Author: David Willis

I remember how it felt and I will never go there again.

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

It has been several years since I have broken up with anyone. About a decade and a half. I still remember how it felt. The pain in my chest. The overwhelming feeling that I would never be happy again. The doubt and self loathing. Feeling just plain miserable. Any of this ring a bell?

In retrospect, I know that none of those relationships were where I needed to be. But, you never know that when you are in the middle of it. You just know the feeling and emotion that you have put into the relationship. The love and the time you have invested. It is devastating when it all goes up in smoke. Even when you know it all needs to go up in smoke.

When Marixa and I first met I knew I enjoyed being around her. After we hung around a while longer I knew that she could be someone that I could care about deeply. It didn’t take me long to know that I never wanted to hold another hand as long as I live. I knew she was the one for me. I knew something else though (and still know), our relationship has to be a priority every day. There are no days off. She is my bride and my best friend and I am all in.

I remember how the heartache feels. I don’t ever want to forget how it feels, because it reminds me how important it is to love Marixa well. I have to pay attention to her needs. I have to help her be the person she is meant to be. I have to love her the way she deserves to be loved (completely). I have to engage in our relationship so that it stays fresh and vibrant.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I am really enjoying the music of The Civil Wars. They have a very moving song called Falling (if you haven’t heard it you can watch the video below). The first line says, “Haven’t you seen me sleepwalking? Because, I’ve been holding your hand. Haven’t you noticed me drifting? Oh, let me tell you I am.”

Have you ever been in a relationship like this? One where you, or your partner has stopped noticing what is going on? Time is drifting by and one of you thinks everything is ok, but the other is really drowning? What a lonely place to be. Lonely, and totally unnecessary.

What is more important than your relationship with your spouse? Not much that I can think of. She is my partner in this life. I choose to walk with her. I choose to love her. I choose to meet her needs. Actually, I already chose these things in January of 1999. Now, I have to make that choice real every day. It takes work, but I know for sure there will be no sleepwalking in my house.

A neat and tidy life…

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

I just finished reading A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller. In the book Donald is sharing the lessons that he learned while turning a different book of his into a screenplay for a movie. He expounds on how the things that make a good character in a story also make a good person in life.

This was my third trip through the book. Each time something different has stuck out to me. This time through this topic from the book hit me: a character doesn’t change unless he goes through hard times and conflict. The character stays one dimensional. When characters stay one dimensional readers don’t stay interested in the story for long.

Think about this in the different stories you have seen. In Braveheart (I don’t know why, but I always seem to gravitate to Braveheart as an example…anyway) Scotland would have never won their freeedom had William Wallace not gone through the pain of losing his wife. Her death at the hands of the English changed the direction of his life.

Or, think of an example from real life. Lance Armstrong would not be the icon we know today had he not gone through testicular cancer. He may have won some races, but his record number of wins at Tour de France would not have the meaning it has now. The disease changed the course of his life. How many people have been helped because of LiveStrong?

Marixa and I had a conversation the other night about this subject. She said this: “Life never does quite work out the way we have planned does it? So, why do we wait for it to? We expect to live a neat and tidy life, but we both know it isn’t going to happen.” I thought about her words for a while. Our lives have been anything but neat and tidy. I have had cancer. We tried for over 5 years to have our son. We have lost people we love. Life has been messy at times.

You know what I am talking about don’t you? Like many others, we have planned to have more children (as many as God will give us) and our dream home and other things that we want. We set time frames for when things are to come to pass. We expect life to adhere to our timeline. We want it to be neat and tidy. We want it to be easy. But, the story wouldn’t be as interesting or memorable if it were.

The advice Donald Miller gives is that you should start to write a better story for yourself. He had found some success, but had become content watching tv, doing little, and just getting by. He was not as happy as he wanted to be and had come to question the meaning of life. As he stated applying the principles of story to his life he realized that his life was boring.  He needed to have conflict in his life that would make him grow. There had to be things he chose to do that were not comfortable so he could begin to really experience living. He hiked the Inca Trail. He biked across America from coast to coast to raise money for a charity, and he started a mentoring project for kids in America. He couldn’t wait for life to come to him. He had to go pursue it.

Marixa and I have found ourselves guilty of this. We have waited for life to come to us. Now, we are in pursuit of life. We are choosing to write a better story with our lives. We don’t have everything figured out, but we don’t have to. A character at the beginning of a story (or other points along the way) doesn’t have everything figured out. They just engage in the story that is taking place. The best characters engage and make the story the best it can be. This is my goal.

How about you? If you were reading the story of your life in a book would it be a page turner? Or a put downer? What can you do this week to begin to tell a better story?

One day the ache will go away

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

Sometimes it happens in the middle of the night. Other times while driving home from work. The could be music playing. It could be quiet. It hurts and you just have to let it hurt. What you ask? The longing for another child.

