The Miraculous Recovery

Moose hunting appears to be the cure for the H1N1 flu. A week before this picture was taken, The Pastor was in the ER. After a lot of prayer, he looks completely well and happy on this day.

Now I'm the one feeling a little woozy, as he wants to hang that moose head in our living room.

Those Were The Days

The mind is a funny thing. Well, my mind is always a funny thing, but I mean in general terms. My son is playing basketball this year. I'm looking forward to the change from Baseball. Don't get me wrong, I love baseball. But usually, it's a summer sport...however, they make the younger kids play early in the season and in North Idaho, that makes for some FREEZING games.

Basketball is a welcome change. It's inside. It's warm. It's exciting. It's my sport. My friend warned me this morning that you just have to be careful you don't get "Bleacher Butt" from watching too many games. I guess I'm not familiar with that because I was always on the court and not in the bleachers (although occasionally on the bench!)

Yes, that's me below. Don't give me a hard time about the uniform, it was 1987. I was a proud Kamiakin Brave and loved the game.



So I took my son to evaluations last night, and while I watched the kids play, my mind began to play horrible tricks on me. I heard the thump of the ball on the wooden floor; I heard the squeak of the sneakers and the sound of the ball on the backboard and I was transported back. I lost complete sight of the fact that I'm a late-thirties woman and felt like I was 17 again. I felt like I could run out there and run and jump and shoot and steal the ball the way I did in high school. There's only one problem....I know I can't.

You see, I've had these feelings before. It was about 10 years ago (maybe more) and someone invited me to play in a 3 on 3 tournament. I was so excited to be hitting the court again....but the excitement was short lived. I soon learned. I was old and slow and out of shape and the team we played was not. No matter how much the memories tempted me, I would never play ball like I did before. They pounded us (me) to a pulp.

So now, I'm happy to be watching my son and I promise to ignore all impulses to run on the court, steal the ball and run for a lay-up. My only injury will be Bleacher Butt.

The Moose Misfortune

The Pastor is supposed to be moose hunting this week. For those of you who don't know, Moose hunting is a once in a lifetime thing (at least in Idaho). He's tried to get his permit to hunt one for about 15 of our 19 married years and has never been chosen. But this year was different. This was his year. Monday was supposed to be his first day of hunting and Saturday night he started coming down with the flu.

Even though he and I have had some pretty heated "discussions" regarding if and where he could hang a ginormous moose head in our living room, I definitely didn't want him to miss his first big day of moose hunting. But he did. And he missed the second one too. The clock is ticking...he has 14 days to hunt his moose and right now he can barely get out of bed.

Please pray for The Pastor!! Pray for me, too. If he actually gets better and shoots one of these things, my living room decor has the potential to change dramatically!