My Philosity

As we sat around the table a few nights ago, someone in the family brought up the idea of having a philosophy of life.

Our preschooler, age four, announced, "I have a philosity."

"Really?" I asked. "What is it?"

"Wellll, my philosity is that if you say something, I'll say, 'What?!'" He punched the word vocally, clipping it with a hint of annoyance. Oh, and he wrinkled his nose and scrunched up his eyebrows, but only on that word. After, he was back to normal. "Try it," he insisted self-assuredly. "Say something."

"Okay," I began, "um, would you like more french fries with your chicken?"

"What?! See, that's my philosity."

I try to imagine how that will fly a few years from now in the workforce. If he's an assistant, let's say, and he's dropped the ball on a merger: "Kroeker, I told you to contact Henderson in accounting two days ago!"

"What?!"

Not so good.

Or if he's the supervisor, and someone comes to him with a problem, asking, "Mr. Kroeker, I have to miss work because my mom is being moved from a nursing home into a hospice."

"What?!"

It's a problematic philosity, lacking in humility or respect, not to mention old-school supervisory in tone; not much room for understanding or tolerance.

On the other hand, it's uncomplicated and concise, and heaven only knows the world could use more simplicity and brevity. Actually I myself should learn from that aspect of his philosity. What's more, it's confident. Sometimes I wish I were that bold.

"Look, there's a police officer following us with his lights on."

"Mom, I accidentally flushed your cell phone down the toilet."

"You'd better scoot down the pew--I think I'm going to throw up."

What?!

Hm, maybe there really are times in our lives when we should adopt my son's philosity?

Fixing What's Broken/He's Alive

It's Easter, and I'm reminded that we're in a broken world in need of fixing. Isn't that one way to summarize Easter?

This past week--otherwise known as Holy Week--has been a week of brokenness, and I mean this literally, not figuratively.

We're having some tile work done in our master bathroom. This is the first major upgrade we've ever had done to our 25-year-old house in the seven years we've lived here. We haven't even had carpet replaced, even though we've needed it, but some plumbing problems led to this decision and at this moment the shower is only half put together. The toilet is sitting in the middle of the bedroom, and the shower has tile halfway up the wall and that's all that's been done for almost a week. It's just sitting there, untouched, unusable, waiting to be completed hopefully sometime in the next week.

Meanwhile, this very week (while my husband was traveling, no less), the only functioning upstairs toilet started leaking. I lifted the back off--water shot up in the air, splurting forcibly practically to the ceiling! The kids were shrieking as I grabbed towels and tried to think while water sprayed down on our heads. Fortunately I had the presence of mind to turn off the water, but we had to condemn that toilet, duct-taping it shut until we solved the problem.

The next day the only operational shower broke. A metal piece flopped out and water shot out of the hole like a jacuzzi jet (but this is not a jacuzzi tub). So we had two toilets and two showers out of order. Only one downstairs toilet and zero showers were available to us.

Easter, therefore, was spent repairing brokenness and making things "new," if you will. I don't mean to be sacrilegious, but it was our reality today and in a weird way holds some metaphorical meaning, this structural resurrection work.

Thanks to a determined and persistent spouse who sacrificed his day off to do the work (and an irreligious Lowes that stayed open on Easter Sunday), we have one functional toilet and shower. It's not how we imagined we'd spend our Easter Sunday, but it's the one we were given and we made the most of it.

But it wasn't all about pipes and plumbing. This morning before tackling the toilet, we ate pancakes and read the Easter story together with the kids.

We used "Resurrection Eggs," which were marketed a few years ago by Focus on the Family. I think they're still available, but I'm not sure. Anyway, we had been opening one or two a day for the past few days. Each egg contains something symbolic of the Easter story. For example, the first one has a little metal donkey in it, to symbolize Palm Sunday. There's a cup, a die and so on until you open an egg with a little piece of linen, another with a stone, and finally an empty egg.

The kids were taking turns opening the eggs, reading the little devotional and and related Bible verses. Our youngest can't read yet, so he could only open the eggs, and an argument broke out over who would open the next-to-last and final eggs. The next-to-last was the stone, which was not only weighty when held but also produced a satisfying thumpity-thump sound when shaken. The last one, being so lightweight and void of thumps when shaken, was not an option for our youngest. He threw a minor fit, and in the name of peace and Christian love, also prompted by some "looks" from Mom and Dad, the other person gave in.

Thanks to her gracious attitude, it was decided that the youngest would open the egg with the stone, and then she would open the last egg, the empty egg, the "Easter" egg, if you will. I think we sold her on that and awakened some curiosity in the youngest.

We read about the stone, and it was time. We opened the final egg.

"Awwww, it's empty!" the youngest complained. What a let-down. All the others had a little toy inside. He made a face and shook his head.

"That's right," we said, "it's empty. Just like the tomb!"

"What?"

Everyone jumped in and exclaimed things like, "The egg is empty because the tomb was empty."

"The tomb was empty because Jesus wasn't there."

"He wasn't there because He's risen! He's not dead, He's alive!"

His eyes grew wide as saucers and he gasped. Then he smiled and squealed, hopped off his chair and ran three times around the circular pattern through the kitchen, dining room and living room. As he ran, he shouted, "He's alive, He's alive, He's aliiiiiiive!"

