When Spring Break rolled around last week, we were faced with five whole weekdays with no work or school but also no plans. Though we knew it was coming, we had treated the week with hesitancy. When the optimistic part of your brain is in a constant state of hope for travel news about the final stages of an adoption making plans that include family vacations—events that require both time-off and money—are tricky. A few days before the week began, I called up our dear friends who live in Memphis to make sure they’d be in town: We were westward bound! We booked a Quality Suites in a nicer part of town with an indoor pool and Continental breakfast. We could’ve just stopped there. If push came to shove, our kids would be cool with a deepish puddle and a waffle maker. That was about all the hotel had to recommend itself but that was okay. We were actually going for three main reasons: 1) To see old friends, 2) To show the kids where we used to live, grocery shop, worship, etc., and 3) To get out of town. We arrived on Monday afternoon. Our first stop was the house we moved to after we’d been married a couple of years. (Fun fact: It dead-ends into Rosser Road.) It looked basically the same: It had the same brownish gray wood siding and the grass still won’t grow under the large oak trees in the front. The new owners had upgraded the mailbox from the one we had. Ours came with the house. It was topped off with a metal silhouette of a couple on a bicycle. Considering that it’s now a very basic, very plain, standard-issue black metal mailbox, I don’t know if that really qualifies as an upgrade. The “bicycle-built-for-two” mailbox was probably a collector’s item. After our car ride down memory lane, we went to our friends’ house. Russ and Amy moved to a different house in town just before we left Memphis but for a big chunk of our time there they had lived across the street from us. In other words, the couple on the two-seater Schwinn on our mailbox could’ve pedaled to their house in about thirty seconds. We hadn’t seen each other in nearly six years, but we picked back up with a comfort and familiarity you only experience with old friends that have been your rescue. That may sound a bit over-reaching but it’s true. I have friends from high school that I can go for years without seeing and then—click—we’re back to our same roles, our same conversation shorthand. That’s because we were each other’s rescue from the teen years. It’s the same with Russ and Amy. We were young adults together, navigating responsibilities like church work and trash day. We were newlyweds together, discussing what was normal to fight about and cheap to serve for supper. We were new parents together…no explanation necessary. We’re still trying to figure out what we’re supposed to be doing. We spent Monday night laughing and reminiscing and watching our kids blend seamlessly like they’d never been apart. On Tuesday, we went to Graceland. If you’ve never been to Elvis’ home I highly recommend it. Our kids have now been to the Trifecta of American Homes: The White House? Check. The Biltmore? Check. Graceland? Check! Afterwards we went to lunch at our favorite hamburger joint, Huey’s. Then we took a tour of the children’s hospital where Brent used to work. Guess which part was the kids’ least favorite? Luckily, it was Resident Appreciation Week and they were serving frozen yogurt in the conference room. Phew! Barely missed a huge Whine-a-Palooza! (If your kids don’t whine at some point, it’s not a real family vacation.) We took the kids back to the hotel to squeeze in a little swim time before returning to our friends’ house for supper. The kids needed to splash and yell a bit after Graceland lines and hospital tours. While they were swimming, they took turns baptizing each other. After Ella took Knox’s confession and gave him a good dunk, he looked at me and asked, “Does that count?” “Does what count?” I asked. “Ella just baptized me. Does it count?” Hmmm. “No, honey. Daddy wasn’t watching. When you do it for real I’ll make sure he’s not on his cell.” It’s been almost nine years since we left Memphis but we still carry it around with us. No, I’m not suggesting that Brent wears a white, bedazzled jumpsuit under his clothes every day. I’m also not saying that we are renovating our house into the shape of the Pyramid. What I mean to say is that during the years (eight for Brent and about 6 1/2 for me) we lived in Memphis we became “BrentandAbby,” an entity, a team, a force to be reckoned with. We did the “leave and cleave” God was so jazzed about in Genesis. After five years of married bliss, we brought home 10 pounds of beautiful baby girl. (That’s 10 lbs divided by two, for any of you mathematicians out there. Our twin daughters weighed about 5 lbs each.) If our marriage were a book, Memphis would be a really pivotal chapter most likely titled “Campbell Soup and Grilled Cheese again?” or maybe “Making Our Dreams Come True (Or Other Phrases from the Lavergne & Shirley Theme Song).” Either way, it would be an amazing chapter!

A few nights ago, I awoke to the sight of my daughter Ella standing by my side of the bed fully dressed, wet hair combed, and ready for school. I glanced at the clock—12:45 am. “What’s the matter?” I asked, groggily. “My alarm went off so I took my shower,” she replied. “I guess it was just a dream.” “Go back to bed. It’s the middle of the night,” I told her. “Should I change?” she asked, pointing down at her blue jeans, t-shirt, and cardigan. “No. Just go to bed.” The next morning I reflected on the weird sleep practices of my kids and I did what I always do when it comes to oddities in my offspring—I blamed it on my husband. Before we were married, I heard stories from Brent’s roommates about his frequent sleepwalking (or sometimes sleep running). Once he was found sitting in the corner of his dorm room playing an invisible video game complete with sound effects of his own making. After we were married, Brent continued with his nighttime activities. Once, I was shocked awake when he stood at the foot of our bed, yelled “Spiders!” and ripped the covers off me. For a Labor Day weekend early in our marriage, we went to the beach with another married couple. We were too poor to get separate hotel rooms, so the four of us shared one room with two queen-sized beds. All through the night Brent attempted to answer the hotel phone that never rang. He also picked up a large cardboard carton of Whoppers candy. Slowly he turned it upside down, letting the hard chocolate candy balls bump into each other, creating a rainfall of clattering sounds. Not satisfied with the level of noise he had just made, he slowly turned the carton right side up, creating the racket again. Our friends lay in the bed next to us, shaking with laughter. Now that we’ve been married more than fifteen years, I’ve noticed that his crazy sleep behavior has pretty much disappeared, or I’ve learned how to sleep through it. Now his only sleep-related strangeness comes in the form of dreams. We’ll be standing in our shared bathroom in the morning following a dream-filled night. As I insert my contacts, he’ll tell me some ridiculous scenario involving a person he hasn’t seen since middle school, his job at a McDonald’s with a malfunctioning cash register, and a sudden locale change to his grand parents’ house that was swiftly filling up with miniature marshmallows. It’s always a weird feeling to get a few hours into your day before you see someone who you realize was in your dream. Even if his role in your dream is completely innocent, it feels oddly intimate and slightly embarrassing to see him. Recently and in the span of a few days, two different people told me they had a dream about me. In one instance, I was giving birth to a baby. In the other one, I was in a house packed full of kids. No matter if these dreams foreshadow any baby news or they just predict a future slumber, these dreams encourage me. They’re not embarrassing at all. These dreamers were thinking of me even in their subconscious. They could’ve been dreaming about marshmallows or spiders or Whoppers but their minds were full of me and kids.

