Photo Scavenger Hunt

Gratuitous photos of our last night of Monday night childcare, just because I can.

And, because I’m going to miss these kids!

Everything

“And it is entirely possible that He will tell us to sell everything we have and give it to the poor.”

 - Radical by David Platt

Jesus has this habit of calling us to do just the thing that we would most like to push into a back corner and ignore. He calls rich young rulers to sell everything that they have and give it to the poor. He calls teenagers to give up the status quo for their summer and go on a ministry trip. He calls parents to send their kids.

At every turn we have to stop and ask and listen, because it is entirely possible that the crazy ridiculous thing you just heard about is exactly what He is calling you to do.

It might be for an hour. It might be for a day or a MONTH or a year. It might be for the rest of your life.

Almost a year and a half ago, He whispered in my ear a plan to pull teenagers out of their normal lives for long enough to encounter HIM and encounter His JUSTICE.

It wasn't what I had planned to do at all.

Rather than “sell all you have and give the money to the poor,” the whisper was “take all of your plans and give them up for these kids.”

It blindsided me so badly that, for ten minutes or so I. Did. Not. Hear. A. Word that the professor was saying (Yes, the whisper came in the middle of class.). That night, I took a candle to a dark, quiet corner of the house and fought with God about it. I still have those sheets of paper, the scrawled paragraphs where I realized that I could either do this or walk away, like the rich young ruler, sad that I could not follow Jesus.

I decided to go for it. What I didn't (and don't) have the power to do was make that decision for anyone else.

What is Jesus asking you?

What crazy thing are you wrestling with Him over?

How willing are you to let Him win?

Life or Death

“In a world that prizes promoting oneself, they were following a teacher who told them to crucify themselves. And history tells us the result. Almost all of them would lose their lives because they responded to his invitation.”

 - Radical by David Platt

This is an interesting one to me. Ever since high school, I have noticed this odd trend in the church. While the younger generations are running after a post modern, hipster, relational vision of Christ and Christianity, the older generations quote encouragement that sounds something like, “and they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony and that they loved not their lives to the death.”

As a seventeen-year-old, standing surrounded by fourteen and fifteen-year-old freshmen, it honestly creeped me out a little.

What kind of grown-up looks at a group of teen and pre-teen aged Americans and thinks, “Death. Martyrdom. Book of Revelation”?

It just seemed a little bit extreme.

And, the fact that they rarely included themselves in the statements only made it all the more disturbing. Where exactly were all of the adults going to be while we were giving up our lives?

I'm well out of high school now (although I still hear similar things said to teenagers on a fairly regular basis), and I think that I am beginning to understand. (I hope that I understand, at least. If I'm wrong, then I maintain the right to be creeped out.)

You see, as a teenager, death seems frighteningly close and real and unnatural. People your own age die in suicides and car accidents and gang shootings. They die when doctors can't find the answers. But, every time, there is a sense that it isn't right. That they were too young to die. That something went wrong.

Grown-ups have a bigger sense of the rhythm of life. People are born. They live. They often give birth to other humans. Then, sooner or later, they die.

Teenagers flee death. Adults assume it.

They thought that they were speaking passion over our lives. We heard them speaking passion over our deaths – which, to a teenager, is not the same thing at all.

In the midst of that, though, I think that we learned something that it is so easy to otherwise forget. We learned that you are not ready to live for something until you are ready to die for it, and that you are not ready to die for something until you are ready to live for it.

We learned, at least a little, how to long for heaven at the same time that we longed for earth.

We started to learn what it meant to live out an invitation to die.

What about you? Are you willing to die? Are you ready to live?

New Job

Two weeks ago I started working at a local elementary school as a reading teacher (paraeducator). Weirdest experience of my life.

I swear that I learn a new testing acronym or word every day (DIBELS, MSP, MAP, PSTF, CBA, fluency checkouts, progress monitoring, benchmark testing, etc), and some of them I'm still not sure that I understand! I know that third graders are supposed to get a MAP score (which is apparently similar to the Iowa Test of Basic Skills that we took as homeschoolers) of 194 in reading, but I have no idea what that 194 is out of. 3,000? Six million? 300?

The kids are fun, though, and I really do enjoy teaching, even when the curriculum is completely opposite of ANYTHING that Jessica would do naturally.

I had a first grader the other day tell me that she, “gets better at reading every week,” because she, “travels a lot and collects words from all around the world.... like Seattle and Portland and Idaho and California and Spokane.” Haha. Yes, I”m sure you do!

