Time For My Close-Up

I have this theory about America. I believe that in a day and age where there are media connections instantaneously taking place world-wide, every person has exactly one chance to be on national TV. Some people use their one opportunity to wave like a goofball on Good Morning America. Maybe this is you. Others, like myself, have been only a few footsteps away from being on America's Next Top Model in Atlanta. Maybe you've heard about this. Still, there are others who have no idea that national television awaits them just moments away until they find themselves candidly on it. Maybe this is someone you know, say a relative you snuck onto America's funniest videos... not that I've done that with any of my relatives... except Heather...

Let's say this fame does await us around the bend- I wonder what it will do to us. Imagine, at any moment throughout the course of your day, what happens when a person barges in your life and gives you the opportunity to change the course of everything you call normal? What do you do when opportunity knocks on your door suddenly and asks you to make a decision, change it all now or leave it to history? Just think, if you go for it, then you have the opportunity to possibly be something great, but at what costs? What are the costs others have to pay for your own glory? Is it worth it? Have you ever had so many questions barraged toward you at any one setting???

At any rate it is difficult to even comprehend that level of intensity, until this week that is. I started thinking about just how grand something like that would be as it presented itself in the weirdest, most unique of ways. It's all quite a long story but the long and the short of it is, I started asking these questions and here I am writing about it. Anyways, let us imagine for a moment that I got on Good Morning America tomorrow or even better, Larry King Live's 50th season debut. Seriously, is it me or does he look more and more like he is a robot and less and less like a human being? Anyways, imagine if you were on one of those shows talking about your life, the things you would change in this world, and bantering about the latest groundbreaking news. Say you had this level of fame, how would you be different? I had to ask myself this question and firmly decided that I would be the different celebrity! I would be concerned with real matters like giving to charitable causes, working to keep public health up, and write my own magazine that would describe how to fulfill your life to the best of your ability- and then I realized I was describing Oprah Winfrey.

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It was also then I realized I just described every Miss America contestant, every Oscar winner, every Emmy nominee, every reality TV show, and everything that has to do with anything concerning the media.

I like to think that the media means well at times. I'm sure they do and this week I was even able to meet some of these people who truly do want to make a difference in the lives of others. However, I know myself better than anyone and I know that my motives can be purely selfish. So I did some thinking and decided the kind of celebrity I should be. I don't want to be the one that has to have a TV show, a spot on Larry King, or even Good Morning America, however if the opportunity presents itself, I'd love to do all of those things. I don't want to be the celebrity who is concerned with charity and gives donations on a daily basis, however if I could, I think I would do both of those things. I don't even want to be the kind of celebrity who has his own magazine or writes cover stories that reach the nation, however that would be one of my greatest dreams-come-true. I think first things first, I need to be the kind of celebrity who gracefully talks to someone who needs encouragement and I don't need a camera there to watch me. I think I need to be the leader who gives not just charity, but part of my own well being to support and encouraged my loved ones and the people I respect as a token of gratitude, not an investment. I think I need to be the kind of celebrity who would act just as selfless on camera as he did off camera.

Moral of the story is, my dear reader, is that this world is full of our audience. May we realize that it shouldn't take a camera in front of our eyes to understand a whole world is watching and waiting to see what we do and who we are from day to day. So here's to living up that quota. Lord knows I fall short of it constantly but I pray I work towards achieving this selflessness more and more each day. Here's to learning how to be a giver when you're in front of a camera and when you are behind the scenes. Life is a stage show and we are running it 7 nights a weeks. And here's to those life changing phone calls you get and emails you might receive in your lifetime- may they be as unforgettable and memorable as can every be. For what is a memory but those moments in life that cannot be described by words...

KB

Social Experiment No. 1

So I sat down at my computer this evening and started to conjure up something to write about.

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Then I see this article on the web about how Facebook.com has announced they have reached over 300 million users, almost as much as the American population. I thought to myself, "Dang... there are a lot of people wasting their time on Facebook!" Then I realized that I was logged onto Facebook when I said that!

So, being unmotivated to write this week, I started pondering what I could do with this information. I wondered how I could twist this into another one of my interesting life lessons and be happy with it. But this week I want to do something new. I want YOU to write my blog. Think you are up to the task?

One of the greatest problems with listening to inspirational messages is that few people ever actually do any of it. I remember my freshmen year in high school having to listen to slick-nosed Tony Robbins telling me how to invest a nickle when I was in high school in a C.D. account and become a millionaire by my late 60's. Needless to say, I thought he was full of crap. Inspiring crap as it was, I never did any of the things he suggested. So here I sit, a soon to be broke, college freshmen with no C.D. account and no big-smiling infomercial sales pitch, just a blog and a laptop. Anyways, I realize the tendency to spectate from afar and agree to what is being said, however I also realize the tendency to veer far far away from the invitation to actually take action. Don't worry, my sales pitch is relatively harmless but if you actually do it, it has the potential to alter your life drastically- like Shamwow (see figure 2).