After waking up my son Knox for school this morning, we lingered a while in his bed discussing possible ways to make his bedroom more toddler-friendly before bringing home a new little brother/roommate. Involuntarily, I found myself saying “if,” instead of “when.” “We should go through all of the tiny pieces that go with your Star Wars figures if we bring Ezra home…” Fortunately, Knox didn’t catch my slip-up. He happily jumped out of bed and ran to the kitchen like always. I, on the other hand, have felt burdened by this alteration in my vocabulary. My hope has waxed and waned throughout our adoption process but I have recently felt myself spending more time at the “Depressed Pessimist” side of the spectrum as opposed to the “Expectant Optimist” side. With document expiration dates looming in the very near future, we’ve begun the updating process for our files. Nearly all of the paperwork we filled out so many months ago must now be filled out again. The first time was exciting. This time is just depressing. Kind friends encourage me with: “Just keep praying!” They say, “Trust God’s perfect timing!” I hear their words but it doesn’t ring true. I can’t imagine that God is pleased with orphans having to wait for a family. How can He approve of the under-staffed Embassy that makes investigating these cases take so long? Is He busy elsewhere when children die of malnutrition and diarrhea when they simply need something to eat and clean water to drink? From my inferior, earthly point of view, God’s timing really stinks. So there’s the chasm I must jump to have a faith that can move mountains. Trusting God when everything’s going great is a breeze. Trusting God when He’s not going in the direction nor at the speed I’d prefer feels foolish and a waste of time. So I ask myself, who was I reallytrusting when there was smooth sailing and calm water for as far as the eye could see? God doesn’t change but I have more moods swings than a Miss America pageant has costume changes. My consolation during this Faith Battle Royale that’s being waged in my heart and mind is my faith in Him doesn’t change His faithfulness toward me. He is the same God no matter how poorly I try to define Him. His power isn’t diminished just because I can’t see the evidence of it. He is gravity, tethering me to this Earth with invisible bands. I can spend the rest of my days denying the existence of gravity–something I can’t see or hold–but I can’t escape its reality. I’m grateful for the friends who continue to pray for our son and the millions of other children who need families. I have days when my prayers seem to bounce back to me like a hollow echo–empty and mocking. It’s a great encouragement to know that when I can’t (or won’t) pray, there are others who step in to fill that chasm.

I wept into my Kleenex as I watched the cast of Les Miserables on the Oscars a few weeks ago. They sang a medley of three songs: “Suddenly,” “I Dreamed a Dream, and “One Day More.” I’m always a sucker for Broadway musicals. And I’ll see just about anything live. There’s an adrenaline rush for me in spite of the fact that I’m just an observer. Maybe this heart palpitation can be attributed to my own oft-times disastrous experiences on the stage. When I was in the second grade, my classmates were set to perform a Christmas program. I was selected to be one of the graceful Sugar Plum Fairies. I won’t say more, but you can read the rest of the incident in my post called “Scars”. (Spoiler: I was neither graceful nor good at remembering my line.) In the third grade, we performed a play all about Johnny Appleseed. I had the honor and distinction of being the first person to have a line. I was supposed to be one of several grandchildren who runs onstage and awakens their sleeping grandpa. Then I was supposed to say “Grandpa! Grandpa! Read us a story!” They asked the “grandchildren” to wear pajamas for their costumes. My mom made me a looong white nightgown. As I climbed the stage right steps, I stepped on the front of my nightgown. In a split second, I was facedown in front of the entire audience as they awaited my line. Did I run out crying? No! The show must go on, so I mustered up every bit of courage and soldiered on. In fourth grade, the theme for our play was the life of Thomas Jefferson. We sang songs about the Louisiana Purchase and the Whirligig–the spinning desk chair he invented. We also sang a song about the debate between the Secretary of Treasury (Alexander Hamilton) and the Secretary of State (Thomas Jefferson). It was high drama, folks! My part was a narrator/townsperson who explained the importance of the debate while fellow townspeople marched in a circle behind me with protest signs in their hands. I had a fairly long paragraph to memorize and it took a lot of concentration to recite it. This was only made more difficult when I was whacked in the back of the head with a protest sign in the middle of my monologue. Did I falter? I can’t really remember. The rest of the play is kind of foggy from there forward. In the seventh grade, I tried out for a part in “Friends Forever,” a Michael W. Smith musical full of parents who don’t understand, friends that move away, and a Boys vs. Girls number called “Get Real.” I got the part of Janet, the girl who moved away. I’m pretty sure I gave a heartbreaking performance every practice. It was a real tear-jerker. On a rainy day before the big night, we were asked to perform “Get Real” in front of the student body after Chapel. In the song the girls and boys faced each other on stage, taking turns advancing on the other group while snapping and singing. That was my limit of coordination. We were supposed to wear sunglasses for the song and I had left mine in the classroom. I asked our teacher if I could run and get them. When I returned, chapel was still in progress so I planned to sneak in the front and sit with my fellow actors on a front pew. Instead, when I entered the room my foot slipped on the wet floor and the momentum I had gained while running to the class and back carried me, on my rear and splayed out on the wet linoleum, across the front of the school. Humiliation galore. I wished I were actually moving away like Janet. I developed an even greater appreciation for the theater when I was in high school. Despite our relatively small school, we had a really active drama group and I was thrilled to be involved in any way possible. When I was a freshman I was scenery, a.k.a. a “bench sitter.” Over the next few years, I helped with props, lights, and sound. I was stage manager and assistant director. I recorded lighting cues and fed lines to forgetful actors. When we put on a performance of Miracle Worker, the story of Helen Keller and her teacher Annie Sullivan, I wrote down each move that Helen and Annie made during a silent food fight. They had to recreate this blocking every time they performed it, grabbing handfuls of scrambled eggs and throwing them in the exact same sequence for every performance. I finally tried to sneak out from behind the curtain and be on stage again my junior year. Our spring musical was The King and I. Our director had already asked me to be Stage Manager but she said I could also have a small part on stage. I auditioned to be one of the king’s daughters. I lied about my height—the princesses were supposed to be 5 feet tall or shorter but I was more like 5’3”—and I got the part. When they stood me up with the other princes and princesses my deceit was revealed and I was told I had to be a prince instead. Was I embarrassed to play a boy? Please read the above paragraphs. I would only embarrass myself if, while playing a boy I also: a) tripped, b) got hit in the head, and c) flubbed my lines. What’s the chance of that happening? I would need to enter the Bermuda Triangle of Embarrassment. I am a Drama Nerd but I’ve never been much of a Drama Queen. There are a million differences between a “Drama Nerd” and a “Drama Queen.” The most obvious one? A Drama Queen rules her kingdom through revealing, public episodes of high emotion and intrigue. A Drama Nerd is the master of no kingdom; her fiefdom is theatrical information, song lyrics, and internal emotions. When I think back on my high school years with my fellow Drama Nerds, I can’t help but smile. We spent all of our free time painting sets and searching for props and laughing…we did a lot of laughing. I wouldn’t switch to Drama Queen for anything. Who wants to be a queen all by herself when she can be a nerd with a bunch of friends?

