Dear Unsigned Letter Writer,

"Children reflect family values very well. Of more than 127 letters (note: 5 from the local newspaper were copied on the reverse side) I found only 8 that did not have great lists of wants; not one word for other needs and desires. Where are family values? One child only wanted to see Daddy once in a while - how very sad. What can we expect from tomorrow's citizens and leaders? What values & love?? We are failing our children every day."

Five Days of Thankfulness, Day 1

My sister-in-law called me out on the Five Days of Thankfulness thing on Facebook.  Given that this is the sort of thing I used to do here, it seemed like a good chance to return to blogging a bit more regularly.  So, here goes.

On Sports and Faith and Life and Balance

Bruce Feiler wrote a great article a few weeks ago that my friend Erik Ullestad shared in his weekly "Recommended Reads" email from Elbow Co. (link here)  Take a few minutes and read what Bruce has to say about sports, faith, and families today, and then come back here for just a bit of me pushing back but also heartily endorsing much of what Bruce says.

Ash Wednesday: Bring Your Kid

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday.  For Christians, the Ash Wednesday service marks the beginning of the season of Lent, a penitential period in which we fast, discipline ourselves, and reflect on the life and love of our Lord Jesus Christ.  It is a holy time of anticipation and purpose, and for many it is our "favorite" season of the church.

But Ash Wednesday begins with a stark reminder of our mortality.  Ministers dip their thumbs in a bowl of ashes made from the palm branches waved to honor Jesus on Palm Sunday and mark a cross on the foreheads of all participants, while pronouncing a death sentence on us all:  "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return."

Friday Five: Roots and Wings Edition

This week's RevGalBlogPals Friday Five, from 3dogmom:

I’ve just returned from an extended road trip, a portion of which included travel through ancestral homelands. While I was gone our son’s first child, Hunter, was born, making me mindful of the gift that our roots can offer to us as we venture through life. That juxtaposition inspires today’s Friday Five.

At a baby shower honoring Hunter guests filled out a card full of hopes and wishes for his life. Thinking about whatever new life may be touching yours (the birth of a child, a marriage, a new call…), choose five wishes from the following and do the same. (For instance, I wrote for Hunter, “I hope you laugh at your grandfather’s jokes.)

I hope you: learn, grow, remember, laugh, get, follow, aren’t afraid, love, respect, try to, never forget, become, experience. 

Bonus: what hopes did someone in your life offer to you that have stayed with and inspired you?

Vision, Direction and Over-Correction

Last night, Beloved and I rode down to the library with our girls.  Our eldest is a very good rider these days - she scoots right along on her big girl bike.  Little sister, however, remains a work in progress.  Riding behind her last night was both comical and nerve-wracking.  She's not good enough to drop her training wheels yet, but she wants to ride fast enough to stay up with big sister; the resulting mess is a wobbly, heart-stopping mix of weaving all over the sidewalk, sudden stops, violent bursts and, in the end, bruised tailbones (and thankfully, thus far, no broken bones).

This child?  Not mine. Most emphatically not.

A Day at the Iowa State Fair

This is what our most recent family trip looked like.  My goodness, it's been a while since we've gone and done a day for just the four of us.  What a wonderful time we had.

We disembarked for the Iowa State Fair at 8:30ish yesterday morning, returned in the late afternoon and watched a little TV together before bath, books, prayers and bed.  Many, many pictures follow.

Confessing the Cost of Vocation

I'm in Chicago with four of our students for Follow Me: Sharing the Gospel in a 2.0 World. It's been an enriching experience thus far: time to re-connect with colleagues, strengthen ties across the church and hear from others about ways to be the hands and feet of Christ in a culture becoming more and more suspicious of or apathetic to the church. I met Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber, who I've appreciated from a distance for a few years now but never had the opportunity to meet in real life. (Her church, House for All Sinners and Saints, sells the awesome shirt shown here) I heard a passionate sermon from Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson, which in itself is remarkable because, even with all of his many gifts taken into account, "passionate" is not a word I would have formerly used to describe the man. Seeing that side of a leader I greatly respect was empowering. His message, which was to meet the question, "Can anything good come out of Christianity?" with Philip's response, "Come and see" was inspiring. My hotel room is swanky and my roommate is gracious, especially when it comes to putting up with my snoring.

