Bruno

Last Saturday, the family and some friends went to Stone Mountain State Park (North Carolina not Georgia). It is a beautiful place with trails and waterfalls. The highlight, you discover, is the mountain itself. Standing on top of it, you feel like you are standing on the moon. The granite goes on forever, smooth as the hood of a car, until you look at it close or rub your hand on it and feel the sandpaper threaten to rip off your fingerprints.

We love Stone Mountain. The hike is about two miles to the top, two miles back down. We have a picture at our house of these friends of ours and us, lying on our bellies on top, pretending that we are hanging on for dear life. Our dog Chelsea is licking the sweat off my face.

Chelsea is no longer with us. And these friends, who now live in Charleston, have kids who had never been to this mountain before. So last Saturday we hiked to the top and imagined walking on the moon while we ate granola bars on the sandpaper rock. We took a picture on our bellies, no dogs this time, but kids. There were no kids back then. Now there are five between us.

That made nine of us total, so we had split into two cars, dividing by gender just for fun. Lia drove our car. She put the keys in her back pocket. She hooked them around the loop of her jeans while we were on top, eating our granola while sitting on the sandpaper. She didn’t realize that the key to our car was missing until we were back down the mountain.

I keep my keys on a carabiner. It’s what you do when you have lots of keys (the cost of having more than one office). My car key I had separated from the rest because (and for those of you who have children you understand this) about once a week one of us forgets something back at the house, and we have to turn around to get it, and it is a pain to turn the car on and off. So only one key was missing, the key that started the car.

 We looked everywhere for it – the car, the parking lot, the bathroom, the grass by the bathroom. We discussed whether the eight of them should hop in the other car while I hiked back up the mountain to the moon rock where Lia assumed the key must have come off when she relocated the carabiner from her back pocket to the loop in her jeans. We contemplated driving home all nine of us to get the spare key. We were in the midst of contemplation when we were interrupted.

The man was huge. His thick arms darkened with dirt. His maroon shirt stretched like a rubber band on his two-hundred-sixty-plus frame. His face hid behind a porcupine of a beard.

He said, “Don’t be afraid.”

It’s the kind of thing huge, two-hundred sixty-five plus pounder men with porcupines for beards say – or angels.

Angels say don’t be afraid, too.

“Did you lose a key?” he asked.

He dangled a single GMC Acadia key in his muscular fingers like a carrot in front of a donkey. He handed the key to my wife like a grandfather placing a Werthers butterscotch in the hand of a child – like a priest handing a parishioner the body of Jesus. 

My friend asked him his name.

“Bruno,” he said.

Bruno. Of course it would be a name like Bruno.  

“Are you an angel?” I asked.

Bruno kind of chuckled.

My friend asked if he could touch him to make sure he was real. His finger made a dimple in Bruno’s thigh-sized bicep. Bruno walked back to his maroon pick-up.  

We waved to him as we drove away in the two cars we came in. Bruno waved back from his leaning against the tailgate of his truck parked in a handicap spot. We turned the corner and headed out of the parking lot. I didn’t check the mirror to see if Bruno was still there or if he had vanished back to heaven where he came from.

Pink Eye

So two days after I returned from Harry Potter World, I woke up to my eyes glued shut! I think I remember something like this happening to Ron Weasley at one point. I thought about taking a Sharpee and writing on a t-shirt: "I took my daughter to Harry Potter World and All I Got Was Pink Eye."

The worst part of it was that I was supposed to go to a National Fellows Conference that afternoon in Washington D.C. I made some calls and the doctors I talked to said I'd probably be fine by that evening. So one called me in some eyedrops and I proceeded up to D.C.

My eyes were not better by that evening. There was yellow goop getting in the way of my eyeballs which made driving through D.C. traffic way more exciting than usual. To make it worse - Prince died. Which was totally sad, but when you are in a car for six hours, there is only so many times you can hear Purple Rain before you go nuts. 

I spent the night with my friend Nathan, who lives on Columbia Avenue right downtown. There is an awesome roof on his apartment building, the kind that allows you to see the whole city. We grabbed a few drinks and headed up the elevator. It was one of those misty nights, or maybe it wasn't - it actually really could have been my eyes. Everything was blurry. 

