laid back than it is now. In fact in those days, most everything about Tybee seemed stoned. Come to think of it, perhaps that is how this decision was made. I’ll have to toke on that for a while and will get back to you.

The Mayor back then was Pat Locklear, a really good guy. He is conservative and a tremendous supporter of the military as is everyone who is elected in Georgia. I think that there are court marshal laws if a politician is elected in the state that does not support the military. But I digress.

The local military bases were looking for a place to train soldiers on how to invade a tropical island. In those days most of our enemies were in Central American countries so it seemed like good planning from a military perspective. Ever the patriot, our Mayor agreed to have Tybee invaded.

In and of itself, this is not particularly a bad idea. It helps the military, provides training for soldiers to protect the nation, and probably contributed to the local economy. The only problem was the Mayor forgot to tell anybody. Perhaps he told his wife though that has never been confirmed and everyone may have been stoned at the time. Who knows?

It is a beautiful day and I am laying on the beach working on my tan. The first clue that we had that something was going on was the sun suddenly was blacked out by the several hundred military helicopters that were in the sky. Now we are used to seeing military helicopters fly over the ocean but never had this many been in formation at the same time.

Then the beach started to rumble so much that I had to grab my beer to keep it from spilling, which is one of the seven deadly sins on Tybee (unlike the rest of the Country Tybee came up with its own list of deadly sins one night during a Beach Bum softball game…but that’s another story).

Looking up there was a squadron of soldiers dressed in full military war dress, carrying rifles, running to where I sat mostly naked in my beach chair. My first thought that I was impressed by what they thought of me to send that many to take me down but then they ran by, jumped over and one of those guys grabbed my beer and took it with him! (It could have been a woman, I really don’t know. I was just staring at their guns!)

That was pretty much my experience though other island residents had it far rougher. Former politician Mallory, before he was a politician, found his house surrounded by guys wearing masks and lighting flame throwers. They had repelled down from the aforementioned helicopters on the Tybee School and several missed their mark and landed in Mallory’s yard. Of course he runs screaming into the street for them to stop so they took him prisoner.

Johnny O can confirm all of this.

They also invaded the famous Sunday night talent show at the old Desoto Beach Club where several hundred would show up to either entertain or be entertained. Of course no one had ever repelled into the talent show before, though many had fallen down, so a group of soldiers with guns won that night.

The following day I was driving home from work and someone had taken the time to make a new sign welcoming visitors to the island. The old one used to say, “Welcome to Tybee Island.”

This one said “Welcome to Camp Locklear!”

You gotta love the elected people of this land!

What I'm trying to do

I woke again this morning in an empty hotel room. Just in a different city. I’ve always traveled a lot at Union Mission making regular trips to Atlanta and Washington but have also had occasion to go almost everywhere. So I’m used to waking up alone in hotel rooms.

Over the past few months though I’ve grown accustomed to waking up at home with Goddess snoring beside the bed. Then it’s a bike ride to the Breakfast Club and then to the ocean to start my day. From July until this past week I haven’t traveled anywhere other than a quick trip to Chicago. It’s the longest amount of time that I’ve simply spent at home.

I’m taking a break from the Sabbatical that I’ve been on, returning home tomorrow before leaving again on Tuesday for the rest of the week. Last week was good for me as I’ve felt revived and had good talks with peers who are advising and helping me put together the plans for what I’m doing next.

Then Conner and I hooked up and he and I always have fun. I remember some of what we actually did, but we’ll be together again in a couple of weeks in St. Martin and there will be new adventures setting sail with Captain Morgan and Hania.

Last night was with the kids and Athens friends. It is homecoming at the University of Georgia so we watched the parade and went out to dinner. Afterwards they had other things that they wanted to do so I commanded the room for myself for the first time that I can remember.

Now I sip coffee in silence and contemplate things. I’ve got a couple of friends who are going through life transitions that are just as major as the ones that I am navigating. Both have reached out to me over the past couple of days asking for guidance and telling me what is going on with them. Sadness abounds in these conversations.

I don’t mind listening to them. The other day I was talking to my Mom and we both noted that nobody likes to hear anyone describe things that are wrong in their lives. People just want to ignore bad times because it may prove to be contagious.

Once my friend Frank Stanton asked me how I was doing. When I began to tell him, he held up his hand to stop me from talking and said, “Mike, I was just being nice. I really don’t want to know.”

He was poking fun but I do believe that is how most folks are. They don’t want to know.

So I’m thinking about my friends this morning as they make themselves get through unwanted changes. I think about where I am now, calmer and quieter than I was just a few months ago. I’ve learned who my friends really are and remain surprised at the number who aren’t. I’ve let go of a great deal of pretense that once ruled my persona. I’ve learned to appreciate the beauty of my surroundings and linger over them rather than rush pass them. I’ve learned to let things come to me rather than chase after them.

Now I’m trying to reframe the changes that have occurred in my life. I am a big believer that life is a gift that each of us shares and none of us asked for. We don’t know how long we get to keep it or how long it will last. The people in our lives and the things that we do are also gifts and we don’t know how long any of them remain. But one thing is certain … gifts don’t last forever.

People come and people go. Jobs end and adventures begin. I think that the trick it to be thankful for what you’ve had (even if it would be your preference to still have it), appreciate the hell out of what you’ve got (friends, places, things to do), and to do your best to prepare yourself for whatever is coming your way (hopefully better days).

At least that’s what I’m trying to do.

The Drive Home

Conner must have driven me home last night.