All of this good stuff, however, comes with a cost. Normally the cost is simply time away from my girls, which in itself is never fun, but endurable in the short term. Campus ministry is a specialized ministry that puts a lot of us out "on the island" in our local context, so we need this time together, even though it takes us away from family and friends. This time, however, the cost is considerably more painful. A flood swept through Ames this week, and unfortunately my being at this conference has left Beloved on her own with our girls in Ames with no day care, no potable water from city lines and heat indexes above 100 degrees. They're safe: friends have provided drinking water, there's water for bathing and toilets, the electricity is running and we didn't have any water in the house. But this week will never make Beloved's list of top ten favorite weeks of all time. Not by a long, long shot.

All of us, not just pastors, have these moments where your vocation, whatever it may be, comes with a price. For the farmer, it's the continual anxiety about rain, sunshine, hail and the gazillion other things that can ruin a crop every single year. For the teacher, it's the long hours, low pay and continual managing of all the different hurdles between a student and their educational progress. For the manager, it's juggling schedules and emotions, maintaining the proper balance between caring for employees and remaining the boss. Every job comes with a price to pay. I think the difference between a profession and a vocation is the willingness to pay the price - and maybe vocation takes an unhealthy turn when one doesn't even notice how high the price has become.

I'm going to be uncomfortable most of my time here, not because Beloved has laid a guilt trip on me, but because I'm torn between my vocation as a husband/father and my vocation as a pastor. Jesus help me if I ever stop noticing how much the latter takes away from the former; if that happens, I'm not sufficiently equipped to be either.

Grace & peace,

Scott

A Preaching Quandary

I am in the middle of a theological, homiletical dilemma. Perhaps you can help me out.

I love my kids. (No, that's not the quandary) I spend a good portion of my time thinking about my kids, driving my kids from place to place, picking them up, playing with them, teaching them, cooking for them, etc. I smile when they wake up in the morning (or when they wake me up, if it's at a decent hour) and both Beloved and I breathe a sigh of relief when we get them to sleep, even though they look adorable all snuggled up in their beds.

Anything into which you pour this much energy is bound to affect your thinking, and over the last three years I've noticed that my teaching and preaching are greatly influenced by my experience as a parent. To a certain point this is all well and good, but here's the quandary: how do I keep it from becoming too much? When do those who listen to me reach the point of saturation and stop hearing the good news because of the way my voice puts it?

When I was nine years old, our church back home had an interim pastor who constantly talked about California. He'd been raised there, and obviously had a great love for his home state. After a while, though, it became a joke: whatever the gospel reading was for that week, it would have something to do with California by the time the sermon came around. From what I remember, he was a pretty decent interim but for this one thing. Our new pastor made a great first impression when someone asked him about California in his "welcome" potluck and he said, "I've heard California is the land of fruits and nuts."

I don't want to be that interim, but I'm afraid I'm heading in that direction. My students have already begun to claim the sermon isn't finished until I've made a poop reference. They say it in jest, but we all know that some good jokes are funny because they're also true.

That's just one aspect of the problem. Another is this: how does "God as parent" preaching sound to the ears of those who don't have kids? When I preach about the patience and love required to be a good parent, how do those who don't have kids hear it? How about those who can't have kids, or those who had abusive parents?

The gospel reading for this week seems a text which offers several opportunities to go off the rails into "Daddy Knows Best" territory. That was my first impulse upon reading the text yesterday, but I'm leery of developing things in that direction for fear of the problems listed above. If you'd like to join a good discussion on the texts themselves, RevGalBlogPals has a Tuesday Lectionary post that always offers fruitful discussion. But if you're willing to offer them, I would appreciate your thoughts on this in the comments section. Tell me what you've seen in my blog posts, in my sermons, in places where I've taught: am I going overboard? Can you offer helpful suggestions to keep from doing so?

There's nothing wrong with loving your kids. In my life, the order of priorities is:

1. Child of God
2. Husband
3. Father
4. Son/Brother/Family member
5. Friend
6. Pastor

I'd like my preaching to reflect this ranking of priorities as well. Thoughts?

Grace & peace,

Scott

Keeping the Main Thing the Main Thing

Had a moment with Ainsley on the way to Pre-school the other morning.