It’s so easy to complain. That’s what I was thinking during the forty-five minutes I spent cutting hair that had wound itself around the brushes and rollers of my vacuum cleaner making it overheat and smell the way my hair dryer does when I get hair caught in the fan end. By the time I was finished, I had a giant hairball the size of my head in the laundry room trashcan. How gross! Poor me! Then I reminded myself how fortunate I am to have a vacuum cleaner at all or carpet or even such a surplus of hair! (Confession: Most of that hairball was mine. I have a lot of very long hair.) If I board the Complain Train this easily then I am spoiled. I think most anyone who is reading this post can relate, at least to a certain extent. (If you’re reading this I’m assuming you have access to the Internet and the ability to read thereby defining you as wealthy by most of the world’s standards. Prepare to feel abashed.) It’s ridiculous the things that make me mad or give me the “right” (I tried to do quote fingers while I typed that but it didn’t work) to complain. So I started a list of ways that we are spoiled: -When I unwrapped a cough drop the other day, the wrapper was printed with an encouraging message: “You can beat this!” It’s a cold not cancer. Am I really so weak that I need to hear from my cough drop that I’m going to make it through this nasal congestion? -I hear commercials all the time for “Sedation Dentistry.” I find this hilarious. I hate getting plaque scraped off my teeth as much as anyone else but I don’t have to be knocked out to survive the experience. I just clench my buttocks cheeks together and bear it. That way I get a teeth cleaning and workout my glutes at the same time! -When we go to a restaurant and the hostess gives us one of those light-up coasters and says that it’ll be thirty minutes before we’ll be seated, I internally go ballistic. It doesn’t show outwardly but I’m thinking, “Why doesn’t this place have call-ahead seating? I should be able to walk into any dining establishment, pass the suckers sitting on faux leather benches, and instantly get a table for five because I called ahead and said, ‘Save me a table! I am coming! You live to serve me!’” Why should we get seated before people who drove in their cars and physically walked into the restaurant before us just because we had the forethought to make a phone call? -Remember when you scheduled your evening around television shows? You knew that if you missed The Cosby Show on Thursday night everyone would be talking about it at school on Friday and it would ruin your day to be left out of the conversation. I’m not suggesting that we miss out on non-TV related events because we don’t want to miss our shows, but now we have a million ways to watch those shows later. My kids can’t understand why the television at the beach doesn’t have a list of pre-recorded episodes of their favorite shows just waiting for them to watch. And they don’t get it when they can’t pause the show to go to the bathroom. “How did you live like this?” they ask me. -I like to text. It’s a handy way to relay information without causing a big disruption to someone’s day. I am, however, afraid that texting has made us sloppy and lazy. It’s a lot easier to be misunderstood (IF YOU TYPE IN ALL CAPS I THINK YOU’RE YELLING AT ME) and disingenuous. I also have a problem with some of the texting abbreviations. (Ironically, “abbreviations” is a really long word.) I think it should be a rule that if you type LOL, you should actually laugh out loud. I picture someone sitting in the school carline, typing it on someone’s Facebook page without even cracking a smile. “LOL. Your cat looks awesome in that Darth Vader costume.” I would hold off on being literal with LMAO. Let’s not get carried away. -When my kids struggle in school or don’t make the team I find myself wishing things were easier. Why is simplifying fractions not very simple for her? Why should he/she have this heartache or failure or setback? The truth is that if they didn’t encounter some bumps in the road every so often, they’d be spoiled rotten. They need to do things they don’t want to and be prevented from doing things they do want to. If I hired Rosie the Robot from the Jetson family to do all their chores, they’d fill up their time with activities not in service of their family. It’s good for things to be difficult sometimes. Difficulties are necessary for us not to be spoiled. It’s okay to be inconvenienced by others and it’s okay to have to slow down.  If I look at serving others as an honor instead of a chore then that giant hairball is a gift, so is doing the laundry, teaching a Bible class to toddlers, and being a room mom. I don’t want to waste anymore time being spoiled.

We received some aggravating news about our son’s pending adoption last week. While I waited outside the dressing room for my husband to try on some drip/dry pants to bring with us to Africa, I checked our email on my phone and found out that the U.S. Embassy in the Democratic Republic of Congo has added a step to the process thereby adding 3-6 months to our wait. It made me sick. In fact, I think I covered at least three of the five stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance) before we left the parking lot. Denial: My first reaction was “Maybe it doesn’t apply to us…Maybe we’re far enough into this that we can still go next month and get him…” As I logged onto Facebook and scrolled through fellow adoptive parents comments, I started thinking, “Maybe this information is wrong. Most of these other parents from other agencies aren’t aware of this change…” I nearly had myself convinced that iPhones don’t even get email and my phone is actually just a fancy calculator. Then Brent left the dressing room with his chosen purchases. Despite my effort to convince myself that the email was sent to us in error, I showed it to him anyway. Anger: When Brent saw the email he deflated. This man who I have seen cry only twice in the almost twenty years I’ve known him, teared up ever so slightly. It wasn’t much but I noticed it and it was effective. That shook me up and brought me back to reality. It also pushed me to the second stage of grief and I got mad. We discussed it briefly and Brent asked if he should go ahead and get the pants. I said, “Sure” in my best 10 year-old with a bad attitude imitation, so we went to the counter to pay. The hipster REI employee was over-the-top friendly as he tried to talk us into the $20 membership plan. He was like “Man, you’re gonna looooove these pants.” I almost asked him to take off her nerdy/chic glasses so I could punch him in the face. Anger was my only friend at that moment. Bargaining: As we walked to the parking lot, we sullenly discussed where we should go to eat lunch. Choosing a place to eat a) without our kids, and b) in Nashville would normally be a fairly pleasant task but beginning Jauary1st, I had pledged to fast from sweets until we brought our son home…that was assuming he’d be home in March. Upon entering the van, I told the Lord that I would continue with my fast—even though that’s the same as promising that I won’t eat another cupcake for six months and we were about to go eat at a place that is half bakery, half restaurant—if He would just try to speed things up. Bargaining with God is about as effective as bargaining with a two-year old—they’re both much smarter than me and it never works. We pretty much stayed at Stage Four (Depression) for the rest of the day. Always one to overanalyze everything, I started asking myself why this latest setback was having such a negative effect on me. I decided I could attribute my utter hopelessness to two main factors: Imagine that it’s late October and you’re eagerly anticipating