I mean to the hotel. At least I woke up in the same hotel room that I had been in the night before. I have no recollection of leaving the French Quarter last night, several blocks away from my hotel, so it must have been Conner who drove. It could have been Jim Withers. He was with us. One of them must have driven me home.

Though we didn’t have a car.

It all started innocently enough.

It was a glorious afternoon in New Orleans. I strolled down to Jackson Square to the Cathedral of St. Louis where I lit some candles for people I love and paid good money to the Catholic Church to do so.

Stumbling outside there was a five piece band with a hot girl bass player. I sat on the steps sipping wine. Savannah and New Orleans are the only cities in the country where you can do that. It is part of what makes them great cities.

Anyway I’m sitting there, enjoying the music, when Dorothy and the Cowardly Lion walk by. They are arguing. In fact, the Lion is cussing Dorothy out. She’s just staring at him as they briskly make their way back to Kansas I suppose. It’s not something that you see every day.

You got to love New Orleans!

Then I made my way to Bourbon Street which was likely mistake number one. I stumbled into a place with a really hot band with a girl singer. They were doing classic rock and were really good. I stayed for several drinks. They were that good!

Stumbling back outside, I wondered where my bicycle was. I can never count on my bike. Oh wait! It’s back on Tybee. Probably getting in trouble!

After that I went back to the band in front of the Cathedral. They were too good to simply leave behind and the crowd was great, the weather nice, the trees in Jackson Square danced to the music, and the bass player was hot.

After an hour or so I made my way back to the hotel. Several Community Health Leaders and I were talking when Conner strolled in. Conner doesn’t walk or rush or run. He strolls, never in a hurry, always calm and in control. Except for that time he passed out in the kitchen on Brant Island in Canada.

Anyway I introduced him to Jim Withers and we were off. Conner immediately got us lost, but he was cool with it. We followed him around until he found a place that he thought he had been to before and we ordered a gumbo feast.

Then it was off into the night for a good time!

Then I woke up this morning wondering who drove me home.

It must have been Conner.

He owed me big time for driving him home last time.

I wonder what happened to Jim?

Waiting In New Orleans

It is hard not to think about my friends Stacy Jennings and Karen Jack when I’m in New Orleans; Stacy because this is her town and Karen because her son Tyler is in school here.

Stacy burst into my life just as unexpectedly as the Saints marched to Super Bowl victory! We’d met but it was a distant knowledge of one another and then through Face Book and blogs and messages to one another this abiding friendship grew deep and fast. We gather together when we can for deep and longing conversations.

Tyler was a baby when we met but his mother Karen and I go way back to the early days of Union Mission. She came on board as the Director of the Magdalene Project eventually taking over financial operations. We became close friends then she moved to Michigan and we touched base from time to time. Then Face Book brought us back together again and we keep up.

I stare out at this magnificent city this morning from the 17th floor of the Loews Hotel where the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is hosting the annual meeting of the Community Health Leaders. I was fortunate enough to win in 2000 and received national recognition and a $100,000 cash award. I gave the money to Union Mission and we ended up buying the property around the Starfish Café with it.

The thing about Community Health Leaders is that we are this fraternity of peers who are out there trying to make the world a better place. It is like a home coming when we gather and of course no one here follows any of the rules.

As soon as the meeting began, Sharon Rohrbach, Judy Bentley and I sat in a corner to talk about the things that we’re doing. Sharon’s getting ready to be on Oprah … again! She was advising me on my career moves. Judy wants me to come to St. Louis to work on a project with her.

Last night this year’s winners were recognized. They are amazing people who are in the trenches of taking health care to people who would never get it otherwise. Dr. Jim Withers opted to skip the ceremony so that he could join a group of New Orleans medical students to go out of the streets and treat homeless people living under bridges or in parks. That’s the kind of group this is.

And Lord knows as I made my way around the city yesterday, New Orleans has its fair share of homeless people! It is hard not to love this city though. The food, jazz, Bourbon Street, voodoo and art tickle the senses constantly.

I’ve made many trips to New Orleans over the years. Most of them had particular missions to them. This time it is different. I’m here with no particular purpose other than I happen to be a Community Health Leader. There will be the opportunity to learn things that the Foundation has orchestrated and many opportunities to network with the other Leaders. I’m waiting on things to come to me even when I’m here. There is no particular agenda except to see what happens.

But then there is Conner. He and I often get in trouble when we’re together. I just got off the phone with him and we’re taking the city tonight. We’re heading back to St. Martin soon together so we need to get in shape for whatever we end up doing there. What better place to do so than New Orleans!

The Smaller Stuff

Atlanta is a perennial traffic jam with skyscrapers and housing divisions built around it. I was sitting in the back of Lucy Hall’s SUV while she and Kim drove me back to the subway station. I stared at the long lines of cars in every direction. Blinkers and headlights and break lights and horns almost make it like a moving version of New York City’s Times Square.

Lucy’s office is near the northern most subway stop and I would be heading to the southern most at the airport. It would take about half and hour which is far better than drive time and there I would sit amidst the diversity of urban culture. Races mixed, multiple nationalities represented, music blaring from earphones … and a collection of people who look …worn out and tired.

I’ve had my share of urban in my life. Eight years in the inner city of Louisville, Kentucky then led to Union Mission in Savannah and the opportunity to do work in most every major U.S. city. I’ve been blessed to visit most of them, many on numerous occasions.