Plus, I'm still new enough to be the “nice” sub that the kids all like. We'll see how they feel when we start testing them hardcore in a couple of weeks...

Jump

“Ultimately, Jesus was calling to to abandon themselves. They were leaving certainty for uncertainty, safety for danger, self-preservation to self-denunciation.”

 - Radical by David Platt

Oh how we as Americans love certainty. Studies have shown that political conservatives put a higher value on steadiness, on unchanging certainty, than political liberals do. Evangelicals tend towards political conservatism. (Not saying that there are not evangelicals on all ends of the political spectrum. Case in point right here.)

We love us some certainty.

We send our kids on ministry trips, but we like to know ahead of time whether or not they will be getting showers and how often to expect a text home from Bobby to let us know that he hasn't been abducted by monkeys.

We trust God with a tithe of our money, but we like to know that the rest of it fits into nice neat budget boxes. (I literally heard a four-year-old I was babysitting singing a song to herself in that little kid way, where they just make up the words as they go. It was a song about Dave Ramsey.)

Certainty isn't necessarily a bad thing. Until it becomes an idol. Until we start waiting to move, waiting for God to erase all of the uncertainty, all of the danger, and all of the giving up of ourselves, waiting for an open door the size of a small tank.

Because, sometimes, God closes those huge doors and opens up a second story window instead.

And then He tells us to jump.

And we have to give up all of our certainty and safety and self preservation and cling to the hope that the one who holds the universe will catch us before we fall.

Gimmick

“Contrary to what I may have thought about Luke 9, Jesus was not using a gimmick to get more followers. He was simply and boldly making it clear from the start that if you follow him, you abandon everything – your needs, your desires, even your family.”
 - Radical by David Platt

Anyone sensing a theme here?

Abandoning things? Not fun. I'm alright with giving away some things. I'll give away a shirt so long as there's still one left in my drawer. I'll give up a book so long as I know I can get it at the library. I'll give away a can of food if I know that there's still something left in the pantry or the fridge.

But, “abandon everything”? Not so much a fan of that. I have projects I want to finish, kids I want to watch grow up, impacts that I want to make on the world.

That's not the way that it works with Jesus, though.

Every morning, when I ask what He wants from me that day, He has one answer.

“Empty yourself, MacFarlan.”

Let go of it all. Forget the answers that you think that you have worked out. Quit trying so hard. Empty yourself. Let yourself be filled with me instead.

Be (you) being filled with the Holy Spirit.

Perhaps that's why, some mornings, I make a habit of not asking. Because, some mornings, I don't want to know.

Jesus isn't using a gimmick. He's issuing a warning. “Follow me. But, expect it to cost more than you think you have to give.”

Porcupine Love

“Plainly put, a relationship with Jesus requires total, superior, and exclusive devotion.”
 - Radical by David Platt

Ouch. See, I like to think that I am devoted to Jesus. Part of me is totally and completely, overwhelmingly in love with Jesus. But, even that part is often in love with Jesus the way that you might be in love with a pet porcupine.

You love it, but you love it from a distance, because, if you get to close, thing stop being comfortable. You get poked. You bleed a little. The thing that looked so soft and fuzzy from a distance is quite clearly not.

Jesus isn't fuzzy. He said things and did things (and says things and does things) that don't fit inside of my boxes, that make it hard to follow Him. He asks that I not be afraid to give up everything. He tells me not to worry. He has this nasty habit of sending people out who seem ill-prepared to do the jobs that He asks of them, so that nobody can make the mistake of thinking that they did it on their own.

He requires total devotion (don't put your hand to the plow and then turn back around).

He requires superior devotion (don't love your father, mother, or any other human more than you love Me).

He requires exclusive devotion (a man cannot serve two masters).

This relationship is not something that I can pick up on Sundays and Wednesdays and Tuesdays and then drop in between. This relationship is not one that I can ever expect to be easy or painless or simple. And, it's not something that non-porcupine lovers can be expected to quite understand.

After all, who in their right minds intentionally hugs a porcupine?

When you run into something “sharp” that Jesus says, do you back away, or do you hold it tighter, until you understand?

Bridge to Nowhere

The weather was gross Monday night, putting a significant gap in our childcare schedule where we would normally be outside, running the kids in circles.

As it turned out, it was no big deal, because the kids spent almost a full hour building a bridge of chairs across the room and back and then walking in never ending circles.

Who needs toys when a few stacks of chairs can keep you fully entertained?

