A late drive home

On my way home tonight, I noticed that my "freeze" warning indicator was illuminated on the dash.

Winter is coming....

The Things I Carried

Yes, I know, I'm ripping off a Tim O'Brien title. Great book, by the way. The Things They Carried is well worth owning and reading.

Tonight, when Hope and I got home from working a CU v CSU game at the Pepsi Center, I realized my wallet was missing. We searched the car. We searched my clothing. We searched my ref bag. And when we finished, we started over.

This was a first. We never found it.

So I started walking backwards in my mind, trying to pinpoint the last time I had it. I had purchased a water and a few Gatoraids for my evening skate at a corner store in Golden. And that is where my memory ended. But after checking my voicemail at the office (business cards in my wallet) and then my email, I began to doubt that I had left my wallet at the store. I began to assume that it had fallen out of my vest pocket when I transferred into my suit outside the ice arena.

So I climbed in the car and began a midnight drive back to the parking lot where we had initially left our car. I say initially since Hope and Emiko dropped me off and then Hope took Emi home to put her to bed before returning to the rink.

I searched the rink lot and found nothing. I called security inside the ice arena to see if anything had been turned in and they said no.

I was at a loss. I climbed back in the car and began to leave the rink. As I pulled onto Speer Blvd, I noticed a strange lump in the road. So I looped around and tried to get a better look. The second loop was inconclusive so I looped again and as I pulled over the lump I opened my car door and sure enough, my wallet was in the middle of the street.

I opened it and found all my credit cards missing.

Not to jump to conclusions just yet, I looped one more time, found a parking space and walked up and down the both sides of the four lanes on Speer. I found my HSA debit card and nothing else.

I returned to my car and began calling the bank and my credit card companies. Discover was fantastic. So was Barclay's. But Wells Fargo? They wanted to know my last deposit. The last transaction. The banker didn't seem to understand that I use my debit card for everything, I didn't have those numbers in front of me to the very last penny. I had to return home, get online to see that info, and call at that point.

Grrr.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the worst part (no, no unauthorized transactions or cash stolen). The worst part was the loss of the little things I always carried with me.

Wallet: a gift from Hope now thoroughly ruined
License: still there though mildly crushed
USA hockey card: still there
CHL game credential: still there
Health Insurance card: a little worse for wear
Various food punch cards: beginning to sound a bit like George but there
HSA debit card: found on the side of the road intact
Aquarium membership : split in half but still there
Yeti business cards: crushed but still with me

LL Bean card: gone
Discover card: gone
Wells Fargo debit card: gone
Costco card: gone

Here is where I began to miss things....

King Soopers card: gone. I know. Just a club membership. But years ago, when I went to Florida to cut wood with Brad and Mac, I had cut the corner from this card to work as a guitar pick while I was visiting my friend Sheila in South Carolina. Every time I used my King Soopers card, I was reminded of the trip and my new and old friends.

Anthony's quote: gone. Written on a Yeti business card with his name on it. My fall back quote that I rely on so much that I always kept close at hand. You may remember this post....

Fibby's quote: gone. Another quote I would look at when I needed a reminder.

Judd Mortimer quote: gone. A quote I have carried on a care-worn piece of paper since some of my earliest days here in Colorado. A quote I cannot seem to recollect at this hour. A quote that I will have to spend some time pondering and remembering.

And that's really what they all are. These things I now am missing. Simply memories, reminders and guides for my spirit when times are low. Part of me says it may be time to find new ones and to let go of the old though they have served me so well over the years.

That's all for tonight...it is way too late at night for any real coherency.

A quiet moment

I noticed a little Honda Element parked along the side of the road on my way to hockey tonight. I've seen cars parked at this location but never quite as askew as this. It looked like they had come in hot and the rear doors were wide open with a sheet spread across the interior. It was empty and no one was inside or in sight.

My heart immediately went out to them as the Element was parked in front of a tiny Emergency Vet clinic where the Vet lives in the adjoining house and is available at all hours of the day and night.

Whenever you see a car parked here late at night, I can only imagine the fear and the pain that must be held inside that tiny red building. But I am also so relieved that a Vet has decided to set up shop, live where he or she works and to be there during my fellow pet owners most trying times.

God bless.

Puddles of light

I was driving home from the rink late tonight and had what I can only describe as a bit of an out-of-body experience.

I was following two other cars and we were spaced out by a few hundred yards. We were headed down a slope so I, at higher elevation, could clearly see the cutoff for each car's headlights. And it was almost as if I was above my car, looking down at all three puddles of light.

Good drivers look outside of their puddle of light. They look into the darkness and watch for movements, reflections and shadows that look out of place. Bad drivers can only see that cutoff of illumination, they cannot see outside of their puddle of light.

I have had several deep conversations with three close friends today. We mostly talked about general things and it was good to catch up with all of them. My most profound conversation was with my Reverend. She and I bounced ideas off each other almost as if we were riffing of each others comments and ideas. I greatly appreciate the fact that each time we talk, I learn something from my younger friend. As much as I may have held her hand in the past, she continues to hold mine as I wander through this life.