I have my favorites. I love Pittsburgh! The drive through the tunnel in the mountain as you make your way from the airport to the city is an explosion of the senses. One moment you are in a lush green countryside then you go through this tunnel and BOOM …the entire city lay before you. Of course I also have good friends there, one of which who has a hot tub.

New York is always a rush because everything in the universe is there. Talk about subway rides! Talk about wonderful entertainment on Broadway and in little taverns and just on the sidewalk. Talk about poverty like you’ve never seen it! NYC has it all.

Washington D.C. I love it but I probably hate it a little more. It is a wonderful city and I have dear friends there too (though none have invited me to their hot tubs …umm… likely cause they’re all on Capitol Hill). But you see the majesty of Congress and sleeping outside is a man on a subway grate with several empty Soda containers filled with his piss because there are no public restrooms that will let him in. The place is a city of extremes that slaps the senses.

Cleveland is a wonderful place if you hit it on a sunny day. Baltimore is wonderful so long as you stay within two blocks of the river. Cincinnati is fantastic and sin-free (just go across the river into Covington, KY for that). San Francisco is as sweet as it gets, especially if you are standing on Martha Ryan’s rooftop garden and seeing a whole city spill down a mountain into the bay. Buffalo is a trip into what American city’s used to be. And Chicago (How could I leave my extended family at the Breakfast Club out?) has Wrigley Field … nuff said!

All of these places are like anywhere though. They’re just on a grander scale. There are good things and there are bad things. There is rich culture and barren landscapes. There are rich and there are poor. There is happiness and there is sadness that cannot be measured.

I sit in another airport again today on my way to New Orleans, another city that I love and have had wonderful times in. This trip ought to be a hoot because two different worlds will collide. Jim Withers, famous doctor who is changing the world, meets my friend Conner, who orchestrates body waxes. The place survived Katrina and bad political reconstruction … I’m not so sure about this.

When you boil it all down though, wherever you’re at, it all comes own to the same things. We’re trying to find ourselves. We’re trying to get out of relationships or get into them. We love what we do or hate what we do. We are sick or we are well. We’ve paid all of the bills or we haven’t.

And while you may have done some combination of the above, the person next to you has done some other some other collection. We only have ourselves to get one another though.

I see lots more kindness in small places than in large places. Maybe that’s why I love Tybee Island as much as I do. People rally for one another. Sure, there are angels and there are assholes like anywhere else, but there is a kindness that blankets a larger geographic area than in the cities.

I’ve seen lots of sadness in my life and have more tee-shirts than I can possible wear in a lifetime (most of them given to me in urban areas). So I’m drawn to the little things now; a Phone Call from a friend; a Face Book private message from another; text message exchange from someone who cares about me.

So urban is great. This smaller stuff is better.

Taking a Break

From the moment that I left Union Mission in June people began to tell me how successful the next big thing that I do is going to be. Julie was the first, though we were newly divorced but she has always been one of the best cheerleaders ever. I was in such a distraught state over a great number of things that I remember her saying the words but was pretty numb to them.

Then it was my former Board chair Herb. “With your experience and abilities to communicate in so many different ways, you are going to be wildly successful when you decide whatever it is that you are going to do.” I sat there at the table in Larry’s restaurant just staring at him, tired and worn out and not wanting to hear such things.

Even my extended family at the Breakfast Club has consistently brought it up, telling me how excited they are to watch it all unfold. Whenever this happens I look to Johnny O who always has clever responses like “Don’t listen to that crap!” or “F**K this! I’m leaving!” and he throws his money on the counter and storms out. I can always count on Johnny O.

While I’ve pretty much laid low in public since June, a number of people have gotten in touch with me asking if they can go with me, as if I knew where I was going. I say that I’ll get back to them whenever I figure out what it is that I’m doing.

For the most part, I’ve stayed on the beloved back deck writing and thinking. I’ve walked Goddess through the marshes of the Back River to listen to the choir of mussels. I’ve taken my bicycle that sometimes drinks too much to Bernie’s or to Fannies. I’ve made my daily pilgrimage to the Breakfast Club for the communion of coffee. Those have been my days.

And I resolved that I would wait on things to come to me and not go chasing after them in some frantic or panic state. It has been hard work because I have a Type-A personality disorder and am a relentless and driven person when I want something.

But it has worked out. Good things have been finding their way to me. Friends that love me and who I know without any hesitation that I can trust were the first. Followed by the emergence of ideas that are still being formulated but a plan is coming together. A calming of the soul is still taking place as I find myself overwhelmed with the beauty of my surroundings. Then a partner showed up who is strong where I am not and she gives me homework assignments and I call her names.

Then yesterday a friend who I love deeply wrote me “I know you are sabbaticaling … I think I made up that word …but I am so excited for you and watching what is next.”

And I paused.

Throughout this Sabbatical I’ve danced with old friends who had been long lost, had Celtic Christianity continued to say that light is born in the darkness, and began the long hard journey of just being Micheal again. It has been both a terrifying and thrilling walk.

I write this in an airport. I’m taking a break from the Sabbatical for a couple of weeks, heading to Atlanta, New Orleans, and L.A. Consulting work first is then followed by a collection of leaders in health care and then an exploding street medicine movement. I am intrigued of possibilities.

Then I’m going back on Sabbatical again.

Last night I began this break when another gift that I didn’t expect came to me on Shirley’s sad little holy dock. The Milky Way was putting on its nightly show and for the first time in a long, long time I felt peaceful. It is a wonderful way to begin a break from the break that I was taking.

Now as I climb on planes, I am excited a bit to see what is out there.

