April 30 – “Embracing the madness”

Two big events highlighted the day yesterday.  One was yet another drive-by.  No, not a shooting … exactly.  Actually there was a shooting involved, but not the kind you think of when you hear “drive-by.”  OK.  Let me explain.  The drive-by in this case was one of those drive-by birthday parties.  No on site activities.  People simply drive by in their cars and say happy birthday.  Sweet, right?  This one was for Noa, so we even had to drive off-Island to get there.

We coordinated with Nathan and April and Cailyn to arrive at the same time.  In fact we met at the fire station right down the street from Noa’s house.  Cailyn hopped out of their car and raced over to decorate a window on ours with some shoe polish.  It was the window behind where I was sitting, so she wrote, “Ho Ho Ho, Noa.”  Hey, that’s my go-to greeting around these kids.  We led the way and waved and hollered a bit before pulling over to the side of the road and getting out of the car.  I know.  Defeats the purpose of the drive-by concept, but we are grandparents.  What do we know?  That’s when we witnessed the shooting.  As Noa went up closer to Nathan’s car, a flash of activity exploded forth.  They had brought along some silly string and were pummeling her with it.  Great move, Nathan, since you did forget the water balloons.  Snicker, snicker.  Some other friends came by to celebrate as well, including her karate instructor and the grand master of the karate school.  Impressive.  Someone else gave her a bag with her very own silly string and some of those confetti-filled Easter eggs that you crack over heads.  The party got a lot more … active after that. We left after a while so the kids could get ready for an online karate lesson.  Great fun.

The second big event to remember?  Power outage.  It hit the neighborhood a few minutes after seven p.m.  We were watching a movie.  In less than a minute we verified that our neighbors across the street lost theirs as well.  A fire call came through about a transformer explosion over by Schlitterbahn (not far from us).  Our neighbor on one side texted to see about us.  While I was on the phone with the electric company the neighbor on the other side rang the doorbell.  When I got through and got word that repairs were underway and were expected to be completed by one a.m., we decided to sit on the front porch and listen to Corey across the street play his violin.  Beautiful.  After a while, though, Chris was getting really cold, so we adjourned to get a jacket and sit in the back yard for a bit to watch and listen to the birds.  We could still hear the violin, too.  Great evening, actually.  Embracing the madness.  I think the power came back on around 9:30.  Kudos to the power company for that. 

Isaiah 41:10 says, “So do not fear for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God.  I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”

Father, thanks for drive-by parties and talented and concerned neighbors.  Amen.