Category: Life

Be Like Pedro

About four years ago, I was asked to do a long-term substitute teaching job for about two months.  The class was an adult transition program, a type of special education class for 18 to 22-year-old students who have finished high school.  In these classes, the students spend some time in the classroom, but also go out into the community to local businesses where they do things like wipe down tables and fill salt and pepper shakers. They help out at the job sites and try to build skills for after they age out of school.  What I didn’t expect was that this would become my favorite sub job ever.

Being a moderate to severe special ed class, there was a range of issues that the students had.  Two were in wheelchairs.  One girl would do a sort of call and response routine where she would call out, “Twinkle, twinkle, Mr. Connally.”  Then I would have to say, “Sing Twinkle, twinkle,” or she would just keep asking.  Then she would sing “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.”  Then you would have to say, “Good job,” or she would sing it again until you did. 

There was another girl who would eat any food she could get her hands on, so you could not leave anything sitting around.  One boy had an aide who would walk around the school with him all day.  Another girl would run away, or have violent outbursts, but was perfectly fine as long as she had pictures to color.

Then there was Pedro.  He was my favorite.  Pedro was a little guy, probably not even five feet tall.  He did not really talk, but he did use sounds and gestures to communicate.  Each morning, I would take my seat at the front desk and set up while I waited for the students and the aides to arrive.  As soon as Pedro came in, he would come up to my desk, tap on my shoulder, and point to his desk.  I would go over and do puzzles with him.  It was our routine.  He would always grab the same two Spider-Man puzzles, and I probably did those same two puzzles two hundred times in my two months there.  Pedro made my day for one simple reason: he was easy to make happy.  He took joy in every little victory.  That joy was contagious.  For example, when we did those puzzles, every time he got a piece to fit in, he would look at me and say, “Woohoo!”  Then I would do it.  It was fun. 

After that, we would do our morning meeting, and we would go over things like what day it was, what season it was, and how the weather was.  We would call on kids to go up and pick answers on the screen about those things.  Whenever we called on Pedro, he would jump out of his chair and run up to the front, pumping his hands in the air and exclaiming, “Woohoo!” like he had just been told to “Come on down!” on The Price is Right.  When we went to the work sites, Pedro would take such pride in his jobs.  At one restaurant, he got picked to pour ice from the ice machine into the ice well at the bar.  I started calling him “Ice Man,” and his face lit up like he was the most important guy in the world. 

That was what I loved about Pedro.  He would get so excited about the smallest things.  This is a trait that everyone should strive for.  It is counter to how many people think.  So many of us are never content.  Most people get desensitized to small joys that used to seem so significant.  Think about how thrilling it was to hear the ice cream truck, or to get a sticker at the doctor’s office.

Someone once told me that they had been around baseball for so long that they do not get excited anymore.  I remember thinking, “How sad is that?  I never want to lose that joy.”  I want to be like Pedro.  I want that childlike exuberance forever.  When someone says that I often act like a big kid, I do not see it as an insult.  I wear it as a badge of honor.  We should all take joy in the little blessings in life. 

I just found my favorite pair of sunglasses that I had misplaced.  It made my day!  That is a good thing.  I still get delighted when I find a nickel on the ground.  If you do not have that sense of wonder in life, I encourage you to work on it.  If you are unhappy, this one thing will help you a lot.  If you are lonely, more people will like you and want to be your friend if you are easily contented.  Not only that, but your attitude will be infectious.  Other people will be happier.  It was hard to be in a bad mood around Pedro.   

After that class got a new teacher, I would often sub for other classes at the same school.  Whenever Pedro would see me, his eyes would brighten up, he would point and get excited like those videos of soldiers surprising their family by returning from deployment.  Pedro may have been in special ed classes, but most of us can learn a lot from him. 

Try it.  Be like Pedro!

Lead by Example

My wife is a businesswoman and she works very hard.  She sometimes wonders why I put so much time into having fun.  As most of you know, I still play baseball at a pretty high level.  I am in a Wednesday night bowling league.  I play poker.  Not only that, but I coach baseball for work.  I also like to be involved in many social events with friends and family.  I am spontaneous.  I was just out to lunch for a friend’s birthday, and another friend asked if I wanted to come over and sing songs while he played the piano.  I did, and it was fun.  I want to enjoy my life.  Even more than that, I want my life to be meaningful and important in a positive way.

This has led to a discussion between my wife and me about what is important in life.  She says that having fun all the time is not realistic.  I agree.  There are certainly things that everybody has to do in life that they do not want to do.  Work immediately comes to mind.  Here’s the thing.  The fact that you have to work does not necessarily mean that it is more meaningful or important than fun.  For example, if 98% of the lawyers and politicians were not working, the world would be a better place.  Just like fun, if work is not done for the right purpose, it is not a good thing. 

I was just re-reading the book of Ecclesiastes, and was reminded that anything we do without it being for God’s purpose is vanity.  This does not mean that nothing we do matters.  It means that the things we do that affect eternity are the only things that ultimately matter.  As Colossians 3:2 puts it, “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.”   What can we do on earth that affects eternity?  We can lead people to put their faith in Jesus.

Once we know this, the only question left becomes, “What will lead people to put their faith in Jesus?”  There are the obvious answers, like inviting people to church or telling people about Jesus, and those are certainly important, but they are not usually very successful by themselves.  I have often seen people at events holding signs telling people to repent and turn to Jesus and wondered, “Has there ever been anybody who repented and turned to Jesus because of somebody doing that?”  In fact, shouting about God on a street corner is probably counterproductive and turns people off.

So, what does work?  What can help usher in a religious revival in our country that actually causes lasting change?  The answer is not to be pushy.  The answer is to lead by example.  Make people want to have a life like yours.  These four things will get people to want to turn to God.

  1. Be fun.  If you are regularly doing fun things, laughing, and in the middle of exciting moments, people are going to like you more.  People want to spend time with likeable, fun people.  If you are not fun, nobody will want to be around you, much less be like you or take any advice from you.  Fun also puts you in a position to meet people and build relationships with them.
  2. Be good.  There are fun people who are no good.  I know people who are a blast to hang out with but are not good people.  I would never put them in charge of money, because they are shady and the money would be gone.  I would never want to work with them because they are flakey.  I would not want them to date anybody I care about because they would treat them badly.  Being fun is certainly not good by itself.  Think about Pleasure Island in Pinocchio.  The kids are having fun, but are being bad.  This is why I specified that I want my life to be meaningful and important in a positive way.  If you are fun, but also honest, trustworthy, reliable, and helpful, people will respect you. 
  3. Be happy.  Fun and happy are related, but definitely not the same thing.  There are people who do a lot of fun stuff, but are not happy with their lives.  Happy people smile a lot and rarely complain.  Happy people keep things in perspective and remain relatively happy even when things go wrong.  Happy people can feel sad when something terrible happens, but their default position is cheerful.  Fun makes people like you and want to be around you, but happy makes people want to be like you and emulate you.
  4. Let people know that God is the key to your happiness and success.  Once people like you because you are fun, respect you because you are good, and want to be like you because you are happy, you have to make it known that you are that way because you are a Christian.  It is the truth.  I certainly would not be good or happy without God in my life.  In fact, life would be meaningless.  Once they know that God is the key to your happiness, you do not have to be heavy-handed or pushy.  Be ready to answer questions about God, but you do not have to constantly preach at people.  Instead, lead by example.  Continue to be fun, good, and happy.

