Hats

I haven't posted something in forever. I'm not naive enough to think that shook your world, but here we go again. Remember getting a new hat? I know that when Brad and I would get a new hat it was an art form creating the "perfect" hat. We would rubber band the bill around a baseball over night, soaking the brim in water so it would dry in a perfect curve. The inside front of the hat always had that plastic layer that would make the hat stand up flat, we hated that, so we removed it. Painstaking process of cutting out the plastic, but you had to be careful because it was very easy to poke the inside of the hat and cause a hole, thus ruining the hat. Then there was the front tip of the bill, sometimes it looked good all frayed, other times we took a lighter to it because it looked better scorched a little. We would literally beat the hat into the wall, against brick, whatever we could do to break it down so it fit perfectly.

The reason I bring this up is because I often think about how many hats I wear "job" wise. In a given day I could be a teacher, department head, DC coordinator, Mentor to new teacher, team leader, middle school ministry leader, high school ministry leader, app salesman, father, and husband. That's a lot of hats. Each one is unique it's in own way and brings both joy and stress. I spend a lot of time mentally beating these hats into a comfortable fit. I want to bend them to fit my life better, because I live with the idea that "I'm needed" to do this job. Then today I woke up from a nap and read a blog by Steven Furtick. The blog basically said "stop kidding yourself that you think you're job is so important that the bigger purpose of life, God, can't be, and won't be carried out". You know the hat that I wear the most? sleeper. 1/3 of our lives we will be asleep. Why do I put so much stress on myself over these many jobs I hold? Because in my mind the stress comes from me believing what "I" do matters the most, instead it should be I do my best and God takes care of the rest. If you haven't seen the movie Facing the Giants I recommend it, especially if you have little kids. Ignore the poor acting and focus on the point.

Line from the movie

“Grant, I heard a story about two farmers who desperately needed rain,” the man said, “and both of them prayed for rain. But, only one of them went out and prepared his fields to receive it. Which one do you think trusted God to send the rain?”

“Well, the one who prepared his fields for it,” the main character replied.

“Which one are you? God will send the rain when He’s ready. You need to prepare your field to receive it.”

Dad

Fathers are special. I'm not trying to lift up my own status or diminish the mother, because the mother is in a league of their own, above all. The father is someone that for centuries people turn to, whether it be advice, conquest, authority, and so on. The father for a long time has been the "name" of the family. To discuss a persons lineage was to discuss who their father was. Talk about responsibility. Your family name could be Mudd, pun and incorrect spelling intended, based on samuel mudd. John Q. Adams once said "Who we were in the past, is who we are now". I'm beyond proud to be linked to my father Jeff Wise. I couldn't have asked for a more honorable man as a father. Well respected, admired, enjoyed. Just a few adjectives people use to describe my father. Growing up my buddies called him "The Dean" and "Coach" titles of respect. They feared him but not in scared way, but because they knew of his expectations he held for us all. Letting down the Dean wasn't on our to-do list. One of the most respectable qualities of my father is his ability to be humble. Brad and I never grew up to stories his football success in high school or college. He could of put us to sleep at night with stories of the "wizard" running up touchdown totals for the college of Wooster, instead he chose to encourage us and push us. I know fathers that talk up their smallest accomplishments, and yet my father always changed the subject when his career was brought up. We had to pry information out of him and our grandpa. I could honestly list all the great ways my father created a name for our family. He chose family over career, staying in Tiffin to be an assistant when he could have been a successful head coach anywhere he chose. He modeled a responsible father growing up, being fiscally responsible, loving our mother, taking care of our home, and providing everything we needed. He modeled a christian home, raising us in a church, encouraging us to live like Godly men. My father isn't perfect, no one is. The best part is that my father didn't hide behind his pride. If there ever was a mistake made, he taught me the mistake he made and showed me the correct way. I'm proud of my father. Proud of my lineage. I hope someday my daughter will look at me when she is turning 30 and think have the good thoughts I have about me, as I do my dad. Love ya dad. I still remember the sand castles, the leg shaking trap, the wrestle matches, the football games, the hours of you catching my pitches and throws (even when I did hurt your hands). Thanks for being my dad even when it was hard.

How to say "The"

You won't find me trying to argue for the firing of Jim Tressel, likewise, you won't find me arguing that he wasn't wrong. The level of wrong as far as I can see would result in a simple "Hey Jim, don't do that anymore, ok?"...instead we have THE OSU turning their back on the man that has more principle than the collection of remaining college coaches. Right now, coaches like Nick Saban, Gene Chizik, and other big programs are scrambling to close the mouths of those whistle blowers that could make them the next JT punchline. The problem of student athletes selling their gear for cash or body ink has zero impact on me. I think they're stupid, but it's their loss down the road. Should a coach be fired because of their lack of nostalgia? Not at all. What fired JT is the simple fact that when it came time to choose loyalty to players or loyalty to what is right, he chose wrong. In a parallel to the final scene of Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade, when the guy chose the wrong holy grail and evaporated into dust, Jimmy T did the same. At the moment when the NCAA asked him in December "did you know about this?" Whether he knew what he was doing or not, he should have told the truth. At that moment when he said "I didn't know about it" blammo evaporated grail style.

His loyalty to the players killed his chances of making it thru this storm. My problem isn't even the loyalty, it's what was brewed before that. It's the false empowerment gave to players like Pryor. His comment in the SI article that bothers me the most is when TP says "I can get anything I want" referring to gear such as shoulder pads, etc. Players like Pryor became bigger than the program, and that I blame Tress for. I don't blame him for any wrong doing other than lying and allowing #2 to become an ego factory. I watched a practice once when Pryor walked out 20 minutes late, nothing snapped up, and didn't even join his teammates for stretching. I looked to Tress to rip his face off, instead I was left expecting more. Instead I watched a lackluster superstar give just that type of effort all practice, never to be talked to. Maybe the machine was already rolling and the scandals were years deep by that point, but that day my OSU pride died a little inside of me because I expected more. Today I sit a broken OSU fan, unsure of what I grab hold of. Before today I could tie myself to the fact that "We do things the right way, the winners way". Now we are looked upon as "every other program". When things started to go south for the program I expected more. I expected more from Tressel and to do what was right no matter what consequence it had. I expected more from the University to stand by their guy. I expected more from players that love him and come to his defense. Instead I am just slowly losing a great source of pride.

So, I think all of ohio state nation needs to start learning how to pronounce word "the" because we aren't THE Ohio State University, we are just the.