It started when it was time to get ready to leave, but she wanted to keep watching the Sesame Street episode we'd called up from the DVR. (Put this one under the "Problems my parents didn't have" column) As sometimes happens with toddlers, hearing "No." brought tears. She cried all the way upstairs. Cried when I asked her to put her flip-flops away and get shoes (no flip-flops at Pre-school). Cried when I brushed her hair. Cried when I put the barrettes in her hair, even though I used the Princess ones. Cried when I opened the door (she wanted to open it, and I was rapidly losing my patience and just walked out of the house with Alanna, who promptly hit me in the eye). Cried for the first mile of the car ride to pre-school. And I didn't care one little bit.

I'll admit it - I was frustrated and emotional. Part of me knows how important some measure of control is for a growing child, and how much it hurts when you don't get something you think is really important. I remember that sense of childish frustration very, very well, and knowing that I'm standing where my parents once stood for me doesn't help matters much. But every little tantrum meant another couple of minutes late for pre-school, and we had lots to do at home and work this week.

Here's the thing, though: by the time we'd driven five minutes, the crying was done. I asked Ainsley what she wanted to listen to, and she said, "Storyhill, please - the ghost song." "The Ghost Song" is "Give Up The Ghost" from their self-titled release on Red House Records:

Some of you who've been reading for a while know that Ainsley has a pre-birth connection to Storyhill. I don't know if that's a contributing factor recently or not, but I do know this: for all that we love Storyhill ourselves, the connection with our kids is even more wonderful. It adds another dimension to the music we already love. So when the song started, I looked into the rear-view mirror, saw my little girls smiling, heard Ainsley starting to sing along, and nearly had to pull over for wanting to cry at how rude I'd been to my kids.

By the time we got to pre-school, all was well. We had listened to "Give Up The Ghost," "Paradise Lost" and "Highlight," and the girls were all smiles. I dropped them off, with hugs and kisses from both before I left, and headed off to work. When I picked them up that afternoon, they were overjoyed to see me, and when we all went to the waterpark later that afternoon, we splashed and giggled and played and loved on each other a whole bunch.

The Gospel reading for this week is Jesus' encounter with Mary and Martha in Bethany, where Jesus reminds Martha, "Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her." It's not that Martha chooses things that are evil or even unimportant; Martha knows, rightly, that there are tasks in every time and place which need doing. But Mary has grasped the main thing, and has her priorities in order. Martha needs re-ordering so that she might receive what Jesus has to give, which can never be taken away from her. Martha, like me, needs to be reminded to keep the main thing the main thing.

Sure, we'll be late to pre-school sometimes. Life does that. I could benefit from remembering that for a three-year old girl, opening doors and getting to pick out your own clothes are far more important, and sometimes it might do me well as a parent to let her go to pre-school in whatever hideous ensemble she's selected, because it really isn't that important right now. I need to be reminded, as I was that morning, that the love I bear for these little girls is far, far more important than running absolutely on time or matching every outfit perfectly. Clothes will come and go. Someday I'll want Ainsley and Alanna to open doors for me because I won't be able to do it for myself. But the love between us? That can't ever go away - and I'm glad to have been reminded to chose the better part.

Grace & peace,

Scott

Something I'd Rather Not Be Doing

Tomorrow morning, Ainsley will have her tonsils and adenoids removed. I'm going to willingly place this adorable child in the hands of another person for slicing and dicing. Yep - not liking the thought of it at all, even though it should help her breathing, sleeping and appetite.

We've been prepping her the last couple of days, but for the life of me I don't think either one of us had the balls to tell her, "You're going to hurt after you wake up." Does that make us bad parents?

Either way, I'm going to hand over my child into the care of others tomorrow. Please pray for all four of us.

Small Catechism, Lord's Prayer, 4th Petition: A Reminder...

Give us today our daily bread.

What does this mean?

In fact, God gives daily bread without our prayer, even to all evil people, but we ask in this prayer that God cause us to recognize what our daily bread is and to receive it with thanksgiving.

What, then, does 'daily bread' mean?

Everything included in the necessities and nourishments for our bodies, such as food, drink, clothing, shoes, house, farm, fields, livestock, money, property, an upright spouse, upright children, upright servants and members of the household, upright and faithful rulers, good government, good weather, peace, health, decency, honor, good friends, faithful neighbors and the like.

Martin Luther's Small Catechism, trans. by Timothy Wengert

God provides...