There is one more thing.  If you are not all of these things, do not tell people you are a Christian.  I relate it to politics.  When I am out wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat, I am a billboard for President Trump, and I want him to win.  I go out of my way to make sure I am smiling and kind to people.  I always try to be that way, but I am even more conscious of it when I am representing President Trump.  I tip better at restaurants if I wear the hat.  I want people to know that the media is lying when they denigrate President Trump and his supporters.  I want them to know that we are good people.  If I am grumpy or rude, it will turn people off.  In fact, I take off the hat when I am driving, because nobody thinks other people are good drivers, even if they are. 

Similarly, if I am not fun, good, or happy, and then I tell people that I am a Christian, I am poorly representing God.  Nobody is going to see a Christian who is unhappy or constantly complaining and say, “How can I be like that?”  I had a friend who would often post on social media about God, but would mostly post complaints about his life or about some girl he was dating.  It drove me crazy because anybody who saw that would think, “That God thing sure isn’t working very well for him.  I’ll figure something else out.”  If you are not fun, good, and happy, work on that before you tell anybody that you are a Christian.

Now, go out and enjoy life.  Having fun may seem frivolous, but it leads to the most meaningful parts of your life. 

Every Path is Not Equal: Harrison Butker’s Wisdom

Say there were two kids.  The first kid was smart, and a voracious reader, who studied hard and listened to his parents.  This kid worked tirelessly to be the best athlete he could be.  He messed up sometimes, but adults generally liked him.  The second kid was equally as smart, but chose not to read or study because he preferred video games.  He often disobeyed his parents.  He was a gifted athlete, but chose to quit the team because he did not like to practice.  He often hung out with troublemakers and spent many days after school in detention.  Which of these kids would you guess will have a more successful, happier life?

This is one of the rare occasions that a conservative and a leftist might agree.  The first kid is far more likely to have a good life.  The reason is obviously that some choices are better than others.  Some priorities are better than others.  Not all paths are equal. 

If somebody stood in front of a group of kids and told them about these two kids, and advised the group that they should choose to be like the first kid, very few people would complain.  Some choices are better than others, and if somebody gives advice to choose the better path, that is a good thing.  Hopefully, kids will listen. 

This is exactly what Super Bowl hero Harrison Butker did on May 11.  The kicker for the world champion Kansas City Chiefs gave the commencement address at Benedictine College, a small Catholic school in Kansas.  Unfortunately, the reaction has been less supportive.  The speech, which you can watch here, was pilloried by the secular media.  The NFL issued a statement saying that “his views are not those of the NFL as an organization.”  There are even calls for Butker to lose his job, including a petition signed by over 136,000 people calling for the Chiefs to kick him off the team.

Did he say something immoral and dangerous, like that boys can be girls or girls can be boys?  Did he defend communism?  Did he condemn Israel?  No.  Had he done any of those things he would have been applauded by the media.  He did say a number of things that are obviously true.  He spent most of the address telling Catholics to be bold in their faith and admonishing priests not to get comfortable with the depravity of our world and to speak out against what is wrong instead of trying to fit in.  He spoke about how many priests abandoned their flocks and went along with the tyrannical lockdowns of churches instead of fighting back.  He spoke out against people who claim to be Catholics, yet take positions on issues that are diametrically opposed to what the Bible says, calling out President Biden specifically.

Then, he got into the part of the speech that has gotten the biggest backlash.  He said that many of the women there were most excited about their marriage and the children they would bring into the world.  He talked about a “diabolical lie” that is prevalent in our culture today.  The lie he alluded to is that women are told that more fulfillment comes from having a successful career than from being a good wife and mother.  He was correctly warning that this lie is harming women, and our country.  He was giving advice.  Godly advice.  Just like the kid who chose to be studious and good, versus the kid who did not, one path is better than the other.

It is difficult to understand why anybody falls for this lie.  Work is not something to be envied.  God literally cursed the ground to make work miserable!  If you look all the way back to the beginning, when Adam and Eve sinned and ate the forbidden fruit, God cursed both of them.  The curse he put on women is that they would have pain in childbirth.  Then He cursed Adam in Genesis 3:17-19.

17 Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’:

“Cursed is the ground for your sake;
In toil you shall eat of it
All the days of your life.
18 Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you,
And you shall eat the herb of the field.
19 In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread
Till you return to the ground,
For out of it you were taken;
For dust you are,
And to dust you shall return.”

In other words, God’s curse to men was that they would be forced to toil and work cursed ground just to eat, until they eventually die.  Now, our culture does something that my dad used to pull with me.  He would tell me to drink the milk from my cereal.  I hated milk, so I would say, “Why do I have to?”  Dad would reply, “You don’t have to.  You get to.”  Our culture now tells women, “Why should men get to go work and you have to take care of the kids?”  They reverse the “get to” and the “have to.”  The difference is, I didn’t fall for it with the milk.  Many women have with the work.  They want the “privilege” of taking on the curse that God put on men.  It is the equivalent of men wishing that they could have pain during childbirth. 

Conversely, children are the opposite of a curse.  Psalms 127:3-5 says: “Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, The fruit of the womb is a reward.  Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, So are the children of one’s youth. Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them; They shall not be ashamed, But shall speak with their enemies in the gate.”  Children are a reward from God! 

Harrison Butker advised women not to fall for this trick like they fell for the serpent’s trick in the Garden of Eden.  He never said that women are incapable of working outside the home.  He never even said that they should not work outside the home.  He was simply advising that one path is more important and more fulfilling than the other.  It seems obvious that raising good kids would be more fulfilling, and more fun, than working.  It certainly seems obvious that it is more important.  Would I have preferred that my mom was a highly paid CEO instead of staying home and raising me and my two sisters?  Definitely not!  My guess is that very few women who chose kids over career regret it.

I will admit that this path is not for every woman.  Butker was speaking in a religious setting.  I will be the first to say, if you are not a religious person, and especially if you are not married, you should not have children.  Some women lack the godly wisdom to be wives and mothers.  I encourage them to take the career path.  Anybody can do that.  It takes a much more exceptional woman to be a good wife and mother.

Some have complained that he should not have singled out women and wondered why he did not also call out the men in the audience.  Those critics likely did not even listen to the speech and are judging based on media reports, because Butker did, in fact, spend the next section of the speech talking to the men, and blaming many of societies ills on the absence of strong men in the home.  I urge you to listen to the whole speech.

While a lot of crazies are attacking Harrison Butker, the news isn’t all bad.  Many people have come out in his defense, including the wife and daughter of the Chief’s owner, their coach Andy Reid, and many teammates.  His jersey is now a top seller.  More importantly, his good advice is now being talked about.  Hopefully, many men and women alike will take it and choose the better path.  It will make them happier and more fulfilled, and make the world a better place.

Hungry Crocodiles, Thieving Monkeys, and Minimum Wage Laws: Singapore, Bali, and Australia

2023 was quite a year!  I got married in April, and I recently got back from a three-week honeymoon cruise through two oceans, two continents, and seven stops across three countries.  As always when traveling, I observed and learned a lot that I want to share.  Here are the highlights from each stop along the way.

