Blog 813 – 11.13.2017

No Cowardly Lion He

I was a timid, shy, and backward little boy, afraid of my own shadow, strangers, and even my own near relatives. I was somewhat comfortable with my mom, dad, and brother. When anyone else came to our little house for years I hid in my room and had to be coaxed out. It was not until my mid-teens that I began to over come this fear of the unfamiliar and I suppose my desire to see and learn all things new and different stems from the great self imposed lack in my childhood. I was a miserable unhappy child most of the time and admired my brother’s bravery, boldness, and adventuresome spirit. I wanted that for my children and first my daughter Emily and later my son Jonathan made those dreams come true.

I have written a great deal about my daughter Emily who died rather suddenly almost five and a half years ago. She was a singer and entertainer all her thirty two years. My son Jon or Jay, as he likes to be called, came on the scene almost ten years in to Emily’s act. She had arrived in 1980 and he in 1990. He was never intimidated by her or anyone. He was and has always been the courageous brave boy I wanted to be but was not. No cowardly lion he as the picture of him on the lion statue says so well. He was roaring loader than the lion when the photo was snapped.

I, on the other hand, at his age had been more like Dorothy’s cowardly lion also pictured. But like him, in time, I did overcome my fear. Fear is but a lack of love. A wise writer once wrote, “Perfect love casts out fear.” If we could love perfectly we would not be afraid of anything. We erroneously think that loving God or others is the hard part. It is not. Fact is most of the trouble we have with God or others is really just masked trouble that we have loving ourselves. William Shakespeare, I believe it was, penned, “Be true to thine own self and thou canst be false to no man.” We don’t talk like that anymore so I will put my point plainly – love yourself and you will find it easy to love everybody else.

You see what that little boy was afraid of was some bad intell that he had picked up from his mama – that if people really knew me they would not love me or want to be around me, so rather than be rejected I hid. I had rejected myself. There is so much beauty in each of us (there was in my mama but she would not let herself see it) and all we really have to do for that beauty to shine forth is get our silly thinking out of the way. There is a lion in everyone of us ready to roar and bravely face whatever scary things might be out there, even Aunt Ethel. I have no Aunt Ethel that was just a joke and if you do I am sure she is a dear, after all it runs in the family along with love and bravery.

Your friend and fellow traveler,

Proud to be Jay’s dad,

David White