This morning, I took the subway to Coney Island. It was always your favorite place. The noises, the laughter and the screams. You always said the smells brought you back to your childhood. I looked out over the water as the sun was rising. My whole world shattered on this day eighteen years ago and all I could do now was take a deep breath, hold it for as long as I could and slowly exhale.
Eighteen years ago today. Sometimes it seems just like yesterday, other times it seems like a lifetime ago. What I wouldn’t give to have you back, to go back in time and keep you from going to work that day. How much different would my life, our life had been? Would it have changed that much? Life went on without you, even though I still don’t know if mine has completely.
Our kids are grown now. Eighteen years of memories, smiles and tears. I am a grandpa now, which means you would’ve been the best grandma. Sometimes when I hold her I can see you sitting in your old chair smiling. I can see you holding her like you held our daughter. You were the best mom. The best wife.
Eighteen years and we have survived, even if we are not whole since a piece of us is missing. Eighteen years of wishes and prayers that will never come true.
I think you would be really disappointed with our world now. Eighteen years later and the terrorists still hate America, maybe even more now. Eighteen years and we are still fighting the same war and I don’t even know what we are fighting for anymore. It seems hopeless. This world is a mess. Hate is rampant. Mass shootings every day it seems like. All those lives lost for nothing. It seems like most people have grown numb to it all and have given up hope.
Sometimes I wonder if God has abandoned us. Sometimes I wonder why he doesn’t do something. Sometimes I wonder why I don’t do something. I know you would’ve done something. You always saw the best in everyone and everything.
Most of those times I will find comfort and hope in your old Bible that still sits on the table on your side of the bed. The answers are there in your favorite highlighted passages.
In a way I am happy for you that you aren’t here to see all this. But maybe if you were here you would be the one that would change it all. I know there is good out there. I know there are still good people in this world. We just need more of them to step up and do something. Change this world you so loved.
Anyway, most days I am good. Some days the wind will blow and caress my cheek and I feel like you are still here with me and I can’t help but smile. Other days, like today and even after all these years, I can’t stop crying and I have to stop and pick up the broken pieces of my heart and push on.
I can see you giving me that look now. I know, I know. You wouldn’t want me to be sad, but even a warrior has his moments when he isn’t so tough. But like a warrior, I will fight on another day.
So today, eighteen years after you left us, I still will not say goodbye. I will never say goodbye. How can I when, like on that day and all days when you left for work, I can still see you smiling at me, giving me a wink and saying love you hon, see ya later.
So babe, I love you just as much today as I did the first day we met and I will see ya later.
If you want to cry, listen to this first song, I tear up every single time I hear it. And it is a good story of how a child grows up without her dad she lost in 9/11
I Miss You Daddy-
The Ones That Didn’t Make It Back Home by Justin Moore –
If I Had Only Known by Reba McEntire-
Jersey On The Wall ( I’m Just Asking) by Tenille Townes-
I came home from work Friday night and Kim told me Deanna, one of her best friends and mentor, told her about a vision her daughter had. Her daughter just finished her freshman year of college and truly lives for Jesus. Deanna said maybe Rob can turn her vision into a poem or a song. I took Kylie up to get her shower ready and sat down and this is what came out.
It is truly an inspiring vision and I hope my words do it justice.
Gave You My Heart
I gave you my heart and you walked away
You’re my dad, you were supposed to stay
I couldn’t keep it all together today
I grabbed what was left of my heart and walked to the beach
Walked far enough until your memory was out of reach
I screamed at you dad until I was too hoarse to speak
Then I saw a piece of sea glass so bright
It had such a mysterious light
It was like a piece of day in the darkest night
I bent down and dug with my free hand
There had to be more pieces under the sand
That’s when I felt the presence of another man
It was like a dream as my other hand held my heart
The one that you, dad, had ripped apart
Then I had a thought, this isn’t the end but a brand new start
I felt this man telling me to turn in his direction
But I couldn’t so I grabbed my sea glass collection
And I tried to hold a piece just right to see his reflection
I couldn’t turn around, I knew what he wanted me to do
I couldn’t give him my heart dad, I had given it to you
And I was scared he would walk away with it too
Then his hand touched my shoulder
My courage grew just a little bit bolder
My tears started to flow as I began to molder
I turned and as he reached for me I saw the scars on his hand
He looked at me and I knew he wasn’t just a man
That’s when I dropped my sea glass in the sand
I let him hold me for what seemed like an hour
I could feel his gentleness, as well as his power
I felt his love pour down on me like a summer shower
I whispered, “If I give you me heart will you walk away?”