My Time to Imagine

On the 30th anniversary of John Lennon’s death I was in New York so we made our way to the part of Central Park across from the Dakota where Strawberry Fields is, the memorial to the former Beatle. It was covered with hundreds of flowers and a large “peace” sign had been formed out of votive candles.

Many hundreds of people were gathered paying homage to him. They were of all ages and many races were represented. Several had guitars and were signing his songs and smiling as lyrics were prayed into the sky.

I remember wondering that this is what it must have looked like after Jesus was crucified. His followers continued to collect telling his stories and singing his songs and remembering. Perhaps it is better stated as Re-membering him; putting it all back together again.

Then we turned to leave and literally ran into Yoko Ono who was coming to pay her own homage to her late husband. She was dressed all in black and was hugged tightly by body guards. Her head was down and I swear that she was crying. We snapped a picture and stepped aside.

Like many people, the Beatles changed the way I thought about most everything. They introduced me to the world in a way that was relevant, unlike Sunday School lessons about ancient Israel where everyone wore robes and threw rocks. John, Paul, George and Ringo gave me my first lessons in love, lust, longing, and losing what you love.

Yeah, yeah, yeah!

The only Beatle that I ever saw was George Harrison during his American concert tour. We all hopped in broken down car and made our way to Atlanta, somehow got tickets with little money, hobnobbed with the Hare Krishna’s and were blown away as the first cords of “What is Life?” opened the show. Throughout the concert, George kept mixing religions so that Krishna gave way to Jesus who bowed out to Buddha.

My Sweet Lord! What was happening? And if you listen to that song as he did it at the “Concert for Bangladesh or at his last concert in Japan, he did it again. It still makes me shiver as he calls all of the known names for God out one after the other to end the song.

“In My Life, there are places I remember…” John sang.

“Yesterday,” Paul chimed in.

“All things must pass,” George answered.

I’ve always been mindful of the passing of things; the milestones of life; leaving home for college; my children leaving home for college; leaving Louisville where I first started the journey to become an adult (I know…many will question that!); leaving my first marriage because I knew that it was time to go only to then be left because she knew it was time to go thereby teaching me both heaven and hell; leaving Union Mission after more than two decades which was long over due.

Watching the crowd at Strawberry Fields that day, they were doing their best to make it like it was. Clapping and hugging or stoically standing there, singing old songs to the tops of their lungs, trying to make it the way that it used to be.

But there’s no going back. If we do all that we find “is old speck house and plywood,” (James Taylor was the first act signed by Apple, so this is a fair inclusion). As much as we may try there is no reconstructing the past or no changing it for the better or the worse.

So what is done is done. It all helped us to get to who we are and where we are, but it is done, never to be much anything more than a memory or a story for the rest of our lives.

The only thing that matters is now and what we plan to do next. That is what I’m trying to do. Or if I can say it as John did, it is my time to …

Imagine.

Selah

I’ve had the joy of an ongoing conversation with a gentleman whom I’ve never met except through Face Book. He began reading my daily musings and has a relationship with my daughter Chelsea as the grandfather of her boyfriend Sam. Will is a graduate of Georgia Tech and is very proud of that and my utter devotion to the University of Georgia has not interrupted these discussions. Our institutions hate one another but then again most institutions, business’ or churches do.

We’ve talked about a lot of things and it is a dialogue that grows richer as we keep at it. The latest installation was yesterday when he summarized all of the things that we’ve discussed over the last few months and offered subjects yet to be explored. And his sign off gave me pause.

He wrote “Selah!”

I haven’t thought of that word in years. I learned it in Seminary where I took several years of Hebrew (which is much easier to master if you take a rum and coke to class in a large Styrofoam cup).

Like everything in the couple of hundred words that make up the ancient Hebrew language, it can mean more than one thing. As a word it means “stop and listen.”

“Let him who has ears hear,” as Jesus put it.

It is also a musical sign used in the Psalms between lyrics symbolizing that a break is needed. Pause! Consider whatever it is that you have just read or sung or done. Contemplate what is coming.

Will’s use of the word came out of nowhere and stopped me dead in my tracks. Selah?

Really?

That is my freakin life right now!

The work that I have done in the past is done. The love that I held in the past has moved on. I talk with my closest friends about what may be coming. My life has hit the pause button as I struggle to understand and put in place what has happened in my past while figuring out the future at the same time.

Selah indeed!

I suppose that I really am standing on holy ground right now spending most of my time on my beloved back deck, the Breakfast Club, Shirley’s sad little holy dock, and at the Bored meeting. These are the places and the people with which I experience Selah. I am stopping and listening; trying to make my ears hear unspoken things; listening for God to sing her songs.

Will has shared with me a life changing experience that he had in his life when he was my age that was just as radical as the things that I am going through now. Aside from telling me about his past, he is also letting me know that it’s all going to be alright. I’m doing the right things at this moment in my life. It is going to get better.

Will is a southern boy, born and bred who was once exiled to the foreign lands of Ohio and New Jersey. He now lives about a half an hour from me and I have no doubt that we’ll get around to making “the word become flesh” and moving from Face Book private messages to dinner and drinks together.

So that is enough. I have to get back to the serious work of pausing and listening.

Selah!

Sitting in the Nether Lands

I read once that the average person falls in love seven times in their life.

It makes sense I guess as seven is the perfect number. Perhaps as we make our way through relationships with the first six we evolve to the place where we love more perfectly.

Of course many people fall in love, get married, stay married though they may or may not stay in love. That is the expectation anyway. Once you get married then you’re supposed to stay married! Dammit! Even if love goes away or it is someone else who makes your heart leap.

