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goodbye Coe, you were my best friend

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Yesterday I said goodbye to my long time friend, confidant, and traveling companion Coe, my black lab mutt for the last 15 years.

Back in ’97 my friend Darren went for a run in the country roads of Altamont area and came across a puppy in the woods that wanted to follow him. Darren kicked her & told her to go back wherever she came from, but she didn’t listen she just followed along. She made her way to camp where everyone fell in love with her. I tried not to mess with her because I knew what would happen. Well, it happened anyways. At the end of our weekend I had gone to get some flea & tick wash (bathing her in a wheelbarrow), fed her some food and had her riding shotgun with me back to Tuscaloosa.

I named her Coe (Co-ee) spelled after my friend Mike Coe, who had been murdered the prior year. Mike was a great friend to me & I wanted to remember him. Little did I know I was putting in his place my closest friend for the next half of my life.

On the way home to Tuscaloosa she threw-up (which was a trend she would keep up for a year or two of travels) looked at me with an “I’m sorry” look and continued on. She was Shawn & mine’s first dog (outside of dogs living with my parents). We had a fun time in Tuscaloosa teaching her to catch frisbee’s and sticks. She taught us how to un-stuff anything that was plush. She also showed up how to take the tops off of coke bottles, rather impressive.

Fast forward to today. Coe & I have been all over, camping, hikes, football road trips, epic east coast road trips, summer missions camps, getting lost many times, chasing many squirrels, 5 different homes, a few girlfriends, a courtship & marriage, a new child and many many friends of the 2 & 4 legged kind over the years. She has been with me through a whole lot of life.

In the last few years she began to develop tumors all through her body. We knew this day would come eventually because of our decision to not intervene in hopes of making it better, but chancing that an end could come sooner. She took a downturn over the past weekend. She was unable to get up the steps from outside (something she’d had trouble with for some time) but more than that she wasn’t eating much. She became really weak. We knew time was short & weep constantly this week. I gave her a bath Wednesday evening and placed her on a soft ‘crimson tide’ blanket my mom made for our two dogs a few years back. She passed away the next afternoon on the blanket.

It’s tough to as Brooks has taken to love Coe. He was pulling on the gate to the outside yesterday calling for her over and over again. She was laying passed away in the kitchen while I was in tears standing next to her. Today he was looking out the bedroom window that looks over the backyard calling for her. “She’s not there buddy..”

I’m having her cremated so that I can keep her with us. It’d be weird to keep her with us without doing the cremation process. I’m emotional, but not ready to go the weird guy spot yet. But, I’m going to miss my friend.

Coe, you were the best dog a young man could ever have. Thank you for sharing your life so generously with me.

Created a little Coe Richardson photo set that I’ll be adding some old photos to in the coming weeks & months.

Haunting Images of Tuscaloosa

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I remember it really clearly. I woke up one morning at 5:30am for work and was there by 6am getting tennis courts ready when my sister called me freaking out “Are You OKAY?” “What’s the deal?” I asked back. “Are you not watching tv?”.. “No?.. I am at work.” “You need to turn on the tv.”

So I did..

My area of Alabama was on the national news as helicopters flew over areas of Tuscaloosa County all the way up to Birmingham. An F5 tornado dropped down in our area during the night. I knew we had a bad storm, but this?..

My buddy Darren came down from Nashville that weekend, Shannon came up from Auburn & we did what we knew to do. We went and volunteered however we could. This was when I had haunting images of tornados capacity embedded in my soul. We went out to an area and from as far as I could see to the left to as far as I could see to the right were wiped clean of any standing structures. No homes, trees down or stripped bare, foundation slabs, crap all over the ground.. People once lived here..

Today, I am unable to concentrate on other things as I am trying to comprehend what all happen to the place I called home for a great part of the decade of the 1990’s. So far, many of my friends still living in Tuscaloosa are accounted for. Still a few waiting to hear from.

As I can tell this tornado started somewhere close to downtown and then moved almost directly down 15th street where you had the likes of Central High School, the bowling alley, the mall, the golf course, and many eateries. Not to mention a huge assortment of apartment buildings & houses were scattered on or nearby 15th street. The tornado seemed to continue all the way up to Birmingham area (some 35-45 minute drive).

 

This guy probably regrets at the tail end of the video becoming an impromptu storm chaser. Gets way to close to a tornado than I’d ever like to be.

photos taken from Jason Clark Facebook album

As I know Red Cross is accepting donations via text for Alabama tornado relief. Text “REDCROSS” to 90999 for $10 donation.

