manrymission.com

By Mugs Manry

“Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven.”

Luke 6:37 (NIV)

Throughout my children’s upbringing, I have not allowed them to verbally hold back forgiveness. The child wronged is required to say, “I forgive you.” Sometimes, my children have told me, “I don’t want to forgive.” Sometimes I tell God the same thing.

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I wait. You wait. We wait. Enduring the endless chatter of the inane news loop where all commentators laugh, joke, and mock trying their best to be comedy central.

The commentators tell me I’m supposed to think it’s funny that a guy bulldozed his foreclosed house to get back at the bank, forgetting he will most likely go to jail. Then they chuckle at some crazy guy who flies a plane into an IRS building in his pursuit to “fight the man,” ignoring the injured workers who endured a day of horror. They annoy ad nauseam and I cannot turn it off. Do they never tire of their own voices?

I cringed when I read that the king of Saudi Arabia kept a giant television on blaring the news while the Secretary of State was visiting him. The news reporter conjectured that maybe he didn’t want their conversation overheard. From Dale’s experience in Iraq and mine in the U.S., I think it is simply that rulers and waiting rooms love to have giant televisions blaring the news.

“It will take an hour and a half,” she tells me at the start. An hour and a half comes and goes. At two hours, I’m told more work must be done. “An hour and fifteen minutes more,” she says.

I brought the paper full well knowing I should have brought a book. The next story breaks. “Oh no,” I think. “Now I must endure the big apology broadcast to the world live in HD.”

Then, a little luck. Suddenly, I’m called. “Yes! Escape at last!” I jump up in a hurry and grab one strap of my purse. I go forward. I go backward. The other strap is caught on the chair. I fall back and catch myself on the side table where sets a man’s full cup of coffee. It spills in slow motion. My pants soak some up and the rest covers the floor.

No quick escape for me.

I apologize profusely and grab napkins to cleanup. He is annoyed, not at his lost coffee or the mess, but that I have interrupted the news. Luckily for him, he can hear it again in fifteen minutes and fifteen minutes after that and fifteen minutes after that.

The most common phrase spoken to Gabe by his principal is “Get a haircut.” The school the kids attend requires boys to have short haircuts. Yet, Gabe wants hair like Shaun White. Gabe loves to grow his hair out to an unruly mess, and he never combs it unless forced.

He will walk around with his hair sticking up all over the place, and add to this fashion a wardrobe of clothes with holes. I once walked into chapel and cringed at the sight of his current state of disarray.

Standing next to me, my friend looked at him and then looked at me. “Doesn’t that kid have a mother?” I asked her. “Oh yeah, it’s me,” I answered myself.

I knew we’d be pushing it when I relented to Gabe’s begging and allowed him not to get a haircut before his birthday. Then the endless snow days happened and our stylist, Simmy, was snowed in.

On the first day back to school, I told Gabe that his principal would tell him to get a haircut, and he needed to have a response ready.  Sure enough, Gabe got to school and the principal told him to get a haircut. Gabe told her, “My Mom said to tell you that my stylist was snowed in.” The principal laughed. It bought us some time.

Gabe before:

Gabe after:

Zeke on the other hand, loves to get a hair cut, and asks to get “the sticky up kind.” Remarkably, he can pull it off. I asked Simmy why it worked on him and she said if the boy has a square face, he can wear a flat top.

Zeke’s current favorite thing to say is “Ladies” ( In Mung’s voice from the cartoon Chowder). Mung thinks himself a ladies man and uses a smooth voice when he says it. Last week, Zeke decided to follow up his opening line of “Ladies,” with “Nice weather were having.”

When I asked him where he heard that line, he replied “Sponge Bob.”

“Doesn’t that kid have a mother?”

“Oh, yeah. It’s me.”

Today was the first day back to school after 9 snow days. We had gladly exchanged the “get to school” routine for the “sleep in and be lazy” routine.

Reality was a bit jarring this morning.

I had put the dog out, found and ironed clothes, cut up an apple for breakfast, and lit the fire. I was thinking I was very efficient, because it seemed I had extra time in my schedule.

Approximately two minutes prior to departure, I saw the empty lunch pails laying on the floor of the pantry.

Oh yeah, lunch.

Last night, Mugs gave the kids a warning that they didn’t get to lay around inside all day today. She expected them to spend some time outside since the weather was supposed to be nice. School was still canceled because of the numerous unplowed roads throughout the area.

We’ve experienced more snowfall this winter than in any other winter on record. The Federal government has been shut down 4 days in a row (Mon – Thur). For the first time in my career, I’m not considered key and essential. So I’ve been off all week as well.

So I expected that Mugs’ warning pertained to me as well. So around noon today we all wandered outside. The kids played with their tennis rackets while I decided to build an igloo. After about an hour, Gabe decided to help me build. After another 2 1/2 hours, Gabe realized everyone else had gone inside, and we had missed lunch. At that point we were almost done, so we pushed on for another 1/2 hour and finished.

We enjoyed a few minutes rest in our finished igloo before heading back inside.

Tired Igloo Builders

I just found out that the Federal government is open for business tomorrow. So you can all rest easy again knowing we are back at work in DC!