• We have cupboards filled with enough food and drink to last a good long while, even if the money dried up tomorrow.
• I have several coats and enough clothes that picking out what to wear each day is sometimes time-consuming.
• I have not one but two pairs of Dr. Marten's boots which have long since repaid the value of the high price I paid for them. I have running shoes. I even have biking shoes now.
• There is a roof over our heads, and the reasonable assumption that, if need be, friends and family would provide a roof if we lose this one.
• Not only is there a roof, but I have a yard in which I love to work when the weather is nice, and even when the weather is not-so-nice. I am the caretaker of things that grow here, and I take that job very seriously and derive a tremendous amount of joy from it.
• I have no fields or cattle, but I remember when I did, and what a good life it can be. And, let's be frank, I like eating cattle. After butchering and cooking, of course, but still...
• I am paid well for doing what I love to do. Not exceptionally well, mind you, but enough that we live comfortably.
• We have what we need, and a little extra.
• My Beloved is a wonderful woman. She is a loving wife, a devoted mother, a gifted youth minister and a caring friend. I need to remind her of these things more often.
• I have two wonderful daughters who fill my life with joy. I can't imagine my life without them, and yet I still have to stop and pinch myself that, yes, they really are my daughters. I have kids. This never ceases to amaze me.
• Servants? Not so much. But I do have a good office manager at work who is not only a good co-worker, but also a friend. Tonight, more than ever, I'm thankful for that trusting work relationship.
• There are some good people working on our behalf in local, state and federal government. I wish there were more of the good ones, and less of the not so good ones, but there are good folks trying their best, and for that I'm thankful.
• The snow is melting. Not too fast as of yet. Spring is finally coming.
• I have never seen a violent crime in person. I have no reason to expect being the victim or a witness to such a crime. This town where we live is largely a safe community. The fact that I don't think about this more often probably says a lot about how insulated we are as a society, and how we take far too much for granted.
• I'm not as fat as I once was, even if I'm not as "in shape" as I'd like to be. I exercise, and most nights I sleep well. Mild depression and being 20 lbs overweight is not anything about which I should complain.
• People keep me accountable in my family, my work, and other areas of my life. Most of them do it appropriately. Most of the people with whom I associate value kindness, respect, integrity and honesty, and again, now more than ever, I am grateful.
• I do my best to take everyone at their word, without judgment, and I think most of the folks I see regularly do the same.
• I could list my good friends here and it would take up several paragraphs. I am richly blessed in the friends department.
• H lets me borrow her snowblower when the weather's bad. A always says hello when she's out walking her dog. P's kids brought gifts when Alanna was born. B clears off our sidewalks if it snows while we're out of town. D pets the dog over the fence and always waves when she comes home. Maybe we're not as close to our neighbors as we'd like to be, but we know who they are all the same.

Why all of this? Because in the midst of trying times we do well to remind ourselves that God provides far more good than the world provides evil. Even though the hard road continues for us, we also have much for which we are thankful. God is good, all the time - even when God's people are sometimes not.

Grace & peace,

Scott

The picture above is our girls playing together last summer. The yard in which they are playing is ironically connected to the Unbloggableness, but it remains one of the most beautiful pictures we have of them.

Faith, Prayer and Drudgery

It has not been a particularly good week. In fact, I've taken to calling it my "FAILcation."

Every day this week has involved someone being home from day care, whether due to illness, holiday or some other conflict. The van was in the shop from Monday until Wednesday. As you've all noticed, the ice has made walking, the most mundane of daily activities, a task which requires hypervigilance. I've been able to work about a grand total of 12 hours this week, and right now I'm so frustrated I could just scream. (I won't, because the other folks working and studying here at Cafe Milo probably wouldn't appreciate being startled like that.)

The thing is, there's not much you can do about weeks like this. Kids get sick. Vans with 100K miles break down. The ice falls on the just and the unjust alike. Seems I've heard that somewhere before (psst: Matthew 5.43-45).

It's not fatalism to acknowledge that life will be life. If you think so, take a swing through the book of Ecclesiastes and see what the Teacher thinks about life. What I'm concerned with is this: is faith about getting out of unpleasant circumstances, or being able to live right in the midst of them?

See, here's the thing: faith is not about avoiding drudgery. It's certainly not a lot of fun to face the week Kristin and I have had, but praying for an escape from that feels more like praying to Santa Claus than to God. Faith and prayer are not about wish fulfillment; at least, not the kind of wish fulfillment that means running away from that which God has entrusted to us. Prayer is conversation with God about our lives, and faith is the power God gives to believe that the conversation is actually happening.

