Making Life Good
Do what you like
Like what you do
is on the back side of my Life Is Good mug. On the front side it simply says Life Is Good. And life is indeed good pretty much most of the time. At least, it has been and is for me.
Last summer a young friend spent the day with me in my office at Holy Nativity. He called it “Father Tom Camp,” and it was no doubt pretty dull for him at age 13. Nothing special was planned. It was a work day for me, planning Sunday worship, drafting the bulletin, reading the lectionary lessons to get my brain focused on sermon thoughts. He worked too. Cleared out junk that’s not used anymore, straightened up both my bookcases, made things neat and tidy. We went to Bayou Joe’s for lunch. Asked what he wanted to do in life he said, “Something I like. I’m not sure, but something I like.” That’s a good start.
At age 13 I knew what I wanted to do in life. Be an Episcopal priest like some seven or eight in the Weller family before me. But my sophomore year in college, deciding I would not like that, changed my major from pre-theology to business administration. Sticking with it in spite of not liking it, upon graduation with a BSBA, I went into the Navy. Officer Candidate School, then a specialty school, then a destroyer.
The destroyer was so much fun I decided, “I like this, this is what I'll do”
and switched from naval reserve to regular Navy.
In another ship a dozen years later, our first evening at sea enroute to WestPac for a nine month deployment in the Vietnam War and having left Linda, Malinda and a weeping Joe back home in San Diego, I decided “I do not like this. I do not like this worth a dee.” It was my moment of decision to retire as soon as possible.
Do what you like
Like what you do
After Navy life and four years or so of a business of my own that I did like except that it had me away from home 75 or 80 percent of each year, I started theological seminary. Seminary was more fun than the BSBA from Florida, the MBA from the Univ of Michigan, and the Naval War College. My first church was more fun than that first destroyer,
and life has only gotten better and better. This is what I like.
Do what you like
Like what you do
I’m there.
Life is Good.
Tom in +Time
USS CORRY (DD 817) refueling at sea
Trinity Episcopal Church, Apalachicola, Florida
Pajama Sunday at Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, Panama City, Florida
USS CORRY (DD 817) refueling at sea
Trinity Episcopal Church, Apalachicola, Florida
Pajama Sunday at Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, Panama City, Florida