Truman's First Bus Ride

(Originally published in the 8-22-12 edition of the Boone County Journal)

Dear Bus Bullies,

Thank you for apologizing to my son Truman for the way you treated him on the school bus last week. Although your apology only came after school officials confronted you about your behavior, I will assume that you are genuinely remorseful following your insensitive actions. I would like to think that because you are so young yourselves, you did not know how hurtful your comments were to my young child. I am grateful to the staff at your school for addressing this situation immediately, and I am hopeful that you will never treat another person in this manner again.

I feel that it is very important to let you know a little more about the person you were being so mean to that day. Truman is five years old, and the day you teased him was only his second day of kindergarten. Having picked him up at school the previous day, Thursday afternoon was his first-ever ride on a school bus. He had been looking forward to that ride for a long time—ever since he first saw his big brother Alex step off that big yellow bus nearly four years ago. Imagine how upset I was when I greeted Truman at the bus stop and asked him how he liked his first bus ride and he said, “Some kids made fun of my hand.”

I am not naïve. I know that kids sometimes tease people who are different. I expected this situation to present itself at some point. I just didn’t expect it on Truman’s first-ever bus ride. It breaks my heart to know that what should have been a wonderful and fun memory will be forever tainted by your unfortunate choice to make my son feel bad about himself. From what I understand, you loudly proclaimed that Truman’s left hand was gross. You yelled, “Ew!” when you saw that he only has three fingers instead of five. I could excuse your reaction if you had immediately stopped drawing attention to Truman’s deformity and apologized, but witnesses claim that you continued to make a big deal about it even after several of your peers told you to cut it out. In other words, you knew what you were doing was wrong and that it could hurt Truman’s feelings, but you continued anyway. Shame on you.

You should know a few things about the little boy you bullied that day. Truman was born in China almost six years ago. A day or so later, he was found on a sidewalk in a big city after being abandoned by his biological parents. No one knows for sure why he was abandoned, but our best guess is because of his deformed left hand and foot. In some cultures, birth defects are considered a curse against a family and the innocent baby is often abandoned—or worse. Truman was lucky, because someone found him on the sidewalk and brought him to an orphanage before it was too late. My wife and I were lucky, too, because we were able to adopt him when he was two years old and bring him home to live with us here in Ashland.

Have you ever seen the movie “Finding Nemo”? It is about a young fish who was lucky enough to survive an attack by a barracuda that left him with a deformed fin which he and his dad called his “lucky fin.” Well, we call Truman’s left hand his “lucky hand” because it was likely what started the chain of events that brought us together. He is proud of his lucky hand and has never felt self-conscious about it for a single moment. It is just a part of who he is, and he is a wonderful human being. Truman is a lively, happy, funny, and positive kid. His spirit shines so brightly that he makes everyone around him feel glad just to know him. And yet, you tried to make him feel bad about his hand. You tried to make him feel bad about who he is. How would you feel if someone tried to make you feel that way?

I tend to believe the best about people, so I choose to believe that you are good kids who just made a bad choice. Learn from your mistakes and grow as people. And get to know my Truman. You’ll be glad you did.

Love & Fried Chicken

(Originally published in the 8-8-12 edition of the Boone County Journal)

In defending his company’s stance against same-sex marriage, Chick-Fil-A president Dan Cathy recently stated his business is “based on biblical principles, asking God and pleading with God to give us wisdom on decisions we make about people and the programs and partnerships we have.” One of the partnerships Mr. Cathy’s company maintains is with an organization called the Family Research Council, an outfit classified as an anti-gay hate group by the Southern Law Poverty Center. According to its own records, the FRC recently lobbied members of the United States Congress against supporting a resolution that denounced Uganda’s notorious “Kill the Gays” bill that calls for anyone convicted of committing a homosexual act to be put to death. Leviticus 20:13 does state, “If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.”