Christmas just a few short months away. You get a call that Christmas is being postponed and they’ll let you know when the new date is but it’s probably going to replace Valentine’s Day. You think, “Hmmm…that makes it really hard to plan. Do I go ahead and put up the tree and the stockings? Maybe not. Constantly seeing the decorations might make our wait even harder to bear.” February rolls around and the Holiday Police—unseen people with tons of authority and no real reason to make Christmas easier for your family—say that they’ve discussed it and the decision has been made to move Christmas to May. They’re going to combine Mother’s Day and Father’s Day in June, which makes a lot of sense to them and only them. You say, “Wait a minute this is MY Christmas that I want to celebrate with MY family! I should be the one to make this decision!” But the Holiday Police ignore you and continue to make changes and empty promises until you begin to wonder if Christmas will ever come. That’s how it feels to wait on an adoption. The other, infinitely more important reason for our frustration is that our SON is in AFRICA. It’s not a faceless, nameless child who is living in a land mercilessly damaged by wars and famines; it’s our boy. I never knew my heart could form an attachment this strong to a child who I’ve never heard or touched or held. It doesn’t make any sense. There’s nothing logical about it. The first time I held my biological son was minutes after he had exited my body—a place he had holed up in for nine months. He looked like his sisters and his dad, so I was obviously in love instantly. My new son shares no genes with me. I’ve never cradled him in my arms during late night feedings when the rest of the house is sleeping. But somehow God has sewn us together with an invisible thread and that connection makes knowing he is so far away so painful. Maybe it’s because I’ve prayed for him every day for longer than he’s been alive. Those prayers have tightened and tangled those invisible threads, strengthening them but often leaving miniscule cuts and rope burn. Nothing about love is logical but neither are the other great virtues—faith and hope. But logic is highly overrated. Faith can move mountains (I Corinthians 13:2), hope can give us confident patience (Romans 15:4), and love can buy us eternal life (John 3:16). I will choose to suffer this illogical love for our son as I cling to a hope and a faith that defy reason.

Prologue Amelia hadn’t seen another car on the two-lane country highway for fifteen minutes. She did see a tractor coming from the opposite direction, but the driver had turned down a rough road before she had reached him. Never one to enjoy visiting elderly relatives, she had known about this assignment for weeks but she had put it off. Now that she had a Saturday with no plans and no excuses, she made the drive to the nursing home. As she turned into the parking lot, Amelia thought about seeing her Grandma Genny that last time. She had spent her final years in a nursing home much like this one. Remembering the smells of antiseptics and wet beds still made Amelia’s stomach turn. She also remembered how confused her grandmother had been and Amelia wondered if she would be able to get the information she needed today. She pulled into a parking spot and cut off the engine. After rummaging in her backpack in the front seat, she found and removed her tape recorder. She pressed RECORD and spoke into the microphone: Testing. Testing. It’s November 3, 2012 at 9:30 a.m. I’m sitting in the parking lot outside of the Dogwood Meadows Nursing Home. I’ve come here to interview my Great-Great Aunt Frankie. My mom told me that Aunt Frankie is a big talker so I’ve brought a recorder. This one has…two hundred hours of recording space—I hope that’ll be enough. The assignment from my creative writing teacher is to find an elderly relative and ask him or her questions about growing up. Then we’re supposed to compile all of our information into an essay that shows (sound of rustling papers)—and I quote—“a common thread throughout the narrative.” I’ve got a list of questions here but to start with I’m going to ask her if there’s a memory from her childhood that she thinks about every day. Then we’ll see where that takes us. Okay, I’ve got my coffee and my notebook. I’ve got to get this done before Thanksgiving break so…I’m going in. (click) Chapter 1 Nobody in town could re-sole shoes like my daddy. Many a time I remember him comin’ home late of an evenin’ on account of that sweaty pile of shoes and boots in the back of his shop. Daddy always said that Nadine Henderson could make a pair of shoes last longer than what you’d think was humanly possible. She did wear a ladies’ 11 1⁄2 extra wide, so you could hardly blame her for keepin’ ‘em a good while. Why, she had to drive clear down to Nashville to get them big shoes! Anyhow, Daddy was workin’ at pryin’ up her cracked outsole when Little Jack came tearin’ in. He banged open the door so hard he knocked off the little brass bell that hung just above the header and it skittered across the floor like it were scared, too. I jumped off the barrel where I was sittin’ and pullin’ tacks off some old work boots. I scattered them bent tacks all over the shop, he scared me so. Daddy hollered at him and told him to speak up, but Little Jack could only stand and breathe hard. I still remember his big white eyes and his ribs pokin’ out the sides of his overalls. We was stuck to the floor, waitin’ for him to talk and then the words he spoke were like a bucket of ice water in my face. He said, “Mister Frank… he dead…yor boy…is dead.” Matt had pitched hay since he was first able to walk. Left hand gripped above the right. Dig deep, swing high. He knew the rhythm of the motions like an experienced swimmer knows his strokes. He was a hard worker, but his mind wandered easily. He would allow his natural grace and athleticism to direct his pitchfork so he could think about the girl in town with the upturned nose and curly brown hair or the truck he was fixing or any other ideas that floated into his mind. Lining the outside wall of the barn, there were tidy bundles of hay made during the hot, dry months of late summer, and Matt’s job today was to move the last of the old hay from the loft to make room for the new. With one final scoop, he heaved a forkful down just as the barn door opened and a shadowed figure entered. Matt heard an unfamiliar cry of bewildered irritation. This was not one of his seven younger brothers or sisters who he had just cloaked in dry straw. This was a woman’s voice— young, most definitely annoyed. Matt slid down the ladder, his bare feet clutching the smooth sidepieces. In an instant, he was brushing hay off a young woman’s shoulders. She was in her early twenties, wearing a pale yellow dress dotted with yellow and green flowers. The dress had stylish puffed sleeves nearly as high as her chin and a nipped-in waist, flattering to her petite figure. Perched on her head was a lime green hat, bowl-shaped and perfectly suited for catching each tiny twig of hay. Matt couldn’t help but think she looked like some sort of autumnal queen with her golden crown. She noticed his amused expression as he regarded her hat, so she quickly took it off and slapped it against her leg. Her red hair spilled out of its hair pins, leaving unruly curls all about her forehead. One curl danced in front of her right eye. Matt was so struck by the force of her beauty and the afternoon sun streaming through her burnished curls that it took every bit of willpower for him to stay his desire to touch that red coil. The young woman blushed, her cheeks coloring nearly the same degree of red as her hair. “I’m Anna, Ernest’s wife,” the young woman declared