In a few minutes, we were joined by several others who decided the roof was the only appropriate place to mourn the death of Prince. One woman in particular, a French woman, just a few years younger than Prince, was falling to pieces. I consoled her the best I could. She played for me her favorite Prince song(s). I told her that Prince left the world a gift by recording songs that we can listen to for the rest of our lives. 

My friend and I finished our drinks as we sat and talked beneath the misty full moon above our Nation's Capital. A night I will not soon forget. 

My eyes were worse the next morning. It wasn't going to be fun, but I knew that I had to go home. I couldn't look myself in the mirror (literally, I couldn't) knowing that I could potentially infect the entire Fellows Nation with Pink Eye. 

It was a long drive home. 

And the eye business didn't resolve itself for several more days - including an uncomfortable morning at church where I led worship and the prayers of the people. 

It made me feel for those of us in this world with visible maladies. That was a hard part - the being looked at. Then there was the lack of physical touch - that was even harder. I didn't touch a human for nearly a week. It was awful. 

It has grown my compassion.

For those of us in this world that need a loving touch. 

I think of Jesus reaching out his hand and touching the leper.

I am thinking how we are called to be the hands of Jesus.

Johnny Chapman

Famous American Day is one of the coolest days of the Summit School year. This is our second one. Those of you who have been around awhile may remember that Anna Rose was a famous American named Susan Butcher. 

I had never heard of Susan Butcher. But by the end of the project I had grown to admire her. She won the Iditarod four times. How many people can say that? No woman. No man. No one. 

Well, David chose a fellow by the name of Johnny Chapman. I didn't recognize his name either. However, a quick search taught me that he went by another name for most of his life: Johnny Appleseed. 

It was a perfect choice for David, good natured fellow that he is.  

 

Turns out there is a lot about Johnny Appleseed that I didn't know either. Did you know you he never wore shores? Like never. One day, a settler gave him a pair. The next day Johnny came back without them. He had met someone who needed them more than he did. 

He walked everywhere on those bare feet, and everywhere he went he made friends. If there was a family that needed help raising a barn, Johnny would stick around and raise it for them. At night, he'd tell the family stories from the Bible or about his experiences on the Frontier. He had lots of them. He was friends with as many Native Americans as he was with settlers, and more than once he was able to mediate disputes between them. 

As for Johnny, he never owned a gun. 

Can you imagine a man back then not owning a gun?

But he wasn't soft. He once floated a river on a wedge of ice (in bare feet of course). 

Of course he planted apple seeds, too. Everywhere he went, he planted apple seeds. And there are apple trees today from those seeds he planted back then.  

But the thing that was so striking to me about Johnny Appleseed was watching David as he played him, as his fellow students entered the gym one by one... 

George Washington - suit and wig

John Adams - suit and wig

Thomas Jefferson...

James Monroe...

Ben Franklin - suit no hair

Then, Johnny Appleseed - overalls and a pot on his head. 

Who was this guy?

He was a man in a world of men famous for their politics or their war heroics or their art or their writing - Johnny was famous for his apple seeds. Really, he was famous for being a good man. 

Is there anything better to be famous for?

Road Trip

Last Sunday morning I waited outside Anna Rose's room at Windy Gap with a surprise in my bag. The surprise in my bag was a clue, and the clue was really a clue to the surprise. Through the crack in the door I saw her slip one sock on and then the other. She was not in a hurry. Like most mornings, she was grumpy. And the thought that her father was getting her out of bed early wasn't helping to assuage her natural tendencies.

She huffed out and sat as far away from me as possible. I patted the cushion beside me on the couch. She huffed over and plopped down. I told her that there was something special I had been planning for her, and that there was a clue in my bag. She moved toward it, a little confused, slightly aware that her mother was video taping. Gruffly, she pulled the flap of the bag back.

A wand.

Like magic, her jaw dropped.

"You're taking me to Harry Potter World?" she half-asked/half-exclaimed.

"Yes," I replied.

"When?" she asked.

"Right now," I said.

Her jaw dropped again.

Thus began the whirlwind road trip I had been planning the last month or so.

It was perfect.

We stayed with friends Sunday night, spent the day at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, spent the night at relatives, woke up at 5am, and drove back.

