Billy Coffey

storyteller

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“We’re all gonna die!”

September 21, 2010 by Billy Coffey 19 Comments

image courtesy of photobucket.com
image courtesy of photobucket.com
“We’re all gonna die.”
 
So said my daughter tonight in the sort of operatic voice she normally reserved for when she mistakes the neighbor’s barbeque for a forest fire.

I listened as well as I could, though I’ll admit she nearly scared me to death at first—Die? Why die? What happened?—but then I managed to get the entire story. She’s eight now, my daughter, an age I’m quickly beginning to see as Not So Young Anymore. The world is opening up to her, and not just the good stuff, either. She’s learning that not all of life is so wonderful and that the future doesn’t always seem rosy.

It was strange at first that what bothered her so much wasn’t something that would happen, but something that already had.

“Do you know how the dinosaurs died?” she asked me.

“No room in Noah’s ark?”

She looked at me like I was the kid and she was the parent. “It was a meteor!” she said.

“So why are we all gonna die?”

“Because there’s more,” she said. She waved her tiny arms around her head as if she were trying to beat them all away. “It like happens all the time.”

“What does?”

“They hit our planet and kill everything.” She slumped down on the sofa beside me and sighed. “One could be coming now.”

“I hope it waits until this ballgame’s over,” I said, “because I really want to know who wins.”

“I’m being serious, Daddy,” she said. “Aren’t you scared?”

I told her I wasn’t, and that seemed to satisfy her enough. Nothing else was said about things falling from the sky. Mission accomplished, I would usually say. But the fact is that I kinda/sorta lied to her when I said I wasn’t scared.

Because I kinda/sorta was when I was her age.

The truth is that the history of our fair world isn’t fair at all. There have been five mass extinctions in our planet’s history, the last of which occurred just over 70,000 years ago after a volcano almost wiped humanity from history before it had even started.

Just weeks ago, two meteorites passed within just a few thousand miles of Earth.

Global warming.

Nuclear war.

Solar storms.

Superflu.

You get the picture.

I remember when I was about my daughter’s age hearing a preacher on the radio saying he’d received a vision from God (which, heard through his Southern accent, sounded more like GAWT) that the world would end in exactly seven days and thirteen hours. I can’t recall who the man was, but I remember the panic he caused among the few who actually believed him. Me included, of course.

I sat out on the hood of my father’s truck that night and waited for Armageddon. Didn’t come, of course. And even though predictions of The End will stick on me like a burr from time to time, I learned my lesson that day.

I learned that no matter how hard we all may try, none of us can keep the bad away. We can lessen its impact, we can fight it, we can even turn some of it into good, but the fact remains that it’s still there and it’s still coming. The world’s full of trouble, and whether that trouble comes from earthquakes or madmen doesn’t really matter.

If that sounds submissive, I didn’t mean it to be. My daughter fell into the very trap I’ve found myself in so many times—she was worried about something she couldn’t influence. In the age of twenty-four-hour news channels and the internet, that’s something we can all struggle with sometimes.

But I’m older now. I can let solar storms and the superflu go.

It’s the other, personal forms of destruction I want her to worry about, and that’s what I’ve learned to concern myself with more, too. Because it doesn’t take a meteor or a volcano to ruin our lives, especially when we can do that just fine on our own.

We can give in to pain rather than get through it.

We can surrender to temptation rather than fight it.

We can yield our dreams rather than cling to them.

Those are our choices to make, those small decisions that perhaps have no influence on the world outside but make all the difference in the world inside.

That’s what I want my daughter to know. Because planetary destruction is in God’s hands, but self-destruction is in ours.

This post is part of the blog carnival on Brokenness, hosted by Bridget Chumbley. To read more, please visit her site.

 

 

Filed Under: blog carnival Tagged With: brokenness

Into the world

August 24, 2010 by Billy Coffey 28 Comments

image courtesy of A Simple Country Girl, used with permission*
image courtesy of A Simple Country Girl, used with permission. For info on available images, please click on the image.
It was a bit of a downer that my kids were left without a sitter on their last day of summer vacation. As a teacher, my wife’s summer had already been over for a week. Grandparents were available, but not without a shuffle of schedules. Aunts, uncles, and nephews were also committed elsewhere. That’s when daddy stepped in.

I took the day off from everything—work, writing, and the computer. “It’s your day,” I told the kids. “We’ll do whatever you want.”

Their smiles were genuine and laced with only the slightest bit of mischief, just enough for me to start to worry about a day of alternating wrestling matches and tea parties.

“Don’t worry,” my son said. “We’ll have an adventure.”

Okay.

