A lion named Tiger, a horse named Pride

An article by Don Quixote    3 Comments

I’m an arrogant ass. I always have been.

I wouldn’t say that I always behave like I’m arrogant, but I know that I have those thoughts in my head. Sometimes I’m so self-centered I think I am the only one who is (self-centered that is). When you’re a person of low self-esteem you find ways to compensate. For me it was this facade of self-importance. That some how I’m some body; I’m the Web Guy, the Game Guy, the IDEAL Guy. Heck this blog is even called The Blog, how full of crap can you get?

I’ve always wanted to be somebody. I used to watch people and think, “Man, I wish I was that guy, everyone likes him.” So I wrapped myself in these trappings of importance hoping to fool people into thinking I was something more than I actual am, hoping that if I pretended long enough that I would be.

Yet part of my inside always revolted in revulsion at the idea. I was always the guy who had to win all the awards but never wanted to receive them. I wanted people to laud me with acclaim, but never wanted to be there to accept it, yet I was always bothered if people didn’t award me or applaud me. Perfect example: It’s 2000, I put together BOBFest, a day long music festival with Dividing the Plunder, Mark Williams, Eric Peters, CJ Fluharty, Mitch McVicker and Andrew Peterson. I paid for, planned and promoted the whole thing. When it was all said and done and they wanted to bring me out for a round of applause I was hidden away in the balcony so that no one could see me.

I don’t know any other word for all of that than arrogance.

When we pretend to be what is contrary to our nature, we deny our true selves.

I took the boys to Build-a-Bear Work Shoppe yesterday (Dafyd got a coupon in the mail and he really wanted to go build a sister for the bear he had made several months back). So we did. Dafyd built another Polar Bear named Michelle and Jace (who was sad that he didn’t get a coupon – you only get one when you build a World Wild Life sponsored animal) decided that he was going to build lion.

When my boys get something in their heads there is no use trying to talk them out of it. I had suggested other names for Dafyd’s Polar Bear (his other one was Bart The Bear): Lisa (from the Simpsons) Brittney, Bethany, Pamela, Polly something with more alliteration, but nope, that was the name he was going to go with.

When it came to Jace, the lady asked him what he was going to name his lion. Simba? Mofassa? Leo? He said he didn’t know. So I sat down with him and asked him. Tiger. I want to name my lion Tiger. Didn’t matter, there was no going back. Tiger The Lion (“the” being his middle name) was born.

I’ve been feeling a lot like that, a lion named Tiger. I try to do and be all these things to everyone around me. I’m a great pretender and as long as you don’t look too close you’ll never tell the difference. I’m tired. I’m tired of my pride, of my quest to be somebody.

I’m not somebody. I’m me, just me. I would have used the Chasing Song by Andrew Peterson but Jamie already beat me to it last week. This one is just as good.

A Horse Named Pride
By Billy Cerveny

I dreamed I saw your garden gates open wide
I tried to enter on a horse named Pride
Two angels stopped me there, sword by his side and looked away

I dreamed that horse she turned towards tomorrow
There she climbed those hills called suffering and sorrow
Pride she lead, my hard heart it followed all the way

And I ride
And I ride
And I ride
And I ride

To a river called Truth, its waters were deep,
Our souls were warm from the endless journey
Pride she stood there, never could drink
The garden now seemed but a myth across those fields of brokenness
Like serpents there, I could hear my sense hiss and I’ve never known a blackness quite like this

And I ride
And I ride
And I ride
And I ride

Pride she fell in this dark lonesome place, she heard the song from a bird called Grace,
It flew me back there to your garden gates

And I fly
And I fly
And I fly
And I fly

If it wasn’t for God’s grace, I don’t know where I’d be. Well, I do actually, and I’m grateful I’m not.