So, it would appear that Chick-Fil-A supports the biblical principle that homosexuals must be executed, right? No, you say? That’s not what Mr. Cathy said, you insist. Surely you do not mean to imply that Mr. Cathy or other devout Christians can pick and choose which verses of the bible to accept or reject. The Lord clearly said in Leviticus 20:22, “Keep all my decrees and laws and follow them.” So, if the bible calls for homosexuals and adulterers to be put to death, then it must be done. The scripture also calls for anyone who curses their mother or father to be put to death, too. (How would any of us survive our teenaged years if this law was followed to the letter?) Or what about in Deuteronomy 22:28-29 when God commands that when a virgin is raped, her attacker must pay her father a fine and then they must marry and never get divorced?

If we are to cite the bible as a reason to keep same-sex couples from being married, then we must follow every word of the scripture. If we reject even one passage because we feel it is antiquated or unjust, then the authority of the rest of the book is called into question. Not comfortable with making rape victims marry their attackers? Not convinced that cursing your father warrants being executed? Me neither. Plenty of bible passages mention examples of marriage that would be considered “non-traditional” in today’s world. King David had eight wives and ten concubines, for example. That doesn’t fit very well with many Christians’ biblical definition of marriage as being between one man and one woman. Since the bible can contradict itself, and because most of us in the modern age don’t accept all the severe punishments it calls for, we must therefore reject the bible as a basis for defining marriage.

How then, can we define marriage? I define it as a lawful union between two people who love one another and who have pledged the rest of their lives to each other. As an ordained minister, I have had the privilege of performing wedding ceremonies for several couples recently. Unfortunately, in Missouri and most states, same-sex marriage is illegal and I am not able to solemnize the marriages of my gay friends. I compare this injustice to pre-civil rights laws that prevented mixed-race marriages. I wonder if those who came out to support Chick-Fil-A last week would have done so if the company openly advocated against the rights of blacks to marry whites. I submit to you that being gay or straight is as much of a choice as being black or white. I have several gay and lesbian friends and I know for a fact that they did not choose to be homosexual. I have seen with my own eyes how dedicated these couples are to one another. It breaks my heart that in this relatively enlightened age, some people dedicate themselves to ensuring that my gay friends can never be married to the people they love.

A friend said I was being intolerant by boycotting a business for exercising their free speech rights. I am boycotting Chick-Fil-A for their financial support of organizations that advocate outlawing homosexuality and same-sex marriage. To me, their effort to marginalize a segment of the population is the definition of intolerance. For that reason, in the battle between love and fried chicken, I choose love. 

Happy Gotcha Day

Exactly one year ago, a little Chinese girl was led into a room full of strange, pale faces all staring directly at her. She had never seen westerners before, much less spoken with any. For that matter, she had not met or spoken with many Chinese either. Virtually everyone on Earth was a stranger to little Tian Tian because in all her seven years of life she could only remember leaving her orphanage twice.

 Considering all this, she would have been forgiven for acting frightened or apprehensive that day. No one would have blamed her for being upset or reticent. In fact, it was expected. It was a day unlike any day she had ever experienced. Every day for seven years, Tian Tian woke up, ate her meager rations, sat around with almost nothing to do, bathed, and went to bed. Because she was born different (cerebral palsy) from the other children, she was not allowed to attend class and receive even a rudimentary education, despite the fact that she had no mental disabilities whatsoever. As she grew older and demanded less attention from her caretakers, Tian Tian was left to look after herself for most of the day. Inmates in American prisons are offered more educational and enrichment services than the innocent little Chinese girl received.

 In seven years, no one bothered to teach Tian Tian to hold her head up. No one showed her how to use chopsticks to feed herself. No one taught her how to blow her nose or brush her teeth. No one taught her how to use crayons or to write. No one taught her how to read. Despite living in a city that hosted the world’s biggest ice sculpture festival because the region is blanketed in a deep winter freeze for half the year, Tian Tian had never seen snow because no one had ever bothered to hold her up to the window of her room so she could see out and enjoy the natural beauty of the world.