So I tell God, "Hey, it hasn't been an easy week."

"Yep. How are you holding up?"

"Not so great today. I'm frustrated, disappointed in myself, anxious about a lot of things and feeling like I'd rather just curl up in the basement and hide until spring."

"You know I can't let you do that, right? And that's not what you REALLY want anyway, is it?"

"I suppose not. It's just that I feel like the weather today: grey, icy, cold. I'm not sure I'm going to be a lot of good to anyone today."

"You might be surprised. Anyway, it's not about what you can do - it's about what I can do through you. I'll make sure what needs to happen, happens. You just trust in me and get back into the game. All right?"

"All right - but I'm telling you, what you get from me today might not be pretty."

"Like that's ever bothered me before?"

Faith, prayer and drudgery. As long as you have the first two, the last will never win.

Grace & peace

Scott

To Ainsley, on her 3rd Birthday

Dear Ainsley,
Three years. How did we get here so fast? You'd think that after waiting 32 years to meet you, the next three wouldn't fly by so quickly. But, here we are: you're three, and I'm 35, and I pray to God we get at least another 40 years or so together.

We still talk about the day you came into our lives. How much fun it was getting to know you. That first bath. Introducing you to your family and friends. And how little sleep we got. And, of course, poop stories. But I wouldn't trade a second of it. Except maybe for that night Mommy was at work and you cried for THREE HOURS STRAIGHT and I had to put you in the car and drive around for an hour just to calm you down so I could calm down. But other than those four hours, it's mostly been incredible.

Ainsley, you've brought so much joy into our lives, most of which has come in surprising ways. Your infectious spirit and your boundless energy inspire me and your Mommy. The best part of my day, every day, is picking you up from pre-school and watching your face light up when you see me and your sister. The second best part of my day is sitting in my chair with you, you watching TV while I read the paper, and realizing, "Hey - Ainsley is my daughter. My little girl." Oh, how precious those moments can be.

You're an amazing little girl, sweetheart. Of course, I'm biased, but others have noticed your kindness and care for others, and have told us about you in words that filled us with pride. This morning kind of summed it up, didn't it? When I told you Mommy's tummy hurt, you said, "Mommy needs to take a BIG Tylenol." Then, when Mommy came out of the doctor's office, you went up to her, rubbed her tummy and asked, "Do you feel better now, Mommy?" Your concern for the people you love is obvious, and we're so amazed to watch you grow and learn how to be kind and caring, often without our help or encouragement.

I hope you enjoy your birthday today, honey, especially your new art station and the pizza and cake we'll share for supper. We love you so much, Ainsley Joy Suzanne - have a happy, happy birthday, and please, stop growing up so fast.

Love always,
Daddy

2009: The Year in Review via RevGalBlogPals

Having left the charger to the MacBook behind while on holiday this week, I'm only four days behind on thinking about 2009 in review. Well, thinking publicly, that is. It was a crazy year, for sure.

It's not much of a stretch to say that there are times I resonate quite strongly with this song from Mary Poppins, which currently resides at the top of Alanna's Disney hit parade:



It would be lovely to live like this. But, alas, like Mr. Banks, my life is not so simple. In fact, upon reflection, the year more properly resembles this:



You know, minus the dead Nazis and such. Also, I didn't get shot. But it was definitely more crazy than predictable.

Last Friday's Friday Five at RevGals was about 2009 moving into 2010. Here's my answers.

1. What will you gladly leave behind in 2009?
Two children in diapers. Ainsley is mostly potty-trained at this point, with just nights to go, and she's doing great. I can't tell you how happy I am to be minimizing my daily contact with poo.

2. What is the biggest challenge of 2010 for you?
Living more purposefully. As any regular reader of this blog has noted, posting has become less frequent and of a lower quality, and that's been a snapshot of the year in real life as well. I make no resolutions for 2010 other than this: to live more in the place I am, in the moments around me, and to refine my use of Facebook et al so that it becomes a tool for connecting and not a crutch for living.

