‘Life is but a vapor’

So, who do you become in your moment of time?

Our year, 2025 is dying. We are in the last few hours of her life. She has been a great friend to help take us out of the remnant of COVID – at least in most states and into a new and stronger place to live.

She will be passing the baton to “2026” – a younger and hopefully even stronger friend for us. In the biography that we are all reading and writing at the same time, I find it a time to sit in my study and reflect. Perhaps I’m a hard-nosed coach on the outside, but when I think of family and what God has taken me through, I need a tissue. Or two. Or more.

In recent years, I needed a carton of them as I have reflected on the decade that my family has gone through and how we have all changed along the path. In the past 10 years, I have seen four sons graduate from high school and then from college. They have all learned to love God, play basketball and most of the time, put the toilet seat down. Yes, you do have an obligation to teach your boys and old dogs to do that. Ask my wife. Evidently, it’s a pet peeve. Yes… there was an ex-wife too. A chapter well reserved for another column. Suffice to say, it was a part of the family history.

All five of our kids got hitched, which led to 6 grandchildren and turned me from “I’m too young to be a grandpa” to “I can’t wait until the grandkids get here so ‘poohbah’ can spoil the giggles out of them.”

In 2006 I was thinking about taking an early retirement 15 minutes from the ocean. Plans of mice and men caused us to sell the house in North Carolina and abandoned ‘living the dream’ to make the move to Michigan and once again take up residence in pulpit ministry. We exchanged our beach shovels for snow shovels. What’s wrong with us that we needed more challenges in our life?

That first year in Michigan we had 104 inches of snow. Five years later, we saw the record broken when we reached 115 inches. In December we were singing, “Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.” In February we burned most of our Christmas CDs.

I met a best friend there. I was sent to help him write the last chapter of his life. Just about the time we had grown close, he was at my door with a diagnosis of “I’ve had a good run.” I wrestled in prayer for him, but God needed him more than I did – evidently. It humbled me that I was the one chosen to walk him to that last door. I then knew, it was one of the reasons why we had to leave the ocean.

I did many funerals in the decade including the death of both of our mothers within a few months apart and then, a beloved aunts and uncles. Relay for Life all of a sudden wasn’t just a “briefs” announcement in the local paper. I plugged in and became proactive. I am finally learning which colors are for which sickness.

And busy? That was the understatement of the decade. I can remember 2011 Tyler was playing Varsity basketball for Alma College, his wife-to-be, Sara was playing varsity for the Alma women’s team, Troy was a playing varsity for Greenville High School and Sethers was playing on the freshman team at Greenville. Oh, and I was the head varsity basketball coach at Ionia High School. We added it up one time, and between us we were in three different cities, and there was total of 124 games that season, not counting the ones I had to scout.

Come Michigan March Madness we breathed a sigh of relief that, at least for a time, we had a well-deserved break. That’s a polite way of saying, none of us were playing deep into the playoffs.

In 2016 I left the formal ministry to come back to my roots in journalism. It will be 10 years March 15, 2026 since that life-changing shock to my spirit.

On my way to Sioux Center, I had a brief 16-month layover in Minnesota where I was involved with two county newspapers. I have fond memories of some wonderful stories there, watching our youngest graduate from Blooming Prairie high school, the DeLap family living Christmas card and our holiday family basketball tournament… and of course, multiple trips to Chanhassen dinner theater.

In 2017, I flew to New York where we visited Ground Zero. I was honored to do a eulogy for friend and 9/11 hero, Jimmy Lanza who died of brain cancer due to complications from that infamous day. Lanza was a firefighter for the FDNY at ladder 43, engine 53 in Spanish Harlem.

There is much more to that story, but perhaps another time, another issue.

I ran 21 5Ks that year, I coached varsity basketball all summer, was writing for two newspapers, and we had both younger boys with us until they had to leave for college in 2017-18.

It seemed to take a long time, but suddenly, we became empty nesters for the first time. We relocated to take a job at the newspapers in Sioux Center and Sheldon, had multiple eye surgeries and found a town which was more than adequate for a steppingstone to where I am today. It was also a time in my life where I would have to learn to fly solo for a time.

I then moved on to photograph for National Geographic and in yet another chapter I learned about eagles and covered bridges, Civil War battlefields and finally a release to find what I thought was my forever home in Wyoming where, God evidently chose to walk me through a world pandemic in the shadows of the eastern edge of the Rocky Mountains. Not a lot of people to cough on me. You need to check the population or rural Wyoming to understand that statement.

It was a place where an entire county embraced me and cheered me on through the good and the bad… the teaching and the learning… and for the first time in a long time, I found the real meaning of “home.” I also published four books, many coaching manuals and hundreds of sermon notes.

When Thecia came in and turned my head and turned my heart, she also turned my direction to Florida where National Geographic photography was very different from the Rocky Mountains. We flirted with retirement – but chose North Carolina instead and have some gained some very good friends and much needed confidants here working for the Bladen Journal.

Most days we find that success has a stress tag attached to it, but with God – we know that all things are possible. With our music, our photography and our 114-pound American Bulldog – Maxwell, we stay busy and with Thecia’s cooking I stay fat and happy.

I am just three months away from 70 years old and I feel like George Burns who said, “If I had my life to live over, I wouldn’t have enough time.” I have found that I make more sound effects when I get out of bed in the mornings at this age, I need glasses in every nook and cranny of the house and my memory is not what it used to be. I have accomplished much, have won some awards, published some books and won some trophies… all of that and $10 will still only get me a cup of coffee at St. Arbucks. I find it’s not what you’ve accomplished, but who you become that is essential to the human heart.

My memory is not what it used to be. See? I warned you.

I hope you have the time this week to reminisce before the ball drop becomes a distant memory, and I pray you are as blessed as I am. Godspeed Bladen.