For the sake of space and attention span, I wanted to make my post about your blogging age a 2 part series.  Who knows…it may even morph into a 3 or 4 part series depending on comments received and overall feedback.

Before I get to addressing some things mentioned in the comments of part 1, I want to continue the thought presented concerning age and how we present ourselves.  This is going to address the idea of age and credibility.  Now for some of you, this will be where we officially part ways.  In fact go ahead and get your delete key finger warmed and ready because this might just cause you to stop reading and run to your friends list and angrily decide to remove me.  And you know…that is ok. 

So here is the advice to some of the younger bloggers again out there.  Don’t blog as if you know all there is to know now about love and relationships when you have yet to live long enough to know enough about either.  I am getting concerned when I see how many “youngens” are blogging and giving advice to others about how to have a good relationship or how to understand love etc.  If you are a teen, you have no idea what love is yet.  Love for many young people is still a phase or crush.  Having a BF or GF in high school is not a qualifier for telling others how to have a “long-lasting” relationship etc.  There are stages of love and relationships that you have yet to even come close to experiencing.  You don’t know what it is like yet to be at the 5 year stage of a marriage or, in most cases, even a relationship yet because…you HAVEN’T BEEN ALIVE LONG ENOUGH YET. 


(intermission as to allow my younger readership time to go un-friend me while Jeopardy music plays in the background)

Ok…if you are still reading, bless you because you are mature enough to listen to me explain more of what I mean.  I am NOT SAYING that someone should not blog about their love or their relationships or share a hurt feeling etc.  I am NOT SAYING that at all.  I am saying that age and experience does matter when someone is trying to give someone else advice about love or marriage or relationships in general.  For example, if you are 18…you really should have been seriously dating someone for no longer than about 2 years assuming you started dating at 16.  Hopefully you have dated more than one person in those 2 years as well.  Now with that assumption, you are equipped to help someone who is just starting to date with advice on maybe how to start etc, but you are not experienced enough yet to tell someone how love really works and how to make a relationship last.  Sorry if that upsets you, but it is fact and it is something you will see as you mature and get older.  Some of us who have been married for several years still look to those older than us for marital advice and for examples.  That is how it works.  That is how you learn.  You don’t yell up the age hill at 18 or so and try to tell a married couple how to better get along or how they can make their marriage better.

Again…recognize your real age and don’t try to be an expert already in the eyes of your readers.

Now this brings me to addressing again something I tried to bring out in part 1.  The most negative responses I received when I discussed the age we portray by what we blog came from those “younger” bloggers.  It was fascinating to see their reaction.  Those who were negative took my post as slam against anyone who was a teen or in their early 20’s.  I kept going back and I tried to see where I somehow said or implied that the younger bloggers should be overlooked or discounted and I couldn’t find it.  But then one particular commenter made me connect the dots to an issue that actually corresponded with my main point.  I am finding a relationship between the young people who responded negatively and arrogance mingled with a dose of disrespect.

(again intermission as to allow ample time for some more friend culling…cue music)

I am still amazed how some 16-21 yr old folks claim to be authorities on a subject when, at best, they have thoroughly studied a subject for only 4 years.  Now again…I am NOT SAYING they are unlearned on a topic or are not skilled, but it seems that the internet and blogging has spawned a new breed of “experts” that can claim to be experts without having to show it through either experience or proven work. 

Here is a way to detect such a person.  They like to throw out the word ignorant a lot when confronted with someone who disagrees with their scholarly assessment.  They claim a “higher understanding” on a subject because of their “years of in-depth study” in their discussions.  They often resort to verbal abuse when someone questions their aptitude.  Sounding familiar?  Have ya met a few of those out here?  These new “Mensa” members have even called others a “kiddo” who was 19 years their elder and made sure that the other person knew that have completed “years of research” at the ripe age of 21.  Some have said, “Old people are being taught by US (younger) because we are more proficient in the ways of today.”  Uh…what???  That is a direct quote by the way from a younger proficient scholar on this blog site.

Now again, this is NOT SAYING that those younger are not intelligent and smart and may know more on some subject than some “older” folks, but only arrogance and lack of respect makes someone claim it outright without knowing anything about the other party in the discussion. 

Advice to the younger crowd again…learn some respect.  Quit vaulting yourself into the category of the intellectually elite and try to show some respect to those who have seen more years of life than you and understand that wisdom trumps intelligence any day of the week.  Young people…you want to be treated with respect and given credibility?  If so then quit with the indecent responses and comments and know that there are plenty of incredibly gifted and intelligent aged members of society who will still respectfully disagree with your own ideology and belief system.

A quote from a favorite movie of mine…”Here endeth the lesson.”

(Edited Friday 8:56PM CDT)  For those interested in seeing what I wrote about in action...please reference the comments.  It did not take long. One friend down and counting...

You don’t have to be very old before you realize that life comes in stages.  Now I am not necessarily talking about stages such as infancy, childhood, adolescence etc.  I am more referring to the different stages of adulthood.  As adults, we make career choices which then involve “where do we live” choices which is really a stage of life.  We all go through it.  Some handle it better than others while some seem to let that stage be the straw that breaks the proverbial camel’s back.  Both those who handle it well and those who don’t often fail to realize that it is one of many stages of life that they will undoubtedly face, time and life permitting.  Those that handle it well often face another stage that is a source of stress and worry down the road of life.