Perfect. It really was.

"It really feels like it is our special day," Anna Rose said as we suddenly got ushered to the front of a line.

I admit. It really felt that way.

My friend Chris said that every once in awhile he will take one of his children in his arms and tell them, "I really love being your dad."

I don't do that enough.

Though it is true...I really love being Anna Rose's dad. 

We may not ever again have such a spontaneously magical, secret adventure like we had last week. But the wildly wonderful thing about being Anna Rose's father is that we don't need adventures like that to know the true magic of love.

And man do I love being her dad.

And as great as Harry Potter World was (the frozen butterbeer is better than the unfrozen by the way), it paled in comparison to the hours we read the books together; it even paled in comparison to the time in the car together; in the end, the Wizarding World of Harry Potter was just a good excuse for all the moments that really mattered. For that I can be grateful.

Until the next adventure, Anna Rose...

Life Lessons

Summit School recently took its third graders to Samaritan's Inn - a homeless shelter off of Northwest Blvd. downtown. Anna Rose wrote this reflection after her experience.

Used to think
Homeless people are gross
They do not need help
They just want money
They are mean and bad

Now I think
It is good to help the homeless
They are people in need
They love company
They are lovable just like you and me

Now, Lia and I have always thought Summit was a great school. Anna Rose thrives there, and she has opportunities to take graphic design and publish books and learn math I only dreamed of learning at age 9 - but what Anna Rose learned at Samaritan's Inn is why my wife and I love having our children at Summit.

Thank you, Summit School.

Harry Potter

Anna Rose and I just finished the Seventh Harry Potter! I once added up the hours that we had spent reading together, but I stopped at 200 hundred. I wouldn't have traded a minute of it. For more reasons than one, I cried through the last twenty pages or so...

It was a true labor of love...and by love I mean I loved it, not to mention my love for my reading buddy...

TOP SECRET: Anna Rose doesn't know this but I've been planning a little trip down to Hogwarts in Orlanda in a few weeks...stay tuned!!! And please don't tell!!!!

Rev

Me pretending to preach at the synagogue in Capernaum, Israel

This weekend I traveled solo to Phoenix, Arizona to go through the final steps of completing my ordination in the ECA. What is the ECA? It's the Evangelical Church Alliance. It's been around since 1887, and they primarily function as the institution that supports non-traditional ministries like: military and sports chaplains, para church organizations, and folks from other countries or who pastor non-denominational churches here in the states. I really didn't know much about them. However, after this weekend I left impressed and feeling a part of a likeminded/hearted family of believers from all over the country.

It was humbling and truly touching to experience the affirmation of becoming ordained. I don't know if I'll don the title Reverend. Actually, I'm pretty sure I won't be donning the title, Reverend, but I hope to be able to use the credential in order to baptize, officiate communion, marry, and visit people when they are sick at the hospital (not that I want anyone to get sick - or get unmarried so I can marry them - or unbaptized if that's a thing...you understand my point). I'm excited about the opportunities that ordination provides the potential for.

All that to say, I am thankful today. And please don't call me Reverend.

Me with cactus antlers over the weekend

Happy Birthday Dave Dave

Happy Birthday to the most kind

most fun

most joyful

most creative

most humble

most goofy

most optimistic

most loving

seven year old I know.

Thanks Jesus!

I meet with a group of guys every Tuesday morning at Panera. We call ourselves the GOYBADS. GOYBADS stands for Get Off Your Butt And Do Something. Which is a funny name to call ourselves because all we have done together is sit on our butts.

But we do talk about doing stuff. We talk about changing the world, or our part of it, and sometimes just ourselves, which may be the most difficult of the three. And I bet before it's all said and done, we GOYBADS will do something. We just don't know what it is yet...

A few weeks ago I ordered my regular: a coffee and a bagel sliced and toasted with nothing on it. It comes to $3.14. It used to be $3.04 but there's been inflation. That morning, a few weeks ago, I forgot my wallet in the car. It being 6:30am and me being the only one in line, I told Leshia at the register to hold on a minute while I ran to my car.

Less than a minute later, I returned to the register, my credit card in hand. But Leshia stopped me and pointed to the bagel guy in the back. I'd seen him before. I even knew his name. And I waved at him a little confused as to why Leshia had pointed at him.

