breaking news...

new guy in our Bible study

I love my Monday evening Bible Study/ Men's small group.

I have really been enjoying our study of the Gospel of Luke, among other books, and learning how God speaks to us...well, me, though words written 2000 years ago.

And I also enjoy the back end of our evenings, when the four or five of us are able to share what's going on in our lives in a safe, non-judgmental environment. For the most part, if one guy is dealing with a particular issue, at least one other guy in the room has been there before, and can offer support and encouragement from experience.

We had new guy join us tonight. I think he sometimes attends the church where we meet.
We had an interesting discussion about Jairus and his daughter, from the first chapter of Luke.
Someone snuck a grab at the cloak of Jesus, and it turns out that the daughter was only sleeping.

When we transitioned into our personal sharing time, the new guy went first, and kept going for nearly an hour. He was clearly in some fresh, raw pain, and he had chosen to join us tonight to share and vent, instead of drinking at home. His life situation is complex, confusing, and painful, and we shared and encouraged as much as we felt our limitations would allow.

But I remember having a regrettable thought after the new guy had been talking for at least thirty minutes. I remember, for a moment thinking that this new guy was taking up too much of our Bible study time, and he was cutting into the time I needed to talk about MY stuff.

But about as quickly as I had that thought, I was struck with a moment of Spiritual wisdom.

I realized that God had a hand in drawing the new guy into visiting our group tonight, and it seemed clear that God wanted our group to give the guy our unselfish and undivided attention and support. No guarantees on how it all might turn out for him, but he was aching to be heard,
and it was much less important tonight for me to speak, than is was for me to listen.

And I did listen. And parts of his story were achingly familiar to me, and after I listened, I was able to share with him some insight on the time I had spent in that same hole.
He listened, and he heard, and he may have even taken some valuable nugget with him that will help him in his next vulnerable moment.

I have been struggling with some life issues recently, and I often ask God as I pray to show me what my purpose is supposed to be here on Earth. But I also have been asking Him to show me how I can be serving Him here on Earth.

Tonight He showed me a glimpse of His answer, and His Grace.

He asked me to be still, and listen.

it's in your blood

This blog post won't really be my usual fun, cute, or poignant posting.
Ok, I hope they are at least cute. Usually.
But at least this one has a happy ending.

Debbie has two grandchildren from her eldest daughter, Angela. Abigail is 5 1/2,
and Jacob is 2 1/2. Abigail has some medication that she is given daily, which comes
in a small bottle of orange cough-syrupy kind of liquid.

Thursday evening, Jacob quietly climbed up onto the counter, grabbed the bottle,
and drank some of the medication, recapped the bottle, and put it into the silverware drawer.
No one was the wiser until a few hours later, when he appeared to be unusually groggy and
unresponsive at bedtime, which is when Angela and husband Graham called 911, and Jacob
was rushed to the PICU of a northside Indy hospital.

Unfortunately, the the liquid cause of his condition was not immediately known, so for over
12 agonizing hours, Jacob was treated for what was thought to be a seizure. On Friday, a new
doctor visited, and deduced through reasoning, questions, and blood work that Jacob had accidentally nearly overdosed on his sister's medicine.

I cannot imagine the mixed reactions and emotions of any parents, given this news.
On one hand, the accidental ingestion of medicine could be relatively easily treated and neutralized, hopefully with no permanent residual effects. And this also rules out what might
have been the onset of some new, or genetic and lifelong medical challenge.
So this is really good news, at least after the child gets home from the hospital.

On the other hand, in this situation, it is very difficult for the parents to not feel guilty for accidentally leaving medication in an accessible place to a young child. But judging by the many stories I've heard this past weekend about children getting into stuff, despite good parents doing their best to protect them, I'd guess there is only so much you can control.

I am told that the doctors and nurse that Angela and Graham spoke with were extremely
kind, capable, and even vulnerable. In addition to telling them several stories of children going to unexpected lengths to get into medicine and chemicals, each had a personal story of their own children creating similar medical situations. The doctor even told of the "poopy pill box".