The day began as every day for the past week had, with the three of us staring through tiny holes of mesh around the butterfly cage. Mommy had ordered caterpillars the week before, which had arrived in little plastic containers of mud and goo. According to the directions, the caterpillars would find their way to the top of the containers and form cocoons, at which point we would transfer them to the cage and stand guard. We watched for three days until the butterflies emerged. Then we had a birthday party—brownies for us, sugar water sprinkled on purple flowers from the backyard for them.

They were fed and loved, oohed and ahhed. They got the prime seat in front of the television so they could watch cartoons. My daughter sang lullabies to them at night. “They’re like my kids,” my daughter said. That was true; she cared for them as such. And the butterflies grew. Their wings grew and changed from a dull gray to bright orange, and they began flittering about the cage. It was time to let them go.

That was one item on the list for that day.

There were also plenty of others.

There was wrestling, yes. Much. And I drank so much imaginary tea that my stomach imaginarily sloshed.

We readied knapsacks for school and checked off their needed supplies.

We took in a matinee movie. Not at the fancy theater down at the mall with the noisy video games and the fancy seats, but the cool one downtown with the creaky wooden floors and the old movie posters.

We visited the school on the way home to say hello to teachers and pitch in to help mommy.

We took a walk around the neighborhood and chased imaginary pirates.

Summer had died. I think we all knew that. And I think we all knew that last day was also its funeral of sorts, a way of saying thanks and goodbye and see you again some day. But rather than mourning summer’s passing, we toasted it. We spent out day eating food we shouldn’t, laughing uncontrollably, pondering the mysteries of the world, and trying to suck the marrow out of every minute.

That’s how every funeral should be, I think. A celebration. A see-you-again-some-day.

I don’t mind bragging—they had fun. Much fun. In my son’s words, “The funnest day ever.” I like to think I had a part in that.

But the truth is that I had fun, too. I like having my kids around. I like the fact they’re nestled in a life that is stable and loving and good. I like knowing where they are, and I like knowing that place is safe.

That night after dinner, the four of us took the butterfly cage outside. My son unzipped the top and pulled it back, while my daughter clothes-pinned it to hold it open. We sat for a few minutes and watched as the butterflies crawled to the top and perched themselves there, slowly opening and closing their wings.

“It’s okay,” my son whispered. “Go!”

We all watched as one by one they did just that, leaving the home they loved for another, bigger one. One full of wonder and delight mixed with danger and darkness.

My daughter sidled up to me and put her head on my shoulder. “I wish my kids could stay here,” she said. “I know they have to go into the world, but I wish they could stay here. Does that make sense, Daddy?”

“More than you know,” I said.

This post is part of the blog carnival on Children, hosted by Bridget Chumbley. To read more, please visit her site.

Filed Under: blog carnival Tagged With: butterflies, children, letting go, safety

Why I got a tattoo

June 29, 2010 by Katdish 46 Comments

tattooThe first rule I ever remember learning was maybe the most important—always keep your promises. The reasoning behind that rule was basic. In the end, all a man has is his word. If we say we’re going to do something, we’d better do it. Simple as that.

I’ve done my best to fulfill my promises over the years. I’ve succeeded most times. Failed some, too. Others have had to be put on hold until the circumstances were right. One of those promises was one I made to myself, one that had been put on hold for seven years. I was determined to keep that promise. Last Saturday, I did just that.

I got a tattoo.

I realize that may sound a little ridiculous. Childish, even. I assure you that neither applies in this situation. My tattoo was serious business, the product of much thought and introspection. It wasn’t done on a whim, and it isn’t, as Jimmy Buffett so eloquently put it, “A permanent reminder of a temporary feeling.”

When I first sat down to write Snow Day, I did so with two thoughts in mind. One was that if it was good enough, it would get published one day. The other was that it could very well give a lot of people what I was so lacking at the time, and that was a sense of hope in their lives.

The odds of getting a book published were not lost to me. I knew what I was getting into and what would be involved. So I promised myself that if I managed to hang on and if God just so happened to smile upon me, I’d get a tattoo.

It’s easy to lose chapters in the story of your life, easy to let the ones already written slip away and into the wind while you’re writing the here and now. I didn’t want that. I wanted to make sure that didn’t happen.

And I didn’t want a run of the mill tattoo, either. I wanted something unique to me. Something that told my own story.

I wanted a Native American feel, since they’re in both my blood and my family tree. To the Native Americans, every person has their own totem, an animal that acts as a protector and guide through physical and spiritual worlds. Knowing your totem is an innate process, they say, and a sacred one. Though my own beliefs don’t really allow room for spirit guides, I’ve always been drawn to wolves. To the Native Americans, wolves were the pathfinders, the protectors of wisdom and tribe. Loyal and strong and independent. Always watching. At home in the mountains and the wild places.

