I’m not sure what we were thinking, but Mark, the super fast, built for running type guy, who’s been running with me almost every Saturday for the last 5 weeks, and I started our 13 mile run on Saturday afternoon.  Earlier on we had tackled an excellent team service project at the Community Harvest Farm in North Grafton, then we decided to meet up again for what would be the longest either of us had ever run, even Mark, the super fast, built for running type guy.

Carie crushed the course, the morning before, and now it was our turn.  And I couldn’t have been more prepared and more scared of anything, including the time I rode the highest, fastest roller coaster in the world at the time at Cedar Point – The Magnum XL 200.  I’m not in the 8th grade anymore, but this was even more terrifying.  What if I couldn’t do it?

So we met at 4:30 pm, and started what we now know as the descent  up to our halfway point.  For that reason, the first half was really easy.  The whole thing was basically downhill, something we might have researched first.  So for 6.5 miles, I thought, we can really do this.  We wooped that run like David jacked up that dang giant with 5 smooth stones and a trumpet.  Then running back it started to get a bit harder.  It didn’t seem uphill, yet my legs were getting tired and when we eventually did get to a part that seemed uphill, I found myself ready to give up.

When I stopped running to take a break, I looked at our gps reading, and we had hit 11.11 miles, and it seemed like 2 more miles would never come.  I felt nauseous.  I felt weak.  I begged for Mark, the super fast, built for running type guy, to go on ahead so he wouldn’t have to wait for me.  He wouldn’t.  He was being challenged too.  The last two miles were so fierce.  Mostly uphill.  All tired.  And to make matters worse, we passed my house at 11.6 miles.  Couldn’t we just stop a bit early?

Finally we arrived at the 13.11 mile mark, and the run was over.  I had nothing left.  No legs.  No breath. Mark, the formerly super fast, built for running type guy and I walked quietly to our cars, looked at each other with faint glances of satisfaction, and went our separate ways.

I drove to my house and sat in my car for a few minutes.  I couldn’t really move and Carie was visiting some family, so sitting in the car just seemed appropriate for the occasion where one can no longer move.  I called Carie, told her I finished, and unfortunately, she was on the other end of what happened next.  I lost it.  For no reason that I know of, and just because I felt like it, or maybe it was because I had nothing left in me…

I just cried into the phone for the next 10 minutes.

A few Mondays ago, I drove with my friend Jay to the basketball game we play every Monday night.  Our team, Barnes Building, had been undefeated, and would be playing a very tough team indeed.  We loosened up as we always do, and I started the game strong, scoring 2 three pointers and a layup in the first 3 minutes.  The problem was, the other team scored about 20 points as we were significantly over matched.  Our team was frustrated and I was among the frustrated.  During one foul called on me, I turned around and mentioned to the referee that he was “clearly wrong about calling that foul.”  He ignored me.  This was not our first altercation.

More frustration set in, and 5 minutes into the game, the ref called a foul on one of my teammates, and I was really upset.  I felt my blood boiling with an intensity probably not seen since the clash between alpha male marine and alpha male car salesman (who I’ve since found out is a trash man).  So the ball had been shot by the opposing team, the foul was called and the ball bounced to me as I headed towards my bench.  In realizing how frustrated I was, I motioned for someone to come onto the court in my stead.  Now I was walking toward the bench with the ball, and I flipped the ball to the opposite ref.

I suppose the referee who called the foul thought in some way I was being disrespectful, because instantly he called a technical foul on me, and stated that, “By rule, the ball must go to the closest ref.”  (this, I believe, is a bunch of crud)  Naturally my frustration got the best of me and I told him he was full of himself and that he must be living in a “horrible call world tonight.”

Then he says to me, “Are you finished?”  To which I replied, “I guess I am.”  At this point, Jay yells at me, “Marty, get out of here and go into the hall.  We need you.  Calm down.”  I knew my control issues were rising, so I took his advice, and walked towards the door.  Three steps away from the door, with my head straight down and my hands on my hips, I chuckle to myself, thinking that I really need to calm down.  Apparently, the provoking ref heard my chuckle, (no one else seemed to though) and called a double technical on me.  I was kicked out of the game.

