Hmmmm

So, I'm not going to try and pretend to be an expert or anything, but since my wonderful Jen is much more knowledgable and much more associated with learning disabilities and that type of thing, I have more of an interest in this than most, which gives me a reason to vent for a minute about Autism. For some reason, it's becoming the new 'thing' with Hollywood. That's all fine and dandy, as long as they're trying to help something, I guess that's all we can ask. The problem is that they're trying to cure Autism. It's not a disease people! You can try to find out why it's increasing in occurrence, which is probably because they now have a better idea of what it is, and people who used to be diagnosed with something else in the past are now labeled as autistic.... and because there is more of it. Find the cause, sure... or find new ways to help autistic people function in society, great, but don't try to 'cure' it, as if there is something wrong with that person. Like Rick says, there can be accidental parents, but no accidental children, you can just as easily say that there are no accidental autistic babies. God made those kids with autism, just like he made me to not be built for professional sports. There's a reason, maybe we won't know what it is in this lifetime, but there's still a reason. It just makes me angry that people treat it as a horrible affliction, like it's something to feel sorry for. I'll tell you what, in my limited exposure to that population, I've seen that people with autism are not looking for us to feel sorry for them, or try to cure them. Sometimes they need our help, sometimes they seek it, which actually doesn't show weakness. Picture this, you, as a "normal" person are having difficulty doing something that 99% of people around you are able to do with ease. You think it would be easy for you to ask one of those people for help? One could actually make a point that people with disabilities are stonger people than the rest of us. If we have kids with learning disabilities, which is somewhat likely since the occurence of it in Southern California is higher than anywhere else in the country, it will be challenging, frustrating, angering, it will make us cry, it will make us want to give up at times, it will make us fight, it will cost us money, it will change our lives more than we can imagine, but it won't make us want to cure them, of fix them.

Now, if they don't have disabilities, I expect them to be professional baseball players, and when they are 2 and 3 years old, and they cry when I drop them off at Sunday school, we'll be ok... we won't have to be in every class they're in, to make ourselves feel better..
but that's for another post.

still running

Well, last Saturday went 7 miles. Actually, I think I went a little over it. Don't really know for sure, since myself and the person I was running with at the time somehow missed the turn we were supposed to make, and after running a while past the 6 mile turn around point, we figured we had gone too far. Still doing good, I get frustrated when I have to walk, because it's not from muscle fatigue, but from stabbing pains in my shins. I call them shin splints, which everyone else would call them, except that the physical therapy doctor didn't see it that way.
Me: I got these shin splints, ice, ibuprofen and raising them, right?
Doctor: Who diagnosed it as shin splints?
Me: Me, I have had them before, cross country and track in high school.
Doctor: Probably not shin splints then.
And that was it. Thanks Doc! So, I ice, and ibuprofen, and raise them up.
Still trying to raise money, and still quite a ways away. We don't want to have to spend it ourselves, but if it comes down to it, we will, but $6200 total for the two of us is a lot.
If you are new, and feel like donating, we'll gladly accept, the links are on the right!

Runnin on empty

Well, today, as we inch closer to the marathon, training went 6 miles. It seems pretty far when running it, until I remind myself that I'll have to do just over 4 times that in January. Actually, running the distance is nothing compared to trying to raise the money. There's still time, so I'm not going to harass people yet, but as it gets closer, you can bet that I'll get a little bit more pushy about it. It is fun to be able to run that far... I'm not the fastest, at all, but like Jen says, it's not so much a race. But actually, it is, it's a marathon. I just don't want to be last, since there's no way I can be first. Pretty fun!

Oh bee-utiful

Well, after 33 years of success, I have failed..... I have been stung by a bee.
Was down at the beach, just walking and hanging out in the sand. I found a little bee wiggling in the sand, probably in the last stages of life. For some reason, I have found many bees in the sand dying or dead, it's like that's where they to to die or something. So, to help this little bee out, I dropped a rock on him. I felt very little-boy-ish, but also very humane, like putting down a horse with a broken leg, all at the same time. About 10 minutes later, I felt a sharp pain on the bottom of my foot, yup, the bottom, so I turned my foot over to see what it was, and there was a little bee, stinger planted in my foot. Now, I don't know if it was the same bee or not, and really, it doesn't matter, the irony of the whole thing is quite funny to me, but the sting, and moreso the end of my streak of bee sting freedom, well those are not quite as funny.
Lame.

A teen-cy bit scared....

Jen and I were talking the other day, about our petrified feelings about someday having teenagers, and the possibility of them turning away from our beliefs. I had the thought that when kids are brought up going to church, and it's all they believe and have learned to believe, that once they get into teenage years and college years, and get exposed to other thoughts and beliefs, do they have more of a tendency to turn away than someone who wasn't brought up in the church? And what makes the difference between someone who grew up believing, and never stopped believing, but in the middle part kinda turned to their own ways for a little while, like she and I did, and someone who grew up believing, and then at some point decides not to believe? And how many people just decide to ignore their deep down beliefs because being a "church person" seems too scary because of what kind of a person they think they need to be? I guess basically it makes me sad to think that there are people who don't actually investigate and make an educated decision about their beliefs, that they just believe what they believe by what they've seen other people do, or how they act. I mean, either there is a heaven and hell, or there isn't. If there isn't, my life will be spent trying to better myself and better the lives of people around me, and trying not to only think of myself. If there is, than all I do is for something that is so much bigger than me, that I'll be rewarded for later.
Thoughts disorganized? That's me!