h is for houseguest May 4, 2009

We had a great weekend with our new friend, Wael.  He is a Saudi student, here on a scholarship at the English institute at the University.  We agreed to host him for a weekend stay after being contacted by one of his teachers who is a friend from church.  The request came to us while we were in Germany being impressed by the generosity and kindness of Chris’ host families.  How could we say no?

We’re glad we said yes!  Wael is a math genius, set to go to MIT in the fall.  He enjoys street car racing and does amazing card tricks.  Yes, he said he can do the card counting thing that the students in the movie “21″ can do.  

For activities, we gave him a tour of the farm, at lunch at a small town cafe, drove through the former air force base, attended a Kentucky Derby Party and a Jazz Fest.  Thomas and he played cards and attended church together. It was great to have him here.

Two things I really appreciated that he shared.  The first was personal.  When asked what activities we should provided for another student visiting us here in the summer, he replied, “If she has a time like this then I think she will be very happy.”  The second was national.  He said, “If my friends from my country could actually visit the United States, they would think it was the best country of all.”

c is for cat May 1, 2009

Thomas has been the Cat in the Hat basically since Christmas.  I think yesterday marked the last appearance of his tall, lanky self in that red and white striped hat.

t

He did an outstanding job with the role, but I was perhaps most proud when I watched him in the hallways outside the auditorium.  Time after time, he crouched low to chat with a preschooler who was amazed to be meeting the REAL Cat in the Hat.  He was so sweet and possessed patience and charm beyond his years.  Now he is back to focusing on what really matters at this time of year:  Which roller coasters to ride at 6 Flags on the class trip and who is going with whom to the 8th grade dance.

I’m going to miss middle school.

o is for old May 1, 2009

When you get older, things hurt.  Yesterday, I spent pretty much the whole day on my feet, from 6 AM to 8 PM or so.  When I got home, everything hurt.  When I woke up too early this morning, everything still hurt.  You hear a lot of old people sit around talking about stuff that hurts.  I am now very impressed with any old person that does not do this.  I am not even 50 years old yet, and all I want to do today is to explain to anyone who will listen how much pain I am in.  I even have old sounding things that hurt like bunions.  

I was on my feet all day for good reasons.  I had lots of work to do, including a great meeting with the leadership team for my church’s weekend of service coming up this fall.  We are closing down church for a whole weekend and going out into the community to serve.  The team is great and we talked through the prelim plans yesterday.  I guess I was seated while we did that.

Prior to that, I spent the morning moving furniture with some fellow staff.  We had to clear our conference room for the afternoon’s activities – a big photo shoot.  All afternoon and into the evening we had lots of community members file through and be photographed by two wonderful professionals who volunteered their time.  All of our subjects were photographed in our promotional t-shirts bearing the live united message.  Kids, seniors, men, women, groups, singles, famous, infamous – they all waited patiently in our crowded waiting area for their turn to be shot.  While it was stressful keeping everybody moving and everybody happy, the results are fantastic and will be invaluable to the creation of our marketing materials in the year ahead.

I got up and went to exercise this morning.  I haven’t been going for a while and I think maybe that is why after a hard day’s work, everything hurts.  After all, it certainly can’t be because I am old!

a is for absent May 1, 2009

I have been away, not from life or home, but just from writing.  Good writers write everyday, so, um, where does that leave me?