3. Is there anything that you simply need to hand to God and say "all will be well, for you are with me"?
Our financial situation. There's a strong possibility that Beloved's call as Family and Youth Ministry Director at our congregation will be terminated in May because right now the deficit between the 2009 budget and projected 2010 giving is so large it's impossible to ignore. We are making changes in our lives to prepare for the worst while hoping things work out for the best.

4. If you could only achieve one thing in 2010 what would it be?
Get my eating and exercise under control and weigh 200 lbs by the end of the year (I'm currently hovering between 225 and 230). Thankfully, I managed to hold off the holiday bulge, but I didn't lose anything, either. I want to be a sub-4:00 marathoner, and that's not going to happen unless I get serious about losing the weight and hitting the pavement. Plus, Jack has turned into a great running partner and I want to continue that bonding time with him.

5. Post a picture, poem or song that sums up your prayer for the year ahead....
You've seen it here before, but it's worth hearing again: "Steady On" by our favorite singers, Storyhill:



I might add that getting to a Storyhill concert in 2010 would be pretty sweet, too.

Grace & peace,
Scott

It Could Have Been Much, Much Worse

It could have been like this:

On Thursday, we took the girls to a local middle school to be vaccinated against H1N1.

JUST.

LIKE.

EVERYONE.

ELSE.

IN.

OUR.

COUNTY.

It was not a pleasant way to spend my day off. For one thing, it was raining. All day. Two kids plus one dog trapped inside all day = two cranky kids, one wound up dog, and two exhausted parents. By 10:00 A.M. I was so fed up I took Jack for a walk in the rain just to get him out of the house and out from underfoot. Everyone was happier for at least a little while after that.

Eventually we journeyed off to the flu clinic. And I mean everyone but the cats. "Oh, let's get Jack out of the house - it won't be THAT long, will it?" Not the last thing I was wrong about Thursday, either.

We were in line for almost two hours. At one point I heard the line wrapped around the entire interior of the building and out the door. It was pretty close to that when we arrived; I don't know how early folks started showing up to get in front. As it was, the girls were really wonderful: some fussiness, but not nearly what we had feared. We did have one absolute heart-stopper when Ainsley got away from us and we lost her for the longest five minutes of my life, but a county sheriff found her and then found us (cue huge sigh of relief and ten minutes of blushing, since we'd just lost our child in front of every parent in Story County, Iowa).

Another "it could have been worse" moment was the poor dad a few families in front of us. He had two boys with him - I'd put them at approximately 8 and 4 years old. The 4 year old was Matthew. I know this because of the Litany: "Matthew, stay here with me. Matthew, please don't lick the glass. Matthew, don't go into the girls' bathroom. Matthew, let me tie your shoe." Ad nauseum. The poor, poor man.

Finally, we got into Hell. I mean, the room where they do the vaccinations. I said Hell at first because if I ever go there, I expect the first thing I'll hear is a lot of screaming children, if whoever runs Hell knows what they're doing - the reaction was unpleasant in the extreme. Thanking heaven that we could both our day off together, we filled out the paperwork as fast as possible, leapfrogging Matthew's poor dad in the process. Matthew, at this point, had been reduced to a puddle of crying boy, punctuated by moments where he tried to get away like a feral cat cornered by a vicious dog. The poor, poor man.

The girls took their medicine well. Alanna got a shot, since she's already gotten her regular flu shot. Ainsley got the nasal spray. Two minutes of tears, then out into the rain for the drive home. Jack the dog, bless his heart, hadn't chewed on a thing in the van, and was so pathetically glad to see us I think I might have forgiven him if I had. By the time we got home, everyone was happy and singing.

Being a huge Stephen King fan, the opening chapters of The Stand popped into my head several times during the afternoon. For those who don't know the plot, here's the basics: the government develops a shifting-antigen flu, which basically means that every time our bodies fight off the flu, it morphs into a different strain until our immune systems can't keep up. Of course the flu escapes its sterile environment, and eventually the pandemic wipes out some 90% of the population of the world. I realized as we were standing in line that when King wrote those chapters about the flu, he pretty much hit it right on the head. First people hear rumors of a pandemic virus, then the first few cases show up, and pretty soon it's ravaging the local population.

Of course, the first few times I read the book (somewhere around 13 or 14 years old, I think), I told myself, "I would go out into the mountains with a shotgun and a month of food before I'd fall victim to a virus like that." Thankfully, H1N1 isn't nearly as deadly for most of us, but it's really easy to find yourself amazed at what sheep we are sometimes. If I remember right, King describes a flu clinic EXACTLY like what we went through last week, with a false vaccine, just to keep the population from rioting. And here we were, obediently standing in line to be vaccinated, just like in the book. So much for the mountains and a shotgun, huh?

