Wife is Good

Today Stacey arrived back safe and sound and thoroughly worn-out from her two-week long work trip to Trinidad. Emily and Kaylee were ecstatic over her return, and were permanently attached to mommy all morning (as evidenced by the picture to the left from the airport play-area) . I got my chance to have an old-person catching up conversation with Stacey this afternoon (while the girls were napping).

It is so good to have her back. I feel a whole new level of sanity and joy returning to me (of course I've never claimed to have a very high level of sanity, even when Stacey is contributing to my mental health).

It's amazing how 10 years of marriage weaves your soul into another person so much that you cease to function as a whole person when you are separated from them for a long time. I am really grateful for how much Staceyness has infiltrated my system (Those of you who knew me in my pre-Stacey years are probably grateful too).

"No longer two, they become "one flesh." This is a huge mystery, and I don't pretend to understand it all." (Ephesians 5:31b-32a. The Message).

Bad Bert

It's a long-held piece of Scott family wisdom that none of us make any big decisions without consulting our resident Public Relations professional, Stacey.

Unfortunately Stacey is out of town, and Bert is new to the family. Since he was quite upset by my previous post regarding his questionable posturing, he decided to take matters into his own hands and underwent an image overhaul. He slapped on a durag, grew a soul-spot and purchased a knife. He's now claiming his arm injury is the result of a gang-war with the Sesame-GTOs.

He's really a good guy at heart. His injury was healing well with the help of Emily and Kaylee coming in to my office to give him kisses every day.

Last night the police picked him up, shaved him and snapped his mug shot. I don't know where things went wrong. This is what happens when Stacey's away too long I guess.


PS: The mug-shot to the left came from bert is evil. After finding the image and posting this, I went back to the site and discovered that it goes way too far into offensive territory (in my opinion), so if you go visit it, you've been warned.

Of Potties, Providence & Pains in the Posterior

My wife created a story to help my twin two-year olds in their struggle to master the intricacies of human plumbing involved in potty training. I'll leave it to your imagination to fill in the narrative and I’ll get straight to the story’s conclusion: a wise ladybug character informs her protégé to "just let it go."

That's easier said than done when your two years old and bladder control is just barely within your grasp. It’s also easier said than done when you’re 34 years old the intricacies of human internal emotional control are barely within your grasp.

None of us can function healthily in the world any better than an un-potty- trained toddler if we can't learn to let things go. We end up hanging on too long to foul things within us. And the result is that we leave a stink (or worse) behind us for others to deal with.

But how do we tap into the emotional release mechanism’s necessary? This isn’t a rhetorical question. I really want to know how you find emotional release. How do you really forgive when you’re the victim of an offense? How do you overcome your biggest anxieties? How do you “let things go?”

Would the Real Bert Please Stand Up

I hate to feed an urban myth that's always annoyed me, but I have no choice:

I purchased some large, lawn-gnome-like sesame street characters for my kids (cuz no-one should deprive two-year-olds of stuff that breaks easily).

Sure enough, Bert received a painful amputation on his second day at our house. I took him into my office and left him on my desk to writhe in pain until I could find some time to re-attach his arm.

When I re-entered my office later I noticed that Bert's arm was not lined up in the original, friendly-greeting pose you see above, but had moved into the effeminate, check-me-out-baby pose you see below.

I'm still trying to figure out why Stacey didn't appreciate me chasing her around the house last night demonstrating both poses while proclaiming "Gay! ... Not Gay! Gay! ... Not Gay!"

PS: Just to add to the weirdness - My kid's have never actually watched Sesame Street, so they named Bert "Boogey Man." And no-one can change his name now - we've tried.

Cod in the Dock

There are no cod in Rosen Lake. In fact, I think there are no cod in fresh water lakes anywhere. And for that matter, I think there are only two or three left in the ocean. But there is one more dock on Rosen lake cuz I built one (which seems more momentous to me when it’s announced under the title of a C. S. Lewis pun).

The dock saga began a couple of years ago when a two-piece floating dock drifted into our shoreline. We left it there, expecting it to be claimed. It never was ... until this spring, only a month after we decided that if no-one was going to come get it, we might as well swim it into a good position and hitch it up. It was a great place to sip my morning coffee (but was too small for more than one person).

After the owners came and took back their dock this week, my kid’s walked around saying "A lady took my dock away!” in their best deeply saddened, horribly offended, never-going-to-get-over-it two-year old voices.

So a couple of days of labour in the hot sun later, we have a dock, built from lumber harvested on our own land. It's a permanent, fixed dock (floating ones are for sissies and people who aren't overweight). And now my kids are walking around saying, "No one’s going to take our dock away!” in their best I-think-I’ve-found-a-reason-to-live-again’ two year old voices.