Do Something

It has been several weeks since I have made a shopping trip with the kids.  I kept saying “Well tomorrow I will take them” and tomorrow would become the next day and the next.  So yesterday I set the goal to actually get up and do something…. do what Magnolia Son was all about.  So I took two deserving young men shoe shopping and stopped along the way for haircuts.  They were appreciative and thanked me several times and each time I would remind them that this was possible due to Magnolia Son and our mission.

After getting off work and going home, I began thinking of how easy it is to become complacent in work, in family… in life.  If we had 20/20 vision we would probably look back on our life and regret our complacent decisions not the mistakes we made when we were actually doing something.

Christian was rarely complacent.  Always moving toward something, setting goals and working toward them.  Failing at times but getting up and often turning mistakes into successes.  This was best displayed when he had been on the tugboat for about two years.  He called me one morning upset at himself because he had “messed something up” (maybe using more descriptive words) while tanking a barge.  I told him it probably wasn’t that big of a deal.  He said “No, Mom it IS a big deal.  It’s a really BIG deal.”  After a 15 minute crash course on how you tank a barge I was still confused but I told him to take a deep breath, take his time and think about what he did wrong and how he could fix it.  Being a worried mother I called several times over the next few hours to check on him but didn’t get an answer.  Much later he called and sounded like the world had been lifted off his shoulders.  He said “The office said I couldn’t fix it and not to try.  I tried anyway and made it right.  Now the guys at the office want to know how I did it.”  I could just see him wearing a cocky grin feeling very proud of himself…. yes, Christian was the complete opposite of complacent.

The tragedy of life is often not in our failure, but rather in our complacency;

not in our doing too much, but rather in our doing too little;

not in our living above our ability, but rather in our living below our capacities.

Benjamin Mays