Singapore

Our trip started with a 17-hour flight to Singapore.  This tiny country is a very unique place.  The first thing you see, obviously, is the airport.  Normally, that would not be worth mentioning, but the airport in Singapore is different.  They have what they call The Jewel, which is a giant, 5-story, indoor mall area built around a massive, man-made waterfall in the center.  We spent about 5 hours there!  I went through two mazes, a giant canopy of nets that you can walk through, high above the mall, three big slides, and a beautiful garden, among other things.  We also got ice cream at Swenson’s, which reminds me of celebrations with my grandma.  Swenson’s is no longer in the United States, so I had not been there in years!  I also tried a different flavor, Durian, which is known as the world’s smelliest fruit.  I was not a fan.  It tastes a little like gym socks and garlic.  Fortunately, we also got a scoop of Sticky, Chewy, Chocolate, a favorite from my youth.  We even called grandma from the table.

Before the trip, my wife made me watch the film Crazy, Rich Asians, which is set in Singapore.  We actually stayed at The Marina Bay Sands, the hotel featured in that movie.  It was extravagant.  In fact, the whole country is pretty fancy.  As one friend put it, “That whole place is like a big country club.”  The hotel itself was just like being in Las Vegas, complete with a giant casino.  Interestingly, tourists are able to enter the casino for free, but Singapore residents have to pay a membership fee to go in, because they prefer the locals not gamble away their money.  We also went to The Raffles Hotel, the birthplace of the Singapore Sling, a tasty cocktail invented by a bartender there because women were not allowed to drink alcohol at the time, so he made it look like juice.

It seemed like Singapore has about a 1 to 1, restaurant-to-person ratio.  Everywhere you walked there was food.  They have renowned hawker markets, with Michelin star-rated food stands.  The best things we ate there were souffle pancakes, which are large, fluffy pancakes that are soft like marshmallows, and croffles, which are waffles made with croissant dough.  The most exotic thing I tried was shark fin soup, which is outlawed in many places.  It tasted fine, but the bigger thrill is angering crazy activists who want to tell people what they can and can’t do.

My biggest political observation from Singapore is how much they are pushing the “climate change” agenda.  Multiple people that we talked to brought up their fear of global warming.  The government of Singapore is pushing the idea that ocean levels are going to rise and flood the country.  Many of their attractions are very centered around global warming propaganda.  One example is a giant, domed, Avatar-themed sky forest.  It is very cool, and visually impressive, just like the movie.  Also, like the movie, it pushes the false narrative that humans are evil, planet destroyers.  Singapore even brags that they have a “vehicle quota system” that caps new cars in the country and sets a zero-growth rate for cars and motorcycles.  I did not realize how widespread this propaganda has reached.

Bali, Indonesia

From Singapore, we got on the cruise ship, Celebrity Edge, and set sail for Bali, where we were in port for two days.  We had arranged for a driver, Putu Dedy, months in advance to take us around the island.  I highly recommend him.  The first day, we went to a giant swing, that swings out over a cliff above a riverbed far below.  It was a rush!  The place also had a menu with a full page of different coffees, including the most expensive coffee in the world, Kopi Luwak Coffee.  It is made by feeding coffee beans to an animal called a civet, which looked to me kind of like a possum.  When the civet poops out the beans, they pick them out of the feces, clean them, and make coffee out of them.  It costs $50 for a cup!  I did not try it, but I did try Luwak chocolate, which was made with the same beans, and actually tasted really good.  We brought a bunch home with us to give to friends and family.  We got some great reactions when we told them how it was made, after they had tried it.  Next, we went to a restaurant, Bebek Tebasari Resto, where our driver got us a table on a bamboo bungalow over a koi pond, with a great view overlooking rice paddies.  They even give us fish food for the koi.  Finally, we went to one of the many beautiful waterfalls on the island before heading back to the ship.

The next day, we got up early and started with a trip to the GWK Statue.  It is a massive statue of the Hindu deity Vishnu riding on his mount, Garuda.  You can see the statue from many miles away and it is the first thing you notice when arriving from the sea.  The area around it is a cultural center, where they have a traditional Balinese show, with musicians and actors.  I got picked out of the crowd to be in the show, where I got to wear a monkey mask and act like a monkey on stage.  It was a blast!

From there, we went to our favorite place in Bali, the Uluwatu Temple.  It is a Hindu temple in a forest along a breathtaking cliff, overlooking the ocean hundreds of feet below.  What makes it extra fun is that there are monkeys who live at the temple.  We hired a guide to show us around because the monkeys are mischievous.  We were warned in advance not to wear hats or sunglasses, because the monkeys will steal them.  If they do, the guide is there to trade fruits or nuts to the monkey for your stuff back.  Our guide had a slingshot to keep the worst monkeys away, because he knew the ones to look out for.  We did, in fact, see two people who had not hired guides, get their glasses stolen by monkeys.  Then they had to pay extra for guides to trade for their stuff.  Our guide did let us hand-feed peanuts to the monkeys.  The funniest part was at the end.  We asked him, “Do the monkeys ever bite people?”  His response, “Yes.  All the time.”

After that, we went shopping and stopped at a place where they have fish pedicures.  Hundreds of tiny fish eat the dead skin off of your feet.  It tickled.  We finished the day by going to a resort along the Indian Ocean for some food, and a dip in the ocean. 

There were some things I learned from our driver that were pretty interesting.  We learned that while Indonesia is mostly a Muslim country, Bali is the only island that is not majority Muslim.  Most people in Bali are Hindu.  We also had a very interesting conversation about the Covid lockdowns in Indonesia.  He was angry about the lockdowns and the masks and the harm that it caused.  For someone who earns his living driving around tourists, he was crippled by the tyrannical edicts of the Indonesian government and had to sell all but one of his vehicles.  He barely made it through.  Then he told us that later he was pulled over by police because he was driving with somebody else in his car without a mask.  The other person was his wife.  Dishonest, stupid governments are a worldwide phenomenon.

Darwin, Australia

Our next stop was probably my favorite.  Darwin, Australia is at the very top of Australia, and was the most like I had envisioned Australia in my mind.  By that, I mean the most like the movie, Crocodile Dundee.  The city itself was small.  We went into multiple shops that had cool souvenirs, like boomerangs, hats with crocodile teeth, kangaroo testicle keychains, didgeridoos, and back scratchers with crocodile or kangaroo claws. 

Then, we got on a bus that took us to a boat on a river, where we got to see huge saltwater crocodiles in the wild.  Our bus driver told us that our tour guide on the boat used to swim in one of the lakes in the area as a kid.  They would just throw some rocks into the water, and if nothing moved, they would jump in.  Then one day, a schoolmate of his got eaten by a crocodile.  I looked it up.  It really happened. 

