Daily thoughts

First, Happy Birthday to my mom, eighty one years young today.

So I wrote on my boards yesterday, “If you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right.” I was at prayer yesterday afternoon. I think I wrote below that I took from a call recently that “I am the answer to.” It occured to me again at Minchah yesterday, which is immediately followed by my seventh grade class.

I want to say that it was one of my better classes with them, but that's really pathetic when most of what I mean is that the ones who usually bother me the most actually decided instead to just be quiet, on their phones or sleeping, enough so I could talk to those at least marginally interested in the first row.

And I did a clearing call last night for an introduction I am leading tomorrow, and I decided the guests are bigger than anything I, or they, could imagine.

When I bring that to my classroom, I'm taking on that they are still just processing being with me. That can take some time, and they are going through their phases, but they'll come around.

I asked my father a week or so before he died, “Why did you make it so hard to love you?”

He replied, “Defense mechanism, I guess.” I don't know why I didn't ask him that earlier, and I don't know if he would have answered. I wish it had occurred to me to, but I don't know that anything would have changed.

We had a coaching for the coaches inside a program I am coaching on Sunday. There was this moment I just got I miss him. I just don't think anyone loved him like I did in the end.

He was a pain in the ass to my mom. To my sisters, I think he was a force that either could not be satisfied, or to be completed with in this turn of the wheel.

Ten things I could do to make it easier to love my classes:

• Give them all 100 from the outset.
• Spend more time finding out what they like.
• Play inside music.
• Play inside poetry.
• Ask them what turns them on.
• Find a way to short out all their phones.
• Bring clay, Playdoh, or plastelina.
• Bring food.
• Watch the right movies with them.
• Let them choose the subject.
• Slip the right questions into my work for them.
• Find time to be with each on his own terms.

It's such a bitch, for me anyway, to start writing again when I've not written for a while. I still can't turn on the computer without getting distracted. I've grades to worry about as I'm teaching again. I don't know if this is a win or a failure, or some combination.

On the one hand, I've trusted myself to make a difference in people's lives. On the other, I'm working with an age group and population that stymies even veteran teachers.

Some classes, I haven't yet figured out how to talk for a minute straight without interruption. I haven't figured out how to give instruction so the whole class actually hears. I haven't found the key to actually stir participation.

It's downright depressing, but I think I'm less depressed than when I wasn't teaching, which isn't saying much.

I've thought much about my campaign. I don't know if it's just an excuse to travel cross country and see my land. I had a student ask me why I am on a mission. I told him I believe in people. The thing is I know that, but I don't necessarily like it. I guess it has me expecting the world from them when many of them have trouble just showing up to class. It's a huge gap, and I haven't figured out how to bridge it.

Though writing this is giving me a clue. Every “haven't (yet)” above started out as a don't. The “don't” is an invitation to throw my hands up and walk away. I live a lot in don'ts. I suppose that would be okay if I was powerful with no, or if I didn't have a bigger vision. And I don't know if I am fooling myself.

Maybe I am just delusional, or maybe I pick schemes that are too big to succeed, at least with my current mo, and so I'm not content, but not enough to actually do anything about it.

And maybe I shouldn't have this part of the conversation at all. Maybe it should just be ten ideas, and ten ideas, and ten ideas, until the powerful action steps show up.

So how about 10 ideas:

• a skoolie
• a conversion van
• a panel truck
• a mobile home
• a pickup with a camper
• a pickup with a top for the bed
• a car with an easy to sleep in seat
• relying on the hospitality of others
• start the damned law suit
• win at marketing
• move to what is familiar
• give it all up and take up some other pursuit

That'll do for today. I've got grades to figure out.

The source of the “crisis“ in Gaza is finally becoming clearer to the West. This source - the jihadi mission to establish a world caliphate - is currently on view in Hamas' struggle to exterminate the Jew, this on the way to subjugating the rest of the world in the name of Islam.

But this is only a symptom of a larger crisis. Put simply, this crisis is the Western abandonment (if it ever really possessed them) of humanitarian values in favor of empty forms and farcical bodies, bodies which assume the mantle of humanitarian concern only when it fits a particular agenda.

Just a few days ago, the United States Senate passed Senate Resolution 526. In it, the Senate:

Laments all loss of innocent civilian life.

Condemns the United Nations (U.N.) Human Rights Council's July 23, 2014 resolution calling for: (1) an investigation of Israel while not mentioning Hamas's continued assault against Israel, and (2) an investigation into potential human rights violations by Israel in the current Gaza conflict without mentioning Hamas's assault against innocent civilians and its use of civilian shields.

Supports Israel's right to defend itself against Hamas's rocket assault and destroy Hamas's tunnel system into Israel's territory.

Condemns Hamas's terrorist actions and use of civilians as human shields.

Supports U.S. mediation efforts for a durable cease fire agreement that ends Hamas's rocket assault and leads to Gaza's demilitarization.


Supports additional funding to replenish Israel's Iron Dome missiles and enhance Israel's defensive capabilities.

I wonder at the depth of this lamentation as the world has stood aside and watched the fires spread which brought 200 million to early graves in the last century. But more than this, I decry the perceived necessity to declare what should be patently obvious: “We, of the West, think a peace-loving country should be allowed to defend itself.“ To me, this is akin to “We affirm the right of a goalie to wear a cup.”

And where is the humanity in a durable cease-fire if the cease-fire is characterized by Hamas' continued persecution of the population in Gaza. Demilitarization itself will not stop any reign of terror.

What must be understood is that Israel stands at the front of a clash of ideas about civilization. This is difficult for the West to understand because most of us have been raised in a tradition that long ago rejected states based on religion. We have come to accept a live and let live attitude. We also tend to think that others think as we do. In this case, this mixture is the basis of much death and suffering.

