Brave Enough To Be Bliss

have to share. It is real. It is terrifyingly vulnerable, as I state in the introduction. And here it is...the epiphany (you'll get it when you read my book), the reason I'm writing to you right now. I swear, it just hit me as I wrote that sentence. In my book, I write about all the unspoken things! I write about all the things that will make you as a Girldad want to lock them up in that cabin and never let them go. I write about the things that will make every person who reads it uncomfortable because there is some part of them that will relate to it because it is about real life. Not social media life. Not a photoshopped life. Not storybook life. But the real, hard, painful life that happens in this world. The life that God doesn't protect us from and that we cannot protect our children from. The life that God walks through with us and that we can walk through with our children if we stop trying to be perfect and instead just be real, flawed human beings so they can be also. And then invest the time and energy to be the healthiest people we can be for ourselves and then each other. While it sounds so far that the title of your book is referring to something very different, that's what I needed to remember in order to finish my book. I talk about Mr. Rogers, "whatever is mentionable is manageable," in one chapter. I believe I have been called to say all the unspoken things that keep us from living our best lives. For you, for Les, for all of us who have wounds from our fathers or mothers, from the absence of fathers or mothers, from the abuse, the neglect, the assault...all the real things that go on every day but that we refuse to talk about because we are too scared. The things we hide because we think no one will love us if they knew, but in fact, most people would love us more because we would actually truly build connections with each other instead of having surface level conversations to assure people we are living our best life when really we're struggling inside and when we struggle we miss the opportunity to be all that we are created to be and fully live and love as we could. The fact is all the ugliness that goes on in our world cannot get better if we don't first admit it is going on and the individuals who are hurting cannot get better if they can't feel safe to disclose what happened to them. For some reason, I believe God has called me to not only say all the unspoken things to those I love, but He has called me to say all the really scary unspoken things to anyone who will read or listen. Or maybe I am just reaching out because I feel for you as a father of three pre-teen girls. Just teasing you, I have a special affinity for Girldads having one of my own who just turned 78 about a week ago. This post was from a few years ago, but still fits him perfectly except now he has four granddaughters instead of three. February 11, 2015 Happy Birthday, Dad! You've been surrounded by girls your whole life...only sisters (four of them), only daughters (three of them), only granddaughters (three of them)...maybe it's because God knew you'd be an especially great big brother, father, and grandfather to little girls. You are one we could all look up to and you were there to look out for us, too. While some people may have a negative perception when they think of a ladies' man, I think you've earned the title after surviving all these years with that much estrogen in your life. Here's the definition of a ladies' man that I think defines you perfectly: a man who is fond of, attentive to, and successful with women. You bring out the best in all of us...thanks for being you! If you made it this far, thank you for reading and letting me take up some of your precious time. I hope you made it to be first in line after the show, but even if you didn't, know that you are blessing your girls simply by being there and loving them as unconditionally as humanly possible. I certainly made mistakes raising my daughter, but one thing she has never wavered on through a very challenging first 25 years of life is that she was always deeply loved. And that is why I now have the privilege tonight of having her ask me to come over and spend the night so we can go out to dinner at a jazz place we haven't been to, come back and catch up on some Netflix shows, and then have brunch tomorrow morning with her husband, a Kansas City Missouri Police Officer who gets home at about 2 a.m. most nights. She gave me a gift a couple years ago that says, "Love always protects." At first, I didn't know what it meant to her or to me, but I knew it was special. When I asked her about it a year later when I figured it out in the middle of the night, she said she didn't know why she picked it out, she just felt she was supposed to get it for me. Love always protects, in fact, it is the only thing that can. I'll explain more in the book, but just felt like I was supposed to tell you that.

For now, though, I'm looking forward to listening to your Chapter 2 while I make some brownies to take to their house.

Take good care of you and your girls, Ginger

And Les, thank you so much for passing this along. You are touching lives and blessing us with your show, keep up the great work!

From: Sandy To: Ginger Bliss Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2022, 07:32:03 AM CST

Hi Ginger, thank you for sharing your thoughts and being open and trusting of me. I always enjoyed our connection through work and felt like it extended into a nice friendship. I texted Les and then followed up by forwarding your email. He was extremely appreciative and said, “I’ll never forget Ginger and Kyl e e.” He also said he would reach out to you. Les is a special person which is why I enjoy the friendship I have with him so much. Thank you for feeling comfortable enough to contact me. Let’s keep in touch. And that experience is what has kept me writing about all the unspoken things even when I got scared. I think God already knew there would be many, many times I would want to quit because it isn’t exactly pleasant to go back to all the hard things I had already lived through, share experiences where others were hurt or write

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