It seems that the child of the doctor had found a small round plastic pill box on the bathroom counter, containing several pills. I don't recall how the doctor discovered that the child had swallowed the pillbox whole, but in the end, it was a waiting game, and eventually, the child pooped out the intact pill box, pills contained, unscathed, and undissolved. The doctor retrieved the pillbox, cleaned it up, and has kept it for a keepsake, and a reminder.

I don't know if it helped or not when Graham called his Mum in Liverpool, and told her the story.
She replied with her own story about how a very young Graham had found a bottle of pills in his childhood home, and convinced his younger brother, Bobby, to take two for every one Graham took. Fortunately, the hospital took care of them, and all turned out well.

After three days of PICU and prayers, Jacob returned home on Sunday, and has improved immensely. He will have a couple low-key days of DVD camp in the TV room, while he regains his footing, his strength, and full muscle control. The ice cream should help...so I'm told.

This might have been the feel-good end of my version of Jacob's story, except that Debbie called her vacationing mom today, who is out visiting Debbie's sister in Montana. When Grandma Dixie heard the story, it turns out she had one of her own to tell.

Dixie reminded Debbie that when she was very young, but still the oldest of six children, she had gotten into a bottle of children's aspirin, and not only helped herself, but she shared with her brothers and sister. When Dixie discovered Debra Jo's aspirin distribution, she called the family doctor, Dr. Kiely, who told Dixie to have the kids drink mustard water, which would make them all regurgitate the pills, and other assorted snacks.

Now that I think of it, I can't recall Debbie ever putting mustard on a sandwich.

Jacob, it's in your blood.

rounding third

Last weekend, Debbie and I took a day trip up to the family lake cottage on Lake Freeman. It was a wonderful day, sitting on the dock, grabbing some sun and some nap time.
And we even took a long boat ride to the dam and back.

While we were there, Dad mentioned the answering machine message from 8 year old Zack, his grandson, and my nephew. And Kristin's son, as long as we're at it. I had a big grin on my big face listening to Zack tell Grandpa about pitching in his game, and striking two people out, and throwing two others out. I decided that I needed to see this in person, even if Zack does live five hours away, near Cleveland.

I'm going through some professional and personal struggles at the moment. I lost my job to downsizing last December, and I've since had difficulty deciding what my next career direction should be, as well as, how to get there. So I have some available time that I would not have with a regular work schedule. I've really tried to to embrace and recognize this time as a blessing.
I've had time at home with Mom, before she died, and I've been able to be here with Dad in the months that have followed, and we take turns leaning on each other, as needed.

There are many things that you can do for your friends, family members, and significant others, but there is rarely any gift more valuable than the gift of quality time spent together. So I've tried to be very aware of opportunities to take advantage of my available time, and share it with my loved ones. This would include several trips to Sweetser, Indiana to watch my brother Kirk's girls play Upward basketball and soccer. I've had the joy of getting to know my grand-nephew Jaylen better, when I helped out my sister, and niece by babysitting, and changing a diaper for the first time in my life (see blog post). Nevermind that I put it on backwards. I proudly wore my Lapel Bulldogs Track t-shirt at nearly all of Sam's high school track meets, and I attended Debbie's granddaughter, Abigail's Memorial Day Bike Parade. I enjoyed reading "The Monster At The End Of This Book" to Debbie's pre-schoolers recently. And Debbie and I have already been to the lakes twice as many times as we went all last summer, when my job schedule was jacked up, and I didn't have the time.

I certainly don't mean to suggest that I'm a Super-Hero for attending all the things that parents attend every day, and every week. I'm just saying that I appreciate having the opportunities to share in these memories at this time in my life.

So when Kristin told me Zack had a game on Tuesday at 6:45pm, I decided that a road trip was in order. Unfortunately, my road buddy, Debbie, is Camp Director at Interactive Academy, and could not make the trip, so I headed east on I-70 solo on Tuesday around noon, and arrived in Wadsworth, Ohio in time to pick up the twins, Allison and Zachary, at their day care academy.