Imitate

“We were settling for a Christianity that revolves around catering to ourselves when the central message of Christianity is actually about abandoning ourselves.”

 - "Radical" by David Platt

See, I like it when my religion centers around me. I like feeling important, like I'm in the middle of something. Part of me likes it when the Gospel presentation ends at, “Jesus died just for YOU, and all that you have to do is accept His gift.”

It's harder when we get to the part about being “imitators of Christ.”

Because, Jesus' life wasn't about Him at all.

It was all about the Father.

It was all about a plan to connect with the people who the Father loved.

It was all about giving up EVERYTHING.

It doesn't seem fair that Jesus would ask so much of His followers (don't bury your dead; don't love your father more than me; sell everything that you have; don't turn back), until I stop to think about what it was that He gave up. This was GOD.

He could have waited until the invention of air conditioning. But, He didn't.

He could have waited for YouTube and Blogger. But, He didn't.

He could have waited for lethal injection, or an electric chair. But, He went to the cross.

This baby, this toddler, this teenager, was GOD.

The Gospel is bigger than me because God is bigger than me. The question is, am I living that way?

Haiti!

When I was still in Kenya, one of my neighbors questioned me about Haiti. “Why do you [Americans/the American government] send money so far away to Africa when Haiti is just there [so close to your border] and the people living there are so poor?”

It wasn't something that we got into much at the time (foreign policy was a little beyond the often interrupted scope of the dialogue), but it was definitely a conversation that I remembered.

Ironically enough, I am going to Haiti this summer, with a group from the youth group at my church, because of an earthquake that snapped Americans out of a little of their complacency. July 22^nd - 31^st we'll be working with Haitian Christian Mission on a VBS – Vacation Bible School – for kids who have never seen that type of thing before.

Over half the team has never been out of the country, but they have been on other ministry trips before. In fact, well over half of the kids were on the Bridgetown trip just a few weeks ago.

Part of the first Haiti training included a note make sure that food was in Ziplocs – to keep out the ants. The girl next to me just smiled and whispered, “It's okay. You just flick them off.” [demonstration with her fingers of flicking ants off a Voodoo Donut].

Haha. Glad there's one thing that won't be new to them when we get to Haiti!

Journey

“I invite you to join the journey with me. I do not claim to have all of the answers. If anything, I have more questions than answers. But, if Jesus is who He said He is, and his promises are as rewarding as the Bible claims they are, then we may discover that satisfaction in our lives and success in the church are not found in what our culture deems most important but in radical abandonment to Jesus.”

 - "Radical" by David Platt

How is it that other people manage to find the words for the things that eat at your insides until you feel them so powerfully that even beginning to look for the letters and syllables feels ridiculous?

This needs to be tattooed on my inner arm, so that, when people ask what my goals are “while I'm in town” or want an explanation of the focus month, I can just read it off to them.

I don't have all of the answers. Some days I have more questions than answers – although I would like to think that they are good questions. And, questions are the slow way to the finish line.

Questions create a journey, a long, switchbacking journey, where it feels like we've been to this place before, because we have. But, last time, we were ten feet lower down on the mountain. The waterfall that was right there at the start of the hike has disappeared, and we're staring at trees, hoping that whoever built this trail knew where he was going.

If he did know where he was going, then every step along the path, no matter how odd of a direction it seems to be, no matter how much it feels like we're not actually getting anywhere, is a step closer to our goal. If he did know where he was going, then all we have to do is trust, and put one foot in front of the other.

I don't have all of the answers. I'm huffing and puffing just as hard as anyone as we keep pushing up the trail. But, if I'm following the path that Christ laid, someday, the finish line will be in sight.

It's a journey, and I invite you to come with me, whether that means following this blog, praying towards justice, getting involved in the new human trafficking task force, or joining up with the focus month. It might be slow going, but, if Jesus is who He says that He is, the end will be worth it.

Tears

This morning, we went over the story of the crucifixion with the 4^th and 5^th graders, and they watched a rather cheesy video of an investigator “interviewing” various people who were present during the trials and their aftermath. It was a little fuzzy on the basic storyline for some of my less churched kids, but, cutest thing ever...

One of my fifth grade boys spent most of the video in tears, wiping at his face every 0.5 seconds so that no one else would “see” that he was crying.

Somehow, past the intentionally terrible costumes and the overacting, he got it. He understood that we were talking about the torture and execution of a real human being, and he knows enough to understand the “why” behind it all.

