We purchased five acres of land once only to find out at closing that it had no actual road frontage. It was not landlocked. It simply did not touch the road. The deed was recorded before the existing roadway was paved and the winding drive now passed by our property a dozen or so feet …
Focus
Amelia stood at the end of the kitchen island, sticker sheet in hand, matching uppercase letters to the alphabet page in her notebook. Ezra climbed up beside her and reached for a sticker so I pulled out his notebook, flipped to the first blank page and handed him a sheet of animal stickers. He eagerly …
Wait For It
“But I wanted to eat it now!” Thomas exclaimed, palms upward, accenting each syllable. His fifth birthday ice cream cake sat on the table in front of him. He had finished his lunch, played all the games, beamed through the chorus of Happy Birthday and blown out his candles. He watched eagerly as his mom …
Cringeworthy
Amelia ran to meet me as I walked through the front door. She half shouted, “I played my recorder and Jake played his recorder too!” From behind her back she took a blue plastic recorder. Ezra appeared, waving a green recorder and their combined demonstration was shrill and fairly deafening. I looked around for Jake, …
Built For Me
Amelia has already staked her claim on a bedroom in her new house. We watched as the foundation was poured and the walls went up. The doors and windows stand ready in the garage, waiting to be installed. Giant metallic limbs spiral down from the attic like an overgrown octopus held back by a net …
Facing The Truth
“Can they hear me?” Amelia asked as she turned questioningly from watching the last roof truss being placed on top of her new house. We had watched the crane set a dozen or so trusses in place from the window before going onto the front porch. She and Ezra ran back and forth excitedly on …
Level
“There’s something wrong with your level, Papa,” my nephew, Caden said after applying it repeatedly to the surface of one board after another of the foundation of my niece, Ava’s tiny home. My dad, who is overseeing the ongoing construction project, learned contracting mostly from his dad but also from his father in law, my …
Imagine
“Are you here with my strawberry ice cream?” my dad asked the young man entering his room. His smile was answer enough as he strode over to place the small styrofoam cup and plastic spoon in my dad’s outstretched hand. Daddy deposited the treat on his bedside table and said, “Take my hand.” The young …
That Hurt
I asked Amelia twice not to encourage her baby brother to do something she’s heard me ask him not to do so when she did for the third time, I got down on her eye level and took a moment to explain a truth every child of God needs to remember and meditate on often. …
Skewed
Our Great Dane, Jake is so big that every other dog looks, well, not so big. I’ve been shadowed by Jake with his long legs and massive body for the past eight years until my dad’s Labrador Retriever, Buddy, who is fairly large for a Lab resembles a Welsh Corgi. When my dad was hospitalized …
A Fitting Reply 