Once on the boat, the tour guide would tie a whole chicken to the end of a pole and hang it out over the water, where the croc would jump for it.  We saw a female, which we learned grow to about 3 ½ meters.  Then we saw a baby croc, which was cool because it could jump really high and get its entire body out of the water.  We learned that crocodiles are cannibals and that the females care for their young for about 6 weeks, and if they are not gone by then, they eat them.  Another interesting thing was that males sometimes bite off the arms of the female while mating, but crocs can turn off part of their heart so that blood stops pumping to that extremity and they survive.  They use their tail to get around, so the arms are unnecessary.  At the end, we saw a huge male crocodile.  Male crocs do not stop growing at 3 ½ meters like the females.  This one was about 4 ½ meters long, and scary!  We also got a nervous chuckle at the beginning, because they are required to show us where the life jackets are in case the boat sinks.  “I’m going down with the ship,” my wife said.

It was an extremely hot day, so when we returned to shore the tour bus took us to the world-famous Humpty Doo Tavern for a drink.  The bar is famous because, as the story goes, the Humpty Doo Tavern sold a giant, 2-liter bottle of beer called Darwin Stubby.  They would have a drinking contest to see who could finish a Stubby the fastest.  The Humpty Doo Tavern also used to allow animals inside, so people would bring all sorts of pets with them to the bar.  The most well-known was a cow named Norman, who would drink the Darwin Stubbies in record time.  People would come from far and wide to try to beat Norman, but nobody ever could.  Animals are no longer allowed into the bar, but it was still a fun place to stop.

Cairns, Australia, and the Whitsunday Islands

The next two stops were snorkeling trips.  The first day was near Cairns, Australia on the Great Barrier Reef.  The most interesting thing we saw there was a large sea turtle, snacking on jellyfish right next to us.  The next day was in the waterways between the Whitsunday Islands, which is a quaint, vacation spot for Australians.  There, we saw a massive stingray that was probably 5 feet across, with a huge barb at the end of his tail.  Crikey!  We also saw a small shark swim by us.  I may or may not have hidden behind my wife when it passed.

Sydney, Australia

The cruise ended in Sydney.  We only spent a day there, and it was plenty of time.  It is just like many other big cities around the world.  We did hit the two main tourist sights that people think of when they picture Sydney:  The Sydney Opera House and Bondi Beach.  We found a really good gelato place in Bondi called Anita Gelato.  I just looked it up and it turns out there is one in Los Angeles, too.

Melbourne, Australia

We took a short flight down to Melbourne on Quantas.  Quantas never crashed, you know?  We stayed with my wife’s friend, who moved there a few years ago.  He works in the restaurant industry, so he knew some good places to eat, like the best place we ate on the trip, Dumpling Palace. 

Our host, Brian, was also able to explain a phenomenon that many Americans do not understand, with the most clear, real-world example that I have ever seen.  Back in a restaurant in Sydney, I saw a sign promoting a drink special that I was curious about.  It had a picture of the drink and the special price, and then it had a higher price for Sundays and holidays.  I wondered why that was, but didn’t give it much thought.  Then in Melbourne, Brian told us that his restaurant closes pretty early in the evening.  In fact, he explained that there are almost no restaurants open late in Australia because they have what they call “penalty rates.”  Basically, the minimum wage goes up after a certain time at night.  Can you guess when else there are penalty rates?  Yep.  Sundays and holidays.  It made perfect sense.  The businesses were forced to raise their prices to pay for the government-mandated, artificially high wages.  In other words, raising the minimum wage causes inflated prices.  Either that, or it forces businesses to make up their costs in other ways, like closing down when the wages are higher.  Government interference in the economy should be the scariest thing you learn about from this article, even more than the crocodiles.

We also went to a cricket match between the Melbourne Renegades and the Perth Scorchers.  I do not know much about cricket, but it was a fun experience.  The match ended in controversy because they stopped it early due to bad field conditions.

Of course, when you think of Australia, you think of kangaroos, so we went to Gumbaya World.  It is a combination zoo, amusement park, and waterpark.  We bought some animal feed and walked around the zoo section, where we saw tropical Australian birds, koalas, wallabies, dingos, kangaroos, and emus, among other animals.  The kangaroos were super lazy, and if you tossed food to them, they didn’t even move.  We had to walk right up and hold it in front of their face before they would even show interest.  The emus, on the other hand, ran over to the fence and were very aggressively going after the little pellets of food.  Had there not been a fence between us, they would have attacked.

The Captain The last interesting story was from the final day on the cruise ship.  The captain did a question-and-answer session with the passengers, and one question stood out.  Many of the passengers had been on the ship since it left Rome, 52 days earlier.  They had gone from Rome, through the Suez Canal to Singapore, with many stops along the way.  One of the stops was supposed to be in Petra, Jordan.  After the Hamas attack on Israel and the instability in the region, that port had to be skipped.  One of the passengers who had been on the whole trip asked the captain, “Were the three American warships that were in the locks with us through the Suez Canal there because of what was happening in Israel?”  The captain’s response, “I can’t say much, but it was not a coincidence that the U.S. warships were with us in the locks.”

High Hopes, No Expectations

Rocky Balboa.  The “Miracle on Ice.”  300 Spartans versus the Persian Army.  The Bad News Bears.  John McClane at Nakatomi Plaza.  Most of us love an underdog story.  Do you know who doesn’t love an underdog story?  The people who were expected to come out on top.  As an athlete, and a very competitive guy, there are few things worse than going into a competition as the heavy favorite and losing.  In some ways, it is better to be the underdog, because if you win, you are a David who overcame Goliath.  If you lose, it is no big deal because nobody expected you to win in the first place.  The pressure is all on the favorite.  If they lose, they are chokers.  If they win, they are just doing what everyone already thought would happen. 

As a player, and especially as a coach, you need to deal with this problem, and I have come up with a mantra to help.  “Have high hopes, but no expectations.”  I can hear some coaches out there saying, “If you don’t have confidence that you are going to win, you will lose.”  Confidence is different than expectation, though.  Confidence is knowing that you are prepared and can win.  Expectation is more of an assumption that you will triumph.  If you expect things to go your way, when they don’t, you will be crushed with disappointment and a feeling of failure. 

I came to realize that this mantra is true outside of sports, too.  Last Sunday at church, the pastor preached a great sermon with the same theme.  He was teaching about how people can make the best of life in a fallen world, and pointed out that life will hurt more if we set the wrong expectations.  He noted that many people expect pleasure and are surprised when bad things happen, making it feel worse.  That is actually the opposite of reality.  Instead, he said that suffering is the norm and blessings are a gift from God.  This adjustment in expectations will greatly improve your life.  If you do not expect anything, you are more grateful for all of the good things that do occur. 

Be careful with what I am saying.  Some people might think I am saying to have low expectations or to expect the worst.  I am not.  That would cause a ton of anxiety and a pretty miserable existence.  For example, I could walk outside and get stabbed by a bum.  This is, after all, California.  I don’t expect that to happen, though.  That would turn me into quite a stressed-out, paranoid person.  Instead, just eliminate expectations, both bad and good.

People realize that this is wise when we talk about things that are very unlikely.  Very few people buy lottery tickets and expect to win the jackpot.  We all can see the folly in that.  Almost everyone goes their entire life without winning the lottery, so you are almost guaranteed to be constantly disappointed if you expect to win.  It is harder to see on other things with better odds, or even things where the odds are in your favor.  As a poker player, there are obvious examples.  When most people are dealt pocket aces, the best possible starting hand in poker, they expect to win.  The problem is, even if the other person has 7-2 off suit, the worst hand in poker, there is still about a 12% chance that the pocket aces are going to lose.  Anybody who has been at a poker table when this happens knows the disappointment and frustration that it causes.  It is often accompanied by colorful language or nasty comments to the other player or the dealer.  The high expectations are what cause this reaction. 