Being a fifth grade boy, he made sure that he was visibly “over it” by the time we got back into our small group circle, but you could practically watch him continue to internally process whatever it was that had just happened. Super cool to see.

And... just to stick with tradition. Before said God moment, all of the kids were extra antsy and hard to focus during small group (from every week kids all the way to first time visitors), and we spent a good chunk of small group patching up a girl who managed to super man dive across the asphalt within ten seconds of leaving the building and scrape hands, elbows, knees, and arms.

Have I mentioned that these kids can sense God moments coming - and that it freaks them out a little?

7-11

Friday night was another middle school fun night, where they run through the main parts of the church like crazy children and hopefully have an awesome time just being kids. (Literally, after an hour and a half or so, half of the games have been abandoned in favor of "chase" and "hide from your friends" through the auditorium and foyer. :D)

The schedule didn't work out for me to be able to regularly hang with the middle school youth group this year, but I stinking love these kids. 

It makes my night to spend a few hours making sure that they don't shoot each others eyes out or strangle themselves on the volleyball net. (And, some of those kids have GOOD arms when it comes to throwing tennis balls!)

“The second question was more challenging. Was I going to obey Jesus? My biggest fear, even now, is that I will hear Jesus' words and walk away, content to settle for less than radical obedience to Him.”

 - Radical by David Platt

I would like to think (for nothing more than the soothing of my own conscience) that anyone who has been following Jesus for more than 0.5 seconds can relate to this one. I know that I can.

In eighth grade, I went on a weekend ministry trip, and, somewhere during the course of that short time period, I told Jesus, “No.” I don't remember what it was about or why – and I clearly made the decision NOT to journal it, which should tell you something about how into self preservation I was (am).

What I do remember is the next song that we sang was Trading my Sorrows. You know, the one with the chorus of, “Yes, Lord; yes, Lord; yes; yes, Lord.”

Yeah.

I thought I was going to choke on the words.

Literal, puke on the floor or the kid next to me, choke on the words.

That time at least, I failed at my, “No.” Since then, I haven't always been so lucky. What about you? When was the last time that you said no and got away with it?

Invitation

I keep getting calls, fb messages, and pass along comments from people who have been impacted by this book, so, I figured that it might be time to go back and take a closer look at it all. Over the next several days - weeks? - I'll be rambling based off of quotes that stood out to me. :)

If you haven't read the book yet, go do it!

“His invitations to potential followers were clearly more costly than the crowds were ready to accept, and He seemed to be okay with that. He focused instead on the few who believed Him when He said radical things. And, through their radical obedience to Him, He turned the course of history in a new direction.”

 - Radical by David Platt

This... this is hard for me. I was always one of those kids who looked around before starting anything, to make sure that I was not the only one. There didn't have to be a lot of other people doing it. One partner in crime was often enough. But, if they wasn't that one, well, I got good at sitting on things, at ignoring that squirming wiggle in my chest that just wanted to move, to go do whatever it was.

I trained my inner wiggle well. I learned how to bite my tongue. And, in turn, I learned to be less than radically obedient to the Spirit's promptings.

I learned how to say, “No,” to Jesus.

Because, it's not always fun to be radically obedient. It gets awkward to not have the answers or the actions or the stuff that people expect you to have. It's uncomfortable to explain that you are doing something because you heard – but not audibly – from God – who also happens to not be visible – that you were supposed to do it.

That's the sort of thing that, in non-religious circles, gets you medication.

But, that's what Jesus used. That's what he used to change cities and countries and continents. And, that's what he used to change every. single. life. he ever touched.

Jesus said hard things and then waited until all of the rumbling and surreptitious glancing to all sides had died down, waited until those who were ready to follow Him stood up and walked to His side, even if they were all alone.

He waited for them until they realized that any decision they made would be a radical one.

Because, not following the Son of God is just as radical as following Him.

To the IRS

Everyone's feelings about taxes are slightly different (feelings about HOW those taxes are spent are even more widely different). But, ever since I ran across it a few years ago, this letter to the IRS has struck me as brilliant. I love it, and I love the frank, forthright attitude that it is written in.

Check it out and let it make you think a little. 

