If you know anything about me, you know I have a book percolating inside of me, Chasing the Shade. For fame? Fortune? Recognition? None of the above. I have to package my life story, and lifelong relationship with the only one that matters, for a single audience! I feel it's the greatest legacy that I can leave. It's such an unbelievable story that I was once diagnosed as being bi-polar because nobody can really go that high or that low. I did, it's all factual, witnessed and, thanks to technology, a lot of it is documented and corroborated. But on this day, I will shine a light small aspects.......
As a young boy about 10ish or so, the local Southern-Baptist Sunday school bus would rumble up on Kentucky St. in the gang infested neighborhood of East Bakersfield. It was a welcome respite for a single mother of a brother and sister that fought ALL of the time, lit bathrooms on fire (sister), and threw rocks at windows (little toe head that birds loved as nest-building material, I was throwing rocks at THEM!!!.) It was all before my own age-of-understanding but I loved Sunday school where everyone was so kind and the reality of my existence in such a bad area was left at the folding doors of the bus.
To skip over the many details, I was baptized in the Kern River and then again at the alter. It was a personal thing, even at that age, and nothing that my family had anything to do with or participate in. It unknowingly set the foundation for the rest of my life. As a boy, I remember walking past churches and being on my best behavior. From an early age, I made a commitment to never use the Lords name in vein and to hear it used as an accepted part of the English language, in seemingly every form of entertainment, falls hard on my ears and makes me cringe. This was the honeymoon phase when I was a baby christian and just a baby in life.
My life would have taken a whole different direction had I stayed in Bakersfield where I was encouraged to learn welding to work in the oil fields. Thank God I had a natural curiosity of these new things called computers and I would spend every free moment either riding the city bus to a basic computer programming course, or the local Radio Shack to play with the new Tandy! This will all come full circle later.
Skip ahead to the early teen years, working graveyard, sleeping on the beach (you know where!) in the mornings, living hand to mouth for every meal and stitch of clothing, feel sorry for me yet? Don't! I had the life and never really wanted for anything! I was surrounded by others just like me, but I was different. I didn't steal, connive, practice deceit or victimize others to survive. Angel? Hardly! I did many, many things that any kid left to his own devices without constraints would probably have done. Any harm I did was to myself and any offense I caused was to my heavenly father who I wasn't particularly close to at the time. Then came Angie! Of all of the girls around the beach, why her? She wasn't even a beach girl! I met her through her sister, who's couch I was crashing on at the time. Why her? She had that same thing in her that made me different and, even though I didn't recognize what it was at first, her beauty radiated as I saw her for the first time through my sleepy eyes, bent over cleaning the toilet in her sisters house that she came to visit.
Speed ahead, she introduced me to Calvery Chapel and Chuck Smith. The christian punk music brought me back, Chuck made me stay. It was familiar and comforting and helped me to kind of make sense of a somewhat odd existence. Let's call this this first weeeeee of the roller coaster.
From a life perspective, I was caught up in the beach life, working at the local bars, drinking excessively before I was legally allowed at every bar on the peninsula, and everything else that goes with it. I found myself doing odd construction jobs too, generally as a helper chamo. I was tearing off roofs for a local contractor that just happened to land a large project where there were not enough bodies to throw at it. They taught me the basics of how to install a shingle roof and then left me on my own on a building the size of two football fields joined together at opposite angles. When I was done with one building, there was another with my name on it. I worked piece-mill, meaning I got paid for how much I did. The method of keeping track was to tear off a piece of the wrapper of each bundle of shingles and put it in my pocket, 3 bundles to a 100 sqaure ft, 10 bucks per 3 pieces of paper. For the first time, I was in control! My only limitations were the amount of daylight that I could work. I was rich, as far as I knew! The catalyst that changed my life's direction.
That little something that made me different manifested itself in my work ethic and my early OCD made my work impeccable. These traits resulted in me starting and growing my own roofing company into one of the largest in the state. Technology came into play as I was able to automate parts of the business that nobody else had, up to that point. Thank you early childhood training! Successful by all accounts by the tender age of 25! But, it was my work ethic and OCD that made it so. I was still a continuation school drop out so when a bump in the road (housing crash) happened I had no defense and my success proved to be fleeting. A blessing in disguise for so many reasons.
Losing my first business was a depressing experience and I really had no clue what I would do next. My mind was awash with everything dark and bleek. I was attending church at the time, kind of bouncing around to friends churches. It had nothing to to with the message or the teachings but everything about who had the best music. But, the message comes by natural osmosis and it was all brought into play as I sought help from a therapist that everybody in my family had gone to! The one man that I credit everything to, Frosty Hickum, gave me an early clinical diagnosis of "Guarded," but his highfalutin title of Director of Mental Health for OC, went out the window, and so did paying him, as he wrapped his loving arms around me. He was a deacon in his church so the marathon 6 hour sessions that he spent with me always had a biblical justification for where he was taking me. I had the foundation but had run out of my own strength. My childhood really caught up with me and I realized that I was psychologically stunted by how I grew up. He gave me a way, a path and a series of baby steps and confidence builders to just keep taking the next step. I'll never forget his words, "you are the smartest uneducated person I have ever met! If you can match that native intelligence with book smarts you will be dangerous!" Surely you are smart enough to take the GED!" That led to a whole series of "you proved that you can do X, surely your smart enough to do Y." This continued all of the way through USC!
