JohnnyBGamer

BOY DAD

I am a boy dad. I thank the Lord for the gift he has given me in my son, Wyatt. The gift that sees that a boys energy and curiosity is normal; The gift that allows me to say that yes, boys are different than girls.

Two years into our marriage, Tabitha and I were driving up Palomar Mountain. I wanted to show her where my Grandpa Ayers used to take my brother and I camping. As we wound our way up the mountain, Tabitha started to feel sick. I wrote it off as car sickness at the time. Elevation + switchback roads = car sickness for some. What I didn’t know, is that on that trip to visit my parents in Southern California, Tabitha was pregnant. I was going to be a dad.

Parenting Wyatt has forced me to wrestle with many things in my life.

My Past

My upbringing of growing up in a home where my dad was home 2 days and then gone 2-3 days. I just wanted him home. I wanted his presence. I wanted him without the zombie schedule truck driving demanded.

I am thankful that God brought other men into my life to fill this need. Men like my Grandpa Ayers. He stepped in, for my brother and I, and showed us what it meant to be men. Whether he was reading us Bible stories or telling tales around the campfire; Whether we were hiking with slingshots, flying RC planes, or playing Chess. Grandpa was that escape, for us, from the feminine world of my mom.

I realize now that both my parents did their best… and I’m thankful for the time I had with my Grandpa.

Who I Am As A Husband

There are many stories that I could write here. But the clearest one that comes to mind is of me sitting on the couch, watching TV, while Tabitha is getting herself and Wyatt out the door for the day. Tab was teaching at the time. Wyatt would spend his days with my mother-in-law. I didn’t do a thing, as I watched The Today Show, to help Tab out the door. We were supposed to be a team, and I was failing.

God knew what I needed. Looking back, I am thankful for us having issues with breast feeding. Thankful for the formula, which I once thought was expensive, that allowed me to take on late night feedings. I miss those times of bleary-eyed snuggling. Him watching me, with those blue eyes, in the darkened living room.

Being a dad has forced me to find maturity as a husband. Praise God.

Who I Want To Be As A Dad

At the end of the day, I want to be a dad who:

Listens – I wanted to be able to talk about whatever Wyatt is into, even if that means talking about Pokémon like a scholar.

Plays – Having a family game night, playing through a video game co-op, I want to play with my son.

Reads – Whether reading the Bible or work of fiction, I want my son to hear my voice/see that men read aloud. I miss hearing my Grandpa Ayers read Bible stories.

Prepares – I want to have those difficult conversations. I want to be a dad who talks about puberty, sex, and dating.

I am a boy dad. I am thankful for my son.

However, I’d be happy being a girl dad too. 🙂

At the Table – Pandemic

Pandemic is a cooperative board game that requires players to take on different roles/coordinate their moves in an effect to treat infections/find cures for four different viruses. At the end of each player turn, cards are drawn which cause the viruses to spread even further. Will solid teamwork win the day?

Years ago, Tab and I had a bad experience with Pandemic. For an entire game, we were told what to do:

“Use your special move to do this.”

“You should move here to stop the yellow virus from spreading.”

Instead of being allowed to wrap our head around the game’s unique mechanics, we were compelled to be good soldiers and follow orders. This experience made Tab and I never want to play Pandemic again… and so we didn’t. We avoided the game like the plague.

Side Note: Our experience, I later found out, was not unique. In the board game world it even has a term: “Quarterbacking”. Quarterbacking occurs in cooperative board games when one player dominates the group by telling everyone else how to play.

Pandemic — *Behold, the board! And the many virus cubes of evil.*

Last year, one of my big pushes was to introduce cooperative board gaming to our family. I wanted less of us all working against each other and more of us working together to overcome the board. So we played a bunch of cooperative games such as:

Castle Panic
Forbidden Island
Jaws
The Mind
The Game Card Game

*From our recent family playthrough of Jaws.*

For Christmas, I decided to ask for Pandemic. I thought maybe playing the game with just Tab and Wyatt might redeem Pandemic in the Hall house. I was right! We had a great time stumbling across the board, as we tried to figure out exactly how everything worked. By the time the world was imploding with viruses, we lost the game. But even in our defeat, we are all eager to play Pandemic again.

Final Thoughts: Castle Panic is our favorite family cooperative game right now. We love the way it plays. However, Pandemic isn’t too shabby. Funny how one bad experience soured the game for us. I am happy to have brought Pandemic back to the table for another go.

From Across the Net – “Crew Dragon Launch Escape Demonstration”

This is so awesome!

From Across the Net – “Coronavirus: Photos From Wuhan Under Quarantine”

Though these photos are a few days old now, they still show a scene many of us have only seen in movies. The Chinese city of Wuhan looks like a ghost town due to the Coronavirus quarantine. The photo of the super market, the way it stretches out (the market looks huge, almost as if a mirror is making it look bigger), is but a glimpse of a much different culture. Yet life goes on, and residents exercise in the street (see photo in slideshow linked below).

Check out the photos here

Change My Default Setting

While reading this morning, I caught this towards the end of Galatians 1:

21 After that visit I went north into the provinces of Syria and Cilicia. 22 And still the churches in Christ that are in Judea didn’t know me personally. 23 All they knew was that people were saying, “The one who used to persecute us is now preaching the very faith he tried to destroy!” 24 And they praised God because of me.

We live in a culture that is skeptical. Daily, we are bombarded with news cycles which are hyped-up and presented as entertainment. In our communities, we bump into the super skeptical–the Moon landing never happened!–. We live in a time where our discernment muscles are worked to a fatigue. This causes many of us to be swept along with the cultural tide, bobbing along the surface of noise.

If our world is skeptical, Christian culture can even be more so. I think back, a few months ago, to Kanye West’s “supposed” conversion. Twitter was a mess with Christians initially calling his new relationship with Christ false. How many times have we done that ourselves with those in our own churches? I am not calling for blind acceptance here, we need to be wise. But I can’t imagine how our modern Christian culture would react to someone like the Apostle Paul. The churches in Christ that were in Judea behaved this way (verses 23-24):

23 All they knew was that people were saying, “The one who used to persecute us is now preaching the very faith he tried to destroy!” 24 And they praised God because of me.

Which makes me ask:

Do we praise God when we hear about a brother or sister coming to Christ?
Is our first reaction one where we are skeptical? Taking a “we’ll just see how this turns out” approach?

Personally, I want to react with awe and wonder at what God has done and is doing. I am not 100% there yet though. Being honest, I am skeptical most of the time. Nevertheless, I want God to change my default setting.