The jaw-dropping look from Allison was priceless, when she spotted me standing in the doorway of her classroom. She yelled, "Uncle Georgy!!!", and then ran to find Zack. Zack did his very best to play it cool in front of his friends, and I got a subduded "What's up?", and a leg hug from him.

We had time for a new house tour and some snacks, before we headed to the big game at a minimalist ball field behind the neighborhood elementary school. We arrived early enough
for the kids to play some pre-game outfield "catch", although it seemed that I spent quite a bit of time retrieving incoming wayward balls. I settled into my foldable lawn chair down the third base line with the rest of the Cub parents. Just before the little sisters of the ball players departed for the nearby playground, they hit up their parents for the snacks and juiceboxes
stashed in the many diaper bags and book bags. One Mom told us that, when she had asked her little girl to grab a snack from the pantry and put it in the bag, she had grabbed a
can of Spaghettio's, and the mom held up the can as proof. No one had thought to bring a Coleman
stove, so the Spaghettio's remained unopened, and uneaten.

The game itself was more competitive and entertaining than I expected.
There were the highs and lows that you might expect.
In this league, they let the kids pitch the first two innings, and then the coaches/dads pitched the rest of the game. It was a bit sad when the coach's son cried after getting pulled from the pitcher's mound 19 pitches into his mandated 25 max pitch count, after walking in too many runners. But he made up for it later with his three run home run.

Zack had a solid game playing catcher. As is the nature of this level of baseball, nearly every pitch was caught by the dad/umpire at the backstop. But it was amusing to see Zack peer into his catcher's mitt after every pitch pass him, always expecting to see the ball miraculously appear in the webbing. At the plate, he made decent contact, got on base a few times, and even scored a run, looking like a Serengeti Gazelle on the base paths.





















Zack's dad, Mark, was the first base coach. He is very good about reminding the kids who reach base about their options, when the next batter makes contact. Mark related a funny exchange with one of the better players on the team, after the kid reached first, and Mark reminded him to
run on a grounder, and tag on a fly ball. The player looked at Mark, and said in annoyed voice,
"You tell me that every time!", to which Mark replied, "And I'll keep reminding you, until you can recite it back to me when you get here."

Despite surrendering an eight run lead in the last two innings, our Cubs managed to hold on and win the game, and after completing the high-five line, players from both teams celebrated with their post-game juice bombs and Rice Krispy treats.

Later at Kristin's home, after some local pizza, Zack and Allison fell asleep laying on top of their a Uncle Georgy on the big couch of the TV room. We carried them upstairs, tucked them into their beds, and said good night. Later, as I lay in the darkness of the basement bedroom, always the coolest part of the house in so many ways, I prayed in thankfulness for the opportunity to spend this kind of time, and create these kinds of memories with my niece and nephew. And it didn't seem like that much later that I heard them bounding down the stairs at 6:45am to wake me up.
We sat in my guest bed, and talked until it was time for my sister to take them to camp.

I was a little sad to pull out of the driveway at noon, and the five hour drive home didn't go nearly as quickly as it had 24 hours earlier. Anticipation and adrenaline are better than caffeine.
Someone once said that, a good companion is the best short cut to a long trip, and I really missed having Debbie in my passenger seat, but I did drive with the fresh memory of smiles and laughter, and several Diet Pepsi's in my cooler.

And in the end, I was much like Zack on third base....I couldn't wait to get home.


.

lawn boy

I am NOT a lawnmower killer.

Toward the end of last summer, I was attempting to clean Dad's push mower after a dusty 75 minute cardio-burning, grass session.
I don't know why I decided to use the garden hose for the first time, but the next time I used
the mower, it ran like there was water in the gas line, or somewhere it should not have been.
Later, the lawnmower shop guy absolved me of my guilt, when he told me that something entirely different was broken, and parts and repairs would be more than a new mower.
So we finished the summer on Dad's John Deere rider.
Up until the flat tire.

