Fix It
My house smells like dog pee. Not as much as it used to, but the scent is still there. It’s all because of this guy: my dog The Roc. 
He can’t really help it. He’s an old, small dog with an overactive bladder. If I don’t get home every few hours during the day to take him outside, he can’t help but to use the living room as his personal toilet. I would do the same thing if I were him.
If you were to visit my house, you might get a whiff of the urine smell when you walk in the door. I’ve had the carpet cleaned and I have an air freshener that mists a fresh laundry scent every thirty minutes. If you have a pet though, you know that when you have pet odor sometimes it never truly goes away.
But I don’t really notice the scent anymore. I’ve gotten numb to it. I’ve spent so much time trying to clean it up and not getting any results that I’ve resolved myself to the fact that the smell ain’t going anywhere.
We often grow comfortable with the commonplace filth around us. When we see others living in filth and doing disgusting things, it is alarming and offputting. If I were to walk into someone else’s house and there were puddles of pee on the floor and an overwhelming stench, I would be disgusted. But when it’s your own mess you don’t mind it so much. I’m densensitized to it in my own house since it’s my dog and I see it all the time. I don’t worry too much about ever stopping the problem – I scrub it up, put some air freshener on it, and hope no one else notices since I don’t really notice anymore.
I think we do this with sin in our life. When we see someone else living in sin we either pity them or are repulsed by them, and we usually feel superior to them. But when we have to confront our own sin we don’t really do anything to fix the issue. For many of us there are sins that we’ve been dealing with for so long that we become numb to them. We do our best to clean up the mess, put some air freshener on it, and present ourselves back into the world as if nothing is wrong without addressing the real underlying problem. (more…)
On The Outside Looking In (Part 2)
When last we spoke in Part 1, I was telling you a couple of stories. One was about customers who used to come to the Movie Gallery store where I worked trying to return movies after we closed. These customers had five days to return their movies but still they waited until the last minute and ended up outside the store, banging on the class, knowing they would have to pay late fees. The other story was about my wonderful dog Maggie and how she’ll go outside to use the bathroom and often come back covered in mud and dirt and other gross stuff. She’ll tap on the door but we won’t let her inside because she’s not clean.
If both of these stories ended there, they would be pretty disappointing stories. Really, who wants to hear about people having to pay late fees for their foolishness, or a dog who’s stuck outside and eternally filthy?
Thankfully, both of those stories have second halves.
Storytellers
Name The Books From These Famous First Lines from Sporcle.com
How well do you know the first lines from these famous stories? What’s your favorite story? The Great Gatsby? To Kill A Mockingbird? Gone With The Wind? Lord of the Rings? Harry Potter?
There are so many great stories out there. Perhaps the better question is what makes a great story? What are the elements that are common to each of these great stories that make them so timeless and beloved?
“Stranger Than Fiction” is an excellent movie that explores what makes a great story by telling the story of a man named Harold Crick (played by Will Ferrell). Harold Crick is an unremarkable man living an uneventful life before he realizes that his life is a story. Like, literally. He begins to hear a voice narrating his every action. What’s worse is that pretty soon the voice begins to speak of Harold’s imminent death.
At first, Harold thinks he must be going insane. But soon he realizes that he has a unique opportunity before him. Harold Crick has the opportunity to view his life as a story. And what an invaluable opportunity that can be.
Take a moment to think about the life that you are living. Think about your everyday routine. Think about the plans you have set for your life. Think about the past week. Think about yesterday. Now try to think of your life as a story. (more…)
Scar Tissue
The Mark Of My Foolish Pride
The first few days of the school year are always a little awkward. We’ve all had our fair share of awkward moments at school. Some of us have peed our pants, some of us have worn our clothes inside out. Some of us have done both (like me). But look closely above my left eyelid and under my eyelash (pictured above) and you’ll see a small scar, the mark of the most embarrassing (and nerdiest) moment I ever had on school grounds.