We can not see the obvious, that a certain vicious stream of Islam is at war with our Western values. This is a stream that sees world submission to its view of Allah as the only way forward, and is willing to kill and even terrorize and manipulate its own people in order to move this agenda forward.

What we must realize is that we cannot fight this ideological war with conventional weapons alone. Complete military domination is only the backdrop against which a campaign of deprogramming and indoctrination can take place. And we loath such words as we like to think of ourselves as liberals the rightness of whose ideas is self-evident.

But if we want a humanitarian solution, we must replace the dominant Palestinian ideology with one which fosters “an ethic of kindness, benevolence, and sympathy extended universally and impartially to all human beings.“ The program of hate must be eliminated and the Western value of respect and value for human life must be brought to the fore.

This is a tall order, perhaps impossible, but worth the effort. If it succeeds, it could bring with it an Arab spring that proceeds to summer. To accomplish this, Gaza must be occupied completely and for the immediate term, in both a military and civil sense. It must be placed in the hands of a strong, ethical governor. He and his staff must scrub Gaza of every hint of militarism and hate. Streets named after “martyrs“ must be renamed, textbooks fostering lies and hate must be destroyed, sermons demonizing the other disallowed, loudspeakers on mosques dismantled, and choice and freedom (except perhaps to spout and pursue evil) guaranteed.

Unfortunately, the United Nations is unequal to this task. It must be undertaken by the strong and the righteous. It is best done by a Jew, the display of whose strong hand just might influence Hamas. It is a difficult task, but possible. It is the path by which General MacArthur gave us modern day Japan. It is the path - perhaps the only path - that can give us a second liberal democratic state in the Middle East, and a true model for representative government throughout the region.

If I think about it enough, there's probably no end of things for which I ought to give thanks, and perhaps we all should, as gratitude and the daily acknowledgement of the things for which we are grateful make us happier human beings.

So, I start with being grateful that I am no longer constrained by the notion that I should not start a sentence with a conjunction. It might seem a small thing, but it's a part of flowing with what is there instead of what I think is the right thing to do, the rules, usually as written by someone else.

I am really grateful I have learned to question other people's rules and default beliefs. Thoughts like “That's the way it is and how it's always been” just don't run me any more. I am in many ways bolder than I have ever been, and feel free to challenge others - and sometimes even myself - to play bigger and bolder games in life, which always leaves me feeling better.

I am thankful for, thank and acknowledge my partner and playmate, Sharleen. She always has my back, is infinitely patient, and is all about creating worlds that work. If someone needs to be taken care of, and it's in her ability, she does it. People are better just for having been in her presence. It's pretty neat.

I am thankful for my great kids, curious people who play with, challenge and engage me. They all make unique contributions to their classrooms and worlds. I am thankful for the great family that made these kids possible.

But mostly, I want to thank my parents. They have taught me what faith is and what it means to be committed to friends and family. They have been unwavering in their commitment to and support for my happiness and success. I love you both.

It would not be Thanksgiving if I didn't thank the people who gave us this opportunity to be mindful, PresidentAbraham Lincoln, Sarah Josepha Hale, and William Henry Seward, but theirs was an exhortation to a greater power, and I join them in remembering that:

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

I thought I'd gotten over this long ago, but some things just keep coming back around. I've actually had a pretty good week, have started to acknowledge myself more for the contribution I make (thanks again to Scott's planner - "celebrate last week"), I've visited with some movers and shakers, and committed to moving and shaking a little more on my own. For all this, I just noticed how much I start to resist something when I declare that I am taking it on.

Or maybe it's just the size of the thing I take on. I have a rowing machine. I have rowed close to 12 million lifetime meters. Coming into this ranking year, I set a new goal for myself, a bit ambitious, but doable given my history. I started out okay, but somewhere along the line, just gave up. I'd miss a week, two weeks, a month. I took on a one month team challenge, and disappeared for two weeks in the middle of it. I have a half-marathon (running) happening next week. I haven't gotten my head around it yet. I obviously knew it was coming. I've gotten out to run a little, but I am not ready.

And it's obviously not just in the area of exercise I seem to be running to extremes. When I have blown off my diet, which I love keeping and feel better on, I've been binging, mostly on chocolate and doughnuts (it's the season). My cars, I didn't just wash, I detailed. The house and office hit a point of greater order than they've seen in quite some time, and now I'm having trouble finding my desktop.

I've set myself down to write, and spent hours on anything but. I notice I can see a big picture, but am not reducing it to the details, most of which I could manage. So what's missing is probably just integrity and perspective. I've been pretty good at keeping some promises (I pray every day and my kids are taken care of), but for those I am clear what the daily tasks are. I think for the bigger items, I just haven't taken the time to plan out what I need to do today to keep these in the realm of reality. And I don't know that it is, but I just hate calendars. I get the clarity they can provide, I'm keeping one at the moment, but mostly what's in it are the big “have to” appointments. It's almost like they go against who I am, but I get that that is just a function of what I declare and act on with integrity.

So I guess what's missing is me consistently bringing integrity to my actions, to actually put the keeping of my weekly planner in my calendar, to systematically break down each project to its component parts, and then determining if I really want to commit to what it takes today, right now, to keep that project alive.

So I am ready again to draw the line, but then I wonder if it won't just be in the sand again. So I will remind myself to Stop It!

and I'll throw it out there anyway, because if I don't declare a new game, I probably won't be in action in anything.

So I commit - once again - to bringing workability to my life, starting with creating order in my home and office. And I commit to rowing at least 200 thousand meters this holiday challenge (that so used to not be a challenge), and we'll go for keeping my diet throughout the challenge, which means keeping it today. But first, I guess I'll put it down in my calendar.