C'mon God, you know me. I know me. I know you know me. I know you know I know me. So why?

I finished that last post and I realized I hadn't said everything that was on my mind.

My little guy Sam is starting to talk a lot. The window to his personality is open, and it's a lot of fun. Of course, sometimes his utterances give us cause for concern. The other day he yelled in a grating, high-pitched voice, "Don'ta put it out wif your boots, Daddy!" This outburst caused a shiver down my spine and deep sense of dread and foreboding. No. Please. Not MY son.

Our littler guy Josh is so interesting. He smiles so much; I sometimes feel like I don't deserve to be his dad. He's pretty impressed with himself because he can now sit up by himself in his crib. He doesn't get happy about it anywhere else. Not on the floor, in the tub. But if he's in his crib, and he's sitting up, he's going beserk.

Sometimes I look at my life and what I've got: this small room with two kids, Becca, and all of the uncertainty and disappointment outside of that room and I wonder why I have this life. Would an all-knowing God really give this kind of reward to someone like me? It sounds trite, but I ask that question because I know myself well, and I'm not really able to pull the wool over my own eyes. And according to the rules of life I believe in, I'm not worthy of this life. It's not like I have this perfect life either--an anti-Brady Bunch mixed family that tries its best but doesn't always pull it off, loved-ones in crisis, financial uncertainty, and an expanding waistline. But my little room in this world is so safe, cozy, and comfortable.

So at least once every day, I have no choice but to stop and think: "I hope you're who I believe you are. I'm pretty sure I know you, and so I sometimes want to ask 'why?' But I'll just say 'thank you.'"

9 to 5 and 10 to 2

That's my new work schedule . . . and it is not fun. But I am more professionally satisfied than I have ever been. You see, I started my own business. I am a publisher now. It's exciting. I've never really been "excited" about my professional career before. I've had jobs that I've enjoyed. But there was never excitement--because there was never fear. Fear is now an integral part of my life, well, my life as a "provider" at least. There's so much uncertainty about what I'm doing that it's kind of cool. I'm out there on the edge. Boom or bust. I could do well, get rich, "build something." I could also come away with nothing but some business credit card debt. Now that's exciting . . . and insane. More later . . .

The things you are willing to do for a friend

I've been trying, without much luck, to stay in touch with my friend Cameron since he moved to the north of the valley and I moved to the south. Maybe I'm stupid to try, but dang it, I love the guy. So I am going to blog again, because it's a way to stay in touch with my hoodoo hunting friend.

I'm not sure my blogs will be terribly interesting, but I'm going to try. And I've realized something. Blogging is a really good way to hone one's skills in the craft of writing. So I'm going to try hard to write well. Not that it matters to anyone or that anyone will read it. It'll be mostly for me.

It's almost over . . .

I'm here sitting through the last class session before the "foreign business excursion" that marks for all intents and purposes, the end of my MBA program. I can't believe I've been doing this for two years. When I started this program, my son was two months old. He is now over two years old. For two years I've said goodnight to him on Monday night and said good morning to him Friday morning.

The trip I'm about to go on is going to be totally awesome. We start off in Japan. We're there for four days, during which we visit Kyoto and Tokyo. The coolest part is going to be our visit to the Toyota plant in Nagoya.

After Japan, we go to Beijing. We'll see the Forbidden City, the Great Wall, the Summer Palace and the silk and pearl market where a string of pearls goes for about $20.

After Beijing we go to Hong Kong, which is going to be awesome.

And then we go to Thailand for four days to finish the trip. What a great way to end two years of hell.

The only downside (and it's as big as Cameron's dirty underwear pile) is that my family won't be with me. I haven't been away for more than a few days before. It's going to be tough. None of the exotic foods I'm going to eat are going to taste as good. I guess I'll just have to choke down the fresh sushi in Japan and the cocker spaniel-sized lobsters in Thailand. I'll be thinking of them.

Cameron, do you want me to bring you anything?