August 3 – “Yesterday at 40 Steps”

Well, Yesterday at 40 Steps was an amazingly productive day.  Sounds like a romantic ballad, doesn’t it?  No, wait.  A country song.  That’s it.  I can hear it now … “Yesterday at 40 Steps, I fell in love with you.  Today you went and left me, and I am feelin’ blue.”  It started out just after seven when the radio was turned up.  Gotta have that inspiration, you know.  Mexican radio at its best … and loudest.  They started working at a faster rate than I ever dreamed possible.  Why?  I think it might have had something to do with the really nasty weather that loomed on the horizon.  If I thought they were working fast the other day, yesterday put that so-called speed to shame.  By the time they took a break for lunch and a siesta (No, seriously.  Every one of the workers was stretched out in the shade under the building taking a nap), the entire side of the building had been covered in plywood as well as half of the roof decking.  And by the end of the day the entire roof was done and the site had been cleaned and organized into a big pile of scrap wood and other, neater piles of unused lumber.  The rains did come last night after they were gone, and they haven’t showed up at all today, but it looks to me like that segment of trade work is complete and they may be waiting for the roofers to swoop in. 

On a sadder note, the newspaper this morning featured an article that confirmed by about 95% that the house is one of the scattered site, voucher based housing sites that the city was required to build by FEMA after Hurricane Ike.  That means for the next 15 years the house will be a rental to people with government vouchers to help them pay for a house that ordinarily would be way more expensive than what they could normally afford.  We already have at least one house on the block under that program, and it has been the stereotypical nightmare.  Yard is unkempt.  Numerous vehicles parked in and around the property.  A trailer out front filled with construction debris from who knows where.  Very loud domestic disputes spilling into the front yard.  Sigh.  Chris and I have already started praying for our new neighbors, whoever they may be. 

1 Peter 2:4-5 says, “As you come to him, the living Stone — rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”

Father, be with whoever ends up in the house next door.  Draw them close to yourself so they can be happy.  And help us know how to be there for them as good neighbors.  Amen.