Sure, Ramona and I are experiencing the customary jolts of nostalgia as we remember the house as it once was: Noisy. Messy. Cloudy with a chance of incoming mud. But I can scarcely contain my excitement. They are flying from the nest. And I will soon have the opportunity to visit their homes.
Here are just a few of the activities I have planned, should they choose to have us over for the weekend:
- Show up and announce, “I brought some friends. What's for supper?”
- Leave taps dripping, lights blazing, and an open mayo jar on the counter overnight
- Replace Michael Bublé CDs with something from The Gaithers
- Use their phone to call friends in Singapore
- Crack the fridge door open for the night
- Gather wrenches and bury them (the wrenches, not the kids) in the sandbox
- Beat the wooden furniture with pillows until the stuffing is gone
- Invite six friends over about 10 p.m. Say, “Go ahead and make yourselves sandwiches”
- Take everyone out for dinner and forget my wallet
Where will I possibly find the time to re-enact all these grand memories in their houses?
Increasingly my ministry is to help my offspring learn, as did I, to hold the stuff of earth loosely, and to practice Bible verses like “Count it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials” (James 1:2). They will thank me for it one day.
Still greater anticipation greets me when I consider the prospects of grandchildren. Oh, the places we shall go; the pranks we shall play.
I read of a 54-year-old grandma in the Florida Keys who was spotted driving around the parking lot with her three-year-old granddaughter perched atop her Lexus. According to the deputies who arrested her, Brenda Bouschet said she “was just giving the child some air and letting her have fun.” The child was in no danger, of course, as Brenda had one hand out the window, holding onto a leg.
Like Brenda, I will be a magnificent grandparent. There will be no PlayStation or Xbox. Instead, I will educate the grandbabies with hands-on experience.
When our kids were small a new principal came to town and promptly sissified the school. Fearful of lawsuits and emergency rooms, he insisted on removing swing sets and tetherball from the playground. He even levelled the King of the Castle Hill and banned scorekeeping at soccer games. I fully expected him to coat the school in Styrofoam.
By contrast, when I was knee high to a teeter-totter, I learned the way a monkey learns: You only put a fork in the light socket once. When someone yells, “Dog pile!” you look eager, but move slowly. I licked a doorknob in December at my brother's request one time. Never again. And bullies are a horrible reality you'll deal with all your life. Without them, I'd never have gotten into comedy.
I grew up in an era when monkey bars served to fortify the gene pool, if you catch my drift. You gained strength and confidence from doing something, not sitting on padded chairs chugging Coke and ingesting YouTube. I've had broken limbs. Each taught me an important lesson about gravity and stupidity, and provided a glorious story to tell the grandkids one day.
We've begun praying for these grandchildren already. That they'll join Jesus early on this grand adventure. I suppose my greatest fear is that the grandkids would settle in for an unexamined, comfortable, complacent life down here. To complicate things, I fear our culture has elevated safety to an unwholesome place. There is nothing safe about life or about faith. The Christianity I've embraced is not the indoor variety. It is no spectator sport. There are bruises to be had along this road.
So when the grandkids come to our house we will choose football over Facebook and survival over Survivor. And, should I still have the energy, I will introduce them to the joys of grass stains, firecrackers and carving wooden whistles.
And if they leave the shower curtain out, it won't much matter. I'll spend a few days at their parents' house and everything will be fine.