NOTE: As I do have a youth worker contingent who is probably wanting to help, let me share words from my experience from our Nashville Flood almost one year ago. If you want to come help, just come and help. Don’t lean on people to do logistics for you as a short term mission camp does. Things are way to fluid & the people there have many pressing issues. Don’t try and schedule a mission trip out of this, this week or next. Wait until assessment groups can pull together and put in systems to be available for long term relief. Your hearts are in the right places, but in ways, the structural set up and needs of a youth community arriving (logistics of housing, a ‘what are we going to do’ etc.) on the scene are too much for people affected in the onset.

Why YouthWorker Circuit?

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In the past year I’ve been getting a number of questions asking, “What are you up to these days?” It has been a rather loaded question as I’ve been leading up to this point. I’ve been doing some side work, which has been fun and viable, but all the while wanting to put something like YouthWorker Circuit together. But why YouthWorker Circuit?

Well…

We believe that youth ministry is a calling.

We also believe that youth workers don’t have time to do it all and are probably distracted from the parts of youth ministry that they love by the parts that they don’t. And that good youthworkers walk away from their calling every day because they feel under-resourced, over-tasked, and alone.

So we thought..

What if there was a place where you could have instant access to quality Wesleyan curriculum and program ideas? What if there was a resource that prompted you with inventive organizational ideas, guiding you toward better, more personal ministry?

What if there was an opportunity to regularly share genuine, live conversation in community with likeminded youthworkers from across the country?

So we have done..

Open Source Helpfulness #pcn11

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One of the best kept secrets in Nashville & probably around the world is the “unconferences” known as BarCamp & PodCamp. Erin & I went to the very first BarCamp back in 2007 at the Exit In. It was a great day of learning for both Erin & myself, from iPhone app development, corporate blogging, twitter, artificial intelligence, marketing, the emergence of Facebook.. wow!

But it is more than that to us!

What was, and is, best of that & the on going experiences of the PodCamp & BarCamp’s here in Nashville is the open source nature of the helpfulness that is embraced by the mass of creative and technical thinkers & practitioners. From sitting in with some great people at these events to having breakfast or drinks on a monthly basis talking shop, family, or events. I have come to love the sharing nature that is embedded within our towns tech community.

I’ve done what I can to give back, sharing some of my different slants on technology & culture in a few speaking gigs, put in time volunteering & show up in supporting by presence. Through this I have made some invaluable friendships and a host of innovators to lean on for guidance and advice. When I had my transition from local church vocation into the larger consumer pool it was my friends of this community that provided some of my greatest tangible support.

How bout you?..

If you come to Podcamp this March 26th at Nashville’s Cadillac Ranch (right on Broadway) you might not have this immediate connection that I have benefited from over the last four / five years. But you will have the opportunity to plug into a community of people that has a ethos of not just being a Source of good knowledge & practice, but also very Open to meeting and sharing with others, and offering Help all along the way.

I’ll be there at all costs!

I will actually be doing a speaking engagement in Memphis the Thursday & Friday beforehand for my youth ministry church leadership type vocation. I am really excited about that. They wanted me to sit in on a number of panels with some very high profile leaders within the church the Saturday of the event (which happens to be Podcamp day), which would have been great exposure for my new transition. But, this community is a part of me that I cannot make any other decision but to be there. So I am driving through the late evening and then getting downtown as early as I can to, 1. get a good parking spot, 2. make sure that I do not miss a thing at this years event.

Getting some Ashes to Start Getting Over Myself

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Yesterday marked the beginning of Lent for us in the Christian faith. I had a bit of an odd experience to begin my Lenten pilgrimage. I went to church…

Now, I am a regular church goer. But this time around I went to my friend Jody’s midday church service at Saint Joseph of Arimathea in Hendersonville. Beyond Jody, I don’t know anyone else that goes to his church (except his wife) and being that Jody is the minister it was a really odd feeling being in a strange church land.

Saint Jo’s is Episcopalian which I generally enjoy, but also frequent infrequently. Just enough to forget some of the rituals that bond that community. I was glad this go round that Jody put scriptures onto the bulletin & that the midday service didn’t have any singing. That meant I only had one book to worry about juggling.

Jody preached the gospel message on Matthew 6, as any good Episcopalian priest would.

“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

His message circulated on standing out, reflecting God’s glory & not our own ego. I couldn’t help but think that I stood out at the church. It is a smaller church community than what I am used to. I’m sure people wondered..Who was this visitor person. He didn’t quite get right all the ups and downs. Sorta knew the liturgies.

This was my frame of mind going in and out of midday service.

So I came to realize.. I have a lot of myself I need to get over. Shall I give myself up for Lent?