This is where the hope part of the equation comes in.  Some people overcompensate and give up when their expectations are not met.  I have heard many poker players say, “Next time I see aces I’m just going to fold them face up.”  That is, of course, ridiculous, because you are going to win most of the time.  You have to remain hopeful.  Hope is what keeps us going.  Without hope, we give up and see no point in trying.  If we don’t try, we will never succeed.

This is true in all areas of life.  In the past, I would go on a few promising dates with a girl and start to think, “This is the girl for me!”  Then, when those expectations were not met, it was awful and heartbreaking.  I had allowed myself to get high expectations.  Thankfully, I remained hopeful.  Had I lost hope and given up, I would never have met my wife.  Hope keeps us going.  As the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky put it, “To live without hope is to cease to live.”

There is an exception to my rule.  I expect effort.  Everyone fears failure.  Get over it.  Try your best.  If a player I am coaching drops a ball, it is not ideal, but I will not yell or get angry.  If, on the other hand, they are worried they will drop a ball, so they slow down and don’t try their best to get to it, I will get mad and call them out for their lack of effort.  You cannot control results, but you can control your effort.

Now, whether it be in competition, business, love, or any other area of life, have confidence, keep the hope, and give your best effort, but eliminate your expectations.  You will be a lot happier, and probably more successful.

I See London, I See France

Hello and bonjour!  As many of you who follow me on social media know, I recently took my first trip to Europe, and I promised to share my observations from overseas.  It actually started in an Italian restaurant on a baseball trip to Scottsdale, Arizona, in October.  After some wine, my girlfriend (now fiancé) asked me if I like the 80s band, The Cure, and if we should go see them in concert.  I said, “yeah,” and she preceded to go on her phone and get us tickets.  After she bought the tickets, she told me that the show was on December 12 in LONDON! 

When booking flights, she decided that we should go across the channel to Paris for a few days after the concert.  Here are highlights from the trip, with some observations, pictures, and recommendations!

  • We arrived in London on Friday afternoon after a redeye flight from LAX.  We stayed at the “Grand Royale London Hyde Park,” which was built by King Edward VII for his mistress, actress Lillie Langtry.  My favorite part about the hotel was the full English breakfast each morning, which ranged from normal stuff like eggs, bacon, and sausage, to things like sauteed mushrooms, marmalade, baked beans, and of course, many kinds of English teas. 
  • We went on a Paddington Bear-themed double-decker bus tour of the city, which included English high tea with sandwiches, scones, cookies, cheeses, and marmalade. 
  • After getting mulled wine in Trafalgar Square, we wandered the wrong direction back to the hotel, leading to a six-mile walking tour through the streets of London.
  • Saturday night was the World Cup soccer match between England and France.  While I am not a soccer fan, I thought it would be a fun atmosphere to sit in a pub and watch with the English fans.  Unfortunately, the pubs were so crowded that many of them would not let anybody else in, and the ones that did were so packed that we could not even move.
  • Since we were there on a Sunday, we decided it would be cool to attend the church service at Westminster Abbey.  The service had a solemn feel to it, with an organ and a boys choir that sounded eerie and echoey because of the giant building and very high ceiling, combined with being otherwise quiet.  The most interesting part was the markers for all of the people buried in Westminster Abbey, from kings and queens, to scientists like Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin, to writers like Rudyard Kipling and Charles Dickens, to politicians like Neville Chamberlain, who is off to a side, and Winston Churchill, who is actually buried elsewhere, but has a large memorial marker right in the middle near the entrance.  I would like to go back when services are not going to read the markers.
  • The Tower of London was recommended by a friend and I also highly recommend it.  I know a ton about U.S. history, but my European history is a little lacking, so I learned a lot.  The tower is a castle that was built in 1078 and has been vital to the defense of the city for centuries because of its location along the Thames River.  It has been used as a royal residence, an armory, a mint, and a prison, among other things.  It now houses the Crown Jewels of England, which you can look at.  There are old weapons and armor on display in the White Tower, which is the oldest section of the castle.  There are also old torture devices, like the rack, that look horribly painful.   You can also see ravens that are kept at the tower because as legend has it, if the ravens ever leave the Tower of London, the Crown will fall and Britain will be lost.
  • It snowed!  We were inside a pub when it started, so we went outside and played in the falling snow, making snowballs and taking plenty of pictures.  It was beautiful!  For a guy from near the beach in California, it was definitely quite a memorable experience.

  • One of the other recommendations given to me was the Churchill War Rooms, and it may be my favorite thing we saw on the trip.  During World War II, Winston Churchill had a complex of rooms and tunnels built and reinforced under a building in London.  Since the Germans were dropping bombs on the city, the allied war effort was orchestrated from the bunker, which included meeting rooms, sleeping quarters, a room for the typists and secretaries, and the map room, which has been preserved in the condition it was in 1945 when they left it, with the original maps up on the walls.  It now also includes the Winston Churchill Museum, where you can get a very good look at one of the greatest men in history.
  • The concert was at Wembley Arena.  The Cure frontman, Robert Smith, was quite an interesting looking guy in the ‘80s, and he still dresses in the same style, making him look a little like if my dad dressed in Goth.  The set list was strange, because although The Cure has enough hits to spread them around, they saved almost all of them until the very end.  In fact, they left, came back for an encore, still did not play hits, left again, and came back for a second encore where they played a bunch of hits in a row.  They sounded good, and when they finally did play Just Like Heaven and Boys Don’t Cry, the crowd ate it up and sang along.
  • Abbey Road!  As a huge Beatles fan, I had to go see Abbey Road and get a picture in the famous crosswalk from the cover of The Beatles final album.  As Paul McCartney found out, you have to be careful, because you have to dodge traffic to snap your picture!

After London, we got on the Eurostar train under the channel to Paris.  My guess was that I would like London better, mostly because they speak English there.  I had also heard from quite a few people that Paris is overrated and dangerous.  Besides that, I had many assumptions about France being full of rude, snooty people, and of course that the French are wimps and ultra-woke leftists.   Here are the highlights from the City of Light.