We were so surprised, we actually laughed--not at him, but at how wonderful to see someone respond with such childlike wonder and amazement to the news. We had just read about Mary, running to tell the disciples the good news, and then here was this spontaneous and related response from our own four-year-old.

Jesus said we had to become as little children in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. Seeing our young son run with breathless excitement at the thought of Jesus being alive left the rest of us laughing and shaking our heads. Maybe over the years we have focused too much on Jesus' death on the cross, and not enough on His resurrection? Maybe he never put it together before, that Jesus is alive?

Would that we could all hear that news and respond with the same delight. "He's alive, He's alive, He's aliiiiiiive!"

Bookcrossing.com

Alert reader Pattie reminded me in the comments section about Book Crossing. Someone had told me about this a few years ago, so when I felt inspired to leave my books by the campground bathhouse, perhaps it was that deeply imbedded comment speaking to my psyche.

Book crossing (please visit www.bookcrossing.com for a full explanation) is an organized version of the Book Fairy. I'm going to do it from now on. In fact, I just registered a book through Bookcrossing and am pondering where to leave it.

By registering a book (it's all free and they swear they will never breathe a word of your personal information to anyone), the book receives a unique bookcrossing ID number. This is then inscribed--handwritten by you, or printed out with labels--inside the book for the finder. I'm leaving a novel someplace with a bookcrossing bookplate taped to the inside page. It has the book's id number on it and the date I registered it. When people find a bookcrossing book, they can take it up and read it, then journal their thoughts on it at the website and re-release it when they are finished (or they can keep it--no one is stopping them). It's all based on the spirit of sharing, assuming that books are fun to read and fun to share.

This formalizes my Book Fairy work.

You should try it. Pass on the fun stuff and see if the world enjoys it as much as you.

Interruptering the Perpetrator

Not long ago I wrote about hanging on to the cute little things that our youngest utters. Well, around the dinner table especially we tend to step on each other's stories. We're trying to break this habit, but it still happens.

The other day he started a story and a sister jumped in to interject something. He scrunched up his eyebrows and wrinkled his nose. "Stop interruptering me!" he shouted. "You're always interruptering me!"

"I'm sorry we keep interruptering you," one of us said. "We'll try to stop."

Another added, "It's not polite to keep interruptering, is it?"

We just can't help ourselves. Even when he's irritated and "aggervated," he's so charming. We all cling to these words and phrases, repeating them with a grin. This morning we all ate "opa-meal," for example. Tomorrow we may make "pampakes."

Another language development curiosity is how accurately he memorizes and applies phrases from movies. We were in the car waiting in a parking lot when an unpleasant odor presented itself. "Hey! Who did that?" I demanded.

"I am not the perpetrator!" our youngest exclaimed.

I whirled around and stared at him. "What did you just say?"

"I am not the perpetrator!" he repeated. "It wasn't me."

"He got it from a movie," a sister explained. They relived the scene, describing the original application.

"Yes, but how did he know it would work in this situation?"

"I don't know," they shrugged. After a pause, one of them asked, "What does perpetrator mean?" The youngest burst out laughing. I shook my head.

Spikes

When I was on the high school track team, someone suggested I train with light hand weights. It seemed like an efficient way to get some upper body or at least upper arm strength simultaneous to the lower body work of running.

I started considering what to use for hand weights. I can't remember if I was feeling creative or cheap, but I tried to figure out what I had available. Who knows, maybe I was just in a hurry? I rummaged through the odds and ends clunking around in the garage and found several railroad spikes we'd collected from the nearby abandoned tracks.

Hmmm. I decided if I wrapped them with black electricians tape, they would work well enough. I wrapped two individual spikes for the lightest weight, then I used four, wrapping together pairs for a heavier option. Voila: "heavy hands" for training. I was a sprinter who wore racing spikes on her feet and carried railroad spikes in her hands. They worked well for me back then, and after all these years I still use them--the railroad spikes, that is; not the racing spikes.

The other day I was out jogging with my single spikes in hand on an unseasonably warm afternoon. Because all my years growing up I ran with them on country roads, not thinking about how I appeared, it never occurred to me that anyone would ever notice what I was carrying. But that warm afternoon I stood at a stoplight and some young men pulled up next to me in an SUV. The windows were down. I could hear one of them exclaim, "Look at that! Look! She's running with nails! I'm not kidding--they're nails!"

I glanced down. Hm, I guess they do look like nails, but something inside of me felt like correcting him. They were all staring at me. I turned and said, "Spikes! They're railroad spikes!"

"Like, from a railroad track?"

"Yes!"

"Whoa."

Then they drove on. I don't know if they admired my spikes or thought I was odd, but as they drove away and I crossed the intersection, I felt even more attached to my railroad spikes. They've served me well for many years--a couple of decades, actually. I felt like defending them. I haven't even had to replace the electricians tape after all this time. Besides, if anyone ever tries to mess with me on a running path, why, I've got heavy iron defense weapons at my fingertips.

If I run tomorrow before some storms come through, I think I'll take the doubles. I need to do some upper body strengthening anyway.

Watch out, though. Don't mess with a runner carrying spikes.