 Tian Tian had every right to feel overwhelmed when she walked into the room that day to be introduced for the first time to her new family. But she wasn’t. When the silly looking white man approached her and said in garbled Mandarin “Wo shi baba. Wo ai ni,” (I am your daddy. I love you.), she smiled and whispered, “Wo ai ni, Baba.” (I love you, Daddy.) And then she gave me a hug. She repeated this process with her new mama, brothers, and grandmother, too. And then she held my hand and just smiled. We posed for a few pictures and signed a few forms and then my new daughter let me hold her in my arms for the very first time. Only it didn’t feel like the first time at all. It felt so natural and so right that it seemed that I’d been holding her for years. And perhaps I was, if only in my heart—and in hers, too.

 In one year, Tiana has made a remarkable transformation. Her short, brittle hair is now long and lustrous. Her legs that were so atrophied from inactivity that she could barely walk twelve months ago are now so strong that her favorite activities include dancing, playing basketball, and chasing her brothers on the playground at Ashland City Park. She has learned how to read and write. She exhibits wonderful table manners (when she feels like it) that include holding her head up, using a fork (or chopsticks), and chewing with her mouth closed. And she has seen and played in snow, something she still swears to this day does not exist in China. For one full year, I have been amazed and humbled (and frustrated) by this little girl on a daily basis. She is absolutely everything I could hope for in a daughter—and then some. Those who have had the privilege of getting to know Tiana over the past 365 days will agree that there is something very special about this child. To know her is to love her. To be loved by her is the greatest gift anyone can be given.

 Happy Gotcha Day, Tiana. Wo ai ni.

Wedding #3

As I was driving to Columbia's Stoney Creek Inn last Friday to meet up with my brother Blake and his family (who were in town to do some house-hunting) and also our father and our grandmother, I received a phone call from my wife Bethany. She said, "Question for you: You wouldn't be interested in doing a wedding tomorrow would you?"

I was a bit taken aback at first, but I recovered enough to ask for more information, which she then gave me. Her friend at work--a woman named Sharon--has a husband named John who is a pastor of a local church, and he was supposed to officiate a wedding Saturday afternoon, only he dislocated his hip this morning and is in the hospital and is heavily sedated on account of the pain. He had heard that I was an ordained minister myself (I had just conducted two wedding ceremonies the previous week) and so he asked his wife if she would see if I would be willing to fill in for him. Weighing the moral imperative to do what was right against my aversion to solemnizing a wedding of two complete strangers on just 24 hours notice, I agreed to help out. I was given the bride and groom's contact info and the script for the ceremony Friday afternoon and a heap of thank yous from a well-medicated Pastor John.

Immediately, I called the groom, a fellow named Mark to tell him that I would be on hand to make his big day go ahead as planned. I asked him how he was doing and he said, "I'm okay, but my fiance is sort of freaking out." Understandably so, I told him, but I assured him that they had nothing to worry about. This would be my third outdoor wedding in the past two weeks, and I was confident that things would be just fine. You could hear the weight slide off his shoulders right then and there.


The rehearsal was at four that afternoon, just a few hours after I first agreed to help the young couple out. By five o' clock, a well-planned ceremony had been rehearsed and the bride was feeling significantly better. I've never heard more "thank yous" in all my life. The next day, we met at the winery in Rocheport at 12:30. I went around and made sure everyone in the wedding party knew their role and at precisely 1:00pm, we began the ceremony. Although it was 102 degrees, no one passed out and everything went exactly as planned. The wedding was a huge success and afterward, I was treated like the second coming of the messiah. I told the parents of the happy couple, and the newlyweds themselves, that it was an honor to be able to help them out on their special day. Soon, about 130 people who I'd considered total strangers just one day earlier shook my hand one by one and thanked me for being there for Crystal and Mark. In a strange twist of fate, the wedding reception took place at the same Stoney Creek Inn that my brother was staying at--the same place, incidentally, where all of the out of town wedding guests were staying, too. It seemed like I knew every single person in that place, and I really almost did.