All three conversations I had deal directly with these puddles of light. The author Paulo Coelho has written on how most people tend to operate in the small sphere of space around their bodies. They walk with their eyes down, looking only to the next footstep. They don't see the people, the architecture, the landscape or the majestic beauty of life that surrounds them. Instead, they operate step to step and point to point without getting involved in all that revolves around their small orb, their small puddle of light.

We need to always hold our eyes to the horizon. We need to acknowledge those friends and strangers that surround us. We need to acknowledge the beauty that can be found in even the most mundane aspects of life. And, perhaps most importantly, we need to realize how our actions, even in our small puddle of light, can so dramatically affect everyone around us. This occurs in all we do. Our relationships with our partners and friends, how we work with others in the office or on the ice, how we acknowledge the strangers who approach us on the sidewalk and how we deal with life in general. I've been doing my best to hold my eyes to the horizon and I am amazed at what I get to see.

A Class Act

I went to see the Av's game with Sally yesterday afternoon. Ok, ok. I went to see the Av's with Sally yesterday.

As you can tell, it wasn't much of a game. But I noticed this. There were way too many high sticks. Some were called, some were not and some were from the same team. During the second period, one Duck got smoked behind his net by his own team mate. He dropped to the ice and had sprung a pretty good leak.

Here is where the class act occurred. Generally, the frozen puddle of blood is left to the linesmen to take care of. Instead, the Duck's team captain, Scott Niedermayer, stayed behind after his team mate was escorted from the ice and scraped up the blood himself. He helped on of the rink's staff get it onto a shovel. And then he skated to his bench.

Niedermayer didn't have to do this. But he did. He paused and took a moment from his focus on the game at hand to help out the rink crew. It's the little gestures like this that make certain people such class acts. And Scott Niedermayer is certainly one of them.

#44

The world felt different yesterday.

I was able to watch a bit of Obama's speech whilst trying to concentrate on work tasks as well. I think just about all of us here at Yeti were listening or watching.

Cheryl and Molly came over last night and we watched the replay on TV. What an incredibly momentous day. I had tears in my eyes as I realized the history that was playing out in front of me. I had tears in my eyes for those who came before us and were not present to watch what they had helped create.

As my father said, "This is the greatest day in American history during my lifetime." I will chalk that phrase up to one of the most memorable statements he has made.

I wish you all a good morning as the morning sun shines on this new era.

MLK

On this day every year, my Mother would bake a cake and sit the family down at the dinner table to talk about Martin Luther King, Jr. What he meant to her, what he meant to our family, what he meant to the nation, what he meant to the world and what he meant for civil rights. Though the cake was there to celebrate MLK's birthday, I think Mom made the cake simply to hold our attention and keep us around the dinner table a little longer than usual. Those nights were always special to all of us.

Our plan is to continue this tradition with Emi. It will start with brownies tonight (I'm not much of a cake baker) but I am planning to learn to make a cake by this time next year.

During lunch, NPR broadcast the "I have a dream" speech in its entirety. I don't think I've ever heard it completely in the past. I was enthralled and so happy that I had taken the time to drive home to visit with Emi and Hope during lunch. If it wasn't for Hope being sick and asking me to come home, I would have been out on a road ride and would have missed the broadcast.

Tonight, at dinner, we will tell Emiko about a great man who gave his life to improve civil rights in America and around the world. It amazes me that Emi will grow up in an era where it won't be unusual for there to be a black man sitting in the Oval Office. But we will make sure that she understands that while MLK's dream has been realized, we still have battles to fight against racism, sexism, homophobia and religious zealotry.

Before we began even trying to get pregnant, I was concerned about the world we would be introducing to our child-to-be. I know now that our country continues to mature. Emiko was born into a world that has noticeably improved over the past 32 years, we have made it a better place. I am hopeful that we will continue to improve our nation in the great American experiment.

A question of love

I don't have much to say about this...I think Keith Olbermann says it all. But I will say thanks to Fibby for pointing me to this video (and I apologize if I am plagiarizing Nostomania in any way).

The next post

I have had multiple topics run through my head. Some I have started writing about, some I have just turned over in my mind. And I hope they all come to fruition. There is so much to talk about. Emi is becoming more and more responsive to various stimuli around her. An African American has been elected President. DHL has closed domestic operations and laid off how many thousands of people.

This morning I came across this article. Why would it be so interesting to me? Well, being half Japanese may have something to do with it. Having a family who was interned in Canada during World War II may have something to do with it. Ultimately, it is the fact that I know so little about Japan following the war. The fact that I know next to nothing about Hiroshima and Nagasaki. These are things my grandparents never spoke about. Unfortunately, I never asked them about the bombs and our family in Japan at the time. My grandfather always spoke openly about the internment camps and I wish I had the blind curiosity to ask more.

This leaves me piecing together patches of stories to understand my past: American, Japanese and Canadian. Someday I hope I'll know enough to leave Emi with more than I know now.