as she held out a small, white hand by way of introducing herself. “You must be Matt.” Matt was struck dumb by her words. Sunlit dust swirled around them both. Was he standing in the eye of a tornado or still on the bleached pine floor of his father’s barn? “Ernest has told me so much about you,” Anna said politely, with her best city manners. Matt stared at the small piece of straw glued to her red lips for what seemed like an eternity until he collected himself enough to speak. “We didn’t ‘spect ya’ll ‘til tomorrow,” he said slowly. “I’m awful sorry ‘bout mussin’ up your clothes…Anna.” Matt hadn’t intended to say her name just then, but with a pause, two syllables, and a warm rush, his words for this redheaded stranger held more meaning and emotion than all the conversations he’d had with the girls in town in his entire life. “I told Ernest that I wanted to walk a little,” Anna mumbled, two hairpins between her teeth as she attempted to fix her tousled hair. “Maybe I should get on back to the house. Your mother said if I saw you I should tell you to come in and wash up for supper.” “Yes’m,” was all that Matt could say. As they began to walk toward the house together, Anna introduced several awkward topics for conversation. “Do you like working on the farm?” “Yes’m.” “Ernest said he mostly worked with your father fixing shoes growing up. Do you ever do any shoe repairs up at the shop?” “No, ma’am.” “Ernest seems to like his job. He said you’re the one who got his truck running. Do you like fixing trucks?” “Yes’m.” “What’s that growing on the far side of the garden?” “Pumpkins.” “They’re awfully big. Are they hard to grow?” “No, ma’am.” Their awkward, lopsided conversation continued in this manner all the way to the house, consisting mostly of Anna asking questions that Matt would answer with a shy, brief reply. As they approached the back porch, Ernest swung open the screen door to meet them. He advanced on Matt with a firm handshake and an arm proudly gripped around Anna’s waist. As they stood facing each other, any observer would see two brothers with different physiques and tastes in fashion. Ernest wore a thin moustache perfectly resting on his upper lip. His hair was oiled to a fine sheen that complemented his dark eyes and lashes. He was several inches shorter than Matt, with a slighter build. His charcoal suit pants were neatly tailored to show off his trim lines. Looking at his brother, Matt realized that Ernest had made a calculated effort to impress his family, and as his mother beamed at Ernest, he realized that the effect was working. “Good to see ya, Ernie,” Matt said as he pushed his way through the group to enter the house. As he passed his mother, she nodded in the direction of the wooden stand just inside the door, where he saw a pitcher of water and a faded blue towel. His grimy appearance must have seemed more obvious than usual, compared to this prodigal in his Chicago clothes. With his long legs, Matt took quick strides to reach the room he shared with his four brothers. He splashed cold well water on his face and dried it on the towel, which was now more brown than blue. Then he used the towel to wipe down his chest and arms. He ran a wet comb through the golden hair on top of his head and used his fingers, then his palms, to smooth down the browner sides. He put on a shirt and his other pair of pants, and suddenly wished he had a mirror. If he had seen his reflection, he would have noticed a muscular man of almost thirty, tanned from spending the summer in the fields. He would have paused to notice how different his eyes were from those of his brother Ernest—his pale blue to Ernest’s deep brown. With no other reason to stay indoors, Matt finally re-emerged from the house to join his family. Even before he reached the door, he could hear the laughter that always accompanied one of Ernest’s visits. “No, Anna, he’s not dangerous. He’s just…” “Dumb as a bucket of rocks,” George, age twelve, piped in. “George, you hesh up. You know that Rufus Haskell can’t hep how he is,” said Momma. “He just spends most of his days mowing the medians down by the square,” Ernest continued. “It’d be helpful to the city if his push mower had a blade in it!” Ernest’s southern drawl was still evident, but five years in Chicago had cleaned up some of the country words and phrases from his vocabulary, like the basket in a percolator sifts through the coffee and leaves behind the grounds. Matt imagined all the y’alls and reckons sitting there at the back of Ernest’s throat, waiting to be used, when he realized that Ernest was addressing him. “Matt, tell the one about Rufus and Miss Bennie Lee,” said Ernest. “Anna, you’ll get a kick out of this one.” “Nah, Anna doesn’t wanna hear that…” Matt mumbled. Shy as he was in public, in his family circle, Matt was known as the entertainer. He had a natural musical ability and he was an excellent storyteller. He could amuse his younger brothers and sisters, especially George, Frankie Jane, and Della Mae, for hours with tales both true and fictional. Though unaccustomed to having a stranger present during story time, Matt eventually cleared his throat and began the story. “Well, it seems ole Rufus was pushin’ his mower down by Vine Street, when he saw he’d gone off ‘thout his belt. He kep a-pullin’ his trousers up and pushin’ that dang mower and stoppin’ to pull his trousers up again. He’d put on his daddy’s ole trousers that morning and everybody knows that Big Daddy Rue was so big it was easier to go over him than go ‘round him. Anyhow, Rufus walked over to the school to see ‘bout getting some rope to tie up his britches. That just happened to be Miss Bennie Lee Waddle’s first day of teaching. She grew up in Alabama and had never been, well… formally intr’duced to Rufus Haskell. He walked up to the window closest to the teacher’s desk and pounded his fist on the glass. Miss Bennie Lee was scared nigh out of her stockins by this rough-looking bag of bones. She yelled to him, ‘What d’ya want?’ thinking he was a-comin’ for her pocketbook. Rufus yelled back, ‘I’s needin’some rope—‘bout dis long.’ Right then, Rufus held up his hands to show the length of rope he was a-wantin’ and he dropped them britches down to his toes. Poor Miss Bennie Lee fainted clear away and hit her elbow on the side of her desk on the way down. When the children came in for school that morning, they found their new teacher a-sittin’ on the floor and cryin’ like a newborn baby.” Though most of them had heard the tale many times, by the close of Matt’s story they were all wiping their eyes and holding their sides from laughing. Only Anna retained her composure. She was unacquainted with this folksy kind of humor and considered certain parts of the story to be inappropriate. “That poor woman,” she said, as much to herself as to anyone listening. “Miss Bennie Lee?” said Momma, “Oh, she got over it mighty quick. We’ve got some real char’cters in Morgan’s Hat.” She affectionately patted Anna’s hand. “Gad night a-livin’! I’m out here a-jawin’ with you younguns and your daddy’s gonna be home and hungry ‘nuff to eat the south end of a northbound skunk.” The screen door slammed behind her. Frankie Jane, not quite nine years old, used the change in subjects to begin her interrogation of Anna. She liked to tell stories just like her oldest brother Matt, but there was a definite difference in how they collected their material. Matt would sit back and silently watch people to form his stories, and Frankie Jane liked to interview them, often to the point of intrusion. “Anna, Della Mae and me wanna know ‘bout you. We heard you and Ernest met up in Chicago, but is that your home? I mean, where did you hail from?” Click here to purchase your advance copy of Oh to Grace!