He said “I’m your father. I’ve never left, I will always stay.”
I knew he was telling the truth so I gave my heart to him that day
(image credit: Kevin Carden Photography)
Busted Heart ( Hold On To Me) by For King and Country –
I was a happy child. I was always smiling, always laughing. I was healthy. I ate good and exercised. I had a few close friends.
However, my best friend was my shadow. He went with me everywhere I went. He played the same games I played. He liked the same animals I liked. We were inseparable. Even when I went to bed at night, he was tucked in right beside me. When the lights went out, I would not worry because I knew he would be there in the morning when I woke up.
We would then start the day again. My shadow always right beside me. I would laugh and smile. We would eat together, play together, and at night we would sleep together. Through the years that would never change.
Until one morning I woke up and it did change. My shadow was gone.
I looked for him everywhere. In the glow of the kitchen light at breakfast, outside at the brightest time of day, and at night with my bedside lamp, but he was nowhere to be found.
I became dark. My smile went away. I no longer laughed. I no longer wanted to play or talk to anyone, even my parents. I wanted to stay in my room all day and all night.
I wasn’t happy. Why would my shadow leave me? There was no explanation that I could find. I woke up one morning and everything had changed. I tried to snap out of it but couldn’t. My parents tried. Nothing worked.
I even quit looking for my shadow.
I lashed out at everyone. Just leave me alone. The darkness would not go away. I hated the person I had become. I felt like a prisoner, trapped in my own mind. I thought things I could not believe I was thinking. I felt like hurting myself, hurting others. I quit doing my schoolwork and I was getting into trouble at school.
Then one day, out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw my shadow. It was only a glimpse, a split second, and I could’ve been wrong, but a hope came over me. A hope I clinged to. And as I started to hope, the darkness started to leave me. And as the darkness started to leave me, I started seeing my shadow everywhere.
And as I started seeing my shadow everywhere, I started finding me everywhere.
The darkness did not win. I could smile again. I was me again.
I know not everyone can find their shadow, if you need someone to talk to reach out to
So I posted this at 1030 this morning, and then I posted it to Facebook. Now it is no longer on WordPress and it can not be found on Facebook. I think the forces are out for people not to read this one.
As with humans, the birds keep repeating history instead of learning from it. Catch up on their history with the links below.
At first, I thought I must be dreaming. I could hear the strength of the water rushing by me, I could feel the wind as if it was piggy-backing on the strong current. I bent down and put my hand into the water and my fingers came out wet. I could pinch myself but I knew this was not a dream. I stood up and I looked to my left and all I could see was a vast desert, no more than ten yards from me, that the river just suddenly disappeared into. I could not fathom how all that water was pouring into the desert with no trace.
The desert was lifeless but I was intrigued to take a few steps into it. I looked back at the river, like a child who is about to do something wrong looks back at its parents, but continued on my way. The river was close, I knew I could return to it anytime I wanted.
I ventured farther and farther into the desert. The farther I went, the thirstier I got. Not for the river, but for more adventure. The desert was alluring but I knew there was nothing out here for me, but I continued to walk. What was I doing? I could no longer see the river but I could remember the life it gave. There is no life out here.
Why couldn’t I turn back? Every time I started to, another distraction caught my eye. I was feeling guilty and ashamed for being gone so long but that made me want to stay away even longer.
