I was talking with Steve Freeland the other day and he brought this fact to my attention. In spite of last summer’s drought this August has been drier than last August. Quite the opposite of all our relatives in Florida who are under the guns of Tropical Storm Fay which has dumped as much as 30 inches of rain on them in 24 hours.
GOOD NEWS. We appreciate all your prayers for Pauline and ask that you continue. She is doing very well right now even though she was feeling pretty sick last weekend, she has started to lose her hair. One good side effect of the chemo is that it is drying up the fluid in her lungs. She has been off her oxygen for several days now, walks out to the mailbox, picks tomatoes, and even ran an errand in her car without it. Another piece of good news we are praising God about is that her bone marrow biopsy came back negative!
She goes in for her second round of chemo Tuesday.
THEY’RE ALL IN SCHOOL NOW. Wednesday was Nate’s first day of kindergarten. He was excited about it before going and he has been excited about it since starting. That’s not to say he wasn’t a little scared. Wednesday morning he and I were in the back hall. He was sitting in the floor putting on his shoes when he looked up and said, “I’m a little bit scared about going to school today, Daddy.” Then, in a more confident tone of voice he added, “But I’ll make it!”
The kids ride the bus, and they still get off the bus at Aunt Mar’s house where they stay until I get home from work. It’s a good arrangement as Mom and Aunt Mar have something to look forward to in the afternoons and the kids have a place to go where they can be pampered with most anything they want to eat (I’d hate to see their ice cream bill).
I think it was Wednesday afternoon when I was there, the kids had all gone outside and I was in the den talking to Mom and Aunt Mar. I happened to look out and the kids were absorbed in watching a bug crawling in the gravel. They were standing right next to the truck which made me decide that it was the perfect time to hit the panic button on my key fob. Seeing them scramble for cover was completely worth it..
TOO CLEAN? Ben still sleeps with a large, stuffed Tigger. He actually uses Tigger as a second pillow. The other day I noticed Tigger was starting to get a bit ripe and put him in the dirty clothes hamper. Vicki washed him with extra fabric softener. That night Vicki asked Ben if Tigger smelled better. “Well,” he finally confessed, “he smells a little too clean.”
KIDS OLYMPICS. I usually like to watch the Olympics, but this year the schedule just hasn’t left a lot of time for TV. But when Sabrina Freeland wrote in their blog about their kids having their own Olympic games (you can read it for yourself here) my mind went back to 1976 when all of us kids had our own Olympic games. That summer we had all kinds of biking and track and field contests of our own. I think we even had our own high jump made out of tobacco sticks. Funny though, no one was brave enough to pole vault, not even Steve.
At that time the Winter Games were the same year as the Summer Games and we had a lot of snow days that year. We played hockey on a frozen pond with tobacco sticks. The cow chip pucks usually shattered on a good slapshot. Our luge run was a frozen creek. With all the rocks and tree roots hidden in the snow it’s a wonder none of us needed stitches.
FASHION POLICE. I am not one to take notice of what people wear. Unless you are naked, obviously underdressed or overdressed for the occasion, or look completely hideous, what you are wearing will make no impression on me whatsoever.
Last Sunday Ben had gotten dressed and went running through the house. As he went by the bedroom door I had a split second to catch a glimpse of him so all I noticed was that his collar was turned up. I called after him to straighten it. A moment later I heard Vicki saying, “Ben, you go back and change clothes right now. You have Nate’s outfit on.” Then she came in and fussed at me for not noticing that Ben was wearing clothes two sizes too small. I would have caught this had Ben stood in front of me and let me look him over, but with a glimpse I had no chance.
You see, what goes against me with Vicki is my track record. Now that she is on staff at church she leaves about 15-20 minutes before the rest of us do on Sunday mornings, but to her credit she picks out and irons their outfits. That leaves me to see to all the silly little details. In the last six months Vicki has been known to get a bit touchy when the boys got out of the house without combing their hair (I keep my hair short enough that combing is unnecessary), when Ben wore a shirt backwards, when Ben wore his ratty old play sandals, or when Ben wore mismatching sandals. (Notice how this is all Ben--the boy with a talent for disappearing when you need him.) Hey, at least I get us there on time and in one piece. Vicki laughs and claims she still loves me in spite of myself.
Joe