I am, however, grateful for the public health folks who are working so hard to help keep the virus under control. My paranoid mind-wanderings aside, we were treated with kindness and efficiency; they got a LOT of people through the line in a very quick hurry, and those of us with small kids were grateful for the extra protection against what sounds like a pretty nasty bug. It makes me realize, again, how fortunate we are to live here in this time - and how important it is to continue working on behalf of those who do not yet have access to the healthcare we so often take for granted.

Grace & peace,

Scott

The picture is a quarantine clinic during the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918.

Blog? I Think I Used To Do That...

Apparently natural selection has eliminated blogging as the weak link in my life for the past few weeks. Who knew?

The semester is ON. Work continues apace. Preaching has been a struggle at times. We're looking at another 18 months of terrible twos at the very least, with more fun to come as the girls' ability to argue and fight expands with age. Money is tight - very, very tight. So I feel as though I've been treading water for the past month. Thankfully, thus far I've been able to keep my head above the waves.

So, life is good, but uncertain, unsure, unsettled at best. Beloved is working her tail off, too, and it leaves us with very little time to just be a family together. Last weekend we traveled to Nebraska for my brother's wedding, which was a wonderful, beautiful weekend with many family and friends. The only problem? It was over FAR too soon.

I keep hoping that I'll grow more efficient with my time, and to a point I think I've done that, but I keep wondering - is efficiency really the issue? Am I just trying to do too much? Life has so much to offer that I want to do it all (well, most of it - I could do without the sea slug smoothie the folks on Survivor had to chug down in tonight's episode).

I want to be a better blogger, but I've been choosing the far more important job of being a better husband, father and pastor (in that order, mind you), and I think I've made the right choice. Then again, this post only took a few minutes - really, how hard can it be? *Sigh* I guess I'll never learn...

Grace & peace,

Scott

What I Do On Mornings Like This

6:00 AM: The alarm on my watch goes off, beeping on my dresser. I get up, get dressed, grind the coffee beans and start the first pot of the day, let the dog out, put in my contacts.

I pour the first cup of steaming bitter blessedness and settle down into the recliner in the basement with my latest book, The Spy Who Came In From The Cold by John le Carre. I'm about 100 pages from the end. I hear Alanna cooing to herself upstairs, and think that I might get twenty pages, maybe thirty, before she insists on getting up and starting her day.

But, wonder of wonders, she goes back to sleep. After about 90 minutes, I have finished the book, including its wonderfully tense final chapters. I check Facebook, make up a few snarky titles for the rumored "Indiana Jones 5," catch up on my Huskers, and read email, which includes the funny poem below, from The Writer's Almanac this morning. Now it's 8:20, I can hear my ladies stirring, and we've missed breakfast at day care - so I'll go upstairs and make scrambled eggs and toast, and we will smile at the luxury of sleeping in and reading good books.

Thus far it's been a nearly perfect morning. Please let's not ruin it, shall we?

Grace & peace,

Scott

A Wife Explains Why She Likes Country

by Barbara Ras

Because those cows in the bottomland are black and white, colors
anyone can understand, even against the green
of the grass, where they glide like yes and no, nothing in between,
because in country, heartache has nowhere to hide,
it's the Church of Abundant Life, the Alamo,
the hubbub of the hoi polloi, the parallel lines of rail fences,
because I like rodeos more than golf,
because there's something about the sound of mealworms and
leeches and the dream of a double-wide
that reminds me this is America, because of the simple pleasure
of a last chance, because sometimes whiskey
tastes better than wine, because hauling hogs on the road
is as good as it gets when the big bodies are layered like pigs in a cake,
not one layer but two,
because only country has a gun with a full choke and a slide guitar
that melts playing it cool into sweaty surrender in one note,
because in country you can smoke forever and it'll never kill you,
because roadbeds, flatbeds, your bed or mine,
because the package store is right across from the chicken plant
and it sells boiled peanuts, because I'm fixin' to wear boots to the dance
and make my hair bigger, because no smarty-pants, just easy rhymes,
perfect love, because I'm lost deep within myself and the sad songs call me out,
because even you with your superior aesthetic cried
when Tammy Wynette died,
because my people
come from dirt.