Obviously I am not average. I’ve fallen in love countless times, far more than seven, though if I sit here and try to count I start forgetting the names of people that I’ve fallen in love with. Later someone else pops into my heart.

A friend of mine explained to me recently that she believes that there is this perfect lover out there waiting for her. She just hasn’t found him yet. Or vise versa. But she believes that it is someone who will only love her, never have a straying eye, and “be hopelessly devoted to”… her.

She is a romantic. And I am too. I believe those things.

The other day my friend Mitch and I talked as I stood on my beloved back deck and he stood on his. He then followed it up by writing me. “I hate that life has handed you this particular load of crap. I've discovered that life is not really concerned with being fair. We just have to handle it the best we can. In the midst of it, I love that friends can be there for one another - if not in person, then at least by phone.”

I have pondered long over his words.

Certainly life isn’t always fair and every one of us has been dealt loads of crap. And God knows we handle it the best way that we can because that is the only way that we know how to handle it. And thank God for friends otherwise none of us would get through anything.

“I’ve been loved and I’ve been hated, mental health is over rated,” sing the Barenaked Ladies, and I certainly have had my fill of both. And it drives you nuts!

Falling in love makes you crazy and falling out of it drives you insane. And either way we get through it the best way that we know how. Hopefully friends are involved.

I now sit in the Nether Lands (thank you Dan Fogelberg) “cause I want a lover and I want some friends.” And I’m trying to figure out “where do I go when I get to the end of my dreams?”

And I sit on my beloved back deck on this quiet peaceful morning, the sun is shinning on me through the Palm Tree and dancing on Fran’s thousand shades of green. A red sky has turned brilliantly blue. The sea sings in the distance and birds form halos over my head.

My heart is filled with the love of friends who are so wonderfully devoted that they make me thank God for them. And if God is love as the Bible says then our circle of friends is this dance of lovers and it is that dance that gets us through.

Though there is always this one.

Waiting.

And when love happens.

It explodes!

The Only Legitimate Question

Before it was the Starfish Café it was called the Bread & Butter Café. Leigh Calhoun Martin thought of it for a functional restaurant that is home to culinary arts training program for homeless people. It came about because America’s Second Harvest approached Union Mission about doing a work training program in the food industry. Savannah Technical College came in as the third partner.

The Employment & Training Center used to be on Congress Street across from Paula Dean’s “Lady & Sons” restaurant. We had acquired that building with funds from the Georgia Department of Community Affairs but it wasn’t a restaurant. So I went to Atlanta to ask if we could sell the building that they had given us money to buy. After a few hours John Bassett agreed so long as we use the new place for homeless people.

So we sold Congress Street and used the money to buy and renovate the Bread & Butter Café which opened with great fanfare. The program has been nationally recognized many times over and immediately generated great publicity and public support.

Then the first crisis occurred. America’s Second Harvest had a change in leadership and the new Director announced they were pulling out of the program and closing the restaurant.

The next day we announced that we had no intentions whatsoever of closing the café. It was a program that works!

Then we were told that America’s Second Harvest had trademarked the name that Leigh had thought up. Leigh worked for Union Mission. They also told us if we didn’t stop using the name that they would sue us.

I was sharing this news with Bill Berry (not the former drummer for R.E.M. but the other one) and his son Micah who were visiting.

“We got to think of a new name,” I explained.

“I can’t believe it’s not Bread & Butter,” Micah deadpanned.

We all busted out laughing.

So the next day Kurt Schmidt of Union Mission climbed on the roof with a can of spray paint and we changed the name. It got a lot of press but it really made the folks at America’s Second Harvest mad.

The Savannah College of Art & Design then got involved and a month long contest was held to think of a new name. The winner got a free lunch weekly for a month. There were over 300 entries and the winner was “The Starfish Café.”

Local artist Sandy Brannen did murals illustrating the story of the little girl who is trying to save a beach full of washed up starfish by throwing them back into the sea. A man tells her that she can’t make a difference because of the number of ones dying in the sand.

“It made a difference to that one,” she tells him. The murals hang in the Café.

So I tell you that to tell you this. Yesterday my dear friend Dedra called me wanting to talk. Might I really be moving to St. Martin?

Maybe. Maybe not. I’ve never been one to be pinned in by other people’s expectations as the above story obviously illustrates.

“We’ll see,” I told her.

A lot of people are telling me what I should be doing these days and I listen and I consider what they are saying or suggesting or demanding. I’m considering right now.

And when we consider we should consider any and every possibility. Why limit ourselves because of what other people think, or rules, or expectations. I think the only legitimate question to ask ourselves is “Why not?”

And whatever it is that we decide to do, for Christ’s sake have fun doing it.

Roma Just Roma

And then there is Roma. She defies description in many ways but this is worth a try.

First of all she is old. I’m not how old she really is but she knows intimate details about the life of George Washington. Very intimate details! She’s up there but she refuses to grow up.

I remember her before she was the Queen. Back then she was the “Yard Goddess” mowing lawns and wacking weeds wearing shorts and bandanas. She would finish up the work in the morning and then meet Johnny O and Judy for lunch and then it was on the way to the daily pool game at 2:00. It was this way for years.

Then the people in charge of the Beach Bum parade lost their collective minds …um, that’s an oxymoron I think because it implies that they have minds … anyway, they elected Roma Beach Bum Queen several years ago. Roma took this as an opportunity to anoint herself Queen of the island. Now everybody calls her Queen Roma.