Furious I left the room ( he wouldn’t talk to me after I made a few comments about his refing abilities) and walked in the hallways for about 15 minutes.  I had become “Angry Marty”.  I was angry.  Then I walked back into the gym, didn’t say a word, and watched as our team played well, but lost.

I guess this post was more about my shortcomings than anything.  I like competition (not a shortcoming), I like to win, and I hate to lose.  I also would (in the flesh, not the spirit) like to give the provoking referee a wedgie, but alas, he will one day be our provoking referee again, and I will need him to not try to provoke me out to the proverbial (or literal) hallway.  One lesson I learned through this however…

Angry Marty is never more productive than Level-headed Marty

Uber genius Gregg Easterbrook (writer of the column Tuesday Morning Quarterback) is one of the few sports commentators I respect, because he says things, not to sound like he knows about football, but to actually sound like he knows about winning football games. Here was his reaction to Sunday’s “crazy online kick call” by Mike Tomlin:

“Tomlin Wins Points with TMQ: After scoring to take a 30-28 lead with four minutes remaining, Pittsburgh attempted an onside kick. On NBC’s “Football Night in the Known Universe,” Tony Dungy said he was “shocked” by the call. That’s the point! The Packers were shocked too — completely unprepared — and the gamble might have won the game then and there had Ike Taylor of the Steelers not recovered the ball 1 yard too soon. Football pundits fell all over themselves assailing Tomlin’s decision, which TMQ thought was a great call. This is another example of the phenomenon that sports-yak types don’t want coaches to make innovative or risky calls (Bill Belichick on fourth-and-2 at Indianapolis and so on). Instead, they want game action to be ultra-predictable — because the commentators don’t want to be taken by surprise. Plus, here were the Green Bay possession results in the fourth quarter: touchdown, touchdown, touchdown. Tomlin knew his defense, especially his secondary, wasn’t performing. The onside attempt made eminent sense.”

This is so not the point of this post, but it about sums it up.

Crossing lines and building bridges seems to be what Jesus was all about:  Samaritans and Jews, friends and enemies, first place and last place, none of that mattered to Him, as long as they were being pointed to His Father.  As for me, sometimes I just want to do my own thing.

A bit over a year ago, I traveled with my friend Steve to Gillette Stadium to see the Patriots play the Steelers.  Being a Steelers fan has its benefits, one of them is having the coolest, manliest colors in the NFL, so I wore my number 7 jersey proudly, along with a turtleneck, a Steelers coat, a Steelers hat, Orange long johns (nobody was going to see them anyway),blue jeans,  my terrible towel, and a pair of work boots.  Loving the Pats like he does, Steve opted for the red, white, and blue of Patriot nation, and the battle was on.

The weather cooled off that weekend just in time for the game, as what had been 60 degree weather turned into rain and 38 degrees on just over a few days.  Our apparel was warm, and our ambition and competitive spirit was high.  Arriving at the stadium early allowed us to find a decent parking spot to pay $40 to park, and this was a good price.  If you’ve ever been to Foxboro, you understand that it isn’t like Boston. There’s plenty of room there, so the owners charge so much for no reason other than their own greed.  This makes me happy I’m a sports fan.  Let’s all cheer for teaching morals and values through sports!

As we walked the half mile or so to the stadium (I suppose a parking a quarter mile away was $60), the drizzle came down like a fine mist, and the conversation with Steve flowed about the game and the big players and our excitement for the evening.  I also asked him in a most humble and wussy way, “Um, Steve, if someone tries to beat me up today because I’m wearing Steelers gear, you got my back, right?”  Steve assured me he would be there.  This made me much happier than the $40 payout I had just given to Bob Kraft and the gang.  When we arrived in our seats, I noticed an unhealthy environment issue around me – When we walked to the stadium, I saw plenty of Steelers fans with their towels and heavy black and yellow clothing and beer in hand, ready for a great game, but when I sat down, my section enjoyed almost all Pats fans.  It was after all, in New England.

