May 9 – “Gentle direction”

We walked three miles yesterday.  Measured as accurately as possible by one of those antique instruments still available on trucks built in 1992.  It’s called an odometer.  Now, I know what you are thinking.  “My car has an odometer.  What’s so antique about the one in your raggedy old truck?”  Ah, my friend, did you know that back in the day they used to include tenths of a mile?  And the numbers appeared slowly as they rolled around and around inside a thing called a gauge.  Does your brand new car show tenths of a mile?  Now here’s the thing.  The new-fangled step counter on my phone app said that we went closer to four miles.  Who do we trust: technology or old faithful?  Anyway, just the three miles would be a new record for Team Vaughan.  5K’s, here we come.  

Chris went into Texas to babysit while Josiah and Jachin were tested to determine the extent of their allergy difficulties.  I stayed home and worked in the office all afternoon.  So what was the verdict?  Jachin is pretty severely allergic to nuts.  All nuts.  Especially cashews and walnuts.  To such an extent that he has to keep an epi-pen with him at all times.  So not really anything new there.  We found that out when he was four years old.  Confirmation.  Josiah, on the other hand, is new at this allergy testing business.  He was there because he seems to have a perennial case of asthma.  Sure enough, he popped out positive for several things.  Cockroaches.  Jachin thought that was a pretty cool thing to be allergic to … if you had to be allergic.  Feathers were included, so birds.  Stay away from the birds, Josiah.  I saw the movie, man.  They can be dangerous.  Especially seagulls.  Mice/rats made the list.  No argument there from Nana.  We’ll never know if she is allergic to them or not, but let’s just say she is taking no chances.  Cats.  Ah, the dreaded feline.  They don’t have a cat, and the only time they did have one, it lived outside and ate mice, like every good cat should.  Shouldn’t be a problem there.  But finally … dogs.  Yep.  Dogs.  Like Freddy, who he loves to pick up and carry all around the house.  Like their own pet, Lucy.  Now Lucy is about a gazillion years old, so there is no picking her up, but she does wander around the house a lot.  The “official” party line from the doc was, “Get rid of your dog.”  But practically speaking, he knows that doesn’t usually happen when he encourages it.  So instead he gave her a regimen of cleaning and dusting and mopping instructions.  Yikes.

Last night we went to the last t-ball game of Josiah’s illustrious career.  Next year he moves up in the ranks to kid-pitch.  He did really well in his swan song game.  I’m sure it is frustrating to him at times, though.  He has not one, but two baseball playing older brothers, so Josiah knows the rules of the game.  He knows where to get force outs and the best angle to take to track down a base runner before he can score.  He even does his best to “gently” educate his teammates.  Like last night, for instance.  There was a runner heading from first to second.  The ball was fielded by the guy next to Josiah, and the kid obviously didn’t know what to do with it.  So Josiah, purely in an effort to assist him, “gently” directed him toward second base.  The youngster must have tripped over a blade of grass or a clod of dirt or something, because he sprawled down onto the ground.  Sadly, the runner was safe.  Josiah’s coach was right there watching, and he even gave him a high five for the assistance.  Later Josiah tried to get another kid to throw him the ball so he could tag out a kid at home.  That one didn’t work either.  Josiah was fine with it after the game though.  They got some really good snacks.  And he’s pretty sure they won the game. 

Hebrews 7:23-25 says, “Now there have been many of those priests, since death prevented them from continuing in office; but because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood.  Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.”

Father, thank you for kids who have their priorities straight.  Be with Jachin and Josiah and their family as they learn to live with these allergies of theirs.  Amen.