The daily pool game has gone by the wayside but Roma conducts a weekly tournament at the Quarter on Tuesday nights. She charges you $6 to play though she just sticks the money in her pockets. She has berated me into becoming a regular though in true Tybee fashion I am rarely on time. She lets me play anyway. After I pay.

She claims to be in charge of the daily Bored meeting at Fannies-On-the-Beach though we really don’t pay much attention to her. Well, the people who work at Fannies pay attention to her or she throws a fit disrupting food and drinks being delivered to customers. I’ve watched her run people off and often wondered why Jenny Orr who owns Fannies allows the Bored meeting to be there at all.

Jenny’s response to the daily disruptions? Buy Roma a super large chair for her to sit in on the sidewalk that has Queen Roma written in magic marker on it. Decorate the sidewalk with plants around Roma’s throne and set up one table just for the royal one. The table has a rose on it.

It just makes me want to flotch!

Oh, that’s another thing about Queen Roma. She doesn’t allow cussing at the Bored meeting or the pool tournament. Because she knows that the people of Tybee cannot complete more than three sentences without using cuss words, she made some up.

“Floch!” Roma will scream when she sees something that doesn’t like or stubs her toe.

“Did you see that flotching idiot?” she’ll ask.

We all just go along with it.

Now Roma is into merchandising and sells hats, visors and tee shirts that have “Tybidiot” written on them. Roma made that word up too. O Johnny (not to be confused with Johnny O) lost his mind and had them made for her. Wait, that’s another oxymoron!

I once witness Roma moon the Tybee Island City Council. The entire room gagged and gave her what she wanted. She once came to my house and vandalized my car by decorating it for Christmas including a life sized lit reindeer on top. That fine outstanding publication “The Tybee Breeze” repeatedly honors her as the islands best character.

It’s all gotten out of hand. All of these people are coming to Bored meetings that none of the rest of us knows. She has stared her own Face Book page, “Roma Just Roma” that she tenderly updates everyday. Once, she got mad that we were not paying enough attention to her so she staged her own death. Everyone fell for it except me and she has yet to forgive me for it.

So Johnny O has started a breakaway Bored meeting on the pier that doesn’t involve Queen Roma. We’ll see what happens.

Though I understand that Roma started a romantic affair with Dean who runs the pier (and could pass for George Washington if he takes his teeth out) and now he closes it claiming that it’s too cold to operate. So we all show up at Roma’s flotching Bored meeting.

That’s Roma. Just flotching Roma!

Soul Search

I was already at the hospital so I thought I may as well drop in unannounced on my friend Mary Ann Beil, pilgrim in Celtic Christianity, lover of books, and manager of Ethics. Her office looks and feels like a tiny Chapel in the corner of a great Cathedral. The light is muted and the walls are adorned with prayers, relics and photographs of Saints.

“Hey,” I said appearing in her doorway, wearing a tee shirt, faded jeans and flip flops.

She was just about to take a sip of coffee from a very ornate tea cup when I did this and she jumped in her seat, sloshing coffee on the round talking table that she has in place of a desk.

“HEY!” she bellowed, “this is perfect timing,” and she hugged me tight.

It is hard not to love Mary Ann and I have now for many years.

“Sit and talk,” she commanded. “This is just perfect! Last night while I was reading John O’Donohue and felt that something would be revealed to me today! Here you are! Tell me everything!

So I did. I spoke of green marshes, sad little holy docks, choirs of mussels that sing at low tides, and Fran’s thousand shades of green. Emotion crept into my voice and it shook. Moisture filled my eyes. I talked about lost serendipity, new found friends, and people who love me who magically appear out of nowhere to bring comfort and happiness. I told her stories of lost love, aching in the night, and a lone shrimp boat that refuses to give up. I talked about healing and how long it can take. I reviewed future travel and new partners that are coming to me rather than me seeking them out.

Mary Ann does not listen quietly. She punctuates everything that I say with a “Yep!”, “Ah-hah!” and “Um-hum” all delivered very enthusiastically. Sometimes she slaps the top of the talking table and flashes me the devilish of grins. When I finish talking it is her turn

“You are exactly in the right place! You do know that don’t you? Your whole life and everything that has happened in it was to prepare you for this soul search that you are in the middle of!”

I sit there and wonder how she consistently does this whenever we talk. Once she called me standing in the sunshine of St. Martin and when I told her that I was in a dark place, she screamed into the phone “Good! Roots take hold in dark places. Dead Saviors come back to life in dark tombs! Light explodes out of darkness!”

“You know Micheal,” she continues, “for all of those years your whole life was consumed with the poor, the widow, the orphan and the sojourner…the things that God holds most dear. None of us know how you did it that long. This is your time for you, those of us who love you, and God. You’ve spent decades doing the most holiest of things and now …” she pauses for effect, “after all of that love you’ve given away it is time for you to be loved.”

How does one respond to something like that?

She told me that she had a gift for me. Mary Ann is forever giving me gifts. A large iron cross is in the apartment downstairs. An ornate beaded one is in the Bible my Grandfather gave me. An eagle’s feather rests beside the computer that I write on.

She leaves and returns with a piece of paper. “This is my prayer,” she explains. “My prayer,” she repeats, “I wrote it just for me and God.”

“Give me strength to live another day; Let me not turn coward before its difficulties…let me not lose faith in other people; Keep me sweet and sound of heart in spite of ingratitude, meanness and assholes…open wide the eyes of my soul that I may see good in all things.”