I purposed in my heart that I would not overtly be a butt head or an over zealous ‘away team’ fan, so as the game started, when the Steelers had something good happen, I cheered, but did not stand or scream, or even wave the “terrible towel”.  Of course, early on, very little happened to make me cheer, so this wasn’t difficult.   Eventually two opposing things happened to make my night as confusing as a young teenager who just wants to be friends but can’t live without that person (please see your teenage friends facebook status for details):  First, it started raining.  The entire game it rained and rained, until everyone, myself included, felt miserable.  Overpriced hot chocolate from McDonalds didn’t help.  A hot dog, that based on what I paid for it could have fed a small orphanage in Peru, didn’t help.  The rain came down cold and wet and nasty, and eventually pressed through my clothing into my skin like tiny tacks that the devil might sit on, ouch!

Secondly, by the time the game ended, even I, who cheered heartily for the victory the future super bowl champion Steelers pulled out that night (33-10, in case you wondered, though that was so not the point of this post) was happy to be walking back to my car.  The entire crowd moved slowly and almost everyone looked down at the ground, not only because of the loss, but also because of the intensity of the rain at the cold at this point in the evening.  As we walked towards the exit, I felt something happen to me – I no longer had my terrible towel in my hand.  Very slowly I turned around a full 360 degrees and saw nothing. And then, deciding to take an additional 90 degrees for fun, I saw these three guys laughing at me and looking back about 15 feet behind me.  I looked at the ground in that particular direction and saw my towel – cold, wet, and clumped on the ground being walked on by other passerbyers.

Glancing toward the direction of Steve, I noticed he had continued walking and with his hood on, he wasn’t able to see the stressful situation his friend had found himself.  So I looked back at the 3 guys and said to the one that appeared to be the culprit, “What are you doing?”  He was short and probably drunk and kind of reminded me of Johnny Lawrence, the anti-Ralph Macchio from the movie “The Karate Kid.” His response was typical of someone who was angry at the loss of his sports team and had numbers to back him up:  “Whatever I want to do, what are you going to do about it?”

So now I have an ethical decision to make in the midst of all this chaos.  Thousand of people walking all around me, most of which think I’m stupid for wearing the colors I’m wearing, and I’m processing,  Do I say something sarcastic and inspire their ire, or do I stand back and not give in to what they clearly want me to do?  Extra, extra, read all about it, local pastor arrested for inciting an argument after last nights game.  He clearly was at fault because of his clothing choice. After some careful thought in 3 or so seconds I was able to think, I looked straight at them, and said:

“Well, I’m going to walk back there, pick up my towel, and celebrate MY team’s victory.  Have an amazing night guys!”

Someday I will be more like Jesus and use that opportunity, not to have an ounce of sarcasm in my voice, but to point people to the Father.  Unfortunately though, it didn’t happen that day…

and it probably won’t happen in that sport.

Last night my basketball team lost in a single elimination playoff game.  If you know me, you know I like this as much as I like watching my sister in laws dog for 5 weeks.  We didn’t play well, and it was quite frustrating, but there was a bright side, a proverbial lesson to be learned.

One thing I’ve learned in my 10 +years of doing what I do is that you can’t win all the time and sometimes you lose, but how you lose can be just as important to your natural growth as a person than actually winning all the time.  The person who wins all the time isn’t mature, for they can’t understand what it is to feel loss, and to know loss is to grow up in ways that winning can’t provide.  So here is just one of a few  thought I had on losing well fresh off our playoff loss last night:

If you’re going to lose, lose with a great team. I can’t tell you I enjoyed losing last night, but I can tell you it will be that much easier to play again because of the group of guys I play ball with.  There are teams in our league that have killed us in the past, and they’ve bickered back and forth about everything – and the next year they were on a different team.  There were a few years at Fellowship when my predecessor made some hard decisions and things were really lean for a while people wise, which of course led to hard financial struggle.  After feeling the joys of winning before, this felt like losing.  But we were able to walk through those difficulties because we enjoyed working together through those valleys.  Last night’s playoff loss produced a bitter tasting puddle in my mouth, but thankfully I love to play with the group of guys I play with each week, so on to next season.  Interestingly enough, this is also one of the reasons I love being at Fellowship now as the lead pastor.  The last two years haven’t always been peaches, but I’ve walked with some truly wonderful compadres, and this makes all the difference in the world.