(Photo Credit)

To My Sunday School Kids (part three)

M*ttie: You crack me up, kiddo. You can dissapear from our group for months, and then show back up as if you were there yesterday. Your face lights up when you're with us, though, and I've seen you turn down the "cool group" of all boys so that you can stay in this crazy place where we send you home to your mother with bloodstains on your shirt and grass marks on your socks. You'll sit anywhere but one of our chairs, but, the moment my hands press down on your shoulders, you melt and things come tumbling from your lips that make the other kids sit up and listen. I'll never know what prompted you to transfer yourself to my group, but we're glad you're here!
P*rker: Of all my crazy boys, you're the only one who I've turned around to find laying "dead" in the middle of the hallway, or hopping along behind us, with your knees up to your chest, under your shirt. You and C*nn*r planted yourselves in our group one day and made yourselves at home. I don't know what you saw in us or what you have seen, but I know that those eyes of yours don't miss a moment. You watch to make sure that I see you when you duck to "hide" behind a car, and you watch to make sure that I am paying just as much attention to the other kids as I am to you. I can only pray that, for a few hours at least, what you're seeing is Jesus.

C*nn*r: I'm pretty sure that I would trust you with the lives of the rest of these kids. You watch them like a patient father, laughing and acting like a nut with the rest of them, but always hyper aware of who is where and if they're safe. I got to watch the split second where you decided that I was a safe person for you and P*rker to be around, and, three minutes later, there you were, staring across the circle at me as if you had always been there. Slowly, I've gotten to watch you decide that, maybe, Jesus is a safe person as well, and I love watching you light up when we talk about Him. You're not such a fan of adult men, but Jesus you understand.

K*itlyn: We've missed you since you decided that it was a better fit to join your parents for church rather than come and hang with us, but I'm proud of you for being brave enough to make that decision. It's hard, in fifth grade, to admit that you'd rather sit with grown-ups than other kids, but you knew what you needed, and you acted on that. That takes guts. We miss seeing your laughing face, though, on the other side of a locked classroom door when you beat us back and hearing your dry, sarcastic (but always very, very true) answers to our questions. When God gave out a sense of irony, I think that you got a double helping. :D

Shakespeare for the Night

Monday night we hauled dozens of costume pieces downstairs to use with the kids during our normal “movie time.” A few of them went straight to work, writing scripts all night long – even while the rest of the kids were running in circles on the playground. (Or, looking at tractors across the parking lot, in the case of the little boys.)

Pretty hilarious. Script writing is, apparently, a very loud boisterous process that involves randomly bursting out into various – completely unrelated – songs, just because one can.

And, when you’re outside… anything more or less flat becomes a desk. :)

 

The better part of thirty minutes was probably spent trying on various outfits and chasing each other around with pirate swords. The mess was impressive, but well worth it, as the parents walked in to find their kids, not watching a movie and whining that they didn’t want to go home, but on stage, loving the mic that we had turned on for them and performing their “plays.”

And, the leaders were loving the fact that they could sit with a few of the littles and eat snack while the rest of the kids kept themselves entertained!

    

Bridgetown – p3

After Night Strike we picked up donuts for the next morning and headed to a different church to sleep. Minus the fact that we couldn’t get into the building.
Not. A. Single. Complaint. From. Anyone.
They just flopped their stuff down in front of one of the doors and started playing “Big Bootie” (kind of like “Who Stole The Cookie From the Cookie Jar?”) and “Umbrella” (which happens to be one of those games where the entire point is to drive the people who have never played before nuts trying to figure out the rules). By the time they finished “Umbrella,” the door situation was sorted out and they were ready to sleep.
Well, the girls talked for another hour or so, but they were in the general vicinities of their sleeping bags, so we’ll count it as sleep.
7:30am came a little too quickly, but they were spurred on by the thought of donuts. The ants, though, were also donut fans.
Twenty minutes later, the donuts were no longer moving – for the most part – and they ate them anyways, albeit, slightly more carefully than they might have otherwise. Eating ant infested food is a valuable life skill, right?
    
We left the church within minutes of donut consumption and a very short debrief (where one of the guys busted out an awesome analogy about a glass bottle) and drove as far as the Falls before we got out to hike.
Actually, the first leg was more of a run-up-until-no-one-can-breathe-anymore and the second leg was a hybrid between actually “hiking” and clambering-up-places-that-are-not-trail-but-look-cool.
Injuries = 0.
Mud on hands, shoes, and pants = 8.
These things happen when you let Jessica hike with seven teenagers. (They did wash their hands in the stream before we came back down, but I can’t say as much for their shoes or muddy knees.) Sometimes, you just have to get up close and personal with nature.
Lack of sleeping plus rapid hiking is apparently exhausting, though, because most of the van fell asleep on the ride home, one of the boys for long enough to earn himself a SpongeBob tattoo. He woke up during the application process (something about having a damp sweatshirt sleeve pressed against the back of your hand…) but was a really good sport about it and let them finish putting it on anyways.
  The team dispersed fairly quickly after we jumped one dead minivan, and I got to ride home in weather that was huge-blue-sky sunny, not too windy, and far warmer than Portland, full to overflowing from a very GOOD day with some pretty incredible kids and a seriously awesome God.
Bonus: I get to go to Haiti with some of these same kids at the end of July. (And… I think that some of them should come on the Focus Month too…)

