If anything was possible

I am a caucasian male.  Slender build, slightly balding (slightly=badly in this case), with brown hair and brown eyes.  I don't have any disabilities or health problems.  I grew up the youngest in a middle class family of 8 children and 2 parents that have been happily married for decades. I have great siblings who have provided me with great examples of what to do and what not to do in life.  I have received a good education and been taught a good work ethic which have enabled me to make a comfortable living.  I was raised in the LDS church with what many would consider some strict yet admirable guidelines.  I have never had any criminal or otherwise legal issues.  I'm a pretty lucky guy right?  Not so much.

Let me move on before this starts sounding too much like a dating profile (though I am single ;)).  I think a lot about my life and the experiences that I have had, but I can't help but think about the question of "What if?".  What if I was born in a different family?  In a different decade?  With a different skin color?  With a different gender?  How different would my life be?

If anything was possible I would like to spend a year of my life seeing it through a different person's body each day.  I think it would be truly fascinating.  What does it feel like to be a female in a male dominated society?  What does it feel like to be of another race constantly fighting stereotypes and prejudice?  What does it feel like to be a homosexual man or woman having to fight for basic equality? What does it feel like to be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of your life?  People can describe these feelings to you but I don't believe it is possible to truly understand unless you walk in those shoes.

I served an LDS mission at the age of 19 with grand hopes of helping to change the world.  Though I helped many people during this time, I realized the person that benefited the most was myself.  I was forced out of my comfort zone and placed in situations where I was in contact with people from all walks of life.  This experience has helped open my eyes and make me a more understanding tolerant person.

My life has been great up to this point and I am grateful, but that isn't luck.  Those who can best understand, tolerate, be compassionate towards and in some instances forgiving of other life situations are the ones who are truly lucky.

Why am I a Kansas City Chiefs Fan?

I am pretty open with the fact that I am a big fan of the Kansas City Chiefs, and that is saying something considering they have been dreadful for the past two decades.  People often ask though how somebody that didn't grow up in Kansas City and has never even visited Kansas City could become a fan of the Chiefs.  Well to answer that question I am going to have to take you back to Colombia Elementary School.

It was a cold rainy day outside and as a child in elementary school this was seriously bad news!  This meant no recess!  Instead, during recess time we were trapped inside like lab rats, left to play the same old board games which were missing half their pieces.  Looking back on it now I realize that the teachers must have dreaded inside recess as much as we kids did.   I still remember Ms. Durrant telling us our options and how much fun we could still have inside. Ms. Durrant was my 2nd grade crush.  I was certain the two of us would have beautiful children someday.  I didn't quite realize she would be like 50 by the time I was marriage ready. So Ms. Durrant if you are still out there and available, I am not taken.....

Even as a child I was fascinated by random facts and learning about things nobody else seemed to care about.  During this particular indoor recess I sat down with a torn copy of the Guinness Book of World Records.  I read through its pages excitedly as if someone had just spouted divine wisdom from the heavens.  The world's fattest man, the largest pizza, and so on.  Eventually I came across the sports section of the book where it listed the records in each of the sports.  I remember reading the stat, "Most Sacks in an NFL Game: Derrick Thomas 7 sacks vs. Seattle".  I thought that was amazing even though my knowledge of the game was very limited at the time.  In my mind Derrick Thomas who was an outside linebacker for the Kansas City Chiefs (R.I.P) suddenly became superman!  I began to watch Chiefs games to see him play.  When he died in 2000 at the age of 33 following a car crash which he caused, I remember being so confused why people are taken way too early.  Following his death I was already hooked on the Chiefs and continued to watch and cheer for them.  To almost an unhealthy level at this stage in life.  haha!

So that is how an indoor recess period turned a love struck 2nd grader into a raving Chiefs fan. :)  Feel free to leave comment and tell me how you became a fan of your favorite team regardless of sport.  Thanks for reading!

I am important! Right?

“A man said to the universe: 'Sir, I exist!' 
'However,' replied the universe. 
'The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.” 
― Stephen Crane, War Is Kind and Other Poems

At 6:30 in the morning your alarm goes off.  You crawl slowly out of bed all the while thinking how much you would rather still be in it.   Your mind begins to ponder the scheduled day ahead.  The drive through dreadful traffic, the big lunch meeting with a new client, picking up the kids from school, and even what you might eat for your meals.  During your pondering you have sheerly out of habit showered, chosen clothing, brushed your teeth, and combed your hair.  Throughout your busy day you interact with dozens of relations in person, and hundreds more when taking social media into account.  These interactions produce a variety of emotions and thoughts that couldn't possibly be counted.  The experiences, thoughts and emotions continue until you once again crawl back into your bed to start the cycle all over again.

Our lives as human beings are a wonder of cellular, pyschological and social complexity.  So much so that with a recent world population estimate of nearly 7.1 billion, it seems unfathomable that each of those people has a life just as full of thoughts, emotions and relationships as complex if not more so than my own.  Suddenly my important life seems a little less important.

Now let's take a step back and observe from a different angle.  I am talking a step waaaaaaay back!  7.1Billion human beings live on the planet we call earth along with many other forms of life.  Our planet is huge yet according to http://solarsystemfacts.net/sun-facts.html we could place the earth inside our sun over 1,300,000 times!  The distances in space are equally as immense and seriously hard for my feeble brain to comprehend.  For example the nearest star to our own is called Proxima Centauri.  This star is located about 4.2 light years away from the sun.  In other words the distance that light can travel in the span of 4.2 years.  Light travels fast folks, like 299,792,458 meters per second fast!  If we launched our fastest spacecraft from earth tomorrow it would arrive in about 50,000 years.  I will be dead by then. :) Our solar system is a tiny dot in the milky way galaxy and and our galaxy is a tiny dot in the scope of the entire universe. I don't need to keep rambling off random facts about space distances as I think by now you can see that space is incredibly immense and is governed by many many physical forces which keep everything neatly in place.

So does my tiny life really matter in the grand scope of the universe?  If space is a giant vast wasteland with no other form of life, then you better believe my life matters.  If space however is full of life and even higher life forms than our own, then our importance could be highly debatable.  Whether life exists out there is quite another topic in itself which I will give opinion on another time.

Your life is now complete!

Your life is now complete!  You are reading a blog by Brett Gardner!  No, not the Yankees baseball player, rather the bald car washing guy from West Jordan Utah.  But in all seriousness thank you for taking the time to read my new blog.

 The purpose of this blog isn't to give you a play by play of my daily adventures (as my life is incredibly boring), but rather to share random thoughts and opinions on a variety of topics ranging from sports to outer space (hence the blog name).  Some may be humorous and others hopefully will inspire deeper thought and healthy debate.  Then again some may be complete and utter nonsense.

I am not a writer, but I did see an episode of Murphy Brown once as a child.  Thus I feel qualified to create this blog.  Let's get this party started!