Now, if I could just find a bright side to dog sitting, we’d be all set.

Many of us are paid based on how much other people trust us..  This is the way the world works, and it shouldn’t surprise people or be up for debate.  In other words, I make my money by being a pastor.  When I became a pastor, I knew I would get paid, in a sense, not only to lead a church, but also to act a certain way to the people I was leading each week.  Every pastor understands this, including the ones that get caught with their proverbial (and sometimes literal) pants down.

Hollywood celebrities know this too.  That’s why they don’t whine when someone takes a picture of them getting out of the pool or taking their dog for a walk downtown to get a coffee at Starbucks.  Occasionally the paparazzi steps overboard and gets a little crazy, and nobody likes to see that, but for the most part there’s an understanding:  Public job = public eye = access to your life.

So then there’s Tiger, who thinks he deserves privacy now, a fact I don’t dispute, unless he means on something that has already gone public, like for instance, his life.  Listen, I could literally spend all day on YouTube watching commercials starring Tiger Woods telling me I should buy this car or this golf ball, or just turn on the Television for any amount of time before I see him again, and now he asks for privacy to the very people he basically gets a paycheck from?

And then I’m reminded of the inauthenticity of our culture again.  We like to be looked at as perfect, as a shining star, and as a poster boy for good role models in the universe.  Pastors, celebrities, athletes alike seek the approval, not only for our main job description, whether it’s preaching or acting or hitting a ball, but also for our character.  Because when our character is questioned, we are reminded that this is what actually helps us as “salespeople”.  In other words, what qualifies us to do what we do is not so much what we know, but how much we look like we can be trusted.  It is a matter, not of position, but of character.

Make no mistake my friends, the reason Tiger wants privacy is not because he doesn’t have privacy in the confines of his house.  There are kings in this world who I could get to faster than I could get to Tiger Woods right now.  But the reason he wants privacy is so we will forget the major character flaw that he has – that we all have – and once again his empire will be worth what it once was, thanks to his likeable smile…

and our horrible memories.

Monday night I played basketball for the first time since I sprained my thumb more than a week ago.  Also, my team achieved their first win after a lot of close games.  We won big.  It was nice.

Toward the end of the game, I drove down the court and basically walked in the middle of four guys who thought I was going to pass to the outside.  I decided to take the layup and headed for the basket.  With relative ease I went into the air, until a player from the other team attempted to block my shot.  The result was he grabbed my arm and the rest of his body slammed my body immediately onto the hardwood floor.  With no defenses, my elbow and knee hit the floor.  Thankfully I was not hurt, but I was madder than a hatter in Wonderland because no foul was called on the play.  So were my teammates as they quickly came to my defense with screams at the referees, who apparently were oblivious to…well, anything at all.  My emotions were getting the best of me so immediately I asked someone to come into the game for me, and I walked out to the hallway of the school to calm down.

It was great that I had friends to stand for me at that point, but I learned a far greater lesson tonight.  There are some situations in life that have no resolution.  You can get mad.  You can yell.  You can lose your cool or cry or blame everybody.  But the result will be the same.  After the game as we had handily won by 40 points, I calmly walked to the ref who missed the call and asked, “What was up with the missed call?  Did you see me fall to the floor when the guy crashed into me.”  His response was, “I was looking at the ball, and didn’t see the foul.  I asked the other ref and he told me he didn’t think you were fouled.”  And he didn’t have to say, End of story, see you later crybaby.

And that is it.  No resolution.  No playback.  Just me getting hit, no foul being called, and life goes on.  I imagine if the stakes were higher it might me more difficult.  If someone I loved piledrove me into the floor, (figuratively speaking of course) I would probably want resolution or some sort of vengeance, but sometimes it just doesn’t come, and we’re left wanting something more, feeling like God and friends have left us in some way.  If the backstabbing hurts or the gossip cuts and there was nothing anybody could do, how do we feel?.

This happens.  And it makes me sad for all parties.

