There is No Real Way of Knowing Which Direction We are Going (HoL 22)

House of Laughter 22

Well, Nancy is taking her turn with the cold that Isaac and I had last week. She has almost completely lost her voice, has a sore throat and is exhausted. Isaac got his flu shot today, but you’d never know it from his attitude.

We had a good baby wrestling session tonight and I got four or five really loud belly laughs out of him.

We also read a new book. This book is second only to “The Fierce Bad Rabbit” in the list of “Children’s books with really great names”. It’s called “Hippos Go Berserk.” What more could you want from a story? It pretty much lays it all out there in the title, just like the upcoming Samuel L. Jackson film “Snakes on a Plane.” You know there are going to be hippos, and they are going to go berserk.

We try to be health conscious parents and make our own baby food. This really isn’t as difficult as people make it out to be. The only real drawback I see is that our refrigerator looks like the test lab for Willy Wonka. We have 60 small cups of brightly colored pureed fruits, veggies and meat. God forbid, I go to get a beer. When I open the door, at least two of these cups fling themselves at me in an effort to gain enough velocity to smash open on the floor. This is where the dog comes in. His new favorite food is finely pureed tuna, chicken, and (new this weekend) ground beef. I’m lobbying hard for Isaac’s next food to be Stamey’s barbecue. It’s not like we’d have to grind it up much more.

Isaac has started dancing some. Unfortunately, he dances like I do: i.e. shakes his head erratically to no particular beat whatsoever. It’s still funny when he really gets moving.

As far as his head goes, I guess he’s doing okay. The helmet doesn’t seem to bother him, and we’ve stripped it down to it’s basic piece, since the chin strap just seemed superfluous. The only problem is, it is starting to develop a serious funk, and no amount of Febreeze cuts into it.

This weekend is our church’s 100^th anniversary. After church on Sunday, we are all going to stand on the steps in front of the sanctuary, and have our picture made. Tonight, I looked at similar pictures that were taken 13 years ago, and over 30 years ago. I like it that Isaac will be part of the history of our church. It was fun looking at the old pictures, and trying to figure out who was in those pictures, and remembering names of people who had left or died. It was also great to see our youth, who were just little kids at the time. On the day those pictures were taken, it probably didn’t seem like a big event, but today they are being carefully scrutinized, and those pictures are a piece of our history. Twenty years from now, they will look at the picture we take Sunday, and ask, “Who’s the kid with the helmet?” and will be surprised to realize that it is Isaac, who has since grown up to do amazing things.

Strength and Honor

Big Matt