Seeing me, he waved back then walked around the counter, pulled out his wallet and slid his credit card down the slot.

"Wow! Thanks Jesus," I said. I told you I knew his name. Jesus has been working at this establishment for several years now. I say hi to him every time I go to Panera. His name is unique enough I remember it.

And that morning, Jesus Got Off His Butt And Did Something for me. Wow. 

Cussing with David

“Daddy, want to know all the bad words I know?” asked my six-year-old son David.

We were driving home from school just the two of us, so I said: “Sure. Fire away.”

“Well, I know the S word,” he said.

“Really,” I said.

“It starts with an S-H actually,” he said.

“Really,” I said, gripping the steering wheel a bit tighter.

“You use it when you want people to be quiet,” he explained.

“Oh,” I said. “That is bad.”

“I know the F word, too,” he said.

I readjusted the rearview mirror to get a look at him.

“It’s another word for toot.”

“Yeah, I prefer using toot,” I said, which is true.

“Then, I know the D word,” David continued on his litany.

How come every NON-cuss word starts with a letter of a REAL cuss word? I wondered.

“It is the same as the other S word.”

“I wouldn’t use either of those,” I remarked.

“And the B word for when people throw up, and O.M.G…You can say that, but you can’t say the words.”

“You really do know a lot of bad words,” I said.

“Yeah,” said David with pride.

“Want to know something Dave Dave?” I call David Dave Dave.  

“Sure,” he said.

“I love you,” I said.

“Love is a good word,” said David.

“Yes it is,” I said.

ChristMAS

CHRIST-MAS

Heading north on Highway 21 near Elkin, you will pass what our family most affectionately calls “The Goldilocks Church.” There’s Baby Bear, a teenie church with its modest four pillars all in a row; then Mama Bear a grown-up church with its four pillars all in a row; and Papa Bear, the big daddy church, just like Mama Bear and Baby Bear with its four pillars all in a row.  

I guess as the congregation grew so did the church. It must have saved them a ton in architect fees to use the same design – just put the original blueprint in the Zerox machine and hit zoom.

It’s one of those churches with a sign in front of it. You know, the one with the letters. Like the sign that said: “Honk if you love Jesus. Text while driving if you want to meet him.” Or “Looking for a lifeguard? We know one that walks on water.” Or “Does your life stink? Well, we’ve got a pew for you.” Those kind of signs.

This church’s sign said: “Keep the CHRIST in Christmas.”

Hell yeah, I thought. He’s the reason for the season.

Actually, to tell you the truth, what I really did (and this may tell you a bit of my subversive nature) is I took the CHRIST out of Christmas…and what does that give you?

Well, it gives you MAS!

I don’t know what it was, maybe the fact that I had just eaten dinner at this Cuban Restaurant called TexMex (misleading, right?) – but the MAS really stuck out to me.

MAS…more…more of what?

I want more of a lot of things. Maybe you want more of a lot things, too.

But this Christmas what about asking for a little MAS of Jesus?

MAS CHRIST. More Christ.

I like the sound of that.

This ChristMAS, may you receive more of Him than you ever have before. Amen.

Childhood Perspective

My parents recently celebrated their 50th Wedding Anniversary. You read that right. 50 years! That's incredible to me on about twenty levels. 

One level was the angle it offered me on my past - to see it through my parents' eyes. 

We don't always get this perspective. For the most part, my growing up was tables at eye level and Legos on the ground, food I ate because it was placed before me, a bed I slept in because it was in the room designated as mine. I didn't question these things. I experienced them. It was what I knew of life. 

It is the life we all remember. 

But having the unenviable task of putting together a slideshow for the party, I noticed something. Do you see it?

How about here?



Or here?

Do you see it yet? My parents. They're not looking at the camera. They're looking...at me. They are treasuring me. 

I was treasured. I grew up knowing that I think. Knowing it without knowing it if you know what I mean. I never thought about the consequences, the implications. I never thought about how much that mattered. That I was treasured...loved...that I was the apple of their eye. 

But thinking about it now I can't tell you how much of a gift that was. 

I wonder, could they have given me anything better?