Seeing as how nearly all of America has a Facebook account (and if you don't have one yet, you will, just see), I propose we do something with that information. I dare you this week to go into your friends and look for somebody who you added just because they asked to be added or you knew them vaguely but you all never talk- a "courtesy add" if you will. Find one of these courtesy adds and send them a personal greeting that says something like, "Hey, just wondered how you are doing!" or "Hey bud, haven't talked to you in a while... what is new with you?" Why do this? Because truth is we live most of our lives like this in real life. We see someone we kinda know and we might do the quick head nod to acknowledge their presence, but very rarely do we go out of our way to show love for someone we know despite potential awkwardness. When life calls for final curtain, I assure you that our final thought on this earth will be about who we reached and who reached us. I pray that in my life, both of those lists are chalk full of people who blew me away with the way they lived. But there is no way to know who will be on those lists if we don't start loving other people right now. As the Good Book puts it, the love of God is loving other people (1 John 4:7-12).

So here is your chance to start that. Here is your invite to do something that will make a lasting impression. Think about it, if you never talk to these people on your facebook, why on earth did you add them? I am looking at my friends and am starting to build quite the list of people I need to reach this week when I get on. So I better get cracking. Here's to hoping you will do this experiment with me. If you don't, then enjoy the video link to the Shamwow gag. If you do dare to try something different, something out of true love for people and not obligation, then I pray your world will be rocked in the good way (and feel free to mention my blog to these people you are talking to (: ... I like free advertisement). Also, if you do decide to try this with me and experience an incredible story or mend a friendship or have another amazing report, send me a message (via Facebook of course) and let me know if it worked. And here's to Facebook.com- 300 million and counting.

KB

Ivan Denisovich

It is a little known fact around the grueling halls of any American high school that the worst assignment you will ever be forced to endure will be reading Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. You may disagree, to which I will cordially mock you and question your sanity. All I remember about the book is a crazy broad with a cake covered in cobwebs. It is essentially an epic- epically painful to read. At any rate, after that long 9 weeks of analyzing, dissecting, and excavating every facet of this horrific and abominable experience, I prayed that nothing like it would ever have to graze my path ever again. And being a man who believes in prayers, I was sincerely let down to learn that my prayer was not answered.

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is by far the worst thing I've ever been forced to read. It is not only drab and monotonous rubbish, it is unfortunately self explanatory. It centers around a man named Ivan, who turns out to be less interesting than learning the original key of parlay-pro in the legal system. This poor deadbeat is locked away in an equally boring prison somewhere in the mountains of Russia. His daily dilemmas include finding out what happened to all the rice, wondering why it's so cold, bugging people about the rice, freezing his butt off at work, complaining that he is hungry for rice, etc.

The author, one revered Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, was banished from Russia and housed and protected by America. He thought it was because his book was so uproarious and rebellious when it came to the overthrow of communism. I think it is because his book was so bad, the Russians couldn't stand to claim him as his own and Americans don't read in general, so we had no problem with him. The only good thing about this wretched book is that it is smaller than Great Expectations. Beyond that, it is worthless to me.

In keeping with the tradition of my blog, I often wrap things up with a clever quip or moral that hopefully challenges the comfort of the way we do things and beckons us to become better individuals all around. Today, I shall void this tradition and simply start by warning you to never read this epic failure. It will be the worst decision of your life, in my opinion. If I must conclude this with a point, then I shall.

Our lives are boring. When read in 3rd period English class, life is utterly and completely boring and pointless. At this moment, I am dreading going to English and listen to another dissertation on the epic struggle of the Russian people under the reign of the USSR in this bloody Siberian camp. Yet this book, to some boring person out there, means something. It apparently had an impact with someone somewhere to care enough to publish it. Maybe they just like watching seniors in high school suffer, but maybe they had a wild hair and actually enjoyed this story. It is hard to believe, but it is unfortunately, most likely, true.

No matter how boring or pointless you see your life, it is still important to someone. It is extremely pivotal to somebody out there. So you may feel down and out, feel utterly useless and distraught about how uneventful or distasteful your life may be, but I guarantee you it is untrue for two reasons: 1) Nobody's life is as drab and mind numbing as this guy and 2) people are watching you, and yearning to be a product of your actions. Some may want to be like you; some may want to be unlike you. Only you can decide which way to live your life. You may feel like you are held in some prison or annex that seemingly dictates your life, whether it be work, school, fear, or whatever else troubles us these days. But you are no more a prisoner of these things than you want to be a prisoner of these things, and in Christ, all things are made new and there is freedom. The important thing to remember is that we are all being observed by somebody out there. So decide how you wish to live, free or imprisoned. Decide what you want people to see when they look at your life and see what you are all about.

