Recent Thoughts

Here is an exerpt from my journal that I thought I would share with the family:

"12-26-2004

Tonight, Holly and I went to see the movie “Spanglish”. It was a beautiful movie that had some profound thoughts. I thought I would write down a few of them before I forget the words.

One of the most poignant scenes in the movie is when Flor has quit her job and is leaving with her daughter. The daughter is upset because it is the end of the life she has grown to love. Flor looks at her daughter and says, “I am sorry to make you face this question at such a young age, but I have to ask you: are you upset because you this life is what you really want, or because you simply want to become a person very different than me.” It is a question we all need to face at one time or another. What is our motivation for what we are doing in life? Is it because it is something we really want, or is it because we want to be something different than what we really are? Or maybe because we want to be something different than what our parents were. I can honestly say, that as I consider my parents, I am incredibly proud to say that I am the son of Dale and Rita Brown. While we may differ on a few things (I won’t go into those here) there are so many qualities of my parents that I am striving to emulate. They love helping people. The truly enjoy giving to others. They invest in the lives of people by giving of themselves personally. They are thoughtful, respectful, compassionate and trustworthy. They have clear ideas about who they are and how things should be done, and yet even now they are willing to learn new things and expose themselves to new ideas. Recently, Tod and I read a book called “Blue Like Jazz” written by a young post modern Christian. We kept going on and on about how many things we had learned from the book, so my dad, knowing he wouldn’t like it, decided to read it. He thought since Tod and I had learned so much from it, maybe he could too. And the best part is, even though he didn’t agree with the author on many points, he still took something away from it. The scene in the movie was quite emotional for me because I wanted to run home to my parents, especially my dad, and say that I have been living my life to become a person just like them. It was a beautiful moment."