Bridgetown – p2

  A little after 6:00pm we met back up as a “large” group of eighteen and headed down the street to a church, where we got our job assignments for the evening and a tour of part of the Shanghai Tunnels under the building that were once used for human trafficking. (The tunnels have been closed down and sealed off for years, but Portland is still a major US hub for human trafficking.)

While we were underground, more than a hundred additional volunteers had shown up for the “Night Strike,” to serve food, wash feet, cut hair, hand out clothes, paint nails, help with paperwork, pick up trash, and just generally hang out under the Burnside bridge.

We sang a few worship songs with them and then split up into our work teams for a quick orientation. Our kids were on every possible under-the-bridge work team (there were also “walkabout” and prayer walk teams who did things similar to what we spent the afternoon doing), and, from what I saw and heard, they jumped in and continued to legitly act out the things that they learn every Sunday.

There are not very many things that consistently scream out to me, “This is Church the way that it was meant to be!” The Reservation on Tuesday nights is one of them. Night Strike is another one.

Those. Hours. Are. Worship.

Getting to be there, and getting to be there with that group of teenagers, was right up on the list with Winter Retreat. I love those kids, and I love seeing them love others. Every moment of watching them serve (strangers or each other) ranks as a “coolest moment ever,” and makes my heart kind of want to leap out of my chest.

Points to the kids for not stopping when they were tired or just wanted to hang with their friends instead of more strangers.

(part 3 in the next post)

Bridgetown

A little before 3:00 this afternoon I pulled back into my apartment after spending thirty hours with an amazing group of teenagers (and a few pretty awesome leaders). We brought them – or maybe they just let us come along – on a quick trip to hang with some cool people who were homeless, and some cool people who were not homeless, in Portland.

Anytime that, within an hour of arriving at the church, there are several dozen sandwiches made and the response to someone not being there (and not answering their phone) is, “Well, let’s just go get him.” …it’s a sign that this is about to be a good trip.

We literally drove to one of the kid’s houses, piled all fifteen of us out of the vans, knocked on his door(s and windows) until he woke up, and took him the way he came out the door. Bed head. No toothbrush. No sleeping bag. Nothing but the clothes, shoes, and ipod he was wearing (and his wallet that had managed to make it to the church without him).

Points for a memorable start.

My van included the youth pastor, one of my cluster girls, the “kidnapped” one, another junior guy who had skipped school to be there, and a kid who actually lives back east now but was in town for Spring Break and came on the trip.

Points for legitly being there because they wanted to be there.

The trip over ranged from bad puns to castrated pirates and discussions of personal pet peeves. Yes. It really was that random, but, points for getting to know each other and having fun in the process.

Three hours of the afternoon were spent in groups of six, handing out sandwiches and trying to get to know the humans we were handing them to. I got to watch the kids in my group fix a pair of sunglasses with a bobby pin and a pocket knife, pray with a retired preacher who was living on the streets, and navigate their way through an area where they know more about where the homeless hang than they do about the insides of the shops.

I saw kids who are not naturally “outgoing” talk to perfect strangers. I saw them go slow enough to take things in and think about what they were seeing. And, I saw them grow frustrated because they just wanted more time.

One of my sandwiches went to a man with the most ridiculously amazing patchwork pants that I have ever seen and the other went to a dog named Mijo who belonged to a couple not much (if any) older than me.
Points to the kids for jumping in full force, with zero transition time, and giving it everything that they had.

(Part Two in the next post.)

One Day Without Shoes

I went barefoot today for One Day Without Shoes. Well, actually, I went barefoot most of today.

I nannied barefoot – much to the consternation of the little boy who couldn’t figure out why I had not left any shoes sitting inside of his front door.

I biked barefoot all day – which garnered a few odd looks from passing motorists.

I rode in the car barefoot – which is normal.

But, I “cheated” and wore shoes (flip flops) while I was on the Rez. Judging from the dirt on my feet when I got home a little before midnight, that may have almost counted as shoeless as well.