My wife and I love being parents to our son. I take nothing away from him. He is God’s gift to us and I am so thankful for him. There are times I look at him and think, “You need a brother (or sister).” He is a sweet boy and will be a great big brother when the time comes along. I can’t wait to see him in that role.

That being said, Marixa and i look forward to also knowing/holding/loving the ones to come. It is an ache like nothing I have ever felt. An emptiness in a part of my heart I didn’t know I had. Life has not gone the way we had planned.

It seems that life doesn’t always follow the timetable we set for it. This is a lesson that I have had over and over these last few years. We were married in 1999. We intended to wait about 4 years and then start having our 2.6 children. Life got in the way. Trey was born 9 and a half years into our marriage. We had hoped that the next one would be along about now. And again, things are not to plan and the ache is there to remind.

I picked up a new CD this week. A group called The Civil Wars put out a fantastic record. There is a song called “To Whom It May Concern” on the album. The video link is posted below. The song is about longing for that perfect someone you haven’t met, romantically. The music and words also fit the ache I have described above. Give the song a listen. It is simply amazing.

I believe that the next little one will be on the way soon. Until then little one, I miss you.

Awesome Skirt Steak Tacos

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

We spent the day with my mom and dad last Saturday. It was a day full of projects and shopping, and by day’s end it was time for some food. There is a general indecisiveness that creeps into situations like these. The conversation goes something the scene in Jungle Book: “What do you want? I dunno. What do you want?” and on and on. So, instead of going out (which seems to be the default on days like today) I went to the grocery store. It was time to make some home made Mexican food. Namely, steak tacos.

I have been working on perfecting steak for fajitas and tacos. I have used different cuts of meat trying to find the right one…asking someone would have been too hard…and have finally landed on skirt steak. I got the idea from Marixa. Marixa’s favorite restaurant steak meal (Carne Asada) is from a wonderful Mexican food place called Mama Rojas in Oklahoma City. After having that meal with her I have been on a skirt steak crusade.

The ingredients: One pound of skirt steak. Fajita seasoning (your choice). A hot grill.

After rubbing the steak down with the seasoning, I let the steaks cook until they were just pink in the center (3-4 minutes per side, depending on how thick the steak is). I took them off the grill and let them rest for a few. As I was cutting the steak into pieces for tacos, I took a bite. Falling down in the kitchen is not recommended, but the steak was that good.

I added sauted onions and peppers with the meal as well as some Spanish rice. It was so very good. The trick to all of it was the cut of meat. The dry rub mixed with those skirt steaks blew me away. It is nice to have pleasant surprises in the kitchen. Sure beats things blowing up! I am sure there are fancier ways of making this meal, but it didn’t need it. I am actually wondering if it is too soon to have them again!

Cutting corners will cost you (or someone else) in the long run.

~ David Willis ~ 2 Comments

It has been colder in Oklahoma recently than any other time that I remember. I went to work last week and my temperature gauge in my Jeep indicated -4 degrees. For my friends up north this my not be a big deal. In Oklahoma?!! That is almost unheard of. If it gets down to 25 degrees around here people don’t like it.

After two rounds of snow finally melted off my yard (it was 81 here a couple of days ago…really….how do you have an 80 degree swing in a week?!!) things looked as if they were getting back to normal. I came home from work on Thursday and realized my driveway was still soaked. It should have been dry a couple of days before. With a little further inspection I realized that there was a small swimming pool forming in my front yard. There was a leak underground.

I took a few hours off on Friday afternoon to dig out the area and get down to the pipes. I wasn’t sure what kind of damage had happened down below, or how deep the lines were buried and the plumber indicated that he might be able to make it to my house late Friday afternoon, so I needed to get after it. Thankfully, he wans’t able to get there until Saturday. I dug for over 2 hours on Friday. I put another good hour in this morning. It took much longer than I wanted, but I finally isolated where I thought the leak was and then waited for the plumber.

Ok. What does this have to do with cutting corners? I am almost there. Hang with me.

When the plumber arrived it took him about an hour to have the line repaired and the water back on. I went out about midway through and he showed me a piece of PVC pipe that had a fitting on it. The PVC pipe joined up with a copper pipe. The leak occured where the two pipes met. The builder (or someone who last made repair on the line) used an incorrect fitting for joining the two pipes. The fitting they used caused a corrosive reaction with the copper pipe. The pipe had disintegrated. (I am sure the cold ground didn’t help the matter either.) The builder cut a corner, used an incorrect part, and years later I am affected.

This experience made me think. Where have I cut corners that might affect someone else? Has damage been done because I didn’t put forth my best effort? Was it laziness or incompetence?

The cost on this cut corner is roughly 500 dollars. The repair bill cost around 200 (much less than it would have been had I not had the hole dug out). My water bill has been almost double for 6 months. All of this could have been avoided had whoever used the right part. Thankfully, it cost much less than it could have. For that I am thankful. I will consider this a good life lesson to do things right the first time.