If God would have made me as an animal, it would have been a wolf.

I wanted a reminder of those long years spent trying and failing, too. I didn’t ever want to forget the faith I found or even the doubts I had, as both served to make me a better man. Our hopes and dreams don’t nearly define us as much as the manner by which we journey toward them. I needed to make sure I could remember that. Which is the reason for the designs around the wolf. Each design represents a year I spent waiting to get published. The small ones are years that went by quickly, when hope was abundant and doubt was hiding. The long ones are the years when I almost gave up.

There are a lot of long ones.

One question has been asked the most—did it hurt? My answer has usually been given in typical Country Boy fashion—“It didn’t tickle.” The truth is that it hurt. The truth is also that I was looking forward to that hurt, because much of the last six years hasn’t tickled, either.

I got a lot of thinking done during the two and a half hours I spent with an electric needle punching me in the arm (the tip of which, appropriately enough, looked much like the nib of a fountain pen). I allowed myself to remember. Everything. The places I’ve been, the people I’ve known, and the blessings I’ve received.

To the artist doing the work, it was just another tattoo.

To me, it was my story.

This post is part of the blog carnival on Strength, hosted by Bridget Chumbley. To read more, please visit her site.

Filed Under: blog carnival Tagged With: blog carnival, endurance, strength, tattoos, writing

Compassion in the Cold

June 14, 2010 by Billy Coffey 34 Comments

image courtesy of photobucket.com
image courtesy of photobucket.com

I remember standing at an overlook in the mountains on a December night in 2006. I remember it was cold. Very cold. And though it made sense for me just to get back into the truck and turn the heat on, I couldn’t. I had to be outside with the stars and the wind. What I had to do couldn’t be done from inside the truck.

So I went ahead and built the fire. Walked down into the woods, found some rocks, dug a fire pit, and gathered kindling. I got the fire going despite the wind and tossed a few bigger sticks onto the pile. Cedar, I remember. I always liked the smell of burning cedar. And then I leaned back and half smiled and half didn’t, because it was all ready whether I wanted it to be or not.

I reached into my bag and pulled out a thick wad of paper bound by two rubber bands. I turned it over in my hands, watching the firelight dance against it.

Now, I thought…now.

But nothing happened. Whether it was the cold or God or the fabled spirits of the mountain, something had severed the connection between my head and my hands.

Failure seemed too bitter a word, so I decided it was all about letting go. About knowing how to as much as when to. The how was easy. I would burn it. That was the first thought that came to mind a few days before when I got the latest reply. The when, though? Not so easy. I thought for sure it would be that night, but I was having my doubts.

When you spend ten years of your life hanging onto a dream, it takes a lot out of you. You learn to get by on things like faith and hope and tenacity. You try to accustom yourself to blocking out the army of voices both within and without that scream you have no idea what you’re doing and therefore you shouldn’t even bother pretending anymore. It takes strength to endure more than it does talent.

I had the strength. The faith, too. Even had the hope and the tenacity. But something was still missing, and it was a big something. Something that seemed important enough that missing it brought me there in the mountains sitting in front of a fire, ready to incinerate five years of my life.

I was going to burn my manuscript. Release it into the ether once and more all and let its memory float away. I wanted to be done with my dream. I wanted to let go of it so it would let go of me.

I tried once more—

…now—

but I couldn’t, so I simply sat there in the cold and watched the flames dance.

This was not about letting go after all, I decided. No, it really was about failure.

I had pushed myself. Worked and tried and refused to give up, and still after all of that I had nothing to show for my life. It wasn’t that I was too weak to hang on or even too strong to let go. It was that I was stuck in the middle, wavering. A tough place to be. Maybe the toughest. But looking back I think that’s a place we all need to find ourselves at some point, if only so we can find out if our dreams are worthy of the people God calls us to be.

I was thinking about that night one day last week while I was looking over the Fall 2010-Winter 2011 catalog for my publisher, FaithWords. Not only was it pretty darn exciting to see my book on page nine, it was even more so to see they’ve used the cover art for Snow Day as the cover for the catalog. If you’d like, you can see it here.

My point?

My point is that in the end, your dreams are all on you. That means having the faith to see them through.

Having the hope to keep believing.

And it means forgiving yourself when you fail.

The compassion we’re called to show others is the very compassion we’re called to show ourselves. That alone is a source of divine strength.

That alone can move mountains.

I’m proof of that.

This post is part of the blog carnival on Compassion, hosted by Bridget Chumbley. To read more, please visit her site.

Filed Under: blog carnival, publishing, purpose, writing

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