With just a few exceptions, I hate to exercise. I don’t do aerobic classes because I’m clumsy and can’t remember my left from my right. I’d rather be water-boarded than run on the treadmill for an hour. “Don’t make my go another mile! I’ll tell you anything you want to know!!” Running outside is a hilarious joke. Why should I punish passing drivers by subjecting them to the sight of me attempting to coordinate my flailing arms and legs? I could cause a four-car pileup! My newest form of exercise, a.k.a. relentless torture, is Wii Fit. I got the game and the balance board about two weeks ago to spice up my workout routine. I decided that if I’m going to look awkward and ungainly I’d rather do it in the comfort of my own home without a trainer hounding me to do just…one…more…sit-up. Little did I know how much the game would become my greatest nemesis. The first day that I tried it—a Monday—I stood on the balance board as the game asked me a bunch of questions. Afterwards, it calculated my “Wii Fit Age.” I’m now on the tail end of thirty-six but the game—a small black box with neither a heart nor a soul—told me that my Wii age is 47. I was a little disappointed but chose not to give that arbitrary number any power over me. It was my motivation to improve. I worked out that first day in several of the categories and felt pretty good about it. The next day, I ran on the treadmill (Please don’t ever tell me any secrets. Now that I’ve broadcasted what my kryptonite is—running in place for an hour—they’ll know how to break me!) so that I could justify buying the aggravating machine. When I went back to the Wii on Wednesday, the first thing it asked me was “Were you too tired to work out yesterday?” That was a little creepy. I felt like I was being bullied by HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey. I started imagining the Wii contacting the other electronics in our house to strengthen its hold on me. Wii:“Microwave and Toaster Oven, report on Abby’s breakfast.” Toaster: “It’s a Pop Tart, sir” Wii: “Unacceptable. No matter. We will break her yet.” When I worked out with the Wii in our basement the following Friday, I tried a game that instructed me to flap my arms like a bird to land on these raised platforms. I felt ridiculous doing it but it did get my heart rate thumping. As I was considering how glad I was to be at home alone while making a spectacle of myself, I looked over my shoulder out the narrow window near the ceiling. I saw a squirrel sitting right by the window watching me. It sat there a full minute glancing back and forth between me and the TV screen. Eventually he scampered forward a little bit but continued to watch me. I had no idea I would ever be able to entertain woodland creatures with my exercising awkwardness but you never know how God will use your gifts. I didn’t use the Wii again until the following Tuesday. Of course, this tyrannical video game was incensed that I had been gone for so long. It also told me that I had gained 3.5 pounds. As if this wasn’t disheartening enough, it gave me a list of choices to select the reason for my weight gain. Since “Bloating/Weight Gain Due to PMS” wasn’t a choice, I chose “I don’t know” instead. Even though it had offered this as a choice, it still had a snarky follow-up question: “Are you sure you don’t know why you gained this weight?” Seriously. It is lucky it’s not built like an anatomically correct man because at that moment I would have placed my anatomically correct knee in its Wii-Baby-Maker, a.k.a. DS-Maker. In spite of the drawbacks for the Wii—annoying questions, completely inaccurate age-guessing and the possible robot army it is building when I’m sleeping—I’m still determined to do well enough to make it give me positive feedback. Why do I care if this electronic box thinks I’m fit or good at kickboxing? Why do I care if I’m fit? I can blow months of working out with just one week of vacation. That’s the hardest part about exercising, much worse than the actual work it involves. It’s exasperating to realize that no matter how hard I work out, there’s always tomorrow’s workout. It’s like every other chore on an endless, repetitive loop. The only thing I can do is keep doing something—even if it’s just a little something—every (other?) day. I’ll just remember the little guys who enjoy my exercising much more than I do. This one’s for you, Squirrel, you little stalker!

Lately I’ve been hooked on British television show called “Call the Midwife.” If you like post-WWII era clothes and music, East End London accents, and multi-layered stories with engaging characters and plotlines, then this is your kind of show. If you don’t like graphically detailed breech births and nurses piecing together placenta in metal bowls and other bloody labor scenes in all their slimy glory, you may want to pass on this one. Being that it’s only an hour-long drama, there are moments and details of the laboring process they have to skip over or at least speed through. And there are times when the newborn baby looks a little too perfect (Where’s the cone head and smushed nose?) to have hung around a birth canal as long as the scene would suggest. Still, all in all, it’s convincingly realistic enough for me. Watching these women labor like there’s no tomorrow makes me think about my own babies. When I had my twins nearly eleven years ago, I had no idea how it was all going to go down. There really isn’t anything that can totally prepare you for that first time so I didn’t even try. I didn’t go to birthing classes or read many books. I got spooked by all of the statistics and horror stories about twin births so I just soldiered on the best I could. I made it to 38 weeks before I was induced. After being admitted, my doctor said I wasn’t far enough along for my epidural so they gave me Stadol, a drug designed to take the edge off the pain. Instead, it made me loopy. I could still feel the contractions but my drugged up mind couldn’t process what was happening to me. My husband told me later that I asked him crazy questions like “If you were a Muppet, which Muppet would you be?” and “Did you just feel that contraction? It was a big one!” Fortunately, the drug wore off before I actually had to start pushing so I have a clear recollection of the big moment(s). When I delivered my son three years later, I entered motherhood with a much better understanding of what to expect. I labored at home from 10:00 p.m. until we checked in at the hospital at 7:00 a.m. the next day and then continued until he was born at noon. Since I wasn’t induced this time, I was able to steadily become accustomed to the building, ludicrous betrayal of my body attempting to turn itself inside-out, a.k.a. contractions. After they gave me my epidural, I was feeling so good that I welcomed a class of nursing students into the delivery room to watch. I put my feet into the stirrups, instructed the nurse as she adjusted the laboring mirror, and gave my doctor a nod that said, “Don’t worry about anything, Doc. I got this one.” Then I started to push. As soon as I saw that little baby head, I stopped listening to my doctor—you know…that real nice lady who went to medical school—and pushed in spite of her warning that I was about to tear. Guess what I did? I pushed anyway. I pushed and I tore a very sensitive area that really should remain intact if at all possible, that is, if you enjoy things like sitting down on a chair without a foam doughnut under your rear. Suffice it to say, I was ready to take out stock in Sitz Bath technology a month later. Even with a labor and delivery already under my belt (and the stretch marks to prove it), I still had so much to learn about becoming a mom. Now I find myself learning another motherhood lesson. Depending on how you figure it, I’m eighteen months into a pregnancy that has been just as difficult and rewarding and confusing and exciting as my other experiences. We signed our first adoption paperwork in July 2011 but conception was probably years before that. The type of pain I feel now is like that night 7 1/2 years ago when I rested between contractions that were too far apart to go to the hospital but too close together to be able to sleep or eat or think straight. It was exciting to think I would be holding my new son, the reason I was on all fours on the living room floor panting through the next contraction. But it was scary to think about the possible complications and worst-case scenarios. That’s what this adoption has been for me: The ups of seeing our little Ezra’s picture for the first time and the downs of finding out that we’re not as far into the next phase as we were led to believe. The knowledge that he’s ours but not as far as the Congolese government is concerned. The excitement of buying clothes for him but the worry that we won’t be able to go and get him before he’ll outgrow them. It’s a roller coaster ride. I have so much to encourage me and point me to the hopefulness of our situation. I can see families that have already picked up their kids from the Congo. I can trust in the experience of our adoption agency and the amazing people who work there. I can put my hope in a Sovereign Lord who I know has called us to adoption with a full knowledge (God’s knowledge, not mine) of how this will eventually end. I can remind myself of all of this every day that I wake up in a house that holds three children instead of four but it’s not always easy. In fact, it gets more difficult every day. But I have to ask myself why we started this whole thing in the first place. Did we do this because we thought it would be easy? No. If child birth has taught me anything, it has taught me that the greatest rewards often come after unspeakable pain—either physical or in the private chambers of my heart. If that formula holds true this time, this sweet African boy will be the greatest blessing of my life.