She hugged me tight again. “You are on your soul search Mike. Get it back.”

Then call me.

Take Another Road

The first story in Jimmy Buffett’s first book “Tales from Margaritaville” is “Take Another Road” the story of cowboy Tully Mars. After major changes are forced upon his life against his will, Tully and his horse Mr. Twain, slowly make their way across the country to the Florida Keys and eventually beyond. He rides his pony through the sand and ends up in another place from a different time. And he finds contentment.

I’ve always loved both the story and the song.

A cold front blew across Tybee Island and a brisk wind blows from the north. Everyone is talking about how wonderful the weather is and how terrific it is in the fall.

I am not one of them. Give me warmer weather and a light ocean breeze. There is nothing worse than cold feet!

So I’m thinking about what road I want to take. Some place where the weather suits my clothes which should be minimal. So St. Martin is in my future again.

Conner called me yesterday and is already making plans for the things that we’re going to do. Hania, his wife, chimed in and those tinges of excitement are beginning to bubble. Before though, I have to go to Atlanta, New Orleans and Los Angeles. Oh, and the Georgia/Florida game is in there somewhere.

My geography has been very small over the course of the summer and through September, with a circle that went from my house to the Breakfast Club, the Bored meeting at Fannies, Shirley’s sad little holy dock, and the swing on the beach at the end of 12th Street. And I’ve enjoyed it like I never have in all of the years that I’ve called this clump of sand home!

After a career of making multiple decisions every day, I haven’t been making many lately. I needed a break and like Tully Mars have begun a new journey from my past to the things that lay in my future.

During this break, several things have become clear to me. First was that I really was one worn out, beaten up individual. Thirty years of saving the world on a grand scale took its toll in ways that I had no idea. It’s taken me a while to begin healing.

Then I’ve been learning how to live by myself for the first time ever in my life! In the beginning it was an incredible sense of loss which has now been replaced by quiet and slow motion.

I was a very public persona in Savannah, forever being quoted or interviewed and forever having people say that they loved me or hated me. Now I sit with Johnny O at the counter at the Breakfast Club and celebrating new days with my extended family there. Or I take my seat at the Bored meeting where yesterday we took chalk and marked off the “Nude Section” of the sidewalk. Important stuff!

And after years of relentlessly chasing things and people, now I sit on my beloved back deck and wait on things to come me. It has been a difficult transition but somehow I seem to be pulling it off. A customer sought me out and there is work to be done. Friends that I knew I had and friends that I had no idea who they were showed up. People that I thought I would have seen have disappeared but now I know who my friends are.

So I remain on this Sabbatical for a bit longer although it is getting ready to take another road. Last night in bed I lay staring at the silhouette of Palm trees in the darkness thinking these things. Reaching my hand to the other side of the bed I dreamed of touching new love.

I am ok. The roads that I’ve taken so far have been good ones. The one to college led me to friends that have reemerged. The one to Louisville led me to a career that has been an incredible ride. The one back to Savannah led me to success beyond my wildest dreams. The one to Tybee Island led me home.

Now it is time for another road I think, “any old place, in time or in space, you pick the century, I’ll pick the spot.”

Sad Sundays

I was listening to a Cat Stevens concert the other day and he was introducing his song “Sad Lisa” by saying that he used Lisa as a disguise. The song is really about him and he just wasn’t honest enough to say so.

I thought that to be poignant and have been thinking about it.

What’s wrong with admitting how we honestly feel? Most of us project how we want to be perceived rather than simply be ourselves. How we really are at the moment. It appears to be alright if we’re tired and meet a friend or go out. We may have bags under our eyes and repeatedly yawn and that is alright.

Admitting sadness…well that seems to be something else entirely.

It means that we’re not happy with the way things are. Or who we are with. Or who we are not with. Or what we do. Or what we don’t do.

In the not too distant past I dreaded Monday’s and they began to kidnap my Sunday’s. I would be sitting here and my mind would be focused on all of the things that needed to be done the next day. This was at the expense of my wife.

Now former wife.

She told me recently that I’ve romanticized my recollections of our Sundays together; that I’ve made them into memories that are not true. I would be gearing up to save the world Mondays through Fridays only to collapse on Friday nights. Saturdays were our enjoyable days. Monday kidnapped Sunday.

I wrote a lot about how I hated Mondays. They were sad writings as I look back on them now. I was unhappy with who I’d become and no longer satisfied with what I was doing. Unhappy with the things that I wasn’t doing which was to take her away and do things that we’d never done.

And the bitch is that I knew all of this. I said it to her. I said it to other people. And I had other people say, “Oh you can’t possibly be serious! Look at everything that you’ve got! Look at how popular and important you are! What would we possibly do without you?”

Now I’ve learned that sadness is born when you don’t do the things that you know you need to do. You need to do them for you most of all. Sometimes you need to do them for others but that is rare I think.

I look forward to Mondays now while I dread Sundays. Sunday’s may be romanticized in my head but that is how I want my life to be. Long walks with the one I love, talking and holding hands, and being quiet and thanking God for the touch of her hair, skin and breath. Having wine in bed or watching movies or listening to music. Just celebrating the joyfulness of being where I actually am.

I don’t have that on Sundays. I used to but I gave it away for things that were important but they weren’t the most important things.

My friend Michael Ruffin posts prayers on Face Book every day and most every day I read them. We went to seminary to together and he obviously wants to shatter the record of friends on Face Book because he and I have reconnected after thirty years. Today he prayed:

Sunday is a day that plays a double role.
It is the first day of a new week
It feels like the last day of the old week
As such, Sunday provides us with the opportunity to reflect upon and evaluate the old week and to look forward and pray for the new week.

