They Grow Up So Fast

Today was the first day of school for my girls, Adalee (8) & Aubrynn (6). We dropped them off at their new school which is 4 times the size of their old school in Ohio. Needless to say we were experiencing a little parental angst. When we picked them up at the bus stop they both were full of stories to tell about the school, the potential of new friends, and how you don't need money for lunch you just punch your student # in a box and they "just give you your food without any money". What they didn't realize is we had paid for their lunches in advance....hmm I'll come back to this. Let me keep my mind on the start of school.

I am a really sappy kind of guy and the start of every schooI year acts as an annual FYI memo to my brain that says "your children are getting older and one day will be gone." Excuse me...I'm getting a little vaclemped...talk amongst yourselves...ok I'm better. With them going back to school so early in the summer I felt bad for them even though they do get five weeks off throughout the school year.

When I was a kid we didn't usually go back until the Tuesday after Labor Day. Three full months of fun before I had to go back and walk to school three miles each way barefoot in the snow. Summer was spent fishing in what I thought was a creek, but later found out it was just city run-off. I guess that explains the neon green three-eyed fish. Growing up life was what I would call normal, another would label amazing, and some would say "poor thing". For the most part we were a typical mid-western middle class family, if you call having a dad who was both a preacher and a hairstylist typical, but I digress. Anyhoo, I lived life without a care in the world knowing that all I had to do was open the fridge and there was free food. Turn on a faucett or light and leave them on. No reason to turn them off because all that comes with the house, right. Oh and there's a bed too. well this is childhood (or for many twenty-somethings young adulthood until you're tired of living in your parents basement, but I digress.)

I guess what I am trying to say is the good things we experience throughout life are all too often viewed as coming to us from the wrong source. Kind of like Addie's view of lunch. She didn't realize that daddy had already taken care of this provision in advanced. In life there is the tendency to look at our provisions through childish eyes. I made this life for me, "it's mine". This is my house...That's my car. All this came to me because I just pushed the right button (right college, right job, right investments) and put the right # in and "look what I got daddy!" and Daddy says " don't you realize I purchased these provisions for you in advance" The Bible says all good gifts come from our Father (Daddy) above." God help us to recognize Your involvement in all our possessions and provisions.

Well that's enough for tonight. My girls are getting older and I realize, they just grow up so fast. I guess one reason it gets me so sappy is, once they're grown where will I learn most of my life lessons from?