Time to hit the 10X fast forward button! Because of my early teachings, Frosty, the families that adopted me, the Monkey, the hundreds of friends around the world, no challenge is too big because "if I did that, surely I can do this......" When all paths lead to failure because the challenge is far to big, I am the guy to take it on and take it on with INTEGRITY! My business dealings have placed me squarely in the cross hairs of the SEC, FBI, and the Federal Postal Inspector where they were desperately looking for guilt by association. Assets were frozen, no representation, no money but it was my integrity that brought me out of it unscathed. When you don't lie and have nothing to hide, it's not hard to keep track of the facts. This all happened during my second financial collapse, the .com bust, the next lull of the roller coaster, and I found myself with a huge ascent before the next weeeeeeee that was in no way visible to me as the top was shrouded in dark clouds.
Needless to say, it was the most profound "if I could do that then I can do this" moments. Over the next decade I accomplished more than I had ever dreamed of sitting on the docks of the harbor of Newport as a boy. I've done things, seen things, been exposed to things, participated in things, owned things, played with things, that people can only dream about. Not once, not twice, but as the normal part of my existence. Who was responsible for all of this? MEEEEEE! I did it! All me and my vast intelligence! I'm unstoppable! Nothing can break me down! It will just continue to get better and I will be more powerful and make more and more money!
Third and most devastating financial collapse: The great Recession!
I never imagined that I would be the economic victim of my own success and become the poster child for the unemployed because I was too expensive and too experienced. It was absolute Hell! Lost my money, my house, my cars, private schools, retirement, college fund, health, mind, body, identity, peanut, friends......................................... Needless to say, I was depressed. All of that coupled with the other side of the parental structure in disarray, I could do nothing but go to THE park every single day and just sit and drown out my head with earphones in my ears and very loud music! My mindset was still "I I I I have to pull myself out of this! How can I I I I possibly pull this off when I have fallen so far????" There was no "if I did that then I could do this" frame of reference to draw from. One day merged with another of me watching the homeless emerge from the bushes every morning and jockeying for position under the trees. As the sun moved, they moved. They were chasing the shade, all day, every day.
10X button again, and the purpose of this post, where I will try and bring it all full circle..........The series of events that happened were God driven, plain and simple, no other explanation and for more reasons than I have room to write. The highlights in basic order: Brother brought me a copy of Purpose Driven Life to the park. "Just read a chapter a day, that's what you are supposed to do." Read it all that day, highlighted, notated and circled all of the things that I disagreed with and was prepared for a spirited discussion. After all, this was not my first rodeo. I presented my arguments and he just smiled at me with grace and lovingly invited me to Saddleback with he and his family. I had been surrounded by other masters-of-the-universe atheist types and I have to admit, my heart was hardened and dark, especially given my own depressing facts of the matter. I broke down into an emotional wreck before the sermon even started! It was the music again! Instantly I understood the error of my ways and how far I strayed off the path that had been laid before me on the bus, in the river, at Calvery Chapel, the teachings of Chuck, Frosty...............How I took the faithfulness and blessings of my God and took full credit for everything in my life from Dock to Park, but not the park!
I read Purpose Driven Life, again, and again, and again...... I was looking for the nuggets than I could hang on to, the truths that could not be disputed that I knew were true from my own teachings and own experiences. I found two that I still hang on to....... The first line in the book, "It's NOT all about YOU!" and "God is all you need when you realize God is all you Got!" Again, so thankful that I have a LIFE and RELATIONSHIP to look back on with clear points of where I strayed off of the path and what the results were. I had finally reached the end of myself!
Now my daily routine changed! I would still go to the park but now Chasing The Shade had a whole new metaphorical meaning. Now I had a lot of catching up and reconnecting to do. Circumstances hadn't changed but I had. I was the prodigal son, for real, with no signet ring or fattest calf but I would spend my time at internet cafe's soaking up everything I had pushed away. None of it was new but it was different because it wasn't faith but factual, based on a life lived full of blessings that I I I distorted.
5X fast forward.............I still spent days in the park but I didn't sit. I cleaned trash, I talked to people, I let the kids play with Peanut, I talked to and helped the shade chasers. During one of my introspection's, and with the God filter back in place, the story of Elijah just popped into my head; a big powerful biblical figure that was so scared he hid in a cave. God came and whispered in his ear "how long are you going to stay here?" My answer was "show me how to get out of this!" He did, we did, here we are. Fully restored into the best version of myself, ever, and we are not talking financially but he took care of that too!
I soon began to actually enjoy my time in the park and I still go back to this day. The faces have changed but the vibe and rhythm is still the same.
Taking everything into account and on this Easter Day, here are my foundational truths:
1. More of him, less of me
2. I am the truth, the light and the way. NOBODY comes to the father except through me.
3. Be a good steward with the gifts that God has given you
4. Do good deeds in secret and store your treasures in heaven. If you get your pat on the back here then you are paid in full.
5. Be a shining light by your example and by your words so that God may be glorified (the purpose of this post)
=
Top 5 on my list and each has it's own reasoning. The only thing I will justify so there is no confusion, Betty is a blessing from God, Xiffy is a blessing from God, the Kids are a blessing from God, the Monkey is the biggest blessing from God. I had different plans for each and he said "here is something better!" I do what I do because of foundation principal #3!
So, with a life full of demonstrable, factual blessings that turned a boy like me into a man like me, factual coarse corrections, and one GIANT smack-down that my daughter calls "the Dog Whisperer" type correction, I wish you a happy Easter! I love my truths to be based on facts! Jesus, came, he died, and he rose...for us...all factual. Look it up.
Last parting question, what shade are your chasing?????