And that is what Sundays have become for me. The past is sad and I admit that. But I pray for the future. And I believe in it with everything that is within me. And it is a romanticized place. Full of love and friends and happiness and fulfillment.

The Far End of the Black

My friend Jodi introduced me to a song several months ago by a friend of hers, J. R. Richards. The title is the “Far End of the Black”. It has come to be a meaningful gift that she gave me.

It is the story of a man who wishes that he could take care of the one that he loves, but life keeps getting in the way. At the same time he longs for her “to wash the harm from his back.” But the world is doing them both harm.

“In those days when nothing seems right,” he begins and then chronicles a liturgy of everything that is wrong. Yet in spite of it he hopes beyond hope for her. And for him. It is a sad soulful prayer of longing and determination and commitment that in spite of the world being against you, you can survive.

Throughout my life I’ve known people who just expect things to go wrong. I remember visiting a family in a hospital once after the father had fallen off of the roof and broken his back. His daughter was holding his hands, hovering over his face when I entered the emergency room. She was whispering to him, “Dad, we know all of our luck is bad. We’ve survived it before. We will now. We know how to live with bad. That’s all we’ve ever had.”

I remember once my folks took us all to the Florida Keys for a get-a-way. Everyone was excited. Dad rented a boat to take us out on and the motor died. We were stuck in paradise just floating. Dad got frustrated that his perfect get-away with his family was going horribly wrong. “This is just my luck,” he said.

Poor and homeless people have sat across from me for the past three decades and told me everything that has gone wrong in their lives. Unplanned pregnancies, lost lovers, families that fell apart, glorious addictions, mental illness, AIDS, former military who just couldn’t cope without the structure, companies that shut down or laid off…I’ve seen and touched them all.

In my own life, after decades of nothing going wrong, everything seemed to go array at once. Wave after wave of unwanted and unanticipated events hit me time and time again. For the first time, I was losing things and not gathering them up. Now I live alone and wonder what it is that I’m going to do next.

Yesterday morning was the epitome of it all. I had a swollen tightly wrapped leg from a surgery the day before. My car wouldn’t start and I had some places that I needed to be. I learned that things that I’d spent years building may soon be dismantled. I was lonely and sad. Chelsea called needed extra money for school as I sat paying the bills.

My son Jeremy called in the midst of all of this and over the course of two conversations we talked through mutual frustration. I called my daughter Kristen needing her help but called her back later saying that I’d just deal with everything tomorrow. I was sad and tired.

Then my friend Joan called out of the blue and talked to me about how much courage it takes to invest time in yourself, even at the expense of what you’ve got.

At the Bored meeting, I laughed because of tourists from Alabama and Mississippi who thought that everything that we said was funny. If you ever attend a Bored meeting, we are anything but finny.

Mom stopped by to check on her son.

Rebekah who worked with me for many years showed up with wine coolers and ideas about all of the good things that “we” going to do when we work together again.

I texted people that I love to tell them that I love them.

Then late in the evening, with my wrapped and swollen leg on my beloved back deck, I listened to this song.

On the far end of the black,
There is light.
There is light.

And it is you.

Meeting Life's Goals

I am still transitioning and trying to figure it out as I go. It’s hard work.

The first time was during my forth year of college when some Dean summoned me to his office and told me that I had to declare a major. I demanded to know why. He said that I’d already broken the rules by not having declared one already.

“Well, what do I have the most hours in?”

“History,” he replied, “but only by three hours.”

“Really? What’s second?”

“You have a tie for second,” he answered, “Religion and Literature.”

So the next year college threw me out with a major in history with a double minor. This was my first big professional transition.

Then I was a successful eight year career as a professional Christian in charge of the Jefferson Street Baptist Chapel in Louisville, Kentucky. Not that we did much that was particularly Baptist. We did generate a lot of press, tremendous growth, amassed money for the place, and had a lot of fun which included creative usage of the baptismal pool. Then the Baptist threw me out and I was transitioning again.

After that it was 23 years at Union Mission where we broke all kinds of new ground. A little tiny homeless shelter was transformed into a multi-campus, multi-million, diverse management company with subsidiaries in housing development, health care, mental health care, and employment services. These things were all accomplished by not doing what we were supposed to do.

In fact I think that most things are accomplished by NOT doing what you are supposed to do. This is how things get created. Creation never happens by doing what you’re supposed to do. That is following. Creating is leading.

Anyway, we created a lot of things that no one else had created, got in the press a lot, won a bunch of awards, helped a lot of people, and tried to have a lot of fun along the way.

It was time for me to move on though so now I am contemplating the next transition. For the moment I am finally living the life that I’ve wanted since I was a child; being a full time beach bum! Well, I’m trying to be a full time beach bum but things keep getting in the way.

It seems that I have obligations with the Street Medicine Institute, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and Lucy Hall in Atlanta. All of these people keep emailing and calling asking if I’ll help them raise money, find a job, guide them on how to develop health care, housing, employment and other programs. My Type-A personality disorder means that I spend as much time answering them as I do on the beach or at Bored meetings.

I put on my favorite Jim Morris song (thank you Judi Ross!).

He’s got a life with no distractions
He’s living in his own world
Looking for buried treasure
Hitting on the tourist girls

Now we talking! The people in charge say that the first thing that we’re supposed to do is establish our goals then develop strategies to meet them.

Done!