I would pass cacti and a few animals out here, reminders that even in the emptiness of a desert, there is life. Life that reminded me of my old life, when things were good. I started to long for that life again, but I didn’t know how to get back there. Out here in the desert, it is easy to lose your way, to continue to go the wrong way, to be desperate to go back but not knowing the way.
Frustrated with the way I was living and desperate for help, I looked back to where I thought the river was and somehow I was able to whisper help me Jesus.
That was a name I hadn’t said in a long time.
Dig. I heard a voice say.
I fell to my knees and started to dig the dry, hard ground. I broke a couple fingernails and my knuckles and fingers bled. Why am I digging? It is so easily to forget the voice I heard.
Keep digging. I am never far from you.
Through the sweat and tears I kept digging for what seemed like hours. Eventually the ground began to soften and shortly after, there was a stream of water. I immediately took a drink and my eyes opened.
It was like I was blind but now I see. I thought I was alone out here but now there were hundreds, no, thousands of others with me. Thousands just like me, wandering aimlessly. Lost souls.
Next thing I knew, I was back at the river. I had found my way home, but I knew I could not stay. I was given a second chance, a new way to live my life, and I knew what I had to do.
I took my first steps into the desert, but this time it wasn’t for me to do what I wanted to do. This time, I had to find other lost ones and bring them back to the river with me.
This is a story about a turkey. However, this was not an ordinary turkey. This turkey did not want to be a turkey. He wanted to be an eagle.
He often thought to himself, “self, I do not like myself. Self, this is one boring life I live.” Day after day he would trot around the yard with all his turkey friends gobbling gobbling and gobbling. He would eat all the food that was given to him and he would watch himself getting fatter and fatter.
He would look to the sky and see the eagles flying around. Soaring above the trees. “So beautiful,” he thought. “I want to be like that. I want to be majestic. I want to be an icon. I want people to look at me with awe. I want to be a national symbol and for people to look at with me with thanksgiving in their hearts.”
As much as he flapped his wings he could not get off the ground. It wasn’t that he did not practice, because he did. Some days that was all he did. He would run around the yard flapping his wings, never to get more than a foot or so off the ground. “God, why would you give me wings but not let me fly very well? Why would you let me see the eagles soar but not let me join them?”
Many of his less ambitious friends would talk behind his back. “Who does he think he is?” “Look at that fool trying to fly like an eagle!” “Doesn’t he realize he will never be anything other than what he is?”
Many days and months passed by and nothing ever changed for the turkey. Every day it was the same thing. Wake up, eat, walk around the yard, eat, try to fly. Every day he would ask the same questions. “Why God why? I want to be more than this. I want people to look at me in awe and be thankful that I am here. I want people to love me.”
Soon the weather started to get colder. Many days people would come and grab some of his friends and he would never see them again. The turkey continued to eat and grew bigger and bigger. One day a family came and walked around the yard looking for the perfect turkey. They found one in the turkey of our story.
The father looked at his family and said, “This turkey is beautiful. He will be the perfect symbol for our thanksgiving dinner .” The little girl looked at the turkey and said “I love you turkey. You are so beautiful.”
The turkey gobbled and gobbled. He was so happy. “Finally,” he thought, ” I am being appreciated. I may not be flying like an eagle yet but at least people are seeing me as special.”
The turkey was taken to the family’s home where he was promptly killed and cooked for dinner. Before they ate the family prayed. “Thank you God for this wonderful meal. Especially this beautiful turkey. We will forever remember this turkey in our hearts on this national holiday.”
You see, God gave the turkey everything he asked for. He was looked at with awe and beauty. He was a national symbol. The people gave thanks from their hearts for the turkey. He was made exactly how God wanted him to be and exactly how he wanted to be seen. He just didn’t realize that who he was was exactly who he was made to be.
What do you ask God for? Have you ever asked for a pure heart? Have you ever asked God to show you the way to be more like Him? Or are all of your asks and wants more about you? Have you ever thanked God for who you are, for who He made you to be?
My God, My Music, My Life 