Me, personally, I want to be unlike this Ivan fellow. He sucks. So take it from a guy who still has a fourth of the book left to read- live life exemplary of Christ and exemplary of life itself. Here's to learning how to live and learning that 1940's literature from Russia by a depressing Russian is never fun.

KB

The Desert Eagle

Thank God for the Second Amendment. The founding fathers knew how important it was to the American goodwill to blow crap up every once and while- it relieves so much stress! I am, as you might tell, an avid fan of the right to bear arms and an enthusiast when it comes to anything gun related. My father and I are into looking at what new guns we can purchase and what kind of targets we can destroy. Our forte' are hand guns. I have shot just about everything from dingy .22's to the big boy handguns. So when the gun convention came to Roswell this year, my father and I jumped, skipped, and hopped our way into a host of NRA, weapon wielding cowboys, always good for laugh if you're into the Jeff Foxworthy Redneck stuff. We saw some stuff we liked, other stuff we didn't l

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ike, but our appetite was whetted by what we saw towards the end of the show. The Desert Eagle, .44 magnum, semi-automatic handgun. The barrel of this weapon is the size of my forearm and it weighs several pounds. I added a picture of a smaller model just to give you an idea of the capacity of this thing. It is huge, no doubt about that. It is powerful, no doubt about that. It is impressive, no doubt about that either. So we bought it.

Out at the range, we pick up the bullets for this thing (about the size of my little finger mind you), and loaded them carefully, almost reverently into the chamber. I stood back as my father gleefully sauntered up to the line like he was Clint Eastwood with less hair. He raised the gun up high, squeezed the trigger gingerly, and let the first shot rip. Standing 20 yards away, I could feel the sound wave hit my chest. Of course, my dad and I look at each other, started grunting loudly in approval, and danced around the desert like a bunch of weirdos, but I've never seen anything quite like it. Then it was my turn. I raise the weapon, squeeze the trigger, then remembered seeing fire explode out the side of it, a cartridge fly out, and peg me, flaming hot, right between the eyes. In pain, I knelt down, let out a cry of pain, then a cry of joy, another cry of pain, then some more joy. Best thing I've ever shot. Before the day was done, the gun had blown up cans, Clorox bottles, and sheared through an iron spinner target with ease. Indeed, a man's man must have built this weapon.

So yeah, I know a little about guns. I also know how to spot a wanna-be, gun lover a mile away. They think they know stuff about guns, but really, they are morons. I don't mean to be insulting... well, kind of... but I also mean to make the point of how idiotic it is to not know what you are doing. I grew up with a reverence towards guns pounded into me at a young age. Little 6 year old Kyle was out there with his dad, shooting piddly guns and squinting when it went off. My dad would show me how I should hold it, aim, and especially not squint when I shoot. I respected the gun and knew what I was doing even then. So now, when I see a couple of homies buying a civil war gun at a gun show with the intention of shooting it, I call them morons since if they knew anything about guns, it's that you don't shoot a 100 year old revolver... EVER! It's dangerous to not know what you are doing more than anything else.

But isn't that how we end up doing things sometimes? We think we know our P's and Q's about things when in reality, we rarely ever keep ourselves in check. How foolish. When we run headlong into a crowd knowing absolutely nothing about what we believe, we end up hurting ourselves more than we hurt anybody else. Basically put, it's getting cocky. "I don't need to read a Bible every once and a while; I already know all the stories." "I don't need to listen to this message; I know what the speaker is gunna say anyways!" Then we aim, we squeeze the trigger, and hope that the shell doesn't explode in our face or worse, misfire and hit something or someone we shouldn't have hit.

Guns need to be cleaned, oiled, tended for, checked over, and be in hands that know what they are doing before they ever get fired. The irony is, though, that when we get so confident in the way we do things today, we hardly ever focus on why we do them or who we do them for. You clean a gun so it won't jam up or misfire. You go to the range to make sure your aim is straight and your gun isn't broken. You take the gun apart to not only clean it better, but ensure the parts are working correctly. Yet translate that to our lives, and we hardly ever clean, inspect, or secure the parts of our lives that need it most. We overlook our everyday routines of praying or giving unto others because they are so basic and mundane, we disregard the necessity of maintenance. If you want to see an example of this in the Bible, read 1 Samuel 5-7 and see how the Israelites got cocky and lost their most precious treasure. They figured since the Ark of the Covenant, or God, was winning all their battles, they would place it out in front of them and not even fight. When the Philistines came running by, lazy Israelites farting around, they grabbed the Ark and took it with them. The Israelites lost sight of what was important, they didn't keep their hearts in check and lost nearly everything in one, fatal swoop.

So here is to never letting your guard down. No matter how mundane things may get, it is never worth losing everything over to just let your guard down. Here is to understanding how vital everything we do in Christ is. We should never lose focus on the prize, never forget the sacrifice made for us. Also, here is to Bubba Gump at the Roswell Gun Show, the one with the police baton and brass knuckles- you are weird and should not be allowed near guns.

KB