Dad jacked up the Deere, removed the tire, and I had the tire guy downtown fix it.
After Dad reinstalled the tire, I fired the rider up for one last pre-fall mow and mulch.
We couldn't get the transmission to engage, and the John Deere sat dormant in the garage
until this Spring, when Dad called his friend Tom, who said he had a guy, and we called his guy,
who came and took it to his shop to look at the tranny, and give it a good Spring tune up.

When he brought it back, he told me that it had only been missing a small metal bar-like
key, that engaged the transmission, but must've fallen out in the garage or the yard.
He had replaced the missing key, and the rider was working fine.
I took three steps toward the driveway, and picked up a rusted piece of metal I'd spotted on the floor just the day before. "That would be the piece you were missing", he said.

I suppose we could have survived with just the riding mower, but I really prefer to push,
at least while I'm still able. I enjoy the exercise, and I think it goes quicker.
So Dad went to Sears and bought a new Craftsman mulching push mower, very similar to
the one we'd had before. The second time I used it, I pulled the rope completely out of....
well, wherever the rope goes when it's wound up inside the mower.
I took it back to Sears.

I was informed that they could not fix it on-site, but would need to send it to Cincinnati, but
we could just get a new one on exchange that day. I took a new one home.

On the first attempt with the new mower, I pulled the rope completely out again.

Now I've been going to the gym with Debbie recently, but I've really only done cardio on the bike and the treadmill, and I am probably in the worst shape of my life. So I refused to accept that I
was out-muscling the mower, as I pulled the ripcord.
So I took it back to Sears.

I was once again told of the Cincinnati option, and the salesperson was a little surprised that I
still wanted to stay with this model of Craftsman mower, despite the obvious model defect.
I noticed another customer browsing the lawnmowers, and I told him that the model he was looking at was the one I was trying to successfully introduce onto my lawn environment,
and it was a good model, as long as you didn't pull the cord out.

Meanwhile, my sales guy processed an exchange for me, and I went back to Merchandise Pickup to....well, you know, pick up my merchandise. After a brief wait, I was told that they were out of stock on that particular mower, but they did have a display model available. I said that was fine, and we walked out onto the sales floor just in time to see the customer I had talked to, paying for the display model of my mower.

Ten days, and two rider circuits later, I finally had a third Craftsman mulching push mower in the garage, and I was more than a little anxious as I pushed it into the driveway to attempt a start.
As Dad watched from the shade of the garage, I very gingerly gave it a gentle, twelve inch pull, and was relieved to see that the mower started, and the rope settled back into it's circular home.

We're nearly two months into the lawn mowing season, and since we brought home the third
Craftsman mower, I haven't had any problems with the rope, and I've actually turned it into a game to see how slightly I can pull the rope, and still start the mower. It doesn't take much.

Now, if all that weren't enough, I thought I killed Debbie's old mower a few weeks ago.
On her mower, the rope is permanently pulled to it's max, and you have to reach underneath
and twist the blade to rewind the cord, before you can attempt to start it. I'm not nearly as comfortable with the idea of sticking my hand under the mower to twist the blade as Debbie is,
so I tilted her mower on it's side, and used a stick to turn the blade.
It took awhile for all the black oil to leak out onto the mower deck, but it was obvious early on
that the 90*, on it's side tilt hadn't been a good idea, and after using three old rag socks to soak up the spilled oil, and having no back-up small engine oil, I abandoned the job with the middle half her back yard left higher than the rest. Sort of a mow-hawk. sorry....so bad.

Fortunately, when I was able to add new oil, and keep her mower upright, it worked fine, and I was once again absolved of lawnmower battery.

Debbie's brother John has a bit of farmland and horse pastures, and he is always looking for thrill-seeking city folk wishing to drive his tractor for fun, but who can actually be Tom Sawyer'd
into cutting down his expansive fields. As thrilling as that sounds, I'm afraid of what mechanical distress I might bring to a large International/Case tractor, with the six foot mowing deck.

I wonder if I could take that back to Sears?