It is hard to put a time frame on these stages because they really vary from person to person and couple to couple.  Couples have faced the stage of do we want to get married and some make it to the next stage of marriage while others are not willing to face that stage of life yet.

My wife and I faced that stage almost 18 years ago.  It was a stage of life that came quickly after another stage, which I will call “the mortality stage.”  Most know that Doctors, which came after we went through a stage that only lasted a few days, but felt like an eternity, have called my wife the miracle girl.  She defied modern medicine by living through a 107-degree fever for over 24 hours after a brain tumor started to bleed on the front part of her brain.  Most of you know that part of our life.  It was a stage that we made it through and then soon embarked on the stage of marriage.  What we didn’t realize is that stage would then lead to another stage several years later.
 
As time moved on, we went from the honeymoon stage of marriage into the normal stage of marriage which has its stresses and trials and issues that couples just need to realize and face (which is a subject for a future post).  It was during the normal stage that we discovered that we would not be able to have children of our own due to the damage caused by the tumor.  As we were facing that stage, we decided we needed something to direct affection towards which led to us owning 2 Old English Sheepdogs (for my new friends, look at my screen name).  This new stage brought us some semblance of what it must be like to be parents since there was feeding duty, poopie duty, babysitting requirements etc.  The stage of dog ownership really helped us deal with the issue of not having children.

Well…we also knew that dog ownership meant that we would most likely face a new stage of dealing with their loss after a few years (we estimated 10-12).  We are now into year 12, almost 13 and we are faced with dealing with that stage at this present time which is more difficult than we imagined and I am realizing it is tied to an inevitable next stage.  Over the past 12 years, we attempted to introduce a new stage to our life again when we started the adoption process.  Without going into the long story, that stage was thwarted when we discovered that my wife had breast cancer.  Needless to say that then created yet another stage of life and one with its own stages.  We look back on that and are so thankful we had our 2 dogs because they were there to relieve our minds of the worry and stress that comes when a loved one is in a fight for her life yet again. 

But now here we are again, facing yet another stage of life.  As our last dog of 2 is showing signs of not being with us much longer, we are facing our own version of the empty nester stage.  This brings to mind again that we do not have our own child.  I am struggling with clearly seeing what this next stage holds for us.  Some words come to mind when I think about what is ahead; sadness, loneliness, fear, apprehension etc.  I am not ignoring these feelings nor is my lovely wife.  We both know and recognize this new stage approaching.  It is causing us to again ponder the possibility of adoption.  We recognize that there are children that need a good home, but we also recognize our age and are pondering the possibility of adopting an older child.  Counselors and psychotherapists will tell you that adopting an older child brings its own set of challenges so that is adding to some of the feelings and emotions.  It breaks my heart to know that there are so many older orphans who need a home, but are being overlooked because of their age etc., so we seriously thinking about the what-if’s of adoption again.

We have made it through every stage that we have been dealt and we know we will make it through this next one as well, but I admit that we are a bit weary. We know that stages are just a part of life and we all have our different versions and no one is immune from what life brings so we both will press on and see what life brings as we embark on our newest adventure.

Thanks for listening.

I hope my memory holds out long enough to be able to remember this past 4th of July weekend for quite some time.  First...the weekend marked the 20th anniversary from the date that my wife and I started dating (now going on our 18th year of marriage).  We started dating at a large Church event that I had traveled to attend in a small town in Oklahoma.  The event is one of two large Church gatherings that take place over the July 4th holiday every year within the Church that my wife and I are a part of.  This year...we attended the one in Springfield MO where we both had a chance to see and visit with friends and family that we had not seen in over 12 years.  A lot of is look different but the relationships and friendships are still there.

Our weekend plans culminated with the fireworks party at our home.  I mentioned in an earlier post that my wife loves to plan and throw parties.  She has a gift at making everything just right and, combined with my gift of gab, we make for some pretty fun hosts. We had originally planned on about 30-40 guests.  We had told everyone who was invited that they could also invite whoever they wanted which a lot of folks did.  We were thrilled at the end of the night when we sat down to recap the party (wife and I) and we counted at least 76 people that came for food and fun.  This was the largest gathering we had ever hosted and we had such a good time. 

I also mentioned the other day that I was raised in California which meant we had limited access to "fireworks" depending on which county you lived in etc.  The "fireworks" that you were allowed to have were only those that stayed on the ground and did not blow up which meant they were fairly boring outside the pretty colors you might see spewing in the form of a fountain.  Well...welcome to Missouri where you can pretty much have any kind of firework that you can think and make for some loud "BOOMS!" 





A friend of ours in attendance is an excellent photographer and she was able to capture some scenes from our party including some of the types of fireworks that we were able to set off. 




 
We are still high on a cloud from our weekend and hope that you all had a great and safe time as well at whatever fun event you were able to attend.