No matter who you are or what you’re capable of, there’s someone out there who has a talent that you envy at least a little bit. Maybe it’s a universally desirable skill like dunking a basketball or singing like Mariah Carey. Or maybe it’s something a little more obscure like the auto-tisement (Did I just make that up? Nope. I just googled it. Already there. Darn.) that said “British Voice-Over Talent, Call 555-1234.” That’s a talent you don’t run into every day. I have a few talents I’d like to develop over the next fifty years: Smooth Talker. I know people who can talk themselves out of any ticket or sticky situation. It baffles me how they do it. I can’t say for sure but a slight disregard for authority probably helps. For me, on the other hand, I can’t pass a postal truck without checking my speed. It’s not as if I’m constantly breaking the law but if I do I will always get caught. I was feeling really rebellious the other day so I ripped the “Do Not Remove” tag from my new pillow. Unfortunately, I ripped the seam open too. Great Memory. My husband has an amazing memory. He says it’s mostly insignificant facts but I’m still jealous. My sisters, brothers-in-law and I once played a game of Trivial Pursuit with him and he won the whole game before the rest of us ever answered a question. When I’m trying to recall the name of an actor or a movie, I have to take him on a trip I like to call “Abby’s Celebrity Road to Nowhere.” It goes a little something like this: “What’s that movie? They ride in a hot air balloon…It’s got that girl with the brown hair…Oh, I know, she played the sister of that other girl who was in that movie about horses…You know the one…The father was a bank robber…” It’s painful for everyone involved. Dance Like No One Is Watching. I’ve never felt comfortable doing anything in public that even remotely resembles dancing—just walking past a crowd can be problematic. I don’t take aerobics classes, either. Just the thought of Zumba-ing in a mirror-lined room full of strangers makes me want to vomit. I’m as coordinated and graceful as a newborn moose. It would be hilarious for everyone else but I’m not that generous. Inventor/Phrase Coiner. My son constantly asks me who invented everything. Sometimes it’s something I already know or I can look up like: “Who invented basketball?” or “Who made the light bulb?” But sometimes it’s not that easy like when he asked me “Who invented swimming pools?” That got me thinking that I’d like to invent something. Imagine if I’d come up with the recipe for the Colonel’s Secret Recipe Fried Chicken. I’d be a millionaire! Or what if I’d invented Velcro instead of that old slacker George de Mestral? I’d be adored by every mom whose toddler has easy slip-on sneakers and by every boy who carries a Velcro wallet! If I can’t be an inventor then I’d at least like to coin a phrase. It would be so cool if everyone started saying a catch phrase that I made up. Like what if I had been the first one to say “No way, Jose!” or “Fiscal cliff?” I’ve got a few options I’m going to throw out there to see if anything sticks. 1) My brother-in-law should actually get credit for this one. My sister and I were talking about the stupidity of the phrase: “That’s like comparing apples to oranges.” You can totally compare apples and oranges. I could come up with about twenty ways that they’re the alike! Instead, my brother-in-law suggested that we say, “That’s like comparing apples to mustard.” I like it. Let’s see where it goes. 2) I’ve also been working on a word for the greasy spots on my sunglasses that show up when they get pushed back too far on my face and rub against my (apparently greasy) eyebrows. I like “smoodge.” It’s short and practically an onomatopoeia. My husband prefers his own phrase: “eyebrow juice.” Since he is the trivial genius in the family, he may be on to something. I guess we’ll just have to let it play out.