  • Pay to pee?  When I got off the train, I went to the restroom.  There were turnstiles at the entrance and it cost a Euro to go in!  How does the whole city not smell like urine?
  • Here is where my assumptions started to fall apart.  We took an Uber to our hotel.  The driver seemed like a standoffish grump at first, but then he started using a translation app on his phone.  He was a really nice guy, who pointed out sights and gave us some recommendations for places to go.  In fact, none of the people we met were rude to us.
  • Statues!  The next assumption that turned out to be incorrect was that the French would be ultra-woke whiners.  Sadly, Americans are in many ways far worse.  One example is that Paris is blanketed in monuments commemorating their history and the men who were a part of it.  Nearly every block has a memorial to Napoleon, de Gaulle, or some other French historical figure.  In the United States, we tear down our statues.  Point for France!
  • Street cafes!  When I thought about going to Paris, I wanted to sit in a street café, eat, and drink wine.  We walked from our hotel to “Le Campanella,” and had a fantastic meal of French stew and a lot of wine.  Magnifique!
  • Museums.  I am not a big art museum guy, but everybody who goes to France wants to see the Louvre.  The most famous art museum in the world holds many renowned paintings and sculptures, including the most well-known painting of them all, the Mona Lisa.  While I enjoyed the Louvre, I surprisingly was more impressed with another art museum in Paris, The Musee d’Orsay.  This museum holds paintings by Monet, Renoir, Van Gogh, and many more.  It was interesting to see how different each artist’s style was. 
  • My last assumption that was shattered was that the French are wimpier than Americans.  When we went to the Champs-Elysees on the night of the World Cup soccer match between France and Morocco, there were literally thousands of armed police officers, police cars, and armored vehicles lining the street and blocking shop windows.  Apparently, Moroccan fans had gotten out of control the last time they played, so the French put out such a police presence that nobody would dare cause any trouble.  In America, we let lawless BLM thugs run amok in our cities for much of 2020, breaking windows, burning buildings, and looting.  France for the win!
  • The Eiffel Tower is obviously a must-see.  We had tickets to the top of the tower, but because of weather, the highest platform was closed.  We were able to go up to the second observation deck, which is still quite impressive.  My girlfriend was a little disappointed because she had hopes of a proposal.  That seemed too obvious, though.  My proposal came two weeks later and was a complete surprise!
  • We took a riverboat tour on the Seine, which was beautiful, although very cold!
  • Moulin Rouge!  We got tickets to the famous cabaret theatre where the can-can was born.  The show was very entertaining, with strong-man acts, acrobats on roller skates, gymnasts, and a girl who swam with very large pythons.

  • On our last night, we decided to get a closer look at the Arc de Triomphe.  We did not realize that it closes, and we also did not realize that there is an underground tunnel that takes you across the 6-lane, busy traffic circle to get there.  We, of course, ran across the road like crazy people.  Once we were there, we looked around and read the inscriptions, until a French police officer came out from said underground tunnel and asked what we were doing there after closing.  We told him that we didn’t know it closed, and asked if we could use the tunnel to get back across.  He said the tunnel is closed, too, and when my girlfriend asked how to get back, he smiled and said, “run.”

Don’t Be Shy

Have you ever taken one of those Myers-Briggs Personality tests?  It asks you a bunch of questions and gives you a four-letter categorization of your personality based on four different characteristics.  The first trait it attempts to evaluate is whether you are an introvert (I) or an extrovert (E). The letters are not supposed to mean that one or the other is necessarily better or worse.  It is just supposed to tell people which way their personality leans.  There is, by the way, some difference between introverted and shy.  A shy person fears negative judgment by others and feels anxious in social situations, so they tend to avoid them.  An introvert is usually introspective and feels overstimulated by social situations.  They often prefer quiet, alone time to think instead of being around people.  While they are not the same, there is some overlap between shy and introverted, namely, that both will often avoid social situations.  For this reason, I believe that one possibility actually is better than the other.  I encourage you to act like an extrovert.

If you are shy, or an introvert (which I will use interchangeably from now on), please do not get defensive.  This is not an attack or even a criticism of you.  In fact, when I take the Myers-Briggs test, I am an INTP.  There is nothing wrong with being introverted.  By that, I mean that there is nothing immoral about being shy.  Someone is not a bad person because they are shy.  This is entirely a qualitative assessment, not a moral one.  I want all of us to have a higher quality of life.

What led me to this thought was a friend on social media.  You probably have some friends online whose posts make you think.  This particular friend of mine often posts stories and memes about being an introvert and trying to avoid going out and spending time with others.  They are amusing and good-natured posts, but whenever I see them, it makes me feel bad for her.  She is missing out on so much in life!

Don’t get me wrong.  Sometimes spending a night alone at home watching TV is great.  That being said, almost all of the most memorable moments in life are spent with other people.  Let’s be honest, people are interesting, and the only way to meet them is by putting yourself in a position to.  My suggestion is to seek out opportunities to go interact with people.  Join a club.  Join a team or go to sporting events.  Go to parties.  Travel and mingle with the locals.  Sing karaoke.  Don’t worry about what people might think.  Most people are too worried about what others think of them to be too critical of you.

Another great idea is to get a social job.  Many of the articles about introverts suggest that they get jobs that do not require much interaction with other people, like computer jobs or cubicle jobs.  Those articles imply that these jobs are a good idea because it fits the personality of the introvert.  The better idea is to do the opposite.  I once dated a girl who was bartending when I met her, but I soon realized was pretty shy.  She said that she got the bartending job to force herself out of her comfort zone and meet new people.  It worked, and her life was richer for doing it.  Heck, she met me.

As I said, I lean towards introversion.  It is all right if you think quietly at times.  Occasionally, someone will notice I am not being talkative and will ask what is wrong.  Most of the time, nothing is wrong and I am contemplating some deep issue of life, or some idea for an article for this blog.  Being contemplative is perfectly fine.  I am not suggesting you have to constantly be the loud, crazy, life of the party.  Thinking before you speak or act is usually a good idea.  People see the strong, silent type in a positive way for good reason.  That being said, never let your feelings stop you from fully experiencing life.

The movie Yes Man with Jim Carrey is a fun, silly film, but it helped me to this realization.  In the movie, Jim Carrey hears a motivational speaker who tells him to say “yes” to every opportunity that presents itself.  When he does, he begins to thrive and succeed in many areas of life because he is putting himself in the position to do so, when previously he never would have had those chances.  Of course, you can’t say “yes” to everything, and eventually, he figures that out, but the principle of being open to more opportunities is a good one. 

My general rule is that if somebody suggests that we do something or go somewhere, as long as it is not immoral, I will say yes.  If a friend calls and wants to go out, say yes.  If somebody invites you on a trip, go.  If you don’t feel like going, ignore that feeling!  It will make your life fuller.

Now, I am going to follow my own advice.  Instead of watching the rest of the baseball playoff games here in my hotel room, I am going to head out to a sports bar in Phoenix to watch.  Maybe I will meet some new people and some fun adventures will ensue!

Why Abortion is Hard to Talk About

With the overturning of Roe v. Wade, abortion is on everybody’s minds.  While those on the left fret that there will now be a plague of babies across the land, many on the right celebrate that our nation’s greatest evil has ended.  Neither, of course, is what the Supreme Court decided.  The decision simply says that the Constitution does not guarantee the right to an abortion, which is obviously correct.  That does not, however, outlaw abortion.  What it does is allows the states to decide their own rules on abortion.  This means that open discussion and persuading people actually matters again.  The question now is, how do we do that?

To many pro-life people, it seems so simple and obviously wrong that they forget to look at the discussion from a pro-abortion person’s worldview.  It is very difficult not to be disgusted and angry with people who think it is alright to murder a baby, but pro-lifers have to remind themselves that without God, murder is not wrong.  People who are pro-abortion do not share biblical values, and without God, those people are logical to think the way that they do.  Trying to convince them is futile because they do not believe there is a God to tell them that murder is wrong.  They do not believe there is a God who will judge them for their murders in the future.  Murder is a perfectly logical thing for them to do if they think it will make their lives better.  If a baby seems like it would be inconvenient, killing the baby makes perfect sense.  In fact, if a neighbor plays their stereo too loud at night, murdering that neighbor makes perfect sense.  If someone is competing for a job you want, murdering that person is logical.  If you find yourself in a love triangle, murdering your romantic competition is rational. 