I don't think so.  

Thanks, Mom. Thanks, Dad. 

Congratulations on your accomplishment. I know it hasn't been easy - which makes it all the sweeter. 

Worm Eating

We were hiking at Bethania yesterday, a normal Erickson thing to do, when Anna Rose decided to take the ordinary and make it extraordinary. 

Standing at a fork in the trail, she did not take it (a la Yogi Berra), she kicked up a rock and found a worm.  

She decided to eat it. "Can I?" she asked.

"As long as I get to video you doing it," I said. 

"Ok," she said.

In popped the worm.

Then, she attempted it again!

Anna Rose, you are so full of surprises. I love that you did this! You have given me a reason to laugh...and laugh...and I've watched these videos at least fifty times and I'm still laughing...

Thoughts on Free Range Parenting

Thoughts on Free Range Parenting

  

In her room at the prow of the house
Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden,
My daughter is writing a story.

That’s the beginning of Richard Wilbur’s poem, “The Writer.” My friend Joan shared it with me. We were talking about parenting and wanting great things for our children and fearing that we will in all likelihood screw them up…

She mentioned this poem because The Writer has a daughter and like Joan and I, he also wants things for his child and fears screwing her up…

He wishes her a lucky passage.

I get that wish. That prayer. Whatever you call it. I want my kids to turn out “all right.” It’s what causes the impulse to protect them, to force them to take piano lessons, to drag them to church. I don’t know if any of this will work. After all, there is no guarantee. And whether you believe in luck or not – it’s going to take some for them to make it through unscathed…

He ends the poem with this stanza:

It is always a matter, my darling,
Of life or death, as I had forgotten. I wish
What I wished you before, but harder. 

The Writer remembers that raising a child really is a life and death matter. So what to do? How to parent? The Writer decides to pray a different prayer for his child. Not a different outcome, just a different way of getting there…

…for it to be harder.

There’s apparently a movement out there called “Free Range Parenting.” Some parents were trying it out in Maryland, letting their children walk the mile to the park. They got arrested. I don’t know whether they should have gotten arrested or not.

I do know that I love watching my children from far away. There is this mountain that we hike not far from here called Bluff Mountain. It’s this big beautiful bald in the middle of the Blue Ridge where you can see from the top every direction for miles. We’ve hiked it enough that the kids know the way. I let them run. The dogs go with them. I love to watch them climb to the top on their own. I love the little blips they become. So much of my parenting is from so up close.

I don’t know if I’ll subscribe to the Free Range Parent movement. But it does make me wonder how God parents us. We hear a story like the one Jesus told folks about the Prodigal Son and his Free Range Father. I wonder what that means.

What does it say about his love for us…his belief in us…his hopes for our future…

Does he not want lucky passage for us?

Yes. He may not exactly put it in those terms…but yes. Unequivocally yes. He wants us to make it through to the other side…the same wish, but harder.

Halloweeen and the Imaginary Quinoa

This year, Dave Dave decided to be an Ewok for Halloween. We had to patchwork his costume as the Ewok options online were lacking. I must say it helps to be shaped like an Ewok. We used Anna Rose's old puppy costume, some brown pants, my bear slippers, ears from the Great Wolf Lodge and a shawl from Lia. There you have it...Wicket's doppelganger. 

Anna Rose wanted to be a werewolf. We said sure as long as you are not scary-looking. That's the one Erickson rule for Halloween costumes. Online, we found this cute little werewolf costume for "tweens." Perfect. 

The scary part is that Anna Rose looks like a tween. The scarier part is that Anna Rose probably IS a tween. Yikes!

Lia loves Instagram. She follows these people she doesn't know. That didn't come out right. She follows a lot of people she does know. That didn't come out right either. She follows people. And of those people, she follows a few that she doesn't know. Like one based on Barbie. And this other one that her sister Cara got her hooked on called Imaginary Quinoa. 

Imaginary Quinoa has imaginary hipster children. 

After this picture of our children, 




Lia asked Cara what Imaginary Quinoa would say about it. This is what she wrote:



Her answers were SO GOOD...Lia and I are convinced Cara actually IS the Imaginary Quinoa! If anyone can help us find out whether or not our theory is correct, let us know!