‘Tis the season for receiving Christmas cards. For the most part, I really love to see photos and read updates of friends from the various phases of my life: High school buddies who saw me through my most awkward stage, married couples who lived on Campbell’s soup like we did during those first years of our marriage, fellow parents whose kids are best friends with our youngsters. The mailbox holds a new treat everyday. The drawback to the whole exchanging cards tradition is the limited amount of space we’re allowed to explain an entire year’s worth of experiences. We carefully choose a picture that projects our intended image. The kids’ faces are round with wide grins and they’re tenderly grasping hands in sibling devotion. The honest picture would show what happened just after the picture was taken. When she pinched him and he bit her and they wrestled on the carpet for ten minutes before mom had to step in and pull them apart. With the advent of Facebook, I should be accustomed to this type of meticulous name branding but it seems more intentional at Christmas. I could post things about my life all day long on Facebook, (“I just made a cake in the shape of Voldermort for Johnny’s birthday!” or “Thank God for lattes! LOL!” or “It’s Monday :(” etc.) but you just have that one chance every year for the card. I’d love to see a card starring a mom stirring a bowl with one hand as she balances a phone on her shoulder and points to the arithmetic mistakes on her daughter’s homework with the other hand. That’s real life. Maybe I’d throw in a naked toddler running just out of the frame and smoke pouring from the oven for ambience. I’m just as guilty as the next girl when it comes to putting on a show for the Christmas card. There are some friends—due to distance and/or busy schedules—whose only correspondence with me is that annual card. What do I want them to know about me and my family? What do I want to know about them? I wish I could sit down with everyone on our list and find out—Barbara Walters’ style—exactly what makes him/her one of the year’s Most Fascinating People. What would they share that they left off their 2012 recap? I know I would discover something new every time. These people I call Friends have talents and experiences completely unbeknownst to me. Although there’s nothing wrong with putting our best face forward when it comes to mass mail-outs, I have to ask myself what kind of card would God send us? Here’s my guess: The holidays are just around the corner and the three angels who visited Abraham are in charge of designing the Christmas card this year. They’re scrolling through pictures for the perfect photo. This card will be sent out to everybody (and when I say everybody, I mean EVERYBODY) so it has to be perfect! ANGEL 1: “Here’s the one with Gabriel on the slopes. Oops…he closed his eyes in the picture…” ANGEL 2: “How about this one? It’s really festive.” ANGEL 3: “No. Michael hates that one. Spike, the rockstar angel, is always trying to do the hair metal, back-to-back, air-guitar thing whenever any angel within fifty feet pulls out a camera. It’s getting lame.” ANGEL 1: “Raphael looks good in this picture. He really has that ‘Hark the Herald’ thing going for him…wait a minute…never mind. His halo’s on backwards. Good grief. We’ll never pick out a card!” After much deliberation, they take their possible choices to God’s throne to get his opinion but He has a different idea. GOD: “This is a going to sound crazy but instead of a Christmas card this year, I’m going to send Jesus down to a tiny town called Bethlehem to be born of a Virgin.” ANGEL 2: “What?! He’s the quarterback for our football team…” ANGEL 3: “And the best baritone in the choir…” ANGEL 2: “And the lead in all the musicals! We were going to do Jesus Christ Superstar this year!” ANGEL 1: “Why would you send Him down there anyway?” GOD: “I want everyone to really know Me. Not the watered-down version but the real, salt-of-the-earth, Creator of the Universe. It’s hard to explain so I’m going to send Jesus and he’ll live it out for me. Don’t look at me like that—it’s going to work. It’ll be messy but totally worth it.” ANGEL 3: “Why not send just send lightning bolts and shake the ground with thunder?” ANGEL 2: “Yeah. I like it, and so will Spike. It’ll be like the best rock concert of all time!” GOD: “Nope. I’ll shake the earth later, I promise. But this year will be about a baby—a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. Now get going to choir practice. I just wrote a new song for you. It goes like this: ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.’” So keep sending those cards! I only wish I could say “Merry Christmas!” to all of you in person!!

There are plenty of things to stress over when it comes to parenting: multiplication tables and table manners, vitamin deficiency and sugar overload, caffeine and nicotine, the birds and the bees…I could keep going but I’m starting to feel queasy. One of the least important things to worry about is facilitating the development of a sharp sense of humor in my kids, right? But if I don’t do it, who will? Spongebob? I don’t think I want to leave something this important in his skinny, less-than capable, yellow hands. I have a few theories about what makes a person funny: Most of kids’ television shows today are pretty lame. The laugh tracks and the predictable storylines make me want to rip my hair out or, at the very least, change the channel. We’ve tried to strike a happy balance in our kids’ television and movie-watching habits. We don’t want them to be totally unable to relate to their peers so we’ll let them watch a few current shows and movies (I especially like Word Girl and Electric Company. And there’s nothing better for fun family entertainment than whatever is the newest Pixar movie.). To keep things interesting, we’ll add in some episodes from The Dick Van Dyke show, The Andy Griffith show, and I Love Lucy. My girls are becoming junior aficionados of musicals from the 1940’s and 1950’s. That should wow their fellow 5th graders. After I teach them the card game Mille Bornesand the finer art of constructing tissue cozy covers out of plastic canvas, their education will be complete. Voted Most Popular of the class of 2020? You’re welcome, girls. Speaking of girls, I think it’s trickier for women to be funny. I’m not blaming chromosomes or uterine lining for it; I’m blaming society. At some point, most girls are brainwashed to believe that they must giggle at every little thing said by the boys they like. This is usually done during the crucial humor development ages of 8-14. They should be making their friends laugh with witty and carefully crafted comments about their chorus teacher not giggling at fart jokes made by the baseball team. Why do you think that most successful comediennes are of the sexual orientation that makes flirting with boys negligible? Growing up, they didn’t care if they made the boys around them feel hilarious. I’m not saying you have to be gay to be a funny woman—not at all—but just think about my theory the next time you’re watching Ellen. Another important part of nurturing my kids’ love of Funny is making sure they’re open to unusual experiences. These are comedy fodder. I’ll give you two recent examples from my own life: I am the co-director for the Shining Stars, a children’s sign language/singing group at my church. We were asked to sing on a Sunday for a large group of Chinese who were coming to our building for a special service. We had chosen “Revelation Song,” a song we’d been practicing for a few weeks. At the Wednesday night practice before “China Sunday,” one of the kids in our group informed us that in China if you stick up your pinky—something that we did about sixteen times in the song—it’s the same as sticking up your middle finger here. Whaaa? Is that for real? We asked a friend whose sister-in-law is Chinese to confirm and yes, it is an offensive gesture. Great! We scrambled to have the kids change the sign to point all of their fingers up to say “I” or “is.” Phew! International disaster avoided. We had a fundraising event at my kids’ school that involved having one grade at a time go outside and walk/run laps around the parking lot. They asked me to wear a furry lion suit so that I could encourage the kids to continue running their laps with my furry hand-waving and kiss-blowing. That sounded easy enough. At the beginning of the day it was cool outside and the kindergarteners were adequately awestruck by my appearance. As the day went on, the suit revealed to me the similarly sweaty experience of its former occupants. In other words, I began to reek. To add insult to smelliness, the older the kids got the less respectful they were of the suit. It was as if an adult wearing a full body animal costume doesn’t mean anything anymore! They started trying to un-Velcro the back. They would slap me as they ran by just to see what I would do. I started fearing for my safety! I would pretend to growl at them when they were naughty but since they couldn’t hear me and my face was frozen in a non-threatening smile, it didn’t have the desired effect. Since all I could see was what was visible through two Ping-Pong ball sized eyeholes and some of the 4thgraders would be bigger than me, I gave up after lunch. Those older kids would have to dig deep within themselves to find the will to go on. I was out! I wouldn’t be able to share those anecdotes if I had been concerned about little details like not knowing sign language or how I look (and smell) in public. Although there are plenty of other weightier things to worry about for parents in this day and age, I have to at least devote a small amount of effort to make sure my kids are funny. But truthfully, they were born with all of the funny this world can handle. My job is to keep laughing so their “funny” supply won’t dry up for lack of use. The good news is that one of the best ways to encourage their humor is the same fix-all they give us for almost everything else: Just sit down to the table for supper with them as often as possible. They’ll have you shooting milk out your nostrils in no time!