Pastor John tried to give me the money the Hoffman's gave him for his services but I flatly refused. I told him to use that money however he saw fit and to concentrate on his recovery. His hip had been severely displaced and required a medical procedure under general anesthesia to pop it back in. I can't imagine the pain he must have been in. Yet to his credit, the first thought that went through his head when he injured himself was, "I don't want to let that nice young couple down." Well, he didn't let anybody down. And he gave me an opportunity to step outside my comfort zone and do something good for some folks in need. That's quite a gift. You can't put a price on that.

Thanks Pastor John, and congratulations Crystal and Mark!

First term stay-at-home dad

First term stay-at-home dad



Published: Wednesday, May 2, 2012 9:43 AM CDT

Have you ever seen the “before and after” photographs that show how dramatically four years on the job ages the President of the United States? Our president never really gets a day off. His vacations are working vacations. He can’t go anywhere to clear his head without an entourage in tow. From the moment he wakes up till the minute his head hits the pillow at night, people are constantly asking him questions, demanding his attention, and depending on him to solve their problems. Can you imagine what it must be like to live with that amount of stress 24/7? I’ll bet you can if you’re a stay-at-home parent. Later this month I will celebrate my fourth anniversary of becoming a full-time, stay-at-home dad. Now seems like an appropriate time to evaluate my first four years on the job, and to contemplate running for a second term.

When I quit my job in 2008, I announced to my friends and family that I was “retiring” from the rat race. Years of working in sales, both retail and wholesale, and in management had taken their toll on my soul. I needed to make a drastic change to rekindle my spirit. Adopting two-year-old Truman and staying home to raise him did just that. I quickly forgot all about the stress of the retail world. Then I realized what real stress is. Real stress is trying to teach a two-year old from China to understand and speak English. Real stress is trying to change a radioactive diaper in the restroom of the Olive Garden without contaminating your nice dinner clothes. Real stress is working on potty training, cooking three meals a day, trying to keep up with the laundry, vacuuming, dishes, mowing, and such while trying to save enough energy to maintain a healthy relationship with a spouse who is sympathetic to your situation, but has a separate set of work-related issues to deal with.

I should have known what to expect. I actually played Mr. Mom to Alex when he was a little guy. But I more or less just “played.” I did not fully immerse myself in the stay-at-home lifestyle back then and did a pretty woeful job of taking care of the house and my wife. Bethany not only brought home the bacon, but she also fried it up in a pan, washed the pan, mopped the kitchen floor, etc. I focused on Alex and neglected the rest of my duties as a husband/homemaker. My forgiving wife graciously allowed me to give it another go when we decided to adopt, and I think for the most part I redeemed myself. In fact, I did such a good job, Bethany and I decided to again add to our brood—and to my workload.

For some reason, I was under the misguided impression that adding a third child to the mix would only increase my workload and stress level by one-third. I was never any good at math. Someone should have stepped in and warned me that adding a third child actually means having 50% more children and 100% more work than when you only have two. Now I have one kid who is learning about a new culture, two who are learning English, and three who are producing more dirty dishes, laundry, and clogged toilets than an army platoon. Stress? You betcha.

Still, I can’t complain. Homemakers in previous generations didn’t have the luxuries of indoor plumbing, washer & dryer combos, and automatic dishwashers like I do. They didn’t have the internet and satellite television to entertain them during their precious few minutes of down-time. Is being a stay-at-home parent the most difficult job I’ve ever had? Yep. Has my hair started turning gray and have bags appeared under my eyes? Yep and yep. Will I be seeking a second four-year term as a full-time dad? With a 100% approval rating from my family, I think I have to. It sure beats “working” for a living.