Without God, people are just animals.  Many on the left will openly push this idea.  You see PETA equating animals with people all the time.  They have equated KFC cooking chickens to the Nazis murdering Jews in the Holocaust.  With that in mind, is it wrong if a lion kills an antelope?  Of course not.  That is just a lion trying to improve its life.  If there is no God, a human killing to improve their life is no different from a lion killing to improve theirs.  Without the shared viewpoint that human life is intrinsically more valuable than an animal’s, attempts to persuade non-believers that abortion is wrong will likely be futile.

Does this mean that we should give up on persuading people that abortion is wrong?  Not at all!  It just means that we must start with the deeper issue of what makes something right or wrong in the first place.  The first chapter of my book, The God Bet, goes into this very issue in depth.  It makes the point that if we do not start from the same foundation of morality, it is very unlikely that we will ever agree on much more than that ice cream is delicious.  There is little chance of convincing someone that abortion is wrong because it is murder if that person has no basis for believing that murder is wrong.  For this reason, the most important and effective way to convince people that abortion is wrong is if we first convince them that God is real and that He created people in His image, with a purpose higher than their own personal pleasure.

Our top priority should be showing God’s love to people so that they want to follow Him, too.  If we successfully do that, we could alleviate most of the problems in our country.  It is obvious to anybody who is honest.  I would wager that weekly church attendees are underrepresented in our criminal population.  When we hear about a string of 7-11 robberies and murders like those that happened here in Southern California last month, a deacon from the local church is probably not the most likely suspect.

This does not, of course, mean that people who believe in God are perfect.  They certainly still do bad things, because by nature everyone wants to do what they feel like doing.  The difference is that people who believe in God have a reason to try to not give in to those urges.  Without God, there is not even a reason to hold back.

This is why when the topic of abortion comes up, we should not automatically jump into the immorality of the practice.  They will see it as pushing our religion on them.  They do not realize that laws against rape, theft, perjury, slander, and murder outside the womb, among others, are also pushing religious values on them.  In fact, this is why we see all these things increasing.  Without the base of our values, God, people have started to decide their own right and wrong.  For example, the rise in violence across the country is not because of guns.  It is due to the weakening of religious values in America.

We need to persuade two groups that abortion is wrong.  The first is the general public, which is necessary to get laws changed to protect the unborn.  For that, I honestly believe that religious revival is the only way to do it.  Arguing that something is wrong with people who decide their own right from wrong is a waste of time. 

Since abortion will still be legal in many places, like where I live, in California, the other group that we need to persuade is women who are pregnant and considering abortion.  This is more immediate because it can directly save lives in the moment, even if it is only one at a time.  Obviously, the best way is again to point that woman to God, but because of the urgency in the situation, where a life is on the line right then, we may have to persuade someone who does not yet believe in God.  Without that belief in God, there is only one other possible way to convince people of something.  You have to appeal to their own self-interest.  I truly believe that God tells us right from wrong not to control us, but because He loves us and doing what He says is ultimately in our own self-interest.  It will make our lives better whether we can see how or not.  Therefore, to convince somebody, we must figure out how making the correct moral decision will also be better for them intrinsically.  When looking at pregnancy, this is easy to see.  I asked on social media if any woman out there regretted their decision not to have an abortion.  Of the over 500 comments, not a single woman regretted having their baby.  So, leaving out the morality issue, we can pretty much guarantee that a woman who has a baby will be glad she did, even on a selfish level.

Remember that we Christians are not of this world.  We do have to live in it.  When we live in a pagan society, we have to keep in mind that other people do not share our values.  When the apostle Paul lived, the society was worse than it is now.  He did not conform to it, but he also did not give up on it.  He did not simply address the symptoms of sin, although he did not shy away from those topics.  He focused on sharing Jesus, because that is how the other problems can be fixed. We should try not to get overly upset with pro-abortion people, because they don’t know any better.  They decide their own right and wrong.  We are on a higher level than them, so expecting them to live at our level is unrealistic.  By all means, keep trying to change the laws, because lives are at stake.  The way to do it is by showing that we have a God who loves us.  Once more people realize that, the rest can be more easily remedied.

We cannot bring people to God by fixing our nation’s problems.  We must fix our nation’s problems by bringing people to God.

My New Favorite Baseball Player

When I was a nine-year-old Little Leaguer, the picture day photographers made the players our own baseball cards.  On mine was my picture and some facts about me, including my favorite player.  I was on the Yankees and my dad had probably shown me the Gary Cooper classic, The Pride of the Yankees, so when they asked me who was my favorite player, I said Lou Gehrig.  I was definitely a strange kid to pick someone who had died nearly 50 years earlier, but The Iron Horse is still a pretty solid choice. 

Now, many years later, I have a new favorite player who is even more unexpected.  Jack Wilson spent most of his 12-year Major League career as a shortstop for the Pittsburgh Pirates.  While Gehrig is an all-time great who hit .340 lifetime with 493 home runs and six world championships, Wilson hit .265 with 61 career homers and never appeared in the postseason.  You probably think I’m crazy to put them in the same sentence, but let me explain. 

As many of you know, I am a baseball player.  I pitched for a few seasons in Mexico and I still play in some pretty competitive leagues and tournaments, including spending most of October each year playing in Arizona.  Many of the better teams are full of very good ballplayers who played minor league or college baseball but fell short of their Major League dreams for one reason or another.  There are even some guys who got a cup of coffee in the big leagues.  Last year when we showed up at the first game, Jack Wilson was in our starting lineup.  Apparently, he was in Arizona because his son was starting college out there, and decided to sign up for the tournament.  Our manager was happy to snap him up onto our team because, although he is no Lou Gehrig, he is also not one of us “almost made it” guys or even a flash in the pan September call up who played a few games in the Majors.  He had a successful big league career, including a Silver Slugger Award and making an All-Star team in 2004.

Let me be clear, I am not easily star-struck and have played with quite a few other Major Leaguers.  As I told Jack, he is not even the most accomplished athlete I’ve spent time with in the last two months.  That honor would go to former “world’s greatest athlete” Caitlyn Jenner.  Jack is not my favorite player because he is good, although that certainly helps.  He is my favorite because he shows what baseball is supposed to be:  fun. 

Today, far too many players forget that baseball is ultimately a kid’s game.  On one side of the coin, some guys seem to be going through the motions and thinking more about their next contract than winning.  On the other side of the coin, some guys talk about being businesslike and “respecting the game.”  Those are the people who complain when a hitter bat flips, admires a home run, or swings at a 3-0 pitch when batting against a position player.  My favorite players are the ones who look like they are having fun and love being on the field.  I was at game 1 of the 1988 World Series as a kid and the other moment that stood out to me besides the Kirk Gibson home run was Mickey Hatcher hitting a home run in the first inning and flying around the bases with his arms in the air like an excited little kid.  That is the joy that players should have on a ballfield.