Did I just see that right?

Thinking of Jesus can be so irritating sometimes. Like in the midst of my heart turning hateful toward my enemies, and His words about loving them, even if they have persecuted me, come rushing into my mind.  For real, that is really irritating.  I was thinking about this a few days ago after I viewed an altercation that came to blows on the basketball court a few days back.  It started normally enough.  Two guys begin mouthing off to one another about a foul or a travel or whether or not Charles Barkley is fat or big-boned, and then it progresses into this full out altercation, complete with balls flying across the room (basket, that is) and fists following shortly after that.  Several guys were more than enough to put a stop to the pugilist fair, but I stayed away as my mind raced to the time I had a brief arguing session with the guy who threw the first punch.

It hadn’t been that long ago, maybe 3 months.  He had just started playing with our group, and apparently he wanted to make a name for himself or something, because it seemed like his mouth aimed at every person he played against.  So I finally decided to stick my words back in his mouth.  Thankfully (as I found out a few days ago) I eventually walked away, and then, as if to pour salt on the wound, I thought of Jesus and those irritating words again:  “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” This is what happened next:

Marty:  Ummm, Jesus, would you mind taking those words out of my mind please?
Jesus:  You should go to Him and apologize.
Marty:  Oh sure, apologize because he has a big mouth, I’ll do that (with a snort).
Jesus:  Have you ever had a big mouth?
Marty:  Every Sunday morning actually, and possibly a few other times, ya know, with my sisters, and maybe a few others times on the basketball court.
Jesus:  So go to him, apologize and Marty, it won’t just help him, it will help you, and the hate you have in your heart right now.
Marty:  But wait, there are people in the world who are just big jerks…
Jesus:  And it’s your personal job to teach them a lesson?
Marty: (walks immediately over to the future Muhammad Ali and apologizes)

Watching the argument take place yesterday, and realizing that after I apologized to said quarreler, we became good acquaintances on our way to friends, I begin to understand that Jesus words are not posted on paper for some uber spiritual, hard to understand reason.  They are there for you and me, so that our hearts stay whole and not ripped to shreds (think Tom Riddle), making future relationships impossible to grow.  They are there because He knows the way the world works, and we don’t.  But still…

It’s irritating sometimes.

Today’s the first full day of my vacation.  Today my neck hurts.  I’ll start from the beginning.

Sometimes I get rolling in something with good fortune, like good health or good circumstances, and feel like I’m invincible, which of course I’m not, unless of course we’re talking about Super Mario Bros. on the original Nintendo Entertainment System.  But two days ago, I had just finished my weekday bout of basketball at the YMCA, and decided to walk around the track a few times.  As I walked, I said hello to a friend of mine we’ll call Kenny (actually, we’ll call Kenny Kenny because that’s his name).  Kenny and I chatted a bit, and I shared with him that I would be going on vacation.  In the course of this story I mentioned that I would be playing basketball the next morning (Thursday morning) before I left for vacation that evening.  Kenny then encouraged me to be careful as I played the next morning because the last time he had gone on vacation, he broke his ankle, and spent the better part of his vacation with his leg up reading archived issues of O magazine (his wife’s a fan, I guess).  After I encouraged him to sneak  a subscription of Sports Illustrated past his wife, I laughed off his warning with some sort of comment about having played basketball at least 4 days a week for the last year, and the odds were in my favor for not getting hurt on this one day before I leave for vaca.
Fast forward 22 hours as I played basketball at the YMCA.  I head down the lane to attempt a layup with two guys guarding me, collide legs with one of them, and fall, knees first into the hardwood gym floor.  “OUCH!”  I exclaimed as I was helped to my feet by one of the defenders.  “Ouch, Ouch, Ouch, Ouch, Ouch, Ouch!
But the real problem was to come, for as I eventually shook off the pain from my knee, I noticed my neck starting to get sore as time went on.  And I sit here tonight somewhere in Central Connecticut with a sore neck and a real desire to connect with a chiropractor for the first time since ‘Nam. Now I won’t be laid up for the entirety of my vacation or anything, but…

I probably will steer clear of Kenny for a long, long time.