"A Wife Explains Why She Likes Country" by Barbara Ras, from One Hidden Stuff. © Penguin Poets, 2006.

Life with HFM: Day 6?

We seem to be on the downslope (knocking furiously on wood)!

Ainsley slept the night through, as did Beloved and Alanna, and everyone woke up smiling but me (I never wake up smiling - it's the coffee that brings the smile). When I went into Ainsley's room to get her dressed, she took a big drink out of her cup of water and said, "Owie all gone!" That was good news indeed.

Now the girls are at preschool/day care, Beloved is at her office with Jack the dog and I'm here, wondering how long it'll take me to get to the top of my desk and, more importantly, where the hell my sermon has gone. So, of course, I'm going to do the Friday Five in a few minutes. Priorities, right? :-)

Thanks again for all the prayers and well-wishes: it sounds like we got off pretty easy in the end, even including the trip to the ER. Our day care provider says that most cases are like Ainsley's or worse, and HFM can rip through families and day care groups like wildfire. We're not totally out of the woods yet, but today has certainly given us reason to hope.

Grace & peace,
Scott

Life with HFM, Day 5ish

Yesterday was a nightmare. Today, not so much.

Actually, yesterday started off pretty well. The girls woke up early, and we were exhausted, but after coffee and some breakfast for all, it seemed as though things weren't so bad. Ainsley ate two whole pieces of banana bread, with some wincing, and Alanna showed no ill effects of anything at all. Beloved went off to her office for a few hours and I, after grabbing a quick shower and shave, took the girls to campus for a walk. We parked at the Center, walked through the Union Bookstore to take some pictures of toddler-sized ISU cheerleader outfits for a friend, then headed over to the Free Speech Zone where the campus Atheists & Agnostics had a booth. After meeting the AA president and agreeing to do some interfaith dialogue (I know, it sounds weird, but it's going to be cool - keep watching), we walked back to the van and headed home for lunch. Beloved came home at about the same time, and after feeding I headed off to a Religious Leaders' Association meeting while Beloved put the girls down for their naps.

I got home at about 3:00 and we decided that after naps we'd go grocery shopping and run some ministry errands together. However, by the time we were done with the grocery shopping, it was pretty apparent that Ainsley was in a bad way. Constant crying and whimpering, with no consolation whatsoever. We put our heads together and figured out that Ainsley hadn't drank anything since lunch, hadn't had a potty or wet diaper all day, and realized she was probably pretty dehydrated. By the time we got home, she was still crying but without tears, and First Nurse advised us to take her to the ER for an IV. Beloved headed off while I fed Alanna and let the dog out for some exercise.

I took some supper over to the ER for Beloved about 30 minutes after they left, and thankfully I was there to help them insert the IV needle. That's an experience I'll not repeat any time soon if it's up to me. The nurse was wonderful, but the first stick hit a valve in her hand, so we had to go for the vein in her elbow. Try explaining that to a toddler who's already miserable because she has sores all over her mouth, a fever, and a dehydration headache to boot. To make matters worse, the elbow vein was a GOOD one - so much so that I wound up with a fairly good spurt of blood on my knee and leg before we could get everything set up. It's one thing to let them stick your own arm - I have no trouble with that. But holding your wailing child and watching her blood land on your leg was a bit much for me. I can't imagine what it must be like for parents whose children bleed due to violence; I'd be in shock, for sure.

Thankfully, the IV was exactly what Ainsley needed. She came home with good color, and it seems she slept pretty well all night. I had campus ministry stuff from 8:30 - 11:00 or so, and when I got home Beloved was in bed with Ainsley helping her sleep. She slept all alone until about 3:00, and when she started crying again I spent the rest of the night in bed with her. When she woke up at 6:30ish, I brought her back into our room so I could get some sleep in my own bed. What happened next is a sign of how much I married above my class. Ainsley and Alanna were both up and running around 8:00, I think, but Beloved took them and stayed with them so I could sleep until almost 11:00. Holy crap, what a woman I married, huh? Now everyone is napping, apparently deeply asleep. The house is beginning to feel a bit smaller than usual, but hopefully we are working our way toward getting everyone up and healthy in the very near future. Thanks again for prayers and well-wishes.

Grace & peace,

Scott