Jack’s love of the game is obvious and his energy is infectious.  He was a shortstop during his professional career but he wanted to play in the outfield for us.  We put him out there.  Then, when I showed up for the game I was pitching, the manager told me, “Jack wants to catch.”  I was thrilled and figured I certainly would not have to shake off my catcher that game.  He was really into catching and talked to me between each inning about how we should adjust and set up hitters.  I ended up striking out 14 in the game.  Jack enjoyed catching so much and was so good behind the plate that we had him catch in the championship game of the tournament, which ended up being an 18-inning marathon win.

When our manager sent out the roster for this year’s tournament, one of the first things I looked for was Jack’s name.  Sure enough, it was on there.  (I heard someone congratulate our manager on getting him back, to which he replied that Jack had been the one excitedly asking him about it.)  At the first game, Jack was smiling and ready to go like a kid on Christmas.  Then, early in the tournament he hit a ground ball and pulled a hamstring running to first base.  He limped back into the dugout looking dejected and said it was pretty bad and he couldn’t play.  Nobody would have blamed him if that was true.  He has nothing to prove to us and was obviously hurting.  However, about 5 minutes later Jack got up, went out to the bullpen, and started testing his leg.  He came back in and said, “I can’t swing the bat, but I think I can catch.  It doesn’t hurt when I crouch or throw.”  We thought he was crazy, but we loved that he wanted to play so badly.  It gets better, though.  The next day when we showed up to the game, Jack told us he thought he could hit left-handed because it’s easier on his hamstring.  He was not a switch hitter during his career, but he barreled up everything and was by far our best hitter for the rest of the tournament.  It was impressive.

On top of having talent and a great attitude on the field, Jack is a really good guy.  He never acts superior to us and enjoys talking baseball and answering our questions when we ask.  I heard guys ask him things that he’s probably been asked 100 times before and he graciously answered, sometimes eagerly telling stories along with it.  When I asked him about his All-Star Game appearance, he told me about the All-Star weekend and his two at-bats; a lineout to left against Ted Lilly and a pop out to second against Mariano Rivera. 

Now, Jack is the head coach at Thousand Oaks High School, which had the highest-ranked baseball team in California last year. The way to get better at anything is to emulate people who are successful at it, so his players have a great advantage.  His enthusiasm is an example that I want to follow in everything that I do.  As a coach, when I do lessons for kids, the biggest predictor of success is enthusiasm.  If a player is thrilled to be on the field, enjoys watching baseball at home, and loves competing, he is more likely to become a good player than a kid with more natural ability who is not passionate about the game.    

Seeing Jack’s childlike excitement and zeal to play helped me gain wisdom that can be applied not only to baseball, but to other areas in life as well.  Off the ballfield, enthusiasm should help tell us a lot about people.  If you are dating someone who acts ambivalent about you, why keep wasting your time?  I want somebody who is enthusiastic about me, wants to spend time with me, and is eager to talk to me.  If I have to struggle for their attention, they probably are not really into me and the relationship will fail.  If you are starting a business, choose a business partner who is enthusiastic about your product.  Otherwise, expect to do most of the work yourself.  In general, if you surround yourself with ambitious, happy people, your life will be better.

As far as baseball goes, Hall of Famer Roy Campanella summed it up best when he said, “You have to have a lot of little boy in you to play baseball for a living.”  Jack certainly has that, and when you really think about it, my picks for my favorite player are actually more consistent than the statistics would indicate.  Jack Wilson plays baseball like he considers himself the luckiest man on the face of the earth. 

The World Series of Poker and the New Jim Crow

Every year the best poker players in the world gather in Las Vegas for the World Series of Poker, the largest and most prestigious tournament series there is.  I look forward to playing at least one WSOP event each June, and have three cash finishes to my credit.  This year the series was moved back from June until October, so I was planning to head out to Vegas for a few tournaments, and had already won a $1,500 seat into the “Monster Stack” event.  Then the discrimination began. 

On August 27 the WSOP announced that they would be requiring all entrants into this year’s tournaments to show proof of vaccination.  Reactions from the poker world were divided.  2003 WSOP main event champion Chris Moneymaker, who gave hope to millions and started the poker boom by winning without being a very good player, previously had planned to sit out the series because he doesn’t understand odds and was afraid to play, but now is thanking the WSOP for their intrusive decision.  On the other side of the coin, 2009 WSOP main event champ and four-time bracelet winner Joe Cada says he will now be staying home this year because of the rule.  Can you guess which one the media portrays more positively?

Remember that the left uses a playbook to make it seem like their position is the norm and any people who disagree with them are on the fringe.  They want you to feel like you are crazy if you don’t think the way they tell you to.  Because of this, I am going to predict the narrative that the media will push about the WSOP this year.  There will undoubtedly be smaller fields in the tournaments than normal and the media is going to lie to us about the reason.  My prediction is that we will soon see stories about how there are fewer entrants this year because people are worried about playing poker due to coronavirus fears and restrictions on international travel.  While there will surely be some players who do not play because they overestimate the odds of dying from Covid (the odds are nearly 100 times less likely than randomly drawing the 4 of clubs from a deck of cards), this will not be the main reason for the lower participation.  The real reason is actually the exact opposite.  People will not play because they are not living in fear like the left wants them to be.  A large number of would-be participants will not attend because they think that people should have the freedom to assess their own risks and make decisions without being bullied.

If it was just the World Series of Poker doing this, it would be a major problem, but this vaccine mandate situation is a lot bigger than that.  Somebody who I respect told me that she does not see vaccine mandates as a hill to die on.  She has been vaccinated so the mandates do not really affect her.  Here is the problem with that thinking.  This is not about the vaccine.  It is about government power and overreach.  Do you think that a tax on tea would be a hill to die on?  I’ll go out on a limb and guess that at least one of those people who threw tea into Boston Harbor didn’t even like tea.  This has as much to do with our opinions on the vaccine as the Boston Tea Party had to do with their opinions on tea.

There are only two directions this can possibly go.  We can choose liberty and allow people to decide for themselves whether or not to get vaccinated, or we can relegate anybody who will not do exactly as they are told by the bullies on the left into a permanent, Jim Crow style underclass.  These tyrants do not want unvaccinated people to be allowed to work, shop, enjoy entertainment, eat, or socialize.  They claim to care about people but are perfectly fine with firing millions of Americans who are willing and able to work.  These good, hardworking citizens will be pushed into poverty or into a growing black-market economy.  Is it strange that the left says they are doing all of this to save lives but seem to have no problem if you die of starvation because they forced your job to fire you?

You may be wondering what I plan to do about the WSOP.  Honestly, I considered pretty much every possible option, but ultimately decided that I do not want the WSOP to profit from me until they stand up for freedom and change this policy.  Not only is it invasive, but it is illogical.  If the vaccine works, then nobody in the building should be worried.  The people who would be scared are vaccinated, and the people who are not vaccinated would not be there if they were scared.  Neither the unvaccinated nor the vaccinated should play if they believe in liberty. 

Instead, I plan to take my $1,500 over to a tournament series at The Wynn and play an $1,100 buy-in event on the same day that the WSOP Monster Stack event is taking place, then go over to The Golden Nugget the next two days for $200 events.  I encourage any other poker players to join me.  Organizations or businesses that discriminate based on vaccine status should be treated the same way as